In the midst of the storm created over the recent shooting of Trayvon Martin finally someone gives us a word of sanity regarding the matter. Thomas Sowell, senior fellow of the Hoover Institution said:

It is not often that I agree with Geraldo Rivera, but recently he said something very practical and potentially life-saving, when he urged black and Hispanic parents not to let their children go around wearing hoodies.

There is no point in dressing like a hoodlum when you are not a hoodlum, even though that has become a fashion for some minority youths, including the teenager who was shot and killed in a confrontation in Florida. I don’t know the whole story of that tragedy, any more than those who are making loud noises in the media do, but that is something that we have trials for.

People have a right to dress any way they want to, but exercising that right is something that requires common sense, and common sense is something that parents should have, even if their children don’t always have it.

Many years ago, when I was a student at Harvard, there was a warning to all the students to avoid a nearby tough Irish neighborhood, where Harvard students had been attacked. It so happened that there was a black neighborhood on the other side of the Irish neighborhood that I had to pass through when I went to get my hair cut.

I never went through that Irish neighborhood dressed in the style of most Harvard students back then. I walked through that Irish neighborhood dressed like a black working man would be dressed — and I never had the slightest trouble the whole three years that I was at Harvard.

While I had a right to walk through that tough neighborhood dressed in a Brooks Brothers suit, if I wanted to — and if I could have afforded one, which I couldn’t — it made no sense for me to court needless dangers.

The man who shot the black teenager in Florida may be as guilty as sin, for all I know — or he may be innocent, for all I know. We pay taxes so that there can be judges and jurors who sort out the facts. We do not need Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton or the President of the United States spouting off before the trial has even begun. Have we forgotten the media’s rush to judgment in the Duke University “rape” case that blew up completely when the facts came out?

If the facts show that a teenager who was no threat to anyone was shot and killed, it will be time to call for the death penalty. But if the facts show that the shooter was innocent, then it will be time to call for people in the media and in politics to keep their big mouths shut until they know what they are talking about. (Latest report: New witness reports cast Florida teen as aggressor)

Playing with racial polarization is playing with fire.

Much has been made of the fact that the teenager was unarmed. The only time I have ever pointed a loaded gun at a human being, I had no idea whether he was armed or not. All I knew was that I could hear his footsteps sneaking up behind me at night.

Fortunately for both of us, he froze in his tracks when I pointed a gun at him. If he had made a false move, I would have shot him. And if it had turned out later that he was unarmed, I would not have lost a moment’s sleep over it.

You know that someone was unarmed only after it is all over. If he attacks, you have to shoot, if only to keep the attacker from getting your gun.

It so happened that the man I pointed a gun at was white. But he could have been any color of the rainbow, and it would not have made the slightest difference.

Let the specific facts come out in the Florida case. That is why we have courts.

Have we forgotten the Jim Crow era, with courts making decisions based on the race of the defendants, rather than the facts of the case? That is part of the past that we need to leave in the past, not resurrect it under new racial management.

Who is really showing concern for the well-being of minority youngsters, Geraldo Rivera who is trying to save some lives, or Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, and others who are hyping this tragic episode for their own benefit?

Race hustlers who hype paranoia and belligerence are doing no favor to minority youngsters. There is no way to know how many of these youngsters’ confrontations with the police or others in authority have been needlessly aggravated by the steady drumbeat of racial hype they have been bombarded with by race hustlers.

THINK ABOUT IT!!!!!!!!

I just read that Afghanistan’s president, Hamid Karzai called American troops “demons”. Referring to the United States and the Taliban in the same breath, he said,”There are two demons in our country now”. Just a week earlier he had called for Americans to hand over control a year earlier than planned –now this. What’s next? I am not an expert on foreign affairs, or anything, but my gut feeling is that we ought to get out NOW, while the getting is good. IMHO our troops are sitting on a powder keg. Are we going to leave them there until someone lights the fuse?

Although their purpose is noble and their efforts are valiant, I shutter to think about them being trapped there and losing their lives for a people who think they are “demons”. It just doesn’t make sense to me. Yes I know about the tension between Israel and Iran and the need to have troops at the ready if Israel attacks or is attacked, but does that justify us leaving them in harms way?

I’m a bit confused as to why there are no protest here in American calling for our troops to be brought home. Where are all the “Bush Bashers” who looked for anything they could find to protest? Where is anyone saying, “Enough is enough. Bring our troops home–NOW!”? There just seems to be a strange silence right now.

Again, I don’t pretend to understand everything regarding this issue–I don’t have all the facts. But by our own admission, even with us there the Taliban “is resurgent and gaining ground”. Now the Afghans see us as “demons”. What do we hope to accomplish by staying there?

I doubt that my voice will be heard or my effort rewarded, but at least I can say I spoke up. If it all goes bad I couldn’t live with myself knowing that I said nothing. If keeping our troops there any longer can serve a good purpose I wish someone would let me know. In fact I’ve got a hunch that there are a lot of folks who would like to know. Maybe they will start speaking up. Think about it!