Our Daily Dead

By way of the Missoulian (and hordes of others)…Eleanor McGovern, whose husband George McGovern served as a U.S. senator from South Dakota and ran for president, died Thursday morning at the family’s home in Mitchell, according to a Mitchell funeral home. She was 85.

George McGovern, a former congressman and senator, was a leading opponent of the war in Vietnam. He was the Democratic nominee for president in 1972, losing to Richard Nixon.

In a 2005 interview with the Argus Leader newspaper in Sioux Falls, S.D., she explained her approach to family life and politics.

“I was determined to help with George’s career, not only by taking responsibility for the family, but by contributing ideas,” she said. “In fact, I never considered it ‘George’s’ career — it was ours.”

From the McGovern Center web site:

Eleanor came to the forefront of national awareness during Senator McGovern’s 1972 Presidential campaign. George has described her as his most helpful critic and most trusted adviser. And as one of his key strategists, she shared in both the victories and the defeats associated with the fight for causes in which she believed deeply. As the wife of a presidential nominee, Eleanor broke new ground by campaigning on her own across the country.

An accomplished speaker, she stirred crowds from coast to coast and appeared frequently as a guest on network television and radio discussions dealing with national and international issues. Her high profile permanently transformed public perception of the role and value of political spouses.

~~The ODDones for OurDailyDead.com

Technorati tags: Eleanor McGovern, George McGovern, president, Richard Nixon, McGovern Center

By way of the AP Wire and CentreDaily.com comes that E. Howard Hunt, the man who helped organize the Watergate break-in, leading to the greatest scandal in American political history and the downfall of Richard Nixon’s presidency, died Tuesday. He was 88.

Hunt died after a lengthy bout with pneumonia, according to his son, Austin Hunt.

The elder Hunt was many things: World War II soldier, CIA officer, organizer of both a Guatemalan coup and the botched Bay of Pigs invasion, and author of more than 80 books, many from the spy-tale genre.

Yet the bulk of his notoriety came from the one thing he always insisted he wasn’t - a Watergate burglar. He often said he preferred the term “Watergate conspirator.”

“I will always be called a Watergate burglar, even though I was never in the damn place,” Hunt told The Miami Herald in 1997. “But it happened. Now I have to make the best of it.”

While working for the CIA, Hunt recruited four of the five actual burglars - Bernard Barker, Virgilio Gonzalez, Rolando Eugenio Martinez and Frank Sturgis, all who had worked for Hunt a decade earlier in the Bay of Pigs Invasion.

“According to street gossip both in Washington and Miami, Mr. Castro had been making substantial contributions to the McGovern campaign,” Hunt told CNN in February 1992. “And the idea was … that somewhere in the books of the Democratic National Committee those illicit funds would be found.”

The idea was wrong, and the fallout escalated into huge political scandal.

And in case you missed it, the E stands for Everette.

~~The ODDones for OurDailyDead.com

Technorati tags: E. Howard Hunt, Watergate, break-in, scandal, Richard Nixon, died, burglar, Bay of Pigs

Now perhaps this is too easy, this adding Fidel Castro to the ODD On Deck group, but we are nothing if not easy.

“He’s getting better, better, I see him improving,” Castro Junior, also known as “Fidelito” because of how much he looks like his father, said after the inauguration of a scientific center in southern Chile on Saturday.

Bring Out Yer Dead! This latest Castro media snippet reminds of the Monty Python skit wherein the man thrown on the cart with all the dead claims “I’m not dead yet” and “I’m getting better!”

His son said on Saturday that the Cuban leader was in a “positive and optimistic mood.” Great. So is George Bush.

~~The ODDones for OurDailyDead.com

Technorati tags: Fidel Castro, On Deck, Castro Junior, Fidelito, Monty Python, Cuban, George Bush