“Some years ago, it was customary for fast-talking confidence men to find some chump with five or ten thousand dollars in cash and sell him the Brooklyn Bridge or the Holland Tunnel. And I hear that when the Pennsylvania Railroad began to demolish its station in New York City, someone bought it for $25,000 cash. Now the swindlers in all those cases are undoubtedly wicked men. They deserve exemplary punishment. But, you know, there must have been something wrong with the purchasers too. Much as we may sympathize with them, we shall have to agree, I think, that they were not overly bright.”

"What We Owe Our Parasites", speech (June 1968); Free Speech magazine (October and November 1995)
1960s

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Revilo P. Oliver37

American philologist 1908–1994

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