Mass Murder and Such

This morning I was chatting with a Facebook Friend about finding a suitable blog platform. She’s a professional writer, so she’s a little pickier than me. She’s looking not just for an audience but for the right audience. Professional writers need the exposure that could lead to a paid gig. And, of course, all professional writers write to be read widely. Otherwise, why write.

I’m not a writer myself. I write basically for my family and friends. A blog is a good way to reach them beyond the bounds of E-mails and letters. Oh, sure, it’s nice when others write nice comments about the things I write, and I have met some fine people through my blog. Can’t deny that, and I hope to meet more good folks with interesting things to say.

My own approach to blogging is simple. I am not at all good at writing about myself. My inner feelings are boring even to me, and I am sort of bored right now. That’s why I tend or have tended to write about external events. And since my interests are quite broad, I am inclined to write according to no particular pattern. Today, I might write about a political event, tomorrow a blurb about an article I ran across in GQ magazine. Whatever strikes my interest at the moment will likely be the topic for the day.

I also like to add a humorous touch to most of the topics I am interested in. That doesn’t mean everything is funny. Some topics are absolutely without humor, child abuse, domestic violence, murder, and suicide, for example, are devoid of laughter.

That’s why the current run of murders in this country is disturbing. Thirteen soldiers murdered at Fort Hood, Texas, one murdered and mayby 15-plus wounded in Orlando, Florida; these are just two of the most egregious examples of recent violence in America today.

Of course, the perpetrators of these crimes will always have an excuse. The guy in Orlando was fired from his job two years ago and he was mad at the company. Oddly, the individuals he murdered are not, “the company.” But somehow in the mind of this deranged individual, the employees who worked for “the company” became “the company.” So, he decided to murder as many human beings as he could.

He may or may not have known or cared that he was shooting individuals rather than “the company.” Is this insanity, or is it a failure of the ability of some people to understand distinctions?  One individual is dead but “the company” lives on. Similarly, thirteen dead but the United States Army survives.

In addition to the damages done to the survivors of these monstrous acts, the perpetrators have harmed the United States in more ways than one. Globally, they’ve added to the perception that this is the most violent country in the world. Say what you wish, but the perceptions of other nations are important within the global system when it comes to the achievement of the vital national interests of the U.S.

Domestically, the current rash of violence has exacerbated the feelings of fear and parnoia among ordinary Americans.  Who among us might be the next mass murder? That guy down the street who looks odd with his little round glasses and close-set eyes? Or a respected Army psychologist?

The most disgusting cipher in the equation is society’s failure to deal with the violence that seems to be a part of our cultural DNA. Why are we as a country so reluctant to tackle the issue? Is it because we feel helpless? Maybe we think its someone else’s job. Or have our leaders failed us? We have a justice system that excuses criminal behavior and a penal system that has become a breeding ground for violence and gang activity.

Whatever the answer may be, it’s a puzzle. As far as solutions go, my own personal impression is that the violence has largely missed the elites of our society. As long as people below the elite level murder each other, as long as the elites do not find themselves the targets of random and mass violence they will continue to largely ignore the issue, appearing on television and uttering meaningless words after a mass shooting or an especially egregious murder.

Somehow, in America, we tend to look at the moment and at the situation. Broader ramifications seem beyond our comprehension.

A Conundrum Named Gavin

I wouldn’t exactly characterize it as rife, but speculation about Gavin Newsom is in the air. It started this past Friday when he announced his withdrawal from the governor’s race. In the beginning, everyone seemed inert, hardly grasping what had just occurred. But the talking pointy heads are beginning to emerge and as time passes, we can expect the underwhelming story to gain a little staying power.

Newsom’s expressed reason for his withdrawal was a desire to spend more time with his new baby daughter. That’s understandable. First time parents always seem a little overwhelmed at the 24/7 tasks of caring for a newborn infant. Some have wondered, however, if a couple as rich as the Newsoms hasn’t already employed a baby sitter or whatever they’re called by rich people, nannies or something European chic such as Au pair.

Naturally, as soon as Newsom ended his press conference Friday, the questions began. Everyone, and I mean everyone, wanted to know the real reason he decided to drop out. The thinking class figured, based on its experience with politicians, that a simple explanation could not possibly be the right one. The want-to-be-with-my-family excuse has been used by virtually every politician in the country at one time or another. Political analysts have a difficult time with both simplicity and repetition.

In the case of Newsom’s real motives, a couple of explanations hit the media waves almost immediately. The first one posited that Gavin was far behind Jerry Brown and falling further in soliciting money for his campaign. In modern American politics, so the theory goes, money equals success. No one aspiring to a political office can approach electability without the monetary resources needed to get his or her message out to the voting public. Gavin came up short in this area.

The second reason Gavin withdraw, according to the pundits, was his standing in the polls. Since the beginning of his efforts to become the Democratic nominee for governor, he has lagged in the polls. In the latest, he was a full 20 points behind Jerry. Overcoming a deficit like this is a challenge to say the least.

Those are the motives proffered by the punditry class. And both of them are valid and logical. But are they the primary motivating forces behind Newsom’s withdrawal? Some have suggested other reasons.

At the top of the list is a hint, never directly articulated, that someone lined up against Newsom was prepared to cover every inch of Newsom’s personal life, or at least enough to brand Newsom as an untrustworthy individual. Does this one hold water? Perhaps. But most likely, given Brown’s commanding lead in money and polls, the nuclear option would never have been needed.

Another possible motive plays on Newsom’s expressed desires in the past to achieve political office beyond San Francisco. This one suggests implicitly that Gavin may be looking for something at the federal level, a congressional seat or something like that. His failure in the Democratic primary would definitely put a damper on further political aspirations. By withdrawing now and using the usual reasons, Gavin leaves open the possibility of revisiting the issue at a more propitious time.

Whether or not any or all of these are the real motive, one fact remains clear. Gavin has withdrawn from contention. At this point in time, motives are irrelevant. Some recognize this and concentrate on the matter of his future. What will Gavin do now?

Again, several ideas have been floated. For the time being, he will finish his second term as mayor, putting his energies into the changes he wishes for San Francisco.

After his second term ends in 2012, the possibilities are open. He may return to his business interests, of which he has several in the pleasure and entertainment business, successful enterprises such as a winery, resorts, restaurants and wine bars.

Some, such as former San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown, believe Newsom will return to politics at some time in the future when the political environment is more receptive.

Regardless of the political tack Newsom may eventually take, he will continue to be a polarizing figure. His stand on gay marriage has illuminated the nascent strength of California’s conservative majority in certain areas of the state such as the interior valleys where conservatives, along with many of California’s statewide population of Black voters, were instrumental in killing state-wide gay marriages.

Of course, outside forces were a strong factor in the passage of Proposition 8, an Amendment to the State Constitution that restricts marriage to one man and one woman. But the point is that conservative strength is there and can be mobilized easily against Newsom.

Perhaps the biggest mystery surrounding Newsom’s sudden withdrawal from the primary against Jerry Brown is the question of who predicted Newsom’s decision to hang it up, at least for the time being, as far back as September 15, 2009.

On that date, an anonymous item appeared in the blog  I Love You Gavin Newsom. The post predicted with uncanny accuracy not only Newsom’s withdrawal but also the exact reason given by Newsom in his public statement on Friday, October 31, a month and a half after the blog post.

Someday, the identity or identities of the author(s) will be known. In the meantime, speculation about the conundrum that is Gavin will continue. Our speculation is that Gavin’s absence from the political arena will be temporary. He is an ambitious individual with a taste for the power political office brings. Power once experienced is difficult to forget.

What the Hell is a Jack Tar?

This is probably a meaningless post unless you know a little about San Francisco. But if you are somewhat familiar with the city, you may recall or have heard about the Jack Tar Hotel.

This relic of another era at the corner of Van Ness and Geary in San Francisco is going to be demolished and eventually replaced by a hospital.

Once upon a storied time, the hotel was one of many in a chain of Jack Tar Hotels. I’m working from memory here, but I believe there was also a Jack Tar in Dallas and several in the Caribbean. I don’t know what happened to any of the hotels in those locations, but the San Francisco Jack Tar somewhere along the line was sold and became the Cathedral Hills Hotel.

I mention all of this because the Jack Tar Hotel has occupied a central part of my life’s story. No, I didn’t attend any galas or other social events there. I didn’t hang out in the bar. I didn’t meet beautiful women in the hotel lobby who took my hand and whispered, “I love you so.” In my eyes, The Jack Tar was a 400-room monstrosity, a garish blot on San Francisco’s otherwise pristine landscape.

Why, then, and how has the hotel remained in my memory since I first became aware of its existence as a young, very young male, hovering in that twilight zone between adolescent stupidity and age-of-consent certainty?

I received a moving traffic violation in the hotel’s underground parking garage. It happened this way.

I was accustomed to driving in Oakland where a U-Turn was legal unless a sign specifically said “No U-Turn.”

One day, I had some business at the Jack Tar. As usual when I drove to San Francisco, I came off of the Bay Bridge and headed North on Van Ness. On this day, the traffic was heavy, and as I reached Geary, I had to wait in the left-turn lane for the light to change.

The traffic in the opposite direction was also heavy, and I knew if I didn’t make a quick U-Turn ahead of the oncoming traffic, I’d have a long delay. Since I saw no sign prohibiting a U-Turn, I decided to chance it.

So, the instant the light hit green, I immediately stepped on the gas and swung around, catching the right lane on Van Ness. From there, I immediately swung right again into the entrance to the outside parking area before the oncoming traffic had moved into the intersection. I had good reflexes in those days.

As I drove slowly into the parking area, I heard a deep-throated motor behind me. I looked in the rear-view mirror and saw an SFPD motorcycle officer. Thinking nothing of it (I was also oblivious then), I continued through the outside parking lot into the underground area looking for a spot to pull into.

The parking garage was virtually full but I finally found a lonesome spot as far into the bowels of the garage as I could drive without bumping the back wall. All of this time, the motorcycle officer hung right with me.

By the time I had parked and stepped out, the officer had already placed his bike directly behind me and dismounted. He said, “You made an illegal U-Turn.”  He asked for my driver’s license and car registration, inspected them, and began writing me a ticket.

Like every idiot who has ever been surprised by a ticket, I tried to explain my way out of it. “I live in Oakland and we can make a U-Turn unless a sign says we can’t.”

This is the old out-of-towner excuse that might work in a tourist area, but I was no tourist and the officer knew it. He merely continued to write the ticket, all the while saying nothing.

I don’t remember now whether or not I signed the ticket. I probably did. But one thing sticks in my mind. The officer never said a word beyond his introductory remarks. He merely wrote the ticket, handed it to me, re-mounted his bike and cut out.

I probably would have argued a little more, but a couple of things gave me second thoughts: the officer’s silence and the knowledge that my company would pay the ticket.

Oh, and one other hint of my absolute stupidity in those days. While I waited for the light to change, the officer who followed me into the Jack Tar parking garage had been sitting on his idling bike in plain sight on Van Ness. I remember he looked very professional.

Little known fact: Jack Tar is a British Navy slang term for a sailor.

Full Frontal Male Nudity

Be honest now, men. If you had a chance, would you pose full-frontal nude in Playgirl Magazine if the editors invited you?

A lot of men have actually exposed all in the pages of that publication, including Burt Reynolds when he was still a hunk. Now, Levi Johnston, the father of Sarah Palin’s grandson, is getting ready for a nude photo shoot. His unadorned pecs and abs and er…equipment…are expected to grace the centerfold of Playgirl’s next issue.

Why is Levi opting for his 15 minutes of fame in the nude? He’s a hardened Alaskan male who, if he wants to pose, would make a more lasting impression as a really masculine guy shooting at a rabbit with an AK-47.

But standing or sitting or whatever in a position carefully calculated to demonstrate his manliness in another way is dangerous. A lot of men are going to see him in Playgirl. Men are not kind when assessing the endowments of other men. In fact, regardless of the size and appearance of his equipment, Levi is going to wish he were on the moon to escape the inevitable razzing.

Besides, his fame may be short-lived. It may dissipate long before his 15 minutes expires. America’s magazine buying public prefers female over male nudity. Playboy is still going strong after 35-plus years. Playgirl’s print version is already out of business. The mag is strictly an on-line publication now.

Which brings me around to the question I used to introduce this post: would any of you men pose full-frontal nude in Playgirl like Levi?

Here’s my take. Your courage would be directly proportional to the length and girth of your appendage. If you were well-endowed, hell, you’d catch the red eye to New York in a heartbeat. If you were lacking, you’d kill any son of a bitch who came within a hundred yards of you with a camera.

This is why I believe Levi is well-endowed. And I think we can expect an exciting Playgirl issue when it hits the internet.

I’m wondering, though, if money plays a role here. I’m sure Levi will be paid for his services. But in your own personal case, how much money would it take to get you to strip naked on a beach on Maui and pose in front of a bunch of gawking giggling tourists?

Gang Rape Culture

When the story first broke, I wasn’t paying a lot of attention to CNN News. CNN is the news outlet after all that continually flashes “Breaking News” or something similar across the ticker at the bottom of the screen. Every thing is “breaking” or “developing.” My mind numbs itself in self defense.

But then something caught my attention. I heard the words “Richmond High School.” There are other Richmonds in the U.S., including Richmond, Virginia. I went back to my latest issue of Country Weekly magazine.

As I read, I heard the announcer, I think it was Kyra Phillips, mention California. My ears perked up. The gang rape occurred on the grounds of Richmond High School, Richmond, California. Once upon a time, I attended that very high school. My tenure there was brief, but still, things stick in the mind.

Richmond when I lived there was a classic All-American town, or perhaps I should say a classic California town. However, I’ve lived in many towns and the habits of teens weren’t substantially different from the habits of Richmond’s teens.

In Richmond, as in Cotton Plant, Arkansas, cars were a big deal, and every Saturday night, McDonald Avenue, Richmond’s main drag, would be lined with cars full of kids dragging the street from 23^rd Street in the east to the train depot at the west end of town.

If the kids weren’t tooling up and down shouting at one another or at a gaggle of girls walking along the street toward the movie, they were parked in or just idling in any available spot near a drive-in with real live and often good-looking girls taking and delivering orders.

If you want to get a good idea of Richmond then, watch the movie American Graffiti. The movie wasn’t filmed in Richmond but in several nearby towns like Petaluma (the primary filming location), Pinole, Concord, Larkspur, Mill Valley, and San Francisco.

Mel’s Diner in the movie was filmed at a diner (since torn down) on South Van Ness Avenue in San Francisco. And 4^th Street in San Rafael was used for many of the street scenes. Another coincidence: my wife and I lived on 4^th Street shortly after we were first married and then later in Petaluma.

Times have changed since American Graffiti was released in 1973. Most of the towns where the movie was filmed have undergone dramatic growth spurts accompanied by an influx of people from other areas of the United States and from foreign countries.

Richmond has also experienced its share of changes. But unlike the positive changes in many other Bay Area communities, the changes in Richmond have been mostly negative.

The reputation of Richmond today is a place to avoid. The town is widely known as the murder capital of the state. In 2007 (last year I have a figure for), there were 37 murders in this town of roughly 100,000 people. And, the part of I-80 passing through Richmond has achieved dubious standing as a war zone based on the number of shootings that happen along that short stretch of the highway.

To compound these negatives, the Richmond-San Pablo area has become rife with gang activity that often erupts in violence. And lesser crimes such as robbery and burglary are beginning to spill over into once small and peaceful enclaves like El Sobrante.

The causes of Richmond’s decline have often been attributed to its ethnic shift. While the town was once overwhelmingly white, today whites make up about 25 percent of the population. The balance consists mainly of Blacks and Hispanics.

However, the attribution of Richmond’s ills to its ethnic balance is a specious argument. So many variables come into play that it’s difficult if not impossible to narrow the root cause or causes to one factor. More likely, the cause lies in both economics and a failure of civic leadership to address Richmond’s burgeoning crime rate and rapidly declining infrastructure. McDonald Avenue, for example, that one-time image of Americana embodied in American Graffiti, became an absolute, decaying roadway to nowhere before the civic leadership seemed to wake up.

Regardless of the reasons for Richmond’s decline, there can be little doubt that many of the students at Richmond High School are products of the current culture of violence, poverty, drugs, decay, and a nation-wide attitude that drives individuals to seek the immediate gratification of their own desires.

Given such an environment, it was probably inevitable that violence would eventually reach the ground of the high school. In fact, at least one of the active participants in the gang rape apparently wasn’t a student and shouldn’t have been at the homecoming dance to begin with.

Don’t get me wrong. Most of the school’s students are undoubtedly decent individuals doing their best to make it in a cruel environment. Moreover, the high school wasn’t exactly pristine when I attended it. There were fights, usually between individual boys over a girl, and other students would gather and watch, cheering on one or the other of the gangly teens.

But there were no rapes on campus, gang or otherwise. Those were different times. In retrospect, so innocent. Sadly, once upon a time will never come again.

Post-Murder Syndrome (PMS)

Another child murdered. Another family in turmoil. Another mother in pain so excruciating that she collapsed on television. This mother now joins other mothers forever deprived of the pleasure and joy of loving a child and watching it achieve in life and in school, attending proms, graduating, heading for college, and eventually having its own family.

What monster could perpetrate such a crime? What kind of twisted personality could snatch a child walking from the school bus to home in virtual plain sight of the child’s friends? Who in God’s name could murder an innocent young human being and toss it’s body on a garbage dump as if it were a piece of trash?

This is what happened to Somer Thompson and her family in Florida. One day, they were happy and loving, the next day, they were thrown into absolute chaos, forever touched by a vicious murder, lives forever dark and brooding. This family and this mother will never “move on” They will live their lives forever in the grip of depression and a Post Murder Syndrome (PMS), which seems to be a peculiarly American disease.

As much as it tends to trivialize and remove the human element from despicable acts, the statistics of child abuse and murder stagger the imagination. Every year in America, about 3,000,000 incidents of child abuse are reported to various government agencies. Sure, not all of these turn out to be legitimate cases of child abuse, but if even ten percent are valid, 300,000 children are the objects of some sort of abuse. That is staggering and it suggests a society that hasn’t come to grips with its acceptance of cruelty against children.

The numbers on homicides are also mind boggling. From the time that statistics on murder began to be reported to the federal government in the early 1900’s until the present time, more Americans have been murdered in this country than have been killed in all of the wars America has engaged in since the birth of the nation. If you doubt this statistic, do as I did. Visit your local library and take a look at a publication called The Statistical Abstract of the United States. Tabulate the number of murders per year, beginning with the first year on record, 1900. My own tabulation covered the years 1900 through 2000, and the total number of murders was just short of 2,000,000. That’s almost two million dead people in a span of 100 years, an average of about 20,000 murders a year. Of course, the number per year will vary. In some years the figure may be less than 20,000 and more in others. But the total number of almost 2,000,000 is still there.

The number of Americans who died in America’s wars, roughly 1,000,000 (I’m working from memory here), pales in comparison to the number of murders. But at least we can understand and accept death as a result of military conflicts. We cannot understand and we ought not to accept senseless murder and child abuse.

What in God’s name can we do to prevent the violence against innocent beings in our society? At the moment, solutions seem elusive. When a murder is sensationalized in the media, we get on a roll and the air and cable waves are loaded with talking heads and experts of all sorts who raise our righteousness to a new level the way a balloon with a (rumored) six year old boy in it rises and soars across the Colorado prairie. Then, as soon as the current murder or sensational event loses its immediate emotional impact and hence its revenue potential, those same media twerps file the story in the bin of yesterday’s news. Remember Elian Gonzales?

Concurrent with the loss of media interest, our righteousness subsides and the victim loses its identity, relegated to the obscure and forgotten pages of The Statistical Abstract of the United States. Unfortunately, there are no solutions in this obscure government publication.

As individuals, we may be powerless to effect change, but as a society, we ought to be ashamed.  Shame, however, is un-American. Murder is the price we pay for freedom.

Writer’s Block

I’ve encountered a writer’s block of unparalleled density. I’ve been chipping at it in my mind for about a month without a great deal of effect. A friend of mine once observed, “We can saw off the leg of an elephant with the wings of butterflies if we saw long enough.” I might add that other variables come into play, such as the cooperation of the elephant, but my friend wasn’t speaking literally. He was talking about persistence. We can do just about anything within reason if we stick to it.

That’s what I am doing at this instant, trying my doggoned best to initiate some persistence by writing a few random thoughts. For instance, I have this feeling that the so-called Balloon Boy hoax is a hoax all right, but it isn’t a hoax perpetrated by the Heene family. Rather a mainstream media that lives on sensationalism combined with a sheriff who seems rather oddly discordant to me equals a hoax in my mind. These feelings are difficult to explain, and I may be wrong entirely but that remains to be seen.

Cougar is another code word that seems to have captured the media’s attention. I am not certain that the average American cares whether older women pursue younger men or not. Of course a few hidebound old relics of the 20^th Century may be stuck in the mores of a distant age when sex for men was okay but unacceptable when women wandered into male territory. I’ve often wondered where these licentious old men got their sex, considering that women were condemned to hell for merely thinking about it. The current interest in women as the aggressors seems to have had its origins among the media when ABC aired a new show called “Cougar Town” starring Courtney Cox as a 40-plus divorcee with a penchant for wrinkle free studs. Courtney is actually 40-plusherself and let me tell you, she has a body like a 25-year old woman in the prime of sexual attractiveness. I think ABC has a hit, although I don’t particularly care for the show. I just watch it in the interests of journalistic curiosity.

The preceding is about all I can think of at the moment. I’m probably entering a change of life. I’m in the midst of a couple of cataract operations, and if nothing goes wrong, I will leave the world of the partially blind and enter the arena of the seeing. I am thinking that Courteney Cox will look even better in a couple of weeks.