08-07-2008, 03:17 PM
(This post was last modified: 08-07-2008, 03:19 PM by Occhidiangela.)
I have heard on the news that the Westboro Baptist Church intends to protest in Canada, for reasons that baffle me, at the funeral of the young man recently murdered and beheaded on a bus. Grisly murder. If you want some insight on how to handle those fools, I'd like to share with you how it was handled down in Corpus Christi, Texas, when the Westboro idiots filed for permission to protest a memorial service for some fallen aviators who had crashed nearby. It was one of the most uplifting events I've ever been involved with.
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The eighty five pound man stood in front of the Alibi Tavern, playing chords on a flying V guitar. His long, tangled, black hair moved in contrapuntal rhythm to Steppenwolf's Born to be Wild. Gathered around the band were a few dozen citizens of varying sorts: old hippies, surf bums, yuppies, vets, bikers, a few off duty cops, a few sailors in mufti, and just plain folk from the hamlet of Flour Bluff, Texas. They were sipping beer, smoking cigarettes, and cheering the cars, pick-up trucks, and motorcycle riders who drove by. No one passed who wasn't waving a flag as they patrolled to and from the packed avenue leading to the Naval Air Station a mile down the road.
The clump of beer drinkers reflected the make up of the larger crowd gathered under a forest of American flags, a muster led by the new militia cavalry. These riders stand shoulder to shoulder with the folks who serve, and who fall.
They are the Patriot Guard Riders. They have provided funeral escorts for hundreds of our fallen soldiers in the past seven years.
With them were members of a few dozen other biker clubs. These men and women wear their flags, and their hearts, on their sleeves. I stopped counting bikes at two hundred. I saw dozens of bike club names on leather vests, but I didn't have a pen to write them all down. Los Reguladeros and Los Paisanos were two club names I recall seeing the most.
It was a heck of a turnout.
The little group in front of the Alibi Tavern was made up of whites, blacks, hispanics, young, old, male, female, vets, hippies, squares, rednecks and yuppies. So too the crowd lining the street. The group at the Alibi Tavern had been attracted to the band, the beer, and the impromptu sign in front of the tavern:
There's no place like home
There's no place like home
So go back to Kansas!
That sign was directed at the Westboro Baptist Church.
That infamous batch of miscreants had filed for a permit to protest outside the Naval Air Station on Groundhog Day, February second, with their usual bile. Their excuse was three servicemen, Naval Aviators. They died in a helicopter crash near Petronila, Texas, while on a training mission. Their names are:
Lieutenant Joshua Gross, USN, 30, of Alameda, California.
Petty Officer 2nd Class David Davison, USN, 22, of Guthrie, Oklahoma.
Petty Officer 2nd Class Alexander LeMarr, USN, 25, of Parker, Colorado.
The word had gotten out that WBC was coming to spit on the graves of these good men. The Patriot Guard Riders, the GI Forum, local citizens, and some folk from out of town decided that this hate mongering from the WBC would not stand unanswered.
I've got famliy in Corpus Christi. I had a meeting Saturday morning with a man I know through a church group. I'd heard about the WBC protest. While I was mad at the media for not being able to look away from the attention mongers, I decided I wanted to see the Patriot Guard Riders in action. And no, I could not look away. Those three men are my kind of people: Naval Aviators past, present, and future.
I adjusted my schedule so that at High Noon, I'd arrive to see "something happening, here." What does such a protest, and counter protest, look like up close?
My wife had warned me to stay out of trouble. She need not have worried. What it ended up looking like was a block party.
I parked a quarter of a mile away from the interchange between NAS Drive and the freeway, and then walked toward the gate of the Naval Air Station. My not having a sign to wave bothered me at first. As I got closer, I laughed at myself.
Signs?
They were everywhere. The majority were of the "We love HM-15" and "Support Our Troops" variety, but my two favorites were slightly off beat. A pretty young girl held a sign that proclaimed:
WBC = Wanna Be Christians
A young man in a pick up truck held up a coarse jest:
Imagine Shirley Phelps
Naked
That's why I'm a homosexual
American flags? It looked like a Fourth of July parade.
I walked past the Alibi Tavern on my way in, raising a thumbs up to the band as they played Eric Clapton's Cocaine. They gave me back a thumbs up. Strangers smiling to one another, reaffirming something positive that we had in common.
I walked as far as the crowd extended, to the point 500 yards from the Naval Air Station's gate. There, the police were defining the boundary between state and federal property. That is where the WBC were, by their permit, going to stage their protest against whatever it is that pisses them off about America.
I didn't see any evidence of the WBC at High Noon, but I saw evidence of a jubilee. Both sides of the street were lined with people, all the way back to the freeway. People were singing, waving flags, chatting, and expectantly waiting for the idiots from out of town to show up. The show of solidarity with the fallen aircrew, and their families, washed over me in a euphoric wave. I talked with a few of the bikers, some of the older vets. One fellow held a sign that said:
"We love out troops in Texas. What's your beef?"
I mentioned to him that I hadn't seen any signs that said
"Welcome to Corpus Christi" nor "Welcome to Texas."
He laughed. We looked up and down the street together. The nature of the welcome was right there in front of us, in the sea of faces, signs, American flags, Texas flags, HM-15 squadron banners, t-shirts, and Navy flags.
People? I guessed about three thousand (the Corpus Christi paper reported "about 2700" the following morning http://www.caller.com/news/2008/feb/03/troop-support/ )
I crossed the street and headed back toward the Alibi Tavern, chatting with folks, sharing my smokes with a few, shaking hands, and getting an intensely good vibe.
All this walking and talking was thirsty work. I decided I'd drop in at the Alibi Tavern and groove with the good folks there for a while. It's a little dive with two dollar Bud in a bottle, smoking allowed indoors, and simple bar decor. The action was out front, though. I got my Bud and joined the folks gathered around the band, immediately welcomed, though I didn't know any of them.
We band of brothers and sisters, strangers and some locals who obviously knew one another, all joked and chatted and drank beer and got into the riffs the band was playing.
And the Riders who kept streaming past. And the cheering. And the flags.
The band didn't have a guy under forty in it. They played 60's and 70's rock standards: Bad to the Bone, Feel Like Makin' Love, I Just Wanna Make Love To You, and more. Before I wandered off, after a few beers and a lot of laughs, yells, fist pumping, and hollering at the cars and bikes passing by with their flags, the eighty-five pound man ended a set with the Jimi Hendrix version of the Star Spangled Banner.
He prefaced it with this: (I think I remember it almost verbatim)
"This song goes out to all you vets, friends of sailors and soldiers, and the families of our people who serve, here and over in Iraq and Afghanistan."
As he played the opening riffs, we all put our hands over our hearts. I was moved to tears. I made it a point to thank him and the band before I headed back to my car, and my next bit of business. This outpouring of positive sentiment had me walking on air.
As for the the WBC, the yellow bastidges never showed up.
People from Oklahoma, Arizona, and Missouri showed up by bike, car and plane, but not the Westboro crowd. All that Phelps' Whelps achieved was to, unintentionally, provide an excuse for the diverse populace of Corpus Christi, and other Texans who'd traveled from San Antonio, Three Rivers, Victoria, Choke Canyon, Mathis, and good hearted Americans from elsewhere, to assemble in public and show the world what we stand for: good people.
The bag of Phelps brand lemons was turned to sweet lemonade, the yellow of the ribbons on the cars and t-shirts a stark contrast to the yellow of the Westboro Baptists' bellies.
I love Texas, and Texans. I deeply appreciate the Patriot Guard Riders, and all the bikers who showed up as the nucleus of the positive, pro-people protest. The assembled crowd were there for
Joshua Gross
David Davison
and
Alexander Lamarr
and their families.
Vaya con Dios, amigos.
>
>
>
The eighty five pound man stood in front of the Alibi Tavern, playing chords on a flying V guitar. His long, tangled, black hair moved in contrapuntal rhythm to Steppenwolf's Born to be Wild. Gathered around the band were a few dozen citizens of varying sorts: old hippies, surf bums, yuppies, vets, bikers, a few off duty cops, a few sailors in mufti, and just plain folk from the hamlet of Flour Bluff, Texas. They were sipping beer, smoking cigarettes, and cheering the cars, pick-up trucks, and motorcycle riders who drove by. No one passed who wasn't waving a flag as they patrolled to and from the packed avenue leading to the Naval Air Station a mile down the road.
The clump of beer drinkers reflected the make up of the larger crowd gathered under a forest of American flags, a muster led by the new militia cavalry. These riders stand shoulder to shoulder with the folks who serve, and who fall.
They are the Patriot Guard Riders. They have provided funeral escorts for hundreds of our fallen soldiers in the past seven years.
With them were members of a few dozen other biker clubs. These men and women wear their flags, and their hearts, on their sleeves. I stopped counting bikes at two hundred. I saw dozens of bike club names on leather vests, but I didn't have a pen to write them all down. Los Reguladeros and Los Paisanos were two club names I recall seeing the most.
It was a heck of a turnout.
The little group in front of the Alibi Tavern was made up of whites, blacks, hispanics, young, old, male, female, vets, hippies, squares, rednecks and yuppies. So too the crowd lining the street. The group at the Alibi Tavern had been attracted to the band, the beer, and the impromptu sign in front of the tavern:
There's no place like home
There's no place like home
So go back to Kansas!
That sign was directed at the Westboro Baptist Church.
That infamous batch of miscreants had filed for a permit to protest outside the Naval Air Station on Groundhog Day, February second, with their usual bile. Their excuse was three servicemen, Naval Aviators. They died in a helicopter crash near Petronila, Texas, while on a training mission. Their names are:
Lieutenant Joshua Gross, USN, 30, of Alameda, California.
Petty Officer 2nd Class David Davison, USN, 22, of Guthrie, Oklahoma.
Petty Officer 2nd Class Alexander LeMarr, USN, 25, of Parker, Colorado.
The word had gotten out that WBC was coming to spit on the graves of these good men. The Patriot Guard Riders, the GI Forum, local citizens, and some folk from out of town decided that this hate mongering from the WBC would not stand unanswered.
I've got famliy in Corpus Christi. I had a meeting Saturday morning with a man I know through a church group. I'd heard about the WBC protest. While I was mad at the media for not being able to look away from the attention mongers, I decided I wanted to see the Patriot Guard Riders in action. And no, I could not look away. Those three men are my kind of people: Naval Aviators past, present, and future.
I adjusted my schedule so that at High Noon, I'd arrive to see "something happening, here." What does such a protest, and counter protest, look like up close?
My wife had warned me to stay out of trouble. She need not have worried. What it ended up looking like was a block party.
I parked a quarter of a mile away from the interchange between NAS Drive and the freeway, and then walked toward the gate of the Naval Air Station. My not having a sign to wave bothered me at first. As I got closer, I laughed at myself.
Signs?
They were everywhere. The majority were of the "We love HM-15" and "Support Our Troops" variety, but my two favorites were slightly off beat. A pretty young girl held a sign that proclaimed:
WBC = Wanna Be Christians
A young man in a pick up truck held up a coarse jest:
Imagine Shirley Phelps
Naked
That's why I'm a homosexual
American flags? It looked like a Fourth of July parade.
I walked past the Alibi Tavern on my way in, raising a thumbs up to the band as they played Eric Clapton's Cocaine. They gave me back a thumbs up. Strangers smiling to one another, reaffirming something positive that we had in common.
I walked as far as the crowd extended, to the point 500 yards from the Naval Air Station's gate. There, the police were defining the boundary between state and federal property. That is where the WBC were, by their permit, going to stage their protest against whatever it is that pisses them off about America.
I didn't see any evidence of the WBC at High Noon, but I saw evidence of a jubilee. Both sides of the street were lined with people, all the way back to the freeway. People were singing, waving flags, chatting, and expectantly waiting for the idiots from out of town to show up. The show of solidarity with the fallen aircrew, and their families, washed over me in a euphoric wave. I talked with a few of the bikers, some of the older vets. One fellow held a sign that said:
"We love out troops in Texas. What's your beef?"
I mentioned to him that I hadn't seen any signs that said
"Welcome to Corpus Christi" nor "Welcome to Texas."
He laughed. We looked up and down the street together. The nature of the welcome was right there in front of us, in the sea of faces, signs, American flags, Texas flags, HM-15 squadron banners, t-shirts, and Navy flags.
People? I guessed about three thousand (the Corpus Christi paper reported "about 2700" the following morning http://www.caller.com/news/2008/feb/03/troop-support/ )
I crossed the street and headed back toward the Alibi Tavern, chatting with folks, sharing my smokes with a few, shaking hands, and getting an intensely good vibe.
All this walking and talking was thirsty work. I decided I'd drop in at the Alibi Tavern and groove with the good folks there for a while. It's a little dive with two dollar Bud in a bottle, smoking allowed indoors, and simple bar decor. The action was out front, though. I got my Bud and joined the folks gathered around the band, immediately welcomed, though I didn't know any of them.
We band of brothers and sisters, strangers and some locals who obviously knew one another, all joked and chatted and drank beer and got into the riffs the band was playing.
And the Riders who kept streaming past. And the cheering. And the flags.
The band didn't have a guy under forty in it. They played 60's and 70's rock standards: Bad to the Bone, Feel Like Makin' Love, I Just Wanna Make Love To You, and more. Before I wandered off, after a few beers and a lot of laughs, yells, fist pumping, and hollering at the cars and bikes passing by with their flags, the eighty-five pound man ended a set with the Jimi Hendrix version of the Star Spangled Banner.
He prefaced it with this: (I think I remember it almost verbatim)
"This song goes out to all you vets, friends of sailors and soldiers, and the families of our people who serve, here and over in Iraq and Afghanistan."
As he played the opening riffs, we all put our hands over our hearts. I was moved to tears. I made it a point to thank him and the band before I headed back to my car, and my next bit of business. This outpouring of positive sentiment had me walking on air.
As for the the WBC, the yellow bastidges never showed up.
People from Oklahoma, Arizona, and Missouri showed up by bike, car and plane, but not the Westboro crowd. All that Phelps' Whelps achieved was to, unintentionally, provide an excuse for the diverse populace of Corpus Christi, and other Texans who'd traveled from San Antonio, Three Rivers, Victoria, Choke Canyon, Mathis, and good hearted Americans from elsewhere, to assemble in public and show the world what we stand for: good people.
The bag of Phelps brand lemons was turned to sweet lemonade, the yellow of the ribbons on the cars and t-shirts a stark contrast to the yellow of the Westboro Baptists' bellies.
I love Texas, and Texans. I deeply appreciate the Patriot Guard Riders, and all the bikers who showed up as the nucleus of the positive, pro-people protest. The assembled crowd were there for
Joshua Gross
David Davison
and
Alexander Lamarr
and their families.
Vaya con Dios, amigos.
Cry 'Havoc' and let slip the Men 'O War!
In War, the outcome is never final. --Carl von Clausewitz--
Igitur qui desiderat pacem, praeparet bellum
John 11:35 - consider why.
In Memory of Pete
In War, the outcome is never final. --Carl von Clausewitz--
Igitur qui desiderat pacem, praeparet bellum
John 11:35 - consider why.
In Memory of Pete