Categories History

The Little Church In The East Room

As the first streaks of dawn quietly announced the arrival of morning on Sunday, November 16, 1969, a 35-year old preacher from Ohio named Harold Rawlings had already been awake for a while after a fitful night of what-could-barely-be-called sleep in a room at Washington, D.C.’s storied Mayflower Hotel. He Continue Reading

Categories American Politics

Palin, Nixon, And The “Secret Plan”

At CQ Politics, Jonathan Allen contrasts Sarah Palin and Richard Nixon.  “Palin doesn’t have Nixon’s interest in, or knowledge of, foreign affairs,” he writes. “Imagine the reaction if Palin suggested she had a “secret plan” to win the war in Afghanistan.”  He is undoubtedly right on his major point, but Continue Reading

Categories Frost/Nixon

F/N Gathering Its Rosebuds While, And Where, It May

As RN often equably observed, his books could always count on at least a couple of hundred thousand sales because the cons —who were eagerly anticipating delicious new Nixonian excesses and outrages— were as likely to buy them as were the pros —who were patiently awaiting the latest expressions of Continue Reading

Categories American Politics

Gen ‘08

In the July 30 “New Republic,” Michael Crowley has a thoughtful profile of McCain right-hand man, co-author, and speechwriter Mark Salter. Here’s the 53-year-old Iowan’s challenge as he heads to to his cottage in Maine to work on Sen. McCain’s acceptance speech at the GOP convention: Salter hints the speech Continue Reading

Categories American Politics

The Great Pennsylvania Debate – in McKeesport

Presidential debates, especially the intra-party variety we are witnessing these days, are frequent to the point of becoming common place, if not benign. They seem to prove what Marshall McLuhan said about medium equaling message. The recent gotcha-fest between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama could make even the wildest political Continue Reading