The current grumbling about the votes or caucuses in Iowa is evidence that the more things change, the more they stay the same. Perhaps some shenanigans were pulled. But then, most of them are politicians—so what do you expect?
How about this: Eugene Debs is the only person to run a presidential campaign while serving time in prison. He ran on the Socialist Party ticket in 1920. (Does that bring to mind someone running today?) Debs got a large number of voters to vote for him, but lost to Warren G. Harding, who received more. Debs was serving a ten-year sentence for publicly criticizing the government’s highly questionable use of the Espionage Act to prosecute citizens.
As a member of the National Speakers Association, I was pleased to make a personal acquaintance with Charlie “Tremendous” Jones at one of our meetings. He was a large speaking presence. During his presentation he actually picked on me!
Abraham Lincoln has been considered by some to be the greatest President America has had to date. Yes, he was great, but he was a lawyer after all. I still think that George Washington was the greatest overall. But I still love stories about honest Abe. Including this one:
My wife has been asking me what I want to do now that I’m retired. The other night I woke up at about 2 or 2:30 with a thought on my mind. It seemed important to me at that time in my groggy condition. So what did I do? I got out of bed, went into my office, found a scrap of paper and a pencil and wrote down my thought.
I always think it’s interesting that George Washington solemnly stated that it would be unwise to have political parties. He thought we should all be Americans and want what’s best for America. Little did he know that Americans disagreed on that score more than on the weather.
One thing about Benjamin Franklin is that he finished much better than he had started out. If you’ve read his Autobiography, which I hope by now you have, you know that Ben left his family, his brother’s printing business, and his city of Boston, at the early age of 17. And that with only a few pennies to his name.
One of Franklin’s favorite sayings was: “All education is self-education.” Meaning you must develop personal learning habits in your personal and professional life. We should fill our minds with reading and then process what we have been reading and learning.
Yesterday I advised you not to become a snollygoster. Then I went to my dictionary and defined snollygoster for you. It is a clever unscrupulous person. A person who is smart and clever, but who has no scruples.