Orange County's favorite pastime besides bashing Mexicans is bashing Stanton, and there was a doozy of a wallop in yesterday's LA Times story on Bill Hunt's demotion. To quoth San Clemente councilmember Wayne Eggleston:

I wouldn't want to stop in Stanton, much less patrol it

That's the same we feel about Aliso Viejo. The quote was ugly enough for gentlemanly Jubal over at OC Blog to call out Eggleston on his civic bigotry. Eggleston responded with an apology and claimed Times reporter Garrett Therolf misquoted him. He ended with this gem:

Lesson: Do not co-operate with LA Times reporters as they are not trustworthy. I have dealt with Orange County Register reporters and they are of the highest quality.

The OC Weekly news team would beg to differ on your latter point, Wayne. But in the interest of fairness and accuracy, we e-mailed Therolf and asked him to respond to your charge. His reply:

I quoted Mr. Eggleston accurately, and I wonder why he did not say he was misquoted until he was criticized on blogs. Mr. Eggleston's statement is in my notes. We don't make up quotes at The Times. However, my editors have said that as a matter of course we do not provide access to reporters' notes.

Fair enough. We're not the Justice Department, and thus won't ask for Therolf to turn over the notes. Besides, he's a good, honest reporter. So awright, Wayne: so what did you really say?

Another law and order triumph for Sheriff Mike Carona. OK, maybe that law doesn't belong there-- there's going to be a lawsuit contending that what Carona did wasn't legal (which in turn calls the triumph part into question)-- but Carona is definitely enforcing order in the sheriff's department. Carona has clearly demonstrated that anyone challenging his leadership in an election is going to pay a big price for such independence. After all, what do people think this is? A democracy or something?

The Los Angeles Times reports:

Orange County sheriff's Lt. Bill Hunt, who unsuccessfully challenged his boss in this year's election, said Wednesday that he has resigned after being told that he would be demoted to patrolman because of his criticism of Sheriff Michael S. Carona during the campaign.

If you're not acquainted with the Hunt's punishment for behaving as though the position of Orange County Sheriff was an elective office, instead of the property of Michael S. Carona, you can find the details here, here, here, here, here, and here.

Hunt, who is going to set up shop as a private investigator in Santa Ana, plans to sue Carona, so undoubtedly more here's will appear in the future.

In a strange way, it is perhaps somewhat fitting that James Brown and Gerald Ford died within a day of each other, since Brown and Ford had a unique bond. As Brian Koller notes in his ePinions review of the James Brown compilation CD Disc Four: Godfather of Soul (1972-1984), "James Brown was probably the only person who thought that Gerald Ford was funky."

Koller is referring to Brown's 1974 hit, "Funky President (People It's Bad)".

People people, we gotta get over before we go under

Hey country, didn't say what you meant
Just changed -- brand new funky president

.
It is, to the best of my knowledge, the only hit song ever to reference Ford's ascension to the Oval Office following Nixon's fleeing D.C. one step ahead of the law.

Of course, Nixon is the other thing Ford and Brown had in common. Without Nixon, Ford would have rated a three paragraph obituary everywhere except Michigan. He would have been remembered as a go-along-to-get-along kind of congressman. A steady member of the Washington establishment, whose brightest moment in the national spotlight was serving on the Warren Commission. Nixon and his need to find a replacement for his first vice president, Spiro Agnew, who was forced to resign when his criminal activities were exposed, changed all that.

James Brown, on the other hand, had less happy results from his association with Nixon. He was widely criticized by fans for performing at Nixon's 1969 inaugural. And following his public endorsement of Nixon's reelection in 1972, protestors showed up at Brown's concerts with "James Brown - Nixon's Clown" signs.

In time, of course, Brown's genius eclipsed all that unpleasantness. His legacy is Nixon-free, loud and proud.

Ford's legacy, however, is bound to Nixon. While it is a standard assertion in the thumbnail sketches of history retailed to the general public by the media that Watergate proved no one in America is above the law, Ford's pardon of Nixon demonstrated rather clearly that no one in America is above the law-- except for those who are above the law. It demonstrated to the presidents who followed Ford that if Nixon wasn't quite right when he asserted "Well, when the president does it that means that it is not illegal", then at least when the president does something illegal, he doesn't need to worry about facing the punishment prescribed by the law. Consider Reagan shrugging off responsibility for the illegal enterprises known as the Iran-Contra affair. Consider George W. Bush sneering at critics of his domestic wiretapping program. That's where you'll find Gerald Ford's legacy.

(Koller review via Norwegianity)

Stumbling out of a holiday food haze? Feeling fat? Wondering what separates you and your good intentions about your waistline from those who seem perpetually and effortlessly svelte? Well, maybe-- just maybe-- it's less your inability to resist Christmas cookies and your little used gym membership than the bacteria packed into your gut.

The Associated Press reports:

According to two studies being published in Thursday's issue of the journal Nature, both obese mice and people had more of one type of bacteria and less of another kind.

A "microbial component" appears to contribute to obesity, said study lead author Jeffrey Gordon, director of Washington University's Center for Genome Sciences.

Obese humans and mice had a lower percentage of a family of bacteria called Bacteroidetes and more of a type of bacteria called Firmicutes, Gordon and his colleagues found.

The researchers aren't sure if more Firmicutes makes you fat or if people who are obese grow more of that type of bacteria.

But growing evidence of this link gives scientists a potentially new and still distant way of fighting obesity: Change the bacteria in the intestines and stomach. It also may lead to a way of fighting malnutrition in the developing world.

"We are getting more and more evidence to show that obesity isn't what we thought it used to be," said Nikhil Dhurandhar, a professor of infection and obesity at Louisiana State University's Pennington Biomedical Research Center.

"It isn't just (that) you're eating too much and you're lazy."

Of course, until scientists develop a cereal called Bacteroidetes Flakes for your breakfast, it's probably best to put down the cookie and step onto the treadmill.

More from the gift that keeps on giving. This time, it's an e-mail Michael Scott "Wanted in Arizona on a Child Support Arrest Warrant" Kerr sent yesterday to participants of the Snowball Success:

From:
Sent: Thursday, December 21, 2006 12:54 PM
Subject: Help!

Hi everyone,

There are three reporters and two individuals who want nothing more than to destroy the Snowball Express and particularly destroy my wife and I.

We would appreciate it if you would send them your feelings about the Snowball Express, what it meant to your family and that you stand behind Jeannie, myself and the Snowball Express team.

Their emails are listed below. Please copy mkerr@snowballexpress.org on each comment.

Roy.Rivenburg@latimes.com

HBerkes@npr.org

ksharon@ocregister.com

tmoore@ocregister.com

Also any editors at NPR Radio, Orange County Register, Orange CA or LA Times would be appreciated. Thank you and God Bless all. Have a wonderful Holiday and see you next year if not sooner.

Best regards,

Michael Kerr
Founder<

The Berkes in question is NPR national correspondent Howard Berkes, who put the nail to the Kerr story last week in an NPR online exclusive. The Sharon in question is Orange County Register reporter Keith Sharon, who snowballed (in porno parlance) Kerr's story last Saturday. No mention of the Weekly, which kick-started this damn scandal in the first place.

We don't know if Sharon, Rivenberg and Berkes are working on more stories, but you know times must be bumming for Kerr if he has to resort to having war widows harrass reporters who merely reported the facts. Stay tuned, but in the meanwhile, click on your right for our previous Snowball Express coverage!

It's a familiar sounding story this time of year-- a virgin with child. Only this time the natural world is outdoing the supernatural, because this virgin is with children. Seven, in fact. And these virgin offspring will have grow up to have mouths filled with toxic bacteria-- though I'm not sure that's really an improvement.

Flora, an eight year old komodo dragon living in a zoo in Chester, England, has produced seven eggs baring ferocious little omnivores, despite the fact she has never known the scaly touch of a male komodo dragon. Parthenogenesis, females reproducing without all the problems associated with mating with a male, is known to occur in some 70 other species, but until this year it had never been observed in komodo dragons. (If you want a quick refresher on these minor league dinosaurs, here's a brief komodo overview.)

Actually, Flora isn't the first virgin mother among the deadly omnivores of Komodo island. Another dragon, Sungai at the London Zoo, pulled off the parthenogenesis trick last May, but that blessed (if slightly toxic) event didn't get the international media coverage Flora's story is generating. All of which proves that amazing new discoveries in science have something in common with comedy-- it's all about timing. History-making virgin lizard birth in May? A story too obscure and boring to touch. Virgin lizard birth in late December? Now that's a story.

Of course, if any herpetologists understand comedy, it should be komodo dragon experts. For decades, the great radio comedians Bob and Ray performed a famous routine about a komodo dragon expert called, appropriately enough, "The komodo dragon". You can listen it here. (scroll down to the bottom)

It was a long fight-- a generational struggle, as President Bush might say-- but UCI Professor Jon Wiener has finally prevailed: the government agreed yesterday to release the last of the classified FBI surveillance files on John Lennon. For 25 years, Wiener, a historian who has written two books on Lennon, has been denied those FBI files on national security grounds. Or the government was trying to hide material that might prove embarrassing to the reputation of the FBI behind a phony claim of national security. You decide: the official reason the government gave for the past quarter century for not releasing Lennon's FBI files was that their release might provoke "military retaliation against the United States."

Yep, declassifying the documents that showed the U.S. government spying on John Lennon's antiwar activities during the Nixon years might bring on military retaliation against the United States. Military retaliation by whom? Sgt. Pepper?

Well, it seems whoever it was that was ready to attack the U.S. when the public learned how much time and effort was wasted spying on a musician devoted to peace has hung up his guns.

The threat of war is over. Happy Xmas.

Update:  In comments, Matt provides a link to Wiener's own account of prying loose the files (and since it's the season of goodwill, I won't point out that Matt's Beatle metaphor uses a McCartney song, instead of one of Lennon's).

Will the Ducks win the Stanley Cup? Will the Angels make it to the Series? Will Tawny Kitaen stay out of jail? Will terrorists hit one of our local targets: Disneyland, the San Onofre nuke plant or TBN headquarters? Should they hit Disneyland? Will home prices collapse? What will happen first: our troops out of Iraq or Bush out of the White House? And what about Britney Spears? Will she find love, or if she can't find love is this crazy world not worth a hill of beans? What kind of beans? Kidney? Refried? Black? Who you callin' kidney?

Folks, we need your help. Please leave your comments in the box at the bottom of the blog link. We are conducting what those crack scientists at Tyra call "research" or an "upcoming" thing we like to call "a piece." Yummm . . . Tyra: now there's a piece. Damn fine kidney, too. Wonder what's in store for her in '07. Tell us below, 'cause like we said, we don't know shit. That's where you come in: to give us shit.

You may believe there's a little bit of Santa Claus in all of us, as long as we keep the spirit of the Christmas season alive in our hearts. If you do, you better not mention that to Disney, because according to the BBC, some of the company's mouse-eared bah-humbuggers are claiming that Disney owns Santa.

When James Worley paid a visit to Disney World in Florida his portly frame and white beard soon had kids asking: "Are you Santa Claus?"

Not wanting to disappoint, Mr Worley, 60, played along with some "ho-ho-hos".

But Disney officials descended, telling him to stop the impersonation or get out of the park. They said they wanted to preserve the magic of Santa.

Mr Worley took off his red hat and red shirt but said: "I look this way 24/7, 365 days a year. This is me."

'Confusing'

Even after bowing to the request to alter his appearance, Mr Worley, from Tampa, said children continued to ask if he was Santa.

"How do you tell a little kid, 'No, go away, little kid'," Mr Worley told local television.

He said Disney had told him "Santa was considered a Disney character".

So, if you resemble a jolly old elf-- broad face (cheeks like roses, nose like a cherry, beard white as snow), with a round, little belly that shakes like a bowl of jelly when you laugh-- best to steer clear of any place designated The Happiest Place on Earth for the next week or so. Perhaps Santa can be found everywhere there are people of goodwill, but those Happiest Places have their own police forces, and lawyers more fearsome than any villain in a Rankin/Bass Christmas special.

Mark Giselson, former City Pages blogger and all-around angry Norwegian, reminds us that 34 years ago today saw the beginning of the special contribution to Christmas history made by local boy turned felonious president, Richard M. Nixon (now Yorba Linda's leading roadside attraction). Up until 1972, Christmas and war had generally been linked by phrases like "Christmas Truce"-- it took Nixon to make "Christmas bombing" part of the Xmas vocabulary. Between December 18 and December 30, the U.S. dropped 20,237 tons of bombs and other ordinance on North Vietnam to force North Vietnam to accept an agreement to end the war-- the terms of that agreement being ones that North Vietnam itself had proposed two months earlier.

If that makes the Christmas bombing seem like a pointlessly murderous undertaking made all the more appalling by its timing-- well, that's just the magic of Richard Nixon.

God bless us, every one.