"Who's Harry Truman?," And Other Primary Barbershop Perils

The following piece was produced by the Huffington Post's OffTheBus project.

This piece is also published on Blue Hampshire.

I'm in between homes right now. It's a long, boring story, but while I await the closing on the new place I sometimes have to feel my way around errands in odd spots.

Such as yesterday, when I popped into a barbershop for a trim. A barbershop in a reliably Republican Granite State town, but one that went for Charlie Bass by only the slimmest of margins last November.

I had been there before eight years ago, and I returned to the spot because I remembered how much I enjoyed the barber's talk, an elderly, charming gentleman with as classic northern New England accent as you'll hear. I was happy to see that he was still there.

After the obligatory Red Sox back and forth, and a few anecdotes about the start of school, he says, "So do you know who you're voting for, do you?"

I say, "Well, who do you like?" He tells me it's much too early to know, but that he believes "we need a change." I tell him the polls don't mean anything now, and he gives me a look that says, "Why are you telling me something we both know is true and doesn't need to be said?"

I tell him I like Chris Dodd, and, he quickly expresses admiration for him and "how well he speaks." Says he's someone with "a lot of experience."

Then my barber, almost finished, related to me how he received a phone call the other night from the Hillary campaign. He let the "young lady" talk about Senator Clinton for a good long time, and then when she asked if he had any questions, he told her that what he thought the country needed most right now was another Ronald Reagan, or Harry Truman.

She replied, "Who's Harry Truman?"

And that's when he promptly hung up.

After handing him his money, and suspecting that my barber, like his town, leaned Republican, I told him that it seemed to me that the national GOP bore little resemblance anymore to traditional Republican values, and that it's a shame. And he gives me a look that says, "Why are you telling me something we both know is true and doesn't need to be said?"

George W. Bush and the faux-conservative movement he rode in on may have lost New Hampshire to the elephants for a long, long time. But in order to attract the people lost in the wilderness known as traditional Yankee Republicans (you know, the Jim Jeffordses and Linc Chafees), we may want to remember our heritage, too.

Who's Harry Truman? A man who presided over a war so unpopular war that he, a sitting president, lost the New Hampshire Primary in 1952, forcing him to scrub his re-election bid. Truman lost to Estes Kefauver, who, according to Wiki, "opposed the concentration of U.S. economic and political power under the control of a wealthy, exclusive elite."

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Comments

[jeffmorgan]

Oh man that doesn't make the Hillary camp look good.

[larry278]

Like the sitcom "All in the Family" theme song said, "...Mr, we could use a Harry Truman again...". A nice Eastern Star lady like Bess would be good too; she always wore dresses. Hillary could learn from Eleanor Roosevelt's example too; both of them are stuck with skirt chasing husbands. Eleanor handled FDR's death soon after an old girl of his visited FDR very well.

[waiguoren]

Listen again. The All in the Family theme said:

"Mister we could use a man like HERBERT HOOVER again..."

[ImmanuelGoldstein]

Actually the song said "...we could use a man like Herbert Hoover again"

[outnow]

Who is Harry S. Truman? I remember him as a man of modest means who lived in Independence, Missouri several blocks from my house. I happened to be present when he turned the first spade of dirt over for the Truman Library over 50 years ago.

The buck did stop at President Truman's desk. The most important decision of his presidency was actually the easiest for him - the decision to drop the atomic bomb on the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan. I even knew one of the pilots on the B-29 bombers named the Enola Gay. But I digress. Others at that time and ever since have disputed the wisdom of that decision, the anniversary of which passed with much comment last summer.

Truman became the first Cold Warrior. He established the doctrine known as the "Truman Doctrine" in attempting to "contain" communism, developed the "Fair Deal," an employment act, set up the Marshall Plan, established NATO, recognized Israel on May 14, 1948, fired General Douglas MacArthur, started the Korean War, survived an assassination attempt, and made countless other important decisions of immense national importance, including the NSA Act of 1947 establishing the CIA.

Truman saved over 15 billion from the military waste and mismanagement, despised the Wall Street schemers, was a Grand Master Freemason, a two year law student, and a doubter of the Red Scare.

I disagree with his use of nuclear weapons, however, and the debate will continue. But at least he took full responsibility for the decision. Indeed, he was the real Decider.