Bucks

poor georgie’s almanack:

In 1851 Ohio, Henry Howe estimated the worth of a muskrat skin at about a quarter, a doe skin 50¢, a buck skin $1.  

In 2018 the average Ohio congressional campaign will cost at least a million bucks.

alien-nation

poor georgie's almanack


Alien-nation

poor george's almanack

Axing questions

poor georgie’s almanack:  

Thinking on the treadmill and axed myself these questions.  

Any answers? 

Are young children your personal property?

We transformed the Earth to our needs.  Were we too needy?

Why is reality now optional?

Bribery as the best immigration policy

poor georgie’s almanack: 

A seriously cheaper immigration solution ... or the cooption co-option:  

A wall will cost untold billions of dollars because of hidden bribes to unions, constructors, the criminal mafias behind them, and political donations.  Instead, pay juicy bribes to the Central American gangs who are the problem.  “Buy them off.”  It's a kind of foreign and domestic policy we usually are very, very good at.  

(cartoon michele paccione)

Immigration, morals, babies

poor georgie’s almanack:

The disruption Bernie and Donald fans pined for was defensible.  The nuclear experiment with a mass murderer might turn out to be a good idea, at least for us.  But, that does not mean the USA should mimic Kim’s dictatorship by putting babies in cages and pardoning evil, immoral and disgusting bootlickers.  

poor georgie's almanack:

Conceptually, the disruption Bernie and Donald fans pined for was defensible. 

Conceptually, the nuclear experiment with a mass murderer might turn out to be a good idea, at least for us. 

But, that does not mean the USA should mimic Kim’s dictatorship by putting babies in cages and pardoning evil, immoral and disgusting bootlickers. 

Punishing the innocent and vulnerable in any venue should be beyond The Pale.  If you don't know anything about The Pale, then you probably are beyond it and susceptible to being beyond reason.

poor georgie’s almanack:

Bernie and Donald fans wanted disruption. The nuclear experiment with a mass murderer could be a good idea, at least for us.  But, the USA shouldn't mimic dictator Kim by putting babies in cages and pardoning evil, immoral and disgusting bootlickers. 

At our expense

poor georgie’s almanack:

Their leadership's unwavering long-term policy is to dominate the world by Making China Great Again. 

Our’s is to conquer the next 12-hour news cycle. 

I assume, leaders in Beijing have dropped their cardio trainers as they now must jump for joy several times a week at America's expense. 

Expense is the key word.  

We have become the enablers by providing the gift that just keeps on giving.

My thumbs

poor georgie’s almanack:

I am totally confused.  

A prehensile thumb and an opposable thumb are the same thing, but totally different. 

I looked it up.  

I think I have both.  

And I think I love each as much as the other.  

What do you think?

An outlier's view of the New World Politics

poor georgie’s almanack.  June 10, 2018 

• FOREIGN POLICY DRAMA GRIPPED THE AMERICAS

• HEAD-OF-STATE PROMOTED RESORTS  

• RONALD REAGAN AND HIS HOLLYWOOD BUDDY WERE IN POLITICAL SPOTLIGHT 

• IN 1978, “THE DUKE” EXPLAINED AMERICA’S FOREIGN AFFAIRS IN 2018.

January 15, 1978 at a Florida Air Force Base:  A few US Senators who had been in Minnesota earlier in the day for the burial of Hubert Humphrey, joined up with the Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and some staff who had arrived from Washington, DC a few minutes earlier.

Together the “delegation” flew to Panama, where in the next two days they would take a helicopter ride over the entire Panama Canal, be feted by the President of Panama, and meet with Omar Torrijos, Panama’s dictator and the actual head-of-state.  

A public relations event with Torrijos was planned for the Contadora Island Resort.  This was a prelude to marathon Committee hearings on Capitol Hill regarding the most pressing political issue of the decade … the potential transfer to Panama, of the Canal and a huge swath of surrounding land that was controlled by the USA.  That territory housed major American military installations.   But, for the most part, native Panamanians ran the day-to-day work of the Canal.   

The area controlled by the “Colossus of The North” cut Panama in half, from its Pacific coast on the west to the  Caribbean Sea beaches on its eastern shore.  Many of the Senators skeptical constituents were saying: “We built it.  We are helping the Panama economy.  It is vital to our national and economic security.  It is ours to keep.”

The first hurdle for the pro-Treaty side was to get enough votes in the Foreign Relations Committee to send the agreement to the Senate floor.  

Jump to 2018, forty years later, US President Donald Trump is taking a page out of the Torrijos playbook.  The Panamanian had seen an opportunity to publicize his country’s upscale resorts to bring them more business.  That’s why Contadora Island Resort, a short plane hop from Panama City, was the agreed-upon meeting spot.  

I wasn’t the Committee’s PR guy, each Senator had his own.  The chief of staff remembered I had headed the Washington Post’s PR dept. during Watergate.  So my secretary and I were assigned to carry briefcases and to handle press liaison with a group of reporters who saw the trip as we did … an opportunity to get some mid-winter sun, eat well, and produce what was expected with little effort.

That explains our being fully slathered with suntan lotion, lounging on a beach about 400 feet from Contadora’s expansive and expensively manicured golf course.  Several reporters were clustered near my very demure secretary who, surprisingly, wore a swimsuit designed to raise testosterone levels.  Ever the outlier, I actually was sweating profusely under my suit and tie.  Viewing the reporters’ actions, I did ponder the different definitions of the word "liaison."

As the Senators and Omar Torrijos, were chatting in the resort’s clubhouse about a block away, literally out of the blue, a small plane landed nearby.  Out stepped THE DUKE, John Wayne in flesh and blood.   He walked over to our gaggle of oglers, shook our hands, and quickly headed to the clubhouse because it was time for lunch.

The mysterious choreographer of that dance had done a great job.  

We followed Wayne into a restaurant with tourists in their beachwear, seated at their usual tables.  Unusually, however, there was a long head table.  Behind it were all the dignitaries, dominated, by the big guy from the movies.  His longtime buddy Ronald Reagan, was back in The States campaigning for the presidency.  Reagan and Wayne we the reigning personification of Hollywood’s political cult.

He was a staunch Republican, but unlike others, including Reagan, Wayne strongly suppported the proposed Panama agreement.  Coincidentally, The Duke owned property in Panama.  Hmmm.

After the lunch plates were cleared, from behind the head table came the usual twice-thrice-four-times-told-tales our seasoned politicos had used as mantras for months about what they wanted in a treaty.  

Fortunately, someone asked if any of the assembled throng had questions.  As I recall it, a tourist responded thusly: "Mr. Wayne, how is it that you, such a good friend of Mr. Reagan, could be so far apart on this issue?" 

Wayne’s unexpected answer was a classic.

Big John said that he was one “of those who convinced Ronnie” to move politically from the very far left to the right.  

“But, the momentum got away from us.”

Epilogue: I still chuckle at his honesty and now cluck about what that momentum has meant to the world order that, until recently, the USA led.  The days-long hearings after the delegation returned to DC proved that the Senators really did know their stuff.  The agreement eventually squeaked through the Senate and was implemented.       

The end....

Congress once was great

poor georgie’s almanack:

I’m drafting a semi-humorous essay about 1978’s Panama Canal Treaty. 

Not funny is that a few Senators who hoped to run for president had to choose … do the right thing for America (be pro-treaty) or do the wrong thing and never be president. 

They did the right thing. 

Compare that with today’s Congress.  

Sad.

Raunch, Race and Respect

poor georgie’s almanack:

Steamy Port Arthur and Beaumont, Texas, Mid-1960s.

RAUNCH, RACE AND RESPECT.

Five of us on The Postmaster General’s staff took turns as Advance Men for his official trips outside Washington. There always were complications. 

At that time the Postmaster General (PMG) still was a Cabinet Member with way more  patronage jobs, like postmasterships, to distribute than anyone else.  So, most of his trips were at the behest of an important Congressman or Senator who would make the job announcements, thereby implying that he was behind the appointment.  Announcing a new post office building and speaking at it’s dedication also was an even bigger prize.

One coworker bragged about his many sexual adventures on “advance trips.”  Except for one instance, as outlined below, I never even came close to such an adventure.  When reporting the episode to my very lovely wife, a longtime nurse, she complained that, popular legends aside, she never was sexually harassed in a hospital. 

Anyway, PMG Larry O’Brien, one of the three Postmasters General I worked for, was scheduled to make speeches in Port Arthur and nearby Beaumont, Texas.  I drew the short straw.  Larry agreed to go at the behest of Congressman Jack Brooks, an immensely powerful Congressman from Beaumont.   

Steaming, uncomfortably humid, Southeast Texas still was the Deep South.  For instance, segregation was alive at side-by-side water fountains with “colored” and “white” signs above them.

I didn’t have a clue about how to make a few things happen so O’Brien told me to contact the Congressman’s chief fund raiser.  “If you want to get something done,” the PMG said, “always contact the fund raiser.  He has the connections.”  

Fortunately, Brooks’ guy lived in Port Arthur.  We met in his home.  Lounging on a couch, he interspersed comments about various local officials and their affairs, along with hints on how to carry out my assignment and his willingness to make a few phone calls.  Port Arthur sounded like the sexy book and TV series Peyton Place.  He also invited me to a cocktail party the next night.

I then toddled off to the post office and went through the usual checklist … police protection, sound system, approving his hotel room, dealing with media, getting a limo to carry the PMG around, etc.  (The limos, as usual, were borrowed from funeral homes.)

Then off to Beaumont, where things turned sour. 

A reporter told me that a potentially serious racial confrontation was expected at the next day’s ceremony.  He reluctantly gave me the organizer’s name and phone number.

The disturbing back story was that black kids had to walk along a busy highway with no sidewalk to get to school.  Along their trek they passed an all-white school.  I was told that repeated attempts by infuriated parents to talk to school and municipality officials and to reporters were rebuffed.  

With cameras and reporters scheduled to be on hand to hear talks by O’Brien, Brooks and a US Senator from Texas, the event was a perfect place to make their case.  The reporter said there was a high potential for it to be rough.  

I called the demonstration’s organizer and left a message.  I called Ira Kapenstein, my boss, and suggested setting up a meeting with the PMG and the protesters’ leadership before the ceremonies.  Ira thought bigger.  He or the PMG would contact the Congressman and the Senator to see if all three would meet with the the organizers.  Quickly the Washington group agreed and a quiet place was located.

Segue now to the evening cocktail party, which seemed from the conversations to be attended by some of the licentious folks the finance guy mentioned.  Not long after it started, a lovely young lady whose husband, she said, had long been deployed in Vietnam, initiated a conversation with me.  I began to ask myself, “Is this a proposition?”  

The thought, in real life, was interrupted by someone who said there was a phone call for me. 

It was from the demonstration’s chief organizer, who coincidentally was a postal employee.  I outlined the proposed plan.  When we hung up I had no indication about what would happen.  Never saw the young lady again because I immediately returned to my hotel to coordinate hoped-for possibilities.

The meeting with the bigwigs actually took place.  Being involved with minor crises, I couldn’t attend.  Apparently, the parents whose kids lives were endangered were satisfied with the results of the meeting because no demonstration arose.  They had made their case to officials way more important than the local scum bags.

O’Brien and I sped to the airport as soon as the ceremony concluded.  The limo’s trunk was filled to the brim with fake grass used at burials and our luggage.  I never learned the fate of the kids at risk.

However, the next day back in Washington I called the reporter and asked what happened, or didn’t happen, and why? 

Bottom line was the organizer told him that I was the first white man who ever called him Mister and Sir.  

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