MCT: Saturday, January 18, 2020

• Cold Fronts
• Road Signs
• Accordion Repair
• Yorkville Market
• Snow Pics
• Beautiful Fire
• BOS Watch
• Streetscene
• Spam Threat
• Humboldt Moonshiners
• Weed Meeting
• Fire Recovery
• MCOE Mixer
• 2020 Census
• OB Meeting
• B Fizzle
• Yesterday's Catch
• People's Party
• Dem Death
• Fishercats
• Lying Lizzy
• Female Coach
• Democracy Farce
• Chill Everybody
• Planning Cancelled
• Powerball Jackpot
• PFAC Rescheduled
• Trump Weak
• Sako 2.0
• Ball Back
• Cannabis Crucial
• Found Object

A WEAK COLD FRONT will bring some gusty southerly winds to parts of northwest California today, along with a round of mainly light rainfall. High pressure will allow for dry weather and even some filtered sun on Sunday with milder temperatures. Another cold front will bring rain and high elevation snow by Monday night and Tuesday. (NWS)

WE THOUGHT ANDERSON VALLEY FIRE CHIEF Andres Avila was either joking or exaggerating when he told the CSD Board last Wednesday that the road signs on Deerwood Meadows Rd looked like something out of a Road Runner Cartoon. So we asked him to send a photo or two. Road signs and proper addresses in the hills of Mendocino County and Anderson Valley in particular are critical to fire responses because they can mean the difference of a few critical minutes of response to a fire or other emergency. Chief Avila and former AV Fire Chief Colin Wilson have been working with the County’s Planning and Building staff — albeit at the Mendo’s typical banana slug’s pace — to make the process of road naming and re-naming easier and they have been requesting Mendo’s hill muffins to make the extra effort to upgrade their signage as necessary so that they are clear not only to emergency responders, but visitors as well.

Chief Avila writes:

“This a great example of the good work our residents are doing to ensure first responders can get to their properties. On the other hand, with the lack of county support to allow emergency response organizations the ability to streamline road names and addresses in the county, we end up with these types of Looney Tunes signs. Imagine stopping to read these signs at each intersection while every second accounts.

The first photo is from the first intersection of Deer Meadows Rd. in Boonville. The second photo is the next intersection up the road. This is only one of many subdivisions in Anderson Valley that have several miles of road systems with multiple intersections along the way and still use a common road name. Thanks to Former AVFD Chief Wilson and the many local FSC (volunteer) groups, we are very close to being able to fix many of these foreseeable problems. It is now up to the Board of Supervisors to allow us to proceed with corrections needed so we can be prepared for emergencies and evacuations.”

Avila told the Community Services District Board last Wednesday that they may need to write a formal letter to the County/Planning Department and the Supervisors to get more attention paid to this important component of fire prevention and response.

(Mark Scaramella)

YORKVILLE MARKET RE-OPENS!

The Market is clean, re-organized, and ready for a new year! This is now our 5th year in business and we have decided to made a few changes and plan to try out some exciting new ideas:

First, our current winter hours will be

Monday -Thursday 8:00-6:00

Friday- 8:00-7:00

Saturday and Sunday 8:30-6:00

We will be opening later during the week days, but also staying open later on Friday nights for happy hour drinks, and our deli items will be available for purchase.

Also, we will be starting the new year with an exciting and delicious homemade take-and-bake menu! We will be spending the next few days cooking, sauteing and baking an assortment of dinner entrees that we will serve fresh in our deli and also have frozen for you to pick up for a quick dinner on one of those busy nights. I will be sending out emails on a more regular basis with what we are creating in our kitchen, and what is ready for you to pick up..

Friday, 1/24, we will be hosting our welcome to 2020 dinner. This meal will feature its own menu of a la carte items that can be purchased individually to create your perfect meal. Vegetarian options will be available. The theme for this dinner will be “Italy meets Yorkville, a Love Story.”

Our next big event is our Pre-fixe Valentines Day dinner on Friday, 2/14. We will be making a multi-course, small plate feast for the senses that will be sure to add that special spark to the romantic holiday evening. The menu will be posted at the Market by the end of the month, and this dinner will be reservations only. Book early as there is limited seating for this event.

We will be officially open tomorrow morning at 8:00am and look forward to seeing you all again! As always we appreciate any feedback or ideas that you may have. Please feel free to reach out to me directly at the Market or via email.

Best wishes for a fantastic New Year!

Lisa Bauer, Yorkville Market, 894-9456

SNOW FALLING ON MENDO

ukiahdailyjournal.com/2020/01/16/photos-snow-falls-on-mendocino-county-thursday/

THE MOST BEAUTIFUL FIRE

May 1997

THIS MAY not be the best time to talk about the beauty of fire given that the Anderson Valley has recently suffered a destructive rash of them, but there was one back in the early spring of '97 that destroyed nothing but was conveniently visible to all of us. That Sunday evening was a perfect time for it. A high marine layer, formerly known as fog prevailed, accompanying winds steady but without the gusts that sometimes accompany the summer breezes off the distant Pacific. It was cool out, not at all the conditions of the fast-moving inferno which struck nearby Peachland Road on a hundred degree afternoon in '96. That one somehow began on Anderson Valley Way near the Tebbutts' gate, and quickly jumped the highway and took off up Peachland, threatening several homes before it was extinguished by a miraculous effort of local volunteers and CDF aerial firefighters.

But the Octopus Mountain blaze of that May Sunday of '97 was as nice as a wildfire can be, occurring on a cool early evening in an area where there isn’t much grass and brush to feed it.

AT APPROXIMATELY 7:20pm the sound of sirens on 128 was heard. A necklace of flame was already burning slowly up the south tentacle of Octopus Mountain, necklacing the volcano-like hill directly east of the Anderson Valley Elementary School behind Phil Wasson’s stately old Victorian, hidden behind redwoods but almost identical in design to the highly visible Reilly Heights(*) and designed by the same builder, I believe. (There's a third Victorian off Anderson Valley Way, but it, too, is not visible from any public vantage point.)

The Octopus fire reached a tree line where a couple of oaks burst into flame. That was about as spectacular as the blaze got as it climbed slowing up the hill. A CDF spotter plane was instantly overhead, circling the the slow moving arc of flame as it consumed's the octopus's tentacles. By 7:35 tiny, yellow-clad firefighters could be seen spraying water on the upper end of the leisurely blaze. Then the CDF helicopter dropped the first of perhaps thirty baskets of water scooped from Anderson Vineyards’ pond not a half mile south from where the fire burned, dumping the pond water on the few oaks in the fire’s path as two CDF borate bombers unleashed their pinkish mists of flame retardant on the fire’s advanced positions.

The impressively quick response of our local volunteers, combined with CDF’s typically efficient appearance both on the ground and in the air, had the fire out by 8pm. Crews mopped up hot spots until midnight. An estimated five acres were burned but no structures were either lost or even threatened.

Octopus Mountain’s several hundred acres had been grazed to the nub by Wasson’s cattle, accounting for the fire’s failure to pick up momentum because there wasn’t much on the ground to feed it.

Spectators were strung out along 128 between Fitch Lane and the Little Red School House to watch the firefighters do their stuff, oohing and aahing as the borate bombers swooped in low to drop their retardants.

Anderson Valley’s fire chief, Colin Wilson, said Monday that a raven, usually known for its function as a messenger of ill omens but this time serving as the ill omen itself, had flown into a power line not far from the Elementary School, burst into flame at impact, and then flown woozily off in the direction of Wasson's place before falling to earth in a burning heap, igniting grass which soon fanned into the flaming crescent that moved inexorably up Octopus Mountain before firefighters stopped it.

We learned later that Deputy Squires had had to threaten the hermit of Deer Meadows with arrest when he denied firefighters access to the Octopus' flank through the hermit's property.

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(*) Valley old timer Christine Clark described the Reilly Heights house in 2009:

The Reilly Family had come over from Ireland in the mid-19th Century and the three brothers headed west, with two settling in Anderson Valley in the late 1850’s. James Reilly (Christine’s great grandfather) built the Reilly Heights House in the 1890’s but unlike many other houses built at that time it had a good foundation and therefore the majestic three story red house is able to survive to this day.

(Bruce Anderson)

BOS WATCH, by Mark Scaramella

CEO CARMEL ANGELO may finally be feeling some pressure to do something about the ridiculously expensive continued operation of Mendo’s Juvenile Hall which at last report housing only a dozen or so delinquents, saying in her CEO Report for next week’s Supervisors meeting: “ At this time, the Executive Office is not recommending closure of Juvenile Hall. In partnership with Chief Probation Officer Izen Locatelli, concepts are being developed [sic] that may improve outcomes for delinquent youth while reducing the General Fund cost of operating the facility. Information will be shared with the Board of Supervisors after additional research confirms viability of one or more innovative concepts.”

“…are being developed”? Why put this on an Board agenda if they’re not yet “developed” so the Board can consider them? Pathetic, really.

SOME AVA READERS may recall in 2018 when County School Superintendent Michelle Hutchins appeared before the Board offering to work with her fellow school superintendents to prepare (“develop”?) options for juvenile hall in context with other juvenile/school problems, but the Board and the CEO chose to ignore that offer and keep the Hall open at well over $2 million per year. What are the odds that Ms. Hutchins’ offer will ever be explored, much less raised on Tuesday as a source of “innovative concepts”?

A the June 2018 meeting, the Board discussed Juvenile Hall’s excessive cost. At that time we wrote: “By the end of the discussion, the Board, wringing their hands at the cruel fates visited upon them by unsympathetic gods, did what they always do — punted. They formed an ad hoc committee of two supervisors (Gjerde and Croskey) to like, uh, well, meet some time with some people and report back. [The Hall had been leaking hundreds of thousands of dollars per year unbeknownst to the CEO until Lake County suddenly said they didn’t want to pay Mendo’s outrageously high day rates which is when the CEO first raised the issue and started exploring “innovative concepts.”] PS. No date was set to solve the million dollar shortfall. For now, they’re just going to continue leaking money. After all, it’s for the good of ‘the kids.’ They can’t even bring themselves to say out loud who these ‘kids’ are which, and sorry to be the bearer of bad news, is ‘entry level criminals.’ Most of them anyway.”

THAT AD HOC COMMITTEE, lead by Supervisor Dan Gjerde, later came up with the “innovative concept” of eliminating the separate kitchen at the Hall and have the main jail kitchen supply meals to the Hall, saving a few thousand dollars a year — barely a drop in the leaky bucket. But nothing else was ever proposed and the Hall has been leaking more millions for going on two years now — all for a dozen or so delinquents. Money that more and more people are saying could be much better used for, say, improving the sorry state of ambulance services in the 101 corridor.

Background: "The Fate of Juvenile Hall"

COINCIDENTALLY, also on next Tuesday’s agenda is Item 6c:

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“Discussion and Possible Action Regarding Formal Request for a Subsidy Price Estimate from Mendocino Coast Healthcare District (MCHD), Transferable to Adventist Health, for One Advanced Life Support (ALS) Ambulance To Be Used Primary for the 101 Corridor in Collaboration with Coastal Valleys EMS Agency, for 911 Responses and Inter-Facility Transfers, as Appropriate (Sponsor: Supervisor Williams)

“Recommended Action: Direct Executive Office to formally request a subsidy price estimate from Mendocino Coast Healthcare District (MCHD), transferable to Adventist Health to the extent it assumes MCHD ambulance operation, for one Advanced Life Support ambulance, staffed full-time, positioned primarily for response to the 101 corridor, location to be determined dynamically by Howard Forest dispatch in collaboration with Coastal Valleys EMS Agency, for 911 response and inter-facility transfers as appropriate.”

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MENDO GEARING UP (AGAIN — WITH ANOTHER $155K) TO DEFEND THEIR DECISION TO ISSUE A PERMIT to the Harris Quarry south of Willits after neighbors and opponents appeal to outside courts where they have won before.

Supervisors Jan 15, 2020 Agenda Item 5b:

“Discussion and Possible Action Including Approval of Retroactive Amendment to Board of Supervisors Agreement No. 19-240 with Thomas Law Group In the Amount of $155,000, for a New Agreement Amount of $280,000, to Provide Legal Services Related to Keep The Code, Inc., v. County of Mendocino (Mendocino Superior Court Case No. SCUK-CVPT-12-60196), Effective July 30, 2019, Through June 30, 2020; and Approval of Corresponding Request for Appropriation-Revision of Funds to Increase Planning Special Projects, Budget Unit 2852, Org Code PS 826184 in the Amount of $155,000 and PS 862239 in the Amount of $155,000

(Sponsor: County Counsel)”

ACCORDING TO A PRESENTATION SUMMARY FOR Next Tuesday’s Supervisors meeting concerning the County’s “cybersecurity” measures, the County gets 10,000-30,000 emails per day on average blocked for spam or other malicious intent, and 50+ viruses and malicious files on average per day are blocked and quarantined.”

So, guess what the cybersecurity consultants conclude?

“Threat level and number of incidents has drastically increased in 2019. We expect this trend to continue. Threat prevention spending will need to increase.”

ODD, OLD NEWS: SPOTLIGHT ON HUMBOLDT MOONSHINERS

kymkemp.com/2020/01/17/odd-old-newsspotlight-on-humboldt-moonshiners/

AD HOCS TO CANNABIS COUNTRY

Cannabis Ad Hoc Committee To Hold Community Meeting In Laytonville Regarding Revisions To The County’s Cannabis Cultivation Ordinance

The Board of Supervisors Cannabis Ad Hoc Committee will hold a community meeting in Laytonville to provide residents with an opportunity to hear a brief update and share their recommendations with the Ad Hoc Committee regarding potential revisions to the County’s Cannabis Cultivation Ordinance for Phase I and Phase III of the program (Code Section 10A.17 and 20.242).

The Mendocino County Board of Supervisors directed the Cannabis Ad Hoc Committee to review the County’s Cannabis Cultivation Ordinance and report back with recommended revisions to streamline Phase I permitting and adjust Phase III requirements.

The Cannabis Ad Hoc Committee will be hosting the public community meeting at the following location:

Laytonville Community Meeting

When: Wednesday, January 22, 2020

6:00 p.m. – 7:30 p.m.

Where: Harwood Hall

44400 Willis Ave, Laytonville, CA 95454

For more information, please contact the Mendocino County Executive Office at (707) 463-4441 or ceo@mendocinocounty.org.

M-ROC YEAR TWO REPORT FIRE UPDATE January 17, 2020

by Megan Barber Allende Chief Executive Officer,

The Community Foundation of Mendocino County

Two years since the 2017 Redwood Complex Fire, Mendocino-ROC continues to work with fire survivors to help them get back home. This year our efforts have primarily focused on rebuilding, while also remaining aware of emotional wellness and other recovery needs. To date, Mendocino-ROC has distributed over $4 million to help those affected by the October 2017 Redwood Complex Fire and 2018 Mendocino Complex Fire. Of this amount over half has gone towards long-term housing in gap funding grants to buy or rebuild a home. The year has also brought new partnerships, most notably a dedicated group of volunteers from Mennonite Disaster Services (MDS). Joining us from throughout North America, a total of 67 MDS volunteers have come for one-to-six weeks at a time to help build homes for fire survivors. They have framed up four homes in the past three months. Our other construction partners, Rebuilding Now and Hope City, along with Mendocino County Construction Corp (MCCC), have completed three homes this past year, and have three more currently under construction. Shortly after MDS leaves in March, we hope to have a total of 10 homes built for our fire survivors.

Over the summer we held the second Camp Noah for children impacted by the fires, welcoming 40 children for a week-long resiliency camp. To mark the second anniversary of the Redwood Complex Fire, we collaborated with Mendocino College’s Phoenix Project to host a community wellness dinner for those impacted by the fire. With 160 people in attendance, the evening was a heartwarming opportunity for volunteers and survivors to connect as a community and share in their collective triumph over the adversity of the past two years. By working collaboratively, we have been fortunate to touch most survivors in their recovery efforts, maximizing our collective resources for broad impact.

With roughly $500,000 remaining, right now it is our intention to get as many people home as possible by October 2020. We thank our partners, our community, and the many volunteers who have made an impact in our recovery efforts.

We hope our third year of recovery will get everyone home! - To learn more about the work we have achieved over the past two years, please review our brief Year Two Report: To learn more about the Community Foundation of Mendocino County’s recovery efforts, visit us at communityfound.org.

Megan Barber Allende, CEO

The Community Foundation of Mendocino County

204 South Oak Street · Ukiah, CA 95482 · (707) 468-9882

'MENDOCINO COUNTS! 2020 CENSUS' WEBSITE LAUNCH

Mendocino County is pleased to announce the ‘Mendocino Counts! 2020 Census’ Website, hosted at www.mendocinocounts.org. This website serves as an excellent resource for information about the 2020 Census, which takes place officially on April 1, 2020.

The Census occurs once every 10 years. It determines the number of representatives California will have in Congress, and determines how more than $675 billion in federal funding will be distributed to California and its counties. The census outcome is essential for: Local business owners, the dispersion of taxes, local government efforts to identify opportunities for improvement and local emergency services funding.

The website www.mendocinocounts.org is available in both English and Spanish, and has answers to the most frequently asked questions about the Census. When made available in March 2020, a link to the online 2020 census questionnaire and the census telephone number (available in 24 language) will be posted there.

This site also features a link to the U.S. Census Bureau’s employment website, where applications are currently being accepted for those who want to work for the Census in our county.

‘Mendocino Counts!’ is a coordinated outreach effort by the County of Mendocino, The Community Foundation of Mendocino County, The League of Women Voters, United Way of Wine Country, and multiple locally-based community organizations that comprise the Mendocino County Complete Count Committee (MCCCC).

For more information, please contact Angela Wartell at 707-472-2754 or wartella@mendocinocounty.org.

OB/GYN AT COAST HOSPITAL

MENTAL HEALTH TREATMENT ACT Citizen's Oversight Committee Mendocino County Administration Center 501 Low Gap Road, Room 1010 Ukiah, CA 95482 707.463.4441

measureb@mendocinocounty.org

County Administration Center, Conference Room C

January 22, 2020 - 1:00 PM

3a) Discussion and Possible Action Regarding Introduction of Chair and Election of Vice-Chair of the Mental Health Treatment Act Citizen’s Oversight Committee for Calendar Years 2020 through Calendar Year 2022

3b) Approval of Minutes of the December 18, 2019, Meeting

3c) Discussion and Possible Action Regarding Expenditure Report on Measure B Tax Funds

3d) Discussion and Possible Action Including Adoption of the 2020 Master Meeting Calendar to Include Scheduling Details of Meetings on the Coast and Willits

3e) Discussion and Update Regarding Approval of Request from Mental Health Treatment Act Citizen’s Advisory Committee for Boar of Supervisors to Direct County Counsel to Conduct Legal Evaluation, Research Analysis and Assessment of Adventist Health Partnership Legality; Including Restriction, Necessary Control, Implications, and Compliance Regarding the Possible Use of Public Tax Dollars to Fund Operations of a Private Entity

3f) Update Regarding December 10, 2019, Board of Supervisors Meeting Regarding Direction to Perform an Operational Feasibility Study of Proposed Measure B Funded Facilities

3g) Discussion and Possible Action Regarding Update on Status of the Architect

3h) Update regarding California Health Facilities Finance Authority (CHFFA) Grant for Crisis Residential Treatment Facility

3i) Discussion and Possible Action From the Regional Behavioral Health Training Center Ad Hoc Committee Regarding Update of Outline Plan Describing Relevant Details of Allocated Funds to Begin Improvements to the Regional Behavioral Health Training Center Before Expenditure

3j) Discussion and Possible Action of Potential Additional Appointment of Ad Hoc Members to existing Ad Hoc Committees

3k) Discussion and Possible Action Regarding Report from the Kemper Report Ad Hoc Committee

3l) Discussion and Possible Action Regarding Development of Measure B Budget

3m) Discussion and Possible Action Including Approval of Expenditure of up to $346.65 of Measure B Funds (Fund 1224/Budget Unit 4052, Mental Health Treatment Act) to Acquire Ado Gov Acrobat PRO 2017 L2 for use by Project Manager; and Approval of Appropriation Transfer from Fund 1224/Budget Unit 4052

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MARK SCARAMELLA NOTES: The lengthiness of this latest Measure B committee “agenda” is in inverse proportion to its actual substance. They have nothing to propose, nothing to try to move forward, and nothing of substance to even discuss. Even though in prior meetings they’ve mentioned the rather obvious problem of the deterioration of the — FULLY FUNDED — Mobile Outreach Program (MOPS) which has been allowed to fall into near nothing after the retirement of a key staffer. Nor have they followed up — as they specifically said they would — on the crisis van idea proposed last year by Ukiah Police Chief Justin Wyatt which everyone wanted to pursue. Instead we find a proposal to spend a whopping $346.65 (to the penny!) on some software so their newly hired “project manager” can keep track of what they’re not doing — or maybe so she can better format their press releases with lists of what they will hear “updates” on.

CATCH OF THE DAY, January 17, 2020

KATRINA BELL, Ukiah. Failure to appear.

MICHAEL CUTINO, Westport. Failure to appear.

SHEMEKA EDWARDS, San Francisco/Ukiah. Probation revocation.

KERM JACKSON, Canoga Park/Ukiah. Loaded concealed handgun not registered to owner in vehicle, pot sales, conspiracy.

DAVID MCKAY, Ukiah. Parole violation.

JESSANN MCLEAN, Covelo. Probation revocation.

ALVINO MIRANDA, Fort Bragg. Failure to appear.

WILLIAM RANTALA, Ukiah. DUI.

SAMUEL SANCHEZ, Ukiah. Parole violation. (Frequent flyer.)

PHILLIP WINTERS, Willits. Elder abuse resulting in great bodily injury or death, damage to power lines.

ON LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY

I would love to see both loathsome, corrupt parties replaced, but there will always be wolves, and the Republicans would just be replaced by republicans, however renamed.

The unnatural thing is that there is no longer an opposition party of sheepdogs to at least try to protect the people from the wolves. Replacing the Democratic Party might not be sufficient, but it is absolutely necessary to even attempt to rebuild this nation.

GRAVE TENDINGS

by James Kunstler

So titanically self-unaware is the Democratic Resistance that it failed to grok it was actually signing the party’s death warrant Wednesday, complete with official Nancy Pelosi commemorative black-and-gold signature pens. And that their solemn, prayerful journey from one side of the Capitol building to the other was actually the conveyance of that death warrant in what amounted to the party’s funeral march. Remember this eternal paradox of the human condition: people get what they deserve, not what they expect.

Could you look at the line-up of Democratic impeachment managers without laughing? Was there ever such a band of hapless, misbegotten ninnies assembled for a suicide mission? Led by the waddling homunculus, Jerrold Nadler, side-by-side with Adam Schiff, oozing a flop-sweat of falsehood, a rank cloud of bathos trailed the procession to the Senate side with its pathetic bill-of-particulars.

Could they actually be so dim as to proffer “abuse of power” and “obstruction of congress” as articles of impeachment? These two figments would be laughed out of a second-year law school mock court. Legal necromancers of the future, with all the time in the world, may never unpack the intended meaning of these charges besides “we hate you” and “you hurt our feelings.” But it’s up to the Senate of today to dispose of them procedurally one way or another, and the exercise is sure to be a high order of entertainment.

In a sane world of rational adults, these charges would be coolly dismissed out-of-hand as lacking any discernible malfeasant substance. As we live in a time of hysteria, the normal rules don’t apply. That being the case, the defense should spare no mercy in unmasking the bad faith and fraud on offer by doing what the House Democrats have asked for, calling witnesses, so as to walk the Democrats into the fiery furnace of humiliation and infamy they so richly deserve.

Wouldn’t you like to hear from the legendary “whistleblower,” since his actions provoked this chapter of the three-year orchestrated coup to oust Mr. Trump? If it’s a basic tenet of law that a defendant has a right to face his accuser, can there be any further excuse for concealing this person’s identity — whose supposed right to anonymity, by the way, has been one of the signal frauds of the whole episode. Would it not be instructive to seat his mentor and former boss, John Brennan, in the witness chair and give him another opportunity to perjure himself? We must also hear from Michael Atkinson, the “whistleblower’s” enabler and Lawfare warrior Mary McCord, Atkinson’s former boss at the DOJ national security desk, who apparently stage-managed the “whistleblower’s” doings through Adam Schiff’s House intel Committee. Mr. Schiff would be the ripest witness of all, of course, since he has left a trail of falsehoods and fabrications longer than the Pacific Trail — but it’s unclear just now whether the Senate rules will allow a manager to be called to testify.

There is also much to be unraveled about the American mischief in Ukraine — which includes, but goes far beyond — the arrant grift of Hunter Biden. For example, the relationships between the George Soros-backed NGO Atlantic Council and Burisma, the NatGas company that put Hunter B on its board, and Ukrainian oligarch Victor Pinchuk, board member of the Atlantic Council (and $25-million contributor to the Clinton Foundation), and Dmitri Alperovitch (also Atlantic Council) co-founder of Crowdstrike, the company that “examined” the supposedly “hacked” DNC servers, and Hillary Clinton herself, the self-dealing Secretary of State behind the international pay-for-play charity fraud she operated while in office. Also bring back former US Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch to ‘splain the actions she took to conceal all these machinations, as well as her role in operating the 2016 Kiev Hillary campaign office.

What would soon be obvious is that the precipitating “whistleblower” caper was an effort to divert attention from a network of Americans that used a politically captive Ukraine — following the Maidan Revolution of 2014 — to protect an enormous racketeering operation threatened by the candidacy, and then the election, of Mr. Trump. Naturally, they are desperate to get him out of the way. So many of the facts are already publicly known and documented about these matters that the legal machinery has yet to catch up with it all. And when it does, the Democratic Party will have driven a wooden stake through its own depraved heart.

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

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MARK SCARAMELLA COMMENTS: All that being as it may be, the fact that Trump hired, among others, Alan Dershowitz as his defense lawyer is all the proof anyone would need that Trump is as guilty as Jeffrey Epstein and OJ on whatever the charges are.

CATS WAITING PATIENTLY for the fishermen to return.

HIJACKING THE STRUGGLES OF OTHERS, Elizabeth Warren style

by Kathleen Wallace

To say Elizabeth Warren is a political opportunist is not giving her enough credit. She has taken the struggles, as well as the identities of others (women, school teachers, Native Americans, public school supporters, people who are able to tweet with humor, actual humans) and has weaponized these categories until the meaning of it all is lost.

Her tweet about leaving your ghosting boyfriend and getting a dog despite your roommate’s objections should have placed her in the pandering hall of fame, and with that should have included a one way trip to some kind of holding cell for the criminally trite.

Her obvious lies (she’s not even good at them, shaking and being sketchy with a tweaker-looking-body-vibe-thing when she tries to pull them off) — well that bit regarding Bernie Sanders has electrified her twitter feed with images of snakes and has even managed to get #RefundWarren trending. At this rate, maybe she can pull in a negative donation for this quarter. What an achievement. The first female candidate to pull that off! Grrrrl Power! Her political instincts are as feeble as her lies — to have her tell it, she was a selfless public servant most of her career (more like a teacher long enough to mention it, and a corporate lawyer as the subsequent defining profession). Her kids only went to public schools (umm no), she is of native heritage (shouldn’t she have helped a bit at Standing Rock with that 1/16600600606006th ancestry that she is so proud of?). Oh yes, her father was a janitor (again, what? No). She is but a champion for the veracity challenged. That’s true at least.

Warren is that person you can never rely on – the one who has no defining characteristic other than self-elevation. Over the years, if it benefited her, she backed a few seemingly decent causes, but it was never about doing the right thing. It was all political expediency and shape shifting. She was a Republican during so many tumultuous years — even during the Reagan era that propelled us towards what we are going through now… Hell, she was a Republican until her late 40s. But now she has reinvented herself as a populist, but she won’t even talk out against Biden, the man from Creditcardlandia. She’s a promiscuous virgin, a carnivorous vegan.

This current trend to take on the struggles of others as your own has been powerful of late. Cops pretend to have coffee cups served to them with pig slurs and Warren puts forth that the very individual who actually urged her to run for president in 2016, changed course and told her women can’t win (despite ample evidence that Sanders has a track record that is decidedly feminist). I think she said Bernie offered her a cup of coffee in their meeting that had written on it something like “Women can’t win, you’re a bitch, how’s menopause treating you, and also your hair is dry and brittle.” (It was a Starbucks Trenta cup so he could go full on misogynist because there was a lotta space to write on – thanks Starbucks, first a war on Christmas, now a war on Women).

So I’d say this is weaponizing a status and taking the struggles of others to pretend they are your own. Stolen valor, really.

For many of us Sanders is a compromise. The changes needed are massive, but he’s the closest thing we’ve got at this point. The hulking size of our nation and the lack of immediacy to those in power over us lends a situation of creating an infantalized population. This is where we are at now. There should be direct accountability and of course we have nothing of the sort. I suspect far in the future, if humans are to survive in any manner, it will go back to some sort of mutual aid, and direct accountability from those making life and death decisions over others, in short, more of a tribal situation. But right now, in our lifetimes, we are tasked with attempting to keep the planet below 150 degrees, to not bake our children before next week.

We have utter nonsense pouring in from the Warren corporate shills and it is wasting our precious time. The recent CNN debate should render that channel irrelevant at best, a direct threat at the worst. Fox comes in with obvious bias, but the CNNs and MSNBCs slip in behaving as if they are reasonable and neutral, assaulting those of us unlucky enough to have to watch them as captives at dental offices. They most certainly help the Warrens and other corporate shills by providing red herring distractions and pleas for incrementalism. This is akin to only turning up your boiling water that you bath in a degree or two every 5 minutes rather than trying to stop the boil. They care about immediate profits and in truth are terribly stupid. Many of us have been raised to be polite and not utter this about others, especially those in power. We look for reasons and conditions for their behavior and choices, but the stark fact is that a lot of these people are ignorant as fuck and want to remain that way — little or no intellectual curiosity and full of base greed. And this will kill us all.

The treachery of Warren towards Sanders is most likely from some back room deal with Biden. He probably told her that he needs help against Corn Pop and while sniffing her hair and unwashed face, (I’m not being snarky without reason, she shared her beauty routine with the media since that’s so pressing in these days of turmoil)… Well, Biden decided that she would be the one to stroke his leg hairs in the oval office as VP. They are the golden hairs of a golden white man, he says. This is the way of Washington – lots of white men thinking their leg hair is the best, but her instincts were shit to have taken a deal like this. No way in hell is Biden going to win, even if the DNC does manage to prop him up as their candidate. Trump will have a field day with him (Biden of the reasonable Republican fable) and if they do debate, the entire country might have a collective intracranial bleed from the batshittery that will be spoken. Trump will be there, all eyes dilated, snorting and speaking gibberish; Biden will be there, all blood eyed and smarmy, talking about how poor kids can be smart too (the more you know). I cry in a corner even considering such a spectacle. I’d rather see Topsy electrocuted than watch that.

Anyway, it’s not unlikely that Warren will get a challenger for her senate seat due to this Judas move. The Bernie supporters will be generous with political donations if that individual materializes, I’m sure. But I’m guessing she will try something again in terms of reinvention and she will refer to herself as the politician formally known as Elizabeth Warren and try to get a judge show on antennae tv. I won’t watch it even if she hits the gavel and says to leave the ghosting boyfriend and get a dog in the event of a sassy landlord tenant dispute brought before her court. I plan on ghosting Elizabeth Warren and her lying ass.

SF GIANTS HIRE FIRST WOMAN TO MAJOR LEAGUE COACHING STAFF: ALYSSA NAKKEN

Alyssa Nakken, a former softball star at Sacramento State, will join the San Francisco Giants coaching staff as the first female full-time assistant in Major League Baseball history.

cnn.com/2020/01/16/us/san-francisco-giants-female-coach-spt-trnd/index.html

EVERYBODY TAKE A BREATH!

My inbox is littered with apocalyptic mail.

Trump's not going to be re-elected, okay? Our brilliant, loyal doomsayers notwithstanding, our red-hatists be damned, Trump is not Houdini. The tools of democracy, that I and we have been lamenting, mourning, decrying and criticizing are in place, and The Donald will be transformed to something you imagine is under the bed, hiding in the closet, lurking in the attic and cellar. What he'll be--not soon enough ("soon enough" would have been 2016) but soon--is dead. He'll be starred in literature as an aberration, as the exception that proved the rule, as a vindication of the foresight of the founders, as--get this!--as democracy WORKING, in the slow, agonizing way it must. You want speed? Monarchy, oligarchy, plutocracy, kleptocracy--all these -ocrasies and -archies are much more expeditious

Also, China is not about to become the world's unchallenged leader. China's consciousness has substantial cognitive real estate devoted to it for 6,000 years. It's not sustainable in the 21st century. "Dog Eat Dog" doesn't work with eight billion dogs. China and Russia are only one or two grave mistakes away from coming apart. Not so the U.S., Canada or Mexico. (A new trade agreement is not a good idea, btw), but Canada and Mexico are priceless trade partners, and we need to adrenalize those relations.

The politics of democracy are and are expected to be always on the boil, and since human affairs are and always will be in a state of change, that's how it should be. Too bad things have to be this snarled to engage everybody and too bad we must hate each other in the process.

(I haven't read a satisfying analysis of this. I grew up in Maryland, a border state in the Civil War. It was the tradition that brother fought brother in Maryland. There were riots in Baltimore. After three Trump years, that history is more immediate and palpable than ever, the tragedy of Lincoln's death--he was about binding wounds, not rubbing ground glass in 'em--has never been more terrible. I don't know why I've yielded to antagonism with old friends--and people I don't know.

Democracy and capitalism are incompatible. The Founders, drunk like everybody else on the staggering potential of the New World and having read "The Wealth of Nations" way more avidly than Adam Smith's other big book, the one he considered his masterwork, "The Theory of Moral Sentiments," they made desperately wrong decisions. Lots more blood will be shed before that is obvious to all, and even then there will be flat-earth type holdouts. Could it be as simple as "self-service" versus "communalism"? Whatever. The Constitution is a monument to political theory, a flop when it comes the the more basic subjects, morals and ethics.)

Anyway: chill, everybody. Iran is under better governance, at the moment, than we are. This moment is calling out talent. When the senate finishes with The Trial, we will have the most accurate measurement of our ruling class and their servants than has ever been taken. Statisticians will look back on this as a watershed moment, when collective folly and wisdom met on level ground, and we got a census of who's-who like never before.

Off topic but crucial, we have a global epidemic of lighted screens, like the ones you and I are looking at right now. The human genome's not ready for this. I hope it never is. I don't give a rat's fanny for how magical reality goggles are. Give me the real stream, the real sunlight, the real smell of pine.

(Mitch Clogg)

PLANNING ON HOLD

Dear Interested Parties,

The February 6, 2020 Planning Commission cancellation notice has been posted on the department website at: mendocinocounty.org/government/planning-building-services/meeting-agendas/planning-commission

POWERBALL JACKPOT GROWS TO $625M FOR SATURDAY DRAWING

usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2019/03/20/powerball-winning-numbers-550-million-jackpot-announced/3229416002/

WE ARE RESCHEDULING the January 23, 2020 PFAC community outreach meeting. Subsequent to setting the date, a hospital board meeting was scheduled for the same date and proximate time. I will keep you posted when we have a new date confirmed – I’m hoping you can help spread the word—again!

Thank you!

Michelle Norvell, Administrative Assistant

Nursing Administration

Mendocino Coast District Hospital

700 River Drive

Fort Bragg, CA

Phone: (707) 961-4633

mnorvell@mcdh.net

JOHN SAKOWICZ REPLIES TO CURMUDGEON (Version 2)

To the Editor:

I am surprised the AVA published the wild speculations, reckless lies, and snarky opinions left anonymously at the AVA’s door about the nine candidates running for the three open positions on the Board of Supervisors.

Why publish "fake news" disseminated anonymous haters?

Why indeed!

Anyone can say anything — absolutely anything, however false or hurtful — about anyone, especially without attribution.

Here are the corrected facts about my life.

FAKE NEWS: I over-stated my Wall Street career.

REAL NEWS

My work history in the financial services industry is documented in my FINRA file, which can be found under the “credentials” section at my personal website, https://www.johnsakowicz.com/credentials.html .

In the United States, the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, Inc. (FINRA) is the private corporation that acts as a self-regulatory organization (SRO). FINRA is the successor to the National Association of Securities Dealers (NASD) and the member regulation, enforcement, and arbitration operations of the New York Stock Exchange. It is the professional association that regulates member brokerage firms and exchange markets. The government agency which acts as the ultimate regulator of the securities industry, including FINRA, is the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Per my FINRA file, I started my career at the Alex Brown & Sons, the oldest investment bank in the United States, and I earned my Series 7 and Series 3 licenses.

Per my FINRA file, I worked at Dean Witter as a national sales manager for managed futures. The legendary, Ken Tropin, who started the multi-billion dollar managed fund industry with John Henry, was my boss at Dean Witter.

I was also Dean Witter’s national sales manager for precious metals. My employment there ended in 1986.

In June, 1988, I co-founded a hedge fund in the Cayman Islands. I worked there for many years, consulted for a few years, retained my partnership equity and cashed out as a partner in March, 2004, and rolled over into another offshore fund.

Per my FINRA file, I worked at the Swiss bank, UBS.

FAKE NEWS: I got fired for “being gay” at the MCSO.

REAL NEWS

There was no firing. There was no lawsuit. There was no sexual harassment for LGBT issues.

I moved to Mendocino County 20 years ago as a semi-retired person. I followed the woman who I would later marry. I adopted her two sons. Seeing no senior professional opportunities in Ukiah in the financial services industry, and being bored and needing something to do, I applied to the MCSO.

After months of vetting in an exhaustive background investigation, I was hired.

Due to understaffing, I worked 50-55 hour weeks for a few years. I worked in the most secure part of the jail, the Administrative-Segregation Unit, in Building 2, Wing 4. It’s the “lock down” unit. Many of the jail’s 5150 psych cases are housed here, as are violent inmates.

The work was stressful. I burned out. Inmates who are psych cases are at constant risk for suicide and self-harm. Violent inmates -- especially those parole violators from Pelican Bay and San Quentin -- are a constant risk for assaulting other inmates or staff.

There was one bright spot in the job. I worked regularly with the county’s late forensic psychiatrist, Dr. Doug Rosoff, which was a privilege and an honor. He was brilliant. He was compassionate. He was a strong proponent of something called "restorative justice".

But the county jail was a low priority for the then-acting sheriff, Tony Craver. In four years, I never once saw Craver in my unit. Not once. No wonder. The unit was loud. Inmates were angry. Angry at being locked down 23 1/2 hours a day.

Inmates would flood the unit by flushing their t-shirts and underwear down their toilets, literally flooding the unit in human excrement and hepatitis virus. They would also throw excrement at staff through the food ports of their cells. This serious rules violation is called "gassing", and inmates can be criminally charged for it.

Inmates would also try to tamper with the electric lights in their cells and start fires.

Assault and battery with shanks on corrections staff was a constant threat. We shook down the unit several times a week.

I resigned in 2004 from the MCSO after a three-month medical leave of absence. The job had contributed to hypertension, and anxiety and panic disorder. I was prescribed anti-depressants, anti-anxiety meds, and blood pressure meds. Dr. Lynne Coen was my primary care physician.

That same year, I returned to work in the financial services industry at the Swiss bank, UBS, after a long application and vetting process.

FAKE NEWS: I got fired from the grand jury. I got fired from MCERA.

REAL NEWS

I left the grand jury after serving three different years. I resigned in my fourth year.

I am a strong proponent that there should be term limits on grand jury service, so as to avoid weak investigations by complacent jurors. This complacency had been the case during the perennial appointment of a certain foreman who was fond of endlessly repeating the phrase, “First, we [the grand jury] do no harm.”

This line, of course, is taken from the Hippocratic Oath. And it’s absurd to thus describe grand jury service. Grand jurors are not doctors. They are grand jurors.

Grand jurors are sworn to investigate waste, fraud, and corruption in county and city government. They are sworn to refer criminal matters that may arise during the course of investigation to the district attorney. And through the courts, a grand jury has the power to subpoena confidential documents and reluctant witnesses.

But during the tenure of this foreman, the grand jury did none of these things.

In recent years, things have changed for the better. The grand jury now undertakes aggressive investigations, evidenced by last year’s report, “Who Runs Mendocino County?”

Meanwhile, at MCERA, I served five years with distinction from 2012-2017, for which I was recognized with a proclamation. The proclamation may be found under the “credentials” section of my personal website.

At MCERA, I served as a public trustee and bonded fiduciary. I was thoroughly vetted to serve as a fiduciary of more than $500 million in pension assets.

I was also highly trained at MCERA. I took advanced trainings in pension management held at Stanford Law School, UC Berkeley’s Haas School, and UCLA’s Anderson School. The training certificates can also be found at my personal website.

I further served on MCERA’s Audit and Budget Committee, and Search Committee.

FAKE NEWS: I am a latecomer to the cannabis industry.

REAL NEWS

Beginning in the 1980s, when I took a leave of absence from Wall Street and served as the executive director of two large AIDS services agencies in Massachusetts — service for which I was recognized with proclamations from the Massachusetts Senate and House of Representatives — I became involved with “cannabis as medicine”.

Since that time, I have either partnered with, or invested in, cannabis farms in four different states.

In the near future, once legalization becomes law, I hope to receive one of the first permits in New Jersey. We will have an indoor grow at a precolonial farm in Frenchtown.

The grow operation will be housed in a new steel metal garage building (1200 sq.). It will be have deep-water culture (DWC) units with top-feed setups.

There is no rural mail delivery at the farm. However, I may be reached at: John Sakowicz, Field of Roses Farm, P.O. Box 38, Frenchtown, New Jersey 08825-9998.

FAKE NEWS: I have a personal beef with County CEO Carmel Angelo.

REAL NEWS

Nothing could be further from the truth. I take issue with Angelo's professional conduct, or rather, Angelo's misconduct.

In the ten years that Angelo has been CEO, she has consolidated power in her office, and "disappeared" those who would challenge her absolute authority. She acts much like a Mafia boss.

I'll explain.

Angelo has eliminated county jobs by privatizing much of HHSA, especially mental health services.

Ortner Management Group got the first contract, and failed miserably, then Redwood Quality Management Corporation (RQMC) got the contract. RQMC is also failing, especially in caring for the county's homeless population.

Why did RQMC get the lucrative contract? Why indeed. RQMC's founders are political insiders and friends of Angelo. They had no experience with adult services before being awarded a $20 million contract and the opportunity to bill Medi-Cal for millions more.

RQMC's founders -- a local married couple -- were only in the foster child business. Nothing more.

But there's a method to Angelo's madness. Angelo can control these amateurs.

Something else.

In privatizing the county's mental health services, Angelo eliminated many county jobs, and importantly, most of those jobs were jobs filled by SEIU members.

Over the years, Angelo has demonstrated a clear animus towards SEIU -- first by cutting jobs and salaries following the 2008 recession, then by freezing salaries for the next ten years. Meanwhile, Angelo was getting big raises. Currently, Angelo's total compensation, including pension, is in the neighborhood of $350,000.

By contrast, the county's in-home health aides -- SEIU 1021 members -- were getting only minimum wage and no benefits up until last month.

Angelo has also consolidated and merged county departments -- Real Property Management, Information Technology, and Risk Management -- into her own CEO's Office. It was a power grab. Angelo enlarged her fiefdom.

Finally, Angelo "disappears" anyone who would challenge her authority.

Her chief deputy, Alan Flora, came to work one day, and was escorted out of the building forever…without cause, notice, or explanation.

Other causalities? HR Director Heidi Dunham. HHSA Director Stacey Cryer. Air AQMD Director Chris Brown.

I could go on and on with a list of disappeared persons, but perhaps the most shocking case of Angelo's wrath was what Angelo recently did to Public Health Director Barbara Howe.

Angelo not only fired Howe, but she attempted to destroy Howe's career by directing a scheme to get a protective restraining order issued against Howe with an affidavit that was nothing short of perjury.

Howe is now working over in Lake County directing their food stamp program. Howe is making a fraction of what she made in Mendocino County. She is in survival mode. Howe has also taken in renters in her home in Ukiah to pay the mortgage. During the week, Howe lives in her van and eats sandwiches.

Welcome to Carmel Angelo's world!

Thank you for allowing me to correct the record. I also what to say I thank and respect each of the other eight candidates running for the Board of Supervisors.

John Sakowicz, Candidate, 1st District Supervisor

FLOW KANA

Devon,

Here is the article, "Flow Kana's Deal with the Devil, Jason Adler", I promised yesterday. It went viral, and I have been interviewed by the national media about it.

Please forward the article to the members of the "candidates forum roundtable" hosted by the Farm Bureau on January 15.

The article is also posted in my Facebook page where it attracted thousands of views, 425 comments, and was shared 296 times.

Flow Kana, and their Wall Street investors, are nothing but carpetbaggers -- carpetbaggers looking to suck billions of dollars out of the local economy of the Emerald Triangle counties, of which we, Mendocino County, are the leader..

During the interview, someone at the roundtable asked me to "imagine a world without cannabis", and then he proceeded to ask me further questions.

I was polite and tried to answer the questions, but the truth is, I cannot imagine Mendocino County without cannabis.

According to a Press Democrat analysis, the Emerald Triangle counties of Mendocino, Humboldt and Trinity, and lesser-known cannabis operations in Sonoma and Lake counties, has a legal outdoor harvest worth about $474 million a year, barring catastrophic crop loss and based on industry standards for yield and the current wholesale value of marijuana, about $500 a pound.

But the black market for cannabis is much bigger.

How much bigger?

Let me put it in perspective. Only 235 cannabis cultivation permits were issued last year by the Department of Building and Planning in Mendocino County. Another 1,000 applications are stuck in the permitting pipeline. And yet another 6,000 to 7,000 farmers are not even seeking permits.

There is no world without cannabis, Devon. None. No world. Our next Board of Supervisors must be very knowledgeable and conversant in all issues relating to cannabis, if Mendocino County's farmers and business community are to be competitive in what is now an international marketplace.

The global legal marijuana market size is expected to reach $66.3 billion by the end of 2025, according to a new report by Grand View Research. It is anticipated to expand at a CAGR of 23.9% during the forecast period. Increasing legalization and use of marijuana in medical, as well as recreational applications, is expected to promote the growth.

Thank you.

John Sakowicz, Candidate, 1st District Supervisor and proud member of the Mendocino Cannabis Alliance

FOUND OBJECT