We keep returning to this editorial!

TUESDAY, JULY 23, 2013

It still doesn’t seem to make sense: Thanks to Kevin Drum’s work on the topic, we often wonder if the nation’s improved test scores are in part a reflection of lead abatement.

Lead has been removed from the air. Lead paint has been removed from walls. This improvement in the environment would tend to make children smarter.

On the other hand: When we read the New York Times, we sometimes wonder if some unknown environmental factor is making our ruling elites much dumber. By now, we’ve returned, several times, to this July 15 editorial, “Trayvon Martin’s Legacy.”

It still doesn't seem to make sense.

We’re mainly puzzled by its claims about self-defense laws. But the editorial started like this:
NEW YORK TIMES EDITORIAL (7/15/13): It may not be possible to consider the case of George Zimmerman, who was acquitted Saturday of all charges in the killing of Trayvon Martin, as anything but a sad commentary on the state of race relations and the battle over gun rights in America today.

Certainly it is about race— ask any black man, up to and including President Obama, and he will tell you at least a few stories that sound eerily like what happened that rainy winter night in Sanford, Fla.
We find that odd in several ways. Can any black man, including Obama, tell us “at least a few stories that sound eerily like what happened that rainy winter night in Sanford?”

We’re not sure what that means. A young person was shot and killed on that rainy night, in circumstances that are hard to define. Could Obama really could tell several stories that are eerily like that?

Presumably, these stories wouldn’t have happened to him, since he is still alive. Or did the editors mean something else? For people who act like they care about race so much, they seem to jot off their editorials in ten seconds flat.

Who writes these editorials? We’ve kept returning to this piece because we’ve found this passage so puzzling:
NEW YORK TIMES EDITORIAL: The jury reached its verdict after having been asked to consider Mr. Zimmerman’s actions in light of the now-notorious Stand Your Ground provision in Florida’s self-defense law. Under that law, versions of which are on the books in two dozen states, a person may use deadly force if he or she “reasonably believes” it is necessary to prevent death or great bodily harm—a low bar that the prosecutors in this case fought in vain to overcome.

These laws sound intuitive: who would argue that you may not protect yourself against great harm? But of course, the concept of “reasonable belief” is transformed into something deadly dangerous when firearms are involved. And when the Stand Your Ground laws intersect with lax concealed-carry laws, it works essentially to self-deputize anyone with a Kel-Tec 9 millimeter and a grudge.
We were puzzled by that on the day it appeared. We still can’t figure it out.

Was the jury “asked to consider Zimmerman’s actions in light of the now-notorious Stand Your Ground provision in Florida’s self-defense law?” Sort of! Unless we’re missing something, there was one perfunctory paragraph in the (lengthy) jury instructions explaining that Zimmerman had no duty to retreat from an attack.

On the other hand, the defense never really discussed Zimmerman’s right to “stand his ground” since it claimed he was flat on his back, with Martin atop him, when he used deadly force.

We’re puzzled by that part of the editorial. We are completely confused by the highlighted passage.

It’s true—variants of the so-called Stand Your Ground provision are routinely said to be on the books in roughly two dozen states. But having made that observation, the editors go on to describe a provision which sounds to us like simple self-defense. Is there some state in the union where a citizen can’t “use deadly force if he or she reasonably believes it is necessary to prevent death or great bodily harm?” That sounds to us like a standard precept, not like “a low bar” unique to states like Florida.

The editors says this precept “sounds intuitive.” We think that's true, and that's the problem with the editorial's reasoning. In our view, Stand Your Ground laws do not.

Do the editors know whereof they spoke? The leading authority on self-defense (United States) offers this brief overview:
WIKIPEDIA: In the United States, the defense of self-defense allows a person to use reasonable force in his or her own defense or the defense of others...

While the definitions vary from state to state, the general rule makes an important distinction between the use of non-deadly and deadly force. A person may use non-deadly force to prevent imminent injury; however, a person may not use deadly force unless that person is in reasonable fear of serious injury or death. Some states also include a duty to retreat, when deadly force may only be used if the person is unable to safely retreat.
According to that, it’s generally true that a person can use deadly force if he is in reasonable fear of serious injury or death.

Is there something we’re missing here? We keep going back to this editorial; it just keeps seeming to make no sense. More generally, we’re often puzzled by the flyweight work, and the ethical blindness, found in the New York Times.

Lead abatement may have made children smarter, but what the heck has become of our adults?

Second question: Can a nation whose “intellectual elites” are thus afflicted really expect to survive? We're just asking, since nobody else seems to see anything wrong!

58 comments:

  1. I have long been struck by the weakness of New York Times editorials. They're often unclear, as Bob points out here. They sometimes give an extremely one-sided a presentation of facts. Outright factual errors are common. (As I understand it, the Times' fact-checkers and Public Editor are not allowed to deal with editorials.) Often they have no facts: they say, in effect, what we believe is right because we're the New York Times. And, their logic is sometimes questionable.

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  2. Bob, you're completely correct in your analysis here. Zimmerman's defense had no need for 'stand-your-ground'. He feared serious injury or death from head injury and was unable to retreat (so no need for stand-your-ground exception). No one is required to die at the hands of another. Self-defense has been part of common law for at least one thousand years. What happened that night in Florida is a tragedy. Two people misjudged another's capabilities and intentions of another, one attacked the other physically, and now one is dead. Sad, tragic, avoidable, but not criminal on Zimmerman's part.

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  3. Why did the editorial put "stand your ground" in caps? And then refer to it in the self defense law of Florida? As others have noted, the two are separate laws and there's nothing "notorious" about the stand your ground (lower case) provision of Florida's self defense law.

    Either they are confused or they're trying to confuse the reader. Perhaps both?

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  4. Thank you.

    Every time I read or hear someone spouting off about "Stand Your Ground" it doesn't take long before it becomes obvious they don't know what makes SYG different from self-defense, don't know that it didn't make a difference in the Zimmerman case, don't know what they're talking about in general, and don't have a clue about what they want changed about self-defense law.

    When they offer up clownish ideas for changes they usually focus on who initiated the conflict, not on issues around retreat and location. They become even more confused as they essentially decide to eliminate centuries of basic self-defense law in favor of insane "remedies" that would have changed the responsibilities in the Zimmerman case, even if they also legalized the killing of someone looking at someone else in a perceived wrong way, as they walk in locations both are permitted to be.

    The irony is that anyone who thinks Martin should have been able to beat and kill Zimmerman for doing just that (including Obama who asked whether Trayvon could have stood his ground that night instead of retreating in the 4 minutes he had to do so) are not only arguing IN FAVOR of SYG but also in favor of lowering the bar for a "reasonable fear of imminent injury or death" to an absurd level.

    Insane.

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  5. Things that don't make sense like this are how you know to suspect that an agenda is at work. Here, the agenda is to repeal gun laws favored by NRA, gun lobby and those who support gun ownership. The NY Times, without thinking too much about it, perhaps believes repealing SYG or even self-defense laws will have an impact on gun ownership and support attempts to limit gun ownership. It is debatable whether that would be the impact of changing such laws, but I think that is the motive for using this case to address SYG laws. I think that is why Zimmerman must be portrayed as a trigger-happy copy wannabe instead of as someone who was forced to shoot because his life was in danger. I have heard so many people argue that if Zimmerman hadn't had his gun with him, none of this would have happened. I think that reveals some of the motive behind the irrational response to the facts of this case.

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    1. Yeah it could be that, or it could be the same reason this occurs every other time: laziness and stupidity.

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  6. Earth to meatheads: The trial is over and no longer have to pretend (like the Casey Anthony jury) that if you don't know exactly this that or the other that known killers must go free. You are now free to use your brains.

    What happened in the Zimmerman action, from an only slightly less than absolutist view, comes from Zimmerman's own admissions: he knowingly scared the victim by pursuing him, refused to state to the victim his purpose when he was confronted by a scared 17 year old, and at that moment grabbed toward his weapon, provoking a self-defense response by Martin.

    Zimmerman got away with it because there is a "guns are people too" movement in Florida and other parts of the US right now. I can understand why right wing nutcases who worship guns think as they do, but Bob and the others are just goofy.

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    1. Why was the scared toddler by the T after 4 minutes' time?

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    2. So you believe we must run for our lives instead of asking why someone is threatening us? Stay away from Florida, they prefer that gutless cowards go elsewhere.

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    3. Why was the scared crimebuster still by the T after 4 minutes time? Banging his flashlight (what the fuck was he doing with his flashlight?)when they told him to stop following?

      Serino: Had he been a goon, a bad kid, 2 thumbs up, you know. No, he don’t make, he don’t, he does not fit the profile of what occurred. Which is another, um, unfortunate thing that we got going on here.
      Singleton: Um, I still, I still don’t understand, when he walked up to your car, why didn’t you say anything to him?
      Zimmerman: I guess fear. I didn’t want to confront him. He seemed…
      Singleton: You were afraid of him?
      Zimmerman: Yes, ma’am.


      I think there's one thing we can all agree on. This reckless frightened dumbass has no business being captain or any part of any neighborhood watch.

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    4. "[Zimmerman] at that moment grabbed toward his weapon, provoking a self-defense response by Martin"

      This is "Zimmermans's own admission" in your fantasy world only.

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    5. In his reenactment video, Z says that when M confronted him, Z searched for his cellphone, including down his right side; that was the side his gun was on.

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    6. "Searched for his cellphone," "grabbed toward his weapon, provoking a self-defense response by Martin" (which Martin wouldn't have known existed), whatever, right?

      It's all the same to you.

      That's why you're accurately perceived as scumbag race provocateur.

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    7. You have got to be kidding. If a strange man pursues you in an unmarked vehicle while your walking home alone on a rainy night, gets out of the car to pursue you on foot when he can no longer pursue in his vehicle, never identifies or explains himself, and you come to the conclusion that he is a predator and you're his prey, and when you decide to confront the guy and ask, "You got a problem?" and he starts reaching quickly for something on his person . . . what, you think you're not going to be forced to assume the worst? You think you're just going to wait and let him find whatever he's frantically looking for when you confront him because you "wouldn't have known [his weapon] existed?" Why don't you go back to whatever right-wing sites you normally go to and peddle your one-sided view of the world over there.

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    8. The wealth of assumptions in your statement Mike L would require much unpacking -- but that's already been done in detail a thousand times.

      There is nothing in Zimmerman's known actions that justifies assault, period.

      "come to the conclusion that he is a predator and you're his prey": you don't even know that, but it wouldn't justify assault.

      "never identifies or explains himself": you don't know that, but it doesn't justify assault.

      "reaching quickly": you don't know that either, but it doesn't justify assault.

      "frantically looking": you don't know that, but it sounds good the way you tell it -- "frantically" -- but it doesn't justify assault.

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    9. I never claimed to "know." I admit I don't "know" at least some of those things -- just like you don't "know" that it was Martin who started the altercation. It's not about "knowing" -- it's about what's highly probable. And each of those things I wrote is highly probable given the various facts and the testimony. Some are beyond reasonable doubt -- for example, that Zimmerman never identified or explained himself. If you're going to start doubting something like THAT, you're just being willfully dishonest and you could doubt ANYTHING about this case then. Not only would it be nearly inconceivable that Z would have failed to mention this in the past year and five months if it were true, but "In Zimmerman’s initial interrogation, the police expressed surprise that he hadn’t identified himself to Martin as a neighborhood watch volunteer."

      Regarding what might justify assault, you are using a rhetorical trick. You are taking each fact one by one and saying it, by itself, does not justify physical force. But that's not the question. The question is, when ALL of the circumstances are taken together, in order, CULMINATING in Z reaching for something on his person when verbally confronted by M, would physical force be justified? Also, it depends what use of the word "justify" you're talking about. If you're talking legal justification, I think Martin, had he lived, would have had a good case to make if he thought Zimmerman was reaching for a weapon, given everything else that had occurred immediately prior. If you're talking about some other sense of the word "jusify," well, that's entirely a matter of opinion, and yours is no more objectively "right" than, say, Trayvon Martin's.

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  7. Bob quotes Kevin Drum as linking lead abatement to IQ rise. This article describes a study concluding that adding iodine to salt had a major impact on IQ during the 1920's.

    http://www.businessinsider.com/iodization-effect-on-iq-2013-7

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    1. Gen. Jack D. Ripper, USAFJuly 23, 2013 at 6:24 PM

      What about water fluorination?

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    2. Fluroidation. And it's an attempt to compromise our precious bodily fluids.

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  8. "We find that odd in several ways. Can any black man, including Obama, tell us “at least a few stories that sound eerily like what happened that rainy winter night in Sanford?” "

    Well, you find it odd because you're doggedly insisting that the profiling and the following doesn't matter. It doesn't matter LEGALLY for Zimmerman's self defense claim, but obviously there are two ways to view this story. One can BEGIN the narrative at the altercation (Zimmerman likes this view, for obvious reasons) OR one can BEGIN the narrative at the profiling/following.

    Beginning at the profiling/following is not an illegitimate way to look at it. When the investigator filed his sworn statement recommending manslaughter charges he said "ultimately" Zimmerman could have avoided the encounter altogether had he waited for police or tried to "dialog" with Martin.

    Obama said he has experienced profiling and defensive measures (car doors locking, etc) based on profiling.

    Honestly, this rigid insistence that this thing began at the moment the two physically connected is completely ignoring a whole different view of events. Obama (and many, many others) see the incident as a whole, not as a series of wholly unrelated "irrelevant" acts UNTIL the shooting. You may disagree, but insisting they're wrong to view it this way is just bull-headed. You're looking at this from the perspective of the defense lawyers. I mean, surely you know that's a narrow view?

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    1. How is it profiling if Zimmerman wasn't even sure he was black, as evidence in the 911 call?

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    2. He profiled him as a 17-year old? Just asking?

      BTW, you can profile someone even if they aren't (or you aren't sure) they are black.

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  9. Or one can begin the narrative at the point of the first aggressive action, when Martin approached Zimmerman, hands in pants and glaring, as Zimmerman sat in his car.

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  10. The whole "Zimmerman was reckless for getting out of his truck because it provoked Martin into committing the first illegal, violent act, after all he's only a kid with poor judgment" angle is interesting.

    It's identical to asserting that a woman who occupies the same sidewalk as a man, who "provokes" him with her reckless choice of clothing and location, who is raped, and who shoots her attacker during the rape, is responsible.

    In other words, it's batshit insane, and that's the best thing you can say about those who are trying to sell it.

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    1. ...so you approve of a stranger following a person at night and believe that the person being followed has no right to confront the stranger. Following a stranger is not an act of provocation? Do you believe that following an African-American teenager is a responsibility or duty rather than an act of provocation?

      Interesting.

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    2. The followed person has every right to confront the stranger with questions, comments, anything except threats and physical contact. If he initiates a fight and ends up placing the other person in reasonable fear of injury or death, with no means of safe escape, he has caused his own death in the event the person he attacked shoots him.

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    3. Following a suspiciously-behaving person in a crime ridden neighborhood for the purpose of informing police is not a duty but is an admirable example of taking on responsibilities for the good of one's community.

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    4. gcwall, you make it sound like he was following him around for a good bit of time, just behind him or something. That's not the case. He was only "following" him in the very loose sense of walking in the direction he had seen him go. When talking to the dispatcher, Z says that he no longer has visual contact with Martin. Yes, he was walking in the direction that he'd seen Martin go, but it's not like he was stalking him down, growing ever closer, as people want to paint it.

      It's hard to see how such "following" can be construed as provocation. Will you now back up and say that being looked at by a person in a car is provocation?

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    5. You guys seem incapable of seeing this from the black guy's perspective, but you bend over backwards to see everything from the "white" guy's perspective. When you consider the full set of circumstances, they can EASILY be considered provocation. I posted a version of this previously, but it needs repeating apparently:

      Probably anyone in M's position that night would experience at least two emotions: fear . . . and MORAL OUTRAGE. "What the fuck is this guy's problem?!" is probably pretty close to what most people would be thinking to themselves if this happened to them -- that is, if some strange man (if you're white, imagine it's a black man to make it more analogous) in a "civilian" vehicle, on a dark and rainy night, shined his headlights on you as you walked home alone, then started following behind you in his car as you walked -- until he was no longer able to follow by car, which gives you an opportunity to get away from him by running, and so you take that opportunity and start running. But the man gets out of his car and pursues you ON FOOT -- undeterred by rain and darkness. The man is not in a uniform of any kind and never identifies himself or explains himself, and you have come to the (reasonable) belief that the man is a predator of some sort and you are his prey. Your fear and moral outrage are heightened now, and you are in fight-or-flight mode and fully adrenalized. Most females, and perhaps even most males, would likely be terrified and would want to just get the hell out of there, despite whatever moral outrage they might feel. But imagine you're a tall, athletic, 17-year-old male and confident in your ability to hold your own in a fight, and your sense of moral outrage is at a peak now. Can you not see how you might let that moral outrage trump your fear and decide to "stand your ground"? Would you really be so clearly in the wrong? And so you decide to confront the guy, and you walk up to him and ask him, "You got a problem?" At which point the man starts reaching frantically for something on his person (a cellphone according to Zimmerman's reenactment video, but who knows what he was really reaching for?). You have no idea what he's reaching for, but you can't take the chance that it's a weapon, and so you attack.

      And by the way, just imagine if Martin's understandable belief that Zimmerman was a predator had turned out to be true. I bet if that were YOUR son in such a case, you would feel he had done a morally (if not legally) justifiable thing by kicking the guy's ass.


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    6. This comment has been removed by the author.

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    7. Mike L says:

      You guys seem incapable of seeing this from the black guy's perspective...

      Not really. The non-black guy was the one whom the police had to decide whether or not to arrest. The non-black guy was the one who ended up on trial in criminal court. In a civil action the question is which narrative is the more likely one to be correct. In a criminal trial determining whether a homicide was justifiable according to the law, all versions of the events which would exonerate the defendant must be disproved beyond a reasonable doubt in order for the state to get a conviction.

      (BTW, the prosecutor represents the state in a criminal trial; not the victim, nor the victim's relatives and friends.)

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    8. CMike, none of what you wrote has any bearing on what I said about not seeing this from the other guy's perspective. And the "narrative" I gave is the one that the pro-Zimmerman side claims is true. I merely filled in what was apparently going on with Martin emotionally based on the known facts.

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  11. If an armed individual provokes an unarmed individual by following him he is not standing his ground, he is provoking him to react to being followed. The provocation did not give TM the right to shoot GZ, but it did give him the right to ask, "What are you following me for?" GZ responded with, what are you doing here? TM could have replied with, none of your damn business. Instead, TM may have chosen to kick GZ's butt for following him. None of this would have occurred if an armed GZ chose not to follow TM as the police dispatcher suggested. GZ was responsible for provoking the teenager, that led to the confrontation, because he continued to follow TM after being advised not to do so. The advice by the dispatcher was intended to prevent a potential violent confrontation, but GZ chose to ignore the advice. One reason GZ chose to ignore the dispatcher's advice was because GZ knew he had a gun and wanted to use it. Manslaughter.

    GZ put himself in a situation that may or may not have required him to use deadly force. There is no right to instigate a confrontation and then shoot the other person, because he is losing the fight his actions caused.

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    1. An armed individual is allowed to follow another person, as is an unarmed one. Trayvon Martin caused his own death.

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    2. Just as a young lady has no right to provoke a teen by her choice of clothing and location, as it gives the teen the right to ask her for sex. After all, her mother told her not to exercise poor judgement, advice intended to prevent potential violent confrontation.

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    3. ...not in the neighborhood where I spent part of my youth.

      Of course, victims are responsible for their own deaths, such as a passenger in a plane crash is responsible for his death, because he did not have to fly or a soldier is responsible for his death, because he did not have to go to war.

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    4. gewell,

      If GZ "wanted to use" his gun why did he allow himself to get beat up first? What evidence is there that Zimmerman continued to follow Martin after the non-emergency dispatcher's comment that the police did not need him to do that? A minute later on the tape Zimmerman explicitly says he does not know where Martin is and the fight starts three minutes later, 40 yards from Zimmerman's truck.

      As a member of the public you're allowed to jump to any conclusion you want on any subject, it's a free country and in the matter of a highly publicized controversial case you probably can't get yourself in trouble for slander regardless of what ends up being proven. However, jumping to conclusions is not an option available to members of the jury. As a legal matter in the American system, even after he is charged to stand trial for a crime, the accused gets the benefit of a presumption of innocence by the triers of fact (in the case of a bench trial the trier of fact) in the matter.

      Do you think that's the wrong system to rely upon when the victim of a homicide is black and the accused is not? Do you think in those cases because of slavery or the history of the "black codes" or because of racism in America or your personal experiences that the fairer system would be be to assume a non-black is guilty when suspected of the unjustifiable homicide of a black person and that the accused should then be required to prove their innocence beyond a reasonable doubt to avoid being convicted guilty of it? I mean that sure sounds like the position you're taking, in this case anyway.

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  12. The provocation did not give TM the right to shoot GZ, but it did give him the right to ask, "What are you following me for?" GZ responded with, what are you doing here?

    Is this true? As I recall Zimmerman said Martin asked him something like, "Do you have a problem?" Zimmerman answered, "No." And, then Trayvon said, "Now you do," and sucker-punched him.

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  13. There are a lot of people I had respect for going off the rails on this. Seems everybody knows what happened or what GZ's or TM's motives were that night.

    The media didn't help any and I can think of only one reason they acted as they did. They were hoping for race riots. Nothing sells soap flakes like live coverage of neighborhoods going up in flames or white truck drivers getting their skull caved in like Reginald Denny.

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    1. "Nothing sells soap flakes like live coverage of neighborhoods going up in flames or white truck drivers getting their skull caved in like Reginald Denny."

      The medias actions in the run-up to the Iraq Clusterfuck are laughing at your naivete.

      Delete
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