Fat City

FreakPowerRevisited
HSTFriday8thEditionVille

Hey!

Here's a thought.

Instead of the taxpayers, why don't the greedheads, those who are going to make a fortune a gazillion times bigger than Ross Rebagliati's appetite after a monster dube-in-half-pipe session, cough up the dough for the capital costs of building everything from highways, to sewers, to the onsite venues required for the upcoming Olympics?

And we could start with the biggest, of the biggest snout-in-troughers.... Intrawest:

"In a move one senior official called the most significant change in the company in 10 years, Intrawest this week announced a corporate shuffle aimed at “growing” the company’s resort business.

Today’s move by Intrawest, the parent company for Whistler Blackcomb, brings together a number of disparate elements within the company to form something called the Leisure and Travel Group.....

The group, which is to be headed by Dan Jarvis and Hugh Smythe, brings all company operations except for real estate development under one umbrella.

The move, Smythe said, is meant to “create a more systematized approach” to the resort business in an effort to increase the number of visitors coming to Whistler and other Intrawest resorts..........

Dave Brownlie, formerly executive vice-president of Whistler Blackcomb, is now executive vice president and chief operating officer of Whistler Blackcomb and Panorama resorts.

Doug Forseth retains the title of senior VP of operations for Whistler Blackcomb. He will report to Brownlie and will take on the added responsibility of guiding the company’s preparation for the 2010 Olympics.

Smythe said Brownlie’s focus will change to one that looks at coordinating company-wide efforts and finding “synergies” within the company....."

'Reporter', Squamish Chief, May 21st 2004.

Of course, making the land-rapers pay their fair share to have us rocket their profit margins into the stratosphere will never be easy as long as the Man from Marathon is running the Province and a chap named Hugh O'Reilly is running the township of Whistler.

What's that you say?

O'Reilly is leaving?

By gum, you're right.

And surprise, surprise here's why:

"The current mayor of Whistler, Hugh O'Reilly announced last Wednesday he would not be seeking re-election, instead taking a job in Hawaii to sell real estate for a division of Intrawest Corp."

Sean Holman, Public Eye Online, Aug 05th 2005

So, what do you do to counter a little piggy-in-a-blanket politico like that?

Well, you could go throw the bum out and go looking for a very different candidate with a different set of principles and a very different election platform.

Like, maybe the following, which was the manifesto of a certain someone who ran for Sheriff in the mountain resort town of Aspen Colorado not so, so long ago:

1. Sod the streets at once. Rip up all the streets with jack hammers and use the junk asphalt (after melting) to create a huge parking lot and auto-storage lot on the outskirts of town.
2. Change the name "Aspen" by public referendum to "Fat City." This would prevent greedheads, land-rapers and other human jackals from capitalizing on the name "Aspen."
3. Drug sales must be controlled. My first act as Sheriff will be to install, on the courthouse lawn, a bastinado platform and a set of stocks—in order to punish dishonest dope dealers in a proper public fashion.
4. Hunting and fishing should be forbidden to all non-residents, with the exception of those who can obtain the signed endorsement of a resident—who will then be legally responsible for any violation or abuse committed by the non-resident he has "signed for."
5. The Sheriff and his Deputies should never be armed in public. Every urban riot, shoot-out and blood-bath (involving guns) in recent memory has been set off by some trigger-happy cop in a fear frenzy.
6. It will be the policy of the Sheriff's office savagely to harass all those engaged in any form of land-rape. This will be done by acting, with utmost dispatch, on any and all righteous complaints.

Hunter S. Thompson, "The Battle of Aspen"
Rolling Stone, October 1, 1970. Republished in RS 970, March 25, 2005.

Yup, that's right, Thompson ran for sheriff on the 'Freak Power' ticket at the tail end of the '60's. He felt that his country was doomed to hell by Nixon. He was in a rut. He was unable to come up with the follow-up to Hell's Angels and he owed Random House a fortune on advances from a book he had been promising them for almost two years whose theme was 'The Death of The American Dream'. He never did write 'that' book, but he only lost the election by a handful of votes, then Warren Hinckle published the Kentucky Derby piece in the soon-to-be-extinct Scanlan's Monthly, and the rest is Gonzo history.

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Update: Turns out that soon to be former Whistler mayor O'Reilly actually lived in Aspen, as a ski-bum of sorts, in the early 1970's. Wonder if he ever ran into, or was run out of town by, the good Docktor or his buddy, lawyer, touch football partner, and soon to by Vegas fellow traveller, Oscar Zeta Acosta?
Sure hope this slakes Thursday's thirst after an extended HST hiatus; now I've just got to finish that darned thing I promised Mr. Barnes.

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