Tucson Sammy

Let me start by saying that San Tan Flat is in no way connected with Tortilla Flat. There are no tee shirts that say, “Where the Hell is San Tan Flat?” Although new to Arizona, San Tan Flat has enjoyed a level of publicity unknown to Tortilla Flat.

Our story begins with a father and son, Dale and Spencer Bell. Dale has operated successful restaurants in both South Dakota and Wyoming. He and his son, Spencer, opened their new venture in Pinal County, Arizona, on the flats next to the San Tan Mountains – hence the name.

After three years of jumping through hoops, they finally opened on 2005 with Pinal County’s blessing. Shortly thereafter, Pinal County began to harass them mercilessly. They made them remove one of their two signs, reduced their road access from four entrances to one, and they made them build a bigger parking lot. They also sent deputies out at night to measure decibel levels.

This sort of behavior usually indicates that some well-connected turgid member of the community wants him out of Dodge. In the older frontier times, they usually just sent the Sheriff around to tell him, “Be out of town by sundown.” These are less direct, less honest, weenie times.

Dale complied with all the harassing demands, until they turned their sights on his customers. They claimed it was illegal for them to dance to the music in the courtyard. They cited an ordinance from 1962 that required “dance halls, penny arcades, and bowling alleys” to be in fully enclosed structures. San Tan Flat is a restaurant bar. As Dale said to me, “I’ve never seen a penny arcade in my lifetime, I’ve never been able to put a penny in a machine and have it do anything, I don’t know how old you are, but I’m an old guy…this thing is pretty obsolete even in its language.” With the help of the Arizona chapter of the Institute for Justice, Dale went to court.

The Pinal County attorneys stated, at four separate times during the initial hearing, that the supervisors thought the outdoor stage at the Country Western Saloon and Steakhouse would be used for “mimes, puppet shows, poetry readings, and art displays.” Why, of course! Any cowboy worth his salt needs a little miming, and poetry read to him every now and again. Those dang Bell Boys deceived us!

Dale has determined that upstanding member of the community Pinal County Supervisor Sandy Smith is directing the attacks against him. It is her appointee, the Pinal County Sheriff, who sends his deputies out three times a night to test the decibel levels. So far, they have had no luck.

I asked Dale why Sandy Smith was trying to make his life miserable. He answered, “Why is she doing it? Possibly petty jealousy over the success of the business, possibly because we did not grovel, or kiss her butt, which is apparently what she was expecting us to do after we were open and permitted.” He had some other ideas that involved millionaire developers, but it’s all just speculation.

The silver lining to this dark cloud is that the longer it drags on, the more support the Bells get - from George Will, who wrote of their plight in his Washington Post column, to Dale and Spencer’s customers. Dale said of his customers, “They don’t say they like it, they say they love it!”

The significance of this case lies not so much in the fact that the petty commissars of Pinal County are being exposed; rather it verifies what we in the freedom movement have come to realize over the past few years.

Traditionally, it was government at the federal level that sent edicts from far away for the great unwashed, doing away with federalism, and exceeding its limited jurisdiction in a rather tyrannical way. It seemed to make sense that when people are reduced to numbers and formulas, they would be treated like them. Now we see those close to us, here at home, behaving in similar fashion. Whether they use eminent domain, civil forfeiture, or “Smart Growth” central planning, our locals have a lust to control people, and property that they do not own.

As the bizarre case of San Tan Flat exemplifies, it is not the remoteness of the power that is corrupting. It is the power itself.

 

 Bizarre Case of San Tan Flat [5:48m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Dutch Rub-Out
Wolfowitz and the World Bank’s Euro-cabal.
World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz faces an “ad hoc committee” investigating his alleged ethics violations today, but it seems the committee has reached its conclusions even before he has a chance to defend himself. This fits the pattern of what is ever more clearly a Euro-railroad job.
On Saturday, the Washington Post cited “three senior bank officials” as saying that the committee has “nearly completed a report” concluding that Mr. Wolfowitz “breached ethics rules when he engineered a pay raise for his girlfriend.” The Post also reported that, “According to bank officials, the timing of the committee’s report and its conclusions have been choreographed for maximum impact in what has become a full-blown campaign to persuade Wolfowitz to go.” So there it is from the plotters themselves: Verdict first, trial later.
http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/feature.html?id=110010008

Comment: Petty and corrupt, now you know why they are called “Euroweenies.” It is sad that a continent with such a rich history would come to this. This is another anecdote that reveals the cultural superiority of the frontier as evidenced by the superiority of America to Europe, and the western states to the eastern seaboard.

When Talk Isn’t Cheap
Campaign finance regulators say speech isn’t free–it’s a form of “contribution.”
Campaign finance laws are increasingly becoming a tool to suppress political speech, and the courts are finally waking up to the danger. Last week a unanimous Washington state Supreme Court struck down an outrageous interpretation of a law that had been used to classify the antitax comments of two Seattle talk-radio hosts as “campaign contributions” subject to regulation–that is, suppression–by local prosecutors and officials who disagreed.
Washington’s highest court struck down a decision by Superior Court Judge Chris Wickham, who in 2005 ordered KVI radio hosts John Carlson and Kirby Wilbur had to place a monetary value on “campaign contributions” they made when they argued in favor of Initiative 912, a ballot measure to repeal a 9.5-cent-a-gallon increase in the state’s gasoline tax. The antitax measure ultimately lost by 6% of the vote, in part because its opponents outspent its supporters by 20 to 1.
http://www.opinionjournal.com/diary/?id=110010006

Comment: It’s stuff like this that make people understand that government, more and more, is the problem, not the solution. Most laws we see passed nowadays are immoral, if not illegal. Here we see an immoral law stretched to illegal extremes.

AWOL
By Robert Spencer
Has it ever happened before, in the history of the world, that almost six years into a major conflict, half of the intelligentsia of a nation fighting the war was not convinced that there was even a war on? Such was the implication of a moment during Thursday’s Democratic presidential candidates’ debate. When asked, “Do you believe there is such a thing as a Global War On Terror,” candidates Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, Bill Richardson, and Christopher Dodd raised their hands. John Edwards, Joe Biden, Dennis Kucinich and Mike Gravel kept their hands down.
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=28084

Comment: Spencer goes on to point out that words mean things, and that it is quite dangerous to give the war cute names like “The War on Terror”, when it is, in fact, “The War on Jihad”. John Edwards (aka “The Breck Girl”) appears to be slipping from the group of those who pose as serious people, to the group of moonbats.

After Imus
No more witch burnings for PC offenses.
BY DANIEL HENNINGER
Don Imus, Bernard McGuirk, Trent Lott, Larry Summers, the Duke lacrosse team, Jimmy the Greek, the kid who yelled “water buffalo” at Penn, Howard Cosell, Jon Stewart, Chief Illiniwek, Jackie Mason and “South Park” all have in common only one thing: They have not been Politically Correct.
http://www.opinionjournal.com/columnists/dhenninger/?id=110010019

Comment: At last, someone has finally stepped back and looked at what has happened to our culture. The Stalinist enforcers of Political Correctness have achieved outside the government what tradition totalitarians used to do within the government.

Tucson Region
Havasupai suit over research tossed
A suit against the University of Arizona, Arizona State University and researchers claiming they misused blood samples from Havasupai tribal members was dismissed by a Maricopa Superior Court judge, but tribal officials say they intend to refile the suit.
Carletta Tilousi, a plaintiff and Havasupai tribal councilwoman, said the tiny tribe’s leaders maintain ASU researchers used blood samples authorized only for the study of diabetes instead for research into schizophrenia, inbreeding and migratory patterns.
http://www.azstarnet.com/metro/181455

Comment: O.K., we can all agree that there should be clarity, and certainly no fraud when sampling for scientific research – but I do not think that that is what is going on here. This is political. American tribes have acquired a great store of political capital that is contingent on imagined glorious cultures that existed, unaltered, from the beginning of time to 1492. That is why scientific research is a threat, and will be fought at every opportunity. I suspect that this is the primary motivation here.

Tucson Region
National prayer day in Tucson
Tucson, Arizona | Published: 05.04.2007
http://www.azstarnet.com/metro/181486

Comment: Uh…um…. Other than a photograph caption, there is no text to go along with this “story”? Does that seem odd to you? Do you suppose the reporter was less than enthusiastic about it? Perhaps there was not an enthusiastic reporter working for the Red Star. Just speculating. Oddly enough, there were seven comments on this story with no words.

The Skinny
By JIM NINTZEL
MARKET FORCES
One of The Skinny’s favorite haunts, the Book Stop, is leaving Campbell Avenue after four decades.
Why? Because the center’s leasing agent/part owner, Richard “Dick” Shenkarow, is a total tool.
Book Stop owners Claire Fellows and Tina Bailey are gonna walk before he makes them run, escaping to Fourth Avenue before Shenkarow raises the rent.
The unassuming bookstore, just north of the intersection with Grant Road, was full of an ever-changing collection of treasures–shelf after shelf of classics, pulp fiction, best-sellers, obscure lit mags, hideous cookbooks, old yearbooks and so much more.
http://www.tucsonweekly.com/gbase/Opinion/Content?oid=oid:95664

Comment: Our friend Jim Nintzel reflects on one of the local bibliophiles favorite “haunts.” He also brings us up to date on the presidential race, including where Arizonans stand.

I am writing not from the “hot zone”, but from the smaller “red hot zone” of West Nile Virus cases here in the Old Pueblo. In fact, last year I received a written warning, with the threat of a fine, for having some tufts of grass over seven inches tall in my yard (gasp!). I also noticed the installation of a mosquito trap across the street from my house. This, apparently, all related to West Nile outbreaks in the area.

In the interest of finding out what the heck was going on, I went to a presentation regarding the West Nile Virus at the Ward VI office yesterday evening. I was all set to be frustrated over the lack of effort regarding mosquito eradication, but I was pleasantly surprised.

As it turns out, mosquito eradication is the focus of governments’ approach to battling the disease. The governments include both the City of Tucson and Pima County. Their approach is to eliminate standing water and tall grass (and other “lush” vegetation) from government property, then enforce similar standards on private properties. Pesticide will also be used in some areas.

Hold it, I know what you’re thinking, “Does this mean that they’re going to pour used motor oil on puddles in the washes?” No, contrary to what the Luddites think about technology, it has provided us with a really cool new chemical for killing mosquitoes. It’s hard to imagine a pesticide being “cool”, but this new stuff really is.

This new stuff is called BTI, and no, I do not know the chemical for which the acronym stands. It kills mosquito larvae in the water by disrupting the inner digestive track. The beauty of the stuff is that it only dissolves and becomes effective only when exposed to the precise ph of the mosquito larvae’s guts; thereby presenting no threat to dogs, cats, children and other living things (including other insects). That’s cool!

There was, of course, a laundry list of things one ought to do to help one’s self and the community:

1. Remove all standing water – even minute amounts. In ideal conditions, mosquitoes can go from egg to adult in three days.

2. Cut back “lush vegetation”, including tall grass. They do not breed here, but the adults like to hang out there.

3. Continue to maintain the chemical treatment of swimming pools. The government folks have a technical term for poorly maintained pools, it is “green pools”.

4. Assist your neighbors with all of the above.

I don’t know how effective this will be regarding the disease, but it sure would be nice to be able to sit outside in the evenings again.

Note to fans: There is a new column entitled “What Magna Carta?” in the “Articles” section

A friend forwarded the following to me in an email:

“mt hood has always felt like an extra room in my house - a great big
playroom - intimate, familiar…home. i feel as if a crime has now
happened inside my demense - a murder, a rape, an unspeakable act of
violence - i fear that it will be a long time before i will be able to
walk on that hill i love so much without seeing the ghastly fingerprints
of the tragedy. i want to go back now very soon - as soon as the
mountain clears again i will return, if only to excorcise the demon that
has temporarily claimed it. i don’t need to look like some voyoeur on
the crime scene. i need to forgive the mountain, and try too to forgive
myself for the things i am inexorably drawn to do to those who love me.

the mountain will live longer than all of us. longer than our children.
longer than our race. it will last longer than any tombstone. it is
therefore a fitting and appropriate memorial for all who have left their
lives there. please don’t look towards it with hate. let that go. go
there again soon, with me if you want, or alone which is often much
better - go there and look up from timberline, or make tracks up the
long slope - go there and remember it is a place of dreams, even if
sometimes they turn to nightmares - in the morning we will all wake and
it will better - believe it.” -ivan

Now, don’t get me wrong. I believe that mountains, and other places, can have great spiritual significance. In some places you can feel the presence of Grace.

What offends me is a man (I assume he’s a man with the name “Ivan”) writing a crybaby missive like some jilted girl. He was correct to criticize himself for anthropomorphizing the mountain. He is also worthy of criticism for making the death of the climbers some great personal tragedy. It is a tragedy, but not his. It is a tragedy for the climbers and their families. It is not some great sin committed by the mountain for which the mountain must seek forgiveness - forgiveness that Ivan appears to be prepared to offer, after much wringing of his hankie.

I know what you’re thinking, “Dang Sammy! You’re really going off on the guy!” Well, not really, I don’t know “Ivan”. I do know that the sort of self-absorbed emotionalism on display in his note exemplifies a type of cultural decline. It’s quite bad, for the individual and society at large, to have no higher purpose, no vision, and little awareness beyond his own emotional roller coaster.

In another time, the families would be supported by those close to them, while the climbing community would learn as much as possible about the tragedy, in the hope that a similar event might be avoided in the future. That’s it, no more, no less.

Look, I don’t intend to criticize Ivan personally. I’m sure that he’s a regular guy and doesn’t watch “The View” while having his nails done, or anything like that.

Thanksgiving is the last of the American religious holidays. It’s about gratitude; more specifically, it’s about thanking God. Expressing gratitude to God should not be a dry practice. It is a practice that is full of love and joy. Few things reach the core of the heart more than song, and few songs have been sung in celebration of Thanksgiving than “We Gather Together.”

Captivating melodies often originate in folk tunes, and such is the case with “We Gather Together”. It’s origins have been traced back to sixteenth century Netherlands. There, new lyrics were put to the melody to celebrate the end of Spanish oppression of the local protestants. It has been speculated that the Pilgrims may have actually been familiar with the song, having spent time in the Netherlands before sailing for Virginia and ending up in what was to become Massachusetts.

I don’t want to give away my age, but I am old enough to have fond memories of singing this hymn every year for the Thanksgiving concert at my local government school (we also sang Christmas carols in Latin, but that is a story for another time).

Actually, “fond” is an understatement. When I hear it, I get choked up and tears come to my eyes. If you want to see what I mean, click the following link and read the lyrics while the melody plays:

http://www.hymnsite.com/lyrics/umh131.sht

Happy Thanksgiving. Thank you God.

Sometimes…no, often the most interesting feature of an election, or any event of consequence, is that which does not happen. I fully expected that there would be much Democrat wailing and gnashing of teeth on the night of the election, and the morning thereafter – the usual claims of voter fraud, intimidation, racism, Diebold, homophobia, blah, blah, blah. I expected these because the Dems have established this pattern of behavior around Republican victories, of which I assumed there would be some of note. There were not, and there was no Democrat uproar. What does this reveal? The revelation is that Democrat accusations have nothing to do with facts, and are merely an attempt to de-legitimize Republican victories.

Speaking of voter fraud, this election begged for it. It is in very close elections that the few extra votes from the dead people, or the absentee ballots disqualified, that can really make the difference. As the title of Hugh Hewitt’s book succinctly puts it, “If It’s Not Close, They Can’t Cheat”. Almost all the pivotal races had razor thin margins.

So, did the Republican fix with the Diebold machines swing it, or did the people who voted six or seven times and the fake ballots from the reservations win it for the Democrats?

The answer is in the results.

If you ever hear another lefty whine about Republicans and the Diebold company, please smack ‘em.