Late Night Thoughts

Fueled by equal parts outrage and Shiner:

Q: What's the difference between Spike Lee, the New Black Panthers, and the KKK?

A: The color of their hoodies.

What I Wish I'd Said

This morning I commented on the Trayvon Martin shooting. In that post I made mention of how ironic it was that the same ethnic group that has suffered so much at the hands of lynch mobs is now in the process of assembling one of their own.

This evening I came across the following post, which says what I was trying to say, but much more succinctly and eloquently.

The Lynch Mob Assembles

I haven’t written about the shooting death of Trayvon Martin in Florida for the simple reason that I was as shocked by his murder as anyone else. I am not a racist no matter what some might say, and as a parent of a teenage boy myself I’m quite sensitive to seeing parents suffer the type of loss that is my own greatest personal fear. But I’ve learned from past experience to never trust initial reports, so I have been waiting for the dust to settle and the truth to be revealed. And waiting. And waiting.

The righteous anger that erupted immediately after Martin’s death has morphed into something else, something much more ugly. It is one thing to demand an investigation into his death, it’s another to call for his killer’s capture “dead or alive” as the Black Panther’s have, or to pass along his address – erroneously it turns out – to your 250,000 followers on Twitter the way Spike Lee has. This is the hysteria of the mob, and it is dangerous yet the politicians who don hoodies in Congress are so caught up in it that they are blind to it.

It is impossible to imagine Martin Luther King jr sending out the addresses of the men who killed James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael Schwerner in 1964 for a very simple reason: He had seen first hand the results of lynch mobs, and he knew their irrationality and power. He had seen innocent men tried, convicted and executed by the mob, and he knew that the greatest antidote for it was the application of slow but inexorable blind justice. Florida 2012 is not Mississippi 1964, so why are so many so desperate to turn the clock back? Convene a grand jury and let the Truth come out, but do not unleash the beast that threatens to devour everyone including those that set it loose among us.

Ever seen a lynch mob? This is how one starts. Someone innocent is going to get hurt, the outcome of most lynchings, and hysteria will be replaced by regret. But by then it will be too late, and those that think they are righteous today will have innocent blood on their hands tomorrow.

Well said, sir, well said.

Talk About A Hostile Work Environment

We tend to take things for granted around here, until something like this pops up in the news.

7 mutilated bodies found in Nuevo Laredo

The mutilated bodies of seven unidentified men were found in an abandoned vehicle Monday morning east of downtown Nuevo Laredo, Mexico.

Authorities responded to a 9 a.m. call reporting the vehicle and bodies at an intersection one block from a Mexican army base, according to a government official who asked to remain anonymous.

“Their arms, legs and heads were cut off,” the source said.

Actually, this incident wasn't even reported locally. I was totally unaware of it until I read the San Antonio newspaper.

Seven mutilated bodies less than ten miles from my South Texas residence and office.

Reporting of those bodies occurs 200 miles away.

I'm a big critic of the media, but unlike the obama lapdog mainstream media, at least the Mexican and local South Texas media have a damn good reason for forsaking their reporting duties. I doubt if I would splash headlines across the front page with my name in the byline while knowing that at any time I could be kidnapped and executed in a most gruesome manner.

One of the things I try to teach my students is to look beyond the immediate consequences of their decisions, and to be aware of the secondary and tertiary outcomes. For those of you that use drugs (even the so-called victimless marijuana), I could care less what you ingest, or what you consider recreational drugs.

But I do get riled up when the downstream consequences of your drug usage contribute to the power and profits of the cartels.

We can debate whether or not drugs should be legal (FWIW, I'm all in favor of legalization), but if you don't man up and admit that your usage supports at least in part the unholy regimes of those vile and evil cartels then we have little common ground upon which to carry on a dialogue.