Mendocino County Today: Thursday, Nov. 24, 2022

Sunny | Mary Korte | Toy Drive | Thanks | 350° | Boonquiz | Wodetzki Bench | Holiday Bazaar | Summertime | Bean Time | Dude… | Planning | Wire Chute | Round Valley News | Open Windows | Volleyball Stars | Carlson-Mullen | Waterwise | Quixotic | Weedville | Sweetshop | PD Standards | Jazzy Husband | Black Belt | C'mere | Carjacker McNabbed | Monte Rio | Food Need | Abandoned | 1948 | Yesterday's Catch | Ladycatch | Relief | Lululala | Reactions | Unruly Fans | Atrevida | Sad | Assemblymember Voepel | Smug Not | Piper | Violence | Bambino | Trumpeter | St. Louis | Media Control | Tesla | Taiwan | Equally Screwed | Ukraine | Heathens | Talk Turkey | Return

MILD, SUNNY WEATHER is on tap for Thanksgiving with interior temperatures generally in the 60s. Clouds and cooler temperatures will move in late Friday with potential drizzle for the North Coast. Cool weather continues into next week and wetting rain possible as soon as Monday. (NWS)

MARY NORBERT KORTE

Mary Norbert Korte, poet known for her role in the San Francisco Renaissance and Beat poetry movements and environmental activist, passed away on November 14th. She was 88 years old.

Korte was born in 1934 between Oakland and Berkeley. She became a nun in 1951, entering the Dominican Catholic Sisterhood in San Rafael. She attended the Dominican College of San Rafael followed by the Catholic University of America for her bachelor's and Master's Degrees, both in Latin. 

In 1965, Korte attended the Berkeley Poetry Conference, a gathering which would become known as a watershed moment in the history of American poetry. She met poets Robert Duncan, Charles Olson, Robert Creeley, Jack Spicer and Lew Welch, among others, and met Robert Hawley, publisher of Oyez Press in Berkeley. Korte's first collection of poems, Hymn to the Gentle Sun, was published by Oyez in 1967. The following year, 1968, Korte left the Dominican order and embarked on the lay life of the poet. Korte befriended poets Allen Ginsberg, Lenore Kandel, Diane di Prima, and many others, and published several more books. 

In 1973, Korte answered an ad to serve as a caretaker at Sanctuary Station on the bank of the Noyo River outside Willits. Soon after moving to Mendocino county, Korte became the Northern California Coordinator for Poets in the Schools, a non-profit initiative that brought published poets in to teach poetry to children in public elementary schools. She also taught writing and literature at the elementary school for the Coyote Valley Band of Pomo Indians. In 1979, Korte learned that a large tract of old-growth redwood forest at the headwaters of the Noyo River was slated to be logged, and vowed to do everything in her power to save this forest. 

She led many direct and indirect actions in efforts to save old growth redwoods. Through a thirty-year legal process and a final deal with the Mendocino Land Trust, Korte succeeded in saving the old-growth redwoods she originally set out to save. Korte's papers are held at the University of Rochester in Rochester, NY. A collection of Korte's poetry, Jumping into the American River: New and Selected Poems, will be published by Argos Books/TKS Press in 2023. Mary Korte will be remembered as tough, intelligent, compassionate and incredibly loving and loved by all who knew her.

GIVING THANKS

Dear AVUSD Community,

I am thankful for so many things this year. I just want to take a moment to share:

A huge thank you to our community for passing Measure M.

A huge thank you to our staff for really caring about our kids.

A huge thank you to our custodial and maintenance staff that always seem to be fixing something that is catastrophically broken.

A huge thank you to our Wellness Committee and cafeteria staff for making food that is tasty and nourishing.

A huge thank you to Bev Dutra, who always writes me a note of encouragement at just the right moment.

A huge thank you to our transportation staff that always gets kids home, even when buses are broken.

A huge thank you to our School Board for always putting students first.

A huge thank you to our community members in the fire department, construction, hospitality and other industries that give internships to our kids to get real work experience.

A huge thank you to Bruce Anderson and the Major for allowing us a platform to share our school news.

A huge thank you to our retirees that always step up to fill my calls for help.

A huge thank you to Don Alameida for managing our construction projects to get the most out of every dollar.

A huge thank you to our district office staff for taking on "out of the box duties" to benefit kids.

A huge thank you to our parents and guardians that never hesitate to show up for committees or to take a meeting about how we can work together to help our students achieve.

A huge thank you to our walk on coaches that spend hours of their time to make sure kids have an after-school activity that is important to them.

A huge thank you to the parents/guardians that volunteer in classrooms, go on field trips, attend dances, drive the vans for sports, and so much more. We couldn't do it without you. 

So very many good things here. Lots to improve for sure, but this solid base is an amazing platform for growth. I thank you for welcoming me into your magical Valley.

Take care,

DECEMBER BOONVILLE QUIZ SCHEDULE

No Quiz this week — something called ‘Thanksgiving' is taking place… In December instead of the 1st and 3rd Thursdays, we shall do the 3rd and 5th Thursdays. That means December 15th and a special Holiday Quiz on December 29th. Mark them on your calendars, you know it makes sense.

Happy Holidays,

Steve Sparks, The Quiz Master

LONG OVERDUE HONOR FOR WODETZKI

Albion’s Tom Wodetzki recently got a big surprise: He was honored by the Mendocino Land Trust for his 11 years of monthly volunteering at the Navarro Point Preserve with a new bench reading “Tom ‘Moonlight’ Wodetzki: A dedicated weed warrior and lifelong lover of the land.” It’s now installed on the Navarro Point headlands just south of Albion looking out over the Pacific. Below is his explanation of the event in the form of a Thank-you note followed by 2 photos taken of some MLT staff and co-volunteers sitting on the bench before starting their monthly shift of removing invasive thistles. 

— Sharon Hansen

Tom Wodetzki Responds:

Hello Mendocino Land Trust staff and board members. 

As you may know, when I started my usual monthly volunteer stewarding shift at the Navarro Point Preserve Thursday (11/10/22), I was greeted by a dozen of you having an on-site “staff meeting” and admiring a beautiful newly installed bench near the headland’s edge looking out to sea. As I approached it I noticed a plaque, and looking closer I read its inscription: “Tom “Moonlight” Wodetzki: A dedicated weed warrior and lifelong lover of the land.” I was totally surprised, shocked to tears, and overwhelmed with this totally unexpected honor. So I'm writing you to thank you profoundly for your recognition of my efforts, and doing so by providing a seat for thousands of visitors to sit on while they soak up the Preserve’s awesome beauty.

After we all broke up, I returned to our monthly task of removing invasive thistles, ex-MLT staffer Matt Coleman strongly came to mind, feeling he was with me again and more deserving of your honoring than I.

Here’s why.

Soon after the Navarro Point Preserve was purchased and open to the public in 2011, MLT employee Matt Coleman put out a call for volunteers to help with projects like erecting signs, building boardwalks and removing trash and invasive species there. Having for years been on the MLT Board’s finance committee and living nearby in Albion, I happily volunteered. Matt, a longtime dedicated environmentalist, was my leader and inspiration. But, tragically, not for long; while doing his MLT work that included checking up on a Save the Redwoods property north of Westport, Matt was fatally shot by a deranged young local on 8/11/11. Upon learning of this, that Matt had lost his life doing MLT work, I decided to commit myself to continue Matt’s efforts by caring for this new Navarro Point Preserve. Which is what I have done monthly for the past eleven years, with the help of several other volunteers and support from the wonderful MLT staff.

Fortunately, the MLT has honored Matt Coleman with a dedicated bench at Mendocino's Big River haul road gate. And when I sit on this new bench at the Navarro Point Preserve, I feel Matt sitting there beside me enjoying the view.

Thanks again to all of you for your recognitions of volunteers like me and staff and donors, and for all you do to protect Mother Earth and provide ever more ways for people to access beautiful, healing nature.

UNITY CLUB NEWS

by Miriam Martinez

The time is right. Its time to cheer. The Holiday Bazaar is here. Black Friday and Cyber Monday are things of the past. This Saturday, December 3rd the Annual A.V. Unity Club's Holiday Bazaar will be held in Apple Hall from 10 to 4. Admission is FREE. Find hand-crafted gifts for your whole family and baked goods for your celebrations. There's something special about gifts made with love.

Children will be welcomed into the Craft Corner held in the Dining Room adjacent to Apple Hall. The Parent Teacher Alliance will guide young hands into making their own ornaments and keepsakes. Then they can visit with Santa and have a photo taken to remember this special day.

Wreaths made by the A.V. Ag. Institute will be for sale. You may also bid on the Grand Prize wreath covered in money at the Silent Auction, as you enter Apple Hall. A list of Auction items will be published and posted at the entrance. Tickets are $1 each or 6 for $5. Vote early. Vote often. You may win the prize of your hearts desire. All prizes are gifts from local merchants, artisans and entrepreneurs.

Our Teen Center is hosting the Canteen, to the right of the entrance, for the first time. Enjoy the food and beverages they will prepare with youthful enthusiasm. Also for the first time, we'll have a booth Unity Attic, filled with new and lightly used items from our own attics.

The lending library, located across the parking lot from Apple Hall in the Hime Arts Building, will be open extended hours from 10:00 to 2:30. Special collections and slightly used books will be available for gifts $1.00 hardbound and $0.50 paperbacks. Come and see the marvelous collection curated just for you.

Ladies of the Anderson Valley Unity Club please note: Our monthly meeting to be held Dec. 1st will be devoted to packaging, pricing and decorating items for the baked goods, preserves and candies booth at the Bazaar. Please also bring your donations to the Food Bank plus any unwrapped toys & books you'd like to give to the families. Donations to our 100th Anniversary "100 Cans" project will also be welcome. The meeting begins at 1:30 in the Dining Room, Fairgrounds on Dec. 1st.

Blessings of the Season

HIT & RUN DRIVER NOW SERVING ORIGINAL COUNTY JAIL SENTENCE … PLUS SOME

While out of custody on bail pending appeal and formal probation – both flowing from her September 2021 felony conviction by jury for leaving the scene of a collision that involved the death of another – defendant Gina Rae Bean, age 44, of Fort Bragg, was arrested in July 2022 and subsequently charged with the illegal possession of a pipe used to smoke methamphetamine. 

Originally denying the new charge alleging that she had violated the law and thus the terms of her supervised probation, defendant Bean ultimately admitted in October 2022 that she had failed to obey all laws by possessing the illegal drug pipe.

When defendant Bean’s case was returned to Judge Brennan’s Fort Bragg courtroom in early November 2022 for sentencing, the original state prison sentence suspended over the defendant’s head in December 2021 was not imposed. 

Instead, Bean’s formal probation was reinstated and she was ordered to begin serving the probationary county jail sentence (210 days) that had been imposed at December 2021 sentencing hearing but later stayed pending Bean’s appeal of her conviction. 

An additional 60 days in county jail was also ordered, said additional time to be served consecutively to the original 210 days. 

Once Bean completes serving the 210-day segment (meaning 105 actual days after statutory credits are applied), it was ordered that she could serve the additional 60 day segment in a probation-approved residential drug treatment program, as long as she successfully completes the entirety of the program. 

The defendant is currently housed at the Sheriff’s Low Gap jail facility.

(DA Presser)

* * *

Previously: Off the Record (February 26, 2020)

DECEMBER 1, 2022 PLANNING COMMISSION AGENDA

The December 1st Planning Commission Agenda is posted on the Department website at: mendocinocounty.org/government/planning-building-services/meeting-agendas/planning-commission

Please contact staff with any questions. Thank you.

Adrienne Thompson

Administrative Services Manager

RESTARTING A ROUND VALLEY WEEKLY

Dear AVA,

In the last year or so I have become a regular reader of the Mendocino County Today online feature and have a great appreciation for the timely and accurate reporting of the functions and dysfunctions of the County government by Mark Scaramella, the wit and insight of Bruce Anderson, and the general tone of a perhaps nostalgic celebration of what is left of small-town life.

I live in Covelo, have for 50 years now. Came here as a young hippie kid enthralled with the possibilities of perhaps living out some kind of utopian vision. I still have that enthusiasm and usually don't mind the work and hassle of dealing with the world as it presents itself.

Your publication, the real newspaper part, not just the daily online piece, helps me navigate through some of the challenges in continuing to try to stay positive and engaged. I serve as a trustee of the Round Valley School District, a board member of our Friends of the Round Valley Public Library, one of the programming and engineering volunteers of KYBU Round Valley community radio, participate on our Municipal Advisory Council and a handful of other random social activities.

There are a few of us who have recently been talking about the need to re-establish a local, Round Valley oriented, journalism project. Not another online page, but something you can hold in your hands. For many years we had the Round Valley news, a weekly, but for any number of reasons that publication has been absent for more than a decade. In our group's discussions we are realistic about the challenges, work-wise and money-wise, which are all very demanding. We will see how this goes.

At any rate, here's $50. Keep up the good work.

Sincerely,

Lew Chichester

Covelo

ED REPLY: Thank you for your kind words. The Round Valley is such a beautiful place. I always tell people who move to Mendocino County that as soon as they're settled they should undertake a familiarization tour of their new home, and read its history and visit each of its far flung communities from Gualala to Covelo, and all points in between. I've especially enjoyed trips over the Mendocino Pass to Willows on I-5, east on 36 out of HumCo to Red Bluff, and north out of Covelo to Alderpoint. I used to get up to Petrolia when my late comrade, the sorely missed Alexander Cockburn, lived there. We took a couple of hikes along the Lost Coast, one on the inland trail, another a rather painful slog straight down the edge of the continent from Petrolia to Shelter Cove. And at least one overnight at Usal helps imagine and re-imagine the special hold this region has on all of us fortunate to live here, especially on soft fall afternoons like the poignancy one feels today (Wednesday) as the sun turns the hills every shade of gold.

ALL NORTH BAY LEAGUE VOLLEYBALL

First Team

• Abby Johnson, Jr., Rancho Cotate
• Siolo Lua, Sr., Rancho Cotate
• Taylor Melland, Sr., Rancho Cotate
• Allie Iversen, So., Ukiah
• Ava Rinehart, So., Ukiah
• Sena Mughannam, Sr., St. Vincent
• Melissa Casas Gatica, So., Healdsburg
• Emery Joy, Sr., Healdsburg
• Alondra Razo, Fr., Piner

Second Team

• Mia Nunez, Sr., Rancho Cotate
• Makenna Ripple, Sr., Rancho Cotate
• McKenna Bird, Jr., Ukiah
• Skylar Taglio So., Ukiah
• Ava Sulivan, Jr., St. Vincent
• Johana Stone, Fr., St. Vincent
• Lizette Gomez, Sr., Healdsburg
• Allissa Sommer, Jr., Healdsburg
• Chelsea Uong, Sr., Piner
• Rosalinda Albor, Sr., Elsie Allen

DIGGING DEEPER 

Editor: 

Aquifers in the Central Valley have been shrinking for 150 years. When I was in fourth grade in the 1950s we learned California history. Textbooks used to show how much the land mass had subsided due to emptying aquifers. To better understand this, place a wet sponge in a sink. Put a brick on it and water will gush out. Even if you fill the sink, the sponge will never regain its lost water. Storage in aquifers is finite, and once the water is gone not much can be done to change that.

I lived in Cloverdale when Gallo bought and re-engineered the land west of Asti. They put in four wells on the valley floor for grapes they planted. Then the well serving the community of Palomino Lakes on the east side of the valley started to dry up. Result was drilling a deeper well.

Until there is a better solution, folks will continue to drill wells. California needs more storage for water. Desalination plants along the entire coast would solve the problem of saltwater intrusion into local aquifers, which is happening around Monterey Bay and other locations.

Plainly put: There is no single solution to the water crisis. All options should be explored.

John Travinsky

Windsor

AN ON-LINE MARIJUANA STORY: I wonder if it was the new officer from down south they tend to get really buggy-eyed when they see “a lot of weed like that” where the local officers don’t really care about it anymore. Is so the newbie got excited and thought this was cool. One time I had four trash bags full of trim I was taking it over to somebody else’s house. I had to stop in town to help a family member. So…while I’m in town police officer walks by he says whose car is this it smells like marijuana I say it’s mine he stops and talks to me. Has me open up the car and looks at the bags and starts getting really excited. He calls his other fellow officers over that were nearby investigating a traffic accident. They all looked at it and said it’s not worth it the judge is just going to throw it out why bother. The guys like it’s marijuana. It’s weed, the other Officer says look you’re going to see tons of this stuff around here this is not that big of a deal and the judge is just going to throw it out. The new officer looks at the other officer and says well this is illegal. That older Officer says I’m not dealing with this and walks off says over his shoulder as he’s leaving you do what you want with it. The young newbie cop looks at me stands around for a little bit more and then shuts the back of my car. I laugh I say hey if I get pulled over again your handprints are there he looks at me with big old eyes and says get the heck out of here. So the newbie probably found it and it was exciting to him. But the newbie in Willits has been pulling people over for rolling right stops and other stuff. Not gaining community support. How long will he stay? Time will tell.

MEMO OF THE WEEK

Press Democrat Editor’s Note: The Press Democrat published a letter to the editor Monday, Nov. 21, that drew a parallel between the Republican Party and Florida’s governor and slavery. This letter should not have published. It violated our own standards about only sharing readers’ opinions that do not use hate speech, make personal attacks, spread disinformation or use a disrespectful tone.

Our Editorial Board’s desire is to be a catalyst for thoughtful, pragmatic conversations across the North Bay, and that commitment means we choose, but do not substantially edit, readers’ letters sent to our Opinion Page editor. This letter should have been rejected. We apologize for our shortcoming and will be even more vigilant in the selection of future letters we choose to publish.

— Richard A. Green,

Executive Editor, The Press Democrat; Chief Content Officer, Sonoma Media Investments

THE ADVENTURES OF OAKY JOE

by Joe Munson

I'm a black belt!

My son Milo and I spend a lot of time in Covelo. We look for jade that has been washed down the mountain during the storms. I used to own mineral rights for most of Pothole Creek from Leach Lake all the way to the Eel River, about 3 miles. I sold my rights because it is almost impossible to protect the claims from poachers.

The Forest Service closes the gate in the fall to keep the yahoos out — they get stuck and have to be rescued and they tear up the road with their big trucks.

But the tweakers drive to the gate and drop a friend to ride a bicycle the last 9 miles to the creek — usually after a big storm when there is fresh material. The assholes hide the jade and come back in the spring after the gate is open and steal the jade I paid mineral rights for. Spangler, you are a thief and I hope you get what you deserve!

Anyway, Milo and I were out searching for jade one day and we forgot our water bottle. I saw the game wardens, two of them, and told them I was dropping Milo off and he was going to meet me at the parking lot 10 minutes later and not to worry about us. The game warden said, “Thanks for giving us a heads up.”

The only people allowed to fish on that creek are tribal members and the game wardens were checking to make sure that people fishing were not breaking the regulations. When they finished, Milo and I invited them to come look at our jade score. Warden Smith and her coworker were impressed and asked us questions and were interested in our project.

About three weeks later Milo and I were turning left headed for Covelo and saw Warden Smith and a Highway Patrol officer each in their own vehicles. The CHP cop was in front and waved to me and then I heard something. Milo said, “Dad, he told you to put your seatbelt on!”

The CHP officer and the game warden both turned around and pulled us over at the tribal headquarters. Out came the CHP Officer and behind him was our buddy Warden Smith. The CHP officer said, “Why didn't you put your seat belt on when I signaled you to?”

I said, “I thought you were waving hello!”

The CHP officer said, “I even used my bullhorn and told you to put it on!”

I said, “I'm deaf and I didn't know until my son told me what you said!”

He said, “Oh.” Then he said, “You guys do Jujitsu?” 

Milo said, “Yes, we do.” 

The CHP officer said, “I'm a black belt! 

Then Warden Smith said, “Where do you study jujitsu?” 

We said, “At Terrell's.” 

Warden Smith said, “Where is that?” 

Milo said, “In Santa Rosa!”

Warden Smith was kind of laughing at the CHP officer because he was so proud that he is a black belt. Warden Smith said, “How did you guys do today?”

We showed her and the CHP officer some of our better pieces.

See you next trip!

PS. Now when I don't have my seatbelt on, Milo says, “I'm a black belt.”

CARJACKING AT STAPLES

On Monday, November 21 2022 at approximately 0914 hours, UPD Dispatch received a report of a possible carjacking behind Staples, 1225 Airport Park Blvd. Officers responded to the scene, spoke to the victim and learned that an unknown white male adult approached the 78-year-old female victim and demanded a ride to the hospital. The victim refused and tried to shut the vehicle door. The suspect placed an aluminum baseball bat into the door jam, preventing her from closing the door. The suspect forcibly pulled her out of the vehicle by her upper arm. The suspect got into the vehicle and fled the scene. The vehicle was described as a 2012 white Dodge Avenger. 

While Officers were searching the area, a citizen called CHP Dispatch to report a suspicious vehicle driving erratically on northbound Hwy. 101. The vehicle had fresh body damage and was last seen turning onto McNab Ranch Rd. The description of this vehicle matched the description of the stolen vehicle and CHP Dispatch forwarded the caller to UPD Dispatch. 

Officers responded to McNab Ranch Rd. and spoke to several witnesses who reported seeing a white vehicle with rear bumper damage on McNab Ranch Rd. Officers continued to search the McNab Ranch area when a UPD Detective located the stolen vehicle at Bus McGall Rd. and Young Creek Rd. The Detective was able to take the suspect into custody without incident. 

The suspect was identified as 57-year-old Erik Norton Smith, a transient from Ukiah. He was transported to AHUV for medical care and then transported to the Mendocino County Jail where he was booked for violations of 215 PC, carjacking and 368 PC, elder abuse. Smith also had a misdemeanor warrant for his arrest for failure to appear on a separate case. 

Ukiah PD would like to thank the California Highway Patrol and the Mendocino County Sheriff’s Department for their assistance in this case. As always, UPD’s mission is to make Ukiah as safe a place as possible. If you would like to know more about crime in your neighborhood, you can sign up for telephone, cellphone, and email notifications by clicking the Nixle button on our website; http://www.ukiahpolice.com.

(Ukiah Police Presser)

NORTH BAY’S LARGEST FOOD BANK GRAPPLES WITH UNFORESEEN DEMAND AMID SOARING PRICES

Since 2021, Redwood Empire Food Bank has seen demand increase 38% as more low-income community members struggle to afford the already high cost of living and the prices of everyday goods continue to increase.

by Alana Minkler

Organizers of Redwood Empire Food Bank, the North Bay's largest hunger relief program, say they have seen demand skyrocket to unseen levels while the cost of goods continues to soar.

Redwood Empire, which both distributes food through their own programs and supplies 19 partner organizations in Sonoma, Lake, Mendocino, Humboldt and Del Norte counties, serves low-income individuals, families, children and older adults who face food insecurity.

Between October 2020 and October 2021, the food bank saw the number of households using their services double. But since 2021, demand has increased 38% as more low-income community members struggle to afford the already high cost of living as the prices of everyday goods continue to increase.

The food bank is expecting to spend 50% more on food this year compared to last year, said operations director Alison Smith.

In a region where housing and other living costs are high, food assistance is critical for many individuals and families, said Allison Goodwin, director of programs at Redwood Empire.

To keep up with demand, the food bank stocks up on food items based on need in previous months and years, “but we don’t have a crystal ball to predict the exact need,” Smith said.

While Goodwin keeps tabs on need from the ground level, Smith oversees the other side of operations, which includes ordering food for their own distribution as well as for the partner organizations that rely on them to keep their pantries stocked.

In holiday months of November and December, food assistance needs typically run high, particularly as people’s utility bills increase and they face expenses related to family gatherings and travel.

But food bank workers were not expecting more than 38,000 households to ask for help in October, a number that exceeds peak pandemic levels.

“Without fail at all of our distributions, were pretty much running out of groceries by the end, if not a few minutes before the end of each distribution,” Goodwin said. “It's just the reality, and we're trying to keep up.”

While the supply chain has improved compared to last year, “prices have not,” Smith said. And to make maters worse, national donations have decreased.

As a member of Feeding America, a network of 200 food banks across the U.S., Redwood Empire typically receives national donations alongside local donations. However, lately, those national donations have become “hard to come by this year,” Smith said. She said it might be because all food banks are strained right now and national donors are choosing not to donate as much.

On top of that, inflation has increased the cost of eggs, dairy, meat and fresh produce, which means the food bank can afford less of these items, but they are also the items that low-income families need the most.

While demand seems to be increasing, the food banks are asking for contributions to relieve the strain, whether that’s in the form of time, monetary donations or food items, Goodwin said.

(Santa Rosa Press Democrat)

MENDOCINO COUNTY HISTORY: Willits Grade Lumber Spill, And Other News From November 1948

by Jody Martinez

Vehicle mishaps were apparently happening fairly regularly in Mendocino County during the autumn of 1948, including the one which occurred Tuesday, Nov. 2, 1948 on the Willits Grade about 10 miles north of Ukiah.

A photo was published in Ukiah newspapers, including the Redwood-Journal (Nov. 4) and the Dispatch-Democrat (Nov. 5) under the headline “Another Mystery Wreck Along North Highway.”

The caption read as follows: “Over the grade some time during the morning of November 2, this truck and trailer was reported Wednesday afternoon still beside the Redwood highway about 10 miles north of Ukiah. It was said the driver had to be taken from the cab, but there is no report of him being hospitalized. The outfit is owned by a man named Eastley, we are told.”

Also making news that week was the election of President Harry S. Truman and Vice-President Elect Sen. Alben W. Barkley. Photos of both of them ran at the top of the front page. Truman’s victory over New York Gov. Thomas E. Dewey is still talked about today, mostly due to premature newspaper headlines that incorrectly reported Dewey as the winner.

Most of us have seen the photo of a gleeful President Truman holding up a copy of the Chicago Tribune with the famous banner headline “Dewey Defeats Truman” (in all caps), although most might be hard pressed to name either man’s running mate.

I had never heard of Truman’s vice president, Alben W. Barkley. During a quick search, I learned that he represented Kentucky in Congress for many years, and at the time of the election must have been well-known to voters since he had been the Majority Leader of the U.S. Senate for a full decade, from 1937 to 1947.

Dewey’s running mate was California Gov. Earl Warren, which might have been a factor in Mendocino County voters’ support for Dewey over Truman. When the local newspapers were printed that week, Dewey had 5897 Mendocino County votes, Truman 5296, with a few hundred absentee votes still to be counted.

Sterling Norgard, of Ukiah, was trailing Sebastopol resident Hubert Scudder by 13,000 votes in the race to represent the 1st District in the House of Representatives.

Following are a few more news items from that edition:

Friday, Nov. 5, 1948 – Ukiah Dispatch Democrat

• Court House bonds have safe majority

Mendocino County went for Dewey and Scudder, elected George W. Decker of Fort Bragg to the board of supervisors, re-elected Guy Redwine and unless 353 absentee ballots upset the present count, voted $580,000 in bonds for a new courthouse and jail.

Unofficial total of the vote on the courthouse bonds is “Yes” 7029, “No” 3417, according to County Clerk James Broaddus. The two-thirds majority required to carry the proposition is 6964, which gives a leeway of 65 more votes than needed.

• Willits telephone building started

Construction started last week on a new telephone central office building at Willits, forerunner to the installation of dial telephone service for that exchange.

The new building will be of frame construction, located on Pearl street between Humboldt and Pennsylvania. William S. Rapp, Santa Rosa building contractor, will do the work.

The company expects to complete the building in March of next year, after which installation of dial equipment will start.

• County property exempt

The state board of equalization has announced property exemptions in Mendocino county, showing that of the total property assessed for taxes, $983,585 is exempt. Bulk of the exemptions, the board said, are for veterans, 1193 of whom own $983,585 worth of tax free property.

• County invites bids to improve airport lights

At the request of Southwest Airways, Inc. the board of supervisors will improve the lighting at Mendocino County Airport near Albion to enable the airways company to land its scheduled night flights without hazard.

The board in session Monday, voted to advertise for bids for the new lighting installation which will be opened December 1 at 2 p.m.

The board also sold school bonds for Willits districts to Bank of America, at 2 1/2 percent interest from 1949 to 1964, and 2 1/4 percent from 1965 to 1973, with a bonus of $9.00. Terms were the same for the $250,000 elementary school and $125,000 high school issues.

• This boy needs help

Allan Brown, the 12-year-old boy who was accidentally shot in the head last September, has so far recovered that he can be outdoors if someone will be kind enough to loan him a wheelchair. The boy needs to get out as much as possible to speed his recovery and if there is an unused wheelchair in the neighborhood the donor will be doing a mighty good turn by telephoning Mr. or Mrs. Fred Orr. They will do the rest. Phone 604 or 200.

• Cub Pack 46 to meet

At the Presbyterian church Friday evening at 7:30 there will be a meeting of Cub Pack No. 46 which all cubs are asked to attend. All cubs must be accompanied to meetings by one or both parents.

CATCH OF THE DAY, Wednesday, November 23, 2022

DANIEL BARTOLOMEI, Lucerne/Ukiah. DUI causing bodily injury.

FLASH BLANTON, Fort Bragg. “Fail Reg Gain/LV Resid,” child neglect/abandonment.

CLIFFORD CASTILLO, Point Arena. Disorderly conduct-alcohol.

AMANDA DEARTH, Fort Bragg. Child neglect/abandonment.

MYLZ DYKES, Willits. Evasion, resisting.

ALDEN LARVIE, Ukiah. Disorderly conduct-alcohol, more than an ounce of pot, vandalism, failure to appear, probation revocation.

ANGELICA PEDROZA, Laytonville. DUI.

MARCOS RODRIGUEZ-TURNER, Ukiah. Parole violation.

MARILYN DAVIN: I read the Catch of the Day with growing dismay as more scary-looking women charged with domestic abuse and other violent crimes stare back at me. I’ve noticed lately that current commercials featuring work environments invariably show a determined woman ordering around groups of hapless, sexless male underlings. And so-called “action” flicks, in a misguided (in my opinion) and perverted nod to “diversity” show violent, heavily armed female leads to be every bit as murderous as their male counterparts of days gone by. I remember in the distant past something about gender equality bringing out the best in both genders, not the worst.

GIVE IT A REST, LULU

Subject: Cut the bullshit

From: "Lulu LaFlamme" <lulzylu000@gmail.com>

To: ava@pacific.net

Cc: "Lulu LaFlamme" <lulzylu000@gmail.com>

"Lulu Schwartz" <bestpartygirl1000@gmail.com>

"Stephen Schwartz" <sulejmanaga@yahoo.com>

I won't read your self-serving guff, old man. You posted a slur about my mental state and an insult about my body. That makes you an accomplice in a HIPAA violation. You directly and deliberately incited an unhinged Jewhater against my family. These are attacks on me as a transwoman. Nobody thinks differently except fascists like you.

I deny your right to degrade me and my family. I will deal with you consequentially. As you say, you are proud to have no friends. My neighbors side with me; the FBI and SFPD protect me.

Didn't see any of this coming, did you?

Thanks for getting Blankfort on the record attacking @ntifa. That's priceless. But I think you deserve breaking of your fingers, one by one, with a hammer. That's for disgracing the journalistic profession. Not that I could or would do it. But since you incited against me, why shouldn't I do the same to you?

So much time, so much of your nonsense.

Times changed.

Lulu

‘THEY WERE IN TEARS’: Unruly fans force California high schools to take action

by Connor Letourneau

For a week after she was the victim of a racist taunt during a girls soccer regional championship game in March, Ciara Wilson barely left her house.

The soccer field had long been her haven. Now, as video of the heckling went viral, the Buchanan High School (Fresno County) senior was missing school to emotionally recover.

“I told her to just take the time she needed,” Ciara’s mother, Rachel Wilson, told The Chronicle. “It was so tough. The spotlight was on her.”

Since spectators began returning to sporting events last year after a 15-month, pandemic-related absence, numerous incidents of fan misconduct at all levels have made national news. Northern California high schools are no exception. With the rate of episodes involving bad fan behavior seemingly at an all-time high, the California Interscholastic Federation has implemented multiple guidelines to foster a safer game-day environment for student-athletes, coaches and referees.

The question is whether those changes will be enough to prevent incidents like the one Wilson endured and bolster lagging officiating numbers. Dave Cutaia, assigning secretary for the Contra Costa Football Officials Association, said poor fan behavior has been the No. 1 reason more and more referees have quit in recent months.

Editor’s note

The CCFOA has had to bring in officials from other regions and use four-referee crews instead of the usual five. Even then, several Bay Area high school football games were postponed this season because of a lack of officials.

“The numbers just aren’t there, and that’s really the case in every association in California and the U.S.,” Cutaia said. “To officiate a freshman game, you get paid $72. I don’t know a lot of people who are going to go out there for $72 and listen to somebody insult or berate them for no good reason.”

More than a dozen Northern California high school referees, coaches and administrators contacted for this story saidthey’ve noticed fan behavior worsen over the past five years. Just in the past 12 months, there have been a slew of reported incidents involving racist taunts, fighting in the stands, and parents threatening players, officials or coaches.

Cell-phone videos and social media ensure that some episodes that might have otherwise gone overlooked will receive public attention. In May, video went viral of Buhach Colony High School (Merced County) parents confronting and fighting an umpire in the parking lot after a baseball game.

But given that the circumstances around each episode have varied, it can be difficult to pinpoint the specific reasons behind the decline in spectator decorum.

Rafael Sevilla, the athletic director and varsity co-ed soccer coach at Fall River High School in McArthur (Shasta County), said he believes the proliferation of travel-ball teams is partly to blame.

A study from Wintergreen Research estimated the pre-pandemic value of the U.S. youth-sports economy, which encompasses everything from private instruction to apps that organize leagues, at $19.2 billion. With parents investing more money than ever in their children’s athletic success, they sometimes forget that high school sports are supposed to be about fun and personal growth.

There is also the fact that club sporting events are less regulated than high school ones. After so much time at Amateur Athletic Union games, some parents might be surprised to see that the jawing that was acceptable at a summer tournament can get them ejected at their kids’ high school game.

Then there is the matter of the COVID-19 pandemic. Studies suggest that an extended absence from the classroom hurt learning, and many high school coaches believe the same is true for fan behavior.

It’s not just that all that time at home made people less comfortable in social situations. According to the World Health Organization, anxiety and depression spiked by 25% in the U.S. during the pandemic. This could help explain why some fans appear more irritable.

“We know that the pandemic caused more dramatic symptoms in emotional disorders like anxiety and depression,” said Dr. Vernon Williams, a sports neurologist at Cedars-Sinai Kerlan-Jobe Institute in Los Angeles. “When those things are present, people will respond differently to the same kind of stressors and pressures that they had previously been exposed to. They won’t have the same kind of resilience.”

Ron Nocetti, the CIF’s executive director, has seen incidents of bad fan behavior throughout his three-plus decades working in high school sports. But he said that he has heard about more problems with spectators lately, which he attributes to what he calls a “trickle-down effect.”

Seldom do more than a couple of days pass without an episode of fan misconduct in pro or college sports capturing national attention. Just in November, an LSU football fan was ejected for refusing to leave the end zone after his team’s upset of Alabama; a fan at that same game was arrested for assaulting a police officer; Premier League team Southampton FC tossed 120 fans from a game against Everton for bad behavior, and 17 Wisconsin students were ejected from the Badgers’ football win over Maryland.

“If you look at college sporting events and professional sporting events, behavior over time has deteriorated,” Nocetti said. “I think it has trickled down to the high school level. With our schools, we need to continue to reinforce that this is education-based athletics.

“If you think behaving inappropriately in the stands is going to be accepted in high school sports by our administrators any longer, that’s just not the case.”

In May 2020, while high school sports were shuttered amid the pandemic, the CIF introduced a policy that any fan ejected from one of its high school games also must miss his or her team’s next game. Those suspensions increase the more a fan is tossed.

Public-address announcers are required to read a PSA before games that outlines punishments for bad fan behavior. To curb incidents, the CIF started handing out a “sportsmanship toolkit” to member schools this past fall that includes an online sportsmanship course, code-of-conduct forms and public-service announcements.

Nocetti said feedback from schools indicates that those adjustments have been helpful for many coaches and administrators. Though Cutaia remains dismayed by the plummeting number of officials, he has seen signs that fans are more aware of the problem.

After a handful of football games this season, parents and students sought him out to shake his hand and thank him for his work — efforts that rarely occurred before the pandemic. It helps that some school administrators have gone beyond CIF requirements to improve fan decorum.

During Fall River High’s fall sports meeting in August, Sevilla told parents that anyone asked to leave a game won’t be allowed back at a school-sanctioned sporting event unless they complete an online course about fan behavior.

“I had a bunch of people looking at me like I was crazy,” said Sevilla, who had seen many incidents of unruly fans in nearby communities since spectators began returning to games post-pandemic. “It just set the tone.”

After reading the CIF-provided PSA at Fall River High games last school year, Sevilla figured that the message might mean more coming from the student-athletes. Ten drafts later, he had a three-paragraph script welcoming fans to the game, reminding them that both teams deserve support and respect, and asking spectators to “please remember that this game is for us, the students.”

While visiting Fall River High in late August as part of his annual tour of the CIF’s various sections, Nocetti became emotional as he watched students read that updated PSA before a volleyball match and a football game. Today, Sevilla’s script is read at high schools throughout the state.

“I got goosebumps when I first heard kids read it because this was one thing that education-based athletics does for our kids,” Nocetti said. “It puts kids in positions of leadership. It puts them in positions of influence. It helps athletes take ownership of their own event.”

Still, work remains. The incident Wilson experienced at the Division I NorCal Regional girls soccer championship game in March underscored the issues in prep sports — not just with fan behavior, but with officials and school administrators.

Buchanan High had overcome ACL injuries to three starters and a COVID-19 outbreak to reach the title game. On Buchanan’s second penalty kick, a loud barking noise came from Oak Ridge’s stands as Daisy Torres — a Hispanic player — missed her shot.

With penalty kicks tied at 1-1, a gorilla-like hoot came from Oak Ridge’s crowd just as Wilson was about to strike the ball. She was the only African American on either team. After making the penalty kick, Wilson — a Fresno Bee Co-Player of the Year who declined to be interviewed for this story — broke down in tears, her hands trembling as she tried to process what just happened.

While her father and older brother walked toward Oak Ridge’s stands and demanded to see who did the heckling, Buchanan High coach Jasara Gillette pleaded for referees to stop the game until the taunt’s perpetrator was removed. This wasn’t the first time someone from the predominantly white school in an affluent suburb of Sacramento had harassed student-athletes of color.

During a girls’ playoff basketball game against McClatchy High School (Sacramento County) in 2016, Oak Ridge fans directed racial and body-shaming jeers at McClatchy’s Asian American players. Referees are instructed to pause the action in such situations until a school administrator has removed the offending fans. If the fans can’t be removed for whatever reason, officials are supposed to suspend the game and leave.

But during that Division I NorCal Regional girls’ soccer championship game, officials continued with the penalty kicks after two racist taunts. Gillette knew then that her team had no chance of winning.

“Our players were completely distraught,” said Gillette, whose squad lost the penalty-kick shootout 4-2. “Penalty kicks require all your focus, and they were in tears. The whole situation was completely ridiculous.”

Oak Ridge principal Aaron Palm told The Chronicle that the student responsible for the heckling received “steep consequences,” but declined to reveal the punishment, citing minor privacy laws. “We understand that we have to be better,” Palm wrote in an email.

In the incident’s immediate aftermath, Wilson struggled to handle all the newfound attention: interviews with local TV stations, numerous shares of the video, racist online comments. After staying home for a week, she returned to school and tried to move past her trauma.

As a freshman on Fresno State women’s soccer team this past season, Wilson started eight games, recording two assists and playing 679 minutes.

“You can tell she still has feelings about everything that happened,” Rachel Wilson said. “It still weighs on her chest a bit.

“Life moves on, but we still live with it. We still carry it with us.”

(SF Chronicle)

AN ARMY VETERAN who was attending the drag show at club Q with his wife and daughter chased the gunman down, tackled him, took the gun, then beat the shooter to a pulp with his own gun.

That hero, Richard M. Fierro, owns a brewery. His wife is the brewmaster. They have merchandise, you know what to do.

THE TRUE STATE OF THE NATION, an on-line comment: Sometimes I agree with you (not always let’s be clear!) Perhaps our democracy is dead due to a combination of 1) Dumbed-down dummies who can’t be expected to vote intelligently on complex issues but also 2) Manipulative politicians and the interests behind them who have decided it’s easier to keep them dumb and manipulate them to vote against their own interests! Thankfully we have a republic and so we have a constitution and Bill of Rights that cannot be simply voted away by the hordes of dummies who go to the polls and vote straight party lines because…well….it’s all too complicated so they just pick a team and pledge loyalty. I was disgusted as a young man watching the War on Drugs sap our country’s wealth and I am still disgusted by the gullibility and idiocy of the average American voter. Sheep led to slaughter, so easily tricked and convinced. On a good day it cracks me up. But most days it’s just sad. Because it means that democracy cannot really work. It is a farce…a farce to entertain the masses while the wealthy steal all the loot. Bread and circuses to keep them occupied….

DEAR LIBERALS: STOP YOUR SMUG CELEBRATION OF THE MID-TERMS

by Paul Street

Liberals and some progressives are feeling smug and self-satisfied over the mid-term elections.

How grotesque.

Yes, there was no red wave. The at least non-fascist major capitalist party, the Democrats, will keep the US Senate for two more years. MAGA candidates backed by the malignant narcissi-fascist Donald Trump did badly, something that is helping cost him support from leading Republican politicos and billionaire donors and raising questions about his viability as a 2024 presidential candidate. A bunch of ghastly election-denier/-stealer MAGA candidates vying for offices in charge of electoral processes and machinery (secretary of state, attorney general, and governor) lost in key contested states where they would have been able to monkey with the next presidential election.

Elections and Rule of Law are “Incidental” for the Amerikaner Base

Super, but guess what? In the United States as elsewhere, fascism is a ferocious and many-sided movement beneath and beyond elections. And our ugly Amerikaners love losing and being out of power. Electoral loss or stalemate doesn’t subdue or restrain them one bit. To the contrary, it feeds their sense of white-patriarchal-Christian-nationalist victimization, encouraging them to double down on conspiratorial madness and the use of violence to keep the ungodly liberal-“radical left” and nonwhite enemy at bay. Keep an eye out for escalated right wing insanity and mayhem.

In a brilliant post-midterm essay titled “Donald Trump is (Still) the President of White America,” Erin Aubry Kaplan makes a critical point worthy of lengthy quotation:

“Trump was, and continues to be, the chief executive not of a nation, or of the Republican Party, or even of a cult, but of a culture — namely a culture of white supremacy…This is actually worse than it sounds. Even very ‘woke’ Americans tend to see white supremacy as an isolated dynamic synonymous with racism, the ‘bad’ America. But what many people don’t realize is that white supremacy is a culture that is much broader and deeper than that. It is about racialized power, an assumed authority of white people (chiefly men) to set and enforce the social and moral order as they see fit, often in the service of values that on their face sound noble, like tradition or family…In this culture, the presidency, electoral politics, the Constitution, rule of law, democratic ideals, liberalism, decency — all are incidental. They can never matter as much as white peoples’ ultimate right to power.”

Yes. The nation’s not-so- “semi” fascist base isn’t chastened by mere election losses or (as in the 2022 “red ripple”) disappointments. It’s about white male power as such, in and of itself, with or without the niceties of bourgeois democracy and rule of law.

Fascist Elites Increasingly See Trump as a Barrier to Fascist Rule

In the meantime, hard right oligarchs and politicos stepping away from Trump (for now?) are doing so not because they have abandoned neofascism but because they increasingly see him as an obstacle to right-wing authoritarian rule. Their new rising Republi-fascist star Ron DeSantis cleaned up in his Florida re-election. He may well turn out to be a more lethal menace to what’s left of democracy and common good than Trump.

Trump Lives

It’s not clear that any other (post-republican) Republican can break Trump’s sick hold on the nation’s demented white Republi-fascist base, which holds disproportionate sway in the presidential primaries. Can more button-downed fascists like DeSantis or Glenn Youngkin really challenge the weirdly charismatic psychopath Donald “Grab’em by the pussy” Trump as “the president of white [male] Amerika” – the “chosen one” atop the deranged Amerikaner cohort?

At the same time, the “Pied Piper” Democrats (who spent many millions of dollars on MAGA-Republican candidates in the 2022 mid-terms) may well want Trump on top of the Republican ticket in 2024. The poor performance of Trump’s mid-term candidates has certainly encouraged that reckless “strategic” orientation, which matches up nicely with Merrick Garland’s thoroughly unnecessary appointment of a special prosecutor to investigate Trump yet more thoroughly long after the wannabe fascist strongman should have been locked up for the rest of his life (if not put on federal Death Row) for obviously committing numerous grave high state felonies.

Haunted House

And, by the way, the Republi-fascists may have under-performed in the mid-terms by the usual historical standards for the party not holding the White House, but they did not lose. There was no “blue wave” either. Two hundred and ten 2020 election-deniers won their mid-term races. Fascistic QAnony reptiles like Marjorie Taylor-Green, Paul Gosar, Matt Gaetz, Lauren Boebert, and Ron Johnson (among other Republi-fascist monsters) were re-elected to Congress.

The rightmost major party won both a majority of seats in the US House and (by a good margin) the national popular vote in the US House elections. Right-wing control of the House will mean more than just blocking supposedly progressive Democratic bills and shutting down the House January 6th committee’s investigation of Trump’s attempted fascist coup. It will also mean constant right-wing “investigation” and harassment of public officials and others who are targeted enemies of the vile right-wing agenda.

The recklessly imperialist octogenarian Joe “Nothing Will Fundamentally Change” (his promise to Wall Street donors in 2019) Biden will use Republi-fascist rule of the House as a welcome excuse for the absence of decent policy initiatives the Democratic establishment doesn’t really want and as justification for his longtime pastime of “reaching across the aisle” to “get things done” with racist and sexist arch-reactionaries we won’t call “semi-fascists” anymore.

‘Moore v. Harper’Means Legislative Control is Enough in Contested States

The Republi-fascists naturally retain firm control of the US Supreme Court. The nation’s top and absurdly powerful judicial body will soon hear oral arguments for Moore v. Harper – a horrific case only taken up because the Court is now a Christian white nationalist Handmaid to neofascist consolidation. The Alito-Thomas-Kavanaugh-Gorsuch-Coney-Barrett ruling in Moore v. Harper will likely give state legislatures the openly authoritarian power to cancel popular presidential votes in their jurisdictions. If the far-right Supremes give a thumbs up to the insane “independent state legislature theory,” state-level Republi-fascists holding legislative majorities in key contested states like Wisconsin, North Carolina, and Pennsylvania (some state vote counts are incomplete as I write this) won’t need their states’ governors, attorney generals, and/or secretaries of states on board to constitutionally monkey-wrench Electoral College slates in 2024-25.

Chilling Media-Politics Deletions and Distortions

There’s plenty more that ought to stop childish and smug liberal and even left cartwheeling over the midterm elections. In dominant media election coverage and commentary, the Republicans were routinely and absurdly normalized and misrepresented as a “working-class” and “populist” party – preposterous descriptions that help cloak their fascist and arch-capitalist essence.

The apocalyptic horseman of nuclear war (actively promoted by Biden over Ukraine) raised barely a ripple in the 2022 elections (insofar as it was an issue, the neofascists brought it up in accord with their attachment to the fascist strongman Vladimir Putin!). Also largely missing from the election – beyond the boundaries of acceptable debate – were the three other and related horsemen ecocide, pandemicide, and, well, fascism. Also missing as usual were the needs and aspirations of human beings living outside the United States, the most globally powerful and destructive nation in world history.

Almost as sickening as these deletions was the media-politics culture’s routine description of the U.S. American political system as a “democracy.” That is a widely inaccurate term for the US-American regime, with its absurdly powerful and outrageously malapportioned Senate, its badly gerrymandered federal and state legislative districts, its openly undemocratic presidential Electoral College, its absurdly powerful and lifetime-appointed Supreme Court, its plutocratic campaign finance regime, its corporate and commercial media oligopoly, and its giant unaccountable military empire. Beneath and around all this is the underlying capitalist class dictatorship’s death grip on the nation’s material-economic base – a command that is both reflected in and reinforced by the nation’s bourgeois political and ideological superstructure.

The Sick Abortion Cynicism of the Dismal Dems

Reflections on class rule (no small matter!) aside, the liberals’ mid-term cartwheels look to me like a big raised middle finger aimed at millions of women and girls stuck in red (brown) states where the female bondage of forced motherhood is now in full force. Please forgive women and feminists living in Texas, Florida, Oklahoma, Alabama and other abortion-prohibiting/female-enslaving states for not joining in liberal celebrations over the 2022 mid-terms.

The most disgusting thing I heard from any politico after the midterm elections was Joe Biden using the Republicans’ takeover of the House to say that that he and his fellow Democrats won’t “have the votes” to act on his pre-election lection “promise” to sign legislation codifying Roe v. Wade as national law. How F’ng gullible does the newly minted octogenarian Biden think we are? He made this statement and his pre-election “promise” on the transparently disingenuous premise that the post-midterms US Senate would have the sixty votes required (under the Senate filibuster that the Democrats refuse to undo) to get such a bill past the nation’s deeply reactionary upper chamber. That was never a possibility. The “promise” was part of the cynical game that the dismal Dems have been playing with abortion for at least half a century.

Look, folks, Biden and the Dems used the abortion issue to limit their damage in the 2022 mid-terms. They continue as before the election to do nothing to make things right for tens of millions of women and girls across the nation. Looking forward to Roe’s death as a vehicle for raising funds and winning votes, the Dem establishment and its allied “choice” organizations (Planned Parenthood and NARAL) refused to mobilize masses to stop the well-telegraphed Dobbs v. Jackson decision from going down. As he did on the day that the Court overturned Roe v. Wade in the Dobbs decision last June 24^th, moreover, Octo-Joe still has but refuses to deploy his power to issue executive orders proclaiming the war on abortion a national public health emergency and mandating the provision of free, safe, and legal abortions on federal lands and military bases across the entire nation, Christian fascist “red” (brown) states included.

Rise Up 4 Abortion Rights (RU4AR), the nation’s leading and militant abortion rights organization was and remains correct. The cynical “blue wave” “strategy” of exploiting the war on abortion to “win the mid-terms” was always aligned against serious defense and advance women’s right to control their own reproductive lives. Forced motherhood is female enslavement and we need a militant Latin American-style Green Wave social movement beneath and beyond the “killing confines” (RU4AR co-founder Sunsara Taylor’s excellent phrase) of US electoral politics to beat it back.

(Paul Street’s latest book is This Happened Here: Amerikaners, Neoliberals, and the Trumping of America (London: Routledge, 2022). CounterPunch.org)

I THINK IT'S PURE, raw human nature to want to watch a fight. Humans have been fighting from day one. It has always been the survival of the fitness. The most powerful guy becomes the leader and even if you hate him, he won and he is the leader. Look at boxers, fighters, gladiators. I knew this guy when I was rodeoing and he was the most horrible guy. He'd come over to your house and leech off of you, eat all your food. If you tried to run him off, he beat you up. He's the kind of guy they make movies about. He's got a strong personality, good looking, he always had women chasing him around. But he was just a horrible person. Maybe we don't think of it consciously, but subconsciously we wish we had that kind of a power over people.

If you met most heroes from movies in real life you wouldn't want to be around them. The kind of people they make movies about are generally not nice. Maybe we are drawn to the power that they have, being able to take over situations in ways you wish you could in your own life. I think everybody has a certain amount of voyeurism in them. When I was rodeoing we saw the most god-awful wrecks all the time. You'd see horses and bulls flip over on people and if you saw the guy wasn't hurt too bad you would just die laughing. You just enjoy that calamity. But you didn't want to see anybody get hurt.

I'm not a big action movie fan, I never really cared to watch them. I've always liked more of the psychological action. I'd rather see somebody stabbed than get run over by a car or blown up. It's something that people can relate to a lot more and it will affect people more in the long run. As little action as there is on the series 'Deadwood,' I think it's one of the best action shows I have ever seen. I have learned more about doing stunts from David Milch than any other director. I learned about how to affect somebody psychologically during action. He said you always have to either make it over faster than anybody expects or take it past the point where they say, "I've seen enough, I cannot watch anymore of this."

Mike Watson

ON LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY

Wish I could remember what all those keys sound like. I used to play Trumpet in high school, so I’ve been watching some trumpet videos on YouTube of late. A relatively new guy – Wayne Bergeron – is pretty damn good, but for my money Doc Severinsen is still the best I’ve ever heard. Not only can he play with infinite presence and clarity in the upper registers up above C4 all day long, but he can employ all the tricks of the trade – lip trills, double and triple tonguing, note slides and slurs, and extended hold at the end of phrases – up there in rarified air too. His lungs had to have been enormous. To listen to a trumpet player of similar talent live is an opportunity that no should ever miss. They can literally fill a room with their volume, and by volume I don’t just mean decibel level. They have a tone and a presence that fills the room in all registers and decibel levels.

SIX CORPORATIONS CONTROL 90% OF THE MEDIA OUTLETS IN AMERICA. 

The illusion of choice and objectivity.

Elite is a word we use in our daily conversations but few people probably know the origin and the history of the word. Elites (French Elite, from Latin eligere, to select or to sort out) are a small group of powerful people who hold a disproportionate amount of wealth, privilege, political power, or skill in society. This elite class, which also includes the Big Tech companies, now controls what we read, watch, or listen to. There is even a new browser extension tool that shows how the Big Tech giants are invading your privacy. 

Today, their impacts are more felt in our online news intake and media consumption habits. 37 years ago, 50 companies control the media in America. Fast forward to 2011, American news outlets are controlled only by 6 powerful corporations. Back in 2018, Jim Morrison, a singer, songwriter, and poet, who served as the lead vocalist of the rock band, once said: “Whoever controls the media, controls the mind.”…

techstartups.com/2020/09/18/6-corporations-control-90-media-america-illusion-choice-objectivity-2020/

A GREAT MIGRATION

Editor,

There seems to be a problem in Taiwan. I have solved it. Taiwan placed itself on the market asking Mexico, "Wouldn't you like to have us?" Mexico replied, "Yes, but you are too expensive." Switzerland asked for a discount and monthly payments. A merger was obtained with the ABC countries. Now known as the Republic of Argentina — Taiwan, Brazil — Taiwan and Chile — Taiwan. Following was the greatest migration since Mississippi Delta to Chicago and Detroit. Thousands of Latinos moved to Taiwan and thousands of Taiwanese moved to South America each month. Don't hesitate to call upon me for international unsolved problems. Two day service in Willits. Elsewhere one week.

Ralph Bostrom

Willits

UKRAINE, WEDNESDAY 23 NOVEMBER

Russian attacks plunge Ukraine, parts of Moldova into darkness

Nation faces blackouts as rockets rain down on several cities, with at least four people reported killed in Kyiv.

A barrage of Russian attacks on Ukrainian infrastructure has knocked out power across large areas of the war-torn country as well as parts of neighbouring Moldova.

In the capital Kyiv, where the water supply was also cut, at least four civilians were killed and nine wounded, authorities said, when a rocket hit a two-storey building on Wednesday.

Multiple regions reported attacks in quick succession as Moscow pursues its campaign to debilitate Ukraine’s essential services ahead of the looming winter.

Before the latest wave of attacks, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy had said Russian strikes had already damaged about half of Ukraine’s infrastructure.

Ukrainian officials say they believe Russian President Vladimir Putin is hoping that the misery of unheated and unlit homes in the cold and dark of winter will turn public opinion against a continuation of the war, but they say it is having the opposite effect and is strengthening Ukrainian resolve.

Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said Wednesday that “one of the capital’s infrastructure facilities has been hit” and there were “several more explosions in different districts” of the city.

Power outages also affected the northern city of Kharkiv, the western city of Lviv, the Chernihiv region in northern Ukraine and the Odessa region in the south.

Anton Gerashchenko, a Ukrainian ministerial adviser, noted that the attacks came moments after the European Parliament declared Russia a “state sponsor of terrorism”.

LET’S TALK TURKEY

Gobble-gobble, gulp-gulp,
A lug of potatoes, a bushel of beans,
Giblets in gravy to burst your seams,
Chomp with pomp, slurp and burp,
Guzzle and swig, grunt like a pig,
Smack your lips and close your eyes,
Here comes grandma’s pumpkin pies,
Exotic ripe fruits swimming in cream,
Enough to surfeit your wildest dreams,
A feast for your gluttony, and here’s to greed,
Take all you want and more than you need,
But try to be thankful and always say please.

— Bruce McEwen