Reportedly Quotes & Sayings

Supermarket mandatory smile. In the late 1990s, Safeway, the second largest supermarket chain in the U.S., instructed its store employees to smile and greet customers with direct eye contact. In 1998, USA Today ("Safeway's Mandatory Smiles Pose Danger, Workers Say") reported that 12 female employees had filed grievances over the chain's smile-and-eye-contact policy, after numerous male customers reportedly had propositioned them for dates. Commenting on the grievances, a Safeway official stated, "We don't see it [the males' sexual overtures] as a direct result of our initiative. — David B. Givens

Excellence, he is known as the Mule. He is spoken of little, in a factual sense, but I have gathered the scraps and fragments of knowledge and winnowed out the most probable of them. He is apparently a man of neither birth nor standing. His father, unknown. His mother, dead in childbirth. His upbringing, that of a vagabond. His education, that of the tramp worlds, and the backwash alleys of space. He has no name other than that of the Mule, a name reportedly applied by himself to himself, and signifying, by popular explanation, his immense physical strength, and stubbornness of purpose. — Isaac Asimov

Facts and Observations #1 If people think you're dishonored, it's no different from actually having been dishonored, except you still don't know anything. #2 When you've been ruined, there are only two options: death or marriage. #3 Since I am gravely healthy, the first option isn't likely. #4 On the other hand, ritual self-sacrifice in Iceland cannot be ruled out. #5 Lady Berwick advises marriage and says Lord St. Vincent is "bred to the bill." Since she once made the same remark about a stud horse she and Lord Berwick bought for their stable, I have to wonder if she's looked in his mouth. #6 Lord St. Vincent reportedly has a mistress. #7 The word "mistress" sounds like a cross between mistake and mattress. "We've — Lisa Kleypas

Undaunted, Will confronted Rose on a street corner and administered what the newspapers termed a "terrible beating." He reportedly "lifted him up and dashed him to the pavement," executing continuous blows and hammering the man's head against the ground until Rose promised to leave town that very night. The story of the thrashing made news across the country. "The feeling among all classes of citizens," observed the Bismarck Tribune, "is that Mr. Taft did a public service and ought to have a medal. — Doris Kearns Goodwin

Several authoritarian regimes reportedly propose to ban anonymity from the web, making it easier to find and arrest dissidents. At Google, we see and feel the dangers of the government-led net crackdown. We operate in about 150 countries around the globe. — Vint Cerf

Writers acquire the hedge habit to conform to the bureaucratic imperative that's abbreviated as CYA, which I'll spell out as Cover Your Anatomy. They hope it will get them off the hook, or at least allow them to plead guilty to a lesser charge, should a critic ever try to prove them wrong. It's the same reason that lawsuit-wary journalists drizzle the words allegedly and reportedly throughout their copy, as in The alleged victim was found lying in a pool of blood with a knife in his back. — Steven Pinker

About the Story

Not all the details in this story are true. The times some events occurred have been changed, and the conversations are made up. Most of the things Tad Lincoln did in this story reportedly happened, including saving Jack the turkey and bombarding the Cabinet Room door with his toy cannon. Tad really was determined to raise money to help wounded soldiers and did persuade his father to pardon a woman's husband so he wouldn't be shot. Although Tad's antics often annoyed his father's staff, most agreed he had a big heart and a special way with animals. Once he even hitched goats to a chair and ran them through the White House, upsetting a gathering of dignified ladies. Nothing was too surprising when it came to Tad.
Although several presidents had declared occasional days of thanksgiving, none had ever officially made it a national holiday. Abraham Lincoln finally did so with his Proclamation of Thanksgiving on October 3, 1863. — Gary Hines

North Korea, under its thirtysomething Supreme Leader, Kim Jong-un, is no country for old men. The latest casualty in Kim's ongoing purge of the senior military command was the defense minister, Hyon Yong-chol, who reportedly committed the classic old man's offense of falling asleep in a meeting. — Barbara Demick

Arnold Schwarzenegger's publicist told USA Today that the actor has not ruled out running for governor of California, saying that he will make a decision soon. Reportedly Arnold needs that time to learn how to pronounce 'gubernatorial.' — Jimmy Fallon

Remember too that business entrepreneurs can be iconoclasts, hermits, and even cranks. Steve Jobs, founder of Apple, reportedly wasn't Mr. Warm-and-Fuzzy in person. He was a perfectionist. But whether they innovate with computers or with education, business and social entrepreneurs share a sense of wonder, curiosity, and the ability to scan for opportunity. They are prone to resilience, either through practice or nature, and it pays off for them. So they keep looking at the world with wide-eyed anticipation for more opportunities to test their mettle, to create new things and ways of accomplishing goals and meeting needs. — Pamela Price

I am just going outside and may be some time. Reportedly the last words of Lawrence Oates according to Captain Robert Falcon Scott, who commanded the ill-fated expedition to the South Pole 1911/12. — Captain Lawrence Edward Grace Oates

As his colleagues have noted in their tribute to him, it was typical of Leo Ryan's concern for his constituents that he would investigate personally the rumors of mistreatment in Jonestown that reportedly affected so many from his district. Leo Ryan is the 88th recipient of a Congressional Gold Medal and only the 4th Member of Congress to receive this high honor from his colleagues. — Leo Ryan

This kind of compartmentalizing - separating one's livelihood from one's social aspirations - is part of the reason David Koch, the hidden hand behind a lot of ultraconservatives and, reportedly, the Tea Party movement in the United States, transforms himself into a respected arts patron by funding a theater at Lincoln Center, or why at Swiss bank that helps U.S. depositors avoid paying taxes generously supports symphony halls and the ballet. It's almost as if there are moral scales, and by tossing some loot on one side, you can balance out the precarious situation your reputation might be getting into on the other. — David Byrne

During the late Victorian period, one English woman in Hampshire who suffered from fits reportedly ate an entire New Testament in an attempt to cure her illness, putting each page in the middle of a sandwich. — Martyn Lyons

Vice President Dick Cheney reportedly has been disturbed over what he sees as the erosion of presidential powers since the Watergate scandal and has urged Bush to take a stronger stand against what Cheney sees as congressional intrusions into the executive branch. — Helen Thomas

Hillary has already gotten a record $8 million advance from Simon & Schuster for the book
reportedly the most anyone has ever received for rewriting history. — Ann Coulter

But those stories inspire observations and experiments that do help us sort out what's going on. The science fiction novelist Isaac Asimov reportedly once said, "The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new discoveries, is not 'Eureka!' but 'That's funny. — Frans De Waal

As the company grew, Charles remained in Wichita, working ten-hour days, six days a week. When he proposed to his future wife, Liz, he did so reportedly over the phone, and she could hear him flipping through his busy date book in search of an open day for the wedding. In preparation, he required her to study free-market economics. — Jane Mayer

Donald Trump's hairpiece has reportedly narrowed its list of running partners down to Don King, Kramer, William Shatner, Dolly Parton and Phil Spector, and has no worries about being upstaged. — Michael R. Burch

A number of women have reportedly been victims of what appear to be discriminatory decisions taken by Sharia councils, and that is a significant concern. — Theresa May

He could not shake the feeling - reportedly common among ghosts - that it was not he but those he haunted whose lives were devoid of matter, sense, future. — Michael Chabon

It's the secrecy surrounding drone strikes that's most troubling. . . We don't know the targeting criteria, or whether the rules for CIA and military drone strikes differ; we don't know the details of the internal process through which targets are vetted; we don't know the chain of command, or the details of congressional oversight. The United States does not release the names of those killed, or the location or number of strikes, making it impossible to know whether those killed were legitimately viewed as combatants or not. We also don't know the cost of the secret war: How much money has been spent on drone strikes? What's the budget for the related targeting and intelligence infrastructures? How is the government assessing the costs and benefits of counterterrorism drone strikes? That's a lot of secrecy for a targeted killing program that has reportedly caused the deaths of several thousand people. (117-118) — Rosa Brooks

Beckett Rush spotted in London Saturday. 'Tinseltown's It Boy reportedly had three dates with three different girls at La Trattoria ... all over the course of six hours. Two ladies discovered the duplicity, and catfight broke out. Taylor Risdale broke up the fight before storming out. Beckett's camp could not be reached at the moment.'" Mr. Rush laughed. "You know what this means, right?"
"That once again my name is trashed."
"That your DVD sales will spike at least 5 percent. — Jenny B. Jones

In ancient Greece, Socrates reportedly didn't fancy a literate society. He felt that people would lose the capacity to think for themselves, simply adopting the perspective of a handy written opinion, and that they would cease to remember what could be written down. — Nick Harkaway

The lawyers doing the sorting for Hillary Clinton in 2014 did not individually read the content of all of her e-mails, as we did for those available to us; instead, they relied on header information and used search terms to try to find all work-related e-mails among the reportedly more than 60,000 total e-mails remaining on Secretary Clinton's personal system in 2014. — James Comey

John Kerry reportedly flew in his private hairdresser before his "Meet the Press" interview for a total cost of $1,000. That's $1,000 for a haircut, which sounds like a lot, but have you seen the size of Kerry's head. — Jay Leno

One story that circulated about (U.S. Minister to Russia Charles S.) Todd concerned his conversation with a lady-in-waiting at an Imperial reception in the Winter Palace. In his bad French with a Kentucky accent, he mispronounced the word for year, so that an explanation of his travels came out: "I was an ass in Paris, part of an ass in London, almost an ass in Germany, and I am two asses here." To which the lady reportedly responded, "And you will be an ass wherever you go. — Norman E. Saul

Obama was apparently relying, at least in part, on intelligence disclosed more than a year earlier by a senior CIA official who, according to the Wall Street Journal, "told a meeting of utility company representatives in New Orleans that a cyberattack had taken out power equipment in multiple regions outside the U.S."47 Later that year, CBS News identified one of the countries involved as Brazil, which reportedly suffered a series of attacks, one of which "affected more than three million people in dozens of cities over a two-day period" and knocked the world's largest iron ore producer off-line, costing that company alone $7 million. The utility's later assertion that the blackouts were caused by routine maintenance failures are difficult to credit. — Joel Brenner

Von Neumann, by contrast, wore a three-piece suit at almost all times, including on a donkey ride down the Grand Canyon; even as a student he was so well dressed that, upon first meeting him, the mathematician David Hilbert reportedly had but one question: Who is his tailor?45 — Walter Isaacson

'I am' is reportedly the shortest sentence in the English language. Could it be that 'I do' is the longest sentence? — George Carlin

Roof was a young man radicalized to race hatred who reportedly wanted to start a race war and who killed nine innocent people as his opening salvo. If that's not terrorism, we need to redefine the term. — Anonymous

By the close of 2015, the queen had visited 128 countries. Her most popular destination was Canada (27 visits), followed by Australia (18 visits). When asked to explain her desire to explore, Elizabeth reportedly had a simple yet logical explanation. "I have to be seen to be believed. — The Editors Of LIFE

After the French town of Beziers fell during the bloody Albigensian Crusade in 1209, the victorious Church-sanctioned army was faced with the problem of how to distinguish the town's heretics from Christians. One of their leaders reportedly said, "Kill them all, for the Lord will know his own," and thousands of citizens were slaughtered. And you thought the Marines came up with that saying. — Cary McNeal

In addition to being dubbed the most "liberal" pontiff, Pope Francis has long been suspected of supporting exorcism. In may 2013, the pope reportedly exorcized a wheelchair bound man who was allegedly posessed by the devil. The Vatican insisted the pope "didn't intend to perform any exorcism," and it released a statement that said "he simply intended to pray for someone who was suffering who was presented to him. — Anonymous

Yogi Berra reportedly said, It's not the heat, it's the humility. — Paul Levine

Obama once reportedly told his aides, [It] turns out I'm really good at killing people. — Jeremy Scahill

This Thursday, Barack Obama is gonna give his acceptance speech, and reportedly it's going to include performances by Bon Jovi and Bruce Springsteen. Yeah. And they say Obama's not black enough! — Conan O'Brien

The Milesians did not model their women after Helen, reported to be the most beautiful woman of their times, & who, reportedly, had five husbands.Nor did they model their women after the Athenian housewives. Instead, Milesians celebrated womanly beauty from the physical endowments of two naked slave girls, Briseis & Chryseis-the bones of contention between Achilles & Agamemnon. Tradition cast Briseis as a tall brunette with a dark complexion & with a very distinguished appearance.Whilst Chryseis was described as fair, slender & small in stature.[INTRO] — Nicholas Chong

When Einstein later complained that "God does not play dice with the world," Bohr reportedly fired back, "Stop telling God what to do. — Michio Kaku

The story is told of Lincoln's first meeting with Mary at a festive party. Captivated by her lively manner, intelligent face, clear blue eyes, and dimpled smile, Lincoln reportedly said, "I want to dance with you in the worst way." And, Mary laughingly told her cousin later that night, "he certainly did. — Doris Kearns Goodwin

(One of Crutzen's fellow Nobelists reportedly came home from his lab one night and told his wife, — Elizabeth Kolbert

Hillary Clinton has reportedly accepted Barack Obama's offer to become secretary of state. That's what they're saying in the New York Times. Yeah, according to Bill Clinton, this is the first time in 20 years that Hillary has said 'yes.' — Conan O'Brien

Detainees were not allowed to talk to each other, but we enjoyed looking at each other. The punishment for talking was hanging the detainee by the hands with his feet barely touching the ground. I saw an Afghani detainee who passed out a couple of times while hanging from his hands. The medics "fixed" him and hung him back up. Other detainees were luckier: they were hung for a certain time and then released. Most of the detainees tried to talk while they were hanging, which made the guards double their punishment. There was a very old Afghani fellow who reportedly was arrested to turn over his son. The guy was mentally sick; he couldn't stop talking because he didn't know where he was, nor why. I don't think he understood his environment, but the guards kept dutifully hanging him. It was so pitiful. One day one of the guards threw him on his face, and he was crying like a baby. — Mohamedou Ould Slahi

Earlier maps had underestimated the distances to other continents and exaggerated the outlines of individual nations. Now global dimensions could be set, with authority, by the celestial spheres. Indeed, King Louis XIV of France, confronted with a revised map of his domain based on accurate longitude measurements, reportedly complained that he was losing more territory to his astronomers than to his enemies. — Dava Sobel

Texas is reportedly going to give college students the right to carry guns on campus. So I guess that next semester, every college student in Texas is getting straight A's. — Conan O'Brien

When trying to explain the violent path of some Islamists, Western commentators sometimes blame harsh economic conditions, dysfunctional family circumstances, confused identity, the generic alienation of young males, a failure to integrate into the larger society, mental illness, and so on. Some on the Left insist that the real fault lies with the mistakes of American foreign policy.
None of this is convincing. Jihad in the twenty-first century is not a problem of poverty, insufficient education, or any other social precondition. (Michael Zehaf-Bibeau was earning more than $90,000 a year working for a drilling company in British Columbia, where he also reportedly proclaimed his support of the Taliban and joked about suicide bombing vests, with no repercussions.) We must move beyond such facile explanations. The imperative for jihad is embedded in Islam itself. It is a religious obligation. — Ayaan Hirsi Ali

It's time to refocus our global fight against terrorism. We must move away from the Iraq-centric policies that are draining our resources and focus on Al Qaeda and its affiliates who are reportedly operating in some 60 to 80 countries around the world. — Russ Feingold

If I were running a campaign, I'd urge taking the mountain of money reportedly squandered on pizza, coffee and bagels and spending it more wisely - on a talented young comedy writer. — Dick Cavett

Olympic organizers are reportedly struggling to fill rows and rows of empty seats. Empty seats! In fact, yesterday officials put out a casting call asking for 200 Europeans or eight Americans. — Conan O'Brien

The postmodern challenge I have heard on numerous occasions goes something like this: "You don't mean to say that you take the Bible literally, do you?" I love to answer with the words of a great Christian who was asked this question and reportedly replied, "The Bible says that Herod is a fox, but we don't think that means he had pointy ears and a bushy tail. It also mentions that Jesus is a door - which does not mean that he is flat, wooden, and swings on hinges. — Ravi Zacharias

The Bible is unfortunately unclear on a long list of moral and social questions and sex is one of them. On the one hand, there are expressions of admiration for the reportedly virgin mother of Jesus, but other portions of scripture speak quite accommodatingly of polygamy. — Steve Allen

Kepler reportedly said, amid the massacres of religious wars, the laws of elliptical motion belong to no man or principality.'17 The same could be said of music. — John Eliot Gardiner

Few people think more than two or three times a year," Shaw reportedly said. "I have made an international reputation for myself by thinking once or twice a week. — Steven D. Levitt

The New York Times denounces America's "dancing with dictators." Guilty as charged. Dance we do. And without apology. With no more apology than Franklin Roosevelt offered when he reportedly said of Nicaragua's Anastasio Somoza, "He may be a son of a bitch. But he's our son of a bitch."

Roosevelt was a grownup. He made choices. He slew his dragons one at a time. He understood that we do not live in the best of all possible worlds. He understood that in an international arena populated by sons of bitches, you make your distinctions, or you die. — Charles Krauthammer

Somewhat more blatant was President Clinton's pardon of Marc Rich, a wealthy financier and oil trader who faced life in prison for illegally trading with the government of Iran and for evading $48 million in taxes. These crimes got him on the FBI's Most Wanted List. Rich's ex-wife, Denise, had been pressing Clinton for a pardon, but Clinton reportedly said he was having difficulties, even though he was "doing all possible to turn around" the White House counsel on the subject. Rich got his pardon, finally, after Denise Rich gave $100,000 to Hillary Clinton's 2000 New York Senate campaign, $400,000 to the Clinton Library, and another $1 million to the Democratic Party. The — Dinesh D'Souza

If life is music, I sometimes feel as though I was born on the off-beat of the song, and I love it. As Christian numbers reportedly decrease in America, my love for Christ feels as though it increases. Perhaps that is a little strange, yes, but in all honesty, I now want to be thought unfaithful about as much as a smug aristocrat wants to be thought a hobo. — Criss Jami

In West Virginia yesterday, a man was arrested for stealing several blow-up dolls. Reportedly, police didn't have any trouble catching the man because he was completely out of breath. — Conan O'Brien

Warren Buffett's company reportedly owes the IRS a billion dollars in back taxes. When he said he wasn't paying enough taxes, he wasn't kidding. — Jay Leno

earthquake P-waves had reportedly been made with microphones — Bernie Krause

Jessie even did drive-bys of your house and yes, that's plural. Reportedly, you didn't come up for air all weekend. — Kristen Ashley

North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un reportedly has had 15 of his top officials executed. So the lesson here is when Kim Jong Un comes to work with a new haircut, you tell him, 'Looking good, Un.' — Conan O'Brien

Stuxnet, a computer worm reportedly developed by the United States and Israel that destroyed Iranian nuclear centrifuges in attacks in 2009 and 2010, is often cited as the most dramatic use of a cyber weapon. — Barton Gellman

Lampaxa Vorheridine? My Latin was never very good. What does that Translate to?"

"Um, nothing. It wasn't named by an Earth scientist. According to the database it was named by a Cheblookan aboard a frieghter when it stopped here looking for fresh food. His friend was killed by one as they searched the swamp for Greppers. After the hunting party killed the creature and determined that it was safe to eat if processed properly, the Cheblookan reportedly named it after his mother-in-law, Lampaxa Vorheridine. he said it sort of reminded him of her, even though they look nothing alike. — Thomas DePrima

Waternish Estate was sold to a Dutchman in the 1960s when Bad-tempered Donald died. In turn, the Dutchman sold a part of the estate to the Scottish singer-songwriter Donovan. Donovan was the first of the British musicians to adopt the flower-power image. He is most famous for the psychedelically fabulous smash hits "Sunshine Superman," "Season of the Witch" and "The Fat Angel," and for being the first high-profile British pop star to be arrested for the possession of marijuana. Donovan has a history of being deeply groovy and of being most often confused with Bob Dylan, which reportedly annoys Donovan quite a lot. "Sometime in the early seventies, Bob Dylan bought part of the estate," Mum tells me. "But he put a water bed on the second floor of the house for whatever it is these hippies get up to, and it came crashing through the ceiling." "Not Bob Dylan," I say. "Donovan." "Who?" Mum says. — Alexandra Fuller

President Bush left for Canada today to attend a trade summit. Reportedly, the trade summit got off to an awkward start when the president pulled out his baseball cards. — Conan O'Brien

The man was reportedly allowed to bring the turkey onboard as a therapy pet because it was an emotional support animal. It's so cute. It had one of those vests saying support animal, do not pet or baste. — Mike Pesca

For the husband, the male prostate can only be accessed through the anus. It is called the "male G-spot" as it is reportedly a source of great pleasure when stroked by such things as a wife's finger. — Mark Driscoll

Monica Besra, a Bengali woman from a remote Indian village, was reportedly suffering from a malignant ovarian tumor when she went, in 1998, to a hospice founded by Mother Teresa's Missionaries of Charity. Nuns at the mission reportedly placed a medallion with Teresa's image on Besra's abdomen, and the tumor disappeared. — Charles Duhigg

What science cannot explain is the psychic effect of this 'mother of all plants,' the sense of the numinous and the spiritual world it reportedly opens up. Those who drink say that each ayahuasca journey is unique. They say that the spirit of the vine comes alive, it guides and teaches, and on the other side nothing is ever the same. Or so they say. — Rak Razam