This is my latest attempt at achieving some sort of victory over this one-eyed Frankenstein monster before me, in hopes of getting my own Blog out. You will have to remember that when I touch electrical and mechanical objects they have a way of staging a revolt or surrendering to their invariable utter destruction in my hands. It's a gift. My first attempt at taking auto hobby shop actually caused the death of my auto teacher; heart-attack 3 weeks into the semester. He died at home and they made a point to say I wasn't to blame, but I never took auto shop ever again. I felt next time I might endanger a fellow student. As an example of my disease or virus, my very expensive Sears 8.5 horsepower snow-blower on tracks has been in the repair shop more often then in actual use and I am beginning to believe other power tools are either hiding from me on purpose to prevent from ritual suicide in my usage or they simply ran away, safely in the hands of tool borrowing neighbors or guided away in the protective hands of some power tool protection agency working against such loathsome people as I. In 1975 I even blew up the engine in my 1966 Ford Mustang, which I raced out on the dry lake bed raceway at Edwards Air Force Base in Southern California. This was up in the Upper Mojave Desert and our Base Commander had authorized us a straightaway raceway for 1/4 and 1/2 mile runs. The base provided racing lights, an ambulance and fire truck to keep things safe. We also had one of our squadron's radar guns on the weekend race days. Now I couldn't build a car, but I loved to race them and my Mustang was hot on 1/4 mile at 132 mph and 1/2 mile at 144 mph. But this day I was racing a Ford Mach 1 and we were nose to nose on the half-mile and I pushed the car a little bit too hard, red lining the tachometer and blowing the engine. Black smoke everywhere and my car rolling to a stop almost a mile from the stands. I ended up selling the vehicle for parts, not even getting what I had paid for the special racing tires and rims. Next time I got into racing was as a civilian police officer running red and blue lights behind some idiot who didn't want to pull over. Over the next two decades I would become involved in a lot of such chases, which always amazed me in that in Alaska there just wasn't a lot of places to go. One such driver tried to kill me with his car and had I taken the two seconds to shoot of a round through his windshield I would have eaten his grill. I caught him a short time later hiding out behind his place. That one came out okay. His jail time got him sober, into the program and saved his marriage. We even joined the Army National Guard the same day and he thanked me for helping he and his family out. You can do those things in small towns. But I've seen a few people crash while trying to elude, even saw one thief slam into a police roadblock.
Now each police officer after he's been on the job for a bit, will develop his own personal guidelines to work under. How far he would allow himself to be pushed, before he strikes out, when to write a speeding ticket or issue a warning and when an arrest is needed or not. See, back in my day we were allowed to decide on our own if an arrest was required, unless in major or violent felonies. Those were a no-brainier. At domestics, we often had one party sleep elsewhere for the night and help them seek counseling, without adding an arrest into the mix. But police officers no longer have that option. An arrest will be made for domestic violence calls. We also know a drunk driving arrest could effect insurance rates, possibly effect one's job and a marriage. So, in a lot of my DWI pull-overs, if the person didn't want to fight, was generally honest, "Sure, officer I know I had too much to drink, I just wasn't keeping count...I made a poor decision by being behind the wheel tonight." In those cases and if their was no cause to suspect another crime was involved, I would either have another driver take over, or barring that, have a taxi take the person home. Then I would have the vehicle towed. This way the driver was only looking at a towing fee and his taxi cost. But if he wanted to lie or come out swinging and blaming me for his lot in life, he went to jail. Police officers are out there to serve the public, not be the blunt of such treatment. Oh we can be cursed at without reacting, we're beyond that, but not to be punched, kicked, knifed or shot.
In Dillingham our 5 man Police Department dealt with quite a lot of violence. My first felony case was a homicide with a gang rape added in. This was a town of 3,500 back then, the community almost doubled in number with April to September fishing season. Hundreds of cannery works came in, along with Anchorage fishing crews and then the Seattle fishing fleets arrived in one of the biggest fisheries in the world- Bristol Bay. Every weekend there were stabbings, the occasional shooting, sexual assaults a plenty, drunk driving- including drunk flying, which was a first for me to make an arrest on a drunken male who made an odd landing, after buzzing town until he almost ran out of fuel. He had also stolen the aircraft and had no license for flying one, which he flew quite well considering how soused he was. I arrested several intoxicated boat drivers, having to help save one after he plowed into a pier piling and fell over the side into freezing water. I then had the misfortune to be working in Dillingham when the fishing strike occurred and fishing boats, buildings, cars and houses were set on fire. Shots fired from boat to boat, has us jumping one to the other until we caught the shooter. It stayed nasty for about a week as the head people argued over 3 cents a pound, with us working two man patrol cars on 12 hour shifts and a lot of sleep time loss as everyone was being called out for emergencies with little sleep. Then came the night that 8 or was it 9 men decided to ambush CJ Talon, (his father was a Louie L'Amour fan), and myself with high powered rifles. I wrote about that once. A young friend of ours, the former dog catcher, saved our lives that night by letting us know by phone this was a planned attack on us. We held up on a bluff overlooking the suspected target zone and we watched with binoculars, giving us some degree of increased night vision. Soon, we eventually spotted the 8 or 9 dark shadows coming out of a 8-10 foot tall hedgerow of thick alder and we even saw what looked like rifles in their hands. Now not being General Custer, we didn't foolishly swoop down on top of 8 armed men, or was it nine, just the two of us. I also never thought CJ was that much of a shot and I was driving. No, we just let them go and in the darkness we could only see the typical Bronco/Blazer and Ford truck, with no license plates as the trucks drove without lights on until they were far down the road. We were still having periods of darkness then, but summer was building.
That's what Dillingham was like, wild and woolly and we called our police department building Fort Apache. This was not meant by any disrespect to our Indian brothers, but mostly because it resembled a cavalry fort standing alone out in the middle of a hostile land. Our two story building, shared with the fire department and upstairs youth center, the closest bulding was nearly 200-feet away. There were only half-a-dozen Indians working in Dillingham. This city was a combination of Eskimo, white and Aleut people. The Aleut people come from the Aleutian Chain and Dillingham was their northern hub. The city was also the southern hub for the Southwestern Eskimo. Over the many years the two people groups had put aside their ancient feuds and their bloodlines had mingled, giving birth to a new line of Native Alaskans. This only bothered the aging elders of each side who were dying off with their old racial grudges. Now, even the Alaskan Interior Indians were mingling with one side or another. This is the new Alaska, with thousands upon thousands of people arriving from the Lower 48 to mingle with not only the three native Alaskan groups but with all the other races coming to Alaska. It seems that here in Alaska, we seem, on the most part, to tolerate or better is the word "accept" the mixed races. It did take awhile. When I got here in the latter 1970's, there were still two drinking fountains, one for whites and one for natives. In olden days the Blacks were expected to use the Native fountain, until the GIs made such a presence here in the 1960's. We try, with so many Christians up here, to look very hard at what lies beneath the skin. Now some Alaskans can't do this, even those reported to be Christian, and the only one made unhappy by this is the "hater".
I mentioned earlier, probably my last blog, how I sent my publisher, Alaska Dreams Publishing, some manuscripts for my planned "The Badge and the Cross" series, with each book a completely separate location and having no connection with other manuscripts.
One such book in the series is entitled "Stronghold", based in Skagway and in the time period I was a member of the Skagway Police Department. Now all the names have been changed to protect the guilty and the innocent, and some changes were made involving the actual incident, so as to keep the key figures involved in the true events unidentifiable by the local readers still living there or having moved there since this time period. I use my actual police cases for 90% of the incidents identified, which includes the homicide investigation of Christmas night. There were my complete series of investigations involving the town's secret coven, who was digging up grave sites and using the bones of long-dead gold miners to build satanic altars with. This is the investigation that nearly got me fired from the people I identified as members. Now for the book, I end this investigation in a different way, to keep the story running in a fictional way. I mainly intended this story to be read by sci-fi buffs who remain on their fences as to whether or not they believe the Lord exists. Or, for the new believer, who like myself truly doesn't understand what spiritual warfare is all about, until as a rookie, I was put right into the middle of it...and it very well could've cost me my life. To my benefit, I have a loving and spirit filled wife, who is truly a strong prayer warrior and former witch. ( I bet that caught you in mid-breath). We all have our pasts and hers has provided her with a knowledge of spiritual warfare, having worked it from both sides and has watched as the Lord's love and power has scored victory after victory.
This is a powerful read, but I've kept Alaska Dreams Publishing busy working on my other manuscripts. Still, I do hope some of you will look at this blog and mention your desire to see such a series out on the sale shelves.
Second in the series is called, "A Political Action", which involves Quebec terrorists, Royal Canadian Mounted Police and Canadian Secret Service, Alaska State Troopers and Alaska Railroad Special Agents. Following a bloody bombing of the Toronto Parliament building, Quebec Terrorists of the 1960's use the bombing to announce their return and how additional bombing well occur unless Quebec is given its total freedom from Canada. In the investigation of the bombing the terrorists strike at the key investigator; a RCMP captain and end up killing his wife and two children. Yes, this is a Christian novel with a power message that becomes clearer toward the end.
The terrorists learn, through a leak in the Canadian Prime Minister's Office, of a planned Official Visit to Alaska, where the Prime Minister is to meet with the Alaskan Governor in Fairbanks and ride in a special train car to Anchorage, with a one night stopover at Mt. McKinley Park. All the law enforcement entities are brought in, but so are the terrorists. The train is stopped in an unreachable spot and the terrorists take it over, causing the state to be placed on full alert, including elements of the Alaskan National Guard. Upon hearing of this, the RCMP captain takes leave and travels to Fairbanks, where he is eventually guided to an Alaskan Railroad Investigator, who was told to stay out of the way by an Alaska State Trooper SERT (SWAT) Lieutenant. Refusing to obey orders the two of them go on to Cantwell, where they finally find a guide to take them up into the mountain area reportedly being used by the terrorists. The guide is a former Army Chaplain who was wounded severely when his helicopter went down in Vietnam and to save some lives he had to kill 8 North Vietnamese soldiers close up and personal. He suffered a loss in faith after this incident, but he did decide to go on this nearly impossible quest of the other two men. Now to go any further might ruin a good read. I do hope you would enjoy this completely fictional story. Except to say I based one main character on a good friend of mine, who is now retired.
The last book written so far in this series is entitled "Militia". This fictional tale involves an Alaskan, a former Army officer with combat duties in Iraq and Afghanistan, and now a member of the FBI, being sent undercover back into Fairbanks as a disabled veteran. He is to make a connection with a new militant faction in Interior Alaska working under the guise of being a militia force. Within a few months, the undercover agent is picked up by the militia due to his old friends in the Fairbanks area, who have no knowledge of his leaving the military or joining the FBI. He soon becomes the unit's training officer and in a short time learns of the militia's plans to attack Eielson Air Force Base, Interior Alaska, during the July 4th Air Show. The Air Force "Thunderbird's" will be in attendance to perform their demonstrations in the skies over the base. An estimated 80,000 people are expected to attend the Open House, where they are to become captives of this rogue militia who now hold a radioactive "dirty bomb" as their bargaining chip to be heard by the United Nations.
A large group of Alaskans, for which this militia is the militant group for, feels the 1959 statehood election was a fraud and done illegally. Less than 50% of the ballots were sent out to the villages and those that were had only been printed in English. The UN had required 4 options be on the ballot, when the actual ballots displayed only two options and how planeloads of GIs were flown up from Washington and they were told how to vote by senior officers. There were other allegations, but the story gets into these. This is a fictional story, with non-fictional accounts and information concerning on-going legal battles against the US Congress over this 1959 voting and the promises by US congress they failed to honor moments after the announcement was made by the President. I'll leave the rest to the book, but I believe you will enjoy it. Talk of secession have increased due to the activities carried out by the current administration. It's anyone guess for now.
But as you follow China's day to day activities, as I do, you'll notice how their sphere of influence continues to widen around the world. They are currently involved with more countries than we are and providing major loans, while we are broke. China is also reportedly constructing and testing a new nuclear submarine which is said to be able to cross the Pacific Ocean from Orient to US in two hours or less. Extremely fast.
The Ebola Virus continues to kill and spread slowly, another new case found in India. Now, after 70 years Japan has seen its first case of locally infected Dengue Fever.
Russia launches military invasion of Ukraine with tanks and military vehicle, with Ukraine appealing to NATO for help. While NATO plans to set up new Eastern Europe bases to keep Russia from entering any other countries that used to be under Moscow's control. Such a plan could bring about a similar circumstance known as the "Iron Curtain", post WWII. Putin has began to see this new NATO move as a potential threat and has begun to respond with military overhaul.
I recommend you follow the Global Times ( English speaking Chinese News), Washington Free Beacon- a conservative news watch, FOX News, Moscow Times-Russia's English speaking newspaper, NY Times, LA Times and Jerusalem Post. This gives you a pretty balance look at world events. Blaze is also a fun read. But please, double or triple check your findings because newspapers are all owned by CEOs, who have their own ideas of what should be carried and what shouldn't. Don't believe it just because its written down, even in my Blog.
I know, another long one today, but I was in a writing mood and its been raining all day. Enjoy your night. BIL
Now each police officer after he's been on the job for a bit, will develop his own personal guidelines to work under. How far he would allow himself to be pushed, before he strikes out, when to write a speeding ticket or issue a warning and when an arrest is needed or not. See, back in my day we were allowed to decide on our own if an arrest was required, unless in major or violent felonies. Those were a no-brainier. At domestics, we often had one party sleep elsewhere for the night and help them seek counseling, without adding an arrest into the mix. But police officers no longer have that option. An arrest will be made for domestic violence calls. We also know a drunk driving arrest could effect insurance rates, possibly effect one's job and a marriage. So, in a lot of my DWI pull-overs, if the person didn't want to fight, was generally honest, "Sure, officer I know I had too much to drink, I just wasn't keeping count...I made a poor decision by being behind the wheel tonight." In those cases and if their was no cause to suspect another crime was involved, I would either have another driver take over, or barring that, have a taxi take the person home. Then I would have the vehicle towed. This way the driver was only looking at a towing fee and his taxi cost. But if he wanted to lie or come out swinging and blaming me for his lot in life, he went to jail. Police officers are out there to serve the public, not be the blunt of such treatment. Oh we can be cursed at without reacting, we're beyond that, but not to be punched, kicked, knifed or shot.
In Dillingham our 5 man Police Department dealt with quite a lot of violence. My first felony case was a homicide with a gang rape added in. This was a town of 3,500 back then, the community almost doubled in number with April to September fishing season. Hundreds of cannery works came in, along with Anchorage fishing crews and then the Seattle fishing fleets arrived in one of the biggest fisheries in the world- Bristol Bay. Every weekend there were stabbings, the occasional shooting, sexual assaults a plenty, drunk driving- including drunk flying, which was a first for me to make an arrest on a drunken male who made an odd landing, after buzzing town until he almost ran out of fuel. He had also stolen the aircraft and had no license for flying one, which he flew quite well considering how soused he was. I arrested several intoxicated boat drivers, having to help save one after he plowed into a pier piling and fell over the side into freezing water. I then had the misfortune to be working in Dillingham when the fishing strike occurred and fishing boats, buildings, cars and houses were set on fire. Shots fired from boat to boat, has us jumping one to the other until we caught the shooter. It stayed nasty for about a week as the head people argued over 3 cents a pound, with us working two man patrol cars on 12 hour shifts and a lot of sleep time loss as everyone was being called out for emergencies with little sleep. Then came the night that 8 or was it 9 men decided to ambush CJ Talon, (his father was a Louie L'Amour fan), and myself with high powered rifles. I wrote about that once. A young friend of ours, the former dog catcher, saved our lives that night by letting us know by phone this was a planned attack on us. We held up on a bluff overlooking the suspected target zone and we watched with binoculars, giving us some degree of increased night vision. Soon, we eventually spotted the 8 or 9 dark shadows coming out of a 8-10 foot tall hedgerow of thick alder and we even saw what looked like rifles in their hands. Now not being General Custer, we didn't foolishly swoop down on top of 8 armed men, or was it nine, just the two of us. I also never thought CJ was that much of a shot and I was driving. No, we just let them go and in the darkness we could only see the typical Bronco/Blazer and Ford truck, with no license plates as the trucks drove without lights on until they were far down the road. We were still having periods of darkness then, but summer was building.
That's what Dillingham was like, wild and woolly and we called our police department building Fort Apache. This was not meant by any disrespect to our Indian brothers, but mostly because it resembled a cavalry fort standing alone out in the middle of a hostile land. Our two story building, shared with the fire department and upstairs youth center, the closest bulding was nearly 200-feet away. There were only half-a-dozen Indians working in Dillingham. This city was a combination of Eskimo, white and Aleut people. The Aleut people come from the Aleutian Chain and Dillingham was their northern hub. The city was also the southern hub for the Southwestern Eskimo. Over the many years the two people groups had put aside their ancient feuds and their bloodlines had mingled, giving birth to a new line of Native Alaskans. This only bothered the aging elders of each side who were dying off with their old racial grudges. Now, even the Alaskan Interior Indians were mingling with one side or another. This is the new Alaska, with thousands upon thousands of people arriving from the Lower 48 to mingle with not only the three native Alaskan groups but with all the other races coming to Alaska. It seems that here in Alaska, we seem, on the most part, to tolerate or better is the word "accept" the mixed races. It did take awhile. When I got here in the latter 1970's, there were still two drinking fountains, one for whites and one for natives. In olden days the Blacks were expected to use the Native fountain, until the GIs made such a presence here in the 1960's. We try, with so many Christians up here, to look very hard at what lies beneath the skin. Now some Alaskans can't do this, even those reported to be Christian, and the only one made unhappy by this is the "hater".
I mentioned earlier, probably my last blog, how I sent my publisher, Alaska Dreams Publishing, some manuscripts for my planned "The Badge and the Cross" series, with each book a completely separate location and having no connection with other manuscripts.
One such book in the series is entitled "Stronghold", based in Skagway and in the time period I was a member of the Skagway Police Department. Now all the names have been changed to protect the guilty and the innocent, and some changes were made involving the actual incident, so as to keep the key figures involved in the true events unidentifiable by the local readers still living there or having moved there since this time period. I use my actual police cases for 90% of the incidents identified, which includes the homicide investigation of Christmas night. There were my complete series of investigations involving the town's secret coven, who was digging up grave sites and using the bones of long-dead gold miners to build satanic altars with. This is the investigation that nearly got me fired from the people I identified as members. Now for the book, I end this investigation in a different way, to keep the story running in a fictional way. I mainly intended this story to be read by sci-fi buffs who remain on their fences as to whether or not they believe the Lord exists. Or, for the new believer, who like myself truly doesn't understand what spiritual warfare is all about, until as a rookie, I was put right into the middle of it...and it very well could've cost me my life. To my benefit, I have a loving and spirit filled wife, who is truly a strong prayer warrior and former witch. ( I bet that caught you in mid-breath). We all have our pasts and hers has provided her with a knowledge of spiritual warfare, having worked it from both sides and has watched as the Lord's love and power has scored victory after victory.
This is a powerful read, but I've kept Alaska Dreams Publishing busy working on my other manuscripts. Still, I do hope some of you will look at this blog and mention your desire to see such a series out on the sale shelves.
Second in the series is called, "A Political Action", which involves Quebec terrorists, Royal Canadian Mounted Police and Canadian Secret Service, Alaska State Troopers and Alaska Railroad Special Agents. Following a bloody bombing of the Toronto Parliament building, Quebec Terrorists of the 1960's use the bombing to announce their return and how additional bombing well occur unless Quebec is given its total freedom from Canada. In the investigation of the bombing the terrorists strike at the key investigator; a RCMP captain and end up killing his wife and two children. Yes, this is a Christian novel with a power message that becomes clearer toward the end.
The terrorists learn, through a leak in the Canadian Prime Minister's Office, of a planned Official Visit to Alaska, where the Prime Minister is to meet with the Alaskan Governor in Fairbanks and ride in a special train car to Anchorage, with a one night stopover at Mt. McKinley Park. All the law enforcement entities are brought in, but so are the terrorists. The train is stopped in an unreachable spot and the terrorists take it over, causing the state to be placed on full alert, including elements of the Alaskan National Guard. Upon hearing of this, the RCMP captain takes leave and travels to Fairbanks, where he is eventually guided to an Alaskan Railroad Investigator, who was told to stay out of the way by an Alaska State Trooper SERT (SWAT) Lieutenant. Refusing to obey orders the two of them go on to Cantwell, where they finally find a guide to take them up into the mountain area reportedly being used by the terrorists. The guide is a former Army Chaplain who was wounded severely when his helicopter went down in Vietnam and to save some lives he had to kill 8 North Vietnamese soldiers close up and personal. He suffered a loss in faith after this incident, but he did decide to go on this nearly impossible quest of the other two men. Now to go any further might ruin a good read. I do hope you would enjoy this completely fictional story. Except to say I based one main character on a good friend of mine, who is now retired.
The last book written so far in this series is entitled "Militia". This fictional tale involves an Alaskan, a former Army officer with combat duties in Iraq and Afghanistan, and now a member of the FBI, being sent undercover back into Fairbanks as a disabled veteran. He is to make a connection with a new militant faction in Interior Alaska working under the guise of being a militia force. Within a few months, the undercover agent is picked up by the militia due to his old friends in the Fairbanks area, who have no knowledge of his leaving the military or joining the FBI. He soon becomes the unit's training officer and in a short time learns of the militia's plans to attack Eielson Air Force Base, Interior Alaska, during the July 4th Air Show. The Air Force "Thunderbird's" will be in attendance to perform their demonstrations in the skies over the base. An estimated 80,000 people are expected to attend the Open House, where they are to become captives of this rogue militia who now hold a radioactive "dirty bomb" as their bargaining chip to be heard by the United Nations.
A large group of Alaskans, for which this militia is the militant group for, feels the 1959 statehood election was a fraud and done illegally. Less than 50% of the ballots were sent out to the villages and those that were had only been printed in English. The UN had required 4 options be on the ballot, when the actual ballots displayed only two options and how planeloads of GIs were flown up from Washington and they were told how to vote by senior officers. There were other allegations, but the story gets into these. This is a fictional story, with non-fictional accounts and information concerning on-going legal battles against the US Congress over this 1959 voting and the promises by US congress they failed to honor moments after the announcement was made by the President. I'll leave the rest to the book, but I believe you will enjoy it. Talk of secession have increased due to the activities carried out by the current administration. It's anyone guess for now.
But as you follow China's day to day activities, as I do, you'll notice how their sphere of influence continues to widen around the world. They are currently involved with more countries than we are and providing major loans, while we are broke. China is also reportedly constructing and testing a new nuclear submarine which is said to be able to cross the Pacific Ocean from Orient to US in two hours or less. Extremely fast.
The Ebola Virus continues to kill and spread slowly, another new case found in India. Now, after 70 years Japan has seen its first case of locally infected Dengue Fever.
Russia launches military invasion of Ukraine with tanks and military vehicle, with Ukraine appealing to NATO for help. While NATO plans to set up new Eastern Europe bases to keep Russia from entering any other countries that used to be under Moscow's control. Such a plan could bring about a similar circumstance known as the "Iron Curtain", post WWII. Putin has began to see this new NATO move as a potential threat and has begun to respond with military overhaul.
I recommend you follow the Global Times ( English speaking Chinese News), Washington Free Beacon- a conservative news watch, FOX News, Moscow Times-Russia's English speaking newspaper, NY Times, LA Times and Jerusalem Post. This gives you a pretty balance look at world events. Blaze is also a fun read. But please, double or triple check your findings because newspapers are all owned by CEOs, who have their own ideas of what should be carried and what shouldn't. Don't believe it just because its written down, even in my Blog.
I know, another long one today, but I was in a writing mood and its been raining all day. Enjoy your night. BIL
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