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Stuck In Traffic Issue 08
Stuck In Traffic #7
By Calvin Stacy Powersÿ
===========
The Verdict
I have to admit being more than a little cranky on the day that
The Verdict was delivered by the jury. And while I'm still
disturbed about the whole Simpson case, I've come to accept the
jury's verdict.
I haven't followed all the post Verdict interviews, but it seems
that the jury believed that the bloody glove found behind
Simpson's house was planted, primarily because it wasn't found
until a couple of days after the initial crime scene
investigation. And frankly it does sound a little suspicious.
Furthermore, the jury apparently did not trust the blood evidence
on the grounds that the "chain of custody" of the blood was
questionable and that some of the blood was unaccounted for. And
on top of it all, there's the indications of racism at work
considering the past history of one of the key investigators. So
I can see how the jury would conclude that there was enough of a
possibility that the evidence had been planted to cast the
"reasonable doubt."
It appeared to me from the beginning that the whole case hinged on
the blood evidence. My reasoning was that the blood absolutely
identified O.J. Simpson. If O.J.'s blood was at the scene of the
crime, mixed with the victims' blood, then one can reasonably
conclude that O.J. was present at the scene of the crime when the
murder happened. And if the police investigators do a
sufficiently rigorous investigation of the crime scene and find no
evidence of anyone else being present, then you can reasonably
conclude that O.J. was the only other person besides the victims
at the crime scene. Now, lack of evidence never proves a point.
So the fact that no indications of other people were found does
not absolutely prove that no one else was at the crime, so you
have to pass judgement on how rigorous the investigation was and
how trustworthy the investigators are. But assume that the
investigation does pass muster, you have proof that O.J. was at
the crime scene at the time of the murder and can reasonably infer
that he was the only person at the scene, I think a jury would
find him guilty in that case.
But they didn't. And as much as I hate the thought of justice not
being served and letting a double murder go unsolved, I've come to
accept that the jury probably did the right thing. It seems to me
that there was just to much doubt cast on the handling of the
blood evidence. And if the jury had found O.J. guilty, it could
serve as a dangerous precedent with regard to the admissibility of
blood evidence in future cases. The thing we have to keep in mind
is that we have just as much an interest in preventing innocent
people from being framed for murder as we have in punishing the
real murderer. If the police are going to take blood samples for
the purpose of typing the defendants blood in the investigation,
we want to make sure every single drop, every single molecule of
the defendants blood to be accounted for, in order for there to be
no question whatsoever of their being any planting of evidence.
In fact, I would go as far as to say that the police, the people
trying to prosecute the case, should not be the ones responsible
for collecting the blood and keeping it. Such duties should be
carried out by a third party who is neutral. And if blood
evidence is to have any value whatsoever, it seems to me that it
must be collected immediately, during the initial crime scene
investigation. This business of finding blood evidence several
days after the initial crime scene investigation again raises the
possibility of evidence planting.
But was the jury predisposed to finding O.J. Innocent? Was the
jury looking for any excuse, no matter how tenuous, to justify
letting O.J. off the hook? Many have made that claim. But I
personally don't see any evidence of that being the case. If such
factors were at work in this case, I find it difficult to believe
that all 12 jurors would be affected and it would have taken only
one person to hang the jury.
==========
The Murder
Accepting the fact that the handling of the case by the police was
subpar to the point of casting reasonable doubt on the
prosecution's case, who killed Nicole Brown-Simpson and Ronald
Goldman? One would think that there are at least a few of the
reporters camped out at "O.J." city with an iota of initiative
that would engage in some investigation of the facts of the case
instead of participating in media slumming at the court house.
Can anyone doubt that O.J. Simpson is still the most likely
suspect? While I accept the fact that O.J. Simpson has been
found "Not Guilty," it is also true that he has not been found
"innocent".
=========
The Media
I find the media coverage of the O.J. Simpson trial to be
absolutely unforgiveable. I can't think of a single good thing to
say about the media coverage of the O.J. Simpson trial. First of
all they devoted way too much time/print space on the coverage.
By about a factor of 100 in my opinion. There simply was not
enough "news" in the trial to justify it. When I think of all
that effort that could have been spent on covering real news
stories, it just sickens me. I keep thinking, "What have we
missed this year that we should have heard about?"
And given the fact that the press did cover the O.J. Trial as
heavily as it did, I'm appalled at the shallowness of the
coverage. The plain fact of the matter is that it was covered
like a soap opera. It was sugarcoated entertainment disguised as
news. Instead of investigative stories about what it takes to
convict someone of a murder in California, we got stories on the
prosecutor's hair styles. It appears that the press corps just
sat around the courthouse waiting to get the latest sound bites
from the lawyers and amused themselves the rest of the time by
talking about how many press people were there.
====================
Mini-Drama at U.P.S.
Life is full of mini-dramas, even during the most boring mundane
parts.
Last week I went to UPS to mail a package late in the afternoon.
It was right about the time everyone was getting off work and the
traffic was bad. Everyone was tired. It was Friday afternoon so
everyone was in a hurry to get the weekend started. Tempers were
short.
At the UPS mailing center there was a long line of people waiting
and only two ladies working behind the counter. One was a tall
black woman, probably in her mid thirties and the other was an
older white woman who looked awfully close to retirement age.
They both looked tired. They both looked like they had been
hauling boxes around all day, which I expect they had.
Everyone in line looked tired, disheveled, and sullen. I hadn't
been paying much attention to what was going on. I was more or
less lost in my thoughts when all of a sudden this woman started
yelling at the top of her lungs at the black lady behind the
counter. "You're not helping me!" she screamed, "I've been
waiting in this line for thirty minutes and now you're not helping
me." Off she went on a tirade about how she had called the UPS
800 number and they had told her that the service center would
help her fill out the right forms and son on and so forth and now
the lady behind the counter refused to help her, etc. etc etc.
It was really loud.
I didn't see the events preceding this tirade, but the woman
behind me in line told me later what had happened. The customer
who had gotten upset had not filled out a shipping bill while in
line. There are signs all over the place in there indicating that
you have to fill out a shipping bill for every package you mail
with UPS. But apparently the customer had some questions about
the form and so had not filled it out. So when the customer got
up to the employee had given her a shipping bill to fill out and
told her to step aside and fill out the form while she helped the
next person in line.
Now, I've seen this happen all over the place, at the post office,
at other stores. Most customers are willing to do this to help
the employees service everyone a little faster. But apparently
the woman working at the counter did not realize that the customer
had not filled out the form because she didn't know how. The lady
behind me in line told me that it appeared to her that the angry
customer was trying to ship an international package. But
international packages use a different shipping bill from domestic
packages and the customer had apparently been given a domestic
form, which did not have room for all the information needed to
ship an international package.
By the way, the lady behind me impressed me with the authority
with which she spoke about UPS shipping bills. Her outward
appearance belied her attitude. She looked like someone who
didn't care about anything other than which Country-Western bar
had the 25 cent beer on draft. But I was totally wrong about her.
Serves me right for judging by appearances. She was quick to
point out to me that she had been a secretary for 10 years and
knew how to ship just about anything anywhere using any company
you could name. After this minidrama was over, she proceeded to
tell me about the trial and tribulations of working as a
secretary. One thing was clear, this was a woman who took her job
very seriously. And I thought to myself, "I'd hire this woman!
She knows what she's talking about!"
After the angry woman had yelled and screamed and otherwise
carried on for about 5 minutes she finally stormed out of the
place. I kept waiting for large, brusque, black woman behind the
counter to lose her cool. But she didn't. She managed to raise
her voice very loudly without sounding angry. She tried to find
out what the angry lady's problems with the forms were but it was
too late for that. By this time the angry lady was fixated on the
fact that she had been set aside and "not helped."
After the angry lady had left, the whole place was filled with an
uncomfortable silence. And this is where it gets interesting. In
that awkward pause after events like this, all the bystanders sit
there and run the incident through their mind and pass judgement
on what they just saw. I admit I was doing the same.
The only fault I could find with the lady behind the counter was
that she had failed to realize that the reason the angry woman had
not filled out her shipping bill ahead of time was because she
didn't know how to do so. But the lady behind the counter was
just trying to be as efficient as possible. If she had just stood
there idly while the angry woman had filled out her forms,
everyone else in line would have had to wait that much longer.
And the sentiments of the bystanders', mine included, were
overwhelmingly in favor of the woman working the counter and
against the angry woman. And this is where I learned a lesson
worth remembering. Judging from the comments I heard other people
in line make, they favored the woman behind the counter because
she kept control and did not lose here cool. Everyone was turned
off by the angry woman's tirade. And even though she may have
started out with a legitimate complaint about not being helped, no
one had any sympathy for her because she had pitched a tantrum
about it.
No matter what the injustice is, no matter how small or large, you
aren't going to get it corrected unless you have the public's
sentiment; and making a nuisance of yourself is sure fire way to
lose favor with the public. Appearances are important.
=============================
Get Ready For The Politicians
Election season is just around the corner. There will be hundreds
of candidates making stump speeches, kissing babies, doling out
sound-bites. The press has long ago given up trying to dig
beneath the surface of the candidate's made-for-TV persona. So
it's up to us to keep the politicians on their toes.
If you go to any candidate debates, or if you have a chance to ask
a politician on a radio talk show, here's a great question to ask.
I got it from the TV show Northern Exposure and I think it forces
a candidate to real show his/her true colors:
Do you see the stop sign as a Jeffersonian or Hamiltonian
expression of democracy in action?
===============================
The only hope in a world where there are men who will kill for a
pack of cigarettes is for there to be men willing to die defending
a pack of cigarettes.
================
Help For Smokers
Reason magazine reports in its latest issue that the FDA now
regulates cigarettes as a "drug delivery device," which means
smokers are now officially classified as addicts who are therefore
protected under the Americans With Disabilities Act. Go figure.
==============
The State Fair
The North Carolina State Fair opens this week, officially kicking
of Fall. Normally I'm not one who's into crowds and noise, but I
love going to the State Fair. There are just too many bizarre
sights and sounds to pass up.
One company that shows up every year sells Aloe based lipstick to
ladies under the premise that it lasts all day without coming off.
I always have this picture in my mind of little old ladies
painting their lips a deep red with this stuff and then never
being able to get it off again.
There is also a man that shows up every year selling various
unusual organic things. He has hundreds of little bottles of
herbs and spices and other kinds of plants and he can tell you
what each one is good for. He can tell you about various
medicines you can concoct with them (Don't tell the FDA) and he
can tell you how to use them in recipes.
The NC State University Drama department and the NC Department of
Agriculture team up each year to put on a show for little kids
extolling the virtues of eating a balanced meal. The stage show
is filled with normally serious drama students dressed up has
carrots, tomatoes, grapes, bananas, sweet potatoes, and slices of
bread (whole grain of course, not white) dancing and singing
across a makeshift stage.
Every radio station and TV station in town broadcasts live from
the Fair during the week. And the various radio and TV
personalities have to work really hard to appear excited to be
there. I don't know why they have a hard time appearing sincere,
but they do. Especially in person. If you walk up to them on
person at the fair, you still get this feeling of separation, like
they are still on TV or something. And inevitably, the TV/radio
personality has to find some 8 year old kid, stick a microphone in
his face and ask the kid what his name is. The kid _always_ takes
a long few seconds to manage a reply, like he or she has had to
think about the answer and then the TV/radio personality has to
act like it's so amazing to be talking to a little kid.
The State Fair is also a good place to go shopping for any Farm
implements you might need. I always enjoy the John Deere exhibit.
They line up the latest tractor models just like you would see
cars on a show room floor, as if they were sleek sports cars or
something. It's really bizarre, almost Kafka-esque.
And I confess to still enjoying the petting zoo. Let's face it,
there aren't too many opportunities to pet a goat during the year.
So you might as well take advantage of it. I can take or leave
the bunny rabbits and the pigs. But goats are cool. They have an
attitude problem which I can respect.
The horses are great too. There are usually several horse shows
during the week and I try to make at least one of them. My
favorite of the horse shows are the jumping competitions. It
seems to me amazing that a horse can jump at all. Just looking at
a horse, it's hard to imagine that they can actually jump. So
every jump they make is a minidrama. And it's even harder for me
to grasp the fact that they can land their entire weight on those
spindly legs.
I'm not into the rides at the State Fair as much as I used to be.
Not because I'm worried that they are "unsafe" or anything like
that. The whole point of carnival rides is to give you a feeling
of "unsafe," so the unbiquitous rumors of this or that carnival
ride breaking down at critical times just adds to the excitement.
But the rides at the State Fair have just gotten to darn expensive
for a tightwad like me. One of my favorite rides looks like the
deck of a pirate's ship. You get into it and strap yourself down
and it simply swings back and forth in this huge sweeping arc. It
doesn't even go all the way around in a loop. It just goes back
and forth. But the ride is very open. It doesn't have a lot of
support machinery around you. So you get this feeling terrific
feeling of air moving around you and the scenery swinging by.
If you have an opportunity to attend a State Fair, go. It's worth
the effort if you keep your eyes open.
===========================
"The best trick the devil ever played was to convince the world he
doesn't exist." -- from the movie "The Usual Suspects"
=============================
"Miracles are so called because they excite wonder. In
unphilosophical minds any rare or unexpected thing excites wonder,
while in the philosophical mind the familiar excites wonder also."
-- George Santayana
==================================================================
Stuck In Traffic is a bi-monthly e-zine edited by, and mostly
written by Calvin Stacy Powers. Copyrights of individual articles
are held by their respective authors. All unsigned work is
authored by Calvin Stacy Powers, who holds all copyrights.
Permission is granted to redistribute Stuck In Traffic provided
that it is redistributed in its entirety (including this copyright
notice), and that no fee is charged. For commercial
redistribution rights, or for permission to reprint/redistribute
individual articles contact Calvin Stacy Powers at
powers@rdu007.pdial.interpath.net.
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