Shooters Shoot: The Thrill of Doing It

 

"We cannot get rid of mankind's fleetingly wicked wishes. We can get rid of the machines that make them come true." – Kurt Vonnegut

*

After each AR-15 slaughter, to respond to the calls for banning assault rifles, we hear the gun fetish crowd chanting one of their favorite bullshit lines: "Guns don't kill people, people do." 

It's a tactic to cast the culprit as a "killer," rather than a "shooter." It sells the convenient notion that the evil-doing perpetrator chiefly wanted to make his victims dead. Furthermore, it suggests the death-dealing method wasn't all that important. Thus, why banish one kind of rifle, when it's people that kill people?

Well, I don't buy it. 

From what I've seen, if they were denied their favorite tools, most of America’s mass-murdering shooters haven't appeared to have been schemers who would have simply switched over to bombs or poison. Instead, I believe those massacre-makers using AR-15s craved the intense thrill of shooting rapid-fire rifles at living people. So my take is that crazy spree-shooters don't usually care about much more than their evil mission to shoot at live human targets.  

OK, killers they were, but they weren't bombers or poisoners. They weren't knife-wielders or stranglers. Motive-wise, most have not seemed focused on knocking off specific people to achieve any particular gain. No, they were shooters. 

Shooters shoot. 

The NRA's Wayne LaPierre and the rest of the shills for the firearms industry like to talk about protecting constitutional rights. What they don't want to discuss is that by defending assault rifles they are mostly protecting frivolous thrills for their AR-15-owning members who are collectors and dress-up private militia types. 

Here's what I see: The AR-15 isn't a hunting rifle. Away from the battlefield, it seems to have little practical purpose. However, owners of such rifles surely do enjoy the thrill of shooting exotic weapons with the power to kill a lot of people, ASAP. 

Of course, most such gun aficionados would never shoot people. Yet, as we've all seen too often, for America's architects of bullet-riddled massacres, a sick longing for the wicked experience of shooting at living human targets can become an irresistible urge. It can be part of what forges a monster. What other factors turn some people into amoral monsters is a topic for another day.

Bottom line: We will all be better off if we stop putting AR-15s in the hands of monsters.

Eric E: Jukebox of Americana

Note: Twenty years ago I wrote this profile of Eric "Rick" Stanley for the February 2002 issue of Fifty Plus, a local magazine.

*

'Eric E: Jukebox of Americana' by F.T. Rea

FEBRUARY 2002: Richmond’s "Eric E" is a jukebox of colorful anecdotes about American music. Push any button and out comes another of his takes on some aspect of the music he has found in his midst. Then you get a set that might include a mix of Jazz, Blues, Rock ‘n’ Roll, Rhythm & Blues, Zydeco, Rockabilly, Country & Western, Hip Hop, Soul, Gospel, or Du-Wop. You name it.

Otherwise known as Eric Stanley, Eric E has made a lifelong study of American working-man’s music styles and the connections between them. His understanding of those integral connections -- synapses between genres -- lies at the core of his own authentic style.

All that said, Stanley is on the air, again, with a better-than-ever version of his trademark radio show: the Bebop Boogie & Blues Revue. He’s back after dodging a bullet that came at him out of blue -- prostate cancer. After a routine test alerted him to his situation, he was basically out of the game for a year.

With that ordeal behind him, what comes out of his listeners’ speakers on Sunday nights, between 7 p.m. and midnight, is the Eric E jukebox of Americana. His free-association decision of what recording to play next can be as improvised as a jazz musician landing on just the right note and quirky pause to justify the experimental riff he just played.

Seamlessly, Eric E moves from Jimi Hendrix to Patsy Cline to Muddy Waters to Li’l Ronnie and the Grand Dukes to Stanley Turentine, all, without worrying about why.

In an age of ubiquitous ticky-tacky radio programming, Stanley’s variety-oriented ideas can’t be packaged into a standard format. Thus, his current arrangement with WJMO, 105.7FM, allows him to do as he pleases with the five-hour block of time. He not only hosts the show and selects the music, but he also arranges for the program’s underwriting. In effect, Eric E. is his own boss.

The product, the Bebop Boogie & Blues Revue, is an utter delight. Typical of the Eric E style, he also does the commercials live. With no canned hype, the ads come off more as endorsements than intrusions. At this writing, BB&BR’s five sponsorships, one for each hour, are the Richmond Jazz Society, Plan 9 Music, Kuba Kuba restaurant, the Commercial Taphouse, and Creole Arts.

“If you advertise with me, I’m going in your business,” says Stanley. “If I haven’t been in the place, I don’t accept the ad.”

The Path to Radio

As a child, Eric Stanley spent as much time as he could at his aunt’s restaurant, a spacious old log-house with a stone fireplace. The Hilltop Restaurant, located on US Route 1 in Ashland, catered mostly to a rural black clientele. In the summer he’d cook hamburgers and do what he could to seem useful.

The Hilltop featured live entertainment, mostly acts from what was known as the Chitlin’ Circuit. Down in the basement, Stanley’s uncle poured off-the-record shots of liquor. Fascinated with the raw music and the natural scene surrounding it, Ricky -- a skinny kid with glasses -- soaked up all he could from traveling bluesmen such as Jimmy Reed and Elmore James.

Sometimes Reed would baby-sit for precocious Ricky (who tended to ask too many questions) when his aunt and uncle were running errands for the business. “I remember it from the late '50s to early '60s,” says Stanley with his easy smile. Of the legendary Reed, Stanley recalls: “He’d give me a quarter for the vibrating [lounge] chair, drink whiskey from a little bottle, and play his guitar.”

Stanley’s favorite hit tunes from his childhood? Off the top of his head he answers, “‘In the Still of the Night,’ ‘It’s All in the Game,’ and ‘Twist and Shout,’ the Isley Brothers version.”

During his high school days, playing drums and harmonica in bands, together with performing as a dancing drum major, Stanley leaned that he enjoyed performing in front of a crowd. That yen would resurface.

In 1968, after Stanley finished Virginia Randolph, he went on to study advertising at Virginia Commonwealth University for a couple of years. For the next nine years he was away from the Richmond area, for the most part, studying Early Childhood Education at Bowie State College in Maryland and working as a day-care teacher in Washington. It was during his period in D.C. that he fell into broadcasting.

A friend was hosting a radio program with commentary about prison life. He helped her with the project and began playing some jazz here and there to broaden the narrowly focused show’s appeal. That led to Eric Stanley’s first program of his own, a 2 a.m. to 6 a.m. gig on WPFW-FM.

Color Radio

In 1979 Stanley returned to Richmond, and in 1982, while managing a Reggae band, Awareness Art Ensemble, he found his way to Color Radio. “I got involved with Color Radio because Charles Williams, of the Good Guys band [bass guitar], called and told me they were starting a station on Continental Cablevision and I should get involved,” says Stanley.

Color Radio (1982-84) was the sound heard behind cable television company’s static color-bar test pattern on Channel 36. The station was started by alternative music enthusiasts who were, for the most part, neophyte broadcasters. Some had had experience at college stations.

The sound traveled by phone line from a makeshift studio over Plan 9 record store in Carytown to Continental, which sent the signal out on its lines. The DJs were invited volunteers -- several were musicians -- and they essentially played and said whatever they liked.

The eclectic, spontaneous style Stanley developed then is what he has used when he could ever since. He dubbed his show, “The Frontline -- 360 degrees of Ba-Lack Music.” Stanley closed each show with what has become his signature sign-off as Eric E, the performer: “Gotta go … Gotta go.”

From WANT to WVGO

In the radio business some things change fast, others never change. One day you’re the toast of the town. The next week your front door key doesn’t work because the station’s locks have been changed; you’ve been sacked. Eric Stanley, like anyone who has hung around for any time in the radio biz, has been buffeted about by a variety of stations through all sorts of changes in ownership and format.

The story of how he came to his present gig on Sunday nights picks up in 1988, when WRNL, 910-AM, hired Eric Stanley to host an oldies midday show. Later, he expanded into Saturday nights, with an R&B-oriented oldies show.

In 1990 Harriet McLeod, popular music writer for the Richmond News Leader wrote:

Stanley, music director since January, has set out to make it [WRNL] Richmond’s funkiest radio station, adding to the oldies format B-sides, album cuts, tunes that never charted in the era when sales in black-owned record stores, and often sales of black artists, weren’t counted for the charts. Stanley draws much of his playlist from a personal collection of 5,000 albums, singles, tapes, CDs.

His move to WRXL-FM marked the beginning of the Bebop Boogie & Blues Revue, which Eric E hosted on Sunday nights. Although it was Blues-based, this time he got the freedom to do something closer to what he had done with his Color Radio show. At this point he called his format “free-form.”

Among other things freeform meant taking risks in stride. In speaking of two of his favorite musicians, Miles Davis and John Coltrane, Stanley says, “The ones [musicians] who got the most respect took chances.”

His next move, in 1992, was to WVGO, 106.5-FM. The new station positioned itself as an alternative to "classic rock" and took the Richmond market by storm. Soon Stanley was recognized widely for his amazing crossover success: in other words, a black radio personality appealing to a white audience. Suddenly he was everywhere; hosting live events for the station and the darling of local entertainment writers.

On the air Eric E pushed the envelope, even for a station with a so-called “alternative” format. In addition to his “almost anything but opera” style of presentation he made a point of playing the recordings of local acts, too; such as Boy O Boy, the Good Guys and Theories of the Old School.

In 1994, having acted as DJ/host of a blues night at Mulligan’s Sports Bar for five years, he moved his act to Memphis Bar & Grill in Shockoe Bottom. There he played records and presented live music on Wednesday night for two years. But in October of 1995 the wind shifted in the market once again. Eric E and WVGO went their separate ways. And the next year he moved his live version of Bebop Boogie & Blues Revue to the Moondance Saloon. At this point he was also busy doing voice-overs for commercials and acting as a consultant and/or executive producer for several area bands' recording projects.

Diagnosis and Recovery

Over the years the resourceful Eric Stanley has worked a number of jobs to fill in and around his show business activities. It was in one of those situations that he suddenly learned of a totally unexpected problem. A screening for prostate cancer, conducted through his workplace, Haley Pontiac, revealed that he had no viable option to surgery, which took place in July of 2000.

Since this meant no work for a lengthy spell and his insurance was inadequate to cover all the ramifications, money problems loomed, not to mention the natural worry about his prognosis. Although these were dark days, there was a shaft of light at the end of the tunnel.

Enter two friends: Marilyn Marable and Lee Pillsbury. Overnight they organized a benefit show at Alley Katz, a Shockoe Bottom live stage. The all-star lineup included; Plunky & Oneness, Rene Marie, Jazz Poets Society, Bio Ritmo, The Deprogrammers/Good Guys (a combination of the two bands), Car Bomb, Inc., The Nighthawks, Helel, and Fighting Gravity.

Of the night of the Alley Katz extravaganza, Stanley says: "The most humbling thing was when they put that benefit on."

Today, cancer free and undergoing no cancer-related treatment, he laughs at an unflattering photograph of a somewhat wan-looking Eric E that accompanied an article about the benefit. "When I saw that picture of me I thought I was dying."

Since then the American Cancer Society has approached him about acting as a spokesman for the organization, speaking to groups of men on the importance of testing.

“Since I’m exercising and eating better, I may be healthier than I was,” says the ever upbeat Stanley. “Last year, I was diagnosed and treated for cancer. Thanks to God, a real good woman [the previously mentioned Marilyn Marable], a good doctor, and the mojo [a green bag of mysterious herbs, bone powder and who-knows-what? he picked up in New Orleans years ago] I keep in my pocket, I'm still here and laughing at you."

Sunday Night Live

Now that Eric E is back in the saddle, the last Arbitron ratings book [as of this writing] reported that the Bebop Boogie & Blues Revue had already shot to a close second to WCDX-FM, Power 92, in his time-slot, among listeners in the 25-to-54 demographic.

So instead of complaining about how lame radio in Richmond can be, the reader is advised to tune in to Eric E for an escape from the ordinary. On top of its entertainment value, his show is not unlike a class in music history. Yes, Stanley sounds very much the professor as he explains, for example, how Muddy Waters put together the traditional electrified blues ensemble of two guitars, drums and harmonica, with piano on occasion.

In fact, Professor Eric E is teaching a class, American Music: Blues, Hip Hop, Jazz, and Rock 'n' Roll, at St. Catherine’s School this semester. So the young ladies on Grove Avenue, nestled up to the Country Club of Virginia, are learning how Chuck Berry took Country & Western songs and gave them a Blues shuffle-beat in order to become a Rock ‘n’ Roll pioneer.

Those private school students will also be exposed to Eric E. Stanley’s well-honed thoughts on the power of music to reach across cultural barriers. Of music’s ability to bring people of different backgrounds together he says: “Many times it’s the hammer that breaks the wall down.”

From the Hilltop Restaurant, by way of countless hours of platter-spinning air-time, Eric Stanley, 52-years-old on February 26 (a birthday he shares with music legends Fats Domino and Johnny Cash), is at the top of his game, again.

Meanwhile, as the former hamburger flipper and dancing drum major would no doubt say at this point, “Gotta go … gotta go.”

* 

Note: A year-and-a-half later, it was my sad duty to write the piece that follows for Richmond.com:

RICHMOND, VA (August 19, 2003): The horns wailed as they entered the Arthur Ashe Center. At about 12:30 p.m. a brass New Orleans-style procession playing "Just A Closer Walk With Thee" led the family, friends and fans of the late L. Eric "Rick" Stanley into the memorial ceremony.

It was a service for the deejay known to his local listeners as Eric E. Stanley died on August 12, 2003.

The program billed the occasion as a "celebration of life." What followed the procession, two hours-plus of music and colorful Rick Stanley anecdotes with a somewhat restrained dose of old-time religion, lived up to the billing.

Many of the faces in the crowd of approximately 1,500 were familiar to anyone who has followed the live music scene in Richmond over the last 20-some years. Interestingly, for a city reputed to be trapped in habits that separate blacks from whites, Stanley once again demonstrated his unique ability to appeal to both sides of Broad Street.

Eric Stanley, who was 53 when cancer took his life, was the host and producer of the Bebop, Boogie, & Blues Review, a radio show of his own invention that was heard most recently on WJMO-105.7FM on Sunday nights. As well, he was a promoter/producer of many live shows.

Stanley's bright-eyed daughter, Erin Stanley, closed her remarks with her father's trademark radio sign-off: "Gotta go ... gotta go."

Tears flowed – of course they did – but the overall mood in the room was decidedly upbeat. Stanley's presence was symbolized throughout the cavernous space by photographs and other traditional remembrances on display, which included his own harmonica – a Hohner Pro Harp, a 10-hole diatonic with black cover-plates.

For the recessional the musicians played "When the Saints Go Marching In" to lead the gathering into the sunlight.

Those who were so disposed went to the closest restaurant/bar, Dabney's, where a lively reception ensued, and lingered. No doubt, it was a crowd Rick Stanley would have enjoyed being a part of.

His silent black harmonica was there. 

-- 30 --

 

Photo by Al Wekelo

'Napoleon' in Manhattan

Abel Gance and Kevin Brownlow in 1967

A few years ago, a chat with a master projection booth technician I met brought to mind a unique movie-watching experience. The conversation was with Chapin Cutler; we were talking about old movie houses when he mentioned that over four decades back he had worked in the booth at the old Orson Welles Cinema in Cambridge. 

In my early days as manager at the Biograph I had a few telephone conversations with the manager of that famous movie theater (I don‘t recall his name). Occasionally, in those days, I talked with my counterparts at repertory cinemas/art houses in other cities. Usually it was a matter of shipping prints of films back and forth in buses, trains, planes and station wagons. The Orson Welles (1969-86) was known then as quite a trend-setter.

Cutler also said he was working in the projection booth at Radio City Music Hall when I saw Abel Gance‘s “Napoleon” on October 24, 1981. He said he had supervised the installation of the synchronized three-projector system it took to present Gance’s restored 1927 masterpiece. It was no easy task to present that film in a fashion faithful to what Gance had labeled “polyvision.” Which entailed split screen images, a quite mobile camera and other special effects, including some splashes of color. All pretty edgy stuff in 1927.

The restoration of the film is a pretty good story, itself. In a nutshell, it was a 20-year project that was supervised by film historian Kevin Brownlow. Then the film, which had been released over the years at various running times, was edited into to a four-hour version by Francis Ford Coppola, whose company, American Zoetrope, released it.

Just as the French filmmaker had originally envisioned, a live orchestra accompanied the silent film. The new score was written by Carmine Coppola, the father of Francis the Zoetrope boss. 

*

As the reader may know, throughout the 1920s Abel Gance had been seen as a great filmmaking innovator. A visionary, maybe even a genius. Then came the mammoth production, “Napoleon,” and its abysmal failure at the box office. In 1927 (or any year), it cost a theater a lot of money to override all  of its systems and install the equipment it took to present it properly, with three projectors working in unison to fill three big screens. 

 

Because few theaters opted to install such a unprecedented, one-off system, the first-run engagements in all of Europe were quite limited. Then boom! "talkies" came along and silent films, in general, were shelved. 

 

Although Gance kept working on filmmaking projects, in the years to come he sometimes spiraled into dark periods of despair. There was a low point when he was said to have burned some of the footage from his original cut of “Napoleon.” So, today, nobody really knows what its true running time ought to be. Hey, I’ve read accounts that suggest some where along the line Gance thought he wanted it to run nine hours. 

 

Eventually, Gance became obsessed with re-editing “Napoleon,” perpetually, trying desperately to transform some new version of it into an important film. A film that would be seen and appreciated by a wide audience. All of which coaxed some observers into seeing him as a washed up crackpot. Thus, finding backing, or work, in the filmmaking industry became more and more difficult. 

 

*

To get to Manhattan I drove to D.C. and then took the train to New York. On the road I got stoned and listened to Kraftwerk albums. During the Metroliner trip from Union Station to Penn Station I read several Charles Bukowski stories from a paperback edition of “Erections, Ejaculations, Exhibitions, and General Tales of Ordinary Madness.” 

 

That book had been purchased at City Lights Bookstore in San Francisco eight months earlier the same year. But I hadn't read any more of it since the flight home. Now I have to say, it turned out that reading several of Bukowski’s briefly-told tales, back-to-back, on a fast-moving train was a gas. To top it off, the whole trip was part of a business project I had been brought in on. 

 

My Biograph bosses in Georgetown asked me to go see “Napoleon” -- with the orchestra -- to gauge the show's commercial potential in markets in the mid-Atlantic region. They were considering making a move to become a sub-distributor of the film and handle it like a road show. They were especially interested in hearing how I would promote it, if they took the plunge. 

 

So, I was traveling on other people’s money ... always the best way to travel. Then, during my walk from the hotel to the theater, bad luck flung a sharp-edged cinder into my eye. 

 

When the movie started I couldn’t watch it, because I couldn’t get the damn thing out of my eye. It was killing me! Since my mission was to WATCH the movie, I had to do something, pronto, so I went out to the lobby to find a men's room.

Long story short, my efforts in the men's room to solve the problem got nowhere. Corny as it sounds, my next move was to ask the first Radio City Music Hall employee I encountered in the lobby if there was a doctor in the house.

The answer was, “Yes.” Hey, this was Manhattan. 

 

Of course there was a doctor on duty to flush blinding cinders out of the patrons’ eyes. It was done quickly. Smoothly. Although the cinder had packed quite a punch, it turned out the thing actually weighed less than a pound. 

 

Back in the auditorium, the movie was spectacular. The power of that score, performed by a full orchestra, would be difficult to overstate. I left the theater overwhelmed. So I returned to Richmond more than a little enthusiastic about the possibility of being associated with screening the same movie at the Mosque in Richmond, and in other large theaters in the region with orchestra pits.

 

*

 

A 1-sheet for the show I attended.

However, the notion of booking Abel Gance’s greatest filmmaking feat in selected cities, accompanied by live orchestras, eventually withered and died. I suppose it was considered a bad risk outside of the largest markets. A year or so later, when it went into general release, the sound was put on the film in a conventional way. CinemaScope was used to show the triptych effect. 

The ambitious deal my bosses had in mind never panned out. Still, the new four-hour version of “Napoleon” from Zoetrope did run at the Richmond Biograph in February of 1983, to mark the cinema's 11th anniversary. It was still impressive, but the experience was not at all what it had been like in Manhattan. However, at the Biograph, I did finally get to see the section of the movie at the beginning I had missed before.

By the way, three weeks after I saw Gance's "Napoleon" at Radio City Music Hall he died. However, at 92, the old boy had managed to live long enough to see his reputation as a great filmmaker rehabilitated. 

 

Well, maybe "restored" is the better word. At the time of his death, in the fall of 1981, critics were once again calling Abel Gance a "genius" in their praise for his "Napoleon." Which provides a satisfying ending to this meandering story.

-- 30 --

‘Beware of False Prophets'

Speaking of the highest court in the land, it's probably fair to say that most professional opinion writers have not had one of their columns become part of the published record of a Supreme Court decision. Still, over the years and years of decisions handed down, no doubt, many political writers have indeed had one or more of their pieces entered into the official record by lawyers pressing cases. However, I'm guessing most of them haven't had their work used with weirder circumstances surrounding it than a particular OpEd that I penned in 2010 about a tricky freedom of speech case. 

Then, in 2011, the (Roberts) Supreme Court ruled that the First Amendment indeed protected the Westboro demonstrators in what was known as the "Snyder Case." It was afterward that I learned from a couple of friends that a column of mine had been presented and used to support the argument advanced by the attorneys representing the Westboro Baptist Church. 

Yikes! 

Hey, 12 years ago, when I wrote "How Free Are We to Express Hate?" for Richmond.com, it never occurred to me that down the road it would be converted into a tool for the Westboro sickos. Although I agreed with what became the Court's decision, with what I wrote before the decision was announced, my aim had been to put the Phelps Clan, itself, in an especially bad light. 

OK, you be the judge, here's the piece I'm talking about:

"How Free Are We to Express Hate?" by F.T. Rea

The Westboro Baptist Church stretches the word “church” into a shape that boggles the mind. It is best known for force-feeding its messages about hate into situations in which they are particularly offensive. According to the Westboro gospel, the list of people that God hates includes Jews, Catholics, Muslims, atheists and gays.

In 1955 Westboro’s founder was Fred W. Phelps; at this writing he is still the pastor of the independent church based in Topeka, Kansas. According to reports most of the church’s 70-or-so members are related to Phelps.

Members of Westboro‘s congregation were in Richmond on Mar. 2, carrying their distinctive signs about God’s hates. Since then Westboro has been in local news stories, because Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli decided against supporting a lawsuit against Westboro that was filed in Maryland by Albert Snyder.

In 2006 Snyder’s son was killed in Iraq. A Westboro contingent armed with fire and brimstone placards demonstrated outside the church at the funeral. Snyder sued Phelps for invading his privacy. Snyder prevailed and was awarded $5 million for the emotional distress he had endured.

In 2009 the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond reversed the decision, saying it violated the First Amendment’s freedom of speech protections. Furthermore, it ordered Snyder to pay Westboro’s court costs of more than $16,000. In October the U.S. Supreme Court will hear Snyder’s appeal.

Cuccinelli apparently agrees with the 4th Circuit’s decision, his office cited a concern about curtailing “valid exercises of free speech,” as its reason for choosing to make Virginia just one of two states not to file a supporting amicus brief.

Westboro grabbed the national spotlight in 1998 when some of its members appeared at the Wyoming funeral of Matthew Shepard, a 21-year-old man who had been brutally murdered. The Phelps contingent brandished signs announcing that because he was gay Shepard was burning in hell.

Since then Westboro has routinely targeted military funerals, to inform grieving families that their lost loved one deserves an eternity in hell. Why? Because the deceased had died serving a nation that enables homosexuality.

When the Westboro group came to Richmond three months ago, Hermitage High School, the Virginia Holocaust Museum and the Weinstein Jewish Community Center were among its targets. At each location four people stood on the sidewalk holding up signs with messages in block lettering that said “God Hates the USA” and “God Hates Jews.” Their pre-announced appearances generated sizable counter-demonstrations, so they got the full treatment from the media -- top of the news.

The Phelps technique, while outrageous, has been seen before in Richmond. In August of 1998 an anti-abortion/pro-life group of about 50 people staged a demonstration on Monument Ave.

The occasion was the funeral of Associate Supreme Court Justice Lewis F. Powell, Jr. at Grace Covenant Presbyterian Church. The demonstrators set themselves up on the grassy, tree-lined median strip in front of the church. Dozens of uniformed police officers were there to keep the peace.

Inside the church Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist delivered the eulogy, “…[Powell] was the very embodiment of judicial temperament; receptive to the ideas of his colleagues, fair to the parties to the case, but ultimately relying on his own seasoned judgment.”

Outside the church the eager TV crews had their cameras and microphones ready. The news-makers held up giant oozing fetus placards and posters citing Powell as a “murderer.” When Powell’s family, friends and Supreme Court colleagues came outside, following the service, they had no choice but to notice the demonstration before them. Lenses zoomed in to focus on their stunned reactions.

It’s difficult to imagine the demonstrators at Powell’s funeral changed any minds on the abortion issue by creating such a spectacle in the middle of the street. It didn’t seem they were there to persuade. It did seem they were there to punish Powell’s family and friends, because the sign-waving zealots still hated Powell for his Roe vs. Wade vote in 1973.

As disturbing as that demonstration on Monument Ave. was, it was also an example of American citizens standing on public property, exercising their right to speak their minds about matters political. Such expressions are usually protected.

However, Snyder has claimed that when he was attending his son’s funeral he was a captive audience, so he couldn’t just choose to ignore the Westboro signs.

Whether the Supreme Court will reverse the 4th Circuit’s decision on that basis remains to be seen. No doubt, it was good politics for attorneys general in those other 48 states to take Snyder’s side. Still, freedom of speech rights aren’t needed to shield popular speech. They never were. And, however designed-to-injure Phelps warmed-over Ku Klux Klan language may have seemed -- in the name of religious speech -- it was definitely political speech.

If the Supremes buy Snyder’s captive-audience argument, it seems that would open the door to laws prohibiting all sorts of demonstrations in public, because particular people couldn’t easily opt out of being subjected to them. So his lawyers may have a tough job on their hands.

If the 4th Circuit’s decision that threw out the damages on free speech grounds is upheld at the highest level, Cuccinelli is going to suddenly look smarter than the AGs in those other 48 states. Such a decision would suggest Cuccinelli wisely avoided jumping on what was an easy bandwagon … just to strike a pose.

*

Note: On March 2, 2011 the Supreme Court ruled 8-1 that the First Amendment protected the Westboro demonstrators in the Snyder case.

In the decision Chief Justice John Roberts wrote:

While these messages may fall short of refined social or political commentary, the issues they highlight -- the political and moral conduct of the United States and its citizens, the fate of our Nation, homosexuality in the military and scandals involving the Catholic clergy -- are matters of public import…

Among the papers Roberts and his colleagues had to consider were copies of the piece you just read. In the brief for respondent Fred W. Phelps, et al, on Page 4 there’s a footnote that cites “How Free Are We to Express Hate?”. 

When I found out from two friends about being in the footnote I was as surprised as it gets. Then I was delighted, because it amused me to no end that the Westboro defense team had to suck up everything else I had written about them, in order to use the part they wanted the justices to see -- the account of Justice Powell’s funeral.

Then in July of 2010, when I posted the unusual news at SLANTblog, about my piece being cited in the Westboro brief, Shirley Phelps-Roper -- Fred Phelps’ daughter and the Westboro lead attorney -- promptly commented:

It's too bad you are compelled to work so hard to distance yourself from the Word of God! This generation hates God's commandments and will NOT have that man Christ Jesus to rule over them. You are so afraid to be aligned with anything close to God that you make a fool of yourself with all your multiplying of words. How sad.

‘Mark 8:38 Whosoever therefore shall be ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation; of him also shall the Son of man be ashamed, when he cometh in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.’

BTW, you should have done your OpEd piece as if you were speaking those words to God! ALL you do should be as if you are doing it unto God, because rebel, you are.

Here’s what I posted as my answer:

Thanks for the advice. And, I have a Bible saying for you:

Matthew 7:15: ‘Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves. You will know them by their fruits.’

Ms Phelps-Roper never thanked me for writing the piece she used to defend her church's mission of spreading hate. So far, she hasn't sent me any more Bible sayings, either.

Parting shot irony: This is still the only time I can remember agreeing with Ken Cuccinelli about anything. 

 -- 30 --

The Sound

The Handbill in this story.

 

Note: A longer version of this story, set during the time in which I was a candidate, was first published in SLANT in 1987. Then, years later, I trimmed it down to this version, which ran as a Back Page in Style Weekly in 2000. Over the years, it has prompted a lot of feedback, mostly positive.  

 

A few brief flashbacks of the events described are still vivid memories. Nonetheless, for the sake of accuracy, I'm sure glad I wrote a lot of it down not all that long after it took place; while my feelings about those events were still fresh. Before some of the details of the story faded into the mists. 

 

What I can see so clearly now, looking back on my stint as a candidate -- 38 years ago! -- is how damn hard it was to do. Hey, if you've never run for public office maybe you think it's an easy task. Perish the thought. It's not. 

 

Which, of course, makes it an all the more worthwhile a project to take on, especially for a writer with some time on his hands. And, without actually running for City Council -- going to all sorts of meetings, knocking on a lot of doors, answering a million questions, speechifying before groups, organizing fundraisers, doing the interviews, posting many, many flyers on poles -- I surely wouldn't have written the piece that follows.    

*

The Sound

by F.T. Rea

 

In the spring of 1984, I ran for public office. In case the Rea for City Council campaign doesn’t ring a bell, it was a spontaneous and totally independent undertaking. No doubt, it showed. Predictably, I lost, but I’ve never regretted the snap decision to run, because the education was well worth the price.

In truth, I had been mired in a blue funk for some time prior to my letting a couple of friends, Bill Kitchen and Rocko Yates, talk me into running, as we played a foozball game in Rockitz, Kitchen's nightclub. Although I knew winning such an election was out of my reach, I relished the opportunity to have some fun mocking the system. Besides, at the time, I needed an adventure.

So it began. Walking door to door through Richmond’s 5th District, collecting signatures to qualify to be on the ballot, I talked with hundreds of people. During that process my attitude about the endeavor began to expand. People were patting me on the back and saying they admired my pluck. Of course, what I was not considering was how many people will encourage a fool to do almost anything that breaks the monotony.

By the time I announced my candidacy at a press conference on the steps of the city library, I was thoroughly enjoying my new role. My confidence and enthusiasm were compounding daily.

 

Announcing my candidacy at the Public Library.

On a warm April afternoon I was in Gilpin Court stapling handbills, featuring my smiling face, onto utility poles. Prior to the campaign, I had never been in Gilpin Court. I had known it only as “the projects.”

Several small children took to tagging along. Perhaps it was their first view of a semi-manic white guy — working their turf alone — wearing a loosened tie, rolled-up shirtsleeves, and khaki pants.

After their giggling was done, a few of them offered to help out. So, I gave them fliers and they ran off to dish out my propaganda with a spirit only children have.

Later I stopped to watch some older boys playing basketball at the playground. As I was then an unapologetic hoops junkie, it wasn’t long before I felt the urge to join them. I played for about 10 minutes, and amazingly, I held my own.

After hitting three or four jumpers, I banked in a left-handed runner. It was bliss, I was in the zone. But I knew enough to quit fast, before the odds evened out.

Picking up my staple gun and campaign literature, I felt like a Kennedyesque messiah, out in the mean streets with the poor kids. Running for office was a gas; hit a string of jump shots and the world’s bloody grudges and bad luck will simply melt into the hot asphalt.

A half-hour later the glamour of politics had worn thin for my troop of volunteers. Finally, it was down to one boy of about 12 who told me he carried the newspaper on that street. As he passed the fliers out, I continued attaching them to poles.

The two of us went on like that for a good while. As we worked from block to block he had very little to say. It wasn’t that he was sullen; he was purposeful and stoic. As we finished the last section to cover, I asked him a question that had gone over well with children in other parts of town.

“What’s the best thing and the worst thing about your neighborhood?” I said with faux curiosity.

He stopped. He stared right through me. Although I felt uncomfortable about it, I repeated the question.

When he replied, his tone revealed absolutely no emotion. “Ain’t no best thing … the worst thing is the sound.”

“What do you mean?” I asked, already feeling a chill starting between my shoulder blades.

“The sound at night, outside my window. The fights, the gunshots, the screams. I hate it. I try not to listen,” he said, putting his hands over his ears to show me what he meant.

Stunned, I looked away to gather my ricocheting thoughts. Hoping for a clue that would steady me, I asked, “Why are you helping me today?”

He pointed up at one of my handbills on a pole and replied in his monotone. “I never met anybody important before. Maybe if you win, you could change it.”

Words failed me. Yet I was desperate to say anything that might validate his hope. Instead, we both stared silently into the afternoon’s long shadows. Finally, I thanked him for his help. He took extra handbills and rode off on his bike.

As I drove across the bridge over the highway that sequestered his stark neighborhood from through traffic, my eyes burned and my chin quivered like my grandfather’s used to when he watched a sad movie.

Remembering being 12 years old and trying to hide my fear behind a hard-rock expression, I wanted to go back and tell the kid, “Hey, don’t believe in guys passing out handbills. Don’t fall for anybody’s slogans. Watch your back and get out of the ghetto as fast as you can.”

But then I wanted to say, “You’re right! Work hard, be tough, you can change your neighborhood. You can change the world. Never give up!” During the ride home to the Fan District, I swore to myself to do my absolute best to win the election.

A few weeks later, at what was billed as my victory party, I, too, tried to be stoic as the telling election results tumbled in. The incumbent carried six of the district’s seven precincts. I carried one. The total vote wasn’t even close. Although I felt like I’d been in a car wreck, I did my best to act nonchalant.

 

*

In the course of my travels these days, I sometimes hear Happy Hour wags laughing off Richmond’s routine murder statistics. They scoff when I suggest that maybe there are just too many guns about; I’m told that as long as “we” stay out of “their” neighborhood, there is little to fear.

But remembering that brave Gilpin Court newspaper boy, I know that to him the sound of a drug dealer dying in the street was just as terrifying as the sound of any other human being giving up the ghost.

If he's still alive, that same boy would be older than I was when I met him. The ordeal he endured in his childhood was not unlike what children growing up in any number of the world’s bloody war zones are going through today. Plenty of them must cover their ears at night, too.

For the reader who can’t figure out how this story could eventually come to bear on their own life, then just wait … listen up.

 -- 30 --

Propaganda War Update

Since 9/11 the Democratic Party's leaders have been consistently losing the propaganda war to the Republican Party's leaders. I suppose we could argue over how badly Democrats have been losing. We might not agree over why. But there's no doubt that for a generation, now, the conservative politicians and flacks have consistently been better at motivating their brand of voters than their liberal counterparts have been at coaching up their voters.

Sure, in the last 20 years the left won a few battles. Still, more often than not, the right has gotten some version of what it wanted in the way of public perception to stick to the wall. 

OK, during his presidency, Barrack Obama scored some points in the game -- Obamacare! -- but if he had actually won most of the key information battles during his eight years in the White House, we probably wouldn't have had to suffer through four years of President Trump. Thus, while Obama's charm got him elected president twice, policy-wise, he still didn't change many minds, to sell the Democrats' other progressive problem-solving ideas. 

However, during the Obama presidency, the charm-challenged Mitch McConnell -- helped by the surly Tea Party movement -- stiff-armed the Democrats' agenda, quite effectively. And, they somehow seemed to convince John Q. Public that having the GOP standing as the party of, "No!" and tax cuts (which is an oblique way of saying, "No") was a worthy strategy. 

Put another way, if liberals have really been right about how to deal with, even solve, the USA's biggest problems, how come we haven't seen a healthy majority of voters in two-thirds of the states happy to buy their approach? How come so many people still don't trust science? Instead, while optimistic but boring Democrats have talked about how to craft solutions, pessimistic but angry Republicans have consistently drowned them out by hurling blame at Democrats. 

Consequently, the river of disinformation coming out of extreme right-wingers has been shaping John Q. Public's perception of what actually constitutes a problem. For instance, how the hell is outlawing abortion truly solving a problem? Consequently, the USA has been in the process of creeping toward the policies of backward nations that routinely treat women as semi-citizens who don't enjoy the same rights as full-citizens: men.

With the mid-terms six months away, well-meaning Democratic Party candidates don't have a lot of time to wise up, reconfigure their approach to messaging and start winning the propaganda war. 

Come on, Democrats! If Trump isn't the most mock-worthy politician in the country, who is? And, there are plenty of mock-worthy weirdos in the Republican Party lining up to be the next Trump. 

So, remember, when it comes to being persuasive, being the funniest guy in the room is sometimes better than being the smartest guy in the room.

VCU’s 2022 Rrecruiting Class

From Chris Kowalczyk, VCU Assistant A.D. : "Toibu 'Tobi' Lawal (London,  England/Lee Academy (ME) has signed a National Letter of Intent with VCU, Rams Head Coach Mike Rhoades announced Monday, May 9, 2022. 

“'We are very happy Tobi committed to our program,' Rhoades said. 'He is a very versatile player with impressive size and athleticism. He fits our style tremendously. We can’t wait for him to get on campus. He is a big man that loves the game and all the work. His motor and approach will be surely appreciated by Ram Nation.'

 

"A uniquely athletic, 6-foot-8, 200-pound forward, Lawal joins the Rams following a prep season at Lee Academy in which he averaged 14.5 points, 11.4 rebounds, 3.0 blocks and 2.0 steals, while shooting 67 percent from the floor for Coach Dan Haynes. Lawal also starred for the City of London Academy prior to his tenure at Lee.

 

"Lawal’s signing completes VCU’s 2022 recruiting class. He joins an incoming group that features high school standouts Christian Fermin (Pocono Summit, Pa./Pocono Mountain West) and Alphonzo 'Fats' Billups (Richmond, Va./Varina), as well as transfers Brandon Johns Jr. (East Lansing, Mich./Michigan), Zeb Jackson (Toledo, Ohio/Michigan) and David Shriver (Philippi, W. Va./Hartford)."

Living in the Moment

 "Tin soldiers and Nixon coming ... Four dead in Ohio"

-- From "Ohio" (1970) by Neil Young

April 30, 1970: President Richard Nixon announced on television that he had authorized the invasion of Cambodia. This border-crossing escalation outraged many in the anti-war movement.

May 4, 1970: During an anti-war demonstration on the Kent State campus, elements of the Ohio National Guard shot four students to death. Those victims were: Allison Krause, Jeffrey Miller, Sandra Scheuer and William Schroeder. Nine others were injured.

May 9, 1970: Two friends rode with me from Richmond to Washington D.C. in my 1956 baby blue Cadillac. We made that 100-mile trip to see firsthand what sort of protest would erupt in reaction to the sudden specter of a college campus becoming a war zone. Other than that I don't think we had a clear plan. The photos accompanying the text of this piece were taken with my then-new Ricoh 35mm single lens reflex.

 

*

As the crowd was being funneled into the grassy ellipse south of the White House, the designated demonstration area, the morning’s temperature had already surged into the 90s. The clinging heat added to the growing sense in the air that anything could happen. 

The White House grounds and Lafayette Park were surrounded by D.C. Transit System buses, parked snugly end-to-end. Looking through the bus windows I noticed that inside the bus wall perimeter, every few yards, there was a cop in riot gear stationed -- apparently standing ready to deal with anyone who dared to try to climb across the wall of buses.  

 
Estimates ranged widely but most reports characterized the size of the crowd at well over 100,000. In those days crowd-estimators frequently let their politics color their numbers, so partisans generally seemed to pick the number that suited them. 

 

Home-made signs were everywhere, including a sprinkling of placards that denounced the mostly-young throng of war protesters. When the program of speakers and singers began, the smell of burning marijuana was already lending its distinctive fragrance to the ambience, giving the politically-driven gathering the feel of an outdoor rock ‘n’ roll festival. So it's worth noting that this was about nine months after the legendary Woodstock Music and Art Fair.

Unlike most of the large anti-war demonstrations of that era, which were planned well in advance, this time it all fell together rather spontaneously. From what I could tell from conversations and from reading accounts of the event, a good many in the crowd had never before marched in protest or support of war. Nonetheless, this time, for whatever reasons, they had heard the call to head for Washington, D.C. — to live in the moment.

*

 

As a convoy of olive drab military vehicles drove into the park area, many in the crowd booed. When it turned out the uniformed troops were bringing in bottled water for the thirsty, the booing subsided. Dehydration was a problem that cloudless day.

After the last speaker’s presentation, thousands of attendees marched out of the park area into the streets. There was talk of stretching a line of humanity all the way around the line of buses. Whether he liked it, or not, the commander-in-chief, reportedly inside the White House, would surely hear the crowd’s anti-war chants.

The demonstration flowed north, then west, from one block to the next. Long lenses peered down from the tops of those distinctively squat D.C. buildings. Fully-equipped-for-battle soldiers could be seen in doorways, awaiting further orders. With the tragedy at Kent State fresh in their minds, many of them must have been afraid they might be ordered to fire upon their fellow Americans. 

Hippies who had been wading in a fountain to cool off scaled a statue to get a better look. A few minutes later a cheer went up. A determined kid had managed to get on top of a bus to wave a Viet Cong flag triumphantly. But it didn't last long.

When the cops hauled the flag-waver off a commotion ensued. Soon the scent of tear gas spiced the air, which kept the protesters moving...

*

May 10, 1970: The next day in Richmond I was in Monroe Park for yet another well-attended event. It was Mother's Day and what was called "Cool-Aid Sunday" featured live music, information booths and displays that were set up by various organizations. They included the Fan Free Clinic, Jewish Family Services, Rubicon (a dry-out clinic for drug-abusers), the local Voter Registrar’s office and Planned Parenthood. 

 
Although it was not a political rally to protest anything, the crowd assembled in Monroe Park -- while much smaller -- was similar to the one the day before in its overall look. As I remember it, other than some heat related dizzy spells, I don't think there were reports about anyone being killed or seriously injured at Saturday’s anti-war demonstration in D.C.

 

Then, a 17-year-old boy was killed on Sunday in the park in Richmond, when a four-tier cast iron fountain he had scaled suddenly toppled. The news photograph of Wilmer Curtis Donivan Jr. falling to his death that ran on the front page of the Richmond Times-Dispatch on the next morning, May 11, 1970, is one I’ll never forget.

No doubt, the convergence of strong feelings from the extraordinary week that had preceded Cool-Aid Sunday had helped to set the happening scene. Shortly before Donivan fell, I remember seeing him on the fountain, seemingly caught up in much the same spirit as the hippies climbing on statues in a fountain in D.C. the day before.

Without that week’s revved up anti-establishment momentum, Donivan may not have felt quite so moved to show off his conquest of that old fountain. Witnesses said he was rocking it back and forth, just before it crumbled.

*

 

That day's pleasant animating tone ended abruptly with a visit from the Grim Reaper. If Donivan's luck had been different on May 10, 1970, he might be 69 now. 

 

In the days that followed those random deaths on Kent State's campus and the one in Monroe Park -- along generational and cultural lines -- Americans became even more bitterly divided over the Department of Defense's unclear war policy in what was then called "Indochina."  

 

Every night on the televised network news, reports of the updated death counts were presented. The latest totals, representing the unlucky, appeared next to little flags on the screen. That rather matter-of-fact style of presentation looked something like the score of a ball game. 

 

*

The fountain (without water) in Monroe Park on May 9, 2021

 -- 30 --

-- Words and photos by F.T. Rea