The whole point of free speech is not to make ideas exempt from criticism but to expose them to it.

Thursday, January 12, 2012

Janklow passes

I have it on relatively good authority that former Gov. Bill Janklow has died. Like him or hate him, it is hard to argue that he was among the most dynamic individuals to serve in public office in South Dakota's history.

Mr. Janklow and I did not particularly get along well. But his contribution to bringing broadband internet capability to rural South Dakota alone, is a tribute to his service.

5 comments:

larry kurtz said...

It's on the AP wire.

larry kurtz said...

21 bong salute.

Bob Newland said...

Clint Roberts recently informed the world via Facebook:

"Newland, you wouldn't make a pimple on Janklow's ass."

It was rather puzzling because, after a lifetime of failed aspirations, that particular aspiration was never on my list. Maybe Roberts had me confused with someone else.

larry kurtz said...

@rcjMontgomery: "I'm not sure what it says about Bill Janklow that even many of the tributes to him on Twitter contain unprintable language."

You got that fuckin' right, DM.

Bill Dithmer said...

Bob Clint licked enough of those asses to get the jobs he got. He also liked pretty blonds, but then don't we all?

Rep. Clint Roberts served in the U.S. House of Representatives in the early 1980s. A Presho native son, Roberts moonlighted as a TV commercial and feature film actor. He appeared in Schlitz beer ads and played a sheriff in the 1976 comedy Western The Duchess and the Dirtwater Fox, starring Goldie Hawn and George Segal. He auditioned for the cigarette role model "Marlboro Man," but was smoked by a Wyoming cowboy.

When I was younger, much younger I had a friend that had a little song he used to sing about Clint. All I can remember now is the first verse.

Hey mister Marlboro Man
Who's the pretty blond with her leg in your hand
Setting on the floor of the house just the other day
Congress by day and acting by night
You sure know how to do it up right
For a boy from South Dakota it looks like your doing ok


RIH Bill Janklow The world is a better place now.

From the heart of the Pine Ridge Reservation where suicide is still thought of as natural causes, and rape seems to be a right of passage.

The Blindman