They are making with the funny in the Bush Library newsletter, headlining a stage in their current renovation as

“The Day the Wall Came Down”

Not really the same thing.

LIKE IKE?

Ever been to Kansas? Doesn’t matter – you too, or rather you three times may vote in the state’s “8 Wonders of Kansas” balloting.

The Eisenhower Library in Abilene is in the running, and campaigning hard, but in order to vote for or against it you have to vote a full slate of eight out of twenty-four prospects. To somehow make up for this Soviet Central committee style “election” you can vote three times between now and years end.

The choices are, um, very Kansaseque. Your natural feature , buildings,

more land, and even more land .

And all that string!

The great John Steuart Curry murals in the state Capitol are on the ballot, but the organizers’ description is rather begrudging.

“The John Steuart Curry murals are a finalist for the 8 Wonders of Kansas because Curry was one of the greatest American regionalist painters and, despite great controversy, he considered the murals in the State Capitol his greatest work!…Curry’s critics disliked his color scheme and the over-all menacing effect of the mural….Still, the murals are known as some of the greatest public art in the country…”

Yup, it’s the color scheme.

“Woodrow Wilson’s former home, located at 1705 Hampton Street enjoys the dual distinction of being the only house his parents ever owned and South Carolina’s only presidential site.”

Wilson lived in South Carolina for four years, and his home’s owners plan to spend two million dollars restoring the home.

Meanwhile South Carolina native Stephen Colbert continues to tease the nation with coy answers to self-generated questions about a presidential run. After putting off Jon Stewart on Tuesday’s Daily Show [“Hold on, mount rush me,”] he announced on his own show. Sort of – got to sell books.

Presidents pick their favorite films

George H.W. Bush digs ‘Karate Kid’

except they are showing “Quiz Show” Saturday. Is the “Show Business Bible” inerrant?

Variety reported urgent news of Presidential flick picks in quiz format – urging readers to match First Fan with their favorite movie titles.

“Karate Kid” would make more sense, in that producer Jerry Weintraub’s sole visible claim to political fame is his legendary yet inexplicable friendship with George H.W. Bush.

Backwards in Britain

I got mine!

The Churchill family cashing in threatens to set the United Kingdom on the path to more presidentialism: cults of personality, motorcades, and our gift to the world, the presidential library.

History News Network reports they aren’t there yet, but are plugging away.

Britain has a functioning National Archives, but that can’t stop the empire builders. The Churchill papers were bought back from the family with public money, and rest at the Cambridge college named for him. Margaret Thatcher is tagging along there, but appears to be thin on actual material.

Her archive head says “What we have here …are the private letters to Baroness Thatcher from members of Parliament, copies of official letters that she was allowed to take with her and much more.”

The Thatcher web site illustrates the redundant nature of the enterprise:

“MT’s own collection includes copies of most of the White House material relating to her meetings with successive Presidents. Gaps in her collection have been filled, in some cases, from the Carter and Reagan Library photographic collections. Bush material will be placed on line with documentary material in early 2006.”

A search in multimedia for “Reagan” gets you nothing but White House photos. There are some bugs to work out on the site itself. Even the link to the Churchill archives is a bust.

The Churchill site is more fun, including Churchill’s memorandum calling for poison gassing Bolshevik troops during the British intervention in Russia’s Civil War.