I never had the chance to met Mickey Leland. But I did work with folks, when I was a Research Specialist living in 
Both of these men, as the current President elect defined the epitome of leadership, public service, dedication and more so than all else – intellect. They had a passion for life that showed in the manner in which they were committed to assisting and helping others. On April 3, 1994, as Leland, Ron Brown, then Commerce Secretary, along with 34 others also died when their Air Force plane crashed into a Croatian mountainside. He had gone to
I never quite was comfortable with Brown’s death being an accident for a number of reasons. First, in an effort to protect his son from prison, he threatens to expose an Asian fund raising plan operated by the Clinton White House's prior to this trip, which by the way had no Enron reps on board for they took their own aircraft. In addition, out of custom, the White House orders the Air Force to skip the "safety" phase of the investigation and move directly to the "accident" phase. Also strange was that the Croatian responsible for the airport's navigation system was found with a bullet hole in his chest.
No autopsy was performed on Brown after the crash albeit pictures were circulated that appeared to show a head wound that was similar to one that looked like a bullet hole. For it was bazaar that of all the 35 on board, Brown was the only one reported to have had died of "multiple blunt force injuries”. I can’t say that Brown or Leland were assassinated, albeit I think it was some strange stuff going on. Not to mention both of their planes did crash into the sides of mountains: one in
I just want to say folk, watch your back, the Capitol Hill and
57 comments:
Dawg, I thank you for this post. I never met them myself, but, I followed the story and did as much digging as I could at the time, and was never satisfied with the events. My brother and I frequently discuss this over java and ultimately just end up angry and conspiracy-theory-filled to the point of riot. OK, not really, but, this is such an outrage.
"mountainsides" - euphemism for the powers that be, in this case. AmeriKKKa will eventually pay for its sins. Peace.
Sweet-friggin-Jesus. It's disgusting the number of good humans that have died under...shall we say...strange circumstances, and the number of people that keep the 'secrets' isn't it?
Just because your paranoid doesn't mean they AREN"T out to get ya..just saying.
I was disgusted when I first learned about this. How would they explain the bullet hole in his head?
I remember getting an e-mail a while back about all of the suspicious deaths under the Clinton administrations in DC and AR.
I'll say it - Ron Brown was assassinated. Everything pointed to it. Especially the fact that he was going to roll on Clinton to keep his son out of jail. Had he done that, there wouldn't have been a second Clinton term. This was precisely the main reason I feared Hillary being in the number two spot. Once you do something (have it done for you) once, the second time is a breeze.
I'm pretty sure Barack is well versed in the sins of those among him. That in itself lends to his "spread the love" approach to politics. Make them happy enough to keep the knives out of your back.
CIA, NSA, Secret Service(SS), Delta Force, Mafia...SAMETHANG!
I have never believed ron brown died the way they said he did. it's always been suspicious!
Funny that you posted this, when there was also this today.
Why people assume that bigwigs sanctioning murder and assassination only happens in bad noir flicks, I'll never know.
Just because your paranoid doesn't mean they AREN"T out to get ya..just saying.
dusty, that's why I love ya. ;-)
Torrance: What are you into, the Conspiracy of the Month Club?
Is it even surprising anymore to hear of someone suffering an "accidental" death once they've crossed the wrong people? Scary what the-powers-that-be can get away with. And what us, the little people, have let them get away with..
These conspiracy theories fill some strange need in people. What is it?
On one hand they create marketing opportunities for some people. Forty-five years after the fact sales of Kennedy Conspiracy books are still brisk. Dealey Plaza is still a place where assassination conspiracy stuff is sold.
Ground Zero in Manhattan is another site. Though thankfully the lowlifes have disappeared from the neighborhood except on September 11 of every year. But they are enjoying healthy Internet sales.
Ron Brown? Kill Ron Brown and 34 other people? Please. Please.
There's no motive. It's just silly.
On the latest 9/11 memorial day, I was told by one of the conspiracy theorists that John Lennon had been assassinated because the government thought he had gotten too powerful.
Then it all became clear.
I realized that Sam Cooke, Richie Valens, the Big bopper, Patsy Cline, Buddy Holly, Otis Redding, Jim Croce, John Denver, Ricky Nelson, Tupac, Biggy and several more had actually been killed by government assassins opeating on behalf of recording studios.
Man as a black girl from the Houston Metro, Mickey was one of my heroes. My life consisted of Barbara Jordan and George Thomas "Mickey" Leland when I would think of great leaders from around my way, still do. Noticed I didn't qualify that with black.
Folk you know I'm all about conspiracy and when the AG collapsed last night I was like is that a warning from some execs on the K? *lol*
My pastor lost his first wife, who was his ex by then, on that trip as well. Beside the Brown and Leland that plane was filled with a lot of what I saw as America's future at the time.
-OG
We donate every year to Africare! Have a great weekend. :)
that was interesting, I had never heard of this... probably b/c i was in kindergarten in '94
=]
Like the unheard of incident that almost brought down Obama's replacement plane it sounds more than a little suspect to me!
Babe don't listen to these folks talking 'bout conspiracy theorist. Taking mofo's out the game has been standard operating procedure with this govt' from it's inception through to the present. Doesn't matter who is at the helm. Catchy title, I like that. No one blogging can tie a title and accompanying post together the way you can.
NOt only Brown but Vincent Foster. Who is the common denominator? Clinton.
You know someone once told me that they thought John-John (Kennedy jr) was put down because the Clinton's believed he was a threat to them. I also know people who say that 911 was masterminded by the Bush Admin. Maybe they are right. Maybe you are right. But until someone can produce real evidence proving their argument then it's all supposition and conjecture and should be left to books and the movies.
The the other side of that though is that with all the threats against the President-Elect which they say is at an unprecidented level, I do hope that they (secret service) put him a bullet proof, bomb proof glass box for the next 4 or 8 years not just for himself but for those who believe in him.
Sometimes ignorance is bliss--well, at least for the briefest of moments before the brain cells kick back in. Thanks for always keeping our brain cells in motion, Torrance!
wow. thats all I can say
Nothing really surprises me and I don't put anything past most people, especially those in high places who have had a taste of power.
Who did you really write this post for, Torrance? Critical thinking bloggers, old enough to remember the three dozen or more folks, including Ron Brown, who died under strange circumstances during the Clinton Administration?
Yeah, I thought so.
I've been pondering a lot of very strange political events of the past ten days. There's a line in the 23rd Psalm. Barack is at that table. He knows it. You and I know it too. Makes me sad.
this dude... i tell you, i enjoy no slappz' comments because they provide an alternate perspective. as there tends to be mass agreement (or praise) in other comments with most of things rdb has to say (and rightfully so)...
conspiracy theories? it's like if i'm going 30 mph on a 30 mph rode and a cop pulls me over and says i was speeding and issues me a citation. i go to court, contest the ticket, plead my case and the judge still issues me the citation because i can't prove that i was, in fact, driving the speed limit. it's the cops word against mine and guess who has clout over me? of course i expect you to find holes in my argument or scorn my comments. besides, people will always question events that just don't seem to add up.
-the donalg
donalg,
The problem with your argument is this:
First, it's 100% hypothetical.
Second, crimes all have a motive. Then there is the issues of "means" and "opportunity."
Thus, if ONE cop issues a speeding ticket to a motorist who was not speeding, his motive is probably tied to meeting a department quota for ticket writing. Thus, even IF your hypothetical story were true, there is no Conspiracy at work.
On the other hand, I have been stopped and fined by "country" cops for speeding in remote places. But corrupt "speed traps" do not rise to the level of Conspiracy as implied by people who think Ron Brown was murdered by sinister goverment operatives.
Curious:
John-John, a threat to the Clintons? Is this part of a comedy routine?
He was a 38-year-old bon vivant living in a Manhattan loft with his crabby wife. He was also licensed to fly small planes. But his skills were obviously insufficient for him to handle the controls in bad weather with visibility close to zero.
Are the John-John Conspiracy Theorists claiming the government produced the bad weather that caused him to crash at sea?
This is probably the silliest Conspiracy Tale I've ever heard.
Curious, you wrote:
" I also know people who say that 911 was masterminded by the Bush Admin. Maybe they are right. Maybe you are right."
Here's a fact. I'm right. The government had no connection to 9/11.
You wrote:
"But until someone can produce real evidence proving their argument then it's all supposition and conjecture and should be left to books and the movies."
The mountain of evidence that 19 muslim hijackers committed the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and the crashing of Flight 93 is taller than Mt Everest. Sure, the 19 hijackers had backers in the middle east.
Anyway, to think the US government -- the Bush Administration -- was behind 9/11 is taking stupidity to intdustrial-strength levels. But, I see it every year at Ground Zero at the 9/11 memorial services.
The screwballs who push this idiocy feel they can ignore the fact that Osama bin Laden has publicly taken credit for 9/11. They also seem to think there is not ONE patriotic American who would blow the whistle on a group of conspirators out to commit mass murder.
You wrote:
"The the other side of that though is that with all the threats against the President-Elect which they say is at an unprecidented level,"
Says who? What threats? Maybe you mean the trash talk from Zawahiri, the al-Qaeda big-wig. You seem to have become a victim of baseless assertions from people who spout off about the thoughts in their heads as though if they believe "people" are threatening Obama then it has happened.
The only reports forthcoming from the Secret Service were reports showing that threats people claimed they heard were not substantiated by investigation.
You wrote:
"I do hope that they (secret service) put him a bullet proof, bomb proof glass box for the next 4 or 8 years not just for himself but for those who believe in him."
The real threats against Obama will come from his deluded supporters who will become distraught when he fails to deliver the dreams many are expecting.
Yeah that does sound strange.
And when you have them skipping procedures it always stinks of cover up.
freedom
obama needs to watch his back is all im saying and thanks
Dusty
thats how they do sinces days of good ole Abe
Anonymiss
u and me both and i had actual autopsy photos
R. Fitzgerald
u know i got idea for this post from your previous comment
Ensayn1
yep
aquababie
they hushed it up quick
Randal Graves
dang the CIA I tell ya
Monroe Anderson
just another thought crime thats all
Maribel
suprising indeed
no_slappz
dang, thats a long list - good job folk
OG, The Original Glamazon
he was standup and classy guy - i remeber folks down in Texas so sad when he died
The Socialite
i loved working for Africare
Gorgeous Geek
statatutory lol
an average patriot
and the leaving of his verizion cell phone records
nicki nicki tembo
thanks hon
Craigjc
clintons were kinda shady
Curious
yep he need to be in a pope box and i never heard that about the son of JFK
socalmuchacha
anytime my fav charger fan
deeteezy
hey u
2sweetnsaxy
guess its the american way
Kit (Keep It Trill)
yep - just want folks to remember cause we gotta have his back and cant fall for the okie doke
Anonymous
i can respect that - all opinion is good to me - still makes folk think
no_slappz
great dialietic slappz
clnmike
always huh?
JONES: Thanks for the post. I never knew Ron Brown nor Mickey Leland, but Lee Jackson who died on Brown's flight was my friend.
We met at a money-manager's club event in London at which over after-dinner brandy we each were required to offer up an opinion for the quarter to come on: one stock, one bond, one commodity. and one derivative. I assure you that Lee Jackson was the first African-American to belong to that club. There were some good guys in it but there were some right-wing Tory locos, too.
Lee and I became instant friends that night and for his entire time in London we'd hang out at least once a week. With all of the fights in Eastern Europe and the FSU I took in those days, it could easily have happened to me. We were really only doing Russian/Central Asian/Baltic stuff at the time and I doubt Ron Brown was letting me on any plane to Croatia even on Lee Jackson's say-so and even if I did have business in the former Yugoslavia, Romanian or Albania.
Oddly Ron Brown, being a New Yorker, was kind of a hero of mine, but my FRIEND was Lee Jackson so I always think of it as Lee Jackson's untimely death.
I spoke to his family briefly after it and told them what a great guy Lee was and how much respect he had in the off-shore money community even though his actual career was a quite a bit more conventional.
Lee just had interesting ideas on a lot of subjects.
Brown and the whole Arrington clan in Harlem were always extremely well-respected as kind of "first families" back there. I'd hate to think that Ron Brown and Lee Jackson's death was not caused by the horrible rainstorm. The alternatives would be hard for me to contemplate and not come away feeling rage.
@ KIT: I don't know who Torrance wrote it for. I'm just glad right now to remember Lee and have a little private cry for missing one of the people whose company made my years in London that much more fun.
Hey No-Slappz, I know that you are kind of unneccasarily argumentative, but even a simpleton who stopped to read and interpret would realize that I was against conspiracy theories and that I was just bringing them up as stories that had been told to me. In fact I laughed when I first heard them but I didn't think that point was relevant to my argument, and if you want you can quote me on that.
Against threats to Obama you wrote:
"What threats? Maybe you mean the trash talk from Zawahiri, the al-Qaeda big-wig."
Huh? What stone are you crawling out from under that you don't realize most threats have come, will come from right here in the United States?
"since the Nov. 4 election, law enforcement officials have seen more potentially threatening writings, Internet postings and other activity directed at Obama than has been seen with any past president-elect, said officials aware of the situation who spoke on condition of anonymity because the issue of a president's security is so sensitive."
and
"Chatter among white supremacists on the Internet has increased throughout the campaign and since Election Day.
One of the most popular white supremacist Web sites got more than 2,000 new members the day after the election, compared with 91 new members on Election Day, according to an AP count. The site, stormfront.org, was temporarily off-line Nov. 5 because of the overwhelming amount of activity it received after Election Day. On Saturday, one Stormfront poster, identified as Dalderian Germanicus, of North Las Vegas, said, "I want the SOB laid out in a box to see how 'messiahs' come to rest. God has abandoned us, this country is doomed.""
and
"— In Denver, a group of men with guns and bulletproof vests made racist threats against Obama and sparked fears of an assassination plot during the Democratic National Convention in August.
— Just before the election, two skinheads in Tennessee were charged with plotting to behead blacks across the country and assassinate Obama while wearing white top hats and tuxedos."
By EILEEN SULLIVAN, AP WASHINGTON (Nov. 14)
You wrote:
"The real threats against Obama will come from his deluded supporters who will become distraught when he fails to deliver the dreams many are expecting."
Again, huh? Where is your back up? Where is your proof? What you say me turn out to be true but until you prove it then you're just blowing it out your ass.
Speaking of conspiracies, I just realized today is the aniversary of the ultimate in conspiracy theories.
That sent shivers down my spine!
So sad. To take a life is so wrong and hurtful to the remaining family members and folks around.
Too much greed already!
Curious said:
"Hey No-Slappz, I know that you are kind of unneccasarily argumentative... "
LOL!
I understand contrarian, but not name calling and taunt in addition. It brings the discussion to a more competitive "prove yourself or be humiliated" type of level.
BTW -No Slappz interesting blog this Flatbush Follies?
My Brother told me about his suspicions about Brown and Leland's
deaths. His suspicions were the same as yours. I don't put anything past these treacherous K-Street types.
@ R. FITZGERALD: Good laughs last night.
But onto the more serious topic at hand. I guess because I liked Lee so much it was painful to read the straight news about the crash, let alone the speculation (I had BT dialup internet then).
And a good thing because I've now come to see some of the destruction the ordinary severity of American law and power brings.
Had I contemplated such things as a Clinton involvement or a Republican or Serbian involvement then, when his loss was palpable, I'm not sure how I would have reacted or what sort of anxiety or craziness it would have provoked in me.
I guess thinking about it today, I'd lean against a Clinton thing because the worst guy Clinton grew up with was Dan Lasater, whom you call bad but not evil. And that's about the worst I can say about the Clintons whom I kind of like. At their worst, their bad but not evil. Indifferent to the public embarrassment of Guanier and Elders, the lack of appreciation for Susan McDougal's rotting in Sybil Brand for 2 years on contempt charges. That sort of thing. Pre-meditated murder and conspiracy is a stretch for them and for the better of the Reaganauts like Baker, Regan, Shultz, Feldstein and Stockman.
Ray Donovan (nee Schiavone), I'm sure, died with a number of notches on his belt!
Oh, it'll take some work to convince me that Vince Foster was murdered for political coverup reasons. He fought major chemical depression his whole life. I do believe that he was having an affair with HRC. I also believe that the ways of Washington plus being scared of both Clintons and his wife finding out and not feeling secure in is position were unique stressors that brought on episodes he couldn't tolerate.
If you read DARKNESS VISIBLE by William Styron or THE NOONDAY DEMON by Andrew Solomon, you'll have some sense that this isn't just being "down". It's more like existing but not existing because of profound obsessional fear and anxiety.
Curious, you wrote:
"since the Nov. 4 election, law enforcement officials have seen more potentially threatening writings, Internet postings and other activity directed at Obama than has been seen with any past president-elect, said officials aware of the situation who spoke on condition of anonymity because the issue of a president's security is so sensitive."
Read the preceding a couple of times, if necessary. Nothing in the text recounts a threat to Obama.
It's almost laughable to think Obama has been the target of more hate than George Bush. In fact, a feature movie was made that included a scene of his assassination. T-shirts with threatening messages on them have been worn by opponents to Bush gatherings. In short, these claims about threats to Obama are coming from wide-eyed or disingenuous journalists.
You included:
"Chatter among white supremacists on the Internet has increased throughout the campaign and since Election Day."
So what? Is this surprising? What else would that crowd do?
And:
"One of the most popular white supremacist Web sites got more than 2,000 new members the day after the election, compared with 91 new members on Election Day, according to an AP count."
So what? Did any of the new or old members issue direct threats against Obama?
And:
"The site, stormfront.org, was temporarily off-line Nov. 5 because of the overwhelming amount of activity it received after Election Day."
Based on the interest of so many journalists, the site was probably swamped. Like shopping the day after Thanksgiving, there are times when business will be brisk. But if it's so easy for the AP to obtain membership information, I think the FBI, the Secret Service and other security groups can get far more without any trouble. I'm sure the Secret Service will have a list of home addresses of every Stormfront member soon enough.
With lots of security agents monitoring those sites, it might be a bad idea to visit them, even if you just want to annoy the members.
You posted:
"On Saturday, one Stormfront poster, identified as Dalderian Germanicus, of North Las Vegas, said, "I want the SOB laid out in a box to see how 'messiahs' come to rest. God has abandoned us, this country is doomed.""
It's possible Dalderian will get a visit from some agents. His words push the limit. However, since Obama is not named, the lack of context dilutes the meaning.
and
"— In Denver, a group of men with guns and bulletproof vests made racist threats against Obama and sparked fears of an assassination plot during the Democratic National Convention in August."
Read the preceding with care. Who heard these threats? Were the threats credible? Were the clowns arrested?
Meanwhile, "fear" is one of those words that has little relevance since it most often refers to something troubling the minds of people who, in fact, have nothing to fear. More likely they suffer from some anxiety about what lies ahead. But the anxiety is some vague amorphous thing that goes away after a good night's sleep.
And:
"Just before the election, two skinheads in Tennessee were charged with plotting to behead blacks across the country and assassinate Obama while wearing white top hats and tuxedos."
I have to admit I laughed at this one when I read about it a couple of weeks ago. These two losers, one 18, the other 24, are two of the most hapless, luckless idiots ever to pretend they were part of some Batman comic crime scenario.
Successful assassins have standards. The 19 muslims who committed the 9/11 atrocities kept everyone in the dark. The investigation suggested that even some of the hijackers were unaware that they were on a suicide mission.
I wrote:
"The real threats against Obama will come from his deluded supporters who will become distraught when he fails to deliver the dreams many are expecting."
You asked:
Again, huh? Where is your back up? Where is your proof?
There is no proof in the present for something that might occur in the future.
You concluded:
"What you say me turn out to be true but until you prove it then you're just blowing it out your ass."
I believe Obama will suffer from the growing enmity of former supporters who become increasingly disillusioned as he fails to meet their expectations.
I expect to see a black Cindy Sheehan emerge.A distrought mother of a soldier who dies after Obama's battle plans put her son in harm's way in Afghanistan, Pakistan or Iraq. Mothers who've lost sons to gun violence will lose faith when shootings continue. Drug problems will remain. No matter what he does about them, he'll cause some disappointment and anger among his constituents. That's how it is.
The truth of my prediction will show itself over time. But I have no control over its emergence.
The ORIGINAL subject of the post was a bolt from the blue for me because I try not to think of Lee's death for this very reason. I don't WANT TO KNOW. I want to remember the couple of years in London hanging out together and that's it.
I understand the motivation for wanting to know. I just don't have the courage to face that much emotion when just the remembering of a friend lost hurts.
I don't understand the motivation for trying to DISPROVE any theories without the facts just to provoke.
I had managed not to think about this for a long time so it's still taking me time to relax about it. I miss him. We had fun together and did good work together.
He should have been on Obama's short list for Treasury Secretary or Commerce Secretary or CEA Chair.
I wrote a little more about it on my spot. But did no speculation about anything. Just described our meeting and the very basics of our friendship and how it oddly enough connected VERY tangentially with 9/11.
NO, I'M NOT SUGGESTING DEEPER CONSPIRACY.
To this day I still say Bill Clinton via the CIA killed Ron Brown. Thats one thing most people shut down on when they give Bill his props.
That muthafucka never did shit for Africa when he was president. Hell Bush has done more to date monetarily than Clinton.
RIPPA: I'm neither agreeing with you nor disagreeing with you because I have no evidence nor suspicion but the loss of my (I guess unimportant!) friend Lee Jackson is painful enough that I repress it not even willfully. If it had been a heart attack or something I would feel the same.
I just don't want to think of his life not only wasted but intetionally so by the man who gave him his giant opportunity and to whom Lee had been nothing but loyal and a great emissary of the US to the UK and European financial world. And I certainly don't want my name nor his dragged into speculation of something like that.
I don't disrespect that you have a viewpoint. But a side player in this who also was killed was a friend of mine and probably would still be. Painful.
RIPPA: The thing of it is that the rest of the players real or imagined from Bill Clinton to Mack McLarty to Rubin to Wesley Clark to Wolfensohn to Milosevic to Yeltsin to Chernomyrdin to Gore to whomever are more like abstractions to me in a history book or on a global chessboard.
Lee was the US Director on the Board of the EBRD and I was running a Russia fund. We were friends and neighbors in London. We belonged to that club together. We'd go out to eat all the time. He invited me to speak at the EBRD on Russian interest rate policy and that stuff. He was no more and no less a FRIEND. But he was a real live flesh and blood person who called me on the phone and I called him. And we discuss the shit that interested us.
Maybe it's been as long as 8 years or so since I've thought about him for this very reason. The theories. I just knew him as one of the people in my field whose company I enjoyed and I know that being a director of the EBRD doesn't SOUND all that glamourous but it is. Even if it wasn't and he was the least important person who died, it still wouldn't change my feelings.
A budding friendship with a great guy was violently ripped out of my life. So, it's hard to read theories about it. Maybe if you included his name as a favor to me it might make a difference or it might be worse. I don't know. I just know that this is depressing the hell out of me and I don't even blame you one bit. This is free space and for the sake of understanding, it's best to get all viewpoints out there.
But what fuck do I really know about this inside shit? I knew he was going on that trip. The reports all cite his adminstrative abilities but he had a trader's mind too. And if there was beef or problems, he never let on to me. He could no more do that than I could tell him anything about my actual business, LPs, other GPs, etc. Because he was a government official and I was a non-series 7 off-shore, multi-jurisdiction manager.
I never told him weird things I'd heard about goings on at the upper levels of Russian finance because I was I could have fucked him up if I was wrong or right. See?
I'm not trying to be an asshole or stop debate. It's just not my favorite episode in my life to say the least.
Finally, is there someone who can set aside a theory no matter how valid and write to me "I'm sorry Lee Jackson died"?
Or is it all so much about being right that No_slappz's provocations and someone else's need to feel like a great global chessplayer trumps the emotions of someone you've come to know who lost a friend who wasn't a real super big shot, but who to me was the nicest most open-minded of all the government people in European development in that time?
I understand. I'm not angry just sad. But if there's truth in the theories everything's finished for me and the USA. It can't just be another dead famous person under suspicious circumstances. If the theories are right, then a not famous person I liked was also murdered.
And that makes every American complicit in my mind. If I have to think about this a lot, I know where my mind will lead me and it won't be anywhere nice. It will be WHAT A SICK COUNTRY FULL OF BRUTES WHO LOVE DEATH AND MAIMING AND KILLING AND STEALING. And collateral damage was MY FRIEND.
Or maybe it's just speculation and it was a rainstorm. Then it's a bunch of Americans grave-dancing and not giving a rat's ass that an insignificant no-name to Americans is someone whom I liked with a big future and is now dead.
So, in the end maybe I end up EXACTLY like "FREEDOM" and if I discuss it I'll end up thinking exactly that AmeriKKKa will eventually pay for its sins. That's an easy position for me to take. I don't live there anymore and I doubt I'll even visit again.
But in the end for me, I want it at least on record here that Lee Jackson wasn't a chesspiece or a story or a mystery.
He was a guy I knew and liked. His death affected my life. Not because of bizarre criminality or whatever but because it hurts to lose a friend. Even if he was only #36 in rank order of political power on that plane. Or #7 or #31. That surely made no difference to me at the time and it makes no difference now. I didn't have any other friends on that plane. I just didn't matter enough to anybody but Lee Jackson.
Matter enough? Shit. Lee Jackson was the only person on that plane who knew my name. And I know his. And I remember what he looked like and what things he was interested in.
Jones, I'm checking out of this one for now. Let me know how the discussion finishes and if anyone "wins". I know I'm going to have nightmares.
Kelso's Nuts,
I'm very sorry for your loss... for our loss ~regards
Interesting as always Torrance! Thanks for bringing this to the light...
@ ESIN:
Thanks. He was a great guy and probably would have been a big part of the Obama economic team.
There just wasn't any of that rigidity or "we know best" attitude to him. He wanted to teach and learn.
And I could always talk to him as a human being and a friend half the time apart from the post-USSR transition.
That's my only agenda in this.
Kelso, I'm sorry for the loss you're suffering in losing your friend...especially in such a manner. Sounds like you have some great memories, though.
As long as Obama doesn't come to Texas (Jasper and Paris for dragging, Dallas for Shootin' (Kennedy) and Austin for LAB's like Ashley Todd.)
I hope that he doesn't try to emulate JFK too much.
I wonder how THAT would be explained.
I was appauled when I heard the news. Wow...There are far more "secrets" than we will ever know, ya dig?
@ Kelso, Condolences to losing your friend on that plane. He sounds like he was decent human being.
@ Rippa, You're right and that aspect of the Clinton legacy. It's one of our weaknesses of our people to fall into the trap of doublethink.
Kelso, I am so sorry that you lost a friend. And the way he went is so sad.
And you are right, this IS more important than any provocation, etc.
My sincerest condolence.
I've gotta learn that there is a place in this world for people like No_Slappz. I detest debating with folks when they deny the remarks with which others respond, only to dismiss it all and go on to something entirely different. It irks me to no end.
@Kelso's Nuts: I truly am sorry for the loss of your friend. When a death hits home, it's sometimes greater than any other death.
However, for you, it is considered a loss of a friend and "NOTHING MORE", but, for many Blacks in Amerikkka (myself included), it was a loss of yet another great leader that we could believe in. Regrettably, you lost a friend, but, we lost a great leader and a lot of us cannot live with the idea that it was all purely accidental when so many other factors point to something quite the contrary.
Those who chose not to believe the power that is wielded by politicians and corporations have that right, but understand that those of who know better(or at least believe so)also have that right to believe as we do and feel that we have a need to express our fears that something is amiss, as well.
In doing so, however, that should not make you feel that we are desecrating the memory of your friend whom you believe (or in your own words "want to believe") died under normal circumstances (at least that is not my intention). Peace.
And yet Bush, Condi, Cheney, Scooter, Hill and Bill get off and are free to run amuck. Look what they did to Paul Robeson.
Ron Brown was one of my HEROES. Aside from his intelligence and instrumental effectiveness, he was a NEW YORKER like me!!!!
I merely wanted to make the point that I PERSONALLY can't speculate about the circumstances because for reasons apart from Ron Brown it's emotionally difficult.
Damn, this was a DEEP introspect & kudos for blogging this !!!
T.
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