Mendocino County Today: Tuesday, Dec. 12, 2023

Clearing | Buffleheads | Found Dead | Dem Disgust | Candidate Forum | Ed Notes | Dog w/Bone | Encountering Jake | PG&E Millionaires | Ceasefire Event | Nobody Cares | Bridge Toll | Local Ecology | Remnant Apples | Shoestring Budget | Woodstock Reunion | Rogers Endorsement | Life Jacket | Albion Mill | Xmas Trees | Yesterday's Catch | Deadly Speedballs | Waterfront | Wind Project | Jack & Larry | Herb v Pigeons | Anti Zionist | Tells It | Fifth Column | Chief Fan | Say What | Funucci Snubbed | Funding This | U.S. Terrorist

DRY CONDITIONS and seasonable temperatures are expected for the next several days as ridging builds over the west coast. Temperatures will warm to 5 to 10 degree above normal late in the week while the weather remains dry. The next chance for significant rain is expected over the weekend and into early next week. (NWS)

STEPHEN DUNLAP (Fort Bragg): A foggy (where did that come from?) 51F on the coast this Tuesday morning. I assume it will clear out today but no idea when? The fog is forecast to linger into Thursday. Rain is now in the forecast starting Saturday. So far this "big event" is holding together, unlike previously advertised systems.

MISSING ISLAND MOUNTAIN MAN PRESUMED TO BE FOUND DEAD

On Saturday, December 9, 2023 and 12-10-2023 the Mendocino County Sheriff's Office continued search efforts regarding the reported disappearance of Scott William Graves, 63, of Piercy.

On Sunday, December 10, 2023 searchers located a deceased person in the missing person investigation established search area.  At this time, the person is unidentified due to the condition of the body.

Sheriff's Detectives were summoned to the location and are actively conducting investigations in an attempt to determine the identity of the person along with the cause and manner of death.

Anyone who might have information that could assist Sheriff's Detectives in this investigation are urged to contact the Sheriff's Office Tip-Line by calling 707-234-2100 or the WeTip Anonymous Crime Reporting Hotline by calling 800-782-7463.

MARIANNE MCGEE on the local dems recent endorsements of Trevor Mockel and Maureen Mulheren:

I am absolutely disgusted with the endorsements of the Democratic Central Committee, especially refusing to endorse Bernie Norvell. He’s done more positive actions for the City of Fort Bragg than anyone I’ve seen in the 25 years I lived here. I will never support any of the people on that list or anyone they represent. I’m in total shock and shows me they don’t care about Mendocino County and the disaster we’re in!!! Shame on all of you!!

ED NOTES

SOME of you will recall that our supervisors unanimously endorsed Trevor Mockel before the perpetually beaming candidate officially announced he was a candidate for First District supervisor. The tiny minority of people who pay attention to the supervisors wondered, “What the hell? Who's this guy?”

TURNS out Mockel had briefly worked for state senator Mike McGuire who, obviously, instructed the politically ambitious but going nowhere 5th District supervisor, Ted Williams, that he, McGuire, sure would like it if the five Democrat automatons dysfunctioning as supervisors endorsed the Redwood Valley lad of no experience of county affairs or any prior indication of interest in same because, uh, because I said so, that's why.

MOCKEL issued a jubilant press release to no applause, announcing his premature anointment as supervisor  because State Senator McGuire, also a guy who wears a permanent grin on his unlined, insincere puss, had directed Supervisor Williams to fix Mockel's endorsement with Williams' inattentive, disinterested colleagues. Which Williams duly did because he and the other four are Democrat-approved. 

WILLIAMS, in a fit of megalomania, has since announced that he is a candidate for the state assembly whose current occupant, a Healdsburg dentist named Wood, said he was retiring to take care of his aged mother. A week later Wood announced that he'd been appointed to another state function that pays better than dentistry with no real responsibility and is even less demanding than occasional wine drunks with Mendolib's herd bulls. 

WOOD'S MOM? I've noticed a well-dressed senior in downtown Healdsburg with what appears to be her belongings in a Safeway cart, but surely she can't…

ALL OF THIS political hustling is brought to us by a small group of Democrat shot-callers who create candidates like Mockel, a construct even less plausible than Wood, McGuire and Congressman Bombs Away Huffman, as vapid a trio of career officeholders unseen on the Northcoast since Doug Bosco, Dan Hauser and Wes Chesbro.

THE SUPERVISORS are supposed to be a locally-focused, non-partisan elected body, not a Democrat playground, partly orchestrated out of two empty offices in the Ukiah cave complex on School Street where Wood and McGuire maintain, at public expense, two offices where no visitor ever appears and the phones never ring.

IF MOCKEL is elected First District supervisor over the two fully-qualified, knowledgeable candidates in Carrie Shattuck and Adam Gaska, Mendo will have gone all the way over into Democrat Biden-ism. (Defined as a combination of incompetence leavened with an utter moral and ethical bankruptcy.)

A SURE FIRE way to know who to vote for is to figure out which candidate is opposed by the supervisors and the local Democrat apparatus then vote for that person. Carrie Shattuck is actually feared by the local political blob because she's smart and thoroughly informed on local matters. And she's a tough, no bullshit person unlike any female who's ever functioned as supervisor in this county, a low bar for sure but still… Adam Gaska is also smart and thoroughly informed on local matters, but more acceptable in the dependably passive-aggressive, smiley-faced ambiance of local politics in which the unprepared person better wear his/her kevlar vest backwards, because the shivs always come from behind. I like both of them, but if I were a resident of the First District I'd vote for Carrie.

IN THE SECOND DISTRICT we have new guy Jake Brown, combat Marine, taking on incumbent Mo Mulheren. Brown should get the nod solely because he hasn't been a member of this board, the worst in the history of Mendocino County. 

FRANK HARTZELL: I was wondering if there was a detour around 128 other than going to the end of Big River Bridge, turning left on Mendo-Ukiah Road and then going to Comptche and turning down Flynn Creek Road?  Is there something else through Navarro Ridge I’m not thinking of?  I’d welcome any perspectives about the road closure. When I did my two year series on the Tar Wall and forced CalTrans to remove it there, the river was not rising like this.  I don’t actually know when they stopped breaking the dam? I imagine before that?  Is there an expert on this? 

Yes, you can turn at the Navarro River bridge and go down Hwy. 1 a quarter mile or so to Cameron Rd. Go east on Cameron Rd. and it ends at the road that Hendy Woods is on (I don't know the name). It's quite a go-around, but it doesn't take that much more time than 128 and it's an easier drive than going to Comptche and Flynn Creek. (The time depends on where you're starting from.) 

MIKE SEARS: Well, there is Cameron Rd to Philo-Greeenwood Rd that I took last night to get to the Philo Grange potluck, but I wouldn't suggest it.

BEVERLY KARKRUFF: Coming back home through the fog on 128 last night , we took Greenwood/Cameron Ridge (turn at Hendy Woods/The Apple Farm) which was above the fog. It was much easier to drive than 128 had been. It takes about 15 minutes extra.

JEAN: There are some devilish potholes on that road, though! Maybe at night they'€™re more visible, but I took it once for fun on a wet day and decided it was a very bad idea.

BEVERLY KARKRUFF: We didn't notice any potholes, and we took it both going, during the day, and coming home at night. Maybe they have been patched since you drove over it. The only big pothole we hit was on Albion Ridge.

NICHOLAS WILSON: A Caltrans worker at the Navarro bridge told me the county did some repairs to the Philo-Greenwood Rd last year, so hopefully the worst pothols have been fixed.

EVERY RAINY SEASON when 128 is closed down by Caltrans, sometimes for days at a time, there is a lot of unnecessary confusion, most of it caused by Big Orange. Caltrans announces these closures clear out on 101 at Cloverdale, then again at Boonville where 128 meets 253. (McDonald's to the Sea and the Boonville-Ukiah Road, respectively, if you prefer romance to numerals.)

ANYWAY, these closure announcements unnecessarily deter lots of day trippers and/or people who don't know the area. And small businesses like the Navarro Store, to name one of many local and coastal enterprises who need all the customers they can get in the winter slack season, take big hits.

CALTRANS should inform travelers headed to the Mendocino Coast that they can get there via Comptche or the Greenwood Road between Philo and Navarro. Ditto for the return trip.

WHY are the roads closed? Because 128 floods near Navarro. Before Caltrans put up gates at the Navarro and Highway One end of 128, warning signs were not enough to deter the more adventurous (or drunk or stoned) drivers who plunged ahead and had to be rescued.

THE ROOT of the flooding prob is that the Navarro River, where it reaches the sea, silts up so badly it seals itself, and seems to silt up more impenetrably every year, as it is sealed now with not enough volume coming down the Navarro to bust it open.

USED TO BE locals would voluntarily clear the sandbar as locals had done for years,  but that was stopped by State Parks on the following basis — take it away, Renee Pasquinelli of State Parks: 

“State Parks is responsible for management of the Navarro property. We too have received questions regarding the closure of the river mouth. This situation has existed for decades; the difference is the previous tenant of the Mill Keepers house artificially breached the mouth (sometimes in the middle of the night) to protect his chemical shed. Below is a recent response that I wrote to Superintendent Loren Rex regarding the Navarro breaching question: River breaching is subject to regulation by the Army Corps of Engineers, Regional Water Quality Control Board, State Lands Commission, and CA Department of Fish and Wildlife. State Parks does not have the authority to simply breach the mouth. Also, past studies have concluded that artificial breaching without adequate rainfall can be lethal to estuary species. Estuaries contain salt and freshwater; the heavier salt water sinks to the bottom forming a highly saline lens beneath a somewhat freshwater upper layer. Breaching siphons off the top freshwater layer, leaving the highly saline layer beneath. Organisms that were able to escape the toxic saline layer prior to breaching have been trapped at the bottom and killed by the saline “brine.” I have literally seen thousands of dead fish, crabs, and other organisms at the Navarro after an illegal breaching incident several years ago. Unfortunately, the Navarro discussions escalate only when people see the closed river mouth and want access to the beach. This stimulates a perception that something has to be done now. Ideally, we need a long term management plan for the Navarro estuary. As I recall from my past work in the Russian River area, Sonoma County Water Agency ultimately worked with Army Corps, the public, and the other regulatory agencies to develop a river mouth plan that included breaching — but the work was justified to prevent flooding of private residences on the lower Russian River. Also, as I recall, the compromise was that the river had to be monitored such that breaching could only occur when certain ecological conditions existed. I would welcome the opportunity to work with CDFW and the other regulatory agencies to pursue funding for a long term plan. For now, there is little threat to the Navarro facilities from the high water level (the Inn was raised a few years ago), and as I understand, there is a great potential for die off of sensitive species if illegal breaching occurs.”   

MAZIE MALONE:

The act of keeping something preserved in its original state or as close to it is a very useful technique for food preparation and historical or personal documents. Saving the innate qualities & flavor of food before it rots, making delicious jams, pickles and sauces. As for the historical documents, keeping them in tact allows us to reference past occurrences & incidents. A valuable look back at where we were, evaluating where we are now and what direction we are heading toward.

Our thought processes that are controlled through the brain can get stuck in a repetitive loop. An ongoing belief & dialogue that maintains our sense of identity and personal convictions. A tactic to preserve life & sustain our beliefs, regardless if they are wrong or ineffective. To sever that loop and form new neural connections and pathways we need a reflective entity. A mirror in human form to highlight the dark ineffective crevices. Bring light to what does not serve humanity, and one of the most influential ways I do that is through writing. So I write, I do it out of pain and suffering, to rid myself of it and expose what is true and meaningful. The Last thing we want to do is hold on to any hurt and conditioning because it is a thief of joy and seriously destructive.

I have unfortunately learned with a lot of anguish and heartache that systems such as our “Mental Health System”  are  an ineffective pretentious attempt to keep wrong thinking intact to preserve the fake infrastructure of services. One of the phenomenons around this aspect is continued narratives, i.e., no thinking required, just repeat what the guy in the blue suit said. And on and on it travels like Covid from one person to the next. Until everybody believes it, without any thought or action it continues and becomes a systemic identity that protects “them” while not serving families as required. The moral obligation does not exist as long as wrong thinking persists.

I was reminded again today of how incredibly difficult it is to be human in a world of false narratives and reiterations of delusional thinking. There is no place at the table for me, that is ok I knew that! I am solution-oriented; the system is not. It is self preserving and non negotiable.

A foul and ominous stench lingers, because we can not preserve what has already decayed. It has rotted from the inside out leaving only itself to gorge upon its very own existence.

Does anyone else wonder about the $700,000 dollars of Mental Health Services Act funds given to the Non-Profit National Association for the Mentall Ill (NAMI)

Where are they ? What are they doing?

I am dying to know!

Mazie Malone

Ukiah

PS. Homeless for the Holidays… 

I ran into Jake Kooy this morning, walking my dog, Happy. 

I noticed him up ahead of me talking to someone in a car who handed him some cash and drove away. His pants were falling down, too big  and baggy, he was carrying his tennis shoes, thankfully he did have socks on. I spent about 10 minutes speaking to him, it was that long because he has extremely slow thought processing. I encouraged him to put the 5 bucks in his pocket and put his shoes on. What would take any one of us a matter of seconds, took him multiple minutes to accomplish. He needs so much help, it’s very sad. I was going to take a photo with him; however unfortunately he smells so bad, I refrained. 

My point is we can argue all day long about the philosophical question of what came first, the chicken or the egg, it does not provide the solution. Mental Illness, addiction, homelessness are all tied together; it is useless to blame one or the other when the solutions for each are the same. Action, Housing, Treatment, Medication and support! Now all I can think about is how police must hate arresting him because of the smell and what do they do to disinfect the squad car after transporting him to jail? And then the image of throwing him naked in a shower and hosing him down with cold water, must be frightening to a guy with very bad mental comprehension. That's my vivid imagination running wild, I hope it’s not actually what happens in lockup. Maybe I watched  too many jail flicks when I was young, remember, ‘Bad Boys,’ with Sean Penn? I loved that movie!! 

BIG PAY FOR GOUGING US

Editor: 

John S. Moore wrote that PG&E’s senior management is “overcompensated.” That may be the understatement of the year. Look it up on Google: PG&E’s top nine executives are paid salaries and compensations between $1.5 million and $14 million a year. Nine multimillionaires. And how many hundreds and hundreds of millions has PG&E paid over the decades to their army of lawyers to fight every piece of legislation or court order that compels them to upgrade or repair equipment? How much has been spent to fight lawsuits while payouts to victims are withheld? And they can face the public with a straight face and announce another rate increase, this time 13%? The temerity and lack of conscience is mind-boggling. Where is the outrage? Instead, the California Public Utilities Commission gives a wink and a nod, and PG&E continues to gouge consumers while the execs live the high life.

Steve O’Rourke

Santa Rosa

THE %$*& LISTSERV

MCN Chatline: D. Dawson writes: “NOBODY CARES!”

That's obvious. But WRONG.

I care. Care that I've been willfully cyberstalked, libeled and bullied by a Neo-Nazi psychopath for over four years on the MCN lists, and continue to be obsessively targeted to this very day. MCN and its benefactor MUSD have been willing to do NOTHING to stop it, even during the three (3) years I had a restraining order, and pled to have this creep leave me alone. Unbelievable. 

And now the Superintendent imperiously announces that, based on his Board of Trustees' illegal decision (The Brown Act) to dissolve the MCN lists, he is putting the unique MCN lists on the chopping block to the highest bullshitter, thus committing the ultimate cop-out of letting these Lists be destroyed for the lack of responsible moderation. 

I've been left no other choice but to fight back, and so apologize to the delicate ears, newcomers and the cognitively challenged, whom I might have shocked and offended in our so-called “community” by answering back to a bully. I can count on one hand (with a couple of fingers missing) the folks around here who have had my back. So excuse me while I vomit.

Who's going to allow swastikas to be pinned-up on the local bulletin board, or to be spray-painted on a targeted person's house? All the name of “free speech?” Give me a break. As some might say, free speech isn't free, and now MCN/MUSD has blown any speech at all - by losing MCN's vaunted listservs at the hands of a vicious, disgusting, mentally ill, Neo-Nazi psychopath - all for a lack of the tenable care they were entrusted with.

A legitimately moderated social media platform has to limit the “swastikas” - as well as the hate speech, criminal threats, vicious libel and other illegal activities that can be, and have been perpetrated over the internet. Specifically, by this Neo-Nazi individual on MCN's Listservs.

“Nobody Cares,” 

Yeah, but I care.

David Gurney

EXPLORE MENDOCINO ECOLOGY WITH UC CALIFORNIA NATURALISTS

Are you looking to learn about the wonders of our local ecology? The University of California’s California Naturalist class is open for registration once again in Mendocino, at the UC Hopland Research and Extension Center (HREC). 

The California Naturalist Program seeks to foster a committed corps of volunteer naturalists and community scientists trained and ready to take an active role in natural resource conservation, education and restoration. The course introduces participants to the wonders of local ecology, engages them in the stewardship of California’s natural communities, and introduces cultural connections with the landscape. Classes combine a science curriculum with guest lecturers, field trips and project-based learning to immerse participants in the natural world of inland Mendocino County.

“We’re excited to be able to offer this class to the community again,” said Hannah Bird, community educator at HREC. “The class is for all who find themselves drawn to the colors of fall, flowing creeks in the winter and the vibrancy of spring wildflowers, you don’t have to be an expert, just to enjoy nature. Instructor Dr. Jennifer Riddell brings such genuine joy and knowledge to the class, coupled with field classes and guest speakers on subjects from geology to bird language and Traditional Ecological Knowledge.”

The class runs from February 10 to April 27, with 6 Saturday classes and field trips to the beautiful oak woodlands and rangelands of the 5,358 acre site at HREC.

In an effort to build an inclusive community of participants, the California Naturalist Program at HREC offers equity pricing. Registration is $470 per person (including certification, instruction, some materials and facility costs). For those unable to pay this amount due to low income or extenuating circumstances, an income guide and sliding scale of payment is available to adjust course cost. Minimum payment is $300. A limited number of need-based scholarships are also available to help support registrants. “Generous donors to the Hopland Scholars Fund have enabled us to create a pricing structure that meets our own costs and the needs of our community,” said Bird.

This class will fill quickly so interested members of the community are encouraged to register early to avoid disappointment. Class size is limited to 25 participants.

Further information and registration can be found at https://bit.ly/CalNat2024 

For more information, email hbird@ucanr.edu or call Bird at (707) 744-1424, ext. 105.

SHOESTRING.

Editor,

Marco here. Re: Marty Durlin's letter titled ‘Inside KZYX’: “On a shoestring budget, KZYX operates...”

That shoestring budget includes paying Marty Durlin $60,000 a year plus full medical, dental, and vision. Just the money she sucks out of KZYX  for herself in three months would fully fund every aspect of KNYO for a  year, you know, speaking of shoelaces. Just two people in the management  suite of KZYX, Marty and the next one in line, personally swallow every  penny of all KZYX membership dues. 2000 members at $50 each is $100,000.  Last time I checked, the station was burning through $600,000 a year,  provided by a six-figure government grant and large, controlling  donations from rich people whose class and stripe and financial  interests you will consequently never hear a discouraging word about.  And then there are underwriters.

About the underwriting. On the KZYX underwriting info page, three points  are stressed to potential underwriters:

/1. Eighty percent of public radio listeners say they have a positive  impression of a company that supports public radio. 2. Seventy percent  of listeners say that underwriting messages have a positive impact on  purchase decisions. 3. Eighty-six percent of listeners considered NPR  personally important to them./

Underwriters are encouraged to buy time for their message on the air  expecting a return in brand attraction and sales. How is that not  advertising? And when programming decisions, like the decision to soak  the broadcast day with NPR shows, are made with potential underwriting  money in mind, how is that different from commercial radio, that  similarly plays what pays.

The reason the low end of the FM dial was set aside for noncommercial  radio was so radio could be done by people not concerned with whether it  made money or not. Radio is only expensive to do when the folks who run  the station like money. And who doesn't like money? So the expense of  acquiring the plant and the license naturally ratchets to absurd  heights, pricing everyone not mainly concerned with money entirely out  of having a reasonably high-power radio station. So real noncommercial  radio needs those specially allocated slots, and can do fine there,  because doing radio is cheap. Transmitters last decades without  maintenance; they're as reliable as a refrigerator. Once you've got the  transmitter and you've got permission to plug it in and switch it on,  your main expense of broadcasting is electricity. If the transmitter  uses 4,000 watts, and electricity is 40c per kWh, which it is now,  that's $1.60 an hour. That's two medium-size bites off the end of a  burrito. A decent mixing board can be had used for just a few hundred  dollars. Computers and microphones are practically free anymore.  Internet access for phones and web is $100 a month, say $200 a month  with all the bells and whistles. You get better equipment for more  money, but you can't hear the difference.

The people who make KZYX's shows from distant places (for NPR and etc.)  are often paid bogglingly well. Ira Glass, for example, just pre-Covid  got divorced and sold his million-dollar apartment in New York. It's the  local Mendocino County airpeople on KZYX who are not paid for their  shows, though they're the ones who do all the actual work the radio  station is there for in the first place, and also they have to  periodically beg for money, “to keep the great shows on the air,” as  they used to put it, money that instead, see above, goes to a handful of  people in the office. All of KZYX's transmitters and  studio-to-transmitter links and all the studio lights and computers and  microwave popcorn ovens comes to well less than $20,000 per year in  electricity. So if the folks in the management suite, including the CEO,  the bookkeeper, the microphone-cable mender guy, the underwriting  salesperson, the program director and the newslady, are getting a total  among them of, say, $200,000, and rent on the various places, and the  tower fees, and replacement lightbulbs, and Henry's roof patch and a  shingle every once in awhile, and so on, come to another $50,000 a year,  that all adds up to less than $300,000. But it's $600,000, isn't it?  Where's the extra $300,000 going? That's three million dollars every ten  years. That's a mystery. Unless my math is way off, KZYX is /swimming/  in mystery money. And if it isn't, where did it vanish to?

The main item on the job desciption for a CEO for KZYX has always been:  the candidate must be able and committed to raise money. Hence the  periodic pep talk and poor-mouthing from the CEO. And yet the first job  of the manager of any business, for-profit or nonprofit, bar or gas  station or pet grooming salon or grammar school, is to see that the  workers are paid before she pays herself. No manager at KZYX has ever  done that, despite all the copious available money. I'd start with a  $1000-a-year stipend for regular weekly airpeople, which is only $20 per  show, but it would be a step. If the airperson is independently wealthy  and $1000 for him is a bottle of fancy alcohol and a Japanese beefburger  with gold flakes in the pickles, and he doesn't need it, he can tear up  the check. People who need it can get a fresh set of tires and a year's  worth of car insurance, or pay rent for January, or have a few teeth  fixed right instead of having to keep gluing the caps back on in the  bathroom mirror.

I was at KMFB for almost 15 years. That was a commercial station, that  didn't get government grants to keep going, and had plenty of expenses a  noncommercial station doesn't have, and was in a depressed radio market,  and the string of owners always took their profit, and manager Bob  Woelfel every once in awhile could not pay himself. Yet he paid us every  time, both for our airtime and a cut of the advertising money our shows  brought in. And he didn't dick around with our shows. Everyone at KMFB  had more leeway and freedom than anyone at any NPR station I have ever  heard of has ever had. That's my model for managerial integrity. Bob  Young at KNYO, same thing. I don't mind not being paid at KNYO, because  nobody is being paid. Bob manages the station so there'll be a station  to do his show on. To paraphrase Kurt Vonnegut, Marty Durlin could  volunteer to manage KZYX, like the airpeople volunteer, but she doesn't  have to if she doesn't want to, and I guess she doesn't want to, so.

With some of poor shoestring KZYX' mystery riches lately MCPB has bought  prime real estate in downtown Ukiah with existing suitable buildings  intact and ready to paint. When they move the office in, meaning some  final paperwork, a dish antenna on a mast on the roof, a new  studio-to-transmitter box, and a lazy afternoon plugging in the mixing  board, phone and internet connections, a couple of microphones and a  wingback chair, that'll be nice, but what will change on the air, where  it counts? Will shows finally be allowed on KZYX that push the envelope  out a little farther than chortling about sports or playing genre music  and reading the liner notes in a genially stoned drawl or Terry Gross  interviewing the granddaughter of the inventor of the windshield wiper,  besides Ralph Nader at 5am Saturday morning?  Will anything change at  all? I'm aware I'm harping on the pay issue, but if the local shows are  valuable (I say even the most banal of them is) and radio work is worth  being paid for, then pay the airpeople. If you value them, Marty, pay  them. Not paying them is not valuing them; it's slapping them in the  face. Of /course/ it's nice to be on the air and it feels good to have a  show, and it's a rare opportunity in the world, and that softens the  blow somewhat. That's no excuse. You can pay them, so pay them. If I  were in your shoes, and if there was any hint of the station being  embarrassed for funds, I'd take a substantial pay cut and pay them some  more. I'd pay the token LGBT talk-show people a lot more. They clearly  take the responsibility seriously. It's the best show you've got. That  is a driveway show, called that because you get where you're going and  sit in the car to hear the rest of it. Their work, and all the other  local airpeople's work, brings in all that money that you pay yourself  with. So pay them.

To compare, KNYO will be moving into another building soon, too, as its  main studio and performance space of ten happy years of very fair rent,  downtown in the city it serves, is being sold, which was expected, and  no hard feelings. KNYO had some trouble this year; the tower-tree blew  down in a storm, money was raised and that was dealt with, and there's  money left over, saved, toward moving the tower and transmitter to a  much better place early this coming year. All the problems, obligations,  technical considerations, paperwork, and real expenses of KNYO are  remarkably similar to KZYX's. And KNYO is constantly changing and  adapting and continues to provide a platform for people to do radio from  wherever they are, with cheap personal studios all over the county,  including welcoming problematical people like me, and that's saying  something. The difference comes from, I think, the level of money  corruption. KZYX, $600,000 (one year it was $750,000!). KNYO, $15,000.  /KNYO, at least forty times less corrupt./ That's a good slogan. I'll  have to write that down.

Oh, also the difference is, KNYO's broadcast radius is limited by law to  just a few miles. KZYX's signal can blanket the entire country 24 hours  a day with a sometimes hourly pitch for ever more money, beyond the CPB  grant that they get because they can blanket the county. Does that  seem fair to you?

Shoestring, tch.

Marco McClean

Fort Bragg

CHRIS ROGERS FOR ASSEMBLY

kymkemp.com/2023/12/11/democratic-delegates-call-for-resignation-of-party-chair-rusty-hicks/

I live in Santa Rosa and have been represented by Chris Rogers for many years (he was originally elected city-wide, and although he now represents a district I don't live in, I still need his leadership and vote on the CC to get anything done).  I am supporting him for Assembly, and think he's one of the best of the “younger” generation coming forward now.

So, yeah, I have a horse in this race.

Even though the link, above, is coming to you from someone who is already biased, I still hope you will be interested, because the opinion of 27 Dem delegates really is a thing, and it will be interesting to see how this plays out.  Beyond my interest in this Assembly race, as a lifelong Dem, I do care about our party's behavior.

Sonia Taylor

Healdsburg

LIFE VESTS

Editor,

Have I ever mentioned to you and your readers that one day I was so very pissed off I wore a life jacket to town to protest the never ending construction insanity we have to endure. But hey, today on my walk across town what did I find? A life jacket, a child’s of course. So sometimes paths of the past come again to remind us that BS has got to go. Lol. 

I hope your day is filled with monster drinks and sprinkles donuts. 

Sincerely yours, 

Greg Crawford 

Fort Bragg

DETAIL, ALBION MILL (another eBay photo of local interest, via Marshall Newman)

THE NEW CHRISTMAS TREE LAW, 1927.

The Union Lumber Company has been for some years protecting their young forest growth from fire and have been replanting young trees on recently cut-over land. … The company has arranged to have trees cut by their forestry department and offered for sale at the Reforestation Nursery south of town at prices ranging from 25¢ to $1 depending on size.

Permits will be issued to those who wish to cut trees for their own use from lands belonging to the company. It is requested that persons obtaining such permits observe carefully the rules set forth on the permit and particularly that they select their tree well before cutting and not throw it away after it is cut for one that looks better.

The permits may be obtained from the company forester, V. B. Davis.

Under no condition will permits be issued for cutting Christmas trees or Christmas berries for commercial purposes.

(Fort Bragg Advocate and News December 7, 1927)

CATCH OF THE DAY, Monday, December 11, 2023

CHARLES BLUNT, Ukiah. DUI-alcohol&drugs, controlled substance.

ANNETTE HENDREN, Clearlake/Ukiah. Stolen property, failure to appear.

JARED KIDD, Ukiah. Failure to appear, resisting.

LETHAL MIX

Have we entered a “fourth wave” of the overdose epidemic?

Nationwide, researchers have identified a rise in deaths that may be driven by people taking both fentanyl and a stimulant such as methamphetamine. In San Francisco, this lethal combination of “speedballs” is making the city’s drug crisis even worse. 

Combining drugs or using them in succession isn’t a new phenomenon, but it is becoming much more deadly with fentanyl now often a part of that concoction — whether or not the user is aware of its presence.

Here’s what a Chronicle examination of death reports revealed:

A rising number of people who fatally overdose in S.F. are found to have recently taken both fentanyl and a stimulant. 

As recently as 2016, less than one-third of fatal overdoses involved fentanyl and a stimulant.

In 2022, 63% of overdose deaths involved this drug combination.

Data from the first half of 2023 suggests the number will be higher than ever this year.

Our reporters spoke to addiction experts, who cite a swirl of factors driving the trend, and to users on the streets of S.F.

“I’ve known plenty of people who died of speedballs or fentanyl, but I think I know what I’m doing,” Chi Minie said one recent day as he prepared to head into the Tenderloin. “And on a night like this, when I’m walking around, I’ll need a speedball. It makes sure I don’t fall asleep where I smoke up  and get all my stuff stolen. That little bit of crack cuts the nods.”

(SF Chronicle)

AN EPIC BATTLE IS BREWING BETWEEN CALIFORNIA AND DEEP-RED SHASTA COUNTY. 

by Kurtis Alexander

MONTGOMERY CREEK, Shasta County — In the sprawling green hills of California’s far north, where the politics run red and rowdy, a new state law designed to clear a path for climate-friendly energy projects is facing a tough debut.

State officials are using their authority under the law, for the first time, to gain approval powers over a plan to build 48 giant wind turbines in Shasta County — powers typically held by local officials. In doing so, they’ve encountered not only opposition to the project but broader anger in a region known for its distaste of heavy-handed government and, in particular, Sacramento Democrats.

Previously, the county Board of Supervisors here rejected Gov. Gavin Newsom’s COVID mandates, scoffed at the state’s support of tighter gun restrictions and vowed to take on the Legislature over whether the county could hand-count ballots amid concerns, though unsubstantiated, about fraud in President Donald Trump’s failed reelection bid.

Now, the new climate law, Assembly Bill 205, has rural Shasta County in yet another dust-up with the state. The confrontation was cemented late last month with a lawsuit filed by county officials, challenging the California Energy Commission’s jurisdiction over the Fountain Wind Project.

“It’s the right thing for us to address this and fight back,” Board of Supervisors Chair Patrick Jones said during a public discussion of the matter.

Yet the county’s latest fight with the state is distinct in crucial ways.

Resistance in the region has typically come from the right, and recently the far right, after a political shift sparked by pandemic-era frustrations and fueled by a group of activists that included anti-vaxxers, self-styled militia members and evangelicals. By contrast, the wind project, proposed in timberlands 35 miles east of Redding, has drawn opposition across the spectrum, including the local Pit River Tribe, which is joining the county as a plaintiff in the lawsuit.

“All the people are on the same side now: the pagans, the Christians, the Democrats, the Trumpsters,” said Brandy McDaniels, a member of the Pit River Tribe, standing in front of her home one afternoon at the Montgomery Creek Rancheria, below the project site, on a wooded slope with views of distant Mount Shasta. “Our community is bonded by our love of the area.”

The objections to the turbines, some of which would rise 600 feet, range considerably. They include doubts about the benefits of clean energy, anxieties over firefighting planes navigating the tall towers, and worries about disturbance to forests and wildlife.

The tribe helped forge the unlikely alliance against the nearly half-billion-dollar proposal because it doesn’t want to see its ancestral lands developed. Tribal members say the project could “erase” their people from history.

The concerns about the wind farm reflect the unpopularity of renewable energy ventures in many California communities that might host them — an aversion that threatens to slow the state’s push to replace planet-warming fossil fuels with clean sources of power. California officials have been frustrated by what’s often perceived as NIMBYism, and for developers, it’s a minefield

“We need all the wind that we can get in the state to reach” California’s energy objectives, Mark Lawlor, vice president of development at ConnectGen, the Houston company that wants to build the Fountain Wind Project, told the Chronicle. “There’s just not that many places that have suitable wind with all the right resources, like transmission.”

While McDaniels is pleased to see Shasta County coming together to fight the state and the turbines, she and others have expressed a possible downside: Their cause could get entangled in the area’s reputation as a hotbed of right-wing extremism.

“We’re not all insurrectionists up here,” McDaniels said. “But the question has been posed: Will we be taken seriously because of the other shenanigans in Shasta County?”

Newsom signed AB205 into law last year, in part to help the state reach its goal of generating all its power from carbon-free sources by 2045. The ambitious target is one of California’s marquee initiatives to combat climate change.

The new law, among other things, allows developers of wind and solar projects to apply to the California Energy Commission for streamlined review and authorization. That process has historically been handled by cities and counties.

The change in jurisdiction, which was done with little fanfare as part of California’s convoluted budget process, was urged by state officials who worried about too few renewable energy projects coming online. The move is one of several efforts by the Newsom administration to cut red tape for vital infrastructure such as power production.

While the state has met its interim objectives for zero-carbon electricity, getting about 37% of its energy from clean sources at last count (not including nuclear and large hydropower), the path to 100% remains uncertain. Increasing demand for electricity complicates matters.

“As we think about building really fast, doubling or tripling the (clean) electric grid, the challenge identified by the administration is the challenge of long permitting timelines,” Siva Gunda, vice chair of the California Energy Commission, said in an interview.

Commission officials did not want to discuss specific power proposals or Shasta County’s lawsuit against the state. But Gunda acknowledged that, under AB205, local concerns will have to be weighed against the bigger and broader threat of climate change.

“No matter what kind of project we’re trying to build, no matter where we’re trying to build it, there’s always going to be potential benefits to the community but there will also be impacts,” he said. “This is a brand-new program. As we go through the process, the agency will learn.”

The proposal in Shasta County is among renewable energy plans that have been shot down locally, from wind turbines on the breezy ridges of Humboldt County to solar arrays in sunny Southern California. Los Angeles and San Bernardino counties have gone as far as banning renewable projects in certain places.

The Fountain Wind Project, near the foothill town of Montgomery Creek, was denied by Shasta County’s Planning Commission two years ago after hundreds of people poured into community meetings to protest. The Board of Supervisors, on appeal, also rebuffed the proposal. The supervisors have since put large swaths of the county off-limits to utility-scale wind power.

With the passage of AB205, however, ConnectGen petitioned the California Energy Commission to put the plan back in play, and this fall, the agency agreed, making it the first project to be taken up under the law.

The county’s suit against the state commission, filed in Shasta County Superior Court, argues that undoing local decisions and providing a developer a “second bite at the apple” is inappropriate and illegal.

Absent court intervention, the commission’s governing board is expected to make a decision on the Fountain Wind Project next summer. The timeline is within the expedited schedule set by AB205, which requires environmental reviews to be wrapped up in nine months.

The project would consist of four dozen remote turbines, down from 72 initially proposed, across 2,855 acres of private forest owned by Shasta Cascade Timberlands. It would generate up to 205 megawatts of electricity, enough to supply more than 80,000 homes, according to ConnectGen.

The site is within easy reach of existing transmission lines operated by Pacific Gas and Electric Co. A smaller wind project already runs across the adjacent Hatchet Ridge.

Lawlor, with ConnectGen, said the project would yield significant benefits for the county: hundreds of construction jobs and 10 to 20 permanent positions, $50 million in property tax revenue over 30 years and, despite what critics say, a reduction in fire danger with the company’s plans to build fuel breaks and increase vegetation management.

Opponents generally say they’re not against green energy, just the location of the proposal. But at least some residents believe the historic threat posed by climate change appropriately trumps local concerns.

“People say ‘no’ all over the place, and that’s got to stop because we need this energy,” said Redding resident Randy Smith, who identifies as nonpartisan. “We’re on the edge of a warming climate that may displace us if we don’t respond more actively.”

* * *

At the Montgomery Creek Rancheria, McDaniels said she selected the site of her modest home, amid the scruffy brush and pine, because of the views of the surrounding mountains. She fears they’ll be tarnished if the turbines go up.

Many residents on the reservation reside in old trailers along dirt roads, with no running water or electricity. McDaniels, a cultural representative for the Pit River Tribe’s Madesi Band, says the primitive conditions are a trade-off for being able to live amid the sacred hills and valleys of their ancestors. The hardship also reflects the struggles the tribe has endured.

“The original narrative of our people is written in this landscape,” she said, looking up at the tree-covered slopes where the wind farm is proposed. “They’ll just come and destroy the land.”

The tribe counts about 3,800 members in Northern California, organized into 11 independent bands, many of which expect to be affected by the project. The tribe’s headquarters is in nearby Burney, where members run a small casino that only recently got a sign that lights up and still operates with limited hours.

On this particular afternoon, a work crew was laying the foundation for a new house at the Montgomery Creek Rancheria, part of an effort to improve the quality of life for residents.

“We’re trying to build a community here. Now we’re in limbo,” McDaniels said. “We really don’t deserve this. We’re still healing from what’s happened to us in the past. When is enough enough?”

Not far from the reservation, Joseph Osa, a retired Department of Defense engineer, was taking a stroll with his two dogs on his 95-acre plot, where he can see a few of the existing turbines on Hatchet Ridge.

The self-described conservative Christian, who joked that “with all the labels we put on people these days, I’m probably one of the bad ones,” acknowledged that he hadn’t thought much about the Pit River Tribe — until the Fountain Wind Project emerged.

His initial concerns were that bald eagles and other birds would get caught in the spinning blades and that firefighting, especially from the air, would be hampered, a claim the developer rejects. For many in the area, the memory of wildlife remains fresh, foremost from such recent monsters as the Dixie Fire, the Zogg Fire and the Carr Fire, all of which took homes and lives.

Now, Osa says, the concerns of the tribe are top of mind.

“Prior to this, I kind of stayed on the property and didn’t meet a lot of people,” he said, noting his increased interaction with neighbors after the project surfaced. “Here (the tribal members) are telling their stories, the kind of stuff they’ve gone through over the years. It’s hard to imagine. We don’t want to be adding to that.”

 One of the organizers against the proposal, Beth Messick-Lattin, said she is encouraged by how easy it was to get different types of people together to discuss their opposition to the turbines, especially amid the divisiveness that has come with the rising voice of the county’s hard right. Messick-Lattin says she leans Democrat on social issues in general but Republican on the right to carry.

She remembers only a few tense moments during the community discussions she helped lead.

“One person honestly believed he was having email conversations with Trump every morning,” Messick-Lattin said. “But mostly, everyone was respectful.”

* * *

County Supervisor Mary Rickert, who represents the Montgomery Creek area and is also critical of the wind proposal, wants to make sure Shasta County is taken seriously in its new fight with the state.

“We have become such a laughingstock nationwide,” she said recently, referring to the widespread news coverage of the county’s surge in anti-government fervor within deep-blue California.

A rancher and Republican, Rickert was on the losing end of a campaign that swept control of the Board of Supervisors from establishment conservatives and gave it to right-wing populists early last year.

She has since been among the minority on the politically divided board, which has set its sights on belt-tightening and deregulation while taking stands on culture-war issues such as LGBTQ celebrations. The board has seen the departure of several top county administrators, including the CEO, county counsel and public health officer. 

This year, when the supervisors began thinking about challenging the state over the new climate law, they discussed doing it in tandem with an attack on Assembly Bill 969, which prevents counties from hand-counting votes. The state bill was signed this fall to put a lid on election conspiracies after Shasta County canceled its contract with Dominion Voting Systems amid unfounded claims that the company’s machines were rigged against Trump.

County Board Chair Jones said AB969, like AB205, represented state overreach. But Rickert argued against a suit packaging the two laws together, calling them “apples and oranges,” a strategy that ultimately won out.

Jones, who helped lead the board’s swing to the right, couldn’t be reached to talk with the Chronicle about AB205 despite phone calls and a visit to his family’s gun shop in Redding, where he keeps office hours. Recently, though, he publicly pegged the county’s chances of winning the fight against the state and the wind farm at 50-50.

At the first hearing held by the California Energy Commission on the Fountain Wind Project two weeks ago, Jones was clear about his disdain.

“You do not live here,” he told state officials. “You do not have the history, and you do not represent the people of Shasta County.”

(SF Chronicle)

HERB CAEN, HITCHCOCK, AND THE WAR WITH THE UNION SQUARE PIGEONS

by Peter Hartlaub

During nearly 60 years as a San Francisco Chronicles columnist, Herb Caen didn’t lose many battles but while restaurateurs, politicians and even Hollywood celebrities were deferential to his sharp wit and barrels of ink, the writer’s war with the Union Square pigeons ended in defeat.

Final score: San Francisco pigeons 10,000 or thereabouts, Herb Caen 0.

One of the most famous Caen photos has the writer sitting on a park bench with Alfred Hitchcock in 1963, looking alternately amused and terrified as pigeons perch on his shoulders and head — part of a promotion for the movie “The Birds.”

But Caen’s disdain for pigeons began as early as the late 1940s, when he started complaining about increased numbers of birds in Union Square after a parking garage remodel, acting as if the war against the birds was one he could win.

“I like pigeons as much as the next cat, but they belong in a sanctuary, safe from columnists and press agents,” Caen wrote in 1958.

At one point in 1962, Caen partnered with an airline to put four racks filled with parasols at the corner of Union Square, calling them “Herb Caen Fallout Shelters.” The columnist was photographed walking through Union Square under shelter of a flimsy umbrella, big smile on his face.

He admitted defeat within days, when all but one of the parasols was missing, and the pigeons remained.

Hitchcock arrived in Union Square on April 1, 1963, two days before “The Birds” was scheduled to open in San Francisco. Caen could hardly hide his displeasure with the pigeon-themed photo shoot. The resulting column’s tone ventured beyond passive aggression — it actually felt a little like revenge against the director and his marketing crew.

“On Monday afternoon the portly figure of Mr. Alfred Hitchcock was to be seen emerging, with a definite ‘thwuck,’ from a large black limousine on Powell,” Caen wrote. “He waddled over to a bench in Union Square and spread himself out like roly-poly pudding. Some nut with a paper bag sprinkled grain at his feet, attracting pigeons by the hundreds.”

Hitchcock delivered one joke after another, riffing with Caen and the pigeons themselves.

“Get thee to Ernie’s,” Hitchcock said, kicking at the birds gently. “I’ll see you under glass at 7.”

It’s notable that Caen buried the exchange, placing it in the second half of his April 3, 1963, column, below a local item about tenant parking restrictions at the Union Square Garage.

“With another ‘thwuck,’ he squeezed back into the limousine, on the rear of which was a sticker reading, ‘The Birds is Coming,’” Caen wrote. “‘So long,’ he waved. ‘I are going’.”

But the photographs are fantastic, with Hitchcock never breaking his solemn gaze, even as Caen appears to be under siege. The poor columnist doesn’t have the same expression in any two photos. He’s laughing in one, flinching in another, looking like he’s ready to flee in a third. Pigeons dig claws into his balding head in several photos. In almost all of them, a pigeon is perched on his shoulder, staring dismissively at The Chronicle legend.

The best photo: The two men on the bench, Caen looking overwhelmed but smiling. The image never appeared in the paper in 1963, at least not surrounding the coverage of “The Birds.” A tight shot of a pigeon fluttering its wings while on Caen’s head appeared on the front page instead.

But that great shot has since become a classic, published when Caen won a special Pulitzer Prize in 1996, after his death in 1997, and many times since them. The photo has been used recently in The Chronicle both online and in print, notably highlighted in “The Chronicle of a Great City” book a few years ago.

As for the pigeons, they continued their dominance over the writer for another three-and-a-half decades after “The Birds.” He wrote about them often, and was always the butt of his own jokes.

The last Caen mention of pigeons in Union Square appeared in 1994.

“Word must be getting around among the pigeons that I am not exactly their best friend,” Caen wrote. “Walking through Union Square, my brown fedora was shat upon, and I could swear I heard the culprit cackling as it flew off.”

ON-LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY

I don’t know if I was a kid in University today and witnessed unguided bombs killing thousands of innocent children in Gaza, who cannot flee anywhere, I would be anti-Zionist as well. “Never again” doesn’t mean it has license to commit genocide. Unfortunately, Israel is signing its own Sovereign death warrant by such ill advised actions.

WHAT JUST HAPPENED?

by James Kunstler

“All these idiots whose ‘identity’ is literally a ‘protected class’ are not protesting anything. Their whole victim act is sponsored, enabled & signal boosted by every powerful institution. The entire elaborate charade amounts to power petitioning itself.” —Aimee Terese on X

If you haven’t discerned this yet, the Party of Chaos — Globalism’s “fifth column” in America — lost ground badly in early December even as the country supposedly enters its annual Christmastime coma. You know what a fifth column is? I will explain: it is a subversive enemy force operating inside a nation to sabotage its interests. The Party of Chaos, of course, is the party of “Joe Biden” the fictitious “president” euchered in plain sight to that position via flagrant chicanery in the 2020 Super Tuesday primary and then the free-for-all fraud-o-rama of the general election that year.

This subversive Party of Chaos (with Marxist characteristics), has worked overtime for years to mindfuck Americans into destroying their own country. Just think of the absurdities you are asked to swallow daily and the punishments meted out for opposing them. It all came to an interesting inflection point lately with the three presidents of exalted universities failing spectacularly to cover their asses in congressional testimony about antisemitism on campus.

At issue was why, after years of grandstanding on the oppression of victim groups, and censoring, silencing, cancelling, and crucifying alternate opinions, they gave their students and faculty a pass in recent weeks on yelling for the extermination of Jews. Wow, did that business disorder the whole Woke cosmography! I’ll tell you why:

My people, the Jews, including a major chunk of the intellectual class, assumed leadership in the Woke crusade because the Holocaust of the 1940s established us as the world’s premier oppressed victim group. That badge of honor stuck for decades. Seventy percent of American Jews vote for the Party of Chaos, which used to be the Party of Civil Rights, which used to be synonymous with truth and justice. Thus, for decades, we American Jews were able to feel marinated in virtue.

Incidentally, the reason American Jews went all in for the Civil Rights movement was because after the big war and all its horrors they felt a victory for expanded tolerance and acceptance in America — the defeat of “Jim Crow” in particular — could only be a good thing for Jews, who, by the way, had demonstrated that a former “out” group could succeed spectacularly in 20th century America if permitted to try, which suggested that other “out” groups could too, and ought to be allowed to try. For Jews, America turned out to be the promised land, and one can easily see how that rhetoric jibed so well with Martin Luther King and his followers in the 1960s.

But the Civil Rights crusade is history now and American intellectuals, Jews especially, appear to be secretly disillusioned and rather ashamed at the less than satisfactory results, such as intractable black poverty and crime. Successful American Jews have been out of their own ghettos for decades, and they have no desire to live adjacent to any black ghetto if they can help it — though they would never dare admit it. However, they flocked to and flourished in the ghetto of elite academia, where they could make a good living in the commerce of ideas, luxuriate in enhanced social status (especially at Ivy League schools), with the bonus of fabulously easy work requirements (two classes a week and then summers off, what a deal!).

Life on campus has become increasingly uncomfortable in recent years as Wokery ramped up. Lately, the demonization of all white people, including most Jews, became the order of the day to account for and expiate the disappointments of the Civil Rights program. It required considerable cognitive dissonance for American Jews, especially in higher education, to go along with the growing aggressive absurdity of Woke politics. And then their remaining illusions blew up in the fall of this year after Hamas went on its savage rampage and Israel decided to bring down the wrath of Yahweh to remind the world what never again means.

American Jews on campus — in the crucible of victimhood politics — now find themselves called out as “oppressors” and “colonizers” on the seesaw of social justice. No longer an “out” group, they are fingered as a cruel and hate-worthy “in” group of the most privileged sort. Jewish students on campus began to feel like they had targets painted on their foreheads. At some colleges, they were indeed actively harassed and menaced. And after all they’ve done, and all the money they’ve given, to assist all the other victims, have-nots, left-behinds and marginalized in this world! And finally, to see how they were sold out by those three smirking boss-girl elite college presidents at the witness table in Congress, equivocating so strenuously that it seemed to affect the oxygen content in the room. From the river to the sea. . . woe unto you!

And now, an even bigger question looms: with Wokery unraveling on campus, will it now also unravel the Party of Chaos — and its ability to act as Globalism’s fifth column undermining our country? Personally, I think it is indeed the beginning of the end of all that, especially the disgraced intellectual class of America’s ability to play along for mere social status brownie points. Perhaps we’ll all begin to discern that the next trip to be laid on the people of this land will be the final one, the Big Enchilada, the event that will truly knock the wind out of Western Civ and leave it gasping and wheezing on the floor: blowing up the banking system. When that happens, we’ll all finally know just where things stand, and then maybe we’ll all start to sing together.

SAY WHAT?

by Larry Bensky?

Say what, and to whom, and why?

Such are the questions being asked these days by those who want to say something. And those questioning what those wanting to say something mean to say.

Can you say anything you choose to say to people in a class in college? Or might what you say get you fired (if you’re a school President or even a teacher) or a bad grade having nothing to do with your course work if you’re a student)?

Can you say what you choose to say to a reporter? What if you believe reporters in general are unreliable?

Can you freely say something in writing (a form of speech)? Is writing your thoughts “protected” by the constitution so that anyone can advocate even horrific actions?

Such questions, normally discussed in law schools and philosophy classes, are now the stuff of TV sound bites, and newspaper articles. As well as daily commentaries.

Exempt from all those concerns is a new multi-million dollar industry targeted on, and practiced by, self-centered fanatics. They center their energies elsewhere.

They work on “motivation.” Their leader is a 55 year old former triathlete and music composer/performer, Jesse Itzler.

For a full portrait of Itzler, read “Peak Performer” by Tad Friend in the December 8 “New Yorker.”

Friend has spent a lot of time with Itzler and a handful of other motivationists . It would be comical to read about them in a work of satire, or investigation. But it isn’t funny to learn about how motivationoids gather in small groups, larger seminars and occasional huge stadium and arena spectaculars.

Itzler and others harangue each of those in attendance — and by extension each of US — about being motivated to climb high mountains, swim vast lakes, lift weights we can’t even move.

And find fulfillment in giving money not to help people, but to help ourselves. And, munificently, the self of Itzler.

A speech by him — one speech! — can bring half a million in dollars, not bitcoin or cryptocurrency, which he distrusts.

He and his ilk survive and thrive doing what they do, while M. Elizabeth Magil and her cohorts are in the headlines, pulled out of their “solos” by events far beyond them.

McGill was, until a few days ago, President of the University of Pennsylvania. She was forced to resign because, during a Congressional hearing, she refused to say she would discipline faculty or students or staff who didn’t share Congressional Committee optics about the Middle East.

What did those Congressmembers want?

Anyone at Penn, or Harvard, or anywhere, who doesn’t share the Congressmembers self-important outrage and dares to say so should be excluded from campuses.

This goes even beyond what Trump and DeSantis and their book-burning acolytes advocate. Ideas and the people who have them, not just books, would be no-nos too, if the Congressmembers had their way.

In fact, what Dr. McGill said took up thirty seconds in five hours of testimony. It was immediately denounced as anti-Semitism, a ludicrous charge given her career. Instances of real blatant anti-Semitism have gone without Congress being so stirred up for decades. (Can you say Richard Nixon or Henry Kissinger?)

Itzler will never have to worry about testifying to Congress because unlike McGill, his concerns are personal, not political. He, like his company, has lawyers but they work on contracts and finances. McGill has expensive lawyers too, but they now have to work as word police (the same law firm worked for Nixon!)

When speech becomes political, politics becomes speech.

Each is always the case, but any sense of balance is now gone.  The current battle, seemingly about words used in reference to the Middle East, is really about who gets to speak like Itzler.  

He’ll never testify to Congress. They don’t care about what he does, because that’s capitalism. if Congress decides to take more he’ll just make more by raising his prices. Victims of his hustle will never get money back from him because he can always say he didn’t promise riches  

And anyway did’t all that money paid make  them stronger?  

McGill can’claim damages, either.  She’s not President of Penn any longer, but a full time law professor there, which she is, gets about $150,000 a year.  And also additional income for outside speeches, for which her lecture fees now may be the highest in the nation.  

So who can say what to whom, and why?  Yelling fire! In a crowded theater is usually considered to be a crime.  

Yelling theater!  at the scene of a crime is generally seen as deranged.  

The Israel-Palestine situation is not a subject for debate.  Real people are suffering death by the hundreds of thousands.  Who has agency and who is performative?  

(Larry Bensky welcomes questions and comments. Lbensky@igc.org)

THE U.S. IS FUNDING THIS…

by Ralph Nader

The humiliation of the U.S. government, which is actively complicit in providing the weaponry, funding, and UN vetoes backing the Israeli government’s attack on the civilian Palestinians/Arabs in tiny Gaza, is in plain view daily. All in the name of the unasked American people and taxpayers.

Earlier this week, at a House of Representatives’ hearing, Trump toady Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY) repeatedly assailed three University presidents with the question of would they discipline students calling for the genocide of Jews, without any evidence that this hateful speech is prevalent on campus.

Pursuing her fulminations, Stefanik was cruelly oblivious to the real ongoing genocide in Gaza with her support of unconditional shipment of American F-16s, 155mm missiles and other weapons of mass destruction used to kill children, women and the elderly who had nothing to do with the preventable October 7 Hamas violence.

Meanwhile, a State Department spokesman continues to say that the Israeli government does not intentionally target civilians. With U.S. drones over Gaza daily, Secretary of State Antony Blinken has visual proof that the overwhelming bombing on civilian structures is killing innocent civilians.

The evidence is in the rubble of hospitals, health clinics, ambulances, schools, libraries, places of worship, marketplaces, water mains, homes, apartment buildings, and piles of unburied corpses being eaten by stray dogs. All this information is in the possession of bomber Biden’s regime.

The Bidenites and their bloodthirsty cohorts in Congress were forewarned when the Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Galant and other Israeli officials on October 8th shouted these chilling genocidal orders to their army: “No electricity, no food, no fuel, no water.… We are fighting human animals and will act accordingly.” (See, Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide). Add an already illegal 16-year Israeli blockade of 2.3 Palestinians suffering from dire poverty, with 40% of their children down with anemia.

Now, about half of Gaza’s population are children, 85% of the entire population is homeless, wandering helplessly into nowhere, afflicted with pending starvation, sickened by spreading infectious diseases and dirty drinking water. There is little or no medicines for diabetics and cancer patients. No surgery, no anesthesia, no emergency transport, no shelter from cold weather, only American-made bombs and missiles blowing up Palestinians into bits with Israeli snipers everywhere.

The Palestinians cannot flee from their open-air prison. They cannot surrender – the Israeli government wants them gone. Bear in mind, the population that is not yet blown up is sick and dying, denied needed outside humanitarian aid. Defying feeble Biden’s wishes, Netanyahu only allows a trickle of aid trucks to enter Gaza, and those that do enter can scarcely reach their destinations.

All this raises the issue of the gross undercount of casualties. The Hamas Health Authority has restricted its count to the names of the deceased and injured supplied by hospitals and morgues. These locations are now largely rubble or inoperative. Bodies under the rubble, many of them children, can’t be counted. Thousands of missing people cannot be counted. The Ministry’s suspended count is over 17,000 fatalities, plus 45,000 injuries. With the far larger carnage unable to be tabulated, the actual fatality toll may reach 100,000 soon.

Nonetheless, about two weeks ago, the New York Times reported the death undercount of children in Gaza in two months was ten times greater than the deaths of Ukrainian children in nearly two years of Russian bombings. One of its headlines – “Smoldering Gaza Becomes a Graveyard for Children.”

There are about 50,000 pregnant women in Gaza and about 5,500 of them are due to give birth. Where are they going to do that? How can they be cared for and be nurtured? These mothers are sick and starving. Add the babies to the terrorists toll.

Gaza’s area is about the size of Philadelphia. How many dead, injured, and dying people would there be if 20,000 bombs were dropped on civilians and civilian structures in Philadelphia? Philadelphians trapped without food, water, medicine or any escape route. Imagine 85% of 1.5 million residents homeless, wandering in the streets and alleys. And with virtually no humanitarian aid coming from outside the city. There wouldn’t be any fire trucks or water to extinguish spreading fires.

Over a nine-week period there would have to be over 200,000 deaths and many more permanently disabled for life.

There are courageous Jewish groups (e.g., Jewish Voice for Peace and If Not Now) and rabbis calling for an end to the slaughter, demanding a ceasefire. There are protestors at all of Biden’s public events/trips reminding him of next November.

Veterans for Peace and other veteran groups are engaged in non-violent civil disobedience in front of the Scranton, Pennsylvania factory producing 155mm missiles for Israel. (Scranton is Biden’s hometown.) Public opinion is turning against the Biden/Israel war without limits on the Palestinians.

Biden wouldn’t want to poll the American people about his $14.3 billion genocide tax, charging American taxpayers to further prosperous Israel’s war of extermination in Gaza. They’ll likely tell Biden that poor children, unaffordable health facilities and other necessities in America need that money first.

There are some 30 Democratic Senators demanding that this Biden bill contain conditions and safeguards so that the money is not used to blow up more Palestinian children and women. But what else are these funds for other than to expand Israel’s military budget? The Israeli extremist ruling coalition under Netanyahu has made no secret of wanting to take over all of remaining Palestine as part of their “Greater Israel” mission to include what they call Judea and Samaria. As Israel’s Founder, David Ben-Gurion, frankly declared referring to the Palestinians, “We have taken their country.” (As quoted in The Jewish Paradox (1978) by Nahum Goldmann.)

It is a cruel irony of history that Israeli state terrorism is producing a Palestinian Holocaust. Netanyahu’s regime has killed over 60 journalists—three of them Israelis—120 United Nations relief workers and instituted total blackouts to keep the grisly events in Gaza out of the news in real time. Netanyahu, to shield his colossal failure to defend Israel on October 7thand to keep his job, is making sure that his country joins the world community of savage, slaughtering regimes, exemplified by the Bush/Cheney unlawful criminal destruction of Iraq and Afghanistan, followed by Hillary Clinton toppling Libya into permanent violence and chaos since 2011. (Obama later called his conceding to Hillary’s demands as his worst foreign policy decision).

Capitol Hill and the White House don’t wait for any blood-guilt to be recognized. That will surely come later with the judgment of history and the nightmarish visions of innocents being vaporized because of Washington’s unconditional backing of the Israeli blitzkrieg against what the Israeli newspaper Haaretz has repeatedly called the “totally defenseless people” of Gaza.