Here are some of the week’s most notable quotes culled from news reports from across Texas, and beyond.
Florida Democratic gubernatorial candidate Charlie Crist, responding to Republicans who claim they lack the scientific background to express an opinion as to whether man-made climate change is real.
I’m not a scientist either, but I can use my brain, and I can talk to one.
—————————————
Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., speaking on the Senate floor after Sen. Jim Inhofe, R-Okla., blocked a resolution that would have simply stated that climate change is real.
I appreciate very much having had the opportunity to hear those words, from what I can only describe as an alternate reality.
—————————————
A sampling of constituent feedback delivered to State Rep. David Simpson at a political forum after reading scripture about not mistreating strangers.
[These Central American] kids have scabies and influenza, viral pneumonia, leprosy. These kids are going to be part of the school system … They are bleeding Texas (Democrat) blue… What we don’t need is more people at the trough. These people are not coming in with a good, Christian heart. Most of them are criminals, anyway.
—————————————
Attorney Ted Olson, on the string of rulings across the country in favor of marriage equality.
I have never seen anything like it, where an important constitutional issue has been decided again and again and again by federal courts throughout the United States in precisely the same way.
—————————————
Rep. Michele Bachmann, R-Minn., accusing the LGBT community of advocating for the legalization of child rape
They want to abolish age of consent laws, which means children would…we would do away with statutory rape laws so that adults will be able to freely prey on little children sexually. That’s the deviance that we’re seeing embraced in our culture today.
—————————————
Texas Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst, claiming that immigrant children from Central America are being helped by drug cartels and the Mexican government.
The cartels, and I’m convinced unfortunately, some in the Mexican government are helping them get into Texas. There’s no way they could make it that far.
—————————————
Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, when asked if the male justices on the court have a “blind spot” when it comes to women.
But justices continue to think and can change They have wives. They have daughters. By the way, I think daughters can change the perception of their fathers. I am ever hopeful that if the court has a blind spot today, its eyes will be open tomorrow.
—————————————
Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, on the cult of celebrity that has cropped up around her on the Internet over the last year.
I admit I had to be told by my law clerks what’s this ‘notorious,’ and they explained that to me. But I think that the website is something that I enjoy, all of my family do.
