There have been a few notable things in the news lately and of course, I have opinions. I read national news daily through my Google home page and the local news through the Toledo Blade’s website.
Fatal Fall in Texas
Yesterday in the second inning of the game between the Oakland As and Texas Rangers at Texas. Josh Hamilton threw a foul ball up to a father and his young son in the front row. The father reached over the get the ball and lost his balance, falling over the rail, 20 feet down behind a scoreboard.
The 39-year-old man died while paramedics did everything they could to save him. His 6-year old son was in the front seat of the ambulance.
I watched the footage, a few times. So sad. So shocking.
There is talk of changes needing to be made. But what kind of changes?
Players won’t be allowed to throw balls in the stands anymore? I’m sure an understandably distraught Josh Hamilton, who didn’t throw balls into the stands often, won’t be doing it again anytime soon. I suppose hitters will be fined if they hit a home run too.
Raising the already waist-high railings would change the game, put balls back in play that would have been home runs or fouled out of play. That could actually make it dangerous for players, having more opportunity for those leaping catches.
The Rangers have started a fund for the family. My thought would be first to make sure there is counseling available for the son, who witnessed his father’s deadly fall. The first empathetic pain I felt was for “Dad’s catching me a ball…” He’s going to need someone to talk to who can help him understand, and not feel responsible.
After seeing the video, it was an accident, a horrible accident. My skin will crawl if there’s a lawsuit, especially when the Rangers are already taking steps to help the family.
Today, for a while, please keep that little boy, Josh Hamilton, the Rangers organization and soul of that loving dad, in your thoughts and prayers.
Jobs Figures
The job figures are dropping again. That’s bad news, especially personally as I’m hoping to be back in the market in the next year!
Washington Politicos, this isn’t a Republic back scratchers and Democrat back scratchers thing. It’s an US thing. It makes me dizzy how many times a way to get jobs back runs around in my head as I try to articulate one more time to the customer service rep in India what’s wrong with my Japanese made electronics or my Mexican built car. If the item is assembled in another country and the customer service is in another country, then part of the product is foreign and subject to the percentage of it that is in import tax. If the jobs don’t come back, companies that deny the American workforce a livelihood will at least be paying for the extended unemployment or welfare necessary to keep Americans alive.
Henry Ford had the right idea when he planned to pay and price his people and products so that his employees, all of them, could afford to drive a Ford. Now it’s all some CEO’s third wife wants a fourth house. So you raise the prices and cut the staff, but expect the same output. That’s not America. That’s a two-class society with a lower class sweat shop.
Caylee’s Law
I am among the many people who was shocked to find that there are not laws that require a parent or guardian to report a missing or dead child in a set minimum time. A child doesn’t have to be missing long at all to report it to police, but it never occurred to me that there wasn’t a maximum. That Caylee Anthony was missing for a MONTH before it was reported and the defense could even think of using a weak story of, “Oh, it wasn’t like that at all, she died in a pool a month ago,” was just appauling.
Just like it takes a deadly accident to get a traffic light at a dangerous intersection, it takes a suspiciously dead toddler to wake up lawmakers to needed legislation.
From the parts of the trial I watched, what angered me most was the right not to testify as a defendant. Testifying doesn’t incriminate you. It may confirm that your deeds incriminated you, but the deeds are already done. If I’d been on that jury, I’d likely have voted the same way they did. There just wasn’t enough hard evidence for the stronger charges. I suspect, Casey Anthony testifying would have supplied either total reasonable doubt or unquestionably reasonable undoubt.
This was a huge trail that left a lot of people feeling “dirty” about our judicial system. We do have the ability to make right some wrongs in our laws. I’m sure no one ever imagined that it was necessary, I sure didn’t, but there are sick people in this world who would not bother reporting their child missing. It should be a law that if broken, makes your children wards of the court and gives them a better future than a parent or parents that care that little.
It’s not a law to be made because this injustice happened. The injustice happened because the law wasn’t made.
Commercial Break…
Okay, commercial commentary break. Not that I’m a huge fan of Miller anyway, but what’s with the un-delivery guy, the one who steals bad beer from events that are to classy for bad beer, insulting our troops? Iraq is NOT pronounced /EYE-rack/ I would think, I’d hope, that our defenders fighting in a war there have at least heard the name of the country they’re in enough to have heard it pronounced /EE-rock/. Anyway, EE-rock is the closest American English pronunciation to the proper Arabic. EYE-rack is the closest to American Redneck, and not the “LOL Redneck” ala Jeff Foxworthy.
I’m just saying, for the probable paycheck a regular commercial image makes, it’s no wonder the rest of the world thinks were rich, stupid and arrogant.
Toledo Weather:
Boy it was hot today!
In Sports…
Red Sox and Tigers both won their games in the daily “bonus cat treats” qualifier games. With the Reds up 2 by going into the bottom of the ninth, Carla came up on the table and cried her plaintive meow in concern when she realized that Francisco Cordero was on the mound. I tell the TV over and over that anything less than a 4-run lead is not safe to have Cordero pitching.
After walking the leadoff batter, he got usual Reds-killer, Ricky Weeks out. There was hope. Then a wild pitch puts the runner in scoring position, followed by a triple. The second out came on an incredible play by Ryan Hannigan, blocking the plate and taking a hit as the runner from third tried to go through him.
Then there was another walk, then a soft hit. Bases loaded. Mark Kotsay at the plate. All it took was a single with two runners in scoring position to render Hannigan’s heroics non-existent and two of the sweetest baseball kitties running off their frustrated energy on the stairs…and in the kitchen. I need to see what they knocked over.
Cordero is a cat-hater.
That’s the news. Good night and have a better tomorrow!
Marbles4ms Note Cards
