They Shoot Horses Don't They

They Shoot Horses, Don't They? is a 1969 American drama film directed by Sydney Pollack. In his youth, the main character saw a horse break its leg, after which it was shot and put out of its misery.

She was not a horse but 87-year-old Lorraine Bayless collapsed last Tuesday in the dining room of the Glenwood Gardens independent senior living apartments and the staff refused to initiate CPR because it was against policy, so the woman died awaiting EMS. I wonder if we will reach a point when shooting people like Lorraine Bayless to put them out of their misery will be acceptable practice. Apparently the family did not protest and the woman had a DNR order…so all the ingredients were there except the gun.

The major concern of the staffer in question was liability of course. Lawyers out there, this could have been your mother, unless of course you react like her family.

The Good Samaritan approach is not only rarely practiced anymore but it is strongly discouraged, especially if you are a nurse or a doctor, because you can be sure you are facing a malpractice suit if there is death or complication. It is the ZEROES (at the right of 1) that make everybody tick NOT the HEROES. The latter are good for a short news segment then bye bye.

Sadly this is cheapening the value of human life In America, at a time where respect for animal life is at an all time high…so is the actual cost of living (no relation but thought I put it there).

As I mentioned in previous blogs, many things have been contributing to cheapening human life: violent video games where lots of people are blown off like nothing, same in Hollywood movies, drone attacks that make war seem very remote and Starwars-like, mass murders by single nobodies (Fort Hood, Aurora, New Town, etc.) or rudimentary methods (manure, turning our own planes against our own WTC).

Of course there were also natural disasters that contributed to the cheapening and sense of frailty of human life: Thailand tsunami, Japan Tsunami, numerous earthquakes, Katrina, Sandy and others.

Nothing however is as cheapening, disheartening and disconcerting as the latest discovery about drones. In the last of INNOCENT UNTIL PROVEN OTHERWISE, drones can actually target American citizens and execute them just based on the belief that they may be terrorists. Collateral damage is something we blame others for. We are back to the Far West where we shoot first and worry about it later, where we hang horse thieves on the spot. At least then the duals tried to preserve a modicum of fairness and the opponent had skin in the game.

I can picture members of the administration sitting in the  situation room watching it all on a TV monitor, like for the Bin Laden kill…except popcorn and refreshments will be served this time around. It would be Reality TV at its finest and most sinister. Wouldn’t that drone video feed closely mimic those very violent videos that we are all starting to blame for gun violence?

What do 00BAMA, H00LDER  and 007 have in common?

A License to Kill…from the Sky!

No Good Deed Goes Unpunished Laments the Samaritan

Chris Kyle, a retired Navy Seal, whose skill as a sharpshooter made him known as one of the military’s deadliest snipers (150+ kills)  and whose autobiography (American Sniper: The Autobiography of the Most Lethal Sniper in U.S. Military History)  became a best seller, devotes much of his time to helping disturbed and disabled veterans. He created a foundation in Lancaster, Texas to help them overcome post-traumatic stress disorder by providing exercise equipment and counseling.  One such disturbed veteran was Eddie Ray Routh and last Saturday, Chris Kyle and his friend Littlefield planned to take Routh to spend the afternoon at a remote shooting range, one of Kyle’s techniques for helping struggling veterans adjust to civilian life.

Routh’s mother, Jodi Routh, had recently asked for help for her son, a former Marine who spent 15 days in a nearby jail last year after a drunken-driving arrest, and who had a history of mental illness. At the range Routh shut his two companions to death and took off with Kyle's new Ford F-350.

Kyle was being a Good Samaritan helping a stranger, and he paid the price! Is it Karma for all 150 people he killed or is it more likely a reflection of the trickery and deceit in human nature. My personal life is replete with such NON quid-pro-quos (meeting generosity and assistance with evil deeds and deceit). An Arabic proverb says it even better: "Beware the Evil from those you Helped" Routh's move and others are plain evil. What makes somebody hate you so much while you are trying your best to help him/her? Is human nature that vile? Is it the glaring symptom of an unfair and unjust society? When you are giving some change to a panhandler, does that remind him of how much more than him you have, so he hates you for it? We can try to rationalize this till dooms day. It simply is lack of appreciation and gratitude of epidemic proportions between husbands and wives, children and parents, neighbors, employees and bosses, doctors and patients, citizens and their government, people and their God, and so on and so forth. It is in my opinion, the single most important cause for family and society breakdown. 

Jesus was first to be sorely punished by the Romans for his good deeds. Missionaries have been killed all over the globe while ministering to the sick and needy and spreading the Word of God. Surely these good deeds will be rewarded somewhere sometime...maybe not in this life or on this earth. Maybe this all means there must be an AFTERLIFE where all accounts are truly and justly settled.

A Good Deed Is Good Indeed...To Cash In Later