Talking Points: Did You See What They Said?

"America cannot afford a Twitter presidency." — Sen. Charles Schumer, D-New York, during the opening of the 115th Congress (C-Span, Tuesday)"I voted no #115thCongress #Ethics" — U.S. Rep. Kay Granger, R- Fort Worth, indicating on Twitter that she opposed a House Republican plan to gut an independent office designed to investigate congressional ethical wrongdoings in the U.S. House (Twitter, Tuesday) "I have a lot more faith in our intelligence officers serving around the world ... than I do in people like Julian Assange."— Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., breaking with president-elect Donald Trump, who questions the assessments of U.S. intelligence agencies that Russia was involved in hacking the Democratic National Committee (MSNBC's "Morning Joe", Wednesday)"Were you going to sneeze, is that it?" — House Speaker Paul Ryan, confused by the attempt of the teenage son of Rep. Roger Marshall, R-Kan., to "dab" during his father's swearing-in ceremony to Congress (Fox News, Wednesday) "Just so you know @Speaker Ryan: He's grounded"—Rep. Marshall's tweeted response after his son's Cal's dab moment (Twitter, Tuesday)"There's nothing wrong with me psychologically."— Convicted white supremacist Dylann Roof, addressing the court during the penalty phase of his federal court trial for the slaying of parishioners at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church (New York Times, Wednesday)"It's the first time that a company can know who you are, it can know what you want, it can know where you are, it can at least make a good guess at what mood you're in and take everything on the ship and customize it to your individual need at this time."— Joe Pine, author of the Experience Economy, on a new tracking device that Carnival Corp. plans to give to its cruise line passengers (Miami Herald, Wednesday)"It's the only time I ever saw Secret Service cry at an event. So it was brutal."— President Barack Obama, reflecting during a History Channel interview on the day he met with the parents of the victims of the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School in 2012 (Yahoonews, Thursday)"It was a $170 KidKraft dollhouse and 64 ounces -- four pounds -- of cookies." —Megan Neitzel of Dallas, explaining that her six-year-old daughter Brooke accidentally placed an order with the family's Amazon Echo Dot, a device that connects users to Alexa, the company's cloud-based, voice-activated digital assistant (Foxnews.com, Wednesday)"Most people are not here to cause trouble. This is where kids come to hang."— Lexi Swanson, a 17-year-old student at Plainfield Central High School in Illinois, responding to a new parental escort policy instituted at a regional mall after large groups of teenagers brawled last week (Chicago Tribune, Thursday) "It's sickening. It makes you wonder, what would make individuals treat somebody like that?"— Chicago Police Superintendent Eddie Johnson, responding to an online video showing a white teenager tied up and beaten as several young African-Americans shout antiwhite messages and insults about President-elect Donald Trump (New York Times, Wednesday) "There was a feeling in 2016 that this was going to happen on the federal level. As of Election Day it became pretty clear that change in terms of the minimum wage at the federal level wasn't going to happen."— Ken Weinstein, owner of the Trolley Car Diner and Trolley Car Cafe, who is leading a coalition of Philadelphia-area businesses that have pledged to increase the minimum wage to $11 an hour by 2020 ( Philadelphia Inquirer, Wednesday)  Continue reading...