Quotes from Richard Cohen

Agesilao had his rivals even in Italy, chief among them Eugenio Pini from Livorno, who could be just as short-tempered. When he fought Rue "The Invincible," the French master who, hit twice in succession, failed to acknowledge being hit as etiquette dictated, Pini pulled the button from his foil and with his next attack ripped open Rue's jacket. He then tore off his mask and shouted, "I suppose that one didn't arrive either?

when the one-legged Marquis de Rivard was challenged, he sent a surgeon in reply and suggested that in the interests of fighting "on an equal footing" his opponent should submit to a similar amputation. The duel was called off.

Once introduced, however, the fighting épée was seen to have merits well beyond its uses in formal dueling; its practitioners had to develop the duelist's mentality: hit without being hit.

As late as 1883, when dueling of all kinds had almost been eradicated elsewhere, a rapier duel between a soda-water seller and a catfish dealer lasted eighty-three minutes before either combatant drew blood.

If you told me back in my Army days that I could have bought the same weapon that I had been using in training, I would not have believed it.

I long ago tired of politicians who never say anything, adhere to their talking points, and avoid all controversy.

My father was raised in an orphanage, and my mother was an immigrant from Poland whose first childhood memory was of hunger. Somehow, despite all of that, I am called a member of the 'elite.' If so, I damned well earned it.

There is precious little that's charitable about the world of charity.

Trump's presidency will fail. Just don't ask me how and when. It will collapse because at its center is a hollow man, lacking ballast, whose chaos cannot be contained.

If every senator looks into the mirror and sees a future president, then every president looks into that same mirror and sees himself on Mount Rushmore.

Republicans remain silent because Trump is doing what they want - lowering taxes on the rich, eviscerating regulations, bulldozing the environment, and insisting that a woman's body is not her own.

I have written about cultural dislocation, and I understand the corrosive effect of diminished expectations.

Sometimes I think that Rush Limbaugh is the dumbest man in America. This happens whenever I take him at face value and forget that he is basically an entertainer with contempt for his audience. He will tell them anything.

Pence is the very personification of the career politician. With the exception of a few years doing talk radio and television shows, he has done nothing but run for office, winning all but the first two times.

I met Clinton during her husband's first campaign for the White House. It was 1992, New Hampshire, and both Clintons had stopped at a coffee shop to greet the folks and get something to eat.

Polanski is a great film director - although the much-acclaimed 'Chinatown' has a muddled script - but his true talent is to make fools of his friends.

Conservatives watch Fox News and read 'Breitbart.' Liberals watch MSNBC and read 'HuffPost.' When we agree, it's the truth; when we differ, it's fake news.

It takes a willful disregard of history to appreciate how white Southerners could look at the Confederate battle flag and see states' rights or a way of life or a tradition - and not one human being whipping another, which was a common occurrence.

The ability and willingness to keep two opposing views in mind at the same time are hallmarks of adulthood.

I am not a German bitter-ender. I am, though, a German never-forgetter.

Let me tell you, seven days without Wolf Blitzer is heaven. A week outside 'The Situation Room' is downright calming. No 'breaking news!' No hype. Blitzer is a first-class journalist, and I mention him only by way of acknowledging his fame.

Every rippling muscle is a book not read, a movie not seen, or a conversation not held.

It is not true that Trump is nobody's fool. He is the GOP's.

Evil comes in through the cable and through the Internet. We look forward to the advent of driverless cars. But they can be hacked. You could be riding along, and some 14-year-old in Romania takes over your car, so you end up running the lights and losing your brakes or, worse, listening to Eminem. What's the purpose?