DeFrank Talk
Reaction to Tom DeFrank’s Gerald Ford tell-all “Write It When I’m Gone” shows an interesting split.
When Ford reinforces conventional wisdom it’s shouted from the rafters:
Rudy: strong. Bill: can’t keep it in his pants.Hillary: pushy dame.
But when Ford speaks ill of the dead turned plaster saint, not so much:
“A superficial, disengaged, intellectually-lazy showman who didn’t do his homework and clung to a naive, unrealistic, and essentially dangerous worldview. Foreign leaders have said they were appalled by Reagan’s lack of knowledge of the issues.”
Ford’s Theatre longs to be so much more than an assassination location. And with $40 million dollars they’ll try to pull it off.
The National Park Service and the Theatre have announced plans to raise big money and get big, dressing up the old dear with elevators, cafes, all the modern conveniences.
Across the street is the Peterson House, AKA “The House Where Lincoln Died.” 
The House will shed it’s bland town house-ness and be attached to a ten story building next door, soon to be home to the august “Center for Education and Leadership.”
Either education or leadership will include a “a tower of books, representing all the words that have been written about Lincoln’s life.”
Let’s enjoy some!
If these timeless verities fail you can always fall back on a modern classic: 
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.
Last night Stephen Colbert took the campaign for Reagan money to exciting new heights, with a proposal to hijack upcoming changes in the Lincoln penny in order to provide a fitting salute to Ronald Reagan.
In 2009 the penny will be coming out in four versions, each with a panel illustrating an aspect of Lincoln’s life.
Colbert would insert “Reagan teaching Lincoln that slavery was wrong” in order to “do the right thing and honor America’s finest leader. And Lincoln. he was pretty good too.”
