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INTERIOR CONDITIONS will continue to slowly ease today with consistent fog and stratus along the immediate coast. Cooling will peak around Sunday along with a chance of coastal drizzle. Above average temperatures will return by mid next week. (NWS)
STEPHEN DUNLAP (Fort Bragg): A foggy 55F on the coast this Friday morning. It looks like our prevailing forecast thru the holiday weekend is for "patchy fog". Next week that changes to "partly cloudy", not sure if we will notice the difference? The fog sure looks large & in charge today.
PANTHER SPORTS
AV Volleyball takes FIRST PLACE at todays Rio Lindo Tournament defeating South Fork, Pacific Union and Technology!
And AV Soccer defeats Credo, 2-1 in home opener.
PEDESTRIAN FOUND DEAD OF HIT & RUN on Highway 101 south of Lake Mendocino Drive. The victim has been identified as Aimee R. Younkin of Arcata.
CHP estimated that the fatal incident occurred between August 8 and August 10 of 2024. Anyone with information related to the incident is asked to call the CHP/Ukiah office at 707 467-4420.
FORT BRAGG FIRE DEPARTMENT SAVES PRINCESS SEAFOOD RESTAURANT
by Frank Hartzell
Surveillance cameras can be worth the investment. That was the case with an early morning fire at Princess Seafood Restaurant in North Noyo Harbor that caused significant damage to the building but thankfully injured no one. The owners say the restaurant, using a barbecue setup, will be open for Fort Bragg’s biggest annual event, Paul Bunyan Days on Labor Day weekend.…
ED NOTES
THE APPOINTMENT of Dina Polkinghorne as KZYX is a step forward for Public Radio, Mendocino County. She had been the director of the crucial Project Sanctuary for many years, an emotionally trying job the smart and vivacious Ms. Polkinghorne managed at the same time she kept Sanctuary fiscally afloat. Public radio is experiencing the same tumult as the rest of media as people go to their telephones for all their information of the great world beyond Zuckerburg, and the info they find in their phones is pre-selected by them for their preferred sources, few of which are what you might call catholic, or beyond confirmation of the reader's existing biases. KZYX being NPR-heavy, and heavy on audio tedium, Ms. P will be severely tested, fer shure.
NOTES from 19th century Ecotopia: A white woman who was scalped and left for dead along the Humboldt River in 1857 recovered, found her scalp and had a wig made from the hair. Immigrant Italian women were so scarce in the state in 1858 that 300 Italian miners walked nine miles to see one. A Trinity County tombstone read: “Here lies the body of Maggie McGinnity / Who lived all her life in the county of Trinity / She lived 85 years and she kept her virginity / Which is kind of a record for this here vicinity.”
A READER WRITES: “When Hollywood gets around to making a movie of the Bari Bombing, I suggest Gene Hackman play you, Bruce; that Billy Joel is cast as Irv Sutley; Renee Zellweger as the young Judi Bari, Kathy Bates as the older Bari; Arnold Schwarzenegger as Bill Staley; Randy Quaid or Quentin Tarantino as Mike Sweeney; John Rhys-Davies or Ben Stiller as Darryl Cherney; and any two NFL tackles as Tanya Brannan and Noelle Hanrahan.”
“WHAT DO YOU THINK of gay marriages?” the caller demanded. Well, I said, I think we all ought to be guaranteed civil protections without going to all the trouble and expense of tuxedos and wedding cakes, but the issue’s kinda off my screen, frankly. I really don’t care who marries whom, but if it’s the only way for some people to get those civil protections, more power to them. “Do you mean you think it’s ok if little naked fags lead big naked fags around on dog chains in public?” Seldom happens in Boonville, I replied, but most of us would probably enjoy the spectacle if it did. “Faggot,” he said, and hung up.
BUMPERSTICKER spotted in Philo: “Animals don’t like GMO foods.” Oh yeah? Who did the survey?
A UKIAH KID got in trouble for issuing “a terrorist threat.” He told a teacher to bleep off. That wasn’t the terrorist threat. But when he added, “and die,” it became one. When I was a kid (groan) a comment like that to a teacher or any other adult got the kid a fast pass to the nut house, but now? A political offense, and a routine one at that.
I KNOW this is pretty far afield, cranky even, but why do so many young women talk like The Chipmunks? And why do so many people of all the many genders talk through their noses? And grown women who talk like little girls, like the news reader on NPR mornings, really shouldn't be in the audio news biz, not to mention the screeching blondes on Fox. Can we get some voice modulation going in this country, please? Mandatory. And Miss Manners for both sexes might be a good instructional idea, too.
SPEAKING OF FOX, Thursday morning the screeching blondes and tough guys were denouncing Kamala as a “San Francisco liberal” which, I guess, is not quite as bad as a “Berkeley communist,” which she was called on NewsMax the other day. NewsMax, btw, is for people who think Fox “is too far to the left.”
YEAH, I tune in Fox and NewsMax regularly to see what's agitating the fascists. Lesson learned? The gulf between the sane — me and ava readers — and the violently hysterical is wider by the day.
NEW RENDERINGS OF MENDO’S $150 MILLION COURTHOUSE MONSTROSITY
by Mike Geniella
Nine more renderings of the planned $150 million Mendocino County Courthouse in Ukiah have been publicly posted by the state Judicial Council of California, which is overseeing the controversial project.
A rendering of the front exterior released in mid-August was greeted with derision by county residents. The latest renderings may not ease community concerns, based on the reactions then.
The additional renderings on the Judicial Council’s website amplify a three-story “barcode” exterior cited by critics, and depict a crisp, stark interior.
The new renderings show interior spaces and how courtrooms in the 82,000 square foot three-story building will look. It will be constructed on a state-owned site south of Perkins Street, and immediately adjacent to the historic Ukiah Railroad Depot, a Colonial Revival-style building erected a century ago in the heyday of North Coast railroad service. Railroad tracks from that era will mark the new courthouse’s rear property boundary.
State officials boast that the new courthouse will feature the most advanced environmental related technologies used in construction today. They, however, will be largely hidden from public view.
Instead, renderings show the new courthouse’s glass-enclosed entrance facing east and away from downtown on its four-acre site, flanked by parking lots, the train station, and a large mobile home park to the south.
The new courthouse’s broad rear will be what downtown Ukiah denizens see from where a courthouse has been located since 1860. The historic site is a square block bounded by State, Perkins, School and Standley streets in the heart of downtown.
The state’s expanded design artistic renderings are not likely to ease local critics, who lashed out at the first look.
Mendocino County resident David King wrote in mid-August that the planned façade looked like a “barcode,” a comment that was readily picked up by others.
A reader named Todd described the design as “hideous prison aesthetic.” Another called the courthouse design “Soviet Brutalist architectural style meets Apple store banality.”
Fentress Architects, a global architectural firm with California offices in Sacramento and Los Angeles, did not respond to requests for comment on the selected design.
The Fentress firm is working with Hensel Phelps Construction Co, a Washington state company, on the Ukiah project. Construction is scheduled to begin early next year, with completion scheduled for 2027.
As it is, the Fentress/Hensel Phelps team is the state’s designated design-builder contractors for the single largest civic construction project in Mendocino County history.
The new courthouse will remove court functions from an ill-designed 1950s era building located in the heart of downtown to a new courthouse located three long blocks away on Perkins Street.
The current courthouse is in a deteriorated state. It is seismically unsound, does not provide adequate access to all courtrooms for disabled people, and needs costly retrofit of basic infrastructure including heating and air conditioning systems, according to state officials.
What will happen to the aging structure is unclear. It will revert to County ownership by a County which is struggling with budget deficits and does not have an estimated $10 million plus for needed repairs so county offices could be moved in. In addition, the new courthouse does not provide space for two critical departments integral to the local justice system: the county District Attorney and the Public Defender offices.
County and city representatives are meeting every other month to discuss the situation, but no clear idea has yet to emerge.
The new courthouse has been envisioned for more than a decade, but state budget woes and other issues delayed action until now.
Construction of the new Ukiah courthouse is currently ranked the second highest on a lengthy list of state court projects.
A smaller courthouse project in neighboring Lake County is at the top of the list.
How the new courthouse will look, and what happens to the old courthouse, continue to be hot topics among residents.
“We already have the Palace Hotel and the former Post Office anchoring downtown decay,” wrote a reader after getting a first look at plans in mid-August. “A chain-link fence around the next corpse is all that is needed.”
RYAN BALLOU
A beautiful day at Glass beach as the tide was coming in.
A COUNTY NOISE ORDINANCE?
by Mark Scaramella
According to Monica Huettl’s Latest report on the Redwood Valley Municipal Advisory Committee meeting at MendoFever.com, First District Supervisor Glenn McGourty said “he is busy despite the fact that the BOS does not meet in August.”
Busy how?
“McGourty has been working on a proposed noise ordinance.”
A noise ordinance! In other words, there isn’t one.
Back in 2014 when the local wine industry’s infernally loud all night wind machines first cranked up keeping most of the Valley awake through the entire night, lots of people thought the County had a noise ordinance, digging through the County code for the word “decibel” and so forth.
They found what appeared to a noise ordinance with rather strict decibel limits for various zoning categories.
It turns out, as we discovered during our lawsuit, that was just a “zoning rule,” which only applies to proposed projects, and barely if then, in the unlikely event that the Planning Department or a very scrupulous neighbor brings it up.
According to Huettl’s report, McGourty said there were “close to 500 noise complaints to the Sheriff’s Department and Code Enforcement in the past month. Complaints ranged from loud parties, to roosters crowing, to barking dogs.”
500 in a month?! Was that Countywide or just in McGourty’s district?
What happened to those complaints? Apparently nothing, or McGourty wouldn’t be talking about a noise ordinance. And that doesn’t include all the noise nuisances that were not reported, probably more than the ones that were reported.
What about disturbing the peace? Again, as we discovered during our wind fan lawsuit, cops will only cite people for disturbing the peace if they think “malice” is involved. Loud parties, roosters, and dogs barking are usually not intentionally malicious. Nor are wind fans. Although persistent identifiable nuisances can sometimes rise to Disturbing the Peace levels.
McGourty claimed, “We will go through the pathway of administrative citations. An appeal officer will be appointed. We are committed to making the district a good place to live.”
An appeal officer? Meaning what? That when the complaint is ignored the complainer will have an opportunity to “appeal”? Oh, yes, that’s very workable for roosters and barking dogs.
Apparently McGourty thinks that a noise ordinance might only apply to his District. A misconception, of course. Any such ordinance would have to be County-wide.
Would the ordinance cover wind fans? Hah! McGourty is the wine industry’s rep on the Board of Supervisors and he wouldn’t do anything to disturb their peace.
During our 2014 lawsuit then-County Counsel Doug Losak argued, highly speciously, that because wind fans had been used in the 50s for pear growing in the Ukiah Valley, they were thus “grandfathered in” as an allowable ag nuisance. Never mind that the wind fans in question in Anderson Valley were newly installed and were far from Ukiah and far from an exempt existing ag practice. It would have cost us thousands of dollars more to even try to argue this point in court — with a dubious result at best given Judge Henderson’s obvious wine-friendly proclivities.
McGourty said he expects the noise reduction hours will be 10 PM to 7 AM, the hours that the wind fans are at their peak sleep-destroying nuisance value.
McGourty said he’s been working with the Sheriff, Code Enforcement, Planning and Building, and County Counsel to “craft” the noise ordinance.
We’ve seen this kind of empty posturing before. There’s very little chance that any kind of “crafted” noise ordinance will ever even see the light of day, much less come to a vote (remember Supervisor Haschak’s failed attempt to regulate private wells several years ago during the last drought?). Further, the odds that a noise ordinance would include the much more annoying wine wind fans are about the same as the Editor winning the Powerball Jackpot.
But if a noise ordinance is ever passed, however weak, we wonder how many Anderson Valley residents would even file a complaint? The wine industry’s position on the subject — as explained by Navarro Vineyards’ Ted Bennett when the machines were first turned on, is: “Our grapes are more important than your sleep.” So toothless administrative citations or “appeals” issued to grape growers would simply be ignored.
Sleep tight, Anderson Valley — at least until next spring when the wind machines are turned on again.
LOCAL EVENTS (this weekend)
CONSTRUCTION ON EAST GOBBI STREET; TRAFFIC AND MTA BUS ROUTE IMPACTS ANTICIPATED
Ukiah, CA. August 29, 2024. Beginning on Tuesday, September 3rd, work to replace the sewer lines will begin on East Gobbi starting at Orchard and moving west to State Street. East Gobbi will have one-lane closures on blocks with active construction; in those areas, traffic will be allowed westbound only. This will, at times, impact MTA's ability to access the Northbound Local 9 bus stops: Co-op, Autumn Leaves, the Ukiah Post Office, Social Security and Big Lots.
MTA will need to reroute the Northbound Local 9 during the hours of construction for affected areas; other traffic will be detoured as well. Thus, neighborhoods in the areas of Waugh Lane, Cooper Lane, Betty Street and Marlene Street should anticipate additional traffic during construction hours.
What are the construction hours? Monday-Friday, 7am - 5pm
Where will lane closures occur? Lane closures will only occur on blocks where there is active construction. The first area will be between Orchard Avenue and Leslie Street. From there, construction will move west toward State Street. At this time, it is unknown how much time will be spent on each section.
Will any traffic be allowed in the construction areas? Yes, but only westbound in those areas.
What about emergency and delivery vehicles? Construction crews will always allow emergency and delivery vehicles through. Residents will also have access at all times.
Why westbound only? The sewer lines are on the south side of the street. Unfortunately, Gobbi Street isn't wide enough to accommodate active construction plus two lanes of traffic.
Will Gobbi Street be repaved after this? Yes. Once the utility and concrete work is complete, Gobbi will be reconstructed.
What about Main Street? Gobbi, Main and Perkins are all part of one large project called the Urban Core Rehabilitation and Transportation project. Main Street is also having utilities replaced and then will be completely reconstructed. Perkins Street will have storm drains added and be repaved. For more info about this project, see cityofukiah.com/ucrt.
For more information on MTA buses, please call 707-462-1422 or visit Mendocinotransit.org; for more information about the construction project, please contact Deputy City Manager Shannon Riley at sriley@cityofukiah.com or visit the webpage at cityofukiah.com/ucrt.
UKIAH PARKS GAP ANALYSIS
The City of Ukiah is conducting a Parks Gap Analysis to assess how well existing parks are meeting community needs, and what might be needed for future parks. In addition to staff analysis, a robust community engagement process will be undertaken. Community engagement will include focus groups, individual meetings, surveys, event tabling, and outreach to City of Ukiah commissions.
An online survey is available at https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/EnglishParksAnalysis (English); a Spanish version is available at https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/EspanolUkiahParques.
In addition to the online surveys, an outreach table will be open at the Ukiah Pumpkinfest for public comment and an open community forum will be held at the Public Spaces Commission meeting on September 10th at 5:30 PM at the Ukiah Conference Center.
The need for this analysis was identified in the City’s 2040 General Plan, which states the City “shall prepare a parks gap analysis identifying areas of the city underserved by parks and recreation facilities access.” Additionally, the “analysis shall, at a minimum, establish equitable access standards, including the minimum distance between parks and every residence, and potential funding mechanisms.” This will help the City of Ukiah to prepare for population growth, changing demographics, and possible annexations.
The process will include mapping exercises, the identification of appropriate level of service measures, and goals for the City’s Park system. Recreation opportunities and needs will also be assessed. Finally, the document will address potential funding opportunities.
For more information contact Araceli Sandoval at asandoval@cityofukiah.com or 463-6231.
THE ANDERSON VALLEY RECORD?
Marshall Newman writes: Did you know about this? I remember the Anderson Valley Advocate, but this one from 1946 is before my time.
Ed Reply: I'm almost ashamed to say I've never heard of it, let alone seen a copy. I wonder if Held-Poage might have it. Very professionally done, too. Thanks, Marshall. I'm going to see if we can track it down.
HIDING IN PLAIN SIGHT
by Ernie Branscomb
I’m glad to see Paul Modic sign his name.
Paul Modic said: “What if even Ernie Branscomb decides to go troll for a minute, is that so bad?”
Like in what’s so bad about writing anonymously?
I was raised in a very cohesive family on an Old MacDonald family type farm in Laytonville with a loving father and mother. The words “I love you” were never uttered or heard. It was just understood.
My father dropped out of school in the 10th grade and went to work for various reasons. He was wise with the wisdom that comes with life’s difficulties. He was poorly educated, but smart. And, ultimately successful.
My mother was a gentle, but supportive person. She saved her ability to be emphatic for times of necessity. She completed high school as a “straight A” student.
I have an older sister who is sweet but she doesn’t know it. Her feelings were easily hurt. She stayed out of trouble and was also a “straight A” student.
I had to give you some of my background because it seemed necessary to tell you something about who I am. I was an Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder kid with boundless energy. I was a “straight C” student who accidently made the Honor roll once, so I was able to back off a little bit and have some more fun. They tell me that I was a serious problem for the neighborhood. I am glad that kids like me were still considered to be “Normal” back then and I wasn’t placed on some drug to inhibit my ambition.
I became interested in almost everything that happened, or anything that anybody said. I had no problem getting an Old-Timer to tell stories about the good old days. I found people to be endlessly fascinating and interesting. That is something that persists with me even today.
A lot of my dad’s wisdom was given to me through teasing me for my failures, or giving me advice about how I might make life simpler. One of his nuggets of wisdom that stuck with me lifelong is: “You are the person that you would be if nobody knew what you did or said.” And, “Your word is you bond, and your name is your honor.”
That seemed confusing to me at first, then it slowly sunk in and became understandable. Like a passage out of Shakespeare that doesn’t make any sense. Then, as you slowly realize what was said, and the meaning behind it, you can see the wisdom. So, I’ve taken on the mantle of always using my name to everything I say.
Realistically, using my own name in comments is a coward’s way out. Because who knows what the future will bring. If I only write what I can take ownership to, I can’t be exposed in the future for saying something that I might regret.
How many people ever thought that back when they committed what they thought would be the perfect crime, that DNA testing would expose them decades later? How many people ever thought that Kym Kemp would know how many aliases you have used on her blogsite?
Actually, signing my own name hides who I really am. I don’t say what I could say. I can hide the jerk that I really am, or the guy who sacrifices all their friends to state how they vote. I can’t express who I like or dislike because it would expose my rudeness. I can’t tell the outlandish lies that I can conjure. Having to own what I say certainly curbs my creativity. And, I am a very creative person! Who I might be “anonymously” scares me.
MENDOCINO’S RITZ CARLSON
Part 2 of 3; excerpted and annotated from “Mendocino’s Hotels & Saloons,” by Dorothy Bear and Beth Stebbins. Mendocino Historical Review, June, 1980.
A clip from the Independent Dispatch of March, 1871 reads: “The outside of Carlson’s Hotel is now receiving the finishing touch of the mechanic’s skillful hand. When finished, this magnificent structure will reflect no little credit on Mr. Carlson. If all would display as much enterprise as has this gentleman, a lapse of six months would leave no trace by which one could discover that that ravenous monster, the fire-fiend, had ever visited Mendocino.” [Which it had done on October 17, 1870.]
As was the custom in European inns, the new City Hotel was to offer facilities suited to formal social life in addition to providing food and lodging for people and horses. On the ground floor Carlson partitioned off a parlor, a dining room, and a saloon. Women could be comfortable in the parlor and dining room; gentlemen frequented the saloon. The dining room became popular as a place for townspeople to have Sunday dinners after attending church services.
How many rooms were for lodging is not known, but presumably each window, at least on the second floor, must have served a small room with a bed, commode and chair. A few hooks on the wall would hold clothing. Indoor sanitary facilities as we know them had not been invented yet but various pots, bowls and water pitchers were furnished to each lodger’s chamber.
The third floor, with its windows open to the breezes, may have contained the Carlson family’s living quarters and housing for employees, or suites for permanent residents.
There are no available pictures of the interior of Mr. Carlson’s hotel, but the exterior was well photographed by both Carleton E. Watkins and M. M. Hazeltine, two excellent (and later famous) photographers at that time.
Surely no hotel built at a later date in Mendocino ever quite equaled the location or imposing stature of the City Hotel. The wide protective porch and the open gallery above, facing the bay and the sea, were warmed by the southern sun and protected from the cold northwest winds.
The rebuilt livery stable was located at the west end of what is now Albion Street, farther away from the hotel than the first one, but conveniently placed.
Carlson advertised in the December 15th, 1877 Mendocino Beacon: “The undersigned having refurnished and refitted the elegant Hotel, respectfully requests the patronage of the traveling public along the coast. The rooms are nicely furnished and the beds are kept scrupulously clean, so that patrons may be assured of quiet and comfort. The table will be supplied with the best the market affords and at the Bar will always be found the choicest wines, liquors and cigars. A splendid billiard table has been placed in the hotel, furnished with Delaney’s patent cushions, where lovers of this gentlemanly game may spend a leisure hour and a quarter or two. A Feed and Livery Stable in connection with the house. All Coast stages arrive and depart from this house.”
The Carlsons, John and Elizabeth and their children, prospered. John was elected to the school board in 1878: “J. E. Carlson received 107 votes, a majority of 5 votes over his opponent, Albert Maxwell,” according to the Beacon. Continued next week.
(The Kelley House Museum is open from 11:00 AM to 3:00 PM Thursday through Monday. Walking tours of the historic district depart from the Kelley House regularly; for a tour schedule, visit www.kelleyhousemuseum.org.)
CATCH OF THE DAY, Thursday, August 29, 2024
VANESSA ELIZABETH, Ukiah. Petty theft, probation violation. (Frequent flyer.)
ANTHONY FOMASI, Ukiah. DUI, suspended license, probation revocation.
JEREMY LOPRESTI, Ukiah. Probation revocation.
RONNIE MAIN, Laytonville. DUI-alcohol&drugs.
JAVIER RAMIREZ, Ukiah. Controlled substance, paraphernalia, probation revocation.
FRANKLIN ROCKWELL, Eureka/Ukiah. Under influence, controlled substance, paraphernalia, probation revocation.
AN OPPORTUNITY
Esteemed Editor,
Congratulations on your new columnist, Paul Modic! An insight into the world of growers has ever captivated the interest of stoners who in their wildest dreams could scarcely imagine the Devine delights of a sage pot pharmer in the heyday of the enterprise!
The fellow is also curiously alert to the possibilities that await a situation and setting that a change in law has rendered obsolete and this piece today suggests an opportunity… to my weak sensibilities.. for it occurred to my eddy brain that a recovery program for trolls is due and if Paul will remember, as do I, those days when the trimmers had to sit and listen to KMUD calll-in shows where the same OCD callers dominated the air until the pay well just wasn’t worth the trouble— like the Wyoming rancher I worked for driving a tractor all day with the dial set to clear channel Rush Limbaugh, the volume all the way up and the knobs broke off with his rifle butt— !
Think of all the addicts created by Suckerberg Muskrat— like white mice in a laboratory they compulsively hit that like button and/or it’s varieties! The when they work their tolerance for rushes of sanctimony and self- righteousness tempt them to venture into the comment pages, the addiction is pretty much a foregone diagnosis.
Paul could make a handsome living running a coffee house kind of therapy office at his conveniently located residence. Plus, he’s loquacious enough to rip out a kind of big book like the AA people rely on so religiously… well, just a thought.
One sad old troll who realized too late how tedious and irrelevant he had become no longer needs such an ameliorating program bug he remains.
Your sincere well-wisher,
Bruce McEwen
Walnut Creek
SSI UPDATE
by Paul Modic
I was doing some research to gather information to assist a few people who wanted to apply for SSI, or had friends they were helping to apply. I came up with a lot of info and wrote an article about it last December, which was published here. Next I launched an outreach pilot project, passing out the info about eligibility and application for SSI For Seniors in large envelopes on every bulletin board in the area for a few months. (Did anyone read the info and then apply successfully for SSI? I don’t know, I hope so.)
To get the information I went to the Social Security website and called Social Security a few times, finding them very helpful. I have been casually working on this project as an unpaid volunteer and am not affiliated with any community or governmental organization. (I have had discussions with local professional outreach workers about expanding the SSI outreach to all ages, not just seniors.)
If you have any questions about any other facets of this program, other scenarios you need to figure out in order to help yourself or a struggling friend or acquaintance, then call Social Security in Eureka, or ask the questions here or email me: infonorthcoastssi@gmail.com
The Eureka office has been very helpful, with no wait time recently.
Eligibility for SSI for Seniors
Sixty-five years or older
$2000 or less in the bank.
You can’t have rental income or any stocks and bonds.
You can own one home of any value, and that will not be counted as an asset.
You can own one car, of any value, and that is not counted against you.
You are eligible if you didn’t pay enough into Social Security (40 units) or never worked. (Each unit is three months, 40 units adds up to ten years. Check your latest statement or call Social Security.)
If you’re already receiving less than $1185 from Social Security, you can also apply for SSI to make up the difference. (For example if you’re getting $800 from Social Security you are eligible for another $385 from SSI, adding up to the California maximum of $1185.)
Call Social Security to apply: Eureka 866.828.1991, National 800.772.1213.
More SSI Scenarios
You can sell your home in the hills (or wherever it is), take the money and buy another one in town (or wherever), and you will still be eligible for SSI. You have to notify Social Security within ten days of selling your house, and you have a month total to buy the new house. If it takes longer than a month to buy the new house then you will lose your monthly benefit until the property deal is done, or until you have spent down the proceeds from selling your land. (That’s a scenario which is important to know if you’re already on SSI, living out in the hills, and trying to figure out how to move closer in.)
If you receive an inheritance you have one month to spend it. (Keep receipts.) You will lose one month of your benefits. The inheritance can be of any amount and the things you buy have to be only for you. If you get a large inheritance which you are not able to spend in one month, then you will not receive your benefit for the months it takes you to spend it down.
If you own something valuable, like a piece of fine art or antique furniture, you have to sell it and spend down the money before being eligible for SSI.
If you own two properties, you have to sell one and then spend down the money. If you sell one of them below market or give it away to a friend or family member, then you have to wait two years to be eligible to apply for SSI.
If you rent out a room in your house, your SSI benefit will be reduced by whatever the amount of the rent is.
The day you first apply, the benefit clock starts ticking. If, for example, it takes six months for you to be approved, then you will be owed a lump sum going back to the first day. This will be paid to you in three payments over six months.
You can receive food stamps, of up to $292 a month in California, and still receive your full SSI benefit.
You can have two vehicles if the value of the second is $2000 or less, according to Kelly Blue Book. (The first vehicle can be of any value.)
If you own a house with a land partner and you sign it over to them, then the value of the rent you aren’t paying will be subtracted from your SSI benefit. Social Security has a formula to figure out how much the house is worth as a rental, and how much of your benefit you will then lose. (So better not to sign it over to them, even if they are friends or family.)
If you’re married you receive less than the full amount of SSI. If you’re just living together then you or both of you receive your full monthly benefit, unless you are deemed by Social Security to be married. (This could happen if you own a house together and/or have a joint bank account.)
WILDFIRE DESTROYED THIS NAPA VINEYARD. DID IT BURN ITS TERROIR?
by Esther Mobley
I’ll never forget the conversation I had with winemaker Chris Howell four years ago, just hours after the Glass Fire tore across his Napa Valley vineyard and home. At the time, according to Cal Fire, it was the tenth-most destructive wildfire in California history, leveling over 1,500 structures. One of those was Cain Vineyard & Winery, the Spring Mountain producer of some of Napa Valley’s most unconventional Cabernet Sauvignon blends where Howell has worked for more than 30 years. The Glass Fire burned not only Cain’s buildings, but also destroyed a significant number of its grapevines.
The conversation with Howell stands out in my memory as uniquely hopeful during a month when nearly everyone I spoke with had lost something dear to them. “The winery may be gone, but Cain remains,” he said. He meant that a winery could be rebuilt, but that the terroir that informs what the Cain wines taste like — the singular, mysterious combination of soil and topography and climate and so much more — could not be burned away.
Now, Cain is releasing its first wine made in the post-Glass Fire era, the 2021 Cain Five ($150). Howell sees this wine as a kind of test for the Cain vineyard, a proof of concept for the idea of terroir that he discussed with me in the fire’s immediate aftermath. He had to make this wine in an off-site facility, without many of the typical winemaking controls he’s used to. The vineyard itself was changed too, with many of the surrounding flora, like Douglas fir trees, gone. Would Cain still taste like Cain?
After tasting the 2021, I can say that the answer is yes. The extreme, fresh woodsiness that I associate with Cain — notes like bay leaf, dried basil, mint — is here in spades, along with a grippy, rustic texture that speaks to its origin near the top of this mountainside.
Howell said that as the fermentation began, in a new winery where he was working as a guest, he was anxiously awaiting to see what the wine would taste and smell like. As soon as the vat started bubbling up, he felt relieved. “It was amazing that we found flavors that we could recognize,” he said.
“It wasn’t a miracle,” he admitted, “but to us it felt like it. To us this is a validation of all that talk about terroir.”
Making wine in a new facility might not sound like a big deal — some winemakers bop around to new places every year — but Cain has never been a typical winery. Famously, the wines occasionally betray traces of brettanomyces, a spoilage yeast that can imbue a wine with barnyard-like aromas and flavors. Brett is common in many European wine regions but considered anathema in Napa Valley, and it often lives in the cellars themselves.
Even in vintages where the Cain wines don’t taste bretty, I’ve wondered whether the ambient microorganisms in the winery may play a role in the flavors of these wines, which are emphatically unlike the archetypal, opulent, fruity Napa Cabernet.
Then there’s the vineyard, dense with trees like bay laurels, whose unmistakable fragrance is a hallmark of the Cain wines. After 2020, “we got to see how the forest responds to fire,” said Howell. Some species, like redwoods, were fire-resilient. Others, like Douglas firs, weren’t.
The cover crop, not the vines themselves, was what fueled the wildfire, Howell said. Although the scene looked devastating in its immediate wake, the land soon began to heal itself. “In the first year after the fire, the grass was luscious,” he said. “The ash from a fire can basically return minerals to the earth and so in fact it tends to increase fertility.”
But that winter, as he and his team began the slow, painstaking work of assessing the health of each individual vine, “there was more damage than we’d understood,” Howell said. Only around 10% of the vines survived, he now estimates. The rest were damaged beyond the point of repair, or in many cases, dead.
Little by little, they’re replanting, and taking the opportunity to reassess what they want this vineyard to be. Howell has replanted drought-tolerant rootstock, something that was not on most people’s minds when the vineyard was first planted in the 1980s.
The construction of a new Cain winery, like the completion of the vineyard’s replanting, is still years away. Howell and his team will remain in this liminal state, making small quantities of wine from the surviving vines in other people’s wineries. But those who love the Cain wines, as I do, should take comfort in the fact that Cain, the place, endures.
That should be comforting to those who love wines from fire-prone places everywhere, in fact. “I think we’ll be living with fire forever, and hopefully stop trying to put it out,” said Howell, alluding to a set of ideas that’s become more popular in California in recent years. “There’s some idea of nature that’s independent of humans.” The same could be said of wine terroir.
(SF Chronicle)
DAVID SVEHLA (San Francisco):
SF’s 43 Million Plan To Cull Its Monuments: They’ve commissioned 5 artworks, so they’ve ALREADY targeted 5 statues for removal. Mayor Breed years ago has funneled untold millions of dollars unfunded from the police to her vastly African-American political supporters, Nonprofit Grifters and virtue signaling consultants. The Commies only destroy, never build. Anything of European Origin — Columbus, Moscone, Amerigo Vespucci — is beyond suspect and has to GO.
And the fact that somebody could even THINK about removing the bust of Moscone from City Hall infers a complete and total ignorance of San Francisco History. This purported ignorance jibes well with the leftist fantasy of repeating sad eras w/ the races reversed: The eradication of Europe’s descendants by the black and brown-skinned.
Not the Leftists THEMSELVES, of course. They plan on being well and gun guarded and physically removed, many of them using our tax dollars. Some of them on Mendocino ranches…
A Happy Labor Day to All.
IN A REMARKABLE DISPLAY of agility and skill, British hurdler Percy Hodge showcased an extraordinary feat by demonstrating the perfect obstacle jump while balancing a bottle and a glass on a tray.
This impressive stunt highlighted not only his exceptional hurdling technique but also his remarkable balance and control. Hodge, who clinched the Olympic gold in the 3000m steeplechase in 1920, was renowned for his athletic prowess. His ability to maintain grace and precision while performing such a challenging task underscored his mastery of the sport. The image of Hodge executing this flawless jump while carrying a tray offers a captivating glimpse into the training and showmanship of early 20th-century athletes. It’s a testament to the dedication and skill required to excel in competitive athletics.
THE NEW WAVE
AVA,
Nice piece by Alexander Cockburn on The Hollywood Juggernaut and even though the French film industry nearly collapsed by the end of the 1940's, the French New Wave with: Francois Truffaut (Shoot the Piano Player, 1960), Jean-Luc Godard (Le Mepris, 1963 with Technicolor and CinemaScope visuals and featuring Brigitte Bardot), Jacques Demy (Lola, 1961 — affiliated with the Left Bank group) began. With the collapse of the American film quotas, Alexander and others were “scuttling from one end of London to the other” tracking down B-movies from Hollywood while a landmark of cinematic history, the French New Wave, was emerging. Scuttling around London for anything at that time must have been edifying.
Jeff Goll
Willits
FROM INMATE RELEASE TO IMMIGRANT HOUSING AID, CALIFORNIA BILLS SPUR END-OF-SESSION FIREWORKS
by Sameea Kamal
It’s not that California lawmakers shouldn’t aim high, but in an election year, they might avoid taking on bills that could upset voters — their own, or voters of their colleagues.
But that’s not always the case.
In the final days of this session, some Democratic lawmakers are pushing bills that seem ripe for Republican attack ads.
Take Assembly Bill 1840 by Assemblymember Joaquin Arambula, which would expand the state’s “Dream for All” down payment assistance program for first-time homebuyers to undocumented Californians.
The bill has prompted criticism from Republican lawmakers, some of whom cited the state’s budget troubles in their opposition. It also drew “no” votes from four Democrats in the Senate Tuesday, where it ultimately passed 25-14. Wednesday, the bill passed through the Assembly on a 45-15 vote and was sent to Gov. Gavin Newsom. Senate Republicans immediately urged Newsom to veto the bill, calling it the latest in “a long litany of taxpayer dollar giveaways…that encourage and reward illegal immigration.”
Arambula, a Fresno Democrat, said the measure is part of representing his constituents, who struggle with being able to purchase a home despite working and paying taxes. He is up for re-election, but primary results indicate he is likely to win.
“Thus far, the Dream for All program has not had the diversity that we are used to seeing within our state benefit from the program, so we need to make sure that we’re passing policies that are inclusive,” Arambula told CalMatters.
Sen. Dave Min, an Irvine Democrat running for Congress this fall, voted against the bill — not because it’s an election year, though. He also did not vote for a previous version of the program proposed in 2022.
“I believe that the problem in California with our housing is that it’s too expensive and that is a bigger problem than down payment or lack of down payment assistance,” Min said. “I believe that that program and programs like it have the effect of increasing our home prices.”
But Arambula said ensuring a social safety net for all is important because of a “broken” immigration system, election year or not.
“We have to make sure that representation means that we’re standing up for every person who’s in our district, not just those who can vote for us,” he said. “We have so many people in our state who are not able to benefit from the programs despite the fact that they pay their fair share of taxes, and are working hard and helping our economy to continue to improve.”
As of 2021, California was home to about 2.4 million undocumented immigrants, who paid about $51.4 billion in state and local taxes, according to the latest numbers available from USC’s California Immigrant Data Portal.
Even if the bill wins final passage and is signed into law, its impact is uncertain. The California Department of Finance told KCRA that the program has no money to give anyone — undocumented or not — because lawmakers didn’t appropriate funds for it this year.
Matt Gunderson, a Republican candidate in a congressional seat in Orange and San Diego counties, is already using the bill to attack his Democratic opponent, Rep. Mike Levin, though there’s no clear connection between Levin and the state proposal.
“Mike Levin owes voters an explanation as to whether he supports giving taxpayer dollars to help illegal immigrants buy homes,” Gunderson said in a press release Wednesday.
Arambula isn’t the only ambitious lawmaker trying to push through a hot-button bill before the Legislature adjourns Saturday.
Sen. Dave Cortese revived Senate Bill 94 from the inactive file on Aug 13 It would allow some convicted felons to appeal for shortened sentences if the crime was committed before June 5, 1990, and they have served at least 25 years. It would not include anyone convicted of first-degree murder of a police officer, of three or more people, or of a “registerable” sex offense.
Republicans blasted the bill as a “pro-criminal” measure that would retraumatize victims or family members who may have to testify again at parole hearings. Republican legislators and crime victim advocates held a rally last week at the state Capitol to oppose the bill.
Cortese, a Democrat from Campbell, has defended the bill, saying it was a “conservative, narrow bill tailored to a specific subsection of our incarcerated population who may not have received the same sentence had they been convicted in the present day.”
On Wednesday, Republicans slammed a similar bill from Berkeley Democratic Sen. Nancy Skinner that would allow inmates serving at least 15 years to seek relief if there have been any changes in sentencing laws to make them eligible for a reduced sentence.
“Rapists, drug dealers, murderers, child molesters and worse. These are the people that legislative Democrats care about, really?!” Senate GOP leader Brian Jones of San Diego said in a statement.
Aside from partisan differences, public safety bills have also been a major sticking point this year in the Legislature among Democrats, with some concerned that the pendulum is swinging back too far towards measures that disproportionately impact communities of color.
Cortese said he has been working to balance the various concerns on the bill for the last two years, and that it has been significantly amended.
“The payoff for that is not necessarily getting the bill signed into law,” he told CalMatters. “That’s the goal. But sometimes the payoff is just to get your hearing and get a vote on it, and we’re still trying to do that.”
Cortese is up for re-election this year, but like Arambula, is likely to win.
Dan Schnur, a politics professor at UC Berkeley, USC and Pepperdine University, said it is more difficult to pass a politically risky bill just weeks before an election than in an odd-year session when there is a full year for voters to calm down or forget.
“Sometimes, a piece of legislation is time sensitive so there’s no choice but to move forward in an election year,” he said. “But it’s almost always easier to persuade a reluctant colleague to cast a controversial vote when their re-election is still off in the distance.”
In Cortese’s view, though, there’s never a perfect time for a bill.
“I think the best policy for a Legislature is just keep doing what you think is the righteous thing to do, regardless of what the polls say or what popular opinion is saying from one day to the next, because it’s very fickle,” he said.
And if it doesn’t pass this year? “I hope it’s this year,” Cortese said. “But if it’s not, we just need to keep working on it. I will do that, either way.”
(CalMatters.org)
AND YOU THOUGHT POLITICAL REFORM WAS A NEW IDEA…
by Jim Shields
OK, here’s your civics quiz for the week. Who said the following?
“It is no limitation upon property rights or freedom of contract to require that when men receive from government the privilege of doing business under corporate form … they shall do so upon absolutely truthful representations … Great corporations exist only because they are created and safeguarded by our institutions; and it is therefore our right and duty to see that they work in harmony with these institutions … In the interests of the public, the government should have the right to inspect and examine the workings of the great corporations … The nation should … also assume power of supervision and regulation over all corporations doing interstate business.”
Still stumped? Well, the same person said this:
“The great corporations which we have grown to speak of rather loosely as trusts are the creatures of the State, and the State not only has the right to control them, but it is duty bound to control them whenever need of such control is shown …”
All right, while you are thinking about whom may have uttered the foregoing, who said this?
“… Our government, national and state, must be freed from the sinister influence or control of special interests. Exactly as the special interests of cotton and slavery threatened our political integrity before the Civil War, so now the great special business interests too often control and corrupt the men and methods of government for their own profit. We must drive the special interests out of politics. That is one of our tasks today … The citizens of the United States must effectively control the mighty commercial forces which they have themselves called into being. There can be no effective control of corporations while their political activity remains. To put an end to it will be neither a short nor an easy task, but it can be done.”
President Theodore Roosevelt made all of those discerning remarks over a 100 years ago when he was battling the big corporations (“trusts), which were attempting to gain monopolistic control over various sectors of our economy. Folks back then called it “trust busting” when Roosevelt used the Sherman Act to break up the illegal monopolies.
History tells us that the last time somebody actually successfully brought Big Oil to heel, was Teddy Roosevelt. At the turn of the 19th to the 20th century, the ol’ Roughrider rode roughshod over John D. Rockefeller in the Standard Oil antitrust case that defined — for a while anyway — just how big and powerful one company should be. Since then, anti-trust action has become a quaint, nearly extinct governmental power seldom exercised to prevent the rigging of the marketplace. After all, the global marketplace requires global-sized “competitors.” And Globalism finds Republicans and Democrats joined at the hip in their rabid support for a new world order where workers, small business operators, and the middle class are all listed on the economic extinction list.
At one time, anti-trust legislation and enforcement was one of the main planks in the platforms of both political parties.
Isn’t it amazing, just a hundred years ago we had people in public office who understood how government should work. TR was a Republican, his cousin, Franklin D. Roosevelt, was a Democrat. They both set this country back on course in perilous economic times. It can be argued that Teddy and FDR saved capitalism from self-destruction. The former broke up the monopolies that were strangling the country’s life breath; the latter glued back together the shattered pieces of a country depressed in spirit and economy, and later would lead the nation to victory in a world war.
One of my boyhood idols was, and is, Bill Bradley, a celebrated collegiate and professional basketball player and former Rhodes scholar, who once had been hailed as an emerging star in the Democratic Party who twice ran for President.
First elected to the Senate in 1978, he emerged as the leader on a major issue only a few times—most notably in shaping the 1986 tax reform bill. In his first two terms, he tended to focus on one issue at a time—whether it was tax policy or relations with the former Soviet Union. After almost losing his seat in 1990, however, he broadened his strategy to encompass more issues—most notably race relations and the economic troubles of the middle class and the poor.
In 1996, he denounced politics in America as” broken”, then announced he would step down at the end of his third term in 1997.
“We live in a time when, on a basic level, politics is broken,” Bradley explained. “In growing numbers, people have lost faith in the political process and don’t see how it can help their threatened circumstances.”
He went onto say, “The political debate has settled into two familiar ruts. The Republicans are infatuated with the ‘magic’ of the private sector and reflexively criticize government as the enemy of freedom, and the Democrats distrust the market, preach government as the answer to our problems and prefer the bureaucrat they know to the consumer they can’t control.”
It kind of makes you both sad and angry that politics are now so broke.
Maybe what is needed today is not a reform of government.
Maybe all we need to do is to return to a government that was reformed a long time ago.
(Jim Shields is the Mendocino County Observer’s editor and publisher, observer@pacific.net, the long-time district manager of the Laytonville County Water District, and is also chairman of the Laytonville Area Municipal Advisory Council. Listen to his radio program “This and That” every Saturday at 12 noon on KPFN 105.1 FM, also streamed live: http://www.kpfn.org)
KAMALA HARRIS IN FIRST INTERVIEW DEFENDS FLIP-FLOPS, INSISTS ‘MY VALUES HAVE NOT CHANGED’
by Steven Nelson
Vice President Kamala Harris tried to explain away her stated shifts on major policy questions Thursday in her first TV interview since becoming the Democratic nominee — insisting to CNN anchor Dana Bash that “my values have not changed.”
Harris, 59, defended her evolving positions when asked if voters can know what they’re getting — as Republicans panned her pivots on immigration, healthcare and energy policy.
Harris defended her evolving positions when asked by Bash how voters can know what they’re getting — after sustained criticism from Republicans of Harris’ dramatic policy pivots on immigration, healthcare and energy policy.
Vice President Harris has been under pressure to sit for an interview since becoming the presumptive Democratic nominee following Joe Biden’s decision to step down.
“I think the most important and most significant aspect of my policy perspective and decisions is my values have not changed,” Harris told Bash in a clip from her first sit-down since President Biden dropped out of the race on July 21, which will air in full at 9 p.m.
“You mentioned the Green New Deal. I have always believed and — I’ve worked on it — that the climate crisis is real, that it is an urgent matter to which we should apply metrics that include holding ourselves to deadlines around time,” added the meandering veep.
“We did that with the Inflation Reduction Act. We have set goals for the United States of America and by extension the globe around when we should meet certain standards for reduction of greenhouse gas emissions as an example. That value has not changed.”
Harris went on: “My value around what we need to do to secure our border, that value has not changed.”
“I spent two terms as the attorney general of California prosecuting transnational criminal organizations, violations of American laws regarding the passage, illegal passage, of guns, drugs and human beings across our border” she said.
“My values have not changed. So that is the reality of it.”
Harris was joined for the sit-down in Savannah, Georgia, by her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, in what critics mocked as a move to shield her from probing questions by also introducing the man who would be her No. 2 if she is elected.
The vice president has backed away from some policies she previously advocated — including her 2019 pledges as a Democratic presidential primary candidate to eliminate private health insurance, decriminalize illegal border crossings, ban fracking for oil and natural gas, and ban the sale of new gas-powered cars by 2035.
Earlier this month, Harris floated and then backed away from plans to battle inflation with price controls on groceries — which even the left-leaning Washington Post editorial board denounced as likely to be ineffective.
Former President Donald Trump for weeks has referred to Harris as “Comrade Kamala” and asserted she is pushing the “Maduro plan” — in reference to Venezuela’s socialist leader Nicolas Maduro.
“She probably goes back to her room and gets sick to her stomach when she says what she has to say, because she’s a Marxist,” Trump said at a rally in Michigan on Thursday afternoon, moments after the first clips of Harris’ interview were released.
Trump cited Harris’ recent claims to support robust US-Mexico border security — after three years of record-high illegal crossings while she served as Biden’s point person on addressing the crisis.
“Now she’s saying, ‘Oh, we want to build a strong border.’ Where has she been for three and a half years?” Trump exclaimed Thursday. Republicans have decried Harris as a political “chameleon” who is falsely claiming to have moderated her positions in a bid to be the first woman elected president.
Harris also claimed Thursday that she intends to name a Republican to serve in her Cabinet — without specifying who that might be.
“I think it’s important to have people at the table when some of the most important decisions are being made that have different views, different experiences,” Harris said. “And I think it would be to the benefit of the American public to have a member of my Cabinet who was a Republican.”
(New York Post)
IN CNN INTERVIEW, HARRIS DODGED GAZA GENOCIDE AND DAMAGED HER ELECTION PROSPECTS
by Norman Solomon
Time is running out for Kamala Harris to distance herself from U.S. policies that enable Israel to continue with mass murder and genocide in Gaza. Polling shows that a pivot toward moral decency would improve her chances of defeating Donald Trump. But during her CNN interview Thursday night, Harris remained in lockstep with President Biden’s unconditional arming of Israel.
Two weeks ago, YouGov pollsters released findings in Arizona, Georgia and Pennsylvania, three swing states now on a razor’s edge between Harris and Trump. “In Pennsylvania, 34 percent of respondents said they would be more likely to vote for the Democratic nominee if the nominee vowed to withhold weapons to Israel, compared to 7 percent who said they would be less likely. The rest said it would make no difference,” the new journalism site Zeteo reported.
Results in the two other states were similar. “In Arizona, 35 percent said they’d be more likely, while 5 percent would be less likely. And in Georgia, 39 percent said they’d be more likely, also compared to 5 percent who would be less likely.”
But on CNN, Harris stuck to echoing Biden’s rhetoric—calling for a ceasefire while dodging the reality that the U.S. government could force one by implementing an arms embargo on Israel.
Huge U.S. shipments of weapons and bombs to Israel keep allowing it to massacre and starve civilians of all ages while violating federal statutes as well as international law. Days ago, Biden approved sending arms to Israel worth upwards of $20 billion. The transfers were called “sales,” but as policy analyst Stephen Semler pointed out, “most if not all of this matériel is paid for by U.S. taxpayers—Israel uses much of the military aid Congress approves for it effectively as a gift card to buy U.S.-made weapons.”
Just listening to Harris during her CNN interview, you’d be clueless about the realities that the UN high commissioner for human rights, Volker Türk, spelled out in a statement midway through August: “The people of Gaza are now grieving 40,000 Palestinian lives lost, according to Gaza’s health ministry. Most of the dead are women and children. This unimaginable situation is overwhelmingly due to recurring failures by the Israeli Defense Forces to comply with the rules of war. On average, about 130 people have been killed every day in Gaza over the past 10 months. The scale of the Israeli military’s destruction of homes, hospitals, schools and places of worship is deeply shocking.”
Notably, Harris gave no indication of the number of Palestinian lives lost—while she did say that 1,200 Israelis, including “many young people,” lost their lives on October 7. That most of the Palestinians who died were children and women went unmentioned.
While the vice president said that Israelis were “massacred,” she relied on passive voice to say only that too many Palestinians “have been killed.”
After recording the interview, I transcribed it in full:
CNN’S Dana Bash: “President Biden has tried unsuccessfully to end the war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza. He’s been doing it for months and months along with you. Would you do anything differently, for example would you withhold some U.S. weapons shipments to Israel? That’s what a lot of people on the progressive left want you to do.”
Harris: “Let me be very clear. I am unequivocal and unwavering in my commitment to Israel’s defense and its ability to defend itself, and that’s not gonna change. But let’s take a step back. October 7. Twelve hundred people are massacred, many young people who are simply attending a music festival. Women were horribly raped. As I said then I say today, Israel had a right, has a right to defend itself. We would. And how it does so matters. Far too many innocent Palestinians have been killed, and we have got to get a deal done. We were in Doha, we have to get a deal done, this war must end --”
Bash: “And in the meantime --“
Harris: “And we must get a deal that is about getting the hostages out. I’ve met with the families of the American hostages. Let’s get the hostages out. Let’s get the ceasefire done.”
Bash: “But no change in policy? In terms of arms and so forth.”
Harris: “No. We have to get a deal done. Dana, we have to get a deal done. When you look at the significance of this to the families, to the people who are living in that region, a deal is not only the right thing to do to end this war, but will unlock so much of what must happen next. I remain committed, since I’ve been on October 8, to what we must do to work toward a two-state solution, where Israel is secure and in equal measure the Palestinians have security and self-determination and dignity.”
When I heard Harris say “I remain committed,” I felt sure that the phrase “two-state solution” could not be far behind. For U.S. politicians and pundits, it has become a handy slogan to assert virtuous intent—rendered more and more absurd as Israel’s terroristic ethnic cleansing persists in Gaza and escalates in the occupied West Bank. And as genocide continues to gain momentum.
There is every reason to believe that Donald Trump—who said this summer that the president should let Israel “finish the job”—would be even worse than Biden as an accomplice to Israel’s slaughter of Palestinian people. But that’s no reason to evade the unconscionable complicity of President Biden in the daily mass atrocities.
A suction tube of euphemisms and evasion has captured many a partisan mind. And so it was from the podium of the Democratic National Convention, when the usually admirable Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez descended into making the groundless claim that Harris “is working tirelessly to secure a ceasefire in Gaza and bringing the hostages home.”
In sharp contrast, with horrors in Gaza continuing, fellow Democratic Rep. Rashida Tlaib has never taken the easy way out. As she has done countless times since last fall, on Thursday she sent out a truthful and disturbing message.
“Palestinian Americans feel invisible, with our trauma and pain unseen and ignored by both Democrats and Republicans,” Tlaib wrote. “We want action to stop the horrific massacres of our families and polling shows that, regardless of political party, the majority of Americans are with us. . . . Yet, even after over 600 weapons shipments since October, including fighter jets, high explosive mortars, and more, the Biden administration has approved another $20 billion in weapons for the Israeli military to commit well-documented war crimes and continue to murder Palestinian children and civilians.”
And Tlaib wrote: “An arms embargo to stop the genocide is not just the moral, just, and right thing to do. It is also good politics.”
Whether Kamala Harris will ever really get the message is unclear.
I can’t think of a single question that was clearly answered by Kampala last night. Funny how her eyes were mostly focused on the table in front of her…..she had no notes, as if she was trying to recall her coaching. Dana Bash never asked a single pointed follow-up question. Pretty much a joke.
Kamala is running as a MAGA now. Democrats don’t need to worry though, she will switch back after she wins.
MAGA Marmon
Meanwhile Trump has come out as pro abortion and government funded IVF treatments. Don’t worry, his handlers will just say he was “being sarcastic.” Captain Flip Flop has reported for duty.
He’s letting the states decide on abortion. He wants to make ivf free. Easier to have kids not kill the kids.
Has anyone thought about how dang hot that entrance will be with the morning sun filling it? How much energy it will use for air conditioning. The entrance should face north towards Perkins for many reasons. It is a dam bar code. Do these ya ya designers ever leave their cubicles to see what they are putting into a small rural community? If we are getting a new court house, they should design it to fit the vibe of the city vs forcing this big city ugliness on us. what a crock.
This is one of the most dog-awful examples of brutalist architecture I’ve seen. It’s also obscenely out of scale for its neighborhood. By the time it’s completed I’ll be well over 70, so it’s unlikely I’ll be answering a jury summons to sit in that civic horror.
If only Casey Hartlip and others demanded the same clarity from Trump and Vance. That’s no joke.
Clarity for Trump & Vance can be found in the 2025 Report by the Heritage Foundation. The same outfit that gave us Trump’s picks for the Supreme Court, and a shit load of federal judges like Aileen Cannon.
All this “anyone but Trump” nonsense is dangerous. Obamala will finish the job of destroying our country and start WW3.
MAGA Marmon
Says the man who worked a government (socialist) job, was in a union, received medical and retirement benefits, has Social Security and Medicare, and could probably apply for food stamps if you blow through all your retirement money. Obalama is the best misogynistic, racist name you can come up with? How do you feel about your Fearless Leader, Commander Bonespurs, insulting veterans and the “losers and suckers” that died for our country in the military?
More name calling and unsubstantiated – and probably untrue – comments from a man so cowardly he will not submit his comments under his own name.
Pleased to meet you
Hope you guess my name
But what’s puzzling you
Is the nature of my game
MAGA Marmon
I feel confident people easily discover your game, since it is a very simple one, as befits a hog rider.
How’s HYPOCRITE Marmon. The rest of your bullshit isn’t worth bothering with.
Stones!
Yep. Trump, especially, is a master at the no-answer–just attacks and defames and hates others–that’s his real answer to just about any serious question.
NEW RENDERINGS OF MENDO’S $150 MILLION COURTHOUSE MONSTROSITY
No more of a monstrosity than the look-alike eggmobiles everybody drives.
IN CNN INTERVIEW, HARRIS DODGED GAZA GENOCIDE AND DAMAGED HER ELECTION PROSPECTS
She lost my vote over her support for the Zionist savages, and would have to do a 180 to get it back. That might not do it either, because there would be a good chance that she was just lying to get elected. The dems need to disappear, or start being what they’re supposed to be rather than being moderate fasciuglicans.
Thank you
Obamala doesn’t care about your vote, she’s going after the Independents and “Never Trumpers” right now. Your vote is insignificant.
MAGA Marmon
Cute condescending name. Now grow up.
Hey Bruce, I know you are older than me. But when I was in school that kind of behavior got you sent to the principal’s office and swatted and a phone call home. Then I had to worry what my punishment that my dad was going to give me.
Columbus was a child sex trafficker. We know this because of the writings of his contemporary – the priest Las Casas. And no, it’s not a case of the morality of the day being different than today’s. Thanks to Las Casas, he was, in fact, arrested for his crimes of brutality. Junipero Serra was a brutal murderer, torturer, and enslaver.
If you want their statues to remain in public view on public lands because of some kind of historical pride, you are a deeply sick person. As for Moscone, I’d be inclined to keep his bust in place, with a note that says “his death catapulted the pro-war, pro-genocide Diane Feinstein to greater power.”
Kamala Harris repeated the completely debunked lie that Hamas had engaged in rape on Oct 7. There were zero rapes. The people who have been using rape as a weapon are the Zionists – in the Safsaf Massacre, the Deir Yassin Massacre, and today in “Israel’s” prisons. Here is video of Zionists soldiers laughing about raping Palestinian children: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MQ1TAOibLss … The clip is from a documentary called Tantura, trailer here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HNtrUjUNkJw
How many times did we hear “How could the German people allow it to happen?” Today, most of the people I know vote for it to happen.
TRUMP’S DISRESPECT AT ARLINGTON
“How The Hell Was Trump Allowed To Use Arlington National Cemetery As A Campaign Prop?
By Charles P. Pierce Esquire: Aug 26, 2024
“Well, luckily for the former president*’s campaign, it wasn’t raining on Monday, when he grotesquely used Arlington National Cemetery as a campaign prop because, as we know, he gets a little nervous around soldiers’ graves in the rain, and he says things that require him to lie his ass off later. Most recently, of course, he devalued the Congressional Medal of Honor in favor of a bauble he draped on Rush Limbaugh and the wife of one of the sleaziest of his sleazy donors.
So the sun was out and shining as this third-generation draft dodger pretended to care about the soldiers who were suckers and losers enough to get killed during the United States’ withdrawal from its Afghanistan adventure. How in the hell this was allowed to happen is beyond me. Arlington is the country’s ‘most hallowed ground.’ (Just ask the tour guides.) Arlington is profaned by his presence on just an average day. But to allow itself to be used for the purpose propping up one of the Republican Party’s most noxious half-truths—as promulgated by its most noxious elements personified by its most noxious candidate—is an insult to the over 400 Medal of Honor awardees buried there…”
Chuck and Charles get the outrage right.
Eventually Marmon and his brethren here will recognize how genuinely craven the Craven One is.
To Ernie Branscomb,
I realize now that all the cute nicknames Kym’s trolls use on RHBB are better than real names. Real names would be a distraction, ya know? Having to think about this real person we all probably know would take away from his jaded opinion. Better to keep it simple and anonymous, si?
(Me? I’m an attention hog so an alias just doesn’t do it for me anymore, plus no more copters.)
PS: Good introductory column. If you want any more ideas here is a list of sixty-three questions with which I tried to interview one of your fellow South Fork graduates, Mark M never responded but then I heard he can’t read very well anyway. These were tailored to him but there’s a lot of leeway, I suppose.
63 Questions
When did you first notice hippies around? See ’em on TV first?
Was Garberville already a tourist town? Foreigners and city people come to see the Redwoods? Have vacation homes?
When did you first talk to hippies?
Were there local townie kids who were hippies before the hippies arrived? (Boys: smoked weed, had long hair; Girls: dressed hippie, put out, etc?)
Who were the wild girls at South Fork?
Was there a dress code at South Fork?
When/how did you meet hippie girls?
Did you stay friends with your townie buddies as the hippies arrived. Still friends?
Why the Harris connection?
When were you first aware of smoking weed?
When were you first aware of growing weed?
Page1/11)
What was the circumstances of your DUI back in 1970?
What did Judge Thomas rule?
Did you know Judge Thomas?
What do you know about him?
Why did he seem to like hippies?
Why did 400 + SoHum rednecks sign a petition to recall him?
Do you have any Judge Thomas stories?
Are you a storyteller?
Were you once a redneck? ie, ignorant and racist?
Were you liberal? When did you become liberal?
Was your family conservative? Racist? Anti-hippie?
Was there a little group of liberals, but mostly conservatives?
Did the liberals stick together? Or did it not matter among school friends?
When were you first aware of weed?
When did you first smoke weed?
When did you grow your first plant?
Who grew the first plant among the rednecks? When? Where?
Who among the hippies? When? Where?
When did you sell your first elbow? How much? Type? Name? Sensi?
Did you become a long-haired hippie? When?
Did you/do you get along with the rednecks?
When did you start to make friends with the hippies? Who first? How?
Did rednecks get drunk at the Blue Room and pull hippies out of the bar across the street (Pre- Branding Iron) and beat them up on the street?
Did rednecks go out and burn down hippies’ houses, shacks?
Did you hear about that? How?
Did Judge Thomas crack down and throw the ring-leaders in jail?
(Pg2/26)
How many pieces of land did your family own?
How much does it still have?
Where did you grow up?
Is there a family home? Is it still there?
Are you aware of the anti-Hippie petition of 1969? Want to see it?
Is your father a good interview subject? Ever do an oral history with him?
How did you get into heavy equipment? Where did you learn?
Can you run backhoe etc? Are you a mechanic? Carpenter?
What jobs did you have as a kid? First job?
What was it like at South Fork? Learn anything?
What did your parents do? How many brothers and sisters?
What do you know about the Redway Raiders?
Did they burn down hippies’ houses?
How was Pauli’s father involved? (Was yours?)
Was Pauli your friend from way back?
When the hippies came did it open your eyes in some way? Influenced?
Who was your first girlfriend?
Who was your first hippie girlfriend?
Were hippie girls looser?
Which was the first hippie/redneck couple to date, etc?
Which was the first Hippie/Redneck couple to get married, family etc?
How did you find your land?
Have you ever lived anywhere else? Where? How long? What did? College?
Did you have enemies at twenty? Why? Now?
When did you hear of sensemilla?
Was Cris McCurdy “The Beaver” who chopped down the SC phone poles?
(Pg3, 26)
Paul
I could answer most of your questions, but I would have to be anonymous. However, you have me intrigued. Judge Charles M. Thomas was at the root of the hippie invasion. His recall for turning drug offenders loose was my first introduction to how dishonest politics can be. The newcomers already knew how to play dirty, the locals were too late to learn. And here we are. We learned to buy locks, hide our stuff and get used to petulia oil. We used to change into our town clothes before we came to town. The hippie girls sometimes looked to us like they came to town in their pajamas. What A SHOCK. But, like any invasion the newcomers learned manners and the locals became more tolerant. And we have become friends. Why do you ask? You saw it all.
Oh, I asked because that was during my interview phase a couple years ago, and am fascinated with how the other side lives. I usually overwhelmed people with too many questions, then they can answer whichever ones they want to. I sent a guy, who had grown out Usal as a teenager, a list of 132 questions about that experience. (No response.)
Well I sort of saw it all (at least at the swimming holes) but really I was in my hippie bubble out in the Gulch, broke at first, and rarely came to what we haughtily called “Garbageville.” Like we were too cool for town, baby…
Yeah, Judge Thomas was about 50 years ahead of the times, ie legal now. Just a couple years ago I realized that he was MY judge when I was busted in ’77 on Highway 101, with the first pound I ever grew, a merry tale of idiotic choices…(He threw it out, illegal search and seizure, thanks Robert Cogen.)
To Bruce McEwen
Damn dude, is that a fan letter or just more career advice? But now that I haven’t written about weed in weeks I feel the pressure to hurry up with something spicy and aromatic for next week. You may call me a columnist but you know the Independent just went out of business, I did have a good run, twenty-eight columns in the last seven months. So here I am, back home.
Your letter to the editor is the real column, a mix of history, opinion, imagination and malarky in one fabulous and unedited heap. However, I thought you were going to refer to my column called My Cult which appeared here a couple weeks ago. I would have liked to see that one get “the treatment.”
Meanwhile here’s something from a few years back which purports to mention you, sooooo…
Who Killed Bruce Anderson?
Mendocino County District Attorney David Eyster sits behind his mammoth desk addressing his visitors Bruce McEwen, Mark Scarmella, and Ed Denson.
Eyster: I’ve called you in today, Bruce and Mark, because the investigation has hit a dead end. Ed, why are you here?
Denson: Just a little ambulance chasing, Davy.
Eyster: Call me Mister District Attorney please. Ed, you’re not a murder lawyer, can you get that with correspondence law school degree too? Be that as it may, we have the obvious suspects in the other room: Sweeney, Cherney, Dr. Keegan, and about a hundred others.
Denson: What about the family, Dave? His brother Rob hated him.
Eyster: Ed, you still here? Don’t you have some drunken driver or pot grower to get off the hook?
Denson: Allegedly drunk, or growing, Dave.
Eyster: Right. Bring in Sheriff Allman.
Allman: Yes, one Bruce J Anderson disappeared on the morning of, wait a minute! Why isn’t McEwen in the suspect room? Anderson ran a piece about him a couple years back when he went AWOL from the paper, identifying him as a drunk and a bad roommate. How did that make you feel Bruce?
McEwen, intrepid court reporter for the AVA, starts to respond when Scaramella raises a hand.
Scaramella: Let it go Bruce. You didn’t see that issue, right? Too blasted chasing the dream of a SoHum clipper girl in your sleeping bag, right? Let it go…
Eyster: What about Aanestad? She was pretty pissed off when the AVA put that Facebook letter of hers seeking love and children in the paper. Then Moon chimed in that Anderson had stolen the work she and Stelloh put into the website.
Allman: No, Christina is clean, she had been down in San Fran all week getting a few more tattoos to complete the job.
Eyster: And Sweeney, any alibi?
Allman: He was last seen huddling in a corner booth of El Azteca with Cherney and Keegan, nothing suspicious there.
Eyster: And what about Rob, the brother?
McEwen: Lets stop this charade right now, the prime suspect is obviously Todd Walton! Did you see that letter Anderson published trashing his writing?
Scarmella: No way McEwen, Walton is lockstep with Anderson on the demise of civilization and…
Allman: We’ll look a little closer look at Walton, especially now that his column has been unceremoniously removed from the pages of the AVA, though strangely his name is still on the masthead. Anyone else Anderson pissed off or annoyed?
Eyster: Easily half the Anderson Valley. We’re never going to solve this one. Ed? You still here? Got any of those 8 ounce Mexican Cokes you’re so famous for? Okay, get outta here you guys, Anderson has probably just run off to Eugene again. Or someone check the parking lot at Oracle Arena, I hear his nephew owns the place.