Mystery endures in case of OK mother ‘Cookie’ Parton, 80, and son, 59, missing since October – FRI 18Mar2022

Search continues for OK mother ‘Cookie’ Parton, 80, and son, 59, missing since October. NASA unveils next generation moon rocket. Schwarzenegger anti-war video making rounds in Russia.

NATIONAL NEWS

Mystery endures in case of OK mother ‘Cookie’ Parton, 80, and son, 59, missing since October

Last October, Dwayne Selby, 59, and his friend and roommate Jack Grimes, 76, left their home in Turley, OK, to attend a horse show in Texas. They never arrived, and were last seen Oct. 25, 2021. Selby’s 80-year-old mother, Glenda ‘Cookie’ Parton, then went looking for them and also vanished. Parton was last seen on Oct. 29 in a Turley supermarket with an unidentified man. A few days later on Oct. 31, hunters found the body of Jack Grimes, dead of an apparent homicide. The vehicle used by Selby and Grimes as well as that of Parton were found abandoned in the Tulsa area. No sign of either Selby or Parton has turned up since.

Just this week, the Tulsa County Sheriff’s Office served a search warrant at the home of Jack Grimes, hoping to turn up clues as to what happened. Authorities haven’t yet revealed whether or not they found anything of interest.

4th missing person from Turley

Just a week before Selby and Grimes went missing, another Turley resident, Shannon Ray Miller, 39, also went missing. His car was also found abandoned. It’s not clear if this has anything to do with the other disappearances or Grimes’ death, but it’s an odd coincidence. Miller’s remains were found on Nov. 29, but his cause of death has not been released.

The year before his death and disappearance, Miller, a convicted sex offender, was arrested on a burglary charge. According to a June 12, 2020, report, an unidentified elderly woman woke to find a naked Miller standing over her as she slept. The woman apparently thought she was dreaming and went back to sleep. Later, the woman found men’s clothes discarded in her house. Deputies came to the house and recovered the clothes, along with Miller’s ID.

NASA unveils next generation moon rocket

NASA has debuted its new SLS moonshot rocket. Just under 100 feet in height, the rocket rolled out onto the launch pad this morning for testing. The space agency hopes to send the rocket on an uncrewed mission to circle the moon in the next few months. If that goes well, an SLS-type rocket will be carrying a manned scientific mission to land on the moon by the end of the decade.

The SLS is part of the new Artemis program, named after the Greek goddess of the moon, which will inaugurate the next generation of lunar and space exploration. When NASA launched the program last year, they stated that their ultimate mission was to establish a crewed base on the moon. If the manned flight missions and the lunar base project are successful, these could form the stepping stones towards a manned mission to Mars.

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INTERNATIONAL NEWS

Arnold Schwarzenegger’s anti-war video making rounds in Russian social media

Actor-turned-politician Arnold Schwarzenegger released a video on Twitter earlier this week addressed to the Russian people. In the video, which is about 9 minutes long and subtitled in Russian, Schwarzenegger talks about his long-standing affection for the Russian people. “I’m speaking to you today because there are things going on in the world that are being kept from you, terrible things that you should know about,” he says.

Schwarzenegger begins by sharing a personal story. As a young man, he met Russian weight lifter Yuri Vlasov, who became an inspiration to him. He speaks of having Vlasov’s poster on his wall, which Schwarzenegger’s father disapproved of. Schwarzenegger’s father fought with the Nazis at the siege of Leningrad (now St. Petersburg), and came back a “broken man” as Schwarzenegger puts it. Schwarzenegger had previously spoken of his father in a video discussing the Jan 6. Capitol riots.

Schwarzenegger shares images from the war in Ukraine and talks about the bombed out homes and hospitals. He says “this is not the Russian people’s war”, and “those in power in the Kremlin” were responsible for the war, rather than the people in Ukraine. Schwarzenegger says the thousands of Russian anti-war protesters who have been beaten and arrested are “my new heroes”.

The video has been trending on Russian social media, including the Telegram app. The Kremlin has blocked Twitter in Russia, but Russians can still access it using a VPN.

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