October 22, 2008
Maui Curmudgeon, U.S. Presidents
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By the Maui Curmudgeon (41st in a 43-part series)
How do the U.S. Presidents stack up? I thought I’d find out by reading biographies of all 42 presidents, in the order of their administrations. Here are briefly the pros and cons of my discoveries, the interesting bits, and how I’d rank him. For comparison, I give you the 1982 Murray-Blessing ranking, a survey of hundreds of leading historians who ranked each president by number. This survey is the gold standard of presidential rankings and is most cited when this kind of thing needs bringing up in media.
GEORGE HERBERT WALKER BUSH: 1989-1993 ~ 41st U.S. President
One of the deans of American political journalism – Jack Germond – has talked with every president from Truman to Clinton. Though he disagreed with the politics of several of the men, he generally found he could find something to like on a personal level with all of them – except with George H.W. Bush. Germond says Bush was nothing more than “an empty suit”, someone who he was sure had merely wanted the presidency for something exciting to add to his resume.
I remember a debate Bush was having with Clinton wherein Bush, in the background as Clinton stood and talked in the foreground, looked at his wristwatch, as if he were missing a nice winetasting and the brie was going over soft, and he’d rather be there than talking to America. Bush was always that out of touch.
Read the rest…
October 22, 2008
> MAUI TODAY
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 National Nut Day
Day 296 of 2008
70 days left in this year
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HAWAIIAN WORD OF THE DAY —
Ho’opunipuni: False
PIDGIN WORD OF THE DAY
— Winom kot: Acquitted
HAWAIIAN PROVERB OF THE DAY
— “The stars are the spies of heaven.”
HAOLE SAYING OF THE DAY —
“We’re putting this in God’s hands, that the right thing for America will be done at the end of the day on Nov. 4.” – Sarah Palin
ISLAND NEWS Archives
October 22, 1945: In what would be his last appearance in his own production of “This is the Army,” Irving Berlin sings “Oh How I Hate to Get Up in the Morning” to an audience on Maui. The Maui visit was the last in an around-the-world tour of the show, which lasted more than 18 months. When his ovation stopped, Berlin thanked everyone and expressed his hope that he would never again have to write another war song. He never did. He had written the song for World War I, just 27 years earlier. He expressed his dismay that that war had not stuck.
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EVENTS ON THIS DAY — October 22nd
1746 Princeton University (NJ) received its charter
1797 Andr‚-Jacques Garnerin makes 1st parachute jump from balloon (Paris)
1836 Sam Houston inaugurated as 1st elected pres of Republic of Texas
1875 Sons of the American Revolution organized
1883 1st NY Horse Show held (Madison Sq Garden)
1883 Original Metropolitan Opera House (NYC) grand opening (Faust)
1906 3000 blacks demonstrate & riot in Phila
1922 Lucerne Street in the Bronx named
1922 Parsifal Place laid out in Bronx, named for knight in Wagner’s Opera
1928 Pres Hoover speaks of “American system of rugged individualism”
1936 1st commercial flight from mainland to Hawaii
1938 1st Xerox copy made
1939 1st TV NFL game-Eagles vs Dodgers
1949 200 killed in train derailment near Nowy Dwor Poland
1950 LA Rams beat Baltimore Colts 70-27
1953 Laos gains full independence from France
1954 West Germany joins North Atlantic Treaty Organization
1962 JFK imposes naval blockade on Cuba, beginning missile crisis
1962 Pacific Science Center opens at Seattle Center
1963 225,000 students boycott Chicago schools in Freedom Day protest
1966 USSR launches Luna 12 for orbit around Moon
1968 Apollo 7 returns to Earth
1969 KAPN-AM in Santa Barbara CA changes call letters to KDB-AM
1972 Oakland A’s 1st championship; beat Reds, 4 games to 3 in 69th World Series
1973 Security Council Resolution 338-cease fire to the Yom Kippur War
1974 Yanks trade Bobby Murcer to Giants for Bobby Bonds
1975 Cin Reds beat Boston Red Sox, 4 games to 3 in 72nd World Series
1975 Soviet spacecraft Venera 9 soft-lands on Venus
1975 World Football League disbands
1976 Rick Barry (SF), begins then longest NBA free throw streak of 60
1977 International Sun-Earth Explorers 1 & 2 launched into Earth orbit
1978 Laugh-in’s Judy Carne arrested at Gatwick Airport for drug possession
1979 Deposed Shah of Iran arrives in NY for medical treatment
1979 Walt Disney World’s 100-millionth guest
1980 New South Korean constitution comes into effect
1981 Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization decertified
1981 US national debt tops $1 trillion
1984 NFL quarterback Ken Stabler retires
1984 Paul McCartney releases “Give My Regards to Broad Street” soundtrack
1988 Elton John sells out MSG for a record 26th time
1988 Supreme Ct Justice Sandra Day O’Connor OK after breast cancer surgery
1989 Denver Nuggets beat Jugoplastika Split 135-129 in 3rd McDonald Open
1991 General Motors announces 9 month loss of $2.2 billion
2136 BCE- Chinese make 1st record of a solar eclipse
4004 BCE- Universe created at 8:00 PM, according to the 1650
4004 BCE- pronouncement of Anglican archbishop James Ussher
DEAD ON THIS DAY — October 22nd
1565 Jean Grolier de Servi‚res French bibliophile, dies
1932 Anna Dickinson dies just a week shy of her 90th birthday
1934 Charles “Pretty Boy” Floyd shot dead by FBI in Ohio
1979 Jesse Bishop, murderer, dies in Nevada gas chamber
1984 Napoleon Whiting actor (Silas-Big Valley), dies at 75
1986 Ivor Francis, actor (Dusty’s Trail), dies at 68
1986 Jane Dornnacker WNBC-AM NYC helicopter traffic reporter dies doing
a live traffic report as her copter crashes
