Laws are a fine thing on paper, but painful when no bribery can ease their bind. - Paolo Bacigalupi

Politics is ugly. Never doubt what small men will do for great power.

At first, when California started winning its water lawsuits and shutting off cities, the displaced people just followed the water—right to California. It took a little while before the bureaucrats realized what was going on, but finally someone with a sharp pencil did the math and realized that taking in people along with their water didn't solve a water shortage.

She does not know how little anyone cares to separate wheat from chaff, when all anyone wants to do is burn a field.