DMN piece on Michael Vick alias Ron Mexico

[AtlCB]

He is a low life punk!

I think running a dog fighting ring should warrant a lifetime ban!

A man that is cruel to an animal has ZERO morals, ethics and intelligence.

What a role model you have Atlanta!

Celebrate your 10 million dollar scum bag.

He is the prefect example for the South's Capital City!!!!!

I hate to break this news to you, but Vick is from Newport News. If you've ever been to the Hampton Roads are, you will find that the people there identify themselves more with the Northeast than the Southeast.

 

[TNCowboy]

I'm a native son of the south....but Atlanta's crime statistics are pretty awful. Check out the link:

http://atlanta.areaconnect.com/crime1.htm

And the stats for places like DC and Detroit aren't awful as well?

 

[TNCowboy]

I hate to break this news to you, but Vick is from Newport News. If you've ever been to the Hampton Roads are, you will find that the people there identify themselves more with the Northeast than the Southeast.

Northern Va = Yankees

 

[Yeagermeister]

Northern Va = Yankees

Anyone north of TN = yankees

 

[iceberg]

i love this. Its been weeks since the raid and so far no charges have been filed against Vick yet everyone already has the rope out. Love this place. Save the dogs but forget about prima facia innocence.

None of you know the facts of the case. Do not know the specifics of what was said about Vick or by who these statements were made but judgemnet has been passed.

I was right on when i coined the DVS.

what i do know mr fuzzbucket:

1) vick told people he's never been there since he bought the house. this is after he's been "busted".
2) 2 years ago he told my friend who was doing PR for him he lived out there *all off-season* just playing video games.

if he's innocent, why lie?

 

[Yeagermeister]

Here we go AGAIN

 

[iceberg]

Here we go AGAIN

'eh, don't look for me to "play long". he wants to put his head in the sand and say "i think for myself i think for myself!!!" like no one else ever had that concept, fine.

i understand what his point is, but i just vastly disagree. that makes me a sheep and him the lone thinker, so be it. we looked for some "middle ground" and came up empty cause he'll only see it "his" way.

animals have no rights and there can be no seperation of animals bred for consumption and animals bred for "sport".

a society can give ourselves rights but we can't extend them and/or set the boundaries for "human decency". (yet we do it every day).

in the end he went from "very intelligent guy" in my eyes to another hard-headed know it all who only seems to value what *he* directly cares about or is involved in.

we got too many of those and since he's shown "he's right, we're wrong" there really isn't too much sense in talking to him.

but we will and it will get nasty and in the end yet ANOTHER dog thread will get locked.

 

[Yeagermeister]

'eh, don't look for me to "play long". he wants to put his head in the sand and say "i think for myself i think for myself!!!" like no one else ever had that concept, fine.

i understand what his point is, but i just vastly disagree. that makes me a sheep and him the lone thinker, so be it. we looked for some "middle ground" and came up empty cause he'll only see it "his" way.

animals have no rights and there can be no seperation of animals bred for consumption and animals bred for "sport".

a society can give ourselves rights but we can't extend them and/or set the boundaries for "human decency". (yet we do it every day).

in the end he went from "very intelligent guy" in my eyes to another hard-headed know it all who only seems to value what *he* directly cares about or is involved in.

we got too many of those and since he's shown "he's right, we're wrong" there really isn't too much sense in talking to him.

but we will and it will get nasty and in the end yet ANOTHER dog thread will get locked.

They keep getting locked because people can't stop the personal attacks and bringing politics in to the discussions.....both of which are violations of our guidelines.

I'm not saying you are doing it but that is the reasoning.

 

[iceberg]

They keep getting locked because people can't stop the personal attacks and bringing politics in to the discussions.....both of which are violations of our guidelines.

I'm not saying you are doing it but that is the reasoning.

and they can't stop the personal attacks because it gets :bang2: frustrating to talk to someone who won't budge or see other views cause they're too busy "thinking for themselves" and looking down on the rest of us as hypocrites simply because we can seperate cruelty from consumption.

ya'll ever make post bets on these to find out when it will be locked? if so, ya'll keep an unbiased mod around not involved to lock it when it's gone it's course? : )

 

[Yeagermeister]

and they can't stop the personal attacks because it gets :bang2: frustrating to talk to someone who won't budge or see other views cause they're too busy "thinking for themselves" and looking down on the rest of us as hypocrites simply because we can seperate cruelty from consumption.

ya'll ever make post bets on these to find out when it will be locked? if so, ya'll keep an unbiased mod around not involved to lock it when it's gone it's course? : )

Yeah....me

 

[silverbear]

Anyone north of TN = yankees

Never mind that most all of the Confederacy's greatest generals came from the Old Dominion...

It's always amazing to me how many great generals lived within 100 miles of where I now live...

 

[Yeagermeister]

Never mind that most all of the Confederacy's greatest generals came from the Old Dominion...

It's always amazing to me how many great generals lived within 100 miles of where I now live...

I'm not even thinking about it in those terms just that everyone above my state is a dadgum yankee.

 

[ABQCOWBOY]

I read the thread that was closed previously and the thing that jumped out at me was the fact that everybody seemed to get hung up on the Dog Fighting aspect of the article, per say. Don't get me wrong. Anybody who knows me on this board knows my position on Dog Fighting. However, the interesting part of that particular article was the following IMO.

"He's a pit bull fighter," the source said of Vick. "He's one of the ones that they call 'the big boys:' that's who bets a large dollar. And they have the money to bet large money. As I'm talking about large money -- $30,000 to $40,000 -- even higher. He's one of the heavyweights."

An average dog fight carries a $10,000 purse.


"Then he started, you know, waving money," the source said. "He was betting with everybody ... He said he got $5,000. He said he's betting on his animal."
Although the source said he doesn't know how much Vick bet that night, he does recall the matches' outcome: Vicks' dog lost. He said Vick is known in the dog fighting community as "the man that comes with all the money" and his reputation is "[that] he brings a good dog and he's going to bet and he's going bring a nice sum of cash."



The NFL released this statement: "Dog fighting is cruel, degrading, and illegal. We support a thorough investigation into any allegations of this type of activity. Any NFL employee proved to be involved in this type of activity will be subject to prompt and significant discipline under our personal conduct policy."
While the NFL continues to monitor the Vick investigation, there's another group closely monitoring it as well … but for a different reason.

I would guess the other "GROUP" is probably the FBI. In this article, you have reference to Illegal Gambling/Gaming, Racketeering and more then likely Tax Evasion at a minimum. It's probably happening across state lines as well. This becomes a Federal Offense as opposed to just Local Law Enforcement.

I have a feeling that this is going to get very sticky very fast for a lot of people. Would also explain why Goodell has not done anything apparent in this situation as yet.

 

[silverbear]

i love this. Its been weeks since the raid and so far no charges have been filed against Vick yet everyone already has the rope out.

It was just last week that Poindexter said charges were gonna be filed (he didn't specify against whom), but that they weren't ready to be filed YET... don't think that this means charges are not gonna be filed...

None of you know the facts of the case.

Well, let's see what facts I have at my command... I'm gonna give you the Reader's Digest version here, but rest assured that I can offer you links to each and every claim made... I have done so in another forum...

Anyway, on to what we know:

1) The Humane Society of the United States had received reports even before the raid on Vick's house that he was involved in dog fighting... we have quotes from Wayne Pacelle, the President and CEO of the Humane Society, and John Goodwin, who is their resident expert in the area of dog fighting, on that subject... Goodwin raises a good, common sense point, that FEEDING that many dogs would cost 100 bucks a day, and remember, the relatives living there were living there for free, suggesting they wouldn't have been able to afford to fund this operation...

2) Poindexter himself at first said he saw clear signs of dog fighting on the property, now he's singing a different story, claiming there was only one injured dog removed from the property... why is his story changing over time?? We KNOW that he's engaged in a bit of verbal disingenuousness regarding the situation there, saying there was only one dog with RECENT scarring... the reports said there were several dogs that showed signs of OLD scarring...

3) The Virginia Animal Fighting Task Force says they have informants that will place Vick at those fights, and one of those informants has been working for them for some time, and has been characterized as one hundred per cent reliable in past cases... this according to one Kathy Strouse, who is a member of that task force... she was the one who said "one hundred per cent reliable"...

4) Vick claims he was almost never there, employees of a nearby store and its owner said he was in that store with some regularity, buying supplies for the dogs, including syringes... if he was on that property with that kind of regularity, he knows good and well what was going on there... legitimate dog breeders put their dogs up in kennels, they do not stake them out with chains affixed to old car axles buried in the ground... they especially do not NEGLECT their dogs, those dogs are their livelihood... the investigators who saw the scene have no doubt what was going on there, even Poindexter, who has seemingly taken on the role of Vick apologist, has said he saw evidence of a dog fighting operation...

5) A dog fighting expert helping investigators with the case, name of Mark Kumpf, who has seen the evidence, says he saw "bloody carpet, scarred dogs, bite sticks"... he also says he has testified in cases in Virginia where people were convicted on less evidence than the state has at this point...

6) All of this is above and beyond the claims made by Ray Buchanan, about how his teammates knew he was heavy into dog fighting, and the claims made by two anonymous friends of Vick's saying he was there (indeed, they claim that there exists, or once existed, video of him at one of these fights), as reported by Sports Illustrated, and the most recent anonymous informant quoted by ESPN, saying he was VERY big in that "industry"... those are, of course, all unconfirmed rumors, but when the rumors beging to pile up, they begin to take on an appearance of legitimacy... particularly when viewed against the backdrop of points 1 through 5... point 1 is the most damaging, I think, the folks at the Humane Society have no reason to want to bring Vick down if he's NOT involved in dog fighting...

7) Against all that evidence, all we have to suggest innocence is Michael Vick's word that he didn't know what was going on down there on HIS property, honest... that's certainly a compelling rebuttal...

Yeah, when I read all that, I'm inclined to judge Ron Mexico guilty of engaging in dog fighting... I reckon his lawyers wouldn't want me sitting on his jury, LOL...

Now, you got anything to offer that even hints at his innocence in this??

 

[silverbear]

I suspect that when the investigation is complete, that is exactly what will happen. I'm glad this is taking some time. That gives me some reason to be optimistic this won't get botched in a rush to charge someone only to have this blow up in someones face later.

Poindexter suggested in an interview that the reason he's moving slowly on this one is he had a similar case blow up on him in the not too distant past, so he's being careful to dot all the I's and cross all the T's before filing...

That said, I do not get a good vibe off of this guy, it's almost like he doesn't WANT to pursue this case... I'd prefer to have the Commonwealth step in and appoint an independent prosecutor, preferably one from outside that area...

 

[silverbear]

And I'm still happily a member...days go by, the ring gets bigger, Vick becomes a bigger player, and the Steadfastly Somber Jurists remind us that, as official jury members, he's innocent until proven guilty so we shouldn't rush to judgment. And, oh yeah, we should put down our pitchforks...Meanwhile, we in the DVS chortle and remind you that this isn't a jury and we haven't yet acquired our pitchforks.

They're on backorder... the good news is, if we can get just a few more members sign up, we can qualify for a volume discount...

 

[silverbear]

'eh, don't look for me to "play long". he wants to put his head in the sand and say "i think for myself i think for myself!!!" like no one else ever had that concept, fine.

If he REALLY wants to "think for himself", he should do what I did over the weekend, put the ol' Yahoo search engine to looking for "Michael Vick dog fighting"... I have offered a synopsis of what I learned by doing so, and that was just following the links on the first 3 pages of the results (10 links per page)...

When he does so, I think he might be a tad more inclined to prejudge the guy, too... the evidence is pretty freakin' strong, if you ask me...

To me, "thinking for myself" involves making a serious effort to inform yourself as to the facts... I have done so, he has not... having done so, I have confirmed to my satisfaction my subjective opinion going into the exercise, that Vick is up to his eyeballs in this crap...

It's ironic, watching him woof about thinking for himself, when he clearly hasn't bothered to even examine the facts...

 

[silverbear]

and they can't stop the personal attacks because it gets :bang2: frustrating to talk to someone who won't budge or see other views cause they're too busy "thinking for themselves" and looking down on the rest of us as hypocrites simply because we can seperate cruelty from consumption.

I no longer involve myself in the "morality" arguments, because they're completely IRRELEVANT... whether or not you think dog fighting is immoral, the plain truth is it's ILLEGAL...

Just because you think a law's wrong, it doesn't follow that you can ignore it... there are laws out there I don't like, but I obey them...

 

[silverbear]

Yeah....me

Oh, NOES... we're DOOMED...

 

[silverbear]

I'm not even thinking about it in those terms just that everyone above my state is a dadgum yankee.

Well, what else can we expect from a freakin' hillbilly?? We here in the Old Dominion have earned our right to call ourselves good Southerners... LOL...