Visiting Column #46 -- Separation Anxiety

I was in my car today when I heard that the House and Senate had each proposed its own version of a form of legislation to address police operations.  The intent of each was supposed to be to prevent the kind of actions by individual policemen that lead to the death of perpetrators during arrests.

I wanted to vomit, though, when I heard that the Democrat-controlled House had decided to name its version the "George Floyd Act", or some title that was named after George Floyd.

And that's when I couldn't get home fast enough to type this piece.

You see, the whole Minneapolis incident -- and I'm specifically talking about the topic of the cop keeping his knee on Floyd's neck until he died -- should be about the now-former cop, Derek Chauvin, and what he did, and not at all about Floyd.

Not to speak ill of the dead, but Floyd was a piece of crap.  Now, I'm going to keep mentioning in this piece that what happened to him was wrong on so many levels, and that Chauvin should be punished to the full extent of Minnesota law, so no one tries to contend that I think Floyd deserved to die.

But this was a man who went to jail multiple times for some seriously bad things he did, the topper being a home invasion where he held a pregnant woman at gunpoint, pointing the gun at her unborn baby.  What's amazing is that he only got five years in prison for that one, given that it was far from his first conviction, far from his first incarceration, and that he had shown no real evidence of straightening out -- for sure, if he was on two illegal drugs and passing counterfeit bills when he was arrested.

In a better world, we would look at the incident and spend far more time condemning Chauvin than trying to canonize Floyd -- this is all about what Chauvin did, and not about whom he did it to.  It should be a discussion about how to stop future unwarranted killings by cops (note the word "unwarranted").

The left, however, is fundamentally unwilling to look at the individual, unless it is the victim (or the person they claim to have been victimized, even if they happily have to create more victim classes to use the term).  They insist on making a group look guilty (vice an individual), so that they prevent us from pointing out bad apples.  In this case, a cop killed an arrested suspect, via choke-hold.  Therefore, according to leftist mythology, all cops must be bad.

Watch how many times the word "systemic" shows up in the left's narratives.  It is vital for them to make it sound like a whole class of people is evil, which renders the remainder as victims, who need more government, led by -- guess who -- the left.

What we need to do is a lot of separation.

For example, we need to separate the late George Floyd and what happened to him, from Derek Chauvin and what he did to him.  The attempt by the left to deify Floyd is because they need to try to create a victimized class by crying "systemic racism."  Floyd's name should be nowhere near a congressional act.

Next -- we need to separate what Chauvin did from why he may have done it.  Think about it -- 100% of the stories out there portray this as a racially-motivated killing.  But has anyone even explored whether it might be something else?  Do we even have a clue that Chauvin was virulently racist, or any kind of racist?  That seems to be assumed, but is it true?  We know he worked with Floyd and knew him; has anyone even considered the fact that maybe they just couldn't stand each other and it nothing to do with race?  Floyd wasn't a great guy, we know.

Next -- we need to separate fact from fiction.  The fiction I refer to is that cops are killing unarmed black suspects all over the place and it's getting worse.  The fact, as the FBI crime statistics tell us, is that such situations -- unarmed black suspects killed by white cops -- has dwindled in recent years down to next to nothing, precisely because of preventive measures and training.  To say otherwise is heresy, but those are the facts, and for Congress to try to address bad police actions based on a problem that is almost gone is just foolish.

Note -- This is just an interruption to point out that what Chauvin did was wrong and he needs to be punished, in case you missed my saying that before.

Next -- we need to separate the actions of Chauvin from those of his team that day, which, by the way, had three other people, one of whom was black and another Asian.  Did the black cop allow it to happen because he was -- what, a racist?  One of the other three was in his first week of service.  Does anyone expect he would have corrected the much-more senior Chauvin?

Next -- we need to separate the legitimate protestors from the vandals and looters.  Someone needs to tell CNN's Chris Cuomo this, after they put clothing on him, but the Constitutional right to assemble literally qualifies that right as needing to be "peaceful."  And he still has a job.  The looters, for their actions, are simply bearing out the stereotype of minorities rioting to get those flat-screen TVs for free.  Nothing is destroying the effectiveness of those legitimately concerned and protesting peacefully than the fact that they have allowed the criminals to take the spotlight.

When we keep "separating", if we have an open mind, we realize that all the attempts to group people are flawed beyond belief.  They cry "No justice, no peace", but "justice" in the USA properly consists of a day in court for Chauvin, and his having to face a judge or jury to determine punishment if he pleads or is found guilty.  That is the justice for Floyd as well.  There will be justice, friends.

I would be really happy if, before Congress votes on a police reform bill, the victim of Floyd's home invasion would testify as to what happened to her, and perhaps urge Congress to rethink what name shows up on the final Act.

Maybe it should be hers.

Copyright 2020 by Robert Sutton
Like what you read here?  There are over 1,000 posts from Bob at www.uberthoughtsUSA.com, and after four years of writing a new one daily, he still posts thoughts once in a while as "visiting columns", no longer the "prolific essayist" he was through 2018, but still around.  Appearance, advertising, sponsorship and interview inquiries cheerfully welcomed at bsutton@alum.mit.edu or on Twitter at @rmosutton

Visiting Column #45 -- Wait a Minute, I Actually KNOW That Guy!

OK, there's a lot of stuff going on in the world, which makes it the perfect time to write about something that is totally irrelevant and will in no way make the world better, unless reading it distracts someone from doing something unproductive.

My wife had some family up north back 20 or 30 years ago, and she and I and the boys were visiting them then, when we decided to take the kids on a side trip and head further up, to New York to see a show on Broadway.  The show was "Oklahoma", one of what I assume to have been several revivals over the years of the ancient Rogers and Hammerstein classic.

At some point early on, a male character appeared on stage -- forgive me, I have long forgotten most of the plot, but this was a friend of the main male character, if I recall correctly.  The actor was a tallish blond fellow who looked really familiar ... really familiar ...

I leaned over to my wife and whispered, "I know that guy!"  As it turned out, I was right.  I hadn't seen him in maybe 20 or 25 years, and barely knew him then, but sure enough, there in the program was his name.

Now, as you know, I am an MIT graduate, and trust me, MIT does not have a theater department, although there is a lot of theatrical extracurricular activity, at least back in my undergraduate days.  The idea of someone who was a student there, a year behind me, having a career in show business is a pretty wild one.  The odds that I would happen to show up from far out of state and actually see him on stage and recognize him are pretty long.

Now, in case you're wondering, no, I didn't wait outside the stage door, or whatever they have there, to see him after the show.  To be honest, although we were both in a production of "Camelot" in 1972, I didn't know him that well and frankly, I kind of hated "Camelot."  I didn't even have any good or bad feelings about the guy himself; I just knew him and he seemed perfectly nice in our minimal interactions.

The funny thing is that while he was pretty good in "Camelot", he was not someone who got your attention with his talent, the way some people do.  He was perfectly fine, but not in an attention-grabbing way.  I hate to say that occurred to me as soon as I realized it was he up on stage there on Broadway, but it did, kind of like "Good for him, but how'd he get there?".

I believe he is a home contractor in South Carolina these days, in case you are wondering, and his IMDB listing suggests that he also had parts in a couple movies or TV shows.  I'd reach out, except that (A) I have nothing to reach out for, and (B) I imagine he doesn't have any memory of knowing me, either.

You would think that kind of occurrence would be a once-in-a-lifetime sort of thing, but not in my lifetime.  By God, if you're going to knock Lucille Ball over on national TV and do the national anthem at a baseball game in front of 40,000 people and have to lip sync to a recording of four people, well, you're going to have some things occur twice.

Sure enough, not long afterward, my missus and I were watching an episode of the original Murphy Brown show with Candice Bergen (back when it was reliably funny).  There was a scene in which she was in a line in a store for some reason, and cut in front of a little fellow with glasses, who took exception to her self-importance.  The fellow had a high, thin voice, and seemed kind of familiar, and ...

I leaned over to my wife once again and whispered, "I know that guy!".

Well, I thought I did, anyway.  The person I thought it was in this case was not an actor, to my knowledge, so I thought I was likely mistaken.  And in this case it was someone we both would have known, her less so than I.  The fellow was named Bob Ryan, and he had been in a chorus with the two of us that was a sort of two-county high school all-star chorus back in the 1960s.  Bob was in a different school, but we were in the same voice-part section and hit it off pretty well.  Same stupid sense of humor, I guess.

Of course, I couldn't wait for them to roll the credits, and sure enough, that was he.  In that case, as opposed to the Broadway fellow, I did indeed reach out to him, and discovered that he had moved out to LA a few decades earlier to pursue acting, despite his degree from Dartmouth.  He was working as a law librarian and had been a writer for the Fox NFL pregame show, but without much other acting credit.

Bob passed away a few years ago.  Indeed, I did "actually know that guy."

It's sort of the opposite of the social game where people our age compare notes on famous people they have met in their lives.  These two were far-less-famous people seen in very public settings that we didn't expect to have seen them in.

Perhaps we all have had that sort of experience, or maybe few of us have.  Just thought I'd share mine.  Have a nice day. 

Copyright 2020 by Robert Sutton
Like what you read here?  There are over 1,000 posts from Bob at www.uberthoughtsUSA.com, and after four years of writing a new one daily, he still posts thoughts once in a while as "visiting columns", no longer the "prolific essayist" he was through 2018, but still around.  Appearance, advertising, sponsorship and interview inquiries cheerfully welcomed at bsutton@alum.mit.edu or on Twitter at @rmosutton