Good morning,
Quote of the day:
“There
are three classes of people in the world, those that see, those that
see when shown and those that don't see.”
Leonardo da Vinci
A
few comments about the shooting in North Charleston:
We
do not know the whole story about what happened before the shooting.
What we do know is that the cop shot the victim in the back. The
report was that the cop stopped the man for having a busted tail
light and an argument ensued and his resulted in a struggle when the
cop tried to pull his Taser. The victim was unable to get control of
the Taser and it ended up on the ground and the victim running away.
The victim was shot even though he was unarmed and the cop was filmed
placing the Taser beside the corpse planting evidence. The only
conclusion to which anyone can arrive at this point is that the
victim was not a threat to the cop nor the community and that makes
it either 1st
degree manslaughter or 2nd
degree murder. In any event the penalty for fighting with a cop or a
busted tail light is not death. This whole thing will result in
media circus once again. They love promoting turmoil of any kind, it
sells newspapers and air time advertising. What if the cop was
Puerto Rican and the victim Chinese? Would we hear about it at all?
Prejudice certainly does exist, y'all, and it is a highway of many
lanes running both directions...but murder is murder no matter who
pulls the trigger.
I
don't know why I remember this but a few years ago my brother and I
had been fishing in Lake Hartwell near Clemson, SC. On the way back
we stopped at a convenience store for a refreshing adult beverage. I
was the passenger so I went in. At the time I had a salt and pepper
beard and hair, now it is white. When I got to the counter the
female cashier asked to see my drivers license and I gave it to her
and asked her why she had carded me since my age is obvious and she
said “I am not interested in your age, I just wanted to see where
you live.” I took a second look at her and she was quite cute and
a hard body and I started to give her my phone number but she had
more tattoos than Rickey Incognito and somehow that turned me off so
I did not pursue it. What? Who is Rickey Incognito? He is/was an
offensive tackle for the NFL Miami Dolphins and was fired for
bullying...I like it.
A
friend sent me a short essay about a fighter pilot in WWII named Bill
Overstreet. On one particular mission Bill was in a P-51 he named
“Berlin Express” escorting a bomber attack in France. This was
before the Allies had kicked out the Nazis. The bombers were
attacked by German fighters mostly bf-109's. Bill got into a running
dogfight with one and had scored a couple of hits and the German
fighter was smoking badly. The German pilot could not shake Bill and
headed for Paris apparently hoping that all the German anti-aircraft
fire would scare Bill off. It didn't, Bill held on like a bulldog in
spite of the German pilot flying through the arches of the Eiffel
tower but Bill followed and scored a couple of more hits and the
bf-109 crashed. Bill stayed low, applied full power and hauled ass
back to safety. The French were impressed with his dogged
determination and awarded Bill the Legion of Merit for his actions on
that day gave the Parisians hope...I would think so. Thanks to Bob
and Jim for this one.
Speaking
of Greenville, MS, I was assigned to the control tower there also.
Greenville AFB has since closed and is now an industrial park.
Anyway, one day when I was not on duty but my barracks was within
sight of the runways (two parallel) and I witnessed two T-33's
collide over the end of one of the runways and fall to the ground in
flames. A team was assembled to find out what the hell happened. As
with every control tower in the world, every word spoken between an
air traffic control facility and aircraft is recorded for reasons
such as this. However, in this case the recorder was inoperative and
whether or not the cause was the fault of air traffic control was
never determined. It was not a pretty sight. By the way, a T-33 is
a trainer version of the Lockheed F-80 “Shooting Star” jet
fighter. The T-33 was used mostly to transition pilots from
propeller aircraft to jets.
A
while back in Aiken, SC someone broke into a man's utility building
and stole a lot of his tools. The next day he saw someone walking
around behind his house and confronted this 46 year old rover. The
rover said that he was looking for his lost dog. The man asked for
his street address so he could bring the dog to him if he found it
and the rover gave it to him. Soon thereafter the cops went to the
given address and recovered all of the man's tools. The rover was
arrested and charged with 3rd
degree burglary and 1st
degree dumb-ass.
This
Date in History April 9
1881 After one hour a jury convicted William Bonny
of the murder of the sheriff of Lincoln County, New Mexico. There
was no doubt that “Billy the Kid” did indeed shoot and kill the
sheriff but it was as part of the notorious “Lincoln County Wars”.
This was simply a war for control of the cattle meant for the
Indians on a nearby reservation. Billy the Kid was on the side of
cattleman named William Tunstall and the other side was the owners of
a mercantile store that had the sheriff of the county on their
payroll. There was a confrontation and the Lincoln County sheriff
shot Tunstall down in cold blood. The hot blooded Billy knew that he
was not going to let this go and planned the execution of the
sheriff. Billy did indeed cap the sheriff. He was captured and was
imprisoned on the second floor of the Lincoln County Jail. Somehow,
Billy got his hands on a firearm and disarmed the guard of their
shotguns. On his way out of the jail, two other guards came running
up and Billy shot and killed them both. He made good his escape but
unfortunately for Billy two days later Marshal Pat Garrett showed up.
Pat knew every nook and cranny where Billy hung out and Pat also
knew his girlfriend who lived at Fort Sumner, New Mexico. Billy
could have ran for a thousand miles but he chose to try and hide out
close by so he could see his girlfriend. Pat found out where Billy
was staying and laid in wait in his bedroom at night. Billy finally
returned from seeing his girlfriend and Pat put a .44 slug in Billy's
sternum and one in his heart. It was the end of the road for the
legendary “Billy the Kid”.
1939 On this date black opera singer Marian
Anderson who had fought her was up from the slums of Philadelphia to
be recognized as one of the finest opera stars in the world was
scheduled for an Easter Sunday concert at the Constitutional Hall in
Washington, D.C. At the last minute the Daughter of the American
Revolution canceled the concert because Marian Anderson was black.
So Marian, followed by 75,000 trudged over to the Lincoln Memorial
and gave a free outdoor concert. The First Lady, Eleanor Roosevelt
resigned her post at the DAR for this outrage. Even after this
dramatic performance in1939, it was 1955 before she was invited to
sing at the New York Metropolitan. In 1963 President John F. Kennedy
awarded he United States Medal Of Freedom. She retired to Oregon
where she died in 1993 at the age of 96. We are better than we were
but there is plenty of racial prejudice out there seething just under
the surface.
Born
today:
1821 French writer Charles Baudelaire. He said “I
love listening to Wagner; it is like listening to a cat hung by its
tail outside your window scratching the pane of glass.”
1894 English heir Tommy Manville. He said of
divorcing one of his 13 wives “She cried profusely and the judge
wiped her tears with my checkbook.”
1461 English playwright Sir Francis Bacon. He
said “Imagination is given to man to compensate him for what he is
not, and a sense of humor for what he is.”
Thanks for listening I can hardly wait
until tomorrow
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