How to Fight Presidents: Defending Yourself Against the Badasses Who Ran This Country by Daniel O'Brien Read Free Book Online

composed entirely of iron and testosterone, described Van Buren as a “dandy” who would walk around “laced up in corsets, such as women … wear It would be difficult to say, from his personal appearance, whether he was a man or woman.”
    Van Buren lived lavishly and was spending all of this money, by the way, during the Panic of 1837, the most devastating economic collapse in American history (until the Great Depression almost one hundred years later). Everyone was out of work and struggling and helpless and Van Buren was sipping wine, flaunting his resources, and enjoying the most relaxing presidency ever. His critics dubbed him “Martin Van Ruin,” which I bring up only to let everyone readingthis know that I intend to use that as my own nickname, should I ever decide to enter professional wrestling.
    Van Buren didn’t care that everyone was trashing his name or that the country was falling apart on his watch, because he didn’t have strong opinions. He avoided controversial subjects and, whenever he was asked his opinion on literally anything, he would dress up his answer in so much vague language and doubletalk that no one ever knew where he stood on any issue. While Van Buren was leading the Senate as vice president, Henry Clay tried to get a rise out of him by trashing his mentor, running mate, friend, and president, Andrew Jackson. Clay was determined to get an opinion—any opinion—from Van Buren, so he delivered a long, passionate speech condemning Jackson’s entire administration. When the speech was over, Van Buren didn’t agree with Clay but he didn’t defend his president. He walked up to Henry Clay, asked if he could borrow his snuff (a tobacco for your nose), took two hits of it, and then
left
. Just walked out without turning back. It’s like no one told him thatcoolly walking away is reserved only for people wearing sunglasses while an explosion happens in the background;
not
for people who just let their mentor get politically bitch-slapped in front of the entire Senate.

    Van Buren, rightly and obviously, did not win a second term. He tried running twice more as a third-party candidate when his own Democratic Party refused to nominate him, but mostly he enjoyed his retirement in an alarmingly though completely characteristically shitty way. He sometimes gambled, but not at a casino or with friends, like a man; falling back on the lessons he picked up in his Albany Regency days, he would gamble on elections that he would personally rig. Rigging elections wasn’t shitty enough for Van Buren; he needed to profit from them and dress it up as a fortuitous gambling win.
    In your fight with Van Buren, I’d strongly recommend guarding your genitals, as he will likely fight dirty. That said, he never played sports, never hunted, never served in the military, and never did anything that didn’t directly contribute to his fancy, party-throwing lifestyle, so you’ve likely got an advantage over him in the general fitness department.
    Blacken his eyes, head-butt him, and sock him in the kidneys a few times—and look out for that left hook.

William Henry Harrison was one of those rare men who had only two main jobs in his life: Soldier and President. A child of the Revolutionary War (when he was eight, Harrison’s home was attacked by Hessian troops, which contrasts starkly with the cartoon watching that you likely did at that age), Harrison joined the army in 1791. Well, actually, he briefly studied medicine first but decided that taking life was much more exciting than saving it. And it all worked out because, as history shows, William Henry Harrison was
great
at taking life.
    Harrison fought in the Indian Wars for a while, earning the admiration of presidents Madison, Jefferson, and Adams (and precisely no Native Americans), and toyed with leaving the military behind for politics, but even as a governor of the Indiana Territory, he was still fighting battles and leading attacks against the