It was a dramatic moment as Bush and Iraqi President Nouri al-Maliki held a news conference in Baghdad. It was a farewell of sorts for Bush, who made a surprise visit to the country to celebrate the newly adopted security agreement between the two countries that would result in the withdrawal of all U.S. troops by the end of 2011.  

Not long into the presser, an Iraqi journalist stood up and threw a shoe at Bush — the ultimate insult in Iraq — and shouted, "This is a gift from the Iraqis. This is the farewell kiss, you dog! ... This is from the widows, the orphans and those who were killed in Iraq!" The journalist missed his intended target, and missed a second time when he threw his other shoe. Bush made light of the incident, though it clearly shook up U.S. and Iraqi officials.

This may very well prove to be a defining moment for Bush and his war policy, but it’s not the first time a shoe became a metaphor in politics.

 

 

This pair of shoes belongs to Nikita Khrushchev, the chief director of the Soviet-Union from 1953 ‘til 1964. But they are sadly not the pair the Khrushchev used to emphasize his point (bang on the table) at the U.N. General Assembly session. That pair was thrown out by his family:

"No, this is NOT the pair that he wore at the United Nations on October 12, 1960‹after his death his family threw it out by mistake‹but another pair with which it had been confused. Sergei Khrushchev subsequently learned that his father had sent a bodyguard to buy a pair of American shoes more appropriate for the unexpectedly warm weather."

 Khrushchev’s inflammable character has been the subject of some historical myths, the most famous of which evolves around the shoe-incident at the United Nations. More than once, Khrushchev banged on the table with his fists, whistling, and shouting in Russian while someone else was speaking. The story goes that during one of these eruptions, he took off his right shoe and banged it on the table.

As the matter of fact, Khrushchev’s usual fist banging has resulted in his wrist watch falling off his arm. When he picked it up from the ground, he saw his shoes, which he had taken of his feet earlier because the stiff new leather was bothering him. He instantly decided that a shoe would make for much better banging than his wrist. And so, out of purely practical reasons, the shoe banging resulted. Khrushchev’s shoe became yet another symbol of the Cold War. An era of retorics and tensions, topped with a dash of propaganda.

 

During the 1952 presidential campaign, Democratic nominee Adlai Stevenson was photographed with his legs crossed, showing a huge hole in the bottom of his shoe. The Eisenhower campaign responded with ridicule and — far more important — buttons, suggesting what a Stevenson victory might lead to. The Stevenson camp responded with buttons of its own, and a campaign song for Adlai led off with, "I’d rather have a man with a hole in his shoe than a hole in everything he says."

 

 

THE FLINT JOURNAL FILES / WILLIAM M. GALLAGHER
Journal photographer William M. Gallagher’s picture of Democratic presidential candidate Adlai E. Stevenson and Michigan Gov. G. Mennen Williams would have been just one more picture of a politician until Stevenson crossed his legs, displaying a hole in the sole of his shoe. The flawed shoe was totally out of character for the aristocratic, intellectual Stevenson, who was having difficulty establishing himself as a candidate of the people in his race against Dwight D. Eisenhower. Gallagher’s shot — taken with camera held at arm’s length so Stevenson wouldn’t realize what was happening — became one of the great political photos of all time and winner of a Pulitzer Prize in 1953. Gallagher was a Journal photographer from 1941 until his death in 1975, at age 52.

 

In 1986, Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos and his family — including wife Imelda — fled the country in advance of a coup that was about to topple him.

Following her husband’s ouster in a popular revolution in 1986, she was found to have collected 1,220 pairs of size 8 shoes.

 In October of 2001 she was arrested and charged with corruption and amassing wealth illegally during her husband’s regime.

 

 

Paul Powell was born in Vienna, Illinois on January 21, 1902. He was a big wheel in the Illinois Democratic Party since WWII. Eventually, he became Illinois Secretary of State in 1965. In 1966, his office was investigated for corruption; he was exonerated, but his chief investigator was indicted for theft of state funds. He was still in office when he died in Rochester, Minnesota on October 10, 1970. Shortly thereafter, a shoebox full of money was found in his room at the St. Nicholas Hotel in Springfield, Illinois.
The famous Paul Powell shoebox was actually more than one box, and not all were shoeboxes. There were also metal boxes, briefcases, and envelopes. This treasure trove, roughly $800,000 in cash, was discovered two days after he died, when Powell’s staff and his estate executor gathered his belongings from the hotel room and storage area. The other, less famous findings included 49 cases of whiskey, 14 transistor radios, and two cases of creamed corn.

 

 

via1
via2
via3
via4
via5
via6
via7