800 Pound Reagan Statue

You know the old joke, "Where does an 800 pound gorilla sit?" "Anywhere he wants!" Fittingly, there is an eight foot high, eight hundred pound bronze statue of Ronald Reagan that was unveiled at the California State Capitol recently.

In the basement.

In an odd little story in my local dead tree newspaper, there is an article that they attribute to the Sacramento Bee. Wishing to quote the article (without an undue amount of typing), I went to LDT's (local dead tree) website, where I could find no trace at all of this article from yesterday's newspaper. So I went to the Sacratomato Bee, and found an article about the unveiling, minus the snark and detail printed in the dead tree version. I even Googled the first ten words of the piece, "Ronald Reagan is the hero who ended the Cold War..." to see if it was anywhere online. No joy.

As a public service, I will now type my little fingers to the bone to give you some of the flavor of this article.

It stands in the "lower rotunda," also known as the basement... Two Reagan cabinet secretaries were on hand for the event, Energy Secretary John Herrington and Secretary of State George Schultz. Schultz, 94 spoke for nearly 12 minutes without notes, telling stories of the Reagan he saw...

Compare & contrast with the current resident of the White House who cannot speak for 12 minutes to a kindergarten class without a teleprompter, or the current and previous Secretaries of State who cannot keep their stories straight for 12 minutes!

...Most of the people who crowded into the basement were Republicans. Several had connections to the governor and president. Only three Democratic legislators showed up, a pathetic showing. No statewide office holders* could break away from their busy schedules, including Gov. Jerry Brown, though Brown did sign the sculpture legislation**,  and included a message that cited Reagan's "courage and unique leadership ability."

Can't you just hear the scare quotes from the author as he talks about their "busy" schedules? Way to stay classy, Democrats! You get the feeling that if these turkeys were ever memorialized in bronze, you could use them as garden gnomes?

I would love to link you to this story so that you could get the full flavor of it, but perhaps it was just a little too honest for the sensibilities of modern newsmen? Or maybe, Brian Williams wrote it??

Should you visit the State Capitol in Sacramento, be sure to go down to the "lower rotunda" and see the 800 pound, eight foot tall statue of Reagan, or as we conservatives call it: "life sized".


* Most of whom are Democrats

** back in 2012