BLANCHARD, OK., (Indiana’s NewsCenter)— 18 year old Sarah McKinley said she did what she had to do to protect her new baby The recently widowed mom killed an intruder on New Year’s Eve after a 911 operator told her, “Do what you have to do to protect your baby.”

Sarah McKinley, who was alone with her 3-month-old son in their Blanchard home, McKinley says two men — one of whom she had met previously — appeared at her door Saturday night and then tried to break in. Two days earlier, she had buried her husband, who died of cancer on Christmas Day.

It’s supposed to be somewhere under Times Topics, one of the Oklahoma stories.

I also tried finding it on MSNBC.com’s web page.  A search through their internal server brought the above story.  But nothing highlighted.

One man — identified as 24-year-old Justin Martin — had come by Thursday to express condolences. But Saturday, armed with a foot-long hunting knife, he and his partner attempted to break down McKinley’s door. She blocked it with her couch, grabbed her baby and fetched a 12-gauge shotgun and a handgun before calling 911.

McKinley said she asked the dispatcher, “I’ve got two guns in my hand — is it OK to shoot him if he comes in this door? I’m here by myself with my infant baby, can I please get a dispatcher out here immediately?”

“I can’t tell you that you can do that but you do what you have to do to protect your baby,” the dispatcher said.

The 911 conversation lasted for 21 minutes. Then the door gave in.

So, for 21 recorded minutes two men, armed with a foot-long hunting knife attempted to break into the young widow’s home.

“I waited till he got in the door. They said I couldn’t shoot him until he was inside the house. So I waited until he got in the door and then I shot him,” McKinley said.

Martin, who charged McKinley with his knife, was hit in the “upper torso,” police said. He was pronounced dead at the scene. His cohort, Dustin Louis Stewart, 29, fled but later surrendered to authorities.

I can just imagine NY Times Editor Jill Abramson, holed up in her (I suspect) Hamptons summer house with knife-wielding thieves attempting for 21 minutes to break in the door.   Might be a life changing event vis a vis gun rights.  Or not.

As a personal aside, my late father carried a gun at his business and kept either a German Shepherd or Doberman nearby.  When a rough looking customer would ask, “Does that dog bite?” his usual answer was

“Only if you mean to bite us.”

In a blog posting on Jewish Week,Hammerman wrote:

“Tebow’s mother, a Baptist missionary, became comatose during her pregnancy and was saved by drugs that nearly killed the fetus.  Doctors anticipated a stillbirth and recommended termination to protect her life, but Tim’s mother refused to abort.”

Hammerman adds:  “His mom’s decision to risk her own life rather than abort her fetus flies against my own — and Judaism’s — values.”

He asserts: “If Tebow wins the Super Bowl, against all odds, it will buoy his faithful, and emboldened faithful can do insane things, like burning mosques, bashing gays and indiscriminately banishing immigrants. While America has become more inclusive since Jerry Falwell’s first political forays, a Tebow triumph could set those efforts back considerably.”

To the board of Hammerman’s synagogue, I say:  He’s a Rabbi in Name Only.  Fire him.

To the millenial generation of Jewish women, I say:  It is not without reason that non Orthodox Jews in America are not replacing themselves.  Each new life, each potential life, is a treasure, and I weep for those never born.

To the rest of America, I say:  Please excuse my coreligionist.  I take my religion seriously, and the nation is a better country to the extent that you do likewise with yours.

Frankly, if my very existence had been so uncertain, if I had emerged to live a somewhat normal life let alone be so blessed as to quarterback an NFL team, I would be extraordinarily thankful.  Some people are said to ‘thank their lucky stars’ for outcomes such as health and an NFL career.  If Tim Tebow wants to thank his God and celebrate his religion, I say more power to him.

Your feature today entitled “Aid for Child Care Drops When It Is Needed Most” is much appreciated.

As you note,

Christian Griffith, chief consultant of the California Assembly Budget Committee, said the state cut $335 million in child care financing this year, and with hundreds of millions in cuts to other public services — courts, schools and the public university system — “there aren’t many good options at this point.”

Here is a suggestion for your editorial page and Board of Directors.  You think that providing child care for poor women is a high priority.  You and others on the left believe that the nation should continue to provide social services whether or not the nation has the resources to do so.

Why not have the New York Times Company provide or at least subsidize these services from its own till?   Yes, it is true that for the first nine months of 2011, your firm has lost $98.6 million, and it owes  $1.8 billion in various debts and pension obligations.

Yet isn’t that just what you folks are urging for a nation, which spent $3.8 trillion while taking in only $2.2 trillion? Which owes $15 trillion and counting?   We should just spend on social needs and borrow more?

Perhaps it’s time for you to take your own advice.   What’s another $20 million or even $200 million if you already owe $2 billion?   We could help you with some letters to the editor in support of it.

Very truly yours

Ashland Avenue

Here is your story: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/14/us/child-care-subsidies-drop-when-families-need-them-most.html?hpw

And here are your financials:  http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/71691/000007169111000012/nyt10-q9252011.htm

I didn’t know or care whether MF would file or escape bankruptcy proceedings.  It was pretty clear even then that stockholders of the firm would face harsh consequences.

What was unfathomable less than a week ago was the idea that hundreds of millions of customer moneys could be unaccounted for at the troubled firm.

Thus, at cnbc.com:

Federal regulators have discovered that hundreds of millions of dollars in customer money has gone missing from MF Global in recent days, prompting an investigation into the brokerage firm, which is run by Jon S. Corzine, the former New Jersey governor, several people briefed on the matter said on Monday.   http://www.cnbc.com/id/45113687

And at NYT:

The recognition that money was missing scuttled at the 11th hour an agreement to sell a major part of MF Global to a rival brokerage firm. MF Global had staked its survival on completing the deal. Instead, the New York-based firm filed for bankruptcy on Monday.

Regulators are examining whether MF Global diverted some customer funds to support its own trades as the firm teetered on the brink of collapse.  http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2011/10/31/regulators-investigating-mf-global/?hp

The collapse has led to disruptions in Chicago trading pits, where many market participants either cleared their accounts at MF or depend for settlements on others that did.

The MF denouement came at least in part because of Corzine’s view that MF should put more of its capital at risk.  Several billions of assets were positioned at risk in European sovereign bonds.  Enough so that a decline in the bonds’ value might have been enough to eliminate the MF capital.

I don’t so much mind the idea of putting one’s capital at risk.   We bear the consequences of bets gone bad, even if it’s bankruptcy.   Here’s what is unacceptable:  How does the former governor of a major state, the former CEO at Goldman Sachs, stand at the helm of an enterprise which puts $700 million of customers’ money at risk.

Want a translation for  ‘at risk’?  Say you had no margin debt, no securities in your account, just cash, and want it transferred to another firm.   Today, if your account was at MF Global, the answer back would be:  Wait a while, we can’t find it.

Remember, this is the industry in which Madame Secretary of State,  when she was just someone’s wife, put less than the legal minimum into a commodities account and saw it spun up to $100,000.  The money she made came from somewhere, presumably becoming a debit in the house’s trading account.

But, losing track of hundreds of millions of dollars in a short period of time takes more than just a tip from management.

Most likely, customer funds were wired out to settle the firm’s margin calls with counterparty firms worldwide.  Something like customer funds were wired out to Bernie Madoff’s favored spots.

Again, how does an ex-GSCO CEO, a former governor, stand by as this happens?

We should have known when he had the bodyguard/driver take the official vehicle past 90 mph on state roads.  A guy who couldn’t wait.

On April 12, 2007, Governor Corzine and 25 year-old aide Samantha Gordon were injured in an automobile accident on the Garden State Parkway near Galloway Township while traveling from the New Jersey Conference of Mayors in Atlantic City to Drumthwacket, his residence in Princeton, to meet with radio personality Don Imus and the Rutgers University women’s basketball team.^[126]

The New Jersey State Police determined that Corzine’s SUV, driven by a state trooper, was traveling in excess of 90 MPH (147 km/h) in a 65 MPH (105 km/h) zone with its emergency lights flashing when the collision occurred.^[127]  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jon_Corzine

Like I said, no problem with guys or companies putting their own capital at risk.  States and fiduciary organizations, however, should be run by grown-ups.

President Obama’s recent slogan seems to be ‘We Can’t Wait.’   Sounds a bit like Jon Corzine stepping into MF Global, doesn’t it?  We have to be big right now.  We can’t wait.

My suggestion to those who oppose the President and his party?  Teenagers and children can’t wait.  Time for grownups to take over.

What do you call a financial company leveraged 32 to one, uncertain as to whether there is a tomorrow?  How about:  one more failure of former NJ Governor John Corzine?

After losing the NJ governorship to Chris Christie, Corzine was hired to head former commodities broker MF Global.   He was not without background in securities, having served as CEO at Goldman Sachs.

On joining MF, he and its board expressed interest in transforming the firm into a mini Goldman.

MF’s $44.4 billion of liabilities are supported by $1.4 of equity.  Six billion of the assets, however, are affected by European debt renegotiations.   A 25 cent haircut in their value wipes out MF’s equity.

From today’s WSJ:

investor fears grew about the roughly $6 billion in exposure to European sovereign debt the company has disclosed holding this year. That exposure, explained in more detail during the company’s earnings call Tuesday, is a large bet relative to the $12 million in revenue the firm generated from principal trading during the latest quarter.

Lesson:  It’s just as easy to ignore a huge and growing pension liability as it is a multi billion dollar commitment to European government obligations.

Prediction:  It will take a grown-up to clean this mess up also.

June 30, 2011 Balance Sheet:  http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1401106/000119312511207641/d10q.htm#tx198607_3

WSJ Piece: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203687504576654992676019306.html?mod=WSJ_hp_LEFTWhatsNewsCollection

I just can’t get my arms around what kind of an American would put an improvised explosive device under the passenger seat of a car taking two boys to a football practice.

This from the NY Daily News:

Erik G. Chappell was driving his sons to football practice late Tuesday afternoon when a pipe bomb planted in his Volvo station wagon exploded.

 

Chappell, 42, was hurt, but his boys, Grant, 13, and Cole, 11, took the brunt of the blast and were more seriously injured.

 

Investigators told the Monroe Evening News that the plotter packed the pipe bomb with shrapnel and placed it inside the car under the passenger seat, where one of the boys was sitting at the time of the blast.

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/2011/09/22/2011-09-22_targeted_lawyers_client_suspected_of_planting_bomb_in_mich_car_bomb_case_vics_91.html#ixzz1YuFuo3qW

The Chappell bombing concerns me because I know Erik and the kind of person he is.  He represented me some time ago in a series of business disputes.

Perhaps the local bombing was even more in mind because of proceedings in New York this week to decide whether or not the United Nations should award national recognition to the Palestinian National Authority, without holding its residents to negotiating the terms and borders of such a state with the Israelis.

Even as the logo which Palestinians were using to put forward their nascent nation takes all of the present State of Israel.

Absent from the logo is any hint that Palestine consists of anything other than Arab territory. No nod is given even to the U.N.’s 1948 decision to divide the region into Jewish and Arab sectors. As for the shape of Israel by the time it was forced into waging the defensive Six Day war in 1967: irrelevant. The logo illustrates that the Palestinian bid before the U.N. for support of a unilateral declaration of statehood is disingenuous and dangerous.

There is not too much left to the imagination here: Israel is “wiped off the map.”  http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/palestinian-logo-suggests-elimination-israel_594027.html

So it was with all of this in mind this morning that I included the names of Erik, Grant and Cole Chappell at that point in the synagogue service when all are asked to pray for those who are ill, or facing difficult circumstances.

After the service, I asked the rabbi, “So, if you were Erik Chappell would you make peace with the person who did this?”  Without missing a blink, the cleric said, “Yes, I have to believe it is possible.”   Underneath it all, we were also addressing whether it is possible for the Israelis to make peace with a group that bombs its people and proposes to wipe it off the earth’s face.

Which is why, I admit to you, that Erik and the Chappells are better people than I.  This is from the statement they issued after the incident:

“As horrific as the bomb and its immediate aftermath were, we continue to be uplifted by the support we have received.  It is a testament that good will always overcomes evil.

My experience, and that of my people is less optimistic.  It is not clear to me that, “Good will always overcomes evil.”  Sometimes it does and sometimes it doesnt.

Meanwhile, my fondest hope is that when officers go to arrest the miscreant who planted that IED in Chappell’s Volvo, the suspect chooses fight over flight.  And that it takes longer for morticians to remove the shells from his body than it took doctors to remove the ball bearings from Cole’s and Grant’s legs.

I think he told me he had once been an FBI agent.  A lawyer, he superbly represented me several years ago.

It was with shock and anger that I saw the following in Free Press today:

Erik Chappell is a respected lawyer who practices in Michigan and Ohio, handling cases such as divorces and civil litigation. He’s a husband and father, a boys’ football coach for the Catholic Youth Organization and a neighbor who hosts an annual Fourth of July party.

Who wanted him dead?

Authorities don’t know the answer yet, but they do know someone planted a bomb on his Volvo to do “maximum damage,” said Special Agent Donald Dawkins of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.

As Chappell, 42, and his two young sons were driving in Monroe on Tuesday evening, the bomb detonated with such force that the blast was heard a mile away.

Flames poured out of the Volvo’s windows, and smoke billowed into the September sky.

The car burned to bare metal.

Chappell and his sons are expected to survive.

“It’s really a miracle, and it’s a blessing that everyone got out,” Dawkins said.

Dawkins said investigators had “a ton” of leads, but nothing was concrete. The ATF is offering a $10,000 reward to help identify the bomber

I am very thankful he and the boys are expected to survive.  My thoughts and prayers are with them.

http://www.freep.com/article/20110922/NEWS05/109220563/In-Monroe-shocking-car-bombing-an-unclear-motive

http://www.lydenlaw.com/

The blog piece is here http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2011/09/walgreens_pharmacist_fired_for_using_gun_to_foil_robbery.html

In the links included are absolutely terrifying videos of the robbery from the store’s surveillance system.

Apparently, Walgreens execs think employees should fully comply with demands of anyone robbing their stores.

Perhaps someone should send Walgreens the following, from www.nypost.com today.

The gunman accused of killing four people at a Long Island pharmacy this past June pleaded guilty today to five counts of first degree murder — with his lawyer saying the shooter wanted to spare the families from reliving the ordeal during a long trial.

David Laffer, 33, who showed up in a Riverhead courtroom wearing a green prison jumpsuit, nodded when asked by a judge if he wanted to plead guilty to charges — one for each of the four victims and a fifth because there were multiple murders.

“Yes, your honor,” Laffer said, as more than two dozen family members of the four victims looked on.

snip

Laffer shot and killed Raymond Ferguson, 45, employee Jennifer Mejia, 17; and customers Jaime Taccetta, 33, and Bryon Sheffield, 71, during the June 19 massacre at Haven Drugs in Medford.

Laffer allegedly swiped 10,000 pills — mostly the painkiller hydrocodone — to satisfy her addiction. Cops later found 2,000 pills in the couple’s home.

Other evidence against Laffer included surveillance video of him donning a wig and sunglasses inside the store, fingerprints that he left at the pharmacy and the murder weapon recovered at his home.

Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/li_pharmacy_shooter_pleads_guilty_EemQYqLSwHWVkvjbW0Nf2O#ixzz1XQJfB45v

Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/li_pharmacy_shooter_pleads_guilty_EemQYqLSwHWVkvjbW0Nf2O#ixzz1XQIyl75C

http://www.wzzm13.com/video/1148135991001/0/Walgreens-pharmacist-fired-for-using-gun

MACKINAW CITY — Gov. Rick Snyder led his first Mackinac Bridge Walk on Monday, striding across the 5-mile-long span with thousands of others in cold, windy weather and continuing one of Michigan’s most popular Labor Day traditions.

About 36,000 made the crossing — fewer than usual, probably because of the gloomy weather, said Bob Sweeney, executive secretary of the Mackinac Bridge Authority. Monday’s walk was the 54th-annual trek across the bridge linking Michigan’s lower and upper peninsulas.  http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2011109060327

And then there was this in the Free Press:

In his strongest words of support for organized labor, President Barack Obama told a riverfront crowd of thousands Monday in Detroit: “As long as I’m in the White House, I’m going to stand up for collective bargaining.”

snip

The crowd, estimated at about 12,000, filled the GM parking lot next to the Renaissance Center and repeatedly chanted “O-BA-MA,” “More good jobs,” and “Four more years” during the speech, especially when Obama said he was prepared to stick up for organized labor.

Then, there was this as described on FoxNews.com

Teamsters President James Hoffa called on workers to get involved in opposing Tea Party-aligned lawmakers next November.

“President Obama, this is your army, we are ready to march,” Hoffa said. “But everybody here’s got to vote. If we go back, and keep the eye on the prize, let’s take these son-of-a-bitches out.”

A Google search of the James Hoffa speech produced 22,700 results, with dozens and dozens of citations.  A search of the NY Times website, on Hoffa speech Detroit, produced the AP story about President Obama’s Labor Day speech, which contained  no reference to Hoffa’s remarks.

He was speaking to an audience of organized labor, to the accompaniment of cheers in the background:  Four more years, Four more years, Four more years!

What  he said (verbatim) was, “and we just need Congress to get on board” to his plans of spending massive amounts on what he described as reconstruction of America’s roads and bridges.

What he meant  (de jure)  was that we just need all of you, and your children, and your grandchildren, and probably their children as well, to get on board for servicing the debt we are going to incur to build these roads.

Of course, it’s possible what the President meant was that he would agree as the nation’s chief executive (as every ceo does) to a program of setting priorities with the nation’s capital.  Perhaps to afford funds to rebuild roads and bridges, we should spend less on providing medical care for illegal aliens who cross over our borders to have Anchor Babies.

Perhaps he meant that we should spend less on unemployment compensation for folks who’ve been on the dole for over a year.  Perhaps he thought that funds going down the Green Energy rat hole are best used for road construction.

If that is true, he has every opportunity to tell the nation about it on Thursday night when President Obama addresses a joint session of Congress about his plans to expand the nation’s jobs and conserve the nation’s capital.

Those who still harbor some last bit of optimism that Obama might give the cost of a Green Lantern comic book towards caution about our expanding levels of debt might want to re-think what the warm up speaker for the President had to say about America’s Tea Party.  Teamsters President James Hoffa Jr. said:

“President Obama, this is your army. We are ready to march. Let’s take these son of bitches out and give America back to an America where we belong,” Hoffa added.