Ain't No Party Like a Whig Party

History Bros, the periodical of note, would like to endorse the Whig Party and Henry Clay for our nation’s upcoming midterms. Compromise is needed more than ever at this moment of crisis, of political divide, of apathy, and of mobocracy! Tyranny has infiltrated this grand nation and I will not sit idly by while “The King” sweeps up those poor souls who believe his demagogic rhetoric while only serving himself. My grandfather didn’t fight the British loyalists and their stiff cronies to see this great nation unravel to ratty threads!

I, of course, am speaking of King Andrew Jackson. Old Hickory? More like Old Trickery! That devilish trickster hick has soiled this American democracy, along with the dirty Irish, as we can all agree.

What do we support? Modernization, banking and economic protectionism. We need to protect the minority interests and the burgeoning middle class! Many claims have been leveled against us that we rub shoulders with the fiscal elite – untrue, untrue, sirs! We rub elbows with all people – except the potato-eating Irish! We are willing to roll up are sleeves and get dirty with our hard-working merchant brethren.

Manifest Destiny? What a sham! We have plenty of land for all our peoples, and we will only instigate unnecessary wars if we encroach further upon the continent. Lyin’ Tricky Hickory has removed our Indian brethren to Okie-homie when all they wanted was a little tract of land for their dance parties. We understand them; we roll up our sleeves with them! The IRISH! Why are they here? Damnit!

I digress. I’m angry. And I am ready to greatly compromise with my foes this coming midterm because we are living in a tumultuous and revolutionary time that will likely never repeat itself again. Go to the polls my property-owning brothers and cast a vote against Crooked Hickory, that mud-farmer who will roll up HIS sleeves with the sleeveless Irish!

Don the Blue and Buff of the Whig Party and get out the vote! Stand like a rock, but like a compromising rock – so, like, a pebble. A tiny rock unwilling but willing to compromise! Does this make sense? Ok. Rock the vote!

Who are we!? Whig Party! Who are we!? The Blue and Buff! Is buff a color!? Yes!?

Ok! Compromise, defeat tyranny, but support some elitist views, slavery --- mmm, we’re not going to talk about that now, but we will get to it!

I have a feeling this new and dynamic party will live for millennia! Whig Whig Whig Whig! Party! Whig out!

What in Sam Hill?

Today’s episode is brought to you by Texas A&M University. Texas A&M, at the forefront of the cutting-edge industries of agriculture and mining, is one of the leading educators and proponents of crop rotation. Do you look like fracking and football? Fuck yeah, you do! Come on down to Texas A&M and join the festivities at the annual Frack Fest. Kids admitted for free! Bob for oil, get your face painted with oil and take an ol’ timey photo in oil!

Speaking of Texas, our guest today is one of history’s preeminent Texans: Sam Houston. Leader of the early Texas Republic and later governor of the state, Sam Houston stunned fans with his pro-Unionist views and repudiation of the Confederacy at the outset of the American Civil War. What a maverick!

HB: Sam, first off, nice bow tie. What is that, two feet in width?

SH: Goddamn right!

HB:  High five!

Both: Crop rotation!

HB: Sam, what are you doing these days? Political career is dead because of your Unionist treachery.

SH: I like to think I came out on top…

HB: Whoa ho! High five!

Both: Crop rotation!

SH: Nah, I’m still in Texas, surprisingly. Just opened an eco-friendly, locally sourced brisket joint called What in Sam Hill?

HB: How are the tips?

SH: Mind blowing.

HB: And I gotta ask, are you living in…Houston?

SH: No, fuck that place. I was pro-Unionist, I’m an f’ing  honorary Cherokee, so I’m not really welcome in most of Texas.

HB: So you live in…

SH: Austin! The only place I can call home now, is Austin. That’s where I set up What in Sam Hill?, I played SXSW with my Duran Duran cover band last year and I’m keeping Austin weird.

HB: Let’s keep it weird with, one, two, three…

Both: Crop rotation!

Martin Van Baller

Special History Bros episode, featuring my longtime pal, past guest and frat brother, Martin Van Buren! The Little Magician. The Dutch Oven. Count Von Puss. We met at Open Dike night in Amsterdam during his year abroad, while I was still a pledge at Sigma Rho Stroopie.

This episode is brought to you by Van Buren Wooden Shoes: more comfortable than your run-of-the-mill wooden shoe, but still not comfortable. Handcrafted by Martin’s insanely high mother, Diejter Van Buren, these shoes come in avant-garde shapes that may or may not fit. No returns.

HB: Little Dutch Boy, how are you?

MVB: I’m good! After the presidency I’ve been taking it easy, shootin’ some hoops in upstate New York and helping mother with her shoe company.

HB: Yeah, she gave me decagonal shoes in what I can best describe as a women’s size 3.

MVB: We’ll trade ‘em in. We’re working on her policy of no returns.

HB: I love the way they look, I just can’t wear them. And you! That’s all you wore when we played basketball.

MVB: That’s what I was used to. Remember when I dunked over Big Ben Rasnowitz during intramural finals!?

HB: Most people don’t know this, but you could ball. You lost a shoe and still threw down over Big Ben Rasnowtiz. And you’re what, five foot…one?

MVB: Yeah, 5’1”. I think it’s my competitive Dutch spirit. I go for it – I go for the slams.

HB: You didn’t make your junior high speed skating team because you were too short, right?

MVB: Didn’t make it. Heart broken…heart broken, because it’s the Dutch national sport. So, I took my Van Buren clogs and started shooting some hoops with some of the outcast Dutch bad boys of the New York Dutch community.

HB: You’re such a baller. Hey, how’s Rick “The Brick” DeFrenzio doing? I haven’t seen him since undergrad?

MVB: Oh my god, you didn’t hear? He was murdered by the Prussians in the territories.

HB: I never heard about it!

MVB: It was a small service, small service. Fight broke out against some of the Prussians in attendance.

HB: Damn! Well, you were closer to him. I get it.

HB: Alright, for old time’s sake I’ve installed a hoop out in the driveway. You think you can dunk on a standard ten-foot hoop?

MVB: Put me on the fucking spot.  Ok, ok.

HB: He’s slippin’ on the clogs. Running. Oh jesus, he’s taking off from behind the free throw line!

MVB: Waffles!!!!

HB: Oh jesus, he hit his head on the backboard. He’s bleeding. Marty, let’s get you inside.

Cato the Clutz

Today’s episode of History Bros is brought to you by pedometers.  Hey Baby Boomer Moms and Grandmas! Need to get your steps in but don’t trust the government with that FitBit Obama invented, tracking your steps AND your money? Pedometer just straps to your nondescript all-white shoes and counts your steps without giving away your location in rural Indiana. Pedometer!

Speaking of pedometers, our guest had to walk everywhere in ancient Rome. No cars! Huh!? Cato, famed orator, politician and critic of Julius “Hot Salad” Caesar, is here today.

HB: Cato the Elder, so glad to have you!

C: The younger…

HB: I’m so sorry.

C: It’s ok. I’m closing in on 50.

HB: You look fantastic!

C: It’s all that walking!

HB: So, no cars at all?

C: No, nothing!

HB: That’s nuts!

HB: Oh, I wanted to ask you this: did OJ do it?

C: Yes.

HB: Cool. 1995.

HB: Cato, you despised Julius Caesar so much that you committed suicide in response to his growing power. A little dramatic?

C: Yeah, in hindsight it was dramatic. I even did a terrible job at it.

HB: No, don’t tell me…

C: I did! I fell off my bed with my entrails halfway out of my abdomen. What a klutz!

HB: Ohhhh, that’s so embarrassing!

C: And then my Greek eunuch slave/cook comes in with 20 banana cream pies, slips on my entrails and the pies fall all over my shocked family!

HB: Butterfingers!

C: I didn’t know if it was because of my entrails or the 20 banana cream pies that my family was so shocked! But, yeah, then I died.

HB: You’re a funny man Cato.

C: Caesar, of course, gets assassinated in the most severe way possible. No slapstick, no humor.

HB: I don’t respect a man like that.

C: At least do a double take toward Brutus.

HB: Yeah, like wide-eyed: “You, huh?” “Oh hell nurrrr!”

HB: And we’ll close with a question I like to ask my guests: last movie watched?

C: Big Momma’s House 2

HB: Good man.

C: Oh, what, what!? My hand’s in your paper shredder!

HB: Cato!

Tiny Flag

This week History Bros isn’t taking money from an advertiser, like Mazda (Zoom-Zoom-Bada-Boom-Dingaling-Bing-Bong), but rather we’d like to draw attention to a serious medical issue facing some brave souls in this country: brachymetatarsia. Brachymetatarsia is a debilitating condition when one of the five long bones in the foot is unusually short, generally the fourth toe, and occurs in both feet. Sometimes, for some fucked up reason, it only occurs in one foot, making it all that more apparent when wearing sandals. People with this sinister genetic disability face cringe-inducing questions like: “What the hell happened to your toe?” or the common “Ah, that’s super weird!” Sometimes it hurts when a sufferer runs; other times it hurts emotionally when someone stares at it. Brachymetatarsia: Be aware, don’t stare.

And in a terrible segue, please welcome our guest, Francis Scott Key!

FSK: Ah, what happened to your toe!?

HB: You owned slaves!

FSK: Touché.

HB: Frank, you were inspired by the American flag still standing after the barrage at Fort McHenry in 1814 by the British, and subsequently wrote The Star-Spangled Banner. What moved you?

FSK: I was actually inspired by how small the flag was. Like, one of those flags you put on your desk or a free one given out by the local VFW on Memorial Day.

HB: Ah, no shit! That tiny?

FSK: Yeah, super tiny. And there were bets going around amongst the British about which boat’s cannon crew could hit it first.

HB: Like a game of HORSE with a tiny desk flag and metal objects that can kill someone?

FSK: Exactly. If it weren’t for the douchy competitiveness amongst the British, we may have lost that battle, possibly the war.

HB: “Oh, say can you see…”

FSK: Right, right! Can YOU see it? I can’t. It’s like a little dot in the distance.

HB: So it was classic irony?

FSK: Yeah, I was in this phase of writing poetry that was more avant-garde. “Whose broad stripes and bright stars…” They weren’t broad. Right? It was a tiny flag!

HB: Yeah, I get it. Pushing the boundaries and reading between the lines.

FSK: “O’er the land of the free…” Again, it’s a tiny flag, so that’s funny. Plus, I owned slaves, so who’s free? It’s classic irony. You pointed that out earlier… Can I share a new one I’m working on?

HB: Be my guest.

FSK: Ok, this is titled, “Beneath my feet are the dead”

HB: Wow, that’s super deep.

FSK: “Don’t, pause, stop, until I’m dead. Breaking sun, moon, all in red. Blood. Death. Where is my mother…”

HB: That’s great, Frank.

FSK: There’s more.

HB: No, I get it.

FSK: Your toe’s weird.

HB: Get the fuck out of here. Again, you owned slaves!

FSK: Your toe’s like a tiny flag.

HB: Your mom’s a tiny flag! Get out!