Wednesday, January 03, 2007

Alien Lore No. 93 - President Jerry Ford, UFOs and The Greys


click letter to enlarge




"Congressman Gerald Ford got on the UFO bandwagon. It was pure politics and he made the national news by demanding that either the Science and Astronautics Committee or the Armed Services Committee schedule hearings on the subject of UFOs....Congressman Ford did get his wish, a congressional hearing was imminent. Someone should ask Congressman Ford what it cost the American taxpayer to hold that hearing and ask him if he would like to reimburse for the expense; because that hearing was totally unnecessary."

Although Gerald Ford had earlier expressed strong interest in studying the UFO phenomenon, once he became President (after Richard Nixon's resignation on August 9, 1974), Ford never again mentioned UFOs, until he left office.

===============================
A Statement by House Minority Leader Gerald R. Ford, R-Mich. On the Air 2 P.M., March 25, 1966:



"I believe Congress should thoroughly investigate the rash of reported sightings of unidentified flying objects in Southern Michigan and other parts of the country.

"I feel a congressional inquiry would be most worthwhile because the American people are intensely interested in the UFO stories, and some people are alarmed by them.

"Air Force investigators have been checking on such reports for years but have come up with nothing very conclusive.

"In the light of these new sightings and incidents near Ann Arbor, Michigan, and elsewhere, it would be a very wholesome thing for a committee of the Congress to conduct hearings and to call responsible witnesses from the executive branch of the government and other witnesses who say they have sighted these objects.

"I think the American people would feel better if there was a full-blown investigation of these mysterious flying objects, which some persons honestly believe that they have seen. " [1]

===============================

Ford News Release Regarding 1966 Michigan UFO Sightings

Congressman Gerald R. Ford
House Republican Leader
News Release
For Release Tuesday, P.M.
March 28, 1966



NOTE TO ALL NEWS MEDIA: House Minority Leader Gerald R. Ford, R-Michigan, today sent the attached letter to the chairman and the ranking Republican members of the House Committee on the Armed Services and Science and Astronautics, urging that one committee or the other investigate the subject of Unidentified Flying Objects. (UFO’s)

Ford is not satisfied with the Air Force explanation of the recent sightings in Michigan and describes the "swamp gas" version given by J. Allen Hynek as "flippant."

Ford has recently received a number of telegrams and letters from individuals anxious to see a congressional investigation of UFO’s.



March 28, 1966


George P. Millar, Chairman Rep. L. Mendel Rivers, Chairman
Science and Astronautics Committee Armed Services Committee
U.S. House of Representatives U.S. House of Representatives
Washington, D.C. Washington, D.C.

Dear Chairman Millar and Rivers:

No doubt you have noticed the recent flurry of newspaper stories about unidentified flying objects (UFO’s). I have taken special interest in these accounts because many of the latest reported sightings have been in my home state of Michigan.

The Air Force sent a consultant, astrophysicist J. Allen Hynek of Northwestern University, to Michigan to investigate the various reports; and he dismissed all of them as a product of college student pranks or swamp gas or an impression created by the rising crescent moon and the planet Venus. I do not agree that all of these reports can or should be so easily explained away.

Because I think there may be substance to some of the reports and because i believe the American people are entitled to a more thorough explanation that has been given them by the Air Force to date, I am proposing that either the Science and Astronautics Committee or the Armed services Committee of the House schedule hearings on the subjects of UFO’s and invite testimony from both the executive branch of the government and some of the person’s who claim to have see UFO’s.

I enclose material which I think will be helpful to you in assessing the advisability of an investigation of UFO’s.

May I first call your attention to an column by Roscoe Drummand, published last Sunday in which Mr. Drummond says, " Maybe all these reported sightings are whimsical, imaginary or unreal: but we need a more credible and detached appraisal of the evidence we are getting."

Mr. Drummond goes on to state, " We need to get all the data drawn together to one place and examined far more objectively than anyone has done so far. A stable public opinion will come from a trustworthy look at the evidence, and not from belittling it."

"The time has come for the President or Congress to name an objective and respected panel to investigate, appraise, and report on all present and future evidence about what is going on."

I fully agree with Mr. Drummond’s statements. I also suggest that you scan the enclosed articles of six articles by Buckley Griffin of the Griffin-Larrabee News Bureau here. In the last of his articles, published last January, Mr. Griffin says, " A main conclusion can be briefly stated. It is that the Air Force is misleading the public by it’s continuing campaign to produce and maintain belief that all sightings can be explained away as misidentification of familiar objects, such as balloons, stars, and aircraft."

I have today just received a number of telegrams urging a congressional investigation of UFO’s. One is from a retired Air Force Colonel Harold R. Brown, Ardmore, Tennessee, who says, " I have seen a UFO. Will be available to testify."

Another from Mrs. Ethyle M. Davis, Eugene, Oregon, reads, "Nine out of ten people want the truth of UFO’s. Press your investigation to the fullest."

Ronald Colier of Los Angeles, who identifies himself as " a scientist from M.I.T.," urges that you " do everything in your power to make the Air Force Project Blue Book ( The AF name for its study and verdicts on UFO reports) known to the people."

Are we to assume that everyone who says that he has seen UFO’s is an unreliable witness?

A UPI story of of Ann Arbor, Michigan, dated march 21, 1966, states that " at least 40 persons, including 12 policemen, said today that they have seen a strange flying object guarded by four sister ships land in a swamp near here Sunday night."

Matt Surrell of Station WJR, Detroit, cites an eye witness account of a recent UFO sighting near Emile Grenier of Ann Arbor, an aeronautical engineer employed by Ford Motor Company. He points out that an aeronautical engineer can hardly be considered as an untrustworthy witness.

In the firm belief that the American public reserves a better explanation than thus far given by the Air Force, I strongly recommend that there be a committee investigation of the UFO phenomena.

I think we owe it to the people to establish credibility regarding UFO’s and to produce the greatest possible enlightenment on this subject.

Kindest person regards.

Sincerely,

Gerald R. Ford, M.C.
GRF:plr
Enclosures
================================

Ford Radio Broadcast Regarding 1966 Michigan UFO Sightings

Radio Tape for Fifth district Stations March 30, 1966 [3]

My friends of the fifth congressional district, this is your congressman, Jerry Ford, speaking to you from the nation’s capitol.

As you know, I have requested a congressional investigation of unidentified flying objects, UFO’s, as they are called.

I am most serious about this; this is the kind of subject that lens itself to some flak, a little criticism, and a shower of compliments.

One day this week, I felt an unidentified flying object whiz past my ear--my right ear naturally. Upon close inspection, I had no more trouble identifying this particular UFO than the Air Force did in telling the people of Michigan they have been seeing swamp gas.

The UFO I encountered was a brickbat tossed by an irate gentleman who believes Congress could use its time to much better advantage than in investigating what he calls "UFO hysteria."

But this is one of the few criticisms I encountered in the more than 50 letters that I received since first proposing that UFO’s be investigated by either the House Armed Services Committee or the House Science and Astronautics Committee.

Many of the letters I have received are from Michigan — from Grand Rapids, Ann Arbor, Kalamazoo, Lansing, Algonac, Petroskey, Port Huron, Utica, Grosse Pointe, Bay City, and other points.

But there is interest all over the country, and everyone but the weilder of the aforementioned brickbat is urging that I follow up on my proposal that there be a congressional investigation of UFO’s. I fully intend to do so.

A few of the letters are pretty far out — like the one which suggested that UFO’s caused the failure of the Gemini 8 spacecraft, the electric power blackout last year in the East, and the recent Boeing 727 airplane accidents.

This letter writer informed me that planet people are piloting the UFO’s, have superior abilities, have the anti-gravity secret, and fly about in spacecrafts that travel at 50,000 miles an hour or better. He wants a Minute Man alert whenever UFO’s are sighted anywhere in the country.

Another gentleman sent me a copy of a letter he had dispatched to a friend of his in the Central Intelligence Agency.

He wrote, " Well, the Air Force has done it. By its ridiculous ‘solving’ of the UFO’s in Michigan in a day or two, they may have doomed the Air Force. Brilliant, Absolutely brilliant. They ( the planet people) were trying to establish their reality...for it must be done, if they are trying to help us. Now they are angry at being called ‘swamp gas’ and are going on the record that they are going to harass the Air Force just as they have been doing to NASA. Knowing what I do, if I were the Air Force, I would be scared witless. But, of course, who ever heard of marsh gas being dangerous/ To make it clear, The SI’s ( Saucer Intelligences) are now going to teach the Air Force a lesson it will never forget. They are turning their attention to harassment of the Air Force in a big way."

Now, Dr. Hynek and the Air Force may not be disturbed by that letter, but they’d better beware of some astronomers in the nation. A chap in Seattle, wash., says he has absolute proof that the Air Force was dead wrong in describing Michigan pictures of an alleged UFO as " The rising crescent moon and the Planet Venus."

Well, happy landing to the Air Force. And I do think that the American people want a better explanation of UFO’s than they have been getting. If my mail is any indication, there are many, many people who find it extremely difficult to believe some of the stories put out by the government on this and other subjects.

This is your congressman, Jerry Ford, saying--so--long for now, and I’ll see you nest week at this same time, same station.

=================================

Congressman Gerald R. Ford
ReleaseFor Sunday A.M. Release April 3, 1966

Statement by House Minority Leader Gerald R. Ford, R-Michigan [4]


As I had expected, some persons have been ridiculed by the call for a congressional investigated of unidentified flying objects (UFO’s). These people are a fraction of those who have given their reaction to my proposal. The overwhelming majority of those expressing a view in letters to me believe a congressional investigation would be useful and is needed.

Those who scoff at the idea of a congressional investigation of UFO’s apparently are unaware that the House Armed services Committee has scheduled a closed- door hearing on the matter Tuesday with the Air Force and that rep. Joseph E. Karth, D-Minn., headed a three man sub-committee which held two days of hush-hush hearings five years ago on behalf of the Science and Astronautics Committee. Karth has confirmed in conversation with a member of my staff that he conducted these secret hearings.

The present Science and Astronautics Committee chairman, Rep. George P. Millar, D. Calif., has shied away from the UFO problem at this time, saying his committee does not have the jurisdiction over the Air Force. But the late Rep. Overton Brooks, D.La., obviously had different ideas because he tapped Karth to summon Air Force witnesses and question them after a flurry of sightings in 1961.

Karth has informed me that his subcommittee made an oral report to the full committee but never released anything to the public. According to Charles F. Ducander, the committee staff director, no record was made of the conversation between Karth subcommittee and the Air Force witnesses. The hearings, he said, took place in Karth’s congressional office.

I have never said that I believe any of the reported UFO sightings indicate visits to earth from another planet. Apart from the pranks and natural phenomena, some of these objects may well be products of experimentation by our own military. If this is so, why doesn’t the Air Force concede it and in this way reassure the American people/ There would be no need to go into detail on the nature of the experiments.

=============================

Congressman Gerald R. Ford House
Republican Leader
For Release Thursday, P.M. April 21, 1966

Statement by House Minority Leader Gerald R. Ford, R-Michigan

The Air Force has informed me it is arranging for a study by high-caliber scientists of some of the UFO sightings which have never been explained.

This study will be placed under contract soon after July 1, start of the new fiscal year. It will be carried out by a university which has no close ties with the Air Force so that the findings will be completely objective, Air Force officials tell me.

Those people engaged in the study will be high-caliber scientists who have never taken a position on UFO’s, the Air Force said. It will be made clear to them that they are not being hired to come up with findings in support of previous Air Force statements regarding UFO’s, I am informed.

The Air Force said there is too much effort involved to ask these scientists to make this study without pay.

The report will definitely be made public, The Air Force assured me. The whole purpose of the study is to make clear the air as far as the public is concerned.

This, of course, was my purpose in recently requesting that public hearings on the subject of UFO’s be conducted by either the Armed Services Committee or the House Science and Astronautics Committee.

It was as a result of my call for a congressional investigation that the Air Force now is arranging for a study of UFO’s by topflight scientists not connected in any way with the Air Force.

I would have preferred a congressional investigation with witnesses to include reliable persons from among those who say they have seen UFO’s. I still think this would be beneficial. But the UFO study by a panel of scientists, with the report to be made public, is a step in the right direction.


===============================

[1] Press Secretary and Speech File, Ford Congressional Papers 1947-1973 Box D37
[2] UFO Folder 1966, Press Secretary & Speech File 1947-1973 Box D9
[3] Jerry Ford Papers, Press Secretary& Speech Files 1948-1973, Weekly Radio reports, Box D35
[4] Jerry Ford papers, 1947-1973, Folder UFOs 1966, Press Secretary & Speech File Box D9
---o0o---


Monday, January 01, 2007

Romney and Edwards Jump Into The Fray; Hillary Clinton's Numbers Plunge



Over the last week, Ex-Senator John Edwards, and now, with Mitt Romney (filing papers forming "an exploratory committee," )we add two more to the Presidential Herd. . .not that they were a surprise. With Obama outpolling her and John Edwards showing some decent numbers, Senator Hillary Clinton's polling numbers have taken a serious plunge. She has plunged from front-runner to the middle of the pack. Maybe even the bottom of the middle of the pack.

Click here for All This Is That's recent tally of the Presidential candidates.


---o0o---

Sunday, December 31, 2006

Presidents Ford & Clinton: One of my favorite Presidential photographs

I saw this picture for the first time the day President Gerald Ford passed away. It's probably a few years old, since I know by the time the Clinton Presidential Library opened that Gerald Ford no longer felt comfortable traveling. Gerald Ford looks about 85 or so in this picture, so it might have been about the time of Bill Clinton's "retirement."


click the presidents to enlarge
---o0o---

The Saddam Hussein Hanging Video


You may need to click above twice to see the video (don't ask me why)

Someone in that room where Saddam Hussein was hung Saturday had a camera phone and recorded the run-up to, and the actual hanging itself. All the hand-wringing by the U.S. and Iraqi governments about whether to videotape the hanging. . .and more debate on whether to release it—if they did indeed tape it in the first place—was moot. It was moot because someone took it in their own hands to tape the execution. And put it on the internet.

The video looks clandestine. . .mainly because the camera is aimed at the floor on a couple of occasions, as if the videographer was hiding the camera/phone when someone was looking at them. It's as utterly depressing as every execution, and bizarre because of the number of voices, and the yelling. This is in no way the somber setting we've come to expect at an execution. The voices are agitated, and, in places, sound almost like chanting. If the Google video player embedded in this post is not working, go here.

---o0o---

Saturday, December 30, 2006

Is there really something to celebrate. . .in Sadam Hussein's hanging?


click painting to enlarge...

Is there really something to celebrate. . .in an execution? Even the execution of a monster? Is there really anything to celebrate now that we have killed, or our actions have led to the killing, of more people in Iraq than Hussein ever had a chance to murder? I don't think so.


Are we even any closer to "winning" or giving Iraq a leg up than we were that day three years ago when the "coalition" forces pulled him out of his foxhole? No. In fact, we have probably lost ground.
---o0o---

Friday, December 29, 2006

The Necktie Transfer Of Saddam Hussein Could Occur Any Moment



Saddam Hussein may be hanged within hours, Iraqi officials said today. The prime minister is speaking with the U.S. to determine if the execution should go ahead the day before the feast of Eid al-Adha—a week-long religious holiday that begins tomorrow.



The president, justice minister, and prime minister, Sami al-Askari, have given the greenlight. The only holdup now appears to be "the fate of the body" and the location of the hanging.
---o0o---

Rick Danko would have turned 64 today. . .





. . .if he had made it. Danko was one of the most generous and lovable souls of rock and roll. His life was no picnic, but he never complained.

If you want to see him at his best, check out the movie, The Last Waltz, and watch him sing and play, and watch him react to people like Joni Mitchell, The Hawk, and Muddy Waters. The interviews were a mixed bag—but he was clearly a mighty presence. He obviously did not like taking orders from Scorsese (witness his pissed off opening at the pool table).

Another great cinematic Danko moment occurs when he is singing inebriated with Janis Joplin on the train in The Festival Express.



---o0o---

Thursday, December 28, 2006

Some of the players in the Ford Administration


Some ex-Presidents --click to enlarge

As we mourn the passing of President Ford, I remember some of the players in that administration. Some of those players are still bedeviling us, and one, we just unloaded a week ago! If you consider the spawn of Ford Administration players, well, then we still have George W. Bush waging war, breaking the bank, and ignoring domestic policy, unless it falls under the bailiwick of fundamentalism.

Defense Secretary: Donald Rumsfeld
Chief of Staff: Dick Cheney
Secretary of State: Dr. Henry Kissinger
Secretary of H.E.W.: Caspar Weinberger
(later Secretary of Defense under President Reagan, nearly tossed in the hoosegow during the contra-gate scandals, and eventually pardoned by George H.W. Bush after he lost his re-election)
Secretary of Labor: Peter Brennan (a real knuckledragger)
Secretary of Commerce (Briefly): Elliot Richardson (earlier fired by Nixon)
U.S. Representative to the U.N.: Pat Moynihan

C.I.A. Director: George H.W. Bush
Alan Greenspan ran the council of economic advisors.

---o0o---

Wednesday, December 27, 2006

Gerald Ford Heads Off For The 19th Hole



Our 38th President, Gerald Ford died yesterday in California. He was the first Vice President appointed under the 25th amendment, and the first President to assume office without benefit of an election. He was in the White House only 895 days, but all it took was one of those days, September 8, 1974, in his first month in office, to PISS OFF VIRTUALLY EVERYONE IN THE ENTIRE COUNTRY with a full and unconditional pardon of his predecessor, Richard Milhous Nixon.

It was hard to dislike President Ford. Even his bumbling, tripping, and occasional tongue-tied speechifying had a certain folksy charm. He bcame the first Presidential target of the then brand-new Saturday Night Live.



President Ford Watches the 1976 election returns with his
old pal Joe Garigiola

He was never actually elected either as V.P., or as President. He appointed Rocky as his Vice-President! It was a crazy time to be President, between Vietnam and the post-Nixon fallout. Gerald Ford held the country together, more or less, after Dick Nixon and his band of misanthropic henchmen did their best to dismantle it. Did I mention that he also served on the infamous Warren Commission?


click to enlarge
---o0o---

Tuesday, December 26, 2006

Saddam Hussein To Be Hanged, Any Day Now—Preferably Televised

The highest court in Iraq has upheld the death sentence of former dictator Saddam Hussein, who must now, they said, be hanged within 30 days (they pegged him for the killing 148 Shiites in Dujail as reprisal for an assassination attempt).

Iraq's high court laughed Saddam Hussein's appeal out the door and said the former dictator must be hanged within 30 days for ordering the killing of scores of Shiite Muslims in 1982.

"From tomorrow, any day could be the day," the chief judge said. Meanwhile, it was just another day in Iraq, with 54 Iraqis killed in bombings, the police discovering 50 more bodies killed in "sectarian reprisal killings." The U.S. announced the deaths of seven American soldiers.

There are reports the hangings of Saddam, and the three other defendants (including Saddam's half-brother) will be televised. I bet The President, who hailed the sentences being upheld, is looking forward to the hangings being beamed into every classroom in the U.S.A.
---o0o---

Sunday, December 24, 2006

Track Santa's flight today and tonight on NORAD


You can track the flight of Santa, and Rudolph, Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, Vixen, Comet, Cupid, Donner, and Blitzen. . .by going right here, to Norad.
---o0o---

Paternity tests reveal that Joseph is not the father!


---o0o---

Scrooge!

If you get a chance today or tomorrow, listen to Lord Buckley's version of Scrooge. I am including the text of the performance here. Lord Buckley was an amazing Beat-era writer and performer who greatly influenced a lot ot later comedians and authors. This is transcribed from his performance (which is worth buying...a few Buckley CDs are still in print). You can probably find the MP3 on iTunes, etc., if you scrounge around enough, or if you use a music file sharing program. If not, you could just buy it:

World Pacific Studios, 1960. Released with "Maharajah" as side two of World Pacific WP-1849
Bad Rapping of the Marquis de Sade, CD released in 1996 World Pacific, CPD 7243 8 52676 2 8
Lord Buckley Live: The Tales of Lord Buckley, Shambala Lion Editions, SLE 20, released 1991

It's not Christmas until I've heard Scrooge by Lord Buckley (and Sunb Ra's "It's Christmastime").

Scrooge

by Lord Buckley


"Yes, me, I'm Scrooge and I got all Marley's barley, and I'm the baddest cat in all dis world. I been studyin' all my life how to Scrooge people, and I guarantee I done some fine work in dat direction.

"Cratchit!"

"Yes, sir."

"You busy?"

"I shorely is, sir."

"See dat you keep busy. Don't want no danglin' wanglin' around here. Keep everybody tight. And tell dem two cats come in here want to get some money I ain't givin' no money away. Dey messin' wit Scrooge. I'm takin' it in. I ain't puttin' it out. Issat clear?"

"Yes, sir."

"Well, keep it clear. People comin' around here wantin' my gold dat's all, tryin' to pry into my vault. Every time I turn around somebody's tryin' to snap... "

"Tell my nephew I don't want to have no dinner wid him an' if he never comes in here again dat'll be too soon."

"I'll tell de cat."

"See dat ya do.

"I don't understand dese people who are after my gold. I close up dis here place and den dey ... What, what? Yeah, let me tell you somethin else - You think that you gonna get off Christmas day?"

"Well I was hopin', sir, dat you'd let me knock off just a little while for Christmas Eve cause I want to go home and cool da goose."

"Well if you gonna get off Christmas Eve you gonna have to work aaalllll day Christmas. You hear me?"

"I hear ya, sir. I'm wid it."

"Well I guess I'll go on home here."

So Scrooge takes off and he cuts on down the street. And the snow's blowin' and da winds is wooooooooin', and Scrooge is goin' along in his loose soul and his loose clothes and his hard cash box and his big money mind goin' on in his wig and he ding ding ding up da stairs and he open his door and he gets inside and he puts a double lock on da door cause he a little bugged tonight. He bein' sayin' "Humbug" so long, "Humbug dis," an' "Humbug dat," he done give himself a natural Humbug. He's got da bug hummin' in him, see. So he double-lock da door.

And he sit dere and all of a sudden dere's an old bell layin' over dere in the corner and da bell goes, ding-ding-ding-ding" and Scrooge say, "Whassat?" Dang- dong. "Whassat?" Bell started ringin' "DING DONG DOONG DOONG" Pretty soon all da bells all over the house started ringin' "Ding Ding Dang Dang Dong Ring Dong Boom Boom, Ding dong, Boom boom"

And he hear somethin' like some chain cats are pullin' all da chains from the chains of time up the hill 'a strife ringing' and dinglin' wid his whole head ringin' and dingin' wid dem chains. And bloooop! In come a cat, da wildest lookin' cat ya ever see in his life. Real gone cat.

And Scrooge does a real wild take "I know who dat stud is - dat's Marley! I know dat's Marley! What's he doin' here? Say, Marley?"

"Yes, it's me."

"Man, you sure chained up dere, man, you got chainsville all over you dere!"

"Well, I put em on myself, dat's da way I lived it. I chained myself. I hung myself up wid all dese chains, you know, bein' parsimonious, ya understand what I mean? I can't get 'em off now. I been luggin' dese chains all over da country for the past seven years."

"Dat's a long time. What's you want wit me dere, Marley Marley? cause I got your barley."

"I don't mess wid no barley no more. I wish I'd given it all away when I had it and I'm gonna tell you somethin' else, too, I'm a spook, you know dat."

"You tellin' me. I know dat. You a spook, man, an' I wanna get straight."

"I'm gonna tell you somethin else, too, Mr. Scroogie Scrooge, Dere gonna be three more gas lightin' spooks comin' in to see you."

"Three more gas lightin' spooks. Say, one spook's enough. Can't I have 'em all at one time?"

"No. Dey comin' one at a time. First one be eleven, next one be twelve, next one'll be one."

"Man, if I had known this..."

"Tell you what. You dig, Scrooge, it's what you puttin' down. You been a real sorry cat all dis time. You gonna be gassed now by dese spooks."

"Well, dey say if I gotta be gassed.. Ain't gonna cost me no money, is it?"

"Cost you more 'n dat, Scrooge."

"Dey ain't no more den money!"

"You find out."

Brrrrt. And Marley split.

And old Scrooge is sittin' dere sweatin' and dinglin' danglin'. And all of a sudden, man, he hears some crazy wild kind of a thing goin' on. He don't know just what it is and all of a sudden . . .

Boom

Here comes a great big fat spook, look like takes a hundred and seventy wings lift him off over da house top and he's got de old beat up cat and spandly legs, and strangly arms and pedicured eyes, and a whole out of his skull wiggin' up a storm and he looks at old Scrooge and he says...

Scrooge is standin' dere in the corner he feel like a disrupted small disregarded and unclaimed white mice midget-style, he's sittin' over dere.

And dis spook say, "Come wid me 'cause I is The Ghost of da Christmas Past!"

And Scrooge say, "Do I hafta?"

Say, "You certainly do!"

And he got on the ghost's wing and - brrt - they took off.

And he's flyin' old Scrooge over da top of da mountain da wind is blowin', da wind is partin' his way, and he's lookin' down, and seein' all dese crazy scenes goin' on.

Zoom!

He goes over a few more miles Takes him down to a sun-lit pasture. And da sun-lit pasture's full of children, and de're singin' and dancin' and lovin' and goin' and swingin' and Scrooge say, "Look, look, look! Dat's me down dere!"

"Yeah, dat's you, dat's you."

"I look pretty good"

"Yeah but ya don't look good now,"

He say, "I wanna hip you gotta get yourself ?

Zoom!

He takes him over to another place and he shows him a pretty little chick got dimples, three dimples on each chin, and she got three little dimpled children, and the next little dimple on da way, and dere's a real swingin' cat around there, and it's a happy time, looks like seventeen carnivals takin' off. An' Scrooge look at dis chick and say, "I remember dat chick. I could 'a married her once."

"Yeah, you coulda if you wasn't so tight wid your purse. You all was thinkin' about yourself, dat's what happened." Say, "Let me hip you further, Mister Scrooge, Let me tell you one thing: you better get everything straight that you wanna and you better straighten up."

"An' take me home."

"Yeah, I will."

Brrrrm Boom

And he's home again.

"So man, that was a shaker. This whole thing, this whole thing is shakin' me up pretty bad." He say, "I want to tell you right now . . . "

Boom!

Here comes another big spook. Ooooohhhh He's a wild lookin' spook. He's a crazy lookin' spook. He's a far-out spook, he's a gas-light spook. He's got a gas light right on the top of his wig goin' around like one of them pilot lights in a light house and he's there gassin' up the whole scene.

He say "Come with me. I'm The Ghost of Christmas Present"

And Scrooge look around and sees the joint is loaded with apples and bananas and oranges and, and credalies and acralonchs and ripalips all kinds of crazy wild grapes and crazy Chistmas scenes and nuts and candy.

And he say, "Come wid me."

Brrrrrttt. Done took off again.

He said "I am The Ghost of Christmas Present." He say, "I'm gonna show you what's goin' on in dis world and how to dig Christmas and how to all enjoy."

And he took him up to a little old outcast. And there sittin on a small beat-up rock was two studs chompin' up on a can 'a beans singin', "Merry Christmas widch you, Merry Christmas widch you. Merry Christmas to the whole world" And so on and so forth.

And he showin' him the people jumpin' for joy, see how the cats that ain't got nothin' got somethin' anyway, and they're all jumpin' for joy singin' "Merry Christmas," and da bells is ringin'. Now you get yourself straight and see how things is ....

So they fly over da Cratchit's place, there little old Tiny Tim, He's sittin' over in the corner crochetin' a little crazy scene, fiddlin' around, ya know what I mean? An carryin' on, see, and they are all talkin' about this here goose, and dey look down here and this little goose about the size of a beat up retarded sparrow, and everybody's ooohin' and aahhhin' all over dis goose, and day sayin' when are we gonna spread it, and Tiny Tim say, "God bless everyone, and even up to and including Scroogy Scrooge. God bless everyone!" That's what Tiny Tim say.

And old Scrooge got red-eyed.

Brrrrt .

Took 'im back again. Sound like the whole side 'a the buildin' open up and in come a long angular spook seventeen gas lights and stove pipes hung together with jingle jangle bells all over Scrooge takes a look at this cat, Says, "Do I have to go with you?"

He says, "You certainly do, 'cause I'm The Ghost of Christmas Future."

He say, "Come wid me."

Say, "Where we goin'?"

"None 'o your business!"

He takes old Scrooge they cut off flyin' around the moonlight is shinin' down. Booom!

They're in the grave-yard. Oooh a wild OOOOoooohhhh crazy spooky graveyard and Scrooge is walkin' around and finally something stepped out at him like he was struck with the force of his eye lids, some sort of an electronic pitchfork, and he reads on one of them billboards in that grave-yard, it say, "Dis is Scrooge, the baddest cat that ever lived. He don't have nothin' he ain't got nothin' and he ain't got nothin now."

Period.

And Scrooge looked at it and . . . They're going to another place, and there's a cat say "You goin' to the funeral?" and he say, "Not me, man, I wouldn't go near that cat, dead or alive. They couldn't pay me to get near that cat." Say, "What cat is that?" And suddenly Scrooge is takin' in the coffin factory and seeing all these coffins layin' around, and see one coffin, all the rest of 'em got flowers around 'n 'dis poor little coffin got nothin on it but just some pinewood boards an' old Scrooge look up and over and he's lookin' at this and that and look all away 'cause he knows who is in dat coffin.

Zooooommmm.

He's swings on back again and the ghost puts him down and old Scrooge is shakin' and shiverin' and he finally falls into a real wild, crazy miser's coma. And he falls out for how long he don't know when and he wakes up and Mornin'!

Aaaaahh, the sun was shinin' on the glorious snow and old Scrooge is feelin' so groovey 'n so wired and he tip tip tip tip tip toes over to the window. He open the window, see a little cat, he say, "Hey, boy."

"Yes, sir."

"You know that great big giant king-size bird down in Doodley's window?"

"You mean the prize bird?"

"No," he say, "I mean that great big king-size bird." "Go get that bird. Here's a twenty."

He knocks a twenty on him. "Go get dat bird. And here's ten more for a cab, an here's five dollar for your sister, and here's twenty-two-fifty for your uncle's new bicycle. Tell anyone who wants anything, 'See Scrooge.' I'm flyin' this here Christmas. I want to see Cratchit swing out with a great big swingin' happy dinner. I'm wid it all da way!"

An' old Scrooge get dressed and he's walkin' down the street, and Ding Dong, Ding Dong Ding, the bells is ringin'. Scrooge got a big smile on his face, and people he's seen for twenty years never said hello,sayin' "Good morning, Mr. Scrooge."

"What you say, Baby?"

An' he carryin' on, carryin' on, happy as the day is long.

And he finally fell into old Bob Cratchit's place and he's got Christmas toys and Christmas joys and Christmas presents for everybody. And they'd just opened the goose, and then little Tiny Tim see him comin', he say, "God bless Mr. Scrooge. He done did the turn about. He's the Lord's boy today."

And that's the story of Scrooge. You can get wid it if you want to. There's only one way straight to the Road of Love.
---o0o---