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A cento composed of quotations taken from the current White House Press Secretary’s media addresses

Sam, we have been through all that.

It’s clear there is nothing more to say.

I am not going to add anything.

You played a semantic game yesterday,

I am not playing that game today.

That has been asked and answered.

The same questions were asked yesterday.

The answer is the same answer.

We don’t have anything to talk about.

Obviously I don’t have all the information.

We have passed along the questions.

We have said they would take them

under advisement. We shall never cut

corners in the interest of public curiosity.

It would be irresponsible to perpetuate

allegations that may prove to be unfounded.

I really wish I could comment on that.

Let me share the important reason

behind our policy of deferring comment:

Frankly, some information we receive

is unreliable. The timeframe is driven

by facts and they are not all in yet.

We have made it clear we have nothing

to say on any of those subjects today.

The president has answered all questions.

Ravi Shankar is a professor, editor, translator and the author/editor of more than a dozen books, including most recently in Australia, The Many Uses of Mint: New and Selected Poems 1997–2017 (Recent Works Press).