To those of us who survived [...], it also means that we have learned to stand outside our history and watch it, without feeling too much. A little s… - Thomas Pynchon

"To rule forever," continues the Chinaman, later, "it is necessary only to create, among the people one would rule, what we call...Bad History. Nothing will produce Bad History more directly nor brutally, than drawing a Line, in particular a Right Line, the very Shape of Contempt, through the midst of a People, — to create thus a Distinction betwixt 'em, — 'tis the first stroke. — All else will follow as if predestin'd, unto War and Devastation."

Paranoia's the garlic in life's kitchen, right, you can never have too much.

You're Orthodox? No. Conservative? Young people never are. My parents were Orthodox. They believe, I believe, that whatever your father is, as long as your mother is Jewish, you are Jewish too because we all come from our mother's womb. A long unbroken chain of Jewish mothers going all the way back to Eve.