Mendocino County Today: Saturday 9/21/2024

Sunny | Pedro & Emmett | Jesse Stafford | Wrong Brian | Part-Time Job | Pool Sentenced | Local Events | Promoting Civility | Trail Hierarchy | Mug-Shot Decision | Probable Cause | Indian Days | Birthday Wishes | Gemini Rose | Posey Ranch | Summer Resort | Ed Notes | Foam Art | Mendo Zones | Yesterday's Catch | Great Delusion | Huggy Schreiber | Free Muni | Mason Couple | Hit Piece | Texas Cotton | Kiffness Remix | Whipped | Permanent Bureaucracy | The Stairway | Evil Empire | Lead Stories | Gaza Kids | Being Cool | Short History

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WARM AND DRY conditions will continue to gradually settle in today with continued gusty north winds along the coast. Heat will peak early next week with above average temperatures pushing out even along the coast. (NWS)

STEPHEN DUNLAP (Fort Bragg): A cool 48F under clear skies this Saturday morning on the coast. The fog has moved down to Pt. Arena for now & thru the weekend it looks like. Perfect weather for the harbor festival today, go check it out! No rain in sight currently.

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VERBAL ALTERCATION LEADS TO SEIZURE OF LOADED FIREARM

On September 19, 2024 at approximately 7:30 P.M., Fort Bragg police officers were dispatched to a local business for reports of a juvenile being verbally threatened.

During the investigation, the business employees were quick to assist law enforcement, and allowed them to review their surveillance footage. Upon review, officers were able to quickly identify Pedro Guzman-Martinez, 24 of Fort Bragg, and Emmett Williams, 25 of Fort Bragg, as the main instigators of this altercation.

Both Guzman-Martinez and Williams left the area in a motor vehicle prior to law enforcement arrival. Based on previous contacts with Guzman-Martinez, officers were aware he is on active formal gang probation out of Mendocino County.

Approximately 30 minutes later, officers located the vehicle involved in this incident and conducted a traffic stop for a traffic violation in the 600 block of So. Main Street. While detaining all occupants of the vehicle, Williams attempted to reach into his jacket numerous times, ignoring officers’ commands to keep his hands visible. Williams was taken into custody after a brief struggle without injury to him or officers. A search of where Williams was reaching within the vehicle revealed a loaded, unregistered, high capacity handgun concealed inside a fanny-pack.

Williams was booked into the Mendocino County Jail for Carrying Loaded Firearm in Public, Loaded Unregistered Firearm, Gang Member in Possession of a firearm, Possession of a High Capacity Magazine, Carrying Concealed Weapon on Person or Vehicle, Felon in Possession of a Firearm, Felon in Possession of Ammunition, Child Endangerment, to Fight in a Public Place, and Resisting Arrest.

Guzman-Martinez was booked into the Mendocino County Jail for Violation of Probation, Child Endangerment, and Challenging to Fight in a Public Place.

Anyone with information on this incident is encouraged to contact Officer Moore of the Fort Bragg Police Department at (707)961-2800 ext 225.

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CORRECTION: WRONG BRIAN CARTER

Dear AVA,

It has come to my attention that in your [on-line] paper dated Saturday, September 14, 2024, you wrote and published the following: “Former Ukiah Attorney Brian Carter, son of the legendary Republican fixer-attorney Jared Carter, and former Attorney for infamous Pacific Lumber CEO… Charles Hurwitz, who now lists his residence as ‘Manchester,’ is running for an appointed seat on the Redwood Coast Fire District board.”

Please be advised that I am not a “former Ukiah attorney,” as I still reside and am still practicing law in Ukiah.

Please also be advised that I am not running for a seat, appointed or otherwise, on the Redwood Coast Fire District Board.

Thank you.

Brian C. Carter

Ukiah

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ANGELA DEWITT:

The Anderson Valley Community Services District's secretary, Caleigh Bennett, will soon be leaving the District to welcome a baby into her family. We wish her all the best! If you or someone you know is looking for a part-time job in a field that supports the community, please be in touch. 895-2020 or secretary@gmail.com.

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FORT BRAGG MAN SENTENCED FOR LEWD ACTS ON 2 CHILDREN

by Colin Atagi

A Fort Bragg man received “multiple life sentences” Thursday after being convicted of committing lewd acts on children more than a decade apart, prosecutors said.

Tomas Yah Pool, 56, was sentenced in Mendocino County Superior Court after a jury convicted him in July of six counts of lewd and lascivious acts upon a child under the age of 14.

The activity involved children between the ages of 3 and 6 from 2004 to 2020, according to the Mendocino County District Attorney’s Office.

“Without going into greater detail and individual count numbers, the court-imposed sentencing outcome equals 123 years to life in state prison, the maximum allowed by law,” the office reported in a Facebook post Friday.

According to a trial brief prosecutors filed in May, five counts pertained to the young daughter of a family friend.

Both families lived in Fort Brag and the abuse occurred whenever Pool drove the kindergartner to Redwood Elementary School during the 2011-12 school year.

Pool, officials said, drove a van, pulled over and sexually assaulted the girl.

“She recalled three specific occasions where it happened, but indicated it happened more than 10 times, but less than 20,” Deputy District Attorney Eloise Kelsey wrote in the brief.

Other assaults included an encounter at Pool’s home while his wife and child were absent, and while both families were driving back to California from a road trip to Chicago.

Assaults stopped after the child fought off Pool and “kicked him in the shoulder” during a trip to school, Kelsey wrote.

Family members did not believe the child when she told them about the abuse until they found writings about it in her diary in 2019.

The sixth count applies to a second girl who was abused in 2020, officials said.

Pool had been dating her mother and the child complained in April 2020 she suffered a “burning feeling” while urinating, Kelsey wrote.

Pool refused to drive them to a medical appointment and he later fled when he learned the girl and her sibling were being taking into protective custody due to abuse allegations.

The girl told a doctor and investigator about the abuse during an examination.

“She said it happened while her mother was cooking,” Kelsey wrote. “She denied anyone else, including her father, ever touched her in a bad way other than Tomas Pool.”

(The Press Democrat)

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LOCAL EVENTS (this weekend)

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“CIVILITY.” The first paragraph of CEO Darcy Antle’s, as usual info-free, September “CEO Report” says:

“CEO Antle and Human Resources have been actively focusing on promoting civility in the workplace. Civility is a cornerstone of a positive work environment, where mutual respect, constructive communication, and effective conflict resolution are prioritized. These values are critical for fostering collaboration, reducing stress, and enhancing job satisfaction across all departments.”

The rest of Ms. Antle’s civility item has the usual bureaucratic barrage referring to workshops, training, policies, guidelines, “open dialogue,” “lead by example,” and “counseling services.”

The fact that the CEO thinks it’s necessary to even bring up “civility,” is a sign of the low morale in most county offices. Management turnover, comparatively low pay, crazy office rearrangements, line staff turnover, high workloads, stupidly imposed hiring freezes, inexperienced new hires, poor personnel policies (as documented by the Grand Jury) and other manifestations of management neglect create unnecessary tension and griping that cannot be papered over with lame calls for “civility.”

BACK IN THE EARLY 2000s, PAUL ANDERSEN was on the Ukiah City Council when he announced he was moving to Vermont, abruptly giving up his County Employee’s Union job and his seat on the Ukiah City Council. (He instead got himself hired as “assistant Point Arena City Manager by former Ukiah Councilman/Supervisor Richard Shoemaker who had got himself hired as Point Arena city manager in the usual cozy lib-lab Mendo shuffle.) At his last Ukiah City Council meeting, Andersen called fellow City Councilman Mark Ashiku “a prick” after Ashiku made some snide remarks about his fellow councilpersons. At the time, the Ukiah Daily Journal kept its readers in suspense for the full length of an entire feature story about the meeting before it finally ended the suspense and reported Andersen’s “uncivil” accusation. But at least the Journal told its readers what Andersen had said. The next day the ever-vigilant Santa Rosa Press Democrat, in a story by their then-long-time Ukiah reporter Mike Geniella, couldn’t bring themselves to report what Andersen actually said, instead reporting, “Andersen let loose from the council dais with a comment that stunned onlookers. Staring at Ashiku, Andersen then called him a name using a slang reference to the male anatomy.” We’re pretty sure the censorship of the word “prick” had little to do with Geniella and was the product of the fake prudery at the PD’s Santa Rosa editorial bunker.

ANDERSON VALLEY has had its share of municipal barbs over the years (sadly missing from most local meetings lately). In the late 1990s former CSD Board member (and retired bank officer) Lynn Roman called then-CSD board member Emil Rossi “an asshole” during a heated discussion about ending the District’s recently passed Benefit Assessment after anti-assessment Rossi had amusingly told the mostly pro-Benefit Assessment audience that the way for the public to participate at a public meeting was to “shut up and listen.” Ms. Roman who was sitting in the row in front of me immediately realized she’d made a faux pas and turned around to me and yelled, “Don’t write that! Say I said ‘Lily-livered wuss’!” I, of course, reported both. It was a public meeting. Everyone seems to have survived that and other bits of “incivility” that inevitably come up now and then in local board meetings. Who cares? Get over it. Move on. Former CSD Board member Sophie Otis (a retired police department psychologist) once proposed some silly “be nice” civility rules for CSD meetings after hearing some jibes among a few of the crusty members of the board, the fire department and the tiny audience. Ms. Otis’s rules were quickly converted to low-grade humor via a fundraising scheme at all subsequent meetings as participants continued to insult each other to varying degrees. Each perceived insult required the alleged perp to make a $1 donation to a piggy bank as a “fine.” Yours truly was, of course, a major donor. As was then-Chief Colin Wilson. Both of us pre-paid $10 each to cover the next few meetings worth of insults. Most of my “fines” arose out of my laughter at things that others present didn’t think were funny. Describing ordinary insults in public meetings as “incivility” is a form of petty censorship that should be avoided. “Uncivil” should be reserved for real rudeness, boorishness, shouting and the like, not ordinary criticisms or insults or disagreements. — ms

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SUPERVISOR MULHEREN (facebook):

“Today the Board of Directors took steps forward to creating what will become the Future Great Redwood Trail Agency with approval of the Organizational Structure.

These positions won’t be hired immediately but I appreciate the level of transparency and vision planning given by our Director Elaine Hogan and look forward to future developments.”

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‘LAZARUS’ (Willits) “Appeals Court Bans Police Mug Shots” – Jim Shields I hope Mr. Shields is correct about the Supreme Court reversing this terrible mug-shot decision. The friends I have left, to a person, are pissed, appalled, or bewildered by what the 9th Circuit has pulled off. It comes in handy to know who the really bad people are in the communities. Granted most are likely young and dumb, wrong place, wrong time, bad luck, whatever… However, when a really bad man or woman comes along, the public should know what to look out for. Be careful out there… It’s getting really weird. Ask around…

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BACK IN 2004 we followed an otherwise minor DUI case involving Ukiah’s current police Chief, then-Ukiah patrol officer, Cedric Crook.

Officer Crook had followed a couple guys in a dark sedan around the sidestreets of Ukiah because they were driving suspiciously slowly at 1am on a Thursday morning. Crook followed them as they made several turns. Officer Crook was sure that the two in the car were aware that he was following them. After several turns the dark sedan turned down a street into a cul de sac. According to the pair, they got into the cul de sac and, instead of driving around the circle of the cul de sac, they did a “three-point turn,” turning left into the curb, backing up, stopping, and turning left again facing Officer Crook’s cruiser. Officer Crook said the pair hadn’t even made it into the cul de sac circle, but simply executed an “unsafe u-turn” in the middle of the road. Either way, the pair in the sedan was now heading out of the cul de sac. The sedan boys said that as they were driving back past Officer Crook, the officer stuck out his hand in a manner like he was signaling left, but with his palm toward the pair, which they took as a request to stop. Officer Crook, who is known to be a by-the-book cop and a by-the-book Police Chief, said he would never stick out his hand to stop a car because that’s unsafe and not according to procedure. Crook said the pair simply stopped and the driver said, “We’re not trying to avoid you, officer.” Officer Crook then asked if he could search the car and they consented. He then asked if they’d take a field sobriety check, which they consented to also. Crook thought they were drunk and took them to the hospital where they tested more than 1.0 blood-alcohol. The driver was arrested and charged with DUI. At trial the case came down to whether Officer Crook had put out his hand. Legally, if he did, that sort of qualifies as “a detention.” So, if it’s a detention, there has to be probable cause. Was there probable cause? There was the unsafe u-turn Officer Crook said the pair made, but which they say they didn’t make. The late Judge Ron Brown took the trouble to actually visit the cul de sac before ruling that he couldn’t determine which version of events was correct and dismissed the case, essentially saying that the word of the by-the-book police officer carried no more weight than the word of the drunk defendant, who, along with his drunk passenger, told what sounded like a rehearsed story about Officer Crook’s “detention” hand. Officer Crook was pretty irritated that Judge Brown didn’t take his word over the two drunks. We expect that now-Chief Crook still remembers this annoying incident, even though Judge Brown passed away more than a decade ago.

— ms

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OUTTA ‘THIS’ WORLD

Editor:

Thank you everyone for your beautiful birthday wishes; they were all wonderful, and my heart received each one! So I’m 62, which is really amazing, considering I barely made it out of my 50s. I was 55 on June 2018 when I had my stroke. But am now reborn, post stroke, and have had to learn how to walk, talk, eat, and take care of my bodily needs all over again. It has been an illuminating experience, since this is so late in life!

And as you may know I’ve had a couple of potentially fatal events since. I had a blood clot through an entire vein in my left leg which got me airlifted to Chico. I then got pneumonia in the hospital, and had a couple of seizures upon my return. Rather than being scared, I mostly have the amusing thought, “Maybe I can’t be killed.” During my near death experience I travelled through the realms of light and love, but also the dark underworld of evil. So maybe it’s true; maybe I can’t be killed! Just kidding, I’m sure I will give up the ghost someday, but until then I’m REALLY excited to keep having more earthly experiences. This is a wonderful dimension, and I enjoy it very much, and I’m discovering that I enjoy persisting!

I’m very excited about my projects and participation in our community, I’ve started a youtube children's channel called “Mr. Skyhawk’s Nest.” It doesn’t have as much content as I would like yet, but we are working on it. I’ve given a few talks about my stroke and NDE experience, where through poetry and anecdote, I open up that drawer. Two of them are posted on youtube. Covid knocked that back, but I’m considering doing some again soon to community spiritual groups and I’m once again programming for KZYX with Universal Perspectives.

Considering the dire times we are facing I’ve been doing a series called “Exploring Late Stage Capitalism; What’s Next?” I explore paradigms where we might co evolve with the earth, as it seems quite apparent that our current political and social structures are unequipped to handle what looms in front of us!

On the local political front, I’ve made no secret of my abject contempt for my former opponent for the 5th District Supervisor Seat, Ted Williams, who I believe is really harming our County. Before I entered the race, I was formerly allied with him in our local fire protection district. He has a very calculating hidden side, which I SERIOUSLY underestimated! Now that he has the job, he seems quite apathetic about the affairs of the county under his supposed “supervision.” There is a very dark, intelligent and cunning sub-personality inside this man. He can read a room, know exactly the images people want to see, show them those pictures with the deepest of sincerity, and then securely return to his apathy! He knows most of his supporters don't bother themselves with the granular details of good governance. I don't think any objective observer would call our County a properly functioning entity, and yet Ted carries on.

A while back in an letter to the Editor I said “beware this man.” While that was admittedly cryptic, this is what I meant. And I’ve since been ostracized and cancelled by his enabling, willingly gaslit apologists who can’t be troubled with the granular details of good governance.

The good news is that I don't miss them. Even though he has a couple of years left on his term, it’s not too early for voters to start considering a plausible electoral alternative, should he decide he wants to continue enjoying the status and salary of his seat.

On the personal front, my 16 year-old twin daughters are doing great, very well in school. They are loved in our community, and are aerial arts rock stars in Circus Mecca. The post stroke collapse of my marriage is another story, but as I said:I enjoy persisting!

On the physical front. my left hand has been in permanent contracture for the last six years, and I have no voluntary control of it. My walking is really a sort of hobbling shuffle, and while I would certainly love to play my guitar again or take a decent day hike with my sweetheart, I’m also enjoying my newfound abilities, The internal landscape is an incredible wilderness to explore!

My life has acquired a very spiritual dimension to it, I was always inclined in that direction, but what I experienced during the stroke and my return to “this” world has taught me a LOT! Maybe it’s because I have so much brain damage, but I’ve learned our hearts actually think! (And they travel through space and time.) There is a thin membrane between the physical and non-physical realms, and I have lots of time to reflect and meditate and dream on these subjects. A while back I was gifted an electric wheelchair that gets me, literally, all over town. I can also cruise the coast trail. It wasn’t a life goal to become a local colorful character, but…

I have various prayer spots for specific intentions I have time to sit, and just watch, I learn a lot in the quiet, and sometimes random strangers come along, and they tell me the most extraordinary things about themselves!

I’m getting increasingly adept at being conscious as I travel inside and across those dimensions, to the point that magical/mystical experiences are quite common for me. My belief is that I’m learning the true meaning and poignancy of what it is to be human! I know people will likely think I’m just a brain damaged nutter; there is certainly ample evidence for that position. But I don't really care, I’m not trying to prove anything!

I love and appreciate support in all its many forms, and I’m comfortable living a Spartan lifestyle. But I do have a Patreon page if anyone wishes to lend their financial support. It’s configured to allow $5, $9 and $20 per month, but I have been told by some Patrons they have been able to customize the amount. Again, obviously I’ve had a pretty rough go, but the level of support, care and love that I’ve received has been nothing short of astounding!

https://www.patreon.com/chrisskyhawk?fan_landing=true

OK thanks again and much love to you all.

Chris Skyhawk

Fort Bragg

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GIANTS LEGEND BUSTER POSEY BUYS FAMED NORTHERN CALIFORNIA HUNTING RANCH

by Matt LaFever

Buster Posey, the San Francisco Giants’ former catcher-turned-partial owner, is a man comfortable in the wilderness. He told the Wall Street Journal that he spent his childhood in Georgia hunting and fishing, and in 2016, he purchased a ranch in Northern California, saying he wanted his children to experience and appreciate the outdoors.

After selling that ranch two years ago, Posey has once again made a big purchase in NorCal. This summer, Posey paid $10.4 million after taxes for the 4,129-acre Six Point Ranch, according to documents obtained by SFGate. The famous property spans Mendocino and Lake counties and is highly regarded as a hunting destination for tule elk, black-tail deer and wild pigs. It contains lands ranging from oak woodland to cedar-capped mountains rising thousands of feet high.

This private real estate sale has not been previously reported; SFGate obtained a grant deed from the County of Mendocino showing that Bullock Family Farm LLC transferred ownership of the property to Lala Ranch LLC. The manager of Lala Ranch LLC is Gerald Posey III, better known as Buster Posey, the beloved former Giants catcher.

SFGate reached out to the Giants and Joe Bullock, the previous owner of Six Point Ranch, for more specifics about the sale. Neither responded by publication time.

If Posey wanted the outdoors, he’s got it. According to an earlier listing of the property, Six Point Ranch includes a four-bedroom, four-bath ranch home with a rustic screened porch and a three-bedroom, two-bath hunter’s lodge. Black bears, turkeys, quail, grouse, waterfowl, bobcats, coyotes and cougars roam the ranch, the listing boasted, with largemouth bass and bluegill fish living in the lakes on the property.

Six Point Ranch partners with the California Department of Fish and Wildlife under the Private Lands Management Program. CDFW manages the land in part to ensure an ideal habitat for herds of tule elk, a subspecies of elk found only in California. The animal was nearly hunted to extinction in the 1870s, prompting the state to step in; now, hunters at Six Point Ranch can only target a specified number of tule elk per year as authorized by wildlife officials.

Posey's nature boy roots were on full display back in 2014 when he spoke with California Sportsman. That year, after winning his third World Series with the Giants, Posey went on a fishing excursion off the Gulf of Mexico with his father. “Fishing with Buster was like fishing with your best friend you’ve known for years,” Jordan Todd, the Poseys’ fishing guide, told the magazine.

There is a “challenge” and an “art” to being outside, the star catcher told California Sportsman. “You can’t appreciate it unless you go out and do it.”

Posey’s purchase of Six Point Ranch signifies his fully realized return to the Golden State after a brief move back home to Georgia.

After his 2021 retirement from the Major League, Posey offloaded his East Bay home for $9.3 million and his first California hunting getaway for $3.9 million. Posey had bought the 106-acre Springer Lodge in Butte County, a vast ranch flowing with lakes and creeks ripe for duck hunting and fishing, back in 2016 for $1.6 million.

Less than two years later, he announced he would be moving back to California. Leaving had taught him and his family that the Bay Area “truly felt like home,” he told the New York Times at the time.

Back in the Bay Area, Posey has leveled up his family home, buying an $8.3 million six-bedroom, 6.5-bathroom home in the East Bay in March of this year.

Kevin Smallcomb, the Development Director of California Deer Association’s Ukiah Chapter, told SFGate that Six Point Ranch is a well-maintained property that has always exemplified a conservation-based approach to hunting. He also mentioned that the property has hosted a program called the Kids Outdoors Sports Camp, which invites youth to the wilderness to learn about hunting, fishing and conservation, for over 25 years.

With the property’s change of ownership, the status of KOSC is unclear. “I’m hoping Buster continues that tradition,” Smallcomb said. Still, he said, everyone he has spoken with about the sale so far is excited about the legendary catcher being their new neighbor. “Everyone up here is a Giants fan,” he said.

Posey’s purchase of Six Point Ranch is a major step in his post-baseball life, blending his love for nature with his return to California. It seems like he’s stepping up his involvement with his former team, too: Posey helped negotiate a deal with star infielder Matt Chapman, though the extent of his involvement has been disputed. If the Giants miss the postseason, though, which seems likely at the moment, then at least Posey will have a sprawling ranch to come home to.

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ANOTHER ANDERSON VALLEY ITEM FROM EBAY (via Marshall Newman)

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ED NOTES

RALPH NADER got 0.4% of the vote in the 2004 election (almost 3% in 2000). As an unrepentant 0.4 percenter, I enjoyed the documentary film about Nader called ‘An Unreasonable Man’ the title deriving from, I think, Emerson's observation that if it weren't for unreasonable men and women nine-year-olds would still be putting in twelve hour days in coal mines.

THE DEMOCRATS said Nader destroyed the republic in '00 and 04 by running for president because he took enough of the Democrat vote to twice elect Bush. But as Nader points out in the film, both parties are funded and owned by the same destructive forces, a fact of American political life verified every election by half the people who don't bother to vote, but a fact that Nader thought he could use to alert people that half-bad is still bad for most of us.

WOULD Gore have gotten us out of Iraq? No. He said he'd send more troops to the slaughter. Would Gore have eviscerated the Constitution and have done all the other bad things Bush has done? No, they would have been half to 75% bad in the tradition of Clinton, eviscerating the Constitution only when no one was looking, and then only to doom low-profile citizens or criminal defendants and prison inmates.

SO NADER put everything on the line because he thought his run for president was the best way to hip people to the dangerous bankruptcy of the two-party stranglehold. And here we are two decades later and the political garrote is as tight around our necks as ever.

OF COURSE the national media ignored Nader's issues-only campaign and he was rewarded with national vilification.

THE UNIQUELY unattractive critics the film hauls out on-screen to damn Nader — Todd Gitlin, Eric Alterman, James Carville, and a couple of laughably pompous former Nader's Raider's — manage only to establish the correctness of Nader's two decisions to run. But if you prefer to believe the fantasy that the Democrats represent an alternative to Republicans, that if Ralph hadn't upset the wine and cheese tables from Mendocino to Manhattan we'd have no war and single payer health insurance, don't see this fine little documentary, and certainly don't stop voting for Kamala and Jared and Mike and Wood. (What's that definition of insanity again?)

THE DAILY BEAST, via Steve Heilig, tells us that Jill Stein is rich, that she's a hypocrite for wanting to crack down on the forces represented in her investment portfolio. Cornel West has made a lot of money over the years but he says it has all gone to three ex-wives and child support. He probably qualifies as a pauper despite a tenured job at Harvard. Ralph Nader is worth about 6 mil, and if ever a guy earned it, it's Ralph. My net worth is an acre in Boonville assessed at about $400,000, a genuine blowpipe complete with poison darts from deep in the Borneo jungle, two small paintings by the renowned Guerneville painter Mary Robertson, and a paid off Honda. (The two manufactured homes on my property have no value, according to the mortgage banks when I tried to get some money out of them.) Clearly, I am the only possible choice for president.

KAMALA HARRIS is worth at least six mil, which seems like magic money given that she's always been employed in modestly compensated public jobs, but then Biden, also a public servant, is a multi-millionaire, a nice hunk of it from selling access to Ukranians and China.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/michelatindera/2020/10/30/how-kamala-harris-and-her-husband-earned-over-7-million-while-she-served-in-the-us-senate

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BETSY CAWN

Does anybody remember the BROWN and PINK zones that popped up in Mendocino County? Where are they now?, we wonder.

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CATCH OF THE DAY, Friday, September 20, 2024

ANTONIO BAYARRI-BARRERA, Ukiah. Under influence.

ALDAR FRAGOSO, 31, Redwood Valley. Damage to power lines, vandalism.

PEDRO GUZMAN-MARTINEZ, Fort Bragg. Fighting in public, cruelty-to child-infliction of injury, probation revocation.

JARED KIDD, 33, Ukiah. Probation revocation.

JASON LUNA, 37, Covelo. Probation revocation.

ERIK MAGANA-MACEDO, 35, Ukiah. More than six marijuana plants, dumping hazardous material onto public roadway without permission, conspiracy.

LUIS MENDOZA, 28, Daly City/Ukiah. Probation revocation.

MELISSA NIDROS, 53, Ukiah. Domestic battery, DUI.

OCTAVIO RIVERA, 55, Potter Valley. More than six marijuana plants, dumping hazardous material onto public roadway without permission, conspiracy.

MATREYUS TISCARENO-MEYER, 18, Fort Bragg. Burglary.

MONIQUE VALADOR, 34, Ukiah. Controlled substance for sale.

LUCERO VASQUEZ-RODRIGUEZ, 40 DUI-alcohol&drugs.

EMMETT WILLIAMS, 25, Fort Bragg. Fighting in public, cruelty to child-infliction of injury, loaded firearm in public, criminal street gang member with loaded firearm not registered owner, large capacity magazine, firearm concealed in vehicle, ammo possession by prohibited person, felon-addict with firearm, resisting.

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DENOUEMENT

by Paul Modic

When I was a taxi driver in New York I roomed for awhile with a fellow cabbie named Heather Schreiber in an apartment on the corner of First Avenue and First Street. The old Italian guys played bocce ball out front and the little Puerto Rican man sold the best egg cream in town for a dollar in his bodega downstairs.

Heather fed her cat rice and vegetables and would chant, “Little black cat with little black paws and little black balls.” She was forty-five with a cute little seven year old with shoulder length blond hair under his baseball cap. She sent him walking across town everyday to PS 41, the cool school in Greenwich Village. She called him Huggy.

I first heard the word when Heather wrote me a year or so later. “I've reached the denouement in New York,” she said. “Can I come out and live in Whale Gulch?” (“No,” I said.)

About thirty years later I saw the name Leiv Schreiber in the entertainment news, he had just won a Tony award for best actor on Broadway. “Could it be?” I thought? I googled his name and Huggy and sure enough it came up that he never liked his mother calling him Huggy.

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ON LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY

The SF mayor must have taken leave of her senses to even consider making it free. Muni is already overloaded with stinky crazies, loud-mouth-behaved louts and other zoological forms of low life. The day it becomes entirely free, it will become a dumpster on wheels, and I, along with the rest of those who currently attempt to use the system, will give up on it entirely.

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JILL STEIN’S IDEOLOGY Says One Thing—Her Investment Portfolio Says Another

The holier-than-thou Green Party candidate rails against Big Carbon, big banks, Big Pharma—while she holds substantial investments in them.

by Yashar Ali (2016)

Green Party presidential nominee Jill Stein has largely based her campaign on her uncompromising positions on the environment, opposition to big banks and Wall Street, defense contractors, and the pharmaceutical industry. But an analysis of her financial disclosures, which she was required to file as a presidential candidate, show she is heavily invested in the very industries that she maligns the most and as a result of her investments, she has built significant wealth.

According to the financial-disclosure form she filed with the U.S. Office of Government Ethics on March 30, 2016, Stein and her husband, Richard Rohrer, have investments (with the exception of real estate) valued at anywhere from $3,832,050 to $8,505,000. (Stein told The Daily Beast she inherited “over a half-million dollars” from her parents.) We don’t know their exact net worth because filers are only required to provide a range of the value of their investments as opposed to exact values.

Stein has also voluntarily released the first two pages of her 2015 federal tax return. That return, filed jointly with her husband, shows a total income of $349,088 in 2015 and an effective tax rate of 21 percent. In a video interview, Stein told a reporter for Forbes in 2012 that she does not rely on accountants or lawyers to prepare her tax returns. In the interview, she said she uses the popular do-it-yourself software Turbo Tax. An examination by The Daily Beast of her 2015 tax return confirms that no outside party was involved in preparing her returns.

Stein, a Harvard-educated physician, has run for office seven times, including two unsuccessful races for Massachusetts governor and a run for the White House in 2012. In the 2012 presidential race, Stein received 469,501 votes.

She has made purity a central pillar of her presidential candidacy, and she has held that the Green Party reigns above all others with respect to moral and ethical supremacy. In an interview with CNN last April, she said, “I have long since thrown in the towel on the Democratic and Republican parties because they are really a front group for the 1 percent, for predatory banks, fossil-fuel giants, and war profiteers.”

Most of Stein’s investments are in mutual funds or index funds. Experts suggest these funds, which are usually highly diversified, provide more consistent returns than picking individual stocks.

It’s important to note that politicians from all parties have been held accountable for their mutual- and index-fund investments. Elected officials and candidates like Barack Obama, Ted Cruz, and many members of Congress have had their fund investments called into question and have been pushed to divest for various reasons.

To learn more about the funds Stein has invested in, The Daily Beast did not have to engage in significant research by any definition. A simple Google search of the name of each of the funds she has invested in returned publicly available marketing documents produced by the investment managers that showed where these funds were investing their capital.

Mutual funds often share the top 10 or top 25 largest holdings in their portfolio and we relied only on this data to determine the composition of these funds.

…

In 2006, Ms. Stein retired from teaching and medicine to focus full-time on her political activism. There’s little doubt that her decision to retire was made easier by the substantial returns her investments were producing, even if they went against her life’s work.

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DONALD TRUMP 'THEY'RE EATING THE DOGS' SONG TAKES OFF ONLINE

by Liz O'Connell

A South African musician who found inspiration behind a now-viral quote from former President Donald Trump during last week's presidential debate gained traction online after turning it into a catchy remix, with proceeds going to the SPCA.

David Scott, also known as Kiffness, told Newsweek via email that he watched highlights of the debate between Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris last week. He said there is "vested interest" in American politics because it has a ripple effect in his home country. Plus he has family members in the United States and a large portion of his fan base lives there.

But one moment from the debate stuck out to him and his fans: Trump's false claim that Haitian migrants are stealing and eating pets in Springfield, Ohio.

Trump said: "In Springfield, they're eating the dogs—the people that came in. They're eating the cats."

Kiffness fans started forwarding Scott the clip and asked him to remix it. He took the quote and immediately got to work.

"My initial desire to remix the quote was because I thought it was amusing and outlandish, but I also recognized the melodic element to the statement," he said. "I decided to give it a shot and I had the basic idea for the song in a matter of minutes."

By Friday afternoon, the parody "Eating the Cats" was uploaded to his YouTube account, The Kiffness, and the views rolled in. The remix racked in nearly 5 million views within five days and currently sits at No. 4 on the trending music channel.

The song begins with Trump's quote from the debate with Scott adding a reggaeton flare.

"People of Springfield, please don't eat my cat," the lyrics begin. "Why would you do that? Eat something else."

Scott jokingly offers different food options for Springfield residents to eat, including bread, eggs and carrots. And to round out the song, he included dog howls and meows.

Scott will donate proceeds from the song to the Clark County SPCA in Springfield. As of Tuesday night, the song brought in $16,000 from YouTube alone. A more accurate number of the total raised will be updated once the streaming platform numbers roll in, he said.

"We've been in touch with Krissi Hawke, the Clark County SPCA president," Scott said. "They're very happy about the funding that the song will provide, as they rely heavily on donations to keep their operation going....Krissi said she was crying before she saw my video and then when she saw it, she had a good laugh."

"As a South African, I am non-partisan," he said. "Whatever your political affiliation may be, music and animals unite us and that is what I'm trying to do with this song. My prayer for the U.S. is that the elections are free and fair. May God bless America."

Following the debate, Trump's quote quickly circulated online as people began using the sound bite to poke fun at the debunked claim.

Some TikTok users created videos of their pets "reacting" to the quote, while others pretended to put their animals on the grill or in ovens and pots as if they were about to prepare a meal.

(newsweek.com)

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MAD TO THE MAX

by James Kunstler

If anything like civil war ignites in this country, the sides will not be the political Red and the Blue but the sane and the insane. Now it happens, unfortunately, that the insane are driving the engine of government. They have been at war with the people of this land for years, depriving them of livelihoods, stuffing them into prison, breaking the social contract, wrecking the country’s relations with the rest of the world, and belaboring the peoples’ minds with one insulting absurdity after another.

They comprise a bizarre coalition of the permanent bureaucracy, the Democratic Party, and the news media. The permanent bureaucracy includes its own machine for making war on citizens: the intel blob, whose tentacles reach into other agencies: Homeland Security, the State Department, the so-called Justice Department, the Pentagon, the myriad Public Health offices, and the shadowy clique that stands-in for a disabled president in the White House.

You can tell they are insane because they are driven by a single motivation: to remain in power for no other purpose than to escape responsibility for their many crimes against the people. This is insane behavior because it depends on the proposition that reality does not matter, that reality is optional, that there is no such thing as truth, and if it happened to exist, to be a thing, it would have no greater value to the human project than its opposite, untruth.

The greatest absurdity of the moment, is the idea that Americans might desire to continue under the rule of this evil coalition devoted to unreality and untruth, that is, to vote for candidates of the Democratic Party. Its greatest crimes, of course, are the lawless measures taken to pervert the very elections that might allow them to retain power in office.

Some of it is well-hidden and abstruse, such as the machinations of election lawfare manager-in-chief, Marc Elias, who for many years has used the courts and the state legislatures to fiddle election rules that make it impossible to account for who is actually casting the votes. This, you understand, is insane. What sovereign people would seek to institutionalize election fraud?

Some election crime is just in your face. The open border policy may have many nefarious angles, but an obvious one is stuffing the voter rolls with live bodies that have names attached, which can be bundled and harvested in ballot form like so many sheaves of oats. No one is fooled by this. Yet the Democratic Party has its heavy hand on the lever of power that controls entry to the country. Alejandro Mayorkas, the Secretary of Homeland Security allows this to happen and bullshits Congress in open committee hearings. Congress has impeached him for this affront and the Democratic majority Senate has declined to hold the attendant trial — because stuffing the voter rolls with illegal immigrants allows them to remain in power.

The remedies for this dastardly mess are pretty simple and straightforward: return to paper ballots cast on one election day, requiring voter ID that amounts to proof of citizenship. Everything else — computerized (hackable) ballot-counting machines, mail-in ballots, early voting, automatic voter registration by means of other government transactions that have nothing to do with elections (motor-voter acts) — only insures election fraud. Sane people do not seek to defraud themselves.

It is widely suspected by the not-insane that even the attempt at massive voter fraud may not avail to put over the paramount candidate of the insane: Veep Kamala Harris. Nobody believes that she is capable of being president. But the insane don’t seek a capable president — in fact, the opposite. They want a president who can only function with direction and management of the blob, by the blob, and for the blob. The blob’s motives, besides seeking to avoid responsibility for its prior crimes, are a license to commit new crimes, especially crimes that expand the many perquisites and privileges of being in power. These include the fortunes to be made in control of the nation’s wealth, and the sadistic pleasure derived from punishing and humiliating their not-insane opponents. For instance, running the insane Ukraine war, with its fabulous kickbacks for the military contractors and office-holders. . . and making you witness more drag queen story hours.

Due to the possibility that sane citizens, despite calculated election fraud, might elect Mr. Trump, who opposes all that psychotic, criminal nonsense, the coalition of the permanent bureaucracy, the Democratic Party, and the news media appears to have few options left besides murdering Mr. Trump. The first two would-be assassins show a train of association with the intel blob. Thomas Crooks (or, at least one of his many cell phones) traveled repeatedly to a downtown DC building adjacent to the FBI HQ; Ryan Wesley Routh has alleged links to the Arlington, Va., Maximus Company, a CIA cut-out — perhaps explaining how the otherwise indigent Routh funded his global travels. Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla) disclosed yesterday that the DHS knows of five assassination teams targeting President Trump, three connected with foreign governments, two domestic.

The most mystifying element in the coalition of the insane is the news media — that is, the cable news networks plus The New York Times/WashPost axis —who have tirelessly broadcast the mantras that Mr. Trump seeks to quash our democracy and that he is a new Hitler who must be stopped at all costs. The inflammatory barrage has had an obvious effect. But the mystery is: what’s in it for these news companies to go along with their insane and desperate partners: the blob and the Dems?

What’s in it for Joe Khan, Executive Editor of The Times? His paper lies and spins unreality incessantly. He surely makes a comfortable salary, but he can’t be getting rich. . . that is, really rich. . . millions. Apparently, he publishes unreal stories because he’s insane. He believes things that are not true. Nor are his reporters getting really rich. They just appear to be blinded by sheer hatred — rising to insanity — and perhaps also by the lurking fear that their many published lies, dating back to RussiaGate, will eventually disgrace them professionally if allowed to be pursued and revealed by the sane.

The temperature is rising in this political crucible. Something is going to melt down. It’s looking pretty clear now who can take the heat, and who can’t.

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TRUMP AND HARRIS both deserve hate, but they don’t deserve any special amount of hate more than all the other managers of the US-centralized empire. If it wasn’t them running it would be two equally evil monsters of the same politics. Don’t personalize the evils of the empire.

The most remarkable thing about Trump and Harris is how unremarkable they are. The thing that matters most about them is how little they matter. They’re just mindless empire goons who can be swapped out and replaced with an ideological clone at the drop of a hat; we just watched this happen in real time with Joe Biden.

If you find yourself harboring any kind of special, seething personal hatred toward Trump or Harris as individuals, you’re falling into the delusion that the evils you are seeing the empire inflict upon the world are caused by wicked individuals. This leads to the delusion that it’s the individuals who are the problem rather than the empire itself and the systems which prop it up, which then leads to the delusion that all you need to do to fix the problems is change out the individuals.

It doesn’t work that way. The candidates aren’t the problem. The presidents aren’t the problem. The empire itself is the problem. The giant globe-spanning power structure centralized around Washington comprised of allies, assets and agreements which fights every day for complete planetary domination, and the oligarchs and government agencies who run it. That’s the problem.

Don’t suffer the indignity of letting them trick you into spending your political energy barking and snarling at the two puppets in the puppet show while the real people in charge construct a cage around the entire world. The only reason to talk about this election is to highlight the fact that it doesn’t matter and that its candidates are fake. Start talking about them like they matter and you reify the illusion.

— Caitlin Johnstone

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SATURDAY'S LEAD STORIES, NYT

With Death Toll Rising, Tensions Run High After Israeli Strike in Beirut

Attacks on Hezbollah Alter Balance of Power in Long-Running Fight

A top Hezbollah leader, who was killed Friday, was accused of planning the 1983 Beirut bombings

As President, Donald Trump Demanded Investigations of Foes. He Often Got Them

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MY GREATEST HEROES were musicians. My father's record collection was full of the Carter Family and Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs and Hank Williams, who led me in turn to Neil Young, Stephen Stills, Eric Clapton, B.B. King and Howlin’ Wolf, who led me to the Who, Led Zeppelin, and the Beatles.

Miles beyond them all, however, was the genius of Jimi Hendrix, whose LPs I checked out from our local library down the hill, and whose guitar-playing truly blew my mind. Hendrix was a black Hippie from northern Washington State, supposedly also descended from a Cherokee princess. He served as a paratrooper in the Vietnam War, after which he made his way to Nashville and then to Greenwich Village, where he was discovered by former Animals bassist Chas Chandler at the Café Wha? where I stopped more than once for the sole purpose of seeing whether I could still feel Jimi's presence.

No one I knew growing up in 1970s America gave a flying fuck about politicians, though. Politicians had lied to us. Somewhere, there was probably a kid in our district who carried a polished leather briefcase with a brass clasp on it and kept a framed picture of our local Congressman, Joseph G. Minish, in his locker at school. I never saw it though. Joe Minish was real enough, however. He was a lumpy man in a bad suit who never finished high school and was treated by the local union bosses, who were friend's of Tony V's relatives in the construction business, as a barely elevated sort of flunky. Nor do I remember any peer of mine vouchsafing the dream of growing up one day to be Richard Nixon, or Spiro Agnew, or Gerald Ford, or Jimmy Carter. Adults never talked about politicians except maybe John F. Kennedy, whose assassination was reliably cited as the moment when the dream died, and everything went to shit.

That said, there was only one political party: The Democrats. Republicans were a foreign species that talked like Thurston Howell III on Gilligan's Island. However, I can't recall anyone hating Republicans, any more than I recall anyone hating the Montreal Canadians hockey team, who regularly defeated the Rangers. Getting too worked up about politics, or hockey, or anything else, music aside, might well be a sign of more deeply rooted issues that you might need to see a shrink for.

A pose of studied apathy ruled our political lives, our romantic lives, and nearly every other part of our lives, which was something that even my father, who was a living link to the exciting and romantic-seeming politics of 20th-century Europe, approved of — the alternative being the kind of popular excitement that brought Hitler and Stalin to power. It was better to simply live your life and drive a Camaro, as opposed to embarking on fantastical crusades of the kind that condemned over 50,000 Americans to die meaningless deaths in Vietnam, and led the hippies to join cults. Being smart meant staying cool. I was cool. My friends were cool. Being cool was the American Way.

Until it wasn't.

— David Samuels, ‘County Highway’

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