Guest Blogger: Martin van Buren

In what I hope will merely be the first correspondence, former President Martin van Buren has written to address me at length about this election, the 21st century media, and world affairs. Enjoy. --Freddie

An Open Letter to Mr. Frederick L’Hote

From Mr. Martin Van Buren, CITIZEN
Lindenwald in Kinderhook, New-York

Dearest Mr. L’Hote,

I must take Liberty to notify you, in the most withering airs of disapprobation that honourable printmen will allow, that you, sir, are a common reprobate and Jacobin dog.

As you will no doubt infer from my career in the political fore, I, sir, consider myself a CITIZEN of our grand Republic. And, as any man of true virtue is wont and encouraged to do, I fancy myself an avid trencherman of all things politick.

Thus, of late, I have become a ready reader of your news-journal broadsides (what do you Jacobin dandies style it? Le Blogg?). In recent weeks I have perused your Whiggish dawdlings in eager anticipation of your take on our nation’s gravest policy concerns — issues, dear sir, that resonate hard and true with the Voting Public, issues that will sway the conscience and chill the humors in this upcoming exercise of our Republic’s freedoms.

It is to my lasting regret, then, that your Francophile editorial airs have occluded the issues of real substance this Election-Day. Where, dear sir, is your commentary on the grave national threat posed by the Caroline affair? Have you not the scruples to critique our banks’ incompetencies in specie mismanagement? What of the hoarding of good American land by jackanape Cherokee speculators? You claim to be a meaningful part of the Publick Discourse, but I only spot folly upon folly. You, sir, are the literary equivalent of a duplicitous, shortsighted upstate Canal builder!

I equally read with disgust and contempt your cowardly recent resolution to eschew your politicking discourse until Election-Day. Your choice of LE BANAL in lieu of further commentary on the candidates makes this restive 225-year-old want to box your ears with the vigor of a sprightly young Henry Clay. O with such Kentuckian rage I should pummel you into submission…

Yet, I can see that your dereliction in duties can only be overcome by the brave act of one citizen: THIS CITIZEN. Thus, for the edification of your subscribers, I offer the following exposition on our candidates for the Executive:

Issue the First: The Economies

Although I am bewildered by the lack of emphasis on the tariffs in this autumnal campaign, it is much to my approbation that both Senators Obama and McCain favor taxation initiatives that will provide relief to the common cooper, mechanic, or shipwright. Yet I am flummoxed by their recent support for a “bailout” of the moneyed speculators from our largest banks. For Obama, the amiable Whig, this comes as little surprise. Undoubtedly, the Illinois senator has constituent steamboat or canal magnates sweetening his campaign coffers. But how can Mr. McCain, champion that he is of the limited Jeffersonian government, betray our Democratic Party principles with this tawdry COURTING OF THE BANK FIENDS? Are they such dullards that the Panic of 1837 is but a small thing, a will-o’-the-wisp of our nation’s collective memory? The choice is simple. We must elect an Executive who will regulate these banker brigands. They must force upon them ironclad directives!! Nay, I say, no more meat for the wolves to sup on! I will vote for the Candidate who will cluck his tongue at the wily moneyed men and cry: “Sirs, back your currency with sufficient gold and silver specie! Or back no notes ‘t all!” The Republic will be nowhere without proper confidence in the bullion supply.

Issue the Second: The Security of the Republic

Lamentably, Mr. Obama and Mr. McCain have presented cocksure, cavalier attitudes in quantum a vital issue of this autumn’s campaign: the protection of Our Republic’s borders. Why, pro unus exempoator, have the Candidates not taken a stand on the aggressions of our Jacobin enemies off the border of Maine? Why, against all sound logic, have they not begun to build walls to keep out these yellow Catholick scoundrels? I would like the Chief Executive to assuage the Publick’s fears of an Aroostook County teeming with Popish jacktars, their rogue lumberjacks raping our Virgin Wilderness of its fine hardwood timber! Is this not AMERICAN TIMBER?? Is this not the TIMBER given unto Our Great Nation by our Holy God himself? And then, is it not our duty to pledge to fight for said TIMBER? Shall we continue to fear the dastardly and wanton incursions of our swarthy Franco-Briton neighbors from the Northward? That Mr. Obama and Mr. McCain have yet to address this timely issue in their many public fora leads me to believe that they themselves may be in the pocket of Louis-Philippe and the Capetian Pretenders.

Issue the Third: The Virtue of the Candidates

In judging one’s qualifications for the executive, I only ask that our writers and publishers answer me a simple question: which of the candidates is a WORTHY MAN, and which the greater jacktar? Friends and fellow Citizens, it is the DUTY of Mr. L’Hote and his brethren to give us a better picture of the virtue, wisdom, and sobriety of our choices for the Executive. By this standard the men of print, to say nothing of the more heavily interested men of politicking (you Jacobins call them le pundits), continue to fail.

Unanswered queries abound. What sayeth Senator Obama on the annexation issue in Texas? How will the question of slavery be decided there? And what will Senator McCain do to improve relations with Prussia? Does either candidate have secret coalitions with MONARCHISTS?

The literati should, nay, MUST endeavor to answer these questions before we call out our ballots in the public square this November.