When I first “transferred” to public schools, there was this guy who hung out with the jocks, and me, being decidedly not one, I was the subject of a taunt or two. I remember him standing along the wall with his big jock friends making a snide comment as I went to my first gym class at the new school.

The gym teacher used to like to “punish” me with push-ups, but I was in pretty good shape so didn’t mind being singled out. Big whoop, I did push-ups at home all the time.

When High School came around there wasn’t much animosity between the cliques. We all did some of the same bad things, so it was more our outward appearances than our private behaviours that separated us. We all got along pretty well.

One night I got a strange call. I thought it was my older brother who was in the Army at the time. The caller made some indecipherable comments and hung up. I didn’t think much of it at the time.

The next morning at school, I learned that the guy who had made the snide comments when I transferred into that school was dead. He also had an older brother in the Army, and his brother had gone AWOL, and came back and shot the guy at the top of the stairs at his house. I was close friends with a couple of his next door neighbours.

I made a promise that I would never fire a gun, in memory of that guy; a promise I broke shortly after 9/11 when I first shot a CAR-15.

Rest In Peace, Terry.

Two People Shot At Southeast DC Recreation Center

Two People Shot At Synagogue

I don’t see stars
I don’t hear angels singing
I’ve traveled far
My heart is all I’m bringing
I called him out
The devil came out swinging
I don’t see stars
I don’t hear angels singing

The sun goes down
The sky turns grey
The party people
come out to play
The sun goes down
The sky turns red
And in the morning
They count the dead

I don’t see stars
I don’t hear angels singing
I’ve traveled far
My hurt is all I’m bringing
I called him out
The devil came out swinging
I don’t see stars
I don’t hear angels singing

MSNBC’s Contessa Brewer deliberately misleads the public, describing a narrative of white people showing up to town halls with guns strapped to their sides.

when, in fact the video they showed accompanying the story was edited to not show the black man totin’ the rifle.

Rachel Maddow makes false racist accusations against Rush Limbaugh. The source of the rumour Maddow cites was an anonymous wiki article.

If that’s what the white house considers a real news organisation, I’ll keep getting my information from Fox News, thank you. They at least invite, well, beg really, to have their mistakes pointed out so they can correct them: “Show us what we got wrong, and we’ll correct it” – Glenn Beck.

MSNBC hasn’t retracted or apologized for their deliberately misleading stories, that I’m aware of. If I’m wrong, please, don’t hesitate to correct me.

I remember a mob beating up an unpopular guy. I walked up to him and asked him if what they were accusing him of was true. I remember the pleading look on his face when he pleaded his innocence. It was something I won’t forget.

And so if you’re wondering, why would I be defending a judge who recused himself from marrying interracial couples? That’s part of it. I hate mob mentality. Given the media’s propensity to generate a salacious headline, and plenty of recent evidence of their willingness to propagate slander or present deliberately misleading stories, it seems to me that on this one, they either didn’t do their homework, or refused to present it fairly.

Think about jury selection. What do they do? They ask questions to determine if a potential juror has a bias, or can not function impartially in weighing a case. If the juror can’t be impartial, the juror is dismissed from the case. By the way, you may recall a recent Supreme Court Justice who admitted a bias, but it wasn’t enough to deny her the job.

In any event, I haven’t seen a single news story that presented any research beyond opinion gathering. That’s the state of journalism today.

Here’s the link to Loving v. Virginia which prohibits statutory laws banning interracial marriage (miscegenation) that some news sources are quoting. It’s irrelevant. This isn’t a statutory ban. It’s one man admitting he can’t be impartial and recusing himself, as he should, according to the Louisiana Code of Judicial Ethics.

I knew a pretty American Indian girl whose Dad was white. She was sometimes picked on when she was on the reservation. Others tried to make her feel like she wasn’t native enough because her hair was a shade lighter.

I’m not singling out Native Americans, but she was a pretty girl, and I like to think about her, so if you’re reading this, either enjoy or suffer through it. I can’t be all things to all people. I’m using her as an example, but an example of what?

Racial pride, perhaps? Racism? Ever wonder where the line gets drawn? Is it a thin line, or one a mile wide, with lots of grey area in between?

Either way, the fact is that kids pick on others who stand out in some way. A lot of what becomes of childhood teasing depends on how parents raise the kids. Parents either teach the kids that we’re all in a big melting pot of blended cultures to be savored and enjoyed; or instead kids might pick up from their parents’ attitudes that life is not much more than a bitter us-against-them struggle.

The real reason I bring this up, is because of some Judge in Louisiana who refused to marry an interracial couple. The news immediately picked up on this story, and how the couple planned to file a discrimination lawsuit.

My first clue that something was fishy is when I googled it, it only seemed to be on liberal websites. So, I held my nose, and got the name of the judge from a liberal blog, and googled that. And found the court’s website. And saw a message on their website about the very thing I was looking into. How about that?!

At the time the license is issued, we are not aware of whom the couple may choose to perform the ceremony.

There are seven judges in the parish, and apparently one of them decided that it would be a hardship on the little interracial babies, so he refused to perform the marriage. Now, if getting married is the objective, wouldn’t you just go to one of the six remaining judges? Not this couple. Apparently, they went straight to the Department of Justice to see about filing a discrimination suit. Love may be blind, but an opportunity to file a discrimination lawsuit is getting rarer and rarer in this day and age.

Truly, this is either an attempt to smear a judge for having his own opinion, or an attempt to make some money. It’s not about a couple who can not get married. It’s about a couple trying to rub a guy’s nose in it for having an opinion they didn’t like. What’s that word for when someone is intolerant of someone else’s views? Oh yes, bigot. In this case, the couple is being intolerant of the judge’s views.

Not that it matters, but I think the judge is being a jerk, too. But at least we have his reasoning in print. That’s more than we have on why this lovelorn couple is filing a lawsuit instead of filing a marriage application.

As a tongue in cheek footnote, what happened to bringing empathy into the courtroom? From this man’s life experience as an admittedly inferior white man, he doesn’t want the poor interracial babies to be teased. Why should the courts force the poor hypothetical children to be subject to such cruelty? I mean, from the Safe Gay Sex School Czar’s point of view, childhood teasing is practically a predictor to violent killing.

Sarcasm aside, you don’t have to look far behind the sensational headline to see this is not the big deal it’s being made out to be.

(incidentally, if he had not given his reason, would this even be an issue? I don’t believe he was obligated to give a reason, nor do I think he’s obligated to marry people).

update:
At least I’m not the only one reading the press this way.

and more updates:
They’ll probably hit him over the head with this:
Prejudicial administration of justice

It sounds like the couple did, indeed go to another justice to get married, and then decide to file a discrimination lawsuit, in which case, I probably owe ‘em a big fat apology. I still think filing a discrimination lawsuit on their part is pettiness. They got their marriage.

more updates yet:
Louisiana’s Code of Judicial Conduct
From what it sounds like to me, now having spent a day looking at things is this:

The lady calls the judge, his wife answers the phone, and tells her he doesn’t perform interracial marriages. From the Judge’s account, he “refers them to somebody else”. The judge believes he should be allowed to recuse himself from performing marriages. Under Canon 3C, he may be covered. I’m not sure why his wife is taking his calls, was this at home, or at his public office? Certainly getting into crossing some lines.

‘cuz that’s what I hear every time someone defends Roman Polanski.

There’s some brawlers in Albuquerque. Some are dangerous boys, some can be dangerous men, but danger is, after all, dangerous.

Now, I admit a certain running together of events, and I’ll even attest that I don’t recall in particular one significant event in my personal history that the generally accepted story line escapes my recollection. The person who told the generally accepted version has since passed on, and I have nothing to put up contrary, so I’ll just let the story be told by the people who remember it. And rest in peace, to the gentleman who passed his version of that particular night’s events on.

But this night was long before that. And, there were enough nights just like that one, involving some of the same people, that I could have it all wrong. But here’s what I remember.

At one time or another, there were a lot of “the toughest guy”s in the bar. Stan was it, on this particular night.
I don’t really remember much except one minute we were drinking shots together, (They still let me drink hard liquor at that time), and about I’d say 12 seconds later Stan and Jeff were on the ground, with the obvious advantage going to the aggressor, (as they say in bar-back legalese talk). Now, I have no idea how the rest of the bar erupted, but somehow Jeff’s Dad who was there was involved, and probably 8 or 12 others. I dunno, I managed to pretty much observe the whole first wave of whatever the hell was going on with drink in hand. Although, I do remember distinctly looking on the floor and thinking “damn, we were just doin’ a shot together, now they’re on the ground”. Profound, I know.

Things settled down, after the first wave of whatever the hell was going on, and the next thing I remember is pulling whats-his-name off of Jeff. But, as I was struggling to pull them apart, we all three slammed into a table, and I’ll never forget that whole catching a drink that slid down the table, and gently setting it on the counter, all while holding on to whats-his-name, while a girl sat at the table wide-eyed. I think it was her drink.

But, after that little bit of slo-mo action, I don’t remember something Jeff related to me a couple years later. “Don’t you remember? You pulled him off of me, and had him in a head lock, and I punched him in the face about 3 or 4 times.” I did not remember that, and was furious when he told me. These guys were all, to one extent or another, my friends. “I didn’t pull him off of you so you could punch him!”. But anyway.

So that’s a few parts of that needless drama. Probably happens everywhere, all the time. Nobody got bad hurt. So overall, I’d call it a good night.

I wonder, what does it mean to be an American citizen? I’m aware that many immigrants are decent people trying to make a decent living. But what would amnesty for the illegales among us mean, exactly? If anyone can be an American citizen, what does it mean to be a citizen?

This is something I wonder, in terms of American sovereignty, among other contexts. Does America belong to anyone who can get away with breaking our laws? What’s the point of having laws? Is there a flaw in our immigration policy, or is it a flaw in the enforcement of that policy?

Our current administration seems intent on joining in a world governing body that rules on carbon dioxide emissions. This will weaken our sovereignty, subjecting The United States to a world governing body that gives an equal say to dictators alongside of democratically elected leaders. In essence, it gives countries that hate the United States a say in how we govern ourselves.

I’m not against being responsible to the world, and treating immigrants fairly. But I’m not exactly in favour of devaluing the status of American citizenship to the point that it is for all practical purposes, only meaningful in the duty to pay taxes that the rest of the world determines how are spent.