Anubis Archives - Page 17 of 24 - Alex's Asteroid Astrology

July 30th, 2020 at 01:50pm by Alex Miller

Aster-Obit: John Lewis

On July 17, 2020 US Representative John Lewis (D-GA), known as “the conscience of the Congress”, passed away at the age of 80. A former associate of Martin Luther King Jr, Lewis was an influential civil rights leader and had served his district as representative for more than thirty years. Lewis, one of the organizers of the 1963 March on Washington and the last surviving speaker at that rally, was a leader of the Selma to Montgomery marches in 1965, which protested suppression of black voting rights, when he was viciously beaten by Alabama State Troopers at the crossing of the Edmund Pettus Bridge. Members of this same organization now saluted his remains when Lewis’ casket was conveyed across that bridge one final time, as part of a protracted funeral process.

The five-day official commemoration of Lewis’ death focused on Alabama, where he was born; Georgia, where he represented the state’s 5^th district; and Washington DC, where he had served in the House, highlighted in a funeral and lying-in-state at the Capitol Rotunda, first African American to be given that honor.

June 18th, 2020 at 10:19am by Alex Miller

Here We Go Again – the Rayshard Brooks Murder

Late Friday evening, June 12, 2020, Atlanta police were called to a Wendy’s restaurant, where 27-year-old Rayshard Brooks was passed out sleeping in his car, blocking the drive-through. Police gave him a sobriety test, which he failed, and talked with him cordially for over half an hour, while he cooperated and consented to a weapons search of his car, which came up clean. Brooks suggested he be allowed to walk the few blocks to his sister’s home, but the officers decided to arrest him for DUI.

At this point Brooks resisted, broke free of the officers as they attempted to cuff him, was tackled, struggled and grabbed an officer’s taser before breaking free once again and drunkenly lumbering across the parking lot. At one point he turned and shot the taser wildly in the officers’ general direction, continuing to run away; Officer Garrett Rolfe shot him twice in the back, killing him. As Brooks lay prone on the ground, struggling for his life, Rolfe approached and kicked him, asserting, “I got him!”, while his partner stood on Brooks’ shoulder; he then waited more than two minutes before offering medical assistance.

May 30th, 2020 at 02:39pm by Alex Miller

The Murder of George Floyd

On Monday evening, May 25, 2020, Memorial Day, police were called to a small shop in Minneapolis, Minnesota following a report of a man trying to pass a counterfeit twenty-dollar bill. Four officers took a black man matching the description of the suspect into custody, handcuffed him, then laid him down in the street, where one white officer held him prone with a knee on his neck for almost nine minutes, while he begged for air and called out to his deceased mother, and the other officers watched or assisted.

Passersby and EMTs pleaded with the officer to relax his stance, but he persisted, for almost three minutes after the man beneath him became unresponsive. Taken to Hennepin County Medical Center, EMTs worked to revive him for almost an hour before he was pronounced dead at 9:25 PM CDT. Protests began the night after the incident, escalating to violent confrontations with police and looting over the ensuing four nights, as demonstrations spread to urban centers across the country. All four officers were terminated from their employment with MPD the following day, and four days later the arresting officer was himself arrested and charged with third degree murder and manslaughter.

March 12th, 2020 at 09:00am by Alex Miller

Coronavirus Update: Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson

Coronavirus received its first celebrity “spokespersons” on Wednesday, March 11, 2020, when actor Tom Hanks and his wife, Rita Wilson, announced they had tested positive for the virus. Thankfully, the couple was in Australia for the filming of Hanks’ latest movie, giving them access to adequate testing facilities unavailable in the US. Both had been feeling unwell, tired and achy, with Ms. Wilson also experiencing chills and slight fever.

March 2nd, 2020 at 08:36am by Alex Miller

Coronavirus Update: First US Death

The coronavirus continues to spread globally, with the first deaths in the United States, Australia and Thailand, all announced within a 12 hour period on Leap Day. Genuine awareness of the economic threat it poses seemed to sink in during the prior week, manifesting as a panicked sell-off on Wall Street to the tune of 3600 points, some 11% of its volume, the worst week since the financial crisis of 2008. February 27^th saw the largest single-day drop in Dow history, shedding 1191 points. Of course, Fearless Leader says it’s just a hyped-up conspiracy by the Fake News Media to discredit him, the Dow drop occurred because investors were depressed by the paucity of viable candidates in the Dem primary (but shouldn’t that make these alleged Trump-lovers happy?), and coronavirus will just “disappear one day … like a miracle.”

February 25th, 2020 at 07:30am by Alex Miller

Asteroid Sleuth: The Case of the Manhole Mishap

On October 15, 2019 at 3:15 AM EDT, a crew of Verizon workers raised a heavy iron manhole cover in the Columbus Circle section of Manhattan, to be assaulted by a putrid smell. Investigation into the vault below found the badly decomposed body of a man, partially consumed by rats, who had clearly been dead for some time. The mystery of how the corpse got under the 300 pound manhole cover, which normally takes two people to lift it, was resolved by examination of surveillance footage of the area.