Tuesday, May 14, 2019

May 14, 2019 Ridley's Believe It Or Not Stars and Stripes Forever Day


Ridley’s Believe It Or Not For May 14, 2019 Comey and those involved in the failed attempt at the FBI to take down a sitting president should be sweating blood as Barr has named a District Attorney in Connecticut Durham to investigate the origin of the Russian counter intelligence probe who in stealth mode has already been investigating; another Blue, Montana Governor Bullock, has thrown his hat into the crowded field of 22 candidates pursuing the Quixote dream of becoming president with many of them like the illegal alien supporter queen Kamala Harris promising full medical care to illegals (what this leftist ideologue fails to grasp is the reality that Medicare for all including illegals means Medicare for none, including the millions of seniors who have paid into the system); Rashida Tlaib continues to disgrace the House with here anti-Semite remarks with the idiotic claim that her Palestinian ancestors provided a haven for Jews fleeing from the Holocaust (this anti-Semite on late night TV was claiming that anyone who slams her anti-Semite claims is a racist idiot and should be talked down to like 4th graders); AOC and Sanders fresh off their idea to cap credit card rates and thereby closing ability of high risk borrowers to obtain credit and increase bank’s risk have come up with the “brilliant” idea of allowing the Post Office to offer banking services such  as loans and savings accounts when the Postal Service continues to lose billions and is devoid of expertise in that field; disgraced pervert Anthony Weiner will soon leave a halfway house and register as a sex offender; Megan Rapinoe a star on the U.S. Women’s Soccer Team is being slammed for her taking a knee as the team begins its defense of its World Cup Championship; on the political correctness front the Texas Senate is moving forward with a bill banning discrimination by businesses like Chick-Fil-A based on its religious beliefs (hopefully the Texas House will come to its senses and pass the bill also); on the academic political correctness front spoiled students at Harvard have forced the university to not renew a house dean position of a Harvard professor whose has joined the Harvey Weinstein defense team because students felt threatened (what a total crock making a mockery of the proposition of innocent until proven guilty and the 5th Amendment right to a fair trial; replaying the past when Coca-Cola contained cocaine, a heir to the Coca-Cola fortune was arrested when a search of his private jet in St. Kitts uncovered 5,000 marijuana plants and $1.3 million of cannabis on board;  44 states and Puerto Rico have filed and anti-trust suit against generic drug manufacturers alleging price fixing and collusion; through May 12, 2019 775 people  have been shot in Chicago of whom 151 have died (what makes the Smollett case so frustrating is that it forced the city of Chicago to allocate scarce detective resources when in only 9% of the shootings resulting in murder have a suspect being charged this year).
1. Dance Like a Chicken Day—dedicated to the “Chicken Song” written by accordion player Werner Thomas from Davos, Switzerland in 1955.
      2. Stars and Stripes Forever Day—celebrating the first public performance of John Phillip Souza’s most famous march “The Stars and Stripes Forever” on this day in 1897 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on the occasion of the unveiling of a statue of George Washington.
3. 2009 Number One Song—the number one song on this day in 2009 on a run of 12 weeks in that position was “Boom Boom Pow” by the Black Eyed Peas. Here is a recording of the song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4m48GqaOz90   
4. Word of the Day—today’s word of the day as we move from words beginning with “o” to words beginning with “p” is “parvanimity” which means smallness of mind which unfortunately describes many of our politicians to a tee.
5. Dream Lover—celebrating the birth on this day in 1936 of noted singer and songwriter Walden Robert Cassotto better known to his fans as Bobby Darin having taken the last name by looking at the neon sign for a Mandarin Chinese food restaurant where the “man” was not working. He was a sickly children and fought several bouts with rheumatic fever overhearing a doctor’s prediction that he would not live past 16 which spurred him to a short meteoric career which ended on December 20, 1973 after having open heart surgery to repair a rheumatic fever damaged heart valve from which he never regained consciousness.  
    As always, I hope you enjoy today’s holidays and observances, a music link to Black Eyed Peas, factoids  of interest for this day in history, the fact that you are not cursed with parvanimity, and a relevant quote from Chief Justice William Rehnquist on DUI, secure in the knowledge that if you want to find a gift for any memorable events like college graduations, birthdays, weddings, or anniversaries, you know that the Alaskanpoet can provide you with a unique customized poem at a great price tailored to the event and the recipient. You need only contact me for details.
    On this day in:                                        
a. 1878 the last witchcraft trial in the U.S. began in Salem, Massachusetts after being filed by Lucretia Brown against Charles Spofford, only to be dismissed by the judge in favor of the defendant.
b. 1913 the Rockefeller Foundation was issued a charter by New York and commenced operations with a $100 million donation by John D. Rockefeller (the equivalent of $2,581,292,929 in today’s dollars.
c. 1961 the Freedom Riders Bus was firebombed near Anniston, Alabama and the riders attacked by an angry mob of whites.
d. 1973 Skylab, America’s first space station was successfully launched into orbit. 
e. 1988 near Carrolton, Kentucky Larry Mahoney with a BAT of .24% two hours after the crash drove this truck into a bus used by a church group, killing 27 people aboard it. He was convicted of manslaughter and served 10 years 11 months and in a silver lining the crash led to the formation of MADD and increased sentences for DUI. 
Reflections on dui from Chief Justice William Rehnquist in 1990: "No one can seriously dispute the magnitude of the problem...drunken drivers cause an annual death toll of over 25,000." --from the Supreme Court decision allowing sobriety checkpoints.
Please enjoy the poems on events of interest on my twitter account below (if you like them, retweet and follow me) and follow my blogs. Always good, incisive and entertaining poems on my blogs—click on the links below. Go to www.alaskanpoet.blogspot.com for Ridley’s Believe It Or Not—This Day in History, poems to inspire, touch, emote, elate and enjoy and poems on breaking news items of importance or go to   www.Alaskanpoethistory.blogspot.com for just This Day in History.
© May 14 , 2019  Michael P. Ridley aka the Alaskanpoet

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