IF A TREE FALLS IN THE FOREST...

The AP reports that the "severed deer head" story starring Virginia Senator George Allen may be a "myth," according to some local law enforcement officers.

Also in interviews with the AP and Salon.com late Sunday, Shelton claimed that on a hunting trip to Louisa County in 1973 or 1974, Allen stuffed the severed head of a female deer into the oversized mailbox of a black household near Bumpass, Va., 40 miles east of the university.

But in interviews Tuesday, two Louisa County sheriff's deputies who were on the force in the early '70s said that they recall no complaints about severed animal heads.

Retired Lt. Robert Rigsby said he was in charge of investigations in the early '70s, and any such report would have gone through him.

"I think that's a myth," Rigsby said.

Well golly gee, if nobody reported it, it didn't happen, right?

Anyone who grew up in the deep South and lived there during the early seventies (I've lived in the South all my life, born and bred, except for blips abroad with my military dad) should know how seldom, at that time, an anonymous black would file a police report alleging harassment. For one thing, a person of color would have had good reason to believe that any such report would be ignored by law enforcement, and that filing one would merely bring him/her to the attention of the authorities as a "troublemaker."

Remember, Allen is quoted as saying he came to Virginia because it was a place where blacks "knew their place." He clearly had no fear that he'd be found out for frightening an unknown black family, so he could indulge his sadistic tendencies without fear of consequences. These quoted specimens of rural Virginia law enforcement sound just like Allen's kind of people.

If a tree falls in the forest, and nobody hears it, did it make any noise? The conservative (and Allen's) response: OF COURSE NOT!

Tags: George Allen, severed deer head