I'm about to spend my fourth, and final, night in Los Angeles, California, or Gollyvornia, as the Governator might call it, when he's not ramping up the state debt as much as possible and rolling over for the unions. And if you saw the original version of Pumping Iron you might figure there's some practice involved in that.

And what a culture it is. I stopped for sushi in Simi Valley at a place owned by a Japanese family. The son of the family was a healthy young fellow--read very big boned and running to fat. We talked about my Kindle. The music was Japanese hip-hop, which is probably better than American hip-hop only because if it talks about murder and hos I can't understand it.

All of the restaurants in Las Vegas and west sound just the same. Some energetic music which is entirely unmemorable and could be done by the offspring of an out-of-balance washing machine and R2D2. It is still more interesting than Philip Glass.

Gertrude Stein said of Los Angeles that there is no there there although perhaps too much has been made of that line. Phoenix is even more spread out than L.A.--you can drive 50 miles, in nearly a straight line, and still be in Phoenix and not see a single tall building. Los Angeles is much the same but even at 3 AM in the middle of every block there will be someone walking or driving.

But there are no American flags. I'm sure there are some on public buildings--I hope there are some on public buildings--but in Texas, the Midwest, Arizona and Utah you see businesses and homes flying them. And signs such as, "Support our troops." Here there are, as you'd expect, signs booming movies and television programs. But no American flags and no culture except that of the self.

The hotel is wonderful; the food great; the people polite; the weather, except for early-morning smog, clement and lovely, but that absence of flags alone makes me wish for an activist seismic fault.

I'm sorry. Really.