MIKE POMPEO, Secretary of State with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in 2018 (State Department photo).

With all the competition for students these days as public school enrollment declines, educators have launched programs to promote the virtues of their districts.

One of the ways this is done is to promote the accomplishments of students who have gone through their districts: entertainers, athletes, and civic leaders. Well, among Orange County school systems, the Garden Grove Unified has a leg up on its rivals in the latter department. The State Department, that is.

Mike Pompeo, the Secretary of State since April 26, 2018, is a 1982 graduate of Los Amigos High School, where he played basketball for the Lobos. From there he went to West Point (U.S. Military Academy) for his bachelor of science degree, and then on to Harvard University for the juris doctorate.

Before serving as America’s top diplomat, Pompeo was the director of the CIA (Jan. 23, 2017 to April 26, 2018) and before that a Republican Congressman from Kansas. He also served in the U.S Army, rising to the rank of captain with the 4th Infantry Division.

In his civilian career, after working as an attorney, he and three friends went into the aerospace industry with some venture capital money and investment from Koch Industries and Bain Capital. The Koch folks were heavy contributors to Pompeo’s 2010 and 2012 campaigns, giving $200,000 combined.

Despite his current job, Pompeo may not always have been the soul of diplomatic tact. In the 2010 race, his campaign’s Twitter account posted a remark – later deleted – calling President Barack Obama an “evil Muslim communist” and slamming Democratic opponent Raj Goyle as a “turban topper” who was not fit to run for Congress because he was not a Christian.

Pompeo later apologized and said he was not involved with the tweet, which included several spelling and grammatical errors.

Neo-Nazis on the Village Green?

The Festival Amphitheater on the Village Green in Garden Grove was long the home of live Shakespeare performances; great plays with a fair amount of stage violence. According to OC Weekly, that same venue – now re-branded as Garden Grove Amphitheater (or Garden Amp) – had some real-life combat during a punk rock concert on Sunday.

OC WEEKLY recent issue.

Steve Donofrio wrote that the show, “A Punk Rock Food Drive,” was interrupted during a set by skinhead types during a set by Reagan Youth,  one of them reportedly hopping on the stage to shout “Orange County is a white man’s town.” Obviously, he hasn’t been keeping up with current events.

A “full-fledged fistfight” ensued and the neo-Nazis were “chased out of the show and badly beaten in the process,” Donofrio reported. Garden Amp security kept the nimrods from returning.

No judgment here. Most events at the “Garden Amp” have been low-profile and violence-free. However, it’s ironical to note that the former incumbent theater group – Shakespeare Orange County – was replaced in favor of, well, whatever it was that happened on Main Street on Sunday night.

For the complete article, go to https://ocweekly.com/neo-nazis-at-reagan-youth-show-garden-amp/ .

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