Monday, July 25, 2011

21 years for ninety murders; does not seem like justice.


JULY 25, 2011

BRUCE A. BRENNAN BLOG FROM THE WORLD AND MY MIND

The news as I see it and the views as I want them.

July 25 is … Threading The Needle Day



Stay away from haystacks while celebrating today.



In Norway, the maximum punishment for any crime is 21 years in prison. It does not matter what the crime is, the number of victims or the number of separate crimes committed in one act, the maximum punishment is 21 years in prison. That means that the Anders Behring Breivik, the 32 year-old Norwegian man that bombed a government building and then drove ninety miles to kill over 80 teenagers will be released from prison when he is 53, assuming he is convicted of the crime. That just does not seem right or just. With that thinking, you might as well kill as many people as you dislike at once since after the first murder, the rest are free.



I will bet it takes Washington DC less than five years to create a slum out of Walter Reed Hospital. Walter Reed Army Medical Center, the Army's flagship hospital where privates to presidents have gone for care, is closing its doors after more than a century.



Hundreds of thousands of the nation's war wounded from World War I to today have received treatment at Walter Reed, including 18,000 troops who served in Iraq and Afghanistan.



President Dwight Eisenhower died there. So did Gens. John J. Pershing and Douglas MacArthur.



It's where countless celebrities, from Bob Hope to quarterback Tom Brady, have stopped to show their respect to the wounded. Through the use of medical diplomacy, the center also has tended to foreign leaders.



The storied hospital, which opened in 1909, was scarred by a 2007 scandal about substandard living conditions on its grounds for wounded troops in outpatient care and the red tape they faced. It led to improved care for the wounded, at Walter Reed and throughout the military. By then, however, plans were moving forward to close Walter Reed's campus.



Two years earlier, a government commission, noting that Walter Reed was showing its age, voted to close the facility and consolidate its operations with the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Md., and a hospital at Fort Belvoir, Va., to save money. Former and current patients and staff members will say goodbye at a ceremony Wednesday on the parade grounds in front of the main concrete and glass hospital complex. Most of the moving will occur in August. On Sept. 15, the Army hands over the campus to the new tenants: the State Department and the District of Columbia. The buildings on campus deemed national historic landmarks will be preserved; others probably will be torn down. The city is expected to develop its section for retail and other uses.



A Target or Walmart  no doubt. I also bet it will be a haven for the homeless, the lazy, drug addicts, drug dealers and prostitutes. You know the type of place where the Mayor of Washington DC hangs out.



"For many of the staff members, even though they know that this is the future of the military health system, in a way, it's still like losing your favorite uncle, and so there is a certain amount of mourning that is going on and it is an emotional time," said Col. Norvell Coots, commander of the Walter Reed Health Care System. The new facility will be called the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center. It will consolidate many of Walter Reed's current offerings with the Navy hospital



On the lighter side of reality, Crooner Dean Martin and comedian Jerry Lewis staged their first show as a team this day in 1946 at Club 500 in Atlantic City, NJ. Actually, the two had met while performing -- separately -- at the Glass Hat in New York City and decided to try an ad-lib act together. The rest is entertainment history.



The duo went from earning $350 a week to $5,000 a week in under eight months, with Martin playing the romantic straight man opposite Lewis as his goofy, unpredictable partner. Ten years later, the curtain came down on their final team performance at the Copacabana in New York. Over that decade, the zany two made seventeen movies including My Friend Irma, That’s My Boy, The Caddy, Pardners, Jumping Jacks and The Stooge.



Dean Martin went on to become a recording star (Memories are Made of This, Return to Me, Everybody Loves Somebody), movie star (The Young Lions, Rio Bravo, Sons of Katie Elder, the Matt Helm series) and host of his own TV variety show, The Dean Martin Show. Lewis pursued a solo career in Hollywood as comic lead (The Sad Sack, Cinderfella, The Nutty Professor); director (The Bellboy, The Errand Boy, The Patsy, Family Jewels, Which Way to the Front); producer; teacher (USC); and consummate entertainer. It would take 20 years for the two to speak publicly with each other again.



Martin died December 25, 1995. Lewis continues to set records in fund-raising during his annual Stars Across America! Labor Day Telethon for the Muscular Dystrophy Association (he has been chairman of the MDA since 1950). Lewis announced earlier in 2011 he was retiring from the telethon although he would still be involved. The Las Vegas resident continues to make nightclub appearances and returned to the stage in the Broadway revival production of Damn Yankees in 1996. Critics called his performance as the Devil, a rip-roaring success.



I know Jerry Lewis is not popular with younger folks and is not understood by everyone but for once the French got it right. Lewis is a comic genius and the world is a better place with him in it. That cannot be said about all of us.



Just a few points to ponder.

BRUCE A. BRENNAN

DEKALB, IL 60115

COPYRIGHT 2011



VISIT ANY OF THE SITES LISTED FOR REVIEW, RESEARCH, ORDERING MY WRITING PRODUCTS OR TO CONTACT ME.













Go to web sites below to buy books by Bruce A. Brennan. It is still a good time to purchase any of my books. The books are interesting and inexpensive reads. My third book should be available later this year, in late 2011. More information will be forthcoming.



www.ebookmall.com (Do search by my name or book Title)

www.barnesandnoble.com (do a quick search, Title, my name)

www.smashwords.com Do a Title or author search.





Book Titles:



Holmes the Ripper



A Revengeful Mix of Short Fiction



"If you want to live a happy life, tie it to a goal, not to people or things."- Albert Einstein




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