Politics

This is not a political blog; the last thing this world needs is another political blog. But politics is a big part of my life, and it does take some discipline on my part to avoid political topics when posting.

So this post is not "political" in the partisan sense of the word. But it is about politics.

Probably my earliest memory of politics is a rally that was held in my little home town of Bellevue, Ohio, in 1960. I remember being the only 4 year old kid who could spell Kennedy. I also remember that I had a crush on Caroline.

I remember a particular joke that was going around school during the 1964 election: Lyndon Johnson is so rich that he has Goldwater in his toilet.

In the 1968 election, Eugene McCarthy ran against the war in Viet Nam, and my sister Linda had McCarthy posters hanging on her bedroom walls. He lost in the primary election, which was marred by the assassination of Robert Kennedy and the mayhem of the Chicago convention.

And so on...



By the time I had completed my enlistment in the Air Force, I was fairly sure that I wanted to do something in the political realm. And four years later, as I was nearing the completion of my degree, I was certain it was what I wanted to do. As graduation approached, I applied for only one job - a 12 month internship with the Ohio Legislative Service Commission.

The internship didn't pay much, and I had to sell my car and stereo to be able to afford the move to Columbus, but it put me on a path and opened lots of doors. I worked for 5 different Senators, one of whom was the Minority Leader, and he offered me a permanent position 6 months into the internship. I worked hard on several Senate campaigns in 1983 and 1984, and I met many interesting people. One was former Delaware Governor Pete DuPont, who was exploring a Presidential run at the time. He was the first of many people I met who were involved in one way or another with national politics. I also met Lynn Nofziger (an aide to Ronald Reagan), Art Laffer (creator of the Laffer Curve), Woody Hayes (possibly the greatest college football coach of any era, and very active in Republican politics), and many, many other lesser known elected officials and political operatives.

And now we are in another Presidential election year. The only one of the major candidates whom I've met -- Fred Thompson -- has dropped out. (I do not count Dennis Kucinich among the major candidates.)

In this 1998 photo, Fred Thompson was spellbound as I laid out my economic proposals. Or maybe he was just trying to figure out how to get a Dewars on the rocks without offending the Teetotaller-In-Chief, Governor Bob Taft, who drank punch and tailed Thompson all night. I'll never know.