Sunday, May 18, 2008

Rest In Peace Rebeckha Whitefield.


She lost control of her Jeep Liberty on a rain slicked road and hit a tree. She was thrown from the vehicle. A witness said she ran outside after she heard a crash outside her home, and saw two bodies strewn on the street. The witness said she wants to erase the memory of this because it is too disturbing. The other passenger in the vehicle, a 16 year old male friend of Rebeckha's is in the hospital with severe head trauma. The poor girl never lived her life. She planned on riding horses again after she began taking a criminal law class, but all her plans will go unfulfilled. She will never go to her junior prom. A sweet girl who always smiled will never smile again. I can't reconcile the memory of her at work with the idea of her being killed and never coming back to work. I hate death. I hate it.

Rebeckha, you were always sweetly nice, and a pleasure to work with. I will miss your beautiful big blue eyes and the warm smile that always melted my frazzled face on those hectic freaky Fridays. I will miss seeing you at the phone and the computer. I wish I had known you longer. Rest in peace, Rebeckha. May God keep you in His loving embrace forever.

Thursday, May 15, 2008

A Red Sox Fan Gets What He Deserves!

A Tuesday, May 13, 2008 article in the Boston Herald, by Hillary Chabot entitled, "Yanks Fan Suckers Sox Guy For $25G" explains how a Boston Red Sox fan named David Sanborn (no relation to the great Saxophone player by the same name) started a fight with a Yankees fan at a California bar, and got punched in the mouth in self defense.

Ms. Chabot seemed incredulous because the Yankees fan, Mario Melendez, sued Sox fan David Sanborn for damages incurred when his punch knocked a tooth out of his assailant's mouth and it got lodged in his hand. Oh, how dare he fight back! The nerve of that damned Yankee! Mr. Melendez is a musician and his hands are his bread and butter. What else should he have done, given the fact that Mr. Sanborn assaulted him and picked him up in the air like a rag doll? Should he have hung suspended in the air, passively like a possum, waiting for the 6'1" brute to body slam him to the floor? Any one in his right mind would have fought back the same way.

So what drove the Red Sox fan to such an extreme display of violence? "No one wants to hear a Yankees fan cheering," Sanborn said. Yes, you read it correctly. This was his reason. Sanborn was watching the Sox game on one television while Melendez was watching the Yanks game on another. When Jason Giambi scored a home run for the Yanks, Mr. Melendez cheered for his team, and this aggravated Mr. Sanborn, who then shouted at Melendez, "Sit your fat ass down, Jeter." The confrontation escalated and Sanborn attacked Melendez. Sanborn didn't like it that a Yankees fan had the nerve to cheer his own team!

He grew up hating the Yankees. No surprise here. "I'll always hate them. I hate them to this day and I'll probably hate them when I'm 6 feet under."

And Hillary Chabot ignores this fact, as if hate is a normal thing that every human being should feel towards the winningest team in sports history. She concludes her article by mentioning that "a Yankees fan was charged with running down and killing a Red Sox fan with a car outside a New Hampshire bar last week.," as if David Sanborn's violent behavior was justifiable vengeance for an unrelated killing. This shows that Hillary Chabot is as stupid as the Red Sox fan she defends in her piece of worthless journalism.

Yet, Ms. Chabot's incredulity matches that of the attacker, Mr. Sanborn, who called Mr. Melendez a "typical Yankees fan," and went on to say that "it just goes to show what a Yankees fan is like. They're greedy." David Sanborn was generalizing, saying that all Yankees fans are alike, and that they are all greedy. In other words, just because the New York Yankees baseball organization has more money than the Boston Red Sox baseball organization, that makes Yankees fans greedy. How one relates to the other is a mystery. Yet, Ms. Chabot seems to think it's okay for a Red Sox fan to verbally abuse and physically assault Yankees fans. Not only did she not condemn the Red Sox fan for his assault, battery and violent brutality, she called Mr. Melendez' lawsuit "an even lower blow than when A-Rod swatted the ball out of Bronson Arroyo's glove." She went on to describe Mr. Melendez' justified lawsuit as "a new bid to see just how low the Evil Empire can go."

Hillary Chabot needs to reassess her priorities and to start behaving like a journalist. What David Sanborn did was wrong, uncalled for and downright stupid. What Mario Melendez did was right. A true journalist will call a spade a spade. The Red Sox fan was verbally and physically abusive, violent and dangerous. The Yankees fan was innocent, minding his own business and had every right to retaliate with force to defend himself from this crazed, hate-spewing fanatic, and to sue him on top of that. As far as I see it, if criminal charges have not been brought on to the Red Sox fan, that too should be demanded. Put the Red Sox fan in jail for a month, just to teach him a lesson in respect and minding his own damned business.

The Red Sox fan got what he deserved. This should be a loud message to Red Sox Nation that Yankees fans will not stand for such violence against them. Of course, they won't hear it from Hillary Chabot. And, of course, no one could expect anything better from an ink-stained rag like the Boston Herald.