MCT: Saturday, October 17, 2020

• Winds Diminish
• Cases Slowing
• Voting Info
• Grease Grange
• Pot Expansion
• Sue Miller
• Dory Dan
• Skull Found
• Fatal Pass
• Big Catch
• Ed Notes
• Cleone House
• Sheriff's Term
• Black Beetle
• Patricide Charges
• Streetscape Update
• Renewal Show
• Village Events
• Driftwood Horse
• Garcia Guild
• Surf Fishing
• Ugly GRT
• Jughandle Bridge
• CVFD Grants
• Yesterday's Catch
• California Changes
• Sign Carving
• Soft Science
• Log Train
• Damn Kids
• Undercover Agents
• Trump Support
• Window Gaze
• Financial Interest
• Witch-gration
• Malign Neglect
• 2020 Endorsements
• Pelo-stration
• Wall Tax
• Why Hunter
• Vote Out
• Organized Evil
• Little Engine
• Economic Squeeze
• Master Juggler
• Marco Radio
• Found Object

GUSTY NORTHEAST RIDGETOP WINDS will diminish today. Otherwise, warm and dry conditions will be likely across the region this weekend into the first half of next week.

RED FLAG WARNING: The offshore oriented pressure gradient is forecast to relax today. However, northeast wind gusts are expected to be sufficiently strong for a critical fire weather threat from southern Trinity County south across Lake County through this morning due to continued low humidity values, warm temperatures, and dry fuels. Otherwise, warm dry conditions will be likely through the weekend into the first half of next week. (NWS)

YESTERDAY'S HIGHS: Boonville 98°, Ukiah 98°, Yorkville 95°, Fort Bragg 84°

THREE MORE COVID CASES reported in Mendocino County on Friday, bringing total to 1080. That’s 38 cases in the last week, or 5.4 cases per day average. The prior week average was 7.7 cases per day. And the week before that averaged 12.7 per week. If this trend continues Mendo should be moved into a less restrictive state category.

ELECTION DAY – POLLING LOCATIONS

This election is the kind of election we have never seen before. Polling places will not be what we are use to be.

By Executive Order of the Governor of California, EVERY “active” registered voter in Mendocino County was sent a Mail In (aka Vote By Mail or Absentee) Ballot. Because of this, in this election - if a “normal poll voter” (where the voter traditionally went to a polling place to vote, was listed in the roster, and normally only had to sign their name to vote) goes to a polling location to vote, like they have in past elections – the voter will have to vote a “Provisional Ballot” and put their voted ballot into a Pink Provisional Envelope – unless they take the ballot AND envelope they received in the mail with them to surrender. This will also apply to a vote by mail voter, they will also have to vote a Provisional Ballot. Again, this is because everyone was sent a mail in ballot. 

If you haven’t received your ballot in the mail, please call us and we will send you a replacement ballot. Please call 707 234-6819 for a replacement ballot. 

Polling Locations are open on Election Day Only – The Drop Box Locations at the City of Willits, City of Fort Bragg, the City of Point Arena and the County Admin Building in Ukiah are available 24 hours per day, 7 days per week; the Boonville Fairgrounds Office is open Monday through Friday from 9 am to 4 pm. 

For questions or additional information please contact the Election / County Clerk’s Office by calling 707 234-6819. 

Katrina Bartolomie

Assessor, County Clerk-Recorder, Registrar Of Voters

501 Low Gap Road, Rm. 1020

Ukiah, California 95482

E-Mail: acr@co.mendocino.ca.us

GRANGE DRIVE-IN MOVIE, This Saturday Oct 17, starting at dark. Donation for attendance, Snacks available. Socially Distances, in cars, or your own car centric social bubble. Masks on when out of car.

SUPES PROVISIONALLY OK EXPANSION OF POT CULTIVATION

by Jim Shields

In case you were thinking there’s just no way this County could further screw up marijuana regulation, they somehow found a way to do it.

At Tuesday’s, Oct. 13 meeting, the Board of Supervisors gave the provisional go-ahead to expand pot cultivation in Mendocino County despite opposition from the Sheriff, environmentalists, and ranchers.

By a 4-to-1 vote, the Board conditionally OK’d numerous new provisions for a proposed Ordinance that will allow cultivation to occur on 10 percent of the total land on parcels zoned as Agriculture, Upland Residential, or Range Land. For example, a 600-acre parcel could have up to 60 acres of cultivated weed, or 100 acres of pot could be grown on a 1,000 acre parcel.

To his credit, Third District Supervisor John Haschak was the lone dissenter, explaining he had “serious concerns about” the expansion because “that’s going to really devastate the small growers. The rangeland, you know, we heard from the Sheriff, environmental groups, ranchers that are against it. There’s not a work plan to move this (forward) so I’m going to vote no.”

Earlier in the meeting, Sheriff Matt Kendall told the Supes there’s an abundance of marijuana in the county already — he estimated at least one million plants in the Covelo area alone — and it was a mistake to open up new growing areas, especially on rangeland, when “we can’t control the areas” now under cultivation. However, Supes John McCowen, Ted Williams, Dan Gjerde, and Carre Brown favored the “bigger-is-better-for-the-county’s-economy” pot cultivation model. 

McCowen argued that unless pot cultivation was allowed to expand, the County’s economic viability was threatened.

Kendall is the second Sheriff to object to opening up rangeland to pot farming. Just last December when the subject came up, then-Sheriff Tom Allman urged the Board to allow voters to decide the controversial issue of introducing pot cultivation on range land (so-called “legacy” grows are grandfathered under the existing, failed Ordinance).

Allman advised the Supes, “Once again, this is a very important topic … We’re at a point where this is the second time this year we’ve talked about range land and with all due respect to the last two speakers (who supported opening up range land for cultivation), I wish they were correct. I wish the vast majority of growers were responsible and respected our land. But as Sheriff I can tell you that’s not true. The vast majority of locals understand the importance of living and growing and raising their children in Mendocino County are responsible people. But I hate to inform people that the dirty truth is this is about greed and not about cannabis … No one is saying there is a shortage of cannabis in this county. No one is saying there is a shortage of land to grow on in this county. So why are we having this conversation (about expanding new cultivation into range land)? … I think the voters should decide. This is such an emotional decision. This is something that needs to go in front of our voters and say, ‘Do you want rangeland in this county to be turned into cannabis?’… It’s almost an end-run around the General Plan, and the General Plan needs to be evaluated.”

Tom Allman was absolutely correct in his assessment of the range land issue. That’s why the voters should decide it and not the very same county officials who have created absolute chaos after nearly four years of ordinance tinkering.

Speaking of Allman’s reference to greed, weed industry heavyweights such as Henry’s Original and Flow Kana submitted pre-meeting written statements arguing in favor of the “10 % rule,” using nearly the identical language that was approved by the Supes. Must be great minds do think alike.

According to Flo Kana’s wriiten statement, “The Board of Supervisors has, on previous occasions, supported cultivation in RL zones and expansion, the only logical plan now, would be to incorporate these components into the ordinance as it is being developed … The amount of land that can be used for cannabis cultivation should be a percentage of overall parcel size.”

Henry’s Original, a subsidiary of the sprawling cannabis network created by Jamie Warm, filed comments hinting that the company may have to pull up stakes and depart unless the County “open the door” to cultivation on resource lands: “As a vertically integrated brand born in Mendocino, we hope to stay. But for businesses like ours to succeed and keep jobs here we need to scale production. Currently, responsible operators are being ‘zoned out’ of the legal industry, and cultivation caps artificially prevent us from operating as any other agriculture industry does … Allow cannabis cultivation up to 10% percent of parcel size.”

Not to confuse matters further because the County’s Cannabis Ordinance chronicles are tortuously convoluted, but this proposed Ordinance is written for pot farmers who either weren’t growing or couldn’t provide proof they were cultivating in Mendocino County prior to January 1, 2016. Those who were bona fide growers before that date are covered under the existing Ordinance, which everyone (including the Supervisors themselves) now agrees with my long-standing assesment as being an utter failure, a description now uttered by Supervisor Williams. 

How utter is that Ordinance’s failure? The chief architect of the Ordinance, Supe McCowen, opined at the meeting that “50 percent of the current applicants” seeking permits won’t get them, for a variety of reasons, including that their files can’t be located. He recently concluded the Ordinance is “unworkable.” 

Keep in mind, that after four years, only approximately 10 percent or around 1,000 of the estimated 10,000 growers have made and presumably paid non-refundable application fees. 

So where is everything on the pot front now?

• The Supes are banking on — literally — that the new Ordinance, which is supposed to be in place by April of 2021, will be so spiffy that it will attract most, if not all, of the 90 percent of growers who so far have avoided the entire legal process.

The likelihood of that occurring is slim-to-none. The vast majority of non-compliant growers have no incentive under the proposed plan to enter the legal market. Many of them long ago expanded their operations. They know the County has never enforced the current Ordinance, and they suspect the County will not enforce the proposed Ordinance, if and when it’s ever approved.

• Supervisor Haschak was the lone dissenter to the proposed Ordinance mainly due to concerns about lifting the existing cultivation caps and the adverse affects on small growers, the so-called “mom and pops.” He believes the little guys will be “devastated.” He could be right, but I’ve learned those folks are very resilient and innovative problem-solvers. I’ll leave it at that. One thing is for sure, all pretenses of County officials looking out for the best interests of family pot farmers died with the introduction of this proposed Ordinance, which sure looks like it favors the interests of the big, capitalized growers.

• By opening up rangeland to cultivation, the County has bought itself big trouble with environmentalists and ranchers. Why pick a fight with people when you don’t have to? Besides the Planning and Building Department advised the BOS, “Incorporating RL (rangeland) and/or expansion above 10,000 square-feet will require additional analysis pursuant to the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) and may create delays to the start of the Phase Three program (Ordinance).”

• Seriously, isn’t there enough pot being grown in this county already?

(Jim Shields is the Mendocino County Observer’s editor and publisher, and is also the long-time district manager of the Laytonville County Water District. Listen to his radio program “This and That” every Saturday at 12 noon on KPFN 105.1 FM, also streamed live: http://www.kpfn.org)

SUE MILLER

You know who else just died? Sue Miller the really quite effective anti-offshore-drilling activist. It says here (in the listserv) she was born in 1948, which interests me because that means she was only 35 in 1983; her expression and manner made her seem older. She was always so pinch-faced and sour and angry, but maybe that’s just the part I saw. She seemed like a firebrand Jewish 52-56, more than any 35. I was 24; maybe that had something to do with it.

The main thing I remember about Sue Miller was when Kay Rudin at I were starting at KMFB (in 1983, right when George Anderson had bought the station from Steve Ryan, the heir of the Ryan Aircraft fortune (Ryan built the Spirit of St. Louis), and George was just about to fire all the quirky hippie deejays and replace them with eager, serious-sounding broadcasting school graduates, but he hadn’t really started firing in earnest yet. Rich Alcott had impressively called him an asshole and quit. Anyway, Kay and I were there at night. I was just about to start my show, which wasn’t much at the time, just playing records. I’d done it a few times already. And Sue Miller met us on her own initiative, for some reason, and she started pointing at things in plain sight and declaring what they were. “This is the record library,” she said, pointing at the L-shaped record bookcase in the broadcast booth. There were letters on pieces of paper taped to the shelves. “These are the A’s.” (She pointed to the far left top shelf, at records whose band name started with A.) She said, “These are the B’s,” and pointed at the records that started with a B. “These are the C’s,” she said. I said, “And so on through the alphabet? Until you get to the X, Y, and…” I pointed to the far low right: “Z?” Sue’s face literally turned red, and she scream-barked, “Don’t FUCK WITH ME!”

People are funny. Everybody has a bad day once in awhile. It’s okay. And then you’re gone and people remember the stories and smile. 

— Marco Maclean 

REMEMBERING DORY DAN

Memories of Dory Dan, so far.

Add to this, if you feel like it. Send your Dory Dan story to the listserv or to me (Marco McClean, memo@mcn.org):

George Hollister wrote:

I spent a day in Albion nearly 40 years ago that included a stop to see Dory Dan, and his girlfriend in their houseboat. It would be inappropriate for me to recount most of my memories of that day here, but I will say, I came home with culture shock. Sorry to hear of the tragic death. RIP, Dan.

Gary Smith:

Thank you, Marco, for the piece on Dory Dan. I have been waiting for something about this. It was a week ago Sunday.

Can’t add much detail, just remember him as an iconic member of the Noyo salmon troll fleet going back to the mid 70s, when I started fishing. He was undoubtedly there before that, but I wasn’t. Last I saw him was on his boat, the Ceac. No idea what the name means. He had netting surrounding the entire deck to keep his two or three chihuahuas from going overboard.

Brian wrote:

Dory Dan was an unassuming but unabashed Ladies Man. Packaged in the body of a hippie freak, was Clark Gable surrounded by Fred Astaire. It was real neat to know him. He was one of the few people I really liked.

Tracee wrote:

I have been friends with Dory Dan since we were both 16, in high school. I was the new kid on the block after transferring in at the end of sophomore year. I wanted to join the school chess club, but I had two strikes against me, I was black and a girl. The president of the club told me only boys were allowed to join.

Dory Dan, was outraged. So he played against me and I won. Then he arranged for me to play each member of the club, he challenged them to try to win against me. None did...his conclusion to them was, they had to let me in because I was better than all of them. A fierce defender of justice, even then! This is Dan when first we met:

I just visited him twice in September, the last time was the the 27th. I so miss his presence on our planet!

(signed) Theresa Sheppard Alexander MA, MFT

(And she sent a picture of Dory Dan when he was 16 years old. Just a cute kid. Happy. Big flappy ears. Level, wide-set, sharp eyes. Perfectly symmetrical face. I'll put that up on the weblog tomorrow night.)

Barbara Sochacki wrote:

In September 1977 I got a load of firewood from Dory Dan. I had cherished friend from that day until October 6, 2020. He arrived with firewood in his coon skin cap just like Daniel Boone! He took me mushroom hunting. Entertained me with his accordion.

A good memory is Dory Dan riding his motorcycle in the early mornings around the headlands to check out the fishing weather and buy the paper with Spotty Boy, one of his herd of chihuahuas, tucked into his leather jacket.

Radek Tuma wrote:

I met Dory Dan after the puppet performance at the Mendocino Theater Company. He stood there with his funny hat, and yelled at me loudly (haha) “Hey, man! I know some Czech people, they were hanging out with me on the houseboat! It was 10 or 20 years back. I still have Susan Swansea’s guitar, here at my beachhouse! Would you like to come and hang out?” We didn’t have any place to stay for that night, so we went, and it was a very memorable evening for the rest of my crew. He talked and talked, his stories about the whales and the shining excrements of the whale. He talked all the night, and when I came in the morning to check in, they were all still talking. Anyway, then he became our good friend, and never minded to ask me to do anything for him anytime (haha). He was a very giving person, too. Every Christmas, he gave my children loads of books, old taxidermied fishes, etc. One day, it was Sunday afternoon, he called and said loudly on the phone, “My bees are swarming! Can you come?” “You mean, right now, yeah?” “Yeah!” I came to Dan’s little cabin on Little Lake and saw the biggest swarm of bees you can imagine on just a skinny, very tall fir tree. “How we are gonna get them?” Dan was holding two trash bags, and said “Just like this! Cut the branch, and put them in!” (haha) Then he showed me his rickety old ladder and I decided to climb on the other tree next to it, better than using that ladder. Well, I knew a little bit about the bees from before, and that when they swarm they are pretty calm, so I wasn’t nervous and just climbed, cut the branch as Dan instructed me, and slid them down in the plastic bags to Dan with the rope. We opened the hives, found the queen, and put the bees into the box. Dan was so happy. I left immediately because I had something else to do; it was around 5:00 in the afternoon. When I got home, I got another call from Dan, with a similar message: “The bees are swarming again! Can you come?” And I said again “You mean right now?” So I jumped into the car and went there. I already knew the way to take them down (haha) we did the same thing; this time, we made sure they had enough extra food around, and then Dan told me, “Great job, man. Remember that old guitar from Susan Swansea, which is still here? You can have it, for the help with the bees.”

And Dick Whetstone wrote:

I knew Dan for many years. He once told me that he had been in a severe automobile accident when he was younger and almost died. When he recovered he felt that he was given a new lease on life. He no longer felt bound by the constraints of the society that he had grown up in and want to live his life as free as possible, which he did with great skill and joy.

One day in the mid '70's, Dan pulled into our driveway in his old Jimmy truck he called "Yellow Peril." He held up a big dead skunk and said "Look what I found!" He laid the skunk on the hood of the truck, pulled out his pocket knife, and skinned it. By the time he was done, he had tears streaming down his face. He looked at his knife and threw it into the woods. After he tanned the hide, he made a hat out of it and wore it for years. He always said nothing gets past a skunk, including rain.

In that same era, I stopped in to see Jan Me and her daughter Yonana when they lived in the hippy shack in the middle of the eucalyptus grove by the Point Cabrillo lighthouse. Dan was there and they were eating a raccoon he had picked up at the side of the road. He had a reverence for life and wanted nothing to go to waste.

Dan was a good man and one of the more unique individuals I have ever met.

HUMAN SKULL FOUND Near the Mendocino/Humboldt County Line Not Far From the 2012 Discovery of a Skeleton in Sneakers

On October 8, 2020, a forester conducting timber harvest inspections in a creek bed southeast of the convergence of Highway 101 and 271 near the Mendocino and Humboldt County line made a grim discovery–a human skull.

mendofever.com/2020/10/16/human-skull-found-near-the-mendocino-humboldt-county-line-not-far-from-the-2012-discovery-of-a-skeleton-in-sneakers/

THAT BIG BYPASS ACCIDENT

On Wednesday, October 14, 2020 at 1743 hours, a 2011 Kenworth was driving northbound on US-101 south of mile marker 45.55. A 2004 Chevrolet pickup truck was driving northbound on US-101 behind the Kenworth. A 2012 Toyota pickup truck was driving southbound on US-101 north of mile marker 45.55. The Chevrolet crossed over double yellow lines and passed the Kenworth. The Chevrolet passed the Kenworth and continued traveling northbound in the southbound lane and subsequently collided head-on with the Toyota. The impact of the collision forced the Chevrolet back into the northbound lane and was then struck by the Kenworth. The Toyota came to rest blocking the northbound lanes. The driver of the Chevrolet was pronounced deceased at the scene. The driver of the Toyota was transported to Howard Memorial Hospital and later transported via air to Santa Rosa Memorial. Both passengers of the Toyota were taken to Howard Memorial Hospital. One of the passengers, a female juvenile, was flown to Oakland Children’s Hospital. The driver of the Kenworth sustained no injuries. The deceased party was transported from the scene to Eversole Mortuary. The collision investigation is being handled by CHP Ukiah. The death investigation and family notification is being handled by the Mendocino County Sheriff’s Department (MCSO). The name of the deceased will be released by MCSO pending notification of the deceased’s family. The driver of the Chevrolet did not appear to be wearing his seatbelt. The occupants of the Toyota and the Kenworth were wearing their seatbelts. It is unknown at this time if alcohol or drugs are a factor in this collision. This collision is still under investigation. 

ED NOTES

THE NATIONAL OCEANIC and ATMOSPHERE ADMINISTRATION (NOAA) has released its new U.S. Winter Outlook predicting warmer-than-average temperatures except for states in the Northwest. It comes after the NOAA's National Centers for Environmental Information revealed that last month was Earth's hottest September in 140 years. More than 45% of the U.S. is currently experiencing drought.

ANDERSON VALLEY is certainly among that 45%. Never have seen it this dry. Never saw the Navarro looking worse. Never saw almost all The Valley's feeder streams dry up. Never saw so many water trucks hauling the stuff of life through The Valley and on into the hills.

THE EERILY DRY WEATHER contributes mightily to the prevalent anxiety out there about everything from the election to the latest employment stats — 23.3 million unemployed and about 6 million more Americans now defined as impoverished, and these are the official statistics, meaning you can safely add ten mil to each.

A REPORT RELEASED this week by the California Department of Public Health declared that Healdsburg and Cloverdale could soon run out of water. The dire news was duly passed along by the Press Democrat although it was denied by Cloverdale and Healdsburg officials, whose denials have not yet been reported by the Rose City daily. “It's not true,” said Healdsburg Mayor Jim Wood. “I think what probably attracted the attention of the state is that Cloverdale and Healdsburg asked for mandatory water conservation. All of our wells are chugging at 100% and are refilling at a normal level. We believe we are fine. We are concerned about the future and we want to conserve water for us here in town, but also for the whole region.”

ON THE LARGE SUBJECT of regional water, a relative handful of inland Mendo and SoCo sons of the soil get off paying obscenely low water rates for diverted Eel River water while domestic users pay ever higher rates. No surprise that Mendo is especially screwed because most of the water diverted from the Eel River and stored in Lake Mendocino is owned by Sonoma County, although none of it goes to Cloverdale and Healdsburg, while huge amounts of water rests in Lake Sonoma for the almost exclusive use of the Yobbos and their jet skis. 

SONOMA COUNTY makes millions of annual dollars selling the diverted Eel's water, with Mendo getting nothing but cheap water for the aforementioned handful of grape farmers. When former Mendo supervisor John Pinches tried to get a discussion going aimed at re-negotiating Mendo's one-way water deal with Sonoma County, he couldn't even get a second. Why? Other than Pinches our supervisors are terrified of the Farm Bureau and its water hogging grape growers, although a new supervisor like Williams of the 5th District, and maybe even Silent Dan Gjerde of the ocean-view 4th District, have little to fear from Mendo County's dominant special interest, that cheap water mafia of Potter Valley and the downstream wine dons of the Russian River watershed.

THAT was a terrible accident out in the middle of the no road shoulders stretch of the Willits Bypass that closed the Bypass for hours Wednesday evening. That disaster is the worst yet, but over time the Bypass will be our very own Mendo Blood Alley for sure. Critics of the project seldom raised the no shoulders issue on that mile-long stretch out in the middle of the thing, but that and the absence of off and on ramps at Highway 20 were and are huge design flaws.

WHERE'S KAREN? Karen Horner, Mendo County Librarian and cultural services maestro, that is. We understand that Karen slipped outtahere unremarked, no presser, no slobbery farewell from the Supervisors. Did she jump or was she pushed? Whatever the circumstances of Kar's departure, she's landed in one piece in Cody, Wyoming.

FOR SOME ODD REASON, the County Counsel’s legal opinion concering the legitimacy of the Supervisors’ appointment of Sheriff Matt Kendall to fill out the last three years of Sheriff Allman’s term (instead of one year and then an election this November) requires a formal “waiver” of “privilege” before the opinion can be made public. The issue arose when a member of the public asked about the appointment a couple of times during public comment at previous board meetings. County Counsel Christian Curtis immediately went all legalistic and told the Board that he couldn’t make his rationale public without a formal Board declaration, making most ordinary observers think that there was something fishy about the three-year appointment. Curtis’s attempt to shift the responsibility of disclosure to the Board also makes the reasoning fishy. Obviously, the rationale should have been made public at the time of the appointment. This just creates a problem when there should not be one. 

Nevertheless, the following item appeared on next Tuesday’s Supervisors Agenda:

“Item 5b: Discussion and Possible Action Regarding Disclosure of County Counsel’s Legal Analysis Regarding the Duration of a Sheriff’s Term Following Appointment
(Sponsor: County Counsel)
Recommended Action:
Direct County Counsel whether to make public the specific legal analysis and authorities relied upon in advising the Board as to the duration of the Sheriff's term following appointment.”

(Mark Scaramella)

PATRICIDE, THE CHARGES

Count One: Defendant did unlawfuylly with deliberation and premediation and with malice aforethough murder a human being, to wit, James Andrew Whetstone.

County Two: During the commission of the above offense, the defendant personally used a deadly and dangerous weapon, to wit a belt, said use not being an element of the above offense within the meaning of the Penal Code. 

DOWNTOWN STREETSCAPE PROJECT CONSTRUCTION UPDATE - OCTOBER 16

The first new sidewalks have been poured! Check out Perkins and Standley around the Courthouse—both sidewalks are one foot wider than before, and it’s surprising what a difference that makes. Note that parallel parking will still be retained on those sides of the street. Within the next 3-4 weeks, the new sidewalks will all be poured on State Street between Perkins and Henry Streets. A detailed schedule is provided below. Please note that, on the day the new concrete is poured, access to front doors of businesses will be restricted. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause. The next day, however, businesses and pedestrians will have full use of the new, improved sidewalks! 

New utility infrastructure continues to move forward on the south end, with sewer construction wrapping up and water main work beginning. 

North Side: Perkins to Henry Street 

Ghilotti Construction and their subcontractors will be completing the installation of irrigation and electric conduit along State Street, and will begin pouring the new sidewalks on the east side according to the following schedule: 

Monday: Forming new sidewalks on the east side between Henry and Smith. 

Tuesday: Pouring sidewalks between Henry and halfway to Smith Street (east side only). 

Wednesday: Pouring sidewalks on the southern half of the block between Henry and Smith Streets (east side only). 

Thursday: Pouring north half of the sidewalks halfway from Smith Street to Standley Street (east side). 

Friday: Pouring the north half of the sidewalk between Standley and Perkins Streets (east side). 

Monday, October 26: Pouring south half of sidewalks between Smith and Standley.

(Please note that the Thursday and Friday schedule varies slightly from what was shown on the orange flyer; last-minute changes were made to accommodate businesses.)

Work hours are from 7am to 5pm in this area this week; no night work is planned. 

South Side: Church to Mill Street 

Wahlund Construction begins the installation of the main water line between Mill and Seminary. Most of the large pits in the streets will be filled in. 

Monday-Friday: Main water line installation between Mill and Seminary. There will be an open trench along the west side of State Street, and some dust and noise associated with the trenching. 

Through traffic will be maintained on State Street, but there may be intermittent closures of driveways and side streets for a couple of hours at a time as needed. (In the case of driveways, individual business/property owners will be notified.) 

Construction work will begin at 7 am in this area this week, and no night work is planned. 

---

Also, breaking news:

City Manager extends Emergency Order expanding the temporary use of property for businesses impacted by COVID-19 

On May 5, 2020, the City Manager issued an emergency order, which was subsequently ratified by the City Council, expanding the temporary use of property for businesses impacted by COVID-19 through December 31, 2020. Given the impacts of COVID-19 will continue beyond the original expiration date, the City Manager issued a revised emergency order on October 13, 2020 that extends the effective date to the "termination of the local emergency or otherwise as deemed appropriate by the City Council, whichever comes first."

The Governor and Mendocino County Health Officer have issued a series of orders that restrict the type of business that can operate and how those businesses can provide services and goods due to the risk of COVID-19 infection. Businesses permitted to open are required to modify their operations to comply with federal, state, and local directives and guidelines to ensure compliance with Social Distancing Requirements and other COVID-19 risk mitigation measures.

In order to comply with health orders, the City of Ukiah recognizes that businesses need to have the ability to modify operations, which requires unique allowances and temporary relief from certain zoning and land use regulations. Therefore, the order allows businesses including but not limited to retail, restaurants, and mobile food vendors to apply at no cost for the temporary use of City-owned and private property for modified business operations as may be necessitated by the impacts of COVID-19. 

What are some examples of this? 

Expanded use of sidewalks and parking spaces for outdoor dining; 

Allowance for food truck operations without a Use Permit; 

Outdoor retail sales; 

Additional business signage 

Find the simple, no-fee Temporary Use Permit application on our website at www.CityofUkiah.com/businesses 

As always, if you have any questions or concern, please feel free to contact me directly. Otherwise, have a great weekend!

Shannon Riley

Deputy City Manager

City of Ukiah

300 Seminary Avenue

Ukiah, California 95482

w: (707) 467-5793

ALEXIS MOYER EDGEWATER GALLERY'S NOVEMBER FEATURED ARTIST

Event: November Featured Artist

Who: Alexis Moyer, Ceramic Artist

Where: Edgewater Gallery, 356 N. Main Street, Fort Bragg

When: November 6 through November 30, Friday-Monday's each, from 11-5 or enjoy it online at https://alexismoyerpottery.com/shop

Alexis will be presenting new wall hanging and freestanding pieces centered around the theme of 'Renewal'. 

In her own words: “Watching the forest fires burn in California, I began to think about the idea of renewal. I decided to create a body of work that represents the forest at work. It was my way of finding hope during a stressful time. I hope catching a glimpse of ourselves in these natural settings will help remind us to be renewed and find the best in ourselves and hope for a better future.”

MUSIC APPRECIATION CLASS + AVFD FUNDRAISER

Reminder tomorrow is Haz-Mobile in Boonville at the county Fairgrounds 9 am to 1 pm - more details see our calendar: https://andersonvalley.helpfulvillage.com/events

And Learn about music and help support your local Fire Department!

Music Appreciation class + AVFD Fundraiser

Here at GLFCAM, we hope that our Anderson Valley neighbors have been able to maintain both safety and sanity during this really tough year. We were so sorry to have to cancel our Bueno Yabbelow Music Concerts but are resurfacing with a partnership with the Anderson Valley Adult School to host a “music appreciation” class/fire department fundraiser that begins soon! 

If you have enjoyed our concerts with music from an array of aesthetics and a conversational style, you’ll enjoy this four-class series (Sunday afternoons) hosted by Gabriela. With special guest performers featured in each class, you can expect a mix of live performance, conversation, questions from students (you!), and light “homework” in the form of suggested YouTube videos and readings before each class. You’ll be introduced to musical styles and artists both, including familiar faces from past BYMS concerts as well as new artists who are already booked by GLFCAM to visit Boonville in the future when the pandemic eases. 

All classes will be taught through the Zoom platform; and all proceeds (minus a modest overhead for AVAS) will go to the lifesaving Anderson Valley Fire Department as Gabriela and her performer friends are donating their time for our benefit. The sliding scale is broad to accommodate all income levels, but please give more if you are able. 

Classes begin October 25th! Please see the flyer below to learn more! 

To register/ question: (707) 895-2953 or adultschool@avpanthers.org

(mailto:adultschool@avpanthers.org)

Anica Williams

Anderson Valley Village Coordinator

Cell: 707-684-9829

Email: andersonvalleyvillage@gmail.com

GARCIA GRANGE/GUILD AT THE BRINK

Editor,

It is with a heavy heart that we on the Garcia Guild board must inform our membership and the community that has supported us of the following: the California State Grange has begun suing local guilds around the state of California to take over the organizations, buildings and assets. The Garcia Guild is one of many guilds that has been sued by the California State Grange. 

The Garcia Guild board which has been managing the Manchester community center has maintained that the building and assets belong to our local community. In the midst of preparing for the lawsuit the Garcia Guild was informed by its insurance company that the board officers’ insurance would not cover the Garcia Guild in a defense against this lawsuit.

The Garcia Guild has been advised by a number of attorneys that it would cost approximately $100,000 to pay for an attorney to defend against this lawsuit. Meanwhile, the California State Grange won a judgment against the Fort Bragg/Inglenook community center. The Fort Bragg/Inglenook community center, like the Garcia Guild, was formerly a Grange.

Based on the prohibitive costs for the Garcia Guild to defend against a lawsuit filed by the California State Grange and the potential negative impact of the judgment in the Fort Bragg/Inglenook community center’s case, the future of the Garcia Guild and the Manchester community center is uncertain.

The Garcia Guild is working to retain an attorney to assist with the resolution of this lawsuit within the resources currently available. We will do our best to keep you informed during this difficult process.

Susan Levinson Palmer

President, Garcia Guild

Manchester

UGLIFICATION VIA OVERHARVEST

Editor:

As you may have read in a recent article in the Independent Coast Observer, Gualala Redwood Timber continues to put profit before our environment. They are now pushing in your face timber harvests that will deface our viewscapes.

It's one thing to destroy habitat in remote areas that they won't let you trespass on. Now they have the temerity to "uglify" the beautiful scenery that you have come to take for granted along Annapolis Road.

GRT knows no shame and they will trod on you and your sensibilities like they would a red legged frog. They are doing similar work in Guerneville where local people are coming together to fight them.

As usual, the Department of Forestry is rigged to support their lumber production over protection of habitat; and now our habitat. This is hitting close to home folks. Our viewskape is part of our very own habitat. We humans. Get it? GRT does not care about residents of habitats.

While they are being fought in court, GRT has its lawyers and they benefit from Calfire's lawyers who are paid with taxpayer money to support the environmental transgressions of GRT. We are paying them to resist the people's efforts to protect habitat.

By all means write to Calfire and your politicians. GRT is owned by Redwood Empire, a division of Pacific States Industries Inc. which is owned by the Burch family. They have a website and they like to talk about how they sustainably harvest timber.

But their algorithm does not take into account habitat. They manage their forest holdings for marketable tree products with the vision of a plantation owner, not for other life forms or your very eyes. So much collateral damage. Redwood Empire's website is buyredwood.com. Get it?

They invite contact. Let them know what you think.

Nicholas Pinette

Point Arena

COMPTCHE FIRE GETS CRITICAL GRANTS

The Comptche Volunteer Fire Department is pleased to announce that last month thanks to the efforts of Mr. Steven Tunzi with the help of Marilyn Stubbs in department applied for and received two grants. 

The first award of $4500 was received from the Bradford Foundation, a family foundation located in Boonville. This foundation has contributed to many of the Comptche Volunteer Fire Department’s larger projects over the years allowing for significant improvement to our operational capabilities. This award was used to purchase 2000 feet of new wildland hose with connectors.

The second grant of $14,622.61 was received from the California Fire Foundation, a nonprofit charitable organization that provides financial assistance to families of those who have died in the line of duty, firefighters and the communities they protect. These funds will be used to purchase 20 sets of much-needed new wildland personal protective equipment and to bring in certificated wildland fire trainers to instruct the Comptche Volunteer Fire Department's firefighters over the coming months.

With the continued support of the Bradford Foundation and its new funding from the California Fire Foundation along with the unwavering support of the Comptche community we are able to obtain much-needed equipment and training which allows our department to be ready for the next wildland fire. Our next goal is to replace self-contained breathing apparatus bottles which are reaching the end of their certifiable life and to replace a water tender which is approaching the end of its useful service

Thank you to our community for your continued support through your various donations, countless volunteer hours and to the members who proudly served in the Comptche Fire Department.

Comptche Fire Department

P.O. Box 164

Comptche, CA 95427

CATCH OF THE DAY, October 16, 2020

KEITH GILCHRIST, Santa Rosa/Ukiah. Failure to appear.

MASON HARRIS, Ukiah. Burglary, firearm theft, obatining property by false pretenses, suspended license.

AMANDA KOSEK, Redwood Valley. DUI.

ERIC KOTILA, Fort Bragg. Probation revocation.

JAMES RAY, Hopland. Domestic battery. 

SAMUEL SANCHEZ, Ukiah. Disorderly conduct-alcohol, parole violation. (Frequent flyer.)

RICHARD SOLORZANO, Anaheim/Ukiah. Prison escape without violence.

KEVIN STARNES, Ukiah. Disorderly conduct-intoxicated by drugs and alcohol, probation revocation. (Frequent flyer.)

JONATHAN WASHINGTON, Fort Bragg. Domestic battery, prison escape without force.

NICOLE ZAVALA, Merced/Ukiah. DUI, child endangerment, suspended license.

CALIFORNIA CONFUSION

by Joan Dideon

This question of "changes," involving as it does some reflexive suggestion of a birthright squandered, a paradise lost, is a vexed issue. I was many times told as a child that the grass in the Sacramento Valley had at the time the American settlers arrived in the 1840s grown so high that it could be tied over a saddle, the point being that it did no more. California, in this telling, had even then been "spoiled." The logical extension of this thought that we were the people who had spoiled it remained unexplored. Nor would it be explored in my book ‘Run River,’ the inchoate intent of which was to return me to a California I wished had been there to keep me. 

"Everything changes, everything changed," one passage, obviously acutely felt at the time I wrote it, begins. "Summer evenings driving down river to auctions, past the green hops in leaf, black birds flying up from the brush in the dried twilight air, red Christmas tree balls glittering in the firelight, a rush of autumn Sundays, all gone, when you drive through the rain to visit the great-aunts." 

The "change," the "all gone" part is seen in ‘Run River’ to have come only with the postwar boom years, the prosperous years when California "as it was" got bulldozed out of existence either for better (as Ben Weingart and Lewis Boyar and Mark Taper saw it when they conceived Lakewood) or (as I then wish to see it) worse.

Californians of more programmatic mind for many years presented these postwar changes as positive, the very genius of the place: it was conventional to mention the freeway system, the aerospace industry, the University of California master plan, Silicon Valley, the massive rearrangement of the water that got funded when Pat Brown was Governor, the entire famous package, the celebrated promise that California was committed to creating and educating and apparently infinitely expandable middle class. 

And the more recent programmatic attitude was to construe the same changes as negative, false promises: the freeways had encourage sprawl, the aerospace industry had gone away, the university had lost faculty in classrooms to budget cuts, Silicon Valley had put housing beyond the means of non-tech California, and most of the state was still short of water.

In a book of readings for students in freshman composition classes at California colleges, the editors and contributors speak of "the threats to the California dream," of the need to keep "the California dream in sight," of "the fashionable new mythology emerging nationwide in which California is being recast as a nightmare rather than a dream," and of which O.J. Simpson -- O.J. Simpson as "the self invented celebrity who climbed from poverty to the summit of fame and fortune" or O.J. Simpson in the white Bronco -- "better reflects the truth about the California dream." 

In either case, genius of the place or its dystopian blight, the postwar changes that transformed California were understood to have been brought about by what was popularly seeing as an unprecedented influx of population, what Pat Brown in a 1962 issue of Look magazine called "the greatest mass migration in the history of the world," and George B. Leonard in the same issue of Look magazine called "the migrating millions who vote with their wheels for California." During World War II and the immediate postwar years of 1940-1950 the population of California did in fact increase 53%. During the next 10 years, 1950-1960, the population of California did in fact increase 49%.

Yet such growth was in no way unprecedented. Nor, in a state that had seen its population increase in the first 10 years of statehood by 245%, was it even remarkable. The decade between 1960 and 1970 brought a population increased in California of 47%, the decade that followed, an increase of 54%. The years between 1890 and 1910 had brought another 60%. Those were the years during which Faulkner's Ira Ewing in ‘Golden Land’ would have fled Nebraska on the night train to end up 25 years later sleepless in Beverly Hills. The years between 1910 in 1920 brought 44%. Those were the years when it came to the attention of Saxon Brown and Billy Roberts in ‘The Valley of the Moon’ that "it looks like the reborn American ain't got no room left in his own land" – two babes convinced that they had been deprived of their Eden by industrialization, by immigration, by whatever it was that they could not name. The 10 years that followed between 1920 and 1930 when only shallowly settled arrivals were to find themselves further marginalized by the onset of the Depression, brought 66% increase. There had been then from the beginning these obliterating increases, rates of growth that systematically erased freshly laid traces of custom and community, and it was from such erasures that many California confusions would derive.

SOFT SCIENCE

Editor:

Regarding the Valley People item of October 7 in which the Editor asked Boonville high school principal about history requirements for students --

It's interesting to me how history and most of the social sciences save for psychology which now is a lucrative field have little prestige or career potential. This is in comparison to the hard sciences and the business/economics field.

I have always been interested in a social science that Americans are woefully ignorant in, geography. There was predictably no geography class offered at my high school in the early 1980s. Fortunately I have an uncle who was a high school teacher and during my sophomore year in high school he got me a World Geography Today textbook.

To me the issue seems to be a male/female bias that the hard sciences and the business fields are male, and the social sciences are female and "soft."

But then again during my one year at UC Davis as a geography major in the late 80s I ran into a female acquaintance from high school and when I told her that my major was geography her face took on a pained expression and she spat out, "What can you do with that?"

So I guess some modern females see the social sciences as "soft."

Keith Bramstedt

San Anselmo

LETTER TO THE EDITOR:

"Rights"? Give ‘em cookies!

Re: a letter in the October 7 AVA by Cindy Young of Santa Rosa --

My dear Santa Rosan Ms. Young:

I am of the opinion your letter on teen voting is heartfelt but smacks of visionary utopianism.

I am also of the opinion you must be a shut in with no that is zero connection with current events associated with the younger generation. You may be institutionalized with no newspapers, no radio, no television. If you had any of the aforementioned and/or outside contact you would then be able to grasp the truth and understanding you unfortunately have been deprived of. This ongoing increase of covid 19 and destructive (peaceful, yeah right!) protests can be placed at the doorstep of our late bloomer teens. Like it or not, take your head out of your bleep, the sand. The truth is sometimes very hard to accept. You and others are in some cases just adding another arrow in their quiver of discontent. It should not be vote and grow up, but rather grow up and vote, 21.

Your governor, Mr. Cave-In Nuisance, has previously stated that our 25 and under Yutes do not have all fully develop cognitive powers and in an unknowing state are breaking laws. What? Gramps calls them brain-dead. In any event your governor has asked the court system to show leniency when sentences are given out. Let's close our eyes, hold our breath and then say, okay Governor, let's say you are on to something, tongue in cheek! How in hell can we then turn around and give these acknowledged retards the power to vote at a lower age of 18? Come on, you must have a gradeschool education!

A potential problem might be these Yutes being allowed to vote then turning around and setting the polling places on fire. After that adding insult to injury complaining that their vote does not count! A stretch perhaps, get the point?

Sometime past an on the street interviewer in New York asked two young ladies about 18 who would you like to see run for the new president and vice president in the next election? They agreed Da and DaDeDah would be their choice. Again asked, And what do you like about their platform? These two girls looked at each other and tittered and said "What platform? We just think they’re cute." There you have it. A well-thought-out vote from the well educated teens. God help us!

As seen on TV news hundreds and thousands of 18-year-olds are gathering in close contact at beach clubs. Churches with no masks with a marked increase of covid 19 cases being recorded. Over half the country is on a steep incline. For some unknown reason these teens showed no concern for themselves or anyone else. Sad! Sad!

On the East Coast a large group of teens started a cash pool for the first one to get sick of covid 19 who would win the cash. For what? Perhaps for gravesite flowers. And who said these teens are without malice of forethought? When we have teens that bet placing money on sickness with no concerns of death, how in the world can anyone allow the 18-year-olds to vote on health care matters at the polls? And other matters they could care less about?

Yet you and I feared time and time again, It's my right not to wear those masks. Right on sweet cheeks, and it is also your right to get sick and your right to die! But what you fail to recognize is it is not your right to give your grandma and others your sickness. Doesn't require a PhD in astrophysics to understand that keeping six feet distance and wearing a face mask could save your life. But it helps!

There are thousands of teens with three or four or five credit cards maxed out and unusable that may be paid up by their parents or grandparents. Poor planning, you think? And you want to give these retards the right to vote? I don't think so!

Even Pandora, Medusa’s sister, would have concerns about this. We are very close to the bottom of the box with little hope remaining. Look that one up in your Greek book of mythology.

When we see the vast majority of youths 18 or so wearing masks and keeping distances and controlling credit card spending and showing they are concerned about others' welfare I would say they could vote at 18. We have two chances of this coming to fruition: slim and none. I think I saw Slim getting on the out-of-town bus to Milpitas.

Gran said, We got off his stool and urine test back from the clinic this morning and they think he may have a bad case of swamp ass. My my! I think I'll put a little cement dust in his morning oatmeal. That may not cure him but I won’t have to scrub his shorts with that stiff Navy brush and lye soap anymore. No more peanut butter and cookies for Pops. Love you Gran!

God bless America, the Donald, Jerry Philbrick and the Kracken,

Very old and very angry

Boonville

LAPD Officers went undercover and dressed up as women to catch a purse snatcher, October 15, 1960.

EDITOR,

I keep hearing people who are confused about Trump’s support. "How can they when he --"? Christians supporting a man so unchristian, poor and unemployed people supporting a man who flaunts his wealth, loggers supporting a fat old man with dyed hair and face makeup like an aging queen?

He gives them back their dignity. He makes them feel powerful. He shits on their class enemies every day on TV that they watch. He denigrates science -- which is the religion of their class enemies. That's why they forget or ignore his personal self. He is taking care of their business. When we moan they cheer -- he proves that he is effective. Stop asking why and start asking how we restore the worth and dignity of the people which our brilliant world has left behind. If we allegedly smart people don't figure this one out disaster for us is just around the corner. The brownshirts are chanting in the stadiums.

Michael Nolan

Comptche

PS. Our brilliant international socioeconomic creation has eliminated most of the entry-level jobs in which many of us first earned our own money and entered the world of work. And then next the jobs which a person of modest intelligence could do competently. Elevator operator, milkman, drill press operator, telephone operator, typist, automobile assembly line, food prep. Mostly lost by automation -- ATMs, robots, more efficient management of resources and time with better equipment and education. Some outsourced (the displaced workers never blame the plant owners who sent their job to China read no, they blame China). That's the basic problem. About half of us are below average intelligence. The new employment reality rewards people who are of above average intelligence and offers little social or economic benefit for the below average intelligent.

In my teens a guy could graduate from high school, go to work on the line at Ford or GM, get married, buy a new two-bedroom house, have a homemaker wife and a couple of kids in a three year old car, a two week vacation and maybe even a season ticket for the Tigers. None of that is possible for him today.

She has graduated from UC with a degree in biometrics, goes to work at Apple and he is an attorney, they are buying a new condo, they decided to wait to start a family until he makes partner, three-year lease on a BMW. Maui vacation. Golf at the club.

It is getting increasingly difficult for a high school grad to live a middle-class life. It used to be normal. He knows about that time and wants it back. He and his good wife want 1957 back. Their mental wattage is too low to grasp how complex the elements reacting together have resulted in this moment and how impossible it is to reconstruct those particular conditions: the rise and fall of countries, the power of dispersed knowledge, the new materials and methods the science that they can't understand has wrought. They attribute their loss to politics. To the erosion of the social standards and religious beliefs that would ensure their prosperity and standing in their community. The shameless coarsening of our entertainment. They look to the past to cure the present. The successful look to the future to cure the present.

ON LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY

What was Crazy Joe and his boy up to in those foreign climes? What normally attracts the attention of normally attentive people is the exchange of a lot of money with an unreasonable justification behind it. If you say that someone spent hundreds of thousands for a piece of construction equipment, and the buyer is a construction company operator, then such a transaction makes sense on the face of it. But when money exchanges hands, when a LOT of money exchanges hands, with flimsy-looking pretexts, then it’s natural to wonder wtf is going on, especially when the payor is domiciled in a notoriously corrupt regime and when the payee was a drug-taking, booze swilling ne-er-do-well, whose Daddy happens to have been Veep of the US of A. Is there a national interest in knowing all about this? Of course there is. What was the quid pro quo? What was Joe expected to do in return for this apparent largesse? 

THE NEW YORKER COVER, Nov. 2, 1963

BLOOD ON THEIR HANDS

by Dr. Nayvin Gordon

Trump has repeatedly said that the cure can’t be worse than the disease — crushing the Covid-19 pandemic is not worth the cost. Congress, on a nearly unanimous basis, passed the CARES Act which transferred trillions of dollars to Wall Street and Corporate America, but it is “too costly” to eradicate the disease and protect the lives of millions. Trump’s favorite advisor Dr. Atlas, a member of the right wing conservative Hoover Institute, advocates an anti-scientific, deadly “herd immunity” — deliberately allowing the disease to spread through the population. Dr. Atlas was publically denounced by many Stanford doctors. 

All reputable health authorities know that the science of “herd immunity” is achieved by mass vaccination to PROTECT the population from disease. 

The White House supports the science deniers at the right wing think tank, the American Institute for Economic Research that recently published the Great Barrington Declaration.

This document advocates allowing widespread infections, illness and death through an anti-scientific policy of “herd immunity.” The Washington Post writes, “The plan of (The Great Barrington Declaration) is endorsing what the president’s policy has been for months.”

This criminally homicidal policy has already resulted in US deaths approaching half a million.

There is still no science-based national policy to crush and eliminate the disease. All we hear about is controlling the spread to prevent hospitals from being overwhelmed. The news media is filled with reports about the need to slow, control, contain, and manage — no mention of stopping, eradicating or eliminating Covid-19 through basic scientific public health practice which requires tens of millions of tests, tracking, and isolation of the infected. 

The editors of the respected New England Journal of Medicine maintain that the standard public health practices have large effects and are not being followed or enforced. 

Strict quarantine, aggressive tracing and isolation were effective in China, Singapore, South Korea and New Zealand have succeeded in eliminating the disease.

The rich, the 1%, and politicians in many countries, have demanded that businesses open up and we get back to work while they take NO responsibility for economic suffering, illness and death. They have failed their United Nations responsibility to protect, and are committing crimes against humanity as defined: Other inhumane acts of a similar character intentionally causing great suffering, or serious injury to body or to mental or physical health. The blood of millions is on their hands.

Demand life and social needs before profits -- protection at work, health coverage, economic support while isolated and unable to work. Demand millions of tests daily, an army of trackers, and safe isolation units. We must eradicate this disease to prevent the catastrophe of millions more infections and deaths. 

(Dr. Nayvin Gordon writes on health and politics. gordonnayvin@yahoo.com.)

GET IT DONE, NANCY

Editor,

As a staunch Democrat who has supported Nancy Pelosi as a bulwark against the worst excesses of the Trump administration, I am nevertheless increasingly frustrated by her hard line in the negotiations for a COVID relief bill.

Millions of people are facing eviction, foreclosure, food insecurity and worse. Winter and the holidays are around the corner. It’ time for the Democrats to meet the $1.8 trillion number the president offered and put the ball squarely in the hands of Senate Republicans. If they balk, then their inhumanity is out there for all to see.

So get with it, Democrats, and do the right thing. People are suffering, both those who support Donald Trump and those who don’t, and they need help now. Get those funds out to our desperate fellow citizens; the rest of the wish list can be hammered out later.

Hank Skewis

Healdsburg

ON LINE QUESTION of the day: "Out of all the crackheads in the world that Burisma could have hired for $186,000 per month, why did the most corrupt corporation in the Ukraine choose the vice president's son?"

THE CLOCKS STRUCK THIRTEEN

by James Kunstler

Was it just me, or did you also notice that NBC’s Savannah Guthrie decided to play Special Prosecutor in Thursday night’s “town hall” gotcha-fest with Mr. Trump, whom they had perched on some Modernista stool-of-punishment? The hectoring interrogation started from the get-go — the “townies” distributed around the set apparently just props — while Ms. Guthrie barked over the President with various renderings of the old shyster’s retort, but do you still beat your wife?

Over on ABC, Ol’ White Joe Biden lounged comfortably in low light and cushy seating with his therapist, George Stephanopoulos, free associating on the wonders and marvels he will bring about in the Kingdom Come of his presidency. Strangely, the subject of his family’s lucrative business dealings in Ukraine, China, and Russia a few years back never came up in the confab, a therapeutic omission that seemed to amount to malpractice.

I speak of the evidence found on a laptop computer apparently belonging to R. Hunter Biden, Ol’ White Joe’s crackhead son, outlining the many services Biden & Co. rendered to bigwigs in foreign lands for millions of dollars when Pop, “the big guy,” was vice-president. The Democrats’ new Ministry of Truth played a DEFCON-3 defense on these matters when it all broke in The New York Post at midweek. Twitter labeled it “unsafe” and banned all transmission of the news. Facebook’s Communications Director Andy Stone, a former Democratic Party employee (House Majority Political Action Committee Director; Press Secretary to Sen. Barbara Boxer), likewise squashed any links to the story on FB’s social network.

The New York Times rolled out the latest Ministry of Truth strategy Friday morning, in a tortured front-page story resorting to the tried-and-true claim that the laptop evidence was “Russian disinformation.” Sh’yeah…. The laptop had languished in the possession of Christopher Wray’s FBI since December 2019. The evidence contained in its some-40,000 emails pertained exactly to the matters at issue in the impeachment of President Trump at that time, i.e. Ukraine favor-seeking. The Delaware repair shop owner who handed over the machine burned a copy of its hard-drive, and when the FBI just sat on all that, he turned the drive over to Rudy Giuliani, one of the President’s attorneys.

One would have to suppose a number of things about these explosive revelations: For instance, that the FBI conducted some kind of forensic study of the laptop and its contents, and that it would not be too difficult to ascertain that the email trove was authentically the “work product” of R. Hunter Biden. If so, Mr. Wray has an awful lot to answer for.

Likewise, one might suppose that Rudy Giuliani, working on an extremely consequential case for a sitting president, and being a former distinguished federal attorney experienced with, and fastidious about, the handling of evidence, took some pains to ascertain the authenticity of the documents he received. Having done so, one might also suppose that Mr. Giuliani had handed off this material to the Attorney General, Mr. Barr — along with documentation he’s known to have collected about the Biden family’s money-laundering trail through the Baltic states to process additional payments for services rendered above and beyond the millions paid to R. Hunter Biden by Burisma, the Ukrainian gas company whose board of directors he was installed on in 2014.

What all that evidence speaks of is a Biden & Co. foreign influence-peddling scheme that amounts to selling out the USA while Ol’ White Joe was vice-president carrying out official tasks in the countries that paid his son enormous sums of money. The evidence clearly contradicts Mr. Biden’s basic claim that he never spoke with his son, Hunter, about his business dealings. The evidence also indicates clearly that Mr. Biden, then vice-president, received a cut of the collected lucre distributed among the family members. In a normal America, these issues would prompt some sort of official inquiry possibly leading to indictments. But these are the most abnormal times, and the final weeks of a vicious national election that is an existential threat to that coterie of Deep State seditionists whose careers, reputations, and livelihoods are at stake in the outcome.

So, of course, their Ministry of Truth is pulling out all the stops to squash the story. But their hubris is showing. Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook and Jack Dorsey of Twitter, being mega-billionaires, probably think that they have the resources to hire every attorney in the known universe to guard their empires. One important lesson for the nation might come out of this: that lawyers and lawfare do not amount to a supernatural protection force. The truth has a mighty power of its own and there are moments in history when it manages to overcome organized evil.

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

FOR MANY CALIFORNIANS, THE PANDEMIC MARKS THE END OF ‘BARELY MAKING IT’

The pandemic is accelerating the demise of the middle class, leaving many unable to sustain financial independence. In Silicon Valley and elsewhere, middle-class workers have found themselves unable to make rent.

calmatters.org/california-divide/2020/10/californians-pandemic-middle-class-end-of-barely-making-it/

W.C. FIELDS: MASTER JUGGLER

MEMO OF THE AIR: GOOD NIGHT RADIO ALL NIGHT TONIGHT!

 Hi. Marco here. Deadline to email your writing for tonight's (Friday night's) MOTA show is around 7pm. After that, send it whenever it's ready, up to 7pm Friday next week, and I'll read it next week, then. You can put this off forever if you want to. There's zero pressure. 

Memo of the Air: Good Night Radio is every Friday, 9pm to 5am on 107.7fm KNYO-LP Fort Bragg as well as there and anywhere else via http://airtime.knyo.org:8040/128 (If that shows up for you as plain text and not a link, just paste it into your browser. That's the regular link to listen to KNYO in real time.) 

And any time of any day or night you can go to https://MemoOfTheAir.wordpress.com and hear last week's show and shows before that. By Saturday night the recording of tonight's MOTA will also be there, in the latest post, right on top. 

Tonight will be a little different, though. I'll be doing the show from the KNYO shop on Franklin Street for the first time in seven months. I won't be entertaining in-person visitors, though. I thought it would be possible but it turns out to be a bad idea. If you want to call in and read your work on the radio in your own voice, the number is 707-962-3022. 

I went there late Wednesday night to make sure it's all working — like the phone thing, for example— and it is, just barely. I've made whole radio stations out of discarded household electronics, so I'm sure I can solve it if things go wonky, but they will go wrong, and I'll need exactly the adapter or cable or whatever that I don't have, and I left my emergency tools and equipment at Juanita's, which reminds me of the old saying, "The true master needs no tools." It'll be an adventure. You and me, whaddaya say? 

Also, at https://MemoOfTheAir.wordpress.com there's a flotilla of items of arguably educational value to explore until showtime, such as: 

* I think that may have more to do with authority than competence, in the sense of the master just telling someone else with tools to fix it, and not the master popping out a dented fender with telekinesis or his thumbs.

Catnip: egress to oblivion? https://misscellania.blogspot.com/2012/06/catnip-egress-to-oblivion.html

1. "He just wanted animal fur." And 2 through 8. (About Wes Anderson films.) https://nagonthelake.blogspot.com/2020/10/why-do-wes-anderson-movies-look-like.html

And teeth. (via NagOnTheLake) https://blog.nfb.ca/blog/2020/09/11/the-internationalist-impulse-new-nfb-animation/

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

FOUND OBJECT