The Bootblack Stand: Letters to Plunkitt from Ashly Tamborine and Opel Thorston
Senator Ervin remains in such robust health. Please send your reply to me at the Indiana State Mental Hospital where my wife has installed me after I became emotionally involved with my moth...
...or even to the alarming rise of mixed nude bathing in the coastal provinces...
...To think that a man of his age can look so young and possess such a sharp mind...
...They hoodwinked poor Senator Montoya into taking his place by an amusing subterfuge...
...they are married...
...But I wonder how many BLBwatchers have been made to feel just a trifle . . . guilty...
...Opel Thorston Indianapolis, Indiana Dr...
...Senate, never smoke and never take a d r i n k . . , in public...
...In 1964 when certain senatorial spoilsports tried to whip up a Senate investigation of the Democratic Administration on the basis of Mr...
...What was the Senate up to by putting the most ignorant and lazy man in the United States Senate on such a highly publicized committee...
...Please send your reply to me at the Indiana State Mental Hospital where my wife has installed me after I became emotionally involved with my moth collection...
...Senator Ervin, like many other redoubtable patriots in the Senate, knows the difference between honest and dishonest graft...
...It is to the Minorities Explosion that I address myself...
...I admire him a lot...
...Senator Ervin's recent behavior indicates that this distinguished constitutional expert also adheres to my dichotomy...
...we can assure you there was nothing offensive in sight...
...George Washington Plunkitt, our prize-winning political analyst, is celebrating the publication of his new book, which is now available at avant-garde bookstores throughout New Jersey...
...Fortunately several astute Democrats finally talked him out of it, for they realized that were his curious daily habits exposed to the public eye, their chances of getting him into the presidency would be slim and none...
...Objections to what, I cannot imagine: I viewed it once and my wife tuned it in occasionally when I was away at Klonvocations...
...There is a difference between the foul play of the Watergate variety and the more traditional boodling of gentlemen like Bobby Baker, and Senator Ervin seems to agree...
...Although Dr...
...I realize you have many high friends in important places and I would like you to find out for me how Dear Opel: I too share your enthusiasm for Senator Ervin...
...A television network has, according to the newspapers, canceled a vulgar entertainment called Bridget Loves Bernie...
...Baker's misfortunes, Senator Ervin moved with admirable speed to help stifle the investigation by voting it down in all the protean manifestations that these vicious Republicans wrapped it in on the Senate floor...
...Dear Mr...
...Address all correspondence to The Bootblack Stand, c/o The Establishment, R.R...
...He actually thinks he is participating in a new television show similar to "What's My Line...
...Plunkitt expects to earn ten million dollars from sales of his new book, he has agreed to continue to advise public figures through this column...
...Bernie is a nice Jewish boy...
...I speak naturally of Senator Kennedy...
...The notion struck many political scientists as provocative and abhorrent in the extreme...
...and I take my text from Mr...
...I am delighted so many of you could make it, what with all this sunspot activity and the price of copra...
...Good afternoon...
...Abe Martin of Brown County, Indiana: "Nobody ever fergits where they buried the hatchet...
...Bridget is a sweet Catholic girl...
...Consider, brethren, the Republic...
...GWP No More Minorities...
...The Jewish parents were portrayed as kindly, earthly-wise, warmhearted and heartwarming, something Sholem Aleichem might have dreamed up in a diabetic stupor...
...No protests were forthcoming from the Catholic community, preoccupied a s it is with the question whether Father Phil's and Sister Liz's first baby will have a tail, or merely cloven feet., Anyhow, objections there were to something that I, not being of the Hebrew persuasion, must have missed...
...Plunkitt's book is about the importance of altruism in politics and it is titled What's in It for Me...
...The great man replies: "If you want to have a long active life in the U.S...
...I do not refer to the late sordid transactions in Washington, just now undergoing an inquisition every bit as sordid...
...The series is being dropped because of objections from "the Jewish community...
...The sight of Senator Ervin impressed me...
...Must I squintingly reexamine my every attirude...
...Plunkitt: I spent the better part of the summer watching the televised Watergate hearings...
...They stood in nice contrast to the rigid, chilly, button-arsed Catholic parents...
...Apprehensively, Ashly Tamborine Ex...
...I shall operate under the assumption that you are referring to New Mexico's Senator Montoya, the Desert Demosthenes, as I am fond of calling him...
...One must be careful...
...I hope to chat with you individually over punch and cookies after the lecture...
...Several years ago I authored a small treatise on American politics, Plunkitt of Tammany Hall I believe it was called, in which I drew the distinction between honest and dishonest graft...
...Of course not...
...Plunkitt: There is mischief afoot in Washington, and the Ervin committee proves it...
...Citizens for Better Government Washington, D.C...
...My copy of Little Black Sambo (he was the hero of my (continued on page 29) 26 The Alternative October 1973...
...I met him in a local saloon the other day and I addressed your question to him...
...11, Box 360, Bloomington, Indiana 47401, Continental U.S.A...
...their respective parents have difficulty adjusting to this and to one another--and thereby hangs a situation comedy than which I would sooner watch Celebrity Bowling...
...Is this Nixon',~ scheming yet again...
...According to the story as I have heard it, there was actually only one senator who really wanted to be on the Ervin committee--the others on the committee are serving as punishment for various infractions of the Senate code regarding shooting rubber bands and launching paper airplanes while on the Senate floor...
...My dear Miss Tamborine: I have had a very difficult time deciding which senator you refer to...
...GWP Dear Mr...
...Is my beloved morning bagel a grotesque overcompensation...
...She is sore beset...
...Or am I monstrously insensitive...
Vol. 7 • October 1973 • No. 1
