Glendale Cherry Creek Chronicle

I recently returned from my biker pilgrimage to the holy city of the Hajj aka Sturgis, South Dakota, the trip every biker must make once in his lifetime. You are required to walk three times around the Full Throttle Saloon, throw stones at the devil, buy a tank top t-shirt and watch overweight Midwestern women flash their boobs before they go home in September to teach their preschool class. I then rolled back across America to the Mile High City.

I purchased a new CVO Streetglide Harley Davidson and it’s equipped with, that’s right technology geeks, an iPod and six speakers. Trust me folks, out of Lusk, Wyoming, going 120 miles an hour, you can hear this baby blasting like it was right next to you in your bedroom.

I don’t pretend to understand technology but if you press a certain button a song will repeat until you hit the button to change tunes. My daughter Shannon and her fiancé Doug Bohm picked my music for me and so from Lead, South Dakota, to almost Lusk, Wyo., I listened to the 18-minute version of Blue Oyster Cult’s “Seasons Don’t Fear The Reaper.” As you can see, years of drugs and alcohol abuse will never damage the music portion of a man’s brain.

Riding with new ink, a pierced ear and a travel bag full of t-shirts, you’ve got plenty of time to think. Remember who travels fast, travels alone. I rode back this time all by myself and I loved it. Other than the antelopes and Angus cattle, there’s jack between Newcastle to Torrington, Wyoming. But the sun is now on another angle, fall is in the air, there are big wheels of hay in the fields, you’ve got to wear all of your leather, heavy gloves and scarves and feel the seasons change.

So I always ask myself, “How many more of these do you got in you?” How many Christmases, birthdays, radio shows, newspaper columns? The tide is high. Stuff ain’t getting any better — from here it’s only gonna get worse. So you start thinking about life and I came back to a remarkably sad story that really got me thinking. Whose life is this anyway? And who owns your life?

That story is about John Wise of Cleveland, Ohio — he was married 45 years to his wife Barbara. By all accounts from the people who knew them they were inseparable and loved each other very much. Barbara had a massive stroke and John went into her hospital room and sat next to her and fired a single round into her head and then sat there and waited for the police.

Mercy or murder? That’s what the headline asked. What is the punishment when you murder someone you love to end their suffering? The papers carried some other accounts: A New York man in the spring suffocated his elderly mother and then cut his own wrists. He told the police that he had cancer and believed that he was going to die also and believed that no one would care for his mother. He got six months. A story out of Washington State — another fellow shot his wife. She was terminally ill also and he told the cops that she pleaded with him to end her life. He’s out on bail.

Now that all of us boomers are becoming the elderly what should we do? When it comes to someone that loves you or someone you love — do they take your life or do you take theirs to end the agony and the suffering?

Now here comes the curve ball. I think reasonable people support the right for someone who is terminal to die. In many parts of the world those laws are already in place. But here’s the showstopper: What if that right becomes an obligation? Remember Colorado Governor Richard Lamm — the only governor seemingly in the last 30 years who didn’t have marital issues — and his “duty to die?” That, folks, was about healthcare money. Now comes national healthcare. You know that someone’s going to have to make the call on who gets the money to live and who doesn’t get the money and has to die.

Should a terminally ill person be allowed to die because they wish it, eliminating the kinds of things John Wise did? Or does a dying person have the right to hasten his or her death and get the help of doctors to do it? Or perhaps worse yet and more frightening and more Orwellian, the government makes the call.

Holland is one of the world’s most civil places. Euthanasia is legal there and for the past 10 years no doctor has been prosecuted for assisting a terminal person to commit suicide. But here’s the bizarre one: In 1990 there were 1,030 Dutch citizens killed without their consent. And of 22,500 deaths due to withdrawal of life support, 63 percent (14,175 patients) were denied medical treatment without their consent. Twelve percent (1,701 patients) were mentally competent but were not consulted. Do you think there’s any potential for abuse?

So, like with many things — I don’t have an answer. Now I’m a granddad to the most amazing little fellow — Liam Joseph Boyles. If it costs money to keep me alive then I’d rather have the money spent on his college education. As long as he doesn’t go to law school.

“Seasons don’t fear the reaper
Nor do the wind, the sun or the rain”

Peter

Peter Boyles is a nationally acclaimed radio host who can be heard Monday through Friday on 630 KHOW 5 to 9 a.m. He has a monthly column in the Glendale Cherry Creek Chronicle. Visit Peter’s blog and comment on his column, or let him know anything else that’s on your mind, by going to the Chronicle Web site at www.glendalecherrycreek.com.

In 1946 literary giant Robert Penn Warren published a book titled All The King’s Men. The title comes from the Mother Goose nursery rhyme about Humpty Dumpty. Remember Humpty — “not all the king’s horses, not all the king’s men could put that big egg back together again.” The novel is about the governorship of Willie Stark in the depression era south of the 1930s. The story is told by Jack Burden — a newspaper reporter who comes to work for Willie as his right arm.

Willie of course is only known as “The Boss.” He goes from being a somewhat good, decent lawyer but a bad candidate to becoming the corrupt governor of what’s clearly the Depression Era State of Louisiana. Most critics believe that it’s really the life of Huey P. Long aka “The Kingfish.” Not to ruin the book for you but Willie Stark, like Huey P. Long, was shot to death in the state capitol by a doctor.

Now let’s take a look at our very own Kingfish — the Mayor of Denver Michael Hancock and his right-hand man and driver Wayne McDonald. The parallels between Willie Stark and Michael Hancock are indeed striking. In the book, Willie’s driver was known as Sugarboy. His real name of course, for all you literary geeks, was Roderick Ellis. I think that Michael Hancock’s Sugarboy is — that’s right you guessed it! — Wayne McDonald. You just gotta love it.

Ok let’s talk turkey. Right now the City of Denver is withholding audio recordings made by a Denver policewoman, about alleged sexual harassment by the mayor’s chauffeur. She’s an investigator who is now assigned to Denver’s District 2 and her name is Leslie Branch Wise. A note of interest: Wise had been allegedly used as a bait cop in stings like the one that resulted in the arrest of strip club magnate Troy Lowrie. And of course it didn’t bother the City of Denver to release that tape but why now, under similar circumstances, are the tapes being withheld? They had no problem trying to expose Troy Lowrie — in fact every media outlet in Denver had the tape — even though all the charges were later dropped.

Oh, and as another side note, Lowrie lost his job at Golden High School as a tennis coach but Sugarboy continues to be the girls’ basketball coach of record at Overland High School. Double standard? Just sayin’.

So was Wise a victim of “Sugarboy” McDonald or “Willie” Hancock or both of them?

Sugarboy was fired at the end of May after the above said female police officer accused him of serious misconduct. Channel 7 reported it as a complaint concerning sexual harassment. Mayor Hancock’s office won’t comment on the complaint citing personal issues. Channel 7 also reported the officer requested to be reassigned after filing the complaint and her request was immediately granted.

I’ve been told by several sources inside the Denver Police Department that reassignment that quick rarely if ever happens. Hancock has said that firing his friend was in the best interest of the city. Are you kidding me? Getting rid of Sugarboy was in the best interest of hizzoner.

Now Sugarboy has picked up a mouthpiece — attorney Anne Sulton. She’s acknowledged that there are audio recordings, but of whom? Of what? What are these two fun-loving public taxpayer employees saying to one of Denver’s finest? Oh by the way — informed sources tell us that the policewoman was never given any formal training on how to be a bodyguard. Is it possible that on good looks alone Willie and Sugar brought her onto the detail?

Anne Sulton was quoted by Channel 7 again by saying that McDonald was never given a written notice of termination. (Remember the German army — the gun is in the desk in the other room. You’ll know the right thing to do when the time comes). I think Sugarboy had the option — resign or be fired. Apparently he chose to be terminated.

Now here are a couple of showstoppers: Sugarboy was being paid $85,000 a year as the wheelman for the mayor. By the way, when Hickenlooper was mayor his driver was paid $40,000. Gee — I wonder what constitutes a $40,000 a year pay raise?

Let’s return to the thrilling days when the Denver Sugar/ Denver Players prostitution ring was in full swing and then-Councilman Hancock was allegedly an active participant. Remember Deborah Sherman at Channel 9. Remember the identification process when the now-mayor’s picture was picked from a lineup. He was identified as a “John” and because Sugarboy had been his buddy since back in the days of college and the urban league, I wonder what Sugarboy knows about the trips to go see the Denver Sugar working girls.

Note to all: If you’re stupid enough to witness sexual harassment and you do nothing or don’t stop it then you are as guilty as the harasser him or herself. So let’s figure this out.

Sugarboy allegedly harasses Ms. Wise and sources have told us he possibly made inappropriate contact. Did the mayor witnesses it and do nothing? If it was ongoing, as some sources suggest, and again the mayor did nothing, how guilty is he?

Just like Richard Nixon suppressing tapes — there is audio. Who holds the audio and why? Who is on the tapes and what are they saying.

Once again, Denver’s hard-hitting media have let another one slide by. So I leave you with a musical question: Denver’s mayor aka Willie Stark and his driver aka Sugarboy Wayne McDonald are both paid by the taxpayers. Sugar was driving a taxpayer-purchased vehicle and Ms. Wise is obviously paid by the taxpayers. Attention Police Protective Association (you guys should at least have her back) how is this all staying out of the public eye? Do you as a taxpayer have the right to know what happened?
Is the mainstream media aka the Axis of Evil protecting Willie and Sugarboy?

Peter

So we begin this month with a musical question: What do Argentina, Belgium, Canada, Iceland, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain, South Africa and Sweden have in common? That’s right! They allow same sex marriage. Guess what? They also recognize and perform same sex marriages in Mexico City. Also, same sex marriages are performed in Israel, a number of Caribbean countries and parts of the United States.

Gee whiz, as you can see those nations have been destroyed by allowing two people of the same gender who love one another to be married. The lead stopper of allowing two people of the same gender who love each other to have the same rights as I’ve had with several women in life is House Speaker Frank “One for two” McNulty — Republican of Highlands Ranch. Wow — way to go Frank. You sure showed them!

For those of you who are fans of George Orwell you know, as said in the classic parody of the Soviet Union Animal Farm, all animals are equal except some animals are more equal. How about that? So me and Frank are more equal than other animals and that’s the way Frank likes it — uh huh, uh huh!
Here in the good old USA, although Barack Obama is like a cat in a sandbox when it comes to same sex marriage, same sex couples can legally marry in Connecticut, Iowa (geez those pig farmers got that right), Massachusetts (where Mitten’s Romney reigned as governor), New Hampshire, New York and Vermont. All of those states are obviously rotting to hell on a hot poker.

Same sex marriage laws have also passed in Washington State and Maryland. Oh the pain of it all! Additionally, many states offer civil unions and domestic partnerships — granting people who love one another state level rights and responsibilities of marriage. In 1996 while George Bush was in the Oval Office and being advised by telephone by Ted Haggard (winky, winky) the United States passed the Defense of Marriage Act. If I would have only known I could have saved myself a lot of pain in the last three and a half years.

Poll numbers in the last couple of years really do indicate, albeit a slight majority, that Americans do support same sex marriage.

When it comes to gay adoption, many callers to my award-winning radio show believe that it’s better for a child to remain in an orphanage than to be in the hands of two people of the same gender who love each other and want to take care of an unwanted kid. (The peyote crop must have been really good this year).

I really don’t get it. I’ve been married twice and the dissolution of those marriages had absolutely nothing to do with what two consenting adults do in their bedrooms. I really don’t understand it. Being homosexual seems to be about the last place that civil rights will be granted. Black people can beat gay people up, white people can beat gay people up, Hispanic people can beat gay people up, straight women can beat gay people up and of course this is figuratively. Even guys like Ted Haggard (a well-known catcher according to Mike Jones) can even beat people up. Other wonderful white Republican men can to do the airport bathroom foot tap and then speak out against other gays.

I guess everybody has the right to be intolerant of gay people and gay couples. Jefferson built that religious firewall for a reason. Don’t bring your Bible, Torah or Koran and smack some hapless gay guy over the head because you think he’s going to hell. My colleague Dan Caplis told over 300 people at a rally at the State Capitol that “marriage has been saved in Colorado for another year. It’s time to celebrate.” Then he introduced McNulty. Fearless Frank told people that this was an attack on family, marriage and how we will protect those values that we hold so dear.

Are you jerking my chain?! Saved from what? Why don’t you ask Roy Romer, Bill Owens and Mayor Michael Hancock about the sanctity of their marriages?

So once again we say, so long and thanks for all the fish.

Peter

P.S. As a single man I guess I’m just looking for the right waitress to come along.
BTW — for those of you playing along at home if you don’t recognize our illustration it’s what the Nazis forced homosexuals to wear before they exterminated them. The homosexuals, some labor leaders and some newspaper editors went before the Jews. Please give that some time.

Peter Boyles is a nationally acclaimed radio host who can be heard Monday through Friday on 630 KHOW 5 to 9 a.m. He has a monthly column in the Glendale Cherry Creek Chronicle. Visit Peter’s blog and comment on his column, or let him know anything else that’s on your mind, by going to the Chronicle Web site at www.glendalecherrycreek.com.

Attention evildoers everywhere. For Gawdsake, whatever you do, don’t do your crimes in Arapahoe County because as sure as Gawd made little green apples you’ll do hard times.
As Rod Sterling from the 1960s television show Twilight Zone always said, “Consider if you would: Sheriff Pat Sullivan and the hammer of justice falling on his head swung at by the Nordic God of Justice Thor, ‘They sure showed him.’”
Let me take you back in time. The office of the Attorney General Iron John “Move That Pot Store Because We Must Protect The Children” Suthers and his hard prosecution of “Pedophile Pat” the kiddes’ pal, one-time head of security for Cherry Creek Schools and longtime sheriff of Arapahoe County. They showed Pat. By the time you read this Pat will probably be on the beach somewhere in the Caribbean making up for all the bad things he did to people. Remember OJ Simpson was going to spend the rest of his life hunting for the true killers of Ron and Nicole Goldman. Pat is also going to make it right to everyone he harmed.
Sure, Pat. (Winky winky). Suthers took over the prosecution and investigation of Sullivan following a January 18, 2012, executive order from your Governor Silent John Hickenlooper and that crack crime fighter then went to work.
Consider if you would 22 full-time law enforcement officers — the Elite Investigative team that included officers from the Arapahoe County Sheriff’s Office, the Aurora Police Department, the Colorado Bureau of Investigation, the Denver Police Department, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office and the South Metro Drug Task Force. All we needed to make this a full-time party would be those fun-seekers from the Secret Service and funding from those thrill-seeking GSA employees.

We’re told its 22 full-timers and as many other LEOs that they needed to investigate Pat and his fun-filled days and nights. I don’t know how many hundreds of thousands of dollars in salaries, manpower hours and effort went into that 30-day sentence that Pat received but I can guarantee you this: Put that many bloodhounds on anybody with unlimited resources and they could get Mother Teresa a double nickel.

Can you smell what John Suthers is cooking?

Now here comes the best part. Eyewitnesses talked about Suthers’ office being represented by another crime fighter Mike Dougherty and Pat’s legal team going into the chambers of Hanging Judge William Sylvester only to emerge some 20 minutes later — everyone smiling. The judge then said, “Remember Mr. Sullivan, you don’t have to take this deal.”

Not take this deal? That’s like saying to me, “Boyles, remember, you don’t have to cash in that Mega Million Dollar lottery ticket.”

At that point the former Sheriff of the Year and Head of Security at Cherry Creek Schools was taken away for his 30-day vacation into the jail facility that bears his name. Just as an aside — Tim Faase, who sold the meth to Pat the Rat, got three years at Canon City. And to further make your day, in two recent sentencings, the former VP of Quality Paving in Brighton got 13 years in the joint for a scandal for bilking tax payers for $1.7 million. The prosecutors on that case wanted 25 years for Dennis “The Menace” Cohen. And dateline Castle Rock — Richard Heeringa was sentenced to 576 years for sexually abusing a girl for three years starting when she was 12. As we used to say in undergrad written tests — compare and contrast those two sentences to how the legal system dealt with Pat Sullivan.

Pat’s final words in the courtroom were that he accepted the court’s decision followed by, “I just want to move forward with my life.” Can I get a big WTF?!

Now common sense tells you that some old creep like Pat could not have been doing everything he was doing, involved with everything he was involved with, without powerful people involved with him as well and getting him a sweetheart deal. I said on my award-winning radio show two days after Pat was apprehended that he would never take the stand. Arapahoe County’s J. Edgar Hoover, Pat Sullivan, I can guarantee you had files and stories on a lot of people.

As I said, by the time you read this, Pat will be sipping margaritas and watching kiddie porn on his handheld mobile device while talking television, movie and book deals. And the Batman and Robin of drug enforcement in Colorado, John Walsh and John Suthers, will be having the feds go after medical marijuana stores. Sullivan will suffer no charges for bringing drug dealers into a school system as security agents. A note to Suthers: What about the children?

Sullivan is a child-molesting, drug and power-abusing monster and he gets 30 days in jail? This is a joke. Remember all of these things when Election Day rolls around.

So have a nice day and thanks for playing.

Peter

Peter Boyles is a nationally acclaimed radio host who can be heard Monday through Friday on 630 KHOW 5 to 9 a.m. He has a monthly column in the Glendale Cherry Creek Chronicle. Visit Peter’s blog and comment on his column, or let him know anything else that’s on your mind, by going to the Chronicle Web site at www.glendalecherrycreek.com.

So the story goes something like this: My son Morgan and his girlfriend Val called me about a month and a half ago to notify me that I was about to become a grandfather. I always thought that was the old guy living in the Swiss Alps with Shirley Temple in the classic film Heidi. He could hardly walk — all he could do was take care of goats and chop wood.

I’m really amazed at how I feel about becoming a grandfather. I guess there are changes in everybody’s life. I think becoming a father was one of the most amazing moments in my life and now all I can say to my son is, “Now you will know how I felt about you.” So if a grandfather is the parent of somebody else’s parent, as frightening as that sounds, I guess here we go.

All I ever knew about grandparents was my father’s mother Rachel who lived with us in a really tiny rental in Pittsburgh, when I was a little guy. I think she taught my sister and me how to read. I later found out that she and my mother were not fond of each other. But then again, with my Uncle Gene home from the war, my mother, my dad, his mother and my sister and I all in four rooms wasn’t the easiest way to live. Rachel apparently had no place to live — a lot of her boys were in the military and a couple of them had run away from home to California. So my old man — the milk of human kindness — took in my grandma. She passed away when I was pretty young so the only grandma I really have any true memory of was my mother’s mother, the lovely and talented Mabel.

Mabel could give a cobra the first two bites and still win the fight. My father was once asked what was Mabel doing and he said she had gone to the Middle East to teach them how to fight dirty. She ruled the roost and lived with my uncle in a little rented apartment with my other aunt and uncle. A real thrilling time for me as a kid was to go over to where grandma lived and watch the guys who married her daughters drink themselves into some form of oblivion.

In fact, I never knew my Uncle Walter drank until I was 11-years-old and saw him sober. Grandma had that effect on men. For my mother’s father, the original grandfather, his life ended early by alcoholism. And my father’s father, the original “Mick” — Big Gene — died in some county home — I guess because as we say today, lifestyle choices.

So that’s kinda what I know about grandparents. However, I saw other kids’ grandparents. In and around Pittsburgh, they were known by ethnic names like “Nonno,” “Pepe,” “Pap-Pap” or Grandpa (insert first or last name here). Short of that, I knew nothing at all about how to be a grandparent. So I guess here we go.

On Valentine’s Day, Val and Morgan were married in a courtroom by Judge Andre Rudolph (what a good man). If I ever pull the pin your Honor, you’ll be the man to do the job. Thank you for what you did for my son and his wife.

I guess what we’re really talking about is three generations of Boyles men all living at the same time. Me, Morgan and this wonderful young gift that’s headed my way. We were talking about what I was going to teach him. I figured skiing and motorcycles would be more than enough to have Val despise me. But hopefully one of my early gifts could be teaching him, as my grandma did, how to read.

I’ve gotten over the fear that becoming a granddad makes me old — hell, I am old. I already have underwear older than my son and his wife. I truly believe that my son, who is a very compassionate man, will be a better father than his father. As a young boy Morgan always went to pro wrestling with me when I was working the ring and TV. In fact one of my son’s early claims to fame was that he had dinner with the Road Warriors — Animal and Hawk. Now his major request is that I never tell his son about or take him to pro wrestling. Ouch. I think pro wrestling is the only real sport left that isn’t fixed.

So the road continues. As the Bible calls it “the begats.” I begat Morgan and Morgan begat the new guy. It’s been said, I believe by Mark Twain, that the reason that grandparents and grandchildren like each other so much is that they share the common enemy. This kid will have a great uncle, my brother Jeff, who again Morgan has asked me to keep away from the new kid. I think it’s because of the things my brother did in wanting to toughen up Morgan at a very young age. I think that stuff becomes embedded. He’s also asked me not to get him a black leather motorcycle jacket that says “Mama Tried” before his third birthday.

What’s interesting is that so far, every grandparent I speak to is helplessly in love with his or her grandchildren. People are just in love with these little guys.

So I end with this: Val and Morgan — welcome to marriage and to parenthood. For me this is just another step into what life brings us.

In an Asian culture the highest moral values are dictated by grandparents. According to some historians they would hold authority over the matters of family such as child-raising and values. I’m really glad that Val and Morgan will not be influenced by Confucianism.

See ya in June little guy.

Peter

He wore a hat that made him look like a Mountie. He was the Sheriff of Arapahoe County.

I think by now everyone in the known universe is beginning to understand the sickness that was a chief law enforcement agent in Arapahoe County. Sixty-eight-year-old Pat Sullivan. Pat’s charges are: possession of methamphetamine, distribution of the same, soliciting prostitutes and one of my all-time favorite charges, attempting to influence a public servant.

So what did the erstwhile Arapahoe County Commissioners do in the face of all these sleazy, unmentionable, reptilian, rat-like events? They are “thinking about” having a “study session” to “consider” renaming the Arapahoe County Jail.

Let me refer you to Commissioner Rod “Hot Rod” Bockenfeld who told your Denver Post that they had heard an outcry from their constituents about the jail being named after the greatest sleaze ball in modern history, Pat Sullivan. How hard-hitting is it going to be when Hot Rod calls a study session next month?

Wow. Acting in laser-like speed. Forget about the corruption; forget about the prostitutes sucking on the meth pipe; forget about the alleged molestation of a 14-year-old boy at a skating rink; forget about it reintroducing recovered persons to meth itself; forget about possibly infecting his wife with HIV along with a couple of runaways; forget about him taking people out of jail (seemingly at will); and forget about him flashing an honorary badge at people in order to intimidate them. The Arapahoe County Commissioners are going to forget all of that and instead have a study session about renaming the jail.

Now, maybe it’s just me but this somehow rivals last month’s column when we realized that the major media in the city themselves have more important things to focus on than high-priced prostitution and gambling rings — namely the “Mile High Messiah” Tim Tebow. Don’t get me wrong — I like Tebow as much as the next guy, maybe not as much as Pat Sullivan, but nevertheless Tebow is wonderful and I enjoy cheering him on.

I would like to help the study group by offering names for the new joint:

1) The Detention Center For Pat Sullivan (it won’t cost any money to make that change)
2) The Naughty Nottingham Home For Wayward Girls
3) The Denver Post/Channel 9 Institution For The Blind
4) The Scottie Ewing/Brenda Stewart “You Mean This Is All The Time I Have To Do” Penitentiary
5) Ritterworth
6) The Chuck Lepley/Mitch Morrissey FBI Crime Center
7) Joanne Ostrow’s Dirty Work Academy
Boys Town (He ain’t heavy, Pat)
9) The Douglas Bruce Bastion Of Republican Interests
10) The Dan Maes/Scott McInnis Center of Political Studies/Plagiarism
11) The Michael Hancock Heritage Center
12) The Wellington Webb….oops! That’s already been done
13) The Federico Pena…wait, I think he already has a street
14) Ward Churchill’s Native American Cultural Studies Institute
15) The Jared Polis School For Boys
16) The Jeff Springer/Harvey Steinberg Study Group For Professional Athletes
17) The Home For Bill Clinton’s National Task Force On Crime (which Pat was part of)
18) National Headquarters For Sheriff Of The Year
19) Here’s one you’ll never see: The Silent Governor John Hickenlooper Colorado Crime Commission To Oversee Sex Scandals In The Mile High City
And last but not least:
20) The Arapahoe County Center For Disease Control And STD Prevention
Any bets on whether Pat will ever have his day in court?

Happy New Year.

Peter

Peter Boyles is a nationally acclaimed radio host who can be heard Monday through Friday on 630 KHOW 5 to 9 a.m. He has a monthly column in the Glendale Cherry Creek Chronicle. Visit Peter’s blog and comment on his column, or let him know anything else that’s on your mind, by going to the Chronicle Web site at www.glendalecherrycreek.com.

The whole world is watching, we’re not violent and we have the right to stay in Veterans Park. Adventures of an old man and the Occupiers.

I think most people know that America is now being Occupied. From Wall Street to Los Angeles, from Florida to Chicago, America is being Occupied. In fact, last weekend I was driving through Empire, Colorado, coming back from Winter Park, and I saw a sign that said, “Occupy Empire.”

Generally when I leave Empire on my way to Winter Park, I always look for the sign that says “Welcome to Grand County, You’re Leaving Planet Earth.”

Occupy Denver began Occupying what’s known as Veterans Park in September. I started making some stops there and made friends with a lot of young people that I have really come to respect and like. For those of you who read Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath, recall when the Joad family got to the government camp and there were committees inside the camp. Committees for policing the camp, medical supplies, guard duty, sanitation and of course the entertainment committee — all of which led to the night where the fight breaks out on the dance floor which would eventually lead to Tommy leaving Ma.

Occupy Denver seemed to be working really well with their committees — in fact I got to be very friendly with two of their media committee members. I’m sure they don’t want their names in this column in case anyone would ever use it against them in a future job app. When the end was coming and pressure was brought about by the mayor and the governor, like all good things Occupy Denver had to come to an end.

Note to self: By ordering the State Patrol and the Denver Police into potential harm’s way on the Thursday night/Friday morning when the Occupy removal began, conspicuous by their absence were the accidental mayor and the boy king John Hickenlooper.

Note to mayor and governor: If you’re sending your guys in to what could be a very precarious situation, be manly enough to go with them.

On the final night and into the final day, the Occupiers knew that the police were coming to remove them. During the day there were over 70 tents but when I got back at midnight it was down to about 35 tents. But apparently the people with good tents packed up and pulled out. One of the things I did see change was an element of people I’d never seen there before. I do believe they were outside agitators who called themselves anarchists. When the first of the law enforcement showed up at around 3:10 a.m., this crowd of people pulled on hoods, looking like street ninjas, and wrapped their heads, making themselves look like Colfax Bedouins.

It was clear, at least to me, that this wasn’t their first rodeo. They looked like they had come to fight. That night and that morning Colorado State Patrol and Denver Police were at their finest. A lot has been said recently about Denver Police getting out of hand; believe me, none of that happened that night.

State Patrol moved into the park from the southeast corner, swept through, and as they promised, tore down the tents. Behind them would come big, orange Colorado state dump trucks and I think, like the Trojan horse, the maintenance workers were all inside the trucks. They immediately got out of the trucks and started throwing the collapsed tents in the back of them. Protest signs went, blankets, sleeping bags — they all went into the truck. Then they stopped. Once given a moment to rest, they began again. They did this three times and in 45 minutes the whole park was clear except the kitchen that had been dubbed “The Thunder Dome,” the medical supply tent and the headquarters tent. These were built out of sturdy 2×4s and anchored on the sidewalk — therein property of the City of Denver.
Then moving in from the southwest side was the Denver Police. Everyone was in riot gear, no one spoke and they put up a wall that contained Occupiers on Broadway. They incrementally moved in. To the credit of law enforcement, by that morning, they allowed the Occupiers to remove all the food stuffs that had been either purchased or donated, and all the medical supplies, to be containerized and placed on the sidewalk. The Occupation was rapidly coming to an end and then it began. These are people who don’t seem to realize that the police don’t lose fights and have the right to go home safely when their shifts are over.

The element that mouthed off and tried to act tough were not the people I had become friends with during the time leading up to when everyone had to leave. And so, about 25 people assumed the boneless chicken position and got hauled off only to be released later that afternoon — law enforcement’s version of “catch and release.” And so it ended.

Here’s the lesson: In my lifetime, political change has come from the streets. The Civil Rights demonstrations from the ’50s became mass demonstrations in the early ’60s and the law in the middle ’60s. Ending the war in the ’70s had its roots in demonstrations in the early part of the ’60s. The same can be said for the struggle for women’s rights and eventually gay rights. So pay attention to the Occupy Movement. As more people lose their jobs, insurance and homes, and in essence their futures, the real question here is will middle class America join the Occupy Movement. It’s happened four or five times in my life already and history would teach us to pay attention to these people — this Movement could potentially have wings.

I’d like to leave you all with a quote from one of my favorite women from American fiction, Ma Joad:

“Did they make you mean in there Tommy? They made Pretty Boy Floyd mean.”

Right on. Power to the people.

Peter

Peter Boyles is a nationally acclaimed radio host who can be heard Monday through Friday on 630 KHOW 5 to 9 a.m. He has a monthly column in the Glendale Cherry Creek Chronicle. Visit Peter’s blog and comment on his column, or let him know anything else that’s on your mind, by going to the Chronicle Web site at www.glendalecherrycreek.com.

I can die happy, the return of the native, the dark at the top of the stairs, look homeward angel and/or you can go home again if only momentarily.

Fifty years went by like lightning. The banner class of Penn High School held its 50th class reunion during the first part of September this year. I’d never attended a reunion before but one of the really good guys I went to high school with, Mort Stanfield, contacted me and asked me if I would conduct an “after the dinner talk and conversation.” I had to think about it for a couple of days and then I thought, “This would be great.” And just like The Lion King, it was the Circle of Life.

So riding back from Sturgis by myself I worked on what I thought I would say. Remember, we’re not the hippies, we’re not the beatniks, we were not a protest generation; we were simply children of the ’40s and our boyhoods/manhoods were spent in the ’50s. I was out of high school almost two years before Jack Kennedy was killed. (Now I sound like my mother talking about Pearl Harbor).

So into the Hamar House restaurant in Harmarville, Pennsylvania, on a Friday night I strode with my close personal friend Dena Pastorini with a lump in my throat and a brick where my stomach was. I had had breakfast that morning with Mort and a man from my neighborhood, Mike Laus, who had managed to get himself a PhD from the University of Alabama. We had breakfast in a café close to the steel mill I worked in as a kid that has now been torn down and the scrap metal I think got shipped to Japan.
One of the women we went to high school with now owns the café, and after being with Mike and Mort for breakfast, I really could have gotten on the airplane and gone home. They had been in touch with a lot of people and knew the outcomes of many of our classmates’ lives. Mort, after returning from Vietnam, spent his professional life helping young people in Pittsburgh. Mission accomplished.

But that night it took about 15 minutes for all the walls to drop, all the stories to begin, all the tears to flow and all the hugs and embraces to start.

Everybody wore a picture of who they were in 1961 — their high school yearbook picture with their name attached. Two old guys would look at each other — not at their faces but at each other’s chests where the pictures were, and then exclaim: “Jesus Christ I thought you were dead!” or “Did you marry her?” or in one of my dearest friends Sam Miglioretti’s words, “WTF have you been doing for the last 50 years?!”

Now Sam, whose real name is Savaro, brought his award-winning homemade wine for our table. Note to self: Sam and I talked about being 12 and 13 years of age and drinking his father’s homemade wine after school and me stumbling home to my parents’ house with the heat on in 1958. Some things just don’t change. (The idea of being in recovery from alcohol seems to have skipped a lot of folks in Western Pennsylvania).

I bought drinks for a lot of guys at the bar that night — now remember where I grew up a mixed drink is a shot and a beer or as they say, “An imp (imperial whiskey) and an iron (Iron City beer).” Now as my uncle would always say, they sent a sample of Iron City beer to a chemist whose return report said, “Your horse is really sick.”

One of the local old DJ legends by the name of Charlie Apple spun the tunes. You forget how wonderful late ’50s and early ’60s doo wop music really is.

Over the course of the evening one of the fellows, whose name I won’t use in this column, had recently come home from over 35 years in the state penitentiary. The beef was murder. Between 1959 and 1961 he was one of the finest athletes in Western Pennsylvania, now reduced to a seemingly frail old fellow in a white shirt, a stingy brim hat and eyeglasses. His sports were track and field, basketball and football. I introduced him that night without mentioning everything that had happened after 1961, and the room gave him a standing ovation. It was definitely a highlight for all of us. And later in the evening my girlfriend Dena went over and asked him to dance.

So what have we learned? Things don’t change, but the more they do change the more they really remain the same. Included in the night’s program was a list of our classmates who had passed away. The series of events were the Vietnam War, accidents, sickness and lifestyle choices. I found out that one of my dearest friends from the first grade on, a kid named Johnny Gest, was gone. That one hurt.
A local physician friend of mine had said, “Well Peter, not everyone gets to live to 70.”
I hate that.

Returning to Pittsburgh was like Neil Diamond said, “L.A.’s home but it ain’t mine and New York’s mine but it ain’t mine no more.” And without the help of my nephew Pad, I couldn’t have found my way around. Thank God Dena understood how to use the GPS. I drove by my Dad’s house and somebody had put aluminum siding on it. I can’t believe six people shared only one bathroom in a place that little. I went to the cemetery to visit and discover my Uncle Gene and Aunt Helen’s graves were there as well. Gene, who had gone all the way to Anzio across North Africa before it was time to go home, drank hard the rest of his life and was always terrific to me. Went up to his grave, put my hand on the stone and said, “Thanks Gene. You were great to me as a kid.”

And so with that we say, I don’t think there are many reasons to return to Pittsburgh. But to see the Allegheny River, that went past the steel mill I worked in after high school, knowing that river is going to be there when everyone from the Class of 1961 is gone, or as they said with the Wiffen Poofs, past and forgotten with the rest.

Thanks,
Peter

If you know the history of Islam every devout Muslim is mandated at least once in their lifetime to make the trip (The Hajj) to Mecca and throw stones at the Devil. I’ve always believed the Devil was extremely frightened of a bunch of Muslims throwing pebbles at him.

So people want to know where the Devil goes when the Muslim people are throwing rocks at him. In other words, when Satan goes on vacation to escape crazy rock-chucking Muslims, where does he take five? My contention is: Sturgis, South Dakota.

Like everybody else, the Devil takes his vacation in August and in fact, in the first full week of August, the Devil seems to be out of town and firmly planted in America’s heartland. Somewhere between Deadwood and Rapid City.

The locals always call it the Rally. It was actually held for the first time on August 14, 1938, by the legendary Jackpine Gypsies Motorcycle Club. (The little pine trees up there are called Jackpines, hence the name). The Gypsies, by the way, still own and operate the dirt tracks, the hill climbs and a lot of the field areas that the Rally is concentrated around. The first Rally only lasted two days and was mainly focused on racing and motorcycle stunts.

The stunts have survived but now it really is Ft. Lauderdale, Spring Break, Mardi Gras, the Kentucky Derby, the Super Bowl, Miss America, the World Series and any and all heavyweight championships all rolled into one. The first year at Sturgis there were 19 participants. This year it’s been estimated between 500,000 and 600,000 of my closest friends.

The Sturgis rally has been held every year since 1938 with the exception of WWII.

The founder is considered to be Clarence Pappy Hoyle who, remember this, bought an Indian motorcycle franchise in 1936. The original Sturgis was a promotion when Pappy challenged the Rapid City Harley Davidson dealer to races and hill climbs.

And that’s about where the tradition begins. Now there are people who claim that Lot’s wife has looked back on Sturgis from the Spearfish Canyon and turned into a pillar of salt. None of that is really true. I’ve been going to Sturgis for 10 years and all except one year I’ve ridden my motorcycle up and back. I’ve never so much as seen a fight or a bad word but there are several exceptions.

One is a bar in downtown Sturgis called The Knuckle. You can fight anybody you want in there every afternoon at 4 p.m. The place is packed and there are always plenty of men and women who seem to want to duke it out with somebody else. Everyone is in agreement, everybody shakes hands and whoever wins the fight gets money thrown at them by the audience. Think Gladiator if you would, only with leathers, ink and heavy duty sunburns.

Part of The Hajj is doing what’s known as going out to see the heads. Make the trip to Mt. Rushmore and it never fails to give me the chills. On the way back there are guys doing the same thing, carving Native American fighting legend Crazy Horse. I always go by and salute the Horse.

I’ve always heard stories of people unloading their motorcycles outside of town and pretending they rode in. This time, crossing out of Wyoming and into South Dakota, I actually did see people unloading motorcycles out of trailers to ride into Sturgis. The Barney badass bikers call that “bringing your motorcycle to trailer week.”

The true people that this Rally is about I don’t think I could ever be. I come as a tourist and they live here. The place where they live shares a total love of motorcycles and motorcycle lifestyles, and I’d be willing to bet a large percentage of them are American veterans and hardworking men and women who once a year go off the leash and have a great time.

These people are the backbone of this country: they work, they pay their taxes and they love their country. In the minds of the progressives in their little reptilian brains, they always seem to make fun of who these people are. Believe me, I would much rather have any one of these people getting off an ultra full dressed out Harley Davidson with their wife on the back than any one of the uptight, sanctimonious, Cherry Hills Republicans or Beamer driving, chardonnay sipping, city dwelling, Obama backing, power elites.

Live long and ride free, God rides a Harley.

My favorite shirt this year: “When you went to Sturgis I slept with your wife.” Although it didn’t say “slept with”….

Live to ride, ride to Sturgis. You’ll see America in a whole different way.

Peter

Peter Boyles is a nationally acclaimed radio host who can be heard Monday through Friday on 630 KHOW 5 to 9 a.m. He has a monthly column in the Glendale Cherry Creek Chronicle. Visit Peter’s blog and comment on his column, or let him know anything else that’s on your mind, by going to the Chronicle Web site at www.glendalecherrycreek.com.

I’ve written before about two of my favorite uncles — my Uncle Barney who was a SeaBee in WWII and my Uncle Gene who went through North Africa and got as far as Anzio. They were spiritual guides and mentors to me as a boy in Pittsburgh. Today they’d probably both be doing time in any prison in Pennsylvania for the things they gave me and taught me as a boy.

As you know today we must have three varieties (i.e. skin colors) of baby dolls in any day care center. And girls are being urged to wear little nursing harnesses so they can emulate Mommy when she nurses the new baby. Note to others: Do you ever get the sense that your daughter will be telling her therapist in 20 years that you bought her a toy that performs mock breastfeeds?

We’ve been over it time and time again — why little boys can’t have toy guns. So let me get this straight: In America today it’s politically correct to have imitation breasts and breastfeed GI Joe as opposed to running around the backyard playing GI Joe? Note to self: Realizing of course that you can’t say anything bad about Muslims, who is GI Joe’s enemy today?

As a boy in Pittsburgh we could always fight Nazis or Japs (realizing that “Japs” is also a politically incorrect term) but many times we’d sit up in a tree with half a red brick dropping them on toy army men and playing bombs over Tokyo.

I’m sure you all remember rubber knives. Who hasn’t stabbed their brother with a rubber knife wishing it was real? I actually had a plastic knife that had a blade that disappeared into the handle, giving the impression that you actually stabbed someone. Now that was a good time. I wonder where in the Front Range a young boy could go today to buy a pea shooter without being followed home by the Jefferson County District Attorney’s office.

How about this one nostalgia fans: slingshots! I always saw ads in outdoor magazines that pictured a guy shooting a deer or rabbit with a sling shot and I always thought I could survive in the wilderness of Pittsburgh armed only with a slingshot. Of course today the slingshot police would put your father in a penitentiary for two years for letting you possess one.

In the spring a young man’s fancy doesn’t turn to baseball, it turns to squirt guns. How you could sit across from a guy in a schoolroom cafeteria during lunch and surreptitiously soak his crotch with a squirt gun, one squirt at a time. When he got up to leave after lunch it looked like he wet his pants. Come on — who doesn’t know a good time when they see it.

Okay say you never did this: a bow and arrow with suction cup rubber tips on the arrows always named after some fake Indian like Tonto or Little Beaver. How long did it take you to remove the suction cups and sharpen the arrow point with your pocket knife (Oops! A pocket knife. You can’t even get on an airplane with one of those nowadays). The lesson to that is what good is a suction cup? It’s not a deadly weapon and you can’t threaten your brother with it but we could play a game called “The Run of the Arrow” with it. You shot the arrow as far as you could and your little brother was given a head start to pick up the arrow, throw it down and run. It’s a game that’s now banned — along with Dodge Ball and anything else that has a first place trophy involved with it.

Sometimes I think, like in Ray Bradbury’s science fiction masterpiece Fahrenheit 451, there’s a place on the other side of the wall where kids still play Mumblety-peg, Dodge Ball, Hangman, Smear the Queer, burning ants with magnifying glasses, hooking rides on the back of the bus, Capture the Flag, Steal the Bacon, who can punch the hardest, saying things about each other’s mothers, playing baseball without an adult present, reading Playboy, learning to smoke cigarettes, bug squishing, spitting contests and of course, where else is a kid supposed to learn about sex? Except from an older kid who is 13 or 14-years-old after which you would walk home saying to yourself, “My mother and father never did that.”
So in closing, the age of political correctness is upon us and I really do think there is something to the theory that the progressives are trying to pound masculinity out of little boys. They want everyone to share and to care and be sensitive of another boy’s emotions. Never to draw airplanes diving down on Japanese soldiers with their heads blowing off flying in the air. (I wonder if any kid today would dare draw a Warthog plane shooting up a mosque full of Hajjis). Instead they want them to draw butterflies, unicorns and flowers. God would that suck!

Hey, enjoy your summer. And in the words of my sainted mother with a Tarrington cigarette in her mouth, “Don’t go near that Gawdamm river” (aka the Allegheny River) which of course was the first place my brothers and I headed.

Thanks,
Peter

Peter Boyles is a nationally acclaimed radio host who can be heard Monday through Friday on 630 KHOW 5 to 9 a.m. He has a monthly column in the Glendale Cherry Creek Chronicle. Visit Peter’s blog and comment on his column, or let him know anything else that’s on your mind, by going to the Chronicle Web site at www.glendalecherrycreek.com.