WWII Legend & More

Here are snippets from Karol Markowicz’s op-ed piece on Covid at nypost.com, edited by yours truly: “On Jan. 9th, NY reported 17,839 new cases. Florida, with about 2 million more people than NY, had 15,445. It has had 22,000 COVID-19 deaths to NY’s 38,000 — despite being open for business. Why don’t NY and California lockdowns work?

A youtube video led me to research a WWII hero unknown to most Americans. Here are highlights from his Wiki profile, edited by yt: Simo Häyhä was a sniper during Finland’s 1939–40 Winter War against the Soviet Union invaders. The diary he kept of his actions was stumbled upon one day. He estimated that he killed 500 Reds, the most kills ever by a sniper. He used a rifle manufactured in his homeland. The enemy referred to him as The White Death. Newspapers frequently featured him as invisible. Soviet troops were not issued camouflage, which made them easy targets in winter conditions. Stalin had eliminated military experts in the late 1930s as part of the Great Purge. Häyhä was seriously wounded by an explosive bullet and believed dead, his body dumped on a pile of others. Someone noticed his leg twitching. Half his face was gone. He regained consciousness a week later and spent 14 months in recovery, undergoing 26 surgeries. As a reward, the government gave him a farm. He was also a hunter, naturally, and dog breeder. He has been the subject of a short story, heavy metal song, Japanese manga, and he is featured in Hemingway & Gellhorn (2011), directed by Phillip Kaufman, starring Nicole Kidman. A feature film, The White Death, was planned, but it seems not to have been completed. There is a seven-minute version under that title at youtube. The story seems a natural for cinema. Every time I think I cannot possibly learn another significant fact of WWII, something fascinating pops up. Here’s the hero, who lived to the age of 96, pre-injury:

The main reason for the new impeachment attempt of Trump is to bar him from running for president again. Dems know he is the only Republican who has a shot at taking back the White House.

With almost zero sunshine to provide warmth, I spent most of today’s session of the floating book shop seated in my car. My thanks to the gentleman who seems in his 90’s, who bought a thin paperback cook book published by Chiquita, and to Ira, who purchased Children of the Matrix: How an Interdimensional Race has Controlled the World for Thousands of Years-and Still Does by David Icke. He likes weird stuff. I hadn’t had any for at least a month. It was good to see him smiling. He needed a lift of spirits, as he was on his way to the doctor.

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