For our April quote of the month, we decided to switch things up a bit and give our audience a quote from a former socialist who changed his political beliefs and became a hard line capitalist. Quite a change of pace from our Leprechaun buddy from last month. Max Eastman was an American writer on literature, philosophy and society, a poet, and a prominent political activist. After completing a PhD at Columbia University, he became editor of America’s leading socialist periodical called ‘The Masses’. The periodical was very critical of the first world war and landed Eastman in trouble with the United States government several times. Eastman twice stood trial under the provisions of the Sedition Act, but was acquitted each time. Unfortunately, the periodical was forced to shut down because of charges under the Espionage Act of 1917. Eastman traveled to Russia and stayed there for over a year and witnessed the Bolshevik Revolution. He was a strong supporter of Leon Trotsky with whom he became friends with and would help to translate several of his works from Russian to English for American readers.

Eastman would later condemn Socialism in Russia after witnessing the Party being overtaken by radical influences such as the ideals of Joseph Stalin who would have someone assassinate his good friend Trotsky while in exile in Mexico. Following the Great Depression, Eastman changed his political beliefs and started to promote free market capitalism and wrote articles condemning socialism in the Libertarian publication ‘The Freeman’. Eastman published more than twenty books on subjects as diverse as the scientific method, humor, Freudian psychology and Soviet culture as well as volumes on poetry, his memoirs and reflections on his personal encounters with many famous people during his career such as Charlie Chaplin, Ernest Hemingway, Sigmund Freud, Albert Einstein and many other influential people. In this month’s quote, Eastman talks about jokes from one of his published volumes on humor. He gives his opinion on how one understands a joke and explains the ability to prove you have a sense of humor…

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It’s the month of March. We’ve already done a quote or two for St-Patrick’s day so we’ve already exhausted most of our quotes on this limited drunken holiday. But, we haven’t exhausted any quotes on leprechauns yet! And we’re not talking about any ordinary leprechaun. Oh,no sir. We’re talking about the evil leprechaun played by actor Warren Davis in the ‘Leprechaun’ film series. Leprechaun is a 1993 comedy horror film written and directed by Mark Jones and starring Warwick Davis and Jennifer Aniston in her first film role. The plot revolves around an evil leprechaun that is imprisoned for ten years in a farmhouse until he is broken free and goes on a killing rampage in search of his beloved gold. The movie was one of the first theatrical releases of 1993 and became a surprise hit. There have been six sequels made with a 7th film set to be released sometime in 2013 with WWE and Lions Gate teaming up to produce the film. One of the great things about the Leprechaun character is that he would often give the audience a great one-liner or comedic joke before attempting to kill someone. These one-liners or jokes would often come in the form of a lyrical poem where several of the words used in the poem would rhyme together. In this month’s quote, the Leprechaun explains to the audience what the consequences shall be if anybody tries to steal his gold…

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This month’s quote may be a little shorter than others since there’s very little biographical information about our next person of interest. William (Bill) Vaughn was an American columnist and author. His memorable distinctions or original thoughts have appeared in numerous books and on many internet web sites. He wrote a syndicated column for the Kansas City Star from 1946 until his death in 1977. He attended Washington University in St-Louis, Missouri and was writing for ‘Reader’s Digest’ and ‘Better Homes and Gardens’ under the pseudonym ‘Burton Hills’. Many of his aphorisms discuss patriotism, American politics, conformity, the holidays and many other amusing and provocative thoughts. In this month’s quote, Vaughn gives us some insight into why size doesn’t mean everything in life…

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It’s the month of January and the holidays have ended and it’s back to another year stuffed with quotes for all of you to enjoy. This month, we take one final quote about the holidays from satirist P.J. O’Rourke. P. J. O’Rourke is an American political satirist, journalist, writer, and author. One of his first major writing gigs was writing articles for National Lampoon. He later became a freelance journalist and wrote articles for such publications as Playboy, Vanity Fair, Car and Driver and Rolling Stone. In addition, O’Rourke is an accomplished author having published 16 books. Two of his novels including ‘Give War A Chance’ and ‘Parliament of Whores’ have reached #1 on the New York Times Best Seller List. O’Rourke has Libertarian political views and has been a frequent political commentator on television programs such as ’60 Minutes’ and ‘Real Time with Bill Maher’. He is a regular correspondent for publications such as ‘The Atlantic Monthly’, ‘The American Spectator’, and ‘The Weekly Standard’. His latest book was published in November 2011 and is entitled ‘Holidays in Heck’. In this month’s quote, P.J. gives us his thoughts on the holiday season and what it means to be drunk just before the new year begins…

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It’s almost Christmas time and that means another quote of the month that has very little to do with Christ’s birth. This month, we take a look at Charles Dickens who was an English writer and creator of some of the world’s most popular fictional characters. Dickens was born in Portsmouth, England and left school at an early age to work in a factory in order to help out his family. Dickens worked hard in order to succeed and was doing multiple gigs including writing novels, editing weekly newspapers, writing short stories and lecturing at various public speaking engagements. Dickens had a soft spot for the poor and wrote extensively about poverty in many of his novels. Dickens was known for his philanthropy and helped out save several hospitals from bankruptcy. In addition, he helped to set up a home for the redemption of fallen women from the working class. During his last few years, Dickens went on a hugely popular reading tour that lasted nearly a decade. While Dickens is best known for such novels as ‘A Tale of Two Cities’ and ‘Great Expectations’; it’s his novel ‘A Christmas Carol’ which will be the focus for the quote for December. The story did much to promote a renewed enthusiasm for the joys of Christmas in Britain and America. Dickens catalyzed the emerging Christmas as a family-centered festival of generosity in contrast to the dwindling community-based and church-centered observations that took place in Victorian England previously.

Some of the characters that he created such as Tiny Tim, Scrooge and the Christmas ghosts have become Western cultural symbols that have been re-enacted every year in various film, television and theater projects. In ‘A Christmas Carol’, Ebenezer Scrooge is a miserly old man who believes that Christmas is just an excuse for people to miss work. He doesn’t believe in all of the good cheer and charity that the season promotes, and he makes sure everyone knows it. Three ghosts visit Scrooge successively: the Ghost of Christmas Past, the Ghost of Christmas Present, and the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come. They show Scrooge his error in valuing money over people. In the fifth and final stave, Scrooge awakens on Christmas morning with joy and love in his heart. Scrooge has become a different man overnight and now treats his fellow men with kindness, generosity and compassion, gaining a reputation as a man who embodies the spirit of Christmas. We finish off 2012 with a quote from Scrooge allowing us all to enjoy Christmas and to enjoy being together this holiday season.

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