Turkey pardon tradition may be tall tale

The Washington Post via Arkcity ^ | 11/22/07 | Monica Hesse

[Santa Fe_Conservative]

WASHINGTON -- Tuesday morning in the Rose Garden, President Bush promised May the turkey that he would not be served with a side of yams on Thanksgiving. Nor would May's pal Flower.

Oh, happy day.

The Thanksgiving presidential turkey pardon. It's a tradition, major newspapers have reported for years, that began in 1947 with President Harry Truman -- a sentimental reprieve from the man who had thumbs-upped two atomic bombs.

"To paraphrase Harry today," Bush said, "you cannot take the heat -- and you're definitely going to stay out of the kitchen."

Americans gobbled up this annual parable of mercy.

But like any masterly misdirection, like a fake FEMA news conference or a government-produced "news" segment, the turkey pardonings are not what they seem.

The photos of Truman pardoning his turkeys looked real enough -- live turkey, live prez, grandly extending his hand toward the tom's wattle in a gesture that surely said Emancipation! Liberation! Freedom!

Except it didn't.

[Santa Fe_Conservative]

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!!! Bush pardoned two turkeys this past week who went off to Disney World and be the parade's grand marshals.

http://www.azcentral.com/offbeat/articles/1120bush-pardon1120-ON.html

[duckman]

I thought he would pardon the two border patrol agents. Guess not. Something going on there I don’t understand.

[meanie monster]

Remember this photo? lol

[Viking2002]

Another lib Postie trying to whiz in the holiday punchbowl by inciting the PETA crowd. May she be found in an alley with an apple in her mouth, and glazed with fall harvest chutney.

[I see my hands]

"Something"

Very much.

[mainerforglobalwarming]

I’d love to see a President walk out on the grounds of the white house, surrounded by the media, take a look at the turkey’s, with a hungry look on his face. Then snap his fingers and have a couple of secret service agents, along with the white house chef take the turkeys into the white house. The president would then smile, rub his stomach and say, “These fellas need to be prepared for their journey, we’ll give them a good home”

[Old Sarge]

Bush Derangement Syndrome drips from the pages of the Compost.

[PLMerite]

Probably more in-depth investigation than the Post did on Cattlegate.

[ProudFossil]

An even bigger tall tale is that of the Washington Post having intelligent, rational personnel on their staff.

[Republican Wildcat]

Really. Is this not ridiculous?

[Mr_Moonlight]

Another lib Postie trying to whiz in the holiday punchbowl by inciting the PETA crowd.

The type who tell little Johnny and Mary on Christmas morning that there is no Santa Claus, gleefully laughing as they burst into tears .......

[Sun]

“I thought he would pardon the two border patrol agents. Guess not. Something going on there I don’t understand.”

Yeah, cook the turkey and free Ramos and Compean.

Let’s all tell the president to pardon our border patrol agents:

comments@whitehouse.gov

1-202-456-1111 (comment line)

[sinanju]

So finally we get to the bottom of this mystery.

While presidents have been presented with turkeys going back to the nineteenth-century, and several times over that history presidents have spontaneously spared the turkey in question the tradition formally began with Bush Senior.

So much for waiting for the “History’s Mysteries.”

p.s. the bird in the Dubya photo does not look at all bloated or hideously bred, he looks quite well-proportioned and athletic to my inexpert eyes. Maybe a different breed from the usual roasters?

[dvan]

I’d rather that Bush pardoned Ramos and Compean!

[MIchaelTArchangel]

Maybe we should ask Hitlery to check the archives in Bill’s presidential library and massage parlor to see if he really pardoned all those turkeys on his last day as President? How knows, maybe he didn’t really pardon Mark Rich, his brother, and all the others.

[ari-freedom]

May these turkeys be stuffed with goodness and pardon me, would you please pass the gravy?

[Russ]

Most of us would like that but it isn’t going to happen until, at least, his final days in office. To equate that pardon with pardoning of turkeys is as rediculous as the author of this article comparing Truman’s OK to drop the bombs with his pardoning of turkeys.