R.I.P. Bill Sparkman

As a government statistician, this one's hitting close to home.  The demographic information the government puts out - labor force data, health surveys, housing surveys, crime victimization surveys, and so forth - mostly depend, in the end, on Census field workers such as Bill Sparkman, knocking on doors in all corners of the country.  They do this for decent money, maybe $12-14 per hour, I'm guessing from dim recollections - certainly not enough to be heroes, or to risk being victims of hate crimes.

We don't know who killed Mr. Sparkman, nor do we know for sure why.  But the damage has already been done: the fact is that the obvious explanation, given the 'fed' written on his body, is plausible.  And that's going to have the Census' staff of field workers wondering today whether the job is worth that sort of risk.

My heart goes out to Sparkman's family at this time.  But to those who stir up hate and fear for political ends, or to maximize their ratings, I say: you have only my loathing.  The sooner you and your kind are relegated to the back streets of our national discourse, where nobody finds you who isn't looking for you, the better. 

And to those in the mainstream media (I'm looking at you, TIME magazine) who would paint fearmongers and hatemongers as legitimate participants in our national discourse, I look forward to the day when your jobs evaporate as your industry declines.  We'll do just fine without you.

Comments

[oddjob]

I hope Ms. Bachmann has the brains to realize her loopy comments about the upcoming census contribute exactly nothing useful to our country.

Dead Census Worker Had Beaten Cancer, Was Contemplating New Career

:(

[litbrit]

And to those in the mainstream media (I'm looking at you, TIME magazine) who would paint fearmongers and hatemongers as legitimate participants in our national discourse, I look forward to the day when your jobs evaporate as your industry declines. We'll do just fine without you.

Repeated for emphasis.

Bachmann et al may well have blood on their evil hands. Yeah, yeah, I know, wait until all the evidence is in. Still.

The Sparkman family is in my thoughts right now, I fear, not logical things like not rushing to judgement and not pinning the blame where it is so clearly crying out to be pinned. :-(

[Prup (aka Jim Benton)]

The story, in and of itself, is horrible, but if you read the comments section...

I am tempted to include a whole page of examples of

a) false equivalency -- comment 5 is "The fault for this man's death resides with the perpetrators of the crime…nobody else is responsible. And I’m curious…are you are equally outraged at those on your political side of the aisle when false and inflammatory broadcasts incite people to unlawful and/or violent acts?"

b) defensiveness coupled with 'this was going too far in a just cause' -- comment 6 "I just wanted to say before some dork-off blames this on Ron Paul - Ron Paul has ALWAYS stated that the grassroots effort against the Federal Reserve, and the Federal Government, be peaceful. This is not in anyway condoned by anyone fighting for liberty."

c) just plain offensiveness -- #4 "Must have been white, if he'd been black they would have mentioned that to incite great hue and cry."

d) and total insanity -- #28 "It may have been an insane person who killed himself and left this marking on his chest to create just this type of hysteria fanned for political ideological reasons"

which gets 'raised' to the following -- by a commenter called "CorruptOCrats" who is out front in trying to find 'far-left equivalencies' not just a 'drive-by'

"Can anyone say "Twana Brawly" type suicide? I wouldn't doubt it.

"After all, census takers are not exactly the brightest, most stable productive members of society. They are low dollar desperate for work types.

"Census taking is like wearing a sign that says 'I'm a friggin loser and this is the only job I can get because nobody will hire a loser like me.'

"Pretty much sums it up."

[I have, btw, no criticsm of those who argue we should wait until more facts are in. We should, before we move this from 'probable' to certain. But the defensiveness from the right starts at once.)

[Help Getting Pregnant]

Anyone really believe the FBI is capable of solving this?

[oddjob]

That's a difficult question to answer at the moment. It depends very much on what clues were left and since the FBI isn't discussing the case there's no way to know what clues they have found.

[Prup (aka Jim Benton)]

I decided to check the story out in the local papers. I'll give more of a report later -- after the usual (and important) morning delays like giving kittenz his shot. But I came across a site called TOPIX. Most sites that allow commenters to 'rate comments' have a simple 'thumbs up'/index.html'thumbs down' system, but this has symbols for 'nuts' 'clueless' 'incendiary' etc.

Which are needed given the first comment is
'I hope this is a warning, loud and clear, to Hussein and all his minions in the fed. Don't Tread On Us!'

and the second -- and I can't tell if this is a poe or real -- 'I am sure that the FBI or CIA killed him in a false flag attack, just like 911. The government is just looking for an excuse to declare martial law so they can gas us and send us to the ovens in one of their FEMA contration camps. That is why they carved FED on him. The US government is a slave to the Rothchild family in England. They took away all our rights after 911 so they could kill us.

'They want to create a genocide in America because they know that the public found out that they were the ones who pulled off 911. We all found out and so now they must kill us. Then they can start World War III.'

This is not a poe, and comes from the same person who 'led the discussion'

"It's too bad someone had to lose their life over a Census but this could be the first shot fired in a revolution in America, where middle America, the great Silent Majority, takes the country back from socialists and communists and the godless."

Then 'Nobama' joins in:
" do believe the government did this so that they can guesstimate on the census so the democratic party can rule tyrannically forever..
time to take our country back from these facists.. email or call your representative to tell them to STOP aiding Barack in destroying American capitalism.
and read steve emersons blog to inform yourself of our true stealth enemy within
Nobama
Reading, PA "

and perhaps the ultimate, from Krabi:
"They killed up to 100,000 Russians after they killed Czar Nicolis and the same thing is gonna happen in America if they get their way. You can call them "Jews", "Zionists", "Communists", or whatever you want, but this small group of crazed radicals now control you're government and they want you out of the picture."

My point is that these aren't one person being repetitive, the comments come from a substntial percentage of the WaPo commenters, and almost half of the Topix ones.

[low-tech cyclist]

"After all, census takers are not exactly the brightest, most stable productive members of society. They are low dollar desperate for work types.

"Census taking is like wearing a sign that says 'I'm a friggin loser and this is the only job I can get because nobody will hire a loser like me.'

I would personally like to punch the people who wrote these comments in the nose.

I have met many Census field reps in the course of my employment. And while there's some variance in every group, they are, on the whole, quite smart and very, very good at what they do.

These people not only are liars, but they care nothing for the truth.

And some of the people writing some of the other comments Prup brings up here are downright evil. It's impossible to say anything less.

[Stephen]

I've considered doing Census work in the past; it just never turned out to be the right deal for me. Far from being a loser job, I've always thought it would be interesting and fun.

Yet another childhood myth is shattered by this nation's conservatives: the idea that Americans are fundamentally helpful, courteous and eager to do their part for the country. I never once thought that being a Census taker would be a high risk occupation.

Perhaps letter carriers in predominately Caucasian suburbs and rural areas should start wearing bulletproof vests and/or carrying firearms. Being a federal employee is becoming dangerous - soon operating a corner liquor store will be seen as a safe option for the federal government's field workers.

[Helio]

could this also be the work of someone protecting their illegal activities and suspecting that Sparkman was coming along not just to take down numbers, but to investigate said activity? Someone on another site's comment thread mentioned it, given how these remote areas can hide much, including pot farms/meth labs etc. I'm not pretending to know anything about rural kentucky or the shit that goes down there, but to avoid pointing fingers too soon, Sparkman's death could have been related to someone fearing their turf was being violated?

Although, even as i type this, I figure if someone was afraid their lab was getting investigated, they'd probably not want to draw so much attention to the area and bring more investigators. Just get rid of the body, discreetly? sigh. Either way, this sucks and I hope they are able to find who ever did this.

[Prup (aka Jim Benton)]

In one of the stories I read there is a quote from a police officer who was Sparkman's friend, telling him to be careful, that there was substantial risk in what he was doing.

And the descriptions of Sparkman hardly fit the 'loser' image.

[Prup (aka Jim Benton)]

Helio: This is certainly a possible scenario, which is why I was careful to talk not about 'look what the right wing has done' but rather 'look how the right has responded.'

[low-tech cyclist]

Helio - the piece at oddjob's link quotes Sparkman saying last year that "My home, my life, is here in Laurel County, and this is where I want to stay." This certainly suggests that he was a local boy, and not some outsider who would have been viewed as "the Feds" by locals. Presumably he would have known how to not trip over meth labs or other illegal activities.

Hell, even a suburbanite like yours truly knows you hello the house in places like that, before you go up and knock on the door. I'm sure he knew that, and a lot more.

[nedclark]

...so he survived biological cancer, only to be murdered by the cancerous evil of reactionary paranoia... So tragic.

[kathy a.]

l-tc, he might be local, and truly not have known where the meth labs were. doesn't sound like mr. sparkman ran in those circles.

helio, i want to point out that your standard meth freak is not so strong on logic, ya know? or your standard mentally ill rural anti-government freak.

[Prup (aka Jim Benton)]

Again, we don't know the facts yet, but we do know the response of the right-wingers I've quoted.

[low-tech cyclist]

kathy, it isn't a matter of knowing where the meth labs are; it's just having a sense of where you don't go if you don't want to find something that people don't want found.

[Helio]

going through the WaPo comment boards, and I feel like I've accidentally clicked on a freerepublic thread. That place has become so (neo)conservative lately that you would be hard pressed to tell the difference between it and the Washington Time.

You are right, Prup, that the right wing response is extremely telling. Even if "fear of the government takeover of america" was not the motive of the crime, the adherents of this (so-called) movement certainly see it as a good and deserved thing. A natural progression to...what, i do not know.

[oddjob]

even a suburbanite like yours truly knows you hello the house in places like that, before you go up and knock on the door. I'm sure he knew that, and a lot more.

If I understand correctly whenever possible the Census Bureau deliberately tries to hire locals so that they are as familiar as possible with the local culture & language. As I understand it it's enormously important to the accuracy of the data collected by the Census Bureau that they hire people who can collect data in as effective a manner as can be done.

[oddjob]

In related news, another sign of the times:

The amount of taxes the federal government took in from the manufacturers of all firearms and ammunition in the fourth quarter of 2008, the period between Oct. 1 and Dec. 31, increased 31 percent over the same time period reported in 2007.

That's from the most recent Firearms and Ammunition Excise Tax Collection Report released earlier this month by the Department of the Treasury. The average increase from 2007 in the previous three quarters of 2008 was 9.7 percent.

Clearly, something is happening.

"Demand for ammunition, across caliber lines, is outpacing supply. In order to keep up with demand, manufacturers are working at full capacity, 24 hours a day, seven days a week," said Ted Novin, the director of public affairs for the National Shooting Sports Foundation.

[jack lord]

No way, how terrible is that? I hope the FBI can get more details. That word FED scrawled on his chest is gruesome. What kind of person would do that?

[oddjob]

...the initial AP story on the death contains “flaws and errors.” That means it’s possible that the AP’s claim, based on an anonymous source, that he had the word “fed” scrawled on his chest could be false. Asked if that were the case, Trosper declined to comment....

Suicide has not yet been ruled out.

[Chris R]

Heaven help us. Our Democracy is falling apart from the bottom up... not the top down.

And this was caused by stoking the fires of hate.

[big bad wolf]

l-t-c, i have to agree with kathy a. meth labs are in the most unlikely places, and the boone national forest is infamous for marijuana grows. mr. sparkman may simply have been in the wrong place at the wrong time and run into a meth freak or a tough gang moving marijuana. the "fed" could be misdirection. it happens.

this is very sad, potentially horrific, if it was the crazies (i think conservatives is not the right or fair word for the crazies). i also remember, however, that on our side, we rightfully decried the suspicions and blame cast upon muslims after the okc bombing. i say this as one who works in a federal building; as one who has his kids there sometimes after school; as one fears a repeat of okc; and as one who has instructed his wife and friends to say publicly that, should it occur at my building that the death penalty is not an appropriate response.

[Eric Wilde]

What can be said? The horror of senseless violence creates another victim and another family bereft of a loved one.

Its easy to jump to conclusions that this was caused by conservatives. Yes, 'conservatives'. At this point I have to assume that they are all either crazy or nihilistic cynics. There's no other explanation for remaining faithful to the brand.

Also, I take them at their word. I've heard growing murmurs about a coming revolution. Don't take it too lightly.

[oddjob]

The local coroner in Kentucky confirms to TPMmuckraker that the word "fed" was written on that dead census worker's chest, apparently using a felt tip marker.

[kathy a.]

the big-audience commentators are fanning the crazies. they know they are; they aim for that; keeps the ratings up, pays the bills. oh, sure, they don't personally and intentionally mean for census workers to be killed in the name of the cause; that's just whaddaya callit, collateral damage.

obviously, i know nothing more about what prompted this killing than anybody else. but practically anyone, anywhere in the US* could set up a meth lab in their kitchen. it's not that hard; most ingredients are readily available. a lot of the labs are discovered only when they blow up.

meth is incredibly addictive. one of its consequences/effects is paranoia, in the psychiatric sense. meth production tends to happen in less populated areas, at least in california [but i suspect elsewhere]; lotta killing tends to happen around meth, too.

* as a side-note, sudafed and products containing its active ingredient [pseudoephedrine] are considered illegal substances in japan. that is because they are so easily made into meth.

[kathy a.]

BBW is correct, that it could be something else entirely, and "fed" was written on sparkman's chest as a desperate attempt to send searchers in another direction. so i hope the investigation is careful and thorough.

[oddjob]

We still don't know very much about the death of Bill Sparkman in a brutal scene in Kentucky. But the far right is obviously concerned that its violent anti-government rhetoric might at some point be implicated. So what do these people do? Notorious homophobe Dan Riehl pre-emptively asks if Sparkman was a gay child predator, because he had an adopted son. He has no other evidence at all.

Can you believe this????

[Sir Charles]

oddjob,

Ubelievable. Dan Riehl is a vile, racist homophobic piece of shit. As Sullivan notes, a new low.

[big bad wolf]

i guess i've lost much of my capacity for shock, but i find it totally believable. inexplicable and disgusting, but totally believable.

[Chris Sweet]

The real question to ask is is Dan Riehl a Child Predator?