Month: October 2024

Since I’m flying to Oklahoma tomorrow, I’m letting Will Rogers take over my column. After all, he knows a lot more about politics, campaigns, and elections than I will ever learn.

“Come pretty near having two holidays of equal importance in the same week: Halloween and Election, and of the two, Election provides the most fun. On Halloween they put pumpkins on their heads, and on Election they don’t have to.” DT #1334, Nov. 2, 1930

“If all the charges that’s been made in regard to both the Candidates were layed end to end it would take ’em over two hours to pass a given point.” Life magazine, Oct. 19, 1928

“In this country people don’t vote for; they vote against.” Radio, June 9, 1935

“The Literary Digest is taking a poll to see how many people there are in the United States who are interested in politics that can write their name. Up to now there has been about a third more Republicans that can write than Democrats. Course, when election day comes and all you have to do is make your mark, why I think the Democratic total will pick up. Republicans have to learn to write on account of signing checks, but Democrats never have to be bothered with that.” DT #695, Oct. 18, 1928

“Of all the ‘dumb’ issues that candidates bring up to try and influence people how to vote, I think ‘prosperity’ takes the cake. How a speaker can convince a man that he is prosperous when he is broke or that he is not prosperous when he is doing well is beyond me.” DT #704, Oct. 29, 1928

“Every Guy just looks in his pockets and then votes.” WA #196, Sept. 12, 1926

        “There should be a moratorium called on candidates’ speeches. They have both called each other everything in the world they can think of. From now on they are just talking themselves out of votes.  DT #1948, Nov. 1, 1932

       “You can’t beat an administration by attacking it. You have to show some plan on improving it.” WA #101, Nov. 16, 1924

“This President business is a pretty thankless job. Washington or Lincoln either one didn’t get a statue till everybody was sure they was dead.” DT #1951, Nov. 4, 1932

“There is only one redeeming thing about this whole election. It will be over at sundown, and let everybody pray that it’s not a tie.” DT #1953, Nov. 7, 1932

You all know Bob Woodward, the journalist who became famous for uncovering the “Watergate” scandal that led to the resignation of President Nixon.

Do you remember reading Woodward’s column in July 2023 in the Washington Post about the mental decline of President Biden? At a fundraising event Biden “never completed a sentence. He told the same story three times in exactly the same way and it meandered… He was just rambling and talking as to what came into his head.” Woodward included several other similar quotes by people close to Biden.

How did President Biden survive such an embarrassing column and go through the Democratic primaries with no prominent opponents? Why didn’t VP Harris jump into the race? And Governor Newsom, and even Gov. Walz?

Well, the reason is that Bob Woodward, the hotshot journalist, sat on this “Breaking News.” He never wrote about it in the newspaper. He kept it secret for 16 months so he could include it in a book he just released.

Thanks to Woodward’s lack of journalistic ethics, Joe Biden is still President. VP Harris is struggling in her three months as a candidate because she had no challenges to sharpen her politicking skills. It would be like an NFL team being selected to play in the Super Bowl after playing no games, NONE, during the season. In that scenario, even the Cleveland Browns could beat them 70-0.

Regardless, the Harris-Trump race is a dead heat, 50-50. Most political commentators think Pennsylvania is the key to victory. Candidate Harris discovered that natural gas is a major source of wealth to Pennsylvanians. (PA along with Ohio and West Virginia accounts for more than a third of this country’s natural gas supply.) So, she altered her total ban on hydraulic fracturing. She now says fracking is fine in Pennsylvania because a survey showed that more than 75% of voters there believe natural-gas drilling is important to the economy and do not want to pay an extra $100 a month for gas and electricity. For voters in the other 49 states, she wants you to know she is still against fracking.

Speaking of voters, the Biden Justice Department is forcing Virginia to allow non-citizens to vote. Is that in the Constitution? Is it a threat to democracy?

Trump and Harris are calling each other hateful names. You’ve heard them over and over so I don’t need to repeat them all. “Crazy” and “misguided” are two of the milder insults. One candidate was president for 4 years so we know his policies pretty well. The other candidate is President Biden’s VP and she says she agrees with him on all important decisions made since January 2021. The clear differences make you wonder how any legitimate voter could be undecided.

The World Series started and the LA Dodgers won the first two games over the NY Yankees. If it goes seven games, it will conflict with plenty of political speeches. As Will Rogers wrote in 1928, “My idea of the height of conceit would be a political speaker that would go on the air when that World Series is on.”

Historic quotes by Will Rogers:

     “There should be a moratorium called on candidates’ speeches. They have both called each other everything in the world they can think of. From now on they are just talking themselves out of votes. (They are) saying things that if they were in their right minds they wouldn’t think of saying.” DT #1948, Nov. 1, 1932

    “When you straddle a thing it takes a long time to explain it.” Convention Articles, June 29, 1924

Note: I’ll be in Claremore, Oklahoma next weekend for Will Rogers Days, celebrating his birthday, #145. Will was born on Nov. 4, 1879.

Candidate Kamala Harris was interviewed Wednesday by Bret Baier on Fox News. Here is a link to the interview: https://www.foxnews.com/video/6363303582112. I encourage you to watch it.

In the interview, she responded to questions about immigration, trans-gender surgery, the economy, and inflation.

Do you wish she had given short, clear, honest answers? Well, you’re in luck! Here are a few of the questions Mr. Baier asked (paraphrased and shortened), and answers VP Harris might have said.

Bret Baier: How many illegal immigrants have you allowed into the country since January 2021?

VP Kamala Harris: About 10 million.

BB: Do you regret canceling Trump’s executive orders that would have required most of these 10 million to stay in Mexico until approved for asylum?

KH: No, we wanted them all here. The more the merrier. And the very first bill we submitted to Congress would have given immediate citizenship to almost all of the aliens already here.

BB: Do you regret that Laken Reilly and others were killed by immigrants that your administration released, and do you owe their families an apology?

KH: Of course, I feel sad for those families. But when you allow millions of immigrants into the country without proper vetting, you’re bound to get a few murderers, gang members and thieves.

BB: Why do the Border Patrol Agents support Trump instead of you?

KH: Probably because I want them to happily welcome immigrants as they cross the border. I insist they take good care of them, give them water, food that matches their culture, and put them on a bus or airplane to get them to a city or town of their choice.

BB: Do you still support taxpayer funded trans-gender surgery for illegal immigrant men in prison who want to become women?

KH: Yes.

BB: Why do more people support Trump on the economy than you?

KH: Well, when you honestly look at the economy under Trump before Covid, and compare it to the economy after Joe and I took office, who can blame them? We added trillions in Federal debt and accumulated 20% inflation, mainly with two bills that passed thanks to my tie-breaking votes in the Senate.

BB: Your campaign theme is ‘Turn the page.’ You’ve been VP since January 2021. What are you ‘turning the page’ from?

KH: I’ve said repeatedly that there were no actions that Biden took that I would change. I’m not Joe Biden. I’m not a Washington politician. My presidency will be based on my values. And my values are rooted in San Francisco, California.

BB: Almost 80% of Americans say the country is ‘on the wrong track.’ You’ve been in office three and a half years.

KH: A long time ago I think Will Rogers said that even if you’re on the right track, if you’re just sitting still, you’ll get run over. Well, we are NOT sitting still.

BB: You spent 90 minutes with Trump on the debate stage. You concluded that Trump is mentally unstable. You have been with President Biden at least once a week. When did you first notice that President Biden’s mental faculties appeared diminished?

KH: About two years ago.

BB: (Note: he didn’t ask this but could have) We invited you on Fox News so you could elaborate on your policies, your plans, your goals for the country. Instead, you mentioned Donald Trump 21 times and said very little about yourself.

KH: Well, since your viewers know very little about Donald Trump, I felt compelled to inform them using the majority of the 20 minutes I could spare for this interview.  On my website, KamalaHarris.com, I have summarized my policies, plans and goals clearly and precisely in a document that is only 80 pages of fine print. I hope your 8 million viewers will devote at least 6 or 7 hours, uninterrupted, to read and understand what I was determined to avoid saying tonight.

Historic quote by Will Rogers:

“Every gag I tell must be based on truth. No matter how much I may exaggerate it, it must have a certain amount of truth.” WA #65, March 9, 1924

Columbus: Two hurricanes hit Florida in two weeks. Those of us with no direct experience with a hurricane usually think of it as extremely forceful winds. The worst effects of Hurricane Helene, in destruction and loss of over 200 lives, were the result of 20 to 30 inches of rain 500 miles from the coast. And Milton caused tornadoes that killed at least 17 in Florida.

Millions of victims in Florida and other Southeast states are suffering without electricity, clean water, infrastructure, and other basic necessities.

You can decide whether global warming has made hurricanes worse. A group of scientists concluded that both hurricanes in the Gulf of Mexico were 30% worse because the global temperature has risen 2.3 degrees Fahrenheit since the Year 1750. They seem to suggest we return to the Pre-Industrial Age, before we had any machinery or other technology powered by fossil fuels, including electricity. Back then the world population was less than 800 million, about one-tenth the population today.

Here are a couple of questions to ponder. Did increasing the population to 8 Billion cause global warming? Did industrialization, powered mainly by coal, oil and natural gas, result in rapid population growth? If the rest of the world followed our lead in reducing “global warming emissions” would that cool the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic Ocean, and reduce our destructive hurricanes?

I read another science article that says we should expect to cool off with another “Ice Age.” But we’ll have to hang around for 100,000 years to see it.

Tomorrow, we celebrate Columbus Day, which used to be on October 12. Based on the quote below, Will Rogers (one-quarter Cherokee) would applaud the decision to also make it Indigenous Peoples’ Day.

Historic quote by Will Rogers:

      “Christopher (Columbus) was just a victim of not knowing what was going to happen to him next. Somebody would have found America though, even if he hadn’t, for you couldn’t hardly get around without running into it. Why they didn’t find it sooner is more than I will ever know. Being an Indian, I don’t mind telling you personally I am sorry he ever found it. The discovery has been of no material benefit to us, outside of losing all the land. And I am proud to say that I have never yet seen a Statue in Oklahoma to him. He wasn’t so much of a discoverer as he was just restless and couldn’t stay in one place.” WA #190, Aug. 1, 1926

The loss of lives and property from Hurricane Helene keep adding up. This hurricane may end up more horrendous than Katrina in 2005.

An outstanding farmer I know in Hickory, North Carolina, immediately rounded up a few friends and began using their drones to airlift supplies, up to 5 miles, to families in the mountains who were cut off. All they needed was an address. Others are bringing them trailer loads of equipment, water, food, generators and other necessary items, often from hundreds of miles away. Of course, charities such as Red Cross, Samaritan’s Purse, UMCOR, and others quickly geared up to help in all the states hit by flooding. The Federal government is providing help through FEMA and our military.

The union representing Longshoremen along the Atlantic and Gulf Coasts agreed to a temporary 3-month delay in their strike. They will get a big raise in hourly wages to help offset the high inflation of recent years. But they are determined to stop automation from taking their jobs on the docks. Our ports are already far behind others around the world in efficiency, so automation and other technology advancements are inevitable.

Can you imagine if our farmers had resisted new technology and automation for the last 50 years? Yes, there would be 3 or 4 times as many people working on farms, earning a wage. But our food would more than double in cost. If fact, more of our food would be grown in other countries by farmers using the latest technology. Interestingly, that would provide more work for Longshoremen handling imports. However, our exports of corn, soybeans, wheat, cotton, almonds, meat and most other agriculture products would dwindle because other countries would out compete us.

A few readers have replied than I have included more negative comments about Kamala Harris than about Donald Trump. To balance the discussion, I am hereby including quotes by Democrats trashing Trump.

Just like you, I’ve seen plenty on social media and television. Here are a few: “Donny Boy has his own special language: demented word salad gibberish.”  “It’s almost impossible to believe he actually exists.” “Trump needs to be extinguished.” “Corrupt and corrupting orange clown.” “Trump is an existential threat to democracy.” “Trump peddles in anti-Semitic stereotypes and fuels Islamophobia.” “What a f**king a**hole the guy is.”

Historic quotes by Will Rogers:

       “Some people spend a lifetime juggling with words, with not an idea in a carload.” DT #2061, March 13, 1933

       “No man is great if he thinks he is.” DT #810, March 1, 1929

      “This country is a thousand times bigger than any two men in it, or any two parties in it. These big politicians are so serious about themselves and their parties. This country has gotten where it is in spite of politics, not by the aid of it. That we have carried as much political bunk as we have and still survived shows we are a super nation.”  DT #1948, Nov. 1, 1932

Note: I switched parties on this quote because Republicans were in charge in 1932, and Democrats are today. “[Republicans] are attacking and the [Democrats] are defending. All the [Republicans] have to do is promise ‘what they would do if they got in.’ But the [Democrats] have to promise ‘what they would do’ and then explain why they haven’t already done it.” DT #1917, Sept. 26, 1932