Reflections of An Uncommon Common Man

  In 1944 a German soldier named named Frederick Albert was captured in Italy and transported to an American POW camp in Arizona. Frederick was a good cook and a baker. He was working in the mess hall one day when a beautiful American Army nurse walked in. You might call it love at first sight because he boldly walked up to her and said "You should know my name. I'm the man who's going to marry you.". If Elinor Powell had been White this kind of boldness would have been shocking enough but this was a German soldier hitting on Black woman in broad daylight in Jim Crow Arizona.   Both Frederick and Elinor were from prominent families. Frederick was from a wealthy German family. Although his family never joined the Nazi Party they were staunch nationalists and believed in Hitler. Hitler rated racial groups from the most superior to the most inferior. The Aryan or Germanic race topped the list. Blacks were next to the bottom and the only race considered lower were

  As a student of history I realize that up until the discovery of penicillin in 1928, and it's first use as a drug in 1929, children died like flies, especially prior to the turn of the twentieth century. They also had to deal with a multitude of diseases that are virtually eliminated today, like typhus, cholera, the plague, smallpox and yellow fever, just to name a few. A couple could have as many as ten children and you were lucky if 3 or 4 lived until adulthood. I love to walk through old cemeteries and read headstones. I am always saddened at the number of small headstones where infants and children are buried and whose young lives ended much too soon. It made no difference back then how wealthy you were or whether you were the king of a country, or president of the United States. Your children were just as vulnerable as the children of the common people. They just died in a lot better surroundings. Abraham and Mary Lincoln lost 3 of their 4 children before they reached th

Where is it written that a person who has committed a crime is off limits from prosecution just because they are running for political office? If Joe Biden molested a four year old would he be off limits from investigation and prosecution just because he is running for president? In essence this was what James Comey was saying when he illegally made the decision not to prosecute Hillary when she committed multiple felonies violating the Espionage Act in 2016. In addition to the crimes committed, wouldn't we want to know if the person that we are voting for is a criminal or not? If we were hiring that person to work for our company, wouldn't we want to know that? On an ethical level, do we want corrupt people representing us in office? It is one thing to spread gossip about your political opponent but that is not illegal, nor should it be. But when you take political gossip, dress it up as fact, and use it as the basis to go after a FISA warrant, in order to spy on your p

  I have had the pleasure of knowing Mike Gruber for about five years now. He is our maintenance supervisor where I work Over the last few days and weeks I have come to learn a little about his family. Mike has both German and Italian heritage and is originally from Melrose Park Illinois. His Italian side is pretty colorful. Mike's 2nd cousin was Joey Aiuppa who was part of the Capone organization. As a young man he drove for Al Capone. Aiuppa also had ties to John Dillinger and the Karpis gangs. He may have been involved in the death of Sam Giancana and would take over as the head of the Chicago mob after his death. In 1986 Aiuppa was sentenced to 28 years in prison and fined 80,000 dollars for a scheme to skim millions of dollars from Las Vegas casinos. After serving nearly ten years he was released for health reasons in 1996 and died at the age of 89 in February 1987. Mike's recollections of his cousin sounds like scenes from the Godfather when they attended family gat