On This Day In History The United Mine Workers Killings Occurred

As History.com notes, on this day in 1970 Jock Yablonski and his wife and daughter were found murdered. 

The discovered bodies of dissident union leader Jock Yablonski, his wife, and daughter are discovered in their Clarksville, Pennsylvania, farmhouse by Yablonski’s son Kenneth. The family had been dead for nearly a week, killed on New Year’s Eve by killers hired by the United Mine Workers (UMW) union leadership. Yablonski’s murder eventually brought down the whole union leadership and ended the widespread corruption of the union under UMW President Tony Boyle (seen in the below photo).

You can read the rest of the piece via the below link: 

http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/the-united-mine-workers-killings?cmpid=email-hist-tdih-2017-0105-01052017&om_rid=de5e4076c942a595dbda53f758321d197499484f6d117f61b6ac5c08e0d6f0aa&om_mid=132217900&kx_EmailCampaignID=9057&kx_EmailCampaignName=email-hist-tdih-2017-0105-01052017&kx_EmailRecipientID=de5e4076c942a595dbda53f758321d197499484f6d117f61b6ac5c08e0d6f0aa

Note: If you want to learn more about the murders I suggest you read Arthur H. Lewis' Murder By Contract: The People v. "Tough Tony" Boyle. 

I became friendly with Arthur Lewis a few years before he died. He talked about this case, which he covered as a reporter, and his other adventures as a journalist and an author. I enjoyed his company and I enjoyed his books.    

On This Day In History Samuel Colt Sold His First Revolvers To The U.S. Government

As History.com notes, on this day in 1847 Samuel Colt sold his first revolvers to the U.S. government.

You can read about Colt and the history of his guns via the below link:

http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/colt-sells-his-first-revolvers-to-the-u-s-government?cmpid=email-hist-tdih-2017-0104-01042017&om_rid=de5e4076c942a595dbda53f758321d197499484f6d117f61b6ac5c08e0d6f0aa&om_mid=131369962&kx_EmailCampaignID=9045&kx_EmailCampaignName=email-hist-tdih-2017-0104-01042017&kx_EmailRecipientID=de5e4076c942a595dbda53f758321d197499484f6d117f61b6ac5c08e0d6f0aa

My Washington Times Review of 'Forging the Star: The Official Modern History of the United States Marshalls Service’

My review of David S. Turk's Forging the Star: The Official History of the United States Marshals Service appeared in the Washington Times.

The U.S. Marshals Service may be the oldest U.S. law enforcement agency, but it is perhaps the least known and understood by the general public. Most of us who grew up in the 1950s and 1960s know the U.S. marshal from TV and the movies. From John Wayne to Hugh O’Brian, the TV/movie frontier deputy U.S. marshal was a symbol of law and order during a generally lawless time and place.

More recently, viewers saw the modern deputy U.S. marshal depicted in the film “The Fugitive” by Tommy Lee Jones and on TV by Timothy Olyphant, who portrayed Elmore Leonard’s character, U.S. Deputy Marshal Raylan Givens, in the series “Justified.”

For the real deal, David S. Turk’s “Forging the Star: The Official Modern History of the United States Marshals Service” offers the story of the Marshals Service and how they have observed, enforced and made modern U.S. history. 

Mr. Turk, the U.S. Marshals Service historian, has written an interesting book that covers the Marshals Service and its involvement with the integration of the University of Mississippi, the federal trial of Teamster President Jimmy Hoffa, the violent confrontation at Ruby Ridge, the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, and other modern historical benchmarks.

You can read the rest of the review via the below link: 

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2017/jan/3/book-review-forging-the-star-the-official-modern-h/?utm_source=RSS_Feed&utm_medium=RSS 

Just The Facts, Ma'am: On This Day In History Dragnet TV show debuts

As History.com notes, on this day in 1952 Dragnet first appeared on TV.

Jack Webb (seen in the below photo) produced, directed and starred in the popular TV crime drama.

 
You can read about the TVs series via the below link:

http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/dragnet-tv-show-debuts?cmpid=email-hist-tdih-2017-0103-01032017&om_rid=de5e4076c942a595dbda53f758321d197499484f6d117f61b6ac5c08e0d6f0aa&om_mid=130948377&kx_EmailCampaignID=9007&kx_EmailCampaignName=email-hist-tdih-2017-0103-01032017&kx_EmailRecipientID=de5e4076c942a595dbda53f758321d197499484f6d117f61b6ac5c08e0d6f0aa

John Kerry’s Practiced Betrayal Of Friends

Wesley Pruden at the Washington Times offers his view of outgoing Secretary of State John Kerry.

John Kerry doesn’t come late to the betrayal of friends. He has had considerable practice.

In 1971, when he was a young lieutenant just back from Vietnam, where he was a decorated skipper of a Swift Boat patrolling the Mekong River, he appeared before the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee to pay his “respects” to the American soldiers, sailors and Marines he fought a war with.

Representing all those veterans, he told the senators, he wanted to talk about war crimes he said “were committed on a day-to-day basis with the full awareness of officers at all levels of command.”

Mr. Kerry proceeded to slander and defame hundreds of thousands of young Americans who were serving at their country’s call in a distant place where none wanted to be, doing their best at achieving the impossible.

Most of us who were there as observers and witnesses — I spent the better part of three years in Vietnam and Southeast Asia as a newspaper correspondent — saw ugly anger at work, the brutal way of war since Cain picked up a stone to slay his brother Abel. Occasional violence verged on atrocity, but we saw kindness and mercy in the midst of the noisy clangor of killing.

Mr. Kerry testified that he saw his country only at the work of atrocity, young men, many of them highly decorated, merciless in pursuit of barbarism. He told of swapping war stories with men who “personally raped, cut off ears, cut off heads, taped wires from portable telephones to human genitals and turned up the power, cut off limbs, blown up bodies, randomly shot at civilians, razed villages in fashion reminiscent of Genghis Khan, shot cattle and dogs for fun, poisoned food stocks, and generally ravaged the countryside of South Vietnam in addition to the ravage of war, and the normal and very particular ravaging which is done by the applied bombing power of this country.”

Old soldiers who served with him on the Mekong were astonished at his fanciful recital of comic-book war story, and gave their eloquent version three decades later when Mr. Kerry was the Democratic candidate for president. They said he was full of it, “it” being neither heroism nor witness to truth. He was a phony, Purple Hearts and Bronze and Silver stars or not.

You can read the rest of the piece via the below link:

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2016/dec/29/john-kerrys-practiced-betrayal-of-friends/?mkt_tok=eyJpIjoiWWpJeE1XTXdObU13T1RZMCIsInQiOiJlbmZQM3A1MkRUWFF0ZVQ0SEd1cTBTaEUwYWdOOXZzajhwVm05ZUJvcitaVklcL2d1eWNtMUFUSFZTeW5hSmw1WmIrNytjVnp4RkdTNUZkM09JTlUxRTlNOHk4aFwvZFVkblNqMVk5bjlSSVwvVW8yVUhtQzBlRjR1Rks4QVFwZGNjdiJ9

The Infiltrator: How Undercover Customs Agent - Played By Bryan Cranston In New Movie - Spent Two Years Partying In $1,000-A-Night Hotels, Driving A Rolls Convertible And Flying On A Private Jets And Then Trapped 85 Drug Lords At Staged Wedding

Over the weekend my wife and I watched director Michael Mann's film The Infiltrator on cable TV.

We enjoyed watched the crime film, which is based on a true case. I ordered the book online and I look forward to reading it.

In the film actor Bryan Cranston portrayed U.S. Customs Special Agent Robert Mazur (seen in the below photo), who went undercover and infiltrated the Colombian drug cartel and the world of crooked bankers.

Daniel Bates at the British newspaper The Daily Mail offers a piece on the true story behind the film.

As the drug lords relaxed by the pool sipping cocktails, they took turns to congratulate the friend who had invited them all to his wedding party.

Wealthy businessman Bob Musella worked the crowd of traffickers in 1988, who trusted him implicitly after he had laundered millions of their dollars from the heroin trade.

But the party was actually a rouse, the wedding was a fake and the 'couple' were both undercover US Customs agents who had spent the last two years duping them.

Even the 50 'family and friends' sipping drinks and making polite conversation were federal agents in disguise.

By the end of the night dozens of Colombian cartel bankers and high-ranking dealers had been arrested in one of the biggest takedowns in the history of US Customs.

You can read the rest of the piece via the below link:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3692397/How-undercover-customs-agent-played-Bryan-Cranston-new-movie-spent-two-years-partying-1-000-night-hotels-driving-Rolls-convertible-flying-private-jets-arranged-arrest-85-drug-lords-staged-wedding.html

Killer With A Kalashnikov: Shocking Moment A Gunman Screaming 'Allahu Akbar' Opens Fire As He Walks Into A Turkish Nightclub Killing 39 People, Including A Security Guard And Israeli Tourist

The British newspaper the Daily Mail offers a piece on the deadly terrorist attack in Turkey.

You can read the piece and view photos and videos of the shooting via the below link:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4079942/Pictured-Female-security-guard-27-gunned-Istanbul-New-Year-terror-attack-nightclub.html