Short Stuff: Animal Politicians

have been elected to office, because that's what we're talking about. Yeah, we are. It's there's apparently a long tradition, not just in the United States, where it's surprisingly prevalent, but around the world. People have elected animals to office, sometimes to make a point, sometimes to raise money for the local whatever, um, sometimes to insult people, usually other politicians. But there's like

a pretty lengthy history of it, there is. And it's funny when you sent me the sources for this, uh photoors, how do you pronounce that? I think you just said it. Photors was one of them, and then I was like, Reader's Digests has got to be one of these, and sure enough, Reader's Digests was one of those sources. Yeah, totally. Um so one of the one of the first UM examples that came across as UM of a guy who

was a mayor. He was a human. His name was Kenneth Simmons and he was the mayor of Milton Washington back in night and he put up a donkey. Uh he nominated a donkey as a committee committeeman, a precinct committeeman. Uh too, I guess work with the donkey. And the donkey's name was Boston Curtis. But the thing was, Milton Washington didn't tell anybody that Boston Curtis was a donkey. He just nominated him and added him to the ballot.

That's right. And this was clearly one of those cases where someone was like, our constituents don't even do their due diligence, they don't do their homework, they don't even care. They would just assume vote for a donkey. Is how the movie scene would go. And even though this mule ran unopposed, I think it was a mule. Is that there's a difference, right, Oh yeah, there is. Please God tell me it wasn't a mule, because I've been saying donkey.

This whole time. Well, the photors says it was a mule. Okay, I'll take it, I'll take the hit. Uh So the mule did run unopposed. But still I think the point was made that these the constituents still did not do their due diligence, because it's not that they didn't think he was gonna win because it was uncontested, but the fact that it got so many votes clearly indicated that

no one was doing their homework, right. Yeah, I mean, even if it is uncontested, if you know it's a donkey, you don't just vote for the donkey, exactly, unless it's possible that all those voters were like, yeah, I'm I'm tired, I'm ready for a change. Yeah. So that's a pretty

good example. That's an unusual example. More often than not, if an animal is elected to office, it is out improud as an animal, you know what I mean, Like, um, there's there's a there, like everybody's everyone knows that they're voting for an animal, like there's And it usually takes place in a town that's unincorporated, so there's not an actual official mayoral position. And then usually they're trying to raise money for that town. Yeah, and it works too.

It's a fun thing, so they will put up. Here's an example in Michigan. In Omena, Michigan, there'll be seven grand for their historical society. And this is just a few years ago in uh when a cat named sweet Tart, which I love, a great name for a cat, uh, one as mayor and then they just filled up the town's government with other pets. I think there was the vice mayor was a puppy named Punkin Anderson Harder. Uh. Special assistant for foul affairs was Penning the Chicken, and

then press it secretary was Harvey the Goat. Am sorry, Harley the Goat. Hardly right, not hard that would not have worked out, um so me and Michigan is actually fairly uh um well known for that. Uh. And there's another town that's pretty well known for it called rabbit Hash, Kentucky.

Let that one sink in for a second. And in rabbit Hash they had a long standing mayor dog named Lucy Lou who was mayored for eight years and then I think Lucy Lou resigned or retired, I guess, not resigned in disgrace or anything like Richard Nixon, but instead said I'm going to go, you know, enjoy my retirement. And so Lucy Lee was succeeded by a dog named Brenneth. Paul Trow and Brenneth I found out or in on

a platform, Chuck of restoring the general store. It's a pretty good platform in a town like rabbit Hash and then quote to bring the yokels of rabbit Hash and beyond plenty of peace and love and quote. I thought the platform you were going to say was that they ran on? Was usin together? All right? Man? You just triggered me. Oh, I'm sorry. Thanks. Uh should we take a break and talk about more of this silliness afterward?

I think so? All right, we'll be right back. So remember, way back, probably a week or so ago, in the a choir that escaped that explosion episode like five minutes for us, and you said that you were glad there wasn't some like dark part to the whole thing. Well, this one does kind of have a dark part. And

we're about to enter. Yeah, this was believe you're probably talking about Lahitas, Texas, uh and on a unincorporated town and they have another symbolic cameral seat that they do for animals, and this one involved, uh, I guess what you would call it a dynasty, a family of goats. The first one was Clay Henry, not Henry Clay elected in nineteen six, and then Henry was and this is all just like shameful. They fed Henry beer and I was like, look, let's go drink beer and get like

wasted drunk. From accounts that I read, yeah, it said like up to thirty five beers in a single day, which you should not give an animal alcohol. This is

all very shameful. And uh, this animal, Clay Henry, lived at the general store there where it would lap up this beer, and was succeeded by Clay Henry Jr. Who it looks like killed Clay Henry Sr. Yes, allege they were both drunk, and Clay Henry Jr. Head budded Clay Henry sor and killed him, oh my lord, and then took over his mayor or was appointed mayor I guess by the human who runs the general store by divine right, right. And then there was a third two right, yeah, you

talk about the third alright, Clay. The third was also a beer drinker, because these people in Texas just kept giving these goats beer, not just any beer to lone star beer, of course, it was uh. And this goat was castrated by a local man who was upset that the goat mayor was drinking on Sunday. And as I was about to crawl out of my skin with anger, I read the next line that this person did face animal cruelty charges. Yes, so that's according to Roadside America.

I couldn't couldn't find it anywhere else, but it's a heck of a story either way, it is. And thank you for putting that last part on me. Welcome. And and then also another long tradition of animals becoming elected to office, Chuck is uh to basically shame politicians, to basically say, you stink, we think you're terrible. In animals better than you and as a matter of fact, you know, we think you're rats, so we're gonna elect a cat.

Or we think you're um uh lazy, so we're going to elect a cat or you know, so on and so forth. I'd say a sloth. But sure, yeah, so that's kind of a tradition as well. Right, Yeah, there was one actually happened in Mexico not too long ago in uh, and they were upset about the rats in the town. Are you know, rats in the political sense and maybe rats period, who knows. And they elected a cat named Morris, who was not orange tabby, but a black and white cat named Morris a tuxedo, I guess.

And Morris was nominated for mayor of uh Lahappa Wapa what Hallapa? I think it's Wahapa, probably Wallapa Hualapa. I nailed it that last time. Uh. And then there was a couple of students, and as you'll see with a lot of these, sometimes it's the younger generation who would do it as a joke, but then it caught on

on social media. This cat gets about a hundred and fifty thousand likes on Facebook and then got seven thousand, five d actual votes on election day, which in the twenty one century, if you get the most votes on Facebook, you automatically are elected to political office. Um. There's another cat, this this one in Alaska was elected because he was

a write in. I believe the town's nine hundred residents wrote him in even though there are humans on the ballot, to basically just show their disgust that how bad the human candidates were. And a similar thing also happened way back in nineteen fifty nine and Sal Paulo, Brazil, where there was a rhinoceros called Cacareco which means garbage. Um, and he beat five hundred other city city council candidates, garnering a hundred thousand votes, which is pretty pretty great

for a rhino, that's right. And then about ten years later in Canada there was an actual rhinoceros party, um and I don't know what's it literally inspired by the Brazilian rhino. I couldn't tell. Okay, I could not tell, but it's obviously a satirical political party. And the argument that was being made was, uh, these they're perfect politicians because their quote thick skin, slow moving, not too bright,

but can still move fast when in danger. Uh and not not the rhino that you hear these days bandied about an American politics, different kind of thing. What's the rhino these days? Are a Republican in name only? Yeah? Man I, As I was asking, I was like, shut up, Josh, if you know this, that's dumb. There's another legendary one too that I had not heard about. But when I started researching, I was like, oh, this is a thing.

There was a pig called Pegasus the Immortal, that was nominated as president for president by the Yippies back in the nineteen sixty eight Democratic Convention, and that was an enormously turbulent, brutal convention. It took place in Chicago. The CPD showed up and beat everybody up every night, arrested everybody for protesting the Vietnam War and all sorts of stuff. Um and the Yippies where the Youth International Party UH co founded by Abby Hoffman and eventually became the Chicago

Eight and then the Chicago Seven. So that whole jam, and that's right, and then and then just Peter Satera and then so in the midst of this crazy chaotic event, this the Democratic Convention in Chicago in night, the Yippies nominated Pigasus, and they brought this hundred forty five pound pig to a press conference to dominate him, basically saying like, we're just going with a will pick because all the other politicians are pretend pigs were why why not just

elect a real pig this time? And they got about half of that out into the microphone before the Chicago police arrested him. For breathing in public and confiscated poor Pegasus. They arrested a pig. Yeah, technically they confiscated it, but we like to say it arrested the pig along with the seven yippies that we're you know, protesting, and I

guess caring for this pig. And I believe that Pegasus was handed over eventually to the Anti Cruelty Society and the Yippies would go and visit and then was like, you got a free Pegasus. I'm sorry Pegasus, and let Pegasus fly, and they did so eventually in Pegasus if you if you believe the story that you tell every kid when you actually put an animal down, they went to live on a farm outside the city for the rest of its life. I saw in the Chicago Tribune,

so hopefully it was. Yeah, and then we really can't talk about and was in politics if we don't talk about the o g right, Caligula's horse, Yeah, what was uh Insatatus? That's yeah, that's what I think too, all right, So this was big Instatus. This is Caligula's favorite horse and was appointed to serve as uh consul to the Roman Senate and uh, but aren't people saying that, like,

this isn't true. Actually this didn't happen. Yeah, they think that it was part of a smear campaign by some of his contemporary or shortly after him, like political enemies, who were smearing him, and they're saying that it's probably like not true. But they also caveat that, which is another kind of Roman thing um with the idea that if Caligula did do that, he didn't do it because

he was mad or insane. He would have done it as an act of humiliating the senators, saying like, my horse is a better senator than you guys are, which is sort of in the tradition we see today. Yeah, exactly, it's a long standing tradition. I love it all the way back to Roman times. Yeah, So get out there and vote, everybody. Rock the vote by rocking your favorite animal candidate next time you go to the polls. The short Stuff is out. Stuff You Should Know is a

production of I Heart Radio. For more podcasts my Heart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.