In The World Of Disabled Texans, A Time For Cracking Down On Parking Abusers...

By PATRICK ALCATRAZ
Editor

AUSTIN, Texas - Beginning tomorrow morning, anyone pulling into a public parking spot designated for the disabled better be disabled. Long a joke to most people who need these spaces, officials here have decided the laugh will now have a new punchline: a $511 fine.

On top of that, Austin is making it a criminal offense.

Until now, those ticketed for violating the law were allowed to merely pay a $278 fine and be done with it. But critics of the old law enforcement practice charged that the police department never made the law a priority, that its officers rarely busted anyone not disabled. That will change today, says Mayor Lee Leffingwell.

The law applies equally to anyone driving or riding a car or motorcycle or bicycle.

In communities elsewhere in Texas, the fine for parking in slots for the disabled can dip to as low as $100 for violators. Many communities do not assign officers the specific duty of eyeballing disabled parking spaces. Additionally, this city will also target those who use fake disabled parking stickers, also making it a criminal offense subject to the hefty fine. Those fines, say officials here, will escalate for second or third offenses, with community service also being an option for judges handing out penalties.

For beginners, Austin says its officers will use the coming weeks to vigorously monitor disabled parking...

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Look Homeward, Angel: Yeah, We're Not Always In The RGV, But, Then, Of Course We Are...

By PATRICK ALCATRAZ
Editor

AUSTIN, Texas - In New York, they would tell me that my living there meant that, try as I might, I'd never be able to leave the city behind. Gotham grabs you in a certain way, they said before noting that, yeah, I'd return sooner or later. Perhaps they referred to the city's verve, that feeling that comes over you when inspiration has found your veins and everything seems possible.

I have been back to New York several times, although much of that has to do with my daughter Gabrielle living there. The city that never sleeps is special, but there's another place that holds me just as dearly:

My hometown.

McAllen and I have had this ever-raging love/hate affair since I left the Rio Grande Valley to serve the military. I never came home. My time in the U.S. Navy was followed by my years at UT-Arlington and later my Journalism career in newspapers and magazines from Houston to Boston to New York. I love McAllen because it retains my roots and because it still affords me a few visuals of those days, when I was a teenager and when my lovely mother was alive. I hate it when I see what it's become, a hodge-podge of development that speaks to money mania and not a well-thought-out journey to something unique.

What is it about our native lands?

A drive down some old familiar byway like Houston Street in McAllen sends me back decades, like when I see a downed fence fronting property I still recall from my days at Travis Junior High. Or a view of a chain link fence separating two homes, such as the one in the photo above this story. Much of McAllen has fast-forwarded to 2011, its streets now lined by new and improved business fronts, much better residential neighborhoods, the entire however-burgeoning visual of what a city should look like in the Year 2011.

It's not like I get a knot in my throat as I drive my hometown when I'm there. Too much time has passed and too much has come to McAllen in the ensuing years. The Bulldog water tower is still there just south of McHi, my old school. The old convention center on S. 10th Street, where the prom came with the music of bands such as The Troggs and Billy J. Kramer & The Dakotas (school officials we were told prohibited the playing of music by the Rolling Stones, however). Still, Prom Night back then meant you chased the comfort of air-conditioned dancing in McAllen and then sultry love across the Rio Grande in Reynosa, where the clubs never closed.

I don't know. I don't know. I worry that one of these days, I'll return to the Valley and see change of the sort that will shoot my memories down the tubes, buried like black & white photos in a dusty scrapbook. Not that I've seen much. Brownsville is still Brownsville and Harlingen is still Harlingen. With few exceptions, most valley communities look as they did in the 70s, newer cars and better roads replacing the battered Chevies and Buicks and Fords of yesteryear, modern blacktops replacing caliche streets and roads that flooded in the weakest of rains. Change is good. But it does mean unexpected goodbyes.

Backward glances are said to be good for the soul. Who knows? I look back and see my back pages have turned a certain yellow in color. And while it's been a good life, I wonder how many of us wouldn't trade one year of whatever time we have left for one long weekend from back then?

I remember.

And, well, I'm grateful for that. And I appreciate being able to move down New York's crowded sidewalks and believe I belong, as I also appreciate cruising 17th Street in McAllen while knowing that I came from a few blocks over...

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For Texas Voter ID Legislation, There Is Still A Long Way To Go...South Texas Against It Except For One Guy...

By PATRICK ALCATRAZ
Editor

AUSTIN, Texas - The former mayor of this city, now a state senator, says he has a better idea on how to protect the integrity of the voting booth: make fraud a felony. That's State Sen. Kirk Watson's idea, and it sounds good. The Democrat, however, has little clout in the battle now being waged by legislators here, most of whom are Republicans who want the state to better-monitor its voting practices.

While it was entertained by his colleagues, Watson's plan went nowhere. The bill was approved by the state senate yesterday and now goes to the House of Representatives, where it is expected to face a little tougher fight. At best, they say, it'll be a month before things are ironed-out there. Not that the crowing is lessening.

State Sen. Mario Gallegos, a Democrat from Houston, sees it as a misguided case of nonsense. Where some Reopublicans would like all Texas voters to flash a state-approved identification card when entering the voting precincts, Gallegos thinks it will only create a legal mess of astral proportions. When a state senator from North Texas noted that Mexico has a national ID card (shown above) it requires from its voters, Gallegos said Texas is not Mexico, or as he put it, "There are a lot of other things Mexico does not do when it sanctions voting. Mexico does not require a birth certificate and it does not register its voters."

And while the larger portion of the South Texas senate delegation voted against the Voter ID Bill, there was one exception.

"Where I live, there is a long history of voter fraud and the bill really wouldn't address the kind of fraud that occurs there," said Rep. Aaron Peña, R-Edinburg, who bizarrely noted polls show voters in his legislative district support the measure. "Political bosses have people taken to the polls, and people who take them tell them who to vote for. Voter assistance, it's called." Pena is shown in photo atop this story.

It is true that the border counties have long suffered from questionable practices, such as the enlistment of politiqueras whose for-hire help brings out the voter who likely wouldn't vote without the added incentive of a free ride to the polls or a few bucks here and there for their effort. If anything, it is the South Texas way of voting that forever shines the light on voter fraud.

Pena should know the voter fraud ropes. Until recently, when he changed political parties, he was a Democrat quite familiar with the ways things are done along the Mexican border.

Still to be decided are a few issues related to the ID itself. For one, what about voters who may have had their driver's licenses suspended? A Texas ID Card would do for them, say the Republicans. That may or may not serve the purpose, however. Precinct overseers would have the last say, is what critics counter.

What is also part of the Bill is the inclusion of a clause that says all Texans over the age of 70 would be excluded from the ID Card requirement.

So, who knows how that would affect South Texas, where the politiqueras generally roust senior citizens from the comfort of their nursing homes for a quick drive to the voting stations...

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Kingdom Of Fear: Life & Death In The Sleepy Rio Grande Valley of Texas...Blood Will Flow...

By VINCE VALDEZ
Special to The Tribune

BROWNSVILLE, Texas - Hey, don't talk about that shit. Could get you killed. Eyes and ears everywhere. They'll come get you in the middle of the night. Take you out to some vacant lot and rip your guts out. Then they'll get in their massive machine and run over your ass. Don't talk about that shit.

The Rio Grande Valley is scared.

Its thousands of residents go about their days as if living on the demarcation line of a raging drug war, as if to stay there is to avoid the killing, as if that alone can ever save them. It is a lie they live. The blood flows downriver daily, butchered bodies bloat in the weed-filled fields and then explode, like bloodied popcorn, scaring the Hell out of rabbits and snakes and scorpions and lizards. In the Valley, a once-passive shank of land on the northern banks of the Rio Grande, life is now a film frame on pause, ghosts and shadows frozen along darkened streets and alleys. The world has stopped turning here. It is as if one of those six-month nights has descended on the land, geography somewhat used to pain and suffering.

How to make sense of it?

Can a peoples merely rise with the new day's sun and walkabout as if that war across the border in neighboring Mexico is someone else's problem, as if to simply bank on three squares and call it a day? What day is this anyway? What problem?

Looked at from afar, it would seem that some would get the idea that these are captive people, prisoners of something they do not feel. Studied a bit closer, it is clear that the Valley is merely going through its paces, ignoring the obvious disarray, focusing on the little things, lamenting the lament in its own what-me-worry way.

Hundreds are being killed along the Mexican bordertowns barely miles away, blocks in the case of this falling town, hundreds added to the hundreds that came before that and the hundreds before that. The price of bullets and grenades is inconsequential. Blood will flow. Heads will roll. Moms will mourn. The sky will darken and the gravediggers will dig. There is no psychology; the brain is in tatters.

How to rationalize it all?

Some joke about it. They can't kill me, they say.Why me? What'd I do? Me? I'm just a schoolteacher, a graphics artist, a Blogger. Why should I die? Why should they come after me? I'm a nobody, a guy just doing his best, his Life Impulse. Leave me alone. Go fuck with someone else. Don't make me mad. I'm all I've got, vato.

And so they wait. They hope today is not their day. Residents living in half-fears, believing it's the other guy who'll catch a bullet in the back, thinking I'm not in that fight, gambling on the idea that the war will soon end. They've done nothing to stop it. They've done nothing to keep the battles on that side of the river. They've done nothing, nothing.

Life does go on. Life asks for no ticket to the circus. Life wants no responsibility. Life is here, and that's enough. He doesn't want to die yet. Barbacoa must be eaten on Sundays. She doesn't want to die yet. There's that fleamarket to go to, to enjoy, brats in tow. They don't want to die, not for those people over there. Fuck that.

Hey, don't talk about that shit...

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In Down-And-Out Harlingen, A New Poke At Life...Trusted Booty Comes Calling...

By RICARDO KLEMENT
Special to The Tribune

HARLINGEN, Texas - It is a pretty succinct statement, as clear as someone saying there are tacos in the Rio Grande Valley, as dead-on as someone else saying drugs run rampant from Rio Grande City to Brownsville. Yeah, there it was on the website bootycall.net:

Harlingen is a mecca for booty calls, everyone knows that. Casual Sex is going down in all corners of Harlingen right this second. How are you missing out? Too lazy? Awesome, because now you can find a casual sex partner in Harlingen right from your computer. You don't have to get up, get out to find a booty call in Harlingen. Browse sexy singles down for casual sex in Harlingen right from your chair, and find yourself a booty call to call your own. :)

Well, we'd heard mostly bad things to do with Harlingen. We'd heard the silliness surrounding the recent resignation of the city's police chief and wondered why any community would go nuts about such a decision. It happens across the world so often that it is no longer anything to wring your hands about; not that, no. Maybe news that the city was being de-incorporated, that perhaps being the result of lousy management and a desire to simply die-off.

But booty being available in Harlingen struck us as being something sort of against the Bad News grain we'd associated with Harlingen all these months. What, is every swinging stud and Lesbo turning their attention to those lovely, roundish, Aztec-brown female butts? Has the trip to the unemployment office now dropped on the things-to-do list? Has the entire town decided it will chase wanton sex instead of jobs?

That would be something to cheer about in a falling town, wouldn't it?

Life is funny that way, is what we like to say...

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For Texas' Death Row, A Lethal Injection Supply Problem...Drug Manufacturer Bails...

By PATRICK ALCATRAZ
Editor

AUSTIN, Texas - Back when I wrote for The Houston Post's State Desk, a job that had me cutting a newshound trail across the Lone Star State, the road sometimes took me to Huntsville, where I'd sit-in on an execution at the state's Death Row Unit. It was sort of dramatic, especially when watching some tough guy fade into the beyond with either a sigh or a kick of the leg. But it also was boring, the chemicals used to kill them doing their job without a sound, without exacting any pain.

The end, it is said in crime, comes too quickly.

Well, maybe not now.

Officials with the Texas Department of Corrections are not saying it's the end of death-by-lethal-injection, but their supplier has said it will no longer produce the drug used to kill the state's most vicious criminals.

Texas, say officials, has a supply that'll last only until May.

The drug is sodium thiopental, one of three in the chemcial cocktail that relaxes a Death Row convict and anesthesizes him before the combination stops his/her heart. The maker of sodium thiopental, Hospira, Inc. of Lake Forest, Illinois, had recently stopped manufacturing the drug and was planning to turn the operation over to a company in Italy. Itlay, however, eventually said it could not export any drug that would be used to kill anyone, prisoners especially.

"There are currently four executions scheduled in Texas - two in February, one in May and one in July," Michelle Lyons, communications director at the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, told the New York Times in a story published in Saturday's edition. "At this time, we have enough sodium thiopental on hand to carry out the two executions scheduled in February. In March, our supply of this particular drug is set to expire."

Texas, she went on, will explore the use of other drugs. Officials in Ohio and Washington face the same problem, as do their counterparts in Arizona, where 134 people are on that state's Death Row. Arizona reported a supply for five executions, although a spokesman there said no executions are scheduled anytime soon.

Pentobarbital, a drug used by veterinarians to put animals to sleep, is being considered as an alternative to sodium thiopental. Pentobarbital has been used in cases of euthanasia in Oregon, but has been described as being too strong - cruel - by opponents of the Death Penalty.

It is these objections to the killing that forced Hospira, Inc. to stop providing the needed drug. Officials for the company cited pressure from civic and activist organizations. Texas, which ranks atop the list of states using lethal injection, executes its Death Row inmates in Huntsville, north of Houston.

Hospira no longer has a facility in the U.S. to manufacture the drug, said spokesman Daniel Rosenberg. The company acknowledged that it produced the drug primarily for medical purposes, but was unable to stop states from using it to kill prisoners. The plan to import it was quashed by Italy, when that government denied an export permit to the company that would have provided it to Hospira, Inc.

According to the U.S. government, 34 of the 35 states that use the death-by-lethal-injection method had been using sodium thiopentol. On average, some 56 inmates are put to death every year. The lack of sodium thiopental delayed scheduled executions in Oklahoma and California last year.

As the shortage was announced early last year, California and Arizona began importing sodium thiopentol from England, but the Brits later halted export of the drug, also citing their desire to not export drugs to be used in lethal injections.

To date, Texas Gov. Rick Perry, a Republican who has roundly endorsed the Death Penalty, has said nothing about what Texas might do if it is unable to find an acceptable substitute...

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News: The Battle Between Offering A Useful Product And Pleasing Local Politicians, Business...Readers Always Lose...

By PATRICK ALCATRAZ
Editor

AUSTIN, Texas - So, where do you get your daily dose of news? It is a question voiced from coast-to-coast these days, from discussions in the bowels of our more illustrious news companies, to the offices of any aspiring politician, to the living room of every Tom, Dick and Harry wishing to know the goings-on of the nation and the world. With the advent and growth of the Internet, the choices are now not only many, but also expanding by the day.

Blogs have risen and found a place on the national news platform. They now number in the millions, according to surveys. Blogs - usually small operations, at times one person at the family keyboard - vary in scope and value. You can find a Blog for practically every topic under or behind the sun. Somehow, they have slowly merged into the country's psyche as veritable places of news & information - not always credible or reliable, but in the ballpark.

You can look around your own community and find Blogs right and left, and we do not say that solely in a political vein. Most of them are elementary in approach; that is, they offer little research and exist largely on opinion-writing. For straight-news junkies, that is a red flag. What they do, however, is draw a crowd of readers who think as they think, who rant as they rant, who bitch as they bitch. Those Blogs do little for any community.

Conversely, there are Blogs that try to stay with the facts, the truth and the useful. To many critics, the fact that Blogs take the unethical road is what demeans their effort and value. Porno on a community-oriented Blog is a credibility killer, they say. Rumor and innuendo also cripple a Blog's desire to be meaningful. What readers want is to be either educated - on news matters - or entertained. That is why mainstream newspapers still carry a Comics page in these, their most trying economic times.

So, should readers depend simply on Blogs?

They could on certain issues, always local, always of the neighborhood variety. A Big City newspaper will not bother with your local debate on, say, the firing of your police chief. A local Blog can go to town on that story and do its community a great service, but only if it stays away from the emotional tuggings of those for or against the firing. Report the news. An "Opinion" piece is acceptable, but only when labeled as such. A Blog without self-policing is a lame amateur effort, and readers will soon see it.

Bloggers should also get out and do their own reporting. Many scold the mainstream media as being behind the times, yet they are quick to steal material from their stories. In the case of the fired police chief, a good Blogger would try for an interview with the main players and then offer his/her readers that interview as a story. It is the words of those in the fight that are important. Do that and find readers who not only seek your Blog for good info, but who respect you. Don't do it and be labeled a wannabe, a puppet or a waste of time.

It happens. Critics are everywhere. As Blogging has evolved, so have commenters. It is a sport for the idle-hands cyber-punks. Know that and know that they can only soil your product, the Blog.

Still, it is worthwhile undertaking when Bloggers set parameters, when they decide on being something with a seriousness of purpose, or something just throwing out juvenile bullshit...

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[EDITOR'S NOTE: We have included two silly photographs with the above story to make our point. We can add a ton of silly, stupid features to this Blog, but what exactly does it add? Nothing. It just makes us look stupid...]

Baring The Lance Armstrong Doping Story: Government Probe May Yield Answers...Armstrong Denies Using Steroids...

By PATRICK ALCATRAZ
Editor

AUSTIN, Texas - Among the many celebrities cruising this capital city's streets and social scene is one Lance Armstrong - the 7-time winner of the annual Tour de France bicycle marathon. Armstrong cuts a very public trail here. He can be seen at this and that function to do with cancer, breast and testicular, the latter his recent nemesis.

But now comes news of an investigation into something Armstrong has battled - and denied - for years, namely allegations that he has used steroids and other performance enhancement drugs while competing domesticallly and overseas.

Chasing confirmation of the serpentine rumors is the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, the dederal agency whose agents previously investigated baseball player Barry Bonds and track star Marion Jones. On the story is the national magazine Sports Illustrated. The magazine is reporting that the feds have focused on whether Armstrong "was involved in an organized doping operation as a member of the team sponsored by the U.S. Postal Service from 1999 to 2004, and since August the grand jury has been hearing testimony from Armstrong's associates and confidants." The sensational story will be featured in the magazine's Jan. 24 issue, which hits the newsstands Wednesday.

Sports Illustrated lists anecdotal info from other bicyclists familiar with Armstrong's pre-race practices and what they say is his way of skirting doping urine tests. Some members of his own racing team go so far as to say Armstrong encouraged them to take the drugs. Victories, they say, were needed to justify the U.S. Postal Service's $30 million investment in backing of the team.

A quote of note in the magazine: "If a court finds that Armstrong won his titles while taking performance-enhancing drugs, his entourage may come to be known as the domestiques of the saddest deception in sports history."

This has been going for years, with most of the accusations coming from European riders. Armstrong has fielded every allegation by issuing vigorous denials, and at all times blaming jealousy as the motivation behind the rumors.

He's been gone a bit from competition, but it appears the stain on his victories remains on a fast downhill roll...

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How To Play At Life: It's Not Always About Going Along With The Herd...That Herd Is Lost...

“Don't play what's there, play what's not there...” - Miles Davis

By PATRICK ALCATRAZ
Editor

DRIFTWOOD, Texas - We're headed here today just because. No real reason, other than it's on our run-around map these days. The Texas Hill Country does that to you, throws rural America and the country way at you every few miles down the road. New places and new faces; that's the ticket.

But, beyond that, it's about play, about doing things that won't shake anybody up, won't disturb the hustle and flow of the city, won't mean anything to anyone other than yourself. Some call it escapism, or simply getting away from it all. Yet, there's more to it. A drive into a new scene always does something to the soul. A hell-o to someone you've never seen before brings a certain joy. Tasting a local culinary specialty is equally as enjoyable. It could be this little town only miles from Austin, or it could be candy stores of Martha's Vineyard off the Massachusetts coast, or it could be the beaches of the Florida Keys, or the lodges of the Rocky Mountains.

What's important is that those places are there, waiting. At times, we ask ourselves why they are there, but there they are, doing their life impulse. Why does Driftwood exist? Dripping Springs up the road has a blooming artist colony, and shops and galleries abound. Invariably, people who own or operate them tell you they lived in the city most of their lives, got tired of the rat race and, yeah, drifted off.

We've made these day outings a mission of sorts, although hitting the trail always has been an interest that must be attended to, like showering for long, long minutes, like walking into a hair salon, making an appointment for months down the road and never keeping it. It's fun; it's play.

Perhaps it has much to do with the idea that we believe there are few serious issues left to resolve. Who was it that said, "There is only one serious question in life, and that is whether to kill yourself." Kafka? Freud? Sonny Corleone? Ah, does it matter?

It's a cool, sunny day here this morning, but weatherfolks are saying a cold blast is headed in. You know the kind, sleet and frigid winds - the sort of temperatures that add to the pleasure of driving the backroads of this neat part of the state. From what we've seen, there is coffee being brewed in most of these little towns, hot chocolate also part of the offerings.

So, we'll play. We'll take whatever the day brings. It's bright, light-sweater weather. It's calling me out, bringing its A-game.

Play. I love that word. It's one of the most under-rated words in the English language, and a word people generally assign to children. I don't. I never have...

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For Hispanics, A Moment For Some Reflection...Daily Quiz...Know Yourselves...

"What the United States does best is to understand itself. What it does worst is understand others..." - Carlos Fuentes, author of The Old Gringo

By PATRICK ALCATRAZ
Editor

AUSTIN, Texas - The news here all day yesterday centered on Gov. Rick Perry's inauguration, which takes place today, but it was another story that also grabbed many Austinites - a giant sinkhole along Cesar Chavez Boulevard in East Austin that blocked access to a popular taco joint, Juan In A Million. Juan's world-class taqueria is far, far from the world of that Capitol Building downtown. And it's a stretch, but it serves as a good entry point to this story.

Where are the country's Hispanics today?

And how much does the growing Hispanic community know about its historical and lingering struggle, its measurable progress, its unique journey?

Let's see. Here's a mini-test of the sort we love to throw at our sentient readers. Okay, everybody take your seat and open your books to this page. Here we go.

1.) Name the country's first Hispanic attorney general:
a.) Antonio Aguilar
b.) Alberto Gonzales
c.) Albert Pujols
ANSWER - Alberto Gonzales

2.) Which of these teams has a Hispanic owner:
a.) New York Mets
b.) Anaheim Angels
c.) Denver Broncos
ANSWER - Anaheim Angels

3.) She played the Tejano star Selena in a movie:
a.) Jennifer Alba
b.) Jennifer Lopez
c.) Maria Felix
ANSWER - Jennifer Lopez

4.) Real name of a 1950s cowboy on TV:
a.) Duncan Renaldo
b.) Don Duncan
c.) Don Osmond
ANSWER - Duncan Renaldo

5.) RGV Blogger arrested for DWI & reckless driving:
a.) Juan N. Cortina
b.) Juan Corona
c.) Juan Montoya
ANSWER - Juan Montoya

6.) Cable TV star recently canned:
a.) Ricky Ricardo
b.) Rick Sanchez
c.) Rick Diaz
ANSWER - Rick Sanchez

7.) The most famous Hispanic Texan:
a.) Tony Orlando
b.) Henry Cisneros
c.) Bill Richardson
ANSWER - Henry Cisneros

8.) The Rio Grande Valley's top private eye:
a.) Joe Rubio
b.) Jack Ruby
c.) Lupe Limas
ANSWER - Joe Rubio

9.) A traditional Hispanic song:
a.) Alla En El Rancho Grande
b.) Feliz Navidad
c.) Livin' La Vida Loca
ANSWER - Alla En El Rancho Grande

10.) Person Hispanics do not particularly like:
a.) Yoko Ono
b.) Dick Cheney
c.) Vitas Gerulaitis
ANSWER - Dick Cheney

Truthfully, we see these questions as being easy. But we'll see. We are forever surprised by the intelligence of our readers. Many of these questions go to our own sensibilities, although it's also fair to say that we're pretty much middle-of-the-roaders politically and culturally. And, again, enjoy the test. It's not the end of the world if you fail it. By the way, 7 of 10 correct answers is a passing grade...

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On Martin Luther King Day, A Lesson in Black History...It's The Story Of All Of Us...

"Almost always, the creative dedicated minority has made the world better..." - Martin Luther King, Jr.

By PATRICK ALCATRAZ
Editor

AUSTIN, Texas - We'll dispense with the horrible injustices this country has lapped on African-Americans. That is a shameful, shameful history best left to a higher power's final assessment. We, here, celebrate our brothers. Perhaps we live our lives in such a hurry that we forget all that we've endured, every road we've travelled, every pain we've felt. And maybe that's best. Life and bitterness is no fun.

So, we honor Martin Luther King, Jr. on this day, 42 years after his assassination, by posting a short test here for our readers. It won't define any of you as smart or ignorant; it'll simply test your knowledge of a sector of our population that exists alongside all others. Indeed, MLK has been gone longer than the 39 years he spent fighting bigotry and racism in the American South.

1.) Martin Luther King's wife was:
a.)  Betty Shabazz
b.) Coretta Scott King
c.) Billie Jean King
ANSWER - Coretta Scott King

2.) Bloody Sunday in the South's struggles refers to:
a.) Birmingham, Alabama
b.) Selma, Alabama
c.) Plains, Georgia
ANSWER - Selma, Alabama


3.) A well-known MLK lieutenant was:
a.) Harry Belafonte
b.) Ray Charles
c.) Jesse Jackson
ANSWER - Jesse Jackson

4.) Site of MLK's "I've been to the mountaintop" speech:
a.) Times Square
b.) Washington D.C.'s Mall
c.) Yankee Stadium
ANSWER - Washington D.C.'s Mall

5.) MLK was assassinated on:
a.) July 4, 1968
b.) Sept. 11, 1968
c.) April 4, 1968
ANSWER - April 4, 1968

6.) MLK's accused assassin was:
a.) James Earl Jones
b.) Earl Weaver
c.) James Earl Ray
ANSWER - James Earl Ray

7.) Before becoming an activist, MLK was a:
a.) sharecropper
b.) Baptist preacher
c.) bus driver
ANSWER - Baptist preacher

8.) Rosa Parks' fame comes from:
a.) Her refusal to give her seat on a bus to a white person
b.) Her design of a Black struggle flag
c.) Her son was Jackie Robinson
ANSWER - Her refusal to give her seat on a bus to a white person
9.) Name of Birmingham, Alabama's bigoted police official:
a.) Buford Pusser
b.) Bull Conner
c.) Orville Faubus
ANSWER - Bull Conner

10.) The president who signed the civil rights legislation was:
a.) John F. Kennedy
b.) Richard Nixon
c.) Lyndon B. Johnson
ANSWER - Lyndon B. Johnson

Remember, it's not about getting the answers right. That's a fleeting accomplishment. The important thing is that you store your history in your brain, so that you never forget it. Freedom is something that must be fought for daily. Freedom is at the heart of Dr. King's mission - a mission for God...

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Ah, Texas: It'll Break Your Heart In A Dozen Languages...But Tex-Mex Slang Is Too Damned Cute...

By PATRICK ALCATRAZ
Editor

KYLE, Texas - Driving here the other day, I spotted a bumper sticker that sets sail the sentiment about who we are in the Lone Star State. "'No Chingues, Buey," it read in black lettering over a yellow background. It went to motoring, of course. Stay away from me, in other words. Sort of fighting, but not really. More like, yeah, I don't need the grief.

Because of its strong connections with Mexico, Texas either enjoys or endures its inclusion of Spanish and Tex-Mex slang in daily parlance, spoken and written. Three tacos, rice & beans, well, everybody knows what that means. But there are other colloquialisms that befuddle some and entertain others. Here are some:

Le caigo caigo gordo     (I don´t get along with that person)

Padre, chido, de pelos, chévere, padrissimo     (Cool)

Que padre, que buena onda     (How cool)

Que buena vibra     (What good vibe)

Andale     (All right, or hurry-up)

Hacer el oso     (Ridiculous mistake)

¡Aguas!     (Look out!)

¡Ay!     (Expression of pain)

Eres una gallina     (You´re a chicken)

Eres un hablador      (You´re bluffing)

Suena como una farsa     (Looks are decieving)

Yachole     (Don´t bother me; shut up)

Fregar, molestar     (To bother)

Chingues     (stronger than bother)

Jodas     (strongest; rude)

Tirar chingasos     (to throw punches)

Está fotografiando     (Mooning)

Que cajada     (What crap)

Tengo que ir a "wishing room"     (Trip to the John)

Tengo que regar las plantas     (Taking a leak, men)

Tengo que ir a empolverme     (powdering my nose, female)

Chismosa     (Gossip, female)

Amante     (Lover)

Fodongo, fachoso     (Dirty, messy person)

Tragon     (Someone who eats a lot)

El rollo     (Someone who talks a lot)

Chechon     (Crybaby)

Tonta, babosa, mensa     (Stupid)

Pendeja, sonsa, perdida     (Stupid, female)

Zorro     (Sleazy guy)

Foesa, pluota, creída     (Snob, female)

Agarramela   (hold it, refers to penis)

Pendejo     (literally pubic hair)

Apestosa     (smelly, female)

Mugroso     (dirty, male)

Quieres cochar?     (querying sex)

Mamamela     (suck me, blow me)

Tienes jale?     (Do you have a job?)

Le gustas a mi vieja     (my wife likes you)

Esta bien cogida     (She is quite sexed)

No tiene pelos     (she waxes pubic area)

Son cabrones todos!     (They're all out for themselves)

Aqui yo mando!     (Here, I reign)

Largense todos!     (Beat it, everybody)

Rayando El Sol     (You've got me all fucked up)

Tu abuela, puto!     (Your grandmother, buddy!)

LOL!!!     ("Loco on Loco" in Spanish, Gay sex)

We could go on and on and on, but you get our drift. Perhaps we'll make this slang lesson a staple and bring you additional entries down the road. I'd be interested in getting some from you, our readers. I know there are some pretty wild ones out there.

Orale, vatos!...

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They Shot The Wrong Politician: From the Country's Long List Of Losers, We Offer Some Names...

By PATRICK ALCATRAZ
Editor-In-Chief

AUSTIN, Texas - Just thinking about the goings-on in Arizona, one would be okay with wondering what Gabrielle Giffords was doing living in the State of Brotherly Hate. She is a Democrat and she is Jewish - both in the unquestioned crosshairs of American hate groups. But, by all accounts that have surfaced since her shooting last weekend, Congresswoman Giffords, shown above, does not fit the profile of politicians anyone would want to kill.

This from U.S. Sen. Kristen Gillibrand of New York, "She's the most non-partisan person I've ever met. She's the vision of hope for this country right now. She embodies everything that President Obama was trying to say, that we have to be better than we are."

In doing her best to bring transparency to her work for the people of her district in the Tucson area, Democrat Giffords was holding one of her string of meetings with constituents outside a Safeway grocery store when crazed shooter Jared L. Loughner, a 22-year-old junior college student fond of white supremacist groups, opened fire and shot her in the head, killing six others attending the open air session and wounding a few more. Loughner was collared and remains in federal custody; Giffords remains under hospital treatment for a head wound. Skinhead Loughner's action is now being diagnosed from coast to coast. Is he crazy, or was he doing the work of right-wing extremists within the Republican Party? It will eventually come out, but, for now, Loughner is being seen as a sicko.

What's clear is that Giffords was not the hate groups' best target. There are numerous others who would have been a better symbolic victim. We won't name names, but anyone who follows national politics would likely be able to form a credible list.

And, as with anything to do with opposing politics, a list could also be drawn for worthy targets anyone with anti-Republican sentiments might consider after buying one of those handy Glock 19 pistols, the darling of Arizona gun owners.

That list could begin with hate-spreader Sarah Palin, the former Alaska governor who was postured as Veep by 2008 Republican Party presidential candidate John McCain, a U.S. senator from Arizona. Palin is nothing but divisive, a hate-filled woman quick to speak, but slow to think. It was Palin's so-called "crosshairs" map that listed Giffords among a number of Democrats Palin thought would be targets for electoral defeat. The crosshairs have clear meaning and symbolism, no matter what Palin says now.

Rush Limbaugh needs to re-assess his actions. He, too, breeds hate on his national radio show. Fox News talk show host Glenn Beck is not far behind. Both men could vanish from the planet and the country would be the better. Add Bill O'Reilly, also of FOX, to the list. He's shameless and a societal cypher. If America lost Palin, Limbaugh, Beck and O'Reilly in some sort of weird shooting, well, perhaps the sun would rise brighter from Bangor, Maine to National City, California.

It's not that this sort of barbaric moron is new to the country's political landscape. We recall insane U.S. Sen. Joe McCarthy of the Communist witch hunts of the 1950s that ruined many reputations, the supremacist presidential candidate Lyndon LaRouche and KKK addict David Duke and anti-government activist Randy Weaver and racist Alabama Gov. George Wallace, Southern Senators Strom Thurmond and Trent Lott and a few others who fade into history.

Oddly, it seems modern Liberals rarely act in kind. Yes, sure, Abraham Lincoln was a Republican at the time of his assassination, but that Republican Party is not today's Republican Party. Congresswoman Giffords' shooting brought back details of another shooting, this one in Denver in the early 1980s, when I worked for the Associated Press in that same city. Targeted then, before Fox News came into being, was a liberal radio talk show host by the name of Alan Berg, who was Jewish. His killer was eventually captured and, yes, it seems he was a white supremacist who said, ironically, that he was tired of the daily liberal opinions voiced by Berg on his radio show. Imagine that.

No, Gabrielle Giffords was not the one to shoot...

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Out West, A Long-Awaited Upbraiding Of Three American Bigots...Brewer, Kyl & McCain Taste Civility...It Goes On...

By PATRICK ALCATRAZ
Editor

AUSTIN, Texas - Jan Brewer looked lost, like a sour politician witnessing something good and inspirational. The governor of the sick state of Arizona had no choice; she had to attend last night's memorial in Tucson, a memorial for the half-dozen victims and a handful of others who fell in a hail of bullets that still has Arizona Congresswoman fighting for her life.

Brewer, cartoonized above, has spent the last two years spreaidng hate in her state. The Republican governor ballyhooed SB 1070 all of last year, legislation aimed at Hispanics and Hispanic immigrants. Residents of that ethnic fold blasted her to no avail. Brewer, a Republican, held hard to policies that targeted all Hispanics in the name of what she labeled the fight against illegal immigration.

Last night, she sat on a chair in the front row of the stage at the McKale Center on the campus of the University of Arizona. Before her came a Hispanic professor of the school to give the evening's blessing in his ancestral Yaqui fashion. At all turns, Brewer looked ill-at-ease while listening to Dr. Carlos Gonzalez deliver his blessing in a distinctively Hispanic fashion. And then she sat stoically as shooting hero Daniel Hernandez (shown in photo above with Congresswoman Giffords)  offered a few words about his role in the saving of Democratic Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords from dying at the scene outside a Safeway grocery store public function last Saturday. Hernandez, an intern volunteering with Giffords' local office, rushed to her side and applied pressure to a head wound, stemming blood loss. The man who followed him a bit later, President Barack Obama, openly called young Hernandez a hero, much to the delight of a throng 12,000 strong.

The Republican governor, not known for showing a pleasant face, applauded as best she could, perhaps wondering how her sympathy would be playing with the heartless right-wing zealots she represents, and how perhaps right-wing hardass Republican U.S. Senators Jon Kyle and John McCain seated nearby would react. Kyle, seat behind Hernandez, looked as if he would rather have been attending a KKK rally, and McCain as if he'd stumbled into something weird and unpleasant.

Not far from them sat the parents of 9-year-old Christina Taylor-Green, a young girl murdered by accused gunman Jared Lee Loughner. Also seated near the stage were Giffords's grieving husband and the families of other victims. In scenes that gripped viewers, hugs spread across the room, showing the president and U.S. Attorney Genreral Eric Holder and Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano, the former governor of Arizona, expressing their sentiments to those affected. Nowhere were Brewer, Kyle or McCain to be seen - perhaps feeling a bit of the criticism aimed at the Republicans for their embrace of hateful political rhetoric.

In the end, it was that scene that sailed out after the memorial, the president being applauded and Brewer, Kyle and McCain slinking off into the night. America is battling through its Era of Stupid Politics, a time history will define as the long-lingering moment the country attacked and stabbed itself repeatedly. It won't end anytime soon. Too many egos around. Too many politicians interested in dividing and too many politicians interested in themselves and their kind. It'll all shake out, however; it always does.

But, for one night, it was good to see the likes of Jan Brewer, Jon Kyl and John McCain look like morons...

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