{"id":16644,"date":"2015-05-21T09:36:37","date_gmt":"2015-05-21T16:36:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/?p=16644"},"modified":"2015-05-21T09:36:37","modified_gmt":"2015-05-21T16:36:37","slug":"two-wheeled-trutherism-a-doggie-update","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/?p=16644","title":{"rendered":"Two-Wheeled Trutherism (&#038; a Doggie Update)"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure style=\"width: 240px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><a title=\"1970842_10152224170437346_1989966499_n by Paul Woodford, on Flickr\" href=\"https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/halfmind\/17907095606\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" title=\"click to view full sized image on Flickr\" src=\"https:\/\/c2.staticflickr.com\/8\/7788\/17907095606_00740ce59f_m.jpg\" alt=\"1970842_10152224170437346_1989966499_n\" width=\"240\" height=\"240\" \/><\/a><figcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">California coast, 1970<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>If you read my motorcycle posts you know I&#8217;m a biker truther. That&#8217;s what they&#8217;re calling members of the motorcycling community who are beginning to question police and media accounts of what happened in <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/2015_Waco_shootout\" target=\"_blank\">Waco, Texas<\/a> last Sunday, when nine bikers\u00a0were killed by gunfire and another eighteen injured during an alleged shootout between rival gang members.<\/p>\n<p>Word is bubbling up through\u00a0the biker community that the shootout was more\u00a0one-sided than initially portrayed by law enforcement and the media; that\u00a0all nine of the dead bikers\u00a0and most of those injured by gunfire were shot by the police.\u00a0The non-motorcycling media &#8230; CBS, MSNBC, newspapers, etc &#8230; are\u00a0so far merely parroting\u00a0what the authorities are\u00a0telling them, which isn&#8217;t much (although, to be fair, the police have <a href=\"http:\/\/www.usatoday.com\/story\/news\/nation\/2015\/05\/18\/waco-shootout-police-involvement\/27530257\/\" target=\"_blank\">now admitted<\/a> that some of the dead bikers may have been shot by law enforcement officers).<\/p>\n<p>Yes, MC gang members are violent. Rival gang members fight with and occasionally kill one another. Big MC gangs are heavily involved in organized crime, and as far as I\u00a0know minor-league feeder\u00a0gangs\u00a0are criminal enterprises too.\u00a0I steer well clear of those guys:\u00a0I\u00a0don&#8217;t want them in my town any more than the good citizens of Waco or Hollister want them in theirs; I hate it that their bad reputation sticks to me and the motorcycling community at large.<\/p>\n<p>I know, too, that what happened in Waco last Sunday is nothing compared to the\u00a0injustice of continual\u00a0police killings of unarmed black men and boys all across the nation. No one cares much about the bikers in Waco, who really are a pack of violent assholes: there&#8217;s no denying they went at each other with\u00a0knives, brass knuckles, chains, and guns in a busy restaurant full of innocent customers.<\/p>\n<p>For good or ill, though, I <a href=\"http:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/?p=13745\">identify with my tribe<\/a>. Knowing how the police view MC gangs and gang members, I&#8217;m inclined to believe the rumors I&#8217;m hearing from Waco; I likewise believe the bikers in New York City who say the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.dnainfo.com\/new-york\/20150520\/washington-heights\/graphic-video-showing-bikers-beating-suv-driver-released-at-trial\" target=\"_blank\">SUV driver they beat up<\/a> in November 2013 started the fight by swerving into their lane,\u00a0colliding with one biker\u00a0and causing him\u00a0to crash, then speeding\u00a0away. When bikers tell me about the outrageous things cagers do to them, I believe them.\u00a0When bikers tell me police in Waco are cracking down by\u00a0imposing\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.reuters.com\/article\/2015\/05\/19\/us-usa-texas-shooting-bikers-idUSKBN0O400820150519\" target=\"_blank\">martial law on\u00a0motorcyclists<\/a>, even forcing the local Harley-Davidson dealership to keep its doors closed, I believe them.<\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;m a biker truther. And I wish the media would do their job and start asking questions.<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<p>I know everyone wants a Schatzi update, so here she is, our little football:<\/p>\n<p><a title=\"IMG_1482 by Paul Woodford, on Flickr\" href=\"https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/halfmind\/17749528310\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter\" title=\"click to view full sized image on Flickr\" src=\"https:\/\/c4.staticflickr.com\/8\/7712\/17749528310_4c9def631e_z.jpg\" alt=\"IMG_1482\" width=\"640\" height=\"480\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;m taking her in later this morning to have her stitches removed. How&#8217;s she doing? She&#8217;s her old self again, although still a bit wobbly on her back legs. I&#8217;ll ask the vet about that, praying the\u00a0answer will be\u00a0&#8220;This is normal, it takes them awhile to fully recover.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile, we&#8217;ve set up a ramp to the couch and I&#8217;m trying to train the girls to use it all the time. They like using the ramp to get on the couch, but if someone comes to the door they forget it&#8217;s there and try to jump to the floor. Schatzi jumped down from the couch last night before I could restrain her, and I nearly had a heart attack. Worse than toddlers, these dogs &#8230; you have to watch them every second!<\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;ll keep you all posted on Schatzi&#8217;s progress.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>If you read my motorcycle posts you know I&#8217;m a biker truther. That&#8217;s what they&#8217;re calling members of the motorcycling community who are beginning to question police and media accounts of what happened in Waco, Texas last Sunday, when nine bikers\u00a0were killed by gunfire and another eighteen injured during an alleged shootout between rival gang [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40,10,16,5,2],"tags":[1360,1865,1867,356,1866],"class_list":["post-16644","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-critters","category-current-events","category-media","category-motorcycling","category-personal","tag-bikers","tag-mc-gangs","tag-police","tag-schatzi","tag-waco"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16644","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=16644"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16644\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16655,"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16644\/revisions\/16655"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=16644"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=16644"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=16644"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}