President Obama's one term?

By Pablo Fanque
All This Is That National Affairs Editor

"If the president goes down the reelection road, we are guaranteed two years of political gridlock at a time when we can ill afford it," Pat Caddell and Doug Schoen wrote in yesterday's Washington Post. "But by explicitly saying he will be a one-term president, Obama can deliver on his central campaign promise of 2008, draining the poison from our culture of polarization and ending the resentment and division that have eroded our national identity and common purpose."

Really? I like the premise (and it is not unprecedented....just ask LBJ--the last voluntary one-term President), but what would really happen is that the GOP would see this as the ultimate capitulation and weakness and would then proceed to steamroll the President for the next two years, leaving us in worse shape than if he went ahead with what to some might seem to be a futile campaign and election.  Or, I guess, he could "pull a Palin," and just quit now and leave Hillary and Smilin' Joe to sort out the mess...

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Scratchboard/reversed scratchboard - four faces by Jack Brummet

click to enlarge

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Painting: Steve

By Jack Brummet

Click to enlarge

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Ex-agent Gerald Blaine says in book: "I almost shot LBJ hours after JFK murder"

By Jack Brummet
Social Mores Editor

Thanks to Dean Ericksen for pointing out this story.

Gerald Blaine, a former Secret Service agent, says in his new book—The Kennedy Detail — that he nearly shot President Lyndon B. Johnson hours after John F. Kennedy's assassination.

In his new book, Blaine remembers standing guard outside the Washington home of the just sworn-in President Johnson in the wee hours of Nov. 23, 1963.  He heard footsteps approaching.

Agent Blaine picked up his submachine gun in the darkness and aimed it at the chest of a man who turned out to be the new President. 

Blaine's nearly fatal mistake left him, naturally, chilled. Only 14 hours after losing one president, the nation had almost lost another one.  Gerald Blaine says his book is the first account of the assassination by a member of Kennedy's security detail. I think that's true.  I have read a lot about LBJ and never heard this one before.  Wow.

Fortunately, Blaine didn't fire, and Speaker of the House, John W. McCormack, did not become President.  As great as LBJ was, who knows...maybe McCormack could have somehow avoided escalating the Vietnam War...but I doubt it.  The tragic juggernaut was already inexorably gathering steam.
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Dr. Suess show in Laguna Beach

I went to a show of Dr. Seuss's fine art works on Monday in Laguna Beach.  It was pretty cool to see his work on a large scale, along with about a dozen sculptures of his unique animals.  While the prints were nice (many of them come from actual paintings he did that he never sold), it was also clear Seuss himself had little to do with the prints.  He didn't supervise the making of screens, or even select the works.  It was also clear that they were being marketed as investments (similar to all the prints of, say, Dali and Chagall that have flooded the print markets).  The guy who worked in the gallery said they were a good deal.  $1,500 to $3,000 for a work where--"some of the early prints have gone up in value to $25,000 in a few years."  Which, naturally, made me suspicious.   Worth seeing, but not buying...

From a press release:  "In 1997, The Chase Group acquired exclusive worldwide rights to publish the work of Dr. Seuss as limited edition prints. Along with publishing certain book illustrations, Chase is making available editions of Seuss’s, "Secret Art". These are paintings that Geisel painted for his own pleasure and never before shown to the public and exhibit a more sophisticated, technically accomplished and quite unrestrained side to his talent."

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Another letter from President George W. Bush

After receiving a letter back from The President, I wrote several more times, but did not get a return letter.  But finally, about a year later, some staffer took pity and fired us off this one.  I suggested incarcerating Howard Dean (since a firing squad would be a bit extreme), and even repealing the 22nd amendment.

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Painting: One of the chinless wonders

Digital drawings: Four faces by Jack Brummet

click to enlarge

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That's one way of getting the job done: Marry The Boss's Daughter

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George W. Bush writes to All This Is That (from 2005)

By Jack Brummet
Social Mores Editor

Five years ago, then President George W. Bush, wrote us to politely decline our invitation.   And now, after two years out of office, we see the slow resurrection and rehabilitation of George W. Bush's image beginning to occur. . .  Check out the original article here.

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Five digital faces by Jack Brummet

Click the drawings to enlarge. Created on an iPad, using Harmonious drawing tools...

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All This Is That Turns Six Years Old This Week

We began publishing this blog in November, 2004.  Since then, we've published 4,260 posts, or, roughly two per day.  At least 180 of these posts have focused on alien lore; 200 or so have been poems by Jack; three or four hundreds of Pablo Fanque's political pieces have appeared, as well as four hundred pieces of original art.  We have also published numerous pranks and japes; two letters from George W. Bush to the editors of All This Is That, dozens of articles on country, rock, bluegrass, and jazz; around 20 articles on Growing Up Hillbilly, hundreds of articles on Presidents, and Presidential elections, many articles on pop culture, and dozens of articles on the folly of humans and the human condition.  It's hard to sum up four thousand posts, but we have generally stuck to our mission of covering the paranormal, poetry, painting, politics, persiflage, and pop.

Over the next week, Pablo and Jack will be posting links to their favorite articles here.  We will also include links to Google's top searches here (of which, interestingly, none appear on either Jack's or Pablo's lists.


We started out very tentatively six years ago, feeling our way along as learned how to blog and how to publish every day.  We've gotten much better at it, and have published every single day for the last six years.  We have published this blog from all around the country--from Boston, Vancouver and Victoria Canada, NYC, San Francisco/Berkeley, Los Angeles, Seattle, Portland, Orange County, England, Mexico, Greece, India, and Turkey.

Stay tuned this week for some of our favorites. 

Before we sign off today, we want to announce that we are adding another editor to our staff.  Our friend, and reformed Republican, Mona Goldwater will become a regular contributor on, or before, December 1, 2010. 

In closing, here is the very first piece to ever appear on All This Is That.  It is a short poem by Jack, that appeared our first day, November 16th, 2004:

Poem: Driving Home To Seattle, We Watch Deer Drinking from the Skookumchuck River


A rainbow loops over
the alder cathedral.


Dark clouds are sinking.
The Lamplighter


loans them a patch of land
and a heartbeat.
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Jack Brummet
(originally appeared in The Croton Review)
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