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Monthly Archives: June 2022

VTAC

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Today, Martine and I went with our friend Jeanie to the VTAC Car Show at Warner Center Park in Woodland Hills. VTAC is short for the Valley Traffic Advisory Council, an agency of the Los Angeles Police Department. In addition to various police vehicles, such as a police helicopter, several search-and-rescue vehicles, and a K-9 unit, there were hundreds of mostly classical Detroit cars that were immaculately polished and cared for by their collector/owners.

Although the weather was cool and cloudy near our West LA apartment, Woodland Hills was sunny and warm—but fortunately not hot. We strolled around for a couple of hours talking to police officers and car owners.

Poster for the Car Show

One positive aspect of Los Angeles’s car culture is that there are a lot of car shows around the city, and even a number of automobile museums. And now during a time when so many cars look alike, it is amazing to consider that for many years the design of automobiles was like a fine art. I love my Subaru Forester, but it won’t win any beauty contests, as good a car as it is.

New Uniforms for the Uvalde TX Police

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Yes, Pink Tutus Would Be Perfect!

As the NRA has claimed so often, the best way to stop a bad guy with a gun (BGWG) is with a good guy with a gun. Well, the cops in Uvalde, TX were supposedly good guys with guns (GGWG), but instead of breaking the door down, they cowered in safety while a BGWG wiped out a classroom full of elementary school students plus two teachers for good measure.

Well, it’s time to get new uniforms for the Uvalde cops. How about pink tutus with a matching pink cowboy hat? Maybe their squad cars should also be painted pink. Mind you, I have nothing against the color pink, but I think those gentlemen would—and it would make them think. (Hell, I could have thrown in a yellow stripe down the back, but pink and yellow don’t match).

After listening to the right wing media blame everything but guns for the shooting, I seriously wonder whether the NRA enthusiasts of Texas have a screw loose in their noggins.

WW2-Land

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The USS Arizona Memorial

It’s a strange feeling to be standing on the Arizona Memorial at Pearl Harbor. Beneath your feet is a sunken battleship in which 1,277 sailors are interred. That is roughly half the total U.S. casualties from the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.

The island of O’ahu has numerous military and naval bases, roughly 21% of the total land area. That includes not only Pearl Harbor itself, but Fort De Russy on Waikiki, Schofield Barracks, Hickam Air Force Base, Dillingham Field, Fort Shafter, and a whole host of others.

In fact, if there is anywhere on American soil that is a center of World War Two commemoration, it would have to be O’ahu. There have been at least four films made about the attack:

  • From Here to Eternity (1953) with Burt Lancaster and Montgomery Clift
  • Tora! Tora! Tora! (1970) with an American and Japanese Cast
  • Pearl Harbor (2001) directed by Michael Bay
  • Midway (2019), which begins with the attack on Pearl Harbor

There have also been numerous books on the subject. (And there still continue to be.) No doubt about it, America is still stuck on WW2.

When Martine and I visit Honolulu later this summer, we will spend a day going over all the exhibits and taking the shuttle over to the Arizona Memorial, as we did back in 1996. No doubt a lot has changed since then.

70 Years Ago

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British monarch HM Queen Elizabeth II, then Princess Elizabeth, pictured in 1951. HM is wearing a priceless Cartier necklace, a wedding present from the Nizam of Hyderabad, a king in India. © Yousuf Karsh

The year 2022 represents the 70th anniversary of Elizabeth II ascending the throne of England. In the language of the media, it is her Platinum Jubilee.

I remember watching TV when Princess Elizabeth was crowned Queen of England. I was a seven-year-old boy at the time, and I was amazed that the pretty lady was so high and so mighty. And, no doubt about it, the young Queen Elizabeth II was a “looker.”

Even though now she is weighted down by the intervening years, and the tragedies that inevitably mar any long life. She had to deal with the deaths of Princess Diana and of her husband and consort, Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh.

So I will choose to remember her as a pretty young lady. At the time, I was an avid stamp collector. Because of the young queen’s beauty, I was drawn to British colonial issues, which usually included at least an inset portrait of the queen, unless they went whole hog with the queen and her sister, as in the following South African stamp:

The above stamp actually predated the coronation by five years. Princess Margaret is the royal on the left. More typical is the Bahamas stamp shown below, which looks to be a 1950s issue:

Whatever happens in the next few years. the reign of Elizabeth II has been a real boon for England—even at a time when it was shedding its colonies. Perhaps, in the long run, the massive expense of the royal family will have been worth it for its symbolism alone.