Frontiersman, September 2004

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Frontiersman, September 2004

Conversation With A Gestapo Thug
Sam Aurelius Milam III
One of our neighbors lives on a piece of land that I’d say is about an acre in size. There’s junk in the back lot and a couple of travel trailers that might have been used as residences. He also had two horses which, previously, lived in the back lot. He was violating a few local codes but, so far as I could see, he wasn't causing any harm. According to rumor, the authorities recently objected to the horses and ordered the neighbor to lock them in two tiny pens under a small shed.
On the evening of August 2, there was suddenly a lot of loud shouting by several men, and a series of percussions. It wasn't clear to me if the percussions were gunshots or the sound of a fist banging on the door of one of the travel trailers. I could see about four or five armed men running in circles in the neighbor's back lot, waving guns. They stayed around for an hour or so, prowling around the lot. I learned later that the neighbor was suspected of being involved in a murder. However, a warrant is responsibly served, and an arrest is responsibly made, by knocking on a door. A violent, armed invasion is a tactic of gestapo thugs.
On August 4, I decided to do a little yard work. At about 10:30 A.M., I went around the house to get my shovels out of one of the metal buildings. I noticed that the neighbor lady was standing by one of her horse pens and that she was surrounded by about five or six armed men. I leaned on the corner of a metal building, well within the property boundary, and watched. I could hear that the neighbor lady was crying but I couldn't hear much of the conversation because of the distance. The only thing that she said that I could hear well enough to understand was, "If I can find (?) then can I keep them?"
The instant that I started watching, one of the armed men noticed me and started staring at me. He stared without interruption while I continued to observe the situation. After about five minutes of staring, he broke away from his gang and strolled across the lot in my direction. I'll report the conversation that followed as accurately as I can, considering that I didn't stop to take notes and that I was so scared that I wanted to turn around and run.

Gestapo Thug: Mornin'.

Me: Yes, it is.

GT: How you doin'?

Me: Not rich yet.

GT: Me neither. Can I help you?

Me: No.

GT: Just watchin' the activities?

Me: Yes.

GT: What's your name?

Me: I'm not going to tell you that.

GT: Why not?

Me: It's information that might be used against me.

GT: You don't trust the police?

Me: I don't like gestapo thugs.

GT: You calling me a gestapo thug?

Me: Yes.

GT: You a vet?

Me: No.

GT: Figures. (He shook his head in disgust.) Better move your cars. I'll find out who you are.

Me: What makes you think they're my cars?

GT: Is this your house?

Me: That's information that might be used against me.

GT: Well, at least we know where we stand. Have a good day.

He sauntered back over to the neighbor lady and the thugs. A few minutes later, they stole her horses. Stealin' horses used to be a hangin' offense. Today, the cops do it.

Please use the enclosed envelope to send a contribution. I prefer cash. For checks or money orders, please inquire. For PayPal payments, use frontiersman@ida.net.

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Frontiersman, 1510 North 22nd Drive, Show Low, Arizona 85901
Also see Pharos at http://www.ida.net/users/pharos/

September 2004

Page 1

Just Call Microserv Customer Extort
Sam Aurelius Milam III

On or about August 12, Microserv¹ implemented a new junk e-mail filter that is mandatory for customers who don't subscribe to the filter service. That is, the filter can't be turned off by a customer unless he first subscribes to the service, thereby gaining access to the button that will turn off the filter. So far as I'm aware, intercepted e-mail addressed to customers who don't subscribe to the service isn't archived for later review by the customer. It's deleted. So far as I'm aware, e-mail that is intercepted before a customer subscribes to the service is gone forever. In other words, Microserv now intercepts e-mail that somebody else has decided is junk e-mail, without the customer seeing it first or even consenting to the interception. The customer will never get a chance to see the e-mail to verify that it really was junk e-mail or maybe some other kind of bulk subscription that he wanted to receive. The customer will have to pay the subscription fee if he wants to resume receiving such e-mail. There wasn't any announcement of the service. I simply noticed one day that I wasn't receiving certain e-mail anymore, and I called Microserv to inquire as to the reason why.

The only way that a customer can avoid using the filter is to subscribe to the service for a monthly fee. As is usual with such schemes, it's necessity was alleged by reference to a worthy cause. Since few people care about junk e-mail, few people will recognize the coercive nature of the arrangement. That is how bad precedents are established. The service could be just as easily available for the same fee, and work just as effectively, with the default setting at "off" instead of "on". Then, customers could pay for the service if they wanted to use the filter or not pay for the service if they didn't want to use the filter.

When I called customer support to inquire as to the reason why I wasn't receiving my e-mail, I was informed of the rules of the new service. I was incensed by the coercion to buy the service. I complained about it and suggested the more ethical approach mentioned in the previous paragraph. As usual, I was honest in describing things as I see them. However, it's a legitimate part of a customer support representative's job to soothe irate customers. Nevertheless, I was treated rudely by Kevin Hemsley, a Microserv customer support representative. Among other things, he threatened to cancel my account because he didn't like my language. His response to such really, really bad words as crappy policy andbullshit, for example, reminded me of the kind of incurable prude who thinks that babies happen by magic. He was also adamantly opposed to any change in the policy. He insisted that my only alternatives were to use the service (one way or the other) or to cancel my account. That sounds a lot more like a government, or the Mafia, than a legitimate service provider. It was, if nothing else, a very unprofessional performance for someone who is, presumably, skilled at dealing with dissatisfied customers.

The similarity of the Microserv policy to a government, or to the Mafia, is interesting. As I previously noted, the service could be just as easily available for the same fee, and work just as well, with the default setting at "off" instead of "on". Customers could pay for the service if they wanted it or not pay for the service if they didn't want it. With such an ethically sound policy so easily available, there's ample cause to question the motives behind the present arrangement. If we accept the notion that we must pay for a service in order to avoid using it, then we are no longer freely contracting for a service. We are being compelled by the service providers. We are paying a tax or a tribute in order to avoid an undesirable consequence. The more dreadful the service, the greater will be the need to buy it. To buy a junk e-mail filter as the only way to avoid its use isn't very much different in principle from paying a tax that you don't want to pay just so the tax collectors will refrain from providing you with their "services". The simple fact is that the Microserv junk e-mail filter service is coercive. Sure, it's penny ante. So was the income tax, originally.

Microserv Computer Technologies, Inc., 1800 E. 17th St., Idaho Falls, Idaho 83404, (208) 528-6161

Please use the enclosed envelope to send a contribution. I prefer cash. For checks or money orders, please inquire. For PayPal payments, use frontiersman@ida.net.

September 2004
Page 2

Frontiersman, 1510 North 22nd Drive, Show Low, Arizona 85901
Also see Pharos at http://www.ida.net/users/pharos/

frontiersman@ida.net

Word Gets Around

Illinois senatorial candidate Barack Obama, he's the new rising star of the Democratic party. He gave the keynote address at the Democratic convention. When they told President Bush about Obama, Bush said, "Isn't that the guy we can't find? Why don't we grab him? He was right there!"

— Jay Leno, forwarded by Don G.

The wife enjoyed fishing trips with her husband even though she didn't fish. One lazy afternoon, she took the boat out alone to read. A "Game Warden" came upon her while she was reading and asked for her fishing license. When she said that she didn't have one, he started writing her a ticket. He explained that since she had all the equipment for fishing then she was guilty. She told him to go ahead and write the ticket but she would have to file a rape complaint against him. She explained that since he had all the equipment for rape then he was guilty.

— forwarded by Sir James the Bold

One rainy evening, a couple emerged from a restaurant only to find that the husband had locked the keys in the car. He insisted he could open the door with a wire coat hanger, so he ran to a department store a quarter-mile away and returned with a hanger, with which he opened the door. As they sat there in the car, soaked and cold, he stuck the hanger under his seat. "Now," he said with a smug grin, "If this ever happens again, I'll have one."

Personally, I keep a spare key in the glove-compartment for when I get locked out.

— Don G.

Letters to the Editor
[Reply to Fahrenheit 9/11, A Review by Don J. Cormier, on page 2 of the August 2004 issue]

Much of what Michael Moore puts into Fahrenheit 9/11 has been covered extensively in the "alternative" media: Radio Pacifica, Independent Media Centers, and general left-wing muckraking. It's probably all true enough, though not common knowledge among people who get their ideas about the real world by watching the corporate networks, or listening to AM talk radio.

One thing I have observed by listening to Rush Limbaugh and company is that talk radio assumes that having an opinion about something is the same as reporting the facts. Thus, since George W. Bush is defined as the great moral conservative leader, he must be so and any detractor is wrong, facts be damned.

What Michael Moore has done is intrude some reality into the public's consciousness (maybe not a whole lot, but more than you will get otherwise in the mainstream media). I suspect this is why he has been so excoriated, and why the public is lining up to see his movie.

1. Either what Moore is saying is true or it isn't. If it's true, then what does it tell us about the Bush gang? And why do conservatives, who make such a big production out of "character", continue to support a president who is morally if not criminally corrupt? Are they that delusional? I worked on the 1980 Reagan campaign and, at the time, real conservatives saw the Bush family as being big money, eastern establishment, internationalist — the very forces conservatism opposed. A generation later, conservatives are in love with the same family. What does this tell us about conservatism?

2. Why has Moore's film caused such an uproar among conservatives? For crying out loud, it's only one movie, competing with the usual barrage of right-wing talk radio and corporate network fluff.

Now if only right-wing constitutionalists and libertarians would learn from Fahrenheit 9/11 and start making their own documentaries.

— Joseph; Northridge, California

Please use the enclosed envelope to send a contribution. I prefer cash. For checks or money orders, please inquire. For PayPal payments, use frontiersman@ida.net.

frontiersman@ida.net

Frontiersman, 1510 North 22nd Drive, Show Low, Arizona 85901
Also see Pharos at http://www.ida.net/users/pharos/

September 2004

Page 3

Dear Sam, Greetings

Thank you for the July Frontiersman! Re: Fox News Sunday (7-18-04) & Meet the Press, don't you think one of the requirements of the "Intelligence CZAR" should be: He/she has to come from the upper 10% of the members of MENSA ....

Isn't G. W. Bush's IQ = to his age? It increases 1 pt per year ever since he figured out how to say "Abu Ghraib." ...

That the "commentators", and "News anchors", etc. use the word "CZAR" is proof the Gov't is a socialistic communistic tyranny, and will fall just like the USSR did and armed conflicts (Chechnya, etc.) will erupt in this country one day soon!

... Law library is almost non-existent and it is hard to do any research. I'm really pissed that websites refuse to give out P.O. Box mailing addresses for those of us who don't have access to computers ....

Have you thought about selling a booklet of all your "sayings" on the Frontiersman? A lot could be made into "bumper stickers." Most will never be "outdated"!

— an inmate

Sam

As long as this country remains under a glazey-eyed, glutinous, hog-beast grizzle binge, idol worshipping, self medicated, frenzy of masturbation, we deserve whatever the Bush Jr's and bin Laden's can come up with to make our lives miserable.

Half of this "democracy" is lost in a bewildered, self gratifying daze, as they worship a dead, Jewish-Arab-socialist-revolutionary, by meekly obeying a murderous, right wing, plutocracy. What? Exactly.

So we deserve three-thousand dead, we deserve to be stopped by police for no reason, we deserve to have our environment destroyed, we deserve unlivable wages, we deserve poor health care and three-strikes.

So keep on jerking off freaks. When that un-diagnosed colon cancer catches up with you, you'll feel righteous and satisfied, as your children starve and get sent to prison, long as your figurehead, corporate-rep "president" had a nice "core of decency about him" and a good personality, it's all good.

If these are Americans, I say "stay out of the voting booth and watch a freakin' sitcom."

— Revolutionary Steve
(formerly known as OTAR)

For a long time now, I've been trying to resist the temptation to conclude that Americans are just inherently stupid. Poppa believed that they were and maybe he had good reason.

— editor

The Sacraments, The Children, and Me
Jim Sullivan

In my youth, I was a Roman Catholic altar boy for more than eight years at the St. Denis Parish in Lexington, Michigan. I served at Mass for our pastor and for many visiting priests, because Lexington was a resort town on the shore of Lake Huron and we hosted many vacationing Detroiters. During all that time, never did a priest speak to me improperly or physically approach me improperly. Quite the contrary. Many priests were helpful, encouraging, generous, intelligent, and fun to be around. Sure, a couple were grouches, but they didn't stay around too long.

The elderly, retired priests who came to our church were occasionally forgetful or even doddering. Most took forever to say Mass. Some forgot to say parts of the Mass. Other priests said certain sections over and over again. One or two couldn't hear our responses and chided us for not paying close attention to the Mass. Poor eyesight, bad hearing, painful arthritis, and deteriorating minds were a big part of their problems. Younger visiting priests, on the other hand, said daily Mass so fast that we altar boys could hardly keep up. Perhaps those young clerics were just anxious to get down to the beach to pray in the sand and the spray.

Seldom if ever did we serve at a Mass for a Monsignor or a Bishop. We never saw, in season or out, an Archbishop or a Cardinal, but no matter what rank a priest held or what honorary Church title he had, none of them ever preyed upon us. They only prayed with us and for us. At least, no priest ever abused anyone of which I was aware. I would likely have heard of it if one had ever done so. Believe me, in our small community, not unlike others, news like that would have traveled fast.

Please use the enclosed envelope to send a contribution. I prefer cash. For checks or money orders, please inquire. For PayPal payments, use frontiersman@ida.net.

September 2004
Page 4

Frontiersman, 1510 North 22nd Drive, Show Low, Arizona 85901
Also see Pharos at http://www.ida.net/users/pharos/

frontiersman@ida.net

My parents were Catholic, so I was born into the creed. Mom and dad put me and my siblings through the faith's traditional religious hoops: Mass every Sunday, every Holy Day, and then some; Baptism; Confession; First Holy Communion; and Confirmation. I did a short stint in a Roman Catholic seminary, a high school that prepared youth like me for future ordination or for other professions, but I didn't complete the Holy Orders. I had thought that I wanted to become a priest, but I left that place early. When asked why by family and friends, I admitted that I had been overwhelmed by puberty. Eventually I was married, so I include Holy Matrimony in the list of sacraments. So far, I haven't qualified for the Last Rites, now known as 'The Anointing of the Sick', which would round out the possible sacraments that could be received by a Roman Catholic. I hope that I don't qualify for the Last Rites, whatever they're called, for a long, long time. However, when I do, I won't be receiving them because I'm no longer a Roman Catholic.

My departure from my inherited faith was in the early 1970s, and without fanfare or public announcement. It followed Vatican II, a Roman Catholic Church Council called by Pope John XXIII, which impelled me into a long search to find out where I belonged in religion. Before I left the church and religion in general, I read Darwin, Copernicus, Galileo, and others. Moreover, that's when I first cracked open the Bible and read from it. Along the way, I investigated many other Christian Churches and non-Christian faiths. None suited me better than Roman Catholicism, which no longer suited me.

People, especially my dear, still Roman Catholic mother, ask me every so often why I left the church. I tell them, and her, that many things contributed: questions about how the church treats women, why there aren't any married clerics, and my dislike for the Legion of Decency, a Roman Catholic group that made lists of movies telling me (and worse, my parents) what I could and couldn't see. To me it was a form of mind control.

Yes, leaving the church was traumatic. However, I had been withdrawing from it little by little through the years. Over that time, I had half-heartedly participated in the Mass, which I regularly attended for the sake of my wife and children. Slowly, however, I quit my involvement. I stopped saying the prayers, taking Communion, going to Confession, and kneeling and standing when appropriate during Mass. Instead, I just sat through it all.

The only thing I never dropped was singing at Mass. Most Catholics, at least in the churches that I attended, didn't sing. Those who did seldom really belted out the tune, despite being backed by a mighty, musical organ and/or other instruments. In any case, heathen though I had become, I loved to sing and the louder the better. I only tuned my volume down when my spouse or older children frowned at me during a particularly rousing number. When I finally no longer attended Mass at all, to avoid the appearance of hypocrisy to my immediate family and to myself, I missed that singing, and I still do.

However, church music blurred into the background of my concerns at that point. My mind was filled with worry about God's wrath: like being struck dead by lightning or my kids or spouse being afflicted with some incurable ailment or receiving a terrible injury, just to punish me for my sin of leaving the church. Well, nearly thirty years has now elapsed and nothing has happened that I believe to be the anticipated punishment. Of course, we've had our dramatic ups and downs like all families, religious or not. We even lost one of our four adult children. That devastated all of us, but no one has ever blamed my leaving the church for her death and I don't blame myself for it.

Although today I believe in an inexplicable Higher Power, I did give up my religious faith and I have not adopted another one. However, my beliefs don't have anything at all to do with errant priests molesting children or the failure of church authorities to address it. Although the Roman Catholic Church does need to correct that problem, although the Roman Catholic Church is flawed like any religion, I still hold it in high esteem. It just shares with all of the others a common characteristic. It no longer fits my needs.

Please use the enclosed envelope to send a contribution. I prefer cash. For checks or money orders, please inquire. For PayPal payments, use frontiersman@ida.net.

frontiersman@ida.net

Frontiersman, 1510 North 22nd Drive, Show Low, Arizona 85901
Also see Pharos at http://www.ida.net/users/pharos/

September 2004

Page 5

Frontiersman
1510 North 22nd Drive
Show Low, Arizona 85901

An Observation Regarding
Due Process:

It would be better for a
hundred criminals to go free
than for one innocent man
to languish in prison.

Acknowledgments

My thanks to the following: Sir James the Bold, SantaClara Bob, Lady Jan the Voluptuous, Karl, of Windsor, Connecticut, Sir Donald the Elusive, Liberty Link, of Orangevale, California, and The Thought, of Glendale, Arizona.

— editor

Buck Hunter Shoots Off His Mouth
Dear Buck
I'm planning to move to an area that has a lot of Mormons and I was just wondering what you think about the LDS?

— Concerned

Dear Concerned

I believe that LDS is a very dangerous drug.

Signs Found in Kitchens
Original Source Unknown. Forwarded by Don G.

• A balanced diet is a cookie in each hand.

• A husband is someone who takes out the trash and gives the impression that he just cleaned the entire house.

• Housework Done Properly Can Kill You.

Alcohol Warning Labels
Original Source Unknown. Forwarded by Don G.

• Warning: The consumption of alcohol may leave you wondering what the hell happened to your bra.

• Warning: The consumption of alcohol may make you think you are whispering when you are not.

Frontiersman

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Reprint Policy — Permission is hereby granted to reproduce this newsletter in its entirety or to reproduce material from it, provided that the reproduction is accurate and that proper credit is given. Please note that I do not have the authority to give permission to reprint material that I have reprinted from other sources. For that permission, you must go to the original source. I would appreciate receiving a courtesy copy of any document or publication in which you reprint my material.

Submissions — I solicit letters, articles, and cartoons for the newsletter, but I don't pay for them. Short items are more likely to be printed. I suggest that letters and articles be shorter than 500 words, but that's flexible depending on space available and the content of the piece. I give credit for all items printed unless the author specifies otherwise.

Payment — This newsletter isn’t for sale. If you care to make a voluntary contribution, you may do so. The continued existence of the newsletter will depend, in part, on such contributions. I prefer cash, U.S. postage stamps, prepaid telephone cards, and so forth. For checks or money orders, please inquire. For PayPal payments, use frontiersman@ida.net. I don’t accept anything that requires me to provide ID to receive it. In case anybody is curious, I also accept gold, silver, platinum, etc.

— Sam Aurelius Milam III, editor

Please use the enclosed envelope to send a contribution. I prefer cash. For checks or money orders, please inquire. For PayPal payments, use frontiersman@ida.net.

September 2004
Page 6

Frontiersman, 1510 North 22nd Drive, Show Low, Arizona 85901
Also see Pharos at http://www.ida.net/users/pharos/

frontiersman@ida.net

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