At perhaps no time since the 1880s' right-of-way battle between Southern Pacific Railroad owner Collis P. Huntington and Irvine Ranch owner James Irvine over a line to connect Los Angeles with San Diego, or 1889, when years of bitterness by ignored residents of what was then southern Los Angeles County came to a head with the formation of Orange County, or 2002, when Hollywood released the horrendous OrangeCounty, have the two counties been so at odds. Los Angeles Mayor Jim Hahn has been relentless in his attempts to not only thwart the will of OC voters who overwhelmingly reject a commercial airport at the former El Toro Marine base, but also to have those proposed runways owned and operated by LAX. Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca secretly maneuvered to plunk his aero bureau at the Los Alamitos military base, and now exposed, he's been loathe to negotiate with the western OC residents who'd have to suffer with noisy police helicopters 24/7. And then there is the most symbolic slap of all: renaming our beloved Major League Baseball team the LOSANGELES!!!Angels . . . of Anaheim.
When Orange County Supervisor Lou Correa was quoted in the March 16 LosAngelesTimessaying, “We can't continue to be the stepchild of Los Angeles,” he was talking about the new Angels name, but those sentiments would apply to so many slights—real and perceived—over the years. Complicating matters further are Orange County's recent pop-culture moments in the sun (really fucking awful OrangeCounty, growing-staler-by-the-episode TheO.C.and still-funnier-than-shit ArrestedDevelopment) that depict our pricier chunks of real estate not only with the dialogue of writers who sip their lattes in LA, but also with actual LA real estate subbing for Newport Beach, which in their twisted views represents all of this diverse county of ours.
Now, we real Orange Countians could pull out those dusty Don't Tread on Me flags we have stowed in the garage next to our muskets and powder horns and (with apologies to Sandow Birk) simply go to war with LA. But that'd be wrong. For one thing, war never solves anything. For another, they outnumber us, 6 to 1. And it'd seem as if we here behind the fabled “Orange Curtain” (coined in LA, no doubt) suffered from a major inferiority complex. We have no reason to. We have cool people, buildings and clubs just like LA does. And face it: OC is the future to LA's funky/charming/blood-soaked past. So we should lead Angelenos by their wrinkly hands and properly introduce them to our promised land. Since the Los Angeles Angels symbolize our interlocking times, we've decided the April 3 opening of baseball season represents the best time to educate our amigos in ElPueblodelaReinadeNuestraSeoradeLos Angeles. Once you get to know us, LA, you'll love us as much as we love ourselves, or at least as much as we pretend to love you (air kiss!). Heck, who knows: maybe the next time someone makes a lame nighttime soap opera about teens in LA, we'll let you film it in The OC. 'Cause that's how we do it here.
Bitch.
