• One Swedish Dishcloth replaces 17 rolls of paper towels. They absorb 20x their weight, are far more hygienic than a sponge, and won’t crumble or pill. They air dry quickly, so it doesn’t breed bacteria or smell. Once you’re ready to wash your Swedish dishcloth, throw it in the washing machine or place it on the top rack of the dishwasher so you can reuse it over and over again.

• I first became aware of him watching television with my father in 1993 when the local news (Channel 4, KDFW, CBS back then) interrupted whatever we were watching with breaking news. They announced Connally’s death. As a confused high schooler, I looked back at my father and said, “What’s the big deal? A former governor died; why is his death so important that they had to interrupt what we were watching?” Stoicly, he replied, “Boy, he was in the same car with Kennedy riding in the front seat when he was assassinated. The bullet went through Kennedy and into Connally. He died with the assassin’s bullet still in him.” Well, that got my attention.
  • Until then, I thought President Kennedy and Jackie were the only ones in the car besides the driver. I also thought they were the only car in the parade. Later, I learned there were a total of five cars, which is why they called it a motorcade, and the Vice President was in one of them. I thought that was so odd; it was just the coincidence of all those things. The VP just happened to be from Texas riding in a car behind the president who got shot, and then he, in turn, immediately became president in his home state. For a teen, it was a lot to process.
    • It was the first time I learned that sometimes a bullet, or its fragments, can’t be removed from a body, and people have to live with a hunk of metal in their bodies for the rest of their lives.
    • That bullet according to the Warren Commission report:  “Governor Connally was struck by a bullet which entered on the right side of his back and traveled downward through the right side of his chest, exiting below his right nipple. This bullet then passed through his right wrist and entered his left thigh, where it caused a superficial wound.”
    • The suit he wore when that bullet struck him is on display at Texas State University.
• So, for the longest time, all I knew of Connally was that he was in the motorcade when JFK was assassinated, and he got struck by one of the bullets. Later, I learned he worked in the Nixon administration and later switched parties, becoming a Republican.
• Last night, I learned that Connally and LBJ go way back and were much closer than I ever imagined. How close were they?
  • Connally met and befriended LBJ in 1936; they were friends their entire lives. As a congressional aid, Johnson helped Connally get a job stacking books in the University of Texas campus library for $0.17 an hour. Connally managed Johnson’s campaign for Congress in 1937 and rewarded Connally for his help by taking him to Washington in 1939 to serve on his staff.
• Before serving as governor, Connally was President Kennedy’s Secretary of the Navy. During his tenure, the Bay of Pigs occurred.
• I think it’s safe to argue that Connally is responsible for three Texans becoming President of the United States. Obviously, there’s his connection with LBJ. But get this, he helped make it possible for both Bushes to hold the office. Party lines back then weren’t as bad as today. To my surprise, he ran himself in 1980. Here’s a snippet from Connally’s Wikipedia page about the Bush connection:
  • In 1971, Republican President Nixon appointed Democrat Connally as Treasury Secretary. Before agreeing to take the appointment, however, Connally told Nixon that the president must find a position in the administration for George H. W. Bush, the Republican who had been defeated in November 1970 in a hard-fought U.S. Senate race against Democrat Lloyd Bentsen. Connally told Nixon that his taking the Treasury post would embarrass Bush, who had “labored in the vineyards” for Nixon’s election as president, while Connally had supported Humphrey.Nixon named Bush as ambassador to the United Nations in order to secure Connally’s services at Treasury. Ben Barnes, then the lieutenant governor and originally a Connally ally, claims in his autobiography that Connally’s insistence saved Bush’s political career, leading to Bush’s eventual presidency and indirectly to the presidency of his son, George W. Bush.

I could watch this for hours pic.twitter.com/roVW3Juqa9

— brooklyn babyy (@thee_SACK) September 17, 2024