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Second Time, Farce

Such was Gerry Ford’s fate that even his bumbling would-be assassins were viewed as indicative of the Administration’s general air of haplessness.

Churchill wrote of the thrill of being fired upon without result. Ford was twice lucky. Two would be slay-gals went gunning for him, and only managed to get off one [bad] shot between them.

Errant shooter Sara Jane Moore had the requisite triple name, but lacked the accuracy America had come to expect from lone, crazed assassins.

Like the better class of killer, Moore had an FBI connection, informing the Bureau on the San Francisco Bay area radical milieu in the wake of the psychotic Symbionese Liberation Army actions of the mid 70s .

No patsy claim though – she owned up to it all. And now she is out.

We’ll always have Carter comutee and Clinton pardonee Patty Hearst to kick around though.

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British Conservatives Look Back in Anger

It ain’t just disgruntled Labour supporters in Britain who dislike the current US president.

British Conservative blogger Ian Dale has polled his largely Conservative readership on ranking US Presidents since World War II. It’s not a scientific poll, but even these hardened fans of the smack of firm government view Bush the Younger as a walking disaster.

The rankings:
Franklin D Roosevelt +67
Dwight Eisenhower +59
Harry Truman +53
Ronald Reagan +50
John F Kennedy +40
Bill Clinton + 20
George Bush Snr -4
Lyndon Johnson -19
Gerald Ford -20
Jimmy Carter -40
Richard Nixon -42
George W Bush -48

Proof that Conrad Black is not a crank?

What Was I Thinking?

Mitt Romney’s Must See Thursday has generated acres of ink.

A passing mention in an opinion piece on the build up recalls an earlier Mormon candidate, Mo Udall, and how he was done in by the sainted Jimmy Carter.

“Religion is neither a qualifier nor a disqualifier for public office, unless you are a Mormon, one of your opponents is a Southern Baptist and you are both running for the presidential nomination of your party…When former governor Jimmy Carter was in tight race with Congressman Morris “Mo” Udall for the Democratic Party’s nomination in 1976, Detroit Mayor Coleman Young, a Carter backer, said to a large audience of black Baptist ministers: “I’m asking you to make a choice between a man from Georgia who fights to let you in his church, and a man from Arizona whose church won’t even let you in the back door.”…Udall, who had left the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints over its policies toward blacks, called on Carter, a Southern Baptist layman, to repudiate Coleman’s comments. Carter refused and won the Michigan primary.”

Glorious days of old! Carter, the man who split the vote and got Lester Maddox in as Georgia Governor, paired with a man who was at least friendly with the Stalinists to slander one of the more decent politicians Arizona ever produced.

The Los Angeles Times provides a Chief Executive map of the stars in the wake of Dennis Kucinich’s claim to have seen UFOs.

And a link for what one hopes is the definitive site on the topic: www.presidentialufo.com .

Kucinich joins the chain of greats from Jimmy Carter to Ronald Reagan

Even salt-of-the-earth Gerry Ford would bow to the Alien Interest on occasion:

Man and mementos

The Associated Press presents Barry Landau as international man of mystery, dancing with queens and first ladies when he isn’t precociously worming his way into an Eisenhower White House invitation. Since then they claim he has been operating at the nexus, working the fulcrum, and in and of himself representative of the convergence of all we hold dear in politics and entertainment.

And snagging a lot of tchotskis over the years. Some of his collection will be reflected in “The President’s Table: 200 Years of Dining and Diplomacy,” first of a threatened three volumes of Presidentish stuff.

“He’s the kind of guy you may not notice in the pictures with celebrities. He is 59 and has been in the company of presidents for nearly 50 years. He is tall and bearded, with a home full of history and a head crammed with names, like boxes in an overstuffed closet ready to tumble out.”

One name that doesn’t tumble out in AP’s account is Hamilton Jordan.

Landau was supporting witness to allegations that Jimmy Carter Chief of Staff Hamilton Jordan used cocaine during a visit to Studio 54, the New York nightclub which from almost any perspective symbolized everything wrong with America in the 70s.

Drugs were the least of their problems

Club owners Steve Rubell and Ian Schrager faced prison for tax evasion, and offered up Jordan’s name as plea bargain bait. Their attorney was sinister New York fixer Roy Cohn, Joe McCarthy’s former counsel.

Cohn, clubbing.

The Special Counsel* appointed to investigate the allegations rejected them, and found Landau to be, shall we say, a questionable witness:

“There were only three people who claimed to have direct information concerning Mr. Jordan’s alleged use of cocaine in Studio 54: Rubell, Johnny C., and one Barry Landau. As witnesses, the most charitable thing that could be said about them was that they were utterly unbelievable….Landau claimed that on the evening of June 27, 1978, while at Studio 54, Mr. Jordan asked him for cocaine. Despite what he had said on the 20/20 program, however, when we pressed him, he did not claim to have any knowledge that Mr. Jordan in fact took cocaine that night. Landau said he did not hear Mr. Jordan ask Rubell or anyone else for cocaine, did not hear any other discussions about cocaine, and did not see Mr. Jordan or any other member of the Jordan group take cocaine. He also said that prior to August 24, 1979, he was never told by Rubell or anyone else that Mr. Jordan had taken cocaine in his visit. Landau declined to be interviewed by the FBI about June 27, 1978.20…Although Landau said that other persons were with Mr. Jordan that evening when Mr. Jordan asked Landau for cocaine, each of those persons explicitly denied that Mr. Jordan asked anyone for cocaine in his presence. I had very serious doubts about Landau’s credibility under any circumstances.”

None of this stops Landau on the book tour. He’s planning to hit the Roosevelt, Eisenhower, Nixon, and Bush Presidential Libraries, and for some reason doing both the Ford Archive and Ford Museum on separate days.

Somehow he is skipping the Carter Library.

*Youngsters may not recall, but one part of the hell that was the 70s was the appointment of Special Counsels at the hint of White House impropriety.