An Extended Vomit-Based Metaphor for Our Current Political Moment

Barack Obama doesn't WANT this kid to throw up on his face, but he wouldn't really be mad at her if she did because she's an adorable baby and sometimes they do that, though it is definitely gross and he would have to change into one of his other identical suits right away.

I like to tell people the story of election night 2008, very early in our relationship, when my now-husband celebrated a little too hard* at Obama’s victory and vomited all over my bed. Luckily, I was not in it at the time. I sent him to the shower, gathered up my bedding, and threw it straight in the dumpster outside my apartment building. (Drunk me thought this was the best choice, and I stand by it, I had more sheets.) I opened the window, shut the bedroom door, and slept on the couch as he passed out on the living room floor and definitely still had some vom remnants in his hair the next morning. And though I made him clean the mattress the next day and it still bore a big stain when I finally brought it to the dump a couple of years ago, I knew this thing with us was legit because I still really, really liked him. Loved him, in fact! As I reflect upon (probably) my greatest act of selflessness NOT TO BRAG, I think about how Donald Trump has never once in his life cleaned up vomit. From anyone, much less from somebody he loves.** Not even his kids. That’s somebody else’s job; a woman's, definitely, and almost certainly someone who doesn’t get paid enough for that shit. And I bet he'd punish the offender for throwing up near him (AKA being a human person who gets sick sometimes) in some emotionally cruel way.

You know who has cleaned up somebody’s throw-up? Barack Obama. You know he’s done dad vomit duty in the middle of the night (Michelle is too classy to vomit, ever), and though it was gross and smelly and maybe he gagged a little bit as he put the sheets in the washer and they never did smell quite right ever again, he still loves the shit out of his kids. It’s just one of those things you do for people you care about sometimes because human bodies are awful and we have to take care of each other.

Anyway, he’s been cleaning up America’s vomit for the past eight years (DO YOU SEE WHAT I DID THERE?), and though I didn’t always agree with his methods, I’m grateful that he did. And even though we ruined the nice new furniture/healthcare he picked out for us and yelled “I hate you!” and slammed our bedroom door on him because this country is extremely racist, he loves America anyway. I think some of the recent surge in his poll numbers and this outpouring of affection for him at the tail end of his second term is everybody being like, “You know, I resented him at times, but I can see now that America’s dad is a fundamentally a good guy and he did his best and was always there for us.” (Joe Biden is our "cool" uncle who has def. cleaned up a LOT of vomit and was also chill about not telling on us since the hangover was "punishment enough." I mean, I have no cool uncles, but this seems like something Uncle Joe would do.)

These are some thoughts I have as one of the only presidents who is definitely a better person than me leaves office (in addition to St. Jimmy Carter, obvs, but that was before I was born). Most politicians are garbage people, but Barack Obama is kinder, more generous, more hopeful, and more humble than a piece of trash like me could ever aspire to be. And we elected him president--TWICE!*** I guess one upside(?) to tomorrow’s nightmare disaster scenario we have somehow chosen for ourselves is a sense of moral superiority I haven’t felt towards our nation’s executive leadership in several years. But even now, as the horrifying results of some kind of geopolitical game of Would You Rather (the other options were, I guess, “have your skin slowly peeled off by giant sentient beetle-men while been force-fed Four Loko and listening to Billy O’Reilly scream his erotic poetry to the tune of Nickelback songs” or “a lady I don’t like, for reasons”) takes office, Obama’s all, “I’m not mad, I’m just disappointed.” And it stings. I'm sorry, Dad. We didn’t deserve you.

Postscript: Maybe our Trump resistance efforts can involve bribing a White House employee (or somebody’s cat) to just throw up in random, hard-to-locate places in the West Wing and the residence, so it always smells just a LITTLE BIT nasty in there for the next four years.

*Definitely lots of drinks involving blue curacao and a champagne circle happened.
**Discussion point: can narcissists love?
***Good job for once (twice), guys!

Happy birthday, Mr. Lincoln!

GUYS, did you know that Abe Lincoln once had hair like Mulder from season 2 of The X-Files?

Exhibit A:

OMG this happened. Source.

Exhibit B:

At his hedgehoggiest. Source.

Double hotness (with bad hair) there for you. YOU'RE WELCOME. Here, go revisit my presidential post about Lincoln. He's so dreamy, you guys!

Mini Lincoln Review and Other Post-Holiday Ramblings

Guys, Thanksgiving was vaguely exhausting since my in-laws were in town. We went to a lot of (thrift/surplus) stores and also restaurants and a movie but we are poor and only so many comments about our poverty can be ignored before I just STFU and put it on the credit card. Note to parents of adult children: your poor kids aren't just whining (probably), they are actually poor. Please buy them Thanksgiving dinner. Also, note to dudes: if you are an adult, you should not comment on the hotness of teenage girls, especially if they are your daughter's friend. Even if you're all adults now. It's creepy as fuck. NOT THAT I AM REFERRING TO ANYTHING SPECIFIC. Also, white people, here's another pro tip: do not mention an ethnic group with a high concentration of population in a particular area and then ask, "What are they like?" This is not cool. If it were to happen in real life, that is, because I am totally being hypothetical and shit. Also: we apparently live in a sod-roofed hut on the prairie now, because I found bugs in our flour and had to take  yet another trip to the grocery store the day before Thanksgiving so I could buy all new flour and sugar and whatnot to make pie crust.

I know you are tired, Abe. Come here and I will snuggle your pain away.

We went to see Lincoln this weekend. And I really liked it. OBVS. You know how much I'm into gangly beardy dudes and also presidents and well, Lincoln in general. My second choice for baby boy name (the first one is secret, unless you know me, and then I may have drunkenly talked about it when mentioning how I want babies but I'm poor, so being drunk all the time is just more cost-effective) is Abraham. I would dress up my little Abe in overalls (little boys in overalls are the cutest thing since baby goats head-butting puppies) and maybe sometimes in little three-piece suits and a top hat. BECAUSE WHY NOT. Though I do realize a real baby would just immediately throw up all over the fake beard I've lovingly crafted out of his father's lustrous beard castoffs. But about the movie: it's mostly about passing the Thirteenth Amendment through the House of Representatives, so it was a bit like an old-timey West Wing episode. But then it got Spielberg-y cheesy sometimes and was all "St. Abe" and maybe a little too self-aware at times. But Daniel Day-Lewis is hot and Lincoln was hot, so two-in-one hotness there. SO GOOD. He should win all the Oscars. Also, smarmy, smarmy, James Spader was so, so good as a sleazy vote-buyer. Also, the mid-to-late 1800s were a prime era for amazing facial hair of all types, so that's something else to love about Lincoln.

UPDATE: I've been waiting for Ta-Nehisi to review Lincoln. Here's his first (of what I'm sure will be many and smart) thoughts.

James Madison: Jefferson II, Basically

At long last, a write-up of one of my few remaining presidents!

Just chillin' with T.Jeffz and preventing "excessive democracy."

James Madison, Jr. was born to a wealthy Virginia planter (shock, shock) in 1751. He was the eldest of twelve children, but since it was old-timey times a bunch of them died as children but whatever. J-Madz, Sr. planted tobacco and his wife Nelly Conway was the daughter of yet another planter. As a young boy, "Jemmy," as the future prez was called then, had a private tutor from Scotland. Apparently Jemmy was good at Latin and was a good student. No word on whether of not he was good at the caber toss.* Eventually Madison went to the College of New Jersey (now Princeton University), where he was a big, big nerd and did lots of debate, and was good at languages. He studied the law, but not to be a common everyday lawyer, but for public policy reasons. He served in the Virginia State Legislature in the late 1770s and at some juncture became Thomas Jefferson's protege.

He worked with Jefferson on the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom, because that's what all the cool kids were doing, and then served as the youngest delegate to the Continental Congress 1780-83. He became a delegate to the Virginia Statehouse in the mid-1780s, but became fearful of "excessive democracy" among state and local governments and was especially freaked out by Shay's Rebellion. Once a lot of people were like, "Hey this whole Articles of Confederation thing isn't working out that well," Madison was instrumental in organization what would become the Constitutional Convention. Madison was totally going to rein in those (other) rascals in the state legislatures now. His Virginia Plan became a template for the Constitution itself, though he compromised on sharing sovereignty between state and federal governments. Oh hey, thanks for the Electoral College! Haha, just kidding, everyone knows that it is officially the stupidest way to elect someone (besides caucusing, of course).

Then came the fight for ratification! And for the first and only time, Madison teamed up with Hamilton and Jay to write what would eventually be gathered together and called The Federalist Papers. At one point, Maddy debated Patrick Henry over the Constitution, who I am legally obligated to refer to as a "fiery orator," and didn't completely suck, which was surprising since Madison was usually really, really shitty at public speaking. Anyway, Madison, who by this time was managing his father's plantation Montpelier, which had lots of slaves, was totally cool with the 3/5 Compromise. Remember how he was, like, BFF with Jefferson? And then Madison wanted to be in the new federal government, but then Patrick Henry totally tried to gerrymander him out of out, but Madison beat out his future Secretary of State James Monroe for one of Virginia's seats in Congress anyway.

Dolley M. basically made up the role of First Lady.
Uh, you're welcome, Hillary Clinton.

In order to avoid calls for a new constitutional convention, now-Representative J-Madz was like, "Fine, let's make a Bill of Rights or whatever." Not exactly anti-federalism, but opposed to the Federalists, Madison helped found the first (Democratic-)Republican Party with Jefferson. Jim and Tom then were like, "Hey, this 1790s Patriot Act is bullshit, states should totally be able to declare it unconstitutional." Oh, states' rights-ers. Never too early for you to show up! But then at the ripe old age of 43, Madison got his bro Aaron Burr to introduce him to a special lady and he FINALLY got married to Dolley Payne Todd, a young widow with a son, whom Madison adopted. In 1801, Madison, Sr. finally kicked the bucket, and the future president officially inherited his plantation, along with 108 slaves. But don't worry, Jemmy never hit the slaves himself. Supposedly he didn't even have anybody else hit them. But we all know that slavery was really actually not so bad, anyway.

James Madison served as Jefferson's Secretary of State and helped negotiate the Louisiana Purchase and carried out an incredibly unpopular foreign trade embargo during the Napoleonic wars. Elected to the presidency as Jefferson's handpicked successor in 1808, Madison basically wanted to stick with whatever Jefferson had going on. This included opposing the Bank of the United States, but he ended up re-authorizing it when the U.S. had another war. Did you know that wars cost money? Between various trade issues, the British kidnapping American sailors for their navy, and Britain arming Indian tribes in the Northwest Territories of the U.S. (supposedly against the French?), Madison basically had to fight them in a stupid, pointless war. The War of 1812, everybody's favorite historical footnote. But at least lots of Indians were conquered by American heroes like our friend Tippecanoe. Americans at the time claimed they won the war and got all patriotic, while Canadians still gloat over their supposed victory. Then Madison ushered in the Era of Good Feelings, where the U.S. started focusing more on emotional and spiritual violence against Native Americans (AHEM, "civilization" projects). Which has worked out super-awesome for everybody.** And Dolley Madison was beloved and was the best hostess the world has ever known, blahblahblah.

ANYWAY, most of Madison's coolest stuff happened before his presidency. After he was president, he was kind of in debt and stuff (just like Jefferson again!) and lost his mind a little bit over his terrible finances. Despite hanging onto all his slaves (one of his few actual assets), Madison thought like many others of his time that slavery should probably be ended and free blacks shipped "back" to Africa. Madison also got really paranoid about his own legacy and would go back through his records, changing information and even editing letters written by other people to reflect his version of history. Which is...sketchy, to say the least. Anyway, J-Madz died in 1836 and his plantation, Montpelier, became a big-deal historical site. He also got a lovely city in Wisconsin named for him, as well as the location that would eventually become known as New York's Madison Square, and he was on an old-timey $5000 bill, which I would not ever want to have to carry around anywhere because it would make me awfully nervous.

But so, way to go, James! Thanks for the not-so-racist parts of the Constitution!

*'Cause his teacher was Scottish, see?
**Okay, well, most things have worked out pretty well for white people, so I guess I shouldn't be so dismissive.

Another Thing I Did Before: The Taft House in Cincinnati

On the same trip as our exciting visit to the Creation Museum back in March, Isaac and I also hit up the William Howard Taft National Historic Site, featuring a tour of President/Chief Justice Taft's childhood home and a museum that had animatronic Taft family members and strange political cartoons. This was my first time in Cincinnati, and I was able to see that there are buildings, the Ohio River, and this museum there. It was a very thorough visit. (We stayed in a hotel on the Kentucky side of the river by the airport that was full of youth soccer players and ate dinner at a generic strip mall sports bar nearby.) But I think we all know that Taft is a favorite of mine. He was a large man, mustachioed, and rumored to enjoy a good soak in the bubble bath.

The president's robot son Charlie enjoys fishing and gossiping about all his family members.

Taft was so good at being a Republican, that he sometimes turned into an elephant.

Here is where I made Isaac stand by the servants' entrance. It was a large house, but we did not get to see any bathtubs.

This is the gate in front of the pretty house. This was a busy street. The energetic tour ranger was wearing a microphone headset, which was only made slightly less awkward when a man and his young son joined us on the house tour, so then there were four of us.

I made Isaac stand by the parking lot.

I am pointing to a tiny buffalo.

This is the president's more successful son (U.S. Senator) Robert Taft, but he is not a robot, just a discolored bust in the parking lot.

I picked up a Taft/Sherman 1908 campaign button I have begun wearing on my favorite corduroy blazer. No one has asked me about it because everyone else is an uninformed, unpatriotic LOSER. All in all, not the coolest of the presidential homes I have visited here in Ohio, but worth checking off the list and buying more history nerd shit from park rangers.

President's Day: Hey, remember when I used to write awesome presidential posts?

From Iotacons by Andy Rash. Love.

Guys, today is President's Day. However, my university clearly hates both Washington and Lincoln and most especially Chester A. Arthur, so I do not have the day off. However, I do have pages of notes on a couple of presidents still floating around, awaiting my attention during another bout of procrastination, so I do mean to finish up my posts about all of them in the near future. In the meantime, I thought I'd gather them all up for your browsing pleasure so you can remember all that awesome stuff I used to write before grad school broke my soul (and some I've written in the midst of the breaking process):

0. The Articles of Confederation: America's first, failed government and pre-Washington presidency (7.10.08)
1. George Washington: Father of Functional Drug Addiction as Well as His Country (8.15.09)
2 and 3. Jefferson and Adams: America's First Frenemies? (4.24.08)
4. UPDATE: James Madison: Jefferson II, Basically (10.16.12)
5. James Monroe: College drop-out with impressive resume (3.11.09)
6. John Quincy Adams: More accomplished than George W. Bush, less successful? (10.9.09)
7. Andrew Jackson: Old Dick-ery, if you know what I mean (7.19.09)
8. Martin Van Buren: He had a lot more nicknames than terms of office (4.17.08)
9. William Henry Harrison: He didn't die of hypothermia, people (5.26.10)
10. The ascendancy of John Tyler: Possible unconstitutional coup! (11.6.08)
11. James K. Polk: America's first (and greatest) mulleted president (3.27.08)
12. Zachary Taylor: Army guy, probably not assassinated (6.17.10)
13. Millard Fillmore: Lucky(?) President Number 13 (7.19.10)
14. Drunk Franklin "Baby" Pierce, helping sectional divides right along (11.20.08)
15. James "Doughface" Buchanan: Crappy president (7.24.08)
16. Do you know him, the Abraham Lincoln? (2.12.09)
17. Andrew Johnson: Impeachably lame (5.16.09)
18. Ulysses S. Grant: America's Greekest General-President (6.12.08)
19. Rutherford B. Hayes: Uncontroversial man elected controversially (1.8.09)
      Special presidential double feature: I go to the Hayes Presidential Center
20. James A. Garfield Extravaganza Part 1 and Part 2 (06.2009)
21. Chester A. Arthur: Possibly Secretly Canadian-Born President of Civil Service Reform (09.25.08)
22 and 24. Grover Cleveland: That mustache is hiding more than a tumor! (7.28.11)
23. Benjamin Harrison: Kinda like Jenna Bush (5.22.08)
25. McKinley: America's most spineless veteran president (9.18.08)
26. Teddy Roosevelt: America's Most Cartoonish President to Date (4.3.08)
27. "Big Lub" Taft: "Presidency? Meh." (3.26.09)
28. Woodrow Wilson: I think I might've dated that guy in college (4.24.10)
29. Warren G. Harding: Tragically being stripped of his "Worst President Ever" title by the current administration (4.10.08)
      Warren G. Harding: Kind of unimpressive house, in all honesty (8.24.09)
30. Calvin Coolidge: Coolly avoiding blame for the Great Depression (6.26.08)
31. Herbert Hoover: Not actually a fake name (9.16.09)
32. FDR: You think you know, and you probably do know some of it (10.9.08)
34. DDE: Looks like a Roman numeral, but is actually a U.S. president! (3.5.09)
35. JFK: Sickly, and not in the sweet way (1.23.09)
36. Landslide Lyndon Johnson: Fraudiest president ever? (5.1.10)
37. Richard Nixon: I think we all know too much already (9.29.11)
38. Gerald Ford: Unelected jock president (5.8.08)
39. Jimmy Carter will beat us all to peanut heaven (5.17.11)
40. Ronald Reagan was a fat child (11.10.09)
41. Read my lips: No second term for you, buster. (George H. W. Bush) (10.23.08)
42. Clinton research IN PROCESS
43. GWB research TOO DEPRESSING TO START
44. I refuse to write an Obama post while he is still in office. I can't wait to write up a Future President Romney post, though!

Enjoy my friends, this long journey will end one day and I will write up VPs or states or something (didn't I start that once?). Or I'll just keep live-blogging Lifetime movies. Either way.

Richard Nixon: I think we all know too much already

If I had a mansion and an unlimited government budget, I'd build a bowling alley in my house too. So impeach me!

Richard Milhous Nixon was one of four sons born to a Quaker family in California in 1913. A sickly child, he was not a great athlete, but excelled as a debater in school, was a good student, and helped run his dad's grocery store. Though he earned a tuition scholarship to Harvard, Richard stayed close to home to help take care of his family because of sickness/death/obligation. He went to Whittier College, where he was originally snubbed by some literary douchebags and had some girflriend or something. He then earned a full scholarship to Duke University Law School. He competed with his classmates to successfully to keep his scholarship, became a school leader, and graduated third in his class. He was a try-hard to say the least.

The Richard tried to join the FBI, but eneded up being admitted to the bar and working in corporate and probate law in California. He did not want to do divorce cases, though, because single ladies who were sexually active apparently made him uncomfortable. Shock, shock. Richard M.  met his wife Pat Ryan in a local theater production. (Undubitably a less sexy situation than Who Am I This Time?) But after he wore her down, they finally got married in 1940 and later had two daughters, Tricia and Julie. They moved to D.C. and R.Nix joined the Navy in 1942 because that's what you did then. He wanted some action but ended up never seeing any combat in the South Pacific.

Then he was chosen by some smoke-filled room to represent the California 12th District in Congress, a seat he won on an anti-Communist campaign. In the House of Representatives, Nixard was on HUAC (also shock), and served a key role in the Alger Hiss case. Tricky Dick was reelected in 1948 and subsequently used more of his Communist scare tactics to win a Senate seat in 1950. He and the infamous McCarthy were totes buddies. Nixon criticized Truman's Korean War policies. Then, in a sudden promotion, Nixon was chosen as Eisenhower's running mate in 1952, and was totally willing to do all the campaign dirty work. At one point, though, he was driven to give his famous Checkers speech about the family dog in order to ward off allegations that he was accepting unauthorized campaign funds. Or something. So Dick and Ike were successful and won the executive branch that year.

Remember when dudes unironically called themselves "Dick"? Me neither.

mysterious white-ish film. BUT ANYWAY: RNix was all set to run for prez in his own right in 1960. But he had the tragic misfortune of running against one of America's most attractive presidential candidates (besides his brother who was hotter but got shot earlier in his career, if I may be so crass/complimentary). Then they debated on TV, and words no longer mattered, only the activity of one's sweat glands, and Nixon did not look cute with a 5:00 shadow and blahblahblah voter fraud and Kennedy won.

Losey McLoser Nixon moved his family back to California where he practiced law and unsuccessfully ran for governor in 1962. After Alger Hiss said some shit about him on TV, the public gained a little bit more sympathy for the DickNix, and he took the opportunity to move back East to NYC where he practiced law some more. He wouldn't run again for president in 1964, but instead supported other Losey McLoser Goldwater in '64 and Republican congressional candidates in '66. I don't know if you guys know this, but some shit happened in America during the '60s. (DUH. Didn't you watch that terrible Julia Stiles and Jerry O'Connell-starring miniseries from the '90s that Isaac used as an excuse to ask me over to his place to hang out during the one week we were only "hanging out" before we become an official couple on Facebook and everything?! Because from what I remember between disgustingly strong cups of Kamchatka and some sort of unimportant mixer is that it was terrible.) Anyway, there was some escalation in the 'Nam and RFK got killed and Johnson though it best not to run again, and basically it was the best time ever to try to be president again.

So Rilhous became the Republican nominee on the first ballot and chose little-remembered but totally resignatory VP Spiro T. Agnew as his running mate. Nix-O ran against former MACALESTER COLLEGE Poli Sci professor Hubert Humphrey and used phrases like "peace with honor" and "law and order" (totally not racist dog whistle terms about urban unrest) and something about a "secret plan" to end the war in Vietnam to win. Also, there was George Wallace who I read a biography about in a 20th century American history class a couple of years ago and he was crazy but later pretended not to be racist but seriously he was never actually going to win but was surprisingly successful but managed not to spoil this election anyway, and Nixon won. FINALLY.

As president, Ricardo Nixono went to China and made out with Mao (diplomatically), he bombed Cambodia and invaded Laos, which was totally a de-escalation of the war if he said it was. He totally overreacted to the 1971 publishing of the Pentagon Papers, interfered in Chile (sorry, Chile), signed the SALT I treaty, and let the draft end in 1973. He had some sort of doctrine in the Middle East, but sold people arms, reluctantly supported Israel, and helped bring about the first of many oil crises. He didn't object to the EPA/save the earth hippie shit brought before him, but he didn't so much like Ted Kennedy's "universal healthcare" ideas. While those one dudes were on the moon, they called President Nixon and had what was an assuredly awkward conversation. He totally did not benefit from that alleged "Southern strategy" which never existed, but he did claim his 1972 opponent George McGovern was totally for "amnesty, abortion, and acid." Though if that were true, I have to say he'd have gotten my hippie-ass vote. Unfortunately I was not to be born for over a decade.

ANYWAY: RMN got reelected HARD. But not so long after, there was this weird hotel scandal of some kind. Nixon ended up resigning over it, but luckily his handpicked successor Gerald Ford was able to pardon him for any crimes he totally unknowingly may have or have not committed. After a short but serious illness, Nixon participated in what would become political movie porn for Aaron Sorkin fans, the 1975 Frost/Nixon interviews. (Listen, if The Damn United or 30 Rock  wasn't enough to make you love Michael Sheen [not a brother of Charlie], this will. Who knew 1970s TV host smarm could be so attractive?) Anyway, he knew he'd been a sleaze. At least on some level.

Then Richard Nixon wrote a bunch of books and supported that totally obscure Reagan guy, attended the funeral of the notorious Shah of Iran, and eventually died of a stroke in 1994 in New Jersey. Richard Nixon has been played by many actors. Since I was in fourth grade when he died, two decades after he left office in disgrace, these fictional depictions are my strongest memories of him as a president. It is strange to me that though he was such an important person in recent U.S. history and our lifetimes overlapped, I don't remember anything about him outside of his historical or cultural legacy. But seriously, did I mention how fucking good Frost/Nixon was? Because I just saw that recently. He's almost a sympathetic character--who DRUNK DIALS. Not that I would ever do anything like that. Would I, friends?

Grover Cleveland: That Mustache Is Hiding More than a Tumor!

Young Cleves: dapper.

America's 22nd and 24th president Stephen Grover Cleveland was born the fifth of nine children to a Presbyterian minister and his wife in New Jersey in 1837. He never went as Stephen as an adult because Sesame Street didn't exist back then, so he couldn't be teased as Super Grover or anything. G.R.over grew up in New York state and was known as sporty type who enjoyed practical jokes. His father died in 1853, so Groves left school to try and help support his large family. His older brother got a teaching job at a school for the blind in NYC and hooked up G-roves with an assistant teaching position for a while. He was offered college scholarships if he would undertake the ministerial profession. But he said no. He probably mostly just hated Jesus.

He moved to Buffalo, NY where his uncle hooked him up with some sweet contacts. Grover became a law clerk and then passed the bar in 1859. He practiced some law and then became Assistant District Attorney for Erie County in 1863. By this time, of course, the Civil War was all "I'm raging and I swear this is totally not all about black people, but let's be honest, it is." Anyway, the Union was requiring all able-bodied dudes of a certain age to enlist unless they had money, and Grover Cleveland was like, "I do not think I want to get dirty in this war. I will pay a Polish immigrant, like, $150 to take my place." And so he did! And so he was the first president elected after the Civil War not to be a veteran. Besides Johnson, duh.

Though he made a good living lawyering it up in Buffalo, ol' Clevey lived a spartan lifestyle and sent money to support his mom and younger sisters. Despite the political currents of the time, Cleveland was all about the Democratic Party. He was elected Sheriff of Erie County in 1871, in which office he personally hanged two people. Murderers, you know, not just regular people or something. After his term as sheriff, Cleves went back to private practice and opened a firm with friends. He was elected mayor of the city of Buffalo in 1881. He was all honest and shit as a politician. He was the third choice for Democratic nominee for New York's governor in 1882, but ended up winning. He started his veto-heavy legacy here. He was against unnecessary spending and made himself many enemies with NYC's Tammany Hall. He did make friends with reform-minded Republicans of the time like TR though.

Should've kept those plaid pants buttoned up, bro!

He was nominated for president by the party in 1884 and defeated James G. Blaine with support from Mugwump Republicans. It is a funny name for a political faction! During the election, everybody was like, "Grover Clover, you totes have an illegitimate babayy!" And Cleveland's campaign was all like, "Well, he might be the father of Oscar Folsom Cleveland, so he did the stand-up thing and paid child support." Oscar Folsom (Sr.?) was his law partner, but Cleveland was single and Folsom wasn't, so he took responsibility since the mother was full of sluttiness. Anyway, some of Blaine's supporters said bad shit about Catholics and the Irish voted for Cleveland enough to win. And then he was president! He did a lot of vetoing and didn't like silver monies or the spoils system or high tariffs. He invaded less foreign countries than other presidents, but was not so racially progressive since he approved of both Chinese Exclusion and the Dawes Act and thought Reconstruction had been a waste of time.

But the big story of his first term of office was that he married Oscar Folsom's daughter Frances at the White House in 1886. She was 21 at the time and they eventually had five kids. Cleveland is the only president to get married at the White House/during his term of office. Oscar was dead by now and Cleveland had helped take care of his estate and to raise Frances. So that is kind of weird. Also, Frances' dad and husband had been fucking the same lady at the same time and either she had an illegitimate stepson named after her father and/or her husband paid child support for her half brother. So, it's a little bit incestuous, is what I am saying.

Kind of almost daughter wife?

 Back to politics! Cleveland's VP Hendricks died in 1885, so he got a new running mate for the 1888 reelection campaign who I refuse to look up. He ran against legacy candidate Benjamin Harrison, and despite winning the popular vote again, was bumped out of the Electoral College by widespread voter fraud in Indiana. Does this story sound familiar to anybody? But anyway, a defeated Cleveland moved to New York City and practiced law for a few years. He reentered public life with a letter protesting the adoption of silver-based currency in 1891. So the Democratic Party was like, "We've only gotten one dude elected in, like 35 years, so maybe we should try that Cleveland guy again." He was nominated for the presidency in 1892 with greenback-supporting Adlai Stevenson, Sr. as his running mate. President Harrison's wife was dying of TB during the campaign, so he did no personal electioneering. Out of respect for Harrison's personal situation, Cleveland didn't go out and campaign himself either. Many Republicans defected to the Populist Party candidate during this election, leading to Cleveland's third popular vote win (in a row), and second successful election.

During his second term, things kind of turned to shit in America, as they do frequently. The Panic of 1893 led to a serious economic depression and a shortage of gold meant to back up the U.S. dollar. Treasury reform led to a re-adoption of the gold standard. There was a messy congressional fight over tariff reform, but it did end up lowered somewhat. There were lots of labor problems (shock shock, workers don't like depressions), and Cleveland notoriously decided to send U.S. troops in to break up the Pullman strike. Cleveland was like, "Railroads deliver mail, and nobody fucks with the mail, and you strikers just shut up and stop bugging me or we will shoot you." The annexation of Hawaii was also pushed through Congress during Cleveland's second term, which was totally awesome and supported by native Hawaiians. Haha, just kidding, of course! Cleveland broadly interpreted the Monroe Doctrine during this term, intervening all over the place in Latin America, though he was pre-Roosevelt Corollary, so he has no foreign policies named after him.

At the beginning of his second term, though, Cleveland had some mouth cancer and got secret boat-based surgery to remove the tumor. 1. I want to read this book so hard and 2. I am also pleased that his mustache was used to hide his surgery scars and whatnot. Facial hair for the win, bitchez! Anyway, he survived and served out his term, but wasn't interested in running for a third term in 1896. He and his wife retired to their mansion in Princeton, New Jersey and he served as a trustee of Princeton for a time while Wilson was university president. At some point he told the Ladies' Home Journal that "sensible women" had no interest in suffrage. Clearly. He got sick in 1907 and ultimately died of a heart attack in 1908. He's buried in Princeton. A presidential library for him is being discussed currently in Buffalo, he appeared on $1000 bills in 1928 and 1934 (who had that much money then?), and also there is a volcano in Alaska named after him. I think the volcano wins for best legacy.

Jimmy Carter will beat us all to peanut heaven

Several months ago, I did research on former United States President James Earl Carter! I never wrote a post. Now I will do so. My last presidential post was many moons ago with my write-up of Millard Fillmore. There aren't that many left, but if I actually get back into regular history posts, I may move on to vice-presidents. Maybe! No promises because of me being lazy. Ahem. Anyway:

I would wear this shirt so hard.

Jimmy Carter was born in 1924 in Georgia. He was the first president to be born in a hospital. Fancy! He was the first of four children. His dad was a business owner, and his mom was a nurse. Jimmy Carter has deep American roots! He has ancestors that came to North America from England in, like, the 1600s and one of his great-grandfathers served in the Confederate Army. As a child, our friend Jimmy was a smarty-pants, always reading, being good at basketball, and participating in the FFA when the letters still stood for something. Jimmy went to a regional college for a few years, and eventually was accepted to the U.S. Naval Academy in 1943. He served on ships and submarines in the Atlantic and the Pacific in WWII, originally planning a naval career. In 1946, he married Rosalynn Smith, and they ultimately had four wholesome children. After his father's death in 1953, though, Jimmy resigned from the Navy and went back to Plains, GA to help run the family business. Sounds like somebody wasn't so committed to the navalling business after all.

The family business was PEANUT FARMING. For serious. Somehow Carter messed up one of his fingers in an "agricultural accident." I think we should spread rumors that he fucked it up while doing something far more sordid (dog-fighting? illegal wrestling? lusting in his heart?). Anyway, Jimmy Carter also loved Jesus A LOT. During the '60s, he worked on a local political career, challenged fraud, and became a Georgia state senator for awhile, but failed to get the Democratic nomination for governor in 1966. But then in the 1970 gubernatorial campaign (GUBER like GOOBER like PEANUTS! I am so funny.) he was more successful. He called his primary competition "Cufflinks Carl" (this is clever!) and was elected even though he was not a segregationist (all though still kind of racist). He was a relatively progressive governor considering it was early '70s Georgia what with public desegregation, not hating ladies who get legal abortions, and making social justice-y and ethical-type programs a priority. He even eventually stopped loving the death penalty.

Anyway, he was a near miss for McGovern's VP in 1972, but got the presidential nomination in 1976. And he won! And my fellow Macalester alum Walter Mondale was his vice president.* Jimmy Carter is largely famous for reporting a UFO sighting** and saying uncomfortable, ungrandfatherly-seeming things to Playboy magazine. But whatever. He was the president during a terrible time. A terrible time for fashion, for politics, and for Jimmy Carter. He granted amnesty to Vietnam War draft dodgers, brokered the Camp David Accords, and suggested people use solar panels and wear more sweaters to save on energy costs (these all sound like good things to me).*** Also though, there was that unfortunate Love Canal incident, we had oil and energy crises, we were still all Cold Warrish and boycotted the 1980 Moscow Olympics because of that whole Afghanistan situation that we would totally end up taking over in like 20 years, also there was that thing called stagflation, which is a stupid way of saying that the economy was shit. Although shitty in a different way than it is shitty now.

Okay, so maybe he's not perfect, but still pretty awesome.

Because I am a liberal hippie communist, I tend to think that while it seems maybe Jimmy Carter was a little bit too nice to be president, he inherited some pretty nasty shit. I mean, the guy before him wasn't even elected. And I actually feel bad that the Iran hostage crisis became all about fucking over Jimmy Carter and then that cowboy movie star guy totally rewarded them with secret weapons that he totally "didn't know anything about" after defeating Jimmy in the 1980 election. Not that I'm bitter on Jimmy Carter's behalf. But Jimmy Carter would never be bitter because Jesus and peanuts keep him on the straight and narrow.

Like Taft, Carter's greatest achievements came post-presidency. Jimmy and Rosalynn started the Carter Center, which helps people and works on eradicating illnesses that sound really gross like Guinea worm disease. Carter also won the 2002 Nobel Peace Prize for being awesome. He is frequently called upon to serve diplomatic missions around the world because people outside of America don't hate him too much. He also likes building houses for poor people, occasionally publicly criticizing U.S. foreign policy, hanging out with the first (and slightly less douchey) George Bush, teaching Baptist Sunday school, solving problems in Palestine, riding bikes, winning awards, speaking up for ladies in the church and generally beating everybody at getting to heaven. So maybe the late '70s were a disaster for America, but I refuse to (completely) blame Jimmy Carter. I think if we were all a little bit more like Jimmy Carter, the world would be a better place. AND I NEVER SAY SHIT LIKE THAT SO TAKE MY SINCERITY VERY SERIOUSLY BECAUSE YOU DON'T KNOW WHEN IT'LL HAPPEN AGAIN.


*We can't all be Kofi Annan or Peter Berg, but VP is still a pretty sweet achievement for a fellow Scot! Can you tell my reunion is coming up? Five years, bitchez! I think I'm finally accepting that I am this old.
**I don't know why this is a big deal. UFO literally means an unidentified object in the sky. Surely we have all seen these and not necessarily been convinced they are alien spacecrafts, no matter what the quacks on Ancient Aliens try to tell you.
***"I mean, Jimmy Carter would have an electric car by now." -Tommy Corn, I Heart Huckabees. LOVE!

Millard Fillmore: Lucky(?) President Number 13

 Majestic statue of Fillmore in Buffalo, NY. Does it look like he's "presenting" to anyone else?

You guuuyys, it's time to write about Millard Fillmore. Because I haven't yet. And also because Matty voted for him way back when I polled you guys. The only presidents left after this one are the dudes nobody wanted me to write about. This whole thing should be fun AND educational! Anyway, let's hop to it:

Millard Fucking* Fillmore was born in 1800 in a LOG CABIN in the Finger Lakes region of New York state, the second of nine children. I found out no information about his childhood, but apparently formal education was hard to come by out in the frontier in those days, since it was illegal for any building made of rough-hewn logs to contain more than three books--one of which had to be the Bible, another some sort of Indian captivity narrative, and a third one probably meant you were a little bit queer. But I digress: at fourteen, the Fillmores tired of having to feed their eldest son and farmed him out to a cloth maker as an apprentice. Millard was not so excited about this apparently, moved around apprenticing a bit, tried to get some education, and ended up clerking for a judge by his late teens who helped him begin his STUDY OF LAW. He passed the bar in 1823 and built a home in East Aurora, NY (scroll that shit down for random Fillmore/Fisher-Price connection). In 1826, Millard "Floppy Hair" Fillmore married his longtime love Abigail Powers, with whom he had two children, Millard Powers and Mary Abigail (SRSLY--could they have gotten any less creative with the names?). But whatever, nobody asks me before they do this shit.

SRSLY though: does he or does he not look like the Jim Halpert of 1820s rural New York law practice in that pic?

In 1828, the Fillmeister was elected to the New York State Assembly on an Anti-Masonic ticket. Fucking Masons. By 1832, he had moved up to the United States Congress, serving as a Whig in the House. During a break between terms in Congress, Fillmore and his friend Nathan Hall started up a successful law firm in Aurora. Fillmore went back to Congress in 1837 and served until 1843. As a Congressman, he opposed the admittance of Texas as a slave state, chaired the powerful Ways and Means Committee, and was nearly elected Speaker of the House. Fucking degenerate "Whig" John Tyler kept vetoing the bills he wrote, though. So Fillard Millmore decided to run for governor of New York state next. He lost. But then he totally got appointed as the state's comptroller and did some boring banking reform shit for awhile. During the Mexican War, he pulled a George W. Bush and joined the New York militia and never really had to do anything. Also, he started the University of Buffalo, which eventually become a SUNY school and is, like, really big or something.

But on to the thrilling political maneuverings of the 1848 Whig National Convention! Haha, just kidding. Weak-stomached war hero Zachary Taylor got the nomination, but the supporters of his rival Henry Clay managed to get Fillmore on the ticket as VP because he was from a populous AND non-slave-holding state. (Gotta balance that shit out.) Though supposedly the Fillbot was opposed personally to slavery, he thought it best to allow the new territories seized from Mexico to be open to slavery (he called it an "existing evil") so the South would be APPEASED.** Oh, and they won the election. Millman presided over the Senate as VP during those crazy days of debating the Compromise of 1850. So much wacky shit went down on the floor of the Senate in those days, like this guy pulling guns on people and whatnot. Anyway, as we know, President Taylor died suddenly in July of 1850 and after his ascendancy to the top office, Fillmore declared his support for the latest version of the Compromise, allowing it to pass with the infamous Fugitive Slave Act.***

I'm not suggesting we bring back slavery for more Senate-floor excitement, but they still know how to do it in Ukraine and South Korea. Aren't you glad we saved them from Communism?

But so blah blah blah, Fillmore pissed off the Whigs by bringing in his own cabinet instead of retaining that of his deceased predecessor and by compromising left and right with Democrats and Southerners and Mexicans and whatnot. He tried to hold his party and the country together over the slavery shit, and it kind of seemed like it was working for awhile right after he signed the Compromise bills into law. In the meantime, Millard Fillingstation played the careful diplomat when it came to relations with Mexico in the post-war era and with Cuba and the various European powers vying for its control (also, the South wanted it for slavery, but the U.S. wouldn't conquer that shit for another forty-five years or so). He did some other stuff that's not really that interesting while in office. Oh, but apparently when Fillmore moved into the White House, there were like no books there (I told you Taylor couldn't read!), so the Millman took it upon himself to start the White House Library, which as we now know, is full of socialist propaganda.****

Annnyway, the Whigs probs could've taken back the White House if Filliment and his popular Secretary of State Daniel Webster had teamed up, but they wouldn't do it. So Millard was denied the nomination in 1852. Instead, we ended up with this winner in the White House. So Fillmy went back to New York, focusing on his position as chancellor of the University of Buffalo, and at some point declined an honorary doctorate from Oxford because he couldn't read it. (That's actually the real reason, though it was in Latin.) As the 1850s wore on, the Know-Nothings AKA the Tea Party/KKK of those days, formed the "American" Party for the 1856 presidential election. Fillmore took up their anti-Catholic/anti-immigrant/anti-your face mantle and ran for a second term. Though he pulled in an impressive 21.6% of the popular vote, the third-partier ultimately lost to the Doughface. So Millardpants stayed in New York, founding and presiding over the Buffalo Historical Society, opposing Lincoln like only an asshole would, pretending to do stuff in the militia but only in New York during the Civil War, and eventually dying of complications from a stroke in 1874, having watched the Civil War come and go. Apparently Millard, Jr.'s will stipulated that most of his father's papers and correspondence be destroyed upon his death, so we don't really have much that he wrote. I doubt there was really anything interesting in there, anyway.***** But so the best parts of Fillmore's legacy are undoubtedly the H.L. Mencken bathtub hoax, the ensuing annual bathtub races as part of Moravia, NY's "Fillmore Days," (sadly not featured on their rudimentary website) and this "comic" atrocity.

*Wikipedia lists no middle name, so I'll just make some up. As usual.


**Millard Fillmore now = Hitler. Or France. Whatever.


***The Compromise was actually a series of five separate but related bills meant to appease the North and the South and slavery's advocates and its opponents. But whatever, law-making is boring--besides the pistol-drawing parts.


****Now Millard Fillmore = Karl Marx. Or at least Trotsky.


*****BTWs, still eagerly awaiting the release of these papers.

Zachary Taylor: Army Guy, Probably Not Assassinated

General Zachary Taylor, in uniform, all "Rough and Ready" to kill Indians and Mexicans, be a slaveowner, and die of contaminated cherries or something.

So, you know how all the early presidents were, like, the sons of wealthy plantation owners from Virginia? Well, so was Zachary Taylor, our twelfth president and second cousin to James Madison our fourth president and distant relative to thirty-second president FDR and also future Confederate General/God/Hero Robert E. Lee! Also, Taylor was a direct descendent of some Mayflower passenger guy. So we're talking pedigree here, people. Pedigree.* All this according to the 'Pedia, obvs. Anyway, he was born on a farm in Virginia in 1784 and his dad totally served with Washington during the Revolution. Zachary was one of nine children and actually spent most of his childhood living in a family cabin on the Kentucky frontier. (Suck on that log cabin authenticity, William Henry Harrison!) He never really had much of a formal education, just tutors his father hired from time to time. Rumor has it that he was not a very good student anyway, so when he was grown up, he did what all good functional illiterates do: join the military. Luckily, Taylormade had family connections (again, Madison), and got a sweet commission as a first lieutenant.**

In the army during the War of 1812/various Indian wars, he led some troops and stuff. He served in Indiana fighting against Tecumseh either with or very near to the aforementioned WH Harrison. Our boy Zachary actually personally accepted the surrender of Chief Black Hawk at the conclusion of the creatively-named Black Hawk War which basically stemmed out of Harrison's prodigious "land-stealing through sketchy treaties" abilities while the territorial governor. Later, TayTay became a brigadier general and led troops against the Seminole in Florida upon the orders of King of the Jackasses Andrew Jackson. But Taylor didn't become a big-time war hero until our friend James K. "Manifest Destiny" Polk sent him to guard the Texas-Mexican border in 1845.*** He fought and defeated Santa Anna's troops at the Battle of Buena Somethingorather and became famous for riding around his aptly named horse "Old Whitey."**** His military nickname, "Old Rough and Ready" not only sounds like it should be the subject line of penis enhancement spam, but also spawned (heh) clubs across the country that sought to "draft" him for the presidency. Because that worked out so awesome with our friend Tippecanoe.

Taylor's pre-politics politics were basically non-existent. Like, he never voted before he ran for president. He considered himself an "independent" or some shit (What is he? fucking Ike?). Though he leaned toward the Whig party, apparently. Though Zachariahhh was actually a slave owner on his Louisiana plantation, he was mostly anti-slavery expansion into new territories. Sounds a little wishy-washy to me. But whatever. Oh, also he was married to a lady named Margaret in 1810 and they had six kids. Their son Richard went on to serve as a general in the Confederate army. Also, one of his daughters was briefly married to Jefferson Davis in 1835 until she died of malaria. So... awesome. But back to politics! In 1848, the Democratic Party basically split over slavery and some dude who got the nomination was like "Let's just not talk about it," but then washed-up former prez Martin Van Buren led a faction of "free soilers" who believed that the expansion of slavery into the western territories should be stemmed.

This incomprehensible cartoon depicting the 1848 presidential election either means the artist was on crack (or opium AKA "antebellum crack") or politics have just always been this ridiculous. BTW, who is the fox? Is that Van Buren? Is the turkey the presidency? WTF? I shouldn't bother to try and understand.

Whatever, so our Whig-nominated friend Zack Attack won the election blahblahblah. While in office, he helped organize the Department of the Interior and encouraged California and New Mexico to write anti-slavery clauses into their constitutions when they applied for statehood. There was some sort of controversy with Britain over control of a possible canal through Nicaragua that never got built (obvs), and they signed some important treaty or something about it. Congress at the time was of course consumed by slavery issues and were debating the various merits of the (disastrous) Compromise of 1850 when the unthinkable happened: President Zachary Taylor suddenly fell ill and died July 9, 1850. Supposedly from "gastroentiritis" or something. It may have involved milk and cherries or something. The doctors did apply their best bleeding, blistering, opium-doping, and other sweet contemporary medical procedures to try and save him; but to no avail. But OF COURSE not everyone believes it was just a real bad stomachache that killed him. Some people think he was POISONED. By a constituent at a Fourth of July picnic. Which actually would be kind of awesome if they had pulled it off and nobody ever found out (in the abstract--assassinations are only for foreign leaders). So in a move that (retroactively) pleases X-Philes the world over, some professor lady got permisison to exhume his body back in 1991. Take a drink!***** They concluded that he probs wasn't poisoned but died of some cherry/milk/open sewers in the D.C. summer/cholera somethingorather. Anyway, that's not that exciting, except for the part where they dug him up. He was reburied in the national cemetary named for him in Kentucky. Zachary Taylor also holds the honor of the being the last president to own slaves while in office. So, that's prestigious.


*Haha, see? The dog food. Right?
**BTWs, I just recently realized why that word is spelled so funny: its etymology is showing! It means an officer who is in charge (the tenant) in LIEU of the presence of someone of higher rank. See? Words are crazy, ppl.
***You GUYS: I started U.S. Grant's charming memoirs and he talks about serving under Taylor in Texas. Though Grant respects Taylor as a general, he was pretty down in general on the whole "let's provoke a war with Mexico so we can have Texas and fill it with slaves" aspect of the Mexican-American War. So, like, the whole thing.
****I don't know why this is supposed to be apt, except I guess for Taylor being an "Old Whitey" himself when elected president like every other president except that Muslim guy we have now.
*****X-Files Drinking Game "exhumation" rule. There is also one for any time somebody says the word "exsanguination." I think it's time to start that series over and watch it all the way through again.

William Henry Harrison: He Didn't Die of Hypothermia, People

You can thank Louis Daguerre for the existence of this photographic rendering. Gotta respect that schnozz, though. Big-nosers, unite!

There are probably a few things you know about William Henry Harrison.* They might be:

1. He refused to wear a coat during his inauguration and died of pneumonia a month later.
2. He was known as ol' "Tippecanoe" from his army days.
3. He was heavily invested in log cabin and hard cider society.

Well, my friends, I have done copious amounts of reading of the WHH Wikipedia entry and skimming a couple of others, and I am here to set the record straight about at least these three things:

1. Both of these facts are true, but medical science tells us that the first cannot have actually CAUSED the second.
2. This one is true. The name comes from the Battle of Tippecanoe against some Indians that launched Harrison to national fame. However, Harrison's federal forces only technically won--they were tactically outmaneuvered.
3. WHH was actually a richie richface who was not born in nor ever lived anywhere near a log cabin and who was so uncool that he claimed his brief foray into the distillery business had been a "sin" and led him to swear off alcohol forever.

These explanations and more on our William Henry Harrison journey below!

Willie was born to an aristocratic planter family in Virginia in 1773. He was the youngest of seven children and part of a great political dynasty. His father, Benjamin Harrison V (besides running a plantation) served in the Continenal Congress, signed the Declaration of Independence, and eventually became the Governor of Virginia.Wihenry was bounced around to various fancy schools, even studying medicine for awhile, but educational funds dried up when his father died in 1791. Of course, the youngest Harrison now had to prove he was his own man, so he joined the army. He was stationed in Cincinnati and fought in the "Battle for Ohio" AKA "expel the Indians from this sweet acreage we want to farm and shit." William Henry Harrison was basically really awesome at being disciplined in the army, so he got lots of promotions. He worked his way up to lieutenant and served as an aide-de-camp** and was even a signatory of the Northwest Indian War-ending Treaty of Greenville. Because of that treaty, my lucky little white grad student ass has an Ohio to live in and fund my education. Sorry, Native American tribes who lived here first!

When his mother died in 1793, William inherited some 3000 acres and a few slaves, all of which he sold off to one of his brothers because he was too busy soldiering for that nonsense. Two years later, he met Anna Symmes, the daughter of a disapproving judge, with whom he eloped and eventually had ten children. Though nine of the kids actually lived into adulthood, Anna spent the majority of her marriage to William sick in bed, you know, pregnant. Anna's father eventually came around and gave them some land in what is now North Bend, Ohio, where they had a bit of a farm. Soon Bill embarked upon his seemingly inevitable political career when he was appointed as the Secretary of the Northwest Territory, where he was basically the acting governor most of the time.

Over the years, Wee Willie built up his local reputation through a successful horse breedery (gross) and became popular for his outspoken support of lower land prices to spur more immigration into the Northwest Territory.*** In 1799, he became a delegate to the House of Representatives (contrary to popular belief, not actually housed in a log cabin) for the territory. Even without official voting rights, Harrison managed to push through the Harrison Land Act, which helped make land easier to purchase in small parcels and divided Ohio from the new Indiana Territory (which encompassed what is now Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, and parts of Minnesota). President John Adams nominated Harrison to be the new territory's governor, so WHH moved his family to Vincennes (now in southwest Indiana) and built a plantation-type house called "Grouseland," which doesn't really sound like somewhere you'd want to visit (note: not a log cabin). Anyway, once Jefferson came to power, he gave Harrison the authority to negotiate Indian treaties. The future prez presided over thirteen different treaties that ceded over 60 million acres of native lands to the United States. For some reason, these transactions were fraught with tension. Especially the notorious Treaty of Fort Wayne, which basically involved the Miami tribe selling off land to the U.S. that didn't really belong to them to begin with and various briberies and getting-drunk-of the various native factions. That pissed some Indian persons off, for some reason. Oh, also, Harrison totally tried to open up the territory to slavery but infamous slave-raper Thomas Jefferson blocked his efforts, for some reason.

Fact: the uniform was added later to this 1800 portrait, after that whole "war hero" thing happened.

Anyway, that whole Fort Wayne thing kind of blew up in Harrison's face a little bit when Shawnee Indian Tecumseh and his prophet brother were like, "Um, no you cannot have all this land." So they rode over to Grouseland and basically threatened Harrison with war and tried to get the various tribal groups to give up their Europeanized ways and unite against the white settlers before it was too late. Which was, you know, actually a good idea. Anyway, tensions tensions tensions and eventually Tecumseh had his own war named after him and Harrison was all gung-ho about armying against Indians again and their forces clashed at the Battle of Tippecanoe. Though the U.S. forces won, Harrison found himself at odds with the Department of War, and the battle raised stakes with Britain, who were strategically allying themselves with many of the involved Indian tribes in an attempt to cut off U.S. territorial expansion. The Tippecanoe battle made Harrison a national hero of sorts and, of course, earned him his nickname. This fighting kind of blended into what became the War of 1812 against Britain, and Harrison spent his time fighting Indians in Indiana and led the construction and naming of Fort Meigs right here in my neck of the woods (I have somehow not yet visited this historical site. Note to self...). Anyway, Hairyson and Tecumseh faced off again at the Battle of the Thames, where Tecumseh was killed. Following these victories, the Department of War basically demoted him, and he resigned in a huff, though he played a key role in postwar treaties.

His soldiering days finally behind him, Harrison served in the House of Representatives for real this time for Ohio, which was now a state. Then he served in the state senate, then lost some other races, but in 1824 was elected to the U.S. Senate and was lovingly known as "Buckeye" to his Ohioan constituents during his term of office. He then served as the minister to Colombia, which he totally thought was a trashy country. But that's probably only because he was too uptight to try the cocaine (Amirite? Colombia? Cocaine? Comedy gold, people.). After his South American diplomatic stint, Hankison settled back into life on the North Bend farm, not really earning much money, except when people wanted to write books about his life and paid him for the rights. Did you know that there were twelve entire books written about this man even before he was elected president? People apparently love to read about dudes who kill and defraud Indians. For awhile, to earn cash, he opened a corn and whiskey distillery, but because getting drunk seemed like too much fun, Harrison closed it down and repented of his grave transgression.

WHH ran for president for the first time in 1836 as the northern Whig candidate. The party was trying to head off the seemingly inevitable election of Jackson protege and heavily-nicknamed Martin Van Buren by running several different candidates, attempting to divide up the electoral college votes and force the contest into the House of Representatives, where the Whigs hoped to gain a majority. Needless to say, this plan failed spectacularly (they didn't even take the House). Luckily for our friend Billy, Van Buren's term of office came to be typified by his reputation as "Van Ruin," having presided over the disastrous economic Panic of 1837. So, Harrison decided to run again in 1840, this time with the Whigs united behind him. He ran on his heroic military record and played up his tough guy frontier reputation. His campaign touted log cabins and hard cider, which as we have seen, was pretty much the opposite of reality. He basically pulled a G.W. Bush, posing as a Jacksonian "common man" type, despite being born into a political dynasty with that old silver spoon in his mouth (I'm surprised more rich babies don't have gag reflex issues because of that). Here's a classic campaign song:

Old Tip he wore a homespun coat, he had no ruffled shirt-wirt-wirt,
But Matt he has the golden plate, and he's a little squirt-wirt-wirt!

Apparently "wirt-wirt" was the tobacco-spitting cue. Gross. Anyway, Harrison beat Van Buren in an electoral college landslide. Probably because of the tobacco song.

The only accurate thing about this campaign poster is WHH hanging out with military dudes. But SRSLY, anxious masculinity much?

March 4, 1841 was the day of Harrison's infamous inauguration. It was rainy, cold, and windy, but to keep up his old "Tippecanoe" rugged manly man image, he refused to wear a coat or a hat. He spoke for over two hours and then walked around in a parade. He did not immediately fall ill, however. As soon as he got into office, the man spent the vast majority of his time fighting off eager office-seekers and trying to convince influential Whig Henry Clay that he was not actually the co-president. On March 26 (NOTICE: three weeks AFTER the inauguration), Harrison got sick with a cold, which eventually turned into pneumonia. Unable to rid himself of the parade of spoils seekers, the president did not take off the appropriate time to get well. He basically got no rest, and even though doctors treated him with opium (awesome!), he never did recover. On April 4, 1841, William Henry Harrison died of pneumonia, jaundice (yellow!), and  septicemia (some sort of vaguely-defined blood inflammatory something or rather). His presidential reign lasted only 31 days. He was buried in Ohio while the executive branch of the government was thrown into a bit of a constitutional crisis with the ascendancy of Vice President Tyler, Too. Besides holding the record for the shortest term in office, Harrison was the first president to be photographed (as seen up top). Also, he has his own curse. Way to be so sickly, William Henry Harrison. At least your political legacy was carried on by your illustrious grandson and 23rd U.S. President Benjamin Harrison!


*If you are reading my blog I'm assuming you're at least a part-time history nerd and thus at least know he is a former U.S. president.
**Assistant to some fancy brass.
***Can you imagine anyone today trying to ENHANCE immigration?