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Posts published in “Features”

Populist For A Day

Did you catch Obama’s populist twitch? The moment when he tossed aside the stifling cloak of compromise, and like Joshua before the walls of Jericho issued the trumpet call to the disheartened Democratic base that…

Letters To The Editor

UNTHINKABLE BEDFELLOWS Editor, The headline for Debra Keipp’s letter last week (AVA, 9/21/2011) could more accurately have been “Hallucinatory Bedfellows.” Miss Keipp seems to have a ten-year repeating pattern (like a mental stutter) of public…

Welcome To Hell

Dear Editor, Tehachapi State Prison. Thanks so much for the subscription the last eight months. It's really helped keep me in touch with the outside world and my mind off my daily struggles behind bars.…

St. Mary’s Hospital: A Love Letter

The morning of July 23rd I woke up with a stomachache. By noon the stomachache was bending me in half but, like a true child of the 50s — no blood, no injury — I…

Valley People

WHOEVER started the flattering rumor that the old ambulance barn has been remodeled certainly has a lot of gall. This individual passed the misinformation along to my editor who inserted it in my report of…

Off The Record

THE MOST INTERESTING THING about former SoCo winemaker LaMarion Spence’s idea to help wine tasters avoid DUI arrests (not mentioned in the Press Democrat’s story last week, of course) is the de facto admission that…

Letters To The Editor

GLOBITY, EMPIRACY, DOOM Dear Bruce, Empires come and empires go, and ours is over. Who said that? Anyone who has been paying attention. Sometimes the end of an empire is due to environmental factors; others…

Is Fascism Coming To America? If So, Dressed As What?

But first, a simple rule for killers: If you are going to murder someone in the United States, don’t try to get the job done in Texas. Keep your captive alive in the car till…

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