As it becomes more and more evident that Mitt Romney will be the
Republican presidential nominee, a strange thing is happening;
strange as in outlandish, but not surprising. For the past year or
so, the liberal media has been panting for his nomination as if
they were in his employ. He couldn’t have hired more efficient hit
men to belittle his rivals or besmirch their reputations. But, as
we have seen many times before, this honeymoon is about to come to
an abrupt end when they will turn on him faster than warm
mayonnaise.
This of course will be explained away by noting that Romney will
be “running to the right” in the general election, and will thus be
transformed from a smooth and articulate business executive into a
numbskulled, knuckle-dragging Neanderthal. And without fail, he
will be labeled with the most damning words in the liberal lexicon:
incurious and un-nuanced. He will be subjected to various and
sundry spelling and geography tests by the same folks who got the
vapors over Dan Quayle’s “potatoe,” yet batted nary an eyelash over
Barack Obama’s “57 states.” Yes, you can bet that the keyboards of
these paragons of journalism will be working overtime reworking
their Mitt bios.
Which caused me to wonder: what if today’s leading lights of
liberal punditry were to describe some our first presidents and
apply their poison pens thusly? Come to think of it, the following
blurbs can probably already be found right in your children’s
history books.
George Washington: A Southern aristocrat who
was born to the purple yet cloaked himself in the same false
humility as his namesakes in the Bush family, he was purported to
be so honest as to have confessed to chopping down a cherry tree,
and so athletic that he threw a silver dollar across the Potomac
River. Yet our sources have revealed that it was his starving
slaves who ravaged the tree, while the tossing of currency was an
apocryphal example of his noted profligacy.
While he was famous for promoting his own extreme religious
views, as a general he launched a unilateral and unprovoked sneak
attack against German immigrants sold into military service by
their greedy princes, on their holiest day of the year.
Best Attribute: Was said to be a prolific dancer and an able
horseman.
Most outrageous quote: “The very atmosphere of firearms anywhere
and everywhere restrains evil interference — they deserve a place
of honor with all that’s good.”
John Adams: Was primarily known as the author
of the Alien and Sedition Acts; the most nefarious legislation the
nation had ever known until surpassed by the even more restrictive
Patriot Act of 2001. Was admitted to the bar after graduating
Harvard, although there is no record of his having published
anything in the Law Review. His most famous case was the acquittal
of three soldiers who gunned down an unarmed African American
community organizer.
Was also notable for having appointed John Marshall as Chief
Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, who, in the famous case,
Marbury v. Madison, somehow decided that the Courts should
be able to decide the constitutionality of laws passed by Congress.
This decision has, of course, subsequently been disclaimed by more
qualified Constitutional experts.
Best Attribute: Although he was self-admittedly “obnoxious and
disliked,” it was nonetheless rumored that most of his
pre-presidential decisions were made by his wife.
Most outrageous quote: “We have no government armed with power
capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and
religion… Our Constitution is designed only for a moral and
religious people. It is wholly inadequate for any other.”
Thomas Jefferson: Best known as the author of
the Declaration of Independence through which he established the
separation of Church and State. And although he was a notorious
enemy of a strong federal government, he nonetheless expanded U.S.
power by seizing nearly one million square miles of land that was
rightfully the property of Native Americans, via the so-called
Louisiana Purchase.
Best Attribute: His record of speaking against slavery while
owning hundreds of slaves himself, was greatly mitigated by his
marriage to his household slave Sally Hemings, with whom he had six
children; subsequently freeing all of them and providing for them
in his will.
Most outrageous quote: “But with respect to future debt; would
it not be wise and just for that nation to declare in the
constitution they are forming that neither the legislature, nor the
nation itself can validly contract more debt, than they may pay
within their own age, or within the term of 19 years?”
Note: All biographical content is the responsibility of the
anonymous authors, although any inaccuracies may well be accounted
for on next week’s New York Times Corrections
page.
