Friday

                       Musings and History

Quote of the day:

“Men have always been able to read maps better than women. It takes a male mind to understand the concept of 1 inch equals 5 miles.”

                                              Suzanne Barr

A while back four illegal aliens stowed away in a shipboard container in the Dominican Republic. The ship docked in Mount Pleasant, SC where only three of them disembarked, the fourth one was dead. The three were captured and turned over to ICE officials. All four of them were convicted drug dealing felons in the US and had been deported but found their way back. As you might suspect, this is not unusual. The Charleston SC Sheriff’s department and ICE have agreed that on a daily basis the police and the illegal aliens see each other but the police do not have the manpower to process all of them. The cops and ICE have agreed to bear down on the criminal illegal aliens and it seems to be working. Over 100,000 criminal aliens have been jailed and/or deported. Who do they think they are kidding? SEAL THE BORDERS is the only viable solution.

This few years ago the Carolina Panthers played the Cincinnati Bengals at home. The Bengals arrived in Charlotte on Saturday afternoon. Before their arrival, Bengal wide receiver Chad Ochocinco (his maiden name was Chad Johnson) tweeted that he would spring for dinner downtown for some of his fans in Charlotte. No one knew what restaurant would be chosen so all of the fancy restaurants downtown had people standing around out front. Ochocinco showed up at the Brazilian Steakhouse on South Tryon Street and picked up the tab for 85 dinners. That, my friends, is at least $50 a plate. You do the math.

          This Date in History  September 30

1955 Actor James Dean and his mechanic Rolf Wutherich are killed in a head on collision in Dean’s Porsche 550 Spyder while en route to a road race. Dean, even though only making 3 movies, became an icon of the restless generation and its convoluted lifestyle. He never could get a handle on his unbounded energy and lust for speed even trying motorcycle racing. I remember him best as Jett Rink in the movie Giant. What an amazing performance he gave us. But what made the movie especially good was that Elizabeth Taylor was co-starring. I have been in love with her for centuries. I guess he is best known for his first movie Rebel Without a Cause where he plays a tortured man that is pretty much like himself. To me he seemed like a person going fast down a hill and don’t know how to stop. His death was a great loss for all of us.

1930 Louis Armstrong arrived in New York to join Fletcher Henderson’s jazz orchestra as second horn. Louis had been playing in King Oliver’s band in Chicago for the previous 12 years honing his skills and now he was going to the most famous jazz ensemble in the world. Louis was immediately recognized for his ability to play solo and to harmonize with others in the brass section. He rose to be recognized worldwide; in fact he died being the most important influence in the history of jazz. A great talent and I miss him.

1938 British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain and French Prime minister Eduardo Daladier meet with Hitler in Munich and sign a pact with this monster that they would not intervene when Hitler “annexed” Czechoslovakia. Chamberlain is elated that war between England and Germany had been averted even though Czechoslovakia was offered up as a sacrificial lamb. Daladier in really pissed off about it but he knew that the French army could not stand up to the German war machine and did not want to have his country destroyed. It happened anyway. The next day the German army rolled into Czechoslovakia. Shortly thereafter Germany invades Poland and Chamberlain has to announce that England is going to war against Germany. The Germans also invade France and they capitulate without a fight. Former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfield one said “Going to war with France as an ally is like going duck hunting with an accordion.”

1962 A black man named James Meredith accompanied by U.S. Marshals tries to register at the University of Mississippi. James had previously been accepted but the acceptance was rejected once it became known that James was black. It is needless for me to say what happened next. There was day and night rioting that was subdued only by the arrival of 3,000 paratroopers from the long suffering 82^nd Airborne. Even then there was sporadic violence but James was finally admitted and began classes. James graduated with a degree in political science. After this James chose to make a march from Memphis to Jackson in protest the unequal treatment of blacks. On the second day he was shot from ambush by a sniper. He wasn’t killed but was hospitalized for long while. Other black leaders showed up and continued the march much to their own peril.

1924 Author Truman Capote is born in New Orleans. Truman achieved much success and wealth from his writings primarily with In Cold Blood and Breakfast at Tiffany’s both of which were made into movies and he was a flaming homosexual. He did not how to handle his fame very well and began a life of jet setting and party, party. Truman died at the age of 60 after a life of excesses.

1946 The Berlin Airlift ends. Let me tell you folks, as an ex-air traffic controller this was the greatest logistical operation ever achieved. Russia had blocked all ground accesses to West Berlin leaving those folks with no way to get anything for survival. So the allies, primarily the good old USA, began flying supplies to the beleaguered city. The Airlift began 15 months previous and those airmen flew 250,000 flights and hauled 2 million tons of supplies into West Berlin. I have seen movies on how this was done without planes running over each other. It was a miracle that there were very, very few instances of danger. After seeing that the allies could supply West Berlin indefinitely the Russian said “To hell with it” and opened the roads and rails.

1889 The state of Wyoming enacted a law that allowed women to vote and was the very first one to do so. There was a lot of speculation as to why a remote western state would be the first and the consensus of opinion was that this was a reward for the pioneer women that helped settle this wild frontier. By 1914 there was a definite pattern emerging because every state west of the Mississippi had woman suffrage and none of the states east of the Mississippi did. What’s up with that? Anyway, all is cool now.

Born today:

1207 Afghan mystic Jalal-ud-din-Rumi. He said “Sell your cleverness and buy bewilderment.” Sounds like the stock market to me.

1921 Scottish actress Deborah Kerr. She said “I came over here (Hollywood) to act, but turned out that all I had to do was be high-minded, long-suffering, white gloved, and decorative.” This girl was dynamite in two movies, From Here to Eternity and An Affair to Remember.

1924 Playwright Truman Capote. He said “Life is a moderately good play with a poorly written third act.” Truman died at the age of 60 probably of AIDS but he burned the candle at both ends.

            Thanks for listening   I can hardly wait until tomorrow