Five-dollar gas is awesome...

Traffic wise.

I made it to the SECURE AMERICA NOW!! a Forth of July event in San Diego. I traveled down from Fremont, California. The drive down seemed a little peculiar traffic wise. I told my brother about the traffic seeming light and he thought it was because of the five-dollar gasoline. The trip home confirmed it.

The event started early Friday morning with the checking in. Security was there to help with the parking and getting everyone signed up. It went very smooth.

It was nice to meet some familiar faces.

We opened with the pledge of allegiance. I'm not sure if this was the exact moment or just who this guy was but I know he is good people and kept us up on the announcements of the day. ( After reading some of the Operation Secure America Now website I think he is Carl Braun.)

From what I remember the fist speaker was Duncan D. Hunter. Duncan Hunter son. He seems to be a chip on the old block and should be a good man to represent us in the government.

Some of the original minutemen took the stage and spoke of many things of the past and dreams for the future.

I met one of the two people I have been wanting to meet since I read Daniel Sheehy book, Fighting Immigration Anarchy. One is Glenn Spencer. The other is Barbara Coe.

Barbara Coe is seen here giving a rousing speech.

She has been at this battle for many years. If you get a chance to read Sheehy's book you can get summery of how she started out working in the Los Angles Police department statistic department when things first started getting out of hand. She took statistics to her bosses that showed troubling trends that showed the city was heading for trouble but they didn't want to hear it. She went on to work on California's Proposition 187, I believe, and also founded the California Coalition for Immigration Reform. It's also known as CCIR. She sends out email alerts and forwards emails of the things that are happening in regards to illegal immigration. When things are really happening there can be a lot of messages. It can a little overwhelming at first but once you get used to it they can really keep you up to date and not much will slip by.

Another person in this picture is Chelene Nightingale. We know her here as Patriot Dream. I was looking forward to meeting her but not in the star struck sense like with Barbara Coe or Glenn Spencer but more as a casual, she's a nice looking women, I've seen a lot of pictures of her and read a lot of her post on the message boards. Much like many of the other Save Our State message board people I always look forward to meeting. I had no idea just who she was in person. Right off the bat I saw her early in the morning. I introduced myself and she welcomed me and made me feel like someone special and a real part of the group. She was able to do that with all of us I believe.

She is one of those naturally gifted people to the stage. She was the Master of Ceremonies for the day and kept the entertainment and speeches organized and flowing on the stage.

If I see her again I may be a little star struck.

We had many speakers throughout the day. I remember one spoke of taking a list of Constitutional violations and charging members of congress criminally. Another has a petition that will be out soon. I remembered to pick up a flyer on the petition. The web address is http://www.taxpayerrevolution.org/. I should really take notes I suppose. Now I'm relying on crossing my fingers and hoping I will hear more about some of the day's topics.

Chris Simcox is a familiar face across the nation.

This is Rubin Medina of the American Union Band. He played and wrote some excellent selections that fit the occasion to a T. We need more events with music. Music worked well for gathering groups in the sixties.

Another part of the intertainment was Loch David Crane as Bafflin Bill Cody. He put on a magical act and was great with the kids. I'm thinking he is a regular at the Outdoor World RV Park next door but I could be sadly mistaken. If he is not, he should be.

We also had showings of a new immigraion film that is coming out. It was the premier showing of  "Documented America" followed By Q & A with CJ Raef. I'm kicking myself for not complimenting her on it but the live music was calling me outside.

Tony Dolz. He spoke and is a candidate I trust.

Bill Lussenheide gave a rousing speech. It was so forcfull it may have been a little scary but it was good scary for me. I'm not sure how a government weazles guilty of aiding and abetting an illegal invasion would take it but I would sure like to be able to vote for Bill to give him a chance to spread the word with them. I feel it is only proper etiqute to warn people before you bring on the el kabong. Bill can do it.

Bill Lussenheide, candidate for US Congress CA District 45

I missed a taking a digital picture about here of Jamiel Shaw's father giving a great talk about his life with his son and his son's life up until it was snatched away by an illegal alien. It wasn't even one of the ones the Revolutionaries in the government pretend to not know about. They had him in custody numerous times and chose to release him so he could continue his crime spree on the unsuspecting public.

He said that many have asked him if he is an activist. He said his answer is something like, "I'm not an activist! I'm just a pissed off Dad, man."

His talk was a real tearjerker. This nation owes him a dept that can never be repaid but could go a long way by keeping their oaths of office and upholding the rule of law.

This is Monica Ramos. She is the wife of the border patrol agent we imprisoned for doing his job. She said she met a border patrol agent that told her the government handling of Ramos and Compean has the border patrol agents second-guessing their actions. That is putting all of the agents on duty in a dangerous situation and makes regaining control of our government an even more pressing issue.

We all owe her family a dept that will be imposable to repay.

The days speakers included many I have not pictured or mention. This is a partial list of them from the Operation Secure America Now website

Darrell Castle, US Vice Presidential Candidate Constitution Party,

Michael Crimmins, Candidate for Congress 53^rd District,

Ted Hayes, Candidate for Congress 35^th District,

Duncan D. Hunter, Candidate for Congress 52nd District, speaking approx 9:00 AM- 10:00AM

Tony Dolz, Candidate for Congress 30^th District,

David Lee Joy, Candidate for Congress 51^st District, Speaking approx 10:30 AM

Bill Lussenheide, candidate for US Congress CA District 45

Chris Simcox, Founder of the Minuteman Civil Defense Corps, 

Barbara Coe, Founder of the California Coalition of Immigration Reform

Jeff Schwilk, SDMM (San Diego Minutemen),

Jay & Tim Fox Filmmakers,

Joni Tofanelli, NorCal MCDC-will broadcast LIVE on her Internet radio program starting at 5:00PM. http://www.b

Rev Earle Fox

TJ Myers, Actress, Film Producer & Patriot

Carl Braun, California leader MCDC & MCCI leadership, BPAUX Co-Founder

Chelene Nightingale, Media & Events Director Save Our State

This is a picture of the raffle. Many prizes were donated to help raise money for Monica Ramos and Jamiel Shaw's familys. I can't remember the final total. The number kept changing. Chelene pulled this Monk thing saying the amount didn't come up to an even number. We would chip in and then with a recount it came out uneven again. We finally got an amount that could be divided by two.

The grand prize was a beautiful Millet 3X9 riflescope. It is packaged in a box and inside of the box is a black velvet bag. Inside the black velvet bag is a scope fitted with clear dust covers. I know because I'm looking at it right now. I can't believe I won the whole thing! Plus the guy that won the scope rings gave them to me to go with the scope. The taste of victory is so sweet.

DARSACRAMENTO or Melissa is another one that is good at pulling people into her circle. Her and some others had clumped up their chairs and were talking before the launching of the balloons. She told me to grab a chair and join them. I did. The group also pulled in others.

What was a clump of chairs grew to a circle and the circle grew larger.

Ted Hayes, Candidate for Congress 35^th District got sucked into the circle here. He gave a great speech earlier. At one point he broke out into a song. He can always fall back on his singing someday if he needs to.

I keep hoping our events will draw more people. We have many members that are good at making others feel welcome.

I grew up in San Diego and I tried to get ahold of as many of the old group as I could find. I found one person in Alaska and another in Texas. Some of those in San Diego seemed interested in coming but things just didn't work out I guess. This isn't anything new for our little group. Sometimes the parties were huge. Sometimes they fizzled.

As I watched the festivities, maybe it isn't so important that everyone join in in every event. The forth of July reminds us we are all part of a bigger group known as the United States of America. Many of our fellow fighters in this battle against illegal immigration remain unseen from the masses. They are out there though, writing and faxing and doing many other deeds that go unseen. There are lots of unsung hero's out there we have yet to hear about or meet. Each chooses their own battles.

The grand finale with the balloons was just one of those things where you just had to be there. I tried to takes some pictures of it but they only show a hint of what it was like.

Around nine o'clock we were each given our own balloon.  They were a trip. Each one had a blinking LED light inside of it so they looked pretty eerie blinking and glowing the way they did. Red, White and Blue. (You'll just have to pretend the green ones are white in these pictures.)

We gathered by the stage waiting for the signal to release them at the same time.

A few test balloons escaped which gave us a clue as to what was going to happen. It wasn't even close to the reality of them all taking flight at once though. Like I said before you just had to be there. I think one of the problems with the pictures is the camera couldn't see many of the balloons when their lights were off. Another was the camera had trouble with the color it being dark.

Man it was cool when the lights went out before the release.

They drifted away. Well except for some that were stuck in a tree but that was cool too.

We were all invited back for the Forth of July in 2009. I'm sure that invitation includes all of you out there reading this message. The infrastructure, in other words, the people running the show and Camp Vigilance, could have handled more people than we had this year, it looked to me like.

I know they could use help during the rest of the year watching our borders. Throughout the day they were taking groups out on guided tours of the border. Even if you have a place you want to watch of your own this would be a good place to get the instructions on how to go about it and get started.

If I was going to give it a try I think I would start by contacting the Minuteman Corps California at;

http://www.campvigilance.com/

by Edwin Markham

He drew a circle that shut me out -
Heretic, rebel, a thing to flout.
But Love and I had the wit to win:
We drew a circle that took him in!