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Mendocino County Today: Wednesday, June 21, 2017

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ROGER HANES

Roger Allan Hanes, 77, died suddenly of natural causes on May 28, 2017 at the Hanes family ranch surrounded by friends and family. He is survived by his children Sylvia Ann Hanes Palmer and her husband Richard Palmer, Leslie Marie Hanes and her husband Martin Culpepper, and Jonathan Elias Hanes and his wife Leslie Winters; and several grandchildren. He was born August 20, 1939 in San Francisco, CA and grew up between the city and the Hanes family ranch in Mendocino County. As a young man, he served in the US Army in a mortar battery in the 30th Infantry Division. After his discharge, he joined the San Francisco Police Department like his father, Ward H. Hanes. In 1965, he was injured and forced into permanent disability. It was at that point when he went to college eventually earning his veterinary degree in 1973 from UC Davis. He practiced as a veterinarian for many years, was an avid horseman, and maintained a active part in the Hanes family ranch business through most of his life. He was laid to rest in the private family cemetery on June 9th. A celebration of life will be held on June 24th at the Cloverdale Veterans Memorial Building. Arrangements are under the direction of the Eversole Mortuary.

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SHORT SHOTS: The only person who can possibly relate to this is former Supervisor Norman deVall, and maybe Dan Gjerde, although he was just a kid at the time, but last week, as I pulled up to the Vet's Building in Boonville for the marijuana sting, er, County meeting to explain the grower track and trace process, I stopped and stared, an old man squinting in the afternoon sun through his rheumy, cataract-clouded eyes at Nancy Barth!

GOD'S TEETH! Could it be? I'm certain Nancy is no longer with us, but there she was, and looking pretty good, too, with a becoming perm atop her ample, Venusian form. I couldn't very well shout out a merry, "Nancy! Nancy! Hello! Remember me!" I might be shouting out a greeting to an apparition, a ghost of land use meetings past. But it was her, I swear. "Nancy! Remember me from the days you and Frank Creasy bedeviled "Norman," as you always called him. Norman this, Norman that. Norman it's raining, do you have your galoshes on?"

I STARED HARD at the woman I was certain was Nancy Barth. Seldom a week went by that there wasn't a letter from Nancy to one or another of the local papers chastising, "Norman," the besieged 5th District solon. And every time I was on Ed Kowas's talk show on KMFB back in the days when there was lively audio discussion in the county, Nancy would call in to upbraid me about one thing or another. One time she even tracked me down at KUKI out of Ukiah, hard as it is to believe Ukiah also had a call-in show. Tom Watters did the Ukiah talk, and a smart, articulate young whippersnapper he was, too.

ANYWAY, still discombobulated at having seen the risen Nancy Barth, and shooting hallucinatory looks over my shoulder at the old girl, I trucked on into the room stuffed with sedate stoners. And darned if Nancy wasn't chairperson! And darned if Nancy isn't the living image of County CEO Carmel Angelo!

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THE FORT BRAGG City Council meeting coming up on the 26th, is mostly about city manager Linda Ruffing's contract renewal. I say be done with it! Give her title to the Old Coast Hotel with the bonus of Hospitality House if she continues to lead the Good Ship Fort Bragg wherever it's going, a matter of some debate in the old mill town.

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THERE ARE PROBABLY a few people in the "village" of Mendocino who will miss the seemingly endless meetings aimed at whatever it was aimed at for a quarter century, but the California Coastal Commission has finally approved the town plan.

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WE'LL be covering the Coan case in depth, but mother and son have pleaded not guilty to the murder of Jamie Dawn Shipman, 57, of Mendocino the morning of May 23rd. The Coans, it seems, had been asked to leave the Shipman property and a dispute between them and the Shipmans ensued. After the shooting, and it's not yet known who pulled the trigger, Ms. Coan departed the Coast in a vehicle belonging to the deceased's husband. She turned herself in in San Joaquin County the next day. Ms. Coan's son, Alexander Coan, was arrested in Comptche four days after the murder of Mrs. Shipman.

Kelley & Alexander Coan

The Coans' preliminary hearing is set for August 14th. Mother and son are being held in the Mendocino County Jail.

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Coach Heath

UKIAH BASKETBALL COACH, Bill Heath, taught and coached basketball for many years at Ukiah High School. Now retired, Heath is in his 38th year at the head of the summer basketball camp he began nearly four decades ago.

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SUMMER READINESS IS KEY FOR SAFE TRIPS

CHP summer driving tips

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THE ANTHROMORPHS are out of control. At least that's the consensus among store owners in Boonville, hence these signs posted on the door of the dog-beset Boonville General Store.

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ACCORDING to the Northern California Construction Training (NCCT) Company’s website they are “a building trade’s pre-apprenticeship training program that helps prepare men and women for entry into various construction trades apprenticeship training programs, with a “carefully selected staff of credentialed teachers.”

IN 2015, Sheriff Tom Allman arranged to have them train a small number of inmates to become apprentice carpenters. On Tuesday, Allman declared the program a success because of the inmates who were trained and released “100%” will not be back in jail.

BUT TWO YEARS LATER at today's (Tuesday's) meeting, the Board declared the program “badly run and substandard.” The Board was reluctant to pay NCCT some $64k in fees because, according to Supervisor Carre Brown, “It could be the trainers they sent us were not up to the standard they should have been.”

APPARENTLY the training included a home remodel job in Ukiah that wasn’t done anywhere near “industry standards.”

NCCT’s CONTRACT with the County, managed by the Probation Department, theoretically ended on December 31, 2016. But NCCT continued “training” right up until a few days ago, and NCCT now wants $64k more for that period.

DEPUTY COUNTY COUNSEL Brina Latkin (or is it Blanton? she switched back and forth between names during the discussion) said that the $64k was somehow “less than the contractor wanted.”

SEVERAL SUPERVISORS wanted to know how NCCT continued with the work when their contract was up in December 2016. Ms. Latkin/Blanton had no idea. Finally, a probation officer named Kathy White, blurted out the real reason: Controversial Chief Probation Officer Pamela Markham (who has been put on extended paid administrative leave while allegations of sexual dalliances with other Probation employees are investigated) told NCCT in mid-December that she “intended” to extend the contract. But it never got extended, even though NCCT kept right on “training.”

BOARD CHAIR John McCowen concluded that the Board wanted staff to determine “the legitimacy of the charges” before any more checks were cut to NCCT. “Do we have legitimate grounds to deny payment?” asked McCowen, waving an as-yet unpublicized report documenting the substandard remodel work, adding, “I doubt they would want this coming out in court.”

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Curry

IN OTHER SUCCESS NEWS, County Ag Commissioner Diane Curry, looking exhausted, as any normal person would be dealing with demanding pot heads all day, told the Board that as of Tuesday the County had received 441 pot cultivation permit applications. The program is in such a state of confusion and delay that Ms. Curry’s announcement that exactly 1 (one) permit had been issued drew a round of applause from the assembled officials and pot growers in the audience. (When we get to two, the standing O will be heard clear over in Boonville.)

SUPERVISOR Carre Brown said, “I congratulate all of you!”

ALSO COMING in for more muted huzzahs was the bewildering Track & Trace program roadshow/workshops the County did. “I did not attended the Track and Trace workshops,” said Ms. Curry, “but I think those went well.”

WHICH WAS EXACTLY not what the people who did attend said.

NEWLY SEATED Third District Supervisor Georgeanne Croskey was almost beside herself: “Congratulations on one permit issued. It’s very exciting. And the staff doing great job with complaints.”

ABOUT HERE, secure from government delusion in our Boonville bunker, we were exclaiming things like, "These people are a lot crazier than we thought!"

MS. CURRY added that two permit applications had been denied by Fish and Wildlife wardens because of “pretty egregious environmental concerns” which will be “costly to remediate.” (They ain't seen nothin' yet.)

COMPLAINT DEPARTMENT manager (and former Ukiah Police captain) Trent Taylor said the County had received 130 pot permit complaints so far, mostly from grow-site neighbors, that the Complaint Department is working on. Supervisor McCowen insisted that the County is trying to be “flexible” in resolving the complaints, presumably because the program is far from final at this point.

TAYLOR said the County is fully staffed with seven enforcement officers now with the seventh one, a new hire from Arizona, expected to be on the job on the Coast in July.

McCOWEN said that he understood that people are going out purchasing property without knowing if the zoning permits pot growing, doing things like “grading and tree removal that are prohibited or not permitted … Creating trouble for themselves based on not knowing what’s required or allowed.” “Think before you buy or alter landscape,” warned McCowen, “otherwise you’ll end up with problems like these individuals” (the ones with Fish and Wildlife violations), adding, “there’s a potential for criminal charges and fines and high remediation cost.”

COMMISSIONER CURRY said she’d met with some realtors and emphasized that people “should understand what’s involved in getting into this program.”

SUPERVISOR DAN GJERDE said he’d run into people who bought property in the northern part of the County thinking incorrectly that Humboldt County’s looser rules applied; Garberville-based realtors had made the sales.

COMMISSIONER CURRY got another laugh out of us when she referred to the County’s application form of four pages of fine print as “small.”

McCOWEN asked Taylor about enforcement procedures and follow-up.

TAYLOR: “We’re there. We’re doing notices and citations. We have a procedure for denial of permits based on violations. We have not issued notices of violation or abatement. In fact, the vast majority will self-abate themselves [aka “harvest”] with a little pressure from us.”

THE RETIRED POLICEMAN said of the 130 complaints so far about two dozen involve people with pending permit applications. “The rest are not applicants.” One of the permit applications that has drawn a complaint is in Anderson Valley, said Taylor, but no details are were discussed because the County is trying to keep such things confidential, while still keeping the Board and the complainant apprised of the status of the complaint.

WHEN SUPERVISOR HAMBURG, a life-long stoner and long-time pot farm proprietor, attempted to join the enthusiasm with “I’m amazed that you can keep track! Maybe as many as 5,000 grows in Mendocino County. This is amazing! Keeping track. All these different steps. Fish and Wildlife, water quality, Planning and Building Services…”

NO SOONER had Hamburg begun to string out the superlatives at a "program" that can't possibly work, when County Counsel Katherine Elliott sternly curbed his enthusiasm: “You have recused yourself on these issues. We are taking no action today. But I suggest you not go any further on this.”

THE GIDDY HAMBURG then suggested his fellow Supes join the praise bandwagon and resumed stroking his "comfort animal," a tiny, rat-like dog no bigger than a child's bong that attends all public meetings with the supervisor.

A FEW pot lawyers complained that there was a problem with “prior cultivation” if the grower was a corporation instead of an individual prior to January 1, 2016. Or vice versa. Or something like that. Or something about the State not accepting LLC applications for pot prior to January 1, 2016. We don’t really know. It’s a legal issue. Have no fear, this will all be worked out. And lawyers will clean up.

* * *

SHERIFF TOM ALLMAN notified the Board of Supervisors Tuesday of a renewed attempt to put a mental health facility initiative on November ballot, noting that last year’s measure fell just a few votes short of the two-thirds vote requirement. (About 165 votes was the diff.) Supervisor McCowen was supportive, declaring that “it’s a fast track timeline,” and that he expects the second measure will address “concerns” that were expressed about the cost of operation, an apparent reference to the mostly spurious “concerns” from Supervisor Dan Hamburg first time around.

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ALSO ON TUESDAY, during the discussion before the unanimous vote to give SEIU and Law Enforcement Management 3% raises over the next two years, plus various bonuses, Supervisor John McCowen told the Board that he was very pleased with the “quick negotiation” involved.

WHICH BRINGS US to the $250k the County plans to spend on a big outside LA-based law firm primarily on labor negotiations.

WHEN we asked CEO Carmel Angelo about this yesterday we got back an answer from Human Resources Director Heidi Dunham (not County Counsel Katherine Elliott) with an attached spreadsheet summarizing the work that the outside law firm “LCW” had done last fiscal year (July 2016 to June 2017).

THE COUNTY expects to end up paying LCW $225k for that period, and then another $250k for July 2017 to June 2018 in twelve categories of “service”: Labor negotiations, grievances, “misc” discipline, SEIU Local 2012 Writ Lawsuit, “Human Resources-Other UI Claims, ADA, Misc employee matters,” Board matters, HR Policy Review and Update, “Lawsuit,” “Department Investigation,” and “Department Investigation (2 investigations).”

MOST of the $225k was about $90k for those “Labor Negotiations” which were supposedly “quick.” (What would the fee for the LA legal gang have been if negotiations had been “protracted”?) The other big cost was for those “investigations” at about $72k.

Williamson

ACCORDING to LCW’s website the “partner” Mendo paid $350 an hour for was LCW’s (SF Based) Donna Williamson which one Union negotiator said maintained a “poker face” during the negotiations. LCW’s website says: “With first hand experience in working for and representing independent schools, public schools, and community college districts, Donna possesses a unique and well-rounded perspective on education issues and the needs of schools and community college districts. As former Director of Labor Relations/Labor Counsel at Sweetwater Union High School District, Donna directed the labor programs of the largest secondary school district in California, serving as chief negotiator representing the Board of Trustees with six employee associations. She has also served as the Assistant Head of School at Midland School, an independent boarding school, in Los Olivos, California, and as a member of the Board of Trustees of the Santa Ynez Valley Family School in Los Olivos. Donna also co-authors the firm's monthly newsletter, Private Education Matters.”

ONE OF THE INVESTIGATIONS LCW got paid mightly to perform probably involved former Chief Probation Officer Pamela Markham who is alleged to have been boffing a fellow Probation employee during and after office hours, causing her to be put on paid administrative leave.

THE MATTER of in-house, work-time boffs is complicated by the fact that the Chief Probation Officer technically works for the Superior Court, not County administration, and our judges have let the matter fester for months — not only fester but rewarded with paid leave for the alleged offender, and that's how the judges would defend their gifts of public funds. "Alleged."

ANOTHER “investigation” apparently beyond the capacity of local authority may have involved a former deputy county counsel attorney who has filed a civil rights lawsuit against the County. (Sexual harassment?)

BUT NONE of this explains why 1. The county didn’t even bring this costly contract up last year, 2. The County counsel’s office isn’t doing at least some of this in-house, 3. Why it costs so much if the biggest contract was resolved “quickly,” 4. Why Human Resources is creating most of the costly referrals to the LA law firm without consulting with County Counsel, and 5. The LA law expenditure assumes all this stuff is ongoing or likely to happen again?

THE BOARD has never asked for competitive bids for this work, never asked why so much work is being referred to LA, and what can be done to reduce it, and why County Counsel can’t do more of this work in-house. Nor has anyone asked why they even need an “attorney” to do the negotiations? (It used to be done by a retired Humboldt County professional negotiator and before that by an Oakland woman-consultant, neither of whom where lawyers.)

SEVERAL TIMES in the last few weeks Supervisor McCowen has raised concerns about small amounts of money which he says could be “a gift of public funds.” But he seems to find these annual $250k gifts to be just business as usual.

* * *

LITTLE DOG SAYS, “The Boss told me to go easy on Fathom. ‘I go way back with the guy, LD,’ he says. ‘Just tell him to use the bathroom next year’."

* * *

CHO MO, ONE STEP REMOVED

On June 19th, 2017 at approximately 10:00 AM, Mendocino County Sheriff's Detectives were contacted by a Special Agent of the Department of Homeland Security and Investigation, San Francisco Division. Information was relayed to the Sheriff's Office that Curtis Andrew Muller, a 32 year old white male from Ukiah, had possibly been exchanging obscene matter, namely items commonly described as child pornography via the internet with a male subject in the United Kingdom. The information had been provided to the Department of Homeland Security and Investigation via Interpol after authorities in the United Kingdom arrested an individual there and a connection was established. Mendocino County Sheriff's Detectives prepared a search warrant which was issued by a Mendocino County Superior Court Judge. On June 20th at approximately 10:18 AM, Mendocino County Sheriff's Detectives, accompanied by Special Agents of the Department of Homeland Security and Investigation Child Exploitation Investigations Unit, served a search warrant at Muller's residence on Talmage Road. Representatives of the Mendocino County Child Protection Services also assisted in this investigation. Muller was not located at his residence, however he was located shortly thereafter in his vehicle in Ukiah. Muller was found to be in possession of multiple images of suspected obscene material as described in California Penal Code Secion 311.4. Muller was arrested for a violation of section 311.11 PC and booked in the Mendocino County Jail and his being held in lieu of $15,000 bail.

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CATCH OF THE DAY, June 20, 2017

Arnold, Boungnavath, Brunk

SHANNON ARNOLD, Goleta/Fort Bragg. Disorderly conduct-alcohol.

SENG BOUNGNAVATH, Ukiah. Pot cultivation, pot possession for sale.

JOHN BRUNK, Fort Bragg. Shoplifting, trespassing, unlawful display of vehicle registration, forgery of vehicle registration, resisting, failure to appear.

Fouche, Madson, Morehead

RANDY FOUCHE, Fort Bragg. Petty theft-retail/shoplifting, controlled substance, obtaining services without paying.

TATE MADSON, Willits. Disorderly conduct-alcohol, paraphernalia, probation revocation.

TYLER MOREHEAD, Fort Bragg. Petty theft.

Mullins, Singleton, Steckel

MIRANDA MULLINS, Laytonville. Paraphernalia, failure to appear.

SHANE SINGLETON, Willits. Probation revocation.

EDWARD STECKEL II, Hopland. DUI.

Vanwormer, Wolf, Wooten

ELEA VANWORMER, Fort Bragg. Protective order violation, probation revocation.

JESSE WOLF, Ukiah. Meth for sale.

DAVID WOOTEN, Salem, Oregon/Point Arena. Disorderly conduct-alcohol.

* * *

NOT SO GREEN: how the weed industry is a glutton for fossil fuels

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2017/jun/20/cannabis-climate-change-fossil-fuels?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

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THE SWEET LIFE: Cherry Stories from Butler Ranch. This coming Sunday June 25 at 4 p.m., Gallery Bookshop in Mendocino will host a special event for “The Sweet Life: Cherry Stories from Butler Ranch.” Storytellers featured in the book will share experiences of George and Ella Butler and their incomparable u-pick cherry ranch on Boonville-Ukiah Road. Editor and publisher Dot Brovarney will introduce the program, which will open with song. Coastal singer-songwriter Sue Nagle, who calls herself “a major forager at Butler Ranch,” will perform her "Ode to George Butler." Mary Buckley, also a singer-songwriter, will lead the audience in her song, “I Love My Pie.” Graphic designer Kiersten Hanna of Braggadoon will talk about her approach to the book. Audience members will be invited to recount their memories of this unique and wonderful Mendocino County place. For further information, e-mail <dot@landcestry.com>, call Landcestry at 707-272-8305, or contact the bookstore at 707-937-2665.

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FIRECRACKER FLOWER

(Photo by Annie Kalantarian)

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THE BIG CON

by Clancy Sigal

A bunch of men in suits and ties in front of TV cameras investigating another bunch of guys in suits and ties could be one of the great shell games of the Trump era. Meanwhile, as the “Russia probes” go on, memos and tweets flying like paper shrapnel, many Americans not in suits and ties sicken and die as a direct result of the suits’ indifference or plunder or both.

We’re all Appalachia now and nobody gives a damn because, here in the Rust Belt and Trump-voting south, legislative thunder and lightning are coming down on our heads. We have no shelter from the hard rain of a trillion dollar cut in “entitlements” like Medicaid, Medicare, Assistance to Disabled Families, Food Stamps, Meals on Wheels hitting us suthiners in partcular and especially hard in the old coal mine valleys. I don’t like using farm language in front of the ladies. But we’re being fucked up the ass by our own people following the lead of the new President we truly love.

So up in Washington I see two different factions of the same Harvard-Wharton class squabbling over who next sits in the Oval Office, Kamala Harris or Mike Pence when Donald is impeached, Lord don’t let it happen.

The Democrats, damn their hides, can’t help me because they too wear the same suit and ties – even the women Democrats seem to. They all belong to the same “made it” tribe and share the same indigenous language native to Washington DC you learn only if you can afford a good college.

Way back in my grandma’s time, the Big Depression, traveling photographers like Dorothea Lange, Walker Evans and Marguerite Bourke White walked among us seeing us at our stoical worst that somehow got the government’s attention to help us in the hollows, valleys and factory towns.

Tonight on TV I see pictures of exploding Syrian babies and Nigerian refugees drowning in the sea. TV glamour.

But we down here, waiting for a Medicaid van that probably won’t ever come, never see a big name anchor nosing around like they did in Vietnam or when there’s a mass shooting. Plain fact is, we’re too ugly, and what’s happening to our people too depressing for Megyn and Rachel to come down here.

After a day’s work who wants to relax looking at us bitching and whining?

God damn it, it’s undignified.

(Clancy Sigal is a screenwriter and novelist. His latest book is “Black Sunset.”)

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ON LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY

What do our elected representatives think about all this? I recently got a sense of this when I took a tour of the Capitol and sat in for a few minutes on an live session of the House of Representatives.

The chamber was mostly empty. One Representative after another were droning about some impending legislation, but few in the chamber were paying much attention.

What caught me by surprise was the some Representatives — in this open session of Congress — appeared to be busy texting on their cell phones, and at least one Representative was conspicuous by having his head buried in a newspaper.

That is your government at work.

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TRUMP'S ATTACK ON CUBA - Ignorance and Arrogance Personified

https://sputniknews.com/analysis/201706191054769583-trump-administration-cuba-relations/

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2017 PURE MENDOCINO INVITATION

From: "Cancer Resource Centers of Mendocino County"

Please join us Saturday, August 26, 2017 in celebration of the 22nd Anniversary of the Cancer Resource Centers of Mendocino County! - http://cts.vresp.com/c/?CancerResourceCenter/05fd81e723/e9632b6940/28154246d3

A summer evening to enjoy the perfect blend of food, wine, fun and a good cause.

Pure Mendocino is the major fundraising event for the Cancer Resource Centers and a unique celebration honoring Mendocino County's leadership in organics and community health.

Tickets are available now for the 13th Annual Pure Mendocino Organic Dinner and Wine Tasting at Dark Horse Vineyard in Ukiah.

Farm Tour: 4:00 pm

Wine Tasting & Appetizers: 5:00 pm

Farm-to-Table Dinner: 6:30 pm

Chef Olan Cox and friends will showcase our community's finest organically grown food and wine.

Silent Auction: 5:00 - 8:30 pm

Unique items in Pure Mendocino-style

Live Music Under the Stars: 8:00 - 10:00 pm

Dance to Dgiin $135 per person - tickets must be purchased in advance.

Purchase tickets online at www.puremendocino.org -

http://cts.vresp.com/c/?CancerResourceCenter/05fd81e723/e9632b6940/590b14d04fhttp://cts.vresp.com/c/?CancerResourceCenter/05fd81e723/e9632b6940/c611c9d253

or call us at (707) 937-3833.Like us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/PureMendocino -

http://cts.vresp.com/c/?CancerResourceCenter/05fd81e723/e9632b6940/f0b445674b

to learn more about the event. This event always sells out well in advance. To ensure a seat, please order early. Thank you and see you there!

* * *

BIRTHDAY POEM

These are the times

golden with him

and new beginnings.

 

He is everywhere --

on Cow Mountain

with his horses and sheep,

in Mill Creek Park

with bass, bream, and bluegill,

in the lowering twilight

with Northern Spotted Owls,

and in the mornings

with Red-tailed Hawks.

 

And how long shall we say

winter will last this year?

How brown the leaves?

How bitter the fruit?

 

Shall we also say

how he takes upon himself

a certain bondage

with his ranch

on Cow Mountain,

which he loves

and sometimes hates?

 

Behold him now

with his herds and flocks.

Thick and green

is the grass

studded with yellow-orange --

California poppies! --

on this, his birthday, June 3.

 

“John John”

* * *

JONATHAN MARSHALL, jvmarsha1@yahoo.com

Foreign Influence in U.S. Politics, Always Bad News

If we can schedule Marshall, we're lucky. He is available only for a limited number of interviews. He is the real deal -- an award-winning journalist and author of five books on international affairs and national security. He is also the Legal Studies Director at UC Berkeley's Law School.

Marshall has recently published a series of articles on the influence of foreign money in American politics, featured on ConsortiumNews. He states: “The combination of lax enforcement and tremendously high stakes -- including billions of dollars in foreign aid, arms sales, and economic sanctions -- has led to intense foreign lobbying in the United States, some of it financed with recycled U.S. aid.”

John Sakowicz at www.kmecradio.org

* * *

MR. SPOFFORD

But there was at least one lonely figure on the scene, lonely and furtive. It was old Mr. Spofford, moving with the particular agility of a thief, down the path to the river. He carried a mysterious sack. He lived alone at the edge of town, supporting himself by repairing watches. His family was formerly well-to-do, and he had traveled and been to college. What could he be carrying to the river on Christmas Eve in an epochal snowstorm? It must be some secret, something he meant to destroy, but what documents might a lonely old man possess, and why should he choose this of all nights to hide his secret in the river?

The sack he carried was a pillowcase, and in it were nine live kittens. They made a lumpy burden, mewing loudly for milk, and their mistaken vitality distressed him. He had tried to give them away to the butcher, the fish man, the ash man and the druggist, but who wants a stray cat on Christmas Eve, and he couldn't take care of nine himself. It was not his fault that his his old cat conceived — it was no one's fault, really — and yet the closer he got to the river, the heavier was his burden of guilt. It was the destruction of their vitality, their life, that pained him. Animals are not supposed to apprehend death, and yet the struggle in the pillowcase was vigorous and apprehensive; and he was cold.

He was an old man, and he hated the snow. Pushing on toward the river, he seemed to see in the storm the mortality of the planet. Spring would never come again. The valley of the West River would never again be a bowl of grass and violets. The lilacs would never bloom again. Watching the snow blow over the fields, he knew in his bones the death of civilizations — Paris buried in snow, the Grand Canal and the Thames frozen over, London abandoned, and in the caves of the escarpment at Innsbruck a few survivors huddled over a fire of chair and table legs. This cruel, this dolorous, this Russian winter, he thought; this death of hope. Cheer, valor, all good feelings had been extinguished in him by the cold. He tried to cast the hour into the future, to invent some gentle thaw, some clement southwest wind — blue and moving water in the river, tulips and hyacinths in bloom, the plump stars of a spring night hung about the tree of heaven — but he felt instead the chill of the glacier, the ice age, in his bones and in the painful beating of his heart.

The river was frozen, but there was some open water along the banks where the current turned. It would be easiest to drop a stone into the pillowcase, but this might hurt the kittens that he meant to murder. He knotted the top of the sack, and as he approached the water the noise in the pillowcase got louder and more plaintive. The banks were icy. The river was deep. The snow was blinding. When he put his sack into the water, it floated, and in trying to submerge it he lost his balance and fell into the water himself. "Help! Help! Help!" he cried. "Help! Help! Help! I'm drowning!" But no one heard him, and it would be weeks before he was missed.

Then the train whistle sounded — the afternoon train that had pushed its cowcatcher through the massive drifts, bringing home the last to come, bringing them back to the old houses on Boat Street, where nothing was changed and nothing was strange and nobody worried and nobody grieved, and where in an hour or two the souls of men would be sifted out, the good getting toboggans and sleds, skates and snowshoes, ponies and gold pieces, and the wicked receiving nothing but a lump of coal.

— John Cheever, The Wapshot Scandal

 

40 Comments

  1. Matt B June 21, 2017

    The service dog / restaurant debate is an interesting one. As a fellow restaurant owner in AV I run into this a couple of times a week. As I understand the current CA laws, a pet owner need only say the words “service dog”, and we are compelled to allow the dog into the restaurant.

    I don’t judge the dog owner or speculate about their mental or physical conditions. I give the customer the benefit of the doubt. For all I know the service dog could be for a Veteran or assault victim with PTSD, and thus carrying scars not easily seen. I do try to quickly assess the dog’s behavior to determine if I should ask a follow-up question about the safety of other patrons. I’ve only felt compelled to do this a couple of times.

    I did have to ask a service dog owner to stop putting her dog on our back-support pillows once. I heard she tried to do that a couple years ago, but on our table instead of a bench. Given the list issues we’ve had with this particular dog owner over the years, I doubt her dog is actually a service dog, but again, not my place to challenge current CA law. Other than that we haven’t had any incidents with Patrons claiming their dogs are service dogs.

    What I find more interesting is why the issue often creates venomous responses from people whose dining or flying experiences weren’t adversely impacted by the presence of a ‘questionable’ service dog.

    (I’m in no way judging the General Store for their signage choices. Their experiences may be totally different; they have very different customer demographics and traffic patterns than we do. Besides with breakfast sandwiches as good as the one I had last week, I want to stay in their good graces.)

  2. LouisBedrock June 21, 2017

    Manna
    n. A food miraculously given to the Israelites in the wilderness. When it was no longer supplied to them they settled down and tilled the soil, fertilizing it, as a rule, with the bodies of the original occupants.

    Devil’s Dictionary
    Ambrose Bierce

    Judaism is happy that Grace spreads Zionist propaganda.

    https://bdsmovement.net

      • Harvey Reading June 21, 2017

        Fundamental?

        • Jeff Costello June 21, 2017

          Despite BB’s cherry picked “factoid,” There’s some good stuff in that Watts book, starting with the title. But he wasn’t an Israel-pusher.

          • BB Grace June 21, 2017

            I’m not an Israel pusher; However, I’m not Zion phobic and “Blame Israel” because I bought Iran’s BS and US perpetual wars.

            Alan Watts, Terrence McKenna, etc.. They didn’t push Israel, nor do many who enjoy and write about mysticism, which if you are into mysticism, there is no better place in the world than Safed, Zefat, Tsfat, Zfat, Safad, Safes, Safet, Tzfat, and that is how my mind opened to Israel and where I found the source, so to speak.

            I see inventions emerge in Israel and a couple of years later they will materialize here at a great profit to the importer. Another is start ups in Israel, invest in 10 and one will double back your investment in the 10. I’ve come to the conclusion that one of the reasons for things like a boycott of Israeli products is the wealthy know all about Israel and what Israel is producing and if the common folks like me get wind, then the field becomes more level. Israel doesn’t limit it’s productions for the rich, but the rich buy them like crazy, so if you want to keep yourself broke and living in crap, boycott Israel. I respect a person’s choice. More great tech and science for me, none for you. I’m not crying. Happily celebrating summer right now.

      • Harvey Reading June 21, 2017

        Oh, for pity’s sake, ma’am, its ALL hokum. every last bit of it.

        • LouisBedrock June 21, 2017

          However, the Israelis continue to fertilize the soil of Palestine with the bodies of the original occupants.

          • Harvey Reading June 21, 2017

            True. And they do it with the self-entitled arrogance of typical European colonizers, which is basically what they are.

            • Bruce McEwen June 21, 2017

              The Alan Watts essay “Murder in the Kitchen” turned his following against him, due to a sentence that equated the death of a carrot with the death of a steer, and the idea that something has to die in order for us to live, a concept vegetarians couldn’t wrap their minds around, like a chapati around a glob of humus — Ooops, I mean hummus!

              Like Dylan switching from acoustic to electric guitar, the faithful were scandalized and fled like the lost tribes into the hinterlands (Mendocino County) and are still licking their wounds…

              • BB Grace June 21, 2017

                Mr. McEwen; Wonderful movie if you get the time:
                Hummus Curry
                http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1152265/

                I dropped out of school when I was 15, took all my savings from babysitting and went home to CA. I found out that McDonald’s didn’t pay rent after a week and found myself on a spiritual journey that took me deep into the North mountains of Arizona where the Native American Church baptized me.

                Most don’t know Dr. John Beresford, he passed away about a decade ago, anyways, he had Hoffman’s library from Sandoz and wanted to establish a similar Church. Beresford was a Buddhist Vegetarian. Every time we would get something to eat he would go vegetarian. So I invited a bunch of folks including Beresford to have pizza with me. I was really into arugula on my pizza at the time and wanted him to try it. So I order extra large peperoni, an everything, and my arugula feta pizzas. When the pizza’s come Beresford doesn’t hesitate takes two slices of peperoni pizza. I say, “I thought you were a vegetarian”, seeing there’s no way he is going to be able to try my arugula pizza. He says, “That was then, this is now. Let’s eat!” LOL

                Veggie Burgers are better with bacon.

                I love pork, deep pit BBQ, sausages.. Umm um.

                • Bruce McEwen June 21, 2017

                  Saint Grace, you must prophet from this menu on the Gaza Strip — it would be as lucrative in I would be happy to consult w/ you on one or two receipts if the chef were involved. We must discuss either a new restaurant chain or a roving food critic: St. Grace?

                  R.S.V.P.

                  • BB Grace June 21, 2017

                    What I would have like to see Mr. McEwen, is The Old Coast Hotel become a Mendocino Farms franchise, with a location in Ukiah, and an agreement that Mendocino Farms Inc. will include on it’s menu, in it’s grocery, foods from farms located in Mendocino County. It gets me that Mendocino Farms Inc. is building restaurants all over SoCA as if Mendocino County exists as a chapter in a Bible Story, say http://www.biblestudytools.com/commentaries/the-fourfold-gospel/by-sections/jesus-defends-disciples-who-pluck-grain-on-the-sabbath.html

                    Mendocino is hungry for better trade/business deals to say the least.

                    Since you asked, there’s a bistro I’ll review for you within July.. I’m going to the CA State Grange in Santa Rosa tomorrow/weekend. Fort Bragg is a Monsanto Grange again if you didn’t know, but I’m there for Whitesboro Grange which this Sunday our wonderful pancake breakfast because our homemade berry syrup is so outstanding, I’ll be serving between 8 – 11:30 before I even get home from the convention! And I bet Maryalice Canclini who is also going to the convention will have fresh baked cookies for sale Sunday morning. How she does it, I don’t know, but I’m stickin’ with these Grangers until I figure it out.

                  • Bruce McEwen June 22, 2017

                    We — and by we I mean Mendo tax-payers — are paying a Deputy DA, out of Texas–? No! Even though his name is Houston Porter, he’s a Sonoma County food critic (and I use the verb loosely, BB) who writes up what I, personally, call “ads” in all the full-color regionals.

                • Harvey Reading June 21, 2017

                  “I found out that McDonald’s didn’t pay rent after a week…”

                  Still doesn’t.

                  • LouisBedrock June 21, 2017

                    “I dropped out of school when I was 15..”

                    Jr. high school drop out at about the 9th grade reading level or below.

                    That explains Grace’s grammar and spelling problems as well as her incapacity to read anything more complex than Zionist comic books and illustrated Bible stories.

                  • BB Grace June 21, 2017

                    I’ve never seen a Zionist comic book. I’m sure I’d enjoy that. Gotta link?

                    Illustrated Religious and Spiritual stories is Fine Arts which I appreciate as many times the pictures tell the story better than say, reading Mr. Bedrock’s ground hog day garbage no matter how perfect the spelling and grammar.

      • james marmon June 21, 2017

        I didn’t know that Ms. BB Grace was a feminist until yesterday, I guess she doesn’t want anything to do with a 63 year old man jacked up on “Super Male Vitality” and “Brain Force Plus”.

        -Disappointed-

        • BB Grace June 21, 2017

          Growing up I believed in everything liberal (as our buddy Alex Jones says, I am a classical liberal, Thomas Jefferson style). My turn around, like many, came with Ron Paul rEVOLution. Yes, I have regrets now, especially because liberals today celebrate cultures, such as Islam, which is not liberal, far more conservative than I could handle as a lifestyle. They have as many children as they can in solidarity with those who still hold the world is overpopulated and climate change from overpopulation is going to kill us all. In that respect, it may be a good thing I didn’t have children.

          Alex products I like:
          Survival Shield X-2 – Nascent Iodine
          Z-Shield
          Superblue Fluoride-Free Toothpaste
          Silver Bullet-colloidal silver

          • Bruce McEwen June 21, 2017

            I, too, am glad you didn’t have any offspring — not that you would put a C-4 vest on one of ’em and put the kid on a bus in Tel Aviv — No-no. What I’m agreeing with is that idea, so strenuously repressed, even by anarchists — let alone “liberals” — that the population is under control and, don’t worry, be happy, there’s order in the universe; that a miracle will come… It comes every day, if you think about it! How many more miracles do we need — and, BB, stop and think about this: Where’s it all going?

            Billy Joel said, “I need a miracle every day…”

            I think we all do.

            A penny for your thoughts, which I don’t consider too much… will you jew me down — me, a legendary scotch skinflint and spend thrift?

            • BB Grace June 21, 2017

              Billy Joel? Really? I’ll have to look that up. Meanwhile:

              I Need A Miracle
              Grateful Dead Lyrics

              I need a woman ’bout twice my age
              A lady of nobility, gentility and rage
              Splendor in the dark, lightning on the draw
              We’ll go right through the book and break each and every law.

              I got a feeling and it won’t go away, oh no
              Just one thing then I’ll be OK
              I need a miracle every day.

              I need a woman ’bout twice my height
              Statuesque, raven-dressed, a goddess of the night.
              Her secret incantations, a candle burning blue
              We’ll consult the spirits maybe they’ll know what to do.

              And it’s real and it won’t go away, oh no
              I can’t get around and I can’t run away
              I need a miracle every day.

              I need a woman ’bout twice my weight
              A ton of fun who packs a gun with all her freight
              Find her in a sideshow leave her in l.a.
              Ride her like a surfer running on a tidal wave.

              And it’s real, believe what I say, yeah
              Just one thing I got to say
              I need a miracle every day.

              It takes dynamite to get me up
              Too much of everything is just enough
              One more thing I just got to say
              I need a miracle every day,
              I need a miracle every day,
              I need a miracle every day, (got to be the only way)
              I need a miracle

              Written by John Barlow, Robert Hall Weir • Copyright © Universal Music Publishing Group

    • Harvey Reading June 21, 2017

      Praise Yahweh, all-knowing and merciful and wise.

  3. sohumlily June 21, 2017

    Dichelostemma ida-maia if you want to get all botanical about it~

    One of the many geophytes Carl Purdy grew and sold from his mail-order business on Cow Mountain back in the late 1800s and early 1900s.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Purdy

    I bought his autobiography from the Grace Hudson Museum way back when; “My Life & My Times”.

    He’s featured in the latest edition of Fremontia (the Geophyte double issue) Dec. 2016. Worth every penny!

    and ps
    Fuck Israel

    • Harvey Reading June 21, 2017

      Amen to the postscript.

      • LouisBedrock June 21, 2017

        Amen.

        • Bruce McEwen June 21, 2017

          My theological training has suffered due to a sour cynicism that was probably more or less inherited genetically from Grandpa McEwen’s Book of Epigrams — the only thing he left the clan — but wasn’t there something called “the Harrowing of Hell,” a quick trip Jesus made to go get those patriarchs and matriarchs out of there between the Crucifixion and the Resurrection?

          All the Good Hebrews from the Old Testament, which Jesus took ’em up to Paradise — before the ban on those who weren’t baptized went into effect — then He broke asunder the gates of Hell so all the subsequent Israelis could be dumped there?

          Help me out here, Louis. The Jehovah Witlesses were here leaving their scholarly little comic books while I was at work, and I’d hate to have to call them in to solve a theological question you could more readily address.

          • LouisBedrock June 21, 2017

            Good Brother Bruce:

            I’m a bit unsure about biblical mythology myself.

            All I remember is that Jesus came out, saw his shadow, ran back into the cave, and they had six more weeks of winter.

            • Harvey Reading June 21, 2017

              It appears to me you have mastered the mythology, Louis. Other things I have heard are just as silly, making them equivalent in a way.

            • Harvey Reading June 21, 2017

              Louis, has the term “biblical scholar” ever struck you as being an oxymoron?

              • LouisBedrock June 21, 2017

                Yes!

  4. Jim Updegraff June 21, 2017

    Time for baseball: Giants 6 Braves 3. Moore, far a change pitched a good game, Slater hit a 3 run home plus sloppy playing by Atlanta – 3 costly errors and the giants win one.
    Houston 8 A’s 4 – Sonny Gray gave up 5 ER in the first inning and that was all she wrote.

  5. Jim Updegraff June 21, 2017

    Trump’s slumlord son-in-law is now in Palestine to negotiate an agreement between the two parties. Nothing will come out of it and Israel will continue on their path of self destruction.

    • Bruce McEwen June 21, 2017

      The slumlord could learn a thing or two about evictions, however, using bulldozers instead of the courts for unlawful detainer-type evictions, which I’m sure most slumlords detest as a waste of time and money.

  6. Alice Chouteau June 21, 2017

    The best news in a long time, is that Tomm Allman will give us another chance to have a mental health faxility in the county, especially after reading that 41% of our ever expanding homeless population is mentally ill.
    Maybe the need for a long-term drug and alocol rehab facility can be addressed next.

    • james marmon June 21, 2017

      One of my favorite Professors would disagree with the 41% really being mentally ill. Diagnosis’s are used for billing purposes only.

      http://www.zoominfo.com/p/Herb-Kutchins/1974342594

      Making Us Crazy: DSM: The Psychiatric Bible and the Creation of Mental Disorders

      https://www.amazon.com/Making-Us-Crazy-Psychiatric-Disorders/dp/0743261208

      Do you actually think that Sheriff Allman is going to solve your problems by locking all those people up? It you do, you, Bruce “the Oracle” Anderson, and Sheriff “cry baby” Allman have a lot to learn about state and federal laws and the constitution.

      I will be here to teach you.

      James Marmon MSW
      Personal Growth Consultant

      ‘don’t just go through it, grow through it’

      • BB Grace June 21, 2017

        I’ll buy you and a guest a Grange breakfast this Sunday for your birthday Mr. 4th of July.. 8 – 11:30.

        • Bruce McEwen June 22, 2017

          “The same warmth of temper, which rendered James Marmon a hot-blooded and intemperate zealot in politics had the more desirable consequences of making him a good-tempered, kindhearted man — who, if sometimes a little misled by vanity, was always well-meaning and benevolent….”

          SCOTT

  7. Mike Dunlap June 21, 2017

    Matt B. (and everyone else too), “Service Animal” rules (a title now limited to dogs only) allow establishment owners/operators to ask what service the dog provides. Also the rules specifically indicate that the service animal may not interfere with the operation of the enterprise or the other patrons. As for restaurants they are still not allowed in food prep areas. Therapy dogs, by the way, do not get the same privileges under the law.

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