Too Good To Pass Up

[delayed in posting]

I don't usually post off topic [unlike a certain Kansan I could name],
but this story on the KKK was just too good to pass up.

Enjoy!

JP

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Duncan Campbell, `Ku Klux Klan Shoots Itself In the Head,` Guardian
[UK], 031126.

The Ku Klux Klan, the white supremacy group notorious for its
lynchings of black people and those who favoured desegregation, has
scored a spectacular own goal. One of its members has been critically
injured after being struck by a bullet fired into the air during a
Klan initiation ceremony.

While the organisation is more a subject of ridicule than fear these
days, it still has members and still holds initiation ceremonies. The
latest took place in Johnson City, Tennessee, the state where the Klan
was formed in 1866 by veterans from the Confederate forces.

About 10 people were present at the ceremony, in which a new member
was blindfolded, tied to a tree and shot with paint pellets of the
kind used by management training groups to build team spirit. In order
to give the event a more dramatic feel, one member, Gregory Freeman,
45, fired a real pistol with live ammunition straight up into the air.

It would appear that the Klan, always dismissive of the laws that
entitled all citizens to vote and receive an education, also has
little respect for the law of gravity. The bullet, having gone
straight up in the air came straight down and straight through the
head of Jeffrey Murr, 24. It went through his skull, leaving him in
critical condition.

Mr Freeman left the scene but was later arrested by police at his
home. He has been charged with reckless endangerment and aggravated
assault and released on bail.

The Ku Klux Klan held its inaugural meeting at Pulaski, Tennessee. The
first gathering of Klan groups was held in Nashville in 1867. The
group, infamous for its costume of sheets and  pointed headgear and
for leaving flaming crosses outside the homes of targets, was a
dangerous and powerful force in southern politics for many years and
was responsible for countless murders.