Category: Uncategorized

# 354, February 7, 2005

COLUMBUS: The New England Patriots won the Super Bowl again last night. If Coach Belichick gets a couple more of those championships they’ll have to rename the Lombardi Trophy after him. He is the Houdini of the NFL. He takes the players nobody else wants and teaches them how to beat better teams. He clipped the Eagles wings, tied them down, and they didn’t even realize they had been hypnotized till after the final whistle. The other coaches, not just Andy Reed, all say, “Yes, the Patriots won. But we’re better.” It’ll take till next season for ’em to figure out his magic tricks, if then.

There was one hero for Philadelphia. Terrell Owens defied medical science by catching nine passes on one good leg and a second one that should’ve been in a plaster cast and elevated.

President Bush needs to find the doctor that got Owens healed in 6 weeks when it usually takes 15. If he can do it with one football player, imagine what miracles he could perform if he was in charge of all our folks on Medicare and Workers Compensation. Patients wouldn’t have to send to Canada for drugs ’cause they would use so few of them. Injured workers would get back on the job so quick output would go up, companies would make more dough and pay more taxes and we wouldn’t have to raise the Social Security age to 75 to balance the budget.

The Super Bowl cleaned up its halftime show and commercials, so the guys wanting to see a little more skin are gonna have to subscribe to cable. Tonight ABC News announced they were surprised that the same cable companies that are making billions from charging extra to air sex shows are giving millions to support Congressmen running on moral values. They should not be surprised. Persuading Congress to prohibit sex on free TV is good for business, just like a different kind of Prohibition 80 years ago. (see last quote) So look for Congress to vote for less free sex on television, and more in the Capitol.

The Iraqis last Sunday taught us a few things about running elections. Ban cars, make everyone walk to the polls and threaten to shoot ’em. Can you imagine the howl if every voter was required to dip a finger in blue ink. Then bar exit polling and make us wait a few days before the ballots are counted and results posted. Say, maybe it’s worth a try.

President Bush gave the State of the Union speech, and left town before the Democrats could respond. He went out campaigning for his Social Security reform plan. When he found out no one understands the economics of how it will go broke in forty or fifty years from spending more than it takes in, he decided it was safe to return to Washington and present his Budget. It calls for spending $2.5 Trillion while collecting $2.1 Trillion. Even with all that spending some folks are getting cut short. The big farmers will have to economize and get by on a $250,000 subsidy. Price of some foods may go up to make up the difference. Cities may have to pay for their own parks, and states pay to educate their students.

Tomorrow night I’m going to see Mark Twain here in Columbus. He ought to have something humorous to say about old age pensions, deficits and sex.

Former heavyweight boxer Max Schmeling died last week at 99 in Germany. (see first quote below) He was the world champion so long ago, 1930-32, I forgot he was still living.

Historic quote from Will Rogers:

“This fellow Schmeling deserves a lot of credit. He has from the start here conducted himself both in and out of the ring in a mighty commendable way that has brought nothing but credit on his country.” DT # 2137, June 9, 1933

“The budget is a mythical bean bag. Congress votes mythical beans into it, and then tries to reach in and pull real beans out.” DT #2047, February 24, 1933.

“I tell you turning your land into a golf course is the salvation of the farmer. That’s the only thing to do with land now, is just to play golf on it. Sell your land and caddy.” DT # 593, June 20, 1928

“Pres. Harding canvassed Denver on ‘The enforcement of the [Prohibition] law.’ The bootleggers all agreed with him that the stricter the law is enforced the better it will make prices. Why, in some places it was getting terrible; the prices had dropped to almost what they were before the law went in. If there is one thing that will starve out bootlegging it is cheap prices.” WA # 31, July 15, 1923

# 353, January 28, 2005

Nebraska City, Neb.: This town on the banks of the Missouri is one you may not be familiar with, but I guarantee you know about a holiday that was started here in 1872. Arbor Day was proposed by J. Sterling Morton, who ranks with Johnny Appleseed in his devotion to planting trees. He said, “Other holidays repose upon the past; Arbor Day proposes for the future.” And he felt “each generation ought to bequeath to posterity as many forests and orchards as we have exhausted and consumed.” Who can argue with that? Teddy Roosevelt proclaimed, “To exist as a nation, to prosper as a state, and to live as a people, we must have trees. See, he was smart enough to know if you want to carry a big stick you need to plant a tree first.

Mr. Morton served a term as Secretary of Agriculture under Grover Cleveland and he believed not just in planting trees but in nurturing them so he and future generations could eat their fruit, sit in their shade, build with their lumber, and heat homes with their waste.

I’m here for a meeting in the Lied Lodge, a wonderful convention center built almost entirely of timber and stone, and situated across the valley from Mr. Morton’s magnificently preserved home. Everywhere in this fine facility you are surrounded by laudatory quotes honoring trees, and by hospitality fit for a king. This entire Lodge is heated by burning wood chips and sawdust, and they tell me in summer it is cooled in the same way.

This week, Nebraska is mourning the passing of one of her own, Johnny Carson. He was born across the river in Iowa, but grew up in Norfolk, northwest of Omaha, and folks there are still proud to claim him. I can’t add much to the stories you’ve heard from so many of his friends and folks who got a boost from appearing on the Tonight Show.

His thirty years of shows gave us a nightly dose of laughter, and we’re still laughing. If you need a mental boost, to turn a frown to a smile or an outright laugh, often all that’s needed is a quick recall of a favorite Johnny Carson incident. Here are three: his comment to the well-endowed Dolly Parton, the night George Gobel followed Dean Martin and Bob Hope, and the longest laugh in television history when Ed Ames didn’t aim quite high enough when demonstrating his skill throwing a tomahawk.

Omaha is getting spruced up for a visit from the President next week. After delivering his State of the Union speech, he says he will go to five states, including this one. That seems backwards to me; if he wants to give Congress the lowdown on the states of the Union, he ought to go see them first, then report.

The Omaha World-Herald figures Mr. Bush is coming to discuss his plan to privatize part of Social Security and persuade Senator Ben Nelson to vote for it. But I got an idea, and don’t be surprised if our President hasn’t thought of it first: he is really coming to Omaha to see Warren Buffett.

See, if he can get Warren to take over running these private accounts, and do for the country what he’s done over the past forty years for his Berkshire Hathaway investors, why this so-called privatization plan would pass in a minute. The AARP could do their next survey on a postcard with one question: Would you prefer getting the current return rate on your Social Security investment, or would you opt for the rates Warren Buffett has been getting?

Historic quotes from Will Rogers:

“It’s just as Mr. Brisbane and I have been constantly telling you: Don’t gamble; take all your savings and buy some good stock, and hold it till it goes up, then sell it. If it don’t go up, don’t buy it.” DT #1019, Oct. 31, 1929

“OMAHA, Neb.: Left Chicago last night at 10 o’clock in a snowstorm and flew to Omaha. These mail (pilots) can get through weather that most people couldn’t find their way from the house to the garage with a well-lighted course. Good planes and good pilots!
The farmers out here threaten to keep Norris as Senator in Washington till they get relief. If I was you, Mr. Coolidge, I would take care of the farmers at once.” DT #489, Feb. 20, 1928

“OMAHA, Neb.: Just been prowling around up in this country with the farmers. They have about given up hope of getting farm relief and have decided to fertilize instead.” DT #494, Feb. 26, 1928

# 352, January 20, 2005

TOLEDO, Ohio:  It’s inauguration day in Washington. Four years ago today I was in Iowa to speak to a Cattlemen’s banquet, and those folks’ favorite line from his 2001 speech was, “The steaks for America are never small.” That’s what they heard him say, and I didn’t have the heart to tell ’em what he really said was ‘stakes’.

Today I’m speaking to a different breed of farmers, at the Ohio Fruit and Vegetable Growers Congress. I listened rather closely to see if the President would say anything these apple polishers and sweet corn pickers might find amusing, perhaps he would lay out a plan to “squash the terrorists”. But, no, he let me down, and I’ve got to come up with my own jokes.

Once again he thrilled the old rancher’s when he said he wanted to “give every American a steak (stake) in the future”.

When he proclaimed, “no one is fit to be a master, and no one deserves to be a slave,” the Democrats applauded. They don’t want to be a slave to the Republicans, and they claim he isn’t fit to be a master.

President Bush laid out a promise of liberty and freedom throughout the world. And he appeared to guarantee our help to anyone that wants it. He said “freedom is the permanent hope of mankind, the hunger in dark places.” Well, I guarantee you these farmers will help erase the hunger if he can get Mr. Edison to supply the light.

Enough of this foolishness. If you haven’t read the full script of the speech go find a copy. For Lord’s sake, don’t just listen to what the so-called analysts or comedians say about it.

Historic quotes from Will Rogers: (on Inaugurations…, and freedom)

“(President Franklin Roosevelt) is a fast worker. He was inaugurated at noon in Washington, and they started the inaugural parade down Pennsylvania Avenue, and before it got half way down there, he’d closed every bank in the United States.

Now a Republican woulda never thought of a thing like that. No, no, he’d of let the depositors close it. And mind you , Mr. Roosevelt was just two days ahead of the depositors himself.” Radio broadcast, April 30, 1933

“Well, all of the papers have been full of the (Calvin Coolidge) inauguration, commenting on the simplicity of it, some of them for and others against…. I don’t think you can stir up a whole lot of excitement and get 110,000,000 people het up over a man getting up out of his seat, and sitting down in the same seat again. If it was a new man it would have been different…. But here is a guy who just raises up and bows and sits down, and the city of Washington feels hurt that the entire mortgage-bearing people of the United States were not there to see it.” WA #117, March 8, 1925

“I am in favor of giving the Philippines their freedom and then us go under their protectorate. That’s the only chance I see of us maybe getting an improvement in the government.” DT #1700, Jan. 4, 1932

“The Philippines are voting on whether they want freedom or not. They were in favor of it till they sent a commission over here and saw what it was. Now they are in doubt.” DT #2416, May 1, 1934

# 351, January 15, 2005

CINCINNATI: Martin Luther King Day is Monday, and Ohio, like the rest of the country, is ready to honor his memory. He preached peace and understanding, and if we could have it for even one day a year it would be a miracle.

The Ohio River here is high, but there’s other towns and rivers where the flooding is a whole lot worse. California is ready for sunshine for a change. Our western mountains need all the snow they can get but folks would appreciate a few days break in the weather for skiing.

We sure haven’t forgotten the tsunami victims. That disaster kinda puts in perspective a mudslide or avalanche or rising water.

I’m in Cincinnati with about 700 progressive farmers who are learning all they can about raising crops without plowing the land. These no-till farmers are reducing erosion of our topsoil, and at the same time taking carbon out of the air and storing it in the ground. That’s supposed to help reduce global warming. But really, it don’t matter to these farmers whether you think the Earth is getting warmer or colder, they know that banking carbon in their soil as organic matter is good for the land and good for growing better crops.

One of the best farmers in Chile, Carlos Crovetto, left in the middle of wheat harvest to speak to this group about how he turned poor ground into an excellent farm when he quit plowing. Jim Kinsella, from Illinois, hasn’t plowed in over twenty years and don’t see any reason to start now. Barry Fisher and Dan DeSutter of Indiana showed how ryegrass as a winter cover crop can add extra benefits to the soil. Steve Powles flew halfway around the world, from Perth, Australia, to show how rotating herbicides is important for farmers.

We’re meeting at the historic Netherland hotel. It was taken over by Hilton, and I figure old Conrad Hilton himself would be proud of this edifice. It has had some notable visitors. Winston Churchill stayed here, so did Eleanor Roosevelt, Bing Crosby, even Elvis.

Historic quote from Will Rogers: (on plowing)

“You know, we’re always talking about pioneers and what great folks the old pioneers were. Well, I think if we just stopped and looked at history in the face, the pioneer wasn’t a thing in the world but a guy that wanted something for nothing.
He was a guy that wanted to live off of everything that nature had done.
He wanted to cut a tree down that didn’t cost him anything, but he never did plant one.
He wanted to plow up the land that should have been left to grass. We’re just now learning that we can rob from nature the same way as we can rob from an individual.
All he had was an ax, and a plow, and a gun, and he just went out and lived off nature. But really, he thought it was nature he was living off of, but it was really future generations that he was living off of.” Radio broadcast, April 14, 1935

# 350, January 6, 2005

RIDGETOWN, Ontario:  All I know is what I read in the newspaper, and Wednesday morning the National Post was devoted pert near exclusively to the Canadian Junior Hockey team. They beat Russia 6-1 to earn the Gold medal in the World Championship. Must have been 8 or 9 pages on it. They held this two-week tournament in the famous American sports metropolis of Grand Forks, North Dakota, and in the whole Western Hemisphere, I rather doubt that anyone outside of North Dakota and Canada hardly knew they were playing.

But up here hockey rules, and with no “senior” hockey thanks to the NHL lockout, these folks flock to wherever there’s ice with a goal at each end. It was great competition, and if the USA team had done better than fourth, it would have attracted more American fans, perhaps from as far away as western Minnesota.

A few hundred miles to the southeast on the same night, Southern Cal rocked the Oklahoma Sooners 55-19 in the college football championship. I got to see it on television piped in from Detroit. The National Post never even had room for the score. Best Trojan surprise attack since Helen hid with her soldiers in a wooden horse. But it wasn’t really a surprise, except for the lopsided score.

I’m up here on the north shore of Lake Erie, speaking at Ridgetown College. The school’s been here since 1922, educating Ontario’s best farmers. You might think we would be in an auditorium, but no, we’re in a livestock arena. It’s a nice arena, concrete floor, with permanent bleachers on each side, and at one end hanging up near the rafters is a big photo of Queen Elizabeth. It’s a younger Queen Elizabeth, and I am guessing that maybe thirty or forty years ago it was a gift to the College President for his office. It is an attractive picture, but after many years he grew weary of having the Queen looking over his shoulder,… along with alumni, parents and politicians…, and decided to look around for an alternative site to hang a queen.

Now I ain’t complaining. These wonderful farmers are gathered for their yearly update on all that’s new and important in the agricultural line, and I told them it was the first time I had presented in front of a photo of royalty. Everyone agreed it was a considerable step up from a picture of President Bush.

In closing today, I want it fully understood that I am receiving no money for airing my political views. Not that I couldn’t use $240,000, which seems to be the going rate. But neither Bush nor Kerry could ever figure out if I was for him or agin him. To stave off poverty till the next election, I may be obliged to start my own educational support campaign, called “No columnist left behind”. Somewhat fortunately for us columnists, Dave Barry is on a well-deserved sabbatical leave to rest up, as he states it, from the rigors of writing a page and a half a week. Dave is such an icon for columnists that Americans will immediately see the need to offer support, guidance and perhaps remedial psychological aid to writers struggling to meet their page and a half weekly quota, not to mention the pressure of, once again, trying to pass their  fourth grade profeciency exam.

Historic quote by Will Rogers: (on Annexing Canada)

“Canada is principally an Agricultural country and we raise more now than the farmers down home can sell for enough to put in the next year’s crop. About the only thing I can think of we could use it for would be a skating rink in the winter and we got such a poor class of Skaters that we couldn’t hardly afford to maintain it just for that. Unless we could trade in Wisconsin on it some way I can’t see any reason for annexing it. So I have advised against it. I think my decision will suit President Coolidge for he has just about all he can handle down there now without annexing 8 million more farmers. What we need is some good country to annex us.” WA #201, Oct. 17, 1926

# 349, December 31, 2004

COLUMBUS: That earthquake and tsunami kinda knocked the “Happy” right out of “Happy New Year.”

If that 9.0 earthquake had struck on dry land, say in California or Japan or China, the world would be mourning the deaths of maybe a million people and wondering how nature could split the ground apart for hundreds of miles. Half of California could be a few feet under the Pacific Ocean instead of just recovering from a foot of rain.

But no, the earth shifted under the Indian Ocean, and didn’t hurt anybody directly. But the tsunami that followed, on a beautiful sunny morning after Christmas, was the worst in history. And it happened where no one expected it or was prepared for it, kinda like a massive hurricane would be in North Dakota.

That fellow Jan Egeland, who’s in charge of raising money for the United Nations, got kinda snooty because our government didn’t jump in immediately with a Billion dollars to finance the recovery operation. Of course if President Bush had made such an announcement, instead of waiting a few days to guarantee at least $350 million, many folks around the world would have blamed us for trying to take over.

Unlike some countries, we don’t depend on our government to contribute for us, we step up and sign our own checks. Americans are reaching deep in their pockets and collectively giving millions. In addition Bill Gates, Wall-Mart, Pfizer, Coca-Cola and thousands of other successful companies and wealthy individuals are donating millions each. Around the world many other companies and governments have jumped in with huge contributions.

Among the donors I didn’t see if the billionaire bin Laden has promised anything to aid his fellow Muslims in Indonesia. So far his only response since the tragedy was to kill a few more of them in Iraq and Saudi Arabia.

I have a question about how to help those left homeless along the devastated coasts. I’m not talking about where the whole island was flooded, that’s different. But where the coast is no more than a mile or two wide, why don’t the survivors walk inland to higher ground? Sure, they might have to walk barefoot uphill, and the injured would have to be carried, but they could find fresh water, escape the danger of illness, and people from the unaffected parts of the country could share their food. That would give the relief aid a few days to arrive from all parts of the globe, and most of it could be directed to those islands where there’s no high ground to walk to.

It seems a whole lot easier for people to move to where fresh water is available rather than having to ship a million little bottles of it from Atlanta.

Now this football news don’t seem so important in the context of these tragic world events, but you might want to know that Ohio State defeated the Oklahoma State Cowboys 33-7 in the Alamo Bowl. We’ve got more bowl games over the next few days, so there’ll be a lot of cheering. But Mr. Egeland can rest assured we won’t forget about the tsunami.

Historic quote from Will Rogers:

“People are marvelous in their generosity if they just know the cause is there.” DT #1523, June 10, 1931

# 348, December 21, 2004

COLUMBUS: All I know is what I read in the papers. Our churches are working to keep Christ in Christmas, and across the country there’s lawyers that don’t even want Christmas in Christmas.

Schools have given up on Christmas trees, Christmas carols and Christmas presents. Even decorations that are red and green are banned. The stop lights in front of some schools were altered for the month of December to simply flash on yellow.

These schools that caved in to threats from the ACLU should unite, stick together, maybe form their own ACLU… American Christmas Liberties Unleashed. We know that not everybody likes Christmas or what our Savior stands for, but does that give them the right to prevent the other ninety percent from celebrating a favorite public holiday?

Not everyone likes football, but just because five percent prefer ice hockey or figure skating don’t mean football gets kicked off public grounds.

In Washington, President Bush is still searching for someone to trust with our Homeland Security. I have heard from a few of my Indian friends, and they say, “Let us take another crack at protecting our borders.” They know we weren’t very successful keeping from our shores the riffraff 400 years ago, but claim the ole Indian learned a lot from sitting on the wrong side of the treaty table. Maybe you think the Indians couldn’t improve on the security record of the past ten or so years; but how could they do worse?

Wal-Mart announced they are allowing Salvation Army volunteers to collect donations. Not only allowing, but encouraging them. Sam Walton’s offspring say they will match any donations up to $1,000,000. That’s mighty generous, and I suggest you take them up on it. Even if you don’t have a million, give what you can.

It was 5 below here yesterday. That’s cold enough to put you in the Christmas spirit. I’m all for opening one particular present early, the package with the wool socks and rabbit fur mittens. I’ll generously wait till Christmas morning to open the tie box.

Historic quotes from Will Rogers: (on Christmas)

“Well, the Christmas spirit is over now. Everybody can get back to their natural dispositions. If there had been as many good wishes in the heart as there was on paper the devil would have to dig up some new clients.
Christmas will never be a real charity benefit till we learn to eat those Christmas cards. If we spent as much with the Salvation Army as we do with the telegraph companies every Christmas, why the poor would be fat all Winter.” DT #753, Dec. 25, 1928

“The holidays got by without much publicity. Christmas was awful quiet after the excitement of the late election. It looked like there was a lot more interest in (Al) Smith and (Herbert) Hoover than there was in Santa Claus. I guess Christmas is getting kinder old and we will have to scare up something new to take its place. The trouble with this generation is they are getting too wise. That is they are getting too wise about things which they ought not to get wise about, and learning none of the things that might be any good to ’em afterwards. We kid the idea of Santa Claus now, where as a matter of fact it was one of the greatest illusions and ideas we ever had. We lost it and nothing has taken its place. Even to presents, why in the old days just any little remembrance was the very thing we wanted and needed, but now with all this Republican prosperity, nobody can’t give you anything you need, for you already got it.” WA #315, Jan. 6, 1929

# 347, December 14, 2004

COLUMBUS: Congress passed the Intelligence Bill. It says we are to hire 10,000 more men to guard the Mexican border, and one man to quarterback the entire security team. Of course I mean men or women; two men already turned down that intelligence czar position (Kerik and Lieberman), so it may be left to the women to protect this country.

They say we are to hire 10,000 border guards, but Congress authorized no money to pay them. So I don’t think this plan will work, if the only income these lookouts collect is what little they can earn in tips from the ones crawling under the fence.

My man, Zell Miller, is still in the running for Czar. He might get past the Senate committee screening because I doubt if he ever hired an illegal nanny. He’s liable to be a unanimous choice when they realize 10,000 full size cutouts of scowling Zell could safeguard our border better than unpaid sentries.

President Bush has had so many Cabinet secretaries resign, it makes you wonder if those folks heard the news that their guy WON.

We learned that Barry Bonds has been using steroids to hit all those home runs. Some fellow wrote a great line about Babe Ruth last week: if Bonds is powered by steroids, what powered Babe Ruth? Hot dogs.

If you think Bonds had a bad year, what about Mark Geragos. He got paid millions to defend Scott Peterson, drags the trial out to a year or more, won’t let him talk, and the jury finds him guilty and votes to hang him. Well, not hang him. This being California, the humane and civilized thing to do is leave him on death row for thirty or forty years, and hope he dies of old age before they inject him with a lethal dose of botox.

In terms of lawyering, it’s hard to do worse. Can you name any licensed attorney who wouldn’t have been just as successful, or even a plumber, and finished in a tenth the time? With his proven record of batting zero, I think we should put Geragos in charge of defending Saddam Hussein. The trial would drag on as long as the war.

We can kid Mr. Geragos, and with the kind of money he’s making he don’t mind some ribbing. We all know he did the best he could with the hand dealt him.

Historic quote from Will Rogers:

“In reading my Christmas good wishes and the morning Los Angeles paper found a long editorial seriously comparing our Christmas Day here to the one held in Bethlehem, Judea. In fact it kinder give us the best of it in the way of weather and natural resources over Christ’s birthplace, and it rather insinuated that in case our Savior is to be born again, the Chamber of Commerce should get busy now and book the event amid ideal surroundings. Bethlehem may have had us beat on milk and honey, but I bet we use more cold cream here than they did, and we got some awful cheap orange marmalade. Then we can stage Moses’ birth, too. We are short of bullrushes but we sho’ got the bull, so buy your reduced-rate tickets for the modern Bethlehem.” DT #1380, Dec. 25, 1930

# 346, December 7, 2004

COLUMBUS: All I know is what I read in the newspaper. Headline says, “40 years later, Rt. 35 is finished”.

Yes, it took Ohio 40 years to build this road, from the Ohio River at Gallipolis, where Bob Evans ground his first pound of sausage, through Jackson and Chillicothe, over to Dayton, where Orville and Wilbur built the first airplane, and on to the Indiana state line. It’s 164 miles, which means they progressed about 4 miles a year, if you can call it progress. Just imagine, if Ohio had been in charge of this country’s Westward expansion, at that rate we would just now be reaching Utah.

Bob Evans was delighted, “Now we can ship sausage to Dayton by truck like we do everywhere else, instead of driving the hogs overland and grinding it there.”

Governor Taft says the new route will create jobs in the region, but I doubt if they can top the number on the payroll to build the road in the first place. They could have kept more men hired and stretched construction out a few more years, but about half way through they were practically forced to buy some Caterpillars and get rid of the mules. But it’s a fine, 4-lane highway, well worth the effort, and traffic will roll right along, until next summer when they set out the orange cones and start patching the oldest sections.

In college football they got another controversy. There’s only supposed to be two undefeated teams at this stage of the season, but the boys at Auburn, Utah and Boise never got the message. Oklahoma and Southern California got picked to play for the championship, but I got an idea of how they can add Auburn and have three teams in the same game.

If my plan works it’ll be USC vs. OK vs. AU, and they kinda play a round robin by quarters. See, they draw straws and two of them play a quarter while the other sits out. Then one of those sits, and they keep rotating until each has played four quarters, which takes a total of six quarters of football. It won’t take much longer than usual because you eliminate the half time; two keep playing while the other rests. The one with the most points at the end is the true national champion, and there’s no argument, except maybe from Salt Lake.

Texas beat out California-Berkeley for another big bowl berth. That don’t seem fair either, and I propose they play each other, preferably in the Rose Bowl.

I doubt if anyone will adopt my plans. These university presidents seem to be dead set against anything different, and they are hard headed enough to get their way.

Now here’s another big football battle for me personally. In San Antonio’s Alamo Bowl it’s Ohio State University from right here in Columbus, against Oklahoma State University, kinda “my” other home state. People ask me, will I favor the Cowboys or the Buckeyes? It’s a tough decision. But I’m leaning toward cheering for…. OSU.

To get serious for a moment, we lost a great man on Thanksgiving Day. Bob Murphey of Nacogdoches, Texas, was one of our best and funniest professional speakers, and also the slowest. He could stretch a good story out longer, with fewer words and more laughs than anybody. Why, sometimes he got more laughs in a speech than he had words. I guess now he’s down to no words at all and we’re still laughing. Interrupted at times by tears.

Historical quote from Will Rogers: (one last 2004 political comment)

“Now hang onto your seats while you get this item of expense: Interest on the Public debt is $731 million… That’s where all the money goes that we pay in Taxes; most of it goes to pay Interest on money we owe. Let’s sell off enough of this Country to somebody and pay off all National debts, then the taxes wouldent be nearly as much.

The Democrats will agree to peddle Texas and Florida. And I am certain the Republicans will let Massachusetts go.” WA # 312, Dec. 16, 1928

# 345, November 28, 2004

WESTON, West Va.: While everyone else was celebrating Thanksgiving week, our lame duck Congress passed out a few early Christmas presents. They said compared to our whole budget these little gifts don’t amount to anything. Well, when they add up to over $10 Billion, that’s more than pocket change to most of us.

Really we don’t even have $10 Billion, cause we’ll have to borrow it from Europe or China or Arabia. By the time we pay off the principal and accumulated interest who knows how much those nick knacks will cost us. Congress gets the credit, and a few more votes in the next election, but we get the bill every April for the next 30 years.

I can’t get into all these “gifts”, that’s for Senator McCain to handle, but I do wonder about a couple of them. Do the poor taxpayers really need to donate $450,000 to the Baseball Hall of Fame, when they could take up a collection among the players and owners and raise millions in loose change?

Do we need to invest $2,000,000 to study hog manure in Kentucky and $1,000,000 to produce more fertilizer in Muscle Shoals, Alabama? If Alabama is in need of fertilizer, couldn’t Kentucky ship ‘em a train load of manure and save us $3,000,000?

Folks, as I wrote this, I had an eerie feeling that it sounded awfully familiar. So I dug into it, and look what Congress did for Muscle Shoals 76 years ago….

“Spent the day looking at the marvelous Muscle Shoals dam and projects. Everybody should see it. It’s a monument to the neglect of our politicians. It was built to manufacture nitrates for fertilizer. It’s the only idle nitrate plant in the world. When you see a $150,000,000 plant lying here idle it gives you an idea of the pull in legislation that the power trust exerts. They say ‘If we don’t get it nobody else will.’” (DT #498, March 1, 1928)

Ohio got their share of useless gifts. One little town got $200,000 for a railroad depot. Only problem is they don’t have no tracks. The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame got $350,000 to teach music. One question: by the time you get into that hall of fame, shouldn’t you already know music?

Congress acted fast on giving away all those goodies, but when it came protecting our homeland, they deadlocked. They got it backwards again.

I had a fine Thanksgiving in West Virginia. Ate a turkey dinner at Buckhannon Run, followed by a turkey supper at Wildcat with about thirty close relatives. (Hey, I don’t want any wisecracks about relatives in West Virginia.) We even had a light snow and it looked mighty pretty on the rhododendron. It’s deer season, and venison is just as popular as turkey.

PS… (Nov. 30) Secretary Ridge resigned today. I still think the person I suggested in September to replace him would be the perfect man to protect our borders: Zell Miller. That scowl he displayed at the Republican Convention would scare any potential terrorist from ever entering America, and might even cause a few to leave.

Historic quotes from Will Rogers: (on Congress)

“Washington, D.C. papers say: ‘Congress is deadlocked and can’t act.’ I think that is the greatest blessing that could befall this country.” WA # 59, Jan. 27, 1924

“Compared to [Congress], I’m an amateur, and the thing about my jokes is they don’t hurt anybody. You can take ‘em or leave ‘em. You know what I mean. You say, well they’re funny, or they’re terrible, or they’re good, or whatever it is, but they don’t do any harm. You can just pass them by. But with Congress, every time they make a joke it’s a law. And every time they make a law it’s a joke.” Radio broadcast, May 12, 1935

“The budget is a mythical bean bag. Congress votes mythical beans into it, and then tries to reach in and pull real beans out.” DT #2047, Feb. 24, 1933