MCT: Saturday, May 18, 2019

• May Rains
• Next B
• Adventist PHF
• Horse Value
• PV Project
• Cell Towers
• Wilbur Sale
• Navaho
• Albion Pirates
• Wildfire Survey
• Bookvan
• July 1930
• Poison Subsidy
• Yesterday's Catch
• Mueller Follies
• Removing Trump
• USS Provocation
• War Drum
• Sez Brooks
• FB Gardens
• Neighborhoods
• Micro Celebrity
• Mexicans Always
• Enduring Facade
• Doppelgrouper
• Hemp Industry
• Indoctrination
• SF Homeless
• Progressive Teddy
• Marco Radio
• Found Object

THE FIRST MAY STORM dropped 3.3 inches of rain on Boonville and 4 on Yorkville. Yesterday (Friday) we enjoyed a break, but the National Weather Service says: "Another potent late Spring storm offshore will move across Northwest California today through Sunday. Drier weather conditions Monday will be quickly replaced by more wet weather Monday night and Tuesday."

---

MARSHALL NEWMAN informs us:

Record Setting Navarro River Flow For This Date

https://waterdata.usgs.gov/usa/nwis/uv?site_no=11468000

THE NEXT MENTAL HEALTH TREATMENT ACT (MEASURE B) Citizen's Oversight Committee Meeting is May 22, 2019. Besides routine administrative matters, the only substantive item on the Measure B Committee's agenda is: “Discussion and Possible Action Regarding Update on Status of the Architect RFQ and Related Feasibility Study.” (An “RFQ” is a request for qualifications.)

SO the only substantive item that has made it on to the Measure B Committee’s agenda in the last TWO MONTHS is a discussion and “possible” action on an as-yet to be issued invitation from the County to the local architectural and consulting community to determine if anybody’s willing to take Mendo’s money to design and/or analyze existing buildings for some as yet undefined mental heath facility or facilities.

SOMETHING TELLS US Sheriff Allman is not going to be too pleased with the pace of this activity.

THE ADVENTISTS PHF?

To the Editor:

If Adventist Health would create a PHF (Ukiah or Willits) and staff it with their compassionate medical teams, then Measure B money would not have to build a PHF. Measure B money could build the first of three Crisis Residential Treatment Centers (CRTC) on Orchard Street with program and staff. The CRTC could begin earlier in any appropriate available space and later move into their building when completed.

As more Measure B money becomes available, a second CRTC could be built on land in Fort Bragg (maybe MCDH land). This CRTC could also operate elsewhere until construction was completed. Then with more Measure B money available, a third CRTC could be built on South Coast, also starting earlier elsewhere.

If there is enough money, an Addiction Recovery Center could begin on the same land as one of the CRTCs.

Sonya Nesch, Teacher

Comptche

…AND THE HORSES YOU RODE IN ON

Consent Calendar Item 4g, from next Tuesday’s Supervisors agenda:

Adoption of Resolution Determining the Value of Horses In the Possession of the County and Authorizing the Chair to Sell Same Recommended Action: Adopt Resolution determining the value of horses in the possession of the County and authorizing the Chair to sell same; and authorize Chair to sign same.

Resolution Of The Mendocino County Board Of Supervisors Determining The Value Of Horses In The Possession Of The County And Authorizing The Chair To Sell Same

Whereas, California Government Code § 25363 allows a county board of supervisors to sell personal property owned by the county that is not required for public use, at private sale if in the unanimous judgment of the board the value of the personal property is less than $500; and

Whereas, Mendocino County Animal Care Services is in the possession of two horses identified and described as:

1. A161932 – Arabian stallion, white in color, 12 years of age;
2. A168375 - Arabian mare, white in color, 10 years of age; and

Whereas, said horses were seized by Mendocino County Animal Control and became the property of the County of Mendocino per the provisions of California Penal Code § 597.1 or former Mendocino County Code section 10.24.080; and

Whereas, said horses are not required for public use: and

Whereas, the County attempted to sell the horses listed above at auction, with a minimum bid for A161932 set at $150.00, and a minimum bid for A168375 set at $200.00, and no buyers came forward to purchase these horses; and

Whereas, Animal Care Services has determined that monetary value of each horse listed above is below $500.00; and

Whereas, continuing to board these horses will result in additional funds being spent by Mendocino County.

Now, Therefore, Be It Resolved That it is the unanimous judgment of the Mendocino County Board of Supervisors that the monetary value of each of the following horses is less than $500.00; and

Be It Further Resolved That said horses may be sold by private sale, without advertising by the Chair of this Board of Supervisors, for as little as $1.00 per horse.

---

BACKGROUND:

BACK IN JANUARY the Board considered:

“Approval of Second Amendment to Agreement No. PH-17-049, with Cole Creek Equestrian Center, Increasing the Amount from $50,000 to $100,000 to Provide Boarding and Care to Impounded Horses, Effective When Agreement Becomes Fully Executed through June 30, 2019.”

Newly seated Fifth District Supervisor Ted Williams, boldly jumped right into the issue, in the process making a clear and early distinction between himself and his somnolent predecessor.

Williams: How many horses are we talking about?

Animal Control Manager Rich Molinari: We have 19 horses. Four came in on October 19, 2017. 13 came in on January 3, 2018. And two foals were born in late March of 2018.

Williams: So we are talking about $5000 per horse?

Molinari: $4750 per horse on a monthly basis.

Williams: One of my concerns is I'm about to drive home through Anderson Valley. I know that if I do everything right and an act of nature puts me in a ditch and I need help, that ambulance has one EMT that is paid $30 for a 12 hour shift. Not $30 per hour, but about $3 per hour. No paramedic. No pain meds. And this is a large area of our county. We have several of these. We are disproportionately spending more money taking care of these horses than our people. I understand the situation that we're in and that maybe we have to do this. But I would like to suggest liquidating the horses immediately. And if the court won't allow that, then we should push back on the court. We need to focus our money more on our people than on horses that have been impounded.

Board Chair/Supervisor Carre Brown: Certainly, I am not a lawyer, but I believe we have legal hoops we have to jump through.

Deputy County Counsel Brina Blanton: There are some legal hoops, but I think we will be able to accomplish those probably this month depending on the court schedule and what we're able to accomplish. Part of the problem is that these horses are related to a pending criminal action. So we have to make sure that the court will let us release them because they are considered evidence.

Supervisor John McCowen: I certainly encourage us to review our practices in this area. There are civil proceedings, there are criminal proceedings, in terms of evidence for the criminal proceedings, medical records, photographic documentation, incident reports from our animal control officers -- to me it's kind of unconscionable that we still have these horses more than a year after the fact [Ms. Delaquadra’s first arrest was in the fall of 2017] and we are paying a lot of money for them. I'm very aware that often things kind of happen but I certainly hope that we do everything possible to make sure that this doesn't happen again. Again, my memory is, I believe we used to have volunteers who would take care of the horses. I understand this could be a special case because one of the involved parties would become a problem to anyone who would try to foster these animals. But there has to have been in another way to resolve this. To hear that we still have a couple of months to go, optimistically, is kind of disheartening.

Supervisor Dan Gjerde: Can we send the bill to the court?

Chair Brown: [Laughs.]

Supervisor John Haschak: Okay. I move to approve the Second Amendment to Agreement No. PH-17-049, with Cole Creek Equestrian Center, Increasing the Amount from $50,000 to $100,000 to Provide Boarding and Care to Impounded Horses, Effective When Agreement Becomes Fully Executed through June 30, 2019.” And I certainly hope this is done as expeditiously as possible.

Chair Brown: Public comment? [None.] Well I guess there wouldn't be, there's no one here. [Laughter.]

Clerk of the Board: Motion passes with supervisor Gjerde dissenting [without explanation.]

---

WHAT’S MISSING from this item is how much the County has paid to board Ms. Delaquadra’s horses, how much they sold the other 17 horses for and the likelihood that the woman from whom the horses were “seized” for malnourishment will buy the last two back for $2.

Mendocino County Board of Supervisors puts aside $100,000 for Potter Valley Project

CELL TOWERS, an amendment via MSP:

The Manchester tower was NOT approved - it was continued

The tower in Manchester was NOT approved, it was continued. The Potter Valley tower will be back in front of the planners at a special meeting July 3rd.

(Paul McCarthy)

DOC MILLER CASHES IN

The historic Wilbur Hot Springs is for sale.

The resort and nature preserve in Colusa County, 25 miles from Clearlake, is on the market for $10 million, according to listing agent David C. Gilbert of Golden Gate Sotheby's International Realty.

The 1,760-acre property's history traces back to the Yocha Dehe tribe of the Wintun Nation, who used the hot springs as ceremonial and healing grounds.

In the early 1860s, Congressman General John Bidwell was searching for gold in Northern California. One of his men became sick, and the hot springs were used as treatment, according to the Wilbur Hot Springs website.

Europeans began coming to the springs in droves.

Two men, Ezekial Wilbur and Edwin Howell, bought a ranch near the springs to mine copper in 1863, according to the website. When their plans fell apart, Wilbur constructed a hotel and opened Wilbur Hot Sulphur Springs two years later.

The hot springs' current owner, Dr. Richard Louis Miller, bought the property in 1972. Miller later purchased the adjacent 1,560 acre valley, now a nature preserve only for visitors.

The property has 25 bedrooms, 16 bathrooms and multiple fireplaces, according to the listing.

NAVAJO YOUNG MAN. 1907. Photo by Carl Moon. Source: New York Public Library.

MSP SAW THIS POST by Glenn Mason‎ to the "Mendocino County History" Facebook page Thursday - they don't have a "share" button so we did a screen grab:

"While on the subject of Albion, I thought you might enjoy seeing a postcard view of the pirate ship in the Albion River.

The ship was used in the filming of the movie Frenchman's Creek in 1944, based on the novel by Daphne du Maurier with the same title. Joan Fontaine and Arturo de Cordova were the stars. Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce of Sherlock Holmes and Watson fame also appeared in the film, the only film they were in together other than the Sherlock Holmes films.

As a teenager in the late 1950s / early 1960s, a friend and I used to take a rowboat up the Albion river to see the scuttled ship. Are pieces of it still there? We also dreamed of finding the lost gold coins on the low flats just up the river. But, that's another story…!"

THE ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH SCIENCES CENTER at UC Davis is researching California wildfires that burned across the state last year. If you were living in California in 2018 during any of the wildfires, and are 18 or older, we invite you to take our statewide online survey (link below). We’re interested in hearing from people who lived in counties that had fires, or in surrounding areas affected by smoke. We also encourage people who were NOT directly affected by the fire, ash, or smoke to take the survey. The information we’re gathering will be part of a larger study funded by the National Institutes of Health to learn how wildfires are affecting the mental and physical health of our communities, both now and in the long-run. The goal is to help government agencies, health care providers and community groups provide better services to people affected by #wildfires. Our survey is online and confidential, and takes 20 to 30 minutes to complete. Thank you! #californiawildfire

Please share this and take the survey here: https://ucdavis.co1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_eLp7b7N9wn5ZdHf

BOOKMOBILE HOLDS TO BE DELIVERED IN COUNTY VAN next week, May 21st to May 24th

May 21st to May 24th the Bookmobile will be in for service, and staff will be bringing patron holds to the regularly scheduled stops in a County van. For more information, please view www.mendolibrary.org or contact the Bookmobile at 671-6684. We apologize for the inconvenience.

STATE SENATOR McGUIRE extends subsidy to wine industry.

“Pierce’s disease is spread by a nasty little bugger and once a vine is infected – the disease will block the water system of the vine, the fruit will shrivel, and ultimately the entire plant will die. There is still no known cure for the disease, which is why it is so important that we do everything we can at the state level to stop the spread of Pierce’s and continue to advance desperately needed research,” Sen. McGuire said. “SB 449 extends the existing Pierce’s Disease Control Program to 2026 which will help keep California’s multibillion dollar wine industry thriving for decades to come.”

SB 449 is endorsed by California Association of Winegrape Growers, Family Winemakers of California, and the Wine Institute.

SB 449 was approved in the Senate with unanimous support, and the bill will now move to the State Assembly for approval.

McGUIRE’S WINE INDUSTRY SUBSIDY WORKS AS FOLLOWS: “The [subsidy] account shall consist of money transferred from the General Fund and money made available from federal, industry, and other sources. Money made available from federal, industry, and other sources shall be available for expenditure without regard to fiscal year for the purpose of combating Pierce’s disease or its vectors and for the purpose described in Section 6047.30. State general funds to be used for research shall be expended only when the secretary has received commitments from nonstate sources for at least a 25-percent match for each state dollar to be expended.”

SO TAXPAYERS provide $300k to the wine industry for every $100k the wine industry puts up.

ALSO: “(4) The proposed treatment of Pierce’s disease and its vectors. Treatment programs shall comply with all applicable laws and regulations and shall be conducted in an environmentally responsible manner.”

BUT no definition of “environmentally responsible” is offered and no enforcement mechanism is mentioned. As usual.

ACCORDING TO THE LITERATURE, most of the insecticides recommended for control of Pierce’s Disease and the leafhoppers (“sharpshooters”) that carry it are especially toxic to bees. So, similar to Navarro Vineyards Owner Ted Bennett’s famous remark about the industry’s sleep-killing night-time high-volume wind blasters — “My grapes are more important than your sleep” — if it comes down to it, grapes are also more important than bees.

UC Davis recommendation: “Insecticide treatments aimed at controlling the vector in areas adjacent to the vineyard have reduced the incidence of Pierce's disease by reducing the numbers of sharpshooters immigrating into the vineyards in early spring. The degree of control, however, is not effective for very susceptible varieties such as Chardonnay and Pinot Noir [which make up the majority of grapes in Mendocino County] or for vines less than 3 years old. If a vineyard is near an area with a history of Pierce's disease, use varieties that are less susceptible to this disease. [the local wine industry would never do that, it might affect their bottom line] … Treat vegetation along the edges of the vineyard where sharpshooters are observed. If sharpshooters have migrated into the vineyard and new shoot growth on grapevines is longer than a few inches, also treat the first 200 to 300 feet in from the edge of the vineyard. Replace traps after spraying and continue monitoring traps and vegetation. Respray if trap catches indicate another population increase. The goal is to eliminate more than 95% of the vector population. … About all that can be done is to try to purchase or lease adjacent properties and manage [apply pesticide to] them so that sharpshooter populations do not build up.”

(See: http://ipm.ucanr.edu/PMG/r302301711.html)

UC’s top recommended insecticide for Sharpshooters is imidacloprid. As of 1999, imidacloprid was the most widely used insecticide in the world.

From the Pesticide Information Center:

Is imidacloprid likely to contribute to the development of cancer?

The United States Environmental Protection Agency (U.S. EPA) decided that there is no evidence that imidacloprid causes cancer based on animal studies. The International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) has not classified imidacloprid for its potential to cause cancer.

Has anyone studied non-cancer effects from long-term exposure to imidacloprid?

Scientists fed imidacloprid to mother rats and rabbits during their pregnancies. The exposure caused reproductive effects including reduced bone growth in the babies. The doses that caused the problems in the pups were toxic to the mothers. No data were found on developmental or reproductive effects of imidacloprid in people.

---

Can imidacloprid affect birds, fish, or other wildlife?

Imidacloprid is not very toxic to birds and slightly toxic to fish, although this varies by species. Imidacloprid is very toxic to honeybees and other beneficial insects. The role, if any, of imidacloprid in Colony Collapse Disorder is not yet clear. Scientists have shown that plants grown in treated soil may have imidacloprid residues in their nectar and pollen at levels that are below those shown to cause effects on bees in laboratory experiments.

Other beneficial animals may also be affected. Green lacewings did not avoid nectar of plants grown in soil treated with imidacloprid. The lacewings that fed from the treated plants had lower survival than lacewings that had not fed from treated plants. Ladybugs that ate aphids from plants grown in treated soil also showed reduced survival and reproduction.

Scientists are actively studying the effects of imidacloprid on bees and other invertebrates. As they finish their studies, new information will be coming out that will help define the risks to these animals.

“…a 2012 water monitoring study by the state of California, performed by collecting agricultural runoff during the growing seasons of 2010 and 2011, found imidacloprid in 89% of samples, with levels ranging from 0.1-3.2 µg/L. 19% of the samples exceeded the EPA threshold for chronic toxicity for aquatic invertebrates of 1.05 µg/L. The authors also point out that Canadian and European guidelines are much lower (0.23 µg/L and 0.067 µg/L, respectively) and were exceeded in 73% and 88% of the samples, respectively. The authors concluded that ‘imidacloprid commonly moves offsite and contaminates surface waters at concentrations that could harm aquatic invertebrates’." … “To members of the species Apis mellifera, the western honey bee, imidacloprid is one of the most toxic chemicals ever created as an insecticide.”

CATCH OF THE DAY, MAY 17, 2019

SCOT ALLENSWORTH, Ukiah. Disobeying court order, failure to appear.

JENNIFER BLACK, Ukiah. Trespassing, probation revocation.

BALDEMAR ESQUIVEL, Covelo. DUI causing bodily injury, probation revocation.

JACK HAYWARD, Boonville. Disobeying court order, failure to appear.

BRANDON HIGHTOWER, Livermore/Talmage. Battery, resisting, failure to appear, probation revocation.

ANDREW JUMP, Covelo. Failure to appear.

JAMES LAFORCE, Ukiah. Petty theft, vehicle tampering, vandalism.

CALEB MACARTHUR, Ukiah. Disorderly conduct-alcohol.

HEATHER MULLINS, Covelo. DUI.

CESAR ROCHA, Hacienda/Ukiah. DUI.

CALVIN TAYLOR II, Ukiah. Disorderly conduct-alcohol.

MILLICEN URBINA, Santa Rosa/Ukiah. Probation revocation.

ARMANDO VALDIBIAS, Ukiah Suspended license (for DUI).

SCOTT WEDGLEY, Fort Bragg. DUI.

FREE FOR ALL

by James Kunstler

“WASHINGTON — House Democrats, frustrated by President Trump’s efforts to stonewall their investigations and eager to stoke public anger about the president’s behavior, are pinning their diminishing hopes on Robert S. Mueller III yet again…. Mr. Mueller, who was invited to testify by the chairmen of the House Judiciary and Intelligence Committees a month ago, has not agreed to do so.” — The New York Times

---

Oh? Is that so? Do you wonder why Mr. Mueller might not want to open his aching heart to any House committee in the desperate, last-ditch effort to wring some impeachment joy juice from the already wrung-out narrative of his disappointing report? For the excellent reason that the minority Republican members of said committees get to ask questions too, and they are sure to be embarrassing questions, perhaps placing the Special Counsel in legal jeopardy.

For instance: why did Mr. Mueller not reveal publicly that his team, and the FBI, both knew from the very start that the predicating “corpus of evidence” for the two-year inquisition was cheap fiction written by Glenn Simpson and his hirelings at Fusion GPS, the Hillary Clinton campaign’s disinformation contractor — including “Russia specialist” Nellie Ohr, wife of the then Deputy Attorney General Bruce Ohr? I could go on, but the above fact-nugget alone is enough to inform any sentient adult that the Mueller Investigation was an entirely political act of seditious subterfuge, and there are many other actionable nuggets of blatant mendacity in the 444-page report to inspire the convening of grand juries against a great many officials in orbit around Mr. Mueller. So, don’t expect Mr. Mueller to show up in any congressional witness chair, though he may occupy one in a courtroom around the time that the next major election is in full swing.

Here’s what will actually happen. These House majority committee chiefs are going to quit their blustering over the next week or so as they discover there is no political value — and plenty of political hazard — in extending the RussiaGate circus. In the meantime, a titanic juridical machine, already a’grinding, will discredit the whole sordid affair and send a number of hapless participants to the federal ping-pong academies. And by then, the long-suffering citizenry will barely give a shit because we will have entered the climactic phase of the Fourth Turning (or Long Emergency, take you pick), in which the operations of everyday business and governance in this country seriously crumble.

The Golden Golem of Greatness will be blamed for most of that. The internal contradictions of Globalism were already blowing up trade and financial relations between the US and China. The Trump tariffs just amount to a clumsy recognition of the fatal imbalances long at work there. As a 25 percent tax on countless Chinese products, the tariffs will punish American shoppers as much as the Chinese manufacturers. Trade wars have a way of escalating into more kinetic conflicts.

The sad truth is that both China and the US are beset by dangerous fragilities. Both countries have borrowed themselves into a Twilight Zone of unpayable debt. Both countries are sunk in untenable economic and banking rackets to cover up their insolvency. China’s fate hangs on distant energy supply lines that run through bottlenecks like the Straits of Hormuz and the Straits of Molucca. The US has been producing torrents of shale oil at a net financial loss — a business model with poor long-term prospects. The temperament of the Chinese people is conditioned historically by subservience to authority, which tends to blow into anarchic rage quickly and catastrophically when things go wrong. The US populace, sunk in decadence, despair, distraction, and delusion, moves sluggishly toward unrest — and for the time being expresses its discontent only in ceremonial narcissistic grievance.

The quarrel between the US and China now threatens to suck the rest of the world into a global business depression, which is what you might expect when globalism seizes up and the global players start scrambling desperately to keep any kind of economy going. The danger then will be that the disgruntled populations of these many lands could become as delusional as Americans, and equally inclined to international violence. There could be all kinds of fighting in all sorts of places while everybody goes broke and hungry. And meanwhile, Robert Mueller meets his protégé Jim Comey for the ping-pong championship of Allenwood federal penitentiary.

(Support Kunstler’s writing by visiting his Patreon Page.)

SEA MONSTER

Editor,

Is dispatching the USS Abraham Lincoln to the 35-mile-wide Persian Gulf an attempt to bait and provoke? Those ships are made to stand, deter, endure, attack, defend and self-replenish indefinitely.

They carry more destructive force than any country should ever need to possess. They cost more to operate than any country should need to spend on defense. Those vessels hold precious cargo: our service people. When military big boy toys are flaunted, as to say “take your best shot,” their necks are on the line. Mothers be afraid. I am.

Bobby Collier

Kelseyville

Barbara Ehrenreich: “David Brooks, who divorced his wife of 27 years and simultaneously dropped Judaism for Christianity, used his latest column to chide ‘working class men’ for their lack of commitment to family or church. Anything you don’t like about America: Just blame the working class.”

GARDENS TO BRAGG ABOUT

It's that time of year, again!

Fort Bragg Garden Club is currently accepting nominations for its annual Sidewalk Gardens To Bragg About contest. Nominate any attractive garden, found within the Fort Bragg city limits, that can be viewed from the sidewalk.

Text the address to (707) 397-5842 or email to thepeggymartin@hotmail.com.

Please use Gardens to Bragg About as the subject. We do need an address in order to send out our judging team.

Last day to make nominations is May 27th. Judging will be on May 30.

Recognition Program will be held the evening of June 10.

Peggy Martin

Fort Bragg Garden Club

DRIVING A SCHOOL BUS

One of my [school bus] routes goes to a working-class apartment complex populated by immigrants. Its lot is filled with food trucks and work vans. I have two stops at the complex, where I deposit around 75 elementary schoolchildren. Then I have a final stop elsewhere with two students, after which, barring unforeseen problems, I’m done for the day. The final stop is at the stem of a cul-de-sac, a mile by road from the apartment complex but no more than a few soccer fields in actual distance.

I’m jolted by the proximity of the cul-de-sac to the complex despite the rupture created by artful placement of park land and commercial property. Juxtaposition of poor and rich neighborhoods is supposed to be a feature of cities in the Global South, but it’s not uncommon in the United States (it’s long been a feature of rapidly-gentrifying DC, for example). US urban planners are adept at designing infrastructure that compartmentalizes people while maintaining illusions of equal access. They don’t tell you that access is contingent on unequal opportunity.

The working-class apartment complex offers exhilarating contradictions. It is worn down, with piles of trash bags outside of overflowing dumpsters, but it also possesses an energy absent from manicured subdivisions with single-family homes. Street life exists in the apartment complex: adults congregate on stoops to chat in multiple languages; children scurry across receding green spaces; everywhere one hears the reassuring noise of music, laughter, argument. Whatever its problems, the complex has achieved the status of a community. The cul-de-sac, on the other hand, is an empty gesture of civic obligation.

— Steve Salaita, from No Flags, No Slogans, a highly recommended blog stevesalaita.com

INFAMY NEVER AGREED WITH MY DISPOSITION. I disliked the attention, which seemed to elicit vague expectations of reciprocity; I hated the rewards that come from reciting slogans and platitudes; I detested the tacit contract that I was supposed to be some kind of role-model to people who proclaim mistrust of authority. After a while I felt obliged to sabotage my fame. No media appearances. No networking. No phony relationships. No orchestrated controversies. No whiny monologues about being repressed. In short, none of the usual bullshit that goes into the making of a micro-celebrity. When a white liberal upbraided me for failing in my responsibilities as an “Arab American leader” (I had criticized one of Bernie Sanders’s terrible opinions about Palestine) a return to pseudo-anonymity seemed to be the only viable response. — Steve Salaita

ON LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY

I am prepared to wake up one fine morning and find the world has misplaced its facade and everything has turned to shit but it is not what I SEE when I get out and about.

“The US populace, sunk in decadence,……..ceremonial narcissistic grievance”. It’s a great line–easy to imagine, almost impossible to see as signs of prosperity with easily printed money pop up everywhere. I am no rich person (except for my health, family, and friendships) but I have been to graduations, weddings, family gatherings, entertainment, beach visits, national park hikes across the country this year and literally everywhere is booming. Is there a seamy underside of desperation in all these glittering venues-undoubtedly. But I don’t experience them. What we have here is an imaginative certainty but not a real Reality, yet. We are as enamored of our prophesied disaster as the religious are of their God and the elite are of their Progress. Seven years ago I watched the first episode of Game of Thrones and it was suggested that Winter was Coming. I subsequently was hooked enough to watch the first season and was sufficiently titillated to consider watching a second season but I was miffed that Winter seemed to have disappeared….

INDUSTRIAL HEMP PRODUCTION SKYROCKETS

We know industrial hemp production is not in Mendocino County, or in the Big Valley. The biggest producing state in 2018 was Montana, at 22,000 acres. Total acres for the US was close to 80,000 acres. "Still, hemp’s large rate of increase is likely to accelerate in 2019, given that hemp has been removed from the Controlled Substances Act and is eligible for crop insurance, farm loans and all other federally backed farm assistance programs."

With Trump’s signature on the Farm Bill, hemp gains federally legal status

Chart: America’s hemp acres hit almost 80,000 in 2018; Montana new leader among states

SAN FRANCISCO’S HOMELESS POPULATION IS ON THE RISE

Preliminary data from a citywide count conducted earlier this year shows a nearly 17 percent increase in homeless residents from 2017, according to numbers released Thursday. That increase, which reflects the results of a count conducted for the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, roughly translates to 1,100 more people living without adequate shelter in San Francisco, up from 6,858 people two years ago to 8,011 in 2019. The City simultaneously conducted its own count with slightly different metrics, the results of which will be released in the coming months. “This is really heartbreaking,” said Department on Homelessness and Supportive Housing Director Jeff Kositsky, who said that increases in homeless populations mirrored or surpassed San Francisco in the region and across the state. While the initial numbers indicate that homelesness among youth and veterans in San Francisco dropped by 10 percent and by 14 percent respectively, the number of people living in vehicles accounted for 68 percent of The City’s increase in unsheltered people. Kositsky said that The City needs to “think long and hard” about how to stem the growing population of people living in vehicles. “A few safe parking facilities isn’t a long term solution,” he said. “Are vehicles the new form of housing? They shouldn’t be.”

sfexaminer.com/the-city/san-franciscos-homeless-population-is-on-the-rise/

MEMO OF THE AIR: GOOD NIGHT RADIO, FRIDAY NIGHT

Hi, I forgot to tell you: two weeks ago Molly Bee won the suggest-my-new-stripper-name contest and proudly took away the prize of the glow-in-the-dark zombified Marilyn t-shirt. You can stop suggesting unless you're just getting a kick out of it. The next contest will be announced on the air by the interim mystery dominar of contests, and the prize will be the DVD box set of the Season 1 of /Farscape/ from twenty years ago.

Memo of the Air: Good Night Radio, 9pm to 5am tonight (Friday, May 17) on 107.7fm KNYO Fort Bragg (and 105.1fm KMEC Ukiah, and via KNYO.org), live from 325 N. Franklin, next door to the fabulous Tip Top bar.

Deadline to email your writing to be read on the air tonight is 6pm or so. If you're not done by then, send it whenever it's ready and I'll read it next week. Or call and read it on the air yourself: 962-3022. Or visit if you're in town. Saunter luxuriously in and head for the warmly-lit room at the back. Bring your second-best stuff; that's plenty good enough. Here's the traditional offering of a few educational bemusements for while you wait for tonight:

Sexy weasels in Renaissance art.

https://www.neatorama.com/2019/05/16/Sexy-Weasels-in-Renaissance-Art/

Frontier psychiatrist.

https://misscellania.blogspot.com/2019/05/frontier-psychiatrist.html

And Leon Russell invented liquid paper so he's not only filthy rich, not to mention still alive, and lately after a period of soul searching and a health scare he just got back together romantically with Bjork's brilliant albino daughter Thistle, the famous physicist and accidental astronaut who made first contact with the Heechee in 2004, 2007 or 1998, depending on the timeline.

https://xkcd.com/2149/

Marco McClean, memo@mcn.org, https://MemoOfTheAir.wordpress.com

FOUND OBJECT