Day: May 2, 2009

Horse lovers and racing fans all over the world consider the first Saturday in May to be the High Holy Day of Horse Racing. Today is Kentucky Derby Day. So ladies, put on your big hats and everyone gather round for mint juleps. We might just have a Triple Crown Winner today.

There has not been a Triple Crown Winner in 31 years. The 70’s were good years for the Triple Crown. Great racing athletes like Secretariat (1973), Seattle Slew (1977), and Affirmed (1978) all ‘ran for the roses’ and walked away with the most coveted prize of all, the Triple Crown.

Technically speaking, a race horse only ‘runs for the roses’ in the Kentucky Derby. In 2 weeks, the horses will run in the Preakness, for the black eyed Susan. Those running in the Belmont will run for the blanket of white carnations. The Belmont Stakes will be held June 6 at Belmont Park in New York.

Every year fans keep their fingers crossed that this will be the year—the year of a Triple Crown Winner. Things are a little wobbly at the moment. Today, Kentucky Derby favored I want Revenge was scratched due to a wretched front ankle. He will go on to Pimlico early in hopes of being well for the Preakness in 2 weeks. Whoever wins today’s derby, might just lose out in the Preakness if I want Revenge is back to normal and is as strong of a runner as some feel he is.

List of 20^th Century Triple Crown Winners

Historical pictures of the Derby

Official Kentucky Derby Site

Video of former Triple Crown Winners

More information on that fine Virginia athlete, Secretariat (1970-1989)

Who is your favorite? Will we have a Triple Crown winner this year? Has anyone ever been to the Kentucky Derby? How many people frequent Charles Town?  Should horse racing be banned, as some animal rights activists want?  Will the swine flu scare keep crowds low at the Derby?

[ED:  Gainesville Resident has found the following link that shows an aerial shot of the race as well as a heart-warming interview with Jockey Cal ‘Bo-RAIL’  Borel.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AjY-rrAoTl8]

Has the swine flu pandemic given rise to even more anti-immigrant hatred?  An article a friend sent me from MSNBC.COM suggests yes:

“No contact anywhere with an illegal alien!” conservative talk show host Michael Savage advised his U.S. listeners this week on how to avoid the swine flu. “And that starts in the restaurants” where he said, you “don’t know if they wipe their behinds with their hands!”

And Thursday, Boston talk radio host Jay Severin was suspended after calling Mexican immigrants “criminalians” during a discussion of swine flu and saying that emergency rooms had become “essentially condos for Mexicans.”

That’s tepid compared to some of the xenophobic reactions spreading like an emerging virus across the Internet. “This disgusting blight is because MEXICANS ARE PIGS!” an anonymous poster ranted on the “prison planet” forum, part of radio host and columnist Alex Jones’ Web site.

There is even talk of conspiracy. Savage speculated that terrorists are using Mexican immigrants as walking germ warfare weapons. “It would be easy,” he said, “to bring an altered virus into Mexico, put it in the general population, and have them march across the border.”

 

 

The following Keither Olbermann video gives further examples of scapegoating. 

 

Do people really respond to microbes this way?  Was this the excuse people were looking for? 

Most Latinos in our area are from countries other than Mexico.  Only about 25% our our Hispanic population is from Mexico.  Have they been treated differently since this outbreak?  Perhaps those who are slinging this kind of trash should be reminded that the first cases of swine flu in the United States were brought back by American Catholic high school students who had been vacationing over Spring break in Cancun.   Surely no one will suggest that we ban American Catholic high school students.

[ed note: I am aware that this video is not neutral view point. However, people’s words do speak for themselves, so I opted to use the material. ]