Press "Enter" to skip to content

MCT: Tuesday, November 19, 2019

* * *

RAIN WILL TAPER OFF across most of the area this morning. Gusty north winds will follow this afternoon through Wednesday. Dry conditions are expected Wednesday through the weekend, with freezing overnight low temperatures in many of the interior valleys and possible early morning frost at the coast. (National Weather Service)

* * *

JOHN SAKOWICZ REPORTS: 3.2 earthquake 1.4 mile east of Ukiah at 8:02 pm (3 earthquakes greater than 1.5 in Ukiah in the last 24 hours).

* * *

PG&E PUBLIC SAFETY POWER SHUTOFF (PSPS) Scheduled for November 20, 2019 through November 21, 2019

Post Date: 11/18/2019 11:29 AM

The County of Mendocino has been notified by Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E) that power may be turned off in our area due to high risk weather conditions on November 20, 2019. At this time approximately 3,000 Mendocino County customers are estimated to be effected in the following areas: McNab Ranch south through Hopland to the County line and the Gualala area along the coast approximately half way to Point Arena. Chief Executive Officer Carmel Angelo stated, “Like past events the information is very dynamic and can change minute by minute. Please be aware the County is dependent on PG&E to provide accurate, updated information that can be shared with the public. Mendocino County will continue to closely monitor the situation and share update as we receive them from PG&E.”

De-energization will be initiated by PG&E and is estimated to occur at 5:00am on November 20, 2019, prior to the start of the 8:00am wind event. PG&E estimates the wind event will last 24 hour, concluding on November 21, 2019, at 8:00am. Following the “all clear” on the morning of November 21, 2019, PG&E will begin power restoration. The County will release any updated information on the power outage and re-energization timelines as they become available.

For more information, please contact the Executive Office at 707-463-4441. For updated County information on the public safety power shut off, please visit www.mendocinocounty.org/psps or follow the County on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/mendocinocounty and twitter https://twitter.com/countymendocino.


WE SCURRIED off to PG&E’s website to check the Boonville zip code to see if we are going dark. The site said, “Pending.”

Pending chaos if we get a repeat of the last “wind event.” An hour later, the site was up and we learned that Anderson Valley and much of Mendo will NOT go dark. “The County of Mendocino has been notified by Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E) that power may be turned off in our area due to high risk weather conditions on November 20, 2019. At this time approximately 3,000 Mendocino County customers are estimated to be effected in the following areas: McNab Ranch south through Hopland to the County line and the Gualala area along the coast approximately half way to Point Arena.”


LAST TIME AROUND, not a leaf stirred in the Anderson Valley but plunged we were into the cold and the dark anyway. Here at the Boonville weekly, where the flame of hope is never extinguished despite all contrary evidence, our layout person and our printer were also unable to function off-grid. Monday morning, as we put together our weekly assemblage of local news unobtainable any place but here, not to mention our cutting edge opinions and deep dish insights, we anticipate another semi-lost week to go along with increasingly erratic postal delivery of our paper-paper. Used to be when our whole show was done by hand we were little affected by power outages. But since we’ve all been herded into these vast cyber-dependencies we’re all prisoners of what we were sold as progress.

* * *

* * *

NIGHT LIGHT OF THE NORTH COAST: Lights Out in Eureka

The PSPS of 10/27/19

by David Wilson

When the PG&G Public Safety Power Shutoff of October 27, 2019 cast its shadow on Humboldt County, the chance to explore Eureka in light of the unusual darkness was irresistible. Just sixteen days earlier I’d had the opportunity to traipse around a darkened Arcata and capture some unusual images of the city under the light of a large moon. And when the second outage hit I was looking forward to doing the same in Eureka. But as fate would have it, other obligations cut my Eureka explorations short and I was only able to bring back an image of the darkened city from the corner of 4th and G Streets.

The feeling was different from that of an unexpected power outage. No one was caught by surprise out in the dark for this planned power shutoff, and people had mostly stayed home. But though the city was relatively quiet, there were some fellow explorers also taking in the unusual sights of a sleeping city. The sidewalks and roads were dark with the street lights out, and it was odd to see a flashlight bobbing where someone walked. Staring coldly vacant, windows poured their darkened forebodings onto the streets.

Occasional cars pierced the darkness with their beams, flashing glimpses of cityscape brightly in their passing glare and sending shadows scurrying crazily across. Then all dimmed again to silhouettes until the next car came: darkness, the glare of headlights, red glow of taillights, and darkness again. Such it appeared to my eye.

But not so to the camera; it was an instance in which the camera could capture the scene differently from the eye. If I left the shutter open long enough, the light from successive cars passing would build up on the image captured, each car’s headlights adding to the brightness in the final photograph. While I saw the light rise and fall with the passing of the cars, the camera would simply gather it as it came and present it all at the end. The cars themselves would be transparent, for they would move so quickly through the view that the camera wouldn’t even register them; it would see right through them. The car lights themselves would show up very well, though, appearing as bright streaks as they traveled across the view while the shutter was open. The fascination of seeing a scene one way, and then using the camera’s weird eye to create a photograph that looks another way is probably what keeps me fiddling with this stuff. At least, that’s part of it.

All city lights were out in Eureka, California during PG&E's Public Safety Power Shutoff on October 27, 2019. The headlights of a few passing cars illuminated the scene, leaving trailing streaks from their taillights. 4th & G Streets, Eureka.

A little free advertising above? Maybe so, but my eye was on the lines and shapes and the strange light. I was aware of the oval sign hanging above me as another shape, and to tell the truth in my mind I felt I was crouched beneath a tavern’s swinging sign. Turned out less romantic

(To keep abreast of David Wilson’s most current photography or peer into its past, visit or contact him at his website mindscapefx.com or follow him on Instagram at @david_wilson_mfx.)

* * *

THE HOLIDAY COMMUNITY DINNER: SUN. DEC. 8 5:30, AV GRANGE. Yes folks , it's coming up sooner than we all think. Sponsored by the Foodshed and the Grange, our yearly FREE gathering for one and all. Started in the late 80's it's become a wonderful tradition. Come have a delicious dinner, turkey, mashed potatoes, gravy, stuffing provided by Grange and Foodshed and all the extras provided by everyone else, ie. a monster potluck with you bringing desserts , salads, drinks, vegetarian options and if you can swing it your own utensils. There's a kids zone, Lynn on the white grand piano with dinner music and perhaps some caroling, and a long line where you get to hang out with friends and neighbors. As always there is much need for volunteers to cook the turkeys, mashed potatoes, gravy and stuffing before the event AND folks to pitch in, run the kitchen, serve, set up, decorate, clean up and on and on. Helping out is a great way to meet and greet both new and old members of our community. If you want to help out before or during the event please call or email Cap Rainbow 895-3807, captnrainbow@pacific.net Don't be square, be there! All are welcome.

* * *

DUNGENESS CRAB SEASON DELAYED FROM MENDOCINO ON NORTH BECAUSE OF POOR QUALITY

Poor quality crab conditions have delayed the start of the Dungeness crab harvest in Mendocino, Humboldt and Del Norte counties, fish and wildlife officials said Friday.

sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/Dungeness-crab-season-delayed-from-Mendocino-14840390.php

* * *

FAIR BOARD. To run for the board you gotta get on a participation roster prior? Whoever heard of such a cockamamie process outside of the Anderson Valley? It’s a County fair, not a secret society. Truth is the Fair Board, like the Cemetery Board, is the last bastion of the old, old timers who, at one time, feared a “hippie” takeover of Boonville’s elected boards. A community swimming pool was shot down back in the early 70s because hippies might go for a dip, which meant respectable people would certainly be subject to all manner of disease, from pellagra to leprosy. Whew. That was close. Why even I, veteran, business owner, husband and father, was once denied Grange membership! And it has recently occurred to me that having achieved the very last column of actuarial tables I might now be denied burial at Evergreen Cemetery!

* * *

RECRUIT NIGHT at the AV Fire Department: Drop in from 4 to 7 on Thursday the 21st and have your questions about joining us answered. Full disclosure: you'll go home with an application! Olie is on grill duty, cooking up tri-tip so bring the fam. No presentations, no speeches, just open doors, dinner, and shooting the breeze.

* * *

BUENO YABBELOW, hosted by the Gabriela Lena Frank Creative Academy of Music, is back! It has been a rough fall for northern California, hasn’t it? If you could use some TLC administered by the sounds of classical guitar, with and without a beautiful vocal, then please join us for our one and only fall event “A Bard Meets a Guitar.” Grammy-winning guitarist Manuel Barrueco and Grammy-winning singer, Tony Arnold, will be on hand, richly assisted by a studio of their top students, the next generation of talents who hail from the US and abroad, including Spain and Latin America. We will also have a surprise appearance by a local favorite and his colleague (Hint: Might have had something to do with a… silent musical…?), and the emerging composer fellows enrolled in GLFCAM. As always, our musicians are warm and generous, happy to tell a tale or two in a space where they can actually see each member of the audience (instead of playing to an anonymous blackened-out theater.)

You are very warmly invited!

Sunday, November 24th, 7pm (Doors open at 6:30pm)

Anderson Valley High School Cafeteria

$10 at the door

Free for 18 and under; students of AV High and their families

For more information, please visit www.glfcam.com

* * *

* * *

THE NEWS from the north — via Kym Kemp's invaluable Redheaded Blackbelt site — that Flow Kana is laying off people shouldn't surprise anyone, despite the huge investments in property and facilities the newbie marijuana merchants have made on the Northcoast. The business model is sharecropping. You grow the dope, you genius self-taught old hippies, now in your third generation, and we'll spiff it up with cool packaging and market it for you. Buy cheap, sell high, higher than street dope. And there's the rub. The old growers with their old distribution systems don't need Flow Kana, and storefront marijuana is much more expensive than marijuana purchased without an expensive middleman like FK.

* * *

ADD this undoubtedly false anti-vaxx tale that popped up on MCN’s chatline last week: “Watch out for rogue Ob/Gyn nurses at FB hospital From: Inger Grape:

A client who recently gave birth at our hospital told me a harrowing story.

After she gave birth, a nurse asked her if she wanted the Hepatitis B vaccine for her baby; she lied to my client and told her that it was mandated by law and that Child Protective Services would take her baby if she didn't comply. Another nurse came in with the syringe, and again asked the frightened mother if she wanted her baby to have the vaccine. The new mother, fearing for her baby, said "Yes." The nurse replied, "Good, because if you had said No, we would have sent CPS to your home to take your baby."

It is not yet illegal to not vaccinate, though the politicians are working hard at making it so. What the nurses said and did was not only untrue, but illegal. To act with coercion or threat fits the definition of assault. My client will be filing a complaint. If I were her, I'd sue. That baby not only got a worthless vaccine that will have worn off by the time he becomes sexually active, he's now been exposed to the following, in addition to the main pathogens….”


NO NAMES of either the evil doctor or the violated patient, but the phony warning went on into the usual faux chemistry science the anti-vaxx demagogues resort to as phony as the anecdote above. No one challenged it either.

* * *

CATCH OF THE DAY, November 18, 2019

Coleman, D.Davis, K.Davis

FREDDIE COLEMAN, Ukiah. Disorderly conduct-alcohol.

DESTANEE DAVIS, Ukiah. Resisting.

KHALIC DAVIS, Ukiah. Trespassing.

Depree, Lawe, Lenhart

JOSHUA DEPREE, Redwood Valley. Controlled substance, paraphernalia, probation revocation.

JAMES LAWE, Medord, Oregon/Ukiah. Domestic battery.

ASHLEY LENHART, Redwood Valley. Petty theft with priors, failure to appear, probation revocation.

Maynard, Pruitt, Quinones

ANDREW MAYNARD, Fort Bragg. Disobeying court order, probation revocation. (Frequent flyer.)

KEITH PRUITT, Ukiah. Suspended license (for DUI), no license, probationi revocation.

PETER QUINONES, Cloverdale/Fort Bragg. Controlled substance, paraphernalia, burglary tools, suspended license, resisting, probation revocation.

Starrett, Wyatt, Yates

SHANNON STARRETT, Willits. Domestic battery.

GARY WYATT, Willits. Under influence, child endangerment.

GEORGINA YATES, Ukiah. Disorderly conduct-alcohol.

* * *

MARK THOSE TANKS

Editor,

Inspections following the 2017 Sonoma Complex fires revealed that some septic tanks and their wastewater dispersal systems were impacted by the flames. In addition, there was damage done by heavy excavating equipment during site cleanup as well as by construction traffic during later rebuild activities.

As soon as reasonably possible, owners should mark their septic tanks. This can be done with inexpensive steel T-post stakes and caution tape or, more substantially, a roll of plastic fencing. Leach fields and more technical dispersal systems in close proximity to the home site could also be marked and protected in similar fashion.

For those unsure of the locations of their underground tank or system, records are often available at the Sonoma County Permit and Resource Management Department. Onsite assistance to precisely locate these facilities may be obtained from many septic tank pumping companies or septic system contractors.

Mike Treinen

Registered environmental health specialist

Santa Rosa

* * *

"Sometimes you have to play a long time to be able to play like yourself." — Miles Davis

* * *

BE BEST!

Letter to the Editor:

Donald Trump denigrated and belittled John McCain.

Donald Trump did the same thing to Marie Yovanovitch.

Donald Trump did the same thing to Jim Mattis.

And the same thing to Humayun Khan.

Now, Dapper Don Jr. was just recently on his facebook site pitching a sale at the TrumpStore, which is an internet retail store selling hugely overpriced Trump branded products. And I quote

“In honor of Veterans Day, TrumpStore will be offering 20% off of our iconic Made in America products now through Monday.”

Do you get this? What a great way to honor veterans. 20% off iconic Trump merchandise. I salute you!

And how about this pitch to sell his new book, "Triggered". And I quote: “Let’s send a loud message to the liberal elites. It would TRIGGER our haters coast to coast if we made the NYT list! This is the book that liberals don’t want you to read or share with others. Get your copy now!”

Ummm, let’s see. Don’t read the book for its content, but buy it to get under liberals (who are Americans too) skin.

(all the while lining his pockets with gangs of dough, stacks of fifties)

What a great marketing strategy. His father would be proud.

And the phrase, “it would trigger haters coast to coast.” Well, isn't that just what we need. More triggering and more hate across the USA. That's really reaching across the aisle. Well, Merry Christmas to you as well Don Jr.

Like father, like son. Oh, and guess what else, speaking of Dad? At the very top of Pres. DJ Trump’s facebook page is what? Yep, more overpriced merchandise for sale. And right under this stuff for sale is yet another huge solicitation.

It says, "President Trump is calling on Patriotic Americans to help defend him against the Fake Impeachment hearing by donating $5,000,000. I donated some fake money. It seemed only appropriate. I wonder how much $5 million is, in Rubles?

Humm and the Khan family, and the McCain family, and the Yovanovitch family, and the Mattis family all seem to be Patriots. I’m sure that they would be more than happy to chip in some dinero for such a worthy cause. Or maybe they have too little spare money left due to shopping on the TrumpStore website.

Hey, if you want to Make America Great Again, it's gonna cost you way more than you thought, if you are a Patriot.

It could cost you your dignity, pride, and reputation. It could even cost you your friends, your dreams and your privacy.

It could even cost you your job.

At least you'd have a pretty red hat.

And if you think that the Presidency isn't for sale, then just go visit the TrumpStore.

Don't even bother to read the Mueller Report or watch the Impeachment hearing on TV.

Just go to the TrumpStore to see the most obscene display of unethical capitalism I've ever witnessed.

For just $1,000, you can purchase a real lifelike authentic synthetic orange strand of hair, just like the Donald has.

I was saving up to buy my wife a nice diamond bracelet for Christmas, but she'll absolutely love this beautifully boxed piece of lifelike (fake) Trump hair even more!

Who wouldn't?

Johnny Keyes

Ukiah

* * *

ON LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY

I learned long ago the guy in power today that you trust can quickly becoming the other sides guy on the next election cycle you have zero faith or trust in.

The Democrats have revealed just how far you can go against that guy you don’t like.

Make shit up, fake witnesses, fake whistleblowers, fake dossiers and doubling down on the hysterics can help whip up the useful idiots.

At this point the FCC should revoke the license of any “news outlet” that does not tell the truth. Opinion pieces should have a flashing bar at the bottom as such.

The media is there to keep government honest and when they line up and take sides as they have who is left to uncover the details?

* * *

TEACHERS’ UNION IN LOS ANGELES ENDORSES A PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE — AND IT’S BERNIE SANDERS

washingtonpost.com/education/2019/11/15/teachers-union-los-angeles-endorses-presidential-candidate-its-bernie-sanders/

* * *

THE MOST PERVASIVE MYTH THAT ALMOST EVERYONE BELIEVES ABOUT JONESTOWN

“…the great myth of Jonestown: that only the feeble-minded could be convinced to kill themselves. But the deaths of some 900 people at Jonestown on Nov. 18, 1978 was not mass suicide. It was mass murder.”

sfgate.com/sfhistory/article/jim-jones-peoples-temple-sf-oakland-13385679.php

* * *

* * *

ENTERTAINING QUESTIONS

by James Kunstler

Anyone who doubts that the Attorney General is dead serious about cleaning up the goddamned mess of sedition spawned by the Democratic Party, its agents in the permanent Washington bureaucracy, and its public relations arm in the news media, might invest a little time and attention in William Barr’s speech to the Federalist Society Friday evening. (Text of speech here and video here.)

Mr. Barr declared unambiguously and in plain English that “in waging a scorched earth, no-holds-barred war of ‘Resistance’ against this Administration, it is the Left that is engaged in the systematic shredding of norms and the undermining of the rule of law.”

Is any part of that unclear? The confounded might take in this more detailed lesson in recent history from the speech:

“Immediately after President Trump won election, opponents inaugurated what they called ‘the Resistance,’ and they rallied around an explicit strategy of using every tool and maneuver available to sabotage the functioning of his administration. Now, ‘resistance’ is the language used to describe insurgency against rule imposed by an occupying military power. It obviously connotes that the government is not legitimate. This is a very dangerous — indeed incendiary — notion to import into the politics of a democratic republic. What it means is that, instead of viewing themselves as the ‘Loyal opposition,’ as opposing parties have done in the past, they essentially see themselves as engaged in a war to cripple, by any means necessary, a duly elected government.”

And anyone who takes in the nauseating spectacle of Congressman Adam Schiff’s House Intel Committee impeachment process can see that shredding of norms on full shameless display, where the attempted defense of nakedly absurd charges against the president is thwarted by a chicane of deceitful rules outside any concept of due process, concocted by Mr. Schiff and his task force of Lawfare hustlers — no right to call witnesses, no right of cross-examination, and no right to argue that set of rules cribbed from the Stalin show trials by way of the Spanish Inquisition.

They’re pouring it on this week ahead of a post-Thanksgiving cold water deluge of bad news that will detail charges against the progenitors of RussiaGate. The roll-call may be a long one, including many actors whose turpitudes have been publicly and richly documented for many months — Messers, Brennan, Clapper, Comey, Rosenstein, McCabe, Strzok, Halper, Ms. Page, et. al — and, if real justice is on order, not a few figures lurking in the Deep State deep background — John Carlin, Bill Priestap, Dana Boente, Michael Gaeta, Sally Yates, Loretta Lynch, Susan Rice, Samantha Power, and perhaps even the archangel Barack Obama, just in time for Christmas, too. Robert Mueller and Andrew Weissmann deserve to be included for what amounted to a blatant, arrantly mendacious malicious prosecution, knowing that they had no case and proceeding anyway for two whole years.

I hope the roundup will extend to the very latest ploys leading to RussiaGate’s successor subterfuge, UkraineGate, namely the exploits of “whistleblower” Eric Ciaramella, his handlers and enablers in Mr. Schiff’s office, and the actions of his accomplice, Michael Atkinson, the current Intelligence Community Inspector General, with obvious conflicts of interest as a major player in the previous RussiaGate dodge — he was legal counsel to Assistant Attorney General John Carlin, who headed the Department of Justice’s National Security Division at the birth of the FBI’s “Crossfire Hurricane” gambit, and before that he was Robert Mueller’s chief of staff at the FBI. Anything to see there, ya think? The “whistleblower” himself was, in fact, a CIA spy in the White House. You may recall that the CIA is prohibited from spying on Americans in their own country, and doing that in the White House is arguably the essence and height of lawless sedition.

Obviously, Rep. Adam Schiff will at some point be called to face the atonal music he composed (with a little help from Karlheinz Stockhausen — give a listen) in a court of law, where different rules apply than the ones now on display in his committee. He has a lot to answer for in his campaign to blow smoke up America’s ass for three years running, with deleterious effects on the public interest generally and on the honor and dignity of the legislature in particular.

The American public also deserves to know exactly who has been leaking transcripts from Mr. Schiff’s star chamber depositions to the news media — most recently last Friday when the supposedly secret testimony of diplomat David Holmes, lately of the US embassy in Kiev, Ukraine, found its way to CBS News reporter Margaret Brennan. A logical presumption would be that the leaker is someone on Mr. Schiff’s staff. Who else might have access to it? (Well, possibly the NSA and thereby the CIA.) It shouldn’t be too difficult to find out. Perhaps one of the minority members of the House Intel Committee might put the question to Mr. Schiff when the hearings re-open on Wednesday — if Mr. Schiff will allow the question to even be entertained.

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

* * *

* * *

BIDEN THEIR TIME

Editor,

The Democrats are going to wait until about three months before the election and then pool their resources behind one candidate and try to buy the election. The impeachment is so sick and so hypocritical that even a 90-year-old can figure out what's going on. The Democrats are hateful and jealous that President Trump beat Hillary and he's draining the swamp and showing how much corruption there is and was in the Obama, Bush and Clinton administrations — 24 years of corruption.

Buckle up, people. We will see what happens. I know I'm right about this.

God bless Donald Trump and all the military and law enforcement people who keep this country safe.

Jerry Philbrick

Comptche

* * *

* * *

COLIN KAEPERNICK REFUSED TO BEND TO ROGER GOODELL’S WILL

by Dave Zirin

“I’ve been ready for three years. I’ve been denied for three years. We all know why.” — Colin Kaepernick

Colin Kaepernick hasn’t played in the NFL for three years because he dared to say that black lives matter in a league that treats black bodies as disposable. He dared take a league that uses patriotism, nationalism, and militarism as marketing, and turn that stage on its head. He dared to be a free man in a league that preaches obedience.

It is crystal clear after last Saturday in Atlanta that the reason Colin Kaepernick does not play in the NFL has nothing to do with ability.

In a workout session that started as a hastily assembled circus of the NFL’s making, Kaepernick threw a series of high-velocity darts and 50-plus yard bombs with the flick of his wrist. At age 32 and visibly in the best shape of his life, he clearly has the ability and desire to compete. What he doesn’t want is to play as a broken person for a league determined to break him. Roger Goodell and the NFL tried to bend Kaepernick to their will this week. They scheduled him for a tryout with only three days’ notice. They insisted he come to Atlanta and work with a coach not of his choosing at the Falcons’ headquarters. They told him that it would be on a Saturday, when coaches and top scouts are busy either preparing for Sunday games or analyzing college contests. They did not tell him who the receivers he would work with would be. They wanted him to sign a “non-standard injury waiver” that have would prevented Kaepernick from suing the league for collusion in the future. Most egregiously, they insisted that the workout not be open to the press. Roger Goodell wanted all the positive public relations for “ending the collusion” against Kaepernick and none of the transparency.

Kaepernick then committed a grave sin in the eyes of not only the NFL but also a pathetic coterie of members of the sports media who also work for broadcast partners with the league. He showed up in Atlanta and refused to work out at the Falcons facility under the watchful eye of an NFL chosen coach. He instead went to a high school an hour away with his own receivers. He kept it open to the press, several of whom live-streamed the workout over social media, preventing the NFL from spinning the event as if he no longer had the goods. Kaepernick wore a shirt that said “Kunta Kinte,” a reference to LeVar Burton’s African name in the miniseries Roots, a name Burton’s character clung to even as he was whipped to accept that his new name would be Toby.

Of the reported 24 team reps that showed up at the Falcons headquarters only a handful had the courage to get in their cars and follow Kaepernick and the assembled media to his tryout. Then Kaepernick, as expected, balled out and said to everyone, “I’ve been ready for three years. I’ve been denied for three years. We all know why. I came out there and showed it today in front of everybody.” Kaepernick then thanked scouts who were there from Washington, New York (the Jets), and Kansas City, and said, “When you go back, tell your owners to stop being scared.”

Immediately afterward, the NFL’s media prizefighters put the day’s tomfoolery on Kaepernick’s shoulders, as if he was the one who set this dumpster on fire. This is a gaslighting, Bizarro World analysis, and should be recognized as such. These journalists—who really want you to sign up for Disney Plus—are doing little more than sucking up to the multibillion-dollar teat of a league dependent on a compliant media’s using Kaepernick as a negative object lesson for any other player who might try to flex their personal or political will. Then, as if by clockwork, Jay-Z, who is being paid handsomely to be Roger Goodell’s racial justice whisperer, let it leak that he was “disappointed with Colin’s actions and believes he turned a legitimate workout into a publicity stunt.” But it’s the NFL that staged a publicity stunt. All Kaepernick did was refuse to play their game.

Now that the spectacle in Atlanta is over, we are actually back where we started. Everyone knows that Kaepernick has the ability to play. Everyone knows that he is only being kept out for political and PR reasons. The question will be whether there is one team that is willing to put their team’s success over their political prejudices. This is where we have been for three years, and this is where we remain.

* * *

A WEEK IN PALM DESERT

by Anne Fashauer

On Friday the 15th of November Van and I headed south to Palm Desert. We had booked a week at a resort there earlier in the year, thinking we’d be getting away from the cool weather here. As we all know it’s still feeling like summertime here, so we just went somewhere even warmer. We drove down in two days; the first we left in the late afternoon from the Valley, stopped for dinner with the grand-baby and then went as far as Gustine. We got up early and hit the road around 8:30am to finish the drive. It was much longer than anticipated - for some reason my car’s GPS took us through downtown LA, which was cool to see but slow. We arrived around 6pm, just in time to get a bite to eat.

Our first dinner was at a small Mexican restaurant recommended to us by the resort staff. It was quite good and filling. I had two tacos plus the usual sides. After dinner, tired from driving, we hit the hay early.

Most of our days were spent the same - get up, have coffee and breakfast, relax, maybe soak in the hot tub for a bit, then load up the bikes and head out. Our first forays into the desert yielded poor biking results. We found a trail to a “lake” - really a reservoir - and found ourselves walking more than riding and when we did ride, it was sand. Ugh. We ended up taking streets back to the car - so what should have been a nice 8 mile ride turned into 15 in the heat of the day. The second day we found some Ok trails but nothing really fun.

On day three we were inspired to drive down to the Salton Sea. We had read about a wildlife refuge there and thought that would be fun. The scenery on the drive was interesting and we found the refuge easily. Unfortunately, we had been misinformed about being able to ride our bikes, so we walked instead. It was very full of life - tons of birds mainly; we didn’t see any snakes, thankfully. After we left there we found a date store and had the obligatory date shake; YUM. Very filling, too. We also picked up a box of the biggest, most delicious dates I’ve ever had. We drove home around the other side of the lake and thus got to see a lot of the area.

Having given up on the idea of riding our bikes, the following day we headed up to Palm Springs and lunch at Sherman’s Deli. We enjoyed sightseeing and the food at the deli was delicious. I enjoyed a liverwurst sandwich - it was nearly 2” thick with liverwurst - on rye. Van had tongue, also piled high. From there we drove up to the tram and took the aerial tram up to the top of the mountains, about 8,000’. It was much cooler up there and quite beautiful. We hiked around a bit and got to see some incredible views of the desert before heading back down.

On our next to last day we decided to go back to the first area we had ridden in and see if we could find any other trails. We lucked out - another visitor, a man named Gary from Vancouver Island, had been riding there for the past two months and he showed us several options that didn’t involve large rocks and cliffs. We found great trails and loops and ended up having a blast for the last two days of our stay.

Besides riding the bikes, we found that the hot tub outside our door was not used by anyone except us; ditto the BBQ. So we felt like we had our own private set up. The pool was saltwater, another plus, and so close we could walk out, hop in and cool off, then go do something else. We only ate out a couple of times - sushi for lunch, tacos another day, then a French restaurant for the last evening. We made it to the movies one night and saw Ford vs. Ferrari, which I loved. I happen to like cars and loud engines, so it was perfect for me.

We headed home on Saturday morning, leaving the resort at 4:30am and, after stopping to see the grand-baby and getting a bite of lunch, we made it home around 5:00pm. It was a long day but it felt good to be home again.

* * *

* * *

ON LINE COMMENTS OF THE WEEK

[1] When impeachment proceedings began against Nixon the public trust in government was 65 to 70%. According to polls, public trust is now in the low teens for Congress and this has been true for over a decade. Most people correctly see this as a corrupt system that doesn’t care if you have decent health care, a marginal standard of living or protection from predatory banks/credit cards. They’re living with the consequences that our “elected officials” would rather attend cocktail parties than do their job and they’re sick of all the posturing. Bernie inspired people b/c he seemed genuinely angry over the dismal prospects most Americans face and he wanted to do something about it. But it’s over for the Democrats — they switched from beer to champagne and they’re not about to go back.

[2] Both of our parties have degenerated into corrupt organizations where legislation is bought and paid for on a daily basis. My parents and grandparents came from a time when the Democrats actually worked on behalf of the working man and his family, but sadly, those days are gone. As far as the Republicans go, they have always been the party of the wealthy, so they didn’t have far to descend. What has puzzled me, is how they managed to convince working class people that they were on their side.

I know it started with Ronald Reagan, and they’ve been able to keep it going ever since. They know how to work the long con, and that’s a fact. If you had told my parents or grandparents that Republicans were on the side of the workers, they would have laughed in your face, and rightfully so.

Either way, looking at the current situation, I don’t see much hope for the blue collar guys, and I have told my kids so as well. With the coming revolution in AI, and robotics, we’re gonna be looking at a completely different world. Throw in climate change, and the problems that will come with it as well, and the future doesn’t look very promising. I’m doing what I can to try & prepare my kids for the coming shitstorm, but really it’s a flip of the coin as far as how things will work out. The one thing I do know, however, is that the wealthy will do better than the rest of us.

[3] I watched the hearings on Wednesday and had to wonder — is someone paying Adam Schiff to destroy the Democratic Party? Because if they are, he deserves a bonus. He doesn’t seem to realize without the completion of a “crime” there is no case and equally important, most people (including Democrats) couldn’t locate Ukraine on a map and don’t want to. They couldn’t care less what Trump said to their president whom they’ve never heard of and never want to again. But they do understand this very well — people in power use that power to advance themselves, get favors, build wealth, wield influence and destroy others. And this includes holier-than-thou Adam Schiff and should-have-retired-a-long-time-ago Joe Biden.

* * *

GIVING BACK: A LEGACY OF CREATIVITY

by Megan Barber Allende, President and CEO, The Community Foundation of Mendocino County

While she may be a world traveler, Holly Brackmann is a firm believer in giving locally. “Supporting local is so important to me, which is why I established the Textile and Fiber Arts Endowment Fund. I want textile arts to continue to thrive in this community.” Evidence that even after 37 years teaching at Mendocino College, her passion to nurture the arts in the county has not flagged.

“Few people really consider where the fibers that have surrounded them from cradle to grave really came from,” Brackmann tells me. “Fiber is so all encompassing in our lives, from what we wear, to where we sleep and how we decorate our homes. Rarely do people reflect on the origins of these textiles, and yet it embraces every aspect of our life. Fiber has been central to Mendocino County’s historic economy, once as dominant as timber. Despite the waning of the sheep and wool industries the fiber arts continue to grow in the county’s communities.”

Brackmann arrived in Mendocino County in 1973 to become the first full-time art instructor at Mendocino College. “Back then I taught all the art classes. Over the years the department moved seven times, by then other art faculty were hired and I was able to narrow my focus to the fiber arts.” Art, weaving, textiles and surface design defined her passions for four decades. Beyond the beauty and craft of design, Brackmann believes in the value of supporting the local fiber arts industries found in the roots of our county.

When Brackmann and her husband began to discuss the importance of estate planning, knowing this was especially critical without heirs to inherit, she knew she wanted to invest in the future of the arts in her community. The idea of funding a passion made her realize how much she wanted to witness its impact, instead of waiting until after her death. To achieve this, Brackmann used her IRA required minimum distribution (RMD) to establish the Textile and Fiber Arts Endowment Fund. The fund encourages the practice and appreciation of traditional and contemporary textile and fiber arts in Mendocino County. Brackmann’s plan is to add to the fund each year from her RMD to build the endowment during her lifetime. A planned gift from her estate will then help the fund remain in perpetuity.

Estate planning is an important way to give locally, but establishing a fund earlier allows our donors to experience the positive impact they are making in the community. In its first year, the Textile and Fiber Arts Endowment Fund supported three projects: Teaching Native American youth traditional skills such as beading and basket weaving through Redwood Community Services; UC Hopland Research and Extension Center’s Barn to Yarn 2019 program, an educational event and journey from sheep to sweater; and the Grace Hudson Museum’s presentation of public programs focused on quilt and fiber arts during the exhibition, “Stitching California.” When Brackmann was notified of the grantees selected to receive support from her fund she was thrilled, “I enjoy the spectrum of work happening here in Mendocino County,” she tells me. “Few of us understand how the textiles we wear, sleep in, sit on, and warm ourselves with come into being. They also fail to appreciate the complexity that leads to their beauty. In establishing this fund, I want to encourage and support future generations of fiber artists in Mendocino County, and I hope more donors will join me to grow the fund so it can continue this work for many more decades.”

Since adolescence Brackmann has devoted countless hours to the cutting, sewing, weaving, dyeing and manipulating of fibers into elaborate creations. Coupled with years of schooling and decades of teaching, Brackmann has truly been a champion for keeping alive this valuable art form in our county. Knowing that this lifetime investment will remain in perpetuity to nurture creativity long after she is gone is a reward she has given herself and her community.

Stitching California – Fiber Artists Interpret the State’s People, Life and Land runs until January 5, 2020 at Grace Hudson Museum. For more information visit: www.gracehudsonmuseum.org

To learn more about the Textile and Fiber Arts Endowment Fund, or to contribute to the fund, visit us here. https://www.communityfound.org/for-donors/donate-today/arts-and-humanities/textile-and-fiber-arts-endowment-fund/

* * *

* * *

AN APPEAL TO CLOSED MINDS

by Stanley Fish

I Wasn’t Censored When I Was Disinvited

I had no right to speak at Seton Hall, but letting me speak would’ve been right.

Recently I was invited, then disinvited, to speak at Seton Hall University. Members of a faculty committee had decided by email that they didn’t want a university audience to be subjected to views like mine. I had been writing on the emergence on campus of what I call a regime of virtue. This was the first time I experienced it directly.

My ideas were judged unworthy of being heard. Protesting students at Williams College insist that some ideas must be heard even if there is no good academic reason for focusing on them. They have pledged to boycott “all English classes that do not take seriously the matter of race.”

Right away, I’m in trouble. The most recent undergraduate course I taught was titled “Major English Poets of the Seventeenth Century.” The poets were Ben Jonson, George Herbert, John Donne, John Milton and Andrew Marvell. It’s not that there’s nothing to say about these authors and race. Jonson wrote a play, “The Masque of Blackness,” in which the queen and 11 of her ladies in waiting appear in blackface. Donne’s “The Anagram” is a parody of the traditional blazon, a poem that celebrates a woman’s beautiful features. His beloved “makes Moors seem white.” In his political prose Milton claimed that Asians and Jews are “inclinable to slavery.”

Still, in a 14-week course with less than three weeks devoted to each author, it would be pedagogically irresponsible to focus on such matters, for they are not what “Paradise Lost,” “Inviting a Friend to Supper,” “The Ecstasy,” “Church Monuments” and “Upon Appleton House” are mainly about.

That’s the point. Race, like any other lens—sex, class, politics, whatever—is not always the appropriate perspective from which to identify and discuss what is centrally significant in a body of work. It is up to the instructor to make the choice on pedagogical grounds—the grounds of illuminating the material. To put certain topics front and center because society’s health requires that we address them—maybe it does, maybe it doesn’t—is to abandon the educational enterprise and turn the university into a frankly political instrument. Or so I would have argued in the talk the Seton Hall committee didn’t want to hear.

I want to say as loudly as possible that there is no free-speech issue here. I have no right to speak at Seton Hall, and I have not been silenced because I was disinvited. Any instructor is free to teach a course on these five poets devoted entirely to race. That would not be my choice—and I remain a skeptic about the possibility of doing it without distorting the poetry—but it is a choice one could responsibly make if it were made for reasons that could be defended academically.

Everything depends on the spirit informing the decisions instructors and universities make. The spirit informing the decision not to hear my views and the decision to boycott courses that don’t have race at their center are anti-educational and anti-intellectual.

(Mr. Fish is a visiting professor at Yeshiva University’s Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law and author of “The First: How to Think About Hate Speech, Campus Speech, Religious Speech, Fake News, Post-Truth and Donald Trump.”)

* * *

FOUND OBJECT

13 Comments

    • Craig Stehr November 19, 2019

      Whatever happens to you, never lose faith in God; you are sure to be rewarded with eternal life and infinite bliss.

      – Swami Chidananda

  1. Eric Sunswheat November 19, 2019

    NPR’s Ari Shapiro speaks with Susannah Cahalan about her new book, The Great Pretender, which tells the story of a landmark study that transformed the field of mental health.

    https://www.npr.org/2019/11/18/780563160/how-1-study-changed-the-field-of-psychiatry-forever

    Just today on my walk, you know, around my neighborhood in New York City, I saw someone who is very seriously mentally ill who was homeless on the street. And I thought, would our, you know, relationship with that person be different if we thought they had Alzheimer’s rather than mental illness? You know, these questions are things that we as a society have to deal with, and I hope that this book contributes to that conversation.

    • Susie de Castro November 19, 2019

      Eric,

      Alzheimer’s is a mental illness.

      “A progressive mental deterioration that can occur in middle or old age, due to generalized degeneration of the brain. It is the most common cause of premature senility.”

      “Alzheimer’s disease is formally recognized as a mental illness. The disease and its symptoms are outlined in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV-TR), which is the main tool used to diagnose mental illnesses.”

      • Susie de Castro November 19, 2019

        Alzheimer’s disease is a progressive neurodegenerative condition. It is one of the most common forms of dementia, a group of symptoms that lead to a decline in mental function severe enough to disrupt daily life.

    • Eric Sunswheat November 19, 2019

      Another way that cardiovascular fitness may slash dementia risk is that exercise (which helps improve cardiovascular fitness) increases levels of the protein PGC-1alpha, which is responsible for improving mitochondrial biogenesis. Research has shown that people with Alzheimer’s have less PGC-1alpha in their brains and cells that contain more of the protein produce less of the toxic amyloid protein associated with Alzheimer’s.7

      Even among those at high risk of dementia, cognitive decline can be reduced with a comprehensive program addressing diet, exercise, brain training and managing metabolic and vascular risk factors.8 Exercise initially stimulates the production of a protein called FNDC5, which in turn triggers the production of BDNF, or brain-derived neurotrophic factor. In your brain, BDNF not only preserves existing brain cells,9 it also activates brain stem cells to convert into new neurons and effectively makes your brain grow.

      Research confirming this includes a study in which seniors aged 60 to 80 who walked 30 to 45 minutes, three days per week, for one year increased the volume of their hippocampus by 2 percent.10 The hippocampus is a region of your brain important for memory. Higher fitness levels were also associated with a larger prefrontal cortex.

      In another study, patients diagnosed with mild to moderate Alzheimer’s, the most common form of dementia, who participated in a four-month-long supervised exercise program had significantly fewer neuropsychiatric symptoms associated with the disease than the control group that did not exercise.11

      Another study published in PLOS One revealed that a progressive walking program that led to participants briskly walking for at least 150 minutes each week was associated with improvements in functional ability in people with early Alzheimer’s disease.12 Among some of the participants, the walking program also led to improvements in cardiorespiratory fitness, and this was in turn associated with improved memory performance and even increases in the size of their brain’s hippocampus.13

      https://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2018/04/12/how-to-decrease-dementia-risk.aspx

  2. John Sakowicz November 19, 2019

    District 1 and District 3 earthquakes during the last month:

    11/18/2019 –
    3.2 mag, 0.9mi depth
    1.42419 mi from Talmage, CA

    11/18/2019 –
    2.4 mag, 0.2mi depth
    1.61794 mi from Ukiah, CA

    10/28/2019 –
    2.8 mag, 6.6mi depth
    5.75963 mi from Redwood Valley, CA

    10/28/2019 –
    2.5 mag, 0.0mi depth
    9.50188 mi from Willits, CA

    10/19/2019 –
    2.8 mag, 5.8mi depth
    7.18124 mi from Talmage, CA

    10/19/2019 –
    2.2 mag, 6.2mi depth
    7.29905 mi from Talmage, CA

    10/19/2019 –
    1.5 mag, 4.9mi depth
    1.90585 mi from Redwood Valley, CA

    — John Sakowicz, Candidate 1st District Supervisor

  3. Cotdbigun November 19, 2019

    Real NFL game 11/1/2015 Niners VS Rams (On YouTube under disrespect) The Rams were so impressed with K’s football ability /vision / touch/awareness and of course ‘flick of the wrist 50 yard bombs to nowhere’ that they did not bother to cover the wide receivers. The Rams pulled both DB’s into the box to cover the run! That left an uncovered receiver on each side of the field jumping up and down, waving their arms to get poor misunderstood Kunta Kinte’s attention for easy TD’s. Plays like that, and I’ve seen many from him, have nothing to do with no teams hiring him to, you know, throw the ball to wide open receivers. Face palm.

  4. michael turner November 19, 2019

    Kunta Kinte???

    • Cotdbigun November 19, 2019

      That’s what it said in big block letters on his shirt.
      I don’t mean anything by that, but he wore the shirt and I read it.
      What his message is with that or the Fidel Castro shirt or the police as pigs sock that he wore, hmm. I don’t know.

  5. George Hollister November 19, 2019

    Found Object:

    The most successful professional victim.

  6. Lazarus November 19, 2019

    FOUND OBJECT

    The new ad from Nike, “Just don’t do it”…

    As always,
    Laz

  7. Kathy November 19, 2019

    Mr. Philbrick’s assertion that he ‘knows he’s right’ suggests either that he doesn’t even know how much he doesn’t know, or that he is nearing the final stages of dementia. Perhaps his care giver could check to see that his Preparation H and his Poligrip are stored on separate shelfs.

Leave a Reply to Cotdbigun Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

-