So I am watching Gerald Ford's state funeral on TV and I noticed something interesting
Whitehouse.gov photo of Ford's casket at the White House Rotunda
I wish I could get a screen-cap of what I just saw now on CNN --and I have been switching channels to see if I can get a better look at the seating arrangement on the left-hand side of the aisle.
Almost all of the Bush family is sitting in the front of the left-hand side aisle. Jimmy Carter and his wife are in the front row along with Nancy Reagan and Laura Bush. Condoleezza Rice is on the third row behind Bush I, his wife and one of their daughters.
Oh! I saw the Clintons.
As Bush is walking down the aisle with Ford's widow, I caught a glimpse of the Clintons. They are sitting to the left of one of the Bush daughters. Off-center and almost off-camera.
Also interesting ... they put Betty Ford with her immediate family on the right, away from the politically charged seating that was arranged on the left side.
The seating on those 3 front rows on the left side say way too much of the effed-up politics of United States. Talk about nepotism and The South controlling politics in the post-Civil Rights Movement Unites States.
ps : Did I just saw Dick Cheney express an emotion? He actually looked sad!
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Courtesy | Politics | Protocol | Semiotics | Bill Clinton | George W. Bush | Gerald Ford | Hillary Clinton | Laura Bush | Nancy Reagan
I just found it interesting that it was a Bush fest
Submitted by liza on 2 January 2007 - 2:41pm.
I just think it's interesting how many Bushes where on those two pews. For a democracy this country has voted people into office as if it were a monarchy.
But also, Bush 1 didn't pretend he was a southener as his son, but even with the Democrats, the country has been manhandled by the south for the past 40 years.
It makes me wonder if a northern stater could win the elections --even someone like Giuliani.
Demographics?
Submitted by SteamGeek on 3 January 2007 - 2:14am.
Errata: I botched the name above. I had the Pat Buchanan / Jerry Falwell crowd in mind and apparently somehow ended up with Pat Robertson in mind and totally missed the name reference. At some point its pretty much the same confusing (shall I say more Rightous than the rest of us) bunch.
From a south voting / outcome winner point of view just for fun what about this? Set aside the NYC Wall Street corporate PAC influence on elections, and consider the massive South / Southwest / Western migrations of Baby Boomers in the 40 year time (sample) you mention.
Think this is a factor in who makes it thru the primary and election process?
I had no idea
Submitted by JJ Ross on 3 January 2007 - 10:57am.
I had no idea the regional (if not party) alienation was so bad from the northern perspective, Liza, is it? I'm down here and FROM here, where the last 40 years have felt very different to me but most assuredly quite American, and where never is heard a discouraging word, not at funerals anyway . . .
p.s. I'm still trying to wrap my mind around this startling (to me) analysis of national politics: Ford was a Michigan man, right? Can't get much further north that that and still be American. And if Ford hadn't been named as VP to follow Nixon (himself a California man) the other Agnew replacement candidates were Rockefeller and Reagan, neither from around these parts!
I saw another televised honorary thing for Gerald Ford during the Michigan bowl game, which had me thinking about presidents and college football rivalries rather than regional political animus, and feeling ill-used because my alma mater has no alumni presidents to preen about, at least that I know of.
It certainly didn't occur to me that in so doing, Michigan was dissing me and the entire south, even though their opponent that day was admittedly the University of SOUTHERN. . . California.
A little curious
I'm going to ask this based on being neither Democrat or Republican (basically I think grouping labels are tools to either hide or cast insult from within). The only group I publicly affiliate is Earthling, and I vote independent, cafeteria style.
My understanding is Ford was more or less disappointed in his post White House years with the direction the Republican party went, especially with deep concerns regarding the Pat Robinson crowd.
If it was a deceased Democratic President, with a sitting Democratic president in the White house do you really think in the current day and age the seating arrangement would be any different, only reversed?