Can you guess who?

With the thrill of elections just around the corner, it’s time to play “Who Said It?” which is a test of how smart you are about government and who said what about it.

The game reveals whether or not you can cast your ballot without asking your wife’s opinion.

All you have to do is write down the name of the author of each quotation listed below, and then check your answers with the names at the bottom of the page. If you guess all the names correctly, you will be awarded a hive of Africanized bees to ward off last-minute political speakers at Rotary Club. Here we go:

1. “Suppose you are an idiot. And suppose you are a member of Congress. But then I repeat myself.”

2. “I contend that a nation trying to tax itself into prosperity is like a man standing in a bucket, trying to lift himself up by the handle.”

3.“ A government which robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the support of Paul.”

4.“Democracy must be something more than two wolves and a sheep voting on what to have for dinner.”

5. “Foreign aid must be defined as a transfer of money from poor people in rich countries to rich people in poor countries.”

6.“ Giving money and power to a government is like giving whiskey and car keys to teen-age boys.”

7.“ Government is that great fiction through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else.”

8. “Government’s view of the economy can be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it.”

9.“ I don’t make up jokes about our government. I just watch and report facts.”

10.“ If you think health care is expensive now, wait until you see what it costs when it’s free.”

11. “ In general, the art of government is taking as much money as possible from one party of citizens and giving it to another.”

12.“ Just because you don’t take an interest in politics doesn’t mean politics won’t take an interest in you.”

13.“ No man’s life, liberty, or property is safe while the legislature is in session.”

14.“ Talk is cheap, except when Congress does it.”

15.“ The government is like a baby’s alimentary canal. It has a happy appetite at one end and no responsibility at the other.”

16—“ The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings. The inherent blessing of socialism is the equal sharing of misery.”

17.“ The only difference between a tax man and a taxidermist is that the taxidermist leaves the skin.”

18.“ What this country needs are more unemployed politicians.”

Here are the authors: 1—Mark Twain. 2—Winston Churchill. 3—George Bernard Shaw. 4—James Bovard. 5—Douglas Casey. 6—P.J. O’Rourke. 7—Frederic Bastiat. 8—Ronald Reagan. 9—Will Rogers. 10—P.J. O’Rourke. 11—Voltaire. 12—Pericles. 13—Mark Twain. 14—Who knows? 15—Ronald Reagan. 16—Winston Churchill. 17—Mark Twain. 18—Edward Langley.