I assume you missed the obituary pages this weekend and thus might not have noticed that George A. Smathers, former Senator from the State of Florida has died. Smathers took a lot of very conservative positions regarding Civil Rights and in noting his passing I am in no way endorsing his positions. But he did do two things we should note.

First, we should all be thankful that he insisted that all federal holidays be moved to Mondays. He created the modern three day weekend! Thanks, George!

Second, he said the funniest thing I have ever seen in politics and I reproduce it here. He denied saying it by the way. But, it was reported that in the middle of a contentious race for the Senate, he used to say of his opponent, Claude Pepper, to some not terribly well educated audiences, the following:

Do you know that Claude Pepper is known all over Washington as a shameless extrovert? Not only that, but this man is reliably reported to practice nepotism with his sister-in-law and he has a sister who was once a thespian in wicked New York. Worst of all, it is an established fact that Mr. Pepper, before his marriage, habitually practiced celibacy.

Politicians were so much more clever in the really not too distant past.

I had trouble not laughing I was re-typing the quote, by the way.

Posted by: Random Penseur at 09:03 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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The following may not be exactly an original thought, but then how many really original thoughts exist?

I was musing on the train this morning about the concept of Jihad, which many Islamic advocacy groups have tried to define in the context of a personal battle, a personal struggle to, say, quit smoking or lose weight. This personal struggle meaning of the term appears to be offered to soften the more widely accepted meaning of holy war.

I will note this. I am not fooled. To define Jihad as personal struggle simply brings to mind another personal struggle that came to be written about in a well known book. Perhaps you've heard of it? It was called Mein Kampf, or my struggle.

To me, there appears to be little difference in whether you call a Jihad a holy war or a kampf, the end result is not good for anyone.

Posted by: Random Penseur at 09:54 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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