BREAKING: 4 years after nine bikers were killed during a shootout in Waco, te DA has announced he will dismiss all criminal cases against the remaining 24 defendants charged in the melee. Nobody has been convicted in any of the related cases.https://t.co/kFIkVf0195
— Olivia Messer ?? (@OliviaMesser) April 2, 2019
What else could the DA do? It was a bureaucratic nightmare!
…[McLennan County District Attorney Barry] Johnson inherited the Twin Peaks cases when he took office in January, and said he has spent 75 percent of his time since then with a team of prosecutors and investigators trying to determine how to resolve the remaining cases.
Johnson’s decision Tuesday means that no one will be held accountable for the multiple deaths or injuries or for the chaotic battle between heavily armed, rival motorcycle clubs waged in a crowded shopping center parking lot while families were on their way to lunch after Sunday church.
In announcing his decision, Johnson said it is time to “end this nightmare that we have been dealing with in this county since May 17, 2015.” …
About 200 bikers were arrested after the shootout on identical charges of engaging in organized criminal activity and held on $1 million bonds each. Former McLennan County District Attorney Abel Reyna sought indictments against 155 bikers on those identical charges and chose to try Jacob Carrizal, the Bandidos Dallas county chapter president, first.
Carrizal’s case ended in mistrial in November 2017, with most of the jurors in his case favoring acquittal, and no other defendant has been tried since.
The way Reyna handled the Twin Peaks cases was the centerpiece of Johnson’s campaign, and he defeated Reyna in the March 2018 Republican primary by 20 percentage points. After the primary, Reyna dismissed all but 24 of the remaining Twin Peaks cases. The special prosecutors appointed to handle four of the cases after Reyna recused his office also were critical of the manner in which the cases were handled and dismissed them, also…
Carrizal is among those whose cases are to be dismissed. Johnson noted that his trial cost $1 million in preparation and trial costs, plus an additional $500,000 in security and overtime pay after county officials ratcheted up security for his trial.
“To open that Pandora’s Box back up and start down that road again when we don’t feel that, after looking at the facts and the evidence, that we would be able to meet our burden of beyond a reasonable doubt would be irresponsible, in my opinion. Therefore, I am making the decision now to end this nightmare that we have been dealing with in this county since May 17, 2015,” Johnson said…
Further reinforcing the outlander perception that nothing good comes out of Waco. I remember posting about this back in 2015, but my weak search skills fail me…
A lot of bad things have happened in Waco, but this shouldn't be "normal" for anywhere. The gun battle broke out on a hot and quiet Sunday afternoon at an outdoor shopping mall. I heard about it from a neighbor shopping at Bed Bath & Beyond.https://t.co/OCh9LxcDJA
— Olivia Messer ?? (@OliviaMesser) April 2, 2019
burnspbesq
Even by Texas standards, Waco is a straaaaaaange place.
trollhattan
Since is open thread, a coda to the Oroville Spillway failure: two years and two months after it broke apart they’ve opened the spillway gates today to maintain the water level at the prescribed flood control elevation. Nice wrapup to what was a massive demo and construction project. Live video cam from across the river.
And California has a 160% snowpack for April 1.
Duane
Nine people died and no one goes to jail? Gang warfare is A-OK in Texas!
Republican heaven.
lumpkin
When everyone can shoot at everyone they think is a threat it’s gonna end up being legal for everyone to kill everyone. But at least it will be a “polite society”.
A Ghost To Most
@trollhattan:
Nice. Colorado is ~150%. Thank you, El Niño.
MJS
Stand your ground, on steroids.
MomSense
Great: I’m still fuming about the malheur mess.
MomSense
@Duane:
White gang warfare is A-ok in Texas.
burnspbesq
@trollhattan:
What’s the over/under on when Highway 120 is open into Yosemite from 395? Fourth of July?
rikyrah
@Duane:
WHITE gang warfare is A-OK
dexwood
Must be president Asshole’s bikers, the ones he threatens to unleash.
A Ghost To Most
@burnspbesq:
I don’t know about the Sierra’s, but I am sure we will be way delayed here.
Sorry about Duke. I’m sure that hurt.
Barbara
I hope some of these “innocent” people sue the city/county for unlawful arrest or whatever other tort or civil rights complaint they can make so that Waco has to spend and spend and spend due to its own incompetence and refusal to hold murderers accountable. The DA deserves misery.
lamh36
Open Thread…cool
Comrade Colette Collaboratrice
Follow-up to Anne Laurie’s post below about Cindy Yang and access for sale at Mar-a-Lago:
Chinese woman carrying thumb drive with malware arrested at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort.
She claimed she was sent there by her friend Charles …
?BillinGlendaleCA
@burnspbesq: Google Maps sez May 22.
Mart
Life imitating art, even if it is the sucky art of “The Purge”: “If on one night every year, you could commit any crime without facing consequences, what would you do?”
Urza
Waco is the kind of city that should just be quietly bulldozed out of existence and everyone pretend they knew nothing about it.
Elmo
@burnspbesq: The first couple of years I lived in Mono County we had epic snow – 500 inches or so – and the pass opened in mid June. Caltrans is already working on Sonora Pass to the north.
My over under date is June 12. But they’ll still be skiing in Mammoth on the Fourth of July.
NeenerNeener
@burnspbesq: But Waco looks so nice on Fixer Upper
White & Gold Purgatorian
Since this is an open thread, anyone have a tried and true remedy to keep a cardinal from bashing himself to death on a window? This one has been hitting one or another of our south windows roughly every 30 seconds the entire freaking day. Late morning I taped up some streamers which have not deterred him at all. As I type, he is still dashing himself into windows. Silly bird is not dead yet, but the cats and I are thoroughly sick of the racket.
laura
@Duane: “white” gang warfare is a-ok!
I see Rikyrah was already addressing the error….
I took a death penalty class in law school and one of the students was from Waco and he would regale us with tales from Waco, one deeply weird town. Lots of religious zealotry if you can believe it. He was one of the very few still in favor of capital punishment at the end of the course in spite of the mountain of evidence that it serves no purpose other than reinforcing disproportionate injustice against poc, the poor and for vengeance.
counterfactual
The shooting wasn’t between the biker members. The shooting was started by city and state police that had been staking out the restaurant.
According to internet rumor I heard at the time, a Texas motorcycle social and lobbying group that included both outlaw and non-criminal groups met regularly at the restaurant. Local authorities started surveillance. An argument started inside the restaurant, but the groups’ road captains got it outside to the parking lot, where it was settling down, when the authorities opened up with automatic weapons. The authorities arrested everyone they could lay their hands on, inside and outside the restaurant, charged them all with murder and set ridiculous bails.
eclare
@lamh36: That was awesome!
West of the Cascades
Waco was also where Jesse Washington was lynched in May 1916 in front of 10,000 spectators. It should never be allowed to forget its place in the racist history of this country. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lynching_of_Jesse_Washington
Mart
@White & Gold Purgatorian: I have taped white paper over the window (always the same window) for years. Read they see their reflection and it is a territorial thing. When it rains the paper comes down, and the head bashing resumes. This has gone on for years. Dumb-ass robin builds his nest in the same spot on the deck frame, soon after an animal tosses to the ground – does this every year as well. Weird thing so far this year – only has head bashed for one day. Also shits all over the deck. Wonder if he moved the nest or is dead?
A Ghost To Most
And to think I sold my motorcycle because I was tired of being god-bothered. I guess I was riding in the wrong places.
lamh36
Finding Your Roots back on PBS.
3 audacious artists.
#KehindeWiley Proof positive that when someone, esp a parent, takes a interest in what their child is doing, and nurtures it…they can do GREAT things!
#FindingYourRoots
Kent
I lived in Waco from 2003-2016 and our home was about a mile or so from where that shootout occured on a late sunday morning. I think I was at one of my kids soccer games.
Some context to this whole damn fiasco.
1. The local and state cops knew there was going to be a big motorcycle gang meeting at this restaurant and they basically laid in wait and opened fire. I don’t think anyone knows how many bikers the cops shot vs other bikers shooting themselves.
2. Location was your average upscale big box strip mall with the Best Buy, Pier One, Cabelas, and all the big chain fast casual restaurants. Totally not where you’d think something like this would occur.
3. The DA Reyna was a complete Republican idiot. Waco had a long-time professional DA who was decent and happened to be a Dem (in name only, but still a Dem). He was probably the last local white Dem politican still standing when he was finally voted out of office by Reyna who was this complete incompetent local GOP tool who only won because of straight ticket GOP voting, not because anyone thought he was remotely qualified to be a DA.
4. When the thing happened they basically threw everyone within a mile radius wearing biker colors into jail and confiscated all their bikes. Hundreds of them. Lots of ordinary folk got caught up in the dragnet. My wife had a doctor colleage who was tossed in jail and had his bike confiscated. Basically anyone who happened to be out on their Harley that Sunday morning.
5. The lawers had a field day getting people out of jail who had been tossed their with no probable cause of any kind or evidence against them.
6. There was video surveilance all over the place by both the police and all the mall security cameras inside and outside the restaurant. So if the DAs couldn’t make cases against actual shooters there probably weren’t cases to be made. It astonishes me that they couldn’t get actual biker shooters on video shooting people. But I guess they couldn’t. This is the modern era and security cameras at newish type places like this are pretty high def.
I’ve been gone from Waco for 3 years now, moved back to the Pacific Northwest so I haven’t followed this case lately. But it was a complete abortion from the very beginning due to the overeaction by the police and incompetence from the DA.
TaMara (HFG)
@lamh36: Damn she’s good.
lamh36
@lamh36:
my nephew also loves art…but he’s not taking art in school…I hope when we visit London that seeing the art and famous pieces will inspire him. My sister likes his art, but feels he should get a degree where he can make money…but he’s not passing those classes.
rikyrah
Polls just closed in Chicago. History will be made tonight ?
Jay
@White & Gold Purgatorian:
Spiderweb stickers.
He’s probably challenging his reflection which he sees as a territorial challenger.
Barbara
@Kent: So they might actually have a valid civil rights complaint?
O. Felix Culpa
@rikyrah: Yay! I’m refreshing the Trib website obsessively for updates. My older son is keeping me informed via SMS.
lamh36
@rikyrah: I think I read Micheal Brown’s mother is up for city council in Ferguson tonight as well.
zhena gogolia
@lamh36:
I hope she can knock out Bernie. Please God.
Part of the reason I feel positively about Buttigieg is that I’m hoping he siphons off some of the BS support.
The Dangerman
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
I’d split the difference between Google and the 4th; I’d go Flag Day.
A Ghost To Most
dailybeast
Kent
Imagine a younger, more ambitious, and more venal and stupid version of Marco Rubio (I know, it’s hard…) and you have the Waco DA Abel Reyna who engineered this fiasco. He thought by standing tough and tossing 200 bikers into jail with 1 million dollar bonds on identical carbon copy charges was going to launch him into the governor’s mansion or at least into Congress. There was apparently no real attempt to investigate deeply and go after the real culprits. They thought they thought prosecuting every last biker within a mile radius was going to be splashier.
I for one would love to have seen the actual scum bikers who deserved to be prosecuted actually be effectively prosecuted. But that never happened. They went for the whole lot all at once and then once individual cases started to crumble on lack of evidence, all the defense attorneys started comparing notes on what was working and did their jobs.
Jay
@A Ghost To Most:
Yup, the norm is to send an e-mail to the e-mail address (15 seconds) with either a confirmation reply or a random number one time confirmation
Martin
I don’t think this is a case of Texas looking the other way. The sense I got right after the event was that the local police and DA were completely out of their depth. They locked up everyone, judges said they couldn’t do that. They fucked up evidence collection (which admittedly would have been challenging given the scale of the event). They resisted help from the FBI and other agencies. It seems that they violated a LOT of peoples civil rights, which pretty much makes it impossible to convict them.
Incompetence > malice
lamh36
Black soldiers treated better by white French population than they were home in America
#findingyourroots
Jay
@Kent:
In order to end the Biker War in Montreal, which included car bombs, the police put in UC’s and cultivated informants. It took a couple of years, but it shut down the war and resulted in convictions.
In a State that has both “stand your ground” and “carry” laws you are kinda hosed on getting a conviction.
Kent
@Barbara:
Yes, the county is going to spend the next decade defending itself against lawsuits. There were real outlaw biker scum there. Drug dealing outlaw murderers. No doubt about that. But on a Sunday morning also just a lot of regular local bikers out doing their thing. The boyfriend of the HR manager at my wife’s medical office was one of those shot and killed. I didn’t know him but from reports he was just an ordinary local guy with a factory job who liked Harleys.
This wasn’t some outlaw biker bar out of the edge of town. Waco has a handful of those sort of places. This was the center of the biggest big box shopping district in Waco located at the biggest freeway interchange between Dallas and Austin. Thousands of ordinary people were out shopping and dining around there that morning. It’s the Bed Bath & Beyond, Best Buy, Kohls, PF Changs sort of place.
SiubhanDuinne
@White & Gold Purgatorian:
There are sticky things, silhouettes of different birds, that you can affix to the inside of your windows. Get one the size and shape of a red-tail hawk in full avenging flight, and I promise you that the cardinal will keep his distance. (I expect he sees his reflection and moves in for the attack, thinking it’s a rival for his territory. But he would flee right smarting if he perceived a predator!)
?BillinGlendaleCA
@The Dangerman: That’s also Trump’s b-day, he’ll probably take credit for opening the pass.
ETA: That looks like a nice road for Milky Ways shots.
counterfactual
@Kent: The internet rumors I mentioned said that all the deaths were due to law enforcement bullets.
A Ghost To Most
@Jay:
Understood. This is decidedly not that. Reason eleventy-seven I never trusted or joined Facebook.
Jay
@Kent:
There’s some concerns here with “patching in”, in which Outlaw Biker Clubs lend “cred” to Suburban Biker Clubs by building relationships with them over charity events, rides, biker issues,
Over time they “adopt” the club as an “affiliate” club, and use them to recruit, radicalize and exploit the connections.
Peale
@White & Gold Purgatorian: you could open the window and let him in.
Jay
@A Ghost To Most:
Yup, not a member of the Book of Faces either and Social Media can have my bunch of email passwords when they pry them out of my cold dead hands.
Steeplejack
Links from and comments to that story at the top of this post strongly suggest that the reason the authorities are letting this case die is because many of the victims were shot by the police, not bikers. Better to sweep it all under the rug.
rikyrah
Lori Lightfoot will be the next Mayor of Chicago.
History made on two levels.
lamh36
Wow!
And in his pension file…he named his owner.
oooh…so I wonder can he file some kinda of litigation to the slave owner anscetors?
Ruckus
@Barbara:
Not the original DA.
But let’s look at the situation. Massive shoot out, nine (I believe) dead and everyone is arrested because no on has a clue who might have done what. It sounds like any evidence gathering that might have been done was done badly – with that much mayhem and death in a smallish town, not difficult to imagine. And for the last, what, 4 years it sounds like the evidence hasn’t gotten any better. One trial, of one of the leaders and they couldn’t make a case for the jury.
Really I can’t see why it’s gone on this long, did/does anyone think they might ever get a conviction for anyone for anything?
And before the pitchforks and ropes with funny knots come out for me, all I’ve done is actually look at the reported nothing and asked a question – who is prosecutable here? It’s not that there shouldn’t be a bunch of trials, there obviously should, but if you ain’t got the evidence, you ain’t got the evidence. I’d blame the people whose job it was to get that cause it sure doesn’t sound like they did.
White & Gold Purgatorian
@Mart: Thanks. I will try some paper tomorrow. Do you cover the whole glass or just “some” of the window?
About 10 years ago we had a cardinal who did this for months. He would go all the way around the house, flying into every single window. At first I worried he would kill himself, then as time passed was kind of bummed he was taking so damned long to get it done. This one may have a nest in a nearby plum tree. Between flying into windows he is perching on the handle of the charcoal grill and pooping all over the cover. We feed the birds and truly enjoy watching — even the cats enjoy bird watching — but the constant whack, whack, whack is beyond annoying.
A Ghost To Most
@Jay:
Indeed. BJ and WaPo comments comprise my entire web footprint. Too many years in IT, and watching the greedy people who came to dominate it.
Jay
“The photo is a nostalgic memory of who I was,” said the 23-year-old. “Now I look at myself, my eye is not there, my cheek is not there, my lips are not there, but I have this picture.”
After the United States abruptly retracted its offer to settle her as a refugee, she is now starting a new life in Canada. But her ordeal began years earlier; she was 17 years old when her brother-in-law – a strongman with links to the Taliban in Afghanistan’s northern Baghlan province – descended on her family home with a 20-man entourage, intent on marrying her off to a cousin 14 years her senior.”
https://www.google.ca/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/world/2018/apr/03/afghan-woman-shot-in-face-canada-refugee
The Dangerman
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
If, for some strange reason, you are in the neighborhood of the Carrizo Plain soon (and, really, you’d probably have to be lost, kinda like I was), the wildflowers were outstanding. There’s a 42 mile long stretch from 166 to 58 (call it the Soda Lake road) that was pretty good road (mostly dirt, but well maintained) and was lovely (no pictures; as mentioned, it was a bit of an accident that I was in that area).
No poppies, but lots of purples, yellows, and baby blues (damn near UCLA colors)…
Kent
@counterfactual:
Heard the same rumors. The investigation was so botched I don’t think they have a fucking clue. Or perhaps started to disover that it was mostly or all cops and then just botched things on purpose and kept the actual FBI pros at bay to cover it up. Who the hell knows. Bunch of incompetent and venal GOP hacks with ambitions were running things.
Yeah I don’t have any idea about that sort of thing. I was a suburban soccer dad and teacher at the time. My riding was cycling on my Cannondale road bike with a group of other teacher cyclists on weekends so that wasn’t remotely part of my world. There are massive Harley dealerships around that part of Texas though. So it is a lot of middle aged white guys with pot bellies and normal jobs who are buying them. This is the place which is a block from where the shootout took place: https://www.wacotrib.com/waco_today_magazine/waco-s-harley-dealership-marks-huge-remodel-anniversary-of-famed/article_beb4d095-07c6-5d20-b268-3f293763e466.html
Personally I think Harleys are pretty ancient technology and not that great of machines. But a lot of people like them. My brother is a motorcycle fanatic who buys old bikes on craiglist and restores them. He has complete scorn for Harleys. But a ton of suburban middle aged white guy types buy them in Texas because the weather and endless country road network is so conducive to motorcycling compared to other parts of the country.
O. Felix Culpa
@rikyrah: Woot! Trib website has Lightfoot with nearly a 3:1 margin, with 66% of precincts reporting in.
White & Gold Purgatorian
@Jay: Reflection, huh? Hell, it isn’t like my windows are clean or anything. Will go with paper tomorrow and look for stickers longer term. Thanks.
rikyrah
The Undecideds broke for Lightfoot, making it a blowout.
tobie
Someone brought up DCCC’s proposed rule change last night that would prohibit the DCCC from hiring consultants aligned with campaigns to unseat House Democrats in primaries. AOC and Pressley have been complaining that the rule is unfair and undemocratic. Well, it turns out that the Congressional Black Caucus asked for this provision:
Lacy Clay, who was challenged by a Justice Dem, had this to say about the rule:
In a different time, and if the country were not facing an existential threat, I would probably oppose the rule, but there’s too much at stake in 2020 to have to spend time and money dealing with the Justice Dem’s political arson operations.
O. Felix Culpa
Grrr. So now the Chicago Tribune has decided I’m in an EU country and has blocked access. I know I’m in New Mexico, which is almost foreign, but srsly?
laura
@lamh36: if your nephew has artistic endeavors, London is a great city for immersion in art and portraiture.
You might want to forward this link to him. Milton Bowen ROCKS! and his family made every scrap of household material available to him for use and his art is reflective of :using what’s available”.
http://www.milton510.com/about.html
Milton Bowen spreads the love art-wise with students all over the SF bay area.
delk
Go Lori!
rikyrah
@O. Felix Culpa:
Google Chicago Board of Elections and follow the results there
A Ghost To Most
@Kent:
So are most Harley riders. They need to scramble to build something younger riders want.
White & Gold Purgatorian
@Peale:
Yes. All 8 house cats vigorously endorse that suggestion
@SiubhanDuinneThank you. I shall seek red tailed hawk stickers. Hope his brains won’t be too addled by then to recognize a predator.
Steve in the ATL
@O. Felix Culpa:
Set your VPN to the U.K. so you won’t be in the EU anymore
schrodingers_cat
@tobie: Justice Dems == Tea Party, BS == Orange. We need to stop them. We can’t have both parties playing for Putin.
Duane
@laura: In normal times the federal government would take charge. (IANAL). Not much of a country if murder in broad daylight occurs without any punishment.
Kent
@Ruckus:
Imagine if there was a big police-involved shootout in a black inner city neighborhood in Chicago or LA and the police did a big dragnet and arrested everyone within a 1/2 mile radius who looked like they were wearing “gang colors” or who looked “gang affiliated” and then threw all 200+ arrestees into jail with identical photocopied charging statements and identical $1 million bonds and most of them who couldn’t pay ended up spending 3+ weeks in jail until they could afford/find a lawyer to get them out.
The civil rights attorneys and BLM protestors would be flying in by the charter plane load. That does not mean there were not actual bad guys and actual culprits in the original roundup. But the overreaction and massive civil rights violation would have tainted the entire process. This case is basically no different from that.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@The Dangerman: Purple and gold work too, I went to gradual school at Washington.
O. Felix Culpa
@rikyrah: Thanks!
@Steve in the ATL: LOL
rikyrah
The Fifth Floor will be occupied by a Black Woman. Wow.
B.B.A.
Naturally the violent gang that calls itself “police” has gotten away with murder again.
Fuck the police.
Kent
@A Ghost To Most:
Yeah, but they are stuck and can’t do that without offending their cash cow old guy market. Young people don’t want motorcycles anymore anyway. I graduated from HS in 1982 and there were dozens of motorcycles parked outside my HS every day. Dozens of them. I teach HS and i can’t remember the last time I saw a HS kid ride a motorcycle to school. Not in Texas and not here in WA either.
O. Felix Culpa
@rikyrah: ???
zhena gogolia
@lamh36:
She really is my favorite candidate. I hope she can dispatch BS soonest.
Kent
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
Bow Down to Washington! So did I. School of Marine and Environmental Affairs. Down next to the School of Oceanography.
A Ghost To Most
@Kent:
Sounds like Harley resale values are screwed. Not that I care – the only motorcycle I would be interested in is a Ural.
O. Felix Culpa
@zhena gogolia: Mine too (although I’ll crawl over the requisite broken glass for any Dem in 2020). Agree also with your follow-up sentiment re the aptly initialed BS.
Steve in the ATL
@A Ghost To Most: are you angling for a position in the trump administration?
Jay
@Kent:
My motorcycle experience is limited to road racing and riding highly modified Japanese street bikes.
Noisey, slow, wallowing pig bike gang rides held/hold no interest for me.
Carving up a canyon is/was fun.
So was extreme mountain bike riding.
Never any group larger than 4, because 1:5 is an asshole.
The thing here is that suburban bikers have gone from solo or buddy informal biker cosplay on the weekends to organized “club” cosplay in all their spare time. So of course, by “patching” a suburban club, Outlaw bikers can recruit the few tired of it just being cosplay, and tap the few in financial or other trouble, as either mules, runners or sources.
When the Vancouver Fire Department Cosplay “Biker” Club “patches” to the Hells Angels, you’ve got a problem.
rikyrah
Lightfoot is the First non native born Chicagoan to be elected Mayor since 1931!
Damn , we ARE a provincial town…LOL
A Ghost To Most
@Steve in the ATL: Ha. Took me a minute. Sadly, there is no other production motorcycle with the goat-like capabilities of the two-wheel drive Ural.
BobS
@Kent: You & your brother are right- Harley’s are noisy, over-priced pieces of shit.
Gin & Tonic
@Kent: An old friend of mine, a Harley owner, calls them “road sofas.”
Jay
@A Ghost To Most:
Naw, they are moving to China to tap that market.
O. Felix Culpa
@rikyrah:
So many firsts! Chicago’s provincialism is reduced a little by being one of the first major cities to elect a black woman openly gay mayor. That’s more than a little awesome.
A Ghost To Most
@Jay:
I don’t quite recognize the world we’re living in. That must really frost the old-timers.
Better to stay above treeline as much as possible.
B.B.A.
@O. Felix Culpa: New York didn’t elect Christine Quinn (a self-described “qualified lesbian”) because she was too conservative.
Jay
@Kent:
Motorcycles used to be cheap, cheap to insure, cheap to run, cheap to modify, cheap to maintain.
Now a used Camry is cheaper than a used Kawasaki Ninja and you can seat 5 in the Camry and drive it year round.
The late ‘60’s, ‘70’s and early ‘80’s Japanese bikes that you could work on at home, are now collector items, and the follow on models are all computer controlled.
A Ghost To Most
@Jay:
I bought a 4Runner to replace the bike.
I’ve managed to spend enough on it to buy a new Harley dresser, but we can go almost anywhere in comfort. I’m building an off-road trailer now.
Jay
@A Ghost To Most:
More and more of their markets are offshore. In the younger domestic market, most will never have the economic advantages to buy a Harley as a Toy. They will buy a late model Camry or Honda Accord and try to help pay for it by taking Gig economy shifts.
Harleys sell in Asia, because they are a status item. Cultural appropriation of a sort.
The Insane Clown POSus’s steel and aluminum tarriffs put a big dent in Harley’s costs, and his Trade War, ( So Much Winning, For China) has made them realize that China won’t put retalitory tariffs on American Brands made in China.
So, mothball Milwaukee and move to Shanghai.
J R in WV
@White & Gold Purgatorian:
They see their own reflection, and think it’s another male cardinal. With whom they must compete with for territory and a mate.
We have 45 windows, and we have cardinals who visit every window, every spring day. Wack, wack. It doesn’t harm them, at least not much. We just try to ignore the poor guys…
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Kent: Econ in Savery Hall for me.
Jay
@A Ghost To Most:
I spent $12k on my ‘84, but that included body work, body armour, and other than the pumpkins, I did all the wrenching. That includes a custom heavy duty tailgate with the Toyota logo re-embossed as Toyzilla.
For that, I got a tank with 32mpg at highway speeds.
An entry level Sportster at the time was $18k.
Jay
@J R in WV:
Are you sure they arn’t seeing altarboys?
Amir Khalid
@White & Gold Purgatorian:
The only recommendation I can think of is some kind of counselling for the self-harming avian.
Anne Laurie
@Gin & Tonic:
So when will Harley enter the increasingly popular motorized trike market? Cuz if that’s where their customers are…
J R in WV
@Jay:
“Are you sure they arn’t seeing altarboys?”
No… I’m not sure of anything, anymore.
The world is like a Dalghren SciFi novel now. I wake up from a strange dream, and don’t know which was real, the dream, or what I read online after I leave the bed at 4 am.
Gin & Tonic
I love old-fashioned direct democracy – spent this evening at the annual Financial Town Meeting, where every resident can gather, question every line of the proposed town budget, reject or (more likely) approve it, and determine how much to collect in taxes to pay for those services, a tradition that’s been in effect for pretty close to 300 years now. A lot of New England still does this.
Keith P.
Meanwhile, Trump is sending the DOJ to Chicago to go after the DA for not trying to throw the book at Jussee Smollett.
Amir Khalid
@A Ghost To Most:
The Harleys I’ve seen here in Malaysia — where quite a few affluent middle-aged Muslim guys, about the demographic equivalent of American Harley owners, belong to the Harley Owners Group — all look old-fashioned and sound badly tuned. They can’t be cheap to run. Their appeal to bikers mystifies me.
Omnes Omnibus
@lamh36: It’s Michael. Pet peeve of mine, sorry.
Ohio Mom
@White & Gold Purgatorian: We had a robin do the same a few years ago. And somebody flew into a different window late this afternoon, so we might be starting another go-round.
Still better than last year’s fauna adventure when that mother squirrel chewed a hole in the eaves and had two babies in the attic.
Anyway, I took a big black garbage bag, opened the window from the top, hung the bag on the outside and closed the window on the last couple of inches of bag. Then I opened to window from the bottom and tucked the bottom few inches of the bag in before closing that end of the window.
It didn’t look all that attractive but it worked just fine. I guess we should be happy that it’s spring and the birds are staking out their nesting areas.
A Ghost To Most
@Anne Laurie:
The geezers are migrating to oversized hover-rounds. Are they going to ship the glut of used Harleys to China as well?
Gin & Tonic
@Amir Khalid: Tautologies-R-Us, but Harleys appeal to the people they appeal to. My aforementioned friend says they’re the best-looking and best-sounding motorcycles ever made (although I doubt he’d turn up his nose at a brand-new Indian.)
cwmoss
@A Ghost To Most: Don’t forget to bring your tools, don’t go over 45 mph, and for God’s sake, don’t even think about trying to go uphill!
A Ghost To Most
@Amir Khalid:
James Dean, James Dean
You bought it sight unseen.
Deep cultural thing.
A Ghost To Most
@cwmoss: The Ural, I take it. My 4×4 is more reliable than my judgement.
Omnes Omnibus
@Kent: Oddly enough, Royal Enfield’s US HQ is basically just across the Milwaukee River from the HD museum.
Jay
@Anne Laurie:
Nope, custom builders have the Harley Trike market cornered, and it’s pretty small.
The Sport Trike market belongs to Bombardier.
plato
Lori Lightfoot : Chicago’s first African-American female and openly gay mayor.
Has totus thug died yet?
J R in WV
And a reformer, gay, black woman won the mayoral race in Chi Town, 74-26%! WOW.
Omnes Omnibus
@Gin & Tonic: I’ll cop to wanting a new Norton.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
He’s putting on another show tonight
oranges
B.B.A.
Which is part of why I don’t set aside the charges.
Nicole
@B.B.A.:
In fact, she was ratfucked by a real-estate backed organization that spent a lot of $$ against her in the primaries. The current Hizzoner is quite cozy with Real Estate here.
(Which, needless to say, has nothing to do with Lori Lightfoot’s history-making victory. Most excellent news!)
plato
Lee Franke
@counterfactual: That was pretty much exactly how I heard it as well.
The reason no charges were filed was because the cops did all the killing. After the first shots started some of the bikers pulled weapons out.
Mart
@White & Gold Purgatorian: @SiubhanDuinneThank you. I shall seek red tailed hawk stickers. Hope his brains won’t be too addled by then to recognize a predator.
That sounds a lot better than what I read on the Google about papering over. Did a quick Google search and found iron on stickers for T-shirts. Only about 3″ in diameter. If he comes back I will use the Snipping Tool to enlarge and to print out a picture of the hawk. I did cover half the window, and Mr. Robin just aimed his head a little higher. Maybe need a couple hawk pictures? The banging into the window sound was less irritating than the bird shit on the deck furniture.)
Jay
@Amir Khalid:
When you buy a Honda, you are buying an excellent motorcycle, across all models.
When you buy a Harley, you are buying an image as a tough guy, a gang culture, and a pretty shitty motorcycle.
That’s why you see milktoast Dentists and CPA’s riding their Harleys with assless chaps, Harley shitkicker boots, Branded sleeveless faux patches vests, vented gloves and the fake Stielhelm DOT rated helmets. Road rash collectors and organ donor brain buckets.
Harley Dealers will try to upsell new customers every piece of Harley branded “image gear” they can.
Honda Dealers will try to sell new customers, SNELL rated full face helmets, just like all the Motorcycle and Automotive Racing Groups require, kevlar/aramid/body armour/goretex all weather safety pants and jackets that are warm and comfortable in a downpour while being cool and dry when it’s 120f in the shade, slider boots and gloves that leave your tendons intact after a 200 foot slide on greasy pavement.
Gerald
white privilege in action! DAMN! Even whites folks are amazed.
Jay
@Gerald:
It’s actually the Blue Wall in action.
Kent
@Jay: I suspect you nailed it.
Who the hell knows what a full blown trial with competent defense attorneys would have uncovered in terms of police misconduct.
No way the locals wanted that in a trial that would have had a national audience.
J R in WV
Drove through that part of TEXAS once after spending a night in Border Patrol detention, with a sweet bunch of guys who exclusively spoke spanish. I was driving a rig with backhoe on tractor on trailer filled with (loaded) toolchests, all towed by a F-350 Lariat, and spent the night wondering if I would wind up in a ditch in the West Texas oil country after they agreed who would get which part of the construction company rig we had….
Waco is so F’ed Up, that whole million square mile desert is so F’ed Up. No wonder the Koresh Cult, the Mormon multi-bride cult, and motorcycle gang wannabe cult all took root out in that desert around Waco – the place is WACKO pretty much.
Never going back to TX as a destination, ever. They are on their own!!! without me. I try to avoid even driving across TX, am willing to take I-40 across the N panhandle which you can do without stopping, unless you need a bathroom break. So for years now I’m only on the ground in TX to take a Crap or Piss somewhere.
Along I-10 in pretty far west Texas, we once ate a fair truckstop type meal, frys and a burger and a coke, then I went into the bathroom, where the water quality failure post was taped to the mirror. Yuck!!!