I don't think they should invite this guy to a football game.
Even if a killing were a mistake, we shouldn't celebrate it.
You know, this week got rough for a minute there in the middle, but on the whole it's been pretty good over here on Clemons Avenue. I hope all of you can say the same, or close to it.
The other New York City killing in the news is the May 2023 death of Jordan Neely, a 30-year-old homeless Black man. A then-24-year-old white Marine veteran, Daniel Penny, killed Neely by choking him on the subway, after Neely threatened other passengers. Penny was found not guilty of criminally negligent homicide on Monday, after a deadlocked jury last week led to a manslaughter charge against him being dismissed. Now Penny has been invited to President-elect Trump's suite for the Army-Navy college football game tomorrow.
I've followed the news about Neely's killing very loosely, and the take that seems most accurate to me is that Penny wasn't wrong to restrain him, but that he held on way longer than necessary. The Wikipedia article is good if you want a rundown of the story. The right wing has adopted Penny, lauding him as a hero protecting innocent New Yorkers, in the much same way it adopted Kyle Rittenhouse—thus the football invitation.
And just—that sucks. However you feel about Daniel Penny and what he did, it wasn't glorious behavior. Jordan Neely was scaring people, but he hadn't hurt anyone. I rode the subways in New York for five years, and it definitely sounds like Neely was scarier than most unhoused folks who loudly address a train car full of people (which is a thing that happens pretty regularly). But I've also seen passengers intervene when a person seems dangerous—New Yorkers are very good at taking cooperative action when they need to, without being jerks—and I know at least one person warned Penny that he was killing Neely, and even if you think Penny was just being too careful, well, he still made a big mistake. He made a mistake that killed someone. It wasn't an act of immense courage. A large, fit Marine used his training to grab a weaker, unwell man from behind. At least two other guys helped. We shouldn't be formally celebrating that, by having the incoming vice president invite him to a luxury box at a big sporting event. What does that say about our country, that we are proud of an act of killing, committed by a soldier against a hungry man with mental illness, in our biggest and best city?
Penny has been compared to and contrasted with Luigi Mangione, who shot and killed* the UnitedHealthcare CEO. (This Fox News clip went viral for castigating the people who are celebrating Mangione, before immediately raining praise on Penny.) But while I, like many Americans, personally have a lot more sympathy for Mangione than I do for Penny, I don't think Joe Biden should invite him on a fun outing. I wouldn't think Kamala Harris should. I don't think Trump should, for that matter (although for reasons I can't quite explain it would be funnier if he did). Very probably Luigi Mangione doesn't think so either—I don't think the point he was trying to make was "It's good to kill people."
*Allegedly, is what journalistic ethics require you to say, but it's weird in cases like this, when the person has already admitted it.
💡 Good to Know
Don't snitch. Police caught Luigi Mangione on a tip from a McDonald's employee in Altoona, Pennsylvania. Tips about the case started coming in faster after the FBI added a $50,000 reward to the $10,000 offered by the NYPD. But there are questions about whether whoever called it in will get paid. (The Washington Post and the AP wrote their own versions of the same article, from a more optimistic perspective.) We'll see. Generally speaking, I think if you rat someone out to The Man for a reward, you should expect that The Man will try to stiff you. That's what The Man does.)
Beautiful. A judge has denied The Onion's purchase of conspiracy theorist Alex Jones's InfoWars media brand, but the CEO of The Onion's real/imaginary parent company has an inspiring message about that.
Nancy in the news. 84-year-old former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has been hospitalized on a congressional trip to Luxembourg. Pelosi has also been working hard to keep Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez from becoming the top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee.
Amazon workers may strike. And employees at an Amazon warehouse on Staten Island—the first of the retailer's warehouses to unionize—are threatening to strike if the company doesn't agree to begin negotiating a contract with them by Sunday. I don't know if one warehouse striking would affect Christmas gifts shipping on time, but you know, make sure you have a plan.
📋 Weekly Survey
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😎 The Fun Part
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