We have laws against private usury, yet where are the laws against public uxory?
Nothing
You cannot have a contemporary prison without contemporary furniture.
—Clouseau
We are pleased when the serious man clowns, dismayed when the clown turns serious.
Experts have replaced adults.
Automated spell-check is an object lesson in tail risk: it reduces the number of errors, but by attempting to correct them with actual words, renders each a potential catastrophe.
No matter how the world appears to be improving, it always feels like it’s falling apart.
Every group exists by discriminating, and every campaign against its discrimination is a campaign against the group.
All Canadians are experts on American politics in the way all childless people, who experience children mostly as squalling public nuisances, are experts on child-rearing.
Many a reputation has been made by dying at just the right time.
At high stakes one must forget them.
At every public lecture the audience, no matter how small, includes at least one member who doesn’t have a question, exactly, more like a comment.