The Will Rogers Plan

Will Rogers

It kinda looks like a bad day for plans... I'm not going to get discouraged though. In fact, these other failures -- well, they've really given me confidence, you know -- more hope that my plan will be a success... My plan is a plan to end all plans. It's to do away with all plans. That's what it is. This country has been planned to death... There ain't but one place that a plan is any good and that it'll really work, and that's on paper. But the minute you get it off a sheet of paper and get it out in the air... it blows away. ... Plans just don't work. If they're milk and honey to you, they're poison ivy to somebody else... My plan is when a senator or congressman -- or even a man of great ability (we must quit joking about those boys, because they're good guys) ... comes to Washington with a plan, you send 'em to Russia. Yes, sir, send 'em to Russia with the plan. That's the home of all plans, you know. That's the home. Russia, they eat and sleep and drink plans in Russia. That's why there's starvation there, because you just can't digest a plan. It don't eat right. Everything in Russia is run by plans; everything here is run by accident... [The Rogers Plan] is: 'Don't Plan' ... Live haphazard... There's nothing in the world as common as an idea, and there's nothing in the world as hard to carry out as an idea. If the Republicans would forget their main plan which is to get into the White House and the Democrats would forget their main plan which is to stay in there, and the others, all these various third parties, would just look at their history which shows that none of them ever did get in there, why, we'd all recover overnight, you see.

Will Rogers - Rogers' Plan to End All Plans
Cassette tape available here.

For those of you who aren't familiar with Will Rogers (1879-1935), here's his bio. I came across this when visiting his ranch in Pacific Palisades, California.

Update (Mar 14, 2008): Here's some of the audio. And a bit more.

There's also a DVD documentary The Will Rogers Story, available via Netflix, which recounts his life. Rogers was an American phenomenon... and a quick study, while others were oblivious. When he visited the Soviet Union in the mid 1920's, he had this to say as he sized up what he saw -

It seems the whole idea of communism or whatever they want to call it, is based on propaganda and blood. Russia is starving her own people to feed propaganda to the world. (29:43-29:52)

You can ask a Russian any question in the world, and if you give him long enough he'll explain their angle and it will sound plausible. Communism to me is one-third practice and two-thirds explanation. (30:01-30:14)

If you want to get away from communism, as we know communism in America, why you go to Russia. You know, a communist, he can't get far in Russia. There isn't a single agitator in the whole country, not a soul trying to plot a strike or tell somebody what to do with their job. The soviet government, it may be wrong, but no man is going to stand up on a soapbox either publicly or privately and announce the fact about it. Over there your criticism is you epitaph. (30:32-30:59)

Those people are going somewhere, and we better watch out while they're on their way. (31:14-31:19)

Will Rogers was a master satyagrahi. He explained,

I use only one set method in my little gags, and that is to try to keep to the truth. Of course, you can exaggerate, but what you say must be based on truth (26:55-27:03)