A READER sends along this comment with some unkind assessments of the mental acuity of AVA staff: “Every time someone tells me how ‘logical’ and ‘rational’ males are relative to females, I merely point to the nearest tax-subsidized sports stadiums where middle class moron males are swilling beer that costs $8 a cup after paying $100 for a ticket… and working themselves into cardiac arrest over the outcome of some game between two corporate teams of overpaid retard prima donna players. Listen, these men take this crap SERIOUSLY. I mean, a guy's fave corporate team losing is enough to make the guy moody and depressed for days afterwards. However, the reasons society does this is to emasculate and weaken and distract these otherwise dangerous males with all this sports clutter.”
AS IT HAPPENS, this moron attended Saturday's 4 o'clock Giants-Cubs game where I bought a lemonade for, I think, $6.75. The ticket was worth $62 but it was a gift. On my own, I buy a $20 seat up in the View section at the top of the ballpark, but those $6.75 lemonades leave me amazed at my own profligacy. But then I remember when air for tires and water for radiators were free at the corner gas station! You may be pleased to learn that “the overpaid 'tards” played well and, by the time Tony sang about losing his heart on the cable car halfway to the stars, I'd had a great time, and couldn't help having noted that about half the 41,000 people present were women. Yes, ma'am, the Giants were 2-1 victorious, and there was indeedy a spring in my step as I footed it out onto the Embarcadero and west up and over the hills in the early summer fog howling in off the Pacific.
THEN THERE'S THE PABLO SANDOVAL situation, and how can you not like a game that makes a millionaire out of a Venezuelan slum kid? The stories I've seen so far on Pablo's alleged rape are completely fact free, but the deluge of comment nicely illustrates how thousands of people feel about their own sex, gender, race, and celebrity obsessions. (Ditto for the Ross Mirkarimi case. Talk about piling on! SF's vengeful DA has even prohibited Mirkarimi from talking by long distance telephone to his three-year-old son!)
DEPARTMENT OF UNINTENTIONAL HILARITY: “The appointment of Nadel and Riemenschneider comes as a great relief to the other judges and staff, as we have been working for more than a year with two vacancies,” Judge Richard Henderson told the Ukiah Daily Journal last week. “We have had great assistance from assigned (visiting) judges, but we miss the expertise and consistency of full-time, local judges.”
EXCUSE ME, YOUR HONOR, but are you kidding? Eight judges and a magistrate for a population of 90,000 people? Without going into how this expensive judicial overkill happened, suffice it to say that Mendocino County does not need eight judges at $178,000 a year plus perks to do the work two judges used to get done for roughly the same population.
THE GOOD NEWS on the judicial front comes from, of all people, a panel of judges appointed by State Chief Justice Tani Cantil-Sakauye. In a report that appeared over the Memorial Day weekend, the panel's 298-pages recommends whacking the state judicial system's governing bureaucracy, noting that the Judicial Council has gone from 430 employees in 2002 to 1,100 in 2011. And these unmonitored, unaccountable people enjoy “a slew of six-figure salaries” and “seemingly unlimited funding for what turned out to be a $1.9 billion white elephant — a computerized statewide case management system.” And on and on. The good news is that Governor Brown will have even less incentive to allow these people to authorize the millions for the proposed and unneeded Mendocino County Courthouse in Ukiah.
THERE'S ORGANIZED OPPOSITION in Sonoma County to PG&E's new tree trimming policy, a very simple policy that sees PG&E clearcutting the areas in and around power poles. No trees, no limbs to bring the lines down. Of course the lines could be buried, but……
LUMA NICHOL writes in response to a Chronicle editorial of May 30 celebrating Independence Day: “Your editorial is misinformed. First, you never mention the minor parties that are running candidates for president. For example, voters registered with the Peace and Freedom Party can choose among four contenders, including Stephen Durham of the Freedom Socialist Party. Given the high rate of people who do not vote, knowing that there are alternatives to the twin parties of Big Business might encourage some to go to the voting booth. Secondly, your message is that the ‘top two’ primary will somehow give independent voters more choice. Far from it. The new system is guaranteed to eliminate all but Democrat and Republican candidates from the general election. Third parties, which struggle against restrictive and discriminatory ballot access laws, might disappear. This is not a cause for celebration.”
AND RICHARD KIRSCHMAN of Point Reyes wonders why San Francisco needs to spend so much money training police and fire personnel: “Mayor Ed Lee is requesting six police academy classes at about $5 million to $6 million each and two fire academy classes at about $800,000 each. Why, I wonder, are these expensive city-run academies necessary at all? If you want to work for the city as an attorney, you are expected to have your law training in hand before you apply for the job. The same is true for physicians, welders and typists. Lots of community colleges offer 1- to 2-year prep courses for police and fire work. And I'd wager that there are already trained experienced police officers and firefighters around the country who would love to move to California for a well-paying, highly respected job in wonderful San Francisco.”
ARENA THEATER Film Club Presents Will — The Arena Theater Film Club will present Will, a 2011 film by director Ellen Perry with a screenplay by Zack Anderson and Perry, on Monday, June 11 at 7pm. Will (Perry Eggleton) is an orphaned soccer fan who journeys across Europe to see his team, Liverpool FC, play in the 2005 Champions League Final in Istanbul. The film features a host of award-winning movie stars including Bob Hoskins (“A Christmas Carol”; ”Who Framed Roger Rabbit”), Damian Lewis (“Band of Brothers”; Showtime’s upcoming “Homeland”) and Alice Krige (“Chariots of Fire”; “Star Trek: First Contact”). Former Liverpool Football Club Manager Kenny Dalglish and soccer superstars Jamie Carragher and Steven Gerrard have cameo appearances. Eleven-year-old Will Brennan’s (Eggleton) life is turned upside down when his long-absent father (Lewis) reappears with tickets to the 2005 Champions League Final in Istanbul, Turkey. But when fate intervenes and his father suddenly dies, Will runs away to Istanbul for the biggest soccer match of the year. En route, he unexpectedly teams up with a former Bosnian soccer star, Alek (Kristian Kiehling), and despite his initial reluctance, Alek finds himself inspired by Will's heroic journey. Together, the unlikely pair makes a remarkable trek across Europe to the match at Istanbul’s Ataturk stadium. Producer and award-winning co-writer Zack Anderson will attend the screening. Anderson has written a widely acclaimed pop culture column for the weekly Anderson Valley Advertiser (AVA) for over ten years. In addition to his column, Anderson has written several screenplays, including “Diversion Girl,” “Boonville,” and “Pig Hunt.” He was nominated by the Writers Guild of America for Best Screenplay for co-writing the political documentary, “The Fall of Fujimori,” which premiered at the 2005 Sundance Film Festival. “Fujimori” received rave reviews from A.O. Scott in the NY Times and was deemed a must-see by Kenneth Turan of the LA Times. Anderson is currently developing screenplays with Jerry Offsay’s Parkchester Pictures. He has a degree in History from Harvard University. The movie is not rated at a runtime of 102 minutes. The Arena Theater Film Club shows classics, independent and foreign films, and documentaries on Monday evenings three times per month. The Cineaste membership level of the Arena Theater ($70 per year) includes free admission to Monday evening Film Club events as well as discounts to regular movies and many live events. Guests are welcome to attend Film Club movies for an $8 (adult), $5 (teen) admission. For more information visit www.arenatheater.org.
SUPERVISOR HAMBURG apologizes for inflicting Mike Thompson on us (from a recent listserve discussion regarding Solomon's silly attack ad aimed at the even sillier Congressional candidate, Ms. Lawson): Hamburg: “Ever heard of Doug Bosco?…a self-proclaimed liberal who lost to Riggs in '90. The ‘liberal North Bay district’ was not so liberal in the 90s with the addition of Napa and Solano, heavily military areas (Mare Island, Travis AFB). I supported gays in the military and major cuts to military spending (though not to veterans), positions that hurt me in the southern counties. I thought the ‘Peace Dividend’ (remember the fall of the USSR in 1991?) would be a welcome reality — my mistake! Also the old 1st had the highest rate of gun ownership of any district in the state; voting for the Brady Bill didn't help me with the gun nuts. Democratic Party turnout in '94 was under 40% (result of NAFTA, HillaryCare, etc.) compared with 60+ in 1992 when the Ds swept. Nonetheless, I should have won and not subjected the district to four years of Riggs and then a dozen more of a Blue Dog Democrat. Sorry about that!” … “I didn't say Solomon's negative mailer was okay. I said it's mild by comparison with the Gingrich-inspired Riggs onslaught of '94 and a thousand other campaigns' negative ads.”
Aprapos of nothing in this piece, I wanted to scream about something I learned this morning.
President Obama wanted to make one of his increasingly am-I-not-wonderful speeches on Memorial Day.
To do so, a combination of the Secret Service, the Park Service and probably others closed the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, known as “The Wall.”
They closed access to it for nearly 7 HOURS. On Memorial Day!
Thousands of veterans, their families and others were kept behind barriers a hundred yards from the monument.
I am not sure even a personal apology from Obama to each and every one of those blocked would be enough.
Jim Armstrong
Potter Valley
The “peace dividend” hyperbole was nothing more than a propaganda diversion for us commoners while our rulers ginned up the first Iraq war to cure us exceptionals of our supposedly peaceful nature and what the traitor’s son, Bush I (his daddy liked the Nazis so well, he continued doing business with them after war was declared), called the Vietnam syndrome.