Did any of you see Comet McNaught yet? I was up all night writing a paper on school violence for my community relations class so I stayed up to see if I could check it out. Dad said it would be out at about 3am, near the moon. I didn't see the moon at all last night but at about 3:30 I found what I thought was McNaught. It was right over the hills to the right of our balcony. It was pretty bright and flickering rapidly but not quite like the picture shows. So I don't know.
Speaking of my paper and being up all night, between scouring Mt. Sac's online article database and the internet, my A.D.D. kicked into fifth gear while I was looking through wikipedia. I found an article about the Symbionese Liberation Army and the SLA shootout dad was in back in Newton Division. Dad has told me the story about a hundred times but I've never really grasped how MASSIVE an ordeal that shootout was. It beat Waco, the UT Clocktower sniper and even the North Hollywood Shootout in terms of number of rounds fired. So I spent about a good two hours researching the different members and what happened instead of doing homework. Tonight dad took me out to dinner and I asked him all about it, this time actually understanding the story for what it truly is. I dont know how much you know about it but I'll expand on it a little.
The Symbionese Liberation Army
[Pictured left to right, top to bottom:]
Kathleen Soliah, Nancy Ling Perry, Patricia Soltysik, William Harris, Patricia Hearst, Donald Defreeze, Emily Harris, Angela Atwood, Camilla Hall
Basically(in condensed form), a group of political radicals from the San Francisco area who did a lot of acid, robbed a few banks, shot a school's superintendent, thought they were this revolutionary army and were crazy. They took over a house in Newton Division of Los Angeles and began shooting through the windows. 9,000 rounds were fired, 400 LAPD officers were called in, the house burned down and where was Dad during all of this? Under fire in the backyard hidden in a patch of weeds. When two of the gunwomen charged him and the SWAT officers staged out back, he opened fire with a shotgun.
Camilla Hall
This big momma came out first, with a carbine. She was hit in the forehead and died immediately.
Nancy Ling Perry
She followed Hall, providing suppresive fire throughout the backyard. Upon trying to pull Hall's body back into the crawlspace, she was hit in the lung and spine.
I got a kick out of reading that story and listening to dad talk about it. It really was something. Can you believe that? 9,000 rounds of high powered rifle ammunition fired through a residential neighborhood and no one injured? I don't know. That's something to write home about I think. Made me proud of Dad. Who else has a father who plugged two psychotic, lesbian terrorists in the middle of quite possibly the largest shootout in American history? You've really gotta hear him tell it himself. I think it might be one of his best.
I pinched a nerve or a muscle or something behind my left shoulder while I was sleeping a couple nights ago and it's killing me. I can barely move. It's reminding me of a certain time I twisted my neck when I was younger and was made fun of to no end by my older sister and the Alvarez family.
Good night to you all!
11 comments:
That is so awesome. All of it.
I really liked the picture of the comet. I never feel like staying up all night to see those, so thanks for sharing it!
And thank you for writing down one of Dad's many stories. I keep telling him he should write a book. Mostly because I can't remember stories like that and would like to tell our kids about them one day.
Sorry about the pinched nerve, man. Hopefully it will wear off soon. Love you!
BTW, I like your random labels
I think that was probably one of his best stories as well. How INTENSE would it have been to be out there without any real cover and all those bullets flying! Crazy is the best description I can think of...probably becase I can't really imagine how it would ahve been.
It's funny. I remember doing research on Wikipedia also after I heard that story of his the first time. I don't think I got into as much depth as you did though. Good stuff. Too bad you couldn't write you paper on that :)
Wow. It's funny how you type these mindless blogs (like anyone could possibly give a shit about them anyway) in such a scholastically inclined or scholarly manner, yet subject matter is so immaturely observed. You are obviously a brainwashed fascist pig, just like your father, if you can make such insensitive comments about the lives of human beings. "Go Dad! You're a murderer! Yay!" What the fuck is wrong with you, Chad Hunter Brown?
Agreed with anon. Not that I agree with the SLA's dogma or what they did, but the way you speak about these events, is with such immaturity and disrespect. Shame on you for having such little respect for life. Is your dad happy he "plugged" these people? If so, that is certainly not the sort of police officer we need patrolling our streets. There are ENOUGH blood crazy gun nuts out there already.
According to investigators, both women came out intending to surrender and were executed in cold blood by the police.
The SLA doesn't deserve anything more than "immature observation." Why on Earth would somebody take a mindless, insane slogan like "Death to the fascist insect that preys upon the life of the people" seriously? LOL BONKERS.
And then to call the author & his father a "fascist pig" for rightfully protecting a neighborhood from Communist oppressors..."Anonymous," someone with a ideologue mindset such as yours wouldn't appreciate anything scholarly. Unless it came from Ward Churchill or some feminist bulldyke.
The SLA were murderers & the cops defended themselves. Period. MY ASS the SLA intended to surrender. Why open fire in the first place? Why not step outside the safehouse & make some disingenuous BS speech about "imperialism, bourgeois conditioning, fascism this and that" in front of the many cameras? Why fire the first shot to begin with? Because like all radical Marxists, they were insane, foaming-at-the-mouth killers and had to be dealt with accordingly.
Maybe it's time leftists had a little more respect for America, its history, capitalism, the sacrifices our soldiers made in Vietnam, apple pie etc...and a little less respect for pretend revolutionaries spitting on America's legacy.
Great post, sir.
Stockholm Syndrome is not what Ms. Margaret says it is [her perception on the matter is troublesome], nor is brainwashing [which couldn't be performed by a bunch of ragtag students]. These (and others even more far-fetched, like being raped and be left at a non-existent closet) were the excuses he and her defense used at trial. At least, she didn't snitched her former colleagues-in-arms. Well, that's not unusual, she betrayed her youth ideals, what's the deal?
The deal is that there's not a significant Left anymore at the United States, since the manhunt performed under senator McCarthy's act, and the pogrom agains those with a leftist affiliation. Now, the so-called left-wing may even have some principles based on the socialism, but they are all there for their properties and for their classes.
[Am I being scholarly enough, Mr(s). Anonymous?]
America's History is all about capitalism, conquest and imposition. It's almost never about building anything together. If the SLA are murderers, what could be said about the jarheads killing, torturing and maiming the Iraqi citizens [Iraq, a USA former-ally, by the way, just like Mr. Bin Laden]? What could be said about an economy system who is built based on the unequallity? Who's based on lording over?
It's not about work [Read about labor reserves]. It's not about freedom [Ask a poor man who were born at a poor family and without any opportunity to compete for a nice jobe if he feels free]. It's not about democracy [Read about the support your government gave to Tyrants at Central and South America].
It's about property. It's about power. It's about some having a lot and a lot having some. After the murder of a Berkeley's student py pollice, after the murder of Sacco & Vanzetti, after the McCarthy's manhunt, by trying to surpress the Left, you shouldn't be that surprised when their youth feel that their only way to act politically is by violence.
And if you like to think about how blessed America is, remember: empires fell before, it's not news. The recent crysis is still fresh, and there's a lot of money being sucked by the speculative game right now. Keep watching. And meanwhile, do something to make your world more equal, fairer, with more justice [from everyone, in the reason of their needs, to everyone, in the reason of their capabilities].
It's about property. It's about power. It's about some having a lot and a lot having some. After the murder of a Berkeley's student py pollice, after the murder of Sacco & Vanzetti, after the McCarthy's manhunt, by trying to surpress the Left, you shouldn't be that surprised when their youth feel that their only way to act politically is by violence.
And if you like to think about how blessed America is, remember: empires fell before, it's not news. The recent crysis is still fresh, and there's a lot of money being sucked by the speculative game right now. Keep watching. And meanwhile, do something to make your world more equal, fairer, with more justice [from everyone, in the reason of their needs, to everyone, in the reason of their capabilities].
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