The politician who intimidated TR: 1/8: A Man of Iron: The Turbulent Life and Improbable Presidency of Grover Cleveland by Troy Senik
The John Batchelor Show
John Batchelor
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🗓️ 22 May 2023
⏱️ 11 minutes
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The politician who intimidated TR: 1/8: A Man of Iron: The Turbulent Life and Improbable Presidency of Grover Cleveland by Troy Senik
https://www.amazon.com/Man-Iron-Turbulent-Improbable-Presidency/dp/1982140747?ref_=ast_author_dp#customerReviews
Grover Cleveland’s political career—a dizzying journey that saw him rise from obscure lawyer to president of the United States in just three years—was marked by contradictions. A politician of uncharacteristic honesty and principle, he was nevertheless dogged by secrets from his personal life. A believer in limited government, he pushed presidential power to its limits to combat a crippling depression, suppress labor unrest, and resist the forces of American imperialism. A headstrong executive who alienated Congress, political bosses, and even his own party, his stubbornness nevertheless became the key to his political appeal. The most successful Democratic politician of his era, he came to be remembered most fondly by Republicans
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Will interest rates change again? |
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| 0:20.0 | This is CBS Eye on the World. Here's John Bachelor |
| 0:26.0 | This is CBS Eye on the World. I'm John Bachelor. It is the spring of 1885. |
| 0:33.0 | The 22nd President of the United States, Grover Cleveland, former Governor of New York, former Mayor of Buffalo, former District Attorney of Eerie County, |
| 0:45.0 | Anders the White House, Anders the Chief Executive's Office with a vision of how we will conduct himself. |
| 0:51.0 | That is the beginning of the policy disputes that will reign over his first term and then with the in-between period his second term. |
| 1:02.0 | This is the only man to hold the office twice so effectively he is the 22nd and 24th President. |
| 1:10.0 | I learn this from a wonderful new book rich with irony, a man of iron, the turbulent life and the improbable presidency of Grover Cleveland. |
| 1:20.0 | Troy Seneca's the author, I welcome Troy. I congratulate him and I begin with the policies of spring of 1885. |
| 1:28.0 | Troy, the President is faced with stories of silver and gold stories of terraforms, stories of civil service reform, |
| 1:39.0 | it's all quite overwhelming for us now to imagine how Congress is going to deal with these. |
| 1:45.0 | But the Chief Executive had a style that was quite different from other presidents before him. |
| 1:51.0 | He had no experience in the federal city, he had no experience at the national level. |
| 1:56.0 | He was a man who had very effectively used the veto when he was Governor of New York, the veto when he was mayor of Buffalo. |
| 2:05.0 | How did he regard himself? What was his mission in his mind as he took on the Congress, the willful Congress dominated by Lords? Good evening to you. |
| 2:16.0 | Good evening, John. It's still light to be with you. The answer to that question, Grover Cleveland is a man who takes the verb preside very seriously in presidency. |
| 2:29.0 | This is a guy who, as you suggest, had used the veto very aggressively as mayor of Buffalo, had used the veto very aggressively as Governor of New York. |
| 2:37.0 | And his conception of the presidency and a presidential power, especially in his first term, is in many ways negative in nature. |
| 2:49.0 | I say in the book that Cleveland kind of sees himself as a kind of ombudsman in chief. |
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