and Rockingham, and moving a date from Darlington and moving into what NA$CAR calls major marketing areas. This would also explain why some tracks which can’t sell out still manage to keep two race dates. Are Mr. Flower’s drug operation accusations real? It’s hard to say. NA$CAR has taken money from criminals in the past to keep it afloat. We know NA$CAR is pretty greedy. And based on information in “Driving With the Devil”, NA$CAR has had irregularities with its books in the early days of the sport.
Big Bill also had some connections with Federal law enforcement from when he worked in Washington DC which he maintained throughout his life according to Mr. Flowers. I’ve shown that the France family has made a lot of political donations at national levels and to both parties to hedge their bets. If you can get local business owners in Daytona Beach to talk, you find out that nothing happens there without the approval of the France family. You also hear that the folks running the city and county are pretty much puppets of the France family. So their power doesn’t just include auto racing. It includes control of their home base. Based on what Mr. Flowers wrote, they have their tentacles in a lot of pies which are beneficial to keeping people from taking a good, hard look at them.
Intimidating and controlling the media has been going on for a while according to Mr. Flowers. NA$CAR tried to frame him on bad check charges. They kept another writer from being hired because he wrote the truth about NA$CAR and his opinions on NA$CAR weren’t exactly along the party lines. Apparently the New York Times had a lot of info about His Royal Highness and his drug use and involvement back in 2003 but didn’t run the story because nobody in New York would care. Considering the NY Times credibility is a bad as NA$CAR’s.
One incident about involvement with organized crime and the Frances was based in part on how to handle the Tim Richmond deal with AIDS and drugs. It seems Bill France Jr. came back from a boating trip with Jim France and some other gents with two broken ankles. The official explanation was a freak wave. I can see breaking both ankles in a car or airplane crash or maybe on a masted ship when a spar broke and came down on his ankles, but it wasn’t a masted ship. Another more believable explanation was that the gangsters that Bill and Jim France met with broke Bill’s ankles to get their point across. And if you think Mr. Flowers made this up, e-mail Pete Pistone and ask him about it. He’s one of the individuals who thought the mob broke France’s ankles.
Another thing Mr. Flowers talk about is The King’s 199th & 200th wins and how he won them. I myself had heard the same things that Mr. Flowers wrote. I don’t know who his sources were, but I know who mine were and they were very reliable. And I heard that there was supposed to be a 201st win also but that The King wrecked in the race he was supposed to win and after that, Bill Jr. didn’t want to take any more risks. As to whether or not these accusations are true, I have no idea. Nobody’s asked The King and Bill Jr. is dead. Of course, there are still some crewmembers from The King’s crew who are still alive who could be asked.
If half of what Mr. Flowers has written is true, I’d say it was high time that NA$CAR was investigated by a Federal investigative group that NA$CAR can’t influence with their political and legal contacts in the Federal government and on Capitol Hill.
Congrats to the “citizen journalists”. Now, when you go to get your credentials from Faux King Brian and his henchmen, take plenty of money and read the form you have to sign very carefully. And look for the line which says that NA$CAR controls everything that’s photographed, written, videotaped, etc. That’s Article 4 and the cause of the original Credential-gate. Also, see if they’ve changed the flavor of the Kool Aid yet or if it’s still the same old purple stuff. Missing from the list of bloggers, and I’m not surprised, are Monte Dutton and Mike Mulhern. They’re like me; they don’t get Christmas cards from His Royal Highness. I’ll be interested to see how this little experiment works out. Will there be some honest reporting as before or will we be having more people joining the Kool Aid Drinkers Club? I guess we’ll have to wait and see.
A big congrats and two thumbs up to Hershel McGriff for a pretty decent finish this last weekend. Even at age 81, Hershel is proving that age is just a number and every start he makes is one for the record books. He’s managed to race back when it was NASCAR and has outlived Bills Sr. and Jr. and may very well outlive His Royal Highness unless His Imperial Ineptitude suddenly stops assaulting palm trees. So keep the shiny side up Hershel and teach those kids a thing or two about racing.
Since it looks like Mr. Happy is going to be hitting the bricks soon and parting ways with RCR. I can’t really blame him really. The cars haven’t been up to par since they went to the clone cars. I read that Stewart-Haas may be his new home. Of course, we don’t know how true that is. And isn’t it strange how RCR’s performance has dropped off since Bob Dilner turned up the deal on the trick rims they were using a couple years ago. But back to the point, with the problems RCR has had with not being able to fully utilize their sponsorship on Mr. Happy’s car because of the Official Fuel Sponsor, the Cup title sponsor chasing off The Mayor’s AT&T sponsorship, and the overall problems of trying to turn a sow’s ear into a silk purse with the generic Box on Wheels, RCR’s performance hasn’t been that great. So I can see why Mr.
Happy would want to move on to greener
pastures. He’ll want to go to a winning team, so
that pretty much eliminates a lot of the Fiat and
Ford teams. That also eliminates a lot of the
Japanese manufacturer’s teams. The top Chevy
team doesn’t have room for him. So that means a
satellite team of a winner who’s actually winning
or performing strong. And while Stewart-Haas
sounds like the logical place, don’t bet your
money on it until it is official. The reason I say
that is because it looked like McMurray was
going to be leaving Roush and now it looks like
he’ll be hanging around if the current rumors are
true.
One of our fellow race fans and fellow military veteran, Submariner Bill, is having some medical
problems. Bill’s been a race fan for quite a while, was a military kid, served in Navy on subs during
the Cold War, and continues his patriotic duties with a blog about his views on a variety of subjects, including politics, which is a 1st Amendment Right and what I consider to be a duty of all free citizens. He’s one of the good guys, so keep him in your prayers.
Motherhood, Apple Pie, and John Wayne
Mad Mikie
Curmudgeon at Large
Want to chat with other race fans about this article and other NASCAR stuff?
Gotta comment, question or want to say hey there...email Mike here
Go visit our home page, called appropriately The Pits & check out our photos & pages. Our most popular page; Race Recon is where you get all the info you need to go to the races including local camping, hotels, bars, restaurants, tracks, golf & other important race weekend information. We also have attending a NASCAR Race tips, tailgating tips & recipes, stories, trivia, quotes & more! While you are surfing see if you are a REAL RACE FAN. Be sure to read the Fan Fables, LAIDBACK RACING’S adventures with the tailgating race fan at NASCAR tracks.
