GOIN' SOUTH
By Ed
Wednesday, November 29, 2006
Ed here,
Goin' South is a movie that was made in 1980 I believe. Jack Nicholson stars along with John Belushi, Danny DaVito, Christopher Lloyd, and Mary Steenburgen. This movie is, without a doubt, my favorite move of all times. The reason I'm bringing it up is because Henry Moon (Jack Nicholson) made a comment while he was on the gallows waiting to be hanged. I never really thought much about this comment until last night. My good friend Steve in Guthrie Center Iowa and I were stationed in Korea in 1976. Steve reads my column every week. He also reads the comments to the so-called column. For lack of a better word, I'll call it a column. Steve brought to my attention a comment that was made on my "Great Outdoors" column. The comment was made by "Anonymous". I have no choice, I must respond.
Henry Moon is tip-toeing away leading his horse. As the music gets louder, he's on the horse. The posse is hot on his tail. Never fear, Henry makes it across the Rio Grande, the posse on one side, him on the other. Henry has luck like I do. His horse faints, so the posse hauls him back to be tried and hanged. While in his cell, women are coming to look at him. His gang comes to see him so he knows they have a plan to spring him. Wrong, Danny DaVito (one of his gang members) tells him they just came to see him off.
It just keeps getting worse for old Henry Moon. A little skinny girl with a chubby ugly girl walks by so he sneers at them. What does he have to lose? A lot, he just doesn't know it. The little skinny one tells her chubby friend "he's not for you", and as they are leaving, Henry tells her "I wouldn't take you to a dog fight, even if you were the defending champ". The sheriff tells Henry "you shouldn't ought a done that". Hell, Henry don't care, he's going to be hanged.
The sheriff asks one of the deputies (Christopher Lloyd) if he told Henry about The Ordinance. The deputy responds by telling him no, because he don't like him. The other deputy (John Belushi) is chuckling. Well come to find out, The Ordinance says that any man short of being a murderer can be saved from the gallows by a property holding female provided he marries her and does what she says. The Ordinance was written because of the severe shortage of men after The Civil War. The look on Henry Moon's face is classic. After all, he harassed all those women that came in looking for a man.
Now it's time for damage control. In a way, Henry Moon reminds me of the politicians running this country today. They sneer at us, then all of a sudden when they are in trouble, they beg for forgiveness. Now on the gallows, in his last words, Henry is saying things like "You can't judge a book by its cover, I'm a veteran of the Great Civil War, and the only reason I turned to crime, was because there weren't no jobs".
The only reason I turned to crime was there weren't no jobs. Let's get down to the point. Anonymous says that no one needs a sub-machine gun to hunt in the great outdoors. I agree. I re-read my column, and I can't find anywhere that I promoted the owning of sub-machine guns. In fact, this country has laws against citizens owning automatic rifles. I agree with those laws. And I, probably more than Anonymous want all guns (a bolt action rifle killed JFK, not a sub-machine gun) not just hand guns off the streets and out of the hands of our children. There is no place in our society for kids to be toting guns around.
I do think that when children are taught to handle guns safely, they will grow up respecting guns for what they are. That means if a child has a gun in his hand, he should be with a responsible adult to teach them right from wrong. A hunter safety course is a valuable tool in teaching safe gun handling. In the state of Iowa, if you were born before 1966 you aren't required to take a hunter safety course to get a hunting license. I would personally like to see that law changed. I would like to see everyone required to have a hunter safety certificate to buy a hunting license. That's just me.
Anonymous says I should talk about my 2nd Amendment to a mother that lost her child to a drive by shooting. The child that gets killed in a drive by doesn't get killed because of my passion for guns. These children get killed because of our government's stand on poverty and minorities. The political leaders in this country aren't worried about poverty or minorities. After all, they don't live in it or with them. The politicians' children go to the finest schools. If the inner-city kids in this country were given the same opportunities that the politicians' kids are given you would see a drastic reduction in all crime, not just drive-bys. "The reason these kids turn to crime is because there ain't no jobs". Well said, Henry Moon.
Anonymous also says that harvesting our children isn't what the founding fathers had in mind when they were writing that ever-so-important 2nd Amendment. Duh! I think Anonymous has a problem with me using the word harvesting instead of killing. A few years ago I was in a sporting goods store buying some hunting equipment. A lady with her young daughter was trying to get the attention of the manager. The manager was basically ignoring her while he was talking deer hunting to another customer. They were talking about killing deer and the look on the little girls face really bothered me. These two morons should know that was not the time or the place for that kind of talk. That is just giving hunters a bad name talking like that. I use the term harvesting because that term doesn't offend little girls.
Harvesting an animal is still killing an animal, but then you have to harvest a cow before you can throw that juicy rib-eye on the grill. I hunt not only for the harvest. As I said before, I enjoy coming home with nothing just as much as coming home with a deer in the back of my pick-up. That being said, every meal I eat using deer meat is one less meal I have to buy from a meat packing giant like Tyson. Money in my pocket, not some CEO's pocket. But in the end, it's all about the great out-doors. So if I offended you Anonymous, it wasn't my intention. Awe shucks, yes it was.
In closing, I strongly recommend going to your local video store and get a copy of "Goin South". 90 minutes of laughs. The cast in this movie is awesome. Don't waste your time renting it Anonymous; you obviously won't be able to keep up with the storyline. It is a comedy western; tough to follow.
Remember, opinions are like ass-holes. I just showed you mine.
Ed
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