How Obama Yoked Donny on DACA
Many know the building for the giant “Last Cappuccino Before the 101” mural that lures customers into the café. The illegal, oversized mural had existed for nearly a decade before the city made inquiries. In 2009 they lobbied community forces, arguing that the painting, over time had become part of the community itself. The caffeinated sign prevailed.
-R. Daniel Foster. Los Angeles Times. June 14, 2011
Obama didn’t mean to yoke Donny. Nobody was supposed to get yoked, well nobody but us, the American people. President Donald J. Trump already knows he has lost the DACA fight. He knows that Obama designed DACA so the kids would stay here forever legally. Donald Trump has known this for a long time. Trump’s lawyers explained to him months ago how the DACA kids were staying and why. President Trump hasn’t told us yet because he is having a hard time explaining how Obama yoked his ass. Let me try to explain it to you, right now, in plain spoken english. You see, there is this huge oversized painted sign on the wall of a building in Hollywood…
Definition of immigrate: to enter and usually become established; especially: to come into a country of which one is not a native for permanent residence
Living in LA I see a lot of Mexicans. I also see a lot of billboards. Billboards bug me. They are right there in your face all the time. In 2002 the LA City Council put out a BAN on billboards in the city. Yep, an all out ban. That didn’t stop people in the years following from making millions illegally by erecting illegal billboards and signs all around LA, right in plain view of officials. The billboard guys sued the city. The city passed so called “sign” measures, ordinances were drafted, it was war. Things became so bad through the years of fighting that the city attorney Carmen Trutanich in 2010 had billboard millionaire Kayvan Setareh arrested in his posh Pacific Palisades home on 3 minor sign violations, misdemeanors. The city, in retribution for all the problems it had been caused by people like Kayvan, jacked Kayvan’s small misdemeanor bail up to one million dollars cash. As an extra dig, the city had Kayvan arrested on a Friday night so the illegal sign man would have to sit in jail over the weekend, unable to post bail until the following Monday morning. One of the problems Kyvan caused was pointing out a huge in your face illegal sign right there in plain sight. The sign was illegally painted on the side of an old building right in the middle of busy Hollywood. Kyvan, at that time accused of illegal sign activity himself, stood there with his finger out pointing to the plainly visible illegal sign, prodding authorities, “what about them?”
You ever see the movie Swingers? Vince Vaughn wrote that movie in The Hollywood Hills Coffee Shop, so it was natural to film the opening scene of the movie there. The Hollywood Hills Coffee Shop has been in that same building on Franklin Avenue, right next to the 101 since the 1930s. In late 2001 Warner Ebbink of the Eat Heavy Restaurant Group signed a lease on the space. Ebbink wanted his new place to look old, retro, cool. He started designing and building out the plan himself, attending to every detail personally. As things go when building with permits in Los Angeles, it took some time. Finally open in 2002 the food was being served while a huge portion of the outside of the building was being painted with an oversized mural, a sign. Since the permitting process had taken so long on the inside of The 101 Coffee Shop, and the year was now 2002, Warner Ebbink missed any opportunity to secure a permit for his sign. Warner Ebbink’s sign was illegal. He had no permit, no permission from anyone, nothing. He didn’t care. He painted his wall anyway, his way. Exactly how he wanted it, with a giant graphic of frothing coffee in a rounded turquoise ceramic cup sandwiched between some ad copy. Warner calls the sign Iconic. The law calls the sign illegal. The ad copy, painted in a specially chosen all caps pre-post modern font reads: “Last Cappuccino before the 101.”

When President Barrack Obama signed the Presidential Executive Order called DACA on June 15, 2012, he was acting a lot like Warner Ebbink did when he painted that sign on the side of that building. Obama had no congressional approval, no senate approval, no bill to sign, nothing, but he went ahead to sign the DACA Executive Order anyway forcing law abiding American communities nationwide to interact lawfully with illegals. This is the actual intent behind Law Professor Barry’s DACA. This is how Barry made 800,000 illegal kids into your newest crop of the legally exploitable permanent underclass. With the careful placement of ink in a specific part of a paper while sitting down in a supremely comfy chair, Barrack Hussein Obama forced a legally established nation to start interacting lawfully with almost one million illegal immigrants. Obama’s action actually legalized them. The final say has yet to be said about DACA, but I did see the exact same thing happen years ago here in LA. Not with the DACA kids, but with that illegal Last Cappuccino sign.
Before Warner opened his 101 Coffee Shop there on Franklin ave, three blocks from Hollywood and Vine, he had the intention to become fabric, lifeblood to the community. He created a space there for physical bodies to inhabit, breathe in, eat in, drink in, work in, live, occupy. Warner designed his restaurant to be minimal, brown, unobtrusive, so the people themselves would not be distracted by anything other than their own interests. They start putting up polaroids taken inside The 101 Coffee Shop on the walls inside The 101 Coffee Shop. People are eating food in booths while having their picture taken looking at pictures of people eating food in booths. Later someone else will have their picture taken in that same booth eating food. Everyone is in the pictures somewhere. Even if they are way, way, way in the background, practically unseen.

If the DACA kids need to fill out forms, someone close is there to help them. When someone pays the fee filed with the forms, the Government gets the money. When the DACA kids enroll in school, DACA kids shop at Walmart for their Chinese made school supplies. When the DACA kids need food, it gets bought from grocery store chains, who buy their food from all over the world. When the DACA kids go out with their friends they all spend money locally at McDonald’s supporting an American based worldwide franchise. The DACA program was designed by Obama at its core to force communities to do legal business with illegal DACA kids. For the kids it is great, they get the free stuff, but the legal lawful community, by Obama’s Executive order is FORCED to deal with the illegal DACA kids, literally by order. What happens in the coming years to Warner Ebbink’s illegal sign he painted directly on the side of his antique building is very interesting. It also shows how the DACA kids are going to get legalized.
Despite LA’s size there are limited late night eating establishments around town. My friend Azalea has waitress’d almost all of them at one time or another. Around the time of the painted sign controversy in 2008 she was working at Swinger’s on Beverly, but trying to get a job, closer to her apartment, at The 101 Coffee Shop. We used to meet at The 101 Coffee Shop often to eat, have a couple beers, then run back to her place to smoke weed and fuck. Whatever Azalea ordered at “the 101” as we called it, was always hooked up special by staff. Azalea knew most of the people working in the place, hostess, manager, servers, busboys. “That is Guadi. He is from San Salvador. I love him.” Here in Los Angeles, the restaurant owners form groups. The groups own several restaurants. The groups restaurants each use other’s workers interchangeably. The guys that own the restaurant groups all know each other. The groups rely on trusted current low level workers to bring in all the other low level workers to do all the low level work. The current workers bring in their buddies, friends, distant relatives, friends of distant relatives to do low level work for the group. The restaurant owners have a steady pool of never ending cheap trusted low level labor. Some workers are permanent fixtures, some work the same jobs but move around between group restaurants, all or almost all are Latino. My friend had worked with Guadi many times through many years in many of the group owned restaurants. Guadi was a 56 year old busboy. Always there for her. Always there for his bosses. As she put it “Guadi has always had my back. He always takes good care of me.” Guadi came over to say hi to Azalea. He smiled at her warmly. She smiled too, excited to see him. He called Azalea, A Z, like the letters. They spoke for a while before Guadi had to clear another table for his boss. The conversation never got too deep. It didn’t get cut short from Guadi going back to work. After working here in Los Angeles for some 25 years, Guadi could hardly speak any english at all.
In 2008, the restaurant Guadi worked for, The 101 Coffee Shop was coming under heavy fire. Kayvan and his lawyers were spotlighting the “Last Cappuccino” sign painted on the side of the building to city officials anytime Kayvan got hassled anywhere in the city for his illegal Billboards. The case was clear cut. The 101 Coffee shop was doing the same thing he was doing. Putting up illegal signs. “If they don’t take down their sign, I don’t take down my sign.”
With the pressure on, the city had no choice but to pursue the matter. When the city council passed the no more billboards or signs ordinance, it literally meant no more billboards or signs. The 101 Coffee Shop had clearly made a sign. Case closed. The city by order says “take the sign down, NOW.” But How?
Total immersion, no not immersion, infiltration. Infiltrate. That was what some DACA kids did just the other day when they mobbed a public Nancy Pelosi press conference shutting her down completely. “This war will be won by 11 million of us in the streets” Angel Reyes said as the DACA kids shouted en masse until Pelosi had to exit. Her hollow rhetoric was silenced by occupation, bodies, breath, life. When the people in Hollywood who ate at “the 101” started hearing about the city’s order to take down the sign on their favorite local late night hot spot, they flipped the fuck out like a DACA kid hearing the word deport. The sign of course, had no voice to shout “legalize.” Those people who loved the sign in Hollywood though, they did have a voice. That voice eventually took the throat of a lawyer.
The roundabout, backwards, left hand kind of way Warner Ebbnik’s lawyers hee haw’d the city into making the “Last Cappuccino” sign legal is really funny af.
It is also base af, disingenuous questionable and undoubtably, the “only thing we could do.” My prediction is that Trump will utter that same quote when he announces that the DACA kids can stay because it’s the “only thing we could do.” The DACA kids staying have nothing to do with Trump. Trump got yoked. The DACA kids staying came built into DACA by Obama. It was just done left handed, like the way Warner painted the “Last Cappuccino” sign on that building. The sign was painted in 2002. The building had been there, historically since the thirties, the building, not the sign. Warner was ordered by the city to take down his sign. The order had nothing to do with the building. So, Warner’s lawyers come into City Council chambers to defend against the order of removal. They are representing “The Last Cappuccino Before the 101” sign making their back door left handed argument to the City Council as such: The building that the sign is painted on is a Hollywood Historical Landmark because the building was built in Hollywood way back in the 1930s. The building, being a Historical Landmark cannot be altered in any way unless the community agrees. Now the sign has been on the historic Hollywood building itself long enough to become part of the building. The sign has been existing on the side of the building for many years now, with no problems, contributing a great deal to the environment of the building itself which then contributes to the Hollywood community as a whole. At this point the sign has become a living, breathing, operating part of the building. A part of it’s very structure. “We demand the city officially recognize this building and ‘The Last Cappuccino Before the 101’ sign as a Historic Landmark, giving the building and the sign every protection afforded under the law.” The small local coffee shop’s lawyer then handed the highest paid city council in the country a petition enthusiastically signed by some 3,000 loving local people indicating the harmless cappuccino sign certainly did have their full support. The council took the matter under counsel assuring the small local shop’s legal team that a final decision would be rendered on the sign’s due fate. They would be notified of the decision through the United States Postal Service before the end of 2009. Good Day.
Today is like most Los Angeles days, perfect. All the lawns are mowed, the dishes are washed, the floors are clean, the stainless steel handrails polished. The city basically called Warner’s Last Cappuccino sign legal in one easy sentence. “The city will no longer pursue this matter.” That’s how Obama yoked Donny on DACA. The 101 Coffee Shop’s lawyers simply attached the illegal sign to the legal Historic building. Obama simply attached 800,000 illegal DACA kids to legal lawful American communities. The DACA kids will now be deemed legal by just saying they are already part of a functioning legal American community. Just like that antique building was slapped with a painted sign that became legal, American communities were slapped with DACA kids that will become legal.
As I am driving up Franklin getting onto the 101, I pass underneath the “Last Cappuccino Before the 101” sign. Slowed by traffic, I look up to my right seeing an old man trudging along with a slight limp. He is next to a younger kid, probably nineteen, who carries a brand new brown backpack with white apron riding on his left shoulder. As the traffic starts up, I look closer at the old man, recognizing Guadi. I honk my horn waving at him. Traffic stops again. I am right next to them. My window is already down I shout “Hey Guadi… How are you? Haven't seen you in a while.” He stares at me strangely. “Remember me? You know, Azalea’s friend?” I look over at the light, still red, then back to him. He’s excited. “Oh, A Z. How is she?” he said in a heavy accent. “What?” I didn’t quite get what he said. He came back louder, a little slower, “Aye-Zee, How is she doing?” “Oh, Good, how are you doing my friend?” I ask as I look back to see the opposite light turning yellow. He started speaking slowly once again in his accent, “I’m good, this is my nephew, Fernando. I got him a job over here at my work. This is his first day he starts work with me. I think he will stay working with me here if he works good.” Guadi motioned toward the kid for him to show me some respect. At the exact moment the kid looked like he was about to step off the curb to shake my hand through the window, the light turned green. I quickly raised my own hand making a strong dismissive waving gesture toward them saying very loudly over the traffic, “Ok, take care buddy! Nice seeing you! Good luck!” As I sped my car over the 101 on-ramp into an endless future, it occurred to me that I may have been rude. I forgot to ask Guadi if his nephew was DACA.
Arthur C. Burnright
