Tag Archives: California

Hang On To Your Flag For This One!

I have sworn not to do more HOA flag stories because there are just too many of them. Tonight, I once again break that vow just because the latest flag nonsense is just so far beyond belief.

A tenant, a paying renter, is being told by his property manager to take down his American flag or they won’t renew his apartment lease. That’s no dog-bites-man news story. It’s way more bizarre than that.

Steve Roberts, who lives at The Oaks in Santee California is displaying his American flag INSIDE his home! The only way anyone can see it is if he opens the blinds inside his house.

How far will the lawn Nazis go to screw up the life of an individual resident? Apparently, there really aren’t any limits.  How much money in legal bills will they run up to demonstrate their disgusting lust for power? Again, no limits.

Folks, I usually don’t encourage you to send out stories to everyone you know, but on this one I am! From our top leaders to people trying to storm our country’s borders, the hate for the American flag is palpable.

(Link to KGTV in Santee)

 

The Saddest Story

OK Bunkie, I realize you haven’t always been tight with your old Gramps. I realize we’ve had some differences, and sometimes you just thought I wasn’t very smart in the ways of the world. Sometimes I’m wrong, I admit it. But sometimes you’re wrong and you should admit it.

So, Bunkie, pull your chair up real close and listen even if this is that last time I ever get to try to share some wisdom with you.

Remember when you said that buying your own place was the best investment you could ever make? Remember when I tried to talk you out of it? You said you’d take your grandma in as a  roommate to help you pay expenses?

But she died and now the HOA won’t let you have another roommate. They say it’s their decision and you can’t stop it. They’re telling you the only way you can stop it is to take them to court.

Bunkie, don’t fall for a sucker’s game! They know they’re going to win. They know that even if you win a decision in court, that court case will have cost you a quarter million dollars.

Sweetie, please listen. When you bought your condo you chose to live under a Communist form of government. I’m not trying to be overly dramatic. Those are just the facts. For the first time in our nation’s history you can make a conscious decision to join a totalitarian political party. It’s sneaky. But it’s all built around the illusion of home ownership. You gave up your rights to be an American and you can’t get them back.

Please don’t cry, Sweetie. It’s just a strange time in our history where the decisions you make really do mean something.

(How much is that condo worth now?)

 

Blue State Blues

Ever since I started using this website to try to hawk my book, Neighbors At War, I’ve been told by well-meaning friends and relatives, don’t ever attack Oregon. That state is so Blue it has a built-in guilt complex. Personal guilt hangs so heavy in the air in Oregon that these blue state leftists walk around in their hair shirts (see self-abuse by Monasteries) and lash their own backs with whips. It’s not the rainy weather that depresses them, it’s the load of guilt on their shoulders. I was promised I would never find a case of embezzling from neighbors in an Oregon Homeowners Association.

I should have obeyed my instincts. My heart tells me that mankind is desperately wicked and that all have sinned and come short of the Glory of God. I was right. My Oregonian friends (God love ’em), were wrong.

Comes, now, an attractive young fellow named David Kobbeman. The newspaper headline doesn’t mince words…. “Sentenced to 48 months in prison.”

There’s no way of telling how many widows he made penniless by embezzling a half million from his HOA. No way of telling how many bright-eyed youngsters will now not be able to afford college. And no way of telling how many sick babies might have found medical cures if their parents could have sold their homes and belongings to pay for new treatments.

The maddening thing….the damnably maddening thing I learned in my forty years as an investigative TV reporter is that the felons who have the absolutely most fun in federal prison are con-men. They are the king of the heap. Every criminal looks up to the con man. Every bank robber and baby molester makes a pilgrimage to the con-man’s cell. He IS THE KING!  The con-man is KING OF THE PRISON! He gets the best food, he gets the first cigarettes, he gets the best women!

Oooh, I guess I might have said a little too much, there. But yes, the con man gets the best women. Are there women in prison? That’s one of the secrets you learn if you’ve spent any time with a buddy who did a sentence at Lompoc or at another low security prison. If you’re high up in the ranks of prisoners, if you’re a con-man, you’re the warden’s good buddy. And yes, you’re occasionally taken into town to meet the ladies. And that warden wants to be seen around town with you.

Bottom line: spend your time swindling money from widows and orphans. When you’re jailed you be assured of having the best damn vacation of your life.

Believe it!

(Ok, now here’s the straight unvarnished, sanitized news:)

 

Judge Rules Against Famous Aviator in HOA Case

Two or three months ago, I told you about Chuck Yeager, the famous Air Force test pilot who was the first human being to cross the sound barrier. I also told you how the now-retired Brigadier General was being sued by a Homeowners Association, which Yeager claimed did not include his two units in Fresno. The 91 year old pilot says the HOA simply doesn’t have jurisdiction over his property, and he had the records to prove it.

Well, a Fresno judge has ruled that Yeager has to pay the HOA $43,000 in fees. The HOA’s original lawsuit demanded $270,000. The HOA feigns success. But it looks like Yeager comes out the big winner despite not having a total victory. From outward appearances it looks like the HOA’s demand was excessive and the judge probably saw through that.

HOA officials are talking about how satisfied they are with getting a judgment. Funny thing is, Yeager cut short his losses because he won’t have to pay legal expenses while these out-of-control HOA lawyers try to run up Yeager’s legal costs.

Besides, says Yeager, “I’m very pleased with the agreement. What’s best is that the judge did not order me to join the HOA!”

(link to Sacramento Bee story)

 

Guts in California, No Guts in Florida

If an award could ever be given to the most irresponsible organization in America, top consideration would have to go to CAI, the Community Associations Institute. The institute has essentially clawed its way to the top of the political food chain, deceiving thousands of Legislators and millions of homeowners into believing it’s a benign organization meant to benefit homeowners. In reality, it’s a massively wealthy parasitic lobbying industry which is sucking the lifeblood out of 335,000 American neighborhoods. CAI is no friend of homeowners. But it, along with other huge lawyer referral agencies like Senator John Carona’s Associa, are throwing billions of dollars into the fight to keep legal control of the HOA racket.

In California, a state which is facing an epic drought and the stark reality of looming food shortages, the simians at CAI have tried to argue that the Legislature has no business ordering homeowners to obey emergency drought restrictions. No, those HOA homes have lush green lawns while the state’s Central Valley is no longer able to supply the food needs of the nation.

Thank God that there’s a God. Because the California Assembly has overwhelmingly voted to ignore the ranting of the CAI primates.

Things are much more difficult in Florida, where it appears the attempt to reign in the horrible abuses of homeowners has again been quashed in the Legislature.

On second thought, maybe critics like me should begin to admire the sledgehammer lobbying tactics of the HOA industry. After all, it takes some talent to disembowel and skin an animal after a deer hunt. Those chops aren’t learned easily.

(link to Associated Press story on drought)

(link to death of Florida legislation)