On Wednesday, President Bush, like Wooderson the morning after the emergency beer bust, essentially announced that he was “getting his third wind.” This affirmation was hardly met Thursday morning with as much jubilation as the prospect of blazing en route to an Aerosmith concert, much to the consternation of your closed-minded football coach. In the face of Bush’s announcement that America will remain in an apparently inexorable, increasingly unmanageable foreign conflict, the weather in Los Angeles shows no signs of deteriorating. In fact, all in all, Los Angeles is looking at a solid 2007.
Despite the injury to versatile power forward Lamar Odom, the Lakers are surprisingly keeping pace in the Pacific Division at 23–13. The often combative and egocentric Kobe Bryant has seemingly come to terms with the fact that although he will have had roughly half a decade more to establish himself in the NBA, he will never be Michael Jordan. This realization of inferiority appears to be best for the team, which is finally coming together after the hard-hitting Shaq-odus. At 17–19, the Clippers are finally back where they are supposed to be as a second-class team. The city, of course, has a shining history of rapidly defusing class conflicts. Disgruntled Laker defectors from last season can happily jump ship once again, although it was never that much of an inconvenience in that they can drive their Mercedes and Escalades to the same place.
The city of Los Angeles will also greatly benefit from the addition of David Beckham to the Galaxy for 5 years at $250 million. Beckham will reportedly play every single position on the L.A. Galaxy in the upcoming season, and the team has been chosen to dominate the MLS with an undefeated record. Aside from its integral spot in the epic legacy of American professional soccer, the European sensation most likely chose the Galaxy because L.A. is full of beautiful people, not to mention palm trees and a scintillating nightlife, perks which will always be there, no matter how many wars America becomes entangled in.
Amidst the inevitable rejuvenation of L.A. athletics, California Proposition 83 signifies a veritable icing on the cake for the untouchable City of Angels. Now that 83 is in full effect, as the Governator announced yesterday in his budget speech, a vast majority of Angelinos are no longer to be trapped in their Bel-Air mansions under supervision for what the L.A. Times deems “nonviolent crimes.” This winter, they can finally take those ski-trips to Tahoe and Vail that they had been denied for so long under the draconian parole measures which so brutally punished cocaine abuse. Realistically, the only ones that cocaine abuse hurts are fans of the painfully uncreative post-’80s Saturday Night Live.
There is no end in sight for the war on terror. Furthermore, despite the inconvenient truth we face as polluting Earthlings in Chicago and much of the rest of America, this winter is simply far too chilly. The moralizing measures of the Franciscans, who first inhabited the region from which Los Angeles so gloriously sprang, have long since deteriorated. Tommy’s 24-hour Burger and the Standard on Sunset now stand as bastions of unchecked debauchery. The Comedy Store and particularly the Laugh Factory have developed into virtual Athenian symposia, where failing comedic personalities can tackle the most provocative of issues to an audience chasing a two-drink minimum. In these tempestuous times of questionable leadership and blizzards, Americans everywhere can take a more than reasonably priced Southwest Airlines flights to the ever-welcoming LAX airport. There’s nothing like walking to baggage claim alongside shifty-eyed drug lords, paper-thin supermodels, and Robert Downey, Jr. (to reiterate, he can travel across state lines now) to convince the weary American that even if we have not yet succeeded in trafficking freedom abroad, at least the sunniest city in the Sunshine State is carrying weight like a Mack Truck.
