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A PERSISTENT WARMING TREND will steadily increase heat risks and fire wx danger as low RH and high temperatures build towards the early week. High winds will also be a factor in the next few days as high pressure sets in. (NWS)
STEPHEN DUNLAP (Fort Bragg): Yesterday was anything but the "sunny" forecast I offered, let's try this again. A foggy 48F this Sunday morning on the coast. With the fog having moved well down the coast we might see the sun today, & the rest of the week they say.
ANDERSON VALLEY VILLAGE List of Events
AV UNIFIED NEWS
Fall is in the air and we are in the swing at school! We are looking forward to seeing you at our Back to School events, which will be Tuesday, October 1st! We have planned for a daytime event and a nighttime event at both campuses, to try to meet the needs of parents’ schedules. It will be a lot of fun, with cookies and other refreshments served at AVES and hot dogs being grilled by Mr. McNerney and members of the board at AV Jr/Sr High. Please come to say hello to your children’s teachers and to hear about what your child will be learning throughout the year, as well as ways you can be involved in supporting their success at school!
Back to School Nights October 1st!
AV Elementary will be 2:00-03:00 and 5:30-6:30
AV Jr/Sr High will be 2:00-3:00 and 6:00-7:00
Exciting Construction Updates:
Our students will be able to access their beautiful new classroom soon. Huge thanks to our community for your support of Measure M. That is what has made most of this current work possible!
High School students will be moving into their updated classrooms by the beginning of November. The corridors will continue to be under construction through the end of Thanksgiving break. After that, the flooring and new lockers should be in place. It will be a beautiful space for our students
High School Science rooms are scheduled to be complete by the end of Winter Break. These rooms are going to be amazing, with newly plumbed hot and cold water, large learning patios, large, sliding glass doors to the outside. The space will be truly state of the art and absolutely gorgeous!
Our Jr/Sr High roof has been updated and repaired, and we are looking forward to sleek, new lights going in on the front of the school soon.
We will be planning the ribbon cutting for sometime in January. Stay tuned for more information on that!
AV Elementary
Saturday Camps and Winter Intersession are coming! The first Saturday Camp will be October 26 and the flier is attached to this communication. A good time will be had by all. Thanks to Mrs. Triplett for organizing it and to all staff who will be there for making it fun.
Over the next several weeks, we will be working together with our amazing staff and awesome counselor, Heather Fine, to strengthen our campus-wide systems to support social emotional learning. An area of emphasis, to start, will be the importance of choosing kind words when speaking to one another.
As you know, Miss Alyson McKay’s last day will be October 1. We want to thank her for her hard work and service to our students. While we move toward hiring a new principal, please feel free to contact Superintendent Kristin Larson Balliet at klarson@avpanthers.org and Substitute Principal Jim Frost at jfrost@avpanthers.org with any questions or concerns. We are here to support students, staff, and parents!
Jr/Sr High
The Leadership Team had some awesome spirit assemblies last week. Mr. McNerney even wore a tutu to show his spirit. Thank you to the Leadership Team and Mr. Bautista for planning a great event!
Homecoming is coming! Mr. McNerney and Mr. Toohey are working out the details around dates and activities. An update will be coming soon!
Athletic Director Mr. Toohey just announced that we have been officially added to the NCL Boys Volleyball league! Games will be Mondays and Thursdays and will start at 6:pm so students will not miss instructional time. Practices will start in early February.
Tennis and Track schedules will be coming soon. Thank you, Mr. Toohey, for organizing awesome sports opportunities for our students!
We are heading in the right direction as we move into October! Lots of wonderful things are happening.
With respect,
Kristin Larson Balliet, Superintendent
Anderson Valley Unified School District
DON’T NEED NO STEENKING PERMITS
Editor,
Chris Hart writes in letter to Marianne McGee as published in AVA, 9/25:
“As For the Willits issue, there is a lot more do that story, but I’ll say this. He (the owner) contested it and he won. That is how the system works.”
I am wondering if the SKUNK TRAIN reimbursed the owner of the Willits property for his legal expenses when Hart says the property owner won the suit, that's how the law works. So the law works that the train was able to try to take the land and the owner had to go thru the legal system spending thousands upon thousands of dollars to win.
It is pretty clear why the city is working to avoid a similar situation when the Skunk Train has made it clear that they don’t have to get permits and don’t have to follow city regulations because they are a Railroad which exempts them from city regulations.
Elizabeth Swenson
Fort Bragg
UKIAH SHELTER PET OF THE WEEK
Goose is a handsome dog with a fun personality. He has great leash manners, knows sit, plays with toys and is mellow indoors. Goose can get a little too excited when it comes to food and will need to learn his table manners. Slow feeder bowls are a great training tool for fast eaters. Goose has a bit of a prey drive when it comes to birds and can be a bit hesitant with some strangers. We’re recommending basic obedience training along with lots of TLC and socialization for this young guy. Goose is a Retriever/Lab, 10-ish months old and 65-ish pounds.
To see all of our canine and feline guests, and for information about our services, programs, and events, visit: mendoanimalshelter.com. Join us every first Saturday of the month for our Meet The Dogs Adoption Event at the shelter. We're on Facebook at: https://www.facebook.com/mendoanimalshelter. For information about adoptions please call 707-467-6453.
JADE TIPPETT
Fort Bragg City Council recommendations:
Ideally, our City Council should represent a wide range of viewpoints, so that everyone in Fort Bragg can feel like their needs are being heard and they are part of our community. With a five-person council, that's a tall order. Two seats are up for this election.
Lindy Peters, who sometimes takes positions I disagree with, has been on the Council for over 20 years. He carries the institutional memory, which will be important for the future. His answers to questions at the Candidates Forum were clear, concise and fact-filled. He also has taken a strong position of holding Mendocino Railway and its owners, the Harts, accountable, opposing their claim they are above state and local laws because they own a (tourist excursion) railroad.
Bethany Brewer is a newcomer to politics, as are the other three candidates, but not to the workings of the City. Bethany brings the perspective of someone who has had to work herself up from homelessness. As the invasion of wealth driven by climate change forces more long-time residents out of their homes, her perspective will be important over the next four years.
Mel Salizar is also a newcomer. Much as I would really like to have her Hispanic voice on the council, representing the 40+% of Fort Bragg residents of Hispanic origin, it was clear to me from the candidates night that she hasn't done her homework. Mel needs to get involved in City meetings and activities, learn the issues and history, and come back in two years.
That leaves Scott Hockett and Ryan Bushnell. Scott owns, by his count, five businesses and has been very active in the North Harbor and planning for the Blue Economy, all good things, although I wonder if he will have the time needed to devote to Council business. Ryan is a truck driver, heavy equipment operator and union man. He knows the "ground" truth of infrastructure and working for a wage. Again good things. Both spoke about "putting the swords down" and expanding economic opportunities so that young people could stay in Fort Bragg, philosophically important but short on specifics.
What gives me concern for both Scott and Ryan is their participation in the "Alliance for a Better Fort Bragg," funded by most accounts, by the train guys, though they'll not likely admit it. The train guys clearly want Lindy out of their way and have great financial motivation to seat a council who would abandon the legal challenges to their claims of being above state and local accountability. Watching the train guys in action, their lack of credibility, their refusal to participate as equals under the law and their lack of concern for the well-being of the people of Fort Bragg, I seriously don't want anyone who is in their pockets on the Council.
I'll be voting for Lindy Peters and Bethany Brewer for Fort Bragg City Council this November.
DAY TRIPPING - PERFECT FIRST DAY OF FALL ON COAST
by Justine Frederiksen
Most days on the Mendocino Coast are beautiful, but last Sunday, the first day of Fall 2024, was quite possibly the most perfect day I’ve experienced there yet.
First, the day started under a blanket of fog, which to me is the most soothing sight imaginable. Maybe it’s because I grew up in a coastal fog belt, so the gray feels like home. Or maybe it’s because I know most people don’t like the gray, preferring to stay in bed until the sun takes the stage, so the fog feels like the world is laying out a red carpet — or, yes, gray carpet — just for me.
Second, I treated myself to breakfast at Egghead’s in Fort Bragg, where I luckily snagged a table just before the crowds appeared to eat at this very popular place.
And even better than the good coffee and delicious omelette I enjoyed there was the full Sunday newspaper I found waiting in a rack by the front door, a wonderful trip back in time to the days when most people spent weekend mornings eating in front of newsprint instead of a cellphone screen.
Third, I stopped in Mendocino for a coffee and a sweet treat, happily wandering into the Garden Bakery where I not only found the most delicious-looking little chocolate lava cake to bring back for my friend, but even something I could eat: a peanut butter cookie without wheat, as the baker told me she only uses “peanut butter, sugar and eggs!” It was both brilliantly simple, and simply delicious.
Finally, to work off some of the sugar, I headed to Big River to walk along the water. And while at first I was disappointed to see that most of the fog had floated away, all the people and animals I found enjoying the water made me even happier than any amount of fog could.
The first person I saw in the water was an older woman, slowly and steadily swimming in place, working her arms against the current. “You get to do this every morning?” I called out to her, to which she responded, “Try to.”
Watching that woman enjoying her daily ritual gave me a new life goal: I want to be her when I grow up!
Next I stopped at a bench with a beautiful view of the river below. Sitting on it was a couple just a bit older than me watching a loud video on a cell phone (I guess any view gets old when you see it every day, and while I can’t imagine how many days it would take for me to tire of looking at the Big River, I’d love to find out!) and I tried to ignore the noise and instead focus on the kayakers gliding by below us, which got pretty easy when the last person in the group got slowed even more by clumps of vegetation and declared, “I’m dead!”
“How far did you go?” I yelled down to his fellow kayaker who had waved up at his audience from above, but he said he couldn’t tell me because his watch wasn’t keeping track. So a man and woman walking by just then told me it was a five-mile paddle to where the river narrows to gravel and forces you to turn back.
The man noted that the river had “Great colors, no?” to which I replied, “Yes, but it’s too bad the fog burned off!” A bit confused, the woman said, “Oh, you want the fog?”
Back at the beach again, I loved seeing a dog launching herself through the water with hops like my dog does (too shallow to swim, her owner said) to fetch a ball over and over, but by far my favorite animals to watch there were all the horses a group of women brought to exercise on the beach before heading out on the trail along the river.
As the fog rolled back in, I watched one horse prance on the sand, as entranced by the sight as the little girl standing next to me was. She pointed out the horse to her mother while waiting on the sand as her father paddled up to us on a board named “Serene Life.”
“Ever paddled next to a horse before?” I asked him, to which he said, “No, that was definitely a first!”
Postscript: Yes, Sunday did include a crushing loss for the 49ers to the Rams, but I didn’t find that out until I returned to Ukiah, so the day on the coast was still perfect.
(Ukiah Daily Journal)
STONE STORIES AT THE LAYTONVILLE CEMETERY
Sunday October 13, 2024 at 3:30 p.m. The Mendocino County Museum's Stone Stories program returns, featuring an afternoon of dramatized obituary readings by local volunteers at the Laytonville Cemetery. This year additional stories we will be shared by special guest Atta Stevenson, member of the Cahto Tribe. Museum volunteer Carol Cox has dug into researching the legacies of those interred at the Laytonville Cemetery and has uncovered fascinating stories about the lives of its residents. Friends of the Mendocino County Museum are hosting the program and attendance is free and open to all, but parking is limited. Event held at the Cemetery located at 1325 Branscomb Rd., Laytonville.
For additional details call the Museum at 707-234-6365.
REDNECKS, HIPPIES & ME
by Zack Anderson
I don’t like it when sniveling little punks from the suburbs make snide and condescending comments about rednecks. “Oh yeah, those rednecks, those scary hillbilly goat-sodomizers in their overalls and Nascar jackets.” It’s a bunch of crap, and the most boring, ignorant cliché.
Nor do I approve when the same über-trendy, pseudo-yuppie scum complain about hippies, as if green living, farmer’s markets and organic produce aren’t direct descendants of America’s countercultural, back-to-the-land movement. “Oh, aren’t they disgusting in their incense and VW buses and peace signs?” Not from here, they’re not.
You see, I grew up with those rednecks. I grew up with those hippies. And my life has been a fragrant stew of the two meats.
Boonville was different in the 1970s. For starters, there were still a lot of redwoods and communes. Trees meant a robust logging industry, Levi’s jeans bought at Rossi Hardware, and a strong work ethic. Communes meant Birkenstocks, not-so-free love, and mystery lentils. There were rifles in the back windows of pick-up trucks and solstice parties at Pomo Tierra where some of the adults smoked dope and got naked. But many of my classmates’ fathers and brothers were loggers or truck drivers or cut skid trails with their caterpillars. So my upbringing was a little of each.
While my father and uncle were distinctly more San Francisco liberal than their more traditional acquaintances, they did have one thing in common: sports. Both played basketball and softball on Charlie Hiatt’s powerhouse teams, sponsored by Hiatt Logging. Charlie, like Ukiah’s legendary Brad ‘Super Jock’ Shear, was known for putting together juggernaut teams from local all-stars. Their motto seemed to be: “Who gives a shit if you’re a commie when you can hit a softball 300 feet? You’re on the team!”
And when my dad and uncle weren’t playing for Charlie, they were recruited to help Shear win another Elks Club tournament beneath the Friday night lights. Either way, it was a lot of playing and a lot of watching games being played. I spent my formative years crammed into the backseats of crappy cars rocketing around Mendocino County from gym to baseball field.
Some of the stars, my first idols, were local boys: Gene Waggoner, Gary Waggoner, Gayle Waggoner, Ted Waggoner (see a trend developing?), Leroy Perry, Rick Cupples, Jed Steele. There was Steve ‘Turbo’ Blackstone from Ukiah, the brilliant shooting guard Steve Tiedeman who starred at Santa Rosa JC, and even Jim Mastin, the fiery coach at Mendocino High, whose eldest son and Mendo grad played in the NFL. (A few years later, another Mastin prodigy, Dan Doubiago, also got some snaps as a pro lineman for the Kansas City Chiefs.)
As for the Arkansas-bred Waggoners, how many of them were there? I’m still not entirely sure, but here goes: Gayle, Peter, Gene, Gary, Ted, Judy, Mickey, Joe, and Steve. Gayle was a phenomenal athlete. Strong as an ox and with cat-like reflexes. He was a big ringer at the time, occasionally dropping in from somewhere like Sonora to fortify a squad. My fondest memory of Gayle is one night at a fast-pitch softball game in Cloverdale. Also on that team was the right reverend Ron Penrose (who wouldn’t play on Sunday, the lord’s Sabbath), a highly regarded pitcher. Anyway, this game, the opposing bozo at third base came about half-way up the line and taunted Gayle, who was in the batter’s box. A man of few words, Gayle looked surprised at being insulted by this cleated clown. Then the wind-up and the pitch: BLAM! Gayle blasted a screaming line drive off of the third baseman’s chest, and was on second base with a double by the time the ball was retrieved. Time out. The victim was laying in the red dirt, sobbing. He couldn’t get up. An ambulance was called. Gayle’s shrug said it all: “He should have kept his mouth shut.”
Gayle’s younger but not smaller brother Ted was a muscular wild man and genial pugilist who my father employed as a sort of maniac sergeant-at-arms. One of Ted’s favorite things was to take G.P. and me down to the swimming hole at Indian Creek and pretend to drown us. He called the game, “Scream For Help,” and promised us sodas if we lived. Ted also figures into my fear of scary movies, as he took G.P., Bobby Owens and me to see “The Exorcist” in Ukiah when it came out. Or, rather, Ted, Bryan Wyant and Charles Davis drank blackberry brandy while G.P., Bobby and I were thrown all the way in back of an old Ford station wagon. At one point during the show, no longer able to endure Linda Blair’s satanic gaspings, G.P. and I ran out into the lobby, only to find it creepily deserted. Figuring that it was a trap by goblins to lure us away from Ted and to our certain deaths, we ran back into the theater, and spent the rest of the movie plugging our ears and covering our eyes. The ride back to Boonville was a lot of fun. Ted stopped several times to drag G.P. and me, screaming, into the pitch darkness by the side of the road and drive off — leaving us to, yes, satan. Thirty years later, I’m still recovering from the trauma. Now that’s child care.
Another Waggoner-induced traumatic experience was when Ted’s younger brother Steve (a great high school football and baseball player) and his cousin Don Summit (a three-sport Panther star in his own right, who played hoops in college) fired BB guns at G.P. and me as we ran barefoot through Eva and Floyd Johnson’s field. We finally made it to Gene and Sue’s house a little ways up the Ukiah Road, and locked ourselves in the bathroom. Steve, never one to quit, proceeded to fire BBs beneath the crack in the door, hoping a ricochet would sting us as we cowered behind the shower curtain. There was no motivation for this; or, rather, we hadn’t coaxed this from Steve: it was that he and Don saw G.P. and I without our shoes on, they had BB guns, and so naturally they thought it would be a hoot to make us run across a thorny field while we tried to dodge their shots.
Gene Waggoner, of course, is more myth than man. He starred along with Charlie Hiatt and Leroy Perry at Boonville in the late Sixties. Gene went on to play basketball in the S.E.C. at Ole Mississippi — the big time — and there was nothing Gene couldn’t do with a ball. I spent entire summers with Gene playing basketball, traveling to tournaments with him and his brother Gary (another superb athlete), shagging flies, throwing rocks, playing steal-the-flag in the dark, juggling. Maybe it doesn’t seem like a lot to do, but it was all a lot of us had, and I’m thankful for every second.
Gary, of course, was taken from this sorry earth too soon. I miss him. Just like I miss Leroy Perry’s dad, Harold, another fine Southern working man, who spent hundreds of hours with all of us redneck/hippie Valley kids. A stately figure with his ballcap and twinkling eye, Harold umped our games, ran the clock in the gym, coached our teams, moved the chains at football games, and even traveled to away games. Harold was kind, patient, encouraging and always there. His quiet strength was a comforting presence. Harold and Gary, wherever you are, if you were rednecks, then maybe some day I can be one, too.
WATER WOES NEVER END
(via Katy Tahja)
Historian Katy Tahja burrowing deep into the archives of the Kelley House Museum in Mendocino found this jewel of a story from a November 20, 1966 Santa Rosa Press Democrat newspaper. It was titled “Anderson Valley Working to Cure Water Problems: Cooperative Plan Seen As Best Answer.”
Excerpts follow.
Homer Mannix said “Let’s face it, water in sufficient quantities would solve many of our present and future problems in Anderson Valley.” (True words spoken 56 years ago.) Mr Mannix continued to beat the editorial drums for a comprehensive water project for the valley with one or more dams and involvement from county, state and federal agencies. There was talk of forming what was then called a water benefit district. It was felt Anderson Valley could not develop its tourist potential without water supplies. (Viticulture was not foremost in anyone’s minds yet.)
“Where there were once 21 lumber mills there was only Philo Lumber left.
Prospects for growth are small.” Mr. Mannix commented. “Boonville has no central sewer or water system and a county ordinance says an acre of ground is required for the instillation of a well and septic tank.” A representative for the Pacific Fire Rating System told Mr. Mannix if the town had hydrants and water to back them up insurance rates would drop 30% on all buildings within 100’ of a hydrant.
Mr. Mannix in an editorial earlier in the year reported.
“Farm Advisor Bruce Bearden said ‘Visualize this area a little Napa Valley providing high quality wine grapes—several thousand acres could be planted if water is developed.’ David Dresbach, program coordinator for the Division of Soil Conservation in Sacramento said a highly cooperative program could result in adequate agricultural and residential water, control of stream water damage, and creation of facilities for fishing and swimming. A system of dams could provide the water.
“Public Law 566, the Watershed and Flood Protection Act. Could provide funding for studies and evaluation of needs. State agencies wanted more evidence of local support. The local area sent supporting resolutions from Mendocino County Board of Supervisors, the Anderson Valley Chamber of Commerce, American Legion Post 385, Odds Fellows Lodge 411, Anderson Valley Lions Club and Anderson Valley Grange #669.The proposed water service area would have reached from Highway 253 to Hendy Woods State Park. The watershed of Rancheria Creek was one area being considered but where the dams would be built would be determined in a “work plan.”
If locals, county, state and federal folks had been able to come up with a plan then what would the Valley look like today and would downtown Boonville have a sewer system in place? Who knows…?
THE MENDOCINO MODEL, c 1890
by Carol Dominy
On display at the Ford House on Main Street is a meticulously detailed scale model of Mendocino as it appeared in the late 19th century. Created by master craftsman Lennard "Len" Peterson between February 1989 and December 1990, the model spans a four-by-eight-foot base, with a scale of 1:384 (3/64 inches to the foot). It features 358 buildings, including hotels, businesses, homes, and outhouses, alongside 34 water towers. The tallest building, at 3-1/8 inches, is the Presbyterian Church.
Peterson studied Mendocino’s topography and spent hours sculpting the foam core base to replicate the surface contours of the town. The model’s streets are paved with actual Mendocino dirt, and each building is carved from balsa wood blocks with basswood planking scribed to resemble siding. The buildings are secured to the terrain with wooden toothpicks.
Peterson's work incorporates intricate details such as the tramway tracks for the flat cars that carried lumber from the mill on Big River Beach behind the Presbyterian Church and along the headlands to the lumber yard on the Point. Len told the Beacon in a 1990 interview, “I used the basswood planking strips, and cut out every other strip with a razor blade so it would look like railroad ties.” The water towers are glued-together basswood strips.
Other details include livery barns with hay and piles of manure, stacked firewood and logs, and the Kelley House Pond. Len even painted rust on water tanks and pipes. He collaborated with his son Scott, who used computer graphics to design windows, doors, fences, and shop signs.
The model is based on research from maps, photographs, and consultations with local historians, ensuring its authenticity as a representation of Mendocino in 1890. Peterson estimated that he spent well over 2,000 hours on the project.
(kelleyhousemuseum.org)
ED NOTES
CITY MEMORIES: One Saturday afternoon on Clement I ran straight into Gavin Newsom. Walked around a corner and there he was. Newsom was mayor then. He was greeting passersby in connection with a petition drive whose purpose I didn't note. The Mayor looked me manfully in the eye and said, “Hello, nice to see you.” I said, “Hello, good to see you too,” and walked on about my business — the purchase of a pork bun. I'd never seen The Mayor live. If I didn't know who he was, and a pro at looking people in the eye and pretending to know them, I would have been surprised that he pretended to know me, and he may have wondered why I pretended to know him, but I was just being polite, and who am I to break the great circle of pretense? The mayor was very pale, with one of those unhealthy, dead man pallors you see on serious juicers. He didn't look well, but then how could he given the givens of his career path? I beat back an impulse to urge him, “Flee, kid. Run. This is all very bad for you. You'll get cancer walking around faking it all day. You're young. Get out while you can.”
ON THE NEXT corner my then-supervisor, Jake McGoldrick, was stationed, standing with a couple of middle-aged men in short pants. In the San Francisco of yesterday, which I yearn for, grown men only wore shorts if they were exercising, but youth has since become eternal in America, as youth itself is older than ever. Anyway, McGoldrick, up close, also looked like a serious boozer. These days, the McGoldricks are gone, replaced with shiney-faced pols with big white teeth, fairly oozing insincerity. McGoldrick's face was turning purple and he had a big, emergency room gut. He also greeted me, “Great to see you.” I said I was happy to see him, too, not that I was particularly, but he did greet me first, and with a superlative yet! I'm old school when it comes to manners, and easily flattered.
McGOLDRICK was beating back an attempt to recall him by people who couldn't beat him in an election. I said I looked forward to voting for him against the recallers, adding that I hoped he'd consider closing Golden Gate Park to all motorized traffic forever, not just the Saturdays and Sundays as he was promoting. He laughed the laugh people laugh when it occurs to them they're dealing with an extremist, and I moved on. The recallers also wanted McGoldrick out of office because he was for a speedo bus lane the length of Geary. I didn't see the need because the Geary buses run often and more or less on time, but like all other vehicular traffic in the city, bog down east of Van Ness because there are too many vehicles for SF's small-size downtown. A rapid bus lane would make no difference in bus speed east of Van Ness where everything is slowed by congestion. Neither issue, of course, was grounds for a recall election. Like Mendo, there's no evidence of planning anywhere in San Francisco.
FARTHER down Clement towards 10th, I ran into the Mexican guy working a fruit and vegetable stand who spoke fluent Chinese, or a dialect thereof. I once heard a Chinese guy say to him in English, “You speak Chinese better than I do.” The Mexican guy replied, “I speak better English than you do, too.” They both laughed. People everywhere get along better than you'd think from the constant media implication that we're on the verge of civil disintegration.
LIVING in the city, you do a lot of scuttling. You walk sideways — scuttle — with your garbage cans through narrow passage ways, ducking beneath overhead plumbing, locking the sidewalk door coming and going. “Ten years ago a burglar got in the building.” That's the lock box rationale I constantly heard, probably because the lock box people knew I secretly hoped someone would break in simply to confirm a decade's worth of pre-emptive suspicion So, we all scuttled in and out of our little stacks of apartment boxes, assuming menace everywhere. I knew only the people in my building, half of whom were related to me, and I knew the Korean family across the street, the young couple who lived next door, and a Chinese woman in her middle sixties who also lived next door. This woman watched the street all day from her upstairs window. She introduced herself to me only, I suspect, to scope me out for my criminal potential. I must have passed muster because she was very friendly ever after. I never saw a single person on our block who even looked like he or she might be malevolently disposed, but everyone I knew was fearful, everyone wary for no real reason at all.
ON GARBAGE DAYS, an ancient Chinese couple systematically rooted through the cans for items of cash value. 150,000 San Franciscans depend on various kinds of “food assistance.” Lots of old people who've had hard lives scrape right to the end no matter how prosperous they become. The Depression scared hell out of my parent's generation. My mother saved string and tin foil well into her eighties. Few Depression survivors threw their money around even after they had some. I knew Arkies in Boonville who kept all their cash hidden in their homes, and they had the best vegetable gardens around long before the gardening movement got rolling. They knew from bitter experience how precarious things are. One old guy I knew carried so much cash in his wallet he wrapped it in wire to keep it all contained between the wallet's sprung-seam covers. The Depression generation knew in their bones the system could go any time like it did when they were young. And who can imagine the terrors an elderly pair of immigrant Chinese had survived, but there they were, the old man working the cans on one side of the street, the old lady the other side. They stacked their finds at the end of the block, hauled it off somewhere, then came back and worked another block. I always wanted to follow them to see their total operation, but I couldn't do it without scaring them. I've tried to talk to them but they'd just smile and keep on moving, on task, not needing to share trade secrets with some hulking busy body of an Ang Mo Qui (Long-nosed monkey or, depending on inflection, red-haired devil in the Hakka dialect.) I saw them working the trash most days and some nights in all kinds of weather.
ONE AFTERNOON a young woman, two small boys in tow, was tying lengths of rope from the spindly limbs of a smallish tree outside my building. She and the two boys looked happy so I assumed she wasn't about to hang them or herself, but I asked her for a clarification. “I want my kids to rope swing like I got to do when I was a kid,” she explained, “and they won't let us do it in the parks like this. You don't mind, do you?”
CATCH OF THE DAY, Saturday, September 28, 2024
LUIS ALVARADO-NOVOA, 21, Ukiah. DUI, no license.
JESSIE ANGUIANO-LOZANO, 27, Willits. DUI while on court probation with 4 priors, probation revocation, unspecified offense.
JAMES BRAY JR., 64, Fort Bragg. Domestic battery, elder abuse, probation violation.
VANESSA ELIZABETH, 55, Ukiah. Disorderly conduct-alcohol, probation revocation. (Frequent flyer.)
AARYAN FISCHER, 33, Fort Bragg. Probation revocation.
FERNANDO HEREDIA-CASTRO, 41, Ukiah. Controlled substance, trespassing, disobeying court order.
DANIEL HOLMES JR., 31, Ukiah. DUI-alcohol&drugs, suspended license for DUI, prior narcotics conviction, reckless evasion, resisting, county parole violation.
LANAE KELLY, 34, Ukiah. Unlawful camping, trespassing, resisting.
GARY KRIMONT, 66, Ukiah. DUI.
BRETT ROBBINS, 25, Willits. DUI.
ARMANDO RUIZ-JARQUIN, 37, Santa Rosa/Ukiah. DUI.
CHRISTOPHER SKAGGS, 41, Lakeport/Ukiah. Controlled substance.
MARCO VAZQUEZ-ORTEGA, 33, Redwood Valley. Domestic battery.
CHRISTINE WHITEHEAD, 33, Ukiah. Paraphernalia, failure to appear.
BRIAN WILLIAMS, 53, Ukiah. Parole violation.
MEMO OF THE AIR: Hubris debris.
Here's the recording of last night's (Friday 2024-09-27) almost-8-hour Memo of the Air: Good Night Radio show on 107.7fm KNYO-LP Fort Bragg (CA) and KNYO.org (and, for the first hour, also 89.3fm KAKX Mendocino): https://tinyurl.com/KNYO-MOTA-0611
Coming shows can feature your story or dream or poem or essay or kvetch or announcement or whatever. Just email it to me. Or include it in a reply to this post. Or send me a link to your writing project and I'll take it from there and read it on the air.
Besides all that, at https://MemoOfTheAir.wordpress.com you'll find a fresh batch of dozens of links to worthwhile items I set aside for you while gathering the show together, such as:
Torremolinos, a little town in Spain. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jTH9z0Cf6Zs
Nine tapdancing noses. https://www.futilitycloset.com/2024/09/21/breathing-exercises/
And an interesting couple. I have always wondered about that kind of ancient Roman shoe. What keeps the shoelace from immediately sliding down to one's ankle? Unless here it's not a shoelace but a cylindrical lissajous tattoo. I knew a girl who had barbed wire tattooed up and down her legs like that, but in Doc Martins, not sandals. Doc Martins, barbed wire, pleated skirt. Giant round blue eyes. Pretty, bipolar, chain-smoker, 17 to early twenties. She'd be, let's see… maybe 50-55 now. If you see yourself in that description, please get in touch; I'd like to hear your story about how things turned out for you. https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=10226990413092362&set=gm.3919989634882554
Marco McClean, memo@mcn.org, https://MemoOfTheAir.wordpress.com
CALIFORNIA INSURER TO DROP ALL FLOOD POLICIES AS IT PULLS BACK FROM STATE
by Megan Fan Munce
The number of flood insurance companies in California, and the U.S. overall, is growing — but one company plans to leave the market.
American National Property and Casualty Company plans to discontinue its private flood insurance in California early next year, according to a filing submitted this month to the California Department of Insurance. Earlier this year, the insurer also began the process of exiting California’s market for home insurance.
Typical homeowners insurance policies do not cover damage from flooding or mudslides — even though 90% of natural disasters in the U.S. involve flooding, according to the Department of Homeland Security.
The first of American National’s 271 flood insurance customers to be dropped will be those whose policies expire on or around Feb. 7, 2025, with nonrenewals lasting through February 2026.
Wildfires may be the most front-of-mind natural disaster for most Californians, but floods can also inflict immense property damage. Last year, flooding caused $90 million in insured losses in the state, according to the Department of Insurance. And climate experts have warned that a barrage of atmospheric rivers could, at some point in the future, cause a disaster akin to the Great Flood of 1862, when both downtown Sacramento and parts of the Central Valley were submerged. Estimates suggest “approximately one quarter of the taxable real estate in California was destroyed by flood waters” that year, according to the California Historical Society.
But few California homeowners purchase flood insurance. As of last month, just 187,000 state residents had flood insurance through the National Flood Insurance Program — the nation’s largest flood insurer — compared to more than 1.7 million Floridians, according to the program’s data. And private flood insurers wrote just $71 million in premiums in California compared to more than $13 billion in home insurance premiums, Department of Insurance data shows.
Flood insurance can provide coverage for both damage to the contents of a home and the home itself caused by flooding either directly or indirectly — such as a flood causing a sewer backup.
The National Flood Insurance Program, which is administered by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, offers policies both directly and through partnerships with private insurance companies. In 2022, the NFIP insured just under 70% of the flood insurance market in the U.S., according to the Insurance Information Institute.
But that percentage has been shrinking. From 2016 to 2022, private insurers offering their own flood insurance policies — which include Liberty Mutual and Allstate — grew from just 12% of the national market to 32%, according to the Insurance Information Institute.
In California, the number of private flood insurers has also increased, possibly because the National Flood Insurance program recently updated its pricing. In 2023, 60 insurers offered private flood insurance policies compared to just 17 in 2016, according to the California Department of Insurance.
Most American homeowners are not required to purchase flood insurance — unless they live in a FEMA-defined special flood hazard area zone and have a federally-backed mortgage.
American National continues to offer auto and commercial insurance, among other lines, in California. A spokesperson declined to comment further on the company’s decision.
(SF Chronicle)
PROP. 33 & WHY RENT CONTROL IS SUCH A HOT TOPIC IN CALIFORNIA
by Jessica Roy
In November, voters will have a third opportunity to decide the future of rent control in California.
Proposition 33 would not impose rent control in California. In fact, it would repeal an existing rent control law: the Costa-Hawkins Rental Housing Act of 1995.
Under Costa-Hawkins, California cities cannot impose rent control on housing built after Feb. 1, 1995, or on single-family homes or separately owned multifamily units like condos. Costa-Hawkins also says landlords are allowed to reset rental prices when tenants move out.
In 2018 and 2020, similar measures to repeal Costa-Hawkins were voted down by about 60% of the voting population. In both cases, opponents of the propositions, including landlords and housing developers, vastly outspent the “yes” campaigns.
All three propositions were sponsored by the AIDS Healthcare Foundation, which has consistently fought planning decisions in Los Angeles that would lead to more housing development. AHF put up the vast majority of funding for those campaigns, though they received small amounts from various organized labor and Democratic organizations. Major funding for the opposition has come from groups representing landlords and real estate developers, though some affordable housing advocates have spoken out against these propositions’ potential impacts as well.
The 2024 version is more expansive than the first two: In addition to repealing existing law, Prop 33 would prohibit the state from limiting “the right of any city, county, or city and county to maintain, enact or expand residential rent control.”
Almost half of Californians are renters. The general rule of thumb is to spend no more than one-third of your income on housing, but the Public Policy Institute of California says close to a third of those renters are what housing experts call “severely cost-burdened”: Rent eats up more than half their income.
You might think a proposition that could limit rent increases would be a slam dunk for voters in a solid-blue state. But rent control is a nuanced issue. And in California, we already have a version of it: In 2019, the state passed AB1482, a law decreeing landlords could only increase rents for tenants in buildings more than 15 years old by either 5% plus inflation or 10%, whichever is lower. Before that, about a quarter of state residents were covered by existing rent stabilization ordinances in San Francisco, San Jose, Los Angeles and some other cities.
Here’s what Prop 33 would and wouldn’t do if passed, and what you should know about rent control in California.
What Prop 33 Would And Wouldn’t Do
Prop 33 would repeal Costa-Hawkins and allow local governments to set their own rent control laws, and the state wouldn’t be allowed to interfere with that.
Prop 33 would not mandate rent control or set the conditions for it. The “No on 33” website points out that Prop 33 contains no special protections for renters, seniors or veterans; no requirements for building affordable housing, and no specific provisions that would reduce rent. Those things are all true — but that’s not what the law is trying to do. The purpose of the law is to give power back to local governments to establish rent control.
That’s where things could get tricky. A San Francisco supervisor said he planned to introduce a measure to immediately expand rent control for apartments if Prop 33 passes. That’s the sort of renter-friendly change the “Yes on 33” campaign promises. But other local governments in California, particularly in wealthier enclaves, have consistently found creative interpretations of the law to prevent people from building things they don’t want. (A “historic parking lot” comes to mind.)
A city could set price controls on rent in new housing to the point where it effectively dissuades housing development. In its recommendation to vote “no” on Prop 33, the Chronicle’s editorial board points to Huntington Beach, where a Republican council member has already announced his plans to use the proposition to evade California’s affordable housing mandates.
The campaign for Prop 33 disputes that interpretation of the law. But it raises the question of why Prop 33 goes further than its predecessors, to the point of preventing state interference in local control. The AIDS Healthcare Foundation has a history of filing lawsuits to block housing development in Los Angeles.
Average home prices in the U.S. are up 47% since 2020. Average rents are up more than 30% in that timeframe. As inflation squeezes people’s budgets, cities and states around the country are looking at tools to combat the affordability problem.
And that’s what rent control is: a tool. It’s not a perfect tool, and not the only one. Critics of rent control say it’s not a panacea to solving California’s housing affordability problems, and even its most vocal proponents would probably agree with that.
The real key to solving the housing crisis, in California and elsewhere, is to build enough supply to meet demand. We are not on track to do that here. A consistent argument against rent control is that it makes the problem worse by dissuading developers from building housing, since it constrains the return they can make on their investment. A state law, AB1482, currently addresses that with a 15-year grace period on new development before rent control goes into effect.
The policy popularity of rent control goes in cycles, said Marco Giacoletti, an assistant professor of finance and business economics at USC Marshall School of Business. America added lots of regulation to the housing market in the 1950s postwar boom; over the next couple of decades, many states scrapped those laws and even passed bans on rent control; then a bunch of those bans were repealed in the 1990s. Right now, he said, we’re in the part of the cycle where rent control is gaining traction again, due in large part to those COVID-era housing cost surges.
The phrase “rent control” includes a few different concepts. This week, the Wall Street Journal reported that Argentina eliminated rent control and saw rent prices drop. But its rent control laws were among the world’s strictest. The government mandated price control, telling landlords what they could charge, and didn’t allow those prices to be increased between tenants — what’s known as vacancy control.
That level of government control on rental housing is more popular in parts of South America and Europe, Giacoletti said. In America, with the exception of New York City, “rent control” is usually rent stabilization: Landlords can raise rent between tenants and can make regular but constrained increases on existing tenants.
It’s challenging to study rent control. You can’t extract it into a petri dish and see what happens under a microscope in perfect lab conditions. You have to look at it in the real world, where many factors influence housing prices.
The closest anyone has come to ideal conditions for studying rent control is probably the 2019 study on rent control conducted by Stanford economists. In 1994, San Francisco expanded its rent control policy to include small multifamily homes built before 1980, but not ones built after that. Those buildings already existed, were in similar neighborhoods, and had renters in them, creating convenient comparison groups for researchers to study.
Rebecca Diamond, a professor of economics at the Stanford Graduate School of Business, was the study’s lead author. She said her team found that renters in units that had been converted to rent-controlled were more likely to stay in their homes for more years and were less likely to move out of San Francisco at all. The displacement prevention effect was particularly strong for racial minorities. But rents increased at surrounding properties, and property owners were more likely to convert their buildings into condos and sell them. Both those factors bring in higher-income residents, increasing gentrification.
Because Prop 33 doesn’t say exactly what rent control would look like under local control, it’s impossible to say exactly what the outcome of its success would be. Most people probably don’t want to live in a place where landlords can increase rent by as much as they want as often as they want and evict tenants whenever they want. But most of us probably also don’t want to live in a place where there’s no rental housing available because the government disincentivizes anyone from doing it.
Under current California laws, landlords can make rent increases with allowances for inflation, while renters are protected from egregious rent hikes and unjust evictions. Anyone who builds a new apartment building has a decade and a half to maximize returns on their investment before being subject to stabilization laws. Do Californians want their local governments to have more granular control than that? We’ll find out in November.
(SF Chronicle)
NO TURKISH DELIGHT FOR NEW YORK’S MAYOR
by Maureen Dowd
It was one of the most anthropologically fascinating dinner parties I ever attended. Cindy Adams, The New York Post gossip G.O.A.T., feted her 94th birthday at her rococo Park Avenue apartment in April.
We joked about her party motto: “If you’re indicted, you’re invited.” (She inherited the line from her late husband, the comic Joey Adams, who coined it to describe Roy Cohn’s louche soirees in the disco days.)
I was mesmerized looking around at an amazing web of scheming New York power brokers. A penthouse full of pulped egos, famous people who had had crazy downfalls. A spidery crop of tabloid Gotham villains uneasily circling one another and eating animal crackers and ice cream in the red-lacquered, Ming dynasty’d-out lair of the tabloid queen.
Woody and Soon-Yi were standing quietly in the middle of the room.
Bill O’Reilly was there with an assistant who was handing out cards awarding a free subscription to his substack. Nearby was Robert Thomson, the top lieutenant and best friend of Rupert Murdoch, the mogul who fired O’Reilly for sexual misconduct at Fox News. (Remember the loofah?!)
Kellyanne Conway was prowling, as was Don Lemon, who lost his CNN perch after saying Nikki Haley was no longer in her prime.
The smiling governor of New York, Kathy Hochul, was standing a few feet from the man she replaced and disavowed after he was accused of sexual transgressions. Andrew Cuomo was also in good spirits, with his lovely 93-year-old mother, Matilda, on his arm. He was out of a job, but New York media and political circles were buzzing that he was eyeing Gracie Mansion.
And there, walking right past Cuomo to the bar, was Mayor Eric Adams. He reversed Cindy’s mantra: He was invited, and now he’s been indicted.
I did a feature on the mayor in the summer of 2022, when he was six months into the job.
He had started with such flair and swagger, but by the time I was trailing around the city after him, his poll numbers were dropping. Some of the mayor’s aides at City Hall were getting very uneasy about his cronies and clubbing at the private Zero Bond. And later, some of his best aides began leaving his increasingly murky orbit.
“It’s like the second coming of ‘Beau James,’ Jimmy Walker,” one top Democratic politico told me, prophetically. Another Democratic mayor with flair, a star of the Roaring Twenties’ Tammany Hall machine, Walker was forced to resign after an investigation showed he had accepted a windfall from businessmen trying to secure municipal contracts. He argued that he took “beneficences,” not bribes, and avoided potential criminal prosecution by disappearing to Europe with his mistress, a Ziegfeld girl.
When I interviewed Adams, he was buoyant. He talked about his favorite show growing up, “Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom,” and I asked him which animal he related to. “Clearly, I am a lion,” he said, laughing. “I am meant to rule the jungle.”
As the daughter of a police detective, I was hoping that the former New York police captain would shine, not tarnish his office.
His story was powerful: The Brooklyn native joined the force after being beaten by the police as a teenager. His mother scraped to support six kids with cleaning work; as a child, Adams would sometimes have to take a bag full of clothes to school in case they were evicted by the end of the day.
I wanted to believe that this moderate Democrat could root out bad cops and bring justice to Black victims while quelling crime and pushing back on defund-the-police and coddle-the-criminal rhetoric on the far left.
But warning signs kept bubbling up.
Our interview — conducted after we rushed to the scene of a murder — was over dinner at Osteria la Baia, a restaurant owned by his friends the brothers Petrosyants, who pleaded guilty in 2014 to an illegal check-cashing scheme designed to evade anti-money-laundering rules.
Mayor Adams had chosen Philip Banks as deputy mayor of public safety, even though he was an unindicted co-conspirator in a corruption scandal involving Bill de Blasio donors in 2014. He had made Frank Carone his chief of staff, despite questions about his past business dealings.
I asked the mayor about all this, and he replied that he wanted to see the best in his friends, to give them second chances.
“The worst day of your life should not define your life,” he said. “I just believe that because I’ve had some worst days.”
And some more worst days are to come. His sketchy associates weren’t the only graspy problem. Adams himself was, according to law enforcement officials.
In a stunning tableau on Friday, Adams was arraigned downtown. He is the first sitting mayor of New York to be charged with a federal crime — a reflection of just how sloppy Adams must have been.
He pleaded not guilty and claims, Trump-style, to be a target of a rigged system out to get him — while Hochul mulled whether to remove him and Cuomo still circled.
It’s hard to believe that a New York mayor could be had for a bunch of luxury hotel suites and business-class seats on Turkish Airlines — taking circuitous routes to Europe, Asia and Africa.
The indictment charges Adams with bribery, fraud and soliciting illegal foreign campaign donations, alleging he got emoluments for clearing away obstacles for Turkish officials, most frighteningly, pressuring the fire department to open a new high-rise Turkish diplomatic building, despite its having a faulty fire safety system.
When I wrote about Adams, his biggest scandal — which I learned at our dinner — was that he still ate fish even though he claimed to be a vegan.
But it seems that wasn’t the only fishy thing about him.
WHEN THEY WERE CALLED SERVICE STATIONS
ON LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY
So many congressmen and senators are elected paupers and leave multi-millionaires on a $180,000 salary. The Justice Department has to know something fishy is going on but don't seem to pursue the big fish.
LEAD STORIES, SUNDAY'S NYT
Why the World’s Biggest Powers Can’t Stop a Middle East War
Israel Keeps Up Strikes Against Hezbollah in Lebanon
Having ignored allies and defied critics, Benjamin Netanyahu is basking in a rare triumph.
Iran projected caution after Israel’s killing of Hassan Nasrallah and bombings in Beirut.
Despair, Celebration and Shock Follows News of Nasrallah’s Death in Beirut
A Decimated Hezbollah Is a Serious Blow to Iran
ARMAGGEDON UPDATE
Israeli airstrikes with American-supplied 2000 pound bombs, battered areas near Beirut again on Saturday evening, hours after Hezbollah confirmed that its longtime leader Hassan Nasrallah had been killed in an Israeli bombing that flattened residential buildings near Lebanon’s capital the night before. The assassination, which Israel said hit the Iranian-backed militia’s underground headquarters, was another escalation of Israel’s campaign against Hezbollah in a conflict that has gone on for nearly a year. Hezbollah began firing into northern Israel on Oct. 8 in solidarity with Hamas, which is also supported by Iran, and Israel frequently responded, intensifying its attacks dramatically over the last two weeks, fueling fears of an all-out regional war that could draw in bigger players like Iran.
TAIBBI & KIRN
Matt Taibbi: All right. Welcome to America This Week, I’m Matt Taibbi.
Walter Kirn: And I’m Walter Kirn.
Matt Taibbi: Walter, how are you? I’m in Vegas so that’s why-
Walter Kirn: Which hotel? It’s a town I spend a lot of time in.
Matt Taibbi: Caesars Palace, baby.
Walter Kirn: Oh, right.
Matt Taibbi: Yeah.
Walter Kirn: Famous from the Johnny Carson show back in the ‘70s. When I’d watch it at night and stay up late, everybody had always just come from Caesars or was playing at Caesars. Shecky Greene, Rodney Dangerfield and-
Matt Taibbi: Don Rickles maybe or …
Walter Kirn: Rickles, yeah. And you got the feeling from the chat on Carson that they were all going to meet up at Caesars maybe later after the show. Johnny would maybe fly out and Charo and Carol Channing and all the other-
Matt Taibbi: Moe Greene.
Walter Kirn: Yeah, the regulars, they’d get together in a big suite and recreate the Brat Pack days or something and it had a huge romantic charge for me, Caesars Palace. When I first went to Vegas, it was a regular sized hotel but they’ve added massive pylon, extra towers to it now.
Matt Taibbi: By itself, it’s like Dubai. I got dropped off by an Uber when I got here and, to get to the hotel registration, I think I walked two and a half miles.
Walter Kirn: Did you drop any money along the way into a-
Matt Taibbi: I did not. I am now old enough that I don’t do that anymore but, yeah, no, it’s cool. My kids are here and they had never seen gambling machines before and they said, “Even the airport has slot machines, why do people gamble so much?” And I don’t know, how do you answer a child question like that but …
Walter Kirn: Tell them it’s a compulsion unleashed by the devil early in human history which has only grown over time.
Matt Taibbi: And it paid for all of this.
Walter Kirn: And it paid for all of this. But the very splendor of Las Vegas, of course, is proof that gambling doesn’t pay because it’s built with the money they make off you losing.
Matt Taibbi: Oh, yeah, of course, yes. It’s why it’s doing so well now because, as desperation increases, people gamble more and, yeah, no, it’s a great, it’s a beautiful thing.
Walter Kirn: Right.
Matt Taibbi: So, yeah, it’s one of the only booming parts of the country it feels like.
Walter Kirn: Well, I live there part of the time and I can tell you that, though it’s booming in places, Las Vegas has a lot of dry crust on its bread and, as you get away from what I call the stationary cruise ship of the Strip, you see all kinds of things and some pretty despairing neighborhoods. As you gamble more, you move further toward the outskirts of Las Vegas until you get to a part in East Las Vegas where there are actually chickens running down the street, I’m not kidding.
Matt Taibbi: Probably feeding on your component remains that you have sold to try to pay your last debts on the way out of the city. Haven’t gotten there yet but we’ll see.
Walter Kirn: Good.
Matt Taibbi: So, all right. A lot happened this week, we wanted to start with a story that’s not getting a lot of attention though it seems to us it should. But a couple of days ago, it was Wednesday, I think, when this happened, that he did this? Let’s roll the Reuters story. Curiously, most of the stories about this, we had to get from foreign media.
Vladimir Putin: Speaker 1: The updated version of the document proposes that aggression against Russia by any non-nuclear weapon state but with the participation or support of a nuclear weapon state should be regarded as a joint attack on the Russian Federation. The conditions for Russia’s transition to the use of nuclear weapons are also clearly defined. We will consider such a possibility as soon as we receive reliable information about a massive launch of aerospace attack means and their crossing of our state border, meaning strategic or tactical aircraft, cruise missiles, drones, hypersonic missiles and other aircraft.
Matt Taibbi: Okay, yeah. So, it’s a Reuters translation of a Vladimir Putin speech and the essence of it is that he is essentially changing Russia’s nuclear strategy or nuclear policy, he’s announcing a change to it. And the key part comes at the end where he talks about how we retain the right to deploy or apply nuclear weapons even when ordinary military attacks are undertaken against Russia or Belarus by a country that’s allied with the nuclear power. So, he’s clearly referring to Ukraine. So, this seems like a pretty big deal because this is in the middle of a discussion by the United States about whether or not it’s going to green light the use of long-range missile attacks into Russia but the reaction in the Western press has been interesting. So, let’s look at The New Republic. Trump suggests giving Vladimir Putin whatever he wants, so that’s their reaction on that day.
Walter Kirn: And what about the story supports that headline? Did you read it? I did.
Matt Taibbi: Yeah, it’s actually an unrelated story. It’s all about how, if Ukraine were to suddenly surrender, apparently Trump said that would be much better and so they led with that.
Walter Kirn: In my reading of this story, what he’s saying is it would’ve been much better if there had been a negotiated peace before this point. And it didn’t sound like a call for surrender at all, it did call for negotiations but the headline spins it as capitulation which I found unfortunate. In a time of nuclear confrontation or pending nuclear confrontation, you would hope that the magazines which support the American government would be less contentious and less hyperbolic.
Matt Taibbi: Yeah. Okay, playtime’s over so you would think that, with this particular topic, you would cut out whatever normal political stupidity you’re applying to news coverage and play a little bit straighter, I guess. But there were a few, I would say, down the middle stories, NBC did one basically saying in a bland way that Putin had changed his nuclear policy but there were an awful lot that had a different character. We should probably … Let’s look at the Kyiv Post which had this story called EU Rejects Nuclear Threat, Reckless Nuclear Threat. And that’s fine, you can call it a reckless nuclear threat, I think that’s totally legitimate. It’s the quote that’s a third of the way down the story if we scroll down just a little bit. Here we go.
“Not for the first time, Putin is playing a gamble with his nuclear arsenal,” EU foreign policy spokesman, Peter Stano told reporters, “We of course strongly reject these threats.” Walter, what does it mean to reject a threat?
Walter Kirn: I’ve been puzzling over that question all morning. Does it mean that we deny that it took place? Does it mean that we refuse to change our behavior as a result of it? Does it mean just, oh, go away? I’m not sure. I would think that any threat listened to would cause some consideration of some kind but merely to reject it sounds rather unwise or unreal. It has to figure into their considerations at this point. I guess they’re saying he’s full of it, don’t listen to this guy, he’s a blowhard. I saw in some of the other articles he’s just a bully, he’s trying to bully us again.
Matt Taibbi: Which could be true, that’s possible. But this is a nuclear power that is saying that it is changing its nuclear policy and, if we do what we’re considering doing, it will-
Walter Kirn: And what, Zelenskyy is in the United States right now lobbying for us to do. I think this was obviously timed to Zelenskyy’s visit to the UN, to Pennsylvania where they signed artillery shells next to his people and him. We’re obviously doing our own bullying, I guess. He’s about to present or has his, quote, path to victory which, as I read it, involves strikes into Russia. Now, I would guess that, United States not having been invaded as many times as Russia has in the last many decades, has a different feeling toward these things but I doubt that they’re going to let themselves … I’m no geopolitics expert but I doubt they’re going to let themselves be thoroughly harassed on their homeland with missiles and so on without some response and it could go up that high depending on, I suppose, where those missiles land. The word as translated from Putin was massive. In other words, if one or two come in, he might not respond but, if he felt…
https://www.racket.news/p/transcript-america-this-week-september-15d
IN KILLING NASRALLAH, Israel chose to open the gates of hell. We'll all pay the price
The West, via Israel, is fomenting for Hezbollah and the Shia resistance their own ISIS moment. Moderates are once again losing the argument – because we lost it for them
by Jonathan Cook
Hezbollah has confirmed that its longtime leader, Hassan Nasrallah, was among the hundreds of Lebanese killed in Israel’s massive bombardment of a suburb of Beirut last night.
Israel’s decision to assassinate Nasrallah, using some of the enormous bunker-busting bombs the United States has been arming it with, is beyond foolhardy. It is outright deranged. Israel has removed – and knows it has removed – a moderating influence on Hezbollah.
Israel’s action will achieve nothing apart from teaching his successor, and leaders of other groups and countries labelled as terrorist by western governments, several lessons:
* That Israel, and the West standing squarely behind it, do not play by any known rules of engagement, and that their opponents must do likewise. The current restraint from Hezbollah that has been so baffling western pundits will become a thing of the past.
* That Israel is not interested in compromise, only escalation, and that this is a fight to death – not just against Israel but against the West that sponsors Israel.
* That Israel's ideological extremism – its Jewish supremacism, and its endless craving for Lebensraum – must be met with even greater Shia-inspired extremism.
Decades of western terrorism in the Middle East unleashed a Sunni nihilism embodied first in al-Qaeda and then in ISIS.
Now, the West, via Israel, is fomenting for the Shia resistance its own ISIS moment. The moderates in what the West dubs “terrorist organisations” have once again lost the argument. Why? Because the US imperial project known as “the West” has once again demonstrated it will not compromise. It demands full-spectrum, global dominance – nothing less.
Israel may make very short tactical gains in killing Nasrallah. But we will all soon feel the whirlwind.
When that whirlwind comes, the job of our politicians and media will be to ensure we make no connection between this moment of savagery and insanity from us and the blowback.
The role of western establishments will be to cry victim, to insist “They hate us for our freedoms”, for our civilisational superiority, because “they” are simply barbarians.
But what comes next, as with what came before, will be entirely predictable. Violence doesn't beget calm, it begets more violence. Israel knows that. Our leaders know that. But they opened the gates of hell anyway.
(Disclaimer: Nothing in this post, in line with Section 12 of the UK Terrorism Act, in any way indicates, or should be seen to be encouraging, support for any group designated as a terrorist organisation by the British government.)
(jonathancook.substack.com)
I stand with Israel!
MAGA Marmon
Maybe by “standing with Israel” you and the uniparty mean that you openly want to foment so much turmoil in the Middle East so that we return to the era of global terrorism? Maybe all of you aren’t satisfied with the current amount of war and you want more chaos since it leads to more profiteering by the military industrial complex.
Is that what you mean by “standing with Israel”?
So where do you stand, death to Jews, “from the river to the sea”?
MAGA Marmon
I’m all for “…the river to the sea,” part. The guilt-ridden west was stupid to give it to a bunch of Europeans who claimed to be Jews after the second war of the world. The bums have been slaughtering and trying to evict Palestinians ever since, and the scum who rule here in freedomlandia, along with its partners in crime from Europe, keep shoveling the the claim jumpers money and armaments for their continuous genocide. You, not surprisingly, offer a false choice.
Why don’t those other countries develop their land like Israel has done? Maybe they should put less money into launching rockets daily and get to work on something positive. Too busy beating their woman to death?
Because they don’t get billions from the morons of this country, and the other “western” morons. Besides, “development” aint nearly so grand as you make it out to be…it’s likely to be the death of the species. Peddle your “Jews are the greatest” BS to the suckers. I’m not having any. They are no better than any other group of pathetic human monkeys.
‘
Death to all Zionists, yes. Just like in World War II when it was death to all Nazis. Not Jews and Germans, Zionists and Nazis.
And yes, a secular democratic state from the river to the sea in which people of all the ridiculous religions who are from that land – including all people born there, as long as they renounce Zionism – just as all Germans had to renounce Nazism.
Unfortunately, the Zionists under Benzion Mileikowsky (Nethanyahu’s real name) have decided on genocide and endless attacks on their neighbors. Just like any aggressors, they must be completely destroyed.
And let’s just be honest here. You wouldn’t be able to find “Israel” on a map.
Then why are you here? Fight the good fight, Marmon!
Re the choo choo in Fort Bragg, I’m glad to see some discussion happening. I haven’t trusted those folks since they started talking about a choo choo out on the headlands. Can’t think of a more stupid idea, unless it’s building a fancy resort which brings nothing but low wages and even less housing available for workers. The city seems to be the best line of defense. And Chris Hart, will you ever answer my question of what “freight” the choo choo will be hauling between Fort Bragg and Willits?
The City and community participated in the planning for the “fancy resort”. Please look at the Millsite Ad Hoc Committee zoning. While you may not like it, it was designed with the public, city staff and council participation. It resulted from a 3-year public planning process. Those plans were far from final but it was made in collaboration. You have 3 years of videos that you can watch.
And I don’t know how you feel entitled to insult people and then insist they answer your questions.
Re Skunk Permits
This has been reported on elsewhere but part of the Skunk Train losing the eminent domain case in Willits included the court ordering them to reimburse the property owner for his legal expenses, including all the attorneys fees. Moreover, the Skunk Train has never claimed they were exempt from any permits for projects on the Mill Site. In fact, they already applied for a Coastal Development Permit for work related to the central Mill pond area. That permit review is controlled by the City of Fort Bragg and will involve a full Environmental Impact Report. I am not sure where all this false information is coming from.
Regarding Jade’s City Council recommendations.
I take no issue with Jade making his choices for which candidates he plans to support. He explains his reasoning. However, his false and nearly defamatory statements about Scott and Ryan allegedly being in the pockets of the Skunk Train simply because they were endorsed by a community group called the Alliance for a Better Fort Bragg is ridiculous. I am appalled that a former educator would resort to spreading false rumors to try to bolster his preferred candidates, although that happened during the last city council election too. Ryan also got endorsed by the City employees’ union, does that put him in the pocket of the city employees? Of course not. The Alliance is not funded at all and has no money to donate to any candidates. Both Scott and Ryan have disclosed they haven’t received or even been offered any campaign contributions contributions from the Skunk Train or its officers like the Hart brothers. The Alliance itself isn’t controlled by or affiliated with the Skunk Train, although Cris Hart, who lives here is one of its many local members. Scott and Ryan, like all the candidates, should be judged based on their experience and positions, not false rumors about imagined back room deals. Jade has lost all credibility, in my opinion.
You say the Railway has no affiliation with the Alliance. But Chris Hart says the Railway hired Kabateck Strategies to do public communication work, and then he asked Kabateck to help organize Alliance meetings.
Yes, they have an affiliation with Chris Hart and he asked for their help getting the Alliance website, etc., going. I guess that counts as Chris effectively donating to the Alliance. I am not sure why Kabacheck’s involvement bothers anyone. It is not like it was a secret since their contact info was on the Alliance’s website. Just because a consultant has two different clients doesn’t create an affiliation between the separate clients. I am a lawyer and have had numerous clients, does that make them affiliated with each other? No, it doesn’t.
I feel anyone is entitled to vote and recommend for whoever they like. Jade has repeatedly shown, however, that he does not care whether he is correct in his attacks and the harm that it causes the innocent.
It is hard to prove an inaccurate accusation to be false. Jade has met over a dozen members of the Alliance and I think every one of us have told him the same thing. In the end, you will see zero contributions to any candidate by the Alliance. I don’t know what else to say.
Nice piece by Zack.
Jonathan Cook’s opinion piece is replete with bias and conjecture.
Give some examples. And remember, time did not begin on October 7, 2023…
National Coffee Day
“Espresso yourself.”
“Behind every successful person is a substantial amount of coffee.”
Get you a cup, 🍵☕…’not just a cup, but a just cup’ (thanksgiving coffee)
Nasrallah was a moderate. He gave speech after speech calling not for an Islamic takeover and Sharia law, but for Palestine to be one country with a secular government where Jews, Muslims, Christians, and others could live together in peace with protection for minorities and supremacists movements such as Zionism banned.
Hamas are moderates. They revised their charter and have offered to accept the 1967 borders and lay down their arms. They also call for a Palestine with all Abrahamics living together.
Now, who is calling for the land to be the exclusive domain of only Zionists? Who is calling for the settlements to be permanent? Well, it’s the Zionists – who have banished their moderates. There are zero left-Zionists in the Knesset.