Weekly Comments Archive
Archived Issue
Tuesday, January 6, 2004
ISSUE #304
Weekly Comments: College football and Mars rover raise emotions

# 304, January 6, 2004

COLUMBUS: Our colleges finished off another season with their big Bowl games. Southern California invited Michigan out to their home territory and sprung a trap on the Wolverines. They claimed they were champions, but then Louisiana State had Oklahoma down to New Orleans for Sunday supper and cooked the Sooners Cajun style, so naturally they laid claim to the big prize, too. Now we’ve got two champions, and it’ll give the boys something to argue over in 2004 besides politics and Pete Rose betting on baseball.

Ohio State won their game out in Phoenix. It wasn’t as big a game as last year, but a win is a win. The Arizona desert air seems mighty agreeable to them and they might not object to a return trip next year. In fact in Ohio the whole state is feeling good about the Bowls, while the entire state of Oklahoma is feeling poorly and ready to change the subject to basketball.

They may argue about this Bowl Championship Series, but there is something to be said when you can have two champions, not just one. And when 25 or 30 teams can go home as a winner that ain’t all bad either.

When the pros wrap up their Super Bowl next month there’ll only be one team that can end on a high note, and the way Irv Favre is looking out for his son Brett, it’s hard to bet against Green Bay.

Forget sports for a moment; did you see the excitement at NASA when that rover landed? Now, a lot of professional speakers will tell you that engineers are a tough audience because they don’t show emotion. But let me tell you, the way those engineers were jumping and hollering and dancing around, if it had been football they would’ve been penalized 15 yards for excessive celebration.

And have you seen those photos from Mars? Over a hundred million miles away, and they’re clearer than a lot of holiday family pictures shot from across the room.

I’m flying out to Des Moines tomorrow, to check on the Democrats. There’s a farm meeting going on, and if I can round up a Caucus, I’ll get an early reading for you on who has the hot hand heading into the Primaries.

It won’t matter whether Iowa favors Dean or Edwards, or Gephardt or Kerry, or Sharpton or Braun, or even Prancer and Vixen. Those birds can stand out in the middle of a frozen corn field and sing the praises of ethanol till their face turn blue, but it won’t warm the hearts, or sway the minds, of the determined voter. No sir, there’s only one plan guaranteed to bring Victory to my Democrats, and it’s the same plan “I” first proposed in 1924. (read below)

Historic quotes from Will Rogers:

The following is part of a “nominating speech” Will wrote for his newspaper column on the Eleventh Day of the 1924 Democratic Convention, where they argued for SIXTEEN DAYS over who to nominate to oppose incumbent Republican Calvin Coolidge.

“Oh, my friends, I am too good a Democrat not to be appreciative of what the party has done for me, not to try and warn you while there is yet time.

We are not gathered here just to name a nominee of the next election, but we are here to name the next President of the grand and glorious United States, of which this party today is the sole refuge for the true patriot.

The man we name must be a man of unquestioned integrity… The man we name must be a man who is not now connected with these inter-sectional fights and feuds here on the floor. The man I am about to name is absolutely aloof from them….

The man we name must be able to go into the far Westland and reap a majority…

The man we name must be able to remove any doubtful States into the realm of certainty. The man I am about to name can give you a majority that will look like a census report…

The man we name here must have no taint of Wall Street. The man I am about to name never saw Wall Street. The man we name here must have absolutely no affiliation with the Klan… The man we name must be of no minority religious creed. The man I am about to name belongs to the creed whose voters are in the majority…

We have our greatest chance this year to bring home victory. That great scandal in our opponents’ party and their close affiliation with predatory wealth has given us an unbounded opportunity… Don’t let us disrupt the party when we can win. We will go to a sure Democratic defeat if we name the wrong man.

The man I am about to name is the only man in these grand and glorious United States who, if we nominate, we can go home and have no worry as to the outcome. Don’t, oh, my Democratic Colleagues, listen to my friend William Jennings Bryan. He named ten candidates; ten men can’t win! Only one man can win. Trust me just this once and I will lead you out of this darkened wilderness into the gates of the White House. There is only one man. That man I am about to name to you is Calvin Coolidge.” Convention Articles, July 3, 1924

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