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    My Favorite Al Haig Story

    My mother met Al Haig back in 1988, when he was under the impression that he was running for President. (Long before I was Doctor Cleveland I was the Granite State Kid, and in New Hampshire you can personally meet all the candidates, even the ones that other people won't remember were in the primaries.) Mom actually met nearly every primary candidate that year, Democratic and Republican, in a series of events sponsored by a local newspaper.

    So Mom, who was a police lieutenant, asked General Haig (ret.) his opinion about women in the military. Haig responds with a story about a female war correspondent who was covering Vietnam (an irrelevant story, to Mom's mind, because it involves an unarmed woman with no military training). And Haig wound up his story with his big clincher: "As soon as the shooting started, my instinct was to throw that girl over my shoulder and run for the nearest helicopter."

    Mom said, "I carry a weapon every day. Don't you call me girl."

    And that's how they were quoted in the newspaper.

    Rest in peace, general. I hope Saint Mary is carrying you over her shoulder to heaven.

     

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    Rest in peace? That old POS was certifiable. Billy Batson. Took one too many numbchuck's to the temple.

    BYE AL! Cool


    I liked how the New York Times handled Haig's obituary:

    He knew, the Reagan aide Lyn Nofziger once said, that “the third paragraph of his obit” would detail his conduct in the hours after Reagan was shot on March 30, 1981. That day, Haig wrongly declared himself the acting president.

    That was, of course, the third paragraph of the NYT obituary.


    Yes. That made me laugh out loud.


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