Daily history

Good morning,




Quote of the day:

“Stress is nothing more than a sociably acceptable definition of mental illness.”

Richard Carlson



I just read where the South Carolina violent crimes are reduced by several percentage points over this time in 2009. Then in the next column I read where South Carolina has taken over third place in the FBI “states with the most violent crimes per capita.” As most of you can guess, it all depends who is giving out the facts as to who is the most accurate. I would not doubt the FBI rating. Almost every day I make a comparison with the violent crimes in the Greenville/Spartanburg/Charlotte arena as compared with crimes in the Austin, Texas area. I chose Austin because it is a close approximation to the Greenville/Spartanburg area in population. There is no comparison. There are three times the violent crimes up here in the piney woods of northwestern South and North Carolina than in the Austin area. I do not know what the reasoning is. Unfortunately, perhaps we rednecks here in the western Carolinas have less respect for the law than those cowboys around Austin. Austin seems like a good place to live to me.



Back in May a 19 year old Clemson coed was picking some things up from a storage facility she had rented. Suddenly she was attacked and thrown into an adjacent cubicle by a drifter that had rented the storage cubicle and was living there. He tied her up and raped her but he did not frisk her. After the drifter left the coed was able to free herself and called 911 on her undetected cell phone and was rescued by sheriff’s deputies. The deputies found out that a 37 year old man named Dennis Temple had rented the cubicle. Dennis was arrested that night and has been in the Oconee County joint ever since. His hearing was this past Tuesday. He is being charged with kidnapping, criminal sexual conduct and larceny. If he is convicted and does not get the death penalty (which is likely) he will be an old man when he sees the light of day again and rightfully so. Like I say, no respect for the law…or anything else.



The most recent Rasmussen Poll shows what we all suspect. That is that the Democrats and in deep doodoo for the upcoming mid-term elections in November. The poll indicated that it a severe anti-incumbent backlash is building into a tsunami. I certainly hope so. By the way, as far as I am concerned the most eligible Republican out there is Newt Gingrich. There is no question that this ex-Speaker of the House has the experience and knowledge to lead us out of this Stygian morass.



Down in Florida the race for the US Senate seat has boiled down to a contest between Governor Charlie Crist and Congressman Mario Rubio. Crist has chosen to run as an Independent and Rubio is a Republican. Rubio is ahead in the polls by almost double digits. About six months ago Crist said that he was opposed to same sex marriage in the state of Florida. He reiterated this stance about three months ago. Now that the most recent polls shows that he is getting his brains beat out by Rubio, he has reversed his position and now sanctions same sex marriage. He justifies this by saying that “he has gotten older and wiser.” I would like to see a show of hands of all that believe that obvious betrayal. Does this give all of you voters down in Florida some insight into his character? He is willing to say whatever is necessary, whether he believes it or not, to get elected. What is he going to do for you Floridians if he does get elected? It is obvious that he is for sale. It should be disgusting to all of you, it is to me. I have met Marko Rubio personally but that does not make me a fan of his, all politicians shake hands and kiss babies. What makes me a supporter of his is that he is endorsed by South Carolina US Senator Jim DeMint. I believe in Jim. I do not think he would lie or mislead his constituents. I hope I am not disappointed.



This date in history September 16



1908    A great visionary William C. Durant founded General Motors with the consolidation of Buick, Oldsmobile and Cadillac along with Chevrolet, Delco, Fisher Body and Frigidaire. The first electric starter came on a 1912 Cadillac; the starter was invented by Charles Kettering. Pontiac came later on and with this consolidation General Motors surpassed Ford in gross sales. But in the early 60’s with the avalanche of better quality import cars, GM had to cut back, close some of their plants and re-think their product quality. We all know what has happened to them recently.



1924    Betty Joan Perske is born in Brooklyn. Betty was a born performer and showed it at an early age by working as a song and dance girl in the local community. Her Mother and Father were divorced and Betty changer her name back to her Mother’s maiden name Bacal, a Rumanian name. Later she refined her name to Lauren Bacall. At the age of 18 she landed a role in the movie To Have or Have Not with Humphrey Bogart. She and Bogie hit it off greatly and they were married until Bogie died of lung cancer in 1953. Later on she married Jason Robards but they were divorced soon afterward. She continued in show biz winning a Tony for her role in the Broadway play Applause. She won an Oscar nomination for her movie role as Barbra Streisand’s mother in The Mirror Has two Faces. A very talented lady.



1949    Warner Bros. introduces the Road Runner Cartoon. It was Mel Blanc doing the “Beep Beep”. They are still funny.



1832    George Washington Custis Lee is born to Robert E. and Mary Custis Lee in Fort Monroe, Virginia. Custis followed his father to West Point and as his father did graduated first in his class in 1854. During his last two years at West Point his father was superintendent. At the outset of the War Between the States, CSA President Jefferson Davis requested Custis Lee as his Aide-de-Camp and was given the task of reinforcing the defenses around Richmond even though Custis was verbal in his request for a field command. After his father died in 1870 as President of Washington (Soon to be known as Washington and Lee) College, Custis became president until he retired in 1897. Custis died in Fairfax, Va. in 1913. Thus ended the lineage of great American leaders going back to “Light Horse Harry” Lee of the American Revolution.



1620    English ship Mayflower leaves Plymouth harbor bound for the new world, Jamestown, Virginia in particular. After a stormy 66 day passage and being blown off course by 500 miles they end up at the tip of Cape Cod and drop anchor in Providencetown harbor. While enroute the passengers got together and made up a document known as the Mayflower Compact. This document was the earliest basis for what is now our present democracy. A few armed men under the leadership of Myles Standish depart the ship and begin a hunt for a suitable site to begin a settlement. They find and open field with plenty of running water and named it Plymouth. An interesting fact about Standish was that he was so short that he had to cut 6 inches off his sword and scabbard to keep them from dragging the ground, that would make him no taller than 5’-3” and probably shorter. But he was a fiery and capable military commander, we are lucky he was aboard. The Mayflower is sailed around to Plymouth harbor and thus began preparations for the tough upcoming winter. The majority of those aboard were religious dissidents against the Church of England the rest were opportunist and entrepreneurs. While anchored in Plymouth harbor one Susanna White delivered a son name Peregrine he being the first child born in this new settlement. In my opinion, this expedition along with the founding of Jamestown, Virginia in 1607, ranks up there with the Lewis and Clark expedition as being the greatest adventure of all time. I would have loved to be on either one.



1920    Someone pulled a wagon load of explosives in front of the sub-treasury on Wall Street and lights it off killing 300 people and injuring many. No one comes forward to claim responsibility and therefore rumors flew that is was the Communists, Anarchists, etc. Some even claim that it was a construction wagon that turned down the wrong street. In any event this mystery remains unsolved to this day. I think it was a Sunni that had spotted a Shiite and the battle was on. They are all crazy as bedbugs anyway, let them kill each other off.



1943    James Alan McPherson is born in Savannah, Georgia. James is a very smart man and a gifted writer and attended Harvard Law School. James won the Pulitzer Prize for Literature in 1977 for his novel Elbow Room being the first and only black man to do so. He also won $196,000 award from the Guggenheim “Genius” foundation. After this his life began to unravel. His interracial marriage failed resulting in a bitter custody fight and his favorite student committed suicide. McPherson wrote but little after that and waited 20 years before writing the novel Crabcakes which was about his trip to Japan to escape the burden of racism. (His words).



Born today:



1858    British Prime Minister Bernard Law. He said “There is no such thing as inevitable war, if there is a war it is because the failure of human wisdom.” Hey Bernie, add to that “unless there are born lunatics like Adolph Hitler, Attila the Hun, Napoleon Bonaparte, Genghis Khan, Francisco Pizzaro, Hernan Cortez, Alexander the Great, etc, etc”



1887    French artist Jean Arp. She said “Art is a fruit that grows in man, like fruit on a plant, or a child in a mother’s womb.” Jean was a driven and gifted artist.



1919    US psychologist Dr Lawrence Peter. He said “Competence, like truth, beauty and contact lens, is in the eye of the beholder.” To me competence is directly tied to the complexity of the issue and the mental capabilities of the solver. There are those that are assigned issues too complex for the solvers abilities, that ain’t incompetence of the solver that is the incompetence of the assigner. In my humble opinion, at least half of a manager’s responsibilities are to assign duties that make the solver stretch his imagination but not so far out of reach of their capabilities that they become discouraged.



1924    US actress Lauren Bacall. She said “Imagination is the highest kite one can fly.” Lauren was married to actor Humphrey Bogart, one of my favorites of all time.



1925    US bluesman B.B. King. He said “We musicians don’t steal from each other; we just borrow from time to time.” B.B. has thrilled us with his guitar “Lucille” and his soulful singing voice for over 60 years.



1926   US TV evangelist Robert Schuller. He said “Don’t look at what you have lost, look at what you have left.” Good advice, Reverend.



Thanks for listening I can hardly wait until tomorrow