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 . . . BIRTH see: "ABORTION" see below: "BIRTHDAYS" see: "LIFE" see "HOME & FAMILY" for other related links Having a baby is like taking your bottom lip and pulling it over your head. --Carol Burnett (1934- ) American television actress Good work, Mary. We all knew you had it in you. (telegram to Mrs. Sherwood on the arrival of her baby.) --Dorothy Parker (1893-1967) American critic and humorist, in Alexander Woolcott _While Rome Burns_ [1934] When we are born, we cry that we are come To this great stage of fools. --William Shakespeare (1564-1616) English dramatist, _King Lear_ [1605-1606] 'Do you know who made you?' 'Nobody, as I knows on,' said the child, with a short laugh. The idea appeared to amuse her considerably; for her eyes twinkled, and she added - 'I 'spect I growed. Don't think nobody never made me.' --Harriet Beecher Stowe (1811-1896) American writer and philanthropist, [sister of Henry Ward Beecher, daughter of Lyman Beecher] _Uncle Tom's Cabin_ [1852] ch. 21 Augustus passed laws to tighten the sanctions against celibacy and to increase revenue, He failed, however, to make marriage and the raising of children more popular - childlessness was too attractive. --Tacitus [or Publius Cornelius Tacitus or Gaius Cornelius Tacitus] (c.55-c.117), Roman orator, lawyer, senator, and historian, _Annals_, bk. 3.25 ----- prepotency pree-POTE-n-see, noun: 1. The quality or condition of having superior power, influence, or force; predominance. 2. (Biology) The capacity, on the part of one of the parents, as compared with the other, to transmit more than his or her own share of characteristics to their offspring. viviparous (vi-vip`a-rous) Producing young in a living state, as most mammals, or as those plants the offspring of which are produced alive, either by bulbs instead of seeds, or by the seeds themselves germinating on the plant, instead of falling, as they usually do; -- opposed to oviparous.   BIRTH CONTROL . . see "SEX" see also: "ABORTION" A fast word about oral contraception. I asked a girl to go to bed with me and she said 'no'. --Woody Allen [Allen Stewart Konigsberg] (1935 - ) American actor, writer and director, at a nightclub in Washington [April 1965] Whenever I hear people discussing birth control, I always remember that I was the fifth. --Clarence Darrow (1857-1938) American lawyer Contraceptives should be used on all conceivable occasions. --Spike [Terence Alan] Milligan (1918-2002) Novelist, poet, and comedian, _The Last Goon Show of All_ [1972] Prevention of birth is premature murder, and it makes no difference whether it is a life already born that one snatches away or a life that is coming to birth. --Tertullian [Quintas Septimus Florens Tertullianus] (c. 155/160-after220) Early Christian theologian, polemicist, and moralist, _The Christian's Defense_ [c.215] . . see "AGE" for related links see "TIME" for related links A lady of 'a certain age,' which means Certainly aged. --Lord Byron [George Gordon Byron] (1788-1824) English Romantic poet and satirist, _Don Juan_ [1821], canto VI, st. 69 I never complained that my birthday was overlooked; people were even surprised, with a touch of admiration, by my discretion on this subject. But the reason for my disinterestedness was even more discrete: I longed to be forgotten in order to be able to complain to myself. --Albert Camus (1913-1960) French novelist, dramatist, and essayist, _The Fall_ [1956] "...there are three hundred and sixty-four days when you might get un-birthday presents--" "Certainly," said Alice. "And only ONE for birthday presents, you know. There's glory for you!" --Lewis Carroll [Charles Lutwidge Dodgson] (1832-1898) English writer and logician, _Through the Looking Glass_ [1872] What is there to celebrate? Birthdays are automatic things. Anyway, birthdays are for children. --Albert Einstein (1879-1955) German-born theoretical physicist; won 1921 Nobel Prize for Photoelectric Effect, best known for Theories of Relativity; initiated U.S. nuclear program in WW II, in _New York Times_ [12 March 1944] I occasionally get birthday cards from fans. But it’s often the same message: They hope it’s my last. --Al Forman, National League umpire [baseball] "Time" [25 August 1961] She may very well pass for forty-three, In the dusk with a light behind her. --W. S. Gilbert (1836-1911) English writer of comic and satirical verse, _Trial by Jury _ [1875] The Grecian ladies counted their age from their marriage, not their birth. --Homer (c. 850? BC) Greek Epic Poet Is that a birthday? 'tis, alas! too clear; 'Tis but the funeral of the former year. --Alexander Pope (1688-1744) English poet, _To Mrs. M.B._ l. 9 Take every birthday with a grain of salt. This works much better if the salt accompanies a large margarita. --John Wagner "Maxine" cartoon . . see "EMOTIONS & FEELINGS" for related links O poor mortals, how ye make this earth bitter for each other. --Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881) Scottish historian and political philosopher, _History of the French Revolution_ Here is a rule to remember in the future, when anything tempts you to feel bitter: not, "This is a misfortune," but "To bear this worthily is good fortune." --Marcus Aurelius Antoninus (121-180) Roman emperor [161-180] and Stoic philosopher, _Meditations_ Book IV, Number 49 I don't want to be bitter about life - about love and friendship and all the human emotional entanglements. I've had more than my share of human disappointments, deprivations, disillusionment. I want to love people and life above all; I want to be able to say always, "if you feel bitter or disillusioned, there is something wrong with yourself, not with people, not with life. --Henry Miller (1891-1980) American novelist and essayist Some old women and men grow bitter with age. The more their teeth drop out the more biting they get. --George Dennison Prentice (1802-1870) American journalist, _Prenticeana_ [1860] O, how bitter a thing it is to look into happiness through another man's eyes! --William Shakespeare (1564-1616) English dramatist, _As You Like It_ [1599] ----- acrimony (noun) ['æ-krê-mo-ni] Physical or psychological bitterness, rancor, hostile resentment. rankle (intransitive verb) To cause persistent feelings of bitterness, resentment, or anger . . see "PEOPLE" for related links see also: "IRAQ" Winston Blair By WILLIAM SHAWCROSS May 5, 2005 The Wall Street Journal LONDON -- Politics is all local, especially at election time. But the "Little Britain" manner in which Tony Blair's enemies have exploited Iraq before today's election is a real disgrace. In their extreme zeal to try and prove that "Blair lied," his critics amongst the Conservative Party and the Liberal Democrats -- and all the left-of-center, fashionable bien-pensant writers, actors and intellectuals of London -- resolutely turn their face against the realities of Iraq and of the Middle East itself. Listening to the tone of the debate, you would think that there were no Iraqis out there and that "Iraq" was merely a code word for some appalling new kind of politically incorrect abuse. You would think that George Bush and Mr. Blair invented the threat from Saddam. Entirely missing from the debate is the fact that Saddam had used WMD against his own people as far back as 1988, had tried to expunge another member of the United Nations from the map, had murdered hundreds of thousands of his own people, and had consistently refused to cooperate with U.N. disarmament inspectors throughout the 1990s. In 1998, President Clinton, the darling of many of those who loathe Mr. Bush (and now Mr. Blair), warned that "If we fail to act [Saddam] will conclude that the international community has lost its will. He will then conclude that he can go right on and do more to rebuild an arsenal of devastating destruction. And some day, some way, I guarantee you he'll use the arsenal." None of Bill Clinton's admirers in Britain quote that today. Charles Duelfer, head of the Iraq Survey Group, shows in his devastating final report that since 1996 Saddam had successfully subverted both international sanctions and the U.N.'s Oil for Food program to build up his regime again. Charles Kennedy, the leader of Britain's Liberal Democrats, says that we should have put our faith in the Security Council. He cannot have looked at the extensive covert transactions, detailed in Mr. Duelfer's report, undertaken by sitting members of the Council in direct violation of the resolutions they themselves had passed. Of course it would have been better if we could have got a second Security Council resolution. But President Jacques Chirac, Saddam's closest ally in the West, decided to stop that. Mr. Duelfer uncovered one Iraqi intelligence report which said that French politicians had assured Saddam in writing that France would use its U.N. veto against any U.S. effort to attack Iraq. In March 2003, France threatened to do just that. Anyone who pretends -- as many of Mr. Blair's opponents do -- that Saddam could have been controlled by the principled resilience of the Security Council in 2003, is deliberately ignoring history. Moreover, the sanctions which contained Saddam -- and indeed, also profited him -- had devastated Iraq's people. Opponents of Western policy toward Iraq used to emphasize that before March 2003. Now they never mention it. Mr. Blair's position in March 2003 was not dishonest, it was just unenviable -- stuck between the rock of his own party's intransigent leftwingers, and the hard place of U.S. determination. When they attack him, Mr. Blair's enemies ignore all the benefits that have flowed -- with pain and blood -- from the decision to invade. Quite apart from not lauding the removal of one of the worst and most destabilizing of modern tyrants, Mr. Blair's critics rarely acknowledge that eight million Iraqis voted in January in the freest election that ever took place in the Arab world -- thanks to Mr. Blair, Mr. Bush, Australia's John Howard, Italy's Silvio Berlusconi, and others. Why are British leftists so silent about the horrors of the terrorists in Iraq, who torture union leaders and murder democrats? Are they not pleased that for the first time in any Middle Eastern country (or indeed almost anywhere) almost a third of elected MPs are women? Why do they not place themselves squarely on the same side as Sheikha Lameah Khaddouri, the Iraqi woman MP who was shot repeatedly in the face last week, becoming the first of the 89 new women MPs to be murdered? Why do they ignore the fact that another of Saddam's mass graves was found last week? Why do they not listen to Iraq's new president, the Kurdish leader Jalal Talabani? He says that Iraqis "wonder in amazement" at the debate over Iraq in Britain today. "Britain should be proud that the liberation of Iraq has, in our eyes, been one of your finest hours. History will judge Prime Minister Blair as a champion against tyranny. Of that I have no doubt." I can think of many, many reasons to vote against Mr. Blair's New Labour party today. But it is really depressing that his role in liberating Iraq (and previously Sierra Leone, Kosovo and Afghanistan) is just the subject of vulgar abuse by Little Englanders. To them anti-Americanism is far more important than solidarity with Iraqis trying to build a new society. Martin Gilbert, Winston Churchill's official biographer, has written that Messrs. Bush and Blair may be remembered as the new Roosevelt and Churchill for their courage in facing down one of the great international threats of our time. Many of Mr. Blair's opponents, on the other hand, will be quickly forgotten. Mr. Shawcross is the author of "Allies: The United States, Britain, Europe and the War in Iraq" (Atlantic Books, 2004). end page | BABIES - BALLET | BANANAS - BARTENDERS | BASEBALL | BASTARDS - BEATLES (THE) | BEAUTY | BED - BEGINNINGS | BEHAVIOR - BELIEF | BENNY (JACK) - BIBLE | BICYCLES - BIRDS | BIRTH - BIRTHDAYS | BITTERNESS & BLAIR (TONY) | BLAME - BLOGGING | BLONDES - BOOK BURNING | BODY (THE) | BOOKS | BOOMERS (THE) - BORROWING | BOSTON & BOXING | BOYS - BREAKING UP | BREASTS - BRITAIN | BROADWAY - BUBBLES (ECONOMIC) | BUGS BUNNY - BUREAUCRACY | BURMA SHAVE - BUSYBODIES | | A | B | C | D | E | F | G | | Return Home | The Credits | The Cast | Act 1 | Act 2 | Act 3 | The End | The Reviews | |
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