Rutherford B Hayes

From Memeorandum I caught a link to New York Magazine, which was discussing President Obama dissing the late President Rutherford B Hayes for rejecting the recent Alexander Graham Bell invention, the telephone.

I sometimes wonder if there is a former [Republican] President the Incumbent does like.

At any rate, it turns out there is a President Hayes Library of sorts and Ms Nan Card is the curator of manuscripts.  Card says it is a canard.  I am thinking this mistaken impression of President Hayes came from a speechwriter, who should now be available for employment elsewhere, or from TOTUS, who needs an adjustment.

From the linked website:

In fact, Card noted, Hayes was not only the first president to have a telephone in the White House, but he was also the first to use the typewriter, and he had Thomas Edison come to the White House to demonstrate the phonograph.  "So I think he was pretty much cutting edge," Card insisted, "maybe just the opposite of what President Obama had to say there."

But, the real question should be about Governments picking technology.  While the predecessor to the US Department of Energy gave us the fusion weapon (H-bomb) within a few years of the TRINITY shot, DoE, created in 1977, hasn't yet given us clean, safe, cheap fusion power, or even dirty, unsafe and expensive fusion power, or anything else, really.

Governments are not a good vehicle for picking winners and losers.  That is a job for the free market, and capitalism.

Regards  —  Cliff