[Ads-l] quote of the year candidate

[ADSGarson O'Toole]

Year: GB 1961
Periodical: American Capsule News
Issue 301; Issue 450
Database: Google Books snippet; must be verified with hardcopy
(Search probe with "1961" shows a header indicating that the volume
contaisn 1961 issues)

[Begin near-raw OCR text]
The farce of Eisenhower being President prompted a well-known wagster
to coin this wisecrack, which has all the truth and no poetry in it:

"George Washington couldn't tell a lie; Franklin Roosevelt couldn't
tell the truth; and Ike Eisenhower couldn't tell the difference."

Mr. Nixon could have been President had he not lacked the intestinal
fortitude of a common ant. When it was found the "Democrats" had
stolen 200,000 votes in Chicago alone, the Illinois electoral votes
(27) tried to fall into ...
[End near-raw OCR text]

Garson

On Fri, Dec 22, 2017 at 2:12 PM, Parish, James <jparish at siue.edu> wrote:
> I remember it from a Tom Toles cartoon, with the third party being Jimmy Carter. (I have it in a collection at home, but that's 2000 miles away just now.)
>
>
> Jim Parish
>
> ________________________________
> From: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU> on behalf of Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
> Sent: Friday, December 22, 2017 12:35:08 PM
> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> Subject: Re: quote of the year candidate
>
>> On Dec 22, 2017, at 1:08 PM, James A. Landau <JJJRLandau at NETSCAPE.COM> wrote:
>>
>> Not a strong candidate, I'm afraid.  If anyone be interested, I will contact the person who sent the graphic to me and "try and" find its origin.
>>
>> George Washington:  I cannot tell a lie.
>> Richard Nixon:  I cannot tell the truth.
>> Donald Trump:   I cannot tell the difference.
>>
>> graphic is at https://www.facebook.com/groups/ATSCC/permalink/1392060604253183/
>>
>
> The original (as far as I know) is Mort Sahl’s line, from 1987 (same year Trump’s ghostwritten _Art of the Deal_ came out):
>
> “Washington couldn’t tell a lie, Nixon couldn't tell the truth, and Reagan couldn’t tell the difference."
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