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David Cordell

Janalu,

I haven't really had an acrimonious discussion with black people. A couple of semesters ago, a black graduate student, who graduated from Princeton and served as an officer in the Army, and I had a good conversation in the semester after he was in my class. He seemed to feel discrimination.

It is a sad byproduct of affirmative action, but early in the semester when he was my student, I couldn't help but wonder if his race was a major factor in his admission to Princeton. Maybe not. He was a very good and conscientious student. But I adopted a racist attitude with the knowledge of racial preferences.

My graduate assistant in the fall semester was from Gabon in Africa. Very black. He didn't have anything good to say about African-American culture, especially attitudes, expectations, and criminality.

I am convinced that most black people want the same things that most white people want, and they mainly want a fair shake. I think they also realize that the police exist to protect and serve, even though it goes very wrong sometimes.

Steve,

I am not inclined to invest in individual stocks. I acknowledge that higher returns are available, but those stocks are farther up the return-risk trade-off than my current comfort level allows. I did move some money into an energy sector fund. a few weeks ago.

Different topic.

I am particulary impressed by black conservatives because they have to have a lot of guts to put up with the grief and name-calling from liberal blacks and whites. In economics, I always enjoyed reading Thomas Sowell and Walter Williams, the latter of whom lived in my neighborhood in suburban Philly and commuted to his faculty job at George Mason University outside of D.C.

I also like the feisty Candace Owens. A sometime-reader of this forum sent me a link to the following 18-minute video that is likely to raise the hackles and blood pressure of the liberals among us.

Steve Keene

David

I have always believed that stock market trades should be self directed and not allowed to be lumped into one fund by an advisor (apologies to Jimmy Baker).  This removes the possibility of poorer quality stocks added to the mix because of the commissions earned by the advisors for promoting the garbage.  See the "Wolf of Wall Street.."   That said people also end up in stocks that they don't know the reason why the bought them, when they are going to sell them or what their tolerance for stop limits as a percentage of the price when a bad stock or stock that no longer meets your criteria should be exited.  You should ride with your winners and sell out of your losers when they hit your stop loss whether it be 10 or 25%,  I was amused by a recent E-Trade commercial that shows that some people who won't take the time to investigate their purchases and pay attention to advice they hear prooves they should not be stock market investors at all.

Lowell Tuttle

I got the e mail about our 69th birthday event at Reunion? Hotel. 

I asked my wife if she wanted to go.  I mentioned it was at our "honeymoon night" hotel.  I remembered booking the night, 12 05 1987.

We asked for and got "the" honeymoon suite.  It included champagne, gift basket, chocolates, and tour.

Still in our "duds," we arrived at the valet and were cheered as we entered the lobby and went to the check-in.  Directed to the appropriate line, we were somewhat discouraged to see about 6-7 other couples waiting ahead of us.. 

As we got to the front of the line, I asked about the "extras."  We were given a voucher ticket for the champagne, gift basket, and chocolates...Not very romantic.

Oh well, I was pretty wasted anyway...

One more memory.  The Sunday morning following was the Dallas Marathon.  It was fun to watch from the tower as the runners ran past 20-30 floors down.

Susie says "too soon" for party's and gatherings...We may or may not make it. 

Russ Stovall

David 

Candace Owens nails it.  

Janalu Jeanes (Parchman)

I agree that Candace Owens is a spitfire and tells the facts truthfully.  I just heard on conservative TV a few minutes ago her statistics verified by US Commission on Civil Rights attorney, Peter Kirsanow, a Black man, that the narrative about systemic racism in our policing system is a totally false narrative.

He couldn't believe what he has heard repeated over and over for the last week.

David Cordell

Lowell,

The night Martha and I were married (Dec 29, 1973) we stayed the night at a tall hotel in Houston with a huge atrium. One of the teams in th Bluebonnet Bowl was staying there. I had ordered flowers for Martha, but they never arrived. Really chapped me, but not as much as when I saw the charge on my credit card bill.

Janalu,

Here's an absurdity. There seems to be confusion about whether someone who dies with COVID-19 is recorded as having died FROM COVID-19. It turns out that George Floyd's autopsy revealed that he was positive for COVID-19. Will the policeman beat the murder rap, i.e., Floyd wouldn't have died if he hadn't had COVID-19? 

Janalu Jeanes (Parchman)

I just read this message from one of my husband's fishing buddies who was eating breakfast this morning with a friend at Cracker Barrel.  He said that a middle-aged Black man walked over to a table where 4 policemen were eating, and he picked up the tabs of all 4 men.  They told him that his gesture was appreciated but that he didn't need to do that.  He told them, "Please, I insist!  And that it was his pleasure." 

So the four policemen stood up, shook his hand, and told him "Thank you very much!"

The Black man continued, "I'm so thankful for all you guys do for us!"  Then he walked over to the cashier, paid the tabs, and left with a smile, as he waved back toward the officers.

What a beautiful world it can be!

Steve Keene

Lance,

You missed a couple of items on your list of conundrums.

In many jurisdictions you can get arrested if you attend church in a group of more than 10 to 25 depending on the neighborhood.  However, if the pastor locks the door of the church and you break the lock with the stated intent to loot the candles and the Hymnal books, two thousand of you can enter the church and sing and yell Halelujah to your heart's content. listen to speakers denigrating the government and praising God, and unmask yourself and be filmed doing it and the authorities will not interfere with you in any way.

George Floyd's life matters.  Black lives matter especially in Minnesota if a police officer kills a black man.  However, Black lives don't matter in Chicago.  Two weekends ago18 blacks were killed in Chicago, the largest weekend total in the city's history.  Those Black lives evidently don't matter because they were killed by other Blacks, some just standing on the street with their girlfriends by drive by gang shooters.  We do not know their names, though they were featured on a page of a Chicago newspaper.  There are no nationwide memorials or protest marchers for these faceless Black victims whose lives evidently don't matter since they were executed by their own kind.  In fact, if you bring the matter up you are likely to be called a racist by the Left.  This is an example of what can happen if the cops are unfunded nationwide.

What a hypocritical world it is!

Sandra Spieker (Ringo)

David,

I know you directed these questions (absurdities) to Janalu but:

Janalu,

Here's an absurdity. There seems to be confusion about whether someone who dies with COVID-19 is recorded as having died FROM COVID-19. It turns out that George Floyd's autopsy revealed that he was positive for COVID-19. Will the policeman beat the murder rap, i.e., Floyd wouldn't have died if he hadn't had COVID-1+

Logic tells me that, George Floyd probably would not have died had the officer's knee not rested on his neck for almost 9 minutes and the other officers were not putting additional pressure on his chest as well.  Even a healthy individual would have an issue if their airways were constricted in the same manner.  The latest defense this officer's attorney is touting is that is was the responsibility of the bystanders to intervene and force the police officers to get off of George Floyd.  Now that is absurd.

George Floyd tested postive for Covid over a month before he was executed by police for suspicion of having a twenty dollar counterfet bill.  Now we have to wonder if his death was caused by Covid-19?  Surely the absurdity here is that there is any confusion at all as to what caused his death. 

Steve Keene

Sandra

No one alive except those four officers truly believe that George Floyd was not murdered.  My question is whether they alowed an open casket.  Statistics show that dead bodies and those that work or come in contact with them, tend to spread the virus.

Sandra Spieker (Ringo)

Steve,

Very interesting.  Show me these statistics!  Website, book or medical reference???

Edited to add this:

Embalming fluid is pretty good preservation, which by definition kills bacteria and virus.  Do you think there is a strong possiblity that they used some embalming fluid on Mr. Floyd's body? 

Logic.  Sheesh.

David Cordell

Sandra,

As Steve noted, no one -- NO ONE -- thinks George Floyd deserved to die. No policeman thinks that Derek Chauvin did the right thing. The three other officers should have intervened. I suspect that they were intimidated by the senior officer. Two of them were very new on the job.

By the way, ont of the three was black and another was Asian. Diversity!

Chauvin didn't end up with a knee on his neck for the $20 bill. The 911 caller indicated that he was very much under the influence. He wasn't compliant in getting into the police car.

https://www.masslive.com/news/2020/05/read-the-complaint-former-minneapolis-cop-derek-chauvin-kept-knee-on-george-floyds-neck-for-nearly-9-minutes-prosecutors-say.html

Does that justify Chauvin killing him? Of course not. 

Would George Floyd be alive if he had simply gotten into the police car compliantly. Absolutely. 

To reiterate: George Floyd would be alive if Chauvin hadn't kept his knee on Floyd's neck for eight minutes. He would also be alive if he had simply gotten itnto the police car peacefully.

Before the left beatifies George Floyd, they should acknowledge that he had, at best, an uneven life history. The following is from https://m.washingtontimes.com/news/2020/jun/7/george-floyd-black-lives-matter-martyr-struggled-d/

In 1997, he was arrested on a charge of possession of less than 1 ounce of cocaine. It was the first of eight arrests on drug and theft charges that culminated in the 2007 robbery of a woman’s home in Harris County, according to records posted by the [U.K.] Daily Mail.

The woman, who was pregnant, “tentatively identified defendant George Floyd” as one of the men who forced his way into her home by pretending to work for the water department. He pointed a gun at her abdomen and forced her into the living room. The men took jewelry and her cellphone before leaving.

Mr. Floyd served five years and was released in 2014.

I think we can all agree that invading a house and robbing a pregnant woman while pointing a gun at her abdomen is a bad thing. By the way, the pregnant woman was black. The Wahington Times story continues:

It’s unclear whether Mr. Floyd started using drugs again after leaving Houston, or whether he ever stopped, but his autopsy report said fentanyl and evidence of methamphetamine use were in his system.

Interestingly, fentanyl, which is 50-100 times more powerful than morphine, has the following as one of its side effects:

• Depressed breathing, shallow breaths, or irregular breaths https://americanaddictioncenters.org/fentanyl-treatment/side-effects

Ya think that will show up in Chauvin's legal defense??

Here are some simple suggestions that I'm pretty sure that most people teach their children. Don't pass counterfeit currency. Don't commit armed robbery. Don't do drugs. If you are stopped by the police, be respectful and do what they tell you to do.

And PULEEEZE don't tell me that that last sentence is my so-called "white privilege" speaking. Tens of thousands of black men have been arrested and have gotten into a police car without getting killed by police.

That said, George Floyd didn't deserve to die.

Janalu Jeanes (Parchman)

Excellent post, David.

Sandra Spieker (Ringo)

I am sitting in the Weatherford ER right now awaiting tests on my mother.  Hopefully nothing too serious, possibly a UTI.   So I have a few minutes to post. 
It seems no one is innocent not George, who paid dearly for the crime he was accused of, nor the police officers sworn to protect all they serve.  He deserved better, no matter his crime, past or present.  The officer had a record too, several disciplinary infractions. In death George Floyd will stand trial on his character and past deeds, in an effort to justify actions of a police officers who  used force way beyond what was necessary to subdue a suspect.  

Bob Davidson

I've been rereading Winds of War and am now on War and Remembrance and avoiding the news after watching it avidly for a time.

A week ago Friday, I watched a bit of a demonstration up close.  Essentially a few thousand people with phones held up to take videos or pictures (overwhemingly black, mostly well dressed and middle class looking -- mixed with some liberal looking whites) lined I-10 through downtown holding homemade signs and chanting about justice for George Floyd.  Some skinny white hipster/skateboarders and large very low-class blacks had climbed over the barriers to the freeway so the cops blocked traffic both ways.  I was on my way home from work and was at the front of the group that got stopped.

There were about a dozen regular-looking cops -- HPD and deputy constables -- on the road trying to get the people off.  The hipsters were running around taunting the cops but staying away from them.  The on-the-freeway blacks attacked the cops, throwing punches and shoving and kicking -- usually about three to one cop, including the couple of young women cops, and getting the best of them.  No cops drew a weapon, but they looked scared to death and were backing away from the bullies -- one slender black woman cop near me was pushed against the concrete barrier in the middle of the freeway and looked like she was getting hurt by two very trashy loud fat black women who were screaming obscenities at her while they pushed and kicked her.  I had my window down and was taking to Terry on the phone.  She said the shouting and cursing sounded really scary and loud.  I was trapped in traffic and could go nowhere -- I had a pistol under my leg and noticed that the middle-aged Hispanic woman in the car next to me had her window down and a big chrome .357 or .44 magnum openly out on her lap.  The demonstrators were staying away from the stopped cars.  A lot of the younger drivers were out of their cars taking phone videos -- most of the older ones were sitting in their cars trying to look invisible.

About 30 HPD cop SUVs with their lights flashing swooped down the freeway going the wrong way on both sides and skidded into the area where the cops were getting beaten.  New cops jumped out and ran to the aid of the other cops.  They were all male, big like weightlifters, with helmets, body armor, and wielding long black clubs.  About half seemed to be black.  They pulled the bullies off the other cops and beat the shit out of them before tying their arms with white plastic loops and throwing them roughly face down on the road.  An enormous, furious black cop ran at both of the creatures attacking the black woman cop -- he grabbed them, spun them around and pummeled them at the same time until they were down on their backs and their faces were bloody while other cops flipped them over and tied them up.  He put his arm around the woman cop and led her very gently away.  All of the people attacking the cops went from terrifying bullies to punching bags in an instant.  The hipsters raced into the crowd like scared rabbits when the cavalry arrived, but the blacks stayed and fought.  The rest of the protesters started chanting, "hands up don't shoot," "Fuck the police," "police brutality" and some more chants I couldn't understand while they threw full plastic water bottles on the road -- I couldn't tell if they were aiming at us in the stopped traffic or the cops since their aim was really bad.  Some of the new cops helped the other beaten, bloody cops into SUVs and drove them off.

Police vans drove up, the cops threw the arrestees into the vans, picking them up roughly by the backs of their shirt collars and pants.  When they had them off the road, they opened the freeway and let us drive off.  We were there about 20 minutes.  Terry said it sounded like a riot.  I never felt threatened, but would have if the scary cops hadn't arrived.

The local news didn't report this incident at all.  Another highway on the other side of downtown had some news footage when they surrounded cars and broke some of the windows.  They said it (and the vandalism downtown) was the exception to the peaceful protests.

Somehow it all makes me think of the Walker Percy novel Love in the Ruins and Germany leading up to World War II.  

My neighborhood is less than two miles from downtown Houston.  It's rapidly "gentrifying" from $600,000 to $900,000 hundred year old restored houses to million dollar plus mcmansions.  The beautiful bungalo directly across the street was torn down this week so a hulking fake victorian build cheaply on spec can go in.  My neighbor said the developer offered more than he could get from a sale of the house as a house.  A number of my neighbors have homemade signs supporting Black Lives Matter.  They seem to be the same people with Sheila Jackson Lee campaign signs in their yards.

As a consumer bankruptcy and family law lawyer, I'm seeing people ruined by the Covid shutdown every day.  Cops beating people is sickening.   

I'm of tremendously mixed emotions right now.

Russ Stovall

Janalu:

She is as sharp as a tack.  I like listneing to her.  She can back up anything she says

Hull Barbee

Sandra ............. realizing the thought of prayer is not high on your lists , I'm putting you and your Mom on mine ........ you are one of the lucky ones to still have yours and I wish only for a great health report on your Mom 

As far as this George Floyd fiasco, none from this cast of characters will receive Sainthood in any body's book ........ but no one deserves to die that way and those 4 officers will get what they deserve. But I , along with a whole bunch of other people, are done with these protests....... whether they are peaceful or not, lots of them tend to morph into riots of destruction........ the points have been made and I'm ready to just get back to fighting Covid 19. 

David Cordell

Sandra,

Hardly any news outlets are bringing up Floyd's criminal record, likely because 1) they are afraid to, and 2) it doesn't jibe with their view of the world. Those that mention it all, mention it briefly. I suspect that less than 1/10th of 1% of ink and TV time on the Floyd killing refers to his record. That said, the attorneys for Chauvin will certainly hit on Floyd's record and his resistance to police, but they will have to walk the fine line to avoid offending the jury. 

Bob,

Thanks for sharing your observations. I think I would have been more anxious than you were.

I have a concealed carry license, or whatever they call it now, but I have never carried. Actually, I probably need to get someone to show me how to load my guns again!

I understand your comment that "cops beating people is sickening," but I confess that I was uplifted by the part describing the arrival of the cavalry.  I like it when bullies get their asses kicked. [Did you see the movie My Bodyguard (not The Bodyguard)?] You may have read my account of how Bobby "T-bone" Tillinger saved me from a potential pummeling by a bully.

I have a theory that the punishment should always be worse than the crime. Let me put it in simple terms. Imagine that  the penalty for stealing $100 is that the thief has to give back the $100 plus another $100. Further, imagine that the likelihood of getting caught is 25%. The expected value of the theft is (75% times $100) plus (25% times negative $100), which equals $50. In my view of the universe, to discourage the theft, the expected value of the theft needs to be negative.

The penalty should be more than $300. At $300, the expected value of the theft is (75% times 100) plus (25% times negative $300), which gives an expected value of $0.  I think the penalty should be greater than $300 so that the expected value of the theft is negative, thus discouraging the thief.

Of course this assumes that the criminal is rational and that the criminal's evaluation of the odds of getting caught are comparable or higher than the actual odds.

Never mind.

David Cordell

Bob, you said, "(I) noticed that the middle-aged Hispanic woman in the car next to me had her window down and a big chrome .357 or .44 magnum openly out on her lap."

It just occurred to me that the geometry that allowed you to see the .357 magnum had to be pretty interesting. Was she in a convertible and you in a monster truck?? 

Wayne Gary

David,

If you want some training let me know.  I am and NRA instructor and I can take you out to a private shooting lease off Belt Line near Seagoville. Gratis

Wayne Gary

I saw on the TV yesterday the officer shown standing and watching had only been on the streets for 6 days and he did not feel he could stop his boss, the officer with his knee on Floyd's neck.

Wayne Gary

David, Bob

Some criminals never learn.

Several years ago I was jury foreman on a trial.

Facts: Defendant was 32 year old. Observed by a undercover office junp out of a pickup truck run around to the back of a house and return carring a $75,00 pruning saw, Proceded to a drug house where he took the saw into house and was arrested when he came out.

We were told he had 3 previous mistameaner convictions for shop listing and burglery of a car. The DA asked we elevate the case from a mistameaner into a felony. (up to 18 months in state jail)

After we convicted the defendent of a :State Jail Felony" for the sentencaning phase we were asked to elevate it to a 20 year felony. Additional facts we could no be told in the "Guilt/Innonce" trial

When defendent was 20 yr old he was given 20 years for drug dealing. He had 3 convictions for burgulary of a habitat while occupied.

We the jury felt he had enough chances and we needed to protect the public.  We gave him 15 years in TDC.

Bob Davidson

David, I drive a Ford F-150; she was in a Camry or Avalon.  I am much higher than a car.

David Cordell

Bob, ya gotta love a bankruptcy lawyer who drives an F-150! Probably helped when hauling Scout stuff, right?

Wayne, I might take you up on that sometime. We didn't have any guns in my family when I was growing up.

Bob Davidson

David,

I did get the truck to pull the troop trailer and haul camping gear. 

One thing I've noticed at the Federal Courthouse is that debtors' bankruptcy lawyers tend to drive paid-for vehicles, to the point that some of the most successful ones have almost ostentatiously old vehicles.  Creditors' lawyers, like family litigators, tend to like Mercedes, BMW, and Lexus cars. 

I think it's like John O'Quinn and his scuffed shoes and ratty sports jackets.  (O'Quinn was a very famous Houston plaintiff's lawyer who won the agent orange case, among others, and was worth hundreds of millions of dollars. He liked to look like a man of the people in front of juries -- he once told me that defense attorneys with their thousands of dollars suits and fancy ties impress corporate boards and allienate jurors.)

I just noticed that our Soros-funded District Attorney Kim Ogg dropped the charges against almost all of the protestors including those who were charged with being on freeways.