Just the Facts, Ma’am

Facts in the shooting death of Trayvon Martin are changing daily, depending on who you listen to, but certain facts are incontrovertible and are central to what happened on February 26 of this year in Sanford, FL.

First of all, George Zimmerman, identified as the shooter, was also said to have been a member of a Neighborhood Watch Group.  For those who know anything about these organizations, it is that weapons are not permitted when acting on their behalf.

Secondly, volunteers for a Neighborhood Watch programs should be of good repute, trained on how to operate and willing to follow directions.  They are not members of a police force, just volunteers who act as eyes and ears for law enforcement.

George Zimmerman has a police record.  In 2005, he was arrested for resisting arrest with violence and battery on a police officer.  Zimmerman was attempting to stop the officer in question from arresting a friend.  It’s also reported that Zimmerman’s one-time fiancé had charged him with domestic violence.

Trayvon Martin, on the other hand, was as typical a teen as you are apt to find.  He was a 17 year old whose parents had divorced.  Trayvon was in Sanford visiting his father and girlfriend and was getting acquainted with his soon-to-be step brother.

Something about Trayvon caught Zimmerman’s attention that night.  Zimmerman told police dispatch Trayvon was "just walking around looking about.”  He added "This guy looks like he is up to no good. He is on drugs or something."

Zimmerman did have a history of such phone calls to police dispatch concerning young African American males, most of which parroted his call about Trayvon.  There were witnesses who later said Zimmerman also warned residents of that neighborhood about "young black men who appear to be outsiders".

Normal procedure would be for a Watch volunteer to call in the info on any suspects and then let the police do the investigation.  But that call to the dispatcher shows Zimmerman wasn’t about to wait. 

What Zimmerman didn’t know was that Trayvon knew he was being followed and at this point he started running.  He’d been talking to his girlfriend, as she has testified, and he stated he was afraid.

Since this incident, I have read so many different accounts of what African American families call “the talk” they have whenever their sons become young men.  It’s about how they should act whenever they are in public to protect themselves; maybe, many reason, to even keep themselves alive.  One of the most important rules talked about is never to run.  That will make police think you are guilty of something.

At this point, Zimmerman told the dispatcher that Martin was running.  The dispatcher asked Zimmerman if he was following Trayvon and when Zimmerman said yes, the dispatcher told him "We don't need you to do that."   Zimmerman seems to suggest something when he muttered “…these (expletive deleted) always get away.”

Trayvon lost his life that night.  We know he’d committed no crimes, but he was profiled by a neighborhood watch member who assumed the worst about him because of his hoodie.

The police accepted Zimmerman’s account of the shooting.  They let him go home with the gun he’d used to kill Trayvon.  He wasn’t drug tested, either.

Trayvon’s body, which the police tagged as a John Doe, was.  Three days later, Trayvon’s body was returned to his parents.

George Zimmerman is still free.

Now is the time for all good J. P.’s to come to the aid of their county

There has been an elephant in the Pike County Fiscal Court meetings for the longest time, and everyone is managing to tiptoe around it. That by itself is a pretty good trick, not tripping over or being stepped on by something that large.

That elephant is a metaphor for the status of the county’s magistrates. In effect, there is nothing that defines what a magistrate’s job should be. Those who have been elected to this position treat it much as their predecessors, the Justices of the Peace, might have. And if anyone remembers the bad old days before the Kentucky Judicial amendment was passed, let’s just say they wouldn’t approve of this setup.

Then, a Justice of the Peace’s district was a political entity with the J. P. in charge, much the way the County Judge/Executive is in charge of the whole county now. The J. P.’s controlled the road departments in their districts and held trials for anyone who was accused of violating any laws.

This is what the Judicial Amendment was meant to correct. Now, of course, judicial and administrative offices are clearly separated, except, of course, the Magistrates have yet to come to grips with this some 40 years later.

So we now have these magistrates, whose only clearly defined role is similar to that of a member of a city council; they represent a district and they attend meetings and vote on laws. And that’s it.

For this they are given what can only be described as the best pay packages this side of professional athletes. As has been mentioned many times, this amounts to around a half a million dollars a year; a $48,000 per year salary per magistrate, vehicles (even if, as was the case with one magistrate, they are kept for up to 7 years), offices and personal assistants.

The whole point is this: The time has come-some time ago, in fact-when the position of magistrate needs to be redefined. And it cannot be as the office of Justice of the Peace once was.

Now mind you, I don’t blame any of the current members of the Fiscal Court for this; they were all elected well after the Judicial Amendment was passed. And I don’t even blame them for not turning down this juicy pay package. No one in their right mind would want to.

But the Magistrates must realize they can no longer be recompensed in this manner. When Judge Rutherford asked the Fiscal Court to consider a 1% occupational tax to make up an expected $1.5 million deficit, they demurred, choosing to make cuts in the county’s operational expenses everywhere, except with magisterial expenses.

Grover Norquist could tell you why they voted against the tax increases. The magistrates themselves would have to tell you why they haven’t cut their own benefits, most of which the county can no longer afford.

The Fiscal Court needs to pass a law that clearly defines what a magistrate is, while setting a far more reasonable pay scale. And their duties shouldn’t have anything to do with areas controlled by the Judge/Executive, such as the county’s road department or Disaster and Emergency Services. These divisions are able to do their duties by themselves.

Who knows? If the Fiscal court is proactive, this might help them out in the long run.

Happy Birthday, Momma

Monday, March 12, 2012 marked the 89^th anniversary of my Mother’s birth.  89 is an age not all that many people get to observe for any number of reasons.  Well, no one ever said it would be easy attaining such an age.  Bette Davis perhaps said it best when she observed “Old age is not for sissies.”

Mom had a twin sister, Texas Lucille, who died at an early age, at 18 months in 1924.    She was buried somewhere around Rawl, West Virginia, probably in an unmarked grave.  No one knows where that grave is now.

Three other siblings died young: Lena Faye, Nov. 1928-Sept. 1929, Frankie (girl) April 1931-Sept. 1931, and Agnus April 1937.  Of the first four who did survive, Mom was the only girl.  Her brother, Millard, was the oldest. Mom came second, and after her came Harper and Ralph.

School in Mom’s day consisted of a series of one-room schools.  Grandpa Walter bought books for her brothers, but didn’t think his girl would need an education, so she did without textbooks.

This was harsh, but harsher still was her health.  As a child, Mom was sickly and because of this, she missed a lot of school.  But Mom had one thing and that was an indomitable spirit that allowed her to conquer obstacles many might have thought impossible to overcome.

When World War II came along, Millard and Harper left for the military.  Ralph was too young at the outset of the war, but eventually left for the Army in 1944.  Mom stayed back for a bit and helped her parents, but eventually was called away to Huntington, WV, to find work.

She took her first jobs as a live-in maid/nanny and kept these jobs until she relocated to Louisa, KY, where she got a job at the hospital there as the cook’s helper.  In fact, at one point, when the cook was hospitalized for a gall bladder operation, Mom took over and never missed a step.

Mom was the only girl in her family for a spell, but eventually, she had four sisters: Edith, the oldest was born in 1935; then Alaphare; Delores or Boots; and Diana Kaye, the youngest, who was born in 1945. 

Mom knew her mother was up against it, what with these four girls to take care of, and in a house with no electricity and no washing machine.  So she stepped up and bought her mother a $300.00 gasoline-powered wringer washer.  That would equate to a huge expenditure today, but that didn’t deter my Mom.

For their part, her younger sisters still look up to her as a Mother-figure as she did all she could to help them out.

On May 19, 1951, Mom and my Dad, Graham Phillips, were married on Grapevine by Church of Christ preacher Bill Johnson.  This is the church Mom was baptized into 74 years ago.

That blessed union resulted in our little family of six: Mom and Dad; brother Steve; sister Jewel; me; and sister Anna May.  We have since lost our Dad, who passed away in 1990, then Steve in 2007, but we soldier on, with Mom as our matriarch.

Everyone in our family, maternal and paternal relatives, all love her dearly, and we all feel as though our lives are so much richer because of her. 

And to Mom, we all say, Happy Birthday to a very wonderful lady.

How to survive, and possibly even enjoy, Halloween

From ghoulies and ghosties and long-leggedy beasties and things that go bump in the night, Good Lord, deliver us! ~Scottish Saying

          There has always been a part of the human psyche that loves to be scared, hence our holiday we have dubbed Halloween.  Halloween has its origins in Ireland, where the Celtic people there celebrated a feast day on the first of November called Samhain (pronounced Sah-ween).  It was believed that at this time of the year, the veil between the spirit world and our world disappeared, and that the spirits of the dead would rise and try to return to the homes they occupied in life.  To appease these spirits, treats, such as bits of fruit, were left for them.  And, as every form of spirit came out, good and evil, to try to fool the evil spirits, so that they might not come to any harm, the Celts donned masks and went abroad disguised as evil spirits themselves, trying to blend in, as it were, hoping that they could go unnoticed by any ghosts who might harbor a grudge against them.

          When Christianity came to Ireland, a festival called All Saints Day, eventually to take place on November the first, came into being, and the preceding day became known as All Hallows Eve, or Halloween.  This was a day set aside to honor the Saints.  Still, customs, such as the aforementioned “trick-or-treating” and the wearing of masks have survived, and the result is a scary good time for all.  So, every Halloween, we have the good little ghosties and goblins and long-legged beasties and things that go bump in the night, who prow our neighborhoods looking for treats, which we gladly provide them to forestall any tricks these sly little devils might have up their sleeves.

But we must remember that this little festival is more for the kids than it is for adults, and let’s face it, that which scared us as children is nothing to that which scares us as adults.  Childhood terrors, such as werewolves, are rather easily disposed of.  A lycantrophically-challenged individual (lycantrophy describes anyone who can turn himself or herself into a wolf) can be quickly and efficiently destroyed with a silver bullet.  So, if it should happen that you are abroad on October 31^st, and are set upon by such a creature, you bring out your secret weapon, a Coors Light that you have, unbeknownst to the critter who is intent on eating you, poured into a Bud Light bottle.  Before the werewolf commences his meal, you ask him, in as neighborly a manner as possible, “Hey, wolfie, how about a pre-dinner drink, you know, to aid yer digestion?  Here, have a Bud Light!”  Well, werewolves are never ones to turn down a free brew, so they take it, and, as is the custom with such uncouth individuals, kill it in one swig, and it is then that you can spring your surprise on them.  “Ha ha” you say.  “Little did  you know that that wasn’t a Bud Light, it was a COOR’S Light, and now you are done!”  And sure enough, once the Silver Bullet hits his guts, the werewolf’s goose will be cooked.

Another creature of the night that has come to haunt our imaginations is the vampire.  Our idea of what a vampire is comes from Bram Stoker’s novel “Dracula”, and our image of a vampire comes from the movies that this novel spawned, most notably the 1931 classic starring Bela Lugosi.  Vampires are said to be the evil “undead” who must sustain what is a sort of immortality by drinking human blood.  Vampires arise from their graves each night, and can assume the form of a bat to aid them in their quest for sustenance.   Popularly, it is imagined that once someone becomes the victim of a vampire, that person, too, becomes a vampire.  This is a way for vampires to procreate, I suppose, as I have never heard of them getting married, and raising little vampires, TV’s “The Munsters” notwithstanding.  (Here is a conundrum; a Frankenstein monster marries the daughter of a vampire, and their son is a werewolf?  Was there a Wolfman in the woodpile?  Go figure!)

Vampires, if anything, have more going against them than even werewolves.  First of all, what kind of immortality is it when you have to live in a grave, or, barring that, sleep in a coffin?  And the meals!  I mean, human blood?  C’mon!  And you have to turn into a bat to get them?  And what about different blood types?  Can a vampire who is, say, type O positive, drink type O negative blood with no ill effects?  It looks to me like that would set off chain reaction that would upset his tummy, to say the least. 

And what about the restrictions on the movement of vampires?  Vampires cannot go abroad during daylight hours.  Sunlight, it turns out, will destroy them, in a cool, special effects kind of way.  This would, it seems to me, leave plenty of time to take care of a vampire once his grave or the location of his coffin has been discovered.  And while it is messy, a stake to the heart will undo a vampire in a hurry.  And, quoting an old Mad magazine feature, it doesn’t have to be any particular kind of stake.  Either a t-bone or a New York strip will suffice.  But if you are squeamish, and blood bothers you, try festooning yourself with garlic, or keep a vial of Holy Water on your person.  Either will ward off a vampire.  Better still, have a Priest bless a fire hydrant, then attach a hose, and wait for an unsuspecting vampire to come wandering by.

Luckily for movie vampires, most people who wish to destroy them will dawdle the day away, and arrive at their lair usually with no more that ten minutes of daylight left in which to complete their task.  This evens things up considerably, and we can all  hold our breaths as we wait to see if the good guys will win out.  And they usually do.  Which makes for a more enjoyable time of it when we go out trick-or-treating, knowing that, at least, we needn’t worry about vampires or werewolves.  Poltergeists, however, are another story!

When minds are closed…

Those of us who are advocates for industrial hemp know one thing all too well when the subject of reintroduction comes up:  Closed minds will do their best to keep hemp illegal.  This was made all too apparent in the article “Pending industrial hemp could go to pot”, from The Kentucky Standard, reprinted in the Weekend Edition of the Appalachian Express.

Yep, doesn’t matter that all the arguments against hemp have been knocked down before.   Just trot ‘em out again whenever this subject is brought up.  Opponents don’t mind using a circular, albeit illogical, defense against changing the status quo.

First of all, let’s all just say “We don’t know.”  We don’t know if this is right for Kentucky farmers.  This comes from Nelson County Extension Agent Ron Bowman.  Sure, everyone knows that Kentucky was a major source of hemp until we all went crazy and outlawed it 1937.  But that was a long time ago.  Heck, it might not even grow here now.  We need studies.

So, if we need studies, why doesn’t someone do those studies?  This is where law enforcement comes in.  You see, according to the article, both the University of Kentucky and Kentucky State University were encouraged to study hemp production, but uh oh, the Drug Enforcement Administration just won’t play ball. 

Hemp, says this article, is considered to be a controlled substance by the DEA.   Hemp, a controlled substance, you say?  Is the federal government concerned that a rash of headaches might hit the U S if hemp was legal to grow?  Because that’s all you’d get if you smoked any of it.

Okay, says the DEA, we are “bound by international treaty laws”.  Yes, and because we are so bound, we as a nation can only issue one permit “at a time” to study hemp.  Did I hear you right?  What genius signed off on a treaty with a clause that stupid? 

We are the fourth largest country in the whole freakin’ world, with fifty states and any number of “entities” that could study hemp and tell you anything you would want to know about it that 10,000 years of cultivation hasn’t already told us, and some bureaucratic Einstein says “Let’s sign this treaty that will limit a country with a population of over 300,000,000 to exactly one permit to study the feasibility of reintroducing the most versatile plant on the whole planet”?  I bet he got a raise.

Kentucky’s newly elected Commissioner of Agriculture, James Comer, aka the voice of reason, was quoted as saying “We will continue to educate people statewide to address the misinformation and the potential (hemp) has for (our state).

That educational process cannot begin too quickly if we are to overcome the ignorance spread by those not yet convinced of hemp’s qualities.

The Bum’s Rush

There’s one thing about Rush Limbaugh-he’s a big man. He and New Jersey Governor Chris Christie are a lot alike in that respect. They have another similarity; I have never seen a picture of either of them with their mouths closed. 
 

Now that could be because they’re always stuffing their mouths with as much food as they can at one time. They each have a unique reflexive reaction. It’s just like Fred Sanford said about one of his relatives-every time their elbow bends, their mouths fly open.

Or it could be that they’re always shooting off their mouths, you know, spouting off nonsense. But that’s how they earn their livelihood. Well, more so Rush than Christy.

The thing about making a living that way is eventually it could land you in some serious trouble. Rush knows all about that. Well, so does everybody else, now. Sure, we know how he attacked a young co-ed by the name of Sandra Fluke and told the world because she testified before some members of Congress in favor of having contraceptives for women covered by their health insurance, she was a slut who wanted to be paid to have sex.

Of course that brought on some serious repercussions. Yes, it seems like all those who were offended by the harsh criticism levied by Rush against this young women began to demand that his sponsors stop supporting his talk show.

And the sponsors listened. As of now, 12 sponsors have publicly dropped Rush. That means that things have gotten out of hand. And Rush reacted in a way that he seldom ever does. He apologized.

That was to no avail. It’s plain to everyone, even Rush, that these people are out for blood. They want to take Rush down. Now, just so you know, you won’t be able to brush Rush aside easily. No, that would strain even Superman’s back.

But I say we do what we have to do: If it takes a large construction crane to dislodge him, then I say we get one on the job and get that barrel of rancid hog fat out of there.

You know, the Book of James talks about the human tongue. How is it, this Book of the Bible asks, that such a small thing can cause so much trouble. In Rush’s case, it isn’t necessarily his tongue, it’s that gaping maw it’s in that bothers Rush.

More than that, it’s the organ that is in control of his tongue. You see, Rush is like a brontosaurus, pea brain, big body, and that brain ain’t big enough to control any of that gargantuan body of his.

Somebody needs to have a talk with that boy about the birds and bees, but also about making ridiculous claims such as it’s his money that will pay for all those extra pills he supposes a woman must need when having all that sex that takes place only in his lurid imagination.

The one pill a day needed can be used to treat medical conditions that afflict all too many women. This was what Ms. Fluke testified to when she spoke before those Members of Congress, except Rush never listened.

In other words, it isn’t like the Viagra or Cialis that men like Rush can get covered by their health insurance. No, this is necessary, and that’s what Rush can’t understand.