Politics rarely leads in anything except bloat, corruption and incompetence. So it's nice to hear a politician did become the world's first in something. He invented the temporary insanity plea, and killed the son of the guy who wrote "The Star-Spangled Banner."

QuoteYou might think the temporary insanity defense was a relatively new thing.  I mean, maybe it began in the 1940s or possibly the '30s.  What with all the psychobabble around in those times.  But, no.  It was actually much earlier.

It all started with a guy named Daniel Sickles.  Sickles (1819-1914) was a U.S. Senator and later a Congressman, as well as a Union General in the Civil War and a U.S. Minister to Spain.  He was known as a major ladies' man and was censured by the New York State Assembly for escorting famed prostitute Fanny White into the Assembly's chambers.  He also brought Fanny White with him to England while Secretary of the U.S. delegation in London, leaving his pregnant wife at home.  And, of course, he murdered the district attorney of the District of Columbia, Phillip Barton Key II, son of Francis Scott Key, the author of "The Star Spangled Banner".

The rest of this plays out like a B-grade poli-sci "thriller," complete with herds of crooked VIPs. They even let him keep a gun in jail, awaiting trial.

http://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2012/11/the-first-person-to-use-the-temporary-insanity-defense-murdered-the-son-of-the-composer-of-the-star-spangled-banner/

I remember hearing parts of this story decades ago, but that was before I knew the difference in lib and con.
This should be interesting reading now that I get it.
Great find.

Same source, on the meaning of "D" in "D-Day".....

http://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2015/01/v-v-day-victory-right-d-d-day-stand/

This place you can get lost in, bouncing between topics.

Quote from: quiller on January 17, 2015, 07:40:03 AM
Same source, on the meaning of "D" in "D-Day".....

http://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2015/01/v-v-day-victory-right-d-d-day-stand/

This place you can get lost in, bouncing between topics.

Really cool site, but in sore need of a copy editor. Every article I read was riddled with spelling and grammar errors. Yeah, yeah, I know.... grammar Nazi.... 

Quote from: TboneAgain on January 17, 2015, 12:09:51 PM
Really cool site, but in sore need of a copy editor. Every article I read was riddled with spelling and grammar errors. Yeah, yeah, I know.... grammar Nazi.... 

YES! Double and triple spacing drives me nuts.

Quote from: Solar on January 17, 2015, 12:25:34 PM
YES! Double and triple spacing drives me nuts.

I didn't notice formatting errors as much as I did the spelling, and especially the sentence construction. I saw lots of run-ons and sentence fragments, and in some cases, sentences that just didn't make any sense, as if the author got lost somewhere between the beginning and the end, or mated the beginning of one thought with the end of a different thought. (That's an error that happens far more often these days than before precisely because most text is composed on a computer screen. On-screen editing, while miraculously efficient, can produce some hilarious and/or frightening results. Been there, done that.)

FWIW, I shot them an email and offered to work as a copy editor. Hey, they pay, even their contributors! 

Quote from: TboneAgain on January 17, 2015, 12:09:51 PM
Really cool site, but in sore need of a copy editor. Every article I read was riddled with spelling and grammar errors. Yeah, yeah, I know.... grammar Nazi.... 

Today's factoid: 51% of all U.S. public schooled children are from poor families.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/majority-of-us-public-school-students-are-in-poverty/2015/01/15/df7171d0-9ce9-11e4-a7ee-526210d665b4_story.html

You get the education you pay for.