“The question we ask today is not whether our government is too big or too small, but whether it works — whether it helps families find jobs at a decent wage, care they can afford, a retirement that is dignified.”
– President Barack Obama, Inauguration, 1/20/09
Ayup, our Gubbmint at work. You know, with this “not working”, one has to wonder if the Post Office is just leaving the starting line in a competition with the Secret Service (and we all know how THAT US Federal department has been doing lately). Take the phrase on the new P.O. stamp – sounds like Angelou, sounds like her book…
…but no, it isn’t- LA Times:
But the Washington Post reported yesterday that the quotation can also be found in “A Cup of Sun,” a 1967 poetry collection by children’s author Joan Walsh Anglund. A Postal Service spokesman told the newspaper that the line, which has been widely attributed to Angelou by people including President Obama, was approved for use on the stamp by Angelou’s family.
In a follow-up story, the Post talked to Anglund, who said the words on the stamp were hers. The newspaper notes that “Only the pronouns and punctuation are changed, from ‘he’ in Anglund’s original to ‘it’ on the stamp.”
A spokesman for the Postal Service, Mark Saunders, did not deny that the quotation may have originated with Anglund. “Had we known about this issue beforehand, we would have used one of [Angelou’s] many other works,” he said. “The sentence held great meaning for her and she is publicly identified with its popularity.”
One would think that with its vast amount of resources, the Feds could at least quote a quote right?
(H/T: Instapundit)
