Just When You Think They Can't Get More Stupid....

The one thing that every elected official and top-level appointed employee of el Pueblo de Los Angeles is that each and every one of them is stupid beyond belief. Individuals who can actually do things never become Bureau chiefs or City Councilmen. El Alcalde's main ability is that of straight-arming his way in front of any news camera that is anywhere within line-of-sight, toppling all those in his way as if they were tenpins.

Allow me to illustrate.

Very recently, a directive came down from City Hall to the effect that "Men Working" signs and other signs that use such politically incorrect words and language be changed to "People Working," and similar.

At a time when el Pueblo is allegedly strapped for cash, every city agency that uses street signs must throw them away and replace them with "gender neutral" signs, at a cost of hundreds of thousands of dollars to already cash-strapped taxpayers.

City engineers have already been required to remove the word "manhole" from all construction drawings, plans and specifications in favor of "person hole." No, that can't be right. It raises another entire raft of forbidden thoughts and the attendant snickers, wheezes and guffaws. Nope, it was, after thousands of hours of high-priced deliberations, decided to call them "Maintenance Holes." To this day, I notice a momentary pause and involuntary intake of breath every time I stubbornly refer to the structures as "manholes," when in company of a younger city employee.

While this might seem incredibly stupid to just about any rational individual, stand by. This is el Pueblo de Los Angeles. Soon or late, they'll come up with something even more stupid!

The true stuff is the funny stuff. --Mort Sahl

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

System? SYSTEM!!! We Don't Need No Steenking System!!!

In light of the gradual nationalization of medicine, I keep hearing reference to a thus far undefined term, "health care system." Health care system. What might be the definition of such a phrase?

Was the mythical doctor in the tv series Gunsmoke part of America's "health care system?" Was the almost as mythical small town doctor I went to as a kid in Grand Forks? Did either of them consider himself part of America's "health care system?" Nope. Nor did any of the real 19th century doctors represented by Doc Adams in the tv series. The term "Health care system" was never used in America until the federal government started its quest to socialize the "health care system." Today, we hear both branches of the Boot On Your Neck Party routinely refer to our collection of doctors, clinics and hospitals as "America's health care system." They should, but will not, be ashamed!

I can't speak for how it was in the Old West. I'm not quite that old. History tells us that doctors in those years used to heal first, ask questions later. Doctors in 1950's North Dakota were much the same way, except they generally demanded payment in the legal tender--not with chickens or bags of wheat.

I've never heard of anyone being turned away by those doctors.

My dad worked for the Great Northern Railroad most of his career. Railroads being nearly nationalized then as now, were required to add major medical health insurance to its employees' list of perqs. The insurance took care of most medical expenses above a certain threshold--I don't know what that threshold was. Below that threshold, Dad was sent a bill, by the doctor--almost like free enterprise.

I don't think anyone in our family ever had an illness or injury that rose to the level to be covered by the railroad's major medical insurance. I think Dad paid for the hospital stay required when each of us was born. I had a tonsillectomy when I was twelve. That may have been covered. Much later, Dad had a hernia surgery. That was covered.

The bills seemed high, according to the comments I'd keep hearing at bill paying time, but Dad paid them. That was the way it was. If Dad really thought the doctor was charging too much, he was free to shop around.

Back to the point: there was no "health care system." There were many doctors, clinics and hospitals, all around the country whose only links to each other were professional organizations and a small amount of unneeded government regulation.

Can anyone, other than a few escapees of the worst communist dictatorships, imagine such an insane freak of nature as a "shoe supply system?" In which every one of the shoe manufacturing, wholesale, retail, shipping and repair entities are under the control of a single "tsar" whose job it is to determine how many shoes are produced, of what materials and styles, where they're shipped, what the prices should be.

How many shoe repair shops should there be? Where located? What kind of qualifications should shoe repair technicians be required to have? What kind of pricing?

What kind of shoe manufacturing and repair trade schools should there be, and who should be admitted? What kind of reporting should be required, so that the tsar's minions will know if its directives are being followed?

These are exactly the horrors that socialized medicine will bring--to an industry that holds, or will someday hold, most of our lives in its hands. We're already hearing comments from socialists, domestic and foreign, about how much care should be given to an aged, ill individual who will "soon die anyway."

Lastly, I'd be remiss not to refer you to the Dr Hendricks "why he quit" speech in Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged.

America's health care system. It'll be the death of us all!

Warm Regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Drought

I've been a mite slow lately adding new articles to this blog. The well is (I hope) temporarily dry. I just can't bring myself to get excited right now about anything political. Both of my Senators, my Congressman, and my state legislators (may they all rot in their own private hells) are raging socialists who won't be swayed by reason or anything else other than vast sums of money. This tends to dampen my enthusiasm just a bit.

Additionally, I'm writing a novel. I was stuck for at time at a point in the plot, beyond which I could not seem to get (make the most of it, TWC!). I puzzled over it for over a year, and I finally know what I'm going to do. The work will require some restructuring and some deep rewriting. I want to make the most of it, in the hopes of finishing the story before senility hits.

I am able to throw in the odd quip on facebook or twitter, thus can conclude that I'm not quite brain dead yet, so I can assume that I won't quit writing this stuff completely. Perhaps I'm just a little bit politically depressed at the thought of America turning into the USSA.

I'll place things here as my mood, and my time permit. I just don't think it will be very rapid-fire for a while.

I apologize, and thank you for your indulgence.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Exodus From Reality

All the years that I've lived in the southern part of Stalag California, I've been aware that there are a large number of Jewish people here. I became even more aware during my twelve-year relationship with a lovely Jewish woman who hails from New York City. Even though she was secular, she introduced me to parts of the Jewish communities in New York, Miami, San Diego and Los Angeles. I met bankers, tax accountants, attorneys, retired folks, entertainers and storekeepers.

I've met two Jewish survivors of the Nazi death camps, their numbers tattooed in the web of their thumbs.

Nearly every one of these folks--one exception was my lady friend--favored gun control.

Gail explained to me that most WWII era European Jews literally didn't believe that the Nazis were enslaving and killing their neighbors that were herded away in the night. Until it happened to them, as one of the elderly camp survivors told me.

None of them thought of defending himself and his neighborhood. Very few of them hid away weapons and ammunition along with their other family valuables. A notable exception was the residents of the Warsaw ghetto in which, with very few old guns and little ammunition, these people were able to defend themselves and their community until the ammo ran out.

Moving ahead to today, we observe tiny Israel, nestled in the midst of several nations with tens of millions of individuals, many of whom wish the Israelis were pushed into the sea. Israel has had to defend itself almost since its inception.

Nearly every military-aged Israeli is armed. Almost every Israeli knows that he--or she--must be prepared to answer an attack anytime, day or night.

Unfortunately, most American Jews haven't made the same mental connections.

Every now and then, some deranged individual has entered a Jewish school or other building with weapons, and has shot up the place, killing a number of people and then himself, or he escaped unscathed to be arrested later. Do American Jews insist on the right to defend themselves? Well, no. More likely, they call for more stringent gun control--doing nothing against the psychotics, but guaranteeing that they won't be stopped.

Jews who are opposed to the right to self defense are, in a sense, Holocaust deniers.

And, by calling for the ownership and use of weapons of self defense to be made illegal, they are depriving themselves and their neighbors of the ability to defend themselves, while doing nothing to curtail the actions of murderers and thieves.

While I generally respect the tenacity and the self reliant nature of the stereotypical Jewish individual, as well as the many with whom I've been acquainted, I'm at a loss to understand this flaw in their philosophy.

Remember, when seconds count, the police are only minutes away.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Reasons To Fear B Hussein Obama

I guess I stepped away from politics for a while, out of utter disgust for the speed with which the once free United States are being thrust into collectivism by one one would be dictator after another. Not only is the slope slippery, but it's getting steeper, fast!

The Patriot Depot, from whom I bought a couple of Gadsden-style car window flags, has brought a well-written letter to my attention. It's an open letter to B Hussein from Lou Pritchett, a former vice president at Proctor & Gamble. The letter pretty well captures many of my thoughts about the most dumbed down national election in US history, and the absolutely hideous results thereof. Have your blood pressure medicine handy while you read it.

Dear President Obama:

You are the thirteenth President under whom I have lived and unlike any of the others, you truly scare me.

You scare me because after months of exposure, I know nothing about you.

You scare me because I do not know how you paid for your expensive Ivy League education and your upscale lifestyle and housing with no visible signs of support.

You scare me because you did not spend the formative years of youth growing up in America, and culturally you are not an American.

You scare me because you have never run a company or met a payroll.

You scare me because you have never had military experience, thus don't understand it at its core.

You scare me because you lack humility and "class," always blaming others.

You scare me because for over half your life you have aligned yourself with radical extremists who hate America and you refuse to publicly denounce these radicals who wish to see America fail.

You scare me because you are a cheerleader for the "blame America" crowd and deliver this message abroad.

You scare me because you want to change America to a European style country where the government sector dominates instead of the private sector.

You scare me because you want to replace our health care system with a government controlled one.

You scare me because you prefer "wind mills" to responsibly capitalizing on our own vast oil, coal and shale reserves.

You scare me because you want to kill the American capitalist goose that lays the golden egg which provides the highest standard of living in the world.

You scare me because you have begun to use "extortion" tactics against certain banks and corporations.

You scare me because your own political party shrinks from challenging you on your wild and irresponsible spending proposals.

You scare me because you will not openly listen to or even consider opposing points of view from intelligent people.

You scare me because you falsely believe that you are both omnipotent and omniscient.

You scare me because the media gives you a free pass on everything you do.

You scare me because you demonize and want to silence the Limbaughs, Hannitys, O'Reillys and Becks who offer opposing, conservative points of view.

You scare me because you prefer controlling over governing.

Finally, you scare me because if you serve a second term I will probably not feel safe in writing a similar letter in 8 years.

Lou Pritchett

I don't know if this will hit you the way it hit me, but it pretty well covers all the bases--until I find more. It looks like a rough four (let's work to see that it's not eight) years, boys and girls. Hide your valuables and keep your powder dry!

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

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

A Trip Back In Time

I've always liked Knott's Berry Farm. I think the first time I went there was in 1969. I was fully involved in reading Western paperbacks at the time, Louis L'Amour in particular. I also like the few Donald Hamilton Westerns and read some of Zane Gray's. Going to Knott's was a way to immerse myself in the trappings of the Old West that didn't involve a long trip.

I won't go into the history of Knott's now, since it's very well covered in the news article linked below. What I used to do was simply wander about in the ghost town part of the Farm and look at the Old West exhibits in the museums and in the buildings of the ghost town.

This past Sunday's OC Register commemorated the 75th Anniversary of Cordelia Knott's Chicken Dinner Restaurant in a story to be found here. I've eaten there several times. The chicken is kind of similar to that of Col. Sanders, but much tastier and more consistent. It's a full, old-fashioned country-style dinner with fried chicken, mashed spuds, gravy, a veggie, biscuits and a dish of rhubarb sauce, followed by a dessert. I could eat at Mrs. Knott's restaurant a lot more than I actually did. I honestly don't know where one can get better fried chicken.

Perhaps the best part of Knott's is through the tunnel under Beach Blvd, where Knott built a faithful replica of Philadelphia's Independence Hall, complete with the Liberty Bell. Within, they run a tape loop of quotes from some of the founders, as might've occurred within the building during the adoption of the Declaration of Independence. It gives one pause for reflection.

Unfortunately, I was never fortunate enough to meet Walter or Cordelia Knott, but I did see Andy Devine there a couple of times. He used to tell tales of the wagon trains in a recreation of a circled wagon camp in the ghost town.

Living in The Valley now, it's a bit farther to drive to the Farm now, but I'll still go there from time to time. The Knotts were freedom-loving individuals who lived their lives during a freer time. They saw the way the country was going even then, and did what they could to fight it. Near the Independence Hall reproduction, there was a book store, selling freedom-oriented books and souvenirs. I'm not sure if it's still there.

Here and there, the spirit of liberty still lives!

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

A Quick And Easy Way To Quit Smoking

I used to like cigarettes. A lot. It's probably why I returned to smoking twice after having quit. I really didn't want to quit. The third time, I wanted to quit, and I quit for good.

The first thing you have to do, is want to quit.

The second thing is that you have to ignore all those messages that say that smoking is addictive. I don't actually know if tobacco is addictive or not, but I refused to believe that it was. After all, I went to bed every night and went smoke-free for many hours until I awoke. Then how about a few more hours?

So, if you want to quit smoking, here's what you do:

1. Disabuse yourself of the notion that smoking is addictive, or that you can't quit. It just is not true.
2. You have several packs of cigarettes on hand. Fine. Continue smoking as is normal for you.
3. Buy one carton of your favorite brand. This will be your Last Carton of Cigarettes.
   
4. You can write that on the box with a sharpie, if you want, but it is your Last Carton of Cigarettes. Keep that clearly in your mind for however many days it lasts. Your Last Carton of Cigarettes.
   
5. Continue smoking as normal, but buy no more cigarettes.
   
6. When you get to your Last Carton of Cigarettes, open it and take out one pack. Set it aside as your Last Pack of Cigarettes.
7. Continue as is normal, but buy no more cigarettes.
8. As you get down toward your Last Pack of Cigarettes, you have to do a little planning. You have to modify your smoking pattern so that your Last Cigarette comes at bedtime.
9. It's bedtime, you have only your Last Cigarette in your hand, and you smoke it, remembering the whole time that it is you Last Cigarette. Enjoy it. Sit on your patio in the cool night air and really enjoy your Last Cigarette.
10. Go to bed and sleep well.
11. When you wake up, you will have already quit smoking for about eight hours, depending 'pon how long you let yourself sleep.
12. Go about your day's routine in the knowledge that you are no longer a smoker. Whenever you think about buying or "borrowing" a cigarette, remind yourself firmly that you no longer smoke and haven't for X hours (include the number of hours you slept). Put smoking out of your mind.
13. For a few days, it might help to stay away from places where people smoke, and avoid smoke, smokers and places in which cigarettes are sold--to the degree that you can.

I followed this path three times. The third time just over twenty years ago.

Also, it worked best for me not to tell anyone about it while you're doing it. you don't want to hear how difficult it is. It's not difficult. You don't want to hear someone tell you you can't quit. You can, and it's the confident knowledge that you can that gets it done. You don't want your friends telling you how addictive tobacco is. It isn't. It takes a physical act of will to light a cigarette, and you simply have to refuse to do it.

I didn't mention to anyone that I was going to quit. Not before, not during and not for some time after. A few of my friends realized, after a time, that they hadn't seen me smoking in a while, and only then did I admit it.

I'm not a nut-case anti-smoking nazi, as are most of the denizens of Stalag California, and I don't mind others smoking around me as long as the smoke doesn't get uncomfortably thick. Seeing someone smoking doesn't tempt me.

I'm cured, and you can be, too. All that's necessary is that you have to want it.

What if they raised cigarette taxes and nobody smoked?

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

A Better Children's Prison?

This blog article is worth a read. While I still think that education should be separated from the state by a titanium wall thirty feet thick, and while I think regimentation and enforced conformity is a huge mistake, these children's prisons seem to be getting results.

Wolf Howling: An Educational Revolution In California?

You can learn, or you can leave.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

A Mind Is a Terrible Thing To Waste

I always feel a little twinge when I hear that some young mind, 'pon taking his BA degree, announces that he's going on to law school. Of course, any intellectual endeavor isn't a bad thing--learning is always useful--but.....law school?

Law is a growth industry, which is why so many students choose the discipline. Legislators (mostly lawyers) continually create more laws, assuring plenty of work for practicing attorneys. It must look very good to the grad, seeing hundreds of thousands of lawyers, in nearly every area of American life, all becoming wealthy helping resolve disputes among men.

I won't begin by saying that the law profession is a negative factor in American society, even though in many ways it is, but I will say that the law profession is largely wasted time.

There are far too many laws. Attorneys create laws for everything. Then, they create laws to fill loopholes in laws. They create laws that contradict other laws. They create laws that cover the same ill (real or imagined) using different verbiage.

They do it largely to make work--hence to make more money as many more hours are needed to sort, separate and identify which law applies to a situation while the opposing attorney finds laws that contradict the case of his opponent.

Wasted time: not wasted time for the attorney, of course--it's cash in the till, but wasted time for the litigants who, in a healthier place and time, might simply discuss the matter, come to an agreement and shake hands to do business together on another occasion.

Why is the idea of doing real work; discovering and applying knowledge gleaned through research, inventing and building useful things, going to new places to explore to find phenomena never before known, and other constructive endeavors gone so completely out of fashion? Why do only a relative few study engineering, physics, medicine--in short, areas of study that will actually lead to something beneficial?

Government has regulated these disciplines to the degree that many of those who might take these studies are apprehensive about the conditions under which they'd have to work. The possibilities presented by the study of law must appear very attractive to the student who sees the uncertainty that exists in the future of, say, medicine.

Don't murder, don't steal and don't lie. These three laws are all that's needed. An unequivocal affirmation of each man's right to his life and property and his right to use and disposal as he sees fit.

Then, and only then will there be freedom for each to be a creative individual to the extent of his ability and potential.

Not many attorneys are needed for that.

From each according to his ability to each according to his ability.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

The Hidden Bonus In This Election

This past weekend, John & Ken, a pair of local talkers on KFI-AM radio in El Pueblo de Los Angeles, held a party/protest out at Tom's Farms, a sort of farmer's market complex outside of Corona, Calif. It was a protest against Guber Schwarzengroper's tax & spend referenda 'pon which some of us voted yesterday. The set of referenda were sniggeringly sold as a way to help balance Stalag California's budget, but would really have served to hand billions more dollars to the Stalag's administrators to wantonly spend on wasteful things the embattled residents of the state neither want nor need.

Reports from The Wine Commonsewer and others indicated that it was a good-natured (if angry) group of protesters as much making fun of the Guber's (and the state legislators') actions as being critical. It seems to have worked, since the event got a fair amount of media coverage and helped point much of the voting portion of the Stalag's population toward fiscal good sense (for a change). The worst five of the six referenda were defeated resoundingly.

Guber Schwarzengroper just happened to be in Washington DC, home of the slickest and most accomplished thieves and murderers our nation can manage to produce, hat in hand, begging for Mr. Thompson President Obama to loot the other forty-nine states and give him the money. The trip had the added bonus of placing the Guber farther from the humiliation of having lost again.

We're all, those of us with even the least regard for our personal well-being and some small amount of pride in our ability to produce and our desire to live independently, are pleased that more and more people are beginning to understand that the looters will take all of your money if they aren't stopped. These insatiable parasites will never be satisfied until they've starved their hosts to death and then will go looking for more.

Michael Chrichton once observed, within the pages of his marvelous novel, Andromeda Strain, that a successful parasite never takes so much from his host that the host's life is endangered. An unsuccessful parasite kills its host by his greed, finally endangering the parasite himself, which must then quickly find another host before he, himself, starves.

Boys and girls, the state is rapidly becoming an unsuccessful parasite.

My congratulations and thanks go out to all who fought, voted against, and ultimately defeated this round of foolishness.

And thanks to John and Ken for making a lot of noise, saying the right things at the right time.

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

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Facebook, Your Agenda Is Showing!

Rep. Jeff Flake (R Ariz), who appears to have been named after his personality, has been selling himself as a fiscal conservative, bordering 'pon libertarianism, for longer than I've known of him (a couple of years or so). He has been hyped as being tight-fisted with taxpayer dollars and has signed on to the Americans for Tax Reform’s Taxpayer Protection Pledge and who says on his website “[t]he last thing this economy needs is a tax hike."

Some of the conservatives on my friends list on facebook recommended adding him, which I did. Not paying a lot of attention to politicians, I didn't think much about Flake until I read this article on Freedom's Phoenix about his having introduced a carbon tax bill, and realized he's just another spineless, tax-and-spend socialist like everyone else in Washington DC. Now, I ll have to remove him from my friends list and write on the blackboard 10,000 times, "I will never believe a lying sack-of-shit politician again!"

Apparently Flake has signed onto the algorian notion (which is to say, psychotically ludicrous notion) that carbon, 'pon which our very own bodies are based, is a pollutant. Algorians are, of course, self-hating fools, but writing this nonsense into law is suicidal!

Well, I made that decision many years ago, but I have a severe weakness of trusting people too much. I just momentarily forgot that Flake is, first and foremost, a thievin' politician and once one goes down that road, one can never come back. Am I disillusioned? Maybe a little. It's unfortunate, though, that one is disillusioned hundreds, if not thousands of times in a lifetime. You get used to it.

The reason I entitled this entry for facebook is that I wrote a somewhat scathing message (no profanity) to Flake's facebook page, then watched it disappear from the screen. That tells me that the fine folks at facebook are good with an all-powerful, ever growing government. But hell, who isn't? Just us couple of million libertarians trying to fly under the Luftwaffe radar.

They've killed Freedom! Those bastards!

Warm regards,
Col. Hogan

Do What You Want--Leave Me Out Of it

All the stuff I've been hearing/reading about the lovely Carrie Prejean doesn't make me regret my vote against Stalag California's Prop 8--well, it kind of does after watching those bloody fools go crazy protesting the way the vote went. If you live by the ballot, you die by the ballot. As I gradually follow many of my libertarian friends toward non-voting, I actually think maybe I should give it up as one of my many filthy habits.

Carrie Prejean was asked a question, answered it honestly--if a mite hesitantly--and has been getting verbally bludgeoned for it ever since. Why can't (certain) homosexuals accept the fact that not everyone likes them?

Proposition 8 allowed anyone who can vote decide how a minority should live. This is the precise practical application of the old definition of democracy: that democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting on what's for dinner. I wouldn't have advocated putting Prop 8 on the ballot. The proper initiative would've been "should government have any role in marriage." The answer is no. There is no clause in the US Constitution allowing government to be involved in this area. There is no rational justification for government involvement here.

The whole thing is simply conservative christians deciding to write christian doctrine into law--already forbidden by the First Amendment. Any couple--or group--wanting to declare themselves married should do so, with whatever ceremony they can put together and with whatever vows they can agree upon.

Marriage is first a religious tradition. It's a rite of passing, a blessings to a couple's union and and, I guess, permission to conceive, birth and rear children. Not being a religious sort, I don't fully understand the concept (in view of the religious persons' oft-exercised propensity to end the lifelong vows exchanged in the ceremony) and probably never will.

Marriage is second a "contract" between the couple for mutual support and division of labor. And for division of property and responsibility in the event of the end of the relationship. In practice, this contract should be explicitly negotiated, agreed 'pon, and rendered fully legal and enforceable prior to the beginning of the union, and should become the first issue to be settled prior to the union.

Terms should be any that can be agreed 'pon by a couple or group, regardless of the sexes, orientations, or degrees of wealth and success of the parties involved.

Once government is thrown out of the equation (except if the parties name government courts as arbiters) , there would be no more arguments over who can marry and who can't. Anyone can declare himself married to anyone--or more than one. The only requirement would be sentience to the degree of being able to sign a contract.

Remember! VOTE ONLY IN SELF DEFENSE!

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Dating In The 21st Century

When I was a wee lad, those many years ago, even the bums riding the rails wore suit jackets and hats--often a long time between cleanings, and usually a mite threadbare, but they wore 'em. Men dressed in suits for dinner in a restaurant, and wore suits for indoor work and hats (if not hardhats) for outdoor work.

Things have deteriorated over time. The breakdown seems to have happened during the late 1960's to early 1970's.

I've been working nights lately, doing in-street work on the very busy (and very narrow and winding) Laurel Canyon Boulevard. For a lunch break, I paused for an early breakfast at Jerry's Famous Deli, in Studio City. I've eaten there many times over the years, and though it's a mite pricey, the food makes it worthwhile. Good cooks, fair portions and a New York deli style I learned to value some time ago. And, they're open 24 hours.

Last night (or this morning) I arrived at about 1:00am. Shortly after I was seated, I saw a lovely young woman returning to her booth, directly next to mine, from the bathroom. She was wearing a delightful yellow summer dress, her hair was done nicely and she looked like the kind of girl any man would be proud to bee seen with. The only flaw I could see was that unfortunate predilection many women have to wear their bra straps visible alongside her dress straps. Tacky, but apparently in style with some.

Momentarily, her date joined her in the booth.

This dope was wearing a pair of those atrocious baggy denim shorts--you know, the ones that are so long and baggy that they can be mistaken for jeans for a fat, but very short guy. I blame baxabaw for this sad trend. The short bit of leg that sticks out of these....er....dare I call them garments?--makes them look like Eric Cartman, of South Park fame. Oh, my! To continue the fashion statement, the otherwise good-looking fellow wore a "wife beater" shirt, was fashionably unshaven (fashionable twenty-odd years ago), had his hair cut so short he looked like he's recently taken chemotherapy treatments, and was heavily tattooed on his arms, shoulders and perhaps more.

The contrast was startling!

Now, we all know that many young women are incredibly careless in their choices in men and their lack of feminine restraint in their company. The high numbers of single mothers easily attest to their lack of discrimination and resolve.

This lovely young woman obviously spent a lot of time preparing for her date, and her date looks like he spent the day leaning against a lamp post in East LA.

Women should take the initiative and require that their dates look presentable, be clean and neat as well as polite and respectful.

Darwin was wrong!

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Chief Pontiac Dies a Second Death

I've never owned a Pontiac car. My brother had a 1969 Pontiac GTO, which he graciously let me drive a few times. Great car! During the many car searches I've experienced, I've answered a few ads for Pontiacs, and almost bought a couple of them, but never actually owned one.

A good friend, the Kosmik Kid suggested that this week's news deserved comment. Though I've had a mixed opinion of the line over the years, he's right.

The Pontiac brand began after the Pontiac Spring & Wagon Works Merged with Oakland Motor Company in 1908. General Motors acquired Oakland in 1909, and built Pontiacs as a companion line with Oakland. Pontiac became an economy six-cylinder which eventually outsold the Oakland. Oakland was eventually dropped.

Pontiac shared many parts with other GM lines (mostly Chevrolet), but mostly used its own running gear.

The Pontiacs I admire most include the post WWII years through the 1960's. Pontiacs had the distinctive trademarks that had reference to the American Indian. Model lines, the Chief the Cheiftain, Star Chief and the Firebird (I'll refrain from comment on the awful Aztek), were blended with Torpedo, Streamliner, Bonneville, Catalina, the Tempest and the GTO. After that, I lose track.

After the first demise of the Pontiac GTO, I (kind of deliberately) gave up on Pontiacs, except for the Firebird. The newer models of Pontiac mostly became re-trimmed Chevys and further became very generic in look and performance. A couple of recent exceptions are the new Grand Am and GTO, with GM's small-block V8.

The long, slow skid to oblivion began with GM's unforgivable caving to outrageous union demands, and its failure to resist unConstitutional edicts from the federal bureaucracy.

GM is on the brink of corporate death. As it stands, it would be better if it reorganized under bankruptcy but, in the effort to keep the union thugs and corporate top management intact, GM has decided to saddle the American taxpayer with its liabilities. The evil socialist who has assumed the office of Head of State, tail-waggingly following his predecessor, is aiding GM in this effort.

In the effort to appease Washington dictators, part of GM's plan to steal billions from Americans is to streamline its operations by dropping one of its marques: Pontiac.

Too bad. This is a small part of the reason why I eschew buying a new car. The car I drove prior to my current 1957 Chevy, was a 1975 Oldsmobile. Oldsmobiles were dropped from GM's list a few years ago.

Farewell, Chief. I'll miss you!

They've killed Freedom! Those bastards!

Warm regards,
Col. Hogan

A Much Needed Amendment to the Constitution

The following is a proposed Amendment to the US Constitution. It's an amplification of an idea proposed in an essay in The Libertarian Enterprise, penned by L Neil Smith.

Proposed: Amendment XXVIII

Whereas: Legislators and other elected and appointed officials, and law enforcement personnel no longer see a need to pay any heed to the limits placed 'pon them by the US Constitution and the Bill of Rights.

Whereas: Legislators and other elected and appointed officials, and law enforcement personnel no longer see any need be truthful in the performance of their jobs.

Be it resolved that, to remind these hired hands of their proper place in society, it becomes necessary for Americans to take control of their local, state and federal civil servants and require that dereliction in their jobs will no longer be tolerated.

Toward this end, we propose the following Amendment to the US Constitution.

Section 1. Any legislative action that is not specifically authorized by the Constitution of the United States shall be considered null and void.

Section 2. Any legislative action that violates any article of the Bill of Rights shall be considered null and void.

Section 3. Any elected official who submits, sponsors, votes for or signs any Bill that violates either Section 1 or Section 2 shall be guilty of committing a felony.

Section 4. Any elected official who communicates a falsehood while acting within his Office, or who violates his Oath of Office shall be guilty of committing a felony.

Section 5. The punishment to be imposed upon those convicted of any of the felonies enumerated above shall be death by public hanging.

Section 6. Congress shall screed all current laws against the wording of the Constitution of the United States and the Bill of Rights, and repeal all laws, directives and regulations found to be out of concert with these documents.

Section 6. Only the wording of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights themselves shall determine the legality of any proposed legislation.

Section 7. Amendments shall be adopted by means specified in the Constitution of the United States.

I don't think very many actual hangings will result from the enactment of this Amendment; government officials and employees want nothing more than to reach retirement and true stagnation. I suspect that the Amendment means Congress will react to it by doing nothing. This, of course, is the best of all possible worlds.

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

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Plenty of Money For Guns, None to Fix the Ravaged Streets

For months we here in and around El Pueblo de Los Angeles have been regaled by Antonio Vinaigrette, el alcalde, with his song of woe regarding the city's financial shortfall--never once blaming himself for his dozens of wasteful and useless programs. Listen to any local news broadcast and you'll hear of proposals to cut programs--never the useless ones which give millions to people whose main characteristic is that they don't feel like working for a living, but rather to lay off teachers and police officers.

Laying off a few of the useless layers of management and administration is never suggested, but just those who do the work--however poorly.

Drive the length of Wilshire Boulevard , if you dare. Everywhere along its length--from downtown to the Miracle Mile financial district to wealthy Westwood and on into wealthier Brentwood, and you'll find yourself bouncing and banging about like a medieval farmer in an oxcart over a cobble road, fighting to miss the bigger and deeper potholes and rough, poorly done patch jobs.

There are a couple of exceptions: As one drives to the west, he'll eventually find himself entering the city of Beverly Hills. It's easy to tell you're entering Beverly Hills. Suddenly Wilshire Boulevard is a smooth, asphalted throughway, virtually devoid of irregularities. Keep driving. Soon, as Rod Serling used to say, There will be a signpost. It says: "Welcome to Los Angeles." The sign isn't necessary, as the street immediately becomes bumpy and full of cracks and potholes again. Like flipping a switch.

To one who lives in el pueblo, it's embarrassing. It's entirely the fault of el alcalde, who likes to lavish city taxpayer money 'pon the gang thugs with whose parents he once lazed on the sidewalks of East LA. Sidewalks which were in much better repair then, than now.

Alcalde Vinaigrette has, acording to this story broadcast on KCAL-TV, recently announced a new wasteful plan to throw away city funds: another gun buyback campaign. KCAL, affiliated with CBS News, appears to approve of this scam, and reports it in glowing terms.

A number of pickup points have been established at which one can take his $600 Glock, turn it in for a certificate worth $100 worth of groceries. What a deal! Your really mean-looking $1500 rifle or carbine is worth $200 in groceries.

El pueblo, ever looking for new ways to throw away money, isn't even going to resell these little treasures to honest citizens to turn a profit, but they're going to destroy them. So they say.

The Invisible Man could undoubtedly sneak into the dens of any of several of el alcalde's pal's and find the best of the weapons that will be scammed from the more stupid gunowners who will go for the groceries.

Better yet, it's all "no questions asked!" Any criminal can steal a gun, kill a member of a rival gang, then have his girlfriend turn the gun in for some groceries. The murder will never be solved.

There are actually people (not many) who will give up a perfectly good gun for $100--el pueblo has no shortage of really dumb people--though most of the guns they get will be useless old chunks of metal that no prudent individual would dream of trying to fire.

But Wilshire Boulevard will remain bumpy and full of potholes. As will Santa Monica Boulevard, Imperial Highway, Ventura Boulevard, La Brea Boulevard and countless others. El Pueblo de Los Angeles will remain in dire financial straits as this alcalde and the next continue to waste money on all manner of scams and boondoggles, filling their own bank accounts as part of the deal.

Remember: VOTE FOR NO INCUMBENTS!

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Addendum:

This past Friday night, the Street Department actually repaved a few blocks of Sunset Boulevard in the heart of Hollywood. They did an excellent job, which shows that they can. Oddly, or not so oddly, all the local news shows made a super big deal about it, including interviews with local denizens, a couple of workers and (predictably) even a couple of City officials. What this tells me, is that this is rarely done, and is cause for special notice whenever it happens.

In a city like Los Angeles, a crew should be working on one street or another full time, year after year. We have no shortage of streets that desperately need repaving. Programs like the gun buyback simply waste money that could help pay for things like this.

We Don't Get No Education.....

I' ve had numerous conversations over the years with parents about the perils of sending your kids to the government children's prisons--my term for government schools, and a more accurate term than those used by the government or the media.

Some tell me that the academics at their kids' school are better than the ones we hear about all the time. Maybe so. Maybe not. Maybe the parents are actively involved, helping the kids learn their school work and even going above and beyond.

What only a relative few parents realize is that, since the federal government has ignored the US Constitution and gotten involved with education, all schools are standardized to a very high degree, in many respects. Even the much touted exceptions--the magnet schools.

Magnet schools started well after my kids graduated, but I'm given to understand that they actually are superior academically to "ordinary" schools--the ones that are inflicted 'pon the poor kids. The ones in which seem to tolerate muggings, rapes, shooting, gangs, knifings and all manner of mayhem except learning.

All these government children's prisons, though, have one thing in common: they are propaganda mills. Well, two things--they're also indoctrination centers. Run largely by leftists, they continually bombard the kids with statist propaganda and indoctrinate them in every sort of leftist cause imaginable, from global warming to fear of weapons and self defense to government can do no wrong and many, many more.

The real reason government school fascists hate home schoolers is that parents won't inject the students with the "proper" indoctrinations and keep them physically restrained in those little desk-chair combos where the only actions that are not forbidden are shut up and listen.

Any child who shows any spunk, of course, is declared ADHD and doped up. We can't allow any initiative or enthusiasm to disrupt the rest of the child-zombies, can we?

Schools try to take moral and philosophical education away from the parents and in many cases, seem to be trying to separate kids from their families and demonize parents who aren't toeing the "proper" leftist line.

All of this is bad enough, but it gets worse. They do this stuff during time when they should be teaching academic subjects. Hence, academics suffer. Kids graduate school unable to read well, unable to perform simply math and with no concept of the history of the country and the world.

But, it's ok. Your kid did well on the standardized tests. They're fine.

No, they're not.

Government has made up standardized tests--nothing new, it began decades ago--that are supposed to tell a number of things, including whether the student will perform well in college and how well he's learned what the primary and high school purports to have taught.

It actually tells how good the student is at rote memorization, and not much more.

At no time does the government children's prison system attempt to teach students effective uses of their rationality. Nor does it attempt to teach critical thinking. The history they offer is stunted and distorted. Economics, if offered at all, assumes the need for government intervention and the market's inability to regulate itself.

Government children's prisons teach sex education, something better left to the child's parents--or even to the child himself. The philosophy of sexual (never romantic) relationships, shifts like the desert winds from various degrees of abstention to "here's how; have fun!"

My son's high school had day care, fer cryin' out loud! For students with children!

Government children's prisons have generally eliminated the practical tech classes, such as wood, metal and auto shops, home economics, music and art classes (not to be confused with the nonsense pottery-making and basket-weaving baloney sometimes offered.

And then, there are the various and sundry "Zero Tolerance" rules for various, mostly politically correct actions. Zero Tolerance is more accurately termed "Zero Intelligence" on the part of school officials. They don't want to, or are unable to consider whether a given action is dangerous, or even worthy of note, or not.

Zero T for drugs includes bringing aspirin from home for a possible headache, or a cold pill to minimize coughs, sensitivity or congestion, or sometimes even prescription meds, unless you get approval from the jack-booted school nurse.

Zero T also forbids students from bringing anything more pointed than the digits 'pon their sticky little hands. Not to allow a boy to carry a jackknife in his pocket is part of the emasculation process, as well as a denial of American heritage. No self-respecting lad in the 1960's or earlier would be caught without a jackknife. Yet, somehow, we avoided killing ourselves or each other.

There are Zero T rules for speech, action, and even thought. A school in Connecticut recently announced a Zero T Policy against any form of touching of one student by another. Teachers can't touch students, although strangely, in some LA schools, students hitting teachers goes unpunished.

Face it: government children's prisons are child abuse.

The 10-year-old will learn more practical knowledge on a three-day camping trip with his parents--or a few days at work with a parent, or a few days working in and around the house--than in a full semester in a government children's prison.

Kids go to school with a great deal of enthusiasm, at first. They want to learn. It usually takes only three or four years for the children's prisons to beat that out of them.

Government children's prisons are hazardous to your child's mental health. Keep your kids out of them!

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

North Dakota's Annual Water Follies

I grew up in Grand Forks. Actually, I went to 1st and 2nd grades in a little town 13 miles west of Grand Forks in which my grandfather owned a general store and a fleet of grain trucks. In his teens, Dad drove one of the trucks to bring farmers' wheat to the railroad. After high school, my dad worked for the Great Northern Railroad in those years, and took jobs in many towns in the northeast of North Dakota. I was born in Langdon, a little town about 8 miles from the Canada border.

Before I started school, Dad had managed to get a more stable position with the railroad back in Emerado. That led to a better job in Grand Forks as I was entering fifth grade.

During my childhood I experienced two of these spring floods. The first was in, I think, 1949. Beyond the river bank, the land is very nearly flat. Once the water rises beyond the levees, it's free to sheet across miles of flat farmland. In '49, I recall that the water in Emerado was 2-3-feet deep.

You couldn't drive a car. Most didn't try to drive trucks. Basements filled with water, but the first floor of houses were often left dry, very slightly above the level of the water. The hardwood floor of my grandfather's store was soaked, causing it to buckle and bulge. Everyone waded around in the streets for a few days, but after a few days or weeks of fixin' and cleanin', things gradually returned to normal.

The second flood, after we moved to Grand Forks, was similar, maynbe not so bad--except now we were closer to it. Aside from a basement full of water, we escaped fairly unscathed. The only thing I remember clearly was the National Guard working on the levees and their amphib vehicles the only vehicles in the streets.

I was a mite young in those days, but most able-bodied individuals would involve themselves in sandbagging the levees, patrolling them, sandbagging around their dwellings and businesses and other work to save their property from the high water.

The river swells every spring there, mostly due to the snow melt. Factors affecting the degree of flooding include the amount of snow on the ground and the suddenness of the spring thaw and, of course, the severity of spring rains.

The 1997 flood was apparently particularly severe, since much of the effort was in vain and there were many dwellings and business buildings lost. I wasn't there, but I'm sure that the heroic efforts of the area residents at least equaled and probably surpassed those of other years.

We're not getting so much news from Grand Forks this spring, since the more urgent danger seems to be 80-miles south, in Fargo. We see a lot of video of local residents working very hard filling and placing sandbags atop the levees there.

Pridefully, I have to say that Dakotans live tougher lives than do most of us, and are aware of the special problems that exist in that part of the country. There's a willingness to work together to overcome these problems. Part of it is a hardy individualism coupled with the knowledge that a benevolent cooperation will overcome difficulties that are just too much to handle alone.

The National Guard is there, as usual--probably in smaller numbers since the feds have commandeered many of them to do the regular Army's job in Afghanistan and Iraq--and using its heavy equipment to its best advantage.

I'm kind of proud, in a way, to have grown up in those surroundings, because I know I'd be there helping if I were still living in that part of the country. Most of us were brought up aware of our situation, to be self reliant with a sense of benevolence for our neighbors.

I've heard just about enough of California whining.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

"Clancy On The Beat" Went The Way of The Dodo

We all feel sad for the murders of four Oakland police officers and, unlike his father, thoroughly condemn parolee Lovelle Mixon, their killer. The Bay area leftist press is doing its best to come up with excuses for Mixon, starting with his presumed depression at the thought of having to return to prison--for not keeping the terms of his parole. We don't, so far, know why Mixon committed the assault that resulted in the warrant for his arrest, but one has to suspect he's among those who cannot connect actions with their consequences.

He shot the two officers who pulled him over in a routine traffic stop, then shot two more of those trying to dig him out of his hiding place. Ultimately, he, and four Oakland police officers died.

According to this follow-up story in the Silicon Valley Mercury News, there were a number of individuals who knew where Mixon was hiding, but said nothing. "But you just don't want to be a snitch. The word, 'snitch,' it's almost worse than murderer," according to one neighborhood resident.

Tensions run high between the poor residents of this neighborhood in East Oakland after the recent police killing of an unarmed man on a BART car recently.

Which finally brings me around to my point.

For thirty-odd years now, there has been a concentrated effort on the part of the federal and local governments, as well as the police themselves, to separate themselves from the general public. Pursuant to the nefarious plots of the proponents of both the "War on Drugs" and the "War on Terror," there's a movement among federal thugs to militarize local police and place a federally-funded and influenced presence in the urban areas of the country. Arguably, this could be seen as a violation of the Third Amendment to the US Constitution. Maybe not so arguably.

Local government goes along because it's "sexy" to have an elite SWAT force at their beck and call. Local SWAT teams are used for everything from drug busts to in-home barricade situations to busting up neighborhood poker games. It's also good to be able to make a phone call and get a squad or two of BATFE or DEA thugs to help absorb the responsibility for blunders.

Police officers themselves play the game because it places them in an elite club--better than the "little people" it's their job to protect and to serve.

The result is mistrust and suspicion going both ways--the police sympathizers trying to disarm and pacify the public and the public resentful of callous treatment by seemingly thuggish police officers.

Until officials and police officers realize that they're in our employ to help those who pay their salaries to protect our selves, families and property, and not to be our moral and behavioral supervisors, there will be this adversarial relationship. Disarming us is not the way to endear themselves to the community.

Follow, if you will, this exchange between a local rancher and the town sheriff in the years prior to about 1910.

"Gonna have to take ya in, Carl."
"What for?"
"Give me your gun."
Carl hands the sheriff his sidearm, butt first. "What's going on?"
The sheriff sniffs the pistol's cylinder. "This gun's been fired."
"Shot a rattler on my way into town. Ain't no law against that."
"That's a fact, Carl. A dead man was found on your land. Shot."
"I don't know nothin' about that"
"I'll let ya go if you're tellin' the truth. Let's go."

And this exchange, in 2009.

"Freeze!"
Man turns to see who's yelling at him.
"I think he's got a gun!"
Blam! Blam! Blam! Blam! Blam! Blam! Blam! Blam! Blam! Blam! Blam! Blam! Blam! Blam! Sounds of reloading. Blam! Blam! Blam! Blam! Blam! Blam! Blam! Blam! Blam! Blam! Blam! Blam! Blam! Blam!

They've killed Freedom! Those bastards!

Warm regards,
Col. Hogan

By His Gods Ye Shall Know Him

I was opposed to GHW Bush's Iraq war from the start. The short reason? Iraq hasn't attacked the US. Iraq's oil is Iraq's oil, not ours. I might lament the fact that the oil isn't owned by a number of private oil firms, but I have no chips in that pot.

I don't know how much GHWB's war had to do with the intensification of the crazed islamist hatred of all things civilized, but the Clinton Presidency did no good calming things down. Now, since the destruction of the World Trade Center, it seems that GW Bush has plunged the US into a 100-Years War by taking his eyes off the puck and swinging his stick at everyone in the area.

I was guardedly ok with the military effort to capture Osama bin Llama and his crazed henchmen and bringing them to justice. The problem was, like often happens with power-mad politicians, GWB couldn't be satisfied with just that.

The result is that much of the middle east is at war with the US, and with Israel. Well, they've always been at war with Israel.

Now, we have a new power-mad President who ran, in part, on the proposition that we end the war in the middle east. Well, B Hussein Obama isn't ending the war quickly enough to satisfy America's tantrum-prone, anti-intellectual anti-war-when-they-want-to-be far left.

I could join an anti-war rally, theoretically. I am opposed to the war on Constitutional grounds, as well as philosophical ones.

There was an anti-war protest in Hollywood yesterday to mark, as this story in today's Daily News reports, six years since the US invasion of Iraq.

The above photo tells me all I need to know to make me decide to steer very clear of this kind of event. The most prominent protester in this particular photo wears a vest with photos of the evil Che Guevara, one of Fidel Castro's bloodthirstiest murderers. This savage killer helped Fidel Castro gain control of what was once a tropical paradise in the Caribbean, Cuba.

The long-standing blockade against trade and tourism into Castro's Cuba, and the world's fawning leftist media, are the only reasons we don't know the extent of the suffering and death caused by the Castro regime.

They are the same reasons why idiot leftists can worship Guevara without getting the crap beaten out of them on every street corner. I'll wager no one wears a Guevara t-shirt in many portions of Miami, where Cubans in exile patiently wait for Castro to die.

How the image of Che Guevara fits with anti-war activism isn't clear, since Guevara was anything but a pacifist. I guess we have to write it off to the utter irrationality of the leftist anti-war movement--so bereft of philosophical consistency that the stark contradiction cannot be seen.

With "friends" like these.......

Warm regards

Col. Hogan
Stalag California