Nation: Cruisin' Down the River

A water-borne version of the old whistle-stop tour

A political emergency brings out the corn-pone opinion in fine force—the one which can't bear to be outside the pale, can't bear to be in disfavor, can't endure the averted face and the cold shoulder, wants to stand well with his friends, wants to be smiled upon, wants to be welcome.—Mark Twain

The chronicler of life on the Mississippi might have had a premonition about Jimmy Carter's descent on the Father of Waters last week. From the averted faces and cold shoulders of the poll readers in...