“Statistics are used much like a drunk uses a lamppost: for support, not illumination.”
Actually said by Andrew Lang, in a 1910 speech: "Politicians use statistics in the same way that a drunk uses lamp-posts—for support rather than illumination", as quoted in Alan L. Mackay, The Harvest of a Quiet Eye (1977), and reported in Chambers Dictionary of Quotations (2005), p. 488.
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Vin Scully 12
American sports broadcaster 1927Related quotes

1910 Speech, quoted in Alan L. Mackay The Harvest of a Quiet Eye (1977), as reported in Chambers Dictionary of Quotations (2005), p. 488.
Widely attributed to Lang (e.g. in Elizabeth M. Knowles, The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations, Oxford University Press; and in Robert Andrews, The Columbia Dictionary of Quotations, Columbia University Press).
Variant: He uses statistics as a drunken man uses lamp posts—for support rather than illumination.

“Magic, madam, is like wine and, if you are not used to it, it will make you drunk.”
Source: The Ladies of Grace Adieu and Other Stories

As quoted in Joseph Telushkin's Rebbe: The Life and Teachings of Menachem M. Schneerson, the Most Influential Rabbi in Modern History