Submitted by John Drexel, Jan 25, 2007 11:55

Mr. Batchelor is, as ever, thoughtful, entertaining, and provocative all at once. However, the comparison of Hillary to Ulysses S. Grant is laughable. Whenever has She Who Must Be Obeyed displayed Grant's directness and force of character? I can, more likely, imagine her uttering (to her sycophants, in the privacy of her inner sanctum, of course) words such as these:

"I find myself in a strange position here: President, Cabinet, [generals] and all deferring to me. By some strange operation of magic I seem to have become the power of the land. . . . [I] am quite overwhelmed by the congratulations I received and the respect with which I was treated. . . . [Congress seems willing] to give me my way in everything. . . . [C]onversation after conversation [calls] on me to save the nation. . . . I believe they love me. . . . God has placed great work in my hands. . . . I was called to it; my previous life seems to have been unwittingly directed to this great end."
And words such as these:

"I am daily becoming more disgusted with this imbecile administration. . . . [The Secretary of State] is . . . a meddlesome, officious, incompetent little puppy. . . . [The Defense Secretary] is a garrulous old woman. . . . The president is nothing more than a well meaning baboon. . . . It is sickening in the extreme . . . [to] see the weakness and unfitness of the poor beings who control the destinies of this great country.
. . . The president is an idiot."

The Saviour of the Republic who penned these words was none other, of course, than George B. McClellan, a man of immense self-importance and minuscule achievement who, following his distinguished [sic] performance in the early years of the Civil War, carried the banner of the Democratic Party as its presidential candidate in the election of 1864. What do the history books have to say about President McClellan?

Oh--and the "baboon" and "idiot" president to whom he referred? Abraham Lincoln.

I rest my case.

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