6-7-1924: The move to compel the Republican Convention to adopt a moderate declaration against the Ku Klux Klan is gaining support because of the convinued agitation of RB Creager, National Committeeman from Texas, who is devoting his attention to an anti-Klan campaign. The Republican leaders, who influenced Mr Creager to abandon his plans at the meeting of the National Committee in Washington in December, find themselves greatly embarrassed by his renewed activity. They had hoped that this matter could be ignored, and now that it has come to the fore there is no certainty that the party will not finally adopt the plank suggested by Mr. Creager. […] The Klan is thoroughly aroused over the strong movement, which is gaining support daily, and it was announced here tonight that one of their cheifs, WS Bassert of Indianapolis, would be here tomorrow to counteract the Creager fight. […]

“I ask, is the Republican Party going to remain silent, while 2,800,000 Klansmen excite prejudices against more than half of the population of the United States? If it does, the party has lost its virility and is a coward before a class who are so cowardly as to conceal their actions under White Hoods. […] The Democratic Party is certain to adopt an anti-Klan plank. What this party proposes to do, certainly the Republican should not hesitate to do, and do it first.”

Understanding Texas politics of the day is a bit confusing. The agitator against the Klan at the RNC Convention was a Texan delegate, and if you consider that 85% of the DNC were Klansmen (not altogether uncommon for a handful of states, though apparently the Texan delegation stood out as particularly odious) it would make some sense in the same way that the Nork York Republican Party was silent about the Klan whereas the New York Democratic Party — well, the Governor was the regular subject of burning effigies and was the living embodiment of everything the KKK detested — excepting maybe the fact that he wasn’t black–, so what do you think they are going to say? But, in 1924, Miriam Amanda Wallace “Ma” Ferguson was elected governor of Texas, and she considered the Main Issue of the Day Opposition to the Klan — running against an avowed tool of the Klan. (And keep in mind that Texas was a one-party state.) Interestingly enough, James Edward Ferguson, running as if he were going to become governor again in the guise of his wife on the ballott, ran a strongly anti-education campaign, promising to cut funding for Higher Education, and saying such things as “College is just there to avoid work for a while, and you know it.”. I suppose college not yet being a mass experience as of yet, such things were more possible in those days. But it lead those College Students old enough to vote to a dilemma: generally pre-disposed to disfavouring the activities of the Ku Klux Klan, and generally pre-disposed to wanting funding for Higher Education… where do you throw your vote? At any rate, the election of Ferguson seemed to play a role in the defection of William H Lewis, former Assistant Attorney General under the William Howard Taft Administration — which appears to be the last Republican President to give black America a significant token nod (and if ‘significant token’ is an oxymoron, that is American Politics), the highest role in government given to a Black Person up to that time, who saideth:

“There are colored men now living who remember the Ku Klux Klan of another day. It came into being to put the colored voter and citizen out of business. Intimidation, coercion, riots and murder were their weapon, were they not? 50 years ago, the Democratic Party was the Ku Klux party. Today, the Republican Party is the Ku Klux Party. The debate in the Democratic Convention was the most refreshing and wholesome thing that has taken place in American politics in a quarter of a century. Mr. Davis has taken his stand upon that issue, and I propose to stand with him. The Republican candidate for President has said nothing up to now as to whether he stands for the Klan or against it. Is the Republican Party afraid to take stand against the Ku Klux Klan? Is it still the party of Lincoln, of Grant, and of Roosevelt? I see no way of putting down the Ku Klux Klan except through the instrumentality of the Democratic Party. All that has been accomplished in Texas, in Louisiana, in Oklahoma, and Arkansas has been the work of the Democratic Party.”

Not that you can give the Democratic Party too much credit here. The agitators in those states are Democrats as well. The esteemed Democratic candidate, John Davis, would not say anything if not prodded by political pressures and perceived opportunities. The last Democratic President was named Woodrow Wilson, and something about him giving a thumbs up to “Birth of a Nation” doesn’t sit well here, and besides which, the Re-rise of the Klan is pretty well directly attributable to the Super-Patriotic fervor brought about by the start of World War One. But what are you going to do? The Republican ticket was a little slippery here.

8-25: (Said by the man who brought the issue up at the Democratic ticket): “In apologizing for the Klan, General Dawes [the Republican candidate for Vice-President] cited the situation in Herrin, Illinois, where Prohibition was not being enforced by the Constituted Authorities and where the Klan undertook to take the law in its own hands. In upholding the action of the Klan in Herrin, where Mr Dawes said its activities resulted in bloodshed, the Republican Vice Presidential candidate overlooked the fact that the District Attorneys, US Marshals, and Prohibition Agents charged with enforcement had been put in office or kept there by his chief, President Coolidge. […]

The Dawes speech did more than even the most abandoned Klansman at the Democratic Convention undertook to do. They did not seek to defend the UnAmerican principles and sinister purpose of the Klan. They merely opposed mention of the Klan by name in the Democratic Platform on the grounds of political expediency.”

8-30: The President did not take up campaign issues and made no direct reference to the Klan Controvery in what he said. Some Republicans had thought that he might make use of this occasion to answer John W Davis’s challenge to take the Klan out of national political debate. He was silent, but, according to some of his advisers, may redefine his position when he speaks before the Holy Names Socieities next month.

The only indirect reference to such organizations as the Ku Klux Klan, in contrast to fraternal organizations, was toward the end of the speech, when the President said: “The rituals of nearly all fraternal organizations are based upon religion. No true fraternity can rest on any other conception. It is for these reasons that they are supporting of the true aims of society, strong relainces of ordered government, according to law, able advocates of the cause of righteousness and religion and effective promoters of peace and good-will among the nations of the earth.” No. I don’t know what that means either.

Big Chunks of a Letter from the NAACP to Calvin Coolidge:

“I beg leave to call your attention once again that thousands of colored citizens are still looking for a public statement from you specifically disavowing for the Republican Party the support and endorsement of the Ku Klux Klan. To a previous request for such a statement sent to you on May 29 of this year no reply was received. To a telegram sent June 6, Mr. Slemp replied that it came during the closing days of the session of Congress when every moment of your time was occupied and that he hoped to call the message to your attention at an early date. No further reply was received. As we said in a previous letter, the issue involved transcends a mere few votes in the coming election, although […] […]

We now feel still greater warrant in asking for some such statement from you, in view of the fact that both the other principal candidates, John W Lewis of the Democrats and Robert M La Follette for the Third Party, have declared themselves unequivocally and unmistakenly on this issue, both of them naming the Ku Klux Klan so that there could be no flavor of evasion about their utterances.

Today you get President George W Bush side-stepping appearing before the NAACP in favor of the Urban League, with the premise that the NAACP is a hopelessly partisan organization that lost its way somewhere or how. But I must say, historical context of when political voting blocks, and organizations representing such, shift is helpful. A strangely self-patronizing letter from a Howard University Professor — Kelly Miller — explains a few political logistics:

However other classes and groups may regard it, to the negro the Ku Klux Klan is the one dominant issue of the campaign. His interest in public life is moral rather than material. With him human rights transcend property rights. He is perfectly willing to defer to the White Man’s judgement as to the wisest and most feasible scheme of tax, tariff, transportation, banks and business, and the commercial aspect of foreign and domestic policies. The majority of the American people, however composed, will not deliberately destroy the prosperity of the country of which they form a part. This thought ought to always keep our politics sane. But the Ku Klux Klan […]

Today we get various types of hawks proclaiming that no other issue matters other than the “War on Terror”. Any discussion on supposed fiscal recklessness is moot — because we need to club them before they clus us. Think of that premise how you may, and it has its nice internal logic. But I don’t think a Black Man in 1924, or anyone else for that matter, has much to apologize for in voting in terms of who takes the stronger stand or who bothers to even take a token stand against a Domestic Terrorist Unit committed against You personally. And consider the words of the Grand Imperial Wizard

“This Klanvokation held here in the Great Middle West is assembled on the battlefield of the immediate future. Some of the Eastern States are today lost to true Americanism and must be rewon, but the great American population of the Middle West, of the South, and of the Southwest are left to do valiant battle. (editorial note: This is the weird “Blue – State / Red – State divide, isn’t it?)

The future of America and the White Race hang in the balance. The blood which produces human leadership must be protected from inferior blood and YOU are of this Superior blood. You are more — you are leaders in the only movement in the world which exists solely to establish a cvilization that will insure these things. History has proved and is still proving daily that only Nordic and Anglo Saxon peoples have reached a high level of intelligence.

The speech goes on to describe how “We’re the Only Protection Against the Hordes” and how after the final Victory everyone will discover that “We actually love the Catholic and the Negro”, blah blah blah. But there’s something I don’t understand, except in terms that this strain of “Know Nothing” Americanism is inherently Isolationist and thus tends to ignore World Events Abroad. This is not the “Only Movement in the world” which “Exists to establish a Civilization that will insure” “Superior Blood” triumphs over “Inferior Blood.” Surely that movement is existant over in Germany, right?

For what it is worth, the Grand Imperial Wizard came out in favour and against nobody in the Presiential Election in 1924, and that a Klansman in good conscience could vote for either candidate, and that both the Democratic and Republican Party have pro and anti-Klan elements in the Party. Go figure.

As always, on the stands as we speak or being removed to make way for the new issue… as… we … speak.

I think its worthwhile to open up. But, looking through it I, I think it’s okay to stop at the Table of Contents page.

U.S. Military: 8; Elite Law Schools: 0. How did So Many Professors Misunderstand the Law? Peter Berkowitz.

Okay. The Federal Judiciary is conducive to relenting power to the US Military. I think I already went through this sense of dread at the Alito Confirmation of his willingness to acede to Power. I had a snarkier version of this thought, but felt the need to actually look at, and read, the article. It concerns the recent court case over the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy as discriminatory and a basis to remove Military Recruiters from College Campuses. I smirk a bit when I say or write or type, as the case may be, that I hardly think most of the plaintiffs’ real objection to military recruiters is this policy.

Three Years and Counting: Why is the Pentagon Withholding Purple Hearts from Deserving Recipients? Jim Lacey.

Maybe they’re gun-shot, what with John Kerry apparently having a non-deserved Purple Heart and all, and are weary of handing Purple Hearts out, pending individual investigations from “Swift Boat Veterans for Truth”.

Also worth a gander: a review of Jimmy Carter’s new book, featuring a petty and gratuitous sniping at the supposed Smallness of Carter’s Humanitarian work in Africa. And John Podhoretz’s assertion that “V for Vendetta is ‘Atlas Shrugged’ for the Loony Left'”.

The third anniversary of the start of the Iraq war also heralded an interesting, although primarily unreported phenomenon: the death of the anti-war movement. When Portland, Oregon, has the second-most-attended protest in the world, at a modest 10,000 individuals (only 200 attended in New York City on Sunday), it provides solid evidence that the movement is dead.

KEN CALHOUN, Tualatin

Hm. I do not understand this letter. Looking at the graph, the letter might make some sort of sense … maybe in January of 2004, sometime just before Bush promised to take us to the Moon. But then, there might have been more people marching in the streets in the occasional organized Big Marches. As it were, and while I’m aware that the politics of the bulk of the protesters do not match the politics of the general population, at this point in time on the issue of Iraq it matches them closer than they do with this letter writer. Thus, Ken Calhoun is standing with a third of the population, taunting the rest of us.

What to do about Iraq? To invade that country was shameful. To leave it in chaos would be more shameful. Here’s what I suggest:

We must complete steps 1 and 2 during the Bush administration. No other administration should bear the burden of correcting the original mistake.
DAVID FILER, Southeast Portland

And if a snag is hit in between Steps 2 and 3, step 3 starting by necessity with “resulting nonviolence” caused obstensibly by Step 2’s enlarged American troop presence, with democratic drafting techniques. (Huh.) Do we leave after Step 4 “no matter what happens” if what happens is, um, Sectarian Violence? I guess we have some vague responsibility to the Sunnis, who would be pulverized by the Shiites through sheer number. But, what do we care about Genocide here in the United States — or so says that upteenth editorial just across the page about how the US and the World are not acting in Darfur.

“Most of us in this room truly believe that America was better off when it was more about ‘Leave it to Beaver’ than ‘Beavis and Butthead.'” — Republican Presidential Candidate and Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee, playing for the Religious Right Vote.

Pining for one television series over another is par for the course with this crowd. Witness:

“We need a nation closer to the Waltons than the Simpsons” — George Herbert Walker Bush, 1992.

Which spurred the production team at the Simpsons to quickly throw up for the opening credits a respone with Bart saying, “Hey, we’re just like the Waltons. We’re praying for an end to the depression, too.”

Though Huckabee has the advantage of a symmetry between “Beaver” and “Beavis”. Working against him is the fact that the show has not had an original episode since 1997. Huckabee’s next act might as well be railing against that there Heavy Metal Music. Also working against him is that Butthead would respond to Huckabee with “Hee hee hee. He said ‘Beaver.'”

By the way, Mike Huckabee is not going to nominated for the Presidency. A recent Survey USA poll for the state of Arkansas, and name recognition is no problem for Huckabee here, showed Hillary Clinton beating the man. And if Hillary — the Northern Eltitist Liberal — is beating the guy in his Southern Home State, what the hell is the point? So, cross him off your list. And if you have a list, what is wrong with you?

1-13-1924: But this Democratic opportunity demands a leadership capable of seizing it. The opportunity without the man may turn to dust and ashes. Hence the first duty of Democratic managers and well-siwhers of the party is to cast about for a Presidential nominee who would not fritter away the tempting chance. They should start with the assured conviction that the best is none too good, and that the best will be needed. John Stuart Mill, in his book “On Liberty”, quoted from the Koran a maxim which reads: “A ruler who appoints any man to an office when there is in his dominions a man better qualified for it sins against God and against the State.” Translated into terms of American politics, this means that a party will be beaten, and deserved to be beaten, if it puts up with second-class material when it has first-class material at command. To apply this concretely, the folly would be obvious if the Democratic Party were to nominate merely some obscure governor of only local reputation, or a Senator whose chief recommendation is that his record is so colorless as to have given offense to nobody, or one who believes to […]
Eventually the un-attributed “Voice of God” editorial contends that JOHN D DAVIS is the Man of the Hour, which is followed by a laudatory paragraph or two.
It would be a great thing to have a man of his repute and character placed in nomination for the Presidency. Even better than that would it be for his party to gain a leadership at once virile, dignified, and compelling. Mr. Davis would make the broadest kind of appeal to the people. His speeches would go beyond the petty exigencies of the hour and the locality and would cleave to those fundamental truths which persist through all changing political problems. The tone which Mr. Davis would be able to give to a presidential electionis suggested by the letter which he sent to the West Virginia Democrats. It dealt with ideas, not with expediences. It singled out the broad and general principles of equality of right, equality of opportunity, hatred of privilegs, trust in the highest judgement of the American people, (etc blah blah platitudes etc)

What American would not think it exhilerating to have such a man as John W Davis made a candidate for the Presidnecy? Even Republicans would feel that they had an opponent worthy of their steel, in whose hands the honor and welfare of the country would be safe. To place his name before the Democratic Convention would be like raising a standard to which the best of his party would be glad to repair. With such a man, so competent, at the service of the Democratic Party, why should it turn aside to less qualified men and invite defeat?

The punchline to this editorial is the Election Outcome of November:
Calvin COOLIDGE : Electoral Votes: 382; Pop. Vote: (54.1%)
John William DAVIS: Electoral Votes: 136; Pop. Vote: (28.8%)
Robert La FOLLETTE: Electoral Votes: 13 ; Pop. Vote: (16.6%)
To be fair, Davis was decided upon after 103 ballots. What we found out at the National Democratic Convention of 1924 was that there was no National Democratic Party. There was a rural party, who hated New York City, Alcohol, and Immigrants. And there was an urban party, which was promoting the nomination of a Catholic Son of an Immigrant New York City boy who Drank a lot… actually, there was a DLC quality to Alfred Smith — he cozied up to Wall Street — a New York City institution that was part of this urban-rural split — and had a Republican businessman running his campaign when nominated in 1928. It made sense in the era of Calvin Coolidge’s “The man who builds a factory builds a temple; the man who works there worships there.”

So in my US History class, we finished the sort of hazy cookie-cutter lesson on World War One and the Woodrow Wilson Administration. The teacher made the comment that we’re skipping the chapter on the 1920s because that decade was a giant sham. I don’t really know what that means, even in terms of an inflated boom such that punctured would bring a bust of enormous proportions. I read the chapter — the truth is that a student could get away with not reading the textbook, but I read the thing anyways. I don’t remember what it told me about the 1920s, oh so many years later. Flappers? At the very least you can’t call teenagers and young college students of this age any more immature than teenagers and college students of that age — Flag pole sitting? (The difference may be that today college is a more mass-experience and not a project for the elite.)

I know the chapter did not cover much of anything about the 1924 Democratic Convention held in New York City. The lesson of which tells us that back then, the United States government(s) was controlled in part and influenced in part by a Secret Society with members tended to claim to be of Christian pretensions borne out of College Fraternity tics with elaborate psuedo-Pagan rituals which operated a Torture Regime against people of different religious persuasion and skin color than they and meted out serious consequences to anyone who uttered the name of this organization. But enough about Skull and Bones. I have to wonder about the High School History regime which can glide over a decade, to the extent that it covers the decade mentions the fads and follys of the Consumer Culture of the era, and not mention the unpleasant reality of the power and influence, the attitudes influencing our political landscape today, of the Ku Klux Klan.
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6-8: Representatives of considerable number of negro organizations are holding conferences here at the Majestic Hotel, in the hope of getting a plank denouncing the Ku Klux Klan into the Republican platform. They also want the platform to repeat the denunciations of lynching and demands for the enforcement of the 14th and 15th Amendments in the Southern States, which have been customary features of Republican platforms in past years; but this time they want something more outspoken and promises of action to back it up if Republicans are successful. The Klan plank is, of course, new and its sponsors are not confident of getting it adopted, but they are confident that a refusal by the convention will have a considerable effect on the negro vote in doubtful Northern States this Fall. […]

“While Northern negroes have, of course, usually supported the Republican ticket” said Mr Brascher “there is a very active minority which has always leaned toward the Democrats. This year, with the Klan directly attacking our group interests, negro voters will be more and more inclined to support the party that promises to do something for them, and promises it in a manner that carries some conviction. In Indiana the Klan nominated a Republican candidate for Governor and the Democrats came out against the Klan. Naturally, there is much doubt about the attitude of the 80,000 colored voters in Indiana.”

And it goes on to describe other minor defections that have taken place. Our high school textbooks tell us that Black Americans defected from the Republican Party — the Party of Lincoln — to the Democratic Party with FDR’s New Deal. As always, the story is not that simple. Just as it’s not that simple in attaching the KKK as a purely Southern Institute or an organization attached solely to the Democratic Party. It really does boil down to Al Sharpton’s quip that “We were promised 30 Acres and a mule. And we waited. And when we never received the 30 Acres and a mule, we decided to ride the donkey as hard as we could.” Though, that’s too simple as well. The Republican platforms of 1956 and 1960 could justifiably scold the Democrats for tokenism in promising Civil Rights. FDR was careful not to have a photograph taken with a black person — something Langston Hughes had in mind when he wrote this poem, what with the Emerging Democratic Coalition being composed of the Klan – ridden South and Urban Blacks… and for that matter Urban Catholic Immigrants. For what it’s worth, the NAACP went on to urge the Democratic Convention to pass a tough anti-Klan plank in 1924. I wonder if it may be a credit to the Democratic Party that they actually touched this issue, and brought it to the forefront, despite disasterous political consequences… whereas the Republicans?
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6-12: Last evening, some of those highly interested in the outcome of the voting in the Democratic Convention learned that at Cleveland the Republicans had passed what was termed an innocuous plank on the Klan. […] Instantly it was seen that great political advantage might be gained by going to greater lengths and meeting a live issue in a straight-forward manner. As a result, no matter what the outcome may be, there will be introduced in the Democratic Committee on Resolutions an anti-Klan plank that will name the Klan by its acknowledged title, condemn its activities, and seek to bind the Democratic Party to oppose its illegal actions by every means in the power of the Government.
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6-23: Governor Nerf (of Texas) fought for an uninstructed delegation, and when the McAdoo forces, which had the backing of the Ku Klux Klan organization, passed an iron clad McAdoo instruction, he promptly announced that he could not conscientously vote for Mr. McAdoo. […] Incidentally, there are several members of the Texas delegation who are not members of the Klan. The article than goes on to describe how the Klan in Texas is on the decline. The next article states that 85% of Texas delegates are Klans-men, and as you shall see contradicts that assertion about the Klan’s decline. This seems to be a recurring theme, and you can see it in my post about Alfred Smith’s disasterous foray into the South.
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6-27: Apparently, the Southern Democracy is facing one of its greatest tests in the issue of the Ku Klux Klan. It is only necessary to talk with a Southern delegate, one who is not a member of the Klan, to realize just how serious the menance of the hooded knights has grown to be. The situation is just as serious in Indiana, Ohio, Michigan, and other Western States, where the Klan has made great progress and where it is admitted to wield great influence if not almost actual political control. […] Strange as it may seem there are in this convention Southerners who go so far as to express doubt as to whether the Democratcs can carry Texas, Oklahoma, and Georgia — three of the star states of Klan-dom — in the event that the Democratic platform arraigns the Klan by name and in the vigorous language urged by Senator Underwood and other leaders of the anti-Klan forces. They hope that even with this handicap those states would stay in line, but as a Texan non-member of the Klan who repudiates everything the Klan stands for put it “The Republicans would at least poll the biggest vote in history in the Klan-ridden South.”
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It is admitted that this plank may fail of passage. It is admitted that a fight in the Platform committee over it is inevitable. It is admitted further that such a plank, if carried on the floor from the committee room, may well cause a turmoil of great consequence. Nevertheless, the men who are now busy drafting such a plank are convinced that the way to meet the Klan issue is to meet it squarely and settle it once and for all. Such premonitions of “once and for all” never turn out that way.

[Kansas Advisor for Platform Committee:] “Well, I am very doubtful about the advisability of making a campaign issue of the Klan, or of anything religious, Klan, Caholtic, anti-Catholic, anti-Masonic, or anything of that sort. There are plenty of real national issues. The Klan is a local issue, to an extent at least, and I think the Republicans would like nothing better than for us to make an issue of it.” On the other hand, one man with the Texas delegation said flatly, “Texas is a Klan State, and we are in the saddle. If there is going to be a Klan plank it has to got be one without teeth in it.”
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9-23: Mr. McAdoo did not refer to the Ku Klux Klan by name, but he accused his opponents of attempting to raise false race and religious issues to obscure the real issue, which he said was “the restoration of the administration of national affairs to the people from the control of a sinister, unscrupulous, invisible government which has its seat in the citadel of privilege and finance in New York City.”
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7-4: 20,000 members of the Ku Klux Klan and their relatives celebrated Independence Day here with demonstrations against Governor Smith and his candidacy for the Democratic nomination for President. The event which drew men, women, and children of the hooded order from all New Jersy and Delaware, and from Eastern Pennsylvania had been announced as a Tri-State Klorero, the purpose of which was to demonstrate the patriotism of the Klansmen and their devotion to the cause of good government. Before the day’s program had proceeded an hour, scores of men and women and many children encouraged by their elders had pounded to a battered pulp an effigy of Governor Smith, which the Kloreans were invited to attack at three baseballs for a nickel. Later in the morning, there was a near riot of 1,000 Klansmen [2 men… helicopter fell… menaced with with possibility of physical attack… accused of being Smith Men… yadda yadda yadda…]

Aside from the bitter demonstrations against the New York Governor, the party was largely a picnic, which held no features of unusal importance. There were speeches, Klan weddings and baptisms, and a parade through the streets of Long Branch of 4,000 hooded men and women, who were escorted through the city by two motorcycled policemen. […]

The morning’s program included a baseball game between the New Jersey and the Pennsylvania Klan teams, a wedding on the upper terrace of the sunken garden, and the Christening of 16 children. The bride and groodm were hooded, as were members of their wedding group, and the players of the purple-caped Red Bank Klan Band.
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I could mention William Jenning Bryan’s impassioned speech to not name the Ku Klux Klan by name. His reasoning was that it gives the Klan too much power. And that the Party should not alienate the good folks, misguided that they may be, who joined the Klan. What was that quote from Howard Dean that the Democrats oughta be the party of the Confederate Flag stickers on pick-up trucks? Okay, I know… there’s no racist implications there. It’s about Southern Heritage. Though, when you delve further into the matter, you never get any further than an explanation that “The South Rules!” Hm.

A sign I saw when I wandered past the big protest (and go to Portland Indymedia for some images of the event) was “Impeach Cheney First!” I don’t really believe in “Impeachment”, simply because you’re removing a president who’ll be stumbling through two years, and two years isn’t too much time to wade through. I note that “They may Impeach Him” has become a Republican rallying cry to spur the base for the midterm elections, nevermind the Democratic Party’s rather… minimalistic… Opposition strategy. But in Impeachment parlor, Cheney would go with Bush. The role of a vice-president has obviously grown from the days of old Throttlebottom.

So, is the question that is up in the 2006 midterms whether our next President is Dennis Hastert or Nancy Pelosi? (Or is there a President Ford in the waiting that can be plucked in to fill Cheney’s role?) I don’t get it.

I heard the final ten songs of the local Classic Rawk station’s “Top 929 Classic Rock Song” list. I did not hear any of the other 919 songs on the list; I just happened to tune into the station at that time. The station in Yakima, 94.5, used to do something to the effect (play every song in their database… or play the top 945 Songs… or go through the top 945 albums… or something), but the last time I was in the Yakima Valley, it was clear that Clear Channel had altered the format for the station somewhat such that it plays this category of “Hard Rawk” — your “Nu Metal” that creeped into vogue in the late 90s and lingers around… so one tired format is a different tired format and the hackneyed schemes of Classic Rock radio no longer apply.

Anyway, it’s a countdown to Led Zeppelin’s “Stairway to Heaven”, and that’s just sort of understood. Nonetheless, the dj (thankfully not the one with the nome de plume “Marty Party”) went to a commercial break with “And after this, we’ll play the Top 3 songs… And I think you’ll be suprised.”

The surprise was that the #3 song was Black Sabbath’s “Paranoid”. The dj makes the comment “That threw us all for a loop.” The con game of the dj was that the logical “surprise” he was trying to instill in the audience is that #1 is something besides “Stairway to Heaven”. I think its contractually obligated that the dj at KGON makes that comment “I think you’ll be surprised” as he enters the commercial break before the final 3 play, because I swear I’ve heard that before. Whether “Paranoid” at #3 is a huge surprise or not, I do not really know. I’m a bit of an Ozzie fan, so it works for me, to the degree that I care.
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Don’t worry. I have a blog entry about the 1924 Presidential Election coming up. I know that’s the sort of thing that has people reading the blog. (Ugh.)