Life, 1928-08-16 · page 5 of 48
Life — August 16, 1928 — page 5: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page features Will Rogers's commentary on a political challenge between two candidates, with a satirical cartoon below. **The Figures:** - "Al Smith" (likely Al Smith, Democratic politician of that era) - References to William Randolph Hearst and various political figures - The cartoon shows a "General Motors" wagon, suggesting corporate interests **The Satire's Point:** Rogers attacks politicians for digging up old records and past votes to discredit opponents rather than discussing current issues. He sarcastically suggests candidates should debate Bryan, Davis, and Cox (prior Democratic figures) instead of Al Smith. The cartoon suggests corporate interests (General Motors) are manipulating the political "offer"—questioning candidates' genuine independence. **The Joke:** Politicians rely on outdated ammunition and personal attacks rather than substantive policy debate, while corporate power lurks behind the scenes.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
“You Can’t Make Any Commoner Appeal Than I Can” Gove At SmitH. Dear Frienp A: I hate to do this but when a man enters the Presidential race, he is no longer his own keeper, he is public property, as you probably have found out by now. Now this is the open season tor De- bates, and I believe you and I could put on about as good a one as one of these others. So I hereby challenge you the way I challenged the other fellow last week. Now the trouble with most Debates, they are confined to a subject. Now we won't Jet that worry us, we won't let issues or questions worry us at all, we'll just rent Madison Square Garden. The chances are Rickard would want his money in advance, now that his fight has flopped on him, but all we do is sell tickets, and let the money go to poor Democratic widows who have given their husbands’ lives to trying to get elected to. some office in the Democratic party. Those by WILL ROGERS are the most deserving women I know of. I think you and I can do a Dempsey, and get in some real jack for those poor old souls. I see where William Randolph White has been kinder snooping around for a Debate with you, Now don’t you go and debate him, he will go and dig up a lot of old records. I hate old records, Bert Williams’ is the only old records that are any good. This White will dig up how you voted on every bill since you been in office. Now I won't do that, I think what a man did years ago has nothing to do with what he is doing today. If you stuck with Croker and Murphy and all those, why more power to you. Suppose you had stuck with Bryan, and Cox and Davis, and all those, where would you have been? You were a wise guy and everybody gives you credit for stringing with a win- ner, So your old records mean nothing to me, What you and I want to talk about, Al, is, “What will we do if we get in?” The first thing I will do is to have that White House painted green, so they can’t call it the White House any more. Prohibition,—let’s not mention that. It has stirred up enough trouble already. Farm relief,—the Republicans give the farmers good prices every four years, so they are about to forget to holler. You know how a Farmer votes. When he gets to the polls he reaches in his pocket and sees how much he’s got. If it’s only a few cents why he says “Throw the rascals out,” and he votes Democratic. But if he’s got as much as a dollar he guesses that the rascals is on his side after all, so maybe he'd better leave "em in. “This year Al, the Republicans has ar- ranged things so the farmer has got his “Hey, Al, how are you going to dispose of this ¢ritrer?” comicbooks.com