The Patriot Post® · Monday Short Cuts

The Gipper: “We who live in free market societies believe that growth, prosperity and ultimately human fulfillment, are created from the bottom up, not the government down. Only when the human spirit is allowed to invent and create, only when individuals are given a personal stake in deciding economic policies and benefitting from their success — only then can societies remain economically alive, dynamic, progressive, and free.”

For the record: “As I listened to Barack Obama’s speech the other night, I noticed he didn’t have any domestic accomplishments to brag about after 2010. Republicans had stopped him and collected more than 900 state-level seats and swept both houses of Congress in two wave elections that brought more limited-government Republicans to Washington than have been here in our lifetime. But because voters demand purity, and politicians keep promising and failing to deliver it, the entire project felt like failure. So primary voters blew it all up.” —David Harsanyi

Braying Jackass: “[I]n my first year as [Virginia] governor, my legislature decided to put … ‘marriage is between a man and woman’ issues on the ballot and the more I listened to the reason they wanted to do it the more I realized I can’t be with those guys, because they’re doing it to try to make the state a hostile place for people I care about.” —Tim Kaine on why he flip-flopped on same-sex marriage

False moral equivalence: “There is always a small group of extremists in practically every religion. We have them too.” —Pope Francis, who added, “If I talk about ‘Islamic’ violence should I speak about ‘Catholic’ violence too? Not all Muslims are violent.” (True, but that’s not the point: Islam is the only major religion that calls for jihad.)

Subterfuge: “I think what the [Supreme] Court said about there being an individual right [to bear arms] is in line with constitutional thinking. And I said in the convention, I’m not looking to repeal the Second Amendment. I’m not looking to take people’s guns away, but I am looking for more support for the reasonable efforts that need to be undertaken to keep guns out of the wrong hands. … [T]hat right, like every other of our rights, our First Amendment rights, every right that we have is open to and even subject to reasonable regulations.” —Hillary Clinton

The BIG lie: “Director [James] Comey said that my answers were truthful, and what I’ve said is consistent with what I have told the American people, that there were decisions discussed and made to classify retroactively certain of the emails. I was communicating with over 300 people in my emailing. They certainly did not believe and had no reason to believe that what they were sending was classified. … I take classification seriously.” —Hillary Clinton continuing to peddle lies regarding classified emails

Late-night humor: “Hillary Clinton gave her big speech at the Democratic Convention [Thursday] evening. And there was an awkward moment when she finished the speech and said, ‘Now where’s my check?’” —Conan O'Brien