Monday, May 12, 2008

Two Important Stories This Morning

I wanted to highlight two stories that appeared in the New York Times this morning - one that is on topic and the other isn't. The first is on legislation in Missouri that will require voters to prove their citizenship, usually with their birth certificate, to vote. The Times does a pretty good job excoriating the legislation, as it should.

The second is on a surfer gang bang murder in La Jolla, Calif. This really has nothing to do with politics, but my family lived in La Jolla for four years and my mom was raised there. The murder is symptomatic of a dark underbelly of surf culture in southern California that rarely gets covered in the press or shown in the movies (yes, I remember those rebel surfers in "Blue Crush," but that was Hawaii and, well, come on). All kidding aside, the defense for these five surfers, or "Bird Rock Bandits," is claiming that the group is no more a gang than a fraternity is. I was in fraternity and we never followed anyone home from a bar and killed them. They should be thrown in jail indefinitely.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

La Jolla is a self-styled paradise with indulged children and self-absorbed parents. This is the history of the "Village". The Windansea surf crowd has long been a tough group of high school dropouts and aging trust fund babies with nothing but time to catch the perfect wave. These are not innocent fraternity kids.