Surfers | Heatwave Breaks | Floral | Assassination Attempt | For All | Shooting Reactions | PA Murder | AV Events | Greg Schindel | Live Bluegrass | Skateboard Assault | Log Truck | Wildfire Death | Water Meeting | Flower Patch | Many Mistakes | Rescuers Honored | Abysmal Failure | Librarian Trap | New Owners | Barn Party | Pet Naomi | Ukiah Concerts | Interfaith Humor | Ed Notes | Car Wash | Elder Abuse | Yesterday's Catch | Send Money | Strong Girl | Urinary Calculi | Volume | Vices | Killer | Mr. Cepeda | Miss Candlestick | Finding SF | Can't See | Little Kinder | Blaming Ralph | Kamala Tee | Gaslit America | Master Pol | Nap | Father Time | Dog Food | Project 2025 | Organized Workers | Israeli Massacre | Look Here
THE PROLONGED HEATWAVE BREAKS while the threat for thunderstorms and dry lighting increases as monsoonal moisture drives in from an offshore low pressure system. After lingering thunderstorm chances Monday, inland temperatures continue to trend down for the first half of next week before turning higher again. (NWS)
YESTERDAY'S HIGHS: Covelo 106°, Laytonville 106°, Ukiah 100°, Yorkville 98°, Boonville 94°, Fort Bragg 60°, Mendocino 55°, Point Arena 53°
STEPHEN DUNLAP (Fort Bragg): 54F in the fog this Sunday morning on the coast. I do not have any rain but showers are in the area this morning. After the moisture passes thru today we return to the "patchy fog" routine in general.
WHAT WE KNOW ABOUT THE ASSASSINATION ATTEMPT AGAINST TRUMP
The former president was holding a rally when he said he was shot in his ear. Two people, including the suspected gunman, were killed and two were critically injured.
by Michael Levenson
A man fired “multiple shots” toward the stage during former President Donald J. Trump’s rally in Butler, Pa., on Saturday evening, killing one spectator and critically injuring two others, according to the Secret Service.
Mr. Trump was rushed off the stage, blood visible around his right ear. He was taken to a hospital, and the Secret Service said he was “safe.” The Secret Service also said its personnel had killed the shooter.
“This evening we had what we are calling an assassination attempt against our former president, Donald Trump,” Kevin Rojek, a special agent at the Federal Bureau of Investigation, said during a news conference at the Butler Township Police Department.
Here’s what we know about the shooting.
The Former President
Mr. Trump ducked quickly after the shots began and as members of the crowd began to scream. Secret Service agents then rushed Mr. Trump off the stage. As he was escorted to his motorcade, Mr. Trump, whose face and right ear were bloodied, pumped his fist in a defiant gesture to the crowd.
He later said in a post on Truth Social, his social media platform, that he had been “shot with a bullet that pierced the upper part of my right ear.”
In his social media post, Mr. Trump wrote, “I knew immediately that something was wrong in that I heard a whizzing sound, shots, and immediately felt the bullet ripping through the skin. Much bleeding took place, so I realized then what was happening.”
There was no immediate statement from medical personnel on the former president’s injuries or condition. Later that night, an aide to the former president posted a video on social media that showed him walking off his plane unaided after he had landed in New Jersey. His injured ear was out of camera view.
The Trump campaign and the Republican National Committee said that the former president would attend the Republican convention in Milwaukee, which is scheduled to begin on Monday.
The Suspected Shooter
The Secret Service said the shooter had fired “from an elevated position outside of the rally venue.” An analysis by The New York Times suggested that the gunman had fired eight shots.
Law enforcement officials recovered an AR-15-type semiautomatic rifle from a deceased white male they believe was the gunman, according to two law enforcement officials. .
In a statement, the F.B.I. identified the man as Thomas Matthew Crooks, 20, of Bethel Park, Pa. The authorities said they were still trying to uncover his motive.
The Secret Service has not said how it killed the shooter. It wasn’t immediately clear if he had any accomplices.
The Casualties
Michael T. Slupe, the Butler County sheriff, said the spectator who was killed was an adult male who was probably attending the rally with his family. Sheriff Slupe said the man had been in the bleachers when he was shot and that he believed the man had died at the scene.
The two people who were critically injured were taken by helicopter to Allegheny General Hospital in Pittsburgh, according to Dan Laurent, a hospital spokesman. The authorities did not immediately release further information on the spectators’ injuries.
Rep. Ronny L. Jackson, a Republican congressman from Texas and Mr. Trump’s former White House doctor, said on social media that his nephew had been injured at the rally.
The young man was treated at the rally’s medical tent and released, Mr. Jackson wrote on X, saying that “his injury was not serious and he is doing well.”
The Scene
The shooting happened as Mr. Trump was holding a large outdoor rally on the grounds of the Butler Farm Show in Butler, a town of 13,000 people about 34 miles north of Pittsburgh. Mr. Trump had been showing supporters a chart about the number of border crossings just minutes into his speech when the shots rang out. Attendees screamed, “Get down, get down!” and “Shots fired!” The Secret Service quickly cleared the press area, moved the crowd out and declared the area a crime scene. There was confusion as the crowd dispersed. Some Trump supporters held hands and prayed and then chanted “U.S.A.!”
The Reaction
World leaders and elected officials across the United States, Republican and Democrat, forcefully condemned the shooting as an affront to democracy.
President Biden, in a nationally televised statement, expressed gratitude that Mr. Trump had been swiftly evacuated and said “There’s no place in America for this kind of violence.” He later spoke to Mr. Trump, according to the White House. The Biden campaign said it was pulling down its television ads as a sign that it was putting politics aside in the aftermath of the shooting.
Former President Barack Obama called on Americans to “use this moment to recommit ourselves to civility and respect in our politics.” Republicans also deplored the violence, with Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky saying: “Tonight, all Americans are grateful that President Trump appears to be fine after a despicable attack on a peaceful rally.”
It was unclear on Sunday morning how a would-be assassin had managed to open fire in the vicinity of a presidential candidate, raising questions about security preparations and potential failures.
The House Committee on Oversight and Accountability said that it would be investigating the attempted assassination and that Rep. James R. Comer, a Kentucky Republican and chairman of the panel, had asked Kimberly Cheatle, the director of the Secret Service, to testify at a hearing on July 22.
(nytimes.com)
DECRYING VIOLENCE — AND SEEING SHOOTING AS A PIVOTAL MOMENT IN RACE FOR PRESIDENCY
Local Republicans call shooting a pivotal moment that all but guarantees Trump a November victory.
by Jeremy Hay
North Bay partisans of all political stripes condemned the shooting of former President Donald Trump on Saturday at a campaign rally in Pennsylvania — while Republicans also called the attack, which Trump survived, a turning point in the presidential campaign.
“Breaking news that someone shot and injured Donald Trump is terrible and sickening,” Rep. Jared Huffman, D-San Rafael, said on X after the shooting. “All of us, regardless of our politics, must condemn and work to end the scourge of political violence. It is NEVER justified, NEVER OK. I wish the former President a full and swift recovery.”
“None of us want to see somebody harmed through violence,” said Pat Sabo, Sonoma County Democratic Party Chair.
Matt Heath, Sonoma County Republican Party Chair, said: “I would call on this as an opportunity to ask all sides to stop the violent rhetoric and focus on what's best for the country.”
But Heath and other local Republicans also said the shooting in Butler, Pennsylvania, — which left at least one rally attendee and the suspected gunman dead — was a pivotal event that all but guarantees Trump a November victory.
“That just about makes him a shoo-in after that, because did you see the picture of the flag?” said John Monticelli of Guerneville, referring to a photograph of Trump with a bloodied face pumping his fist at the crowd while bodyguards hustled him off the stage.
“Boy, that'll be all over the place. It kind of reminds me of planting the flag on Iwo Jima. You know, that kind of publicity,” said Monticelli, who described himself as a Republican but “not a Trump fanatic.”
The image will both cement support for Trump and indicate where the rhetoric fueling “the division in this country” is coming from, said Heath. “The left.”
Heath conceded that Trump, who has praised rioters who stormed the Capitol building on Jan. 6, 2021, as patriots and has dominated Republican Party discourse for about a decade, bore his share of responsibility for the nation’s politically polarized state.
“He plays a role in it. And hopefully everybody learns at this point, ‘Hey, this has to stop now. It has to stop.’ But the left has to stop always calling every single Republican a racist, every single Republican a white supremacist and Nazi, all of that. Because that has no place in it, that feeds right into this bullshit,” Heath said.
In a statement, Rep. Mike Thompson, D-St. Helena, chairman of the House Gun Violence Prevention Task Force, called on people shocked by the attack on Trump — and who were condemning it — to get behind his longtime efforts to pass gun control legislation.
"While we await more information on today's events, one thing remains clear: Gun violence of any kind is unacceptable. I unequivocally condemn today's act of political violence against the former president and I am grateful to hear he is safe,“ said Thompson, a Vietnam War combat veteran and avid hunter who has spearheaded House Democrats’ campaign for universal background checks on firearm purchases and other measures to combat gun violence.
“My thoughts remain with the former president and those in attendance. I urge my colleagues who are speaking out in horror to join the Gun Violence Prevention Task Force in its efforts to pass the common sense laws that help prevent these threats," Thompson said.
(pressdemocrat.com)
MURDER IN POINT ARENA
On Thursday, July 11, 2024 at approximately 8:06 PM, the Mendocino County Sheriff’s Office Communications Center received a 911 call from 47-year-old Pan Jasper Brady, reporting that he had just shot a person.
Brady reported that he had been in an argument with the victim, a 54-year-old male, and Brady retrieved a handgun and shot the victim. Brady secured the firearm while awaiting the arrival of responding law enforcement personnel.
Mendocino County Sheriff's Office Deputies and California State Parks Peace Officers responded to the scene at 38500 Eureka Hill Road, Point Arena. Due to safety concerns related to the nature of the call, medical personnel staged in the area awaiting law enforcement. Upon the arrival of law enforcement personnel, the victim was found to have succumbed from injuries that included at least one gunshot wound. Brady was detained by deputies and Mendocino County Sheriff's Office Detectives responded to take over the investigation. Brady was ultimately arrested and booked into the Mendocino County Jail on a charge of homicide, and an additional charge for using a firearm during the commission of a homicide. Brady is being held in custody in lieu of $1,000,000 bail.
The identity of the victim will be withheld until his legal next of kin has been notified of his death. An autopsy will be scheduled for the victim of this case and the official cause and manner of death will not be released until the final autopsy report is available.
This case is actively being investigated and anyone with information related to this incident is encouraged to contact the Mendocino County Sheriff's Office Detectives by calling 707-463-4086. Information can also be provided anonymously by calling the non-emergency tip line at 707-234-2100.
AV EVENTS TODAY
Free Entry to Hendy Woods State Park for local residents
Sun 07 / 14 / 2024 at 8:00 AM
Where: Hendy Woods State Park
More Information (https://andersonvalley.helpfulvillage.com/events/3667)
AV GRANGE PANCAKE and Egg BREAKFAST
Sun 07 / 14 / 2024 at 8:30 AM
Where: Anderson Valley Grange , 9800 CA-128, Philo, CA 95466
More Information (https://andersonvalley.helpfulvillage.com/events/3892)
The Anderson Valley Museum Open
Sun 07 / 14 / 2024 at 1:00 PM
Where: The Anderson Valley Museum , 12340 Highway 128, Boonville , CA 95415
More Information (https://andersonvalley.helpfulvillage.com/events/3983)
SKUNK TRAIN:
A note from our President on the passing of the Train Singer, Greg Schindel. April 1st, 1946 – July, 12th, 2024.
There is something magical and haunting about the sound of train’s whistle echoing through a canyon, and today may our train whistles echo a little longer for the indelible legacy the Train Singer® gave us.
Thirty-two years ago, when I started my high school summer job, I had the pleasure of meeting Greg Schindel: a school teacher, an artist, a family man, a lover of trains, an admirer of people, and a jokester who always had the next ‘best joke’ to put a smile on your face. Greg gigged with the Skunk Train during the summer, working for tips. Many years later I encouraged Greg to come work for us on a more regular schedule, to redo his outfit (to its most recent look), and to register a trademark for his name ‘Train Singer’ so that all the hard work he put in to building his brand would be protected.
Greg wrote numerous songs about his beloved railroad and the many people he encountered over the years. From California Western Special, to Northspur Station, to Engineer Brooks, to Woopie! What a Ride!, each song told a story and each song brought a smile to the faces of many. Train Singer wasn’t an employee, he was a friend. I didn’t get to see him as often as my career advanced, but every time I did, he gave the best hugs and always had a joke to follow.
So today we celebrate the life of an amazing human who gave so much and never really expected much in return. To his wife Donna, daughter Heidi, son Malaki, his grandchildren, and his entire family, thanks for letting him ride the rails and be a part of our family for more than three decades. Train Singer was and will always be a jewel in the crown of the California Western Railroad / Skunk Train.
Woopie! What a Ride!
Robert Jason Pinoli
President & CEO
PS. We know that Greg was a part of so many lives over the years. Please share your memories, photos, or videos of the Train Singer, we’d love to hear and see them, and to include them in an in memoriam. Services will be in the fall.
California Western Extra 45 west, Highball!
ASSAULT AT THE FARMER'S MARKET
Editor,
I get attacked all the time in many ways for every direction. And you what? So be it. No one else ever seems to do the right thing. Including this officer today. This young man needed a wake up call. He beat 64yo, disabled man with a skateboard and walked away.
Dear Chief Crook.
I was knocked to the ground by a skateboarder. The officer couldn't find him and gave me a log number to give if I saw him again. Two hours later out of nowhere he shot by me within inches and began circling me. As I tried called the police he started beating me with his board. I hit him once on top of his head to get his attention which backed him up. He then smashed my phone with his board until market people showed up and lead him away. He waited for the police and ambulance. They handcuffed him then decided I was at fault and released him. The officer said he had every right to be there despite the signs saying no skateboarding and I'm there with a business license practicing my trade. I am going to follow this all the way through. I have been severely injured and have to buy a new phone. THIS, it why we have problems and citizens are righteous in their complaints about the lack of police protection and compassion for the criminals!
Mark Donegan
Ukiah
MENDOCINO COUNTY OFFICIALS INVESTIGATE FIRST DEATH DUE TO WILDFIRES THIS YEAR
by Danielle Echeverria
The Mendocino County Sheriff’s Office is investigating the first death due to a wildfire this year after finding a body in a building that burned down during the Mina Fire near Covelo.
In a press release, deputies said that firefighters alerted them about human remains in the burnt structure on Tuesday.
The day before, officials talked to a man who told them that a family member, 66-year-old Dagmar Stankova, was last seen at the residence trying to fight the approaching flames with a garden hose. He also said a burn pile had escaped and started the wildfire, which had burned 98 acres as of Saturday morning.
Officials said that, due to the burned condition of the body, they have not been able to positively identify the person, but believe it was Stankova “based on the investigation and circumstances of the fire.”
The sheriff’s office investigation is ongoing, the press release said, and Cal Fire officials are still investigating the cause of the fire.
As of Saturday morning, the Mina Fire was 85% contained and had destroyed two structures, according to Cal Fire. The death was the first caused by California’s more than 3,500 wildfires so far this year, according to the agency.
(SF Chronicle)
THREE MILLION GALLONS USED IN FIREFIGHT, UKIAH WATER PROJECTS MOVE FORWARD
by Monica Huettl
The Ukiah Valley Water Authority Executive Committee convened for a special meeting on July 9, 2024, to discuss significant advancements in local water infrastructure and services. Highlights included securing grant funding for new infrastructure planning, moving forward with a tax-sharing agreement to facilitate consolidation, and confirming that the unified water service will commence on January 1, 2025. Additionally, the meeting addressed the extensive water usage required to combat a fire at the recycling center.…
mendofever.com/2024/07/14/three-million-gallons-used-in-firefight-ukiah-water-projects-move-forward
A READER WRITES:
Regarding the County’s fiscal checks and balances, since the Executive Office has “taken over” payroll, there have been too MANY mistakes. They have overpaid some county employees in overtime, in some instances by a couple thousand dollars, then they wanted the employees to repay the overpayment at an incorrect amount. There have been cases of Social Workers not being paid the proper on-call pay. And at least twice now the County has miscalculated sick rate accruals, with the last one happening just this week. As for the request of policies and procedures in writing, it won’t happen without some type of order. If there is something in writing, then the Executive Office can’t change the rules as they go. How convenient that they have strategically positioned themselves in “temporary” department head positions throughout the County, yet want to blame everyone else for the problems that are currently happening.
WILLITS MAN HONORED FOR RESCUE OF COUPLE ON SNOWY SUMMIT
by Justine Frederiksen
A Willits man and a fellow Caltrans employee received medals of valor recently for a rescue they performed on a snowy summit in northern Mendocino County, where they convinced a couple to leave their stuck RV just minutes before the vehicle was crushed by a fallen tree.
“Branches were snapping all around us like shotgun blasts,” said Michael Butner, who was a tree cutter for Caltrans in the winter of 2023, recalling that when snow began covering the highways and felling trees near Laytonville on Feb. 23, he and his partner Gonzalo Garcia, of Lake County, were dispatched to Highway 101 for a semi-truck that had jack-knifed at Rattlesnake Summit.
“There must have been 200 to 300 trees down between Leggett and Laytonville,” he recalled, describing how more and more wet, heavy snow began overloading branches and covering the roads as they drove from Highway 1 to Hwy. 101 until they reached the line of vehicles stranded behind the jack-knifed semi. At the summit, Butner said he and Garcia began clearing as many trees and vehicles as they could, starting with “helping those with all-wheel drive vehicles to turn around and safely leave.”
One vehicle that could not be moved, however, was a very large RV directly behind the stuck semi, so Butner said he and Garcia “advised the elderly couple in the RV to leave, because it wasn’t safe for them to stay there with all the trees snapping, and we offered to help them unhook the car they were towing and drive that vehicle from the area.”
But at first the couple refused, opting instead to wait out the storm in their RV, until Butner came back and declared urgently that “there are trees right above your RV that could snap at any moment,” he recalled, explaining that both his work as a firefighter and his mother, who was a nurse, taught him how to stay calm while quickly assessing an emergency situation and deciding how to react.
Finally, just in time, Butner and Garcia convinced the couple to leave their RV, because “once we got them and their car safely moved, by the time I walked back toward the RV, a tree had fallen and crushed it. If they had still been in it, they would have been injured very badly, or worse,” he said.
In recognition of their determination to save not only the couple in the RV but others trapped on that summit, Butner and Garcia were two of nine Caltrans employees who received Medals of Valor at a ceremony held at the State Capitol in Sacramento on June 26.
In a press release, Caltrans described the Governor’s State Employee Medal of Valor as “the highest honor California bestows on its public servants,” and that both gold and silver medals “are given annually to state employees for acts of heroism to save lives or protect state property.”
Attending the medals ceremony was Butner’s daughter, Tiah Ross-Butner, who also received an award that week, as her artwork was declared the winner of the 2024 Congressional Art Competition for California’s Second District.
“I asked her, ‘so, will you be onstage with me then?!” Butner recalled with a laugh as his daughter explained to her dad that no, she would be honored at the U.S. Capitol, not the state one! “But she did come to Sacramento for my ceremony, then flew that night to Washington D.C.”
In a press release, the office of Rep. Jared Huffman (D – San Rafael) noted that Ross-Butner “received round-trip airfare to Washington D.C. to attend the awards ceremony, and that her piece, titled “Where We Come From – Klamath River,” will hang in the U.S. Capitol for one year along with other art pieces from each congressional district across the country.”
A READER WRITES:
Jim Shields: You are right on so many points. (Re: “The Main Solution to Solving the Mental Health Crisis.”) I could see what was happening with the new law. I was a psychiatric technician at Mendocino State Hospital. I was working on the acute receiving and treatment ward RT-2. We had a long history of treating and returning patients to their home. When the act went into force patients would be leaving prior to recovery. So I left the job to become a Mendocino County Deputy Sheriff. I wound up dealing with many of my old patients. If I was on duty I was sent on 100% of the mentally ill calls. We had a unit called PUFF where 5150 WIC allowed us to place mentally ill people to be treated for 72 hours. In my opinion it was an abysmal failure.
It was staffed by people who worked the “back wards” at MSH [Mendocino State Hospital] and decided to stay in Ukiah after the hospital closed. They were not the most motivated individuals. Later the county put an individual in charge who was a total failure at dealing with the mentally ill, and just closed the unit and turned the sick out on the street compounding the problem for everyone. Now we are dealing with 50 years of this failure.
JOHNNY SCHMITT (Boonville Hotel): Just a friendly plug for my new favorite nosh in Ukiah… O'HARU has new owners and they're doing an awesome job. The place is spotless, serene and friendly and food is some of the best Japanese food I've had in a while. Unfortunately with the street construction and whatever else, is pretty quiet when I go in there and want to see them succeed, so check it out. Also a beautiful Harley out front for sale… Lol. (570 No. State Street, Ukiah. 707 391-8178. And 462-4762. Open for Dinner starting at 4pm.)
JUDY'S BARN PARTY
Don't miss out on the fun. Mark your calendars now. July 20th at 6 PM until who knows when.
Local icon, Gregory Sims, will be leaving the valley and this is a chance for his friends to gather and give him a royal send off.
BYOB and a POTLUCK to share at High Shams Ranch.
If you play an instrument, please bring it along.
Call 621-4244 if you need more information.
UKIAH SHELTER PET OF THE WEEK
Naomi is a sweet girl who likes to be RIGHT by your side! She has a mellow personality and lovely indoor manners. Naomi lived with another dog in her last home, and we think she will make a great family dog. We like our canine guests to meet any potential dog roommates, just to be sure the fit is good! Beautiful Naomi is 3 years old, 56 mighty adorable pounds, and spayed—so she is ready to leave shelter life behind and jump right into your heart.
To see all of our canine and feline guests, and for information about our services, programs, and events, visit: mendoanimalshelter.com Join us every first Saturday of the month for our MEET THE DOGS Adoption Event at the shelter. We're on Facebook at:
https://www.facebook.com/mendoanimalshelter
For information about adoptions please call 707-467-6453.
UKIAH COMMUNITY CONCERT ASSOCIATION
Season Memberships Selling Like Hot Cakes--Get Yours Now!
Greetings! Another stellar lineup of artists for 2024-25?--You betcha! And the UCCA board that chose these four groups is raving that this may be our most exciting season ever! Check them out, tell your friends, and buy your season membership for just $120 if you haven't already. Membership cards will be mailed out around mid-September in plenty of time before the first concert on Sunday, November 3. If you’re not sure whether or not you’ve already renewed, please email us for confirmation at info@ukiahconcerts.org
Not a season member yet? You can purchase your season ticket on the UCCA website, and we thank you in advance because that is how we are able to pay the deposits to our artists. For 2024-25 (November through May) the cost for the season is still just $120 for four fabulous concerts, and that includes two members-only catered receptions giving you, our season ticket holders, an opportunity to mingle with the artists in the company of your fellow music-loving UCCA supporters. You can also make a donation to the UCCA on on our site. It is donations that enable us to finance the balance of artist fees, pay production, printing, and rental expenses, and continue our Educational Outreach programs for local students.
For more information, contact the UCCA at 707-463-2738 or email us at info@ukiahconcerts.org
We're looking forward to celebrating great music together with you! The UCCA Board of Directors
Thank you for supporting the UCCA! Stay connected through our website: www.ukiahconcerts.org
ED NOTES
RECENT INFIRMITIES have kept me close to hearth, home and medical supplies. But when I was able and still lived in Boonville, I'd head south on the hunt for culture, usually stopping in at the MOMA in the City to see what was new in artistic fraud before heading a block over to the California Historical Society headquarters on Mission, members free and I'm a member. Some of the best exhibits and most interesting lectures this un-arrived arriviste has experienced.
NEXT DOOR to the Historical Society which, incidentally, is housed in a restored private home from circa 1880 but dwarfed by the high rises that now surround it, there's a very good delicatessen called Cotto Affumicato, Italian for “No Bums Allowed,” I believe. Whatever, as the young people say, I ordered a salami sandwich, the only edible I recognized of the posted fare. As I stood in line to pay, an emblematic urban event occurred.
A CHIC-LOOKING blonde woman of 30, I supposed, seemed to be paying her bill to the matronly cashier, a woman of 50 or so. The blonde had a uniquely flat boxer's nose, which I would recognize if I saw it again. I was kind of studying her nose, frankly, because it didn't fit with the rest of the up-market package. It was the kind of nose that chic blonde women who can afford expensive clothes and fancy haircuts would certainly spend a lot of money getting a plastic surgeon to elongate, to un-Jake Lamotta the disfiguring schnozz, you might say.
SUDDENLY, the matronly cashier waved her arms in front of her face and said, calmly, “I can't see.” She didn't seem particularly upset but she was squinting and violently flailing her arms as if fending off something unseen. I thought maybe tiny flying city bugs had attacked her. The cause of the poor woman's distress was not visible as she called a kid from another counter to replace her at the register, and another kid led the cashier off to the rear of the deli.
THE CHIC BLONDE turned to me and the other guy standing there, both of us clueless, and said, “My pepper spray accidentally went off.” Good thing it wasn't a gun, I said. She stared back at me like she wanted to give me a spray. Then, looking towards the rear of the store where her victim was last seen, the blonde said to no one in particular, “I hope she'll be alright,” and with that she walked rapidly out onto Mission Street.
IT FINALLY OCCURRED to me that I ought to do something. I stuck my head out the door and called out after the pug-nosed sociopath, now moving so fast she was almost running, “Hey! You should at least stick around,” immediately denouncing myself to myself as an ineffectual lunk head. For all I knew, though, the blonde spent her days walking around the city pepper spraying cashiers to evade paying for her food — weirdos come in all kinds of deceptive packages these days. But I could hardly run her down on the sidewalk because I, a scruffy rural beatnik seen grappling with a respectable woman of means, would certainly be pummeled to my knees by passersby as a street perv. Well, I'd tried to be a responsible citizen, I consoled myself.
BACK INSIDE, the young deli guys were still debating if they should have detained the blonde. A city emergency services crew had appeared and were helping the cashier wash her eyes out. The cashier had said she was going to be okay, and didn't seem angry about getting a face full of pepper spray or angry that the unfeeling mini-monster who'd done it hadn't bothered to stick around to make sure she was going to be okay.
I LEFT MY NAME and address in case there was police follow-up, and trudged up to Market, turned west, and made my way to my daughter's house where a sink hole had materialized in the street at her front door. A policeman had just lit several flares to warn drivers around it, and a street person had paused to sing him an ironic happy birthday.
SHERIFF KENDALL:
I try not to weigh in on national stuff and keep to Mendocino County issues but here we go.
I hate it when we say “Not my President” if we were all acting like Americans we would likely not be saying that. There have been a few I liked and a few I disliked, however they were all “My President.”
I feel terrible about the shape our country is in at the moment. I also feel terrible for President Biden.
Lots of people are saying he’s in great shape for his age and honestly it’s a different game than that.
Michael Jordan is in great shape for his age, of that I am certain. That being said he doesn’t belong on the court with Steph Curry because he wouldn’t be able to compete.
At some point we also have to look at the well being of the president and ask what is being done to him in this process. At times it looks like elder abuse.
My pop was about 81 when we noticed he was suffering from cognitive decline, it worsened over the next six years until he passed. We sheltered him from what could be a tough world for someone suffering this condition. That’s what sons and daughters do and we were lucky to have an RN sister, without her knowledge it wouldn’t have been possible.
I can honestly say I wouldn’t let my father go through this. So as the children of our nation, is this OK? That’s my question and, That’s my 2 cents.
CATCH OF THE DAY, Saturday, July 13, 2024
REMI ALEXANDER, Point Arena. DUI with blood-alcohol over 0.15%.
LINDA ALMOND, Ukiah. Trespassing.
PAN BRADY, Point Arena. Murder, use of fiream in commission of serious felony.
REFUGIO DAVILA-ROBLES, Covelo. DUI.
AIVANA FABER-CASTILLO, Ukiah. DUI, no license.
ALAN HERNANDEZ, Ukiah. Disorderly conduct-alcohol.
CALVIN LAWRENCE, Mendocino. DUI.
ELOY LOPEZ JR., Ukiah. DUI, suspended license for DUI, probation revocation.
MICHAEL LUCAS, Ukiah. Battery with serious bodily injury, fighting in public, violation of civil rights by force or threat of force, county parole violation.
PAUL NELSON, Ukiah. Controlled substance, metal knuckles, resisting.
JASON RAMOS, Santa Rosa/Ukiah. Controlled substance, suspended license.
ROBERT VALADEZ, Ukiah. Domestic violence court order violation, county parole violation.
AIMEE YOUNKIN, Hilltop Lakes, Texas/Ukiah. Trespassing, resisting.
PASSIVE FUNDRAISING
Fundraising for a Spiritual Nomadic Action Group
Sitting in an air conditioned room at the Royal Motel, listening to the hum of the refrigerator. ~The End. Send money here: Paypal.me/craiglouisstehr
ASK THE VET: Urinary Calculi in Sheep and Goats
by Kendall Wilson, DVM
Urinary calculi or urolithiasis, is a common life-threatening condition that can be seen in all sheep and goats however, castrated males are most commonly affected. This is due to the complicated twists and turns of the male urethra in ruminants. Urinary stones are solid masses, almost like small pebbles that form within the urinary tract, causing obstruction of urination. These stones form for a variety of reasons and are extremely painful for the animal.
The most common clinical sign noticed by owners of a goat suffering from urinary calculi, is flagging of their tail and attempting to urinate with no success. Most animals affected will go off of feed and will often bleet out indicating discomfort. Some affected animals may be able to expel small amounts of urine that is often blood tinged, until full obstruction occurs. Later clinical signs would include bloating due to the bladder rupturing, complete inappetence, lethargy and swelling around the prepuce area. Once the condition has progressed to this late stage, it is life threatening and the animal will succumb to death.
The composition of the stones is heavily based on the location that the sheep or goat is raised. Hay, minerals in water, and feed impact the type of stones formed. The most common form of stones are calcium and phosphorus based. Pet or show sheep and goats are more commonly affected, due to higher concentrated feeds being offered. These feed types to help keep them conditioned and show ready.
Treatment is very difficult and often frustrating in the field. It is recommended that the animal go for surgery to remove all stones present within the entire urinary tract. Surgery is the only curative option. Minor field procedures such as removal of the urethral process can be performed, but likely will only resolve issues for a short time, before the animal relapses. It is often recommended to feed ammonium chloride to help acidify the bladder. Some owners will add apple cider vinegar to water sources to try and achieve a similar goal. Management practices and keeping feed balanced is the most effective way to prevent stones from forming. If you suspect your sheep or goat is suffering from urinary calculi, contact your veterinarian as soon as possible, as it will help with the best outcome for your animal.
RED WINE
Editor,
I would love to have a glass of wine with dinner, make that two! Mmm, I can taste it, feel the cool liquid warming me, the alcohol aftertaste, but if I drank it there’s a good chance that I’d wake up in the middle of the night and be unable to get back to sleep for three or four hours, a very annoying result from drinking a delicious glass of red.
I stopped drinking twenty months ago as part of my campaign against insomnia and only have insomnia about once a month now. (I have adopted new rules for better sleep: having a set bedtime, no electronics in the bedroom, no eating, drinking, or screen time three hours before bedtime, no alcohol, no coffee after noon, no chocolate after three, and no saunas after two. I remember fondly the days, years, and decades when I did whatever I wanted whenever I wanted, what happened?)
Oh for a glass of wine with dinner!
I started buying red wine by the case twenty or thirty years ago when I heard it was actually good for you. One night when staying in my friend’s very old ten room mansion in Austin, he and his girlfriend took me out to a high end wine bar and I noticed my glass cost thirteen dollars. “I’m used to buying five dollar bottles of Trader Joes wine,” I said.
“When ya gonna spend it?” Mike said, and after that I bought ten dollar bottles when I stocked up at TJ’s twice a year.
Maybe if I had a glass of wine with lunch, instead of dinner, it wouldn’t affect my sleep? I also liked to smoke a joint after drinking wine but I wouldn’t want to do that midday, a reminder of the wake ‘n bake daze back in ‘98, when at my worst, or best as Fat Freddie would say, I’d start about 10:30 am and smoke three fatties a day, in half joint increments.)
I haven’t been super strict: I had a beer at Christmas, another on Superbowl Sunday, and a quarter glass of watered-down wine with a friend out on the deck last fall, which turned into a regretful night of insomnia.
Last summer in Mexico, after eight months strictly on the wagon, I drank two or three glasses of wine with some friends, the only Americans who live on that mountain full-time. The wife got drunk enough to ask to see my fifty-eight second dance move, I was drunk enough to actually do it, and her husband sat there looking seriously unamused. It was a very fun time, weed and homemade apple pie included, but then I had insomnia for three of the next five nights, and realized I just couldn’t, shouldn’t, drink anymore. (Well, it was a good time to stop as the latest studies say, oops, alcohol is actually not good for you, what?!)
I had a guest last month and finally lived a little: We tried some of Mushroom Mike’s strong tasty weed, drank the bottle of Peach Bellini which the previous guests left as a gift, a strange fruity beverage made with carbonated wine and peach flavor, and I slept soundly through the night, after all.
Paul Modic
Redway
THEY'RE WITH ME
Editor,
I am writing about the recent passing of Orlando Cepeda. His death made me remember a story that taught me something about that man.
Many years ago, my friend Bill Vespa and I made our way into the lower level access tunnel (without tickets for that area) at a Giants game. We started up some steps (with two men in front of us) that would take us out to the expensive seating behind home plate. We all waited for a break in the action before proceeding. After a pitch, we were to go forward. The men in front of us (one of whom wore a white straw hat) started to enter the stadium. The usher welcomed the men in front of us and acknowledged the one in the hat as “Mr. Cepeda.”
We followed and the usher asked us for our tickets. Before we could give up and turn around, Cepeda offhandedly said “they are with me” and the usher let us enter.
From everything I have heard, this is indicative of the kind of man who filled those shoes (and that hat) — thoughtful and kind. He will be missed.
Jeff Moss
San Rafael
DOUGLAS NEUMANN:
I miss Candlestick. When I was a student living in The City, I tried to attend one game every series. I would buy a bleachers ticket and sit on the far right (left field) towards the back, which seemed to be protected from the wind. I would see the fog roll over the stadium lights but not feel any discomfort.
ON THE WAY TO SAN FRANCISCO
by Doug Holland
I grew up in Seattle, but I’d had enough of living the expected life. My girlfriend had dumped me, and I hated my job. I had only a few friends, and a yearning for something unexpected.
So I sold or gave away or dumpstered almost everything I owned, then packed what little was left into my van.
With a few thousand dollars saved up by living poor, I drove to California, and eventually landed in San Francisco. That's not where I was headed, though. Could've sworn I was moving to Los Angeles — swimming pools, movie stars.
Spent a couple of weeks in L.A., sleeping in my van but renting a hotel room every third night for a shower. The City of Angels vexed me, though. The sprawling hugeness of it was daunting, and there were no neighborhoods with the very cheap housing I wanted. Pretty soon I shrugged, and decided if Los Angeles didn't want me, then screw the place.
Retreating over a minor mountain, I stopped for breakfast at Pappy's Coffee Shop in Bakersfield, a hundred miles north of L.A. The omelet was great, and halfway through the hash browns, I decided to settle in Bakersfield.
From room-for-rent listings in the paper, Bakersfield housing seemed about 50% off from Los Angeles. To find rents even cheaper, I drove around the city's worst neighborhoods, looking for a “room for rent” sign.
In an area where half of the homes were boarded up and the others had rusted beaters on blocks in the front yard, I turned a corner and found what I'd been looking for.
The sign said, “Ajax Motor Hotel,” a smaller sign underneath said, “Vacancy,” and a third, even smaller sign listed the rates: $9 nightly, $50 weekly, $175 monthly. That was damned cheap even then, and less than I'd hoped to pay.
The Ajax was a long, very old one-story building, behind a blistered parking lot. It was so run down and dilapidated, for a moment I wondered whether it was abandoned.
No, a few people were smoking cigs and talking in front of their rooms. They looked Mexican, which was AOK by me. The more they spoke Spanish, the less they'd speak to me, and I prefer the quiet.
So I parked, got out, and heat bouncing off the ancient asphalt melted me. Bakersfield is a sweaty place. I opened the door and walked into the manager's office, which was air conditioned, thank cripes.
An old white lady was reading a newspaper at the desk, but she put it down and smiled at me. We traded good mornings, and I said, “I've never stayed in a hotel with weekly rates, so how does that work?”
“You can stay as long as you pay,” she said. “Daily, weekly, monthly.”
“Can I see a room?”
“Sure, sugar,” she said, and I liked her already. She turned to a row of slots on the wall behind her. Most held mail, but a few of the slots had only a key inside. She grabbed one, announced “Eleven,” handed me that key and pointed south.
It was a hot day and a long walk to the door with “11” on it, so I got into my van again, started the engine and especially the a/c, and drove to the room.
Turning the key and opening the door, cockroaches were the first thing I noticed. A dozen were visible on the wall as I walked inside.
A very old air conditioner was in the window, and I turned it on. It blew out air that stank of mildew, but it was cool, refreshing mildew.
I splattered a roach on the wall, which hurt my hand. Holy moly, the walls were made of concrete! No amount of huffing and puffing could blow the place down, which seemed reassuring, this being earthquake territory.
The room had a bed that sagged and squeaked, a single wooden chair, and a small linoleum table that soon became my writing desk.
There was no kitchen, but I found a counter with an outlet, just right for my microwave and mini-fridge. I don't cook, so who needs a kitchen?
The bathroom was ridiculously gigantic — a sink, toilet, and shower, spread across a space almost as big as the bedroom. I'm not a party guy, but one person could've sat on the toilet while another shaved at the sink and a third was in the shower, and none of them would've felt crowded.
The a/c worked well, making the place almost comfortable within minutes, the neighborhood was largely abandoned so it ought to be quiet, and I'd lived with roaches before, so everything seemed fine to me. I hauled in a box of books from my van to mark my turf, and returned to the manager’s office.
Told the lady I'd take it, and she asked only, “Daily, weekly, or monthly?”
“Monthly,” I said, and slid cash across the counter. She pushed a registration book toward me, and I signed it, making the Ajax Motor Hotel my home.
Never lived in a hotel before, so I asked, “Is there maid service?”
She smiled but did not chuckle. “This ain't that kind of hotel, toots.”
I said thanks, and while walking back to my new room, it occurred to me that I could've signed in as Toots. I could've been Toots Tooterson — she hadn't asked to see any identification. No references, no background check, no employment verification. “You can stay as long as you pay,” and that's all they asked.
She also hadn't bored me with any ominous rules, so yeah, I knew I'd like the place.
And I did. Liked it a lot. It was my first residential hotel, and unlike the bum hotels I later stayed at in San Francisco, my bathroom was all mine.
And that bathroom was so preposterously oversized, I pushed the bed into it. This left the bedroom as mostly storage and wasted space, and gave me the great luxury of being able to literally roll out of bed and into the shower or onto the toilet in about two footsteps.
Where I'm living now, it's 28 dang steps to the toilet, and I envy the memory of living in that ginormous john at the Ajax.
With the motor hotel’s concrete walls, killing roaches by hammering the wall did no damage, except to the roach. “Oh if I had a hammer” — blam! — “I'd hammer in the morning” — blam! Many roaches were splattered to the rhythm of that song, and their corpses stayed on the wall as decorations.
My first instincts about the manager proved true — she was a delightful old broad, always friendly but never asking too many questions. Marge, was her name. She's still the only rez hotel worker I ever saw who wasn't named Patel.
She subscribed to the local newspaper, cleverly called ‘The Californian,’ but she rarely bothered to get it from wherever the paperboy had tossed it. When I came and went, I would pick that day's paper off the asphalt, bring it to Marge in the office, and we'd talk for a few minutes.
Other than ordering burgers at the drive-through and arguing with someone at a grocery store once, Marge was the only person I had any conversations with in Bakersfield. I loved her non-nosiness. She never asked where I was from, or how long I was staying, and never asked me to accompany her to church. Bless you, Marge, wherever you are now.
After just a few weeks, though, I knew I'd be moving on. Marge and the roachy Ajax were great, but Bakersfield was unbearably hot — 109°, the day I decided I was leaving.
Also, the city is repressive, with the meanest cops I've seen anywhere. You'd see police at the side of the road hassling someone, and of course, it was always someone Mexican or Hispanic or black. In my month in Bakersfield, I must've seen 40 people being hassled by cops, and none of them were white.
There were also police helicopter patrols, overnight. It was Blade Runner, or a nightmare. A chopper would hover over the neighborhood, shining a high-power spotlight down, illuminating one street, one alley at a time, like a manhunt for an escaped convict — except it happened almost every night I was there. The concrete walls blotted out most of the helicopter noise, but Bakersfield wasn't America, and I couldn't stay.
Before leaving, I thoughtfully wiped hundreds of splattered roache corpses off the wall. Then I said goodbye to Marge, dropped off the key, and stopped for one last breakfast at Pappy's.
Even then, San Francisco wasn’t in my sights. Thought I’d try living in Fresno, maybe, or Sacramento, but a San Francisco Chronicle was in an empty booth at Pappy's. Eating my omelet and coffee, I skimmed the news and sports, and then flipped to the arts & entertainment section.
The paper had ads for several San Francisco theaters showing old movies, and I love old movies. And that's when I finally had the thought I should've started with, when I'd decided to leave Seattle.
San Francisco is famously weird, and I was absolutely a weirdo, so why not try it? By sunset I was there, the next day I'd found a room, and it wasn't long until San Francisco became part of me.
“IT'S A BIT EMBARRASSING to have been concerned with the human problem all one's life and find at the end that one has no more to offer by way of advice than 'Try to be a little kinder’.”
— Aldous Huxley
STILL SCAPEGOATING NADER?
Editor,
Here we go again, in 2024! Folks such as Deborah Friedell sobbing that Ralph Nader cost Al Gore the 2000 election because of Florida. They perpetuate this myth no matter how many times facts smack them over the head.
Nader got fewer than 100,000 votes in Florida, while 330,000 Florida Democrats voted for George Bush. Democrats!
Had Gore won his home state, Florida wouldn't even have mattered, but Tennesseans knew him best.
Had Nader not run, surveys showed that a significant number of his supporters either would not have voted or would have voted for someone other than Gore.
Finally, Gore DID win Florida, but he refused to fight for it even when it was evident the voting was crooked. Read Greg Palast’s The Best Democracy Money Can Buy.
Nader, who's devoted his life to public service, never wanted to be president. His campaign was always an educational one to raise issues both parties ignore: true universal health care, the need for a living wage, prosecution of environmental and corporate crimes, corporate ties to the military and its ever growing obscene budget, and more.
I always voted for Ralph Nader with pride! Haven't voted for a Democrat (and never a Republican) for president since George McGovern, and certainly won’t this year.
Jayne Thomas
Richmond
GASLIT AMERICA
Editor:
As Gerard Baker wrote in the Wall Street Journal on July 2, “They’ve deceived and gaslit us for four years, all in the name of ‘democracy.’ That collapsed Thursday,” during the presidential debate. Deception came, in part, by hiding the president’s infirmity.
Deception came with bad policies hurting Americans from all walks of life. Excessive regulation is one area used to compel an all-electric society by trying to ban gas cooktops, as well as changing standards to ensure only electric vehicles can be purchased. Political handouts were illegally given to people with student loans who no longer had to pay them back; taxpayers are now on the hook to pay for someone else’s degree. The list of progressive policies goes on. Hiding Joe Biden from public view and manipulating him behind closed doors was required to mandate dangerous policies using executive orders.
“So much for the moral high ground Democrats have claimed to occupy,” wrote Baker. “The events of the past week have exposed the depth of the Democrats’ deception and disregard for democracy.” Where are presidents like Ronald Reagan or Abraham Lincoln when you need them most?
Robert Koslowsky
Cloverdale
RACHEL MADDOW’S ASSESSMENT of the Big Boy press conference: “President Biden showed a startlingly impressive command of the issues at his press conference. He is not only strong on foreign policy, he is just just fundamentally right on foreign policy in the way that he talks about it. It just shows you he is a master of the foreign policy field and has been for decades in his career.”
THIS “MASTER OF FOREIGN” POLICY voted for the most destructive war in US history and is now supervising a genocide in Gaza, refusing to engage in diplomatic talks to end a bloody stagnated war in eastern Europe and actively trying to antagonize China across the Pacific….
— Jeffrey St. Clair
FOR BIDEN, A RACE AGAINST TIME
by Maureen Dowd
When my mom got into her 80s, we had to deal with periodic medical issues. Fainting. Falls. Broken bones.
Luckily, she was in good stead with the local rescue squad because she faithfully attended their crab feast fund-raisers.
Each time, my siblings and I would move heaven and earth to get her home from whatever hospital she had landed in.
In 2003, I tried to talk one emergency room doctor into releasing her after 11 hours.
“I’ll let her out if she can tell me who the president is,” the doctor said.
We both looked at my mom, expectantly.
“George,” she said.
I was thrilled; W., it was.
“George Washington,” she finished.
After each episode, I’d proudly tell her internist, Dr. Simon, how we had nursed her back to health.
At last, he said with exasperation: “You don’t understand. Picture your mother hanging off a ledge, holding on by five fingers. After one of these incidents, she’s hanging on by four fingers. Another incident, three fingers. And so on. You think you’ve gotten her through and you’re starting fresh, but you’re not. It’s cumulative.”
My mom was a stubborn old bird and she hung on with two fingers, and then one, until she was 97. We gave her morphine at the end, with a bourbon chaser.
I know that octogenarians and nonagenarians can keep their wits about them. My mom was sharp and funny into her 90s.
But I also know they begin losing threads of the narrative, and it’s as painful to them as it is to those who care about them.
At some point, older people find themselves on that ledge. And, as Dr. Simon taught me, each traumatic incident you pull through just leads to another.
President Biden is now trying to prove he can hang on without falling and taking the House, Senate and democracy with him.
After his debate malfunction, Biden tried to start fresh, first an interview with ABC’s George Stephanopoulos, then a news conference Thursday night, next an interview with NBC’s Lester Holt on Monday.
He is promising to curb his schedule to get more rest, while careering around the country and the world to prove he has stamina.
His gymnastics — showing he can walk and talk in a way that instills confidence — fill me with sadness. Every stumble, jumble and tumble will now be treated as if it’s a constitutional crisis.
As The Times’s Annie Karni reported, the president pushed back in a call on Friday with the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, when Representative Mike Levin, a vulnerable California Democrat, told Biden he needed to move aside.
“That’s why I’m going out and letting people touch me, poke me, ask me questions,” the president replied. “I think I know what I’m doing.”
Pretty lame that a president needs to be poked to show he’s with it.
At a moment when Joe Biden should be getting hosannas for his good work and becoming the party paterfamilias, his team is sniping at Democratic luminaries like Barack Obama and George Clooney.
The Biden crew is hectoring journalists to leave the president alone and explain how awful Donald Trump is. I have used every damning word in the thesaurus, thrice, about Trump. And I’ll invent some new ones if I have to. (Suggestions welcome.) But it is not my fault if 2016 Hillary Clinton and 2024 Biden are unable to prosecute the case against a candidate with as many psychoses and felonies as Trump. It’s theirs.
Biden’s new campaign tact is lashing out at elites, which is silly. You can’t trash elites when you’re the president. And he loves the regard of elites. The media elites on “Morning Joe” are serving as his de facto campaign managers and spin doctors.
In the hour he spent with reporters Thursday, Biden was so busy proving he was compos mentis that he didn’t attack Trump as an existential threat. Instead, he talked about all the elites, from historians to Nobel laureate economists, who approved of him.
People in the White House compare it to a submarine; they have a hard time fathoming what’s going on in the country, even though they’re in the nation’s nerve center.
At the news conference, the captain of the submarine went into a weird whisper, saying that he wouldn’t get out of the race unless his team “came back and said, ‘There’s no way you can win.’ Me. No one is saying that. No poll says that.”
Biden’s party, his allies and some of his staffers are in a panic about his numbers, congressional desertions, donor defections. With his polls lagging in battleground states and some blue states looking purplish, Biden has a larger battlefield with less money, and stamina, to cover it.
He is oblivious or in denial, bolstered by Jill and Hunter’s self-interested fantasies.
Jill should come to her senses, protect her husband from the humiliations to come, and repeat the trick of 2004 that made her feelings clear about a possible presidential run.
She walked into the room at their Wilmington home where advisers were imploring her husband to get into the race, wearing a halter top with the word “No” scrawled on her belly. Joe got the message.
Biden is hanging onto a ledge with an ever-weakening grip.
You can’t outrun Father Time.
(NY Times)
LOOK OUT, AMERICA: PROJECT 2025
by Jim Hightower
We’ve seen a ton of social media posts and emails in the last week or so about Project 2025, and although we’re still working on a fuller analysis to give you the lowdown on what it means to you, as well as tools to fight it, we felt it was urgent to get some solid info into Lowdowner’s hands as soon as we could. Y’all are quite the army of activists (we see the results when you take action!) and we know that if we offer up the goods, you can take them and run with them.
Here’s our brief primer on what this mess is, what’s at stake, and what you can start to do. What is it?
If you don’t know what Project 2025 is, or would like a brief summary to use to alert others about it, here you go:
It’s a painstakingly detailed, 922-page step-by-step plan to impose an American dictatorship of moneyed authoritarians and Christian nationalists, removing your and my democratic rights. Yes, this is an actual coup.
It sounds insane, yet there it is—a document written and being loudly promoted by a power-mad cluster of Trump bosses, Putin-esque despots, Reagan-loving economists and Ayn Rand-ian academics, moneyed corporate donors, and general far-right quacks and media blowhards. It’s innocuously coded “Project 2025” because the intent is to launch their full assault on the democratic fabric and structure of our national government next January, on Day 1 of another Trump presidency.
This scheme has been devised by The Heritage Foundation, a DC think tank set up in 1973 to promote the elitist economic and cultural doctrines of its über-rich founding funders, Joseph Coors (yes, that Coors) and Richard Mellon Scaife (yes, that Mellon). In recent years, Heritage has gone from merely being right-wing zealots to off-the-charts Trumpists, and now they’re going deep into the distant extremist cosmos. Thus, the head cosmonaut, Kevin Roberts, has megalomaniacally exulted that Project 2025 is “the second American revolution.”
Unfortunately, it’s a dangerous devolution, with little tin-hat Kevin acting out what he pretends is a heroic coup.
This would be silly and inconsequential, except the Trump Party has become alarmingly treacherous. Ominously referencing the January 6th violent assault on democratic rule, Kevin said that his coup “will remain bloodless if the left allows it to be.”
Of course, “the left”—i.e., sane democracy fighters like you and me—do not acquiesce to tyrannical wannabes.
But his ace is that The Donald, despite his denials, has hailed Heritage’s authoritarian agenda as his own and has cheered its plan to fire thousands of public employees on Day 1, replacing them with a lockstep army of enforcers that Heritage and others say they’ve already recruited to seize and Trump-ize every federal agency. This, combined with Trump’s own pledge to use the US military to enforce his political will, is where Project 2025’s subversive coup gets real.
Here are just a few of the steps we’ve learned so far that Heritage autocrats intend to implement:
Nearly eliminating abortion access altogether at the national level.
Cutting Social Security benefits.
Giving ever-more tax breaks to corporations and gabillionaires.
Selling off national parklands, wetlands, wildlife sanctuaries and other public properties
Eliminating the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (NPR, PBS).
Imposing a “biblically-based” definition of marriage and families.
Eliminating the Department of Education.
Preventing LGBTQ+ couples from adopting children.
Eliminating the food stamp program (SNAP) and the free school lunch program.
Putting the Department of Justice and other independent agencies under the direct political control of the President.
Eliminating organic food promotion, conservation programs, and most climate policies of the Agriculture Department
JEFF BLANKFORT
Report from Mazin Qumsiyeh on today's Israeli massacre in Gaza!
A new Israeli massacre of 71 civilians and injuring 289 others in Al-Mawasi tent city near Khan Younis. This is a place Israel asked residents to move to as a “safe place”. The victims include civil defense personnel, ambulance drivers, aid workers, women, children, worshippers in a prayer tent (mosques were already bombed), and journalists (now 150 journalists were murdered in Gaza). The scenes are too horrific. The only nearby hospital is essentially able to offer only first aid as no medical or surgical equipment are allowed to enter. The world still watches massacre after massacre daily. Also watching mass starvation. 21000 Palestinians are also being tortured literally to death in Israeli gulags worse than any of the medieval age.
This is taking place now on the West Bank. Bulldozers at work. First you take away the infrastructure to make life impossible. And, then?
https://twitter.com/AJEnglish/status/1811040117852705069
Israel deliberately destroyed all of Gaza’s hospitals with US approval and support: There’s not a single functional medical facility left in the enclave, while the direct and indirect death toll could be approaching 200,000 https://www.rt.com/…/600856-israel-destroyed-gaza…/
‘I’m bored, so I shoot’: The Israeli army’s approval of free-for-all violence in Gaza. Israeli soldiers describe the near-total absence of firing regulations in the Gaza war, with troops shooting as they please, setting homes ablaze, and leaving corpses on the streets — all with their commanders’ permission.
https://www.972mag.com/israeli-soldiers-gaza-firing…
From The Nation: These are the true 'winners' of the war on Gaza
https://www.thenation.com/…/gaza-war-profiteers…
The fascist regime marches on. No other system in the world today exists with this much social pathology and spiteful anger. It is lashing out without much logic. But while they try to fragment our society and finish us off, we still persist. Thus, I am convinced more than ever that the end of Israeli apartheid is close. The predictable outcome of the enterprise in the same way that Apartheid in South Africa had a predictable outcome. Unfortunately, those lessons in history tell us that the meanness will get worse as the regime feels cornered and will not face the reality of its own racism but starts to lash-out at anything and everything. That is the last stage of dismantlement of racism.
Revolutionary Optimism and Student Protests: from Vietnam to Palestine!
Me on Iran’s Press TV
https://www.urmedium.net/c/presstv/130061
Stay Human and keep Palestine alive
Mazin Qumsiyeh
A bedouin in cyberspace, a villager at home
Professor, Founder, and (volunteer) Director
Palestine Museum of Natural History
Palestine Institute of Biodiversity and Sustainability
Bethlehem University
Occupied Palestine
http://qumsiyeh.org
http://palestinenature.org
6/7 presidents shot at were conservative. 2020 made this generation of liberal nuts. All you have to do is look like a trump supporter and they want you dead. Stay safe out there people, these liberals are grimy. They smile to your face and plot behind your back.
It is being reported by multiple sources that the alleged shooter was a gun-loving registered Republican. Doesn’t sound like a liberal to me. Better go hide in an air raid shelter scaredy-cat – the boogie man is coming to get you.
Keep watching cnn nutty boy. Remember he just fell
I nominate you for asshat of the day Boudoures. Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and to remove all doubt. GFYS
Keep running your mouth, chances of you changing out of your pajamas is slim. I’ll be good.
Your description is ‘way off. What you described in your last two sentences is more applicable to MAGAts, at least here in Wyoming, and, as I recall, the “Golden State”, too. By the way, just how does one “look” like a trump supporter? Is it a certain brainless expression, perhaps? Or, is it the loaded assault weapon copy?
Straight white male with a short haircut. Stay in Wyoming Harvey your budget won’t cut itoutside of a conservative state. Things have changed physcopath.
You appear to me in need of assistance. Perhaps you should consult with a practicing MAGAt. In the US, the more things appear to have changed, the more they have stayed the same. Our propaganda is very effective. Just read Manufacturing Consent, by Chomsky and Herman.
Norm Thurston: The dead kids’ weapon was a semi-automatic rifle with a detachable magazine. I own several, which I use for hunting and plinking. A gun ban on the scary looking semiautomatic rifle would not have made one iota of difference. It was not the gun (which is an inanimate object) that pulled its own trigger, it was the kid that pulled the trigger. In my view it is the fault of the Secret Service advance site reconnaissance team. They missed or ignored the AGR building with its elevated roof that had a direct line of site to the speakers platform only 130 yards away. An easy chip shot for an average shooter.
Did you misplace your comment? I don’t recall making a comment that covered anything about military look-alike popguns, such as the crap you clam to own and are so proud of. I consider them a total waste of time and money.
I believe the last ban included guns that could accept clips holding more than 10 rounds. I have not seen any reports on the capacity of the clip used by the shooter, but that could have made a difference if the rifle accepted a clip that took more than 10 rounds. I agree that there were serious mistakes made, including tips from attendees about the man’s presence that fell on deaf ears.
Warmest spiritual greetings,
The answer to the global crisis which defines social life on the planet earth right now, is to form spiritually conscious nomadic direct action groups! Intervention in history requires the formation of entities which are spiritually directed, with the individual participants letting the Absolute work through them without interference. I am actively seeking others, and this is my best response to a world imploding in every possible way. Thank you very much.
Craig Louis Stehr
Royal Motel
750 S. State Street, Ukiah, CA 95482
(707) 462-7536, Room 206
Email: craiglouisstehr@gmail.com
Craig’s wisdom of the day is the best so far. These are tough days for American for sure. Almost surreal, very unsettling and scary. I really do wish all here the best, as we figure out together what is next and what will work for us all.
Ironic that the shooting of Trump would probably not have happened if the republicans had allowed either Presidents Obama or Biden to reinstate the Federal Assault Weapons Ban.
Even more ironic that they both sent a hundred thousand assault weapons over seas.
Red herrings: The argument of last resort.
Good luck Norm, the SCOTUS just overturned Trump’s Bump Stock Ban. I don’t think they’re be much different on what you freedom haters call a Federal Assault Weapons Ban.
MAGA Marmon
I am aware of the ruling on bump stocks, and am not surprised. After all, the current Supreme Court is fully owned and operated by the Heritage Foundation. FYI, I am a freedom lover, not a hater. What I do hate is thousand of innocent American men, women and especially children being brutally mowed down by assault weapons. I mean, I know it is not as important to you radical right types as Donald’s ear, but those lives are worth something, aren’t they?
The Democrat SCOTUS was in control of our County for almost 60 years before Trump, we were in need of a correction, and got it. Things just got too crazy.
MAGA Marmon
Nah, things are getting crazier, what with the trump court being stacked with fascists, who have it in mind to turn us all into even greater slaves of the wealthy than we already are today. It’ll affect the likes of you, too, if they’re successful, but don’t go thinking we’re gonna stick up for a turncoat who worships them and their brainless mutant rich boy master.
STILL SCAPEGOATING NADER?
Thank you!
The PHF did a good job of supporting people to recover, stabilize and go home until Tony Craver started sending inmates in orange jump suits with armed guards to the PHF. They frightened the other patients and the staff and caused the PHF failure. Staff quit or went out on leave. Contributing also was the County refusal to pay the necessary RNs a fair salary. I have never heard of another county mixing inmates with other patients at a Psychiatric Health Facility.
Sonya Nesch
Comptche
That’s one thing you and I agree on. A friend of mine who was a RN there had her arm broken by one of Craver’s inmates went out on disability just shortly before its closure. Allman remembers that as being the good ole days. I hope the new PHF is completely operated by a private operator or we will have the same mess happen again. Sheriff using it as a jail wing, and the Court ordering inmates to be admitted there until their court hearings were over. A PHF is a 72 hour facility not somewhere where an inmate could take up a bed for months at a time with no financial compensation for their care.
MAGA Marmon
Biden and the Dems are directly responsible for what happened yesterday because of their over the top rhetoric. They wanted this to happen.
Trump is not Hitler or a dictator.
MAGA Marmon
Regarding your first two sentences, you could not be more wrong. Do you really believe that, or are you just repeating the latest instructions from truth social? Those statements are just plain crazy.
LOL. That is about the dumbest statement ever made, even for you. Trump is a brainless mutant who leans, horizontally, to the right. He has yet to be elected by a vote of the people.
The electoral college, as I assume you know, has nothing to do with whom was popularly elected. It’s biased toward minority rule, since it’s apportioned by the number of federal legislators each state has, which includes an equal number of senators for each state, that is to say, it’s biased in favor of the less populated states. It should have been disowned long ago. I hope to live long enough to see the day when people rise up, write a new constitution, and approve it, and any future amendments, by simple majority popular vote, with Senate votes (not senators; each state would still get two) apportioned based on population of the state they represent. The senate votes in the electoral college (if it not trashed in the new document since it’s useless) would be the same. I am sick of minority rule and the morons who, in their pathetic ignorance, still support it.
James, the shooter is likely a nut with a gun. A same nut with a gun could have gone after Biden, just as well. Then would Trump be to blame?
The major weakness of nearly all post assassination-attempt reporting, is that the underpinnings of the mess we’re in is incredibly not viewed as economic. Pundits of all stripes tut-tut about gun availability and predictably call for the shopworn American fallback position: harsher punishment, even to the point of imprisoning parents judged neglectful in locking up their guns. So far no one is asking how a 20-year old young man, one who won a prize in high school for his mathematical talents and abilities, ended up living with his parents and working as a cooking assistant in a nursing home. He’s just one individual, and no specifics about him are known yet. But to men who may be reading this, I ask you: What were you doing when you were 20 years old? Bernie is the only politician who really understood this. Add the context of bright and cheery Democratic claims for a “booming job market” and a constant diet of uncontrolled and unregulated social media violence, and: Voila! Here we are. This brings to mind one of dozens of insights offered by Evan S. Connell in his masterpiece, Mr. Bridge. While musing about how best to influence his rebellious teenaged daughter, Mr. Bridge philosophically mused on the ultimate futility of punishment.
At age 20, I was pumping gas, maintaining and repairing motor vehicles, and inspecting and installing motor vehicle pollution control equipment (with a class 3 state license), while attending college in the Bay Area. For that, I was paid $2.50 per hour… It was crappy then, too! Don’t expect me to pity the young ones of today, as though they’re getting a rawer deal.
In all likelihood the 20 year old was a nut with a gun, and nutty young people of that age are usually living at home, on the streets, or in prison.
Several sources have said the shooter had been bullied much of his life. He was a loner, and a guy who went to High School with the shooter said, “You could look at the guy and tell that something was wrong with him,” to paraphrase…
And he lived with his parents. The photos shown confirmed his profile…
I suspect there are many more of him out there.
But no getting around the shooter’s perch should never have been available. The Feds, State, and Local Cops blew it! Straight up…
Have a nice day,
Laz
America
David Remnick of The New Yorker writes in sadness for our country today:
“On April 5, 1968, the day after Martin Luther King, Jr., was assassinated in Memphis, Robert F. Kennedy, who was pursuing the Democratic nomination for President, spoke to the Cleveland City Club about the ‘mindless menace of violence in America which again stains our land and every one of our lives.’
In a mournful cadence, Kennedy told the crowd that a sniper is a coward, not a hero; that the ‘uncontrolled, uncontrollable mob is only the voice of madness, not the voice of the people.’ Violence, whether it is carried out by one man or a gang, he said, degrades an entire nation:
‘Yet we seemingly tolerate a rising level of violence that ignores our common humanity and our claims to civilization alike. We calmly accept newspaper reports of civilian slaughter in far off lands. We glorify killing on movie and television screens and call it entertainment. We make it easy for men of all shades of sanity to acquire weapons and ammunition they desire. . . . Some look for scapegoats, others look for conspiracies, but this much is clear; violence breeds violence, repression brings retaliation, and only a cleaning of our whole society can remove this sickness from our soul.’ ”
“Do unto others as you would have them do to you.” – Luke 6:31. “Chickens coming home to roost” is another apt phrase.
The Times Trump has Advocated for Violence -Axios
State of play: Trump made statements condoning and encouraging violence throughout his presidency.
https://www.axios.com/2022/05/02/trump-call-violence-presidency
You guys are exactly what’s wrong with politics.
It is not normal to climb on a roof and try to kill someone. Obviously we have an individual who has some kind of mental illness. It’s not the gun, it’s not words. If anything it’s the lack of common sense, and respect.