Excerpt from Letters of a Self-Made Diplomat to His President:

Tower of London, London.114
May 17, '26.
MY DEAR MR. PRESIDENT:
I been hearing rumblings of rumors now.
Just how is things breaking over there anyway? Some papers we get over here say you are sorta skidding on the turns and they look for you to throw a tire in the home stretch. Other papers of opposite form of public insanity claim that it is just a little natural reaction setting in, that a man can't go on high every minute; that he has to sorter slow up and look back every once in a while to see if anybody is getting close to him. Course, there has been a lot of races lost by looking back at the wrong time.

They claim that the farmers are kinder losing confidence in you helping them out. Well, you are pretty wise; you know there ain't many Farmers. There is an awful lot of people farming but if it's only the FARMERS that are against you, why, you haven't lost much strength. You got to do more than just live in the country to be a Farmer.

Then again you got to figure that it's a long time till the fall of '28. A couple of good crops and any fair luck working along the line of supply and demand, and you will capture the Farmers back again. You know rain in Iowa, an Epidemic of Appendicitis among the Boll-weevil, or fallen arches on the Chinch Bugs, all play just as big a part in the national career of a man as his executive ability does.

You give me a few showers just when I need them most and let me have the privilege of awarding them around among the doubtful states as I see best; let a certain demand for steel crop up which I didn't even know was going to crop; let the Argentine and Russia have a wheat failure; let the foot and mouth disease hit every country out west of the Mississippi; let, as I say, all these things happen over which I have no direct control, and have even me in there as President, and I will be reelected by such a large majority that I won't even take the pains to talk to you over the rodeo. Give me all those things for 10 years in succession with me as President and I will give Lincoln a run for his laurels, even if I can't spell cat, and eat with my knife, and don't know a tariff bill from a Tee Bone Steak.

Being great as President is not a matter of farsightedness; it's just a question of the weather, not only in your own Country but in a dozen others. It's the elements that make you great or that break you. If the Lord wants to curse about a dozen other Nations that produce the same thing we do, why then you are in for a re-nomination. If we are picked out as the goat that year and are to be reprimanded, why, you might be Solomon himself occupying the White House and on March the fourth you would be asked to "call in a public conveyance and remove any personal belongings that you may have accumulated" So it's sorta like a World Series—you got to have the breaks.

Everybody figures Politics according to what they have accumulated during the last year. Mayby they havent earned as much as they did a few years ago, because they haven't worked near as hard, but all they look at is the old balance sheet and if it's in the RED why his Honor the President is in the alley as far as they are concerned. It takes about 20 or 30 years to really tell whether any President really had anything with him beside Sunshine and Showers. We have to look over your achievements in view of what they have to do with the future, of course, bad advice will ruin you just about as quick as total Earthquake all over the land would, if you are trying to be elected and then listen to a typical Politician or a bunch of them (for there is nothing as short sighted as a Politician unless it is a delegation of them.) Well, if you are going to pay any attention to Politicians during your administration you can just right away imagine yourself being referred to as "Ex-President Jasbo." They, I really think, can ruin you quicker than unseasonable weather.

Now, your personal habits, your looks, your dress, whether you are a good fellow or not with the boys, the old assumed Rotary or Kiwanis Spirit, why that don't mean a thing. You can shut up and never say a word for the entire four years; you can go out and talk everybody deaf, dumb and blind; you can be a teetotaller; you can have a drink whenever you like—in all these things and a million others you can be either on one side or the other and it won't make the least bit of difference in the world, if the Country has enjoyed prosperity, over ninety percent of which you had no personal control.

Every Guy just looks in his pockets and then votes, and the funny part of it is it's the last year that is the one that counts. You can have three bad ones and then wind up with everybody having money, and you will win so far you needn't even stay up to hear the returns. You can go to bed at 10:30. On the other hand you can get a great break and give them a great first three years of your incumbency and then the last or election year flop on account of a drought and you will be beat so far they will think you was running as a Wet.

So that's how much all these write-ups and Editorials amount to. They haven't got any more to do with conditions in November '28 than Idaho has advising Borah.

In Politics, as well as in anything else and even more so, you have to sorta bet or play on a man's luck. Take Golf, for instance. Hagen they will tell you can't play as good a game as Bobby. But you let there be a few hundred beans in a bag that has been wagered on the outcome and Hagen will make the last 10 holes in ONE each. Now they may think they can out general you but let them look up your record and they are going to have a tough time out lucking you.

That guy, Smith, is another guy that carries Horseshoes where poor Bryan never had anything on his person but Peacock feathers. Now, mind you, I am granting all of you the same ability. But it's the four leaf clover that brings home the bacon. So don't pay any too much attention to anything till 1 get there, and confer with you personally. They say you must have the tide with you to swim the Channel. Well, you certainly have to have the weather with you to keep on being President.

Good wishes for many more happy returns of Inaugurations,
Your "Dug-out" in Europe, WILL.