Babylon5quotes.com

[PillowRock]

Well, this (first?) batch of quote stuff does seem to focus on quotes that:

A) Are, for the most part, particularly short. (I think this alone can account for the lack of Londo quotes. )

B) Will generally resonate even with people who have never even heard the title "Babylon 5". (If it mentions Vorlons or Narns or the Grey Council or Psi Corps, it's automatically out of the running.)

C) However, they can't be so generic that a B5 fan seeing it completely out of context might not *immediately* recognize where it came from. Therefore, there is no "What do you want?" or "Who are you?" or "Not on my watch!"

D) Are single lines; no "dialog" that needs both a prompt and a response from two different speakers.


I mean, you don't have to a thing about B5 to "get" quotes such as "Faith Manages", "Hope is all we have", or "I'm in the middle of 15 things, all of them annoying."

Even the two that mention Ivanova by name ..... you don't really need to have any idea who Ivanova is to "get" the point of the quote.

Actually, the one that comes the closest to violating rule B) is probably the "No Earth captain ....." one. But that is such a cool line ......

 

[Jan]

No telling when it'll show up, but I've started a thread on the newsgroup for suggestions. It would be cool if quotes would rotate some.

Jan

 

[PillowRock]

Actually, I've always liked:

"Only an idiot starts a war on two fronts.
Only the heir to the throne of the Kingdom of Idiots starts a war on 12 fronts."


Edit to clarify:

The above line is spoken by Londo, to Refa, in the scene where he tells Refa that he has given him the first part of a two stage poison. This is at the beginning of "Ceremonies of Light and Dark".

 

[A_M_Swallow]

Actually, I've always liked:

"Only an idiot starts a war on two fronts.
Only the heir to the throne of the Kingdom of Idiots starts a war on 12 fronts."

Front 1 = Afghanistan
Front 2 = Iraq

Front n = ?

“* OPERATION IRAQI FREEDOM includes casualties that occurred on or after March 19, 2003 in the
Arabian Sea, Bahrain, Gulf of Aden, Gulf of Oman, Iraq, Kuwait, Oman, Persian Gulf, Qatar, Red Sea,
Saudi Arabia, and United Arab Emirates. Prior to March 19, 2003, casualties in these countries were
considered OEF.
“

“*** OPERATION ENDURING FREEDOM (In and Around Afghanistan), includes casualties that occurred
in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Uzbekistan.
“

“**** OPERATION ENDURING FREEDOM (Other Locations), includes casualties that occurred in
Guantanamo Bay (Cuba), Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Jordan, Kenya, Kyrgyzstan, Philippines, Seychelles,
Sudan, Tajikistan, Turkey, and Yemen.
“

If you want to find the war just follow the trail of dead bodies.
http://www.dod.gov/news/casualty.pdf

Now who is the US President?

 

[Jan]

Is there a valid reason for posting this in a thread about quotes? It's completely off-topic to the thread.

Jan

 

[PillowRock]

Like I said:

I've *always* liked that quote ...... since the night it was first broadcast over the old PTEN pseudo-network ....... years before W was even a candidate, or the US (and allies) were on the ground anywhere.

It's a truism (fighting shooting wars on multiple fronts simultaneously is very unlikely to work well), and one that I found to be expressed in an amusing phrasing.


People assuming that it must be a current political statement may be what keeps it off merchandise for a while ...... unless JMS decides that he wants to invite that interpretation.


As for:

Front n = ?

The reason the quote says "12" is because this about quotes from Babylon 5, and (unless I'm mistaken in my memory of the line) Londo said "12" in the show.


The fact that it is even possible to interpret *that* quote in particular as applying to current events just brings up another B5 quote:

"Nobody reads Santayana any more."

(And *that* could be another decent candidate for quote merchandise.)

 

[A_M_Swallow]

Is there a valid reason for posting this in a thread about quotes? It's completely off-topic to the thread.

Jan

The list is off topic for quotes in general. It is on topic for the quote about the number of fronts. Each country can be considered a different front. There are 12 fronts in the first paragraph and the list keeps going.

Future discussion of the sub-thread probably needs moving to the political forum.

 

[fisheggs]

Is there a valid reason for posting this in a thread about quotes? It's completely off-topic to the thread.

Jan

Maybe it's just a sneaky way to inform non-members that there are other forums, if they join.

 

[Ninja_Squirrel]

For those who haven't noticed JMS's latest over at JMSnews.com regarding the quote merchandise...

BTW, a couple of small updates.

Appparently some of our Canadian brethren (and sisthern? sistern?) to
the North have been hit with GST because Cafe Press isn't correctly
labeling their boxes. So if folks up there want to hold off on their
orders on stuff for a bit (it might take a couple of weeks to
straighten this out), there's a way to carry over the discount for
y'all.

Also...we're tweaking some of the quote stuff to make it look spiffier,
so a few things will be coming off in a bit for a while as we make it
better. Just FYI.

jms

 

[Boxie]

...we're tweaking some of the quote stuff to make it look spiffier,
so a few things will be coming off in a bit for a while as we make it
better. Just FYI.

jms

That's what I wanted to hear! Hot dog, we're gonna get spiffy!