As Mark Hemingway points out, Teddy Roosevelt had been governor of N.Y. for two years before being tapped for the ticket by William McKinley. He too was an anti-corruption reformer as NYC Police Chief. I thought of him the other day, because he was well known for spending lots of time in the West, hunting, fishing, leading expeditions… living a very non-East Coast life. I’m sure he would have had a seaplane and a snow machine had they existed. He was a great advocate of the character-toughening rigors of the outdoor life (though he didn’t slight intellectual accomplishments).
And, as every school girl (school person?) is taught, the day Roosevelt ascended to the Presidency upon McKinley’s assassination, party boss Mark Hanna — architect of the modern campaign, and harsh judge of the stature and qualifications of politicians – famously said, “That damn cowboy is in the White House now.” It wasn’t a compliment. It certainly implied something unserious, impetuous and unsophisticated. Earlier he had called Roosevelt a ”madman.”
John McCain looks pretty healthy to me. But Sarah Palin is certainly a cowboy (Annie Oakley in a suit!), and the GOP has often done worse than TR.