My late father-in-law grew up in a shack like this:

He picked cotton to help his widowed mother care for the five children she was left to raise when his father died young.

He worked he way through two years of college before joining the Army Air Corps aviation cadet program in 1939. He earned his wings and was commissioned a second lieutenant in September 1941. He proposed to my wife’s mother on December 6, 1941 — the day before the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor.

After training many Air Corps pilots for combat, he was sent to the Pacific Theater in 1944, where he flew many combat missions. He stayed in the Army Air Force (as it became) after the war ended and flew many more combat missions.

He rose to the rank of colonel and ended his career with command of a wing. He would have made brigadier general, but Lyndon Johnson gave the slot to his Air Force One pilot.

He retired from the Air Force with 30 years of service and lived out his life happily and comfortably in his adopted hometown.

He died at the age of 96.

He hated Democrats. Not because of what Lyndon Johnson did to him but because of what Democrats were doing to the country.