“America is just like an insane asylum. There is not a soul in it will admit they are crazy.” – Will Rogers, 28 April 1935. I’ll even go one farther than you Will and say there ain’t a soul in it that will admit that they might be wrong about anything. That mentality is what has got us all into so much trouble lately.  We all think that the way we see life is the only possible view. Any others are just plain wrong. This in itself is just plain wrong…. I don’t know when this became the face of … Continue reading Like An Insane Asylum….

“In schools they have what they call intelligence tests. Well if nations held ’em I don’t believe we would be what you would call a favorite to win.” – Will Rogers, 25 June 1935 I don’t think we would either Will.  We would probably be about the same as where we are with our crazy healthcare system. Near the bottom of those that have schools  and hospitals anyway. But there are a few of us who are darn smart and maybe they make up for all the dunces among us… Continue reading Our Nation’s IQ???

“My hair is arriving at a sort of a blend that it deserves respect if nothing else. A graying head is a mark of respect in any land…” – Will Rogers, 18 November 1934 I don’t know a lot about the year 1934 but I kind of expect it was different from it is here in the 21st century. When I think of that year, which I guess was a measly twelve years before I was born, I see Walton’s Mountain with multiple generations living in the same household and everyone respecting Grandma and Grandpa Walton and constantly seeking their … Continue reading Will Rogers – Mark of Respect…

The header of this blog contains one of my favorite Will Rogers quote.  “Do the best you can and don’t take life too serious”. It would be years before I realized the power of putting those two things together. We all have different skills and capabilities. We all have different talents. I think that the secret to a satisfying life is to discover just what your skills and talents are and then do the best you can to make them flourish. My personal history it this regard is kind of so-so. But I did for the most part do the … Continue reading Do The Best You Can….

“I guess our country holds the record for dumbness. The Pope spoke to the world this morning in three languages and we didn’t understand a one of ’em. But the minute he finished and the local stations got back to selling corn salve and pyorrhea tooth paste we were right up our intellectual alley again.” – Will Rogers, 15 May 1931 Continue reading Our Dumbness….

“Hunt out and talk about the good that is in the other fellow’s church, not the bad, and you will do away with all this religious hatred you hear so much nowadays.” – Will Rogers, 11 March 1923 This quote hit home with me especially after my recent post about Pope Francis and the poor. There was one sad creature who tried multiple times to put in some vile words about the pope in particular and Catholics in general. It is obvious that he has nothing but hate for that group of people. Of course I did not let him … Continue reading Hunt Out The Good…..

“A fool that knows he is a fool is one that knows he don’t know all about anything, but the fool that don’t know he is a fool is the one that thinks he knows all about anything. Then he is a dam fool.” – Will Rogers, 7 August 1927 This is one of Will’s more philosophical quotes. Those who think they know everything are just damn fools. I have certainly run across my share of these folks. Many have even passed through this blog on occasion but thankfully they don’t stay long. Continue reading A Fool’s Fool…..

“I don’t care who you are, you just can’t reach middle life without having done and said a whole lot of foolish things.” – Will Rogers, 28 December 1934 I think cleansing my soul might be a good way to start off this new year and what better way to do it than around a quote from Will Rogers. :) I will personally attest to what Will said in the above quote.  I did some pretty foolish things in my years.  At the tender age of 17 I became addicted to nicotine. That addiction would last for over thirty years … Continue reading Foolish Things….

“There is one rule that works in every calamity. Be it pestilence, war or famine, the rich get richer and the poor get poorer.” – Will Rogers, 1 November 1929 Notice this quote was only a couple of days after the giant stock market crash starting the Great Depression. That day wiped out a lot of “paper” fortunes and a lot of real jobs. It would be more than a decade before we began to really recover. And that even took a world war to accomplish.  While we have faced many more calamities in the years since nothing compares to … Continue reading The Rich Get Richer….

“I think the same fellow who started that self-made man gag started that other asinine expression, ‘100 per cent American.’” – Will Rogers, 28 October 1923 Will was just not one to parse his words. He spoke what he thought. I like to think I am like him in that regard. I also like to think that I also, like him, do it in a respectable manner without rants and personal attacks. At least I try to do that. Will was turned off by certain phrases and these two above were on that list. To him there is no such … Continue reading 100% American…

“A nation is just like an individual. If a man’s neighbors all hate him and he is continually in trouble, and all his fights and troubles are always over in the other fellow’s yard, he must be wrong.” – Will Rogers, 30 March 1927 Why we continue to always be fighting in the other fellow’s yard is beyond me. I am very thankful that for the most part our fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan are over. We will likely on leave a couple hundred thousand of our soldiers there but that is considered a withdrawal by modern standards. . ;) … Continue reading In The Other Fellow’s Yard….

“And that’s what makes us a great nation. We take the little things serious, and the big ones as a joke.” – Will Rogers, 15 September 1933 I must admit that getting away from the politics of our nation the above quote rings pretty true of these times.  But, in these times everything is a joke in politics.  I bet when Will originally penned these words in 1933 many people weren’t taking the serious things to do with the Great Depression as a joke!  But that was just Will Rogers for you; he tried to put some jovial spin on … Continue reading Taking Things Serious……

“Too many people spend money they earned..to buy things they don’t want..to impress people that they don’t like.” ― Will Rogers Continue reading To Impress People…..

“No nation ever had two better friends than we have. You know who they are. They are the Atlantic and the Pacific oceans.” – Will Rogers, 9 April 1933 You know Will you are on to something here.  I know you were around when all the saber-rattling was going on in Europe in the early 1930s. I know you had at least a preliminary taste of what Hitler would bring onto that region but you missed out on the second war to end all wars. We tried to stay out of that one but our now Japanese friends insisted on … Continue reading No Better Friends…

On 15 August 1935, Will Rogers and Wiley Post were on their way from Fairbanks, Alaska, to Barrow, Alaska, when they encountered some heavy fog. Post knew they were near Barrow, but due to the conditions, was having difficulty spotting any landmarks. After spotting a small native camp near Walakpa Lagoon, Wiley Post landed the plane to ask for directions to Barrow. After Will and Wiley got out and stretched their legs, Clair Okpeaha, one of the natives, directed them towards Barrow. Upon take off from lagoon, the plane began a steep accent, and banked sharply to the right. At … Continue reading Here’s To You Will…

“Plans get you into things but you got to work your way out.” – Will Rogers, 25 June 1931 Be careful you might just get what you plan for. I seem to have to learn that lesson over and over again through my life. I am a planner to my soul. When I was six years old you could often find me out on the dewy grass on a summer night staring at the stars and wondering/planning what my future would look like.  And for the next sixty years I have continued to the same thing. In my very early … Continue reading Planning…

When some nation wants us to help ’em out they use the same old “gag”, that we should exert our “Moral Leadership” and, like a yap, we believe it, when as a matter of truth, no nation wants any other nation exerting a “Moral leadership” over ’em even if they had one.  — Will Rogers Will it amazes me how eighty plus years ago you can tell us so much that we think is somehow new today. Moral leadership, yeah that is a good one.  I remember President Bush using those words over and over again to get us into … Continue reading “Moral Leadership”…

  Nobody wants to be called Common People, especially common people.” – Will Rogers, 21 June 1925 Let’s face it, no one likes to think that they are common. We all like to see ourselves as different from everyone else. As teenagers we spend an inordinate amount to time to make ourselves different. So much so that teenagers all end up being pretty common. :) About the worst insult you can give anyone is to call them common.  Many of us refuse to believe in statistical analysis that can show in advance what we think or who we will vote … Continue reading Common People….

  “This country is a thousand times bigger than any two men in it, or any two parties in it.” – Will Rogers, 2 November 1932 I seem to often get ground down by the politics of the day. Especially with all the gridlock and bickering that is always there. Thanks Will for reminding me that the country is a thousand times bigger than all those ornery folks in Washington or the two parties that now occupy space there. Outside the Washington beltway and several State houses there is still a lot of good going on in this country and … Continue reading Bigger Than….

“There is nothing that sets a nation back as far in civilization as prosperity.” – Will Rogers, 2 April 1933 Yeah Will, prosperity does seem to bring out the animal in many of us. Just look at the Robber Barons of the early 20th century for evidence of that.  Heck, you don’t even have to look that far back, just look at the 1%ers now who will do just about anything to maintain their wealth.  Prosperity brings out the best in a few but the worst in others. Continue reading Prosperity…

“…elections are a good deal like marriages, there is just no accounting for anyone’s taste.” – Will Rogers, 10 May 1926 You got that right Will. Of course when you made this quote Calvin Coolidge was president Hoover was just around the corner to replace him. I guess you were a pretty good predictor of the future.  I had the very same thoughts in November 2004 when Mr. Bush was given a second term.  I couldn’t understand the taste of the electorate that year. Continue reading No Accounting For Taste…

  “It takes a long time to find out how wrong you are sometimes.” – Will Rogers, 8 August 1933 I’m not sure why what Will declares here is true but I think it has something to do with our stubbornness. Once we get locked into a particular idea it is just so hard to admit that we might have been wrong to start with.  I know  it took the radical stands of Ronald Reagan for me to finally admit that I belonged to the wrong political party if I belonged to any party at all. ;) I know everyone … Continue reading It Takes A Long Time…

  “This is a great country. You never know where our heroes will come from.” – Will Rogers, 7 June 1933 One of the great things about this country is that anyone who is fortunately enough to have just the right circumstances come about can be a hero for future generations.  Many have sports heroes who they admire for their ability to do a particular thing like putting a ball into a hole, hitting it with a stick, throwing it to a teammate. I can’t say that any of those qualities make someone a hero to me. But to each … Continue reading You Never Know….

When we start out trying to make everybody have Moral elections, why, it just dont look like we going to have Marines enough to go round.” – Will Rogers, 26 May 1928 After Mr. Bush discovered that there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq he turned on a dime to say that he invaded Iraq so that the people would have moral elections.  It looks like that argument is older than I thought as here is Will’s quote from eighty-five years ago saying the same thing.  We didn’t have enough Marines this time around either. He ended up … Continue reading Moral Elections……

Betrayed by friendship is not a bad memorial to leave. – 16 June 1931   Will Rogers Will, I had to think about this one to understand what you were talking about. I think it means that is it better to have friends even if some end up betraying you than it is to have no friends at all.  That’s kind of deep but knowing you as I do I suspect that is your point. It kind of like the one about “its better to have love and lost than not to have loved at all”. Yeah, some friendships can result … Continue reading Betrayed by Friendship….

Somebody is always telling us in the papers how to prevent war. There is only one way in the World to prevent war, and that is, FOR EVERY NATION TO TEND TO ITS OWN BUSINESS. – June 28, 1925  Will Rogers Will I know you are right about this but it seems that eighty years later our country still can’t seem to understand your words of wisdom. We still want to get into every nation’s business as if it were our own.  There are those in the Senate, particularly Mr. McCain and that bunch, who have not seen a war … Continue reading Tend To Our Own Business….

There is an awful lot of difference between reading something and actually seeing it, for you can never tell, till you see it, just how big a liar History is. —  1926 Will Rogers I doubt if there is a thing in the world as wrong and unreliable as History. History ain’t what it is; it’s what some writer wanted it to be, and I just happened to thing I bet ours is as crooked as the rest. I bet we have started just as much devilment as was ever started against us — maybe more.  —  March 12,1932   … Continue reading About History…

Americans have one particular trait that they need never have any fear of some other nation copying, that is, we are the only people that will go where we know we are absolutely not wanted.   — Will Rogers January 8, 1927 — And you thought this was a recent thing didn’t you.  But once again Will shows us that we have been butting our noses in where we are not welcomed for at least eighty years now and I suspect much longer than that. This trait is very strange to me; about the same as our fascination with guns. … Continue reading Where We Are Not Wanted….

The more ignorant you are the quicker you fight. 12 August 1929   Will Rogers I must admit that I am a wimp when it comes to fighting. The last time I had a physical fight was when I was about seven years old. I punched my best friend Johnny Gallagher in the nose. I don’t really remember the circumstance behind the fight but I think I was goaded into it by some other kids. That seems to be the way many fights are started. I was devastated that I had actually hurt my buddy. I vowed then and there to … Continue reading Ignorance and Fighting….

I don’t care who you are, you just can’t reach middle life without having done and said a whole lot of foolish things. 29 December 1934   Will Rogers I have to admit that I have done some pretty foolish things in life, especially in my high school years. Things that I am not particularly proud of but I own up to them. Don’t get me wrong, nothing I did left any permanent harm on others and only a little to myself but some of them were a little bit unlawful. :) I used to readily admit that I drank much more before I was … Continue reading The Foolish Things We Do….

We got one thing to be thankful for anyhow. The country is not in as bad shape as the rumors have it. 3 September 1931  Will Rogers One of the things I have always liked about Will is that he seemed to be an eternal optimist. This quote was about three years into the Great Depression and he was still an optimist. But it does go to the heart of another of my favorite quotes and that is things are never as good as you had hoped or as bad as you had imagined. There are so many rumors around about what will … Continue reading Not As Bad Shape….