Things I Think

It's been awhile since I did one of these...

Workplace violence. That's what they're calling the case of Anne Le who was found murdered in a Yale laboratory last Sunday, the day she was supposed to get married. A few days later they had a "person of interest." Today they arrested him, Raymond Clark III. Turns out he worked with Le in the lab studying mice and other animals for science. He strangled her and stuffed her body behind a wall in the basement section of the lab. Why? We have yet to learn why. Some people are saying he was a control freak. There are rumors of some kind of dalliance between the two and she was getting married in a few days. But the thing that's got me thinking about this case is the security cameras. They caught her going in and not coming out. They caught EVERYONE going in that morning. Putting aside the stupidity of Mr. Clark's deciding to murder someone in a place that you needed three swipes of a security card to enter, thus severely limiting the number of individuals who could have done the deed, the thing that gets me is that with all the cameras we've got watching everyone's every move, it's getting very hard to get away with murder these days. We're living in Orwell's world. Now. Today. The only thing Big Brother hasn't mastered yet is how to quickly review all that film and analyze it at supersonic speed so decisions about guilt and innocence can be made instantly, a la Minority Report. But he's a quick study and he'll learn. People are so willing to give up their privacy for "security" that they don't mind more and more cameras. In fact, raise your hand if you're RELIEVED when you hear that a camera was used to capture a murdering fuck as it was in this case. I know I usually am. But deep down I know nothing comes for free. There's a cost associated with all these cameras, we just haven't seen it yet. We're almost there though. It's just around the corner. In the meantime, any sociopath with a brain in his head is going to have to learn that he's got to kill people in the country, not the city. Fewer cameras there.

Obama-as-Hitler. Obama-as-Hitler sneaks up on you. You don't expect to see it, so it's a little shocking at first. There's Obama's face, usually cast in black and white, for that 1941 Invasion of Poland effect, and just above his upper lip is that little mustache, the wisp of black hair, a style that Hitler ruined for all men forever. Invariably, the sign on which Obama's Teutonic/African visage appears is wielded by an overweight, middle aged white male or female with a right wing axe to grind. I have yet to see a black person or Jew carry an Obama-as-Hitler sign. Or anyone in Birkenstocks. This all begs the question: Why the comparison to Hitler? Weeeeellllll, you see, people are ANGRY! Vewwy angwy with Obama. No, no, not because he initiated a holocaust against a specific group of people, or targeted a minority and tried to erase them from history. Obama hasn't done THAT (yet). No, he hasn't invaded France. Or even Belgium, though he's up the ante in Afghanistan and Pakistan. We don't blame him for those, since they were started by someone else. But what he's trying to do is ALMOST as bad as these things. Bad enough to justify that little mustache. What is it? I'll tell you. (But I have to do it really quietly because if he finds out, I may get arrested and thrown into a socialist gulag. He's.... It's almost too hard to say. He's.... He's trying to force universal health care down everyone's throat.) THERE, I SAID IT. I DON'T CARE WHO HEARS ME NOW! He's going to balloon the deficit! He's going to tax everyone! He's going to turn America into a SOCIALIST COUNTRY!!!!

He's just like Hitler.

I ask you though. When it comes right down to it, who's REALLY more like Hitler? Obama, or the guy before him who started two major wars that have resulted in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people, and who locked prisoners of war up in internment camps where they were tortured for years? Hmmmmmmmmmmmm.

I've been reading about too many gruesome murders lately, but here's my latest stand on the death penalty.
I'm for it. In extremely limited cases. Far more limited than those that exist today. I'd impose it in cases where a murder was committed under aggravated circumstances, as defined under each state's law and only when DNA or other evidence unequivocally demonstrated someone's guilt. In other words, I'd raise the standard to higher than beyond a reasonable doubt for the sentencing phase. Circumstantial evidence could not be used. The evidence would have to be direct and conclusive. I think that's a fair compromise. The upside is people like Garrido, Clark, and that sick fuck Hilton in Tennessee I think it is, of recent fame, would be fully eligible. I've said it before, some dogs are rabid and need to be put down. The same should be true for humans, who have far more freedom of choice than a dog.

The Hofstra Non-Rape. A couple of days ago, an 18 year old Hofstra University student alleged that 5 men, all black or latino, tied her up and gangraped her in a bathroom. They posted the pictures of these men, boys actually, all over television and the newspaper. The stereotyping began. Only one of them looked somewhat cleancut. The others looked a bit gang-y. I read the story when it came out then the comments on cnn.com. One of them said something along the lines of the following: "Oh, and they all just look so innocent don't they? I heard one of their mothers say he was the 'best' and I wanted to throw up all over my television. Sick bastards. They should castrate all of them, or lock them up and let THEM get gangraped in jail." Strong words, yes.

Turns out, however, that the girl was lying. There was no gangrape. The sex was consensual. She was forced to admit it to the D.A. when one of the participants happened to have, you guessed it, a cell phone video of part of the incident that clearly showed that the girl was not being raped or forced to do anything against her will. The charges against the boys were immediately dropped and they were released from jail. (Thanks to those cameras again.) All the more reason why we shouldn't let our Blink! instincts trick us into assuming five gang-y looking boys who find their mugshots on television are automatically guilty of doing what they've been accused of doing. But we'll keep on doing it. We're all too hardwired to stop. But maybe, just MAYBE instead of assuming, we'll think, just for a split second, "Let's wait for the evidence, let's wait a couple of days before we assume anything." That's what I did with Mr. Clark in New Haven. Now I hope he gets his just desserts.

Tough decision. Who would I rather punch in the face, Glen Beck, Bill O'Reilly, or Anne Coulter? Tough call. I think I have to go with Beck. For right now. But maybe if I get them to stand really close together...

Things I could give a fuck about: Kanye West, Kate & Jon, Joe Wilson, swine flu, town halls,

WTF is up with Ernie Anastos?



Then this:



The guy's got farm animals on the brain - too funny. But really, who doesn't let a slippery curse word out by mistake every now and then? I'm actually surprised it doesn't happen more often on the news. If I were a newscaster, I'd pull a Ron Burgundy every night and go out with something like:

"You stay cock-y, New York City!"