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You are here: Home / Organizing & Resistance / Fables Of The Reconstruction / Post-Racial America Update

Post-Racial America Update

by Zandar|  May 15, 201512:30 pm| 114 Comments

This post is in: Fables Of The Reconstruction, Bring on the Brawndo!, Flash Mob of Hate, Meth Laboratories of Democracy, Sociopaths, Stuff About Black People Written By a Black Person

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Good to know that racism is dead, and that the era of laws designed to perpetuate structural white privilege are a barbaric relic of the…oh dammit hello there, Florida.

A pub owner in Orlando, Fla. was arrested after allegedly holding a black couple at gunpoint and telling them to call Jesse Jackson, the Orlando Sentinel newspaper reported Wednesday.

Oh good. They were there for a birthday dinner and drinks. Apparently in Orlando, instead of singing Happy Birthday to you, they threaten to shoot you.

Bruns then reportedly left the room and came back with a black revolver identified by police as a .357-caliber Magnum Colt Python.

“Bruns pointed the firearm at her and stated, “I will shoot you [profanity],” according to the arrest report obtained by the paper. “Bruns then picked up a drinking glass from the bar, throwing it at Davis. The glass missed and shattered against the wall.”

Elwin offered to pay for the drink, but Bruns reportedly wouldn’t let them leave.

“I’ll shoot you too if I have to. It’s legal,” Bruns reportedly said. “Call Jesse Jackson, [profanity].”

Bruns denied pulling the gun or threatening the couple. She refused to hand over surveillance video of the incident to police.

While being arrested for aggravated assault, Bruns ranted at an officer, according to the police record.

“I can’t believe you would take those [racist profanity] side over mine,” records state.

It’s those two bolded sentences that of course are the real problem.  The angry pub owner clearly thought she wouldn’t face any consequences for using her firearm, and she was likewise shocked that the cops didn’t immediately take her side and cart the black couple off to jail.

The fact that this time, that did not happen just brings to the forefront the real problem with our justice system.

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Reader Interactions

114Comments

  1. 1.

    Calouste

    May 15, 2015 at 12:35 pm

    “It’s all false accusations,” Bruns told the paper. “I have black people who work for me. I have never used a racial slur.”

    Well, if you don’t have any black friends, you go with what you got. Probably quoted straight from Jefferson Davis.

  2. 2.

    c u n d gulag

    May 15, 2015 at 12:40 pm

    This racist pub owner is obviously a future Rand Paul voter.

  3. 3.

    Tenar Darell

    May 15, 2015 at 12:40 pm

    Oh for FFS! I’m wondering how many customers she’s treated badly or worse that haven’t involved her arrest.

  4. 4.

    Napoleon

    May 15, 2015 at 12:40 pm

    I wonder if they then got a warrant to seize the surveillance tapes.

  5. 5.

    scav

    May 15, 2015 at 12:40 pm

    It’s Brun’s 10th arrest since 1984. She’s apareently been practicing.

  6. 6.

    Kropadope

    May 15, 2015 at 12:42 pm

    “I’ll shoot you too if I have to. It’s legal,” Bruns reportedly said. “Call Jesse Jackson, [profanity].”

    This woman clearly felt like she was being threatened.

    Now it’s the prosecutor’s job to prove she didn’t feel threatened, good luck.

  7. 7.

    Fridaynext

    May 15, 2015 at 12:45 pm

    Just a clarification. The drink Elwin offered to pay for was a drink he sent back earlier in the store. As excerpted I thought he offered to pay for the drink Bruns just threw at him. Not a huge detail, but I was a little taken aback at first.

    ETA: On reread, it was a drinking glass, but probably didn’t have a drink in it at the time. I misread the hell out of that. Sorry.

    Also, too. This woman has a lengthy criminal record, including assault in a bar fight, and has done time, and somehow she still qualifies for a liquor license? I’m sure if she were black the state would be equally accommodating.

  8. 8.

    Randy P

    May 15, 2015 at 12:46 pm

    @Kropadope: The problem is that she THREATENED to shoot them.

    If you actually kill someone, then you’ve got a Stand Your Ground defense. The live person is automatically innocent by virtue of feeling threatened, right? Who is there to testify otherwise?

  9. 9.

    Betty Cracker

    May 15, 2015 at 12:47 pm

    George & Dragon pub? They should have asked to speak to George! But seriously, if she’s been arrested 10 times and has done jail time, why is she allowed to own a gun?

  10. 10.

    Randy P

    May 15, 2015 at 12:51 pm

    More in the bar-owner’s defense:

    Davis said that comment and another bar employee asking her whether she was OK bothered Davis enough that she returned the untouched drink and told Bruns she and her boyfriend were leaving. But the bar owner told other customers, “Don’t let that [multiple profanities] leave,” the arrest report states.

    That’s when Bruns is accused with stepping out of the barroom and returning with a large black revolver police later confiscated and identified as a .357-caliber Magnum Colt Python, according to the arrest report.

    See? She was just trying not to lose a customer. Don’t they teach you in sales school that you should do whatever it takes not to lose the sale?

    Update: In reality, I’m puzzled by her so-called thought process here. Why was the customer wanting to leave sufficient to cause her to pull the gun? What upset her about this and what was she thinking would happen next? A nice dinner?

  11. 11.

    Belafon

    May 15, 2015 at 12:52 pm

    From the Sentinal article:

    “As soon as she gave it to me, she said, ‘I’m watching you, and you better not give any drinks to minors,'” Davis said. “It felt weird and racist a little bit.”

    And then the racism was confirmed.

  12. 12.

    Kropadope

    May 15, 2015 at 12:52 pm

    @Randy P: You’re right. She’s screwed.

  13. 13.

    scav

    May 15, 2015 at 12:53 pm

    Brun’s also seems to be fairly confident about the rest of the patrons and staff in that bar (while downright stunned about the cops). All the thinks she has to do it suppress the video, everything/one else will fall into place behind her.

  14. 14.

    Patrick

    May 15, 2015 at 12:56 pm

    @Randy P:

    The problem is that she THREATENED to shoot them. If you actually kill someone, then you’ve got a Stand Your Ground defense. The live person is automatically innocent by virtue of feeling threatened, right? Who is there to testify otherwise?

    It is such an idiotic law that I don’t even know where to start. Yet, Floridians must love it since they still have it in spite of all the incidents that has happened because of it. Go figure…

  15. 15.

    Belafon

    May 15, 2015 at 12:57 pm

    @Randy P: As someone said in the comments, if she’d just shot them, she’d probably be in less trouble.

    Sad that statement can even be written half seriously.

  16. 16.

    peach flavored shampoo

    May 15, 2015 at 12:57 pm

    Day’um. When it was clear you were clowning on FL about race, I thought for sure you were going here.

    Damn, FL cant stay out of the news. Good thing no minorities live there.

  17. 17.

    shawn

    May 15, 2015 at 12:58 pm

    a “black” revolver, does the color matter??

  18. 18.

    dedc79

    May 15, 2015 at 1:00 pm

    @Belafon: If it’s her bar, she probably could’ve made the whole “I felt threatened and fired in self-defense” argument even without the crazy new Stand Your Ground stuff.

    Self-defense has always been a problem-plagued tradeoff. The country just happens to be making it worse by doing its best to ensure every idiot owns and is carrying a gun, and by making it so that confrontation is favored over retreat.

  19. 19.

    scav

    May 15, 2015 at 1:00 pm

    @peach flavored shampoo: watching that one bubble up too. How many times has email showed up now? Ferg, one in CA recently, and . . . ETA that’s a plea for help ‘membering

  20. 20.

    Face

    May 15, 2015 at 1:02 pm

    @Betty Cracker: How is she allowed to get a liquor license with 10 priors? Wait, she’s white? Nevermind, found my answer.

  21. 21.

    Belafon

    May 15, 2015 at 1:03 pm

    @shawn: She’d never use a “white” revolver on Those Others.

  22. 22.

    Bill

    May 15, 2015 at 1:04 pm

    “I’ll shoot you too if I have to. It’s legal,” Bruns said, according to the arrest report. “Call Jesse Jackson, [profanity].”

    Now where on earth could she get such an idea? It’s not like any Floridian with a gun fetish can kill a black person on the street without suffering serious consequences.

    Oh wait…

    There’s a part of me that’s kind of happy half of Florida will be under water in the not too distant future.

  23. 23.

    inkadu

    May 15, 2015 at 1:05 pm

    @peach flavored shampoo: Florida has public arrest records; most states do not. Any crazy thing that happens in Florida is an easy news story to report. Crazy things may be happening elsewhere, but it would require reporting; and since it’s usually just evening news filler, why bother when you can just recap an arrest report?

  24. 24.

    Punchy

    May 15, 2015 at 1:10 pm

    Where do I go to wager on things like “3-1 odds that the surveillance tape has been crushed, partially burned, and placed in the back dumpster” by the time the cops get a warrant?

    Encouraging to hear that Flordia crackers now view themselves legally entitled to off The Negroes with impunity. SYG in full effiz’ect.

  25. 25.

    inkadu

    May 15, 2015 at 1:10 pm

    @Bill:

    Florida will only get more crazy as sea levels rise. The reasonable parts of the state are on the coast; the lunatics are inland.

  26. 26.

    inkadu

    May 15, 2015 at 1:11 pm

    @Fridaynext: Ha! I was confused about the same point, and thought it was Zen Master Level move — offering to pay for the drink someone just threw at you.

  27. 27.

    Brachiator

    May 15, 2015 at 1:12 pm

    The fact that this time, that did not happen just brings to the forefront the real problem with our justice system.

    What does this have to do with the justice system?

    A crazed white person endangers two black people. The first newspaper article is even unclear about what set the crazy ass white woman off in the first place. The Orlando Sentinel link gives more info and context.

    In an interview Wednesday, Davis said the trouble began when she asked Bruns for a drink recommendation, as she had just turned 21 two months earlier. Bruns made her a Kamikaze cocktail, Davis said.

    “As soon as she gave it to me, she said, ‘I’m watching you, and you better not give any drinks to minors,'” Davis said. “It felt weird and racist a little bit.”

    Davis said that comment and another bar employee asking her whether she was OK bothered Davis enough that she returned the untouched drink and told Bruns she and her boyfriend were leaving. But the bar owner told other customers, “Don’t let that [multiple profanities] leave,” the arrest report states.

    That’s when Bruns is accused with stepping out of the barroom and returning with a large black revolver police later confiscated and identified as a .357-caliber Magnum Colt Python, according to the arrest report.

    The pub owner was arrested and had been arrested 10 times before. Maybe part of the problem here is how we handle mentally ill people.

  28. 28.

    Belafon

    May 15, 2015 at 1:13 pm

    @Punchy:

    Encouraging to hear that Flordia crackers now view themselves legally entitled to off The Negroes with impunity. SYG in full effiz’ect.

    Not quite. It seems that some blacks in Florida still believe they can go into any place a white person can. And to the very brave minorities in Florida, keep it up.

  29. 29.

    RareSanity

    May 15, 2015 at 1:14 pm

    Anytime I hear a white person mention either Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton with sarcasm or anger, I know immediately that I am dealing with a Fox News addicted, 3rd degree Master Wingnut…stuck culturally somewhere between the 60s and 80s.

    I would estimate that there are roughly 27% of Americans that think either one of them is in anyway relevant to issues of race in 2015.

  30. 30.

    Mike in NC

    May 15, 2015 at 1:16 pm

    How many bars in Florida would offer drinks on the house to George Zimmerman if he walked through the door?

  31. 31.

    fuckwit

    May 15, 2015 at 1:17 pm

    The “it’s legal” comment is the most chilling to me. That’s those stupid Stand Your Ground laws, and Zimmerman, and that shit has got to go.

    But I guess it’s an improvement that, for once, the cops arrested the racist assaulter rather than the black victims of the assault. I guess maybe all the media attention in the last year has started some self-awareness in motion among law enforcement.

  32. 32.

    Bill

    May 15, 2015 at 1:17 pm

    @inkadu: I don’t know about that. I’ve vacationed in Panama City.

    In any event we should start building a wall along Florida’s northern border. Conservatives like walls, so we should get no objection.

  33. 33.

    JPL

    May 15, 2015 at 1:18 pm

    As a business owner, Rand Paul would be the first one to defend her right to treat customers the way she fit.

  34. 34.

    low-tech cyclist

    May 15, 2015 at 1:18 pm

    @Betty Cracker:

    George & Dragon pub? They should have asked to speak to George!

    They should have asked to speak to Peter Noone, aka Herman of the 1960s pop group Herman’s Hermits.

    “The George and Dragon” is a song he sings in Hold On!, the movie the Hermits did in order to try to keep up with the Beatles. It goes with a dream sequence where he’s a knight coming to the rescue of Shelly Fabares. (Damn, my memory is filled with useless but mildly amusing clutter.)

    But seriously, if she’s been arrested 10 times and has done jail time, why is she allowed to own a gun?

    Because freedom, of course!

  35. 35.

    japa21

    May 15, 2015 at 1:18 pm

    @Calouste: Seems the same argument was able to be made by the slave owners, too, and we all know they weren’t racist.

  36. 36.

    low-tech cyclist

    May 15, 2015 at 1:20 pm

    @Bill:

    In any event we should start building a wall along Florida’s northern border.

    Just be patient, 30 years from now there’ll be a lot less of Florida than there is now. And they still won’t believe in global warming.

  37. 37.

    Peale

    May 15, 2015 at 1:20 pm

    @Bill: They’ll just move north. How’s that going to help? Thankfully I live far enough to the north that the great migration shouldn’t hit my area until 2050, and I’ll be too old to care by then, if I am still alert enough to notice anything at all.

  38. 38.

    Belafon

    May 15, 2015 at 1:20 pm

    OT: I think you all will get a kick out of this (from Daily Kos), tweet from Judith Miller:

    I sit down with James O’Keefe and talk about the state of journalism today.

  39. 39.

    Kropadope

    May 15, 2015 at 1:21 pm

    @Mike in NC:

    How many bars in Florida would offer drinks on the house to George Zimmerman if he walked through the door?

    Presumably the ones in the “right” neighborhoods.

  40. 40.

    Amir Khalid

    May 15, 2015 at 1:22 pm

    @Belafon:
    What would either of those two know about journalism? (the retired journo harrumphed.)

  41. 41.

    JPL

    May 15, 2015 at 1:23 pm

    @Belafon: hahahahhahhahahahahahahaha

  42. 42.

    Bill

    May 15, 2015 at 1:23 pm

    @Peale: I was assuming most of them would say: “Global warming aint real. Don’t care what Al Gore says!” As they slowly drown.

    But to be safe…the wall…let’s build a wall.

  43. 43.

    Benw

    May 15, 2015 at 1:23 pm

    Man, I would have gotten serious with that lady. Less than 10% tip. For sure.

  44. 44.

    inkadu

    May 15, 2015 at 1:27 pm

    @Punchy: If she destroyed evidence, that is bloody *wonderful*, because destroying evidence is an actual crime, unlike the constitutional right to point guns at 3/5’s of a person.

  45. 45.

    BethanyAnne

    May 15, 2015 at 1:31 pm

    haha! Racism is dead! Some fool said so 7 years ago! haha!

    Really, Zandar, hon, that horse was dead a *long* time back. Why are you still flogging it?

  46. 46.

    inkadu

    May 15, 2015 at 1:31 pm

    @Bill: I’d miss Miami. You can do shows like Miami Vice or Burn Notice in St. Paul.

  47. 47.

    SFAW

    May 15, 2015 at 1:32 pm

    @inkadu:

    unlike the constitutional right to point guns at 3/5’s of a person.

    For those situations, is it more important to have smaller bullets? Or better aim?

  48. 48.

    scav

    May 15, 2015 at 1:33 pm

    OT, Other news on the first husband front: Luxembourg’s prime minister Xavier Bettel and Gauthier Destenay say ‘I do’ Luxembourger Wort and Guard.

  49. 49.

    Amir Khalid

    May 15, 2015 at 1:37 pm

    @BethanyAnne:
    That incidents like this still happen in a “post-racial” America is proof that the horse you speak of is not in fact dead.

  50. 50.

    Mandalay

    May 15, 2015 at 1:39 pm

    @Belafon: From the video of O’Keefe interviewing Miller…

    O’Keefe: Why do you think people hate you?

    Miller: I think journalists who poke holes in comforting narratives tend to be subjected to a fair amount of scorn…I have spent my whole trying to poke holes in comforting narratives…

    Beyond parody.

  51. 51.

    JPL

    May 15, 2015 at 1:52 pm

    @Mandalay: From an article that I read in the New York Magazine several years ago, that’s not the only thing she was poking.

  52. 52.

    SFAW

    May 15, 2015 at 1:52 pm

    @Mandalay:

    O’Keefe: Why do you think people hate you?

    Miller: I think journalists who poke holes in comforting narratives tend to be subjected to a fair amount of scorn…I have spent my whole trying to poke holes in comforting narratives…

    Beyond parody.

    And that they were not incinerated on the spot is perhaps the clearest proof that there is no such thing as a just God.

  53. 53.

    SFAW

    May 15, 2015 at 1:54 pm

    @JPL:

    that’s not the only thing she was poking.

    Well, that’s when she was in her women’s Libby phase.

  54. 54.

    Mnemosyne (iPhone)

    May 15, 2015 at 1:55 pm

    @Brachiator:

    I’m guessing the bar owner is going to try and claim they were trying to leave without paying, and that’s why she would be justified in getting the gun to stop them from leaving.

    The bit with the other employees asking the customer if she was okay is a little creepy — did they see the owner spit in the drink or something?

  55. 55.

    catclub

    May 15, 2015 at 2:08 pm

    @inkadu:

    The reasonable parts of the state are on the coast;

    Scariest thing in the whole thread.

  56. 56.

    shell

    May 15, 2015 at 2:14 pm

    Magnum Colt Python

    Hey,
    can we squeeze any more chest-thumping names into that?

  57. 57.

    SRW1

    May 15, 2015 at 2:22 pm

    @Belafon:

    Not only is irony dead, there is now credible evidence that there never was such a thing.

  58. 58.

    Tone in DC

    May 15, 2015 at 2:24 pm

    Just so fucking sick of this shit. I can barely type right now. I suppose I ought to be glad no one died or was hurt.

    Please let the judge away the bar owner (damn refugee from “Cops”) for good.

  59. 59.

    Tree With Water

    May 15, 2015 at 2:26 pm

    Let’s pass a federal law that every gun owner must wear a “cop camera” every time they handle a weapon, or their weapons will be confiscated and they sent off to a re-education camp.

  60. 60.

    BethanyAnne

    May 15, 2015 at 2:27 pm

    @Amir Khalid: Who says America is post racial? Who? That is the dead horse.

  61. 61.

    KG

    May 15, 2015 at 2:29 pm

    @Belafon: saw this on the American Spectator blog, even the commenters there were having none of this ish.

  62. 62.

    Tenar Darell

    May 15, 2015 at 2:29 pm

    @Belafon: Reality seems to be competing with The Onion lately.

  63. 63.

    Frankensteinbeck

    May 15, 2015 at 2:32 pm

    @BethanyAnne:
    The entire Republican party, fully half of the country.

  64. 64.

    Germy Shoemangler

    May 15, 2015 at 2:32 pm

    How Alabama taught its children to be racists.

    Hint: textbooks.

    “The loyal white men of Alabama saw they could not depend on the laws or the state government to protect their families. They knew they had to do something to bring back law and order, to get the government back in the hands of honest men who knew how to run it.

    “They (the Klan) held their courts in the dark forests at night; they passed sentence on the criminals and they carried out the sentence. Sometimes the sentence would be to leave the state.

    “After a while the Klan struck fear in the hearts of the “carpetbaggers” and other lawless men who had taken control of the state…. The Negroes who had been fooled by the false promises of the “carpetbaggers” decided to get themselves jobs and settle down to make an honest living.

    “Many of the Negroes in the South remained loyal to the white Southerners. Even though they had lately been freed from slavery, even though they had no education, they knew who their friends were.”

  65. 65.

    Robert M.

    May 15, 2015 at 2:33 pm

    @shell: I’m not sure we can, actually. The only remaining step beyond “Magnum Colt Python” would be to just call it a “Giant Horse Cock”, and that would risk alienating the Christian militias.

    Now what we could do, though, is start manufacturing the gun equivalent of Truck Nutz. I can easily imagine a pair of dangling faux testicles with a little flexible ring that slips over the barrel. Show everyone just what you’re trying to prove!

    (I’d Google to see if such a thing already exists, but… I’m not sure I want to know the answer.)

  66. 66.

    H.K. Anders

    May 15, 2015 at 2:38 pm

    What does this mean?

    Bruns refused to allow police to view a surveillance-camera video of the confrontation after first claiming she never threatened Davis and Elwin with a gun.

    Do criminal suspects in Florida have a right to deny police the ability to collect evidence?

  67. 67.

    Brachiator

    May 15, 2015 at 2:40 pm

    @Mnemosyne (iPhone):

    I’m guessing the bar owner is going to try and claim they were trying to leave without paying, and that’s why she would be justified in getting the gun to stop them from leaving.

    But the point is that this story doesn’t have anything to do with the justice system, or whatever this clearly disturbed woman (10 arrests) might claim later.

    And I get the impression that the other employees asked the customer if she was OK because they had seen the owner do crazy stuff before.

    The woman is disturbed. The real question here is whether she should be allowed to have a handgun. She probably shouldn’t own a business where she has to deal directly with customers. There is not much point in trying to fly a Florida George Zimmerman flag over this sad story.

  68. 68.

    NonyNony

    May 15, 2015 at 2:42 pm

    @Tree With Water:

    Let’s pass a federal law that every gun owner must wear a “cop camera” every time they handle a weapon

    We can’t even get trigger locks and you think we’d be able to get cameras?

  69. 69.

    gene108

    May 15, 2015 at 2:45 pm

    @low-tech cyclist:

    Just be patient, 30 years from now there’ll be a lot less of Florida than there is now. And they still won’t believe in global warming.

    The two basic tracks of right-winger denial on global warming is (1) the science is not conclusive, so let us not destroy the entire economy by taxing carbon, like we tax sulfur dioxide because it will destroy everybody’s jobs, and (2) we cannot do anything to alter natural process anyways because we’ve had ice ages and stuff, so therefore it is probably fated to happen; sure the Earth is getting warmer and ice sheets are melting, but it was just meant to be.

    Isotope dating, the theory of Evolution, and other such scientific advances have been around for well over 100 years and conservatives still do not think they are valid explanations for the world around us, thus their insistence on a young Earth be taught in science classes.

  70. 70.

    Tree With Water

    May 15, 2015 at 2:47 pm

    @NonyNony: Once again I go for a chuckle and am shot down.

  71. 71.

    Frankensteinbeck

    May 15, 2015 at 2:49 pm

    @Brachiator:

    “I’ll shoot you too if I have to. It’s legal,”

    That, right there, is the reason to paint a George Zimmerman flag over this. As bad as the Trayvon Martin shooting was, the worst offense to the black community was that it declared murdering blacks to be legal. This woman got that message.

  72. 72.

    Germy Shoemangler

    May 15, 2015 at 2:52 pm

    @Tree With Water:

    Let’s pass a federal law that every gun owner must wear a “cop camera” every time they handle a weapon

    And then “America’s Funniest Home Videos” can feature a compilation of the most hilarious accidental discharges.

  73. 73.

    Tsukune

    May 15, 2015 at 2:53 pm

    It better racial news and somehow beating the 100 year delay, the winner of the Battle of Henry Johnson will be awarded the Medal of Honor.

    One Harlem Hellfighter versus at least a dozen Germans (some sources say possibly 30).

  74. 74.

    Belafon

    May 15, 2015 at 2:55 pm

    @gene108:

    Isotope dating

    I had that argument recently with the resident creationist at work. He was talking about how some of these isotopes seep in and out of the rocks, so we really can’t tell how old they are.

  75. 75.

    Roger Moore

    May 15, 2015 at 3:00 pm

    @Brachiator:

    Maybe part of the problem here is how we handle mentally ill people.

    Arming them is not the solution?

  76. 76.

    Gravenstone

    May 15, 2015 at 3:03 pm

    @Belafon: With those two, I would suggest the state of “despair”.

  77. 77.

    trollhattan

    May 15, 2015 at 3:05 pm

    It’s no stretch to conclude this woman is nucking futs, has anger-control and decisionmaking issues, and perhaps should be encouraged to have no further contact with alcohol, guns and the public. So we’re oh for three here and the wingnuts will go to the mat to Protect Her Right to continue being a danger to herself and everyone within fifty miles.

    Just great.

  78. 78.

    trollhattan

    May 15, 2015 at 3:06 pm

    @Belafon:
    They can seep back in? Who knew?

  79. 79.

    Pangloss

    May 15, 2015 at 3:14 pm

    Is the “Under New Ownership” banner out yet?

  80. 80.

    Elizabelle

    May 15, 2015 at 3:15 pm

    Tsarnaev jury back in.

    I hope they do not give him death. There has been enough. He is young.

  81. 81.

    Germy Shoemangler

    May 15, 2015 at 3:16 pm

    @Belafon:

    I had that argument recently with the resident creationist at work. He was talking about how some of these isotopes seep in and out of the rocks, so we really can’t tell how old they are.

    “God made the world in six days and was arrested on the seventh.”
    – Ambrose Bierce

  82. 82.

    Brachiator

    May 15, 2015 at 3:24 pm

    @Tsukune:

    In better racial news and somehow beating the 100 year delay, the winner of the Battle of Henry Johnson will be awarded the Medal of Honor.

    Very cool link. Thanks for posting it.

    There is a pretty good graphic novel devoted to the Harlem Hellfighters.

    http://www.amazon.com/Harlem-Hellfighters-Max-Brooks/dp/0307464970/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1431717616&sr=8-1&keywords=harlem+hellfighters

    One positive thing about the recent centennial remembrances of World War I has been the acknowledgement that it really was a global war and that many people of color from many nations fought in it.

  83. 83.

    Amir Khalid

    May 15, 2015 at 3:27 pm

    @Elizabelle:
    I hope so too.

  84. 84.

    Roger Moore

    May 15, 2015 at 3:28 pm

    @Mnemosyne (iPhone):

    I’m guessing the bar owner is going to try and claim they were trying to leave without paying, and that’s why she would be justified in getting the gun to stop them from leaving.

    I think her problem is that she got so angry she didn’t think about what was going to happen after she threatened them. I can understand trying to keep them there until they paid. It’s wrong, but at least it makes sense. I can understand shooting them as criminals who were trying to steal from you by walking out on a check. Also wrong, but also makes some kind of sense. But she couldn’t make up her mind which one, so she just wound up pointing the gun at them and neither forcing them to pay- not even letting them pay- or shooting them. I guess she probably had somebody call the police to haul away the scofflaws for skipping on the check and was terribly surprised when the police thought her holding people at gunpoint was the primary problem.

  85. 85.

    ThresherK

    May 15, 2015 at 3:28 pm

    @Pangloss: With that kind of service I get the feeling they’ve needed to put up that banner before. Perhaps life will imitate art.

  86. 86.

    Gin & Tonic

    May 15, 2015 at 3:30 pm

    @Amir Khalid: It’s death.

  87. 87.

    Elizabelle

    May 15, 2015 at 3:31 pm

    @Gin & Tonic: I am disgusted with that “death qualified” jury.

    How shabby and cruel.

    This is beneath them, and not justice.

  88. 88.

    Elizabelle

    May 15, 2015 at 3:34 pm

    I feel like writing to the Boston Globe and telling them I am going to give the Boston area a wide berth in my upcoming travels.

    Boston Strong. Not.

    What simps.

  89. 89.

    Gin & Tonic

    May 15, 2015 at 3:34 pm

    @Elizabelle: I’m not convinced 60+ years in the federal Supermax is “justice” in any way, either.

  90. 90.

    schrodinger's cat

    May 15, 2015 at 3:35 pm

    I had an epiphany while watching Wolf Hall. The GOP wants to take the country back, to Tudor times. Specifically Henry VIII and Bloody Mary’s times, where you could get rid off people for thought crimes.

  91. 91.

    Elizabelle

    May 15, 2015 at 3:36 pm

    @Gin & Tonic: True, I think that is too harsh, too. Better to give him the hope of mingling with a general population, as a carrot for good behavior, or even release once he’s no longer a danger to society and has paid his debt.

    Killing a teenager who was raised on rage does nothing but make him a martyr.

    I am sick of the “justice” system in this country, and ashamed for Boston’s jurors.

  92. 92.

    Elizabelle

    May 15, 2015 at 3:39 pm

    Betty’s put up a new thread on the Tsarnaev sentence.

  93. 93.

    schrodinger's cat

    May 15, 2015 at 3:39 pm

    @Elizabelle: I am against the death penalty in general. However if one thinks that the death penalty is justified then what Tsarnaev did surely qualifies him for it. He killed innocent bystanders for no apparent reason in a country that had granted his family asylum.

  94. 94.

    Gravenstone

    May 15, 2015 at 3:43 pm

    @Robert M.: Actually, the nest step up in terms of intimidation technology would be something like the “Israeli Desert Eagle” in .50 caliber. For when you want to shoot them, and the entire block behind them.

  95. 95.

    Gravenstone

    May 15, 2015 at 3:46 pm

    @trollhattan: Tides Isotopes go in, Tides Isotopes go out

  96. 96.

    Quaker in a Basement

    May 15, 2015 at 3:59 pm

    @inkadu: @inkadu:

    The reasonable parts of the state are on the coast; the lunatics are inland.

    You must mean the Atlantic coast. I grew up on Florida’s gulf coast and I am here to testify that folks there are as loony as anywhere else in the state.

  97. 97.

    Quaker in a Basement

    May 15, 2015 at 4:01 pm

    @Roger Moore:

    I can understand shooting them as criminals who were trying to steal from you by walking out on a check.

    Seriously? Shooting two people over an unpaid tab?

  98. 98.

    Origuy

    May 15, 2015 at 4:05 pm

    @H.K. Anders:

    Do criminal suspects in Florida have a right to deny police the ability to collect evidence?

    Yes, until they get a warrant. Which won’t take long, I bet.

  99. 99.

    CONGRATULATIONS!

    May 15, 2015 at 4:12 pm

    Do criminal suspects in Florida have a right to deny police the ability to collect evidence?

    @H.K. Anders: Cops need a warrant to collect that evidence.

    I know that applies only to white people, but let’s pretend we still have some sort of functioning legal system here.

    ETA: BEATEN BY ONE POST. Fuck!

  100. 100.

    Brachiator

    May 15, 2015 at 4:13 pm

    @Frankensteinbeck:

    That, right there, is the reason to paint a George Zimmerman flag over this. As bad as the Trayvon Martin shooting was, the worst offense to the black community was that it declared murdering blacks to be legal. This woman got that message.

    This woman is clearly disturbed. She probably gets messages through her tinfoil hat from space aliens.

    @Roger Moore :

    Arming them is not the solution?

    Definitely not. Of course, the gun ownership extremists have no problems protecting the right of the mentally ill to have guns.

  101. 101.

    Roger Moore

    May 15, 2015 at 4:20 pm

    @Quaker in a Basement:

    Seriously? Shooting two people over an unpaid tab?

    I did say in the very next sentence that it was wrong, but at least has some kind of logic to it; those people are criminals, so it’s OK to shoot them. What doesn’t make sense to me is just holding the people at gunpoint without either demanding that they pay- and actually refusing when they offer- or shooting them. What’s the endpoint of that strategy? The only thing that makes sense to me is that she thought she was holding them at gunpoint until the police could show up and haul them away. It goes along with the shock when the police took their side instead of hers.

  102. 102.

    CONGRATULATIONS!

    May 15, 2015 at 4:25 pm

    It was Bruns’ 10th arrest in Florida since 1984. She served 62 days in the Orange County Jail after a 2011 fight at the Blue Jeans Bar in Apopka.

    OK, I seriously do not understand how this woman got a liquor license. Florida has different laws than my home state, but they’re not THAT different.

  103. 103.

    Brachiator

    May 15, 2015 at 4:26 pm

    @Elizabelle: I have mixed feelings about the death penalty here. However:

    Better to give him the hope of mingling with a general population, as a carrot for good behavior, or even release once he’s no longer a danger to society and has paid his debt.

    He could live to be a thousand, but his debt to society could never be repaid.

    Killing a teenager who was raised on rage does nothing but make him a martyr.

    I don’t know that he was raised on rage. Radicalization does not necessarily involve anti-social rage. And Americans always tend to deny the extent to which these acts are political and seen as legitimate acts of war.

  104. 104.

    Patricia Kayden

    May 15, 2015 at 4:26 pm

    @Napoleon: Now that would be the smart thing to do. But I guess what she told the police officers is pretty damning even without the video.

  105. 105.

    Patricia Kayden

    May 15, 2015 at 4:28 pm

    @Roger Moore: “I can understand shooting them as criminals who were trying to steal from you by walking out on a check.”

    What?!! I can’t.

  106. 106.

    brent

    May 15, 2015 at 4:34 pm

    @Patricia Kayden: His point is that he can at least understand the internal logic of such an action. Its obviously not a reasonable thing to do but you can see how a disturbed person could get from A to B in that frame of thinking.

  107. 107.

    CONGRATULATIONS!

    May 15, 2015 at 4:44 pm

    @CONGRATULATIONS!: OK. Here we go. Section 561.15 (2):

    (2) No license under the Beverage Law shall be issued to any person who has been convicted within the last past 5 years of any offense against the beverage laws of this state, the United States, or any other state; who has been convicted within the last past 5 years in this state or any other state or the United States of soliciting for prostitution, pandering, letting premises for prostitution, or keeping a disorderly place or of any criminal violation of chapter 893 or the controlled substance act of any other state or the Federal Government; or who has been convicted in the last past 15 years of any felony in this state or any other state or the United States; or to a corporation, any of the officers of which shall have been so convicted. The term “conviction” shall include an adjudication of guilt on a plea of guilty or nolo contendere or the forfeiture of a bond when charged with a crime.

    All 10 priors not felonies? Guess it’s possible, it is Florida and she is white. At any rate, she’ll have a felony now. So how do you get your license revoked?

    561.29 1 (b) Violation by the licensee or, if a corporation, by any officers thereof, of any laws of this state or any state or territory of the United States.

    Well, I’d like to think her days as a bar owner are over, but I know better.

  108. 108.

    Brachiator

    May 15, 2015 at 4:47 pm

    @Roger Moore:

    I think her problem is that she got so angry she didn’t think about what was going to happen after she threatened them. I can understand trying to keep them there until they paid.

    Uh, no. The couple felt uncomfortable and insulted.

    “As soon as she gave it to me, she said, ‘I’m watching you, and you better not give any drinks to minors,'” Davis said. “It felt weird and racist a little bit.”

    Davis said that comment and another bar employee asking her whether she was OK bothered Davis enough that she returned the untouched drink and told Bruns she and her boyfriend were leaving.

    Bruns lost it. She didn’t ask them to pay for the drink. She blew up and pointlessly escalated the situation. And shit. People in restaurants return entire meals, even after they have taken a bite, if it is not something that they want. Owners don’t usually pull a gun on them.

    “Bruns then picked up a drinking glass from the bar, throwing it at Davis. The glass missed and shattered against the wall.”

    After the glass-throwing incident, Elwin told police he offered to pay for the drink so they could leave, but Bruns started swearing at him.

    Bruns is the nuisance, creating more property damage in her own pub. She continues to go nuts even when the couple offer to pay for the drink.

    The entire source of the problem here was this crazy ass woman.

  109. 109.

    Woodrowfan

    May 15, 2015 at 4:52 pm

    @Face:

    @Betty Cracker: How is she allowed to get a liquor license with 10 priors? Wait, she’s white? Nevermind, found my answer.

    but white privileged is a liebrul myth!!!! Beck proved it on his blackboard or something..

  110. 110.

    trollhattan

    May 15, 2015 at 4:55 pm

    @Brachiator:
    “At George & Dragon, Customer is always #1ventilated”

  111. 111.

    Steeplejack (phone)

    May 15, 2015 at 5:09 pm

    @CONGRATULATIONS!:

    I haven’t read the original story, but the stuff quoted above shows 10 prior arrests, not convictions. And the bar fight for which she served time could have been a misdemeanor charge.

  112. 112.

    Roger Moore

    May 15, 2015 at 5:22 pm

    @Patricia Kayden: @Brachiator:
    I think I must have expressed myself badly. My point was that it might have made some kind of sense to get the gun to shoot them, or to use it to force them to pay their tab. Those are reasons for getting your gun; they’re horrible, wrong, twisted reasons, but ones where having the gun allows you do accomplish whatever it is that you were trying to accomplish. But she didn’t do either of those things. She just blew her top and got her gun without thinking through what she was going to do with it.

  113. 113.

    Plantsmantx

    May 15, 2015 at 5:56 pm

    I noticed that the Orlando Sentinel reporter felt the need to tell us that these youngsters were both gainfully employed and planning to go to college. I guess he wanted to let us know they’re “respectable”, and didn’t deserve the treatment they received. Still, some of the commenters weren’t having it:

    barefootinflorida
    Why do we need to know where Davis & Elwin work and plan to attend college?

    @barefootinflorida, to show that they’re turning their life around.

    I totally don’t believe that a young black couple from Orlando will not make trouble for themselves. Perhaps they consumed liquor and didn’t want to pay, to me that is a more plausible reason a barkeep will pull a gun on someone, pay up or I’m gonna get my pound of flesh.

  114. 114.

    Plantsmantx

    May 15, 2015 at 6:01 pm

    @Belafon:

    And to the very brave minorities in Florida, keep it up.

    …or maybe not. More and more, I find myself thinking that someone should bring back The Green Book.

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