Political Gossip and Tidbits Wandering About The Small Wonder That is Delaware-The 8/14/15 Edition

Cats are people too. A pig for the Apple Scrapple festival icon? Much more tidbits with a bit of snark thrown in.

The Apple Scrapple Festival Icon-A COP-PIG?

Apple Scrapple is a great event annually in Bridgeville, Delaware to help promote agriculture and the Town of Bridgeville. Scrapple is made in Bridgeville and great apples are grown at nearby TS Smith and Sons Farm and the two merge for this classic Sussex County event. Learn more by visiting http://www.applescrapple.com/

Back in the 60’s I was a lush young female, full of vigor with a lust for life. I marched against the Vietnam war, an awful war that cost me my first marriage for the draft. I walked with Civil Rights Activists and participated in the infamous “Hands Across America” joke, if anyone remembers this.

And I always referred to cops as PIGS.

Now I understand that scrapple is made from pigs. I’m just not sure folks will make the connection from the pig icon the Apple Scrapple people are using for their icon or perhaps like me, they remember those days when cops were pigs.

Eventually, insert smile here, I married a cop and that “pig” reference became a dirty smear that I abhorred.
They must be youngsters in charge of this Apple Scrapple Festival because they’d never use that PIG icon, a really stupid, stupid idea, especially with all the police/public issues now occupying the national dialogue.
They need to ditch that festival icon toot de sweet.

Worst Crime Small City in America

This is from a Blog and I understand this is not an expert source. So I included a largish quote below that explains the logic of choosing Delaware’s beloved Wilmington the most dangerous small city in America.

Wilmington is a gorgeous town filled with lovely neighborhoods and peaceful surrounds. SAID NO ONE….EVER!
I’ve been to Wilmington and by me it’s a little Baltimore.

And we all know how Baltimore turned out.

To produce this ranking, we first decided on a list of small cities between 50,000 and 75,000 residents in size. After eliminating those without available crime data, we were left with a list of 234 places to study.

Using data from the FBI’s 2012 uniform crime report, the latest available, we measured seven distinct crimes using the total reported incidents of each:
• Burglary
• Theft
• Motor vehicle theft
• Murder
• Rape
• Robbery
• Assault

We separated these crimes into four groups: murders, violent crimes (murder, rape, robbery, and assault), property crimes (burglary, theft, and motor vehicle theft), and total crimes. The cities were then ranked on the incidents of each group per 100,000 residents per year, from 1 to 234, with a higher score being more dangerous. We calculated the number of crimes per 100,000 residents for 2012 in order to have a level playing field on which to compare cities with varying population sizes.

The individual rankings (murders, violent crimes, property crimes and total crimes) were then weighted to create a final overall score. Murders, violent crimes, and property crimes each comprised 30 percent of the total, while total crimes made up 10 percent. The higher this combined score, the more dangerous the city.
Below, you’ll find a breakdown of how each of the 10 most dangerous small cities fared when judged on these criteria.

The most dangerous small city we studied, Wilmington is on the larger end of our range with a population of just over 72,000. Despite the efforts of local authorities, which have included placing the city’s entire downtown area under CCTV surveillance and other aggressive tactics, crime continues to be a serious problem in Wilmington. It topped the list in terms of violent crime, outranking 233 other cities for this dubious honor, with 1,703 violent crimes per 100,000 residents.

Wilmington didn’t fare much better in other areas, ranking as the third-most dangerous small city in terms of murder (it saw 26 in 2012) and total crime (5,052 were reported there the same year). The only instance in which it did even slightly better—and then only relatively—was property crimes, where it placed ninth overall for its 5,305 crimes per 100,000.

With a reported 150 shootings by the end of 2013, it would seem that Wilmington has a long way to go before it can be considered a safer place to live.

Protecting Cats-Confusion Abounds

I have three cats. They are indoor cats and are quite happy with that status.

Including cats in the protection of the so-called “dangerous dog” act, signed into law just last week, has caused much confusion around Delaware.

First, we all know there are people, mostly older females but don’t tell anybody I typed that, that tend to accumulate large quantities of cats cause one cannot have too many cats can one?

This law does nothing to reign in this somewhat obsessed group of people who keep many cats but it DOES include cats as a possibly mistreated animal if attacked by a dangerous dog.

As to what constitutes a dangerous dog, well it seems to be a dog who attacks animals on their own property to include other dogs, chickens and now….cats.

I purchased some items at a place where one of the owners, a young female in this case, fed all the neighborhood cats and goodness come meal time she must have had fifty cats coming for their meal. They are feral cats and I suppose she’s being kind.

Now before this law, if a dog roamed the swamps of Delaware and suddenly attacked these cats (which, by law, must be on their owners’ property and properly under their care) that dog would be considered a dangerous dog and then evaluated and handled as….well a dangerous dog. Whatever they do to dangerous dogs now applies to dogs that attack cats.

Cats. Heh. Trust me, dogs are their favorite toys. They love to tempt and tease dogs, which is why dogs attacking cats was considered more….eh….normal….than dangerous.

At any rate, we shall see how this thing goes down as we cannot have too many laws and we shall make new laws even if they are quite questionable.

Filming in Lewes of Famous Swedish Boat

My first thought was to wonder if this guy is related to our famous legislator, Gerald Hocker.

I know it’s probably not spelled the same but it made me smile.

So this boat is now docked in Liberal Lewes and it’s a beauty. And they’re going to make a documentary about it.
I am to understand that this ship is in port in Liberal Lewes through Labor Day, near the Cape3 May Ferry terminals.

Dr. Frederick Hocker, director of research at the Vasa Museum in Stockholm, Sweden, arrives in Lewes as filming continues on “Forgotten Journey,” a documentary about the first trans-Atlantic voyage of the Kalmar Nyckel. Hocker is one of several subjects who will be filmed on board Kalmar Nyckel while the ship in port in Lewes this August.

New Secretary of Education

This tidbit seems to be garnering much attention here in the swamps of Delaware. Most likely the impetus behind this replacement is that godawful Common Core.

The current Secretary of Education, Mark Murphy, will be replaced by New Castle county’s Steve Godowsky, former Vo-Tech Superintendent.

I have no proof of this but my gut is that Murphy wasn’t as open to forcing that Communistic Common Core down our throats as this new guy, for the right annual salary, will be happy to force upon us.

School is starting soon and so we shall see.

I do not respond to comments on my posts. I certainly have no problem with such commentary and, indeed, encourage it. But I’ve written my piece and I don’t want to argue it further.

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NEXT :Sunday political talk shows coming up and who knows, I might actually find the Sussex county council some day.