HARTFORD, Conn. — It was the plea heard round the world. “Don’t Tase me, bro” — shouted by a Florida college student as officers removed him from a speech by Sen. John Kerry — tops this year’s list of most memorable quotes, compiled by the editor of the Yale Book of Quotations.
Second on the list is from Lauren Upton, the Miss Teen USA contestant who was asked why one-fifth of Americans can’t locate the U.S. on a map.
“I personally believe that U.S. Americans are unable to do so because some people out there in our nation don’t have maps and I believe that our education like such as in South Africa and Iraq and everywhere like such as and I believe that they should our education over here in the U.S. should help the U.S. or should help South Africa and should help Iraq and the Asian countries so we will be able to build up our future for us,” Upton said.
The words of both young people were immortalized in videos posted on YouTube, the video-sharing website.
“These new media are spreading these things,” said editor Fred R. Shapiro, 53, associate librarian and lecturer in legal research at the Yale Law School. “I’m not listing the most admirable quotes, the most eloquent quotes. It’s the most memorable quotes.”
President Bush this year didn’t break into the top 10. That doesn’t mean politicians didn’t say anything memorable.
Third on the list is Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s comment in New York: “In Iran we don’t have homosexuals like in your country.”
Sen. Larry Craig, R-Idaho, took eighth place with “(I have) a wide stance when going to the bathroom,” his explanation for his foot touching the foot of an undercover police officer in an airport men’s room.
