Uncommon Sense in a Texas Children's Prison District

Dozens, nay hundreds of children, teachers and bystanders have been killed, actually by crazed murderers, but with anti-gun, anti-self defense politicians as accessories before the fact. It might even be said that these self-same politicians are accessories after the fact as well, for their attempts to minimize punishments for these psychos. Now, there seems to be a small island of sanity in the northern plains of Texas.

According to a story on the Chron.com web page, a small school district in North Texas--Harrold, Texas--has adopted a policy of allowing school teachers and staff to carry concealed firearms in classrooms, the better to help protect the inmates, should one of these demented individuals decide to pick one of their campi to make his final stand.

There will be a small number of qualifications staff must pass in order to carry on campus, but they should be fairly easy for anyone to satisfy. Unless he is one of the aforementioned psychos.

Here's hoping this tiny ray of intelligence can be multiplied before any more schools, churches, shopping centers and restaurants become shooting galleries.

Gun free zones are free fire zones.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Memo to Fuhrer Bloomberg: The Attack Already Happened

The Mayor of New York City, not to be outdone by George Bush, has a plan to turn a once-great American city into a virtual prison. Since technology has almost outstripped the need for traveling papers, there's not really much need for "papers, please" checkpoints any more.

Second most scary phrase in the American lexicon: We're from the government, and we have a plan.

According to this story, the NYPD and police in the boroughs and in surrounding cities within 50 miles of Manhattan will be using radiation detectors to find nuclear weapons, illicit x-ray machines and old radium wristwatches. I'll be watching for the first time they send SWAT in smashing down the doors of a dentist's office.

NYPD will also be monitoring and recording the license plate numbers of all cars and trucks that enter lower Manhattan. They'll be installing more and more cameras all over the city so as to be able to track vehicles as they go about their business.

And....get this! They plan to place 3000 cameras below Canal Street--in the area surrounding the location of the World Trade Center.

Second memo to der fuhrer: They've already destroyed the World Trade Center. There's no point in protecting it anymore. And they didn't do it with anything that a camera in every square foot of Lower Manhattan, with a half-dozen cops watching each monitor could've stopped.

They're already rousting selected subway riders (being careful to never offend any islamic terrorists) to see if they're carrying any nunchuks or brass knuckles. They've already, decades ago, stripped New Yorkers of their right to self defense.

Here's the ultimate solution: Place a wall around New York City and dozens of machine gun towers at intervals atop the wall. Let no one in or out on pain of death. NYC will be safe, as will the ghost of the World Trade Center. It worked well in the movie.....Just make sure fuhrer Bloomberg remains inside! Y'know, I used to like New York.

Goose stepping toward totalitarianism.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

First, Kill All the Dogs

Looking through my handy dandy copy of the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution of the United States and the accompanying Bill of Rights, I'm unable to find the clause that states that government has the mandate to regulate what one ingests. I've looked several times. Yet, the illegal War on Drugs, more properly called the War on Americans' Rights, continues unabated.

It's an oft-asserted fact that 'pears to even the casual observer, that this government's ongoing assault on individual rights costs far more, in any manner of measure, than does the kind of rampant drug use imagined by the evil federal government, even in its most loony fascist's worst imaginings.

The tales of police brutality against the guilty are only exceeded by their atrocities against the innocent. A casual search will turn up hundreds of instances in which due process is ignored, not only by police, but by elected officials, the news media and the courts--especially the bought-and-paid-for Supreme Court, every member of which should (and no doubt does) know better.

The most recent case of crime-by-police took place in Berwyn Heights, near College Park--itself just a few miles east of Mordor. The victims of this outrage were the Mayor of this little slice of suburbia, one Cheye Calvo, his wife and her mother. And, of course, the real victims were the family's two black labs, Payton and Chase, who were given an on-the-spot execution under the guns of this gang of thugs, merely for being dogs.

The sordid tale, starting in Phoenix as a convoluted cross-country movement of a quantity of marijuana to the area. Rumors that the mules were two scruffy guys riding Harleys proved to be untrue.

Arizona police learned of the drug movement and alerted the police agencies in Maryland that the pot was to be delivered in several packages, to various addresses in the area, including Calvo's. Before the packages were delivered, they were to be picked up by the local sellers with the addressees none the wiser.

The plot thickens. Prince George County cops caught the delivery boys and confiscated the drugs. Undercover cops delivered the packages to the addressees, not knowing that they were merely names picked out of a phone book (or the like).

Prince George County's finest then staged the raid 'pon the Mayor's home, killing the dogs, then tying up the Mayor and his mom-in-law on the floor beside one of the bleeding dogs. All the facts got sorted out, as the Mayor's wife came home to find the house covered in blood (the cops tracked all over the place) and torn apart.

Maryland has no law allowing no-knock search warrants by the cops, except they can if they feel like it.

Read the entire sordid story here. Also, see Balko's fine commentary here.

Oh, the County Mounties have not, and apparently will not apologize.

The FBI has been called in to investigate the matter which, if the Ruby Ridge murders are any guide, means the thugs involved in this atrocity will be given promotions, awards for valor and new squad cars.

And, for the capper, guess who has to clean up the Mayor's house (Hint: it won't be anyone with a badge).

People shouldn't be afraid of their governments; governments should be afraid of their people.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Treat Your Prostate Well

"Men over the age of 75 should no longer be screened for prostate cancer....." is the first sentence of a story in the Aug 5th, 2008 Los Angeles Times. A front page story. Above the fold. It must be important.

Seems a federal panel (uh, yeah, another one of those!) says that the potential psychological and physical harm of seniors learning they have prostate cancer outweighs the benefits of treating it. Some doctors argue against treating prostate cancer in those over 75 because they might die from something else anyway. Think of the many and sundry implications of that mindset!

Anyone can die anytime from any of hundreds of causes, but if a guy gets shot in the leg do you just let him bleed because he might get hit by a car tomorrow?

Other doctors, fortunately, take the opposite view, saying that this is a ploy by HMO lawyers to save their firms' money, and that it's a form of ageism. It'd also be easy to make a case (since it was a "federal panel," that they want to exclude the elderly from treatment to save medicare money.

My view is slightly different. Many doctors, especially the federal ones, look forward to a fully socialized, nationalized medical industry. The realistic ones already realize that under socialized medicine, service to the public will and must deteriorate and ultimately be rationed. "Important people--politicians, and industrialists and businessmen who toe the line with them, will continue to get the best medical care. The rest of us will wait in a line. The only way the line will move forward, is when the dead are pulled out of the line in front of you.

In time, as medicine deteriorates, even medical care for the elites will slide, but the elites don't think that far ahead. It won't occur to an ex-President, for example, that after age 75, or 70, or however bad it gets, that he's just another old man.

Waiting in line.

"Do you know what it takes to perform a brain operation? Do you know the skill it demands, and the years of passionate, merciless, excruciating devotion that go to acquire that skill? That was what I would not place at the disposal of men whose sole qualification to rule me was their capacity to spout the fraudulent generalities that got them elected to the privilege of enforcing their wishes at the point of a gun. I would not let them dictate the purpose for which my years of study had been spent, or the conditions of my work, or my choice of patients, or the amount of my reward. I observed that in all the discussions that preceded the enslavement of medicine, men discussed everything--except the desires of the doctors. Men considered only the 'welfare' of the patients, with no thought for those who were to provide it. That a doctor should have any right, desire or choice in the matter, was regarded as irrelevant selfishness; his is not to choose, they said, only 'to serve.' That a man willing to work under compulsion is too dangerous a brute to entrust with a job in the stockyards--never occurred to those who proposed to help the sick by making life impossible for the healthy. I have often wondered at the smugness with which people assert their right to enslave me, to control my work, to force my will, to violate my conscience, to stifle my mind--yet what is it that they expect to depend on, when they lie on the operating table under my hands? Their moral code has taught them to believe that it is safe to rely on the virtue of their victims. Well, that is the virtue I have withdrawn. Let them discover, in their operating rooms and hospital wards, that it is not safe to place their lives in the hands of a man whose life they have throttled. It is not safe, if he's the sort of man who resents it--and still less safe, if he's the sort who doesn't." --Ayn Rand

People should not be afraid of their governments. Governments should be afraid of their people.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Another Open Letter to Congressman Howard L Berman (D-Calif.)

As I suspected, Congressman Berman didn't see my previous letter, or at least, didn't see any need to answer it. His staff did, however, find the time to add my email address to those to whom he sends a monthly e-flier detailing his visits to senior centers and shopping malls.

So, here goes:

Attn: The Honorable Howard L Berman

Dear Congressman Berman:

After House Democrats embarrassed themselves Friday (8-1-08) by cutting off debate and calling for adjournment at the point of a debate and subsequent vote on the single most important issue of the day, an end to the ban against petroleum drilling in areas controlled by the Federal government, I’ve decided that House Democrats have far more interest in maintaining a flawed, self-hobbling debilitating policy that helps keep more and more Americans dependent ‘pon government at the expense of America’s greatness. I particularly viewed Speaker Pelosi’s act of turning off the lights and cameras to be one personally embarrassing to me as a Californian. Ok, she’s from Frisco, and they’re pretty crazy up there. But still!

I might add I regard any involvement in these areas of free market capitalism to be unconstitutional and morally wrong. Indeed, who was it that forbade men like J D Rockefeller making oil available to the world and improving the lives of all of us immeasurably? In a different time, it might have been people like those in today’s Democrat party. We’d still have to step around road apples as we walk to work on muddy streets.

Going through this kind of dramatics simply to keep from doing one’s job! Really!

Democrats, slaves to the pronouncements and edicts of fascistic environmentalist crazies, have been wrongly asserting for more than ten years that drilling for oil in ANWR, off our coasts and in the Midwest will not help the energy problem. Yet, the President’s merely having mentioned the possibility of our exploiting those areas caused the price to drop by over $15 per barrel in only three days.

It’s very clear that elected Democrats are pursuing a path that will lead to an impoverished America. As a constituent of yours, a voter and a possible activist (who has yet to receive an answer from my first letter to your office), I have to tell you that this is folly and it’s keeping many Americans from achieving their potential. People around the world have been looking to America as a shining light for over two centuries. Your party is throwing mud at that light by placing the barricades of draconian regulation and taxation in front of productive Americans. Friday’s tantrum is an example of the hysteria by which Democrats say, “No, you can’t” to those who want to make America a better place.

Thanks very much.

Sincerely,

Now, I don't for a second exempt Republicans from these very same criticisms--they've done little (collectively) to resist the Democrats' sabotage of American capitalism--in fact, many of them stand at the forefront of the destruction of America as a free country. It just happens that, unfortunately, my local Congressman is a Democrat, and seemingly one who is looking for a free ride by floating with the currents and not rocking the boat.

He'll probably be reelected (though, not with my help) because most of his constituents are Hollywood leftists and philosophical airheads, or am I repeating myself?

Remember! VOTE FOR NO INCUMBENT!

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Let Them Eat Sprouts

One of the reasons, I guess, that I stay in El Pueblo de Los Angeles is the drama. Home of Hollywood, Surf City, Beverly Hills and the famous San Fernando Valley, LA seems to be the place from which all the nuttiness that sweeps the world springs. It's hip! it's happenin'!

It also seems to be the fount of all the big government meddling scams that sweep the several state capitals and, finally, Washington DC.

• The anti-air pollution movement? started in LA.
• Hippies? Right here.
• Anti-nuclear power? LA, again.
• Freeways? LA.
• Smoking bans in bars? El Pueblo.
• Chain cosmetic surgery? Our own Beverly Hills.
• Health food craze? Still, LA.
• Anti-obesity? See above.
  

The list could go on, but I'll be merciful.

This time it's the LA City Council. I don't think anyone other than a far-left loon could get elected to the LA City Council even if he got to count the votes.

This last, the anti-obesity thing, is the excuse the LA feudal lords and....no, calling them ladies would be way too much stretch....for calling a moratorium on fast food in South-Central LA. See the sordid story here.

It used to be called South-Central. In yet another moronic move by the City Council a few years ago, 'twas decided that changing the name of the district from South-Central LA to simply South LA, would wholly change the character from a poor, crime-ridden racial ghetto to a pleasant, tree-lined suburb. Well, it's still a poor, crime-ridden racial ghetto. And, it's still called South-Central by nearly everyone but the LA City Council.

They won't actually do anything about the street crime, because it might offend someone.

Businesses won't relocate or set up branches in South-Central because they'll be vandalized and robbed, and there are relatively few buyers and employable workers there.

There is, however, no shortage of fast food stores and liquor stores.

The sages at City Council have, at times, threatened to close down the liquor stores, as if that constitutes a cure for alcoholism. In the linked story, they apply the same (none dare call it) logic to repair the largely imaginary obesity problem.

Yet, a majority of those misguided individuals who vote for City Councilfolk keep returning these incredibly dysfunctional idjits to the Council term after term. They do nothing but make speeches that say nothing, dedicate horribly tasteless art projects at municipal parks and buildings and call for higher taxes.

In the dreamworld in which a Ruth's Chris will open at Crenshaw and Imperial, who in that neighborhood will have a hundred fifty dollars or so to treat his date to a steak dinner. Well, there are several crack sellers that might, but they spend their leisure time on Rodeo Drive or in Westwood. Nobody'll open a Ruth's Chris in South Central.

It'll be Church's and McDonald's for most of those folks--not that I think there's anything wrong with them--even if they have to take a bus to Inglewood for it. That is, until that same dreamworld City Council lightens up on their tax load so they can afford to improve themselves.

All government can do is take things away.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Nation of the Flies

I often wonder what the world will be like a century from now, or even twenty years along. I'm observing that the government children's prison system and the media are seem to be doing everything they can imagine to keep children from full adulthood--by de-emphasizing the need for personal responsibility and critical thinking, and many other activities to which man (in Dirty Lab lingo, man is an abbreviation of human, which is a species of critter that has a female sex--woman--and a male sex--man--and is inclusive) must attend if he's to even begin to fulfill his potential. One can only conclude that the individuals who operate these institutions want to see mankind stunted and mentally/psychologically crippled to remain a sort of world of children throughout their lives.

Another trait these elitists are trying to destroy is that of defiance. As I've mentioned in the past, the only reason for this is that the elitists want a subdued, compliant populace to follow quietly along the elitists' path toward a new feudalism. Most of us are already in the mindset of serfdom already, after decades of conditioning and propagandizing. We can see it wherever we go.

Since the children's prisons seem to be teaching mainly compliance and subservience. Any teaching of that which is necessary for children to become adults must come from the parents. In addition, it has to be hoped that there's some spark of individualism left with the parents, they already having been bathed in humanity-robbing propaganda during their own school years. One bit of evidence that young people are failing to reach adulthood is the relatively common phenomenon of adult children living in their parents' homes well into legal adulthood--presumably with their teddy bears.

The failings of many of today's parents include the inability or lack of desire to:

• Teach their children the work ethic.
• Teach critical thinking.
• Teach time management.
• Be parents.
• Teach children to dress properly.
• Teach children common courtesy.
• Teach them to defend themselves.
  

Many parents fail to allow their children to learn for themselves by:

• Never allowing them to be alone.
• Never letting them set their own goals.
• Never letting them achieve their goals on their own.
• Never letting them achieve self reliance.
• Never letting them have adventures.

Or even:

• Letting them walk to the places they go.
• Letting them go to a public rest room by themselves.
  
• Letting them go to summer camp without their cell phones.
• Letting them find work, earn money and spend it as they will, on their own.

I became a streetcorner newsie when I was ten. It was wonderful, having my own money.

Years ago, I had a job in which I hired kids. I'm not sure if that could still happen today. I tried to instill in them responsibility and pride in a job well done. I tried to teach them to make change properly--something the children's prison hadn't done. We didn't have cash registers with pictures on the keys in gas stations back then.

They'll have kids of their own by now. I hope a little of what I tried to teach stuck.

The road to serfdom is all downhill.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

The Chimp Made A Monkey Out Of The Zookeeper

I don't think I ever saw anything so pathetic--or funny--in my life......well maybe, but not recently.

According to a story on Metro.co.uk, with video having been shown on tv news programs everywhere, a chimp stepped out of his cage, which was left open. This happened in the Ishikawa Zoo in Japan. A zookeeper with a trank dart gum went to subdue the chimp, and this is where everything went wrong.

The zookeeper looked like he's never held (much less fired) a gun of any kind in his entire life. He didn't know how to hold it or aim it. He was afraid to fire it. He didn't have a good grip on it.

Now, believe me when I tell you, this stuff can't be made up. As the venerable Mort Sahl used to say, "The true stuff is the funny stuff."

The wily 42-year-old chimp reached down and took it away from him. The chimp simply dropped it to the ground but I, truth be known, was hoping he'd shoot the stupid zookeeper with it. It'd do the little idiot a lot of good, to take a long enforced nap. Perhaps he'd wake up realizing that he'd better learn how to do his job.

Now, I know Japan has no history of the use of firearms, with the exception of those few years leading up to and including WWII. This fellow is far too young for that.

Perhaps they're having problems with quality in Japan's children's prisons, too.

The inmates are taking over the asylum.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

The International War On Hunger

So I'm watching Fox News, more listening than watching the continuing coverage of the comments of various thieves, power-mad politicos and pundits about the untimely death of Tony Snow. Snow was one of the nicer and smarter DC denizens, even despite the fact that he'd fallen in with a bad crowd. Compared to most of the thugs that inhabit Washington DC, he seemed to stand out as an honest, intelligent and rational individual (to the extent of my observation).

But, the passing of Mr Snow isn't what I'm writing about, today.

One of the thievin' thugs being interviewed by the Fox News talking head was Mike Huckabee, one of the unsuccessful Republican candidates for the party's nomination for President. Despite a few areas of grudging agreement, I'm happy that he didn't get the nomination.

Somehow, like most Republicans, Huckabee waxed altruistic (is it altruism when a man wants to give away money stolen from others? Of course it is!), and applauded the notion of the federal government "helping" in the fight against world hunger.

There are many problems with this idea, none of which will be addressed in the rush to take more and more money out of the control of those who produced it, and giving it to those who produce nothing.

• The entire notion of forcing goods from their producers to give to non-producers destroys the philosophically required principle, and very American tradition, of one's right to one's life and the products of that life.
• There is no Constitutional justification for "foreign aid" of any kind--in fact, the founders warned us in their writings about avoiding foreign entanglements.
• Much of the money stolen from its producers will end up in the pockets of American politicians and bureaucrats, rather than the hungry people we're (sneeringly) told are to benefit.
• Almost all the rest of the money will help fill the private bank accounts of the dictators in the countries whose people would supposedly help.
• The few truckloads of actual food to be given to the hungry people will exist mainly to provide photo opportunities for the partially complicit and/or very gullible world news media.

Huckabee is an evangelical preacher, and hence a class I altruist, whose altruistic ardor has led him to the other half of the Dark Side--politics. All the faith and force you can imagine, all wrapped up in one somewhat charismatic fellow. Given his deepest wishes, he'd have all of our hard-won production at his disposal--not for himself, mind, but for the ever growing numbers of others. Not that he'll stint on his own creature comforts, of course.

They never do.

What has to be done to end world hunger is to make the parts of the world in which poverty runs rampant become productive. That requires freedom. It requires recognition of the individual's right to his life and the products thereof.

That's not the prerogative of the federal government of the various United States. It falls to the people in the areas affected to right things for themselves--though interested individuals might find ways to help.

The world is smothering itself in an orgy of altruism.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Sambo's: Murdered By Overly Sensitive Victocrats

A blog entry at TF Stern's Rantings reminded me of a pancake house I used to frequent back in the early 1970's. Sambo's. I don't remember what their lunch and dinner menus were like, but I do recall that their breakfasts were very good and not terribly expensive.

Stern's rant comes as a result of a couple of incredibly stupid Dallas politicians (who are black, and apparently of the racist persuasion) who took offense at the fact that ".....someone said the county's collections office, Central Collections, has become a black hole." Better these thievin' bureaucrats should quit raping the productive residents of Dallas than make silly racial connections.

It brings to mind the true tale me of the equally moronic Washington bureaucrat who took offense at the use of the word "niggardly."

Stern wisely recalled the fact that the children's book Little Black Sambo has been pulled off the shelves of the libraries of most (if not all) government children's prisons because of the complaints of other stupid, overly sensitive black racists, in spite of the fact that the story is very complementary of the intelligence of the protagonist (who happens to be black).

Having read Stern's entry brought the late Sambo's to mind. Sambo's had about 1200 restaurants in 47 states by 1979. After the bad press caused by these bigoted individuals, and after various moves in the attempt to save the firm, Sambo's went bankrupt in 1981 and soon disappeared from the American landscape.

Well, I just learned the news: there is still one Sambo's left. It's the first and only remaining store, is located in Santa Barbara, and is owned by the grandson of one of the founders of the firm.

I guess I'll have to make it a deliberate place to visit every time I happen to be in Santa Barbara.

It takes better men to build than it does to destroy.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

I Can't Drive 55!

The 55mph national speed limit has once again reared its ugly head, and once again, it's leftists, in the guise of algorians, wearing their frightful mask. As one of the many unworkable plans to keep American oil companies from actually adding to the available petroleum supply, including solar power (which is still in its primitive stages,and will be for years to come) and windmill generators (which kill large numbers of birds and are too unsightly to be employed along the Massachusetts coastline) algorians now suggest that we "save" our existing, largely imported oil supplies by driving slower.

That's the "solution" the leftists of the day tried to apply to the government manufactured gasoline shortages of the Jimma Carter years--even more evidence that a B Hussein Obama Presidency will be Carter's second term.

There were many problems with the 55mph speed limit back then.

• The US Constitution has no language to allow a mandated national speed limit.
• No one observed that speed limit anyway.
• Cross-country driving took much longer than necessary.
• The cost of transporting goods by truck increased.
• State and local governments used the speed limit as a cash cow, stepping up enforcement to help fill government coffers.
• Commuters' drive time was increased, lengthening the time of their exposure to possible collisions and breakdowns.

It's an easily observable fact that Guber Schwarzengroper is looking for ways to lessen the state's deficit without actually cutting spending. CHP is already leaving non-injury collision victims to duke it out for themselves while they write citations. Thanks to a relatively new law allowing the doubling of fines for traffic violations in construction zones, virtually all of the Stalag has become a construction zone.

Two cities I spend a lot of time in, driving, are Culver City and El Pueblo de Los Angeles. There's no question that they've stepped up traffic enforcement. Parking enforcement is a growth industry, as well. Lovely Rita is working overtime.

LAPD sets up a ticket factory a couple of times a week near my work area, and CCPD has a truck checkpoint they set up, complete with portable scales, once or twice a month.

What's next? A 40 mph speed limit? Freeway bicycle lanes? Increased license fees for vehicles with engines of over a liter (61 cubic inches, in American) displacement? The algorians really want to see us looking under rocks for food.

Anything at all, to avoid the rational solution: Drill now, drill here and drill fast!

Drill, ye tarriers, drill!

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

What Once Was and What Might Be Redone, Better

Two hundred thirty-two years (and two days) ago today, arguably the greatest political document in history was ratified in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. I was contemplating a well-crafted, scathing reminder of our lost freedom (anybody who still thinks America is a free country, I have a parcel of beach front property in Chad I'll sell you) when I stumbled across this article the freedom-oriented newspage, Freedom's Phoenix. Since L Neil Smith, freedom writer emeritus, says what I want to say far better than I can, here's the link.

Nonetheless, I celebrate Independence Day with more attention and reflection than any other of America's scheduled holidays. I miss fireworks. I don't attend those public fireworks shows--a poor substitute for neighbors touching off various types of rockets, fire showers and pinwheels in the street, together--although sometimes I see them from afar. As with most things, Disney does it better.

Each year, I reread the Declaration of Independence and marvel at the man, Thomas Jefferson and many of his contemporaries.

How great is this land, America, and how much greater it might have been!

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

The Smith-Suprynowicz Freedom Test

I found this in the current issue of the online magazine, The Libertarian Enterprise.

* Would [you] support the right of a nine-year-old girl to walk into a hardware store and, without signing anything or producing identification of any kind, pay cash for a submachinegun, several hundred rounds of ammunition, and a supply of morphine? If [you] wouldn't, then whatever [you're] in favor of, it isn't freedom.

When I first read this, I muttered, "Huh? What would a nine-year-old girl want with a submachine gun?"

Then, recovering, I reasoned that as long as she doesn't use it to initiate force against me or someone else, it really isn't any of my business. Or anyone else's.

Same reasoning goes for the morphine.

One of the biggest things we can do to enhance the police state that now governs us, is to believe that what other folks do that we may not like or understand (in the absence of initiation of force) is something that needs to be controlled.

I justify this by means of the requirements of man's life qua man, but if you want to justify it by means of the Second Amendment, all you have to do is read it. The right isn't limited by age, race or gender. Arms can mean guns, knives, swords, truncheons, brass knuckles, nunchuks or anything else. As long as they're not used to initiate force.

There is no limitations mentioned as to where one might bear arms. If one has the right to be in a place, one has the right to defend oneself there.

As for morphine, there is no mention in the Constitution anywhere that allows government to tell one what he may or may not ingest.

Remember: VOTE FOR NO INCUMBENT!

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Tragedy of the Commons--Malibu Style

Southern California leftists are gnashing their teeth over the fact that the heavily socialized beaches are becoming as violent as prison exercise yards.

News of the strife has been reported daily , the past week or so, of the event at Malibu in which several feral photographers followed popular actor Matthew McConaughey to the beach, at which he planned to do some morning surfing.

Photographs of celebrities of Mr McConaughey's status sell for upwards of $1000 each--often much more. We've all heard of these photographers, called paparazzi (I know not why), following celebrities around in packs, and we've all seen the photos on tv, the net and 'pon the printed page--even if we don't peruse the idiotic tabloid newspapers and magazines at the checkouts of the supermarkets.

The current dust-up, as reported even on the national news, is a result of the fact that dozens of local surfers took umbrage at the intrusion of these very unhip interlopers and expressed their dismay in a number of unsubtle ways. Several cameras were destroyed and a number of individuals were bruised and contused.

Since not all the cameras were destroyed, visual records of the incident are everywhere. Local surfers promise more of the same if these invasions continue; paparazzi clamor for legal intervention.

In 1972, leftist airheads prevailed in convincing not terribly intelligent Californians to approve a referendum called Prop 20, the Coastal Initiative. 55% of those who voted, mostly leftists, hippies, people who want the use of the property of others for free and some beachside property owners who sought advantage by means of cronyism voted for this proposition. People who respect the right to property, a minority, vote against it. Once again, the dumb people prevailed.

But, what did they win? A huge, taxpayer-funded commission and bureaucracy that has a near-absolute stranglehold on all land within 100- to 200-yards of the Stalag California coast (the expropriated territory has since amended numerous times to include anything they can get away with--including entire coastal towns such as San Juan Capistrano). You can't build anything, building, fence or wall, remove or plant a tree in the coastal zone without the approval of the Coastal Commission.

Returning to the beach at Malibu, it's important to mention that among the many other provisions of the referendum is the requirement that public access be provided to all beaches and coastal areas (except, of course, areas the Coastal Commission decrees "off limits" for "environmental" reasons). This has required some property owners, in densely built areas and formerly exclusive beach communities, to lose a slice of the edge of their property to build accessways from the street to the beach for the public. Beaches, you see, are now public property.

Beachfront property owners have absolutely no control over the beaches adjoining their property--which should properly be a part of their owned land--which they'd otherwise maintain and keep neat just as they do the rest of their lot. They could also control the numbers and kinds of visitors to their homes, as do we all. Some could allow public access, as might be their desire, perhaps for a fee to offset maintenance costs.

Mr McConaughey and his friends could surf mostly undisturbed in the Malibu area, on a beach kept private by the residents for the use of themselves and their invited guests--a right they paid for when they bought property in that very exclusive area. They can, and would keep themselves free of the paparazzi, rampaging fans and people they would try to avoid on the street. Rabble like myself, and the many others who have chosen not to live on the beach can, on the one or two days a year when we go there, enjoy beaches in areas made available by their owners for public use.

One could pick a beach on which there are beer and margarita kiosks, or a beach where smoking is allowed, or one where there are no amenities at all. There might even be beaches where fat people in teeny swimsuits aren't allowed--as not to scare the whales. One suggestion is that the reason the occasional whale beaches itself is sexual desire, caused by a sighting of a group of fat chicks sunning themselves.

I find this preferable to the average Stalag California public beach, at which the bathrooms are hideous toxic waste dumps and rarely maintained, if they exist at all, there are no food nor drinks available, or the kiosks seem to be exempt from all cleanliness requirements, and the litter of "No Littering" signs obscures one's view of the waves.

One of the very best examples of The Tragedy of the Commons in Stalag California (and around the world) are public beaches and parks. Next, the California Coastal Commission plans to expropriate land near the Colorado River and Lake Tahoe.

He who thinks he owns property in Stalag California is delusional.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Climate Wars: The Revenge of the Algorians

Yet another of the US federal government's paid shills for the global warming hoax is calling for imprisoning Americans for their opinions. According to a story--one of the many stories that the US news media fail to notice--in Guardian.co.uk, Dr Robert Stadler James Hansen, a pseudo-scientist for NASA, the government agency charged with the task of making sure no one else is able to make it into space, is sacrificing whatever professional reputation he might have, for whatever future bones he might be tossed by algorian politicians for his professional treason.

Additionally, he doubles as the evil Algore's science advisor (according to his Wikipedia page), so I guess that takes care of any bit of honesty and objectivity that was ever part of his makeup.

Well, he's going to speak before Congress where he's going to recommend that oil company executives be prosecuted for "spreading doubt about global warming." He also says he plans to work to unseat uncooperative Congressmen, as well. I'm sure that'll go over well in the committee room.

First, in the absence of any other information, that bit tells us that Mr Hansen is a leftist. Only leftists (well, not only leftists), would think that dissent is a criminal offense. This also in view of the fact that the algorians have never even begun to prove their case.

Of course, they've never proven that second-hand tobacco smoke, as encountered in normal situations is harmful either.

The Big Lie. If enough influential people tell a lie enough times over a long enough period of time, it will be believed by many.

Let them freeze in the dark.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

While We're Talking About Oil

Greg Perkins, over at NoodleFood, found some wonderful technological news in an article on the TimesOnline website. Seems LS9, a computer firm in Silicon Valley, California, has genetically altered a microscopic "bug" which eats biological waste, such as wheat straw and wood chips and excretes petroleum. At a time of worldwide oil shortages, LS9, and other firms working along the same lines, could turn the OPEC nations into minor players in the energy production industry.

At a time when global oil demand is increasing daily and our anti-productivity Congress is keeping the world's most productive nation in neutral, inventiveness of this sort could restore America to its normal place as the world's leader in technological development. All LS9 has to do now, is keep the government out of it.

Call me a fan.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

.....And Now For Something Completely Different.....

After having placed B Hussein Obama in precise company with both Democrats and Republicans who long for a neo-feudal society of starving peasants, rendered immobile by government policies robbing them of the ability to own private vehicles, and even get approval to use public carriers, I now find myself in the very uncomfortable position of having to offer a limited kudos to the unsavory gentleman.

For months now--indeed years, neocon pundits have been talking about the need to treat captured al queda savages as we would enemy soldiers in a conventional war. Leaving aside, for the moment, the very flawed rationale for attacking Iraq in the first place, if we were going to do this, well, in both WW's I and II, combatants found out of uniform were considered spies and simply shot. POW camps were strictly for captured uniformed soldiers.

Instead, the Bush Administration, with the approval of the Limbaughs and Hannitys of the neocon media, has rounded up the usual suspects, seemingly irrespective of any proof of guilt, and stashed them in cages in America's little corner of the People's Paradise of Cuba. Forever.

No charges, no due process, no trials, no finite sentences. Forever.

Today, also on the afternoon tv talk shows, B Hussein Obama was quoted as saying, "Why can't we just follow the Constitution?" or words to that effect.

Hooray!

Well, why can't we just follow the Constitution? We'd have to observe due process. We'd have to find proof that each of these individuals actually committed a crime. We'd have to bring him to trial in which his guilt would have to be demonstrated to the satisfaction of a jury.

If the Administration has no proof of individual wrongdoing, why are we holding these individuals? Where does it say in the US Constitution that its tenets apply only to Americans? Is our Republic on such shaky ground that we can't stand to apply these principles of Jurisprudence to all?

Or should we simply shoot them as spies?

Thanks, Senator, for a brief moment of lucidity with respect to the Principles under which we (ought to) live and which (ought to) constrain our sadly misguided federal government.

First you will be given a fair trial, then you will be shot.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Drill For Oil? That's Incredibly Naive!

I don't often watch Keith Ubermann--who wants to listen to an ex-sportscaster with a minor speech impediment talk about politics? Ok, as a good, politically correct libertarian, I have to apologize for calling him an ex-sportscaster. Problem is, I went to Fox to watch O'Reilly, but he started right off accusing "the evil oil companies"of price fixing, monopolizing, trying to profit at more than 4%, and probably child dismemberment. When it comes to anything sexual or anything involving oil, O'Reilly must have serious issues. There is no rationality whatever in the man's head regarding either of these issues.

So, I switched to MSNBC and the Ubermann show.

The topic with Ubermann, predictably, was oil as well. He showed a clip of McCain suggesting that it would be a good idea to allow offshore oil drilling. He still, stupidly, won't admit drilling in ANWR is a good idea, which must be a concession to his famed reputation for bipartisanship. Still, drilling off the coast of the Stalag, as well as Florida, the Caribbean, the Gulf and other places, would help. He then showed B Hussein Obama saying that "drilling won't have any effect on the price of gas today." I'm pretty sure this is an exact quote.

Of course it won't, dummy. We aren't drilling today.

The Aussie sang, "If you want your boomerang to come back, first you've got to throw it." The proper counter to B Hussein's proclamation is, "If you want the price of gas to come down, first you've got to drill it."

Aside: A clip of B Hussein at a campaign stop in Iowa where volunteers were filling sandbags. He said (subsequently cut from the clip), "I can do that! I've seen shovels before!" At which point he took up a shovel and slowly, deliberately placed part of three or four scoops of sand in and near a sandbag held by a swooning supporter.

The blushing Democrat then put the bag in the trunk of his car, saying he was going to have it bronzed and hanged on the wall in his den.

Back to the point. I don't know how many times lying leftists have quoted, word for word, the mantra, "We can't drill our way out of the gas crisis."

Well, yes we can. Drilling, in fact, is the only way. Developing an inexpensive, universally available high quality replacement for petroleum to fuel our vehicles, heat our homes and supply fuel from which to produce electricity will happen, but not today. Not tomorrow. And if government gets involved, not for a long, long time.

The truth of the matter is, most political officeholders, both Democrat and Republican, want to immobilize Americans. It's been observed that most feudal serfs never traveled more than ten miles from where they were born. They were far easier to manage that way.

People should not be afraid of their governments. Governments should be afraid of the people.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Kroozin' the Boulevard--A Criminal Offense

Two stories appeared one after the other on KTTV Fox News At Ten this evening; laughable in the stupidity so ably illuminated.

The first story has been an ongoing lie on the part of local government: apparently our New York/Boston import Chief of Police, William Bratton still believes that gang murders and other gang activity isn't racially motivated. In the same story, LA County's Sheriff Lou Baca, who rarely utters any other comment that that his department needs a larger budget, disagrees He says that some part of gang criminal activity is racially motivated. Duh!

The underlying message of the Police of El Pueblo de Los Angeles is that they really don't want to seriously attack gang activity. El alcalde, Antonio Vinaigrette, after all, was once a gangster himself before he found it more fun to be a philanderer.

Instead, the city police, the county deputy sheriffs and the California Highway Patrol (all ordered to extract the maximum possible legal tender from every possible motorist, to help mitigate the deficit) have decided it would be far easier and more fun to make driving, as Chuck Berry says, "With No Particular Place To Go," illegal on Hollywood and Sunset Boulevards.

Over the years youths, including myself years ago (hell, who am I kidding--I still do it once in a while!), enjoyed kroozin' the various major boulevards in LA just to see and be seen, check out the chicks (who are checking out the guys), and to stop by Tubby's for a burger and fries. For an idea of what I mean, watch the movie "American Graffiti."

Van Nuys Blvd, Whittier Blvd, Bristol Blvd and many others have been favorite Kroozin' streets over the years, and all have been rendered illegal Kroozin' streets by cops with nothing better to do (while real criminals run rampant, virtually unchecked).

Now, it's the natural kroozin' circuit--up on Hollywood, back on Sunset. The bastards.

I'm wondering if there's an attorney who will sue the agencies for gas taxes and license fees for our having been deprived of the right to the pursuit of happiness.

Cops say it's because the Kroozers make a lot of noise and disturb neighborhoods. I'm pausing to clean up the Diet Coke I splattered all over my screen, laughing when I heard that! If you've ever been in the Hollywood/West Hollywood portions of those streets, there ain't no quiet. Ever. Well, maybe between three and five in the morning you'll hear not much but the drunks, snoring on the sidewalks.

There's no fine for that.

But there is a minimum $275 fine for Kroozin'. And, they've doubled it for the duration of the state, county and city deficits.

They've killed Freedom! Those bastards!

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Finally Giving Up On Another Leftist Hoax

I've known it for twenty years, as has anyone who has a brain, and who's paying attention: AIDS in heterosexuals is rare. A story in The Independent, via Drudge, gives us the details. Dr Kevin de Cock, (gentleman that I am, I will resist the temptation to make an insensitive comment here) the head of the WHO's department of HIV/AIDS said that there is no HIV/AIDS epidemic among heterosexuals outside of Africa.

I remember the sense of helplessness and fear most folks felt as we learned of the horrors of AIDS, back in the early 1980's. I was in a committed relationship at the time, and canceled all plans to cheat. As we learned that AIDS could be spread by blood transfusions, I'm sure some folks had serious difficulty with accepting blood from an unknown donor during that period, and we all knew or knew of a few individuals who contracted AIDS in that way. Fortunately, the medical community adjusted very quickly and eliminated that path.

Women had fear for a time that a casual lover might be bisexual and might have the virus from a previous male partner. Men worried that a casual female lover might have had relations with a bisexual man. Remember the old public service announcement on radio and tv: If you have sex with a person, you're having sex with everyone that person has ever had sex with? Remember the full-body condoms illustrated on comedy tv shows?

We were very afraid.

The fact that it very quickly put an end to the Sexual Revolution started by Hizzonner Hugh Hefner pleased the religious zealots so much that for a short time, I thought it might be they who imported the virus. Fer cryin' out loud, I thought Dr Laura was going to have an orgasm over the fact that she could now say, "Dooooon't do it!" and have people take her seriously.

Well, in spite of the millions donated by everyone from Bill Gates to the lowliest leftist schlubs in Berkeley and Hollywood, almost all of which was wasted or misappropriated, we've never had an AIDS epidemic among the heterosexual persuasion. It was a hoax. Much like the algorians' global warming hoax.

Please don't take this to mean that I'm anti-homosexual in any way. Among male homosexuals, there was an epidemic. I lost a friend, a neighbor and two other friends lost partners to the disease in the 1980's. Whether those two other friends are still alive, I don't know. I lost track of them when I left San Diego in 1992.

Back to The Independent story, Dr de Cock will not admit that the heterosexual AIDS epidemic was a hoax, and cites the high AIDS rate in sub-Sahara Africa. Pardon me, but the largest parts of those countries are awash in prehistoric savagery and have rulers who think nothing of committing genocidal murder sprees when they wake up in a bad mood. Awake and aware folks in those countries should simply leave--even if they have to walk.

The whole point is, there is no heterosexual AIDS epidemic. There never was much of a heterosexual AIDS problem. It was a hoax developed by AIDS activists so that mainstream Americans would donate money to scammers who want to enrich themselves and keep Americans in a state of fear so that freedom-limiting legislation can be enacted.

It worked for a while.

A fool and his money.......

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Open Letter to California Congressman Howard L. Berman, (D-Calif)

I don't suppose anyone will actually show this letter to the Congressman, the Baron of the lands that include what I chortlingly (post KELO) call my house, home and castle, in view of his Democrat (ie, leftist) mindset, so I'll circulate it in other places as well.

Everyone who's read entries to this site over the months and years knows that I love cars and I love to drive. In fact, I took a twenty-odd mile drive around the Central Valley this afternoon--kroozin' along Ventura, Van Nuys and Sepulveda Boulevards, looking at the other cars, the buildings, the businesses, the girls and the other scenery.

Losing the ability to do this will seriously piss me off.

Hence, the first of (perhaps) a number of these missives:

Dear Congressman Berman:

Today, most gas stations are selling regular gasoline for around $4.50 a gallon. Diesel, for reasons I can't fathom, is even more. News stories are beginning to come out that gasoline and diesel are being stolen from cars, trucks, farms and construction sites. Yet, the federal government refuses, in the light of all this, to see reason, to get out of the way and allow oil companies to drill in US territory.

There will be alternative energy someday. It'll happen faster if government stays out of it and allows entrepreneurs and investors to allocate funds intelligently. But, it'll take some time.

In the meantime, the United States government holds billions and billions of barrels of oil off the market....for what? So that Americans will have to return to a hunter-gatherer society?

What's next? Americans shooting those they see siphoning gas from their cars? People unwilling to go to work because gas is too expensive to make their drive to expensive to be worth the effort? General strikes?

I ask you to reconsider your opposition to a prosperous America and lead an effort to free oil producers to drill and refine oil for the use of Americans. Voters like myself are watching America deteriorate, and we don't like it.

Thanks for your attention to this matter.

Sincerely,

[Col. Hogan]
Sherman Oaks

We'll see whether he represents those of us who commute in cars, or whether he represents himself only.

People shouldn't be afraid of their governments; governments should be afraid of their people.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

All the Sports Unfit to Report

There's a sports program on ESPN called Mike & Mike. I guess it's on radio, too. I rarely watch it because....well....who would watch a sports talk show on tv? I occasionally go to a particular pizza-sandwich shop for lunch near where I work. Pretty good Phillie steak sandwiches.
While I waited for my sandwich, Mike & Mike were on the house tv.

It was unbelievable!

We're in the middle of the NHL hockey playoffs, well into the NBA baxabaw playoffs (if anybody's noticed) and well into the big league beisbol season. Mike & Mike aren't talking about any of this. They're talking about foopbaw. And they're not really talking about foopbaw, they're talking about.....get this.....Brett Farve's locker. I'm not sure who Brett Farve is, but I know who Brett Favre is.

They weren't talking about Brett Favre, but somebody named Brett Farve. Well, they were talking about Brett Favre, but sometime in Favre's ancestry, somebody started mispronouncing the name and, being from Mississippi, no one had the intelligence to correct him.

Back to the point. Mike & Mike weren't talking about Brett Favre, but about Brett Favre's locker up there in the dungeons under Lambeau Field's grandstand.

Those two sports dorks spent at least fifteen minutes arguing over whether or not Brett Favre's locker should be retired as a shrine!!

For my part, as very little as I care about it, I think it's a stupid idea, since there have been numerous foopbaw players of Favre's stature in the Packers over the length of the team's history. They'd have to move the players to a nearby barn to dress--all of the lockers in the dressing room would be shrines.

But, even that's not important. What I don;t understand is how a pretty good sports tv network can give dopes like these a tv show when there are so many hockey, lacrosse, rugby and pistol target matches going untelevised.

Well, this entry is a mite outside of my usual area of discussion, so I'll leave it there.

Now, we return you to your regularly scheduled rants.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Highjacking At T-Shirt Point

First, allow me to suggest that all of this airport security is really a scam to put in place a system by which all prospective travelers must be cleared by government to leave their current location. Additionally, it gives them the information as to just where they're going. The Third Reich did just this sort of thing--in a much lower-tech fashion as befitted the time--in Germany during the period leading up to WWII. Looking at the way the US federal government (and others) is arranging things, it parallels the German model fairly well.

Although, as we all know, the whole of what is sniggeringly called "Homeland Security" is dressed in the trappings of keeping Americans safe from terrorists.

First it was guns. Then it was knives. Then it was anything that could be remotely imagined to be able to break the skin--such as pen knives, nail clippers and--I kid you not--knitting needles. I haven't yet heard whether they confiscate blind folks' canes. Then, they started inspecting shoes. May their hands all develop athletes' foot. They started confiscating bottles of shampoo and tubes of toothpaste. They started feeling up people's genitals and women's breasts. Checking out pregnant women's abdomens.

I remember when the airport people would open the door. They'd check each passenger's ticket and let them walk out to a portable stairway that led to the door, where a stewardess would take a look at your ticket and give directions to your seat. Ah! Those were the days. The only federal sloths at the airport were safely confined to the tower, and were rarely seen.

'Tis true that the airlines, who have a true, rational interest in keeping dangerous individuals from interfering with the plane's flight to its destination, were very lax concerning their responsibilities along those lines. Several highjackings to Cuba should have lit a bulb somewhere, but didn't. I suspect there were federal restrictions as to what could be done, that interfered with the airlines' best interest.

Making a long entry even longer, I have to refer you all to the most moronic (not by far, but still, pretty dumb) event along these lines. It happened at London's Heathrow (where else?) and has cause groans of derision and peals of laughter all round the civilized world. As reported in Thisislondon.co.uk, a young man was refused boarding on an airliner and threatened with arrest for wearing a t-shirt with the image of a Transformer!! A Transformer that has some sort of machine gun for an arm.

Let's pause for a moment to allow ourselves to get up off the floor and recompose.

During a day in which there were at least a two teen-agers killed in knife attacks reported 'pon that same news page, whose murderers (if caught) face no more than a couple of years in stir, Heathrow officials are worried about a bloody (to use local vernacular) t-shirt!

This in a country in which self defense is illegal.

Englishmen! Englishwomen! Run, don't walk off that island, where insanity rules.

V, where are you when we need you?

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Half a Vote Is Better Than Following the Rules

The Democrat Party, rather than being seen as "disenfranchising" the voters in Florida and Michigan, are going with the same kind of compromise used by the attendees of the first Constitutional Convention in the 1780's, as the delegates from the Original Thirteen tried to cobble together a document that would replace the Articles of Confederation. Because the southern states had relatively sparse populations, it was thought that they'd get the short shrift regarding the number of Representatives they could seat in the House.

Since black slaves weren't thought of, back then, as citizens--or even as fully human by some--they weren't counted. And since a great percentage of the populations of the southern states were slaves, it was finally decided to call each slave 3/5ths of a person for apportionment purposes.

In that light, since most southerners were Democrats back prior to the suffrage and integration of blacks into the full society, one wonders why the delegates of Florida and Michigan aren't given 3/5ths of a vote at the Democrat Convention, rather than half a vote. It seems like a sort of aesthetic consistency, doesn't it?

I don't know how it came about that the Democrats required no state (with exceptions) to have its Primary election prior to Super Tuesday, but they did. I don't know why the officials of Florida and Michigan decided to blow the ruling off and have their Primary early, but they did.

Florida's and Michigan's delegates should not be counted at all. To do otherwise is to change the rules in the middle of the game. Any school child will tell you that changing the rules in the middle of the game isn't fair.

Democrats, as we all know, aren't concerned over what is or is not fair. Democrats live in the world of emotions, not of reason. It doesn't feel right that the voters of Florida and Michigan, and the delegates for whom they voted, shouldn't count.

Well, why can't the Dodgers, finding themselves on the short end of a 9-1 score in the third inning, declare that for the rest of the game, each Dodger run counts as three. It doesn't feel right that a great team like the Dodgers should be that far behind.

Well, as dubious a distinction as it's turning out to be, we all, including Floridans and Michiganers do get to vote for the unprecedentedly poor choice of candidates for the most powerful office in the world this November. The most powerful office except, one might assert, that of the Pope. A lot of very good Roman Catholics don't get to vote for Pope.

My suggestion is that the Democrat voters of Florida and Michigan turn their ire toward the individuals who decided to flout the rules of the Democrat National Committee and hold their Primaries earlier than the Democrats' rules allowed.

Or, they can call each delegate 3/5ths of a person.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Gang Problems In The Barrio? Let's Patrol the Amusement Parks!

We are all aware (except for the Chief of Police of El Pueblo de Los Angeles) that there are numerous gangs, who are at each others' throats over both race and turf. They battle, almost exclusively, within the poor neighborhoods--their own or those of their rivals. We rarely hear of much gang activity in Holmby Hills or Palos Verdes.

Imagine my ironic chuckle as I read this story in today's Los Angeles Daily News. The headline, "CityWalk In Cops' Spotlight," in which a large bit of our law enforcement dollar will apparently be spent.

"In an effort to stop a gang problem before it starts, police who patrol Universal CityWalk are getting extra help over the next month to keep the San Fernando Valley hilltop tourist attraction safe as the popular summer season heats up.

"For years, the restaurant, entertainment and shopping strip bordering Universal Studios has been the kind of place Los Angeles-area gang members have brought their girlfriends - but not their guns, police say."

So, in an effort to fight gangs, say police, money is being set aside to patrol CityWalk, to patrol what is essentially a very nice, Disney-like, restaurant and souvenir shop row adjacent to the Universal City Studios theme park.

Never mind that Universal City has private security that rivals that of Disneyland. Never mind that, while gangsters frequent the place, gang crime within the CityWalk environs is quite rare. Rather than put our police out where the crime is, to combat that element of society which is a danger to us all, for which they're paid handsomely. Don't believe the propaganda that police are underpaid--Los Angeles police, if you consider their retirement and a long list of other benefits that are part of their remuneration, are paid quite well.

So, I'm sure that hard core gangsters are relieved that, as long as they avoid Universal CityWalk, they can pretty much do as they please. They can carry arsenals under their baggy clothes while honest individuals can be prosecuted for carrying a handgun to be able, one hopes, to do for themselves that which the police are not available to do.

They've killed Freedom! Those bastards!

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Teddy's Dilemma

Much as I'm (snif) upset about Senator Kennedy's illness, and wouldn't wish it on my worst enemy (wait! he is one of America's worst enemies), I just have to ask.......

To which of the countries that offer universal health care will Senator Kennedy go for care and therapy in his current health crisis?

Inquiring minds want to know.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

In Search of Clean Air

The first time I visited El Pueblo de Los Angeles was in 1961, which happened to be the same year I graduated High school. I had just finished boot camp in San Diego and came to LA to visit my grandparents, who had moved here several years earlier.

Gramp took me downtown one day, sightseeing. We also cruised through Hollywood and Beverly Hills. One of the most memorable things was the foulness of the air. It was a hot day, and it seemed like it was foggy. It wasn't fog. The smog was a palpable thing. It smelled, made my eyes water and caused occasional coughing jags.

Five years later, my new bride and I drove into LA on a rainy September day, to better our lives. A mere few days later, after the unseasonable rain cleared out and it became hot and sunny, the smog closed in once again.

I eventually got used to it, though from time to time it became too obvious to ignore. The sun was dull in the sky. From a window fourteen or so stories up, the ground couldn't be seen. Buildings looked like they grew out of fog. It wasn't fog. Once, I flew into LAX on a hot, sunny day. LA looked like a sea of fog with several dozen of its taller buildings sticking out.

Over the years since, the state has created many thousands of laws designed to fight smog. Most of them merely served to help impoverish the less well off in California, but some of them actually worked. The state faltered, stumbled and spent billions, most of it wasted, but in the past ten years the smog has been lessened to a degree that it isn't so much noticed anymore.

Oh, I won't say the air's clean. Not exactly. There's still noticeable smog, occasionally, in the east at the San Bernardino foothills, but nothing like it was.

One could say that we ought to stand pat. The free market (if it were allowed to work) would supply us with a cheap, clean replacement for the gasoline-powered engine, eventually.

The point of this little history lesson? Several years ago, in spite of the rational arguments of many, the evil and stupid California Air Resources Board (CARB), decided that raw gasoline, evaporating into the atmosphere, was a major cause of smog--the same smog that was even then a diminishing problem. After much experimentation, testing, bribery of CARB officials and state legislators, the state was divided into zones. One zone was the San Diego, LA, western San Bernardino and Riverside counties and the San Francisco area. The other, the rest of the state.

The urban areas were to use a very expensive fueling nozzle that picked up all the fuel vapors during pumping and stored them in the underground fuel tank. It was called a vapor recovery system. Fuel delivery trucks also had a complex, expensive dual-hose system that returned the vapors to the truck tank as the underground tank was filled.

All was again right with the world.

The rest of the state eventually was required to implement a fuel recovery system as well, but it remains far less ponderous and expensive than its urban counterpart.

CARB officials and state legislators were wearing Ace bandages on their wrists and elbows for months, from slapping each other on the back.

So, the war on smog is over, right? Not, as they say in Boulder City, Nevada, by a damsite.

As long as there is one molecule of a substance that can be called a pollutant, hovering over any part of the state of California, Sacramento will keep giving CARB tens (at least) of millions of dollars a year to chase it.

Meanwhile, they're ignoring the fact that their precious vapor recovery system doesn't work. It's worse than the old way--putting the bare hose nozzle into an open fuel tank and letting the vapors go where they will. Now, instead of a little vapor escaping into the air, the high-priced, overly-complex nozzles spit out the best part of a pint of liquid gasoline all over the rear of your car, and on the pavement underneath, where it's free to evaporate over the following few minutes. This, of course, is a pint of the four-dollar-a gallon gas that you pay for. They do this, just about invariably, when the stream clicks off as your tank fills. At times, the nozzle actually pops out of your car, falling 'pon the pavement and spilling even more liquid gasoline under the rear of your car.

CARB won't do anything about this, because to them, it's a done job. To them, no more gasoline vapor is escaping into the air. And so it goes.

You can't trust any air you can't see.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Training People to Act Like Sheep

A number of people are sitting and standing in a large room. It might be a bank, or maybe the waiting room of an airport. It might even be a store. Suddenly, as Snoopy often writes in the Charlie Brown strip, a shot rings out.

A man falls to the floor, motionless. Everyone else runs, screaming, in every direction, looking for the cover of something under which to cower, quivering in fear, awaiting further shooting.

Today on the KCAL evening news, they showed video of the above scene as part of a Homeland Security drill.

What was wrong with the scene? Why, of course! People were hiding under tables and behind partitions, waiting for death. Nobody had a gun.

Has ten to twenty percent of these trainees been carrying mockup handguns in their holsters or purses, they could've had a real drill in which the trainees could simulate shooting or arresting the mock killer before he could cause any further mock damage.

Sadly, it isn't within the psychological makeup of the jackbooted thugs of Homeland Security who formulate such drills, to put together a scenario in which the prospective victims could actually defend themselves. Yet, a populace capable if its own self defense is by far the best way to deal with the "terrorism" with which we're supposedly warring.

It leads me to suspect (as I've written several times) that the entire "war on terror" is nothing more than a plan to more rapidly put an end to the freedom we all own as sentient beings and which the people who regard themselves our leaders wish to see ended.

The actors in the drill were clearly depicted as helpless, and simply waiting to die, or perhaps be rescued by the armored and anonymous police squads upon which we're being taught to depend. I Find the entire notion both disgusting and offensive.

They've killed Freedom! Those bastards!

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California