Neal Boortz
Monday, Oct. 22, 2001

"The limitation of tyrants is the endurance of those they oppose." – Frederick Douglass

There is a bit of a difference of opinion going on about the fate of Osama bin Laden. One story says that the CIA wants bin Laden dead. Another says that the Joint Chiefs want him alive. Methinks the Joint Chiefs are a little eaten up with political correctness right now.

Bin Laden alive? You have to be kidding. If he’s taken alive that means that we’ll have to have some kind of a trial somewhere. That would be nothing less than a two-year platform for every Third World dirtbag with a hatred of America to step forth with a list of grievances and demands.

The best outcome? Figure out which cave this fanatic snake is hiding in and collapse all entrances. Better yet – run a few pigs in there before you collapse the entrances. Maybe Osama will have some food and water stashed away. If he lives a few days or weeks in his tomb, fine. In the end, let him die with the pigs.

Hillary Gets Booed ... And It's All Talk Radio's Fault

There goes Hillary Clinton again. This time she and her husband inserted themselves into Paul McCartney's "Concert for New York" at Madison Square Garden Saturday night. Local firemen and police officers were invited to the show.

The World's Smartest Woman walked onto the stage to introduce a video clip from Jerry Seinfeld. One eyewitness told FreeRepublic.com that she was "booed so loudly, she had to yell into the mike to be heard." VH1 cameras caught firefighters and policemen booing her. One NYPD officer yelled, "Get off the stage! We don't want you here!"

Hillary's handlers went into a panic. They took a chance – put Hillary in front of something other than a hand-picked audience – and she gets booed. Quick! An explanation! We need an explanation for this!

The explanation? Well, Matt Drudge reports that one Clinton confidant said, "How could we not know this would be the wrong forum for Hillary? These are cops and firemen, who listen to right-wing talk radio. They still think she killed Vince Foster, for Christ's sake!"

Other Hitlary supporters are chiming in to ease the pain. One reader who e-mailed Drudge said the "drunken, angry, mostly white, conservative uniformed fire fighters behaved badly throughout the night and put a real tarnish on the 'hero' designation they were repeatedly given. ... All things considered, Hillary had nothing to be ashamed of when you consider the company she was in."

So, there you have it! The people who booed Hillary Clinton were nothing more than a bunch of rude white conservative firemen who listen to right-wing talk radio.

It’s the same now as it has always been. Even though these men succeeded in saving thousands of lives on Sept. 11 – at a staggering cost to their own ranks – Hillary still looks down her nose at them.

There have been similar stories of The Hildebeast’s arrogance and her disdain for those she considers to be lesser than she for more than a decade. It goes back to her treatment of policemen, state troopers and government employees when her husband was the governor of Arkansas.

So, while firemen and rescue workers dig through the ruins of the World Trade Center, Hillary digs for media coverage wherever she can find it.

Hey, all you New Yorkers who voted Hillary Clinton into office: Aren't you so proud of your junior senator? Are you myrmidons going to follow her lead and dismiss New York's real heroes as just a bunch of right-wingers? Go ahead. Bad-mouth them until you're blue in the face – but they'll still come to your rescue when the chips are down.

Still Don't Want to Arm Pilots?

So ... even after four airplanes were hijacked and used to kill more than 5,000 people on Sept. 11, you're still a little squeamish about letting commercial airline pilots carry guns? Then it's time for a story.

It happened on July 6, 1954. During this time, pilots routinely carried pistols. They carried pistols because they hand-carried the mail from the plane to the terminal, and postal regulations required pilots to be armed.

American Airlines had their pilots buy .380 semiautomatic pistols. The late Captain William "Bill" Bonnell of Fort Worth, Texas, had bought one too. He kept it in his flight bag. He was no stranger to guns, having flown in the Army Air Corps during World War II.

That morning, Bonnell had flown the American Airlines DC-6 from Fort Worth to Cleveland. There were 58 passengers on board. They were all seated. Bonnell spoke to a young mother with two small children seated at the front of the aircraft. Then he entered the cockpit and locked himself, his co-pilot and the engineer inside.

Then the cockpit door opened. It was a teenager – a big kid armed with a pistol. He told Bonnell and his crew, "I want to go to Mexico – no stops."

Bonnell and the co-pilot tried to explain that the plane didn't have enough fuel to fly to Mexico. But the teen wasn't convinced. Flight engineer Bob Young told the kid that they would take off as he ordered – but it was necessary to throw a switch behind him before the plane could taxi.

The hijacker turned to look for the switch. That's when Bonnell reached into his flight bag, pulled out his gun, and shot the hijacker. The hijacker tried to shoot back – but his gun misfired. Bonnell shot him again.

After the hijacker was taken to a hospital, Bonnell flew the DC-6 back to Fort Worth. In mid-flight he received word from Cleveland that the hijacker had died. His name was Raymond Kuchenmeister, and he had run away from home, stole a pistol, and planned to hijack an airplane earlier in the day.

Here's a man who saved the lives of his 58 passengers and his crew. He proved that armed pilots can stop hijackers from taking control of an airliner. Yet our federal government still refuses to arm commercial pilots – and in the same breath resolves to send Air Force fighter jets to destroy a hijacked plane before it can be used as a weapon.

Another Self-defense Story

Mobile, Alabama. 39-year-old Tracy Torres of Hitchcock, Texas, was staying at a motel in Mobile on Thursday night when a man came into his room. The man tried to rob Torres. But Torres was prepared. He pulled a gun and shot his attacker several times. 43-year-old Robert McNeil died a while later at a local hospital. No charges were filed against Torres.

What if Tracy Torres didn't have that gun? Worse yet – what if he had kept the ammunition in a separate place? Would Robert McNeil have waited patiently while Torres loaded his gun? Would he have paused for a moment while Torres removed a trigger lock from the weapon? Of course not. Torres is alive and unharmed today because he had quick access to a gun.

Neal Boortz is the hugely popular nationally syndicated radio host.