Today -100: June 10, 1912: Of warships, wretched palterers in chicane and corruption, and the mighty Mississippi

The US is now sending two warships to Cuba, without having informed Cuba in advance.

The NYT says that the RNC’s rejection of all of Roosevelt’s contested delegates demonstrates a plot to buy the presidency for Roosevelt, a plot which has failed “because of the utter incapacity of his miserable agents. Had their skill been equal to their, and his, unprincipled audacity, if instead of being wretched palterers in chicane and corruption they had been competent in crime, men thoroughly schooled in the higher branches of political villainy, the picture now presented to the eyes of the Nation in Chicago might have been very different.” (In another editorial a couple of days ago I didn’t link to, the NYT dismissed the primaries, in which TR beat Taft’s ass like a flabby drum, as a failed experiment, because turnouts were so low that clearly most people would rather just leave the selection of their presidential candidate to the party bosses.)

Pro-Roosevelt Gov. Walter Stubbs of Kansas says “It is just as reprehensible to steal delegates as it is to steal sheep or horses.” And that’s pretty darn reprensible.

The Mississippi has been flooding. Roosevelt says if he’s elected president, he’ll put a stop to that.