Mendocino County Today: Monday 10/14/2024

By AVA News Service on October 14, 2024

SEASONABLE TEMPERATURES and coastal stratus will continue today, then a period of light rainfall is expected north of Cape Mendo Tues through Thurs, with drier weather expected further south. Widespread gusty N winds are possible Thurs with a frontal passage. (NWS)

STEPHEN DUNLAP (Fort Bragg): A foggy 55F this Monday morning on the coast. Sneaker waves are forecast along the coast today, be careful along the shore as they are "sneaky" & can take you out. Patchy fog leading into a chance for rain Tuesday night - Wednesday morning. Dry skies thru the weekend then mid next week is looking wet right now.

RANDAL SCOTT FRASER

Randal Scott Fraser took a walk to the wild side and left this world last night, October 12, 2024.

He lived a life that touched many hearts and made a lot of people feel cared for, protected and safe. His wry wit and humor has been passed on to his kids. And his creativity as well. He loved me. He loved me well. He was a man of honor. He stood by his word. He had a weak stomach and could not deal well with puke or shit, Literally or figuratively. Our door us open, please call or text to give us a heads up. Burial and memorial details to follow. Tip a cup.

(Saffron Fraser, Philo)

KATHLEEN KIRKPATRICK

Kathleen Kirkpatrick, 80 years of age, passed at home in Willits, California on Saturday, August 17, 2024.

Kathleen was born in Kingsburg, California to Melvin and Marguerite Rieffel. She was the eldest of their three children. Kathleen was raised in Bakersfield, California. After completing high school, she attended the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB) where she earned her B.A. in Art History in 1966 and a University Recommended Standard Teaching Credential in 1968. She made many friends while at UCSB, particularly her college roommates Carole, Nancy, Paula, and Peggy. These friends gathered annually throughout their lives to celebrate what they called “Happy Camp”.

After college Kathleen became the Visual Arts teacher at Terra Linda High School in Terra Linda, California, 1968-1970. Kathleen traveled in Europe and North Africa, 1970-1972, where she sought-out all the great museums. The thrill of viewing works of art in-person, instead of on the printed page, never ceased to delight and awe Kathleen. After returning to the U.S., Kathleen moved to Willits, California. She first worked at the Mendocino County Museum and was an active member of the thespian community with memorable performances in Drac-u-la-la and The Miracle Worker.

Kathleen met the love of her life, Bob Kirkpatrick, while they both performed in The Miracle Worker. After a whirlwind romance, Kathleen and Bob were married early in 1983. Their marriage would become the overlying passion of their lives. Bob was truly smitten with Kathleen. He charmed and adored her every day they were together. “Whatever Kathleen says” was a frequent utterance of his. They built a charming open-beamed home in Willits with extensive gardens that were complemented with Bob’s ceramic bird houses, whimsical quotes, and sculptures.

Kathleen contributed many painted garden gnomes and Tole painted folk art that were charming and admired. Kathleen was the Visual Arts Teacher (1982-2007) and Chair of the Performing and Visual Arts Program (1985-2007) at Willits High School. It was there that she established a culture (her legacy) of inspiring, enchanting, and educating the multitude of students who came through her classroom. Many of those students were astounded when their own inner creativity was coached to life by Kathleen.

Kathleen was also a part-time Visual Arts Instructor at Mendocino College, 2001-2014. Even after years of retirement, Kathleen still corresponded with many of her former students. In addition to Bob and teaching art, Kathleen also loved a long parade of Rottweilers and Bernese Mountain Dogs. Her four-footed companions were spoiled and admired. Many of their portraits were on walls of Kathleen’s home. Another love of Kathleen’s life was Apple Technology. She said: “Steve Jobs is a creative genius!”, more than once.

Kathleen prided herself on knowing how to navigate and utilize every Apple product. She attended several presentations by Steve Jobs. She took part in many technology workshops and read many books and manuals. After retirement she started her own business helping others with their Apple products and made many new friends.

Art, in all its forms, never ceased to fascinate Kathleen. Many works by local artists were found hanging on the tall walls of her home. She constantly tinkered with the hues, shapes, and objects around her house. Bold colors of every kind greeted visitors, followed by a brief oration on primary, secondary, and tertiary colors.

Always ready for a good time, Bob and Kathleen started a cooking club called “Gourmand Anon”. Along with their friends, they drank and dined at near and far-flung restaurants. They also had a rotation of potlucks of various cuisines with everyone cooking their own interpretations.

Kathleen is preceded in death by her husband, Bob; parents, and two siblings. Kathleen is survived by her stepson Rob Kirkpatrick and stepdaughter Kathy Kirkpatrick; Rob’s wife, Ruth Kirkpatrick, their children Sean and Mackenzie Kirkpatrick; Sean’s wife Savannah Dills, and Sister-in-law Elizabeth “Betty” Vrenios.

Rob and Ruth Kirkpatrick are planning a memorial for Kathleen Kirkpatrick during Spring 2025. If you are interested in attending such a memorial, please email Rob and Ruth Kirkpatrick at robnruth25@gmail.com.

In lieu of flowers, please consider donating to the Visual Arts Program at Willits High School in Willits, California.

AV UNIFIED NEWS

Hello Anderson Valley Community,

It has been another fantastic week in AVUSD!

Important Reminder: Parent/teacher conferences (also known as PLPs at the Jr/Sr High School) started Friday, October 11 and will be continuing throughout this week, Monday, October 14 through Friday, October 18. Therefore, every day this week will be a minimum day for students.

We look forward to seeing every student supported by a parent or guardian. Please reach out to the school office if you have questions or need to change your appointment time.

Exciting Events at AV Elementary

New principal, Mr. Ramalia, has enjoyed his first week and is looking forward to meeting parents as they visit the school for conferences. Please take a moment to meet and welcome him to our school community!

Saturday Camps are starting!! All AVES students are welcome; please reserve your child’s spot using the registration forms attached. Upcoming camps are:

Spooky Saturday Camp on Saturday, October 26, 8:00-12:00 and ASP 12:00-5:00. The staff are planning some amazing activities!

Cultivating Gratitude Camp on Saturday, November 16, 8:00-12:00 and ASP 12:00-5:00. Sign up now to reserve your child’s spot!

Thank you to Charlotte Triplett and her Saturday Camp staff for coordinating these awesome opportunities for AVES students

Jr/Sr High News:

Don’t forget to prepare for your PLPs, students! It is going to be a great week.

With this week being Homecoming Week, excitement is in the air. Alexys Bautista’s group has planned an awesome Spirit Week. We look forward to seeing staff and students dressing for the occasion each day:

Monday - PJ Day

Tuesday - Western Day

Wednesday - Class Colors

Thursday - Pink Out

Friday - School Colors

Homecoming festivities will finish up on Saturday the 19th starting with a parade at noon, soccer match at 1 pm at AVJHS field and a dance for 9-12th grade students from 7-10pm.

Measure M Bond Oversight Committee Update:

Last Thursday was the Measure M Bond Oversight Committee meeting. Philip Thomas, Ric Bonner, Kat Bennett, Heath McNerney, Leigh Kreinhop, and Kristin Larson Balliet attended. The meeting was productive, and the group took a tour to see the progress with construction at the Jr/Sr High. We continue to be on timeline for the most part. Ceiling tiles have been a bit of a delay, but are scheduled to arrive early this week. Some highlights of the Jr/Sr High School project:

Sinks are being installed in the Science rooms

Flooring is in progress; carpet has been installed in one room and tile in two.

Counselors' offices are looking really good and they will be moving into the main building by early November. The library will be moved back to the main building at this time as well.

Hallway flooring and lockers will be installed during Thanksgiving break.

Track Construction News:

The plans for the track are still in DSA review but are moving along. Our architects are revising plans for drinking fountains and benches to ensure accessibility. We are making good progress and look forward to going out to bid in November or December. Construction will begin after the rainy season. We are thankful to the CalTrans Clean California grant, which is making this endeavor possible.

Thank you to our community for your involvement in the education of our students! Please do not hesitate to reach out to me if you would like to discuss concerns or ideas!

With respect,

Kristin Larson Balliet

Superintendent

Anderson Valley Unified School District

UKIAH VALLEY WATER AUTHORITY PUSHES FORWARD WITH DISTRICT INTEGRATION

by Monica Huettl

The Ukiah Valley Water Authority (UVWA) is gearing up for its launch on January 1, 2025. The launch will bring together water districts across the region under one streamlined system. The October 1, 2024, meeting of the UVWA Executive Committee outlined efforts to prepare.…

https://mendofever.com/2024/10/14/ukiah-valley-water-authority-pushes-forward-with-district-integration/

JASON COX MEMORIAL

To the Editor:

A celebration of former Covelo resident deputy Jason Cox’s life was held on Saturday, October 12, at the Saturday Afternoon Club located in Ukiah. The memorial service started at 3:00 p.m. and ended about two hours later. About 200 people attended.

Notably absent were Sheriff Matt Kendal, retired Sheriff Tom Allman, and retired Covelo resident deputy supervisor Lieutenant Shannon Barney -- all from the Mendocino County Sheriff's Office (MCSO).

And what a life it was to celebrate!

Jason Cox was the most courageous law enforcement officer most of us will ever know. He crossed the "thin blue line" to report police corruption in his own department…and that, my friends, is often professional suicide, and, sometimes, it will actually get you killed.

I'll explain.

In 2006, then-deputy Jason Cox filed a whistleblower lawsuit alleging "sheep dipping" in the MCSO's Covelo unit. It was alleged that supervisors and commanders were either expressly or implicitly involved.

The sheep dipping practice involved junior deputies being coerced into wife swapping and other acts of adultery with the wives and girlfriends of other deputies -- illicit activities which were videotaped or photographed by supervisors.

Blackmail in hand, these deputies could then be controlled by their supervisors. They could be forced to participate in widespread corruption, especially during cannabis raids and seizures. At that time, cannabis was a $1 billion cash business in an underground economy in the Emerald Triangle, the Northern California region world-renown for the cannabis grown there.

Cox filed a whistleblower lawsuit. It was investigated. It was quietly settled by Mendocino County. The settlement was sealed, and Cox was required to sign a NDA.

Following the settlement, Cox was ordered out of the Covelo precinct for his own safety. He became a special undercover agent with the K-9 unit, then transferred to DA's Office where he was an investigator.

What happened next is shocking.

Deputies Eric Gore and Brett White allegedly committed "suicide" within a year of each other between 2006 and 2007. Many people have their doubts about the suicides.

Barney called in White's suicide on 911 while in White's home. (How did Barney come to be in White home? No one asked.)

White had shot himself.

Gore's suicide involved an anonymous 911 call and a fake bomb threat.

After shooting himself in his bathtub, Gore bled to death from the otherwise non-fatal gunshot while paramedics needlessly waited for over an hour for a bomb squad from Sonoma County Sheriff's Office.

Barney? He got promoted to a cush job doing “emergency preparedness planning” and he was transferred to the MCSO's headquarters in Ukiah. Barney had an office right next to the sheriff.

Police corruption, especially during cannabis raids and seizures, continued unabated for at least the next ten years in the Emerald Triangle.

It continued until the price of cannabis slowly collapsed in the years following the 2016 passage of Proposition 64. During that time, cannabis prices fell from an average of $3,000 a pound to $500 a pound.

In 2021, three Mendocino County marijuana cannabis farmers and a former police officer from Texas filed a new federal lawsuit alleging widespread theft, corruption, and coverups among local law enforcement officials policing the Emerald Triangle.

The lawsuit alleged “hundreds, if not thousands, of acts of extortion, theft, and robbery of cannabis, guns and cash” by law enforcement officials from at least four separate agencies, including the Mendocino County Sheriff’s Office, Mendocino County District Attorney’s Office, California Department of Fish and Wildlife, and Rohnert Park Police Department.

MCSO Sargent Bruce Smith was cited by name in the lawsuit.

Such is our way of life "behind the green curtain" in the Emerald Triangle.

Jason Cox took a stand against this way of life. He took a stand against police corruption. I said it once, and I'll say it again: Jason Cox was one of the most courageous people most of us will ever know.

Speaking at Cox's memorial on Saturday afternoon were Miguel Vazquez and Mike Smith. Both worked at the MCSO. But they weren't speaking in an official capacity. They spoke as Cox's friends and colleagues.

By my count, there were very few members of the Sheriff's Office among the group of 200 mourners. Maybe four or five. All but one were retired.

No active-duty representative in an official capacity from the MCSO was present at Cox's memorial service. No spokesman. No sheriff. No honor guard. No one.

And there was no Tom Allman and no Shannon Barney.

Allman now lives mostly in South Carolina and only returns to Mendocino County to close on a real estate deal or to have his ego stroked while hosting a local charity auction.

Barney lives in Montana where he mostly plays at being a “cowboy.”

At the memorial service, I was pleased to meet Jason Cox's wife, Shannon, a former deputy DA who now works in the county counsel's office. I also met Jason's children by his two marriages and his sister.

On Saturday, I learned a lot about Jason Cox.

I learned Cox transcended a very difficult childhood. His mother was seriously bipolar. I learned that even as a kid, Cox was smarter than most and had unshakeable integrity. He broke horses as a boy, worked in tractor trailer rigs, and once found his way back to his childhood home in Riverside, California after being abandoned by the side of the road in the middle of nowhere in New Mexico.

I also learned that Cox's K-9 dog was named Ben, and Cox and Ben were once photographed in full tactical gear rappelling out of a police helicopter.

Jason Cox died on September 17. He died of septic shock following pancreatitis. He was only 49, and no doubt PTSD was a contributing cause of death.

PTSD from being a whistleblower.

As they say, “Only the good die young.” Rest assured, Tom Allam and Shannon Barney both have long lives ahead of them. Allman is 63 and Barney is 57. And both have no money worries. Allman and Barney both collect big, fat six-figure pensions from the county.

R.I.P. Jason Cox. A long slow hand salute.

John Sakowicz

MCSO, Badge No. 2526 (2000-2004)

Ukiah

HISTORIC HOPLAND TAP OFF HIGHWAY 101 CLOSES, final concert Sunday night

Hopland Tap, with its historic 1880 brick building, bright green door and proximity to Highway 101, ended its six-year run this weekend, but is holding one last concert Sunday evening.

by Alana Minkler

A beloved taproom just off Highway 101 in Hopland, 45 miles north of Santa Rosa, is holding one last hoorah Sunday night after closing its doors this weekend due to a combination of setbacks, its owners said.

Hopland Tap, known for its historic brick building — which was constructed in 1880 — its bright green door and proximity to Highway 101, ended its six years in business on Saturday as a result of hardships related to three fires, two floods and the pandemic, according to a post the business made on social media.

“So long, and thanks for all the fun!” co-owner Ron Lindenbusch said in a Sept. 21 post on the business’ Facebook page. “It was worth a shot...the challenge was surreal, and we’re done.”

To show appreciation for Hopland Tap patrons and the surrounding community, the owners have hosted a handful of farewell concerts. They added in one last surprise post-closure concert at 7 p.m. Sunday.

The night’s farewell concert featured the band Weird Year and $5 craft beers.

The building at 13351 S. Highway 101, which has housed Hopland Tap for the past six years, had previously been home to the HopVine Saloon in the early 1900s, according to 1910 articles from the the Santa Rosa Republican (which eventually became The Press Democrat.)

From 1920 to 1933, during Prohibition, it appears the building served as a meat market, according to a 1992 Press Democrat article.

Once Prohibition ended, the site was occupied by the first brewpub in California since before Prohibition began. Called Hopland Brewery, it became the Mendocino Brewing Company, which created the iconic Red Tail Ale microbrew, according to Press Democrat archives.

The building’s original brick walls, dating back to the 1880s, and stamped tin cladding from 1906 are still there, according to Hopland Tap’s website.

Lindenbusch, co-owner and founder of Hopland Tap, is a former employee of the Mendocino Brewing Company and — in a 2018 Ukiah Daily Journal article announcing the Hopland Tap’s opening — described it as being “packed with fun.”

Lindenbusch, eventually became the longtime chief of marketing and sales for Lagunitas Brewing, but left that job to open Hopland Tap when he drove past the building saw it had a “For Lease” sign out front. He said he decided to resurrect the taproom.

In March 2020, the owners posted the bar would be forced to close due to the coronavirus. The announcement was accompanied by a picture of a whiteboard that read: “Stupid, Stupid Virus! Y’all stay safe & hang in there!”

The business reopened a few months later, but was again forced to close down temporarily due to overcrowding.

When the pandemic subsided, flooding and wildfires continued to impact the region, and the burden became too heavy for owners Ron and Cheryl Lindenbusch, according to social media.

“We truly love the Hopland community where we’ve made our home, and we’re not going anywhere so we’ll be seeing you around,” they said in their post.

(The Press Democrat)

COSTCO MOLESTER GUILTY

A Mendocino County Superior Court jury returned from its deliberations just before the close of business Tuesday afternoon to announce it had found the trial defendant guilty as charged.

Defendant Timothy Scott McIlvain, age 55, generally of Cloverdale, was convicted by jury verdict of misdemeanor sexual battery, misdemeanor attempted indecent exposure, and misdemeanor delaying or obstructing a peace officer.

In late May of this year the defendant groped an intimate part of a female food/drink sales demonstrator working at the Costco store in Ukiah. He then moved on to a different food/drink sales demonstrator and attempted to expose his penis to that woman.

After Costco management called for police assistance, the defendant delayed and obstructed the two Ukiah police officers who responded to the store to investigate.

While it was not brought to the attention of the jury, the defendant committed the above crimes while on court probation for a misdemeanor vandalism conviction he suffered here in Mendocino County in 2023. After the jury was excused, the Court found true the District Attorney’s allegations that the defendant had violated the terms of his probation on May 30th.

On motion of the DA, the defendant was remanded into the custody of the Sheriff pending sentencing or, alternatively, unless and until he posts a $30,000 bail bond.

The sentencing hearing now stands calendared for Thursday, October 31st at 1:30 o’clock in the afternoon in Department H of Ukiah’s downtown courthouse.

The law enforcement agency that investigated the May crimes was the Ukiah Police Department.

The DA’s Bureau of Investigation provided witness and courtroom support that allowed the People’s case to be presented to the jury in an efficient manner.

District Attorney David Eyster presented the People’s evidence to the jury and will also handle the sentencing hearing on the 31st.

The DA extends a special note of appreciation to the two women who showed courage by coming to court, confronting the defendant in the courtroom, and testifying before the jury about how defendant McIlvain had separately victimized each of them.

Retired Mendocino County Superior Court Judge Richard J. Henderson, sitting on temporary assignment, presided over the two-day trial. Judge Henderson will also preside over the sentencing hearing this coming Thursday morning.

CALLING ALL MASOCHISTS

by Tommy Wayne Kramer

We can and do empathize with those who for circumstances unexplained and perhaps inexplicable, toil at tasks that cannot be accomplished.

A man spending his days, years and lifetime pushing a boulder up a steep hill, only to have it always roll back to the bottom. It is to weep.

A woman locked in a room each night with a bale of hay, told she must convert the bale into pure gold by morning. Cruel fate!

A lowly spider ceaselessly climbing up a water spout, only to have rain strike when he reaches the top, washing him back down. Forever.

Pity now the public relations officer instructed to produce colorful pamphlets depicting Ukiah as a worthy destination for potential tourists. You ask the impossible!

Yet persist they must, those creative but doomed publicists trying to spin silk from thistle and turn dust to diamonds, as so many before them have tried. And failed. It cannot be done.

Ukiah is Ukiah, and no amount of printed prattle about a “charming downtown” or a “vibrant-anything” will bring innocents to the town, and certainly not twice.

Veteran tourists are knowledgeable, wary, and do not easily fall for glib PR fluff. They are not tricked into driving two hundred miles based on advice from an online blurb telling lies about the many fine activities in the Heart of Mendocino County.

Every tourist bureau is competing with every other tourist bureau to lure the same breed of tourist to its town. Every brochure and every website brags about its charming downtown, its historic neighborhoods and its close proximity to biking, hiking, kayaking, fine dining and golf.

Which got me to thinking.

I locked myself inside my cold stone turret with only a prayer mat for company, and I wondered and pondered and called upon Yahweh for guidance. I asked also that the same guidance be provided the wizards who strive to lure tourists to Ukiah. And lo, come the morning sun, all was revealed.

Vacationers and tourist seeking golf courses, kayaking options, gourmet dining, hiking and biking trails are sought by every tourist bureau. They all want hikers and bikers. They all want artsy folks driving BMWs and Porsches.

BULLETIN: These tourists have been hunted to extinction. Pebble Beach has the golf crowd, Carmel has everything else, and for Ukiah to compete is preposterous. It can’t be done.

But then, in that tiny tower turret following many minutes of meditation, there came a great unburdening from within. I suddenly knew the solution, and so did our local bureau.

Instead of mountain climbers and wine aficionados Ukiah needs to look elsewhere. I see that now, and so do the publicists who realize they must focus on a narrow, neglected but potentially lucrative demographic that all other tourist bureaus ignore.

QUESTION: “But Who?”

ANSWER: People Who Want To Be Tortured.

Masochists (and Sadists) are out there, but no other municipalities are catering to them. Starting now, let Ukiah be that destination. Go to: https://visitukiah.com/plan/explore/downtown/

Scroll down a bit. There, in big bold all-caps typeface overlaying a photo image of bar patrons, it reads:

DRINKS AND TASINGS

And yes, I agree that if anyone is curious about the effects of firing electronically charged staples into our flesh, we ought to first do some serious drinking.

After that comes the writhing in shock, pain, uncontrolled spasms of out-of-body horrors, and maybe soiled underwear.

And that’s our local tourism board’s best effort? “Visit Ukiah for Drinks and Tasings”?

Just my opinion, but it still sounds better than biking and kayaking with tourists from Marin.

ED NOTES

OLD TIMERS will remember Bicycle Man who sporadically appeared in Anderson Valley through the 1970s pushing his antique bicycle laden with what we assumed were all his worldly possessions. Some parents deployed Bicycle Man to scare their children into good behavior. “Better stop that or I'll call Bicycle Man.”

UP AND DOWN 128 he went, a semi-familiar warm weather sight. I don’t recall him asking for rides or any other form of assistance. Of indeterminate years, Bicycle Man was a self sufficient unit, a kind of throwback hobo. Brad Wylie wrote a story about him, I believe; maybe Brad will dig it up for us as the interesting little piece of valley history it is.

BICYCLE MAN was such a familiar sight for the several years he appeared in the Valley that we came to expect to see him, if not expect to chat with the famously non-communicative pedestrian.

ABOUT the same time a Russian hermit lived in a tree stump at Hendy Woods. I thought maybe Bicycle Man was on the road to visit his compatriot, but who knew? The Russian could be quite garrulous, although it was impossible to follow the bouncing ball of his life’s narrative, which had to have been a fascinating one. From Russia to a redwood tree in the Anderson Valley of California? There's a life trajectory for you!

SURELY you've noticed that the people who pick and prune the grapes tend to go unmentioned in the endless hype of the labor-dependent wine industry. The people who own the vineyards are called “grape growers” as if they aren’t really bankers, lawyers, stockbrokers, or fourth generation trust funders, not a true son of the soil among them, but seldom a word about the people who make their vanity possible.

“THE WINERY brought in 48 tons of zinfandel…” As if the whole show simply happened. Or the wine shills use the simple “it,” as in, “It has crushed more than 2,000 tons of chardonnay.” Sure it has. It being the farmworkers, it being Mexicans, it being Mexicans forced off their own little plots of land south of the border by the liberals, Clinton in particular, via NAFTA.

THEN THERE'S this one: “Winemakers watched sugar levels rise and flavors mature, and they made that critical call to bring in the crop.”

THE WINEMAKERS called the Mexicans, and the Mexicans came, at least the ones who weren’t in the hills working a much more lucrative plant. “It'll be coming in hot and heavy the next two weeks, maybe three weeks…” followed by, “The clusters that arrived at the crusher…”

EMPHASIZING the need to get the grapes off the vines, and pronto, we'll get a “grower” saying, “All the wine guys are getting the idea right now that they better get on it.”

MEXICANS. “I don’t know your feelings on this, but…” And so commences many a diatribe about “illegals” and, in this area anyway, how “the Mexicans are taking over.” There are, to put it mildly, tensions, and by god if we can’t add to them, who will? But seriously, it seems from here that the schools, as this fragmented community’s central institution, ought to carefully and clearly explain why and who gets into its programs, because the perception among the more excitable Anglos is that the schools “cater” to Mexicans, which is a tough perception to change when the student body is largely Spanish-speaking and an even tougher one when the reality is that the Anderson Valley contains many more Spanish-speaking young people than it does white English-speaking young people.

THE PERCEPTION, for once, is the reality. That reality is not going to change any time soon. But I remember a time not that long ago when parents avoided the Boonville schools because they thought the schools in Ukiah or Mendocino were better. Or offered programs more in line with what these parents thought their children needed. Or offered a student body more class-compatible with the student body desired by the young person’s parents for their young person.

BUT INSTRUCTION in Boonville is comparable to quality of instruction in Mendocino and Ukiah and, as a cursory glance at American culture establishes, the best art produced in this country has come from people who mostly educated themselves, if art is the standard you judge things by — and name a better one. These days, unless you’re born rich and get yourself one a them high-priced schoolin’s, education remains pretty much an existential affair. The schools are good at teaching the basics of reading and math, but as soon as the hormones kick in you’re on your own, educationally speaking.

BACK to The ReConquesta, if that’s still the subject of today’s sermon, San Francisco’s affluent parents, for instance, like white and Asian parents everywhere in the country, avoid public schools with large Black and/or Hispanic enrollments. Frisco’s schools are totally balkanized along racial lines. If the city's white and Asian parents can afford it, they opt out of the public schools altogether for private schools because, and this is what they all say privately, they fear their kid will be on the receiving end of violence, and they think that the public schools are overly tolerant of the aberrant, unruly behavior of students the public schools have to try to educate by law.

A FRIEND of mine just got his daughter into University High School in SF, a strong secondary school much favored by the city’s professionals. Daughter had attended the city’s public schools up through the 8th grade. She is fluent in Spanish and an A student. She was one of only a few white kids at both her elementary and junior high schools, which are located in the Mission District. “Now, at least,” her mother says, “she’ll be in a school where the kids won’t make fun of her for being a good student. She’ll finally be a nerd in a school of nerds.” Which isn’t evading the public high schools for race reasons, but hostility for the educational process is another prevalent reason for parents avoiding the public schools.

HERE in Mendo County, ambitious parents have been fleeing the public schools for years, but Boonville High School has sent white and Hispanic students to competitive colleges for years, a fact Boonville High School has every reason to be proud of without mentioning that it seldom graduates a young person who can’t read or write at least a little, a claim lots of high schools can’t honestly make.

“TO WHAT EXTENT was it an inter-species liaison between you and the does? I imagine they would butt up against your breasts; probably at those very times when you were nursing yourself. Did you get that first hit of awareness; how little differentiation there truly is between ourselves and other mammals?”

— Beth Bosk, asking a question of an interviewee for her ‘New Settler Interview’ magazine

FACT CHECK - WESTERN MOST POINT IN CONTIGUOUS US

The westernmost point in the contiguous United States is at Cape Alava, south of Cape Flattery in Olympic National Park.

Cape Blanco extends farther west than any point of land in the contiguous United States (lower 48 states) except portions of the Olympic Peninsula in Washington …

Cape Mendocino is Third - westernmost point in California

Dobie Dolphin

Albion

CATCH OF THE DAY, Sunday, October 13, 2024

AUGUSTINE FREASE, 53, Ukiah. Controlled substance, paraphernalia, failure to appear.

GABRIELE JASYTE, 34, Mendocino. Trespassing.

JONATHAN LAFORTUNE, 41. Ukiah. Disorderly conduct-alcohol.

AARON PETRI, 41, Fort Bragg. Fugitive from justice.

PRISCILLA RONCO, 39, Ukiah. Parole violation.

JOHN SCOTT, 62, Arcata/Piercy. DUI.

ASHTYN TAYLOR, 18, Ukiah. Possession of firearm without ID, pistol grip that produces conspicuously beneath the action of the weapon, unspecified offense.

JAIME TINAJERO, 46, Ukiah. DUI, false personation of another.

LANCE TREPPA, 40, Ukiah. Controlled substance, county parole violation.

VICTORIA VASQUEZ, 26, Ukiah. Controlled substance, suspended license, disobeying court order, failure to appear.

CHRISTINE WHITEHEAD, 33, Ukiah. Under influence, resisting.

VULGARITY EVERYWHERE

Editor:

In recent years I have sadly grown used to being in the proximity of people in the public square using vulgarities, often loudly. This is particularly true for some folks when they are talking on their phones. It has also become common for some drivers to believe that their music should be “shared” at top volume with anyone in the vicinity.

Now I notice there are billboards for cannabis dispensaries and “adult” shops that include language and phrases that seem to defy any sense of propriety, being necessarily placed in highly visible locations. I am not a prude. I came of age in the ’60s and ’70s and lived with a father who swore like a sailor. I myself swear frequently when the occasion and location warrant. I simply believe in the notion of time and place for all things. This apparently quaint notion appears to be losing ground.

Richard A. Durr

Santa Rosa

A NEW WOLF PACK, IRATE RANCHERS, AND THE ASTONISHING COMEBACK OF CALIFORNIA’S MOST CELEBRATED PREDATOR

by Kurtis Alexander

QUINCY, Plumas County — Everyone cheered. Except the cowboys.

On a balmy night in this rural northern Sierra town, a California wildlife official announced at a conservation forum that the state’s new population of wolves was growing “exponentially.” After years of uncertainty, he said, the animals were thriving.

The crowd of locals, which included college students and outdoorsy types, largely welcomed the report. But not those in the wide-brimmed hats and dusty ball caps. The few dozen or so unexpected guests at the recent Audubon Society speaker series in Quincy waited for the presentation to finish, then lobbed grievances toward the stage.…

https://www.sfchronicle.com/california/article/wolf-pack-wolves-quincy-19748024.php

S.F.’S NEW COUNTERCULTURE MUSEUM TO TELL THE STORY OF HAIGHT-ASHBURY IN THE 1960S

by Sam Whiting

The Counterculture Museum at the intersection of San Francisco’s Haight and Ashbury streets got off to an early and unofficial start this week when curator Jerry Cimino hung a poster of the Human Be-In of 1967 on a white brick wall visible through the picture window of his empty storefront.

Right away tourists were pressed up against the window, so Cimino hung a banner that read “Counterculture Museum Coming Spring 2025.” That excited them so much they started taking pictures of the banner.

And that’s how, as of Tuesday, anticipation was already building for a place that will give context to San Francisco’s most famous corner. Cimino’s plan is to tell the story of Haight-Ashbury in the 1960s in the same way that the Beat Museum tells the story of North Beach in the 1950s.

Cimino can say this with confidence because he operates both attractions, and the Beat has been going for 21 years as a learning hub and bookstore with exhibitions that rely mostly on posters, vintage films, periodicals and ephemera.

In essence, the Counterculture Museum will be a continuation of the Beat Museum, with a special admissions deal offered to people who want to see both.

“The whole intent is to concisely encapsulate how history influences our present and into the future,” said Cimino, who has been nursing the Counterculture Museum idea since before the COVID-19 pandemic.

There have been starts and stops and deals in other neighborhoods that looked perfect until they fell through — all of which is fortuitous, because the ideal location came along only in June, after a clothing store called RVCA folded in a space that was formerly a Gap store.

As proof, museum art director Brandon Loberg grabbed a famous 1967 picture of the Grateful Dead gathered around a Haight-Ashbury signpost, went to the window and held it up to show exactly how that image was framed by photographer Herb Greene

“From that perspective, seeing the roof lines of Ashbury Street at Haight, tells me we are exactly where we need to be in order to bring these stories to life,” said Loberg.

It is important to note that the Counterculture Museum does not own a vintage print of that picture — nor does it own, as of yet, a single artifact rare and valuable enough to merit display in an art museum. But the term “museum” has a tradition of being loosely defined in San Francisco, an example being the now-defunct Bigfoot, UFO & Loch Ness Monster Museum, which opened in the mid-’90s.

Cimino’s own Beat Museum was open for eight years before he had a single major attraction that was donated, not loaned. That was a 1949 Hudson Commodore that was used in the movie version of “On the Road.” It was the same model as the one Neal Cassady drove.

“You don’t need Jerry Garcia’s guitar, which is worth millions, to tell Jerry Garcia’s story,” said Cimino. “People come to museums to learn and to have experiences and to understand how the items they are looking at relate to their lives.”

Cimino and his wife and business partner, Estelle, are counting on that, because they have a 15-year lease on 4,600 square feet — a space one-third larger than the Beat Museum. The Counterculture Museum is being operated as a nonprofit, and $300,000 has been raised from philanthropy, which is enough to launch the place. City government, through its SF Shines promotion of small businesses, provided a $25,000 grant for architectural and design services.

On Tuesday, Cimino walked into the Relic Vintage boutique two doors down and introduced himself and his idea to proprietor Oran Scott. “You mean like the Beat Museum?” Scott answered, not knowing how accurate he was.

“It’s not a chain store,’’ he told a reporter later, ‘and it will bring people to the neighborhood.’

Across the street, at a gift shop called Haight & Ashbury, Chris Warren said the Counterculture Museum is “focusing on what people come here for. They come for the musical history and to see where the Dead lived, where Janis (Joplin) lived. This will only add interest.”

But the Ciminos see their mission as broader than the Summer of Love. If you are only interested in that, there are perpetually a half dozen people sitting on the corner opposite the museum strumming guitars and reliving it.

Rather, the museum’s exhibition space will be divided into five categories: the Beats, the hippies, civil rights, feminism and LGBTQ+

“Counterculture is more expansive than just the hippies,” said Estelle, executive director of the museum. “It’s anything that goes against the grain of normal.”

But the hippies are what brings people to the Haight, and the Ciminos have a wish list of 100 items they would like for their opening. A poster from writer Ken Kesey’s famous 1966 “Acid Test” at Longshoremen’s Hall, known as the event that kicked off the psychedelic era, is at the top of it.

They are confident that even if the collection is sparse when the museum opens — tentatively March 1, 2025 — it won’t stay that way.

The Beat Museum started with nothing but used books and reprinted photos. Then people started dropping stuff off. There are now more than 10,000 items in the collection and not enough room to show them all. As a result, the basement of the Ciminos’ North Beach home is overflowing.

“There are tens of millions of hippies still out there and they’ve all got stuff in the attic that their kids don’t want,” said Cimino. “We get boxes unexpectedly coming in the mail. Some of it is Beat and some of it is hippie because they are so closely linked.”

(SF Chronicle)

ON-LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY

My parents live in the Tampa Bay area. I am glad they are allowed to evacuate to safety. I am furious at my own government for denying this right to people in Gaza, which thanks to the US and Israel has become “a mass death trap.” The moral stain will be indelible.”

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MIKE GENIELLA:

JUST SAY NO. Israel's far-right leadership led by Bibi Netanyahu continues its murderous assaults on civilians in Gaza and Lebanon with $19 billion in military aid from the U.S. this year alone. Now it wants our high-tech defense to protect it from Iranian missile attacks as it enemies seek retaliation. Someone needs to tell Israel to get serious about a cease-fire, and only then will the U.S. provide the latest defense systems.

The United States is sending an advanced missile defense system to Israel, along with about 100 American troops to operate it, the Pentagon announced on Sunday. It is the first deployment of U.S. forces to Israel since the Hamas-led attacks there on Oct. 7, 2023.

U.S. to Deploy Missile Defense System and About 100 Troops to Israel

The Pentagon announced it would send the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense battery and its crew as Israel considered retaliatory attacks against Iran.

President Biden directed Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III to deploy the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense system, or THAAD, and its crew, Maj. Gen. Patrick Ryder, the Pentagon press secretary, said in a statement on Sunday.

The move will put American troops operating the ground-based interceptor, which is designed to defend against ballistic missiles, closer to the widening war in the Middle East. It comes after Iran launched about 200 missiles, including ballistic missiles, at Israel on Oct. 1 and as Israel plans its retaliatory attack.

When asked about it on Sunday, Mr. Biden said only that he had ordered the Pentagon to deploy the system “to defend Israel.” General Ryder said in his statement that the battery would “augment Israel’s integrated air defense system.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/10/13/us/politics/us-missile-defense-iran-israel.html

— NYT, SUNDAY

THE PRIMARY FUNCTION of the Democratic Party is to sell stuff to the populace the Republicans can't get away with on their own, like throwing single mothers and children off the welfare rolls or exporting America's blue collar jobs to Mexico and China. Briskly enough, Bill Clinton handed economic policy over to the Wall Street traders, led by his Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin. The Clinton years saw a bubble boom, pushed along by consumer-spending by the rich. The ratio of wages for the average worker to the pay of the average CEO went from 113 to 1 in 1991, just before Clinton stepped into the White House, to 449 to 1 when he quit. The overall bargaining position of labor got worse, as did the situation of the very poor. Two-thirds of Clinton's famed fiscal turnaround stemmed from cuts in government spending relative to GDP (54%), something well beyond Republican capabilities.

— Alexander Cockburn

TIME FOR A UNITED FRONT AGAINST TRUMP AND REALISM ABOUT HARRIS

If it becomes a reality, the Trump-Vance administration will force progressives back on their heels, necessarily preoccupied with trying to mitigate the onslaught of massive damage.

by Norman Solomon

With Election Day just three weeks off and voting already underway in some states, the race for president is down to the wire. Progressives could make the difference.

While no one in their left mind plans to vote for the fascistic and unhinged Donald Trump, some say they won’t vote for Kamala Harris because of her loyalty to President Biden’s support for the Israeli war on Gaza. That might enable Trump to win with enough electoral votes from swing states—Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.

Those seven states are where progressives may well hold the future in their voting hands.

The policy that Harris has defended for the war on Gaza is despicable. At the same time, she is the only candidate who can spare us from another Trump presidency, which—from all indications—would be far worse than the first one.

The need is urgent for dialectics—“a method of examining and discussing opposing ideas in order to find the truth”—in this case, the truth of what’s most needed at this electoral crossroads of fateful history.

“The harms of the other options” mean that the best course of action is to vote for Harris, 25 Islamic clerics said in a letter released last week. They focused on an overarching truth: “Particularly in swing states, a vote for a third party could enable Trump to win that state and therefore the election.” The U.S. clerics called such a vote “both a moral and a strategic failure.”

Personally, as a resident of solid-blue California, I have no intention of voting for Harris. But if I lived in one of the seven swing states, I wouldn’t hesitate to join in voting for her as the only way to defeat Trump.

Some speak of the need to exercise conscience rather than voting for Harris. Yet in swing states, what kind of “conscience” is so self-focused that it risks doing harm to others as a result of a Trump presidency?

If it becomes a reality, the Trump-Vance administration will force progressives back on their heels, necessarily preoccupied with trying to mitigate the onslaught of massive damage being inflicted by right-wing zealots with vast government power.

On domestic policies—involving racism, reproductive rights, civil liberties, the environment, climate, labor rights, the social safety net, civil rights, voting rights, LGBTQ rights, freedom of speech and the right to organize, the judicial system, and so much more—the differences between the Trump and Harris forces are huge. To claim that those differences are insignificant is a nonsensical version of elitism, no matter how garbed in leftist rhetoric.

On foreign policy, Harris is the vice president in an administration fully on board with bipartisan militarism that keeps boosting the Pentagon budget, bypassing diplomacy for ending the Ukraine war while stoking the cold war, and—with vast arms shipments to Israel— literally making possible the ongoing genocide in Gaza.

At the same time, anyone who thinks that Trump (“finish the job”) wouldn’t be even worse for Palestinian people—hard as that is to imagine—doesn’t grasp why Israel’s prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu is so eager for Trump to win.

The leadership of the Uncommitted movement has sorted out the political options. The terrain was well described by Uncommitted leader Abbas Alawieh, who said last month: “At this time, our movement opposes a Donald Trump presidency whose agenda includes plans to accelerate the killing in Gaza while intensifying the suppression of anti-war organizing. And our movement is not recommending a third-party vote in the presidential election, especially as third-party votes in key swing states could help inadvertently deliver a Trump presidency, given our country’s broken Electoral College system.”

As his frequent collaborator C.J. Polychroniou noted last month, Noam Chomsky “has repeatedly made the argument that voting for a third-party or independent candidate in a swing state would accomplish nothing but increase the possibility of the most extreme and positively nuts candidate winning the election.”

In an interview with Jacobin a few weeks ago, Alawieh had this to say: “As someone who has family who lives in South Lebanon right now—who are living under the terror of U.S. weapons raining down on them from the Israeli military —I do not have the luxury of giving up on the only one of the two major parties where there is room for this debate. To be clear, there’s room for this debate not because the Democratic Party is friendly to Palestinian human rights. There’s room for this debate because A) the Republican Party is not the party where we can have this conversation; not a single federal elected official on the Republican side even supports a cease-fire as this genocide has raged on, and B) the Democratic Party speaks of being the party of justice and inclusion, and there are more and more of us within the party who are insisting that the party change its immoral and illegal support of sending weapons to harm and kill civilians.”

Similarly, another prominent Uncommitted movement leader, Palestinian American Layla Elabed, said: “We urge uncommitted voters to register anti-Trump votes and vote up and down the ballot. Our focus remains on building this anti-war coalition, both inside and outside the Democratic Party.”

This is certainly not the presidential election that we want, but it’s the one we have. The immediate task is to prevent a Trump victory. His defeat is essential to keep doors open for progressive change that a new Trump presidency would slam shut with extreme right-wing power.

“I believe that today more than ever a book should be sought after even if it has only one great page in it: we must search for fragments, splinters, toenails, anything that has ore in it, anything that is capable of resuscitating the body and soul.”

— Henry Miller

"To be silent the whole day, see no newspaper, hear no radio, listen to no gossip, be thoroughly and completely lazy, thoroughly and completely indifferent to the fate of the world is the finest medicine a man can give himself."

— Henry Miller

THREE REASONS I’M VOTING FOR DONALD TRUMP

by Michael Goodwin

In endorsing Kamala Harris, The New York Times said many strange things, starting with the headline. It called Harris “The only patriotic choice for president.”

Color me curious because the Times frowns on anyone who identifies as an American patriot. The Gray Lady’s knees jerk at a word it associates with being a white racist who has a blue collar job and lives in a fly-over state.

For the snooty jet set, patriotism is for suckers and Donald Trump supporters.

Yet here is the Times draping Harris in red, white and blue. It’s as phony as her claim that she’s “fighting” for the middle class.

The weird vibe grew weirder because the first three paragraphs of the endorsement were all about how rotten, terrible, awful Trump is.

Not until the fourth paragraph did the paper mention Harris, and it came with a backhanded compliment. After saying, “regardless of any political disagreements voters might have with her,” the editorial repeated the claim that she is “the only patriotic choice.”

It’s like saying we know you don’t like her or her policies, but the other guy is worse. Trust us.

Hell no!

Gray Lady’s Old Routine

There was zero doubt Harris would get the endorsement because the Times hasn’t backed a Republican for president since Dwight Eisenhower in 1956. But what is striking is the extremely weak case the editors present.

Unable to find a solid thing to say, the paper claimed she “has offered a shared future for all citizens, beyond hate and division,” as if every candidate doesn’t promise that. It also lowered the bar to say “She has begun to describe a set of thoughtful plans to help American families.”

“Begun?” She’s been vice president for nearly four years, the nominee for months — and is just starting “to describe” her policies?

Fortunately, making the case for Trump is much easier. Here are the three main reasons why I am voting for him.

First, he’s been right on the domestic issues that are most important — the economy and the border. A Wall Street Journal poll finds that voters in seven battleground states prefer him on both.

By 10 points, the Journal writes, respondents say Trump would better handle the economy. His margin jumps to 16 points on border security and immigration. The comparisons are beyond dispute.

On the economy, Dems engaged in binge-spending that inflated prices by some 30% on food, energy and other essentials, and most workers’ real wages have fallen.

Until COVID came along in Trump’s final year, inflation was low and real wages were rising, especially for working-class Americans.

Thanks to tax cuts and deregulation, black and Latino workers were narrowing the income gap with whites.

A rising tide really was lifting all boats.

The border offers an even more dramatic comparison. Trump built some of the wall he promised and developed tough policies, including the “remain in Mexico” program that required asylum seekers to wait there until hearings were held.

Out of pure hatred for anything Trump did, Biden and Harris ended those policies and sent a “come and get it signal” to the world.

Well, the world came, to the tune of more than 12 million people.

City and state taxpayers across the nation are being staggered by the costs, terror watch lists are swamped and officials lost track of more than 300,000 children who crossed the border without a parent, according to the Department of Homeland Security

World-class Leadership

Foreign policy is the second reason why I’m voting for Trump, and again the Journal finds the public agrees he did a better job. Its poll reports that, by 50% to 39%, battleground voters say he is better able to handle the Russia-Ukraine war.

By 48% to 33%, they say Trump would better handle the Israel-Hamas war.

The fundamental difference is that Trump understands the concept of peace through strength, while Biden and Harris see American power mostly as a shameful relic — which flashes weakness to dictators.

Their cut-and-run from Afghanistan led Iran, Russia and China to fill the vacuum. Israel and Ukraine are the first victims, but four more years would create more conflicts and raise the odds of global war.

The culture wars are the third big reason why I want Trump elected. The rise of antisemitism on college campuses reflects a dereliction by university presidents, faculties and administrators.

Yet Biden and Harris have mouthed only platitudes while undercutting Israel’s fight for survival against Islamic terrorists, who are also our enemies.

And the White House is shamefully silent about domestic antisemitism because it’s coming from their party’s left wing.

Other examples of cultural madness include the administration’s attacks on the First and Second Amendments, the near-religious devotion to transgender ideology and using elementary schools to indoctrinate children in radical gender and race theories.

Finally, there is the use of legislation and the courts to punish political opponents.

A dozen blue states tried to keep Trump off this year’s ballot, and the former president is the first in history to face prosecution after leaving office.

All the cases were brought by Democrat prosecutors, and bear the fingerprints of the White House.

A Trump victory would be a resounding rebuke to all these assaults and a comeuppance for the corrupt media that forfeited credibility in lockstep support of the leftist agenda.

His Own Worst Enemy

Given his record and the way the world is unraveling, Trump should be heading toward a landside.

He’s not and there’s one clear reason: him.

More specifically, his use of nasty, childish insults instead of arguments is part of an inexplicable pattern that turns off many voters.

Day after day, he calls opponents and critics dumb, stupid, lunatics, crazy and idiots. Women are the most frequent targets.

All insults, all the time was a novelty — in 2015.

If you were an undecided voter, especially a woman, would Trump calling Harris or Liz Cheney dumb” or “stupid” make you vote for him — or against him?

That’s not to suggest his crude language is more important than his policies. But in a race this tight, almost anything could be decisive.

And if Trump wins, alienating large numbers of people with insults will make it harder to get anything done. Governing requires compromises and trust.

The day after he was wounded in the first assassination attempt, a shocked Trump told me, “I want to try to unite the country.”

As we sat on his plane en route to the GOP convention in Milwaukee, a white bandage covering his right ear, he seemed wistful about the challenge, saying “I don’t know if it’s possible.”

To be sure, Dems are no better and often worse. The language many use about Trump and his followers is part of why he was the would-be assassins’ target.

Still, as the campaign enters the final stretch, Trump should remember why he thought it important to tone down the rhetoric.

And this time he should do something about it and lead by example.

HOW TO CONTROL SLAVES

by William Lynch, 1772

Gentlemen:

I greet you here on the bank of the James River in the year of our lord, one thousand seven hundred and twelve. First, I shall thank you, the gentlemen of the of the colony of Virginia, for bringing me here. I am here to help you solve some of your problems with slaves. Your invitation reached me in my modest plantation in the West Indies where I have experimented with some of the newest and still the oldest method for control of slaves. Ancient Rome would envy us if my program is implemented. As our boat sailed south on the James River, named for our illustrious King James, whose Bible we Cherish, I saw enough to know that our problem is not unique. While Rome used cords or wood as crosses for standing human bodies along the old highways in great numbers, you are here using the tree and the rope on occasion.

I caught the whiff of a dead slave hanging from a tree a couple of miles back. You are losing valuable stock by hangings, you are having uprisings, slaves are running away, your crops are sometimes left in the fields too long for maximum profit, you suffer occasional fires, your animals are killed, Gentleman— You know what your problems are; I do not need to elaborate. I am not here to enumerate your problems, I am here to introduce you to a method of solving them.

In my bag, I have a foolproof method for controlling your slaves. I guarantee everyone of you that if installed it will control the slaves for at least three hundred years. My method is simple, any member of your family or any Overseer can use it.

I have outlined a number of differences among the slaves, and I take these differences and make them bigger. I use Fear, Distrust, and Envy for control purposes. These methods have worked on my modest plantation in the West Indies, and it will work throughout the South. Take this simple little list of differences and think about them. On the top of my list is “Age” but it is only there because it starts with an “A”; The second is “Color” or shade; there is Intelligence, Size, Sex, Size Of Plantation, Attitude of owner, whether the slaves live in the valley, on a hill, east or west, north, south, have fine or coarse hair, or are tall or short. Now that you have a list of differences, I shall give you an outline of action. But before that, I shall assure you that Distrust Is Stronger Than Trust, And Envy Is Stronger Than Adulation, Respect Or Admiration.

The black slave, after receiving this indoctrination, shall carry on and will become self-refueling and self-generating for hundreds of years, maybe thousands.

Don't forget you must pitch the old black males vs. the young black males, and the young black male against the old black male. You must use the dark skinned slaves vs the light skin slaves. You must use the female vs the male, and the male vs the female. You must always have your servants and Overseers distrust all blacks, but it is necessary that your slaves trust and depend on us.

Gentlemen, these methods are your keys to control, use them. Never miss an opportunity. My plan is guaranteed, and the good thing about this plan is that if used intensely for one year the slave will remain perpetually distrustful of his fellow slaves.

Louisa Jenkins casually smokes a cigarette as the police try to question her at a protest in 1957.

Louise Jenkins Meriwether, a novelist, essayist, journalist and social activist, was the only daughter of Marion Lloyd Jenkins and his wife, Julia. Meriwether was born May 8, 1923 in Haverstraw, New York to parents who were from South Carolina where her father worked as a painter and a bricklayer and her mother worked as a domestic.

After the stock market crash of October 24, 1929, Louise’s family migrated from Haverstraw to New York City. They moved to Brooklyn first, and later to Harlem. The third of five children, Louise grew up in the decade of the Great Depression, a time that would deeply affect her young life and ultimately influence her as a writer.

Despite her family’s financial plight, Louise Jenkins attended Public School 81 in Harlem and graduated from Central Commercial High School in downtown Manhattan. In the 1950’s, she received a B.A. degree in English from New York University before meeting and marrying Angelo Meriwether, a Los Angeles teacher. Although this marriage and a later marriage to Earle Howe ended in divorce, Louise continues to use the Meriwether name. In 1965, Louise earned an M.A. degree in journalism from the University of California at Los Angeles.

Meriwether was hired by Universal Studios in the 1950’s to became the first black story analyst in Hollywood’s history. Beginning in the early 1960’s, Meriwether also wrote and published articles in the Los Angeles Sentinel on African Americans such as opera singer Grace Bumbry, Attorney Audrey Boswell, and Los Angeles jurist, Judge Vaino Spencer. In 1967, Meriwether joined the Watts Writers’ Workshop (a group created in response to the Watts Riot of 1965) and worked as a staff member of that project.

Her first book, Daddy Was a Number Runner, a fictional account of the economic devastation of Harlem in the Great Depression, appeared in 1970 as the first novel to emerge from the Watts Writers’ Workshop. It received favorable reviews from authors James Baldwin and Paule Marshall. Daddy Was a Number Runner, is a fictional account of the historical and sociological devastation of the economic Depression on Harlem residents.

Meriwether followed with the publication of three historical biographies for children on civil war hero Robert Smalls (1971), pioneer heart surgeon, Dr. Daniel Hale Williams (1972) and civil rights activist Rosa Parks (1973). In addition to numerous short stories, Meriwether published novels, Fragments of the Ark (1994) and Shadow Dancing (2000). Louise Meriwether has taught creative writing at Sarah Lawrence College and the University of Houston. She is a member of the Harlem Writers Guild.

“I am a writer, and also a dedicated activist and peacenik. In New York City in my twenties I was chapter chairman of my union, marching in May Day Parades and having rotten eggs thrown at my head. In Los Angeles I was arrested in a sit-in against the racist Birch Society and sentenced to five years probation. In Bogalusa, Louisiana, I worked with the Congress of Racial Equality; back in New York I was instrumental in keeping Muhammad Ali, then world’s heavyweight champion, from fighting in South Africa and breaking a cultural boycott. In Washington D.C. I was arrested in 2002 in a protest against the disastrous policies of the World Bank and the IMF. Back in New York I was active in several forums breaking the silence about the rampant rape in the Congo and the multinational corporations and countries involved. Last year I helped set up a forum at Riverside Church on the Abolition of Nuclear Weapons.” ⁣
⁣
In addition to her civil rights activism, Jenkins has also written several children’s books on important African American figures in history, which include Robert Smalls, Daniel Hale Williams, and Rosa Parks.⁣
⁣
“After publication of my first novel … I turned my attention to black history for the kindergarten set, recognizing that the deliberate omission of Blacks from American history has been damaging to the children of both races. It reinforces in one a feeling of inferiority and in the other a myth of superiority,” she said.⁣

She passed away on October 10, 2023.

IN PRAISE OF THE FIRST PIANO DUETS

by David Yearsley

The season has changed, if reluctantly. Time to put the storm windows on the old clapbord house, tune the grand piano and take out a volume of 18th-century duets off the nearby music shelf. And so, this tribute to those composed by Charles Burney in the 1770s; these charming pieces were, like his four-volume History of Music, the first of their sort ever published.

The triumphant opening of Johann Gottfried Müthel’s Duetto in E-Flat strides across a continent, from its native Riga on the Baltic Sea where it was published 1771 right into Charles Burney’s drawing room in 1775 in St. Martin’s Street in London, the one-time home of Isaac Newton. Burney brought the work back from his European travels of 1772, like the spoils of war reaped by a conquering general, or like the marbles Lord Elgin would relocate some thirty years later from the Parthenon to the British Isles (where they were admired by Burney’s daughter Sarah, who saw casts of the statues in the London house of William Richard Hamilton, Elgin’s personal secretary).

That the mighty Duetto could be heard to reflect not only interior psychological dramas but also an ethos of colonial exploration and expansion is, I like to think, implicit in Burney’s treatment of Müthel at the end of his travel diaries, published in three volumes in the early 1770s as the Present State of Music in France, Italy, Germany, The Netherlands, and the United Provinces: “When a student upon keyed instruments,” wrote Burney, “has vanquished all the difficulties to be found in the lessons of Handel, Scarlatti, Schobert, Eckard, and C. P. E. Bach; and, like Alexander, laments that nothing more remains to conquer, I would recommend to him, as an exercise of patience and perseverance, the compositions of Müthel; which are so full of novelty, taste, grace, and contrivance, that I should not hesitate to rank them among the greatest productions of the present age.” Another of Burney’s daughters, the famous novelist Frances (called Fanny), updated the military metaphor in her own journal calling the fabulously popular piece the “big gun” of the 1775 season of the Burney salon: the duet’s cannonades and soliloquys sent thrills of pleasure through the attendees—diplomats, explorers, foreign princes, English lords and ladies.

Bringing home printed music may not have been as as difficult or as costly as transporting marble antiquities, but duets for two keyboards were not an altogether inexpensive proposition: until the mid-1770s in London you had to have two harpsichords or pianos to be able to play four-handed music as the genre was then practiced. The Müthel duet and lesser works of its ilk required means beyond those of many everyday middle-class musical consumers. Less lofty in technical ambition and less demanding of musical furniture, Burney’s Four Sonatas or Duets For two Performers on One Piano-Forte or Harpsichord were written the next year, the author proudly claiming at the outset of his preface to the volume published in 1777 that they were “the first that have appeared in print.”

To be sure, the market was potentially a good deal larger for this four-handed mode than for duets for two players at a pair of keyboards: anticipating robust demand, the set was sold, as the title page announced, “at all the Music Shops” of London. In his preface Burney enumerated the pedagogical merits of the new approach: students could practice at the same time and far less tuning time was necessary. Owning and maintaining two harpsichords may have not been a problem for someone who had the Swiss-born inventor (of keyboards and other contrivances) John Joseph Merlin more-or-less on the family staff. But not everyone had such grand rooms, resident technicians, and the requisite instruments for musical entertainment of this sort: the single-keyboard duet avoided, as Burney put it, “the inconvenience of crowding a room”—a gracious way of praising the merits and defending the décor of the modest middle-class parlor.

The physical proximity of the players at a single keyboard could also be turned to advantage in teaching proper deportment: “And though, at first, the near approach of the hands of the different performers may seem awkward and embarrassing, a little use and contrivance with respect to the manner of placing them, and their choice of fingers, will soon remove that difficulty.” Burney signed his preface “St. Martin’s Street, January 1777”—thus placing his new duets in the most celebrated musical drawing room in London. Even on the home turf of the behemoth that was the Müthel, Burney’s own intimate duets offered an enticing four-handed alternative.

Many of Burney 57 keyboard students—this daunting teaching load made it possible for him to live in the house in St. Martin’s Street—frequented his house concerts. For all their glamour, these events were part of his brand, and, though free of charge, indirectly contributed to his livelihood. Yet as his letters make clear these gatherings were not always his favorite way to spend a Sunday afternoon.

Of lowly Shropshire origins, Burney was—notwithstanding his associations with Samuel Johnson, Thomas Boswell, David Garrick, Joshua Reynolds and other luminaries—a working man among the wealthy. Burney’s rise to become the fashionable set’s favorite music master and a metropolitan man of letters was inextricably linked to the history of the piano in England, the kind of instrument praised for its chiaroscuro effects in his preface to the 1777 duets; it was in this rapidly evolving keyboard culture of mid-century England that the young man made his steep ascent from servitude to self-made cosmopolitan— the good Dr. Burney who would consort with famous artists, writers, and aristocrats.

Burney had come to London in the early 1740s as the indentured musical servant of the cruelly exploitative Thomas Arne, a major composer on the capital’s theatre scene. Burney also did odd jobs for the harpsichord maker Jacob Kirkman, whose sumptuous instruments were prized by the wealthy. According to Burney’s memoirs, Fulke Greville— the rakish High Sheriff of Wiltshire, Member of Parliament, and high stakes gambler—went to Kirkman’s shop in 1746 in search of a musical servant and interlocutor who “had a mind and cultivation, as well as finger and ear.” Taking a dim view of the sociable and intellectual gifts of musicians in general, Greville maintained that no such person existed, but Kirkman immediately thought of the witty and companionable Burney. In the event, Greville was swiftly taken by Burney’s musical gifts and humor, and promptly hired him as music master at his country residence, Wilbury House, where Burney lived in 1748-9.

One of the chief reasons Greville had gone to Kirkman’s shop in the first place was because he wanted help with, and lessons, on a prized fortepiano he had recently purchased from Samuel Crisp. Seventeen years older than Burney, Crisp would become a central figure in the great historian’s life and that of his family, especially dear to Burney’s most famous daughter, Fanny. Burney later described Crisp and Greville as the “travelled and heterodox gentlemen” who taught him to appreciate modern Italian music. Other than Neapolitan opera, Burney did not specify which proclivities—and/or debaucheries— this heterodoxy involved.

Crisp had inherited a substantial fortune that he then burned through at an impressive rate on his lengthy Grand Tour in Italy where he studied music and fine arts and collected antiquities, books, and musical instruments—including a pianoforte, perhaps the first such instrument of its kind to arrive in England, transported there by Crisp on his return to his family home west of London in 1740. Soon, however, the cash-strapped Crisp had begun selling off his collection of musical instruments including his prized pianoforte. We read about this instrument in the entry on the “harpsichord” that Burney wrote for the great British reference work of the early nineteenth century, Abraham Rees’s Cyclopædia:

“the first [pianoforte] that was brought to England was made by an English monk at Rome, Father Wood, for an English friend (the late Samuel Crisp, esq. of Chessington, … a man of learning, and of exquisite taste in all the fine arts. The tone of this instrument was so superior to that produced by quills, with the additional power of producing all the shades of piano and forte by the finger, that though the mechanism were so imperfect that nothing quick could be executed upon it, yet the dead march in [Handel’s] Saul, and other solemn and pathetic strains, when executed with taste and feeling by a master a little accustomed to the touch, excited equal wonder and delight to the hearers. Fulke Greville, esq. purchased this instrument of Mr. Crisp for 100 guineas, and it remained unique in this country for several.”

The price of 100 guineas was considerable—twice that of a top-quality two-manual harpsichord from Kirkman. This particular piano was of great historic and aesthetic value for Burney. It was at Greville’s country house that Burney met Crisp in the autumn of 1747.

Crisp continued living in his ancestral home outside of London through the performance of his verse tragedy Virginia mounted, rather reluctantly, by David Garrick at the Drury Lane Theatre 1754. This venture contributed to the already catastrophic sapping of Crisp’s inheritance, forcing him finally to sell his house and the rest of his belongings. He then joined his ruined friend Christopher Hamilton in Surrey at Chessington Hall, a rambling and dilapidated mansion said to date from 1520, set among muddy fields and difficult of access. The two men shared household expenses and when, after Hamilton’s death in 1759, his unmarried sister Sarah set up a boarding-house in the house, Crisp became her first boarder. Crisp called himself Lem and professed to share Gulliver’s view that men are yahoos. Yet Crisp remained kindly and sociable, at least to the Burneys—though not to Fulke Greville, with whom he had become estranged, cantankerously refusing to give him directions to hard-to-find Chessington.

Crisp and Burney had met again in London in 1763 and from then on kept in close contact, remaining dear friends until Crisp’s death in 1783; Chessington Hall became a regular country retreat in the summer holidays for Burney and members of his family. Fanny called Chessington “a place of peace, ease, freedom & cheerfulness, & all its inhabitants are good humoured & obliging—& my dear Mr Crisp alone would make it, to us, a Paradise.” (Crisp’s portrait was painted at Chessington in 1782 by Charles Burney’s nephew, the artist Edward Francisco Burney.)

Crisp had an especially close relationship to Fanny, who was forty-five years younger than he: Crisp became her dear second “Daddy,” while he referred to her as “Fannikin.” She regularly sent him installments of her brilliant journals, getting in return, as she put it, the “most delightful long, & incomparably clever Letters, giving frank advice on her conduct, marriage prospects, and finances, as well as her writings. Aspects of Crisps’ character provided material for Mr. Villars in her break-out novel Evelina (1778) and later in Sir Jaspar Herrington in the darker baroque of The Wanderer (1814).

Among the many long letters Fanny sent to Daddy Crisp were two from 1775 describing in vivid detail the performances of and enthusiastic reactions to Müthel’s Duetto: “the Noblest Composition that was ever made” wrote Fanny to Crisp in November of that year. “Nothing could exceed the general applause. Mr. Harris was in extacy; Sr. James Lake who is silent & shy, broke forth into the warmest expressions of delight—Lady Lake, more prone to be pleased, was quite in raptures—the charming Baroness repeatedly declared she had never been at so agreeable a Concert before; & many said They had never heard music till then.” Fanny concluded: “It is not possible for Instrumental music to be more finished.”

Music was a vital mode of leisure and conviviality not just in Burney’s London residence but even more so during the summer weeks at Chessington. There appears to have been just one harpsichord in the Surrey house, so the heroics of Müthel duets were not possible—and likely not wanted. Affectation and display were better left in the big city, not packed up and taken with the holiday-makers to the countryside. In a letter dated August 1, 1779 to her elder half-sister Fanny, Sarah Burney recounted a trip with her father to stay with Crisp, concluding with news that Crisp “is fond of my father’s third duet of the second set which we play like anything.”

Burney’s friend, the musical enthusiast Thomas Twining, heir to the tea fortune, heard the new duets for one keyboard played in late 1776 just prior to their publication, and was enthusiastic in his response: “’twill be something new, as well as good, & run like wild fire,” Twining wrote to Burney in November of 1776, one year after the premier of Müthel’s Duet at the House in St. Martin’s Street (Twining’s had recently heard one of the many reprise performances of that huge piece, too, at the Burney salon).

For the Burneys the musical recreations with Crisp at Chessington offered an escape to provincial calm from the anxieties of metropolitan life and work; refuge in the real affection of friends versus the trying affectations of polite society. These duet sessions allowed for intimate, pleasantly physical music-making with beloved daughters of a dear friend—the highpoint of a country afternoon for this Lemuel inhabiting his own Island of Laputa, that place in Gulliver’s Travels dedicated to music and the arts.

Four years after that 1779 August of duets, Crisp died of gout; his death deeply affected Burney, who wrote a touching obituary in the Gentleman’s Magazine and also supplied the verse eulogy for a plaque mounted in his friend’s memory in Chessington’s church—all that remains of the place as Crisp and the Burneys knew it. The house is gone, in its place suburban cul-de-sacs and a safari adventure park. But Burney’s duets survive. In these conversational, witty, endearing, and literally touching pieces the authentic dynamics of friendship and family can be heard and felt, and then heard and felt again.

(David Yearsley is a long-time contributor to CounterPunch and the Anderson Valley Advertiser. His latest recording is Handel’s Organ Banquet. He can be reached at dgyearsley@gmail.com.)

The olive tree of Vouves, on Crete. This tree, which has a trunk 15 feet in diameter, is at least 2,000 years old, and likely 2,900 years older, based on the graveyard found nearby. This tree likely lived through the writing of the Iliad, the golden age of Athens, the rise & fall of the Roman Empire, the birth of Christ, it lived during the time of mastodons, the Aztecs - and then lived for 2,000 years after that. It still produces olives.

CAN WE PLEASE JUST FIND THE ALIENS ALREADY?

by Claire Isabel Webb

Picture an ice-covered landscape, rough and rocky. Plumes of water vapor erupt from the surface. Tendrils of algae lurk in the bright white glaciers. Leagues below the surface, microorganisms and other creatures cluster near hydrothermal vents, fissures in the ocean floor where life can thrive.

This could be the scene on Europa, a moon of Jupiter where life could have sparked like it did on Earth.

We may have a chance to discover if this is really the case. Very soon, NASA will launch the space probe Europa Clipper, one of the most ambitious missions in its storied history, to investigate Europa’s potential to harbor life. Its findings may help confirm, as some would expect, that all life in the universe originates through a shared evolutionary pathway. Or the investigation may stumble on something radically unexpected that suggests life can take root in far more ways that we’ve only begun to comprehend. Either discovery would force us to reconsider much of what we know about biology and the origin of life.

Clipper is one of the most vital astrobiology projects yet aimed at answering the question of whether we are alone in the universe — a goal that should be NASA’s highest priority. The agency is best known for its human exploration missions, sending astronauts into orbit and to the surface of the moon, and being the driving force behind the International Space Station (which has been occupied by humans continuously since 2000). NASA hopes to resurrect the glory of Apollo with Artemis, its successor lunar exploration program to send astronauts back to the moon. But rather than pursue self-mythologizing goals of colonizing other worlds, NASA should do more to invest in and develop missions that more directly and intimately study extraterrestrial life and make them the lodestar of the agency.

Our cosmic backyard is brimming with planets and moons that might be ripe for alien life-forms to flourish. Astrobiologists think Europa is one of the most promising places to find extraterrestrial life despite its harsh conditions unsuitable to humans. The moon is believed to be encrusted with a 10-to-15-mile-thick ice shell. Sunlight cannot penetrate more than a few meters. Europa’s surface temperatures at its Equator at midday never rise above a frigid negative 225 degrees Fahrenheit. Its thin oxygen atmosphere provides no shield for the incessant radiation; even wearing a spacesuit, a human being would be hit with a lethal dose in under 24 hours.

Yet Europa seems to have the ingredients needed to stimulate life: water, hydrogen, carbon, oxygen, nitrogen, sulfur and phosphorus. These elements are churning together in a liquid water ocean sitting below the icy shell and warmed thanks to the massive friction induced by Jupiter’s awesome gravity. These conditions could have seeded strange cousins of earthly life-forms in the ocean’s depths near hydrothermal vents.

When Clipper arrives at Jupiter’s system in 2030, it will perform dozens of flybys of the moon and get as low as 16 miles above Europa’s surface. Its suite of instruments will map nearly the entire surface of Europa and photograph the icy world in visible light, infrared and ultraviolet. It will acquire as much data as possible about the chemistry of the interior ocean. It will analyze potential vapor plumes that may vent out into the atmosphere, which could be the best opportunity to understand what the liquid ocean is harboring.

Given how inaccessible the ocean is, Clipper is unlikely to find definitive proof of alien life. (Though never say never.) But it may find complex organics compounds important to sustaining bacteria or other microorganisms. The hope is that by mapping the surface, NASA can identify sites in the ocean under the icy crust that could be home to life. Future engineers who can build more audacious missions may be able to drill through the ice and explore these sites in depth.

Clipper’s scientific objectives are a refreshing break from the 20th century’s Space Age. Back then, NASA was dominated by missions designed to fulfill dreams of human colonization of outer space. Neil Armstrong’s “one giant leap for mankind” was not just a triumphant end to the Cold War competition with the Soviet Union to put humans on the moon first; his boot print was also tangible evidence that humans could travel between celestial bodies and survive elsewhere.

Residues of the Space Age propel the U.S. space program today. Space Force, a new military branch that cost the federal government $29 billion in 2024 alone, recalls Cold War fears of planet-wide warfare. The International Space Station has long been lauded as a beacon of peace and cooperation in space, but it also excludes Chinese participation and is a point of nervousness amid deteriorating American-Russian relations. The Artemis moon program — egregiously over budget and repeatedly delayed — will scout out locations for permanent lunar outposts as a steppingstone to Mars. And there is the rise of private companies like SpaceX that build their own rockets and spacecraft for crewed travel, often with the help of government contracts.

The Europa Clipper mission represents a sea change for NASA. After all these decades, we’re witnessing missions that are more intensely devoted to investigating alien — not human — habitability. In 2028, NASA will launch its Dragonfly mission to Saturn’s moon Titan and investigate its ocean and methane seas. The detection of a peculiar gas emanating from Venus’s clouds hints at the presence of biological activity — and a pair of missions beginning next decade may confirm these suspicions.

There are many other worlds in the solar system to explore. Saturn’s moon Enceladus has a subsurface ocean that may be habitable to life of some sort. Jupiter’s moon Ganymede is also a worthy candidate. The presence of water on Ceres, the only dwarf planet in the asteroid belt, raises even thin hopes that life could have arisen there.

Journeys to alien worlds are crucial if we’re to solve the profound and abiding mystery of the origin of life and learn whether we’re alone. That, to me, sounds like a much more worthy endeavor of our energies than our longstanding treatment of space as a void waiting to be conquered.

(Claire Isabel Webb is a historian of science and the director of the Future Humans program at the Berggruen Institute in Los Angeles, where her projects investigate the simulation of alien life, consciousness studies and science fiction. Her forthcoming book, “Reflexive Alienation,” follows the pursuit of microbial and intelligent life since the Space Age.)

23 Comments

John McKenzie October 14, 2024

“HOW TO CONTROL SLAVES”
This letter is widely viewed as being a hoax primarily because no evidence of it’s existence can be found prior to it’s first appearance in the early 1970’s. But that doesn’t mean it’s not worth reading. It’s message is very relevant to our current situation if you replace the word “slave” with “sheep”. Use the term “rich and powerful” instead of “gentlemen” and replace “overseer” with “main stream media”. It’s a tried and true way to control the masses, keep them distracted by the nonexistent or nonrelevant issues so they don’t start thinking about the big picture. Wouldn’t be great if people ignored the constant daily stream of enflamed rhetoric and began to ask who what why?

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- Pat Kittle October 14, 2024
  
  Problem is, “who what why” can lead to forbidden truths.
  
  So be content to do what folks like George Carlin & Rush Limbaugh did/do:
  
  Rail endlessly & furiously against “The Elites!!” — and leave it at that.
  
  Reply
Paul Modic October 14, 2024

Avocado Disaster
The United States’s voracious appetite for avocados, which I eat regularly, has caused massive deforestation in the avocado capital of the world, Uruapan, in the Mexican state of Michoacan. There is illegal farming when land is violently stolen by the cartels, and others, as this green gold is massively produced for the US market. (Nature suffers, though many do have low-paying jobs.)
There was an uprising earlier this year and the locals chased the gangsters out of town, killing a few of them. They soon came back for their revenge and all the rebellious villagers had to flee their homes. (Some probably tried to come up north, and I can’t blame them.)

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Chuck Dunbar October 14, 2024

RANDAL SCOTT FRASER

“He lived a life that touched many hearts and made a lot of people feel cared for, protected and safe. His wry wit and humor has been passed on to his kids. And his creativity as well. He loved me. He loved me well. He was a man of honor. He stood by his word…”

How much is said about this man–a man I did not know–in just a few words. What man or woman would not welcome such deep tribute at our passing?

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Harvey Reading October 14, 2024

“The harms of the other options” mean that the best course of action is to vote for Harris, 25 Islamic clerics said in a letter released last week. They focused on an overarching truth: “Particularly in swing states, a vote for a third party could enable Trump to win that state and therefore the election.” The U.S. clerics called such a vote “both a moral and a strategic failure.”

Meaning the country has turned into a total POS…I’ve written in Stein/Barber. Rationalize away, yuppie.

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George Hollister October 14, 2024

The biggest winner in the upcoming presidential election might end up being the party that loses.

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Harvey Reading October 14, 2024

“Journeys to alien worlds are crucial if we’re to solve the profound and abiding mystery of the origin of life and learn whether we’re alone. That, to me, sounds like a much more worthy endeavor of our energies than our longstanding treatment of space as a void waiting to be conquered.”

“Profound and abiding mystery…” Whadda laugh. It’s always seemed highly likely that life (perhaps even life as we dumb monkeys know it) exists elsewhere in the universe. Who gives a damn about that? We should be cleaning house by reducing human population size and throwing out the “renewable energy” morons who simply want to increase their wealth even more, then think they can retire to a hideaway when the poop finally hits the fan.

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Matt Kendall October 14, 2024

Mr Sakowicz your mention “ Notably absent were Sheriff Matt Kendal,” from Jason Cox’ funeral. As always a backhanded effort at some type of conspiracy theory which most of us realize is just you in true you style. Many folks may not realize you’re a person who offers opinion as fact and in a vacuum of information you will simply make something up. So let me take a moment to set things straight.

I worked with Jason for several years and I always liked him. Jason was a tenacious investigator with a great sense of humor and strong work ethic. Jason was also a good father and husband. I always considered Jason to be a friend. I hadn’t had much contact with Jason following his retirement as often happens when someone retires and their fellow officers are still working. That doesn’t mean we don’t care or think about each other, it’s simply a time management thing when many folks don’t have a lot of time in the schedule.

I left the house early and was on my way to Round Valley the morning Jason passed away. I was entering Covelo when I received the call regarding his passing. I made sure his body was escorted to the funeral home by our patrol cars and personnel. I also called my wife and advised her of Jason’s passing. My wife worked with Jason’s widow for several years.

This past weekend I had several engagements. My wife and I had planned on attending Jason’s services, however our son had come home for the weekend with our daughter in law and our first grandson. They live out of the area and we don’t get to see them as often as we would like with some very busy schedules. I cut several engagements short and had to skip others in order to do what I believe is right for my family.

Jason’s passing at such an early age was a shock to all of us. I am praying for Jason’s family and I let his widow know they are all in our prayers. Jason’s passing also caused me to re-evaluate my priorities and to work harder at spending time with my family when I have the chance. Perhaps grandchildren are what the all mighty sends us to help us stay centered on the family.

Your distortion of my relationship with Jason is misleading to all who read it. Your insinuation there was any bad blood between Jason and I is a far fetched tale to say the least. I would actually take it a step further and call it a blatant lie. I don’t know what drives you to do these things nor do I want to spend any time pondering that question as it would simply be wasted time . But you are you so I think most folks simply expect falsehoods and half cooked conspiracies on a fairly frequent basis. In true me fashion, if you’re going to take a poke at me in the paper you should expect one back.

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- peter boudoures October 14, 2024
  
  Trying to tie someone to murder without evidence is wild stuff.
  I do agree Jason was a solid guy and great dad. I played bball with him and our kids are in the same program.
  
  Reply
  - Matt Kendall October 14, 2024
    
    He was a good ball player also! Loved basketball. I was terrible at it, preferred baseball. On night shift while doing a school checks in Laytonville, Jason saw a basketball left out in the playground I watched as he sunk some 3 pointers. I tried to dunk on the 8’ rim with no glory.
    Jason told me years ago he had tried out for professional football when he was in his late teens however that didn’t pan out for him. I don’t remember which team he went for a walk on.
    
    Reply
John Sakowicz October 14, 2024

Sheriff Kendal:

Name one active-duty senior member of the MCSO who was present at Jason’s memorial service. No sheriff. No undersheriff. No commanders. No honor guard.

In fact, name anyone from the MCSO’s active-duty rooster who attended.

Their absence was disgraceful.

Nothing was more important than honoring a member of your own department who tried to restore the public trust with a whistleblower complaint that took real courage to bring, was shocking in its content, was substantiated, settled and sealed, and was either directly or indirectly was a contributing cause to White’s and Gore’s deaths and Cox’s own PTSD, stressed immune system and ultimate demise.

There are no distortions, no lies, no misrepresentations in my tribute to Jason Cox….just “inconvenient truths”.

Netflix could make a documentary based on what was in Jason Cox’s complaint. “Murder Mountain” in Humboldt County had nothing on the pure evil that existed in Mendocino County before the collapse of cannabis prices. And you know it. You just can’t publicly admit it.

But someday, I hope the truth is told. The public has a right to know. And if the Department of Justice can still bring cases that survive the statute of limitations, then those cases should be brought.

Jason Cox signed an NDA back in 2006, but it’s rumored he videotaped an interview from that time …a videotape he called his “insurance policy” should anything ever had happened to him. I hope that videotape now finds its way into the right hands. I know a few independent producers and directors who have worked with Netflix. And I know a few people on NPR’s national news desk. Those would be good places to start.

Finally, I hope your prayers for Jason Cox are enough. But that’s between you and God.

John Sakowicz
Ukiah

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- Matt Kendall October 14, 2024
  
  Do you know what other events were occurring in the same date? Who was having a wedding, who was out of town? Obviously not, you didn’t know why I wasn’t there. So if you want to run those things down and report out that would be prudent. If not it’s just a little more BS from a wind bag hoping to look like someone in the know.
  
  Reply
  - John Sakowicz October 14, 2024
    
    Tonight, I was thinking: What if Sheriff Kendall were to revert to the “hear no evil, see no evil” attitude toward official misconduct and public corruption that some say characterized his immediate predecessors? What if the MCSO’s North Inland Operations, particularly Covelo, were to revert to the scandals that Jason Cox pushed back against in his whistleblower complaint in 2006?
    
    Could it happen again?
    
    And the answer is yes, which is why Mendocino County needs a civilian review board. We need to “police the police”.
    
    Known as “police oversight,” “civilian review” or “police monitoring”, this function of policing the police can take the form of agencies, boards, or committees.
    
    The main goal of these programs is to provide an independent system of checks and balances that ensures law enforcement agencies are doing things the right way. A large part of this process is demonstrating that community members are being treated fairly and equitably and guiding agencies in their efforts to be sensitive to the community’s culture and diversity. Another part is protecting against police misconduct and public corruption, and cover-ups of the same.
    
    Many agencies find a form of a police force monitor program preferable to other types of reform such as court injunctions and federal oversight from consent decrees, which are involuntary, inflexible and expensive.
    
    It is shocking to me that the MCSO avoided oversight when Jason Cox made his whistleblower complaint.
    
    Back in 2006, I did my part. I sued.
    
    Back in 2006, I knew then-DA Norm Vroman was misappropriating asset forfeiture funds.
    
    With those misappropriated funds, I knew Vroman was buying a gun locker full of Heckler & Koch G36 automatic assault rifles equipped with silencers — two ATF violations. (Vroman wasn’t a cop. He was a lawyer. Machine guns and silencers were no-noes.)
    
    I knew Vroman had a gunsmith under contract to make modifications to those guns. Vroman also used DA monies to attend a tactical firearms training academy in Arizona.
    
    I knew Vroman was equipping his car with police lights and sirens. (Again, Vroman wasn’t a cop.)
    
    And I knew Vroman was probably arming a private local militia with those guns and silencers. (Vroman was a libertarian nut job, and he was buddies with plenty of other libertarian nut jobs. Vroman once promised to resist the National Guard if martial law were ever declared in the Emerald Triangle.)
    
    So, I sued.
    
    http://extras.ukiahdailyjournal.com/extras/04_apr_2006/042706_UDJ_lowres.pdf
    
    Vroman filed two separate demurrer pleadings, both of which were rejected by the Court. The U.S. Attorney in San Francisco then formed a joint task force which raided Vroman’s home, and Vroman had a heart attack, which later proved fatal, while reading the search warrant in his driveway.
    
    My point? Civilians care. Civilians care how cops and prosecutors use, or misuse, their power. They care about abuses under the color of authority.
    
    Final point? I timed my lawsuit to more or less coincide with Jason Cox’s whistleblower complaint.
    
    God bless whistleblowers and honest cops. God bless civilian review boards.
    
    They can work together.
    
    Civilian review boards go back all the way to 1895, when Roosevelt was appointed President of the New York City Board of Commissioners by then-Mayor William Strong. The six-member board was responsible for the governance of the NYPD and rooting out graft and corruption, improving departmental standards and officer accountability, and many of Teddy Roosevelt’s leadership principles have been thoroughly studied and are still in use today.
    
    Reply
    - Ron43 October 15, 2024
      
      First of you would have to believe what Jason cox had to say. He was/is an angry malcontent.
      
      Reply
    - Suzy October 15, 2024
      
      Sakoschitt – you would be THE LAST GUY ON EARTH ever appointed to another commission – of any kind – in this county. But you obviously fail to comprehend how everybody else sees you and your constant re-writing of history to suit your latest whine.
      (Does your wife still put up with your radio girlfriend John)?
      
      Reply
- Lurker Lou October 14, 2024
  
  I attended Jason’s service with my children, and the obvious lack of law enforcement (retired or active) there to pay respects to Shannon and the kids was pretty telling. I’m not pointing the finger at Sheriff Kendall or any one person specifically, but the absence definitely did not go unnoticed.
  Although I’d much rather be surrounded by the ones who did show up in force – local coaches, teachers, and the kids’ teammates and friends – it did make me sad for Jason and Shannon that law enforcement was nowhere to be found.
  
  Reply
Pat Kittle October 14, 2024

Speaking of masochists and sadists…

“Hit me!” said the masochist.
“No” said the sadist.

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David October 14, 2024

Ed Notes
ALL parents, no matter what the color of their skin, have taken to avoiding Americas’ Public Schools.
And what’s not to avoid? Virtually every official associated with the Chicago Public Schools is of the Democrat- mandated “Black and Brown” group. And ALL of them send their kids to Private Schools.

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- Steve Heilig October 14, 2024
  
  “ALL” parents and officials? You’re spreading garbage here, as is easily fact-checked. That’s textbook trolling.
  No wonder you won’t use your full name.
  
  Reply
Mike J October 14, 2024

There’s the possibility of microscopic life on Europa but we have extensive databases of vetted cases of the third and fourth kind of close encounters with a wide variety of consistently reported extraterrestrials here:
https://www.et-cultures.com/post/a-briefing-glimpses-of-uap-related-non-human-intelligences-and-their-activities

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- Harvey Reading October 14, 2024
  
  LOL. Where’s that report on trade talks with ET?
  
  Reply
Steve Heilig October 14, 2024

Michael Goodwin, the Trump voter quoted at length herein, writes for the pro-Trump (and rabidly pro-Israel) New York Post.
(Just in case anybody wonders)
I think this guy knows Don the Con much better:

“He is the most dangerous person ever. I had suspicions when I talked to you about his mental decline and so forth, but now I realize he’s a total fascist. He is now the most dangerous person to this country…a fascist to the core.”

This is how former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley, the nation’s highest-ranking military officer and the primary military advisor to the president, the secretary of defense, and the National Security Council, described former president Donald Trump to veteran journalist Bob Woodward. Trump appointed Milley to that position. “
-Heather Cox Richardson, historian. (Her almost-daily updates well worth reading):
https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/october-13-2024?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=20533&post_id=150195795&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=8n6iy&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email

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DeLang October 14, 2024

Voting for the “lesser” Evil serves to support, promote, and most importantly, strengthen the powerful influence Evil already enjoys. I’ve come to believe that it’s my obligation as a citizen of the U.S. to become informed as well as I can be about the policy platforms of each political party and then select and vote for the candidates representing the party whose platform most closely reflects my own ideas about how our society should be organized. When I first became eligible to vote, I cast my ballot for George McGovern, as I was then young, impressionable, politically naive, and frankly, still developing what my own ideas would become about the best ways of organizing our society. That was the last time I found myself voting for either a Democrat or a Republican for the office of President. I’ve always been able to discover a platform adhering more closely to my core values than those offered by these two parties. I do this without consulting the NYT table of which pollsters have called which winners in which states as much as six months prior to the first ballots being cast, let alone counted. If my calculus for determining how I cast my vote cannot be reasonably considered a valid and acceptable one within the context of the system as it exists, then we really don’t have much of a democracy worth protecting from the abuses of a candidate like Trump anyhow, do we? I can’t predict which ticket will prevail in the upcoming election, or possibly despite the election, but I can confidently express the opinion that whoever is addressed as POTUS beginning in January 2025, the only real winner will be the oligarchy, especially that parasitic subset known as defense contractors, and the loser, once again, will be the American people. MAGA has an assured victory; either a very large one if their party is elected, or a more moderate one, if not, as the center is pushed a couple of notches further to the right. Whatever the result, we will have the government we deserve, not because the people will have spoken, but rather because they’ll have demonstrated once again that they are content with not having any real voice regarding who they are expected to choose between. I believe Mr. Solomon will and should vote in whichever way seems right to him, but he should stow the “Safe State” BS and acknowledge that the prime drivers behind his decision may be fear and obedience rather than reason.

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Mendocino County Today: Monday 10/14/2024

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