Mendocino County Today: Thursday, May 12, 2022

Storms North | Wild Iris | Coast Blackout | Shipping Point | Outage Observations | Museum Gathering | Microbusiness Grants | Ed Notes | Caspar Sawmill | Home Construction | Tree Planters | Opening Night | Cleone Mill | Ukraine | Desegregation 1960 | Caregiving Forum | Vintage Ads | Food Bank Benefit | Yesterday's Catch | Future View | Village Spirits | Baseballs | Jackie Robinson | Pollinator Workshop | 1872 Mining | Garage/Art | Internet News | Miss Atomic | Disaster Music | Splash Dam | First Term | Windy House | War First

A COUPLE OF STORM SYSTEMS will track across the Pacific Northwest today through Saturday. Periods of mainly light rain will affect areas north of Cape Mendocino, with locally heavier rainfall across Del Norte County. Clouds will linger along the coast through the weekend, while the interior clears out and warms up. (NWS)

INTERNET GOES DOWN IN FORT BRAGG: WHAT HAPPENED?

I imagine that most of you are aware that we sustained a major communication outage here on the north coast starting abruptly at 10:40 yesterday when a main optical fiber cable entering Ft Bragg was inadvertently cut by a construction crew. As a result, all internet, all cell phone service regardless of carrier and all landline telephone to call out of the area or receive calls in was lost. This required us to activate our disaster action plan, as did local fire and police. For example the 911 system went down and emergency services had to implement other plans. While there was no compromise of care in the hospital, however, there were challenges that still had to be addressed. All in all, I think it was a wonderful experience to practice having a major communication outage without having the mass casualties from a disaster to go with it. We learned a lot.

So, what happened to the Miller Report? Well, first, there was no way to send it out yesterday as we had no internet connectivity. Second, I spent the night in the hospital as the on site administrative - physician lead making sure there were no problems. I spent today still working on the winding down of our incident command response. As a result, I did not get the Miller Report out to you. Sorry, but patient safety had to come first.

I plan to write a Miller Report tomorrow on the incident, what we did and what we learned. I know that for some of you, this means that we missed the deadline for this week. While for others, it can still be posted on-line. So, what would you like me to do? Send it out tomorrow, knowing that some venues will not be able to use it. Or wait and just miss this week with a brief explanation and send it out next week so that everyone can publish it? 

By the way, upcoming ones will include (a) comments about National Nurses Week / Month and a history of the nursing profession and (b) an update on the worsening COVID lockdown situation in Shanghai.

Thank you all for what you do in keeping our communities informed.

William Miller, MD, FACP | Hospital Medical Director & Chief of Staff

YESTERDAY'S LONG MENDO COAST INTERNET OUTAGE, an on-line comment: “One thing I noticed about the outage is that KZYX did not get information early enough about what was going on and what was available and not available. I went right to my little radio, Turned on KZYX, like we always do when there’s weather or other interruptions. As we look back on what happened and what could be improved. Someone really needs to take charge of communicating with KZYX and how best to keep them apprised of how widespread the outage is and what is an isn’t available.

---

CHRIS CALDER: Via the in-the-know checker at Cleone Grocery as of 7:30p.m. Tuesday, who got it from an AT&T guy in an actual AT&T truck, internet and phone service (for everybody, not just AT&T customers) on the Mendo Coast will not be back on until 5 a.m. tomorrow.

WHAT?!

So why am I wasting my time posting on Facebook? Same reason as always. I can't stop looking at my phone. Turns out it doesn't even have to work. So, while I can, for those who may never experience it, or maybe never have, this is the world without internet:

After you have established that a global catastrophe is not, in fact, underway, you move on to the next most important things. What about my shows? My doomscrolling? My 70s rock? My Zuck-given right to pester former neighbors, co-workers, significant others and high school classmates with unasked-for opinions and “humor”, and be pestered in return? My right to not answer emails?

Where Did My Life Go?

On the other hand, today I saw:

- a teenager playing soccer with his little brother out on the normally empty lawn, announcing it like it was the World Cup.

- a family walk all the way down the road to visit the horses, who are usually so bored.

- a guy out in front of his house working on his boat. I've seen the boat many times. And the huge 4x4, and the Trans Am in pieces in the driveway. Never seen the guy out working on any of it.

- a little kid walking down the sidewalk rocking a cardboard sword clearly made by himself. It's been years since I've seen a good home made sword.

On the other-other hand, ATMs and 911 don't work.

So...yeah.

THE AV HISTORY MUSEUM, a.k.a. the Little Red School House

The board will be hosting a festive gathering at the Little Red School House Museum on Sunday, June 5, 1:00 to 4:00 pm. Admission is free!

For your enjoyment, the afternoon will include music by Bob Day and Erica Zissa, complimentary snacks, local beer & wine and lemonade, plus Brad Wiley will entertain with stories of yesteryear. The party will be outdoors, with all museum buildings open for your wandering pleasure. We’re combining our get together with this year’s AV Historical Society annual meeting. In years past, the annual meeting has included a presentation of financial statements and a run-down of the previous year. This year, we’re simply making that information available via handouts so we can get right to the festivities. Non-members who would like in on the fun are welcome. So tell your friends that this is their chance to get fed and feted while supporting the AV Historical Society & Museum. Come see your friends and neighbors at the Little Red Schoolhouse Museum. See you there.

facebook.com/events/1056282001632707

COVID-19 MICROBUSINESS RELIEF GRANTS NOW AVAILABLE

The Prevention, Recovery, Resiliency, and Mitigation Division (PRRM), in partnership with the Economic Development and Financing Corporation (EDFC), is excited to announce the availability of $2,500 COVID-19 Microbusiness grants.

Grants are awarded on a first-come, first-served basis to microbusinesses physically located within Mendocino County. Grant applications are being accepted through June 1, 2022. There will be a brief review period of the applicant’s eligibility and approval will be ongoing throughout the application period with an anticipated time of disbursement of all grant funding to take place by June 30, 2022.

Eligible use of grant funds includes the purchase of new equipment, investment in working capital, application for or renewal of a local permit, payment of business debt incurred during the COVID-19 pandemic, and costs resulting from the pandemic health and safety restrictions or business interruptions or closures due to the pandemic.

Priority is being given to microbusinesses operated or owned by a member of a group that has faced historic barriers in accessing capital, including, but not limited to, women, minorities or persons of color, veterans, undocumented individuals, and individuals living in low-wealth or rural areas on low incomes and Microbusinesses that suffered economic impacts or revenue losses due to COVID-19.

To see the full eligibility criteria and to apply for a grant, please visit: https://www.edfc.org/microbusiness-relief-grant-program/. For application support, please contact EDFC at (707) 234-5705 or by email at robert@edfc.org. Assistance in Spanish is available upon 

ED NOTES

NOT ACCEPTABLE, AV Health Center. A local lady with a serious tick bite with the tick probably still burrowing away in her arm but the Health Center “can't fit her in”?

DRIVING EAST over the hill to Ukiah this morning, the distant Yolly Bollys were painted white with a fresh coat of overnight snow, and farther east there was probably enough snow up on the Mendocino Pass for the adventurous to do a little cross-country skiing. The trip over the Pass, btw, is highly recommended for the sights to be seen its lonely length. North to Willits, east on 162 off 101, through Covelo and up and over into the Sacramento Valley the whole way on 162, arriving eventually at the I-5 town of Willows. From Boonville it’s 4-5 hours depending.

NOT TO BE JUDGEMENTAL, but given the cruel fact of radical climate change and the looming likely end of the human species, it would seem to be incumbent upon County officials, especially the one at the very top of the law enforcement pole, to eliminate his lawn. 

Yes, we all know how he loves it, and how emotionally wrenching it is for a committed lawn person to look out his big view window and not see his chemically-soaked lawn's green, lunatic perfection but, collectively, lawns are killing the goddam planet! And they soak up obscene amounts of water, which is a goddam finite resource! 

BUT ENOUGH PIETY and on to desireable alternatives to ersatz greenswards. As one of our many public services, Boonville's beloved weekly offers… wait for it… offers the zero management alternative of a cactus garden! Perfect for the desertification of NorCal presently underway, aesthetically pleasing, and some botanical diversity, especially welcome in the bland uniformity of suburban neighborhoods. Why, here's one in Boonville installed by the gifted landscaper, Tom Akin, that the County's top law enforcement officer might be inspired to try. Xeriscape is what we want. Repeat after me, Xeriscape — zeer is scape.

BACK in the happy days before the internet, the AVA would print our ballot recommendations and our candid assessments of the candidates. It gratified me no end to hear accounts from various areas of the county where bush hippies would stride into the polls brandishing the AVA's ballot recommendations, annoying no end the staid Republican ladies overseeing the vote. “I don't have time to read all this bullshit, Bruce, thanks for your help,” said a guy with nothing but free time in between harvests. But now? With so many citizens voting by mail a month or so ahead of closing time? Print recommendations aren't as central as they used to be. But here's what I've got for you electronically and, of course, also in next week's print edition.

PRELIMINARILY, I'll say that most County department heads do a good job only to be tarnished by the poor job the Supervisors and the CEO's office do. Line workers, too, who, btw, tell me that they never see anyone from among either the Supervisors of the CEO's office. One would think the leadership would be curious about how services are delivered, but…

JUNE is a primary election so the ballot is overstuffed with people literally out of the money it takes to win state office while our two-party monopoly has plenty of money they get from mostly destructive forces, as most of you have figured out by now. The AVA tries to avoid endorsing anybody affiliated with either of the two death-bringing parties, instead going for unknown Greens and Peace and Freedom nostalgics.

• CONTROLLER: Laura Wells
• TREASURER: Meghann Adams
• ATTORNEY GENERAL: Dan Kapelovitz
• INSURANCE COMMISSIONER: Nathalie Hrizi
• BOARD OF EQUALIZATION: No Preference
• GOVERNOR: Luis Javier Rodriguez
• LT. GOVERNOR: Mohammed Arif
• SECRETARY OF STATE: Gary Blenner
• U.S. SENATOR: John Thompson Parker
• U.S. SENATOR, PARTIAL TERM: Daphne Bradford
• UNITED STATES CONGRESS, 2ND DISTRICT: Anybody But Huffman
• STATE SENATOR: Not McGuire
• ASSEMBLY: Not Wood
• JUDGE OF THE SUPERIOR COURT: Shanahan (Unopposed Because It's All One Big Lawyer Club In Mendo)
• STATE SUPERINTENDENT OF SCHOOLS: Tony Thurmond
• COUNTY SUPERINTENDENT OF SCHOOLS: Michelle Hutchins
• SUPERVISOR, 5TH DISTRICT: No Recommendation
• ASSESSOR-CLERK-RECORDER: Katrina Bartolomie
• AUDITOR-CONTROLLER/TREASURER-TAX COLLECTOR: Chamise Cubbison
• DISTRICT ATTORNEY: Eyster
• SHERIFF-CORONER: Kendall
• MEASURE M (ANDERSON VALLEY SCHOOL BOND: Yes

UKIAH: SCALED BACK WESTERN HILLS DEVELOPMENT PROJECT RAISES ITS HEAD

Editor:

Please make the AVA readers aware that construction is about to take place in the Western Hills in Ukiah, despite the fact that it is the highest fire severity zone in the city and county. In addition to the fire danger, there is the potential disruption of breeding areas for ground nesting birds and other wildlife as new roads and buildings fragment wildlife habitat. 

David Hull, the developer who initiated the large Western Hills project last year (which ultimately was voted down), also now owns land on the north ridge top of Doolan Canyon Road. His property extends to the south-facing slope, which connects to an easement that adjoins San Jacinta Drive. 

Mr. Hull is planning to build at least one home on the ridge top. For access to the home(s), he is planning to pave from the easement to the ridge top. Access then, will be via San Jacinta Drive, not Doolan Canyon Road. 

It is important that your readers learn about this project now, as it will be launched soon. Their voices need to be heard. 

Thank you.

Sincerely,

Nancy Walker

Ukiah

MENDOCINO THEATRE COMPANY PRESENTS: VISITING MR. GREEN

a review by Marylyn Motherbear Scott

It was the opening night of a new season for Mendocino Theatre Company’s Visiting Mr. Green, by playwright Jeff Baron, directed by Ricci Dedola, the first theatre gathering since the Cemetery Club Gala in March 2020. That play, as beautiful a work as it was, barely saw the light of the stage, closed down because of the Pandemic. In that review I said, and I repeat for the sake of reminding —

In a time when the public is told that we should not touch — not a handshake, a hug or a kiss, Mendocino Theatre Company brings us into an intimate conversation amongst three female friends, about what it is to touch and be touched, the unwritten codes of relationship, marriage, life and death. 

Over two years later we meet again. Fully masked, proof of vaccination is shown before entering the sacred realm of our Mendocino Theatre Company. We enter the ante-chamber, there greeted by beloved friends and tribe. This time, heads turned to the side, hugs and handshakes are exchanged. Eyes gaze for a moment. Tears rise up in gratitude. We have returned.

Visiting Mr. Green has similar themes to Cemetery Club — relationship and the ever vital so-much-more. Perhaps all drama, life itself, basically shares this theme. While Cemetery Club is about intimate female relations, Mr Green begins with an accidental — perhaps God ordained it? — meeting between two men, the elder Mr. Green, and Ross, a young man who is forced to do community service by the court. And thus the weekly visits to Mr. Green, an unwilling, grumpy old man, begins. 

Kosher meals brought by the younger to the elder begins to break down the old man’s resistance to having a stranger in my (his) house. Ross’s direct and considerate approach to the elder’s resistance ultimately breaks down the conversations into greater intimacy, revealing “secrets” on both of their parts. Ross and Mr. Green share the Jewish religion, albeit from unique perspectives. Much to the elder’s consternation, Ross gets into Mr. Green’s business, his mail, his past, his present; all lending greatly to the fact, and to the funny, in this articulate yet down-to-earth script. 

Their secrets reveal confounding aspects of how inner self and the soul interacts with outer self and the world. The reason for secrecy is the meat of the play. Revealing would spoil. Society, along with religious precepts and long-held societal and family beliefs, all too often dictate what we do not say and what we do not do. Pretense takes the place of honesty; and honesty is often concealed by unwilling vulnerability. These unconventional and court-appointed confrontations reveal more and more of these vulnerabilities, taking Mr. Green, Ross and the audience, deeper into the heart and mind of the matter, and deeper into the issues that humanity faces.

Bob, Cohen, Veteran MTC actor, director, gives us a convincing Mr. Green, subtle and real in the changes that occur within the character’s portrayal. MTC theatre-goers have come to expect that level of engagement from Bob. He does not disappoint. The character of Mr. Green underlines how elders generally like things to stay the same; change comes hard. Bob Cohan, in his role, gives us that notion in spades; along with some good laughs. 

Gus Mayeno, acting since a youngster in school plays and MTC programs for youth, is nonetheless a newcomer to the professional stage. His years of practice paid off; not a nuance was missed in the portrayal of Russ Gardiner. His character offers a clear and thorough storyline of the difficult issues in this character’s life; sadly representing so many young people in today’s world.

Hmmm, we have a Mr. Green and a Gardiner. I cannot assume anything but purpose. For sure, Ross was care-fully tending the garden of Mr. Green. I cannot say more. Curious? Attend the play for the full story.

Over the years MTC’s stage has shown us sets that add an almost-secret physical language to the presentation. In Visiting Mr. Green, we are once again treated to the skills of set designers, Diane Larson and Dale Cohn. Enter the front door! There are so many touches that speak to the heart of the matter — a sacrosanct bouquet of dead flowers, newspapers strewn about, and lots of twosomes — two sets of dishes, two chairs, two men. Also set in intriguing twin-ness, two identical doors placed next to each other. Hidden within, a toilet and the bedroom, places of secrecy. 

Director, Ricci Dedola, has taken her own sweet and perceptive sensibility’s into the construction and staging of this script, bringing together many of MTC’s skilled and devoted hands. And hearts. Ricci’s love for theatre threads the needle for our visit to Mr. Green.

Stage Manager, Patricia Price, is a treasure. After the long absence, headphones on and at the ready, she warmly greeted all. Patricia has become a strong and devoted MTC presence in whom many a directer relies; and in which, the success of many a play lies.

Pamela Allen, MTC’S Producing Director since 2015, is moving out-of-state, retiring from MTC. Pamela, with a wave of her own offbeat elegance, has done a fabulous and beautiful job bringing together an extended family of devoted theatre goers, and offering timely, sometimes provocative plays that are meaningful for our times. Pamela Allen will be greatly missed. 

In the final analysis, the controversial subject and sub-themes of the script reach for oneness out of duality, successfully bringing together opposing viewpoints by two men, into workable and loving solutions. I cannot help but mention that women, though near central to the play, are not seen; and yet are mysteriously and importantly present. 

I encourage you all to visit Mr. Green. 

VISITING MR. GREEN plays weekends through May 29th.

Tickets and information — mendocinotheatre.org; or phone 707-937-4477.

AS WEDNESDAY DRAWS TO A CLOSE in Kyiv and in Moscow, here are the key developments of the day:

Ukrainian officials are raising alarms about the civilians and last soldiers remaining in the bombed-out southern city of Mariupol. Russian troops control the area, but Ukrainian forces have taken their last stand for weeks in the city's Azovstal steel plant. Two of their spouses met with Pope Francis, hoping for his help arranging an evacuation of the Ukrainian troops. All civilians are believed to have been evacuated from Azovstal by the United Nations and International Committee of the Red Cross.

Ukraine is opening its first war crimes trial of a Russian soldier, accused of killing a civilian on Feb. 28 in a village 180 miles east of Kyiv. Prosecutor General Iryna Venediktova identified the soldier as 21-year-old Vadim Shishimarin — a member of the elite 4th Guards Tank Division — and said he is in custody in Ukraine.

Congress is preparing a $39.8 billion package to maintain U.S. support for Ukraine, the latest round of funding in a bipartisan effort to help the country repel Russia's invasion without committing U.S. troops to a deadly war. The House of Representatives has approved the package, and the Senate is expected to quickly do so as well and send it on for President Biden's signature.

Russian gas shipments to Europe through Ukraine were disrupted for the first time since the war began. Ukraine's pipeline operator halted Russian shipments of natural gas through a key hub in the country's east, citing Russian occupation and fighting in the area. Ukraine said it was trying to reroute the gas but Russian gas giant Gazprom said switching paths was too complicated.

A fan-favorite band from Ukraine advanced to the Eurovision grand final. The three member rap-folk band Kalush Orchestra — known for their colorful traditional clothing, pink bucket hat and energetic breakdancer — is favored to win the European song contest on Saturday.

— NPR

ON MAY 10, 1960, Nashville became one of the first major cities in the South to begin desegregating public facilities when six downtown stores opened their lunch counters to black customers. This largely resulted from sit-ins staged at segregated Nashville lunch counters in the spring of 1960, led by Fisk University students John Lewis and Diane Nash. Participants were given rigorous training beforehand so they could endure whatever abuse they might suffer without responding. On February 27, 1960, several Nashville college students made purchases in a local department store. They then took a seat at the lunch counter. They were kicked and punched. Lighted cigarettes were pressed into their necks. Still they sat there. Quiet. Without retaliating. Just as they had been taught. Eighty-one of those peaceful protestors were arrested that day, but not one of their attackers. The students were charged with disorderly conduct.

To the sit-ins was added a boycott. Black Nashvillians refused to continue financially supporting businesses that discriminated against them. Then, on April 19, an explosion destroyed the home of Z. Alexander Looby, a city councilman and attorney who had represented students arrested in the sit-ins. Within hours, 3,000 Nashvillians participated in a spontaneous march from Fisk University to the public square. There, Mayor Ben West made a public appeal to Nashville citizens to end discrimination, agreeing that segregation of lunch counters was not morally right.

CAREGIVING IN THE VALLEY FORUM (5/17) 3 to 5 PM (Anderson Valley Village)

Please join us for this unique opportunity: AV Senior Center and via Zoom (link below)

As we get older many of us begin to look for someone to help us or our spouses with daily care so that we can stay at home for as long as possible.

Questions arise such as: When is it time to get support before we become too exhausted, depressed, or frustrated and angry ourselves to continue to be effective caregivers? We have no organization of seasoned caregivers here in the Valley, but that doesn’t mean that we have no experience or that there aren’t any. Numerous Valley residents have had to find help for family members in recent years and we would like to share our experiences with you.

To that effect, we are planning a forum to discuss the phases and steps one goes through in deciding when we do need to find help and what kind, and how to structure the hours or days of employment with a total stranger in our homes. What are our expectations and how do we arrive at them? How do we discover and make the most of the varying strengths and weaknesses of individual caregivers? What is the new commitment going to cost and how to think about meeting this expense?

Then there is the other side of the coin: what will caregivers do and how do we arrive at a clear understanding with them to manage mutual expectations? Caregivers have needs and sensitivities too, and to form a good working relationship both sides must be frankly discussed.

The forum will present a small sample of different residents and caregivers who will talk about their experiences and both will be available afterwards for questions or a chat. If you are facing the need for additional help in the near future, we hope this event will help you reflect on some of the issues you will be facing.

Contact: Heidi Knott, hknott@mcn.org

Please Note: Our gatherings are open to everyone, but COVID Vaccinations are now REQUIRED - please bring your vaccination card (one time) as proof. Masks are required inside - thank you in advance for your understanding.

Join Zoom Meeting: https://gmail.us3.list-manage.com/track/click?u=cea1e601922fa82e47579cc80&id=4def3e7140&e=358077c1c9

Meeting ID: 434 337 6734 Passcode: avv

VINTAGE ADS THAT PROBABLY WOULDN'T APPEAR TODAY

FORT BRAGG FOOD BANK BENEFIT CONCERT SATURDAY, 5/21/2022, 4 pm

Local singers invite you to an afternoon of fun music to raise money for the Fort Bragg Food Bank.

A cappella groups In the Mix and River present a concert of great songs on Saturday May 21, 4 pm at Larsen Hall, St. Michael and All Angels Episcopal church in Fort Bragg. Special guest singers Jason Kirkman and Randy Knutson lend their voices to several numbers. Pianist Marie-Claire Dizin accompanies River on a few songs.

A $20 donation is suggested at the door but any amount is welcome. The donations go directly to the Food Bank at this all-volunteer concert.

You'll hear songs by the Beatles, Paul Simon, Irving Berlin, Johnny Mercer, Sting, and even Mozart.

The church is on the northeast corner of Fir and Franklin. Please plan to show your proof of vaccination card. Masks are recommended.

In the Mix: Cathy Boxell, Robin Knutson, Darcie Mahoney, Kathy O'Shea, Nancy Severy, Carolyn Steinbuck River: Carolyn Carleton Browe, Cynthia Frank, Sari Scanlon

CATCH OF THE DAY, May 10, 2022

TRACY ESLINGER, Fort Bragg. Probation revocation.

CHAD MCCALLUM, Ukiah. Failure to appear, probation revocation.

TONY MCELROY, Ukiah. Disorderly conduct-alcohol. (Frequent flyer.)

JAMES PAYNE, Fort Bragg. Assault with deadly weapon with great bodily injury, battery with serious injury, false imprisonment.

JOSEPH PITMAN, Ukiah. Burglary, vandalism. 

JEREMIAH RAY, Covelo. Failure to appear.

CARLOS RODRIGUEZ-SOLORIO, Santa Rosa. DUI, no license.

ON LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY

I’m hoping one of these days you guys will begin to emotionally balance out.

First it was hope-ium thinking that things would go back to normal aka happy motoring. Now, cynical pessimism is all the rage, with dark moody expectations.

How about, what we’re seeing & experiencing is just the logical and completely normal step down function as we transition to scarcity.

But, you claim, the entire system, whether supply chains, governance or finance are so dependent on surplus that the entire edifice will fall.

Yes, there will be systemic failures, but make work patches will always be sufficient to keep critical elements operating.

Collapse is a long drawn out process. We know the inevitable future outcomes ie lower population levels, less energy consumption, lower standards of living.

But there are plus sides as well to keep people satisfied. Drugs, alcohol, sex, a complete virtual reality easily maintained as long as electicy flows.

Nuke power means society can continue to cobble along. Since it preserves the existing govt system, you can bank this is what will be rolled out.

So please stop being so negative. A poster noted how he transitioned in a smaller town. I believe this is the future model. No exciting crash, just a slower wind down.

BALLS

by Fred Gardner

For years the marketing experts of Major League Baseball (MLB, the owners' consortium) have been tinkering with the manufacturing specifications. For a while they assumed that fans wanted above all to see home runs, so the ball was “juiced” to fly off the bat and carry further. Then the process was reversed and the current complaint is that the ball has been deadened. 

”Inconsistent baseballs plague MLB. Does Japan have the solution?” was the headline on Scott Ostler's May 6 Chronicle column. He quotes three complainants: “The Mets’ Chris Bassitt says the balls are terrible. The Braves’ Collin McHugh says some are 'dusty slick.' Giants manager Gabe Kapler says some balls are smooth and hard 'like a cue ball.'“

Scott Ostler identifies as a humorist, so after citing a serious problem (if you're still serious about the former national pastime), he made light of it, reeling off four joke-attempts on the order of “The balls are slick, sticky, soggy and silly, which are also the four Dwarfs who didn’t make Snow White’s traveling squad.” 

The item ended with Ostler praising the unwavering quality of “balls used in Japan.” According to our man in Tokyo, the official ball of Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB) is made in China by Mizuno, as are 80% of the baseballs used worldwide. The balls used in the Tokyo Olympics last year were manufactured in Sri Lanka by the SSK Corporation.

As purveyed by the US media, the important aspect of the baseball-manufacture story is not the outsourcing of the work but the mysterious juicing of the ball and the pitchers' tactics in response. The outsourcing happened long, long ago, and it was hardly news at the time. 

“I know how it happened. I saw it begin.” —Bob Dylan

In the mid-1950s my father was working for the Spalding sporting goods company, which was then the sole supplier of baseballs for both the American and National Leagues. One night he came home from a trip to company headquarters in Chicopee, Mass. and said, “You're not going to believe this. The women aren't sewing the baseballs in Chicopee anymore. They built a plant in Haiti. They're paying the women there a nickel an hour!” (Sewing through leather is hard work that deforms the hands.)

About a year later he came home and said, “You're not going to believe this. They're not making the tennis racquets in Chicopee anymore. They're making them in Pakistan.”

The writing was already on the wall by 1957 and it spelled “The companies will operate where labor is cheapest.” It was obvious that the only way for working people in the US to protect our longterm interests was to support workers organizing for higher pay and better working conditions overseas. The AFL-CIO made no effort to support foreign workers. Its leaders, George Meany and Walter Reuther got Medals of Freedom for fighting “Communist influence in the labor movement” while US corporations relentlessly escalated the outsourcing of their members' children's jobs. 

Throughout the '60s, '70s and '80s the most significant economic trend of our time went unnamed. It wasn't until the '90s that the corporate media began using the term “outsourcing” to describe the transfer of production from the US to foreign countries. Because God loves irony and is capable of micromanagement, the Spalding baseball was among the first to go.

Some of the relevant history can be retrieved online. Spalding supplied every baseball used in the majors for a century. “It all began in 1876, the year the National League was officially organized,” wrote Steve Cady in the New York Times. “A young pitcher for the Chicago franchise named A. G. Spalding opened a baseball manufacturing concern. Until then, pitchers had made their own baseballs. When the American League was formed in 1901, Spalding maintained its role as exclusive supplier.”

In 1975 the leagues turned down Spalding's request for a small price increase. AL president Lee MacPhail said, “We're sorry to be ending such a long and proud relationship. But we've been able to work something out with another manufacturer.” That other company was Rawlings.

Cady wrote, “At Spalding's headquarters in Chicopee, Mass., a spokesman said that the company's action represented a 'mature decision' to strengthen profit positions. The company's 10‐year contract with the majors ends in 1976, and requests reportedly had been made for a 5 per cent price increase this year and 5 per cent next year. Last year, most of the industry substituted cowhide for horsehide as the ball's cover. Other than that, the only major change in baseballs for at least 35 years was a move from the United States to Haiti for the handstitching.”

Today MLB baseballs are manufactured by Rawlings in Costa Rica. A website called ThinkBlue (insanely Pro-Dodger) informs us that “until 1987, all Rawlings baseballs were manufactured in Haiti, but sensing political instability in the small island country, Rawlings opened a second factory in the friendly Central America country of Costa Rica. This move proved to be a wise one for Rawlings, as increasing political tension forced Rawlings to shut down their Haiti factory in 1990 and allowed the Costa Rica factory to continue manufacturing baseballs without interruption.”

Cheap labor isn't the only benefit the corporations get when they build factories overseas. They are also far removed from journalists and others who want to observe the production process. A rare look at the workings of the Rawlings plant was provided in 2000 by Leslie Josephs, a Reuters reporter:

“For 10 hours a day, workers at the world’s only factory authorized to supply Major League Baseball, in the town of Turrialba in central Costa Rica, sit at desks yanking strands of waxy red fiber to form each baseball’s 108 stitches.

“In professional games the balls quickly become too dirty and scuffed by bats to use, or get lost in the crowd on a foul ball or home run. To feed the demand, the factory turns out as many as 2.4 million baseballs a year, all assembled by hand.

“The cork and rubber cores, Tennessee Holstein cowhide and gray New Zealand sheep’s wool yarn are shipped tax-free to the plant where more than 300 workers sit in neat rows to sew, their arms rhythmically rising and falling like a rowing team.

“The finished balls are boxed up and shipped to Miami...

“The work is tough and some employees have shoulder injuries from trying to churn out too many balls to win bonuses. They earn a base salary of $1.60 an hour, slightly above Costa Rica’s minimum wage...

“'It’s pretty hard to find work,' said Rocio Gamboa, 33, who has been stitching baseballs at the factory for 11 years. She produces 200 balls a week, and receives a 52 cent bonus for each ball she completes above the 156-ball minimum. The major league balls are sold at retail for $14.99.”

In 2020 the start of the baseball season was delayed by the advent of Covid-19. By then Rawlings had 500 employees at the Torrialba plant — 190 of whom got laid off. A little piece by Sarah Blaskey in The Tico Times noted that, “During normal operations, about 300 of the factory’s employees are sewers, while many others are assemblers or winders responsible for constructing a ball’s core.”

PLANTING FOR POLLINATORS, Saturday, June 4

Join Horticulturist, Mishele Stettenbenz to learn why pollinators are so important and why they need our help. Learn to build a pollinator garden and discover the best native and non-native pollinator plants to grow on the Mendocino Coast. This workshop will consist of a PowerPoint lecture and a brief walk through the Gardens to observe pollinator plants at work.

Learn more and register: gardenbythesea.org/calendar/planting-for-pollinators/

TODAY'S THE ANNIVERSARY of the 1872 Mining Law, a 150-year-old law that still guides how we extract minerals on public lands.

In 1872, Ulysses Grant was the President, post-Civil War Reconstruction was a hot political topic, and there were only 37 states admitted to the Union. Kerosene had just surpassed whale oil as the dominant fuel source used for illumination.

The population of the U.S. was approximately 12% of what it is today, life expectancy was just a few years over 40, and infant mortality was roughly 315 deaths for every 1,000 births.

Although the Fifteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which provided Black people with the right to vote (on paper, though not in practice), had been passed two years prior, women would have the legal right to vote for another 48 years, and Native Americans another 52 years.

It is within this context and period of time that the mining law CURRENTLY governing the extraction of minerals on public lands was passed.

REASONS TO HATE INTERNET NEWS

(A Lot of it, Anyway)

by Marshall Newman

Author’s Note – Some may say I am railing against the very thing I am guilty of in writing this article; reporting without providing substantive evidence to back it up. So here is my evidence. Pew Research reported in 2021 “about three in ten Americans say they are ‘almost constantly’ online.” More to the point is the empirical evidence. Readers should compare the time they spend getting information from television, radio and the newspaper to the time they spend getting information from the internet. It should be all the evidence needed. 

Print and broadcast news have gone through a rough patch lately. People today have less time and less inclination to watch the evening news, listen to news radio or read the newspaper. Lower profit margins have reduced the number of journalists. The growth of cable news channels and expansion of television news hours have made reporter appearance even more important, to the detriment of good research and good writing. But the real cause for this rough patch is the rise of the internet, the now-ubiquitous force that has taken over so many lives.

With the internet, the line between news and entertainment has been blurred to such an extent there is a big, messy mingling of both at the center. Plus there is a whole pile of “pretend news” and “pretend entertainment” on the internet. The “pretend news” items provide a biased view of the story with little or no evidence. The “pretend entertainment” stories feature celebrities either showing off fashions or showing up at events. 

Newspapers have advertising and subscription revenue as their funding source. Television news and radio news have advertising as their funding source. All three have reasonable measures of their success, be they circulation numbers, Arbitron ratings, Nielsen ratings or other data sources.

Internet news has advertising – and the occasional paywall – as its funding source. But it has one main measure of success: clicks. 

Clicks are paramount to internet news; the more clicks, the more opportunities to put paid advertising in front of those browsing the internet. This quest for almighty clicks has caused internet news to toss the rules of traditional journalism out the window and replace them with new rules that are an embarrassment to journalism as a whole.

Let us start with headlines. Headlines are the tease; the “come-on” to entice readers, watchers, listeners and viewers to stick around for the story. Except on the internet, where headlines can be all tease and zero substance. Here’s one: “Warning over Daily Use of Common Drug that Could Cause Internal Bleeding.” The author of this headline from the internet had no intention of providing any information, he/she’s only goal was generating that click. Here is a different internet headline on the same story that got it right; “Over 60? Here’s Why You Should Not Take a Daily Aspirin.” 

There is a subset of headlines, usually for “pretend entertainment” articles, that uses readers’ lust or emotion to get them to click. Here is a recent example (with the name deleted to protect the guilty): “Blah Blah Shared a Magical Moment for Mother’s Day and it’s the Sweetest Thing We’ve Ever Seen.” Really? How nice for you. Why should the rest of us care? 

Then there is the lede, that first paragraph that SHOULD provide the gist of the news story (though not details). Newspapers – mostly - get it right. Television and radio news, though often dependent on “packages” (pre-recorded segments) also usually get it right. Internet news outlets – except those pulling directly from those other sources – frequently get it wrong. They want readers to move down the page, so they will see more paid advertising. A recent “In the Know (by Yahoo)” illustrates this perfectly. The key to the article, a list of things one should know about one’s partner after six months, was finally mentioned in the third paragraph. To get there, the reader had to navigate past six paid content links. Thanks a lot!

In a similar vein, but largely avoiding the issue of copy (because it uses so little), is the slideshow. These usually, but not always, can be found in entertainment news. To see the fashions stars wore to a certain event (one example), we have to click through a slideshow, each page of which shows one photograph, but more than one advertisement. Some of these slideshows have more than 50 pages. Of course there is no index; how could they get as many clicks as possible and show as many ads as possible if there was an index? 

Last, but by no means least, are photographs. Most of the articles that highlight photographs are “pretend entertainment” and most of them grab those photographs from places like Instagram or Twitter (not that celebrities mind; free publicity is why they are on those platforms). Amazingly, some internet articles publicizing a photograph don’t include the photograph being publicized! Incredible. InStyle (Hearst Magazines) and Prevention are frequent offenders, but there are others doing the same thing.

So what should we who look to the internet for news, whether occasionally or more than occasionally, do? For starters, subscribe to your local or regional newspaper, either in newsprint or online. Every place, big city or small town alike, needs a newspaper to inform and engage it citizens. Local news represents the heartbeat of a place and it rarely appears on the internet. If traditional broadcast media is preferred, then by all means watch local news on television or listen to local news on radio instead. Again, local journalists assign, produce, write and present the stories and they know the local landscape. 

Also, keep a “cheat sheet” near the computer to jot down those “lousy headlines, buried ledes, and missing photographs” websites, those “pretend news” websites that with biased, inaccurate reporting, and those websites with excessive “click bait”, or excessive advertising. Then avoid clicking on them. Maybe even e-mail the offending sites and let them know. Clicks pay the bills, and if enough people did this, websites might pivot in their ways. Of course, they may create even more irritating ways to drive their click counts, but we can hope for better. 

The internet is a great invention and it can be a great source of news. By taking a responsible and disciplined approach to internet news, we can help make internet news more responsible. 

HANDEL ON FIRE

by David Yearsley

Fire season is upon us. There’s no off-season anymore. 24/7 takes on paradoxically darker and brighter—and ever hotter—connotations.

One of the biggest, most destructive fires in New Mexico’s history is sweeping through the mountains east of Santa Fe, having already engulfed more than 160,000 acres. The Calf Canyon and Merit Peak Fires began as separate blazes but merged ten days ago. Elsewhere in the American Southwest dozens of smaller fires rage.

Science can be prayed to by the right-thinking, but it holds out less hope than religion, which might offer the better odds and greater solace, even if your local church has burned down too. Besides, few human activities are greener than folding the hands and talking to God. Who knows how Pascal would have wagered were he alive today?

The cause of the Calf-Canyon/Merit Peak Fires has not yet been determined, though Act of God(s) is as good as any. That’s been the go-to explanation for millennia. The scale and frequency of fires and floods take on increasingly Biblical proportions. The New York Times begins to look more and more like an illustrated edition of Exodus.

From Genesis to Revelation the Bible is not just a fascinating compendium of environmental attitudes and attacks, but a renewable resource for the mining of scenarios for blockbuster shows.

Seeking to map liberal-causes onto box-office riches, Hollywood has been drawing, if indirectly, from this treasure trove, as in last year’s seriocomic call-to-action (or at least to streaming) movie on Netflix, Don’t Look Up.

As in so many things, Handel was ahead of his time, proving himself a master of enviro-carnage centuries before Cecil B. De- and Leonard Di- Mille & Caprio got busy wrecking stuff on screen for the purposes of entertainment and edification.

Hailing from a small city tucked away in the forests of central Germany, the enterprising and ambitious Handel left home for bustling Hamburg as an eighteen-year-old, then to Italy where he continued to make his mark on the era’s most lucrative and prestigious theatrical medium — opera. Desired by many for his gifts for dramatic song, Handel landed in London in 1710 at the age of twenty-five and churned out some forty operas over the next three decades.

Many were his successes, artistic and financial. The life was thrilling, turbulent, rich with celebrity and incident.

But opera is a notoriously bankrupting pursuit. In March of 1738 Handel withdrew the last fifty pounds from his checking account at the Bank of England. He had had many thousands just a decade earlier.

He had just folded his opera enterprise, its demise the result of competition and mounting indifference among the London populace to overpaid Italians crooning in a foreign language on English stages. Handel now turned his talent — and money — to oratorios sung in English and making abundant use of spectacular choruses. This novelty was calculated to attract audiences after years of operas dominated by that vehicle for star singers, the solo aria.

The year before emptying his cash reserves Handel, then 52 years old, had suffered a major health scare that left him unable to use his right arm, a necessary appendage both for writing music and playing the organ. It might have been a stroke or poisoning from too much wine stabilized, as was common practice, with lead. He journeyed to the continent for a cure, putting in epic sessions in the baths of Aix-la-Chapelle. The Man Mountain, as he was called by his detractors and even some admirers on account of his girth and notorious gourmandizing, recovered. He returned to London eager to get back in action.

Soon, though, Handel was in dire straits, teetering on the brink of insolvency with competitors trying to sabotage him.

Faced with disaster, he turned to disaster music. Israel in Egypt, many of its numbers culled from his back-catalog and even from other composers, was nonetheless a new kind of entertainment, one jammed packed with rousing choruses. The work was dense with destruction, scenes of horror visited on Pharaoh and his subjects: rivers of blood; armies of frogs; then lice; then wild animals; livestock stricken by disease; Egyptians break out in blotches and blisters; locusts destroy crops; the land is shrouded in darkness; firstborn sons die.

Unstaged, the oratorio’s music was no less vigorously visual. The diverse and immensely theatrical choruses made you see the scenes of devastation. Handel was a cinematographer in sound.

Charles Jennens, who also collated the text for Messiah, melded together passages from the Psalms and from Exodus for the seventh plague, the text provoking one of Handel’s most rousing treatments of extreme weather: “He gave them hailstones for rain; fire mingled with the hail ran along upon the ground.”

Handel opens the scene with bouncing repeated notes in the oboes, soon joined by a succession of strings, the bows jumping, the ensemble then hailing down in descending scales, letting up only to gather renewed strength in another wave of precipitation as the voices come crashing in. The choruses’ shouts of “hailstones” are punctuated by timpani and trumpet blasts, a trio of trombones painting the dark skies above. (The YouTube video by the appropriately named Apollo’s Fire cuts out the calmer C-major chords that Handel used to presage the oncoming storm: this Cleveland band gets right to the mayhem.)

Handel divides his vocal forces into two choirs that answer one another like squalls ripping across the Nile floodplain. Fire mingles with hail as the strings shake and crackle, the brass assault building intensity. Colossal chords, held longer as they are buffeted by orchestral gusts, make the word “Fire” leap in technicolor. The two choirs crash together as the flames mingle with hail. These swirling vocals then resolve into a unified proclamation of the ongoing destruction, then fragment into back-and-forth torrents before all voices and instruments align for a final massed utterance that lands — music and hail — emphatically on the ground. The orchestral play-out rages onward in voiceless fury, stamped at its close with brass and drums in a statement of climatic triumph, the elemental victor disappearing as quickly as it had struck.

The is no respite, no refuge; no time to pray, no time to run for cover Many hailstorms come and go in two minutes, the length of this Handelian plague when it is conjured as energetically as it is by Apollo’s Fire. The cataclysm is over almost before it has really begun. But the destruction is total.

Just a week ago in the Times we learned that tornados and hail were coursing over the Central Plains. Hailstones more than two inches in diameter fell in the Western Ohio Valley. With fires already sprung up, the drought-stricken Southwest braces for yet more blazes as lightning threatens and the Calf Canyon/Merit Peak conflagration is whipped along by high winds.

If scientific soothsayers are to be believed, the present disasters are just a prelude of the truly Biblical ones to come.

In spite of Handel’s gifts for creative destruction even with the Bible as his libretto, Israel in Egypt was a bust, poorly attended over its paltry three initial performances. (It was only after his sojourn in Dublin in 1741-2, Messiah in tow, that Handel’s fortunes turned sharply for the better; he died a rich man in 1759, buried in Poets’ Corner in Westminster Abbey.)

Handel’s musical representations of the plagues visited on Egypt by the One True God provoked clerical disapproval. The theater was not the place to tell stories pillaged from Scripture. But Handel’s audience also seemed unprepared for the works’ succession of choral jolts.

The oratorio is now a perennial favorite for audiences attuned to the disaster entertainments that Handel helped pioneer. I’m not sure whether these same audiences are attuned to reality. It’s surely better that way; better to enjoy the thrill of the musical moment far from the real flames and distracted from worries about what it is to come.

(David Yearsley is a long-time contributor to CounterPunch and the Anderson Valley Advertiser. His latest book is Sex, Death, and Minuets: Anna Magdalena Bach and Her Musical Notebooks. He can be reached at dgyearsley@gmail.com.)

GAVIN NEWSOM’S FIRST TERM

by Dan Walters

Last weekend, Gavin Newsom released the first video ad of his campaign for a second term as California’s governor.

It is, therefore, an appropriate moment to look at what he said he wanted to accomplish as governor during his 2018 campaign and how it has turned out.

A two-word summary would be “reality bites.”

Candidate Newsom, touting a book entitled “Built to Last: Successful Habits of Visionary Companies,” embraced its central point that visionary leaders should seek “big, hairy audacious goals.”

“I’d rather be accused of (having) those audacious stretch goals than be accused of timidity,” he said at one point.

True to that philosophy, Newsom told voters he wanted to do big things, such as creating a single-payer health system, solving the state’s chronic shortage of housing and completely converting California to renewable energy.

During his 2018 campaign, the state Senate passed a single-payer bill and Newsom enthusiastically endorsed it, saying there was “no reason to wait around.”

“I’m tired of politicians saying they support single-payer but that it’s too soon, too expensive or someone else’s problem,” Newsom said.

The 2018 bill stalled in the Assembly but when another bill cleared the Senate and was pending in the Assembly this year, Newsom made no effort to get it passed and it died without a vote.

A commission Newsom appointed to study single-payer’s feasibility has issued a report that lays out options but offers no clear path to implementation. Essentially, single-payer is no more likely today than it was four years ago.

Instead, Newsom’s budgets have incrementally extended Medi-Cal coverage to uninsured residents, including undocumented immigrants, but in the long term, that coverage depends on the state’s notoriously volatile revenues.

As he was running for governor, Gavin Newsom pledged to “lead the effort to develop the 3.5 million new housing units we need by 2025 because our solutions must be as bold as the problem is big.”

The pledge would have required increasing production to 500,000 units a year, but actual construction has been, at best, about 20 percent of that figure. Newsom downplayed his pledge to “a stretch goal,” telling the Los Angeles Times, “It’s a stubborn issue. You can’t snap your fingers and build hundreds of thousands, millions of housing units overnight.”

And so it has gone — Newsom edging away from “big hairy audacious goals” one-by-one when they proved impossible to achieve in the real world.

Two recent positions on high-profile environmental issues also illustrate how reality has tempered his governorship.

One reality is that California is afflicted by severe drought and, due to climate change, may face permanent shortages of water. One very controversial option is tapping the limitless supply of ocean water and stripping out its salt.

Recently, the state Coastal Commission recommended that the state’s second desalination plant not be built, but Newsom reiterated his support.

“We need more tools in the damn tool kit,” Newsom told the Bay Area News Group editorial board.

That, at least, was a consistent position, but he modified his stance on another real world issue — whether California’s only remaining nuclear power plant, Diablo Canyon, should be shuttered as now scheduled.

The San Luis Obispo County plant generates at least 6 percent of the state’s electrical energy and closure could leave California, whose power supply is already marginal, in the dark.

Newsom had supported decommissioning Diablo Canyon but told the Los Angeles Times editorial board last week that California will apply for federal funds aimed at keeping threatened nuclear plants in production, saying, “We would be remiss not to put that on the table as an option.”

(CalMatters.org)

BIDEN WANTED $33B MORE FOR UKRAINE. Congress Quickly Raised it to $40B. Who Benefits?

Tens of billions, soon to be much more, are flying out of U.S. coffers to Ukraine as Americans suffer, showing who runs the U.S. Government, and for whose benefit.

by Glenn Greenwald

From the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine on February 24, the Biden White House has repeatedly announced large and seemingly random amounts of money that it intends to send to fuel the war in Ukraine. The latest such dispatch of large amounts of U.S. funds, pursuant to an initial $3.5 billion fund authorized by Congress early on, was announced on Friday; “Biden says U.S. will send $1.3 billion in additional military and economic support to Ukraine,” read the CNBC headline. This was preceded by a series of new lavish spending packages for the war, unveiled every two to three weeks, starting on the third day of the war:

• Feb. 26: “Biden approves $350 million in military aid for Ukraine": Reuters; 
• Mar. 16: “Biden announces $800 million in military aid for Ukraine:” The New York Times; 
• Mar. 30: “Ukraine to receive additional $500 million in aid from U.S., Biden announces”: NBC News; 
• Apr. 12: “U.S. to announce $750 million more in weapons for Ukraine, officials say."  Reuters;
• May 6: “Biden announces new $150 million weapons package for Ukraine”: Reuters.

Those amounts by themselves are in excess of $3 billion; by the end of April, the total U.S. expenditure on the war in Ukraine was close to $14 billion, drawn from the additional $13.5 billion Congress authorized in mid-March. While some of that is earmarked for economic and humanitarian assistance for Ukraine, most of it will go into the coffers of the weapons industry — including Raytheon, on whose Board of Directors the current Secretary of Defense, Lloyd Austin, sat immediately before being chosen by Biden to run the Pentagon. As CNN put it: “about $6.5 billion, roughly half of the aid package, will go to the US Department of Defense so it can deploy troops to the region and send defense equipment to Ukraine.”

As enormous as those sums already are, they were dwarfed by the Biden administration's announcement on April 28 that it “is asking Congress for $33 billion in funding to respond to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, more than double the $14 billion in support authorized so far.” The White House itself acknowledges that the vast majority of that new spending package will go to the purchase of weaponry and other military assets: “$20.4 billion in additional security and military assistance for Ukraine and for U.S. efforts to strengthen European security in cooperation with our NATO allies and other partners in the region.”

It is difficult to put into context how enormous these expenditures are — particularly since the war is only ten weeks old, and U.S. officials predict/hope that this war will last not months but years. That ensures that the ultimate amounts will be significantly higher still. 

The amounts allocated thus far — the new Biden request of $33 billion combined with the $14 billion already spent — already exceed the average annual amount the U.S. spent for its own war in Afghanistan ($46 billion). In the twenty-year U.S. war in Afghanistan which ended just eight months ago, there was at least some pretense of a self-defense rationale given the claim that the Taliban had harbored Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda at the time of the 9/11 attack. Now the U.S. will spend more than that annual average after just ten weeks of a war in Ukraine that nobody claims has any remote connection to American self-defense.

Even more amazingly, the total amount spent by the U.S. on the Russia/Ukraine war in less than three months is close to the Russia's total military budget for the entire year ($65.9 million). While Washington depicts Russia as some sort of grave and existential menace to the U.S., the reality is that the U.S. spends more than ten times on its military what Russia spends on its military each year; indeed, the U.S. spends three times more than the second-highest military spender, China, and more than the next twelve countries combined.

But as gargantuan as Biden's already-spent and newly requested sums are — for a ten-week war in which the U.S. claims not to be a belligerent — it was apparently woefully inadequate in the eyes of the bipartisan establishment in Congress, who is ostensibly elected to serve the needs and interests of American citizens, not Ukrainians. Leaders of both parties instantly decreed that Biden's $33 billion request was not enough. They thus raised it to $40 billion — a more than 20% increase over the White House's request — and are now working together to create an accelerated procedure to ensure immediate passage and disbursement of these weapons and funds to the war zone in Ukraine. "Time is of the essence – and we cannot afford to wait,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said in a letter to House members, adding: "This package, which builds on the robust support already secured by Congress, will be pivotal in helping Ukraine defend not only its nation but democracy for the world."

We have long ago left the realm of debating why it is in the interest of American citizens to pour our country's resources into this war, to say nothing of risking a direct war and possibly catastrophic nuclear escalation with Russia, the country with the largest nuclear stockpile, with US close behind. Indeed, one could argue that the U.S. government entered this war and rapidly escalated its involvement without this critical question — which should be fundamental to any policy decision of the U.S. government — being asked at all. 

This omission — a failure to address how the interests of ordinary Americans are served by the U.S. government's escalating role in this conflict — is particularly glaring given the steadfast and oft-stated view of former President Barack Obama that Ukraine is and always will be of vital interest to Russia, but is not of vital interest to the U.S. For that reason, Obama repeatedly resisted bipartisan demands that he send lethal arms to Ukraine, a step he was deeply reluctant to take due to his belief that the U.S. should not provoke Moscow over an interest as remote as Ukraine (ironically, Trump — who was accused by the U.S. media for years of being a Kremlin asset, controlled by Putin through blackmail — did send lethal arms to Ukraine despite how provocative doing so was to Russia).

While it is extremely difficult to isolate any benefit to ordinary American citizens from all of this, it requires no effort to see that there is a tiny group of Americans who do benefit greatly from this massive expenditure of funds. That is the industry of weapons manufacturers. So fortunate are they that the White House has met with them on several occasions to urge them to expand their capacity to produce sophisticated weapons so that the U.S. government can buy them in massive quantities:

Top U.S. defense officials will meet with the chief executives of the eight largest U.S. defense contractors to discuss industry’s capacity to meet Ukraine’s weapons needs if the war with Russia continues for years.

Deputy Defense Secretary Kathleen Hicks told reporters Tuesday she plans to participate in a classified roundtable with defense CEOs on Wednesday to discuss “what can we do to help them, what do they need to generate supply"….

“We will discuss industry proposals to accelerate production of existing systems and develop new, modernized capabilities critical to the Department’s ongoing security assistance to Ukraine and long-term readiness of U.S. and ally/partner forces,” the official added.

On May 3, Biden visited a Lockheed Martin facility and “praised the… plant that manufactures Javelin anti-tank missiles, saying their work was critical to the Ukrainian war effort and to the defense of democracy itself.”

Indeed, by transferring so much military equipment to Ukraine, the U.S. has depleted its own stockpiles, necessitating their replenishment with mass government purchases. One need not be a conspiracy theorist to marvel at the great fortune of this industry, having lost their primary weapons market just eight months ago when the U.S. war in Afghanistan finally ended, only to now be gifted with an even greater and more lucrative opportunity to sell their weapons by virtue of the protracted and always-escalating U.S. role in Ukraine. Raytheon, the primary manufacturer of Javelins along with Lockheed, has been particularly fortunate that its large stockpile, no longer needed for Afghanistan, is now being ordered in larger-than-ever quantitiesby its former Board member, now running the Pentagon, for shipment to Ukraine. Their stock prices have bulged nicely since the start of the war:

But how does any of this benefit the vast majority of Americans? Does that even matter? As of 2020, almost 30 million Americans are without any health insurance. Over the weekend, USA Today warned of “the ongoing infant formula shortage,” in which “nearly 40% of popular baby formula brands were sold out at retailers across the U.S. during the week starting April 24.” So many Americans are unable to afford college for their children that close to a majority are delaying plans or eliminating them all together. Meanwhile, “monthly poverty remained elevated in February 2022, with a 14.4 percent poverty rate for the total US population….Overall, 6 million more individuals were in poverty in February relative to December.” The latest data from the U.S. Census Bureau found that “approximately 42.5 million Americans [are] living below the poverty line.” Americans with diabetes often struggle to buy life-saving insulin. And on and on and on.

Now, if the U.S. were invaded or otherwise attacked by another country, or its vital interests were directly threatened, one would of course expect the U.S. government to expend large sums in order to protect and defend the national security of the country and its citizens. But can anyone advance a cogent argument, let alone a persuasive one, that Americans are somehow endangered by the war in Ukraine? Clearly, they are far more endangered by the U.S. response to the war in Ukraine than the war itself; after all, a nuclear confrontation between the U.S. and Russia has long been ranked by the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists as one of the two greatest threats facing humanity.

One would usually expect the American left, or whatever passes it for these days, to be indignant about the expenditure of tens of billions of dollars for weapons while ordinary Americans suffer. But the American left, such that it exists, is barely visible when it comes to debates over the war in Ukraine, while American liberals stand in virtual unity with the establishment wing of the Republican Party behind the Biden administration in support for the escalating U.S. role in the war in Ukraine. A few stray voices (such as Noam Chomsky) have joined large parts of the international left in urging a diplomatic solution in lieu of war and criticizing Biden for insufficient efforts to forge one, but the U.S. left and American liberals are almost entirely silent if not supportive.

That has left the traditionally left-wing argument about war opposition to the populist right. “You can’t find baby formula in the United States right now but Congress is voting today to send $40 billion to Ukraine," said Donald Trump, Jr. on Tuesday, echoing what one would expect to hear from the 2016 version of Bernie Sanders or the pre-victory AOC. “In the America LAST $40 BILLION Ukraine FIRST bill that we are voting on tonight, there is authorization for funds to be given to the CIA for who knows what and who knows how much? But NO BABY FORMULA for American mothers!,” explained Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA). Christian Walker, the conservative influencer and son of GOP Senate candidate Herschel Walker in Georgia, today observed: “Biden should go apply to be the President of Ukraine since he clearly cares more about them than the U.S.” Chomsky himself caused controversy last week when he said that there is only one statesman of any stature in the West urging a diplomatic solution “and his name is Donald J. Trump.”

Meanwhile, the only place where dissent is heard over the Biden administration's war policy is on the 8:00 p.m. and 10:00 p.m. programs on Fox News, hosted, respectively, by Tucker Carlson and Laura Ingraham, who routinely demand to know how ordinary Americans are benefiting from this increasing U.S. involvement. On CNN, NBC, and in the op-ed pages of The New York Times and The Washington Post, there is virtually lockstep unity in favor of the U.S. role in this war; the only question that is permitted, as usual, is whether the U.S. is doing enough or whether it should do more. 

That the U.S. has no legitimate role to play in this war, or that its escalating involvement comes at the expense of American citizens, the people they are supposed to be serving, provokes immediate accusations that one is spreading Russian propaganda and is a Kremlin agent. That is therefore an anti-war view that is all but prohibited in those corporate liberal media venues. Meanwhile, mainstream Democratic House members, such as Rep. Jason Crow (D-CO), are now openly talking about the war in Ukraine as if it is the U.S.'s own.

Whatever else is true, the claim with which we are bombarded by the corporate press — the two parties agree on nothing; they are constantly at each other's throats; they have radically different views of the world — is patently untrue, at least when it comes time for the U.S. to join in new wars. Typically, what we see in such situations is what we are seeing now: the establishment wings of both parties are in complete lockstep unity, always breathlessly supporting the new proposed U.S. role in any new war, eager to empty the coffers of the U.S. Treasury and transfer it to the weapons industry while their constituents suffer.

One can believe that Russia's invasion of Ukraine is profoundly unjust and has produced horrific outcomes while still questioning what legitimate interests the U.S. has in participating in this war to this extent. Even if one fervently believes that helping Ukrainians fight Russia is a moral good, surely the U.S. government should be prioritizing the ability of its own citizens to live above the poverty line, have health insurance, send their kids to college, and buy insulin and baby formula.

There are always horrific wars raging, typically with a clear aggressor, but that does not mean that the U.S. can or should assume responsibility for the war absent its own vital interests and the interests of its citizens being directly at stake. In what conceivable sense are American citizens benefiting from this enormous expenditure of their resources and the increasing energy and attention being devoted by their leaders to Ukraine rather than to their lives and the multi-pronged deprivations that define it?

(greenwald.substack.com)