Friday

                              Musings and History

Quote of the day:

“Your best friend is the one who lifts you up when the wings of your heart forget how to fly.”

                                                       Golda Meir

A county deputy in Mobile, Alabama was called to a domestic disturbance. As he got out of his car a man came running out of a house wielding a machete and struck the deputy on the shoulder. The deputy was able to retrieve his 9mm Glock and sent that man to the Promised Land. The cops later found out that that man’s parents had been found hacked to death down in Palm Beach, Florida with a machete-like weapon. The deputy saved us a lot of money….no incarceration for years and years.

Recently a group of New Zealanders built a 65 foot catamaran sailboat made totally of plastic bottles. They were able to sail that puppy 4,000 mile across the Pacific Ocean successfully. They were demonstrating the invincibility of the plastic bottles and stressed that they should never be thrown into the ocean as trash. They last forever.

I am still reading the history of the Comanche in the western United States. I have changed my mind somewhat about their fate. When the settlers began moving into west and southwest Texas the Comanche were already the bullies of the southern plains because of their possession of thousands of Spanish mustangs and their unparalleled horsemanship. Not only that, their unbridled brutality was legendary. The beginning of the end was the breech loading Sharps .50 caliber used by the buffalo hunters. This rifle had and effective range of 800 to 1,000 yards. 26 buffalo hunters armed with the Sharps were able to hold off 300 Comanche at the battle of Adobe Walls in the Texas Panhandle. Then along came the repeating Henry and Winchester rifles. But the Comanche were able to gather up many of those weapons themselves. The final blow came in the form of a US Cavalry officer name Ranald MacKenzie. This man decided that he was not going after the Comanche themselves, he went after their horses knowing that the Comanche could not exist without them. They had no agrarian segment; they relied on the buffalo alone. MacKenzie was responsible for the slaughter of thousands of Comanche and Kiowa ponies which put the warriors afoot. This horrible campaign worked and eventually all the Comanche, Kiowa, Arapaho and hundreds of other southern plains tribes surrendered to a life of having to wait for a handout from Uncle Sam. It broke their spirit; it would have broken mine too.

Tidbits:

Democratic Congressman Charles Rangel of Harlem has become a liability to the Democratic Party and they are leaning on the 80 year old legislator to resign/retire. They are hitting him where he is the most vulnerable...ethics. This influence peddler will go down in history as having the hungriest pockets in the catalog of corruption.

Jack "The Assassin" Tatum formerly of the Oakland Raiders has died at the age of 61 from a heart attack.  As far as I am concerned he is among the top five hardest hitting defensive backs in history.

Tim Tebow former quarterback of the Florida Gators has signed a contract to model underwear for Jockey. Tim had mention that after college he was going to become a missionary. I suppose that to some women (and some men) seeing Tim Terrific in a pair of abbreviated briefs would be a spiritual experience.

             This Date in History   July 28

1976 On this date the most powerful earthquake in modern history occurred in Shantung Province, China. The quake occurred at 3:50am while all were asleep. The earth shook for 23 seconds and the city was leveled. As you might suspect, the buildings were light years from being earthquake proof and collapsed and crushed the people inside to the tune of an estimated 500,000 killed. Not only that, the earth rose and fell and ruptured many natural gas lines and enormous fires erupted and thousands were incinerated. The strange thing was that the people reported that a few days before the quake, large packs of rats ran panic stricken through the streets in broad daylight. They reported that they saw multi-colored lights and bright flashes in the sky and wells would overflow and then the water would go so deep that their rope and bucket would not reach it. Offers from all over the world offered assistance and medical supplies but the arrogant Chinese government refused saying that they would take care of their own. They certainly were not prepared for a disaster of this magnitude but they were not going to admit to the world that the Communist Chinese government was not perfect. Thousands of Chinese people died from the lack of medical treatment and supplies. Shantung has been rebuilt and the greater majority of the buildings were rebuilt using earthquake proof technology. But even this disaster cannot hold a candle to another earthquake that also occurred in China in about 1760 that took the lives of over 800,000.

1868 On this date the 14^th Amendment to the Constitution is adopted. This amendment assured the full American citizenship to blacks. One of the phrases in the amendment stated that “all citizens shall have equal protection under the law.” This was the hardest thing for our citizenry to accept, both north and south. But it was the US government implemented the Reconstruction Act that cause the most animosity and polarized the northern states the southern states. This act made the southerners just a hair short of vassals to agents that were sent to oversee both legal and illegal transactions to cheat the southern land owners after the Civil War. It was this behavior that gave birth to the KKK that thrived as long as the Reconstruction Act was in effect and for many years thereafter. Don’t get me wrong, the KKK was/is a bunch of disgusting bigots but it was the Reconstruction Act gave this organization the fire in its belly.

1943 Earlier the British Air Force launched Operation Gomorrah the mission of which was the destruction of the tools of war being manufactured near Hamburg, Germany. The Brits had bombed Hamburg into kindling but on this night they dropped over 2, 600 tons of incendiary bombs creating a firestorm unparalleled in history until Hiroshima. Some of the British pilots reported that there was not a series of fires but one monster that scorched 8 square miles of the city and killed 40,000 civilians. The fire was so hot that air was rushing into the middle the winds reached hurricane force and literally sucked people into it if not asphyxiated them by using up all the oxygen within a certain radius. War is hell, literally.

Born today:

1807 Swiss naturalist Louis Agassiz. He said “I cannot waste my time making money.” Hey Louis, where did you go to eat and drink?

Died today:

1913 English naturalist Sir John Lubbock. He said “What we see mainly depends of what we look for.” A few years back I was looking for a girl friend that looked like a 30 year old Elizabeth Taylor and had the libido of an alley cat. Now I am looking for a more comfortable couch to take naps on.

                Thanks for listening   I can hardly wait until tomorrow