I usually begin my post with a welcome to all of the out of town visitors to the City of Albany. I don’t think that is an appropriate thing to do.
Firstly, I am deeply sorry for the family of George Floyd for the atrocity that occurred in the City of Minneapolis the other day. For obvious reasons I can’t mention the name of the cop directly involved or the other of his coward cohorts, but when they convict all of them, and they will of murder, I hope the powers that be make them serve their sentences in the general population of the nastiest federal penitentiary they can find.
According to the Constitution of The United States we as American’s are entitled to peacefully gather and protest without repercussions from any persecution. It does not however give the people the right to throw bricks through the windows of a business, enter and loot that business of anything of value that isn’t nailed down. Nor does it give the right to throw objects at police officers and set their cruisers on fire. That, my friends is exactly what has been happening the last couple of nights in Albany. One thing I can’t wrap my hands around is that there were a number of businesses that were vandalized and looted that were black or brown owned. This isn’t protesting, this is criminal behavior. I’ll bet if you were to arrest ten looters and put them into a room together eight out of ten of them couldn’t pick Mr. Floyd out of a photo array.
And it appears that the media has forgotten all about Covid-19. Right now it’s all hands on deck with the riot stories. They’re sending their best anchors out to see who can choke on the most tear gas. And everyone wants to rip Albany’s Chief of Police Eric Hawkins for not being in town when all this was going down. Apparently, he was out of town on a pre-arranged engagement, and he returned to Albany as soon as he could. Where was he? That’s nobody’s business but his; and doesn’t anyone believe he got here as quickly as he could? I’m never been a fan of Mayor Sheehan, but she has done an admirable job in the face of incredible circumstances. Anybody out there want to send your employees out to have rocks and bottles thrown at them and have their cars set on fire. I didn’t think so.
Readers that are Millennial’s might not know what movie I am talking about, but some may as it is a classic. I am talking about Animal House, the 70’s iconic movie about a fictitious college set in 60’s America. At the end of the movie, they ran a scroll of what ended up happening to the main characters after college. There was this character by the name of Doug Neidermeyer. I had to Google search the movie to get the spelling of his name right, and in the process I came across a description of his character as being a abusive, narcissistic, sociopathic, bullying conspirator. The credits said that he was shot by his own troops in Vietnam. Remind you of anyone? If that doesn’t fit a description of our commander in chief, I don’t know what does. Not only has he made a complete mess of the governments handling of the Covid-19 crisis, he’s treating the racial unrest happening in the country as a campaign event. Who in their right mind would threaten to send troops into American cities. Last night after that babbling of propaganda in the Rose Garden of the White House, he grabs a Bible and marches off like Alexander the Great to St. John’s Church, where it takes the police, and police on horseback using rubber bullets and teargas to clear a way for him just for a photo op. That is clearly not how the leader of the free world is supposed to behave. He watches cable news all day, doesn’t attend briefings, and refuses to listen to his advisors including his entire cabinet. I think I read somewhere today that he has ordered the 2020 class of West Point cadets to report back to campus for graduation ceremonies later on this month so he can spew a commencement speech full of his MAGA rhetoric. Too bad the cadets don’t have the option of ignoring the order. November can’t come soon enough.