RSSJuly 01, 2008
Quick Quiz: Grover Norquist
Grover Norquist calling Barack Obama "John Kerry with a tan" prompts Paul Slansky to ask, "Who's Grover Norquist?"
1) Grover Norquist is a Ronald Reagan-adoring anti-tax fanatic. Complete the quote that will probably be in the lead paragraph of his obituary, summing up his miserable world view: "I don't want to abolish government. I simply want to _____________"
reduce it to the size where I can drag it into the bathroom and drown it in the bathtub.
starve it to death and watch its little tummy bloat up while I eat a big banana split.
eviscerate it and splatter its entrails on every desk at the IRS.
2) What was Grover Norquist's response when asked, "Why shouldn't the state help the needy?"
"Why should it? How do the needy help the state?"
"Because to do that, you would have to steal money from people who earned it and give it to people who didn't. And then you make the state into a thief."
"Whatever happened to 'Survival of the Fittest'? It literally makes me ill to think that money I earned is going toward keeping society's dregs alive."
3) As head of the Ronald Reagan Legacy Project, how did Grover Norquist propose to honor Ronald Reagan?
Replacing Alexander Hamilton on the $10 bill or Andrew Jackson on the $20 bill with him.
Replacing Franklin D. Roosevelt's face with Reagan's on half of the nation's dimes.
Both of the above, plus getting something named after Reagan - a school, a mall, a mile of highway, anything! - in each of the fifty states.
4) How did Grover Norquist justify his campaign to recast Ronald Reagan as the lead on the ten dollar bill?
"Hamilton was a nice guy and everything, but he wasn't president."
"Who do you want on your money? A guy who got shot and died or someone who got shot and lived?"
"Most of the people who don't like Reagan don't have much money anyway, so they won't have to see him as much."
5) False or true? During an interview with Terry Gross on NPR's Fresh Air, Grover Norquist compared the estate tax to the Holocaust.
False. He did, however, refer to the estate tax as the "death penalty."
True. What a fucking loon.
6) True or false? In a 2003 interview, three years before the Democrats took back both Houses of Congress, Grover Norquist predicted the exact number of Republican seats that would be lost in 2006.
True. Norquist is known to have a shrewd - some would say intuitive--sense of what the future is about to bring. He even predicted that Bill Clinton would pack the Senate by granting statehood to Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, and the District of Columbia. Oh, wait, that didn't happen.
False. Norquist proclaimed, "The Republicans are looking at decades of dominance in the House and Senate."
7) What does the name Grover Norquist and the personality and visuals that come with him suggest?
Porn stardom.
Membership in the Teamsters Union.
A childhood that included regular schoolyard beatings.
The author regrets that he was unable to find a way to work John McCain calling his wife a "cunt" in public into today's quiz.
Filed under: Quick Quiz, Grover Norquist, Grover Norquist Ronald Reagan, Grover Norquist Ronald Reagan Legacy Project, Ronald Reagan Legacy Project, Grover Norquist conservative, Grover Norquist conservatism, Grover Norquist Reagan Revolution, Grover Norquist Reagan money
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