Posted on 06/03/2015 8:34:06 AM PDT by Jack Hydrazine
What happens if you put a 9-foot-long missile in the passenger seat of your convertible and drive for an hour on busy South Florida streets on the day the President of the United States is visiting?
Nothing at all.
Some people were a little horrified, but nobody did anything, Boca Raton businessman Tom Madden said.
Madden drove from Dania Beach to Boca Raton on Thursday morning with the business end of an Israeli Air Force air-to-surface missile rising from the passenger seat of his topless Volvo.
I drove 35 miles an hour on U.S. 1 all the way, Madden said, because I thought if I drove on I-95, it might cause an accident.
Madden, who owns the public relations agency TransMedia, got the missile from an elderly widow who lives in Miami. The womans deceased husband won it years ago at a Palm Beach auction to benefit the Israeli military, Madden said.
The missile, minus its explosive charge, is purported to be an artifact from the Six-Day War in 1967.
She got tired of schlepping the missile around to various apartments, Madden said.
So he was happy to take it off her hands, figuring that the Israeli missile may still have some fund-raising value in another charitable event. So he picked it up, and with the help of five guys lugged it into his office.
We could have sent a truck for it, he said, but I thought Id have some fun.
The day he decided to get the missile just so happened to be the day President Barack Obama was visiting the National Hurricane Center in Miami-Dade County after a night of local fund-raising.
With Obama in Miami, I was having second thoughts, Madden said. I thought people would see me driving around with a missile and it might cause some trouble.
But he had nothing to worry about.
When a police car pulled up beside me, Im thinking This is it, he said.
But the officer didnt stop him. And it didnt faze the McDonalds worker in the drive-thru lane either, when he pulled up to order a diet Coke, Madden said.
I had to say to her, Do you see whats beside me? he said. But she didnt react. She just said, You want a small or large?
I guess that Homeland Securitys slogan, If you see something, say something, hasnt quite penetrated the local consciousness.
Either that, or the missile was just too big of a weapon to cross the threshold of concern.
Take, for example, what happened seven years ago, when William Barnes, a former West Palm Beach police chief, decided he would donate an antique rifle to the Historical Society of Palm Beach County.
Barnes had a rife that had been seized in 1924 from Florida gangster John Ashley. A curator at the historical society expressed interest in the weapon, and so Barnes delivered it.
But when he walked into the old Palm Beach County Courthouse in downtown West Palm Beach with the antique rifle on his shoulder, he created panic among the staff, causing waves of deputies to come running to the building.
Maybe Maddens journey to Boca Raton would have been more eventful if he had a rifle instead of a missile sticking up from the passenger seat of his convertible.
If you see something, say “would you like fries with that?”
yeah...’artifact from the Six-Day War in 1967.’
`This is my missile. There are many like it, but this one is mine.’
Some years ago, when I was working in DC an Army colonel was stopped and arrested with an 3 1/2 inch unguided atg rocket strapped to the side of his pickup truck. Don’t know what he was planning to do with it or if he considered his truck to be a “technical”. Traffic has always been a b1tch in DC.
Let’s be precise, now, SOUTH FLORIDUH, LIBERAL DEMOCRAT STRONGHOLD...............The North part and the Panhandle are conservative....................
How long before the shit hits the the fan.. tick tick tick..
True, whenever I drive through Clearwater, it seems every other Subaru and Prius on the road got those insipid coexist, and/or yellow equality bumper stickers smugly placed on their back windows. But since it’s the land of LGBT/FUBAR’s and scientologists, I’m not surprised. It’s like San Francisco-upon-the-Gulf. I’m about an hour north in Hernando where things are quite a bit more normal.
Get this printed by a professional on plastic and put it in YOUR back window!...................
I got Calvin peeing on 0bama on my back window. The only reactions I’ve got were positive. If any pasty-faced lib were to give me crap about it, in the words of Mr. T, I PITY THE FOOL!
Nobody was worried..he was, after all, driving a Volvo..
I have wanted to do that for so long, but I have yet to come across one.
-PJ
Obama is not extremely popular these days, people were probably pulling over so he could pass to make sure he got to his destination on time.
Looks like an AIM-9 Sidewinder to me too. Thought it might be an ASM Maverick but they don’t have the forward fins.
Is that a missile or are you happy to see me?
“There was an article a few years ago about a PIAT launcher pulled out of a river/lake, and the authorities treated it as a dangerous explosive.”
From what I have read about the PIAT they weren’t very dangerous (at least to the enemy) when functional.
That’s one way to deter tailgaters...
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.