Here are some of the week’s most notable quotes culled from news reports from across Texas, and beyond.
Texas lieutenant governor candidate Jerry Patterson.
I get lots of questions all the time, ‘Well, we should secede.’ I say, ‘No, I’ve got a better idea. Instead of secession, I’m a proponent of expulsion.’ I want to kick about four states out of this union.
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U.S. Rep. Louie Gohmert, R-Texas, claiming Arizona Sen. John McCain is a supporter of al Qaeda.
I heard just before I came, some senator from Arizona, a guy that liked Gaddafi before he wanted to bomb him. A guy that’s been to Syria and supported al Qaeda and the rebels. But he was saying today the shutdown has been a fools’ errand. And I agree with him, the president and Harry Reid should not have shut this government down.
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Arizona Republican Sen. John McCain, responding to accusations against him made by U.S. Rep. Louie Gohmert, R-Texas.
Sometimes those are, comments like that are made out of malice, but if someone has no intelligence, I don’t view it as being a malicious statement.
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Dr. Ben Carson, a rising star in conservative circles, comparing President Obama’s health-care law to slavery.
You know Obamacare is really I think the worst thing that has happened in this nation since slavery. And it is in a way, it is slavery in a way, because it is making all of us subservient to the government, and it was never about health care. It was about control.
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Former Saturday Night Live cast member Julia Sweeney, in response to a Times Square digital billboard taunting atheists over the existence of God.
OMG, there is no god!
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Texas Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst, perpetuating debunked claims about the attack on a U.S. Consulate in Libya and calling for the impeachment of President Obama.
This election is about protecting you and your freedoms, which are given to you by God, but which are being trampled on by Barack Obama right now. I don’t know about you, but Barack Obama ought to be impeached. Not only for trampling on our liberties, but what he did in Benghazi is just a crime.
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U.S. Rep. Gerry Connolly, D-Va., responding to a report that his Republican colleagues sang “Amazing Grace” before rejecting the latest proposal to raise the debt ceiling and end the government shutdown.
Isn’t that usually sung at funerals?
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Texas Freedom Network President Kathy Miller, on publishers who are refusing to water down or compromise instruction on evolution and climate change in their proposed new high school biology textbooks.
This is a very welcome development for everyone who opposes teaching phony science about evolution in our kid’s public schools.
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Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson, addressing a reader’s query about the Creation Museum and the theory of a “Young Earth.”
Well, I have certain sympathies for the expulsion idea. Why not do it like the ancient Greek ostracism? If enough signatures can be collected, there has to be a plebiscite attached to the next federal election, whether a state should be kicked out for the next 10 or 20 years and be treated like any other foreign country during that time. If more than one state makes the list, the voters have to choose just one. It may be necessary to adjust details, so that e.g. California cannot just by size immunize itself.