Democratic Forum

1. “Say, how old do you have to be before you can join the Democratic Forum?” 🙂

2. I didn’t know this was still a thing. Where do they meet?

3. They meet in a basement, and the code word is “education.”

4. One of the most memorable attendances I ever had over the years at the Democratic Forum was back in May of ’81, when McGovern was the guest speaker. Back then, the Forum met at the top of the downtown Holiday Inn in the rotary room (In more ways than one 🙂 ). AND, it had then been four plus months since McGovern had left the Senate after having been beaten by Abdnor in November of 1980, when he spoke at the Forum this time, and the president of the Forum at the time, whose name I do not recall, introduced McGovern to the Forum in a rather awkward manner because he didn’t know if he should introduce him as George, George McGovern, Mr. McGovern, or Senator McGovern since McGovern was no longer in the Senate. Well, McGovern had fun with this and put the Forum president at ease with an explanation of how, when you leave the Senate, one of the first things you receive is a letter from the Secretary of the Senate explaining your dos and don’ts as a former senator. McGovern explained further that according to this letter, you can still be referred to as “Senator Smith,” or whatever, and that actually all senators are senators for life with continued access to the Senate gym, the Senate dining room, and even the floor of the Senate with some lobbying restrictions in hand. Then McGovern went on to tell the Forum crowd how this introduction of him today reminded him of a once-joke involving Evita and Juan Peron, and General Francisco Franco. As the joke goes, the Perons were visting Franco in Spain and they were all situated in a very ornate hotel room, but then they decided to open the french doors and walk out on to the balcony to a large swarm of onlookers and supporters beneath them, except that some of the crowd was not that friendly towards Evita due to her checkered past with some yelding names at her like whore or lady of the evening, and it was this negativity which eventually led the three to leave the balcony and retreat to the adjoinging hotel room where reportedly then Franco looked at Evita and said: “Don’t worry, Evita, some people still call me General”…. 🙂

   AND, on another note, today Forum is mostly filled with former educators, and I want to thank them for their service, but I remember a time when Forum was filled with people from many different professions, but that all seemed to change in concert with the emergence of Janklow. In my personal opinion, Janklow intimidated many professionals from getting involved or staying involved in the SDDP, and that’s why we should take special note of a recent comment by Obama about Trump, intimidation, and resistance, because I think Trump is doing to America what Janklow once did to South Dakota:

   https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jul/22/obama-breaks-silence-trump

   #TheJanklowizationOfAmerica

5. Political cartoons are free speech. It’s a better way to ridicule Republicans who can’t see that Trump is a threat to democracy. Today, the press got kicked out of government. All networks and media protested but yet it happened. There goes freedom of the press and soon after other forms of fascism. Are assassins patriots? Will the military generals take over with a coup? Impeachment doesn’t work. How can a seated president be removed?

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