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The Original Unsocial Media. Anonymous Letters to the Editor with Pictures. Published Daily by Noon Since 2002. No Saturday Edition
 I read with interest the mention in the July 4 Citizen that former Key West cop Sam Cagnina was jailed in Key West on July 4, 1964, for robbing an armored car at the Kwik Chek Foodstore on Flagler Avenue. This was not the first crime Cagnina committed in Key West. Terry Schmida recounts the story of Cagnina’s other Key West crimes in his book “True Crimes.” For many readers intrigued by the still unsolved mysteries of the Kennedy assassination, Cagnina is an important connection of a one-time Key Wester to that terrible crime.You see, there is reason to believe that Cagnina was involved in the August 1975 slaying in Miami of Johnny Rosselli. Rosselli was a flashy gangster who was the first mafia leader approached by the CIA to kill Castro. Rosselli reportedly operated a training camp for anti-Castro activists in Key Largo, and he personally ran several boat missions from the Keys toward Cuba. Rosselli was a drinking buddy in the Keys of legendary CIA spook David Morales, who boasted to his friends of his involvement in the JFK assassination. In his book “Sons and Brothers,” Kennedy historian Richard Mahoney wrote that Rosselli himself admitted to his lawyer his involvement in the assassination. Rosselli’s 1975 murder came shortly before he was scheduled to make a second appearance before the congressional committee investigating the assassination. According to Rosselli’s biographers. Cagnina admitted his role in the Rosselli slaying to two fellow inmates while he was imprisoned for another crime. Cagnina was associated with Tampa mafia don Santo Trafficante Jr., who many believe was behind the Rosselli murder.
Bottom line: One of Kennedy’s killers was likely silenced by Sam Cagnina, a man who spent several years in Key West and even a few months as a Key West police officer. Cagnina’s reported participation in the Roselli murder is one of several Keys’ connections to the JFK assassination. ~KW Citizen, Tim Gratz |
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 [Baking] Is there a rule of thumb for adding leavening agents? Some recipes call for the addition of baking powder, some baking powder, and some both! |
| I agree that if Sloan Bashinsky would stop telling people he was crazy (angles instructing him) he would be the new KW mayor. |
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| During Prohibition, 80% of Canadian Club whiskey found its way to the United States. |
 [“Best western”] The best western of all time is the Searchers with John Wayne, Ward Bond, Harry Carey Jr, and Ken Curtis. Or isit Red River with John Wayne, Montgomery Cliff, Walter ‘dad burn!’ Brennan. I can’t decide. |
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 [Spam] Hawaiians eat 7,000,000 cans of the pretend food each year, not individually, but as a whole. |
| [Eat Your Vegetables] Recalling a positive memory about vegetables can make the ones on your plate more enjoyable (you’ll take a bigger portion too). |
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 The Big Pine Flea Market has gone fishin’. We will be closed August and September. We will reopen the first weekend of October. Have fun this summer! |
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 I am not sure about Tegu Lizards but I have seen several monitor lizards in the Keys. |
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 [“Best Western”] Shane? Stagecoach? These are considered the best western movies by your readers? Director Sergio Leone’s “Once Upon A Time In The West” would be the gold standard of that currency. It is widely considered “The Godfather” of western movies. Had Clint Eastwood been in it, it’d have won an Oscar. Instead, nobody has ever heard of it outside of critic/film buff circles. Even Shane said that was a shame. |
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 [Ebola] Well I’m sure the right (FTR Guy) will blame Obama for letting the Ebola patents back into the country. On the other hand, if Obama had blocked their return, the right would have exploded. Blaming Obama citing Benghazi and whatever else they could come up with. Myself, I do not have a good feeling about this. |
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| If your wife finds dessert better than sex, tell her drop a note to the Personals and I will let her get a second opinion on the subject. After all, it is the Keys, where you don’t lose your girl you just lose your turn. |
 [Boat ‘Wheelie’] Here’s one way to clean out those clogged canals behind your house. Video |
| So Bernadette Noe wants to travel the county and raise funds to help defray the cost of her current litigation regarding same sex marriage. I suggest that she first look for the $50 million stolen from Ohio taxpayers. That could finance a lot of legal fees! Link |
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 Happy Monday from Springer’s Bar and Grill. Today’s special is Brazilian Chicken. A little spice with a whole lot of yum. Tuesday special: 2 topping pizzas $10 Wednesday special: seafood Shepard’s pie Thursday special: meatball sub Friday special: mahi mahi with roasted pepper sauce and cilantro pesto Happy Hour 2-7 daily with great drink specials and happy hour menu. There’s Always Something Special at Springer’s |
| [“Jobs”] Whoever quoted 233,000 for July 2014 from The Bureau of Labor Statistics did not dig deep enough. “The number of persons employed part time for economic reasons (sometimes referred to as involuntary part-time workers), at 7.5 million, was unchanged in July. These individuals were working part time because their hours had been cut back or because they were unable to find a full-time job.” Translated full time jobs are few and far between. |
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| [Typo: Crowds] “Crows” at the boat ramps? Oh my, was it a murder of crows? |
 Brown recluse spiders do not live in Florida! I have been hearing this for years and years about them existing here. They do not live here so you didn’t get bitten by one, nor your friend or your cousin. Any Brown Recluse that is temporarily here came in someone’s suitcase and will die shortly. Enough with the misinformation and sensationalism. They look like the common Florida house spider and that is what they are. And we have plenty of them to be sure. Not Brown Recluse. The range lies roughly south of a line from southeastern Nebraska through southern Iowa, Illinois, and Indiana to southwestern Ohio. In the southern states, it is native from central Texas to western Georgia and north to Kentucky. |
| [Corruption at Shark Key Sewers] Someone asked about Shark Key. Shark Key got a special deal. First they only have to pay a $2500 fee to connect to the central sewer. The rest of us have to pay $4500. The reason they have to pay less is I don’t know, only the County Commissioners know and they are not telling. The second special deal is the County Commissioners agreed to have the taxpayers pay for the pipes to be installed on private property (you know the property that is behind the big, fancy gates where the rest of us are not allowed to go), even though the original plan stated that the County would not pay for pipes on private property. Again the County Commissioners are not telling why they made an exception for Shark Key. |
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 I’m not condoning illegal immigration into the U.S., but these corporate elite shysters who have taken over our government, the Military Industrial Complex, and both the Democrat & Republican politicians in Capital Hill, are keeping you knuckleheads busy side tracking you with their diversions transmitted by the corporate controlled media. They are purposely creating the diversion of illegal immigration and want you to voice out loud, “We want our country back”. The truth is that if you want to take your country back you must fist take it back by voting out both Democrats & Republicans and filling in the vacant seats with Independents. Once we accomplish this, we voice out loud for a two term limit from now on, and a minimum wage salary for them. That’s the fist and second step to taking your country back! |
| [“Roadwork between Marathon and Grassy Key”] It’s being resurfaced because its coming apart. And Grassy Key is in Marathon. |
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| Fast crazy boat in Australia. Talk about being ‘trimmed up’! Video |
 I’m missing my friends in the lower Keys. I read the Big Pine Key daily. Lots of people have come and gone in my life, but the people in the lower Keys are special. The people in California do not understand what they are missing in the Keys. |
| If we can keep the Ebola virus contained in one of our special hospitals, I don’t see why we can’t bring the Muslim prisoners to an American high security prison and close Guantanamo once and for all. |
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| I’m very concerned about the inshore water quality in Marathon. From the canals near the high school to Vaca Cut, the water quality is terrible. There is almost no visibility. It is worse than before the sewers were installed. That being said, the canals on the north side, behind the airport are much improved. |
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| [Best Western] A couple of other pretty good cowboy movies are “Red River” and “The Culpepper Cattle Company”. |
 [Water Supply] The toxins that contaminated the drinking water supply of 400,000 people in northwest Ohio didn’t just suddenly appear. Water plant operators along western Lake Erie have long been worried about this very scenario as a growing number of algae blooms have turned the water into a pea soup color in recent summers, leaving behind toxins that can sicken people and kill pets. Is this what we get to look forward to? Link |
| I was just looking at (MLS) real estate listings and noticed the description of this one on the ocean side of Big Pine Key in Cahill Pines and Palms. “Remarks: Beautiful, custom 3 bedroom, 2 bath home on a crystal clear swimming canal! ” These canals that have been dammed off from the ocean for maybe 30 years, like the ones on north Little Torch and on Ramrod, are consistently better quality water than the ocean outside the canals. All the homes on these canals are on septic tanks. This listed house is 20 years old and sitting next to a canal that was dug “too deep”. Still, the canal is described as crystal clear, and I have seen that it has a wide variety of captive fish including tarpon and snook plus two varieties of sea turtle.This house will be getting a grinder pump on a pressurized sewer line. Are you stupid enough to believe that his crystal clear canal is not in danger of raw sewage contamination from the pressure sewer and individual grinder pump stations that it has not experienced in decades of septic tank use? Pressure sewers are not about saving the environment. It’s just a toilet tax and one more false promise. |
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 I have always thought that there should be a toll at the 7 Mile Bridge to let you into the Lower Keys. The best of the Keys $4, one-way, seems reasonable, with a local’s discount or free pass. They had a toll on Matecumbe years ago. See what someone else is doing: Link |
| They didn’t have this ‘green thing’ back in the earlier days. Back then, we returned milk bottles, soda bottles and beer bottles to the store. The store sent them back to the plant to be washed and sterilized and refilled, so it could use the same bottles over and over. So they really were recycled. But we didn’t have the “green thing” back in our day. Grocery stores bagged our groceries in brown paper bags that we reused for numerous things. Most memorable besides household garbage bags was the use of brown paper bags as book covers for our school books. This was to ensure that public property (the books provided for our use by the school) was not defaced by our scribblings. Then we were able to personalize our books on the brown paper bags.We walked up stairs because we didn’t have an escalator in every store and office building. We walked to the grocery store and didn’t climb into a 300-horsepower machine every time we had to go two blocks. But she was right. We didn’t have the “green thing” in our day. Back then we washed the baby’s diapers because we didn’t have the throw away kind. We dried clothes on a line, not in an energy-gobbling machine burning up 220volts. Wind and solar power really did dry our clothes back in our early days. Kids got hand-me-down clothes from their brothers or sisters, not always brand-new clothing.
Back then we had one TV, or radio, in the house — not a TV in every room. And the TV had a small screen the size of a handkerchief (remember them?), not a screen the size of the state of Montana. In the kitchen we blended and stirred by hand because we didn’t have electric machines to do everything for us. When we packaged a fragile item to send in the mail, we used wadded up old newspapers to cushion it, not Styrofoam or plastic bubble wrap. Back then, we didn’t fire up an engine and burn gasoline just to cut the lawn. We used a push mower that ran on human power. We exercised by working so we didn’t need to go to a health club to run on treadmills that operate on electricity. We drank from a fountain when we were thirsty instead of using a cup or a plastic bottle every time we had a drink of water. We refilled writing pens with ink instead of buying a new pen, and we replaced the razor blade in a razor instead of throwing away the whole razor just because the blade got dull. Back then, people took the streetcar or a bus and kids rode their bikes to school or walked instead of turning their moms into a 24-hour taxi service in the family’s $45,000 SUV or van, which cost what a whole house did before the “green thing.” We had one electrical outlet in a room, not an entire bank of sockets to power a dozen appliances. And we didn’t need a computerized gadget to receive a signal beamed from satellites 23,000 miles out in space in order to find the nearest burger joint. But isn’t it sad the current generation laments how wasteful we old folks were just because we didn’t have the “green thing” back then? |
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| [Sewers] The County and FKAA will not have the problem that our neighbors are facing with failures of the vacuum sewer system. (25 leaking pits, out of over 400 pits, permitting seawater to enter the treatment plant) The pressure system with grinder pumps being used for the Cudjoe Regional Wastewater System (CRWS) will not fail and allow water into the treatment plant. When any of the thousands of plastic welds fail, or the connections to the almost 2,000 grinder pumps let go, when the shut off or check valves at the street fail, or when someone cuts into the hundreds of miles of plastic pipe buried two feet deep, the sewage, under pressure of up to 180 PSI will flow into the trenches that were dug during installation and then into our canals and near shore waters. The fiction of a vacuum system versus a pressure system is that when components of the vacuum system fail, the operators see water incursion. When a pressure system fails, it is almost untraceable until the sewage runs into the streets or our canals. That is why pressure sewer systems are rated as only slightly better than septic systems when it comes to environmental quality. |
 [“Local gun range probable a hoax”] There’s one on Big Coppitt and the rumor is there’s a pistol range coming to Big Pine Key. Being an enthusiast, I can’t wait! |
| Anyone else get the ‘Monties’ eating at the local beaneries during lobster fest? Something tells me the local joints do not really clean their places according to Hoyle. Bad ice, bad water, dirty dishes and bad hardware. Where are the restaurant inspectors? at the bank depositing their kick backs? |
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| [Cynic] Every time I hear about another species that has gone extinct I think, Good, one less thing to compete with and one less justifiable do-nothing government leach. |
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| Fox News, true to form, is busily trying to stir up a panic over Ebola in this country. |
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| WOW only people talking about impeachment every other breath is koolaid drinking socialist. Its not going to help you. raise all the money you want. CANTOR loss was the harbinger of democrat doom for the 2014 mid terms. get ready folks you gonna have to put your lefty friends on suicide watch after nov! |
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Please think about the disdain the Obama administration has for the law and the Constitution. There is a growing body of evidence that strongly suggests that the Admin used the IRS as a political tool to attack it’s enemies. It is fact that the Director of the CIA lied to Congress when he denied engaging in domestic spying and spying on Congress. It is fact that the Admin unlawfully bugged the phones of media personalities that are critical of the Admin. It is fact that the Admin actually bugged the computers of certain Senators. It’s a fact that the admin unlawfully sold guns to Mexican narco terrorists. It is fact that the admin bugged the telephone of the German Head of State, Angela Merkle. The admin refuses to enforce our border laws and we are literally being overrun by illegals. The power, the reach, and the audacity of this administration are frightening. Much of his overreach would have been impossible if it had not been for the actions of the Democrat controlled Senate. It will take years of sound and reasoned governance to repair the damage done by this set of Democrat leaders. It will take years to erase the Hatfield—McCoy mentality that the Democrats have brought to our governance. Part 2) Some folks are overjoyed at the July employment numbers released Friday. They shouldn’t be.
Only about 209k Americans found new jobs. 300k had been expected. Sadly, the number of new hires lower than it has been each month since April. The increase in hourly wages is all but stagnant, up only about 1 cent per hour. The reported u/e rate has again risen, this time to 6.2%. But the actual/true unemployment rate is about 12.2%, that rate includes people who are forced to work part time because no full time jobs are available. Unemployment amongst blacks is horrific. Unemployment of youths is staggering. In July, the number of unemployed Americans increased by 197,000. The number of persons who actually hold full time jobs in America only increased by 131,000 in July. 11,472,000 Americans have left workforce since Obama took office. In July 2014, there were 92,001,000 Americans, 16 and over, who were classified as “not in the labor force,” meaning they not only did not have a job, but they didn’t actively seek one in the last four weeks.
New home sales fell in May and June. Our GDP growth for the first two quarters of 2014 is unchanged from last year. New car sales declined by 2.3% in June. Manufacturing declined in June. With all of that, the unemployment rate for government workers is just about half that of the entire workforce. Where is the recovery that the admin keeps braying about? ———————————-
FTR’S RESPONSE: That Deer Friends is one of the most fascinating and revealing postings that we have seen from left field in a long, long time. Think about it. The poster said he “had” to listen to his companion complain about Obama. Ask yourself, was he free to leave, or was he tied to the bar stool? Or was he adhering to the Democrat practice of mooching…..drinks this time? Why didn’t he disagree and just sing the praises of Obama? Was he afraid? Why didn’t he try to correct the “inaccurate thinking?” Why didn’t the poster tell us at least one thing that his companion said that was wrong? After all he tells us his companion was “wrong on all counts.” I sincerely hope that the poster will take the time to tell us what is friend was wrong about and why his friend was wrong. Don’t you wonder exactly what the poster meant when he accused his companion of “inaccurate thinking?” Is that nothing more than “thinking” that poster disagrees with, or is it very much like the “thoughtcrimes” chronicled in Orwell’s famous novel 1984? In 1984 a “thoughtcrime” is independent thinking that disagrees with the central government. It was a very serious offense. |
Part 3) “I had to listen to a guy railing against the President yesterday at a Marathon bar who was wrong on all counts. I was surprised at the level of misinformation he was sharing. With people like him and their inaccurate thinking it’s no wonder some of them want to impeach the President.”