Stop The ACLU BlogBurst / Strange Plane Crash In New York Kills Yankees Lidle

This article below was printed in the New York Times on September 8th of this year about the Yankees pitcher Cory Lidle, who was killed in that still somewhat mysterious plane crash yesterday into the hi-rise apartment building. It is very strange in that the interview focuses on the pitcher's flying airplanes and a prophetic comment he made during the interview below that is strangely prophetic. Pay particular attention to the part which I have in bold. This behavior might be what caused this accident if you were to ask me.

In Lidle, Yanks Have Extra Pitcher and Backup Pilot - New York Times: "When the Yankees fly, the pilots are not only in the cockpit. There is another pilot in the main cabin, where the players sit. He is probably studying his hand-held Global Positioning System receiver, tracking the weather and noting the plane’s precise speed and altitude.

He is Cory Lidle, who has been a major league pitcher for nine years and a pilot for seven months. He earned his pilot’s license last off-season and bought a four-seat airplane for $187,000. It is a Cirrus SR20, built in 2002, with fewer than 400 hours in the air."

A player-pilot is still a sensitive topic for the Yankees, whose captain, Thurman Munson, was killed in the crash of a plane he was flying in 1979. Lidle, acquired from the Philadelphia Phillies on July 30, said his plane was safe.

“The whole plane has a parachute on it,” Lidle said. “Ninety-nine percent of pilots that go up never have engine failure, and the 1 percent that do usually land it. But if you’re up in the air and something goes wrong, you pull that parachute, and the whole plane goes down slowly.”
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Lidle, who is making $3.3 million this season, met with Stanger (his flight instructor) twice a week, for three or four hours at a time, all winter. He became queasy once, Stanger said, somewhere over New Mexico while returning from Texas. Otherwise, Lidle was a natural.

Part of Stanger’s job is to surprise students by simulating emergencies. He will pull the throttle to the idle position, essentially letting the plane coast as if the engine were failing.

Other times, he said, he would instruct a student to wear blinders so only the instrument panel was visible, simulating bad weather. Then Stanger would tilt the plane nose-high or nose-low, making the student recover by trusting the instruments.

Were they possibly simulating this type of emergency when one actually occurred? I hope not. That is a pretty freaky and spookily prophetic statement to be featured in a story about the pitcher just one month ago after what occurred yesterday.

Over at stoptheaclu via msunderestimated they have a post that covered the story by gathering the reactions of people on the scene of this tragedy with a montage of pictures. Here's part of it below.

Breaking hard and fast, said not to be terror-related, but smoke can be seen for 7 miles after a small aircraft or helicopter crashes into an apartment building at 524 E. 72nd Street, near the East River. Story here.

And It's Thursday, Stop The ACLU blogburst day. They also have a post that questions whether or not the ACLU deserves it's status as a tax-exempt non profit organization.

Imagine if a Church used the power of its tax exemption as a lever towards political campaigns. Can you imagine the outrage from groups like the ACLU if a Church used its tax exempt donations to create political ads opposing candidates that did not adhere to certain “American values” as interpreted by that Church? What if a Christian Religious organization were to use its official title to oppose certain political issues such as abortion?

We don’t have to imagine, the ACLU’s history shows us. They would challenge that Church’s tax exempt status.

Read more at stoptheaclu.com

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