The Daily Dose/February 28, 2020
By Gaylon Kent
America’s Funniest Guy
Leading Off
Notes from around the human experience…
WHAT THE HELL’S GOING ON HERE?: Yesterday in On This Date the lead item concerned some Japanese evildoers who were executed for their part in a subway gas attack. The item noted that they had found out they were going to die the morning of their executions and some of you thought we were mistaken.
We Are Not Making This Up: No, we weren’t. It’s the way it’s done in Japan: you’re convicted, sentenced and allowed some appeals and when those are denied you sit and wait, sometimes for two or three decades, and nobody tells you when you are going to die.
On any given day you may be executed or you may not be executed. You have no idea. It’s up to the whims of the government. When they want to kill you they will. Until then you wake up every morning not knowing whether or not you’ll be waking up tomorrow morning.
Some Philosophy Crap: We suppose you could say that none of us know for sure if we’re going to wake up or not tomorrow, but most people reading this aren’t under sentence of death.
Dry, Technical Matter: When it is your time to go you’re given about an hour’s notice. You can draw up a will and pray to whomever you feel will do you the most good before you make your final walk.
USA! USA! Death row in the United States has a lot to answer for, but it’s probably better than being condemned in Japan. In America, you’re sentenced to die and eventually you’re given a date. Sometimes this is 90 days or so beforehand, though Ohio has assorted executions scheduled through 2023, which to us seems almost as bad as not knowing your date at all.
My Country Tis Of Thee: Fortunately or unfortunately, depending on how you look at it, sentences take so long to be carried nowadays the condemned are more likely to kill themselves or die of natural causes than they are to be executed as stays on death row now routinely top 20 years.
Japan and America are the only two industrialized countries that still have the death penalty and both should be ashamed of themselves. Death row in America is pretty cruel, but boy, not being given a date and wondering every morning if you should make your bed or not has got to be worse.
Gaylon For US Senate…Vote Early, Vote Often: America, and probably Japan, too, has executed innocent people. The death penalty should be abolished everywhere.
Editor’s Note: Gaylon is a candidate for the Colorado Libertarian Party’s US Senate nomination. Click here to lift the manhole cover and find out more.
Today At The Site
Writing worth reading. Usually.
The Diary of a Nobody: With The Wife back, there have been some changes around the cabin. Today’s Diary.
One, it’s clean…Two, the heater, after being at 69 degrees and not being touched for two whole months, is back to fluctuating between 43 and 110, depending on whatever particular mood The Wife happens to be in…
Click here to get in on the laffs: Sparrow, The Bottom Ten, the funniest books you’ve ever read. We offer 4Ever and Ever access, or cheapskates can purchase books and columns individually.
On This Date
Great moments in us.
In 202 BC – The Han Dynasty in China begins when Liu Bang becomes Emperor Gaozu of Han. Bang had been an official in the previous dynasty as well moonlighting as the leader of the rebel forces. He ruled for seven years until his death in 195 BC and with the exception of 9-23 AD, the Han Dynasty would rule China until 220 AD, when China was divided into three states, known to History as the Three Kingdoms period.
In 1967 – Wilt Chamberlain of the Philadelphia 76ers establishes a new NBA record for most consecutive field goals made in a season, making his 35th consecutive in a 127-107 win over the Cincinnati Royals, in a game played at Syracuse, New York. Chamberlain missed his next shot and finished the night 11-of-14 from the field, finishing the game with 28 points. The streak had started on Feb 17. The Cincinnati Royals are now the Sacramento Kings and research into whose record Chamberlain broke was inconclusive.
In 1970 – Simon and Garfunkel are at #1 on Billboard’s Hot 100 for the first of six consecutive weeks with Bridge Over Troubled Water. The song went to #1 in four other countries, including France and Great Britain, was Billboard’s biggest song of the year, the second biggest of the decade and ranked 229th on Billboard’s 60th-anniversary Hot 100 in 2018. It was the third and final #1 song (The Sounds of Silence, 1965; Mrs. Robinson, 1968) for the group and Bridge Over Troubled Water has since made the Hot 100 on five other occasions, and Buck Owens and His Buckaroos hitting #8 on the country chart with the song in 1971.
Quotebook
The wisdom of the ages. Whatever.
For there was that within me which misfortune could not steal away. – Wen T’ien-hsian (1236-83), Chinese poet
Answer To The Last Trivia Question
It’s not who you know, but what you know.
The Denver Nuggets and Detroit Pistons hold the record for most points in an NBA game, combining for 370 in a 186-184 Detroit victory. The game took three overtimes.
Today’s Stumper
Cheaper than Trivia Night at the bar.
How many Top 10 hits did Simon and Garfunkel have in Great Britain? – Answer next time!
