A time to kill.

Down in the wooded coastal plain of Lavaca County, TX, we're pretty proud of the Spoetzl Brewery that's been making Shiner beer for over 100 years. Also, there's a kind of old school wisdom that supports an interesting point in Texas law:

(a) A person is justified in using deadly force against another: (1) if the actor would be justified in using force against the other under Section 9.31; and (2) when and to the degree the actor reasonably believes the deadly force is immediately necessary: (A) to protect the actor against the other's use or attempted use of unlawful deadly force; or (B) to prevent the other's imminent commission of aggravated kidnapping, murder, sexual assault, aggravated sexual assault, robbery, or aggravated robbery.

Texas Penal Code Section 9.32

I've always wondered if I would see such a case. Dad walks in, finds another man molesting his daughter, and kills that man. The especially compelling part about this new case in Shiner, TX is that the alleged molester (now deceased) was with a 4 year old girl, and that the father used his bare hands to kill the man.

They'll trot it before the grand jury to get the dad acquitted, but it looks like everyone is willing to sign off on it, due to the above Penal Code reading.

If it happened the way that it is alleged, I'm fine with it, too, in my heart. But you know, the story reads that the father "stopped him by striking him in the head several times." How many strikes to the head were rendered after the effective cessation of the aggravated sexual assault?

I think back to the 2009 case of OKC pharmacist Jerome Ersland, who shot and killed a robber that he had just incapacitated, and was convicted of murder. There was even video of the whole stick-up.  But this was a little girl being raped, and this is Texas, and there's no video of the father's final swings, so I guess it's his story to tell.

I sincerely hope that, if it all went as he says, it all works out for the father and his daughter.

Nice take on TSA screenings

Those Chinese news animators sure hit a home run on occasion, don't they?

Motivation for a drama queen.

A lot of things have been attributed to the late Kurt Vonnegut, some of which the crusty old writer disavowed. But Derek Sivers says he saw Vonnegut describe this phenomenon himself, in a lecture, about why people demand drama. Good, quick read, with graphs!

Do you still get to use $0.29 stamps?

32 year-old friend Claire writes a letter to her 17 year-old self.

Man oh man, why didn't I ever get any of those letters from my current me, back then?

I don't surf Craig's List much...

...and if I did, I wouldn't put any time into the "Casual Encounters" section.

But since I've had this post brought to my attention, I have to ask:

Wouldn't that be a little off-topic? Nothing about it sounds casual. It sounds quite formal, I should say.
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(Yes, I note that the linked posting is not hosted by Craig's List. I suppose that it's possible that someone else just decided to host it, since it likely would have been deleted by now. In fact, don't we all pray, and fervently so, that this is a hoax?)

Gunship Diplomacy

Friend Tamara brings up a good point: If we're gonna be called an imperialistic hegemony, and people are going to treat us like one, then why can't we act like one, once in a while?

Tamara also brings to mind a scene that was best portrayed in one of my all-time favorite movies, The Wind And The Lion.

There are two superb scenes in that altogether great movie.

The first is in the opening scene, where Sir Joshua Smith is taking high tea with the American Mrs. Eden Perdicaris in her Morocco courtyard. Disturbing their tea, a group of armed Berbers sweeps in on horseback to kidnap Mrs. Perdicaris and her brood. The British man, like all good gentlemen abroad, is heeled. He draws his Webley, stands, and begins firing with some effect, unhorsing at least two Berber attackers before his revolver goes click on an empty chamber as another attacker bears down on him. Sir Joshua Smith looks at his revolver with great disdain and says "Dahmn!" before he is cut down.

I was about 14 when I first saw that movie and that scene, and ever since then, I've wanted a Mark I or early Mark II Webley .455 revolver.*

The second great scene of the movie is when, irritated that a foreign "dignitary" (for such Raisuli, the leader of the pirates, claimed to be) should take an American captive, and not unaware of the international (as well as political) repercussions of his actions, Theordore Roosevelt decides to send in the South Atlantic Squadron (later known as the South Atlantic Fleet). When negations for the Perdicarises fails to bring their release, a company of Marines, supplemented by sailors, come ashore in Tangier and march at double time to the palace**, where they take the Pasha captive, right smartly. The guard force that too late attempts to defend the palace is dispatched with alacrity.

It's beautiful.

The movie is loosely based on a historical incident. Some have made hay over the fact that diplomacy won the day, and that no shots were fired in the taking of the port of Tangier in the actual 1904 incident. So? When a fleet of SEVEN battleships and several companies of Marines comes knocking at your door, and you submit, you have effectively been subdued by military force (the threat thereof.).

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* Roberta knows what I'm talking about.
** You really ought to watch that clip, if you've got a minute. Part 1 to that is HERE.