Wednesday Evening Non-Trump Open Thread

As I said earlier today, I’ve been researching. The main archival collection I’ve been examining is the papers of Jim Weaver, who was an Oregon congressman in the 70s and 80s. Weaver, who was the grandson of the 1892 Populist presidential candidate of the same name, was a sort of iconoclastic liberal who was mostly known for being quite pugnacious and even obnoxious to his opponents. He was pretty successful though and was going to take on Bob Packwood (speaking of pugnacious) in the 1986 Senate election before a small ethics scandal (he was cleared) took him down. Peter DeFazio won his congressional seat and of course remains in the House today. Anyway, Weaver and Reagan’s diabolical Secretary of the Interior James Watt hated each other. Weaver would lambaste Watt during hearings, outraging his Republican colleagues. Watt was of course the bête noire of the environmental movement in the 1980s. Stuck in the back of a folder was this document, which had no information, no context, and is a bad copy. But it really does have to be shared.

I am sure Weaver thought this was hilarious. I’d love to find a way to use it in a book.

Anyway, consider this an open thread, but all Trump-related comments are banned because, you know, I think we’ve been talking enough about that dude.