Matthew Bird

“I questioned what else I had already missed so far, in my own life, simply through the limits of my character.”
― Martin MacInnes, In Ascension

“America lacked the hereditary aristocracy of Europe, so New York found itself creating its own elite criteria. Four hundred names, roughly the number of people who could reasonably fit in Caroline Astor's Fifth Avenue ballroom, defined the true upper crust of the city.”
― Deirdre Mask, The Address Book: What Street Addresses Reveal About Identity, Race, Wealth, and Power

“No president in American history has ever been removed from office by way of a Senate impeachment trial. A two-thirds vote requirement for conviction requires a bipartisan buy-in, which will be very difficult to achieve unless there is significant popular support in the nation. Those conditions likely existed during the latter months of the Watergate scandal of President Richard Nixon, but he resigned in August 1974, thereby ending the impeachment process.”
― Donald A. Zinman

“On Achtung Baby U2 took conventional tracks and radicalized them; on this material U2 is taking radical tracks and covering them with a veneer of convention.”
― Bill Flanagan, U2 at the End of the World