Where It All Went Wrong? 
A perennial feature every campaign season is the release of genealogies supposedly demonstrating which kings, past presidents and vaguely familiar names 
presidential candidates are related to.
A lot of the work is done by genealogy hobbyists, sometimes assisted by the candidate’s own wild-ass claims. John McCain was recently called out for a bogus claim of descent from Robert The Bruce.
Hunt To Kill 
And now Richard Nixon is nominated for historical orphan-hood.
A long and lustrous line is shown for Nixon on Genealogy.com, but a critic hopes to chop it off in the 18th Century. Will Johnson says Genealogy.com grafted Nixon onto a family tree he has no business in.
Getting down in these weeds leads you to questions like: “The 1st and 2nd Baronet of Burton Agnes: dead-enders?”
“…the extinction of the baronetcy proves that neither Sir Henry 1st Baronet, nor Sir Henry 2nd Baronet had any surviving male- line issue. i.e. brothers, sons, nephews in the male line…[It] also disconnects Richard Nixon from this family. His ancestor, if he was indeed his ancestor at all, Samuel Griffith said-to-be “of Wigmore” who died in Maryland in 1717, does not belong to this family. “
If Nixon’s Genealogy.com ancestry held up he would be some sort of cousin to McCain and Obama . They are all supposed to be relatives of King Edward 1, famous for invading Scotland and expelling the Jews from England.
Father of Our Country 
For Some It Never Ends 
Grand Rapids continues to salute former President Gerry Ford, despite the indifference of the Ford family.
No family members plan to attend the premier of a Ford musical tribute, “One of Us, Portrait of a Humble Healer.” This latest slap to local pride comes Friday when the Grand Rapids Symphony premiers the work, accompanied by David “The Tom DeFrank of Pictures” Kennerly’s photographs.
No one from the immediate family attended the 2007 dedication of Gerald R. Ford Middle School.
Longtime local Ford memorialist Marty Allen says the Ford’s desperately await the music’s CD release. Next Fall.
“I know the family wants it done, because they can’t be here,” Allen told the Grand Rapids Press. “And they’re anxious to hear it.”
Allen is Chairman Emeritus of the Library, and cementing his place in history as Ford family stand in. The Ford Library even holds a painting commemorating the historic day when he received the flag 
which had flown at half staff to mark Ford’s death.
“a man walks by the barn and sees this little boy in this room filled with manure? And he’s [the boy] standing there and he’s digging, and he’s digging, and he’s digging. And the man says, ‘Son, what are you doing up to your hips in manure with that little shovel?’ The boy says, ‘Well, with this much manure around, there’s got to be a pony—and I’m going to find it.†Hillary Clinton
Reagan biographer “Doctor” Paul Kengor is super impressed.
“Mrs. Clinton’s use of that anecdote is the first time I’ve heard it from a public figure since Ronald Reagan.”
Which is sadder – that Hilary Clinton is now channeling Ronald Reagan’s use of this beloved chestnut, or that hapless Reagan biographers haven’t seen these lines used since the Age of Teflon?
The pony metaphor most famously metastasised post-Reagan in a thoughtful appreciation for the good things that came from slavery.
If These Thistles Could Talk 
We feared we’d never see the wedding – the Washington Post was among the media hordes resorting to Bush ranch edges file photos while repeating how little we knew.
Then the White House released manna from heaven, and the nation embraced the lovely couple and her sweaty family.
The President is strangely the only normal looking one here. 
The Next Voice You Hear 
Miss Grandpa’s voice on the radio?
Fret no more, Ronald Reagan is coming back to AM! It’s the very best of radio at it’s most analog, lovingly resurrected to win another generation to the cause.
It’s the hits of the 70s, 80s, 90s and today, without the clutter of those last three.
As Reagan re-animation efforts continue to reach new heights, the musty scripts are being presented as timeless words from yesteryear, “over 1,000 radio addresses that clarified his vision for America.”
And of course, “Non-political in nature.”
FDR gave his fireside chats while he actually held power, facing epic troubles larger than the looming abandonment of the Panama Canal Zone. But the idea of replaying his tapes during the 60s wouldn’t have passed the laugh test.
