By David Stockman
\nContra Corner<\/p>\n
This is not the first time that an invalid has occupied the Oval Office.\u00a0<\/strong>After apparently exhausting himself in behalf of the \u201cWar to Make the World Safe for Democracy\u201d and orchestrating the \u201cpeace conference\u201d at Versailles that guaranteed the carnage of WWII, Woodrow Wilson succumbed to a nearly fatal stroke in October 1919 while barnstorming the nation in behalf of the League of Nations Treaty.<\/p>\n As it happened, America was than blessed with a perfectly serviceable Vice-President, Thomas R. Marshall, who had been a famous Midwestern lawyer, governor of Indiana, outspoken \u201cprogressive\u201d and contender for the Democrat nomination in 1912. Wilson won the nomination on the\u00a046th ballot but only after his advisers secretly promised Marshall the vice presidency<\/strong>\u00a0in a very smoked-filled room in the wee hours of the Dem convention.<\/p>\n Perhaps that is why Marshall\u2019s most famous quote is known to almost everyone more than 100 years later. Thus, observed America\u2019s #2 leader\u2014<\/p>\n \u201cWhat this country needs is a really good five-cent cigar.\u201d<\/strong><\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n Notwithstanding Marshall\u2019s status as a second term almost-president, Edith Wilson was having none of a succession plan. And that\u2019s despite the fact she did not have a degree in \u201ceducation\u201d nor did she answer to the \u201cDr. Edith\u201d title.<\/p>\n But she had proven herself around Washington as no mean hostess when she slipped into the First Lady role during and\/or after (it\u2019s disputed!) the illness and death of Wilson\u2019s first wife in 1915<\/strong>. Either way, Edith Wilson was not about to disembark from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue solely because her husband was virtually paralyzed on the entire left side of his body.<\/p>\n Indeed, the extent of her intrigues and deceptions designed to hang on to power are now legendary. As medical historian, Howard Markel, has told,<\/p>\n Everything changed on the morning of Oct. 2, 1919. According to some accounts, the president awoke to find his left hand numb to sensation before falling into unconsciousness. In other versions, Wilson had his stroke on the way to the bathroom and fell to the floor with Edith dragging him back into bed. However those events transpired, immediately after the president\u2019s collapse, Mrs. Wilson discretely phoned down to the White House chief usher, Ike Hoover and told him to \u201cplease get Dr. Grayson, the president is very sick.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n Grayson quickly arrived. Ten minutes later, he emerged from the presidential bedroom and the doctor\u2019s diagnosis was terrible: \u201cMy God, the president is paralyzed,\u201d Grayson declared.<\/em><\/p>\n What would surprise most Americans today is how the entire affair, including Wilson\u2019s extended illness and long-term disability, was shrouded in secrecy. In recent years, the discovery of the presidential physicians\u2019 clinical notes at the time of the illness confirm that the president\u2019s stroke left him severely paralyzed on his left side and partially blind in his right eye, along with the emotional maelstroms that accompany any serious, life-threatening illness, but especially one that attacks the brain. Only a few weeks after his stroke, Wilson suffered a urinary tract infection that threatened to kill him. Fortunately, the president\u2019s body was strong enough to fight that infection off but he also experienced another attack of influenza in January of 1920, which further damaged his health.<\/em><\/p>\n Protective of both her husband\u2019s reputation and power, Edith shielded Woodrow from interlopers and embarked on\u00a0a bedside government that essentially excluded Wilson\u2019s staff, the Cabinet and the Congress.<\/strong><\/u>\u00a0During a perfunctory meeting the president held with Sen. Gilbert Hitchcock (D-Neb.) and Albert Fall (R-N.M.) on Dec. 5, Grayson and Edith even tried to hide the extent of Wilson\u2019s paralysis by keeping his left side covered with a blanket.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n As it turned out, the immobilization of the presidency during the last 18 months of Wilson\u2019s term was one of history\u2019s great serendipity\u2019s. Absent Wilson\u2019s tireless promotion, the abominable League of Nations Treaty died aborning. America was thus given one more chance to return to its ways as a peaceful Republic untroubled by the petty intrigues of nations beyond the great Atlantic and Pacific Ocean moats.<\/p>\n Needless to say, that reprieve has long since been kicked away. America is now a dangerous Empire and its president is virtually the helmsman of the planet.\u00a0So the fact that Jill Biden has apparently read and copied the entirety of professor Markel\u2019s account of America\u2019s first Spousal Regency is troubling indeed.<\/strong><\/p>\n It was evident beyond a shadow of a doubt last Thursday night that a second Spousal Regency is now underway.<\/strong>\u00a0\u201cJoe Biden\u201d would have received his gold watch from Washington\u2019s grateful ruling apparatchiks long ago, save for the obvious fact that Jill Biden has said that absolutely \u201cnyet means nyet\u201d.<\/p>\n At this point, of course, it would be helpful if Jill did speak a bit of Russian because the minions helping her conduct this unauthorized, unlawful and constitutionally- repugnant Regency have gotten her marooned in what amounts to an helacious Moscow Winter. Alas, however, it appears that her second language lies elsewhere.<\/p>\n That is to say, Jill\u00a0Jacobs<\/s>\u00a0Giacoppo\u2019s tribal ferocity did not originate from the bucolic hills of Willow Grove Pennsylvania or the classrooms of Upper Moreland High School or even the instructors at Brandywine Junior College.\u00a0Her father\u2019s family had emigrated from the Sicilian village of Gesso, losing the \u201cGiacoppo\u201d part within days of passing Lady Liberty, but hanging on to the blood loyalty part even unto the present fraught hour.<\/strong><\/p>\n
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