Mother claims daughter is Navajo citizen
By Steele Coddington| April 1, 2009
TWO GUNS, ARIZONA – April Smothers, who made headlines and amazed doctors when she found out she was pregnant at 87, has filed a law suit. She claims her daughter, who was born on the Navajo Reservation in northern Arizona, is an “anchor baby” and therefore eligible for Navajo citizenship. Her daughter, according to Mrs. Smothers, was born while she was on a hunting trip on the Reservation.
“I was hunting with an old Navajo scout friend of my family, Charlie Tall Arrows, just north of Two Guns, when my contractions started,” she recalled, “and my daughter was delivered by Charlie Tall Arrows’ wife.” The baby daughter was proudly named Pocahontas right after the delivery in the back of a Ford half ton pickup.
“Charlie and my father were friends and Charlie’s son, Horatio Tall Arrows was on Guadalcanal with my brother in the Marine Corps. So I’ve been hunting with them up near Canyon Diablo for years. Maybe I underestimated how close I was to the time Pocahontas was expected, but being a pioneer woman and with a friend like Charlie’s wife, who helped me deliver, we came through with flying colors.”
Mrs. Smothers has stayed on the Reservation and intends to legally fight any attempt to remove her from her spread near Two Guns. She has hired the lawyers of American Conservatives Love U.S. (ACLUS) to help her establish her daughter’s Navajo citizenship and will fight any liberal counter-suits by organizations that challenge traditional American rights. “Hell, if illegals can have anchor babies, so can I,” she claims proudly.
“How will you school your daughter?” the State Superintendent of Education asked in an interview. Mrs. Smothers said, “I’m gonna combine Home Schooling with the common sense that’s taught on the Reservation so she don’t grow up to be a damn Socialist like all them taxaholic liberals in Washington stealing my hard earned money to spend on transferring wealth to a bunch of ding-dongs who will spend it on tattoos, earrings and other paraphernalia and end up with nothing to show for it.”
Mrs. Smothers and her family are at peace with their Navajo friends and plan to establish a business in Two Guns to provide a private sector, free enterprise entity that survives on hard work and profits without government handouts.
Photo: Pioneer Cave Creek woman April Smothers holding her new daughter Pocahontas, made headlines last year when she announced she was pregnant at the age of 87.
Photo by Steele Coddington
Spur Cross Stinker
By Don Sorchych | April 1, 2009
CAVE CREEK – Is there a monster at fabled Spur Cross Ranch? Everyone has heard of the Abominable Snowman, Florida’s Skunk Ape and similar creatures that quietly reside in remote regions.
There have been rumors that a huge, smelly, ape-like critter lives at Spur Cross Ranch (SCR) and adjoining Tonto National Forest.
So I asked John Gunn, supervisor of SCRCA. He answered, “I don’t want to talk about it.” “Why?” I asked. “I have a reputation to uphold,” he said.
“Well John,” I said, “I know you plant all kinds of cameras out there to photograph wildlife, so you should know. Can I see the photos? They are public records you know.”
“I had a fire and all the photos were destroyed,” he replied.
Getting nowhere, I thought I would try Richard Mocco, the artist that has resided at Harmony Hollow at the south edge of SCR for a long time.
Mocco and his associate John Woodjack have a splendid vegetable garden there. Mocco said, “Yes, I see him regularly but don’t tell anybody, he is friendly. The only problem is he is huge and eats most of our vegetables, not to mention chickens, but what the hell, he has to eat.”
I asked what he looked like. Richard said he looks a lot like the Suns basketball mascot only bigger, hairy and with a horrific odor.
Hmmm, the Suns mascot wears an ape suit.
I asked if he had a photo. Richard said he once got out his camera and it was the only time the beast got vicious so he put it away and the beast quieted.
“Could I take his picture?” I asked.
“Only if you are tired of living,” he chuckled.
Driving south on Spur Cross Road, I stopped at Town Manager Usama Abujbarah’s house. He said many had told him of such a creature but he didn’t believe it until strange things happened at his house.
“Like?” I asked.
“I saw a big thing running by my patio and my parrot, which is often free, flew under the couch with its feathers askew, squawking and shaking. Both my wife Juman and my daughter Kinda were terrified,” he said.
“You hadn’t imbibed with your hookah had you?” I asked.
“Maybe, but I only had tobacco in it,” he promised.
So I went further down the road to Bill Payne’s house and told him of the three interviews.
Bill was thoughtful, and said, “Some big varmint comes around occasionally. I saw this big ape-like varmint and my hackles went up. My neighbor’s dog was there and he whined and ran home with his hackles up. Maybe it was some nut in an ape suit, but it was hot and that thing was at least seven feet tall and smelled God awful.”
Investigation continues. Watch for updates.
Pelosi decries drug testing, helps push toward decriminalization
By Linda Bentley | April 1, 2009
President vows veto
WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., stated during a Wednesday morning press conference, “Under no circumstances” would she support legislation requiring random drug testing of members of Congress, while Democrats continue demanding decriminalization of marijuana possession.
After addressing a group of illegal aliens last week, where she called employment raids by Immigration and Customs Enforcement “un-American,” Pelosi said employment raids forced undocumented families to sell drugs just to put food on their tables.
“It is un-American to take away their livelihoods or send them to jail while they’re here trying to improve their lives,” said Pelosi.
Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., was adamantly opposed to the bill introduced last week by Rep. John Shadegg, R-Ariz., who asked, "If so many jobs in the private sector require random drug tests, why shouldn’t Congress? Where better to show we’re serious about the war on drugs than right here?"
Last July, Frank introduced a bill to remove all federal penalties criminalizing the possession and use of marijuana by adults.
Frank said, “To those who say the government should not be encouraging the smoking of marijuana, my response is I completely agree. But it is a great mistake to divide all human activity into two categories: those who like to smoke pot and those who don’t. In a free society, there must be a very considerable zone of activity between those two poles in which people are allowed to make up their own mind as to whether or not it really matters if they like smoking marijuana since they’re not impinging on the rights, freedom, or property of others, unless, of course, they’re smoking a large amount of someone else’s pot. Criminalizing choices adults make, no matter how kinky they may seem, is not appropriate in a free society.”
Last year, Frank, along with co-sponsors Rep. Barbara Lee (D-CA) and Lacy Clay (D-MO), urged lawmakers to support HR 5843, which would have removed federal penalties for the “personal use of marijuana by responsible adults.”
In 2004, the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML) donated $1,000 to both Pelosi and Frank and in 2006 it contributed $1,500 to Frank’s campaign.
President Barack Obama said he would veto both bills if they should come across his desk.
In a December 2008 Esquire article, “Why Obama really might decriminalize Obama,” NORML Executive Director Allen St. Pierre, while pointing out some of Obama’s biggest financial donors are friends of the legalization movement, stated, “Frankly, George Soros, Peter Lewis, and John Sperling — this triumvirate of billionaires — if those three men, who put up $50 to $60 million to get Democrats and Obama elected, can’t pick up the phone and actually get a one-to-one meeting on where this drug policy is going, then maybe it’s true that when you give money, you don’t expect favors.”
Now St. Pierre says it appears Obama “said whatever he needed to say to whomever in order to get elected,” but hasn’t given up hope.
After all, St. Pierre asked, “How can Obama – the same guy who helped sell marijuana and cocaine out of a hot dog cart in Honolulu with Frank Marshal Davis when he was a teenager – turn his back on those who propelled him to the White House?”
When asked their thoughts on decriminalization, Obama said, “Smoking marijuana makes it hard to think,” Vice President Joe Biden said, “I really just prefer to drink,” while Pelosi acknowledged it helps her blink.