A TALE OF THREE CITIES: NEW YORK, L.A. AND SAN FRANCISCO IN OCTOBER OF ‘62 (69 page)

In 1999, Los Angeles began its recovery. It
was embodied first by the building of Staples Center in downtown
Los Angeles. This coincided with a three-year NBA championship run
by the Los Angeles Lakers, led by coach Phil Jackson and two
superstars, Shaquille O'Neal and Kobe Bryant.

The downtown L.A. corridor was refurbished
by a gentrification project run by Mayor Richard Riordan. In
addition, air quality standards were put in place, creating vastly
cleaner air than Los Angelenos had been forced to breathe in 1962.
When Pete Carroll took over and created one of the all-time great
football dynasties at Southern California in the 2000s, it helped
revitalize downtown L.A. even more, building on the momentum of
Staples Center and Laker glory.

This helped in the building of the Galen
Center, USC's new basketball arena, which in turn helped the
creation of new businesses and nightlife in the heretofore moribund
south-central Los Angeles area around USC.

The
San Francisco Examiner
went out of
business. Many of its writers joined the
San Francisco Chronicle
. The
Chronicle
actually
improved its sports section, largely on the basis of absorbing
talent from the
Examiner
and also writing about prep sports. The political
tone of the paper continued to be liberal, with columnists like
Herb Caen, Charles McCabe and Art Hoppe replaced by even-less
impressive scribes, most of whom found little alliance with Truth.
As a direct result, the
Chronicle's
subscription base has gone down . . . down . . .
down. At the same time, two local radio stations, KNEW and KSFO,
went to conservative formats, and even in liberal San Francisco
have blown ratings competitors away. Whether this fact is
scientific proof of conservatism's superiority over liberalism is
not known but worth exploring.

The
Los Angeles Herald-Examiner
went out
of business. Former sports editor Bud Furillo passed away in 2006.
The
Santa Monica Evening Outlook
also went out of business. The
Orange County Register
thrived in the growing suburbs of the Southland. Jim Murray
passed away in 2000, and this had a direct effect on the quality of
the
Los Angeles Times
. Its sports coverage went downhill and, especially after the
Chandler family sold its interest to the umbrella company of
the
Chicago Sun-Times
, of all things, the paper became reliably Left-leaning in
the Bill Clinton years. As a direct result, its subscription base,
like the
New York Times
for essentially the same reason, has plummeted.
The Rupert Murdoch-owned
New York
Post
became much more popular.

In 2000, George H.W. Bush's
son, George W. Bush, was elected President of the United States.
This anguished Teddy Kennedy, who had long felt that
his
was America's "royal
family," and that
he
was the "crown prince." Instead, a former alcoholic,
tobacco-chewing, born again Christian fighter pilot from Midland,
Texas was the man turning the Bush family, not the Kennedys, into
America's political dynasty.

George W. Bush's election and subsequent
re-election in 2004 symbolized the face of America's changing
political landscape, traced back to the 1964-65 Civil Rights Act,
and Richard Nixon's 1968 "Southern strategy," when he made himself
palatable to voters who otherwise would have cast ballots for the
segregationist Alabama Governor, George Wallace.

Despite his family's Greenwich, Connecticut
pedigree, Bush was a Southerner. His father had ventured to west
Texas in the 1950s, where he made his millions as an oil
"wildcatter." The odd conundrum was that the Civil Rights Movement
was probably the greatest accomplishment of liberalism in the
1960s. Its benefactor was not the Democrats; it was the GOP when
Nixon successfully husbanded the South into the mainstream of the
union by making the party palatable to Southerners who abhorred the
Left in the 1960s. Integration occurred with seamless success under
the auspices of the GOP, much of it brought about when conservative
football coaches like Alabama's Paul "Bear" Bryant recruited blacks
in confluence with his team's home loss to the black-dominated USC
Trojans at Birmingham in 1970. Ronald Reagan had harnessed the new
sentiments and consolidated them. Clinton and his Vice President,
Al Gore, briefly made the Democrats competitive in the South, but
in 2000 Dixie, unimpressed with the Clinton's immorality, rebuffed
them.

On September 11, 2001, Islamic terrorists
flew two jets into the World Trade Center in New York City. Mayor
Rudolph Giuliani ascended into heroic status for his handling of
the crisis. Giuliani had made his name in the 1980s when, as a
Reagan Administration prosecutor he all-but ended Mob rule in New
York City, using the RICO statute to dismantle the organized
criminal network of John Gotti and the Mafia.

Giuliani was elected Mayor
and cleaned up Times Square of prostitutes, pimps, drug peddlers,
porn shops, and other undesirables. He beefed up the police force,
reduced crime, and performed what seemed to be a miracle.
Single-handedly, Giuliani returned New York to its 1962 splendor,
if not greater
panache
.

In 2000, the Republican Giuliani ran for the
U.S. Senate seat from New York against Democrat Hillary Clinton. He
easily would have won, but had to drop out when he was diagnosed
with prostate cancer, which he subsequently overcame. In 2008,
Giuliani ran for the Presidency.

After 9/11, President Bush launched two wars
against Islamic Jihadism, in Afghanistan and in Iraq. Initially,
the fall of the twin towers created terrible economic conditions.
Against great odds, Bush restored the economy to its greatest
levels in history. Whereby the Clinton economy had risen on the
strength of the "peace dividend," courtesy of the GOP; policies put
in place by a Republican Congress; and the false investments of the
"dot-bomb" era; the Bush economy rebounded from 9/11 on the
strength of sound financial principles.

In 2002, the Republicans swept the mid-terms
and in 2004 Bush and his party were re-elected with the largest
number of votes ever recorded. By 2008, victory was achieved in
Afghanistan and Iraq. When this occurred, it had a profound effect
on the Democrat Party, which as a result may actually dismantle
and, by 2012, not even be a viable political entity.

The Cold War, while considered "Reagan's
victory," in fairness was won by America, Republicans and Democrats
alike. Harry Truman, John Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson fought it and
deserve a share of the credit. But Ted Kennedy's decision to
abandon our South Vietnamese allies in 1974 led the party on an
inexorable path of destruction. The very same strategy was
attempted during the dark days of the Iraq War.

Republicans, like Winston Churchill standing
alone against Adolf Hitler, were the only ones who stayed the
course instead of cuttin' 'n' runnin'. When victory was attained,
they and they alone were able to take credit and thus reap the
rewards.

Osama bin Laden was forced
to look upon the world's landscape and gulpingly realize that of
all things he may have wanted to occur when he ordered the planes
to fly into the World Trade Center in 2001,
the very opposite is what actually occurred!

Francis Fukuyama's prediction that history
had "ended" in 1992 had been premature. "World War III" had been
the Cold War, won by America, led by Ronald Reagan. "World War IV"
was the failed effort by bin Laden and the Jihadists to fuel a
worldwide Islamic revolution. He had failed and American had won.
Instead of bin Laden's goal coming true, the United States now was
the dominant political-military force in the Middle East,
buttressed by the second-most powerful entity, Israel. The
Palestinian Intifadas had been rebuffed, replaced by Fatah holding
sway over a divided Hamas, with a peace deal resulting in
Palestinian statehood now on the agenda, orchestrated by Secretary
of State Condoleeza Rice.

The "Axis of Evil" was now dismantled by
Bush: Iraq, suddenly America's second-best ally in the Middle East;
North Korea, acquiescing to arms inspector's demands after years of
obfuscation; Iran, unable to gain a foothold or expand its "Persian
Empire" in neighboring Iraq when General David Petraeus's "Surge"
was successful, suddenly demonstrating they were no longer pursuing
nuclear weapons with its previous bellicosity.

` In 2008, the United States of America
stood astride the world like a colossus, a power over and above all
previous assumptions, even American ones after World War II or the
winning of the Cold War. The only power greater was God, which many
Christian Revelationists are predicting will return at the End of
Time, said to be between 2011 and 2012.

Whether Jesus Christ returns soon or not,
the U.S. - his favored country? - has seemingly vanquished as much
evil as possible in preparation thereof. Colonialism, slavery,
nationalism, Nazism, Communism, terrorism; each deposited into the
"ash heap of history" by the United States.

Carthage, the enemy of the Roman Empire,
which according to the statesman Cato "must be destroyed" in order
that the glory of Rome be allowed to prosper unfettered, had been
destroyed.

The October of their years

"You have to have a lot of little boy in you
to play baseball."

• Roy Campanella
  

When I pitched in the
Oakland organization, I had a chance to get to know Bill Rigney
personally. In 1994 I wrote a screenplay,
Once He Was An Angel
, about former
southpaw Bo Belinsky, who pitched for Rig. Even though I had not
been a major prospect with the A’s, Rig remembered me, and gave me
valuable insight into that period. One funny anecdote involved a
friend of mine, Kevin McCormack, who for years would call my house
and identify himself to my dad as some well-known sports figure;
say, Reggie Jackson or Vin Scully. One day Rig calls me, my dad
answers and asks who is on the line, and Rig says, “Bill Rigney.”
My dad said, “Yeah, right, Mac,” before recognizing the voice as
Rig’s.

Bob Case was the Angels’ clubhouse attendant
when the team played at Dodger Stadium. He remained close friends
with most of the old Angels, and eventually came to own one of the
best baseball memorabilia collections in the nation. His Westlake
Village neighbor, Charlie Sheen, a rabid baseball fanatic,
regularly perused Case’s collection, buying many items. When he saw
a photo of Bo Belinsky, Sheen said, “There’s my hero. I wanna play
him in a movie.”

"Once He Was An Angel" was
the name of Pat Jordan’s chapter – excerpted in
Sports Illustrated
– about Bo
Belinsky in his masterful book,
The
Suitors of Spring
. My screenplay was based
on Jordan's article and Maury Allen’s book,
Bo: Pitching and Wooing
.

For several years Bo and I
went through the odyssey of trying to get that script made into a
movie. Getting to know Bo Belinsky personally turned out to be one
of the most fascinating experiences of my life. I re-visited the
Belinsky epic in 1999 when, as a columnist for the L.A. sports
magazine
StreetZebra
, I wrote a “Distant Replay” about Bo.

Between 1962 and 1964 Belinsky, who was
talented but never lived up to his potential beyond the night of
his 1962 no-hit game against the Baltimore Orioles, was the most
publicized athlete in the nation. More than Sandy Koufax, Willie
Mays, Johnny Unitas, Wilt Chamberlain or Bill Russell; all
superstars of the era.

“I don’t know that there were more words
written about Bo than anybody else,” Maury Allen said in 1999, “but
he was up there.” This despite an ultimately losing record in 1962
and a bad 1963, in which he was demoted to the minors.

Rigney and Belinsky feuded
from 1962-64, when Bo was arrested for throwing a lovesick showgirl
out of his “lipstick red” Cadillac, later assaulted
L.A. Times
sportswriter
Braven Dyer, and showed up “reeking of booze and broads,” only to
find the club’s Boston hotel burning down.

“
See me at the ballpark
first thing in the morning,” was all Rigney, who had thought Bo was
burning up inside, said when he observed him try to “blend in” with
the pajama-wearing group.

It was around this time that Bo had a well
publicized fling with B movie starlet Mamie van Doren. “Rig was
always trying to hit on Mamie when I’d bring her to team parties,”
recalled Belinsky, who lived in Las Vegas until his 2001 passing.
“They all tried to get in her pants. Every time I’d get in trouble,
Rig would call me on the carpet and say he was my friend, but
behind my back he’d say I was bad for the game.”

Rigney certainly had no hard feelings. He
said his sole motivation in helping the research of a screenplay
about Bo’s life was, “I’ll do it if it helps Bo.”

An older, mellower Belinsky had fond
memories of his old manager.

“
If I’d listened to him
then,” he said in 1994, “I would have had a much better
career.”

Bo bought Mamie a rock but
the engagement broke up. Later he married
Playboy
Playmate of the Year Jo
Collins, but that ended in divorce. Belinsky was unable to control
his taste for wine, women and song, and for a while was homeless.
He eventually saved the life of an heiress in the Hawaii surf and
married her, but that marriage also failed. Finally, his old
teammate Albie Pearson came to him and helped Belinsky find Christ
prior to his passing in the early 2000s.