h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

The President doesn't have any say in the Constitutional Amendment process. It's Congress and the states - he didn't give women the right to vote. He didn't personally like suffragettes and was slow to come around to the cause.

I'm not saying that Wilson wasn't a good President overall - I think he was. He was one of the great Progressives, but I don't kno, I'm just not comfortable writing about racism. I tried an entry on Woodrow Wilson once (nothing out of the ordinary, I think I've started and given up on an entry on all of earth's six billion by now) but couldn't bring myself to write some of it. I don't think it featured prominently in LBJ or Tricky Dick's entries, but now that I've had this conversation, I know I'd have to do it in the .

Plus, just listing a bunch of accomplishments doesn't make for interesting writing or reading and I can't think of what else I'd write for Wilson to keep it from becoming a wikipedia article.

I didn't say he was responsible for the ratification of the 19th Amendment. I said it happened during his administration.

So you're saying there was nothing interesting about the man?

Good grief. There are almost 2000 researchers signed-on. I hardly ever go to who's online, but I've never seen more that 500 before.

No, I know. But I felt an implication that I wanted to squash

Well, I'm sure that there are interesting things about him... It's complicated when I'm writing an entry. Among other reasons, things have to be just right in putting together a personalized format and content arrangement or I'll get frustrated and give up.

Yeah, it's mostly message board folk. I don't think they're all hootooers. I think most of them aren't, in fact.

Besides, what is, is. (Depending on what the meaning of 'is' is, of course.) Racism and sexism are unfortunate parts of history. Refusing to talk about it doesn't make it go away. What you do in a situation like that is segue into it ---- an otherwise remarkable career was tarnished by Wilson's personal views concerning race.

But you shouldn't write articles that don't interest you. This is supposed to be fun.

No, I know. It's more complicated than that, I promise. I choose to write about topics that let me write about them the way I want to write. (eh?) If I just picked topics, I might as well just blindfold myself, spin around and write about whatever I'm looking at when I take the blindfold off.

True. Ok. You want impressions of Eisenhower from someone who remembers when he was in office. Ike was the first president I actually remember. (Truman doesn't count because I only remember him as a former president.)

I am trying to separate what I actually remember about the period from the adult perspective I have now.

He was very soft-spoken. Wasn't a dynamic speaker.
He always seemed pleasant and grandfatherly.
He was shown on TV news a lot - usually on the golf course. There were lots of jokes about him playing golf so much.

Eisenhower was often referred to as a mediocre president. You have to remember that the news media were more respectful of the office in those days and didn't do a lot of personal targeting and muckraking like they do today. It was commonly believed that he left much of the actual policy making to Dulles.

I remember the 'I Like Ike" jingles. And what the campaign buttons looked like.

He disliked Nixon - passionately. A lot of people thought he should have helped Nixon when he ran against JFK.

I remember comments that always began with "Ike was a great general and I admire him for that, but....." On the other hand, people were comfortable with him in the White House.

In spite of Leave it to Beaver and later programs portraying the 50's as a gentler, safer era, you should think about the reality of living with monthly duck and cover drills at school, family escape plans and ads in the newspapers for fallout shelters. My generation was the first one to grow up with the threat of planetary annihilation hanging over our heads. While Ike played golf, the Soviets locked up Eastern Europe, the cold war became very nasty indeed and the arms race was off and running.

I think I can use two or three of those

I can just imagine the segue into the last quote - "Some people are more critical of Ike now that the hero-worship has subsided. Take, for instance, the impressions of this deranged woman from Missouri-"

I will probably use the last one. I might be able to work the first two into the body, but they're not substantial or personal enough to blockquote.

Thanks

I should have posted that on the other thread. Oops.

Is that good enough or do you want something else? Don't leave out Brown vs. the Board of Education.

I am taking this conversation to the Eisenhower thread.

I'm not even into the Presidency yet
Don't worry about threads. I think we've scared the rest of 'em off by now

Everyone...........coooooooooooooooooome baaaaaaaccccccccckkkkkk!

We won't do it again.....promise.

She just doesn't want to be locked in a thread with me alone.

Saaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaveee meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!

*ties her to the railroad tracks*

Do I look like my name is Pauline?

About Ike:
'He was shown on TV news a lot - usually on the golf course. There were lots of jokes about him playing golf so much'

One of the golf magazines I've read at one point or another created a button for him that read 'Don't ask what I shot' or something to that effect.

He also has a tree named after him at Augusta National (because he always hit it).

Of course he lived in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania at the end of his life and his home is part of the National Park system down there.

And last but not least, he is somehow related to my wife's family.

Gettysburg... I think I remember reading about that place

So you're almost related to Ike? Well, that's something.

I think I'm going to have to make a section on golf at this rate.
Ooh

Are you a golfer? Does caddy for you?