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I really like Teddy Roosevelt, but don't kid yourselves that he was popular then within political circles: he wasn't wanted by most of the corrupt party hacks back then either. Kind of the same position John McCain is in now, or Winston Churchill was 75 years ago. No large organization (Democrats, Republicans, General Motors, etc.) wants an orginal thinker, or tolerates them for long. Emerson and Self-Reliance, you know? Those kinds are the type to start a party, a philosophy or a company, but they are not company men.
Teddy Roosevelt was cleaning house in NY, and angering the local hacks, and some in the Republican party thought a good way to get rid of him was to get him to be a VP running mate. That way he'd be out of NY poltics, but without any power. Only an assassin's bullet (McKinley) brought him to power.
There was even a Senator (Hannah, I think) who said of this Republican maneuver "Don’t you realize there is only one heartbeat between that madman and the White House?.”
It is true enough to say that only freak accidents or terrible dangers bring us great leaders (Roosevelt, Lincoln). But hey, that just means that every cloud has a silver lining. Thank God we live in times peaceful enough to endure a Clinton or a Bush, our present wars and threats notwithstanding.
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