The Olympic Record

By Leo LaBranche

Opening Statements

All Persons are created Equal unless you used the word Olympic and that’s where Equality ended. A music-man’s solitary battle against an international conspiracy attempting to deny all Americans the Right and Privilege to use the word Olympic any time, any place, for any reason under pain of destruction and financial ruin. Congress was not responsible for this extreme position espoused and enforced but the law was subject to interpretation with prejudicial and gratuitous support from the federal courts, all the way to the top. Royalty had truly visited our federal courts. With few exceptions, most jurists bowed or curtsied as the case may be. I’ve heard of star-struck but this was too sad not to be true.

The 99th & 100th Congress, the Department of Justice and Federal Agencies, and 46 states were bright spots in author’s Quixotic quest to use the word Olympic for his music label “Olympic Records” formed in Burbank, California 1982.

NOTE
The Olympic records of athletes are published every four (4) years by Bantam/Doubleday/Dell Books since 1964. “Guinness Book of Olympic Records” requires no permission from any Olympic committees to own and publish these statistics, now or ever. B/D/D owns the rights to the copyrighted compilation of facts in book or any other form of Media.

Follow the bouncing balls of fickle fate and bear witness to the “luck of the draw” in a fixed contest. Feel the intensity of fight or flight, a primal expression and powerful motivator. Author had an “obligation to capital” which made the conflict necessary leaving no personal choice. Some battles were won but to no avail. The war was lost in the Supreme Court (1988) and ten years later was “won” in the Congress (1998). The Epilogue reveals a closure of sorts.

Dedications
To the Lawyers, the Legislator, and the Judge I dedicated this compilation of facts and experiences. Without those particular Human Beings I could not have persevered, and without Mr. Brown I would not have written the story. He suggested it early on and emphasized the necessity of a chronology kept. The sub-title, The Pro Se Litigant, (as he named it) refers to the fact I was my own attorney until the U.S. court of appeals. Also the largest thanks of all to the existence of our Libraries.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Leo LaBranche
• Release date: Oct 12, 2011
• ISBN: 9781613647318

Leo LaBranche

Musician for life. On stage at three (why?) and continued after that first imprinting. Played trumpet for decades, still record some. Recordings available soon. Instrumental Music ala Mood, Alpha, Spa, or New Age soft jazz. Spent formative years in Atlanta in the 70's. Located to Hollywood in 80's - Scottsdale in the 90's. Florida in early 2000 for caring for elderly parents. Had home production audio studio for 25 years. Digital, analog, and Midi recording enabling complete recordings for singer/songwriters, usually guitar based. Contact Info [e-mail]

Book preview

The Olympic Record

Leo LaBranche

The Pro Se Litigant

Legal Dedications

Lewis M. Brown, the Father of Preventative Law

Ruth C. Tachna, Personal Attorney

Michael H. Gottesman, Supreme Court Counselor

Peter W. Rodino, Jr., House Judiciary Chairman

Alex Kozinski, Chief Judge, 9th Circuit U. S. Appeals Court

Personal Dedications

Lori, Amy, Leo, Elsa, Keira, and Chloe

Published by kokopelli books™

Smashwords Edition

© Copyright 2010 Leo LaBranche

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to others. If you would like to share this book with other persons, please purchase additional copies. Thank you for respecting the copyrighted property of this author.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

PART I

Prologue

Introduction

Chapter 1 11300 Vanowen

How Olympic Records came to be (1982)

Doug's Suggestion

Song Material

Go Find Olympic Records

Chapter 2 Corporations

The NEW YORK Corporation: Olympic Records, Inc. (01.05.83)

Chapter 3 Recording Sessions

For Your Inspiration Only, Kindra Koury

Chapter 4 Thomas Briccetti

RADIOLYMPIC

The Trademark design

Radio Promotion

Radio Markets

Advertised on Radio in Major Markets

Instrumental Music Sessions

Chapter 5 Trademark Office

Trademark Registration Refusal

Move to Idyllwild, California

Preparing for the Trademark Administrative court

The CBS Broadcast news program titled CROSSROADS

Federal Court

Earthquake

The First Summer from Hell

Chapter 6 Washington, D.C. Federal Court

D. C. Federal Court filing

Transfer the Case

Chapter 7 Los Angeles federal court

Ready Set - Start

The Federal Agencies

Read All About It!

The States

USOC letter to the States

Chapter 8 Gay Olympic Games - San Francisco Arts & Athletics

Amended Complaint filing

Ex-Parte - Caution - Blunder ahead

Meeting of the Parties

Chapter 9 You Lose, Mr. LaBranche

PART II

Chapter 10 Appeals Court

National Center for Preventative Law

Private Lobbyist

What to do?

Take the Case goes to Congress

Back to Congress

Congressional Replies

Journalists

Chapter 11 Petition

Chapter 12 The Olympic Record

Newsletter Sent to 2,500 entities

Background of Olympic Records

The Suit

My Personal Petition

Excerpt From Petitions

Revised Amateur Sports Act

Participate in the Legislative Process

PART III

Chapter 13 Martian Rules of Procedure

Martian Rules of Civil Procedure

The Amateur Sports Act of 1978 - FOOTNOTE TABLE

The Amateur Sports Act (author’s proposed bill)

Author's Comment

Aftermath of § 380 Amendment

Chapter 14 President Jimmy Carter Appeal

Summary

Chapter 15 Canada

Caution - Blunder Ahead

Welcome to my Olympic Blunder

Report and Transcript from Producer of the C.B.C. Journal

Chapter 16 National Association of Olympic Businesses

PART IV

Chapter 17 Dissenting Opinion

Honorable Judge Alex Kozinski

Chapter 18 NAOB and HR-1988

Chapter 19 Supreme Court takes SFAA

Summary of Argument

After the Ruling

Chapter 20 Linguistic Theft

Good-Bye Dr. Waddell – Eulogy

Chapter 21 Michael H. Gottesman

PART V

Chapter 22 Washington, One More Time

Supreme Court Opinion

Chapter 23 Peter W. Rodino, Jr.

House Judiciary Committee Response

Bio of Mr. Rodino

Chapter 24 Dear Owimpic

New York Times

Judgment And Permanent Injunction

EPILOGUE

Appendix Table

Appendix A Pro Se Litigant InformationWikipedia source

Appendix B First Amended Complaint

Appendix C Federal Court Evidence Record

Appendix D Legal Brief

Appendix E Tables of Statutes and Case Law

Appendix F Federal Rules of Evidence

Appendix G U. S. Olympic Businesses

Some people never quit. Senate Judiciary Committee correspondence.

Prologue

EQUALITY

All Persons are created Equal unless you used the word Olympic and that’s where Equality ended. A music-man’s solitary battle against an international conspiracy attempting to deny all Americans the Right and Privilege to use the word Olympic any time, any place, for any reason under pain of destruction and financial ruin. Congress was not responsible for this extreme position espoused and enforced but the law was subject to interpretation with prejudicial and gratuitous support from the federal courts, all the way to the top. Royalty had truly visited our federal courts. With few exceptions, most jurists bowed or curtsied as the case may be. I’ve heard of star-struck but this was too sad not to be true.

The 99th & 100th Congress, the Department of Justice and Federal Agencies, and 46 states were bright spots in author’s Quixotic quest to use the word Olympic for his music label Olympic Records formed in Burbank, California 1982.

NOTE

The Olympic records of athletes are published every four (4) years by Bantam/Doubleday/Dell Books since 1964. Guinness Book of Olympic Records requires no permission from any Olympic committees to own and publish these statistics, now or ever. B/D/D owns the rights to the copyrighted compilation of facts in book or any other form of Media.

Follow the bouncing balls of fickle fate and bear witness to the luck of the draw in a fixed contest. Feel the intensity of fight or flight, a primal expression and powerful motivator. Author had an obligation to capital which made the conflict necessary leaving no personal choice. Some battles were won but to no avail. The war was lost in the Supreme Court (1988) and ten years later was won in the Congress (1998). The Epilogue reveals a closure of sorts. I submit the story is the only closure I get, if any.

My son at nine years old after observing me fight for three years asked, Dad, are you going to be doing this the rest of your life? Little did I know. Twenty-three years later the unhappy spirit rises from the dusty boxes.

Dedications

To the Lawyers, the Legislator, and the Judge I dedicated this compilation of facts and experiences. Without those particular Human Beings I could not have persevered, and without Mr. Brown I would not have written the story. He suggested it early on and emphasized the necessity of a chronology kept. The sub-title, The Pro Se Litigant, (as he named it) refers to the fact I was my own attorney until the U.S. court of appeals.

Self-Defense No Longer Allowed – Sorry

This may seem stupid but…

Say you were attacked and in defending your life you killed your attacker. There were witnesses and no question you were in mortal danger. It might have been a homicidal maniac or anyone bound to do you great harm. It is a basic human right to protect and defend yourself or your property and there could be no law denying it or penalty for doing so. The right to survive is basic human law, section 1, ad infinitum. It goes without saying. This law of survival is considered as true in business as it is in human relations.

One insurmountable difficulty encountered in this Odyssey was self-defense being taken off the table. Now if you kill someone in your own defense you’re guilty of homicide and it matters not you were about to be departed. Sound a little warped? Believe it or not.

The United States Olympic Committee dictated and pursued policy and position that it had a federal law prohibiting anyone, any time, anywhere from using the word Olympic (or Olympics, see story) in the U.S.A. for any reason and no defenses of any kind in historical law, time, or precedent for thousands of years would be entertained or allowed. In other words if you used the word Olympic for any profit or non-profit purpose you were guilty and go directly to jail, figuratively. Do not pass go, do not collect $200. You were NOT considered innocent until proven otherwise. You were guilty as charged arriving in court, and, after Supreme Court opinion in the Gay Olympic Games case, it was the Law of the Land (1987). Over time the law was amended (1998) and corrected or changed to conform with, of all things, the author’s positions claimed and asserted in Petitions filed with the Congress noted as received and referred in the Congressional Record.

Only the mythical Gods of Olympus had such deviated clout and they were a fiction. The original Olympic law was concocted in France in 1894 with the Olympic word borrowed from Greece. In 1978 Congress did a good deed and enacted the Amateur Sports Act, gave them $30 million, and as usual, no good deed went unpunished.

CLOSING

I am not an author except of a song or two. I’m reporting my experiences that created the Public Record that became The Olympic Record. I left the story in boxes for 23 years because I had no use for the experience and re-visiting disappointments is not an act of sanity. During the court time I amassed 100 pounds of documents and evidence stored in boxes cataloging the experience and events. The boxes followed me through the years. Some had records showing $300k in expenses from start-up in 1982 to Supreme Court opinion in 1988. I would not acknowledge the events except when I moved the boxes that for some reason I could not throw away, and I tried. I thought it must be penance, punishment or purgatory for standing up for myself. A great payback for being correct.

January 1, 2010 I woke early one cold Colorado morning and wondered how long I had to live. Three months later this story was completed. Snow outside and ten hour days. Something I had to do that had been in avoidance and denial for many, many years.

See what you think, after all, it might have been You.

Introduction We Are the Public

The reader may be entertained by this non-fiction or be disbelieving of it and possibly both. No matter your take on the story, the parties, or the author, we have one thing in common. We are members of the Public. Things I say are mine by being a public member are also yours, unless you beg to differ. We have Public rights and privileges, Public laws, Public parks, Public records, Public protections. We have a Constitution enacted for the Public (people), and we have the Public Domain. Sometimes the words Public and National are interchangeable. A National Park is there for us, the Public. The entire U. S. Constitution and Bill of Rights is a public document, and it belongs to us. It is supposed to be Our contract with Our country. The laws therein are ours if we chose to know what they are and use them. This history is about the word Olympic which belongs to the Public and as a member of the Public it also belongs to me. We are, in fact, the Olympic Public.

A public domain was one of the Framers' (Constitution) most important gifts to our cultural traditions. Lawrence W. Lessig, Stanford Law Professor and author.

Code and the Laws of Cyberspace.

PART I

Chapter 1 11300 Vanowen Street, North Hollywood, California

Imagine a dark, windowless space with black and white (linoleum) squares on the floor likely not deep cleaned in 20 years. Two bath rooms, his and hers, and a small storage room at the back. The walls reflected the breathing, actions, and karma of local patrons over the years - I mean, this isn't Cheers. The space had been rented by an immigrant for the past 20 years. He moved and put his new version his bar, the Embers, less than 300 feet away in a separate building. The original Embers was the corner unit of old strip mall, front and back door only. In the 'mall' we have a Korean market, an adult bookstore, a laundry, and a suspicious never opened unit, and me in the ex-Embers bar. The owner of the mall is a nice guy from Beverly Hills, his zip is 90210, like the TV show. Across the street are heavy-duty aerospace companies and support technologies, in part, to support the Burbank Airport a few miles down the road. I marveled at the Rolls Royce right across the street. I could see it by looking through my peep hole.

This is before Olympic Records and I was driving a delivery truck at the time. In Southern California, like many large cities, businesses have difficulty disposing of large objects they don't need because it cost a fortune to get rid of them if required to pay someone to pick them up. When I would deliver to the backs of businesses there would be things worth thousands of dollars if someone were to come and get it. There were wealthy salvage barons who would make the rounds every few days. They were equipped with small cranes and lifts and could grab just about anything. The trouble with salvage is you must have a place to put it, and there is little space in southern California for anything or anybody, and this was then (1981). One day I started salvaging because I drove/had a truck, I was barely making a living, and I had some space since I had nothing in it but the Fender Rhodes piano, a salvaged recliner, and a cat. One day I saw 50 2-ply solid glass windows that had been removed from a hi-rise. Some of the sides were chipped. They were encased with rubber sealant that coated all edges. It must have been installed and removed for flaws. These were silver plated windows you see in the skyscrapers. Each piece was 38 by 56 and came in at 54 pounds. This I wanted, a treasure I guess, maybe sell some. I went back that night and picked up 40 windows, about a ton of 2-ply glass. They were absolutely beautiful (silver/steel grey glass with diffuser between the panes) and my rental unit could use a lift of any kind. I glassed in 1000 of the 1200 sq. ft.. When you walked in the room it was interesting. No outside light so when you lit the room right with a few small lights you could make the room look like heaven (subject to who was in it). It covered the ugly and was a one of a kind space. The future home of Olympic Records, not yet a tone in this musician's ear. After getting used to it you didn't see the mirrors at all. Thick glass is sound proof and it was quiet.

How Olympic Records came to be (1982)

We were going into business. Start-up capital has been established. In August 1982 we're sitting around the table at Vanowen discussing how to organize our new company and music release. Present are Sally, me, Doug, Joe, and ever present T.O.. I was producer and musician, Sally was finance and therapist, Doug was computers and musician, and Joe was promotions and musician. Still in the talking stage, what to call the company? In many ways it didn't matter what it's called as in the music business, to a large extent, it is just a handle for identification. A trade-name. You have A&M, RCA, ABC, Capital, Columbia, Motown, MCA, Arista, Planet, Capital, Atlantic, Pacific, Liberty, American, Virgin, Sun, Moon, Stars, BMG, BMW, your kids name or your dog's name, it doesn't really matter - but could it? The value of the name of a music company or record company is directly associated with its reputation and the value and popularity of the music and artists it owns and releases for public consumption. Like a song, no one really cares or knows, or even thinks about, who wrote the song. It makes no difference in their accepting of a recording. They only absorb who is singing the song and it doesn’t matter a 'hill of beans' who wrote it. (Everyone thinks Elvis songs are Elvis songs. Elvis wrote few of them). So, something germane would be the right name. The word Records prefaced by something. And soon there won’t be any more records 'cause records were vinyl and vinyl was leaving the building. PS: A good vinyl pressing (record) played on a record player with better than average needle going to a decent reproduction system (amp and speakers) is better than any music fidelity you will ever experience anywhere except for, or with, metal masters, which you would never hear. Aficionados still buy and special order vinyl records and sales are increasing exponentially.

Doug's Suggestion

After a few beers, Doug (our soon to be computer programmer when PC's were just arriving) suggested Olympic Records. We all laughed knowing full well it existed already. The name was so common and obvious we were sure it was in use. I would have lost everything (I little to lose) on the bet that Olympic Records was somewhere just around the corner in L.A. or New York. I would have bet my life on it, figuratively speaking. My experience in the music business made me more positive than anyone and more wrong than anyone. The meeting adjourned when we ran out of beer and I proceeded with normal start-up activities. Sally Singer, Doug Belli, Joseph Kelly, Kindra Koury, the singer, and I, were the principals. T.O. was climbing around in the rafters as always. Five people and cat became the core of the company.

Song Material

I began the process and searched for song material for Kindra who wanted to record a gospel music album. This was a good idea since that market is small compared to the general market and we would be able to handle it with our modest start-up resources. Religious radio stations, sometimes referred to as Christian radio stations, were nationwide so it would be possible to cover the country and see if we could make a mark in that genre with our first recording. Month to month we prepared for the first recording sessions that would begin in October with a release of the record to radio in the early Spring. The Vanowen studio space was just right for rehearsals and after locating and choosing the songs we got them ready for the recording sessions to follow.

TI-99 Texas Instrument

One of the first consumer PC's on the market was a Texas Instrument product called the TI-99. The only place you could buy one was Toy's R Us and they didn't seem to be selling like hot cakes. They were right next to GI Joe. It cost about $1,000 and was simply hardware that you had to assemble. If you wanted it to function you had to get the programming manual and program it yourself. If you wanted the CPU to do anything other than basic tasks you had to buy hardware plug-in modules and then program for that particular use. Thank God for Doug 'cause without him we were going to be using pencils, paper, and a typewriter. He spent many hours daily learning to program the box so we could have