Free Republic

VANDENBERG AIR FORCE BASE, Calif. — Beefed up security at Vandenberg Air Force Base is preventing public access to the state's Point Sal Beach, which can only be reached on foot through military base property. Outdoor recreational activity has also been banned on most of Vandenberg's 98,000 acres near Lompoc. The military says the heightened state of security will be in place indefinitely. Officials with Vandenberg's 30th Space Wing says the Department of Defense ordered the increase in security and no details are being released. However, the measures were imposed after Osama bin Laden released an audio recording threatening Americans.

Since Sept. 11, Americans have plastered their windows, bumpers, and just about anything flat with mass-produced replicas of the American flag. But few have taken their patriotic fervor to the extreme that Bodger Seeds Ltd. of Lompoc, Calif., has. The family-owned firm has created a flag that not only covers 6-1/2 acres of land – but is also, quite literally, homegrown. This floriculturist's fantasy lies nestled among the fields of central California's "Valley of Flowers," and is composed of roughly 400,000 red, white, and blue larkspur plants. With each plant yielding approximately four to five buds, that adds up to...