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Charles Carreon
Editor / ed@ashlandfreepress.com and
chas@charlescarreon.com
Tara Carreon
Research / ambu@americanbuddha.com
Josh Carreon
Illustrator and Layout Artist
Joshua.Carreon@gmail.com
Publication Design
Rogue Design Group / www.RogueDesignGroup.com
Our Mission
To
provide Ashland and the larger Southern Oregon and Northern California
region with fearless reportage and critical analysis of local, national,
and international issues. To give voice to topics of importance to
people and groups that are screened out of media coverage. To serve as
an example of how a small, independent publication can help a community
recover its unique human and environmental identity. To reverse the
trend toward homogenized media produced by information czars whose
agendas are controlled by corporate and government apparatchiks.
Publication Information
Ashland Free Press is published four times annually. Authors may utilize
pseudonyms, in keeping with the tradition of American freedom of the
press as established by the Founding Fathers, who published their
seminal work on government, The Federalist Papers, pseudonymously, and
made it lawful to copyright artistic works pseudonymously through the US
Copyright Office. Contents are subject to Copyright © 2006 as works of
the Ashland Free Press and/or the respective authors and artists whose
work is published herein. Aside from the fair uses permitted under 17
USC 107 and 17 USC 108, these works may not be reprinted in whole or in
part without permission.
Submissions
The
AFP eagerly reviews all submissions. You can mail or drop off a hardcopy
or CD in the mail slot at AngelPort in the Underground Market at 33
Third Street, Ashland, Oregon 97520. You may also email a submission to
ramonesfreak@gmail.com.
Advertising
The
AFP is deeply appreciative of the support of small businesses and
individuals whose advertising helps to defray the cost of publishing a
top-quality policy quarterly.
Contact Us
Ashland Free Press, LLC
c/o
AngelPort
33
Third Street
Ashland, Oregon 97520
Tel:
541-482-2321
Printed
on Recycled Paper
What’s Inside...
4
Editorial: Will write for Latte
By Charles Carreon
6
The Last Empire: America’s Nostalgia for Armageddon
Lo-Fi Nikita explores America’s romance with nuclear weapons, and why
the President said “an Angel still rides in the whirlwind.”
10
A Legend In His Own Mind: Michael Ruppert Soldiers On
Charles Carreon interviews Mike Ruppert, investigates the burglary of
his office, and reviews Ruppert’s big 911 book.
12
The AFP Interviews 3 Local Progressive Candidates
Randy Dolinger, Eric Navickas and Muni Court candidate Judge Joe
Charter.
14
Mt. Ashland At The Crossroads
Joshua Carreon covers both sides of a mountainous issue.
15
Art In The Hot Zone
The AFP visits Gathering Glass
17
Funding Local Sweat Equity
Taylor Marks on RVCDC’s Affordable Housing Projects
17
Unvalue
Poetry by Michael Wear
18
No Good Deed Will Go Unpunished: The Mike Bianca Story
Charles Carreon on why Ashland traded a popular Police Chief for a real
bad cop.
22
Burnt, Man
Carlos Ramone isn’t a fan of the Burning Man pyrofest
23
How To Have The Burning Man Experience In Your Own Home
Anonymous and indispensable
24
A Highly Improbable Production
Taylor Marks reviews the BBC version of Doublas Adams’ Hitchhiker’s
Guide to the Galaxy
26
Ayahuasca for The Masses
Charles Carreon explains how Congress and the Supreme Court view
visionary religions.
27
Night
Poetry by Tom Brill
32
Nature Tripping
Poetry by Michael Wear
36
President Wolf
Lof-Fi Nikita on propaganda.
39
Werewolves In Ashland
Sumner Wellbourne’s fiction debut, chapters
1&2.
44
Free Speech Weathervane
Lo-Fi Nikita on The Tidings’ phony web comment board.
46
Mt. Ashland History & Photomontage
Mt. A in words and photos.
49
KSKQ Radio Schedule
Leslie Delorean spins the dial.
49
Craft, Meet, Swap, Groove
Winter events for fun and profit.
Editorial:
Will Write For Latte
Charles Carreon
It’s not
always possible to see where you’re going until you get there. This has
been especially true of the Ashland Free Press. When I started this
adventure about sixteen months ago, I felt depressed about the state of
the world, and powerless to change things. The Bush regime was
triumphantly celebrating the success of its Big Lie. The Dean campaign
proved that geeks have money but don’t hit the streets. The Kerry
campaign was a blatant co-option of liberal sentiment that drained the
last of my enthusiasm for electoral politics. Local law enforcement were
acting outrageously, arresting Wes Brain for shooting a video of a
demonstration, and sparking a near-riot in Jacksonville when the
President came to visit the old county seat. There was a lot of
head-shaking, and people talking about leaving the country. I went to
Europe, and discovered people don’t hate us, they just want us to stop
starting wars.
I returned
to Ashland realizing I could do one of two things -- go on as if nothing
had changed, when obviously everything had, or do something utterly
outlandish that would satisfy my soul. I checked my bank account and saw
that I was not yet destitute. I checked my age, and concluded that by
reaching the age of 49, I’d done better than most human beings since
history began. I checked the time left on the planetary habitability
meter, and decided that there was no time to waste. I’d better do the
outlandish thing right away, or I would have no one to blame if: (a) I
never got around to it, (b) the world went down the tubes while I was
waiting, or (c) I got carted off to re-education camp for having a bad
attitude about the Chief.
So I began
this adventure -- playing the game of journalist, using the mainstream
media as my guide -- if they did it, I wouldn’t. Looking for topics that
mainstream media doesn’t cover, won’t cover. And most of all, just
lending my brain and analytical skills to my fellow-Ashlanders so they
could take a look at the same stuff I was examining. Guess what? You
liked it. You commented. You called me up, and buttonholed me in the
street. You asked when the next issue would be out. You gave me ideas
for other articles, asked my opinion about current issues, and often
enough, gave me a big thank you. So to every one of you -- thank you
right back!
Nowadays
it seems as if the fog of blind belief is thinning out, and people are
less afraid to speak out against the authoritarian mystique that held
sway over the nation for about five years. We’ve got a crop of new
politicians coming up. Carol Voisin is taking on Greg Walden. Randy
Dolinger is seeking election to replace appointed councilman Dave
Chapman. Eric Navickas and Nick Frost are seeking council seats. Alice
Hardesty’s taking over Jack’s seat on the council. The real estate boom
is sputtering, so there is a possibility that the City of Ashland won’t
disappear under a wave of million dollar homes. The 9/11 Truth Movement
is picking up momentum, primarily because people are starting to trust
their own eyes, and opting to consider terrible truths rather than
embracing ignorance.
But one
thing has not gotten better, not at all. We still are almost entirely
without an independent press on the newsstands. I can tell you why, too.
Paper and ink are expensive. Distribution is hard work. Advertisers in a
small town are hard to get, and your best friends, people who think your
paper is just the very thing our town needs, are still afraid to back an
outspoken paper that attacks hypocrisy under whatever banner it
masquerades. This is not a complaint -- it’s realism. For merchants, it
is intimidating to court the disapproval of the City Council, the Police
Department, the Chamber of Commerce, the real-estate agents and
landlords. For hippies, liberals, progressives, or whatever you want to
call us, the disapproval of Peace House, the local New Agers, or the
Green Party insiders, can seem like a life-or-death issue. Nationally,
the stakes are even higher.
As a
result, our nation simply lacks an independent press. Almost as much as
a lack of literacy, the lack of an independent press is a huge hurdle to
honest government. Locally, countwide, statewide, and nationally, people
read what is cooked up daily in newsrooms that are powered by
sound-bites, manipulated by publicists and spinmeisters, and operated by
the same companies that own the TV, the cable, the sattelite, and the
big Internet portals. The technique for keeping the readership
enthralled is simply overkill. Each day dawns, and the anchorwoman
launches into a litany of concerns, telegraphing her earnestness, her
respect for the government, her love of our soldiers, her deference to
the rule of law, her willingness to gild with her belief anything that
appears on the Teleprompter. New news is superceded by newer news, and
the President’s “approval rating” is monitored like a heart patient’s
blood pressure. When it seems he might flatline, they find Jean-Benet’s
Killer. Not. The Vice President harbors perjurers, shoots a man in the
face, and menaces all opponents. A conservative dirtbag molests pages!
The media yawns, and the FBI, on the alert for terrorists, can’t find
one Congressional pedophile.
Is it any
wonder that Americans have lost control of their ship of state? Any
wonder that the nation spends on weapons as if there were a war in our
streets, and spends on schools as if education were a luxury?
So we’re
putting the idea to the test. For the price of a latte, you can fund a
local, independent press, and the AFP will keep delivering the truth to
a community that isn’t afraid to hear it. Because truth, my friends, is
priceless. AFP
Click "PayPal" to order the
Fall/Winter 2006 AFP: $5.50 delivered
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