S S Administration Quotes & Sayings

The Obama administration's attempted short-term fixes, even with unprecedented monetary easing by the Federal Reserve, produced average GDP growth of just 2.2% over the past three years, and the consensus outlook appears no better for the year ahead. — Glenn Hubbard

Let me just say, I think there's a reasonable criticism to be made of the Obama administration on the way that it left Iraq. — Dexter Filkins

When George W. Bush decided to save the American position in Iraq by going against the advice of all of his wise men, of Jim Baker and the whole Iraq Study Group, and 90% of his administration, that was George W. Bush's decision. So we have to bear in mind that this isn't an administration we're electing. It's a person that we are electing. — Bret Stephens

Make no mistake about it! There is an organized movement against organized labor and it's called the Bush Administration. — Edward Kennedy

Every system of control depends for its survival on the tangible and intangible benefits that are provided to those who are responsible for the system's maintenance and administration. — Michelle Alexander

This is a perfect example of the power and ridiculousness of a website like Wikipedia. I did give a slightly contentious graduation speech, where I decided not to be funny as my classmates had hoped, which was why I was chosen. I was not valedictorian, that's for sure. Instead, I talked about the failure to communicate between the administration and the teachers and students. That's what was contentious about it. At some point, somebody wrote about that incident on my Wikipedia page. And then somebody added the bit about me exposing my genitals to the crowd. — Nick Kroll

Let's go back to the beginning of the Obama administration, when Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama led NATO in toppling the government in Libya. They did it because they wanted to promote democracy. A number of Republicans supported them. Well, the result is, Libya is now a terrorist war zone run by jihadists. — Ted Cruz

A friend of ours said if the same laws were applied to U.S. Presidents as were applied to the Nazis after WWII, that every single one of them, every last rich white one of them, from Truman on would be hung to death and shot. And this current administration is no exception. They should be hung and tried and shot as war criminals. — Zack De La Rocha

To try to be authentic these days, to ask questions of the people in power - it's difficult. This administration has evolved new techniques to handle people like me. Their strategy, in a word, is simple: ignore them. — Ron Suskind

It's now clear that from the very moment President Bush took office, Iraq was his highest priority as unfinished business from the first Bush Administration. His agenda was clear: find a rationale to get rid of Saddam. — Edward Kennedy

Most people are just too self-absorbed, well-meaning, and lazy to bother orchestrating Machiavellian plans to slight or insult us. It's more often a boring, complicated story of wrong assumptions, miscommunication, bad administration, and cover-ups - people trying, and mostly failing, to do the right thing, hurting each other not because that's their intention but because it's impossible to avoid. — Tim Kreider

I had once thought this was a third world problem. It is not. It is a politician's mentality. A problem is only a problem if it has the immediate potential to stall the economy or contract the popularity of the administration. — Ray Anyasi

At college my three main interests were - in descending order of importance - a steady supply of recreational drugs, a 2-S draft deferment, and overthrowing the Nixon administration. — Garry Trudeau

Brainy folks were also present in Lyndon Johnson's administration, especially in the Pentagon, where Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara's brilliant 'whiz kids' tried to micro-manage the Vietnam war, with disastrous results. — Thomas Sowell

I do not espouse the unitarian position. President Clinton's assertion of directive authority over administration, more than President Reagan's assertion of a general supervisory authority, raises serious constitutional questions. — Elena Kagan

Know that the immediate staff and others in the Administration will assume that your manner, tone and tempo reflect the President's. — Donald Rumsfeld

Following its recognition as a state in 1832, Greece spent most of the remainder of the 19th century under the control of creditors. The pattern started with a default in 1832. In consequence, Greece's finances were put under French administration. — Steve Hanke

The press is going to have to learn anew that it's possible to work in an environment that is not so toxic and to readopt those kinds of techniques. The relationship between the press and the Clinton White House during the later period was not a healthy one. There was a lot of hostility and a lot of suspicion. This administration has done systematically what no other administration had done. They came in with a corporate mentality, an ability to stay on script that was without parallel. — Ted Gup

The dome of the U.S. Capitol has fallen into severe disrepair ... As the Chairman of the Senate Committee on Rules and Administration, which oversees matters of the Capitol's physical plant, I have serious concerns about the consequences of omitting this funding from the stopgap spending measure. — Chuck Schumer

Every administration has this idea to talk tough to Israel and make nice to the Arabs and the Palestinians, and that's the way to bring about peace. It's counter-productive - it's actually the opposite. — Chuck Schumer

The fact is ... that when totalitarian nations like China and Saudi Arabia play ball with U.S. business interests, we like them just fine. But when Venezuela's freely elected president threatens powerful corporate interests, the Bush administration treats him as an enemy. — Robert Scheer

Given the pervasive secrecy of the Bush-Cheney administration, and the sorry consequences of that disposition, President Barack Obama's early emphasis on openness in government seems almost inevitable. — Noah Feldman

It's very clear that the Bush Administration is out of control. It contains some truly dangerous people. — John Pilger

The temperature in the gym reached 125 degrees, qualifying anyone there to be served rare.
"Could we," Dr. Henneman said, wafting her hands about, "open those back doors, let a little air in? Please?" ...
Miles Paterini and Pete Couvier ... pressed down on the metal bars. The doors didn't open.
People actually gasped.
Dennis began calculating the amount of oxygen left in the gymnasium.
Dr. Henneman's doctorate in school administration had prepared her for this.
"Is Mr. Wrona here?"
Mr. Wrona, the school custodian, was not here. He was at home watching women's volleyball with the sound turned off and imagining the moment everyone realized the back doors were locked. — Larry Doyle

I can conceive of no reason for all this administration of the higher to the lower, unless it be for the purpose of advancing our Father's children along the lines of eternal progression. — B. H. Roberts

I believe the American people spoke loud and clear to the Bush Administration in yesterday's election that they disapprove of the current direction in the war in Iraq. As a result, the President wasted no time in dumping Secretary Rumsfeld. — Jim Clyburn

The fact that the Bush administration, and those in Europe who have followed its 9/11-inspired agenda, somehow believe that the future of the world is being played out in the Middle East and Central Asia rather than East Asia has only served to accelerate China's rise and the U.S.'s decline. — Martin Jacques

Bill Nelson has demonstrated that he is a rubber stamp for the Obama administration and he's out of touch with the solution that we need to implement in order to get America back on the right track. — Adam Hasner

Al-Qaeda's resurgence brings out the worst in the Bush Administration's math and logic. — Jon Stewart

I think as far as the adverse impact on the nation around
the world, this administration has been the worst in history ...
The overt reversal of America's basic values as expressed by
previous administrations, including those of George H.W. Bush
and Ronald Reagan and Richard Nixon and others, has been the
most disturbing to me. — Jimmy Carter

Certainly Nancy Reagan had an extraordinary effect on her husband. I'm truly not sure that, say, Laura Bush had that much effect on the Bush administration. She certainly, you know, seems to be a nice person who I think the public likes. But I can't really put my finger on any huge impact she's had. — Gail Collins

She [Justice sandra Day O'Connor] rejected the [George] Bush administration's claim that it could indefinitely detain a United States citizen. She upheld the fundamental principle of judicial review over the exercise of government power. — Patrick Leahy

The Bush people have no right to speak for my father, particularly because of the position he's in now (Alzheimer's Syndrome). Yes, some of the current policies are an extension of the '80s. But the overall thrust of this administration is not my father's - these people are overly reaching, overly aggressive, overly secretive, and just plain corrupt. I don't trust these people. — Ron Reagan

We thank those Senators, both Republican and Democrat, who stood firm against tremendous pressure from the Bush administration, pro-drilling members of Congress and their allies in the oil industry. They recognize that the budget is an inappropriate place to decide controversial national policy matters like America's energy policy. We urge all members of Congress to remain steadfast in their belief that the vast, unspoiled wilderness of America?s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is more than a line item in the Federal Budget. — Carl Pope

The way to have good and safe government is not to trust it all to one, but to divide it among the many, distributing to everyone exactly the functions in which he is competent ... It is by dividing and subdividing these Republics from the great national one down through all its subordinations until it ends in the administration of everyman's farm by himself, by placing under everyone what his own eye may superintend, that all will be done for the best. — Thomas Jefferson

American nuclear reactors are well into middle age. The median age of an operating reactor in the U.S. is 34 years, placing start-up in midst of the Carter administration. — Bill Dedman

I generally leave the details of fiscal programs to the Administration and Congress. That's really their area of authority and responsibility, and I don't think it's appropriate for me to second guess. — Ben Bernanke

Despite the Obama administration's proclaimed commitment to global Internet freedom, the executive branch is not transparent about the types and capabilities of surveillance technologies it is sourcing and purchasing - or about what other governments are purchasing the same technology. — Rebecca MacKinnon

That's why they (the Bush administration) had to make up that story about weapons of mass destruction. Because that was the only thing that would sell to the American people, and that wasn't true. — Nancy Pelosi

Your message is stupid. Iraq is not afraid of you or anyone else when it has a right to claim. What you warned about is not on Iraq's agenda. Iraq is vital and powerful. It is not an opportunistic country. Your administration has not learned from the past. — Mohammed Aldouri

There was a huge, tremendous amount of disabled veterans and the Veteran's Administration just wasn't geared up for it. I know for a fact that it's getting better and better. — R. Lee Ermey

The Obama administration, which has brought more prosecutions against leakers than all prior presidencies combined, has sought to create a climate of fear that would stifle any attempts at whistle-blowing. But Snowden destroyed that template. He has managed to remain free, outside the grasp of the United States; what's more, he has refused to remain in hiding but proudly came forward and identified himself. As a result, the public image of him is not a convict in orange jumpsuit and shackles but and independent, articulate figure who can speak for himself, explaining what he did and why. — Glenn Greenwald

The Obama administration came into Utah and said, 'We're not going to listen to what the U.S. Supreme Court said. 'We, the federal government, are going to recognize marriages in the state of Utah and Utah state law explicitly does not recognize as marriage,' and that was really, in my view, an abuse of power. — Ted Cruz

Once you take yourself off the pedestal, saying, "It's bad for you to torture, but for us, this is our national security, so we're gonna do it". You can't live that way and the United States doesn't need to do it, it shouldn't do it, and I think a Democratic administration, whoever the democratic president is, will repudiate that kind of conduct. I think it was an overreaction caused by a lot of different strains of thought in the administration. I think it was clearly wrong and I think that repudiation, which will come from the United States, will be a key in restoring America's legitimacy. — Wesley Clark

John Lewis Gaddis is not only the favorite historian of the Reagan administration, but he's regarded as the dean of Cold War scholarship, the leading figure in the American Cold War scholarship, a professor at Yale. — Noam Chomsky

But real-world questions aren't like word problems. A real-world problem is something like "Has the recession and its aftermath been especially bad for women in the workforce, and if so, to what extent is this the result of Obama administration policies?" Your calculator doesn't have a button for this. Because in order to give a sensible answer, you need to know more than just numbers. What shape do the job-loss curves for men and women have in a typical recession? Was this recession notably different in that respect? What kind of jobs are disproportionately held by women, and what decisions has Obama made that affect that sector of the economy? It's only after you've started to formulate these questions that you take out the calculator. But at that point the real mental work is already finished. Dividing one number by another is mere computation; figuring out what you should divide by what is mathematics. — Jordan Ellenberg

So the Bush-Obama administration has taken a fiscal stance diametrically opposed to that of the patron saint of free enterprise. While escalating war in Afghanistan and maintaining over 850 military bases around the world, the administration has run up the national debt that Smith decried. By shifting the tax burden off property and off rent-seeking monopolies - above all, off the financial sector - this policy has raised America's cost of living and doing business, thereby undercutting its competitive power and running up larger and larger foreign debt. — Michael Hudson

There isn't any question about Washington's greatness. If his administration had been a failure, there would have been no United States. A lesser man couldn't have done it ... Washington was both a great administrator and a great leader, a truly great man in every way. — Harry S. Truman

I was born in 1953, so that's the Eisenhower administration. — Lincoln Chafee

The plea agreement negotiated by Janet Reno's Justice Department with Nora, Gene and Trisha Lum is a hoax. It allows two key players in the campaign finance scandal to plead to lesser offenses and effectively concludes a serious investigation that, if taken to a conclusion, could have seriously affected the Clinton Administration's claim that it committed no illegalities in the campaign finance scandal. Nora Lum was a close confidant of Ron Brown and remains close to John Huang. Trisha Lum, her daughter, worked for Brown at the Commerce Department and worked on trade missions. — Larry Klayman

There is a resurgence of anti-Semitism in Europe. The policies of the Bush administration and the Sharon administration contribute to that. It's not specifically anti-Semitism, but it does manifest itself in anti-Semitism as well. — George Soros

When liberal celebs stammer out a litany of shopworn bleats about the administration's attempt to turn America into a theocratic prison state, people can't help but notice that these buskers and mummers seem unmoved by the horrors of actual prison states. (Saddam commissioned a copy of the Quran written in his own blood - but John Ashcroft is the real religious nut, don't you know.) — James Lileks

A Romney-Ryan administration will protect and strengthen Medicare, for my Mom's generation, for my generation, and for my kids and yours. — Paul Ryan

The Obama administration has revealed the size of America's nuclear arsenal. We have 1,000 warheads aimed at China, 1,000 aimed at Russia, and the rest aimed at Fox News. — Jay Leno

You can't blame the administration and the Republicans for taking us back to deficits, for spending the Social Security surplus and assaulting the environment. That's what they promised to do in the last election. — William J. Clinton

I'm arguing for progressive positions on behalf of a progressive administration in front of a court who, before Justice [Antonin] Scalia's death, had a conservative majority that was quite conservative, frankly. — Donald Verrilli Jr.

In Andrew Jackson's administration, collaborated with the South to keep abolitionist literature out of the mails in the southern states. It was the Supreme Court of the United States that declared in 1857 that the slave Dred Scott could not sue for his freedom because he was not a person, but property. — Howard Zinn

Well, I don't know whether it caused anguish in China, but it was not a wise way to proceed. But one has to remember that it was the first experience. And in a Republican administration, there is a conservative wing that looks at China as the last embodiment of communism, which therefore tends towards a more bellicose rhetoric anyway than I would. It's not the dominant element, but every once in a while they get a crack at public statement. — Henry A. Kissinger

When resentment and contention threatened to destroy his administration, he refused to be provoked by petty grievances, to submit to jealousy, or to brood over perceived slights. Through the appalling pressures he faced day after day, he retained an unflagging faith in his country's cause. — Doris Kearns Goodwin

The plain message conveyed by the new administration is that George W Bush's America is a Christian nation, and that non-Christians are welcome into the tent so long as they agree to accept their status as a tolerated minority rather than as fully equal citizens. In effect, Bush is saying: "This is our home, and in our home we pray to Jesus as our savior. If you want to be a guest in our home, you must accept the way we pray." — Alan Dershowitz

The average plan administrator charges 1.3% to 1.5% annually (according to the nonpartisan Government Accountability Office). That's $1,300 for every $100,000 just to participate in the 401(k). So when you add this 1.3% for the plan administration to the total mutual fund costs of 3.17%, it — Anthony Robbins

The Israeli lobby has clout in the U.S., which means that re-arranging the region and controlling its resources one way or another, will serve Israel through its control over the American administration. — Bashar Al-Assad

It was not until the Abraham Lincoln administration that an income tax was imposed on Americans. Its stated purpose was to finance the war, but it took until 1872 for it to be repealed. During the Grover Cleveland administration, Congress enacted the Income Tax Act of 1894. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled it unconstitutional in 1895. It took the Sixteenth Amendment (1913) to make permanent what the Framers feared
today's income tax. — Walter E. Williams

Have. Harry Truman, of all people, comes to mind, when he said, concerning his administration's programs, We'll just try them ... and if they don't work ... why then we'll just try something else. — Robert M. Pirsig

I'm a writer. That's who I am, at my core. I'm a writer, and then I learned production and administration, along the way. I feel like most people can learn it because production and the administration part is all about logic, and it's all about learning rules and budgets. — Ronald D. Moore

The privilege of creating and issuing money is not only the supreme prerogative of Government, but it is the Government's greatest creative opportunity. By the adoption of these principles, the long-felt want for a uniform medium will be satisfied. The taxpayers will be saved immense sums of interest, discounts and exchanges. The financing of all public enterprises, the maintenance of stable government and ordered progress, and the conduct of the Treasury will become matters of practical administration. The people can and will be furnished with a currency as safe as their own government. Money will cease to be the master and become the servant of humanity. Democracy will rise superior to the money power. — Abraham Lincoln

The American administration is trying to achieve any gain in the shadow of the embarrassment hitting it because of its failures in Iraq, Afghanistan and Palestine after the failure of Israel's war on Lebanon and the retreat of America's project in the region. — Mohammad Hussein Fadlallah

This week the Obama administration warned China to remove its secret agents from the U.S. Then in the middle of Obama's announcement a plant behind him got up and walked away. — Jimmy Fallon

The Bush Administration's failure to be consistently involved in helping Israel achieve peace with the Palestinians has been both wrong for our friendship with Israel, as well as badly damaging to our standing in the Arab world. — Barack Obama

But the fact is, it's illegal for the Administration to spend North west taxpayers' money to develop this rate hike proposal, just so it can turn around and raise their energy rates. — Maria Cantwell

Peace in the Middle East has been on the Obama administration's mind from the beginning. Two days after his inauguration, the president traveled to the State Department to announce the appointment of George Mitchell as his Middle East peace negotiator. — Elliott Abrams

For me as an American, the most painful aspect of this is that I believe that that administration has taken the events of 9/11 and has manipulated the grief of the country and I think that's reprehensible. — Dustin Hoffman

The political system of the United States is essentially extra-European. To stand in firm and cautious independence of all entanglement in the European system has been a cardinal point of their policy under every administration of their government from the peace of 1783 to this day ... Every year's experience rivets it more deeply in the principles and opinions of the nation. — John Quincy Adams

If the administration asks for $5 and Congress appropriates $4, that's what they get. If the government creates a subterfuge by going outside the government to raise money through a private entity, that's a violation of the law. — Lamar Alexander

What's missing is leadership in the White House. And the story that Barack Obama does tell, forever shifting blame to the last administration, is getting old. The man assumed office almost four years ago - isn't it about time he assumed responsibility? — Paul Ryan

The Veterans Administration is a scandal. It's corrupt, and what's going on is a disgrace. And, believe me, if I win, if I become president, that will end. The veterans will be treated properly. — Donald Trump

The Petraeus-Crocker testimony is the kind of short-lived event on which the Administration has relied to shore up support for the war: the 'Mission Accomplished' declaration, the deaths of Uday and Qusay Hussein, Saddam's capture, the transfer of sovereignty, the three rounds of voting, the Plan for Victory, the death of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. Every new milestone, however illusory, allows the Administration to avoid thinking ahead, to the years when the mistakes of Iraq will continue to haunt the U.S. — George Packer

As millions of Americans look for work, the Obama campaign and Democrats are attempting to distract attention away from this administration's dismal record. The attack they have launched against Mitt Romney shows just how worried they are about facing him in the general election. — Jeb Bradley

There's the assumption being made by the national security advisers to the Obama administration that the North Korean leadership is not suicidal, that they know they will be obliterated if they attacked the United States. But I would point that everything in South Korea and Japan is well within range of what they might want to do. — Oliver North

The only plan the Administration seems to have for winning the war is that there is no plan and no schedule for our troops to come home and get out of harm's way. — Eliot Engel

La Raza stands for 'The Race' - and they say so openly. They are a pro-Hispanic organization; I will call them a racist organization. They base their philosophy on race. They advocate for those minorities that fit within the category that they define as drives them. They are apologists for illegal immigrants - and we are funding them with your tax dollars in this administration through earmarks. It is outrageous. It's an in-your-face act on the part of this Congress. — Steve King

In this way, the Hearsts became the symbol of the overly lenient parents of the era and a counterpoint to the Republican administration's voice of discipline and order. — Jeffrey Toobin

He (George W. Bush) is going in the wrong way. And I dare say, that is what the strategy of his administration is, is just to wipe out government's purpose for any social and economic justice at all. — Dennis Kucinich

The Defense Department's plan to ban newspaper reporters from pool coverage of military operations is incredible. It reveals the administration to be out of touch with journalism, reality and the First Amendment. — Arthur Ochs Sulzberger

I believe that the many administration officials, lawmakers, and regulatory policymakers - and their staffs - who poured a year and a half of prodigious work into the legislation had been guided, knowingly or not, by a simultaneously high-minded and pragmatic sentiment that Woodrow Wilson voiced before he launched the effort that would establish the Federal Reserve System. "We shall deal with our economic system as it is and as it may be modified, not as it might be if we had a clean sheet of paper to write upon; and step by step we shall make it what it should be," Wilson said in his first inaugural address. Wilson's words continued to make good sense a century later. — Ben S. Bernanke

I strongly support the Bush Administration's clean diesel rules, which will reduce air pollution from diesel engines by more than 90 percent, and reduce the sulfur content of diesel fuel by more than 95 percent. — Steve Buyer

By giving the FDA adequate resources and authority to both prevent outbreaks and intervene once they appear, we can support the administration's efforts to reassure the parents of America that the food they feed their children is the product of the safest system in the world. — Diana DeGette

The goal of liberalism is the peaceful cooperation of all men. It aims at peace among nations too. When there is private ownership of the means of production everywhere and when laws, the tribunals and the administration treat foreigners and citizens on equal terms, it is of little importance where a country's frontiers are drawn ... War no longer pays; there is no motive for aggression ... All nations can coexist peacefully. — Ludwig Von Mises

This is one of the great tragedies of the Bush administration. The more successful they've been at intercepting and stopping bad guys, the less proof there is that we're in danger ... . It's almost like they should every once in a while have allowed an attack to get through just to remind us. — Newt Gingrich

I am proud of the decision of this Administration to overthrow Saddam Hussein. I am proud of the liberation of 25 million Iraqis. And I'm proud to see an Iraq that is now emerging with a stronger government, a truly multiethnic, multi-sectarian government that's about to have its second set of elections, that's inviting private investment into Iraq, and that is making peace with its Arab neighbors. — Condoleezza Rice

The big story of 2013, a very distressing year, is that Americans continue not to be able to find the full-time jobs they need, and that's something which the president has to recognize as the first priority of his administration. — Mitt Romney

The Bush Administration do have moral values. Their moral values are very explicit: shine the boots of the rich and the powerful, kick everybody else in the face, and let your grandchildren pay for it. That simple principle predicts almost everything that's happening. — Noam Chomsky

I hate to make predictions, but I think the economy is going to be permanently changed for the worse. I think our foreign policy is going to lead to changes that will be definitely for the worse, particularly if we drift into a nuclear Iran, which I gather that's what the administration is doing. — Thomas Sowell

President Lyndon Johnson's administration was known for his War on Poverty. President Obama's will become notable for his War on Prosperity. We're speaking, of course, of Obama's plans to hike income taxes on the most wealthy 2 or 3 percent of the nation. He's not just raising the top rate to 39.6 percent; he's also disallowing about one-third of top earner's deductions, whether for state and local taxes, charitable contributions or mortgage interest. This is an effective hike in their taxes by an average of about 20 percent. — Dick Morris

Why shouldn't two new Justices be appointed each administration? A re-elected President would then have four opportunities to appoint. At the beginning of each administration, the two oldest Justices would automatically hand in their resignations, to take effect at the President's convenience. Thus new blood would be infused into the Court at regular intervals without rancour, and the Court would normally be renewed every 16 years ... Whenever death or retirement occurred, the President would have an extra appointment. — Harriet Boyd Hawes

An apple a day might have kept the doctor away prior to the industrialization of food growing and
preparation. But, according to research compiled by the United States Drug Administration (USDA) today's apple contains residue of eleven different neurotoxins - azinphos, methyl chloripyrifos, diazinon, dimethoate, ethion, omthoate, parathion, parathion methyl, phosalone, and phosmet - and the USDA was testing for only one category of chemicals known as organophosphate insecticides. That doesn't sound too appetizing does it? The average apple is sprayed with pesticides seventeen times before it is harvested. — Michelle Schoffro Cook

Bob Gates has unusual standing in the debate about the Obama administration's foreign policy: He was defense secretary for both a hawkish President George W. Bush and a wary President Obama. He understood Bush's desire to project power and Obama's skepticism. — David Ignatius

Because the Bush Administration will set no timetable for the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq, both chambers of Congress acted to make sure our troops will not be left in Iraq indefinitely. — Jan Schakowsky

Decrying the mismanagement that led to the summer's catastrophic wildfires: The Clinton administration didn't cause these fires, but their policies have left the Forest Service under-funded and under-prepared for this crisis. I don't think it's a conspiracy, but it's a philosophy they have that leads to explosive fires that destroy everything. — Marc Racicot

Oh, I can think of many reasons. Perhaps it's a signal, so that any strange ship entering our universe will know where to look for life. Perhaps it marks the centre of galactic administration. Or perhaps - and somehow I feel that this is the real explanation - it's simply the greatest of all works of art. But it's foolish to speculate now. In a few hours we shall know the truth. — Arthur C. Clarke