A Special Day for America

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There was an inquiry in the comments yesterday stating that since the commentor did not live in Columbus and did not really know where Columbus was anyway, was there a way he could see my little piece that was in the Columbus Pioneer.

Yes there is. Go to the online paper and on the left there is a link called "blog". Now we all know a "blog" is short for Web log which is a "ongoing diary or commentary by an individual". But this is in a newspaper. There is no Web. Could it be a Newspaper log, a perlog? Have I discovered a new catch name? perlog?
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I'm not going to get all googly with events of the day. There are many other places you can read Obama stuff.

But what I am finding interesting is the amount of stuff on American TV looking at the History of our government.

For instance, last night I watched a special on each of the first six presidents. The History channel is going over every one with pretty interesting stuff. Did you know that Thomas Jefferson hated being President so much he did not want it put that he was President of the United States on his grave stone? It says:

HERE WAS BURIED
THOMAS JEFFERSON
AUTHOR OF THE
DECLARATION
OF AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE
OF THE
STATUTE OF VIRGINIA
FOR
RELIGIOUS FREEDOM
AND FATHER OF THE
UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA
BORN APRIL 2, 1743 O.S.
DIED JULY 4. 1826

Then I watched an hour all about Air Force One and what it takes to send a President overseas and then the history of the White House. Sweet stuff. Piano's falling through the floor to two bears in cages.

One thing among many I found REALLY interesting was how John Quincy Adams attained office. He was the 6th President of the U.S and the son of the 2nd President John Adams.

The 6th election was the first one to have a popular vote even though the electoral vote was used to decide. I guess they wanted to see what the "people" thought. Running were John Quincy Adams, Speaker of the House Henry Clay, Secretary of the Treasury William H. Crawford, U.S. Senator Andrew Jackson and Secretary of War John C. Calhoun.

The popular vote was way way for Jackson with Adams a distant second, Calhoun and then Clay.

The electoral vote was in the same order Jackson, Adams, Calhoun and Clay.

The problem was that according to the Twelfth Amendment you need a majority which means the election is decided on a vote by House of Representatives, which is lead by a very very powerful Henry Clay.

As luck would have it Crawford had a stroke so he was out of the picture and now Clay was in the mix. Clay HATED Jackson.

Deals were made and when the House voted. Adams (right) was the winner with Clay being awarded the Secretary of State.

This REALLY pissed off Jackson and his supporters as they believe that Jackson was going to be the winner (sound like anything we have experienced?). Adams achieved nothing in his 4 years as President as it was spent deflecting criticism.

In the next election it was Jackson vs. Adams and historians say this was the ugliest, cruelest and dirtiest campaign ever. The low point was when the press accused Jackson's wife Rachel of bigamy.

Jackson won by a land slide. John Quincy Adams is only one of three Presidents not to attend the inauguration of his predecessor. The other two were his dad and Andrew Johnson.

On a side not Jackson's opponent called him a jackass and this was the start of using the donkey as the symbol for the Democrat party. The Jackass later died but about 30 years later it was revived. ACTUALLY the rooster was the symbol of the Democrats and Eagle for the Republicans but they did not catch on.
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In other interesting political news. The Governor of Illinois, that guy with the raccoon on his head? I got some interesting tidbits from my brother who lives in ILL.

Seems EVERYONE new he was a crook/mobster (Blagojevich not my brother). But no one could do anything because, well, he held all the purse strings. The FBI had been taping his phone conversations for over a year and had 2000 hours of taped phone calls and knew they had a solid case. They were just waiting for the perfect moment which would be AFTER Blagojevich left office.

Blagojevich even KNEW he was being taped but did not care, he was above the law. Problem came when he decided to sell Obama's seat. The Feds REALLY did not want that to happen so they had a little news conference and played a few tidbits hoping to get people worked up a little.

THAT HAPPENED!!! All of a sudden government and private companies by the hundreds were coming forward saying they had been bullied into making deals. You could not do ANYTHING in Illinois that concerned money without cutting a deal with Blagojevich. For instance, the editors of the Chicago Tribune had to be fired before any papers could be filed for selling the Chicago Cubs who are owned by the Trib.

So - Illinois wanted to impeach Blagojevich but there was a timing issue. Only four weeks left before break and a NEW group of Senators woukd take seats and according to Illinois law, you can not impeach a Governor with two sets of Senators. Once you start you must finish. The Democratic Senate stood down and felt the wrath of the public for not doing anything.

No problem. Blagojevich promised he would not fill that seat, go on vacation. Once everybody left Blagojevich assigned the seat and all hell broke loose. The Republicans came after the Democrats for sitting on their hands and doing nothing.

The rest is still happening as I type.
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WOW - that's a lot of politics to get off my chest!! YIKES

Enough for today
Have a great inauguration day.
Rod