rogressive Senator from California. Johnson in his day had been Teddy Roosevelt's nominee for Vice President on the breakaway Bull Moose ticket in 1912. In the interim, he'd been elected as GOP Senator from California, he was in every sense of the word a maverick, back when it was a cause not a brand. And Johnson he was the King of Causes, he favored old age pensions, unemployment insurance, bank regulation, a minimum wage, the eight hour day and government regulation of banks, railroad and anything else Big and Malevolent.
Johnson though, was a xenophobe and a bit of a humorless prig, he intensely disliked the easygoing conservative Harding and his his backers in the "smoked filled room", he turned Harding down and thus missed out on the one remaining chance for Bull Moosery to achieve ascendence in the GOP...for if he had said yes, he'd a become President in September 1923 when Harding's heart gave out in San Francisco.
Instead the GOP "Base" rose in reactionary revolt all its own and installed the cheap-ass Governor Calvin Coolidge of Massachusetts as it's Vice Presidential Nominee...the rest is history.
This would be quite literally the national debut of the fabled "GOP Base" like Dr. Fu Manchu though, they would be heard from again.
Hiram Johnson though, went on as the Senator's Maverick Maximus, a progressive power house, isolationist and xenophobe par excellence unto the last. Symbolically he died on the same day that Hiroshima was bombed in 1945...and by then the GOP was fully embedded with the whole notion of "Pointing with Pride, 100% Americanism, Low Taxes, High Yields, The Gallows,The Lash, Dry Sundays & No Public Improvements".
And they've stuck to that to this very day...
Sunday, March 09, 2014
Apropos of Nothing....
but the Golden Autumn of Bull Moose Republican Progressivism was likely in the summer of 1920. Amiable Blatherskite Warren Gameliel Harding had been given the GOP nomination for President by the infamous "Smoked Filled Room"(composed mostly of ward healers, thugs and senatorial hacks of octogenarian vintage). Known mostly for his backslapping bonhomie, Harding needed a VP, and he offered the job quite spontaneously to Hiram Johnson the wild man P
rogressive Senator from California. Johnson in his day had been Teddy Roosevelt's nominee for Vice President on the breakaway Bull Moose ticket in 1912. In the interim, he'd been elected as GOP Senator from California, he was in every sense of the word a maverick, back when it was a cause not a brand. And Johnson he was the King of Causes, he favored old age pensions, unemployment insurance, bank regulation, a minimum wage, the eight hour day and government regulation of banks, railroad and anything else Big and Malevolent.
Johnson though, was a xenophobe and a bit of a humorless prig, he intensely disliked the easygoing conservative Harding and his his backers in the "smoked filled room", he turned Harding down and thus missed out on the one remaining chance for Bull Moosery to achieve ascendence in the GOP...for if he had said yes, he'd a become President in September 1923 when Harding's heart gave out in San Francisco.
Instead the GOP "Base" rose in reactionary revolt all its own and installed the cheap-ass Governor Calvin Coolidge of Massachusetts as it's Vice Presidential Nominee...the rest is history.
This would be quite literally the national debut of the fabled "GOP Base" like Dr. Fu Manchu though, they would be heard from again.
Hiram Johnson though, went on as the Senator's Maverick Maximus, a progressive power house, isolationist and xenophobe par excellence unto the last. Symbolically he died on the same day that Hiroshima was bombed in 1945...and by then the GOP was fully embedded with the whole notion of "Pointing with Pride, 100% Americanism, Low Taxes, High Yields, The Gallows,The Lash, Dry Sundays & No Public Improvements".
And they've stuck to that to this very day...
rogressive Senator from California. Johnson in his day had been Teddy Roosevelt's nominee for Vice President on the breakaway Bull Moose ticket in 1912. In the interim, he'd been elected as GOP Senator from California, he was in every sense of the word a maverick, back when it was a cause not a brand. And Johnson he was the King of Causes, he favored old age pensions, unemployment insurance, bank regulation, a minimum wage, the eight hour day and government regulation of banks, railroad and anything else Big and Malevolent.
Johnson though, was a xenophobe and a bit of a humorless prig, he intensely disliked the easygoing conservative Harding and his his backers in the "smoked filled room", he turned Harding down and thus missed out on the one remaining chance for Bull Moosery to achieve ascendence in the GOP...for if he had said yes, he'd a become President in September 1923 when Harding's heart gave out in San Francisco.
Instead the GOP "Base" rose in reactionary revolt all its own and installed the cheap-ass Governor Calvin Coolidge of Massachusetts as it's Vice Presidential Nominee...the rest is history.
This would be quite literally the national debut of the fabled "GOP Base" like Dr. Fu Manchu though, they would be heard from again.
Hiram Johnson though, went on as the Senator's Maverick Maximus, a progressive power house, isolationist and xenophobe par excellence unto the last. Symbolically he died on the same day that Hiroshima was bombed in 1945...and by then the GOP was fully embedded with the whole notion of "Pointing with Pride, 100% Americanism, Low Taxes, High Yields, The Gallows,The Lash, Dry Sundays & No Public Improvements".
And they've stuck to that to this very day...
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment