Unintended consequences

Oh but your conservative-leaning old columnist has been chuckling and having enjoyment over the pickle that the Democrats have gotten themselves into.

Case in point. Governor Ralph Northam, D-VA, goes on radio to give support to a late-term abortion law that his State’s governing body is contemplating. A qualified medical doctor himself he explains how a fetus can be brought to full term, delivered, found defective, and then left to die. Great cries of infanticide were raised by representatives of both parties, Democrat and Republican. Terrible! Well, the good doctor/politician was speaking from experience but such practices are just not supposed to see the light of day.

It is kinda like Governor Cuomo, D-NY, pink lighting the monument of the World Trade Center to celebrate New York State passing a law to allow full term abortions. The modern Democrat Party appears to be all in for unlimited abortions but they are just not supposed to talk about it in public. That is why they couch their language as “A woman’s right to choose” and other such nebulous phrases. In my opinion, the woman definitely has a right to choose but has already made her choice nine months before the birth of a child.

In Gov. Northam’s case, his public plea to pass his state’s full term abortion law went viral on national media, embarrassing to the Party so somehow they decided they had to get rid of him. The decision was made, behind closed doors, to release a 35-year-old photo of him in a school annual showing a young Ralph Northam in blackface or disguised in the robes of the KKK. Either way not acceptable today! That too backfired as it exposed how the Democrat party in its past systematically put down their constituents with darkly pigmented skin, kept them from holding elected office by suppressing their ability to vote. Business leaders and politicians in the South were the champions of the KKK where they could remain anonymous in their KKK wardrobe and go out and terrify the black population. That is the history of the Democrat Party and now they aren’t too proud of it and again try to suppress that memory. Unintended consequences.

Now don’t feel too lily white because we too have a local history of blackface antics. I remember as a little kid, must have been in the early 1940s, attending a minstrel show staged as a fundraiser by the Kiwanis Club. Held at the Fox Theater where local businessmen in blackface put skits live on the stage and told jokes using black slang which was considered funny at the time. It mattered little here because our black population was zero and the South with its KKK and Jim Crow laws was far away. That was some 70 years ago and I hope we are more enlightened and doing better today.

You dear reader will notice that an accompanying article in this issue of the Gazette our McCook Airport has earned the title “Part 139 Airport of the Year”. It is a great honor that is only granted to one of Nebraska’s airports hosting Essential Air Services each year. Our McCook Airport received the honor in great part due to the fantastic improvement to customer service and hence ridership to and from Denver that our Boutique Air feeder airline has given us. The great increase in boarding’s contrasted to prior poor service that was the hallmark of Great Lakes Airways before they went bankrupt.

Now in last Friday’s Weekend Edition of this paper my fellow columnist Mike Hendricks prints up a long screed of how bad his experiences have been in riding Boutique. No doubt true Mike has been unfortunate. In contrast, though there is no mention of how happy a vast majority of passengers that have ridden on Boutique relate their experiences.

Mike at Night writes in great detail how he rejects Boutique by driving to North Platte to ride on competing Skywest DBA United Express. An additional 60 miles drive each way, a night in a motel $80-$100, then the flight to Denver at about three times the fare of what Boutique charges. Then on the return from his trip, Mike, writes of how he likes to travel First Class and drink prodigious amounts of booze, he spends another night in the $$$ motel (he cites deer but may feel a bit alcohol-impaired) and drives home next day.

Yes, Boutique has had a few troubles these past few months. A representative of Boutique told us on the Airport Advisory Board that they are aware of and are addressing their problems. They have purchased more aircraft to fly their routes and have recently hired in excess of 20 new pilots to help carry the load. Then too as a long experienced pilot, I can assure that it is not a great idea to be pressing any pilot to push flying into real bad weather. I cite for example the Boeing 737 of Southwest Airlines that recently slid off the taxiway in Omaha on an icy ramp. Brings to mind the old adage is that when a pilot gets himself, and passengers, killed flying in marginal weather they always seem to hold the funeral on the bright sunshiny days that follow.

With all Mike’s bad mouth of Boutique, I fear that he may be influencing others to avoid riding our great little airline from McCook. If ridership falls too far then Boutique may just tell McCook to pound sand and leave us high and dry. What then Mr. Mike Hendricks is the plan to provide valuable air service to the airline hub in Denver?

Again unintended consequences.

That is the way I saw it.

Dick Trail