{"id":7669,"date":"2022-08-14T08:42:00","date_gmt":"2022-08-14T15:42:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rjgeib.com\/?p=7669"},"modified":"2022-09-19T08:41:52","modified_gmt":"2022-09-19T15:41:52","slug":"attack-on-salman-rushdie","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rjgeib.com\/attack-on-salman-rushdie\/","title":{"rendered":"Three Deaths and a Vicious Knife Attack"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

All last week I was out of contact with the larger world. No Internet, no newspapers, nada.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I was on a cruise in the Caribbean and was mostly in the middle of the ocean, and I loved it! I could just relax and enjoy my vacation. The outside world would still be there when I got back.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But when I arrived back in Florida and docked last Saturday morning, I connected to the Internet again and caught up on the news via my iPhone. I was hit with the usual tragedy which the newspaper brings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I read first of all that my acquaintance Carmen Ramirez has been struck and killed by a car while walking in a crosswalk in Oxnard. I knew Carmen from having served on the board for the Center for Civic Education, as we were both appointed to it at the same time. Her life\u2019s mission when I knew her was to serve and try to improve the community where she worked and lived, Oxnard. When I would bring up the unpleasant aspects of the place in conversation with Carmen \u2013 the poverty, the lack of education, the gang violence \u2013 she would shrug her shoulders and say, \u201cI love being by the beach here. I love Oxnard.\u201d You couldn\u2019t argue with that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Carmen, who was a lawyer, would speak in the pretentious and careful self-important cant of the politician in board meetings, in my experience \u2013 self-promoting and pompous. But that is how all politicians seem to speak, it seems to me, and how most board members spoke when we were there. (My inability to do so \u2014 speaking bluntly and to the point, or remaining silent otherwise \u2014 highlighted why I was unsuited to be a board member.) Carmen was in her element there. The lack of candor and the speaking out of both sides of one\u2019s mouth, while a negative for me, would seem to be a requisite for those seeking political office. Carmen later went on to become a Ventura County Board Supervisor. I was not surprised.<\/p>\n\n\n

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At any rate, I will not say anything negative about the late Carmen Ruiz. She was a lady who tried to help others, cared about her family and community, and was tragically killed while performing a perfectly innocuous task: crossing the street. A totally unnecessary death. Rest in peace, Carmen. I enjoyed knowing you and teaching your niece. I even forgive you for being a lawyer and a politician.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That same morning I read that a former student of mine, Trey Barber, had also been killed the day before. He was in Rio de Janeiro when a local gang member reportedly fired a gun at a bus, and a stray bullet passed beyond the scene and traveled through a window in the apartment Trey was in, struck him in the neck, and took his life. Maybe Trey was not murdered, but he was the victim of voluntary manslaughter, at the very least. Trey\u2019s death is even more tragic and unnecessary than that of Carmen because: his shooting was less of an accident than the Oxnard crosswalk collision, and Trey was much younger than Carmen. Trey was only 28 years old when he died.<\/p>\n\n\n\n