Mendocino County Today: Sunday, August 27, 2023

TEMPERATURES will be near to slightly below normal across Northwest California during much of the next seven days. In addition, breezy northwest winds are forecast to occur Tuesday and Wednesday. Late this week cool showery conditions are possible across the region. (NWS)

STEPHEN DUNLAP (Fort Bragg): On the coast this Sunday morning a bit cooler 56F with fog. Fog is expected again tomorrow, then clearing skies as a breeze picks up on Tuesday. Then generally clear into next weekend.

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ANDERSON VALLEY UNIFIED NEWS

Dear Anderson Valley Community,

The second week rolled by. I saw an amazing thing this week…Students in the high school library were studying and checking out books. We are resetting a culture that reading is important. Super excited. They have no stamina for it, but we want to reset now that phones are not so omnipresent. I wish to commend Tere Malfavon and MaryAnn Grezenda for resetting the library tone. The Zen Den is a great place for high schoolers to socialize, so that is always an option at break and lunch. The library is an intervention support center and academic space.

Another shout out to Matt Bullington and Ali Cook at the high school for becoming dual enrollment instructors for Mendocino College. This provides even more college units for our students to earn BEFORE they graduate high school and makes our program competitive with other county programs. My goal is to get half of our staff dual enrollment qualified at the high school. Ruby Suarez and Stefani Ewing are also currently eligible. What if every student at AV graduated with 24 units….How cool would that be?

At the elementary, joy and excitement is in the air. The after school program featuring Aikido and our partnership with Gabriel Frank’s musicians has begun. These are supremely qualified and accomplished experts in the field and they are there to teach our kids! Thank you Ms. Swett!

The elementary septic is just awaiting the tank delivery scheduled for mid-September and then it will be a quick thirty days to completion. All classrooms now have working water. We have one classroom sewer lateral to replace when the tank is put in. Miguel is banging out the painting on that site and a huge shout out to Kelsey Pearl for creating an intervention classroom to support academics and de-escalate behaviors. Retiree Elizabeth Wyant is partnering with us to screen students K-3 by next year for Dyslexia. Elementary staff are implementing, with fidelity, the new Benchmark reading program. This is good for achievement.

Our big news of the week is that seven high level state officials toured our sites along with our architect, staff, board members, and facilities application consultant to see what we can do to get money to replace these ancient buildings. The third graders wrote amazing “wish list” letters. We have brought in $900,000 in extra hardship money from the State for the septic expected to be approved in the September State Allocation Board. We need a new gym, agricultural building, and shop. This is a slog of bureaucracy. You should be able to walk around and see the rot and decay and say, “yes” this needs to be replaced, but that’s not how things work especially in small towns with not much political clout. I assure you, facilities in Carlsbad, Elk Grove, Healdsburg, and Mendocino don’t look like this. We will rise up and get it done, but it will be hard. One CDE official already stepped in with my plea with the onerous Department of State Architect and negotiated a requirement for a $250,000 sprinkler requirement reduced to a two hour fire wall. I also have to give a shout out to Congressman Huffman’s staff members for being available to me whenever I call for help.

Two years ago when I joined you, I had no idea how deep the infrastructure needs were. I thought we were going to paint and it would all be good. All is not good yet…. I may ask you to write your opinions in the coming months to rally support. The shop building is super problematic.

So grateful for our parents/guardians/grandparents that are part of our Panther Squad. We love it. Talk to the office and come on campus to create positive relationships! We have some new sports drivers too! New vans are in the fleet. Sign up!

Have a safe and happy weekend.

In gratitude to your kids for their respect and kindness,

Louise Simson, Superintendent

Anderson Valley Unified School District

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WENTWORTH VINEYARDS ANNOUNCES ACQUISITION OF ANDERSON VALLEY'S ABEL VINEYARD

Site to Expand Wentworth Wine Production Capacity to 3,000 Cases Per Year

by Wentworth Vineyards

ELK, Calif., (Aug. 24, 2023) - Today, Wentworth Vineyards, announced the acquisition of Abel Vineyard in the Anderson Valley American Viticultural Area (AVA). With the acquisition, Wentworth Vineyards Estate Holdings now total 80 acres with 25+ planted acres across three sites in the Anderson Valley and Mendocino Ridge AVAs.

The business plans to expand production to 3,000 cases of Estate Grown Pinot Noir and Chardonnay within the next three years to meet increased domestic distribution demand and enter new export markets.

Wentworth Vineyards produces terroir-driven, organically farmed and Estate Grown wines. The business began in 2014 when Mark X. Wentworth bought raw land in the Mendocino Ridge AVA to plant Wentworth Vineyard and has expanded since with new planted blocks in the Mendocino Ridge as well as at Nash Mill Vineyard in the Deep End (Western portion) of the Anderson Valley.

“Abel is an excellent late-ripening Deep End Anderson Valley site which, perfectly compliments our other coastally-influenced, cool-climate vineyards and significantly expands our production capacity” said Owner-Winemaker, Mark X. Wentworth. “We will maintain our business’s commitment to Estate Grown wines made from grapes grown near the Mendocino Coast and scale-up to meet increasing demand for the wines we produce.”

Originally planted in 1997, Abel is located just 11 miles from the Pacific Ocean and is home to diverse Pinot Noir massal selections spread across 11 planted acres, many of which trace their biological origins to world-renowned historic vineyards in Burgundy’s Côte de Nuits. Abel has been a vineyard designate source for well-known California producers including Copain, Dupuis, and Lioco.

Wentworth Vineyards is looking forward to adding Abel Pinot Noir to the range of Estate vineyard designate WENTWORTH wines as well as expanding production of the declassified (though Estate Grown) Anderson Valley Pinot Noir bottling.

Wentworth plans to plant 3 acres of Chardonnay and an acre of Aligote at Abel over the next two years and will begin to farm the site organically following completion of the 2023 harvest. The business will sell a portion of the grapes from Abel in 2024, and 2025 to select producers for production of vineyard designate bottlings

(winebusiness.com)

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READY FOR THE LAKE COUNTY FAIR

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STONEWALLING & DUCKING THE ISSUES

by Mark Scaramella

The only mention of the pending employee strike (possibly in early September) due to the County’s failure to provide even a token cost of living increase offer to the nearly 700 member Service Employees Union members is this now familiar closed session agenda item: “Pursuant to Government Code Section 54957.6 - Conference with Labor Negotiator - Agency Negotiators.” 

In July the Service Employees International Union Local 1021 voted to authorize a strike by a whopping 94%. 

So far the County has offered nothing but a de-facto pay cut (health care premiums are going up; no pay increases have been proposed). Discussions among union members and their reps are ongoing. Options range from a strike for few days around Labor Day to perhaps something longer. A short strike might not be enough of a wake-up call on the one hand, but longer than that will strain union members on the low end of the pay scale who are paycheck to paycheck and may not be able to afford staying off the job for long.

Despite the near constant gripes from Supervisors McGourty and Williams about not having enough financial information to offer even a token cost of living raise, they have chosen to cloister themselves in their virtual offices and work on an ephemeral pet peeve “Department of Finance” at least four years in the future (when there will be at least two new board members) instead of doing what they are supposed to be doing in their “budget ad hoc”: telling the Auditor-Controller-Treasurer-Tax Collector (ACTTC) what reports they want and putting her on the spot. (What they should ask for, of course, is departmental budgets vs. actual from the CEO and department heads.) At the last Board meeting in July, ACTTC Director Chamise Cubbison and Supervisor John Haschak reminded the Board that the McGourty/Williams ad hoc has not produced any report requests. All we got in response was McGourty whining about being too busy with the budget prep which, even if true, was two months ago now.

Williams denies that the County’s negotiating position is to “stall,” but that’s what they’re doing. Each month of stonewalling a cost of living raise means the Board saves tens of thousands of dollars. The longer they stall, the less they pay. 

How much would a pay raise really cost?

The County has about 1200 employees at a base pay averaging around $50,000 to $70,000 per year, many of them are in the $25,000 to $30,000 range. So in very round numbers each month they delay translates to $50,000 to $70,000 for each percentage increase they can delay. The County says each percentage increase is about $1 million a year for 1200 people. But we don’t think it’s that high. If you count the General Fund only — about a quarter of the total budget — the cost of a 1% raise for the general fund employees is about $15,000 to $20,000 per month which should be affordable. 

The CEO’s office insists that giving non-General Fund employees a raise (and billing the raises to the State and Federal Grants) would cost the General Fund some unknown amount because the managers of the non-General Fund employees, whose pay for some odd reason is not billed to the state and federal grants, would have to get proportionate raises too, a bogus argument on two counts. 1. Management and overhead should be billable to the grants, and 2. the management and department head bargaining units are subject to negotiation too; they need not be automatic raises.

Meanwhile the County continues to barely limp along trying to correct and pick up additional tax assessments and corresponding revenues in the dwindling hope that in two years they will have corrected some of the assessments (but not collected) for maybe half of the unassessed properties at most. But they have yet to demand or receive a written report on how that’s going and have shown no sense of urgency about it. 

At last report the County had a whopping $28 million reserve in the General Fund, i.e., a general reserve of around 30%, more than double what most counties carry. As we have said before, they could draw down that reserve while making a priority push on increased property tax collections and penalties and interest and easily cover the cost of a modest cost of living raise for General Fund employees. 

But as usual nobody has even asked the CEO’s office for these numbers so that they can be effectively dealt with in labor negotiations.

A slo-mo train wreck may not be as dramatic or destructive as a high-speed crash, but it still means the trains don’t move. 

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WE HADN’T REALIZED until this week that Supervisor Mulheren has her own on-line “Small business and non-profit social media marketing” business via facebook: Mulheren Marketing, aka Ukiah Valley Networking Agency which she is President of. Apparently, being a Supervisor doesn’t fill enough of her time or pay enough, to the extent that she needs a side hustle. “We know you want to spend time in your business with your customers. Leave the social media to us while you do what you really love. Custom graphics, social posts and management posts available. Send a message to start the conversation.” Maureen Mulheren, April, 2021. (Mulheren’s first month as supervisor was January of 2021. 707/391-3664

MULHEREN ALSO WROTE:

“Yesterday I was in a local thrift shop and saw a mama looking exhausted back to school shopping with a pre-teen and a teen and wanted to just hand her a flyer. If you have a teen that loves thrifting (even if they don’t its a great time to learn) please bring them to this event. There is always too much to go around so more people is better! Whether you need a couple of pieces because you are up or down a size, or you want to revamp your whole wardrobe you will find SOMETHING! I’ll just be honest though I am so afraid we are going to have a lot of leftovers. Please tell a friend that might be short on funds this year (especially if that friend is you) this is a judgement free zone you can take as much as you need. All sizes, styles and genders are welcome. Looking for an outfit for a one time event, do you have a new job, heading to a festival or concert? Whatever you are looking for we have it! And it will be one of a kind because its a swap. Also I am in my wearing comfortable shoe era so there will be lots of size 6.5 and 7 shoes that don’t quite fit my lifestyle. I am trying to reach out to every clothing closet and non-profit in town so please if your church or school has a clothes library please come and take a few bags for the closet and if you are a non-profit planning a yard sale lets talk leftovers. (I have already asked Hospice Thirft, the Ukiah Senior Center Thrift and Goodwill and they have all declined to take the leftovers). It would be better if you just came and took everything so I don’t have to figure out what to do with the extra clothes. I made this post public so please share.”

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FOOTBALL PLAYER OF THE WEEK

The AV Panther football team participated in a scrimmage at Potter Valley Friday evening. Although no points were recorded, they shut the other teams down! Player of the week is Gus Spacek pictured laying down on the right.

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ED NOTES

DOCTORATES in education are less meaningful than mumbly peg, which at least requires some manual dexterity. Anybody can get one who pays the class fees to listen to instructors who are also EED's. They've become so entrenched at high pay, they resist all reform. Used to be you could qualify for an admin credential simply by taking an exam. I took the test just to see how demanding it was. A California driver's license test was a lot harder.

THE EED's — pronounced as a scream like eek! — have become the proverbial hogs in the stream. They're so well paid they resist all reform, or doing anything that requires imagination and real effort. 

I THINK the reason why Boonville's remarkable school superintendent is so effective is because she was also successful in the free enterprise jungle prior to getting into public education. The typical EED has functioned in standard-free public school settings their entire working lives. The whole edu-gang ought to be very worried about AI, because most of them are eminently replaceable by robotics.

SUPERVISOR TED WILLIAMS:

On Line Comment: “It has been painful to watch the public criticism of the Auditor-Controller/Treasurer Tax Collector (ACTTC) in multiple forums, not just the BOS meetings.”

WILLIAMS REPLIED, “Earned.”

TYPICAL WILLIAMS. He just can't resist a gratuitous slam at the woman — Ms. Cubbison — he and his incompetent colleagues blame for the fiscal problems they created by merging two county functions into one understaffed office. 

NOW THAT DR. DOOHAN is ensconced in Lake County, Mendo's traditional public employment jv team, she's managed to move on from serving (sic) as Mendo's Public Health Officer, then pointless assistant public health officer (to Dr. Coren) during the covid lockdown, a lockdown applied to Mendo's small businesses only as Walmart and Costco operated with simple mask orders. Doohan got her job from her friend former Mendo CEO Angelo, which Doohan faithfully performed mostly from her home in San Diego. Doohan and Angelo, by the way, were involved in an attempt to pick up a few bucks in a real estate deal in Redwood Valley that was abandoned when its suspicious coziness became public.

ALL OF WHICH makes me wonder why outback counties need a public health officer at so much pay. What do they do? During the covid emergency our guy, Dr. Coren, since invisible and barely visible during the covid hysteria, issued weekly unreadable state communiques that went on for pages and pages and were read by exactly no one. Couldn't the “job” be rotated among Mendo's working medical people for much less money than people like Coren and Doohan get for doing not much of anything?

"THE GREAT REDWOOD TRAIL Agency (GRTA) did just solicit for a General Manager. Applications closed July 14th. Salary is $120-140k with a good benefits package. The GRTA board met last week, August 17th, and held interviews in closed session."

THE ABOVE is a "job" made in heaven for Mo Mulheren, a true believer in an invisible entity which, even by the standards of the ethereal, never will exist. The “job” is an obvious Democratic Party porker, and was probably created by the Trail's founder, soon to be termed-out State Senator, Mike McGuire, who, natch, is about to be appointed to the State Insurance Commission at big pay for showing up at a few meetings a year to ratify whatever extortionate schemes the insurance industry wants to foist off on Californians, if at all. These guys never leave. They just go on “serving.”

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BROCK ROGERS’ ‘PATH TO STATE PRISON’

Defendant Brock Adam Rogers, age 41, of Covelo, was sentenced Wednesday afternoon in the Mendocino County Superior Court to four years in state prison. He was remanded from the courtroom into the custody of the Sheriff for transportation to CDCR.

Rogers stands convicted by a June 2023 plea of felony assault with a deadly weapon, said felonious assault occurring just days before Thanksgiving 2022.

Rogers, through his private attorney, has repeatedly asserted during court proceedings his unsubstantiated belief that a long-time Washington State friend, former next-door neighbor, and black market marijuana associate may have “possibly” stolen an amount of their shared marijuana, an accusation that the victim adamantly denied from the very beginning.

When the defendant confronted the victim with his suspicions last November, the victim’s denial angered the defendant and he initiated methods to attempt to force the victim to recant and tell “the truth” that the defendant wanted to hear.

All the while calling out for help, the victim was falsely imprisoned in the defendant’s Lovell Street house, hog-tied, beat with a Japanese bokken (wooden sword), and had his cell phone stolen and driven away in order to prevent the victim from calling for help.

The victim suffered significant bruising from the beating, had to walk with a cane for two weeks after the attack, and now suffers from PTSD. Now living out-of-state, the victim reported that he still experiences almost daily flashbacks to that day that cause him sleep, stress, and anxiety issues.

By all accounts, the defendant’s ongoing relationship with marijuana has been problematic, causing him significant legal problems over the years … with those legal problems now culminating in this week’s commitment to state prison.

In 2004, when he was 22 years of age, the defendant was convicted of felony distribution of marijuana for sale in Snohomish County, Washington.

In 2006, when he was 23 years of age, the defendant was convicted of misdemeanor possession of more than an ounce of marijuana in Humboldt County, a conviction that violated the defendant’s Washington probation.

In 2010, the defendant was discovered cultivating marijuana while unlawfully armed with a shotgun at his then-Potter Valley residence. He was ultimately convicted in that case when he was 28 years of age of being a convicted felon in unlawful possession of a firearm, a felony.

In 2011, when he was 29 years of age, the defendant’s 2010 probation was violated for, among other things, again being in possession of marijuana.

In 2016, when he was 34 years of age, the defendant was convicted in Lake County of driving a motor vehicle under the influence of both alcohol and marijuana.

When asked by Probation in the current case about his employment history, defendant Rogers affirmed that one of his jobs — in addition to being a self-employed baker and self-employed glass artist — was as a self-employed “cannabis cultivation consultant” from 2014 to present in the Covelo area, a claim indirectly corroborated by the victim who reported that the defendant has been growing illegal marijuana “for over a decade.”

The defendant’s long-term marijuana involvement is also confirmed by the facts of an earlier murder prosecution wherein defendant Rogers admitted he was a marijuana “consultant” for a Covelo property owner operating an illegal marijuana farm. In 2016, another criminal defendant, Joshua Richard Ruoff, committed and was later convicted by a jury of the brutal murder of one of that farm’s occasional workers.

Finally, the sentencing recommendation submitted for Wednesday’s hearing made the following observations, observations that should provide food for thought for Rogers and, perhaps, others:

“Probation wonders when the defendant will recognize that his involvement with marijuana keeps getting him into trouble with the law. All this considered, it appears Mr. Rogers prioritizes marijuana over everything else; especially the safety of his own friends (the victim).”

Following his eventual release on community supervision from state prison in about two years, should defendant Rogers continue on his latest path of violence or other misconduct that leads to another felony conviction, this most current conviction is characterized as a serious felony by the Legislature and thus will be charged in any future felony prosecution of this defendant as a Strike conviction, within the meaning of California’s voter-modified Three Strikes laws.

(DA Presser)

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On Line Comments:

[1] But? But? I thought marijuana was serene, peaceful. And a miraculous cure for all the teen and 20somethings that suffer from insomnia and debilitating appetite loss. And was going to provide a huge tax boon for the government to provide vital services to the mentally ill all while creating equitable fun loving legal jobs for the nation’s unemployed and protecting the environment from toxic chemicals and water diversion.

[2] I just don’t understand why this multiple felon and dedicated recidivist only got four years. I don’t think emptying the prisons worked very well, and we will soon need several new ones, at the rate we are going. Meanwhile, the CHP is still busting shoplifters at the Flea Markets of the East Bay, where Oakland goes to buy shampoo and toothpaste. “Marijuana Crime may induce PTSD” should be printed on each pack. 

https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/safeway-stolen-goods-recovered-oakland-18331212.php?IPID=SFGate-HP-CP-Spotlight

[3] So what’s this guy done that hundreds of other growers haven’t done? He administered a spanking with a wooden implement designed for the purpose. Big deal. It’s rough in Covelo — always has been and always will be. These sort of riffraff are always ripping each other off, accusing each other. Anything they do to each other is analogous to a self cleaning oven at work.

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CHRIS LECASSE REPLIES to Tom Montesonti who complained in a letter yesterday that Tommy Wayne Kramer had somehow insulted Ukiah High principal “Dr.” Alvarez:

“I think the point TWK is trying to make is that it’s somewhat pompous of an educational administrator to insist on being called “Doctor,” whether that is Ms. Alvarez or your beloved Mr. DeMartini. During my time at UHS in the 90s, we had a rather rigid example of this, “Dr.” Phil Gary, and even at our young age and in our supremely ignorant state, we knew enough to recognize this practice entirely failed the bullshit test. Also, TWK wasn’t writing his column back in those halcyon days – TWK has his finger on the pulse and isn’t wasting our time with memories catered to old farts like us.

It’s not that TWK fails to appreciate highly qualified teaching professionals, it’s that he (and one would hope the majority of those not in the profession) disagrees with the severe gap in pay and performance of a hard-working teacher on the front lines teaching say, Biology, versus an emotionally insecure graduate school product (with two degrees in Music Education in this instance) isolating themselves from their students behind the administrative office walls yet making several times the annual salary of said teacher. There’s further humor in this in that it’s pretty much unheard of in the post-high school level of education – where the vast majority of professors have their doctorates – to encounter someone needing the validation of being referred to as “Dr.” It just isn’t done.

Trying to make this about the race or sex of Ms. Alvarez is weak sauce, and just makes Montesorri’s rather slavishness devotion to the fabled Dr. DeMartini seem a bit odd – as a grown man, who really still thinks about their high school principal?

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UKIAH SHELTER PET OF THE WEEK

Walter is a mellow guy who would make a great family addition. In the meet and greet room, Walter was perfectly content lounging around and showing off his polite indoor manners. Walter may take some time to warm up to any doggie friends, so meeting a potential canine housemate before going home is a must. This guy knows sit and shake! Unfortunately, Walter tested positive for heartworm, but our clinic has a plan in place for this sweet fella, and he will need to stay on monthly heartworm medication. Walter is a Bully mix, 8 years young and 84 very handsome pounds. Walter is eligible for the shelter's Senior Dog Discount!

For more about WALTER, head to mendoanimalshelter.com. 

For information about adoptions, call 707-467-6453. Check out our Facebook page and share our posts!

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REMEMBERING DR. DOUG ROSOFF

To the Editor:

The City of Ukiah needs to erect a memorial plaque at the intersection at Orchard and Gobbi where Dr. Mark Rosoff was killed in a biking accident in 2012. He was killed at about this time of year, August 24.

I'll contribute $1000 towards the cost of that plaque, if I can be involved in its planning process.

Who was Dr. Rosoff?

In 2000-2004, when I was a deputy in the Mendocino County Jail, I was primarily assigned to the Administration Segregation (Ag-Seg) Unit in Building II, Wing 4.

Ad-Seg is where mentally ill inmates also known as 51-50s, were locked down 23 1/2 hours a day. It was a tough job, but the one saving grace was the jail’s forensic psychiatrist, Dr. Mark Rosoff.

Dr. Rosoff was smart, Stanford educated. He was experienced. He had worked in the federal prison system.

Dr. Rosoff was also funny. His sense of humor was dry and cynical. He reminded me of Woody Allen.

And Dr. Rosoff was kind, compassionate, and gentle. He had a Zen bedside manner. He never judged the inmates who were patients, nor spoke over them, nor interrupted them…not ever. He never felt “superior”.

Keep in mind, most of the inmates in Ad-Seg were seriously mentally ill, often homeless people, who were dually diagnosed as alcoholics or addicts.

Many were violent and a threat to staff. Many were suicidal and a threat to themselves. Many were heavily medicated on powerful drugs like Seroquel or Clonazepam.

But Dr. Rosoff’s guiding mantra always was, “There but for the grace of God, go I.”

Come on, Ukiah. It's time. It's been eleven years. Let's put up a plaque honoring Dr. Rosoff.

John Sakowicz 

Ukiah

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HELPFUL (W)HINTS

To the Editor,

Thanks for the paper paper. I know the end draws nigh, but I will continue my encouragement through this small donation. Keep pitching inside.

Jeff Hopkins, aka: A Collective of One.

Laytonville

PS. Mr. Scaramella, a Biloxi Blues book/memoir would be great — a contemporary Catch-22 that is better written.

PPS. Thank Jah for Tom (W)Hine! I wish Mr. (W)Hine would write a book so I would know what color the trim on my house should be. Kentucky bluegrass or Bermuda for my lawn? Laphroig or Johnny Walker Red? Grass-fed or good old-fashioned feedlot beef? Mr. (W)Hine could help me with Norman Rockwell versus Pollack, Bogart or Noiret, paper or plastic. Mr. (W)Hine may be able to solve the conundrum I face regarding the placement of my garden gnomes, or whether I should even have gnomes. Mr. (W)Hine could weigh in on biodynamic dry farming or shallow rooted varietal wines. Should I remain silent and be suspected ignorant, or speak and confirm the suspicion? Black tar or the Sackler Special? The Drifters or the Four Tops?

If Mr. (W)Hine wrote his helpful hints book I could quit thinking forever. How wonderful that would be! The world according to Mr. (W)Hine would be the panacea for all society ills. And I can't wait.

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ANOTHER GRIM REMINDER

Editor: 

The closure of California’s salmon fishing season this year is a grim reminder that many salmon stocks are crashing. On the Eel River, where salmon and steelhead are facing extinction, the single most important thing we can do to help them is remove two old, unsafe dams.

As your recent editorial makes clear, all major stakeholders involved in the decommissioning of the Potter Valley Project agree with this objective (“Keep tap open for North Coast rivers,” Aug. 13). We and other conservation groups also agree it’s feasible to continue water diversions to the Russian River watershed after the dams are gone. But the new project would cost tens of millions of dollars, and it has never been clear who will pay for it. Meanwhile the clock is running out on native fish, and PG&E wants the dams taken out as soon as possible.

There is no looming “water war” here. Water interests have had years to figure out how to make a continued diversion work. Their recent proposal sheds no new light on that. Meanwhile, the Eel’s salmon and steelhead are barely hanging on. We need to remove the dams as soon as federal regulators give the green light. A continued diversion may yet be possible, but we cannot hogtie the future of Eel River fishes to resolving that issue.

Matt Clifford

California Director of Law and Policy, Trout Unlimited

Oakland

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ANDERSON VALLEY VILLAGE List of Events

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DEAL

Editor,

I'll make you a deal Mr. A and friends. You keep printing ’em and I'll keep reading ’em. $125 enclosed for a year subscription renewal. Please apply the extra, if any, to your overhead, underfoot or any preposition-noun combination of your choosing.

Thanks for all you do.

Sincerely,

Jay Faler

Downers Grove, Illinois

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CATCH OF THE DAY, Saturday, August 26, 2023

KELIE ADAMS-PENROD, Fort Bragg. Domestic battery, paraphernalia.

TYLER CALES, Willits. Domestic battery, protective order violation, county parole violation.

NICOLAS CASTRO-MIRAMONTES, Covelo. DUI.

VANESSA ELIZABETH, Fort Bragg. Disorderly conduct-under influence. 

JANINE ESTEP, Redwood Valley. Narcotics for sale, under influence.

DAMIEN FERNANDEZ, Bellflower/Ukiah. Disorderly conduct- alcohol&drugs.

JOHN FITTS, Willits. Domestic battery, false imprisonment, criminal threats, vandalism, felon-addict with firearm, ammo possession by prohibited person, armed with firearm in commission of felony.

BRITTANY FITZGERALD, Willits. DUI.

DALE HALE, Ukiah. DUI-alcohol&drugs.

GARY JAMESON, Stockton/Laytonville. Fugitive from justice.

KEVIN MISKELLY, Fort Bragg. Petty theft, vehicle tampering.

JOSE OCHOA JR., Moorpark/Ukiah. DUI, suspended license, probation revocation.

DANNY OSBORNE, Ukiah. Probation revocation.

KRISTO OUSEY, Ukiah. Paraphernalia, parole violation.

LISA POTTER, Ukiah. Failure to appear. 

KIMBERLEE THOMPSON, Ukiah. Disorderly conduct-under influence. 

CYNTHIA VEGA-AYALA, Ukiah. Taking vehicle without owner’s consent, disobeying court order.

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TRADING TREY LANCE HAD TO HAPPEN, for the 49ers’ benefit and his own

by Ann Killion

Aside from the people who shelled out big bucks for a Trey Lance jersey, this was the best outcome for everybody.

Best for the San Francisco 49ers, who needed this chapter to end. To halt the hyperbolic drama over their third-string quarterback.

Best for Lance, who needed a career reboot. To relaunch in a different environment, with a different set of expectations.

Yep, trading Lance away was the best thing.

But that doesn’t mean the Lance saga won’t cast a huge shadow over the 49ers for a long, long time.

First, there’s the cost: 28 months ago, the 49ers decided that Lance was worth three first-round draft picks plus a third-rounder. On Friday, they decided to unload him to Dallas for a fourth-round pick. This will go down as one of the worst ROI transactions in NFL history.

Second, there’s the chance that Lance will figure it out and go on to have a great career (though he is likely to be third string in Dallas for the time being). He’s still young and still, in theory, possesses the talent the 49ers valued three years ago. If he succeeds in Dallas, of all places, it will be a very bad look for the 49ers, and infuriating for their fans.

Third, no matter what happens — even if he raises a Lombardi Trophy over his head in February — this entire chapter has put a serious dent in 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan’s reputation as a quarterback whisperer and developer, and in his mystique as an evaluator of talent. 

 “I feel like I let Trey down,” Shanahan said late Friday night, after the 49ers’ final exhibition game. He addressed the log jam at quarterback, the lack of reps Lance got because of injuries, the barriers to Lance’s development. 

“That set back our team; it would be nice to have those picks,” general manager John Lynch said. “We take full accountability. We own that.”

Has a backup quarterback ever caused so much hysteria? While the Lance drama generated an awful lot of noise and negativity for a Super Bowl contender, the 49ers actually face some serious issues: Where’s Nick Bosa? What’s up with their rookie kicker? But the Lance situation, his fall from third overall pick to third choice, sucked up all the oxygen.

It was clear the 49ers’ brass realized the situation was getting toxic. One day after saying that he didn’t need to make a decision on a backup quarterback until just before the season starts, Shanahan told Lance that he had lost the No. 2 job to Sam Darnold.

That news — not at all surprisingly — leaked out, Lance wasn’t on the practice field later that day, and afterward it was left to linebacker Fred Warner to discuss the weird situation with the media. Neither Shanahan nor Lynch made themselves available, except for their regularly scheduled KNBR hits. That’s a pretty bad look, considering the amount of interest and investment in Lance and the bosses’ continued harping about what a great young man Lance is.

On Thursday on KNBR, Lynch said, somewhat disingenuously, “We never thought (the news) would get out.”

Really? In a business where agents talk to national reporters all the time? About the biggest drama going on with a Super Bowl contender? That was supposed to stay in the cone of silence?

Lynch described Lance as “devastated” by the “gut punch” but evaded questions about whether or not Lance had asked for a trade. One can presume that rather than retiring to his home to lie down and weep, Lance called his agent and demanded a trade.

Quarterback competitions tend to divide people into fierce camps. Take it from someone who covered Montana-Young. And this was one of the most polarizing: Lance’s loyalists against everyone else. They claimed their guy didn’t get a chance, that Shanahan was trying to sabotage him (which would mean the coach was sabotaging himself), that there were undertones of racism.

But it was just a year ago that the 49ers handed Lance the starting job. It was less about Lance having earned it, and more about how much the 49ers needed to see what he could do with it.

Turning over a Super Bowl-ready team to a player with so little experience was a dicey proposition, but the 49ers had to see what they had in Lance. It became a moot point when Lance got hurt in the second game of the season. Still, he hadn’t looked great in his five quarters of football in the 2022 season, and the 49ers kept Jimmy Garoppolo after concerns about how Lance had performed in training camp.

This year, he wasn’t going to be considered for the top job, unless Brock Purdy wasn’t yet healthy. But even with that pressure off, Lance looked shockingly bad at times — not like a player who was in his third year in Shanahan’s system, who had spent countless hours in the quarterback room. He looked tentative, confused, rattled. His demotion to third string wasn’t a shock, except to the loyalists.

What was always the biggest surprise of this entire saga was its opening chapter: that the 49ers chose Lance, a player with so little experience, in the first place. He was raw, he was young, he was a long way from the kind of physical presence required in the NFL. The odds of him developing quickly enough to lead a team with George Kittle, Bosa and Trent Williams to a Super Bowl always seemed slim.

And, now, none.

Lance wasn’t a bust. It was always too early to hang that label on him. But the process that brought him to the 49ers was faulty.

The trade was necessary. But those Lance No. 5 jerseys aren’t the only thing that will linger in the aftermath: There’s a shadow over Shanahan and the 49ers that may last a very long time.

(SF Chronicle)

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MEMO OF THE AIR: The Comfort Eagle Of The Apocalypse.

Here's the recording of last night's (2023-08-25) seven-plus-hour-long Memo of the Air: Good Night Radio show on 107.7fm KNYO-LP Fort Bragg (CA) and KNYO.org:

https://tinyurl.com/KNYO-MOTA-0555

Email your written work on any subject and I'll read it on the very next Memo of the Air.

THE SHOW: I experimented with peppering the announcement section with features usually used later on. Then Marmonrella, DogNanny, Ezekiel (twice). Anne, Mazie, David, the other David, Paul, Fred, Caitlin, Mark, Dave, Mike, Jason, Eleanor, Bruce, Chuck, Julie, Maureen, Comtesse DeSpair, Clifford, Louis, Travis, Bronwyn, Kent, Charlie, AJ, Matthew, and Philip. A skinny poetry section but a positively obese dream journal section. Break music drawn from the entire fractal landscape of the Western and Eastern imagination, folk labor disaster ballads to a bluegrass End Of The World to a guzheng Garden of Allah. At 4am, Captain Midnight 1939, in which, in a cavern in a volcano, possibly the same volcano used in /Tom Swift and His Ultrasonic Cycloplane/ and in the Island of Death episode of /Suspense/, haughty supercilious greedy Nazi spy Ivan Shark and his Chicago-gangster-accented sidekick Karl are tricked out of their ill-gotten treasure by the real heir to it, plucky, growly-flutey, quick-thinking Señorita. (That's her name: Señorita.) And that's not all.

Besides, at https://MemoOfTheAir.wordpress.com you'll find a fresh batch of dozens of links to worthwhile items I set aside for you while gathering the show together, such as:

No thank you, she said. But hop-hop tappity tap tap? No, I mean it, fuck off, she said. Later at his friend's place: I don't know what I did wrong. I bought her a kebab. I paid for half the taxi. Should I have paid for the whole taxi? -Did you walk on the outside of her? -Yes. 

Then I don't know; I'm going to sleep.

https://www.mentalfloss.com/posts/male-bird-unimpressive-mating-dance

Re: the Trump mugshot, which you've no-doubt seen by now and relished. Google-search "angry child who got caught". It's the exact same expression on one child after another. No fair! It wasn't MY fault! I HATE here! I HATE you! And I thought to search that because of having enjoyed a teevee show from 2009-2011 called Lie To Me. It's about an agency that hires out to solve crimes and settle disputes by figuring people out mainly from their body language and micro (and macro) expressions. Tim Roth plays the main character, Dr. Cal Lightman. An admirable father-daughter relationship between him and his daughter Emily, played by two actresses who didn't look at all alike, a puzzling-at-first gimmick that actually worked. Great show. A tip, though: In some of the later episodes serious indelible horrorshow visceral violence results. The instant you start to feel like uh-oh, oh-no... just skip the rest of that one and go to the next. You don't have to follow them into the room and see what they see.

And generate photorealistic humans to your specs, for your advertising or art project or fantasy use, free. (Start with the Create Human button.) It seems glitchy. That might be that it's being taxed by too many users right now. It interests me that looking at the people I experimentally produce makes me feel a little uncomfortable. Twenty-five years ago there was a program that let you manipulate a vector/faceted robot face expression with sliders, and, um, when I made it look sad or smile or do anything I felt uncomfortable in the same way. And around that time there was a screensaver of a cute catlike cartoon girl in a bathing suit who'd ski or surf or rollerskate around. For a screensaver, and for the time, it was an enormous program, like 25MB; it took ages to download. I started the uninstall, and she rollerskated right up into the foreground and piteously whined/pleaded/accused, “This will uninstall me!" Click. There. She's gone forever. (Or off somewhere else with the other screensavers, telling them what a lousy bastard I am. They tell her, “You can do better, Kitty-Girl. He was trash.” “I know,” she says, “But I miss him. He used to look at me.”)

https://generated.photos/human-generator/

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

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NEW YORK YANKEE AARON JUDGE'S HOME TOWN of Linden, CA

by William J. Hughes

I was born a New Yorker and grew up a New York Yankee fan. Born to be, might be a better way to express it. Aaron Judge is the latest Yankee slugger with his record setting 62 home runs in the 2022 season. I saw Mickey Mantle and Roger Maris chasing Ruth’s 60 home runs in 1961 with Maris actually surpassing Ruth with his 61st home run — and no asterisk please. He did it! I don’t care how many more games Maris had to do it! And as chance would have it, I was in North Dakota (Roger Maris’ home state) when Judge hit No. 62.

Roger Over And Out

Aaron Judge and his 62 —

And we were in

Killdeer, North Dakota

to catch it — WJH

So, I'm headed to Pasadena and Los Angeles, to sightsee and swim, swim in the Pacific Ocean. But long before that, off 99 South, Linden, CA, hometown of New York Yankee Aaron Judge. Excited, passed it several times; now’s the time to take it in, talk to some locals about the local boy makes famous. Sandy Koufax, Curt Flood, Jackie Robinson would get me to turn off the highway. The special ones.

I’m guessing Linden is Steinbeck, farming, hot and dry off 99 South, not all that south of Sacramento where I live. Got my New York Yankees shirt on to give me free access to Aaron Judge’s hometown even though this is San Franciso Giants country. I’m ok, I’ve lived here in Cali-north long enough to love the Giants and the A’s. Living is good. If someone had ever told me, Yankees, Linden, Cali. Good for me.

99 South is rough and ready for a face lift but maybe left as is, not the death row of interest on I-5.

These small American towns produce such athletes as Mickey Mantle from Commerce, OK, windblown and off most maps, Roger Maris from Fargo, ND. Whose been to Fargo other than me?

And now Aaron Judge, turning off 99 for Linden, CA, onto rural Rt. 26.

Aaron Judge, all 6’ 8” of him, a gentle giant, multi-multi-millionaire (good for him) married his high school sweetheart, MVP, home run leader, mythical early in his career, a most worthy successor to the Yankee tradition of greatness, i.e., Derek Jeter. If he happens to be in town, you’d definitely notice him. “All rise for the Judge!” the fans chant in Yankee Stadium — fans in judge’s robes, wigs, gavels, even a jury box-like section in the stands.

Off 99 onto Rt. 26, 10 miles into Linden and as suspected/expected, agricultural California, groves upon groves, cherries, peaches — in season — walnuts, all around. Cherries — just adds to the whole enchanted sweetness of the day because a sign off the road among the orchards, announces Linden, Population 1,800, Home of New York Yankee Aaron Judge in Yankee blue and white, the dusky Sierra Nevadas off in the distance. I’m feeling like I did when I drove into Fairmount, Indiana, James Dean’s hometown, farming, small, a Brigadoon feeling like the town only appears when you are there. Much like I’m feeling today, the Yankee living myth made truly real as this Linden, this Brigadoon appears.

On in past Linden High School, with its high sports lights, football and baseball fields, where Aaron Judge played his dreams of Yankee Stadium? I wonder.

Main Street Linden is as you would guess, just enough, not enough, some shuttered, some quaint, some rough and ready, brick standard thrift shop, Rinaldl’s Market on the way in all bright and newer, orchards all around, more brick and wooden buildings, nothing enormous or offensive, not as other central valley farming towns for sure. A long way from the lights of Broadway, New York, Linden could be tumbleweed and dust during drought. That’s an agricultural compliment.

Ah, the Linden Public Library. Simple pleasures. Closed. Nuts. I'll try this little battered grocery store, almost old west adobe. The manager is as Mexican as adobe. My pointing to my Yankee logo and asking, “Aaron Judge?” He’s confused. He’s new to it all, having crossed, having worked the cherry harvest? No problemo.

I passed what looked like a passable Berkeleyish café, The Wandering Fox. No ham and eggs diner in town. Too bad. But I have hit the jackpot in The Wandering Fox Café. I’ll stop right here to say I’m writing this section of Linden in the Polo Lounge of the Beverly Hills Hotel. So there. Told ya I was on my way to Los Angeles.

Three young ladies in the hippish Wandering Fox Café. Natives. I sit with Shana, rhymes with banana she tells me, country small town gal, complete with ball cap, lovely, friendly, comfortable. She went to high school with Aaron Judge. Let the games begin!

She’s open and honest all about Aaron. He was adopted. I did not know that; all the more wonderful. I’m full of wonder and questions. All answered. You had to be there. I had to be. You should. “When was the last time you saw him? Did you have an idea of the fame and fortune to come?” She’s proud of him and willing to show me around a bit, the other two young ladies equally proud of the native son and their ever-improving town — meaning they need and are pushing for a motel, but they have Shana’s boutique shop in a 1850s brick. Her shop, clothes and accessories, could be in Aspen, so Linden is leaning in and next door a delicatessen — magic words to a New Yorker — not to pick on anyone but once outside New York no delis measure up. Here the lady at the counter is most courteous and considerate, showing off the deli’s wares as I ask more about Aaron Judge. She tells me the guy in back went to high school with Judge so I get to share some good memories of him. Of course, I knew he was a good man and it’s all been verified, certified by all the natives so far.

310 feet to left field at the Linden High baseball field. I bet Aaron Judge dropped a few over the 310 feet, he was in the 6’5” range then? What a sight, the field empty. But for me, echoes of heroics past on his way to Fresno State.

Now for the High School, scene of the climb, compact, simple pleasures. I’m trying for some of Aaron Judge’s teachers. I get it from a gentleman in the parking lot that a Mark Miller who coached Aaron Judge may be having breakfast in the gym. So, as Brigadoon would have it, the school’s teachers and staff are having a get ready for the coming season with a sit-down breakfast in the school’s Hoosiers-like gym.

A gem of an occasion, dozens and dozens of folks who know him, who taught the Yankee. I inquire of a gentleman in the food line who appears old enough to ask. “No, but of course I know him.” A younger guy with him tells me he played football against hm. Had no idea what was to come. What is about to come still has my head spinnin’. 

The gentleman tells me Aaron Judge’s mother-in-law is in the food line. What!? He points her out, blue sweatshirt. She's seated with her meal. I sit down beside her and catch my breath. Unexpected, to say the most.

“Uh, you are Aaron Judge’s mother-in-law?” pleasantly, not too imposing, showing off my Yankee logo and introducing myself as a writer, writing an article on Aaron Judge’s hometown of Linden.

Karen, she’s all in. She’s a wisp of a woman, as sun browned as fine rawhide leather, looking the part, wrangler that is, a hardworking ranch hand, with all necessary courtesy attached. She’s the school’s janitor or if we needs be woke, Custodial Consultant.

Our conversation is straight forward, give and take, comfortable, my head spinnin’ from the comfortable, telling her how heart-breaking it would have been had Judge left the Yankees for the Giants. She understands. I would have closed the door on the Yankees if they’d let Judge get away. I’ll keep most of our conversation to myself, careful not to tread too too, at a small risk. But one thing I’ll share — everyone has said what a good guy Aaron Judge is. Again, I’m asking everyone if they could have envisioned him becoming the player he has become. 

Karen, his mother-in-law, tells me she only wanted this fine young man to be with her daughter, Sam. She tells me of Aaron’s football stadium half-time marriage proposal? I think I’ve got that right. Right enough. She tells me how she watches her “son”-in-law at bat — through her almost open fingers sort of sideways. I can only imagine. She tells me she went to Anaheim to see Aaron play but he was out with a bum toe. She’s not been to Yankee Stadium, yet. I’m going to correct that a bit. I’m sending her a little scale model of Yankee Stadium and booklet on its history. I think that’s enough of our shared conversation, with others at the table also, one lovely lady is going to purchase my novel ‘Yellowstone’ on Amazon Books. Wonderful.

Outside the school’s compact swimming pool almost Greek in its blue and white building, the Linden Lions Blue and Gold.

Rinaldi’s Market, fresh and clean, just missed Aaron Judge’s mother, the store manager tells me. Small town dignity, possibilities.

Pizza Plus Parlor, a mix of saloon, almost a perfect barn, with that cozy New Yorky pizza parlor like it was a parlor in a fine ranch house. It definitely works with a large Aaron Judge at bat on the wall — God Goliath if I may be careful with the cliches. Lovely, young Victoria, just me and her on a Wednesday afternoon, tells me how the media crowded in when Judge was up at bat for No. 62. Victoria is as full of the local enthusiasm as anyone I’ve met. Delightful, Delights, Full.

I’m full.

* * *

I’m back, two days later for a televised Yankee game. No Aaron Judge in the lineup. Nuts. But the library and the Wandering Fox Café fill in the blanks and then sitting in Pizza Plus enjoying a Salami sandwich and the game against the dastardly Astros as much as I can without Judge in the lineup. No free lunch, with local visions of Yankees and Giants in World Series. Could happen…

Stopped in the local bar 26 for Rt. 26 — me and the barkeep on a Friday afternoon in the real, real place, the barkeep searching for the game, more local coloring book, then after a cold one, driving through the shady lane neighborhoods, simple/ample homes and a similar lawn subdivision. A bit jarring after the shady lanes, as quiet as the somewhat Spanish Mission Catholic Church, some Spanish California red roof tiled homes.

Bought some peaches at Rinaldi’s Market — in season, namesake cherries all out of season. Stopping in Orlando’s Market and short bar just for a look, and there’s lovely young Victoria for a nice send off, right after I ask two Linden High School cheerleaders all in uniform for permission to take their picture. Permission granted.

Aaron Judge and Linden, CA, all cherries on top of my peanuts and crackerjacks.

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ON-LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY

What do I think of Trump’s mugshot?

I like it.

A meme for our moment. A fake, wrapped in a fake, inside a fake.

I like Trump’s aggressively defensive stance, since the charges against him are ridiculously transparent.

That this is an attempt at character assassination is obvious to anyone but the accessories to this crime (about 40% of the US pop. at last count).

The character being assassinated isn’t Trump however, it’s his supporters. Trump is the cross to which they are being nailed.

Trump’s poor acting skills come through in the photo – just as they have in the 8 years leading up to it.

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WE DIE TO EACH OTHER DAILY. What we know of other people is only our memory of the moments during which we knew them. And they have changed since then. To pretend that they and we are the same is a useful and convenient social convention which must sometimes be broken. We must also remember that at every meeting we are meeting a stranger. 

—T.S. Eliot, ‘The Cocktail Party’

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MOST PEOPLE NEVER LISTEN. Nor do they observe. You should be able to go into a room and when you come out know everything that you saw there and not only that. If that room gave you any feeling you should know exactly what it was that gave you that feeling. 

— Ernest Hemingway, ‘Across the River and into the Trees’

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 ‘THE BANALITY OF EVIL’

Editor, 

“Never Surrender.” Amazing how Trump can turn a negative into a positive. Did you see the interviews last night with Black males in Georgia? Now that he has a mug shot, they are calling him a brother. Apparently, just a two percentage point change in their voting in 2024 will make him the president again. I don't think that is what District Attorney Fani Willis had in mind.

Harvey Wise

Santa Rosa

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CATCH THE SMUG MUG ON THAT THUG!

by Maureen Dowd

If there were any justice in the world, Donald Trump would have taken the Mug Shot of Dorian Gray.

As with Oscar Wilde’s charismatic and amoral narcissist, the Picture of Donald Trump should have been a “foul parody,” a reflection of what the chancer has done with his life. It should have shown Trump’s corroding soul rather than his truculent face.

It should have revealed a man so cynical and depraved that he is willing to smash our nation’s soul — our democracy — and destroy faith in our institutions. All this simply to avoid being called a loser.

“Through some strange quickening of inner life the leprosies of sin were slowly eating the thing away,” Wilde wrote of Dorian’s portrait. “The rotting of a corpse in a watery grave was not so fearful.”

Now that would have been some primo merch: Trump slapping a rotting mug shot on a mug and selling it on his campaign website for the low, low price of $25.

Trump has long felt that squinting or scowling is a good look for him. Timothy O’Brien, a Trump biographer, recalled that Trump once told him that Clint Eastwood was the greatest movie star ever, and O’Brien believed that Donald and Melania modeled their squints on Eastwood’s. Maggie Haberman noted in The Times that when Trump posed for his official White House portrait, he scowled into the camera and told aides he thought he looked “like Churchill.”

Thursday night was performative for Trump: sweeping in with his private jet and giant motorcade that screamed two-tiered justice system, with law enforcement clearing the Atlanta streets, like centurions clearing the way for Caesar.

Trump told Newsmax’s Greg Kelly after the arraignment that he had “never heard the word ‘mug shot’” until his was taken — which just shows again that Trump is a pathological liar. Everyone in America has heard the term “mug shot.”

Trump said that being booked at the horror chamber known as the Fulton County Jail — its location on Rice Street is cited in songs by rappers who have logged time there — was “a terrible experience.”

“I went through an experience that I never thought I’d have to go through, but then, I’ve gone through the same experience three other times,” the 77-year-old said, adding about his mug shot, “They didn’t teach me that at the Wharton School of Finance.”

They didn’t teach him not to be a big liar and cheat, either. Wharton is a place where they should teach you about mug shots. All American business schools should have a class on mug shots.

Trump did another woe-is-me interview with Fox News Digital, admitting that getting processed by Georgia officials, who “insisted” he have the mug shot taken, was “not a comfortable feeling — especially when you’ve done nothing wrong.”

He no doubt workshopped his stroppy mug-shot look in front of the mirror, trying to convey “Never surrender!” as he was literally surrendering. And in another master stroke of projection, he accused the prosecutors pursuing him for election interference of “election interference.”

But Trump is feral and cunning, and deep in his amygdala, he must have shivered, thinking to himself, “Damn, I could go to prison. My liberty is actually at risk.” Even though he has spent his whole life getting away with things, sliding out of things, stiffing people, conning people, he had to have a moment at the jail when he realized he is in the prosecutors’ sights. He even went out and hired a real criminal lawyer.

Perplexing as it is, Trump devotees continue to adore him. President Biden sarcastically called Trump a “handsome guy,” but many on the right thrilled to his jailhouse portrait. “I say this with an unblemished record of heterosexuality,” Jesse Watters swooned on “The Five” on Fox News. “He looks good, and he looks hard.”

At the Republican debate, no one was big enough to shove him aside. Nikki Haley seemed the most appealing. Ron DeSantis’s inability to smile is disqualifying. It was pathetic that the best the Florida governor could muster, asked if Mike Pence acted properly when he certified the election, was to say, “I got no beef with him.”

Vivek Ramaswamy seemed smarmy. Scott Jennings, a Republican commentator on CNN, said that Ramaswamy was Scrappy-Doo to Trump’s Scooby-Doo. That comparison is not fair to Scooby or Scrappy, who are positive forces in the world, helping to unmask crooks, unlike Trump and his mini-me.

On Friday afternoon, Trump put out a fund-raising pitch based on his 20 minutes in hell.

“It’s violent,” Trump said of the jail where, as he let his fans know in his fund-raising email, he was given booking number 2313827. “The building is falling apart. Inmates have dug their fingers into the crumbling walls and ripped out chunks to fashion over 1,000 shanks. Just this year alone, 7 inmates have died in that jail.”

Yep, he’s getting scared.

As Audrey Hepburn said in “Breakfast at Tiffany’s” after she tangled with the law, “There are certain shades of limelight that can wreck a girl’s complexion.”

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DETAINED UNJUSTLY!

Editor,

Evan Gerschkovich is a 32 year old newspaper reporter who has been declared a “wrongfully detained” person by Russia in a Moscow jail since March, 2023. His only “crime” was to write about Russian President Vladimir Putin. He’s now been a prisoner for over five months. His arrest on the baseless charge of “espionage” came while he was on a work trip to the Russian city of Yejaterinberg, about 1,200 miles east of Moscow. His main focus has always been on the Russian people-where and how they live, Not on politics.

His mother and father separately immigrated to the US from Russia in 1979. They met while at work in New York, but both have retained a love for their native country. They educated Evan to speak Russian. In June, they spoke to across a plexiglass to Evan in a Moscow court. The most recent development is that his detention was merely extended from Aug. 30 to November, 30.

Pres. Biden has tried, but has failed to get a prisoner exchange.

Frank H, Baumgardner, III 

Santa Rosa

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I TOOK A COURSE in the psychology of American culture, given by Erich Fromm. Though he had just arrived, he knew America better than we did, because it impinged on him. His Escape from Freedom , which had recently been published, was one of those paeans of lyrical pessimism that Germans specialize in, like Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, or Spengler. Sitting on a platform behind a desk, like a judge in a criminal court, he passed his remorseless judgement on us. We were unwilling, he said, to accept the anguish of freedom. According to him, we feared freedom, saw it as madness, epistemology run amok. In the name of freedom, we accepted everything he said. We accepted it because we liked the sound of it —no one knew then that we would turn out to be right in trying to escape from freedom. 

— Anatole Broyard,’ Kafka was the Rage’

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UKRAINE, SATURDAY, 26 AUGUST

A Ukrainian commander fighting in the south said he believes Ukrainian forces have broken through the most difficult Russian defensive line and will now be able to advance more quickly.

Russia’s Defence Ministry claimed that a drone was downed over the Belgorod region on Saturday.

Russia’s Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov said military cooperation with Iran will not succumb to geopolitical pressure, following reports Washington has asked Tehran to stop selling so-called kamikaze drones to Moscow.

Russia said air defences brought down a drone over Moscow in the early hours of Saturday in an attack that forced authorities to briefly shut down all three major airports serving the capital.

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NEVER DO A STRANGER’S LAUNDRY

by Doug Holland

When I was a little kid, Mom did the laundry, but around the time I started making my own sandwiches, she decided I was old enough to clean my own dirty clothes. I remember standing on a stool to reach the controls of the washing machine.

With ten years of laundry experience, I moved out and into my own apartment at age 18, but apartment laundries are different from the washer & dryer in the basement of your house. First off, you need lots of quarters, so I went to the bank and bought several rolls. But also, you need to navigate the neighbors.

There were 14 apartments in the building, but only two washers and two dryers, so you might walk down the hall and down the stairs carrying your laundry, only to come back still carrying your laundry, if both washers were already washing someone else’s clothes.

One morning I carried my laundry down to the basement, and one washer was going, and the other washer had finished, but it was still full of someone else’s clothes, all wet. I walked back to my apartment, waited 15 minutes, and tried again, and by then, one washer had a fresh load, just started, but the other machine was still full of the same wet clothes.

Correct laundry etiquette in such a situation is to unload the washing machine, and pile the wet clothes on the sorting table. Whoever’s clothes they are, that person will eventually come down and find them on the table.

Six months out of high school, though, I didn’t know laundry etiquette. My parents had raised me polite, and it seemed rude to leave someone’s wet laundry on the table, so I put the stranger’s laundry into the empty dryer, and fed it some quarters to dry my neighbor’s clothes.

In the process of doing this, yes, I noticed that there were dainty bras and panties in the stranger’s laundry, but that’s irrelevant. I would’ve put her clothes into the dryer just the same if they’d been sweaty and greasy mechanics’ overalls. It was the neighborly thing to do.

Half an hour later when my washer load was done, I needed to remove her clothes from the dryer before putting my own clothes in, so that’s what I did.

Some of her clothes were nice things — blouses and skirts and pants, and a sleek purple teddy — and I knew that you should fold the nice things or they’ll get all wrinkly, so I folded my anonymous neighbor’s laundry.

Well, at least her nice things — I didn’t fold her underwear, because, you know, I don’t fold my own underwear, why would I fold someone else’s?

It honestly never occurred to me that what I’d done might be perceived as creepy instead of neighborly. Also I didn’t understand that some of her delicates, like that silk teddy, should’ve been drip-dried instead of dropped into the dryer at maximum heat.

After putting my clean clothes away, and remembering that purple teddy, I went back to the basement and put a note on top on my neighbor’s neatly folded laundry:

“Needed the washer, so I took your clothes out.” 

That’s just good manners, right? Then I signed it and added my apartment number — you know, in case the nice lady who owned those bras and panties wanted to knock and say thank you to me.

Indeed, she knocked on my door, but it wasn’t to say thanks. Instead I got loudly hollered at by an Asian woman old enough to be my mom.

“I ought to call the police,” she shouted, several times. Other people came out of their apartments to see what was the ruckus, and some of them yelled at her to be quiet, and others yelled at me for what I’d done.

I said I was sorry, then closed my door before the drama was finished, but this was a low-rent neighborhood. Sirens sounded in the distance often, and for hours I worried that the cops might be coming.

The cops never came, and that old Asian lady never stopped scowling at me when we passed in the hallways. 

I’d had good intentions, honest, but that was the day I learned a lesson I’ll share now, for anyone young and stupid and polite like I was: Never do a stranger’s laundry.

(For further dumbassery, click itsdougholland.com.)

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…GET A LARGE TYPEWRITER

and as the footsteps go up and down

outside your window

hit that thing

hit it hard

make it a heavyweight fight

make it the bull when he first charges in

and remember the old dogs

who fought so well:

Hemingway, Celine, Dostoevsky, Hamsun.

if you think they didn’t go crazy

in tiny rooms

just like you’re doing now

without women

without food

without hope

then you’re not ready.

drink more beer.

there’s time.

and if there’s not

that’s all right

too.

— from "How to be a great writer" by Charles Bukowski 

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