Posted on 01/06/2004 8:46:08 PM PST by Bayou City
It was only short-sighted and egotistical if you know nothing about Teddy Roosevelt. The reason he is the greatest President the US has ever known is that he wasn't a party man - he was an idea man with the ability to work within the party system to get good things done.
The reason he went back into the race wasn't totally ego, (although he did have a big problem with Taft personally,) it was more the fact that he saw Taft as a political hack who was letting the bosses back into the ballgame and undoing much of the work he had done in society and in the military.
You have to remember the only reason he became President is because the Republican bosses in NYC didn't want him to be Governor of New York and ruin their fun, so they pushed him as vice-president where they thought he would be forgotten for eight years, except fate intervened.
In many ways, he was more progressive than Republican even when he was in office. Everyone remembers "walk softly and carry a big stick" but giving people a "square deal" was just as important to him.
Busting the powers of the unions, while limiting the abuses of monopolies; attacking corruption and establishing the national park system; protecting America's borders and America's kitchens.
While I thank God every day that we have GW in charge, in many ways its only because I believe he has a lot of the same characteristics as TR. (At least I did until he started pulling all of these LBJ "great society" giveaways out of his bag of tricks.) :(
I read Roosevelt's Wilderness Writings over the Christmas break, and enjoyed it immensely. It contains an incredible account of his trip down the 'Unknown River.' Really looking forward to sourcing a biography and some more of his writings.
Sinky, you'd be the most niggling poster who's ever floated through FR's punchbowl. You backstab your betters and tear everything down, all just to satisfy your craving for any kind of attention. I look forward to the day when JR finally tires of your whining and naysaying and gives you your long-overdue boot.
The Man In The Arena
"It is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly...who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself in a worthy cause, who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who have never known neither victory nor defeat."
Teddy Roosevelt
I care not what others think of what I do, but I care very much about what I think of what I do. That is character!
Only those who are fit to live do not fear to die. And none are fit to die who have shrunk from the joy of life and the duty of life. Both life and death are parts of the same Great Adventure.
To waste, to destroy, our natural resources, to skin and exhaust the land instead of using it so as to increase its usefulness, will result in undermining in the days of our children the very prosperity which we ought by right to hand down to them....
A finer body of men has never been gathered by any nation than the men who have done the work of building the Panama Canal; the conditions under which they have lived and have done their work have been better than in any similar work ever undertaken in the tropics; they have all felt an eager pride in their work; and they have made not only America but the whole world their debtors by what they have accomplished.
I'm a very keen hunter, like Roosevelt was. But I'm amazed at his sensitivity to nature, and jealous at his oneness with the natural world. I've thought about it a lot, and I guess maybe the difference is the amount of time- months, per expedition- he was able to spend in the bush. That kind of commitment must heighten the sensitivity to one's surroundings enormously. Sadly, due to the crazy pressures of modern life, so few of us can commit that amount of time. Who knows? Maybe, when I hit retirement? I'll have to comfort myself with that. Once again, I really appreciate your posting this obituary, BC.
Not corny at all. What branch were you in? I was enlisted Army 79-85.
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