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A FINAL PULSE OF RAIN and snow above 2000 feet will impact the area this afternoon through early Friday. Drier but cooler weather is expected through the weekend. (NWS)
STEPHEN DUNLAP (Fort Bragg): Forget what I said last fall about a dry winter forecast. A cloudy 39F with .12" of fresh rainfall this Thursday morning on the coast. Rain today & tonight then it fizzles out Friday morning giving way to a COLD & dry weekend. Rain returns next Tuesday. Ahem...
TED STEPHENS
When one looks at all the facts now, it is hard to imagine why the supervisors would have gone along with this DA scheme unless they were in it to bring the Auditor-Controller/Treasurer-Tax Collector functions under their full control and obfuscation. Many of us advised against the consolidation and had serious concerns about the timing. Now their argument is going to be, oh well, we are already along the journey of getting rid of these independent offices and it would just create more confusion trying to put it back as it was.
After the dust settles on the criminal charges, I think we, as citizens and voters, need to demand they put it back as it was for two reasons. First, so we maintain the independence and accountability of the separate offices. Two, to send a message if you try these shenanigans we are not going to let you get away with it.
This experience is going to cost our county A LOT of money. We should also make sure the two remaining supervisors in this debacle go down the road and find another place to practice their mayhem. As for the DA’s use of the law, I think it is pretty clear who he was protecting. We should demand better.
SHELSON’S THREATS
Threatening Words Can Land You A Felony Conviction.
A Mendocino County jury returned from its deliberations Tuesday afternoon to announce it had found the trial defendant guilty of the felony charge.
Defendant Shelson Louis Cabada, age 26, of Redwood Valley, was found guilty of felony criminal threats, said crime having occurred on October 29, 2024.
A criminal threat under California law is when a defendant willfully makes a threat to commit a crime that can result in great bodily injury or death to another person, with the intent that the statement be taken as a threat and that the threat is so specific and unequivocal to the person threatened that he or she harbors a sustained fear of the immediate prospect of execution of the threat.
The jury found the defendant not guilty of a separate misdemeanor count of battery.
After the jury was excused, the defendant and his case were referred to the Mendocino County Adult Probation Department for a background study and sentencing recommendation.
The defendant, who remains in-custody unless and until he posts bail, was ordered to return to court on March 4, 2025 at 9 o’clock in the morning in Department A for consideration of probation’s report, sentencing arguments of the attorneys, and pronouncement of judgment and sentencing.
The law enforcement agency that developed the evidence and identified the witnesses needed and used at trial was the Mendocino County Sheriff’s Office.
Trial support was provided by the District Attorney’s own Bureau of Investigations.
The prosecutor who presented the People’s evidence to the jury was Deputy District Attorney David Moutrie.
Mendocino County Superior Court Judge Keith Faulder presided over the two-day trial.
(DA Presser)
LOCAL EVENTS
MENDOCINO COUNTY DIVESTS FROM ROYAL BANK OF CANADA!
Feb. 5, 2025 Success! Mendocino County has started its divestment from weapons not used in the national defense. As of January 21, 2025, the Mendocino County Treasurer, Sara Pierce, has sold off a $3 million bond in the Royal Bank of Canada. The Treasurer’s action was largely in response to pressure from county residents regarding the Royal Bank of Canada’s financing of weapons used to target civilians in Gaza and elsewhere, along with their financing of fossil fuels. Mendocino County for Ethical Investing (MCEI), a grassroots organization formed by Mendocino County residents in response to their tax dollars being used to fund the killing of Palestinian civilians and the destruction of the planet, has been organizing since April of last year.
“We focused on Royal Bank of Canada because the County’s investment with them was set to mature in January,” said MCEI member Amelia Taylor. “Royal Bank of Canada funds Palantir, Elbit, General Dynamics—all companies that make weapons of aggression that kill civilians and destroy our environment. They’re also the seventh largest financier of fossil fuels in the world, and a major funder of the Coastal GasLink fracked gas pipeline—stamping on Indigenous rights, land, and the environment.”
After an impassioned presentation by MCEI and other community members at a November Board of Supervisors meeting, the Board unanimously voted to request that the Treasurer remove the Royal Bank of Canada from the County’s investment portfolio in January 2025.
In mid-January, MCEI members waged a pressure campaign to ensure the County went through with the divestment. The Treasurer stated that the $3 million bond had been pulled from the Royal Bank of Canada. “It was such a relief to find out that the money had actually been moved,” said MCEI member Katherine Flink. “Despite the unanimous vote from the Board in November, we had some doubts on whether the County would follow through. But they have listened to the will of the people they represent.”
MCEI plans to continue its efforts to ensure that our taxes support humanity and the planet. “We’ve assessed other investments in the County’s portfolio for their contributions to the weapons industry, and we look forward to working with the County to continue this exciting divestment process,” says county resident Linda Helland. “Mendocino County residents do not want to be forced into complicity in genocide through the use of their tax dollars. We want our investments to reflect our values.”
Contacts:
Katherine Flink, (972) 207-7804
Linda Helland, (707) 391-3174
mendodivest@gmail.com
FRIENDS OF THE EEL RIVER: WORKING FOR THE RECOVERY OF OUR WILD AND SCENIC EEL RIVER, ITS FISHERIES, AND COMMUNITIES.
Greetings Friends,
You may have seen the news that PG&E released their draft license surrender application on Friday, January 31. This is the latest step in the long process of evaluating the best options for Eel River dam removal. Following the release of this draft, PG&E will accept comments from stakeholders (see below for details) until March 3 before submitting their final License Surrender Application in July this year.
Tomorrow, February 6, PG&E is hosting a virtual presentation about their draft plan. See below for details.
We remain cautiously optimistic about PG&E’s plans to remove the two dams in the Eel River beginning in 2028.
While we are still reviewing the 2,100 page document, our initial thoughts are that there is nothing unexpected. The document proposes a “rapid removal” process for Scott Dam outlined in previous documents, which would take approximately two years and result in flushing a very large volume of sediment downstream. The roughly 12 million cubic yards of sediment released are likely to cause serious impacts which require further assessment. However, the rapid removal plan limits the temporal scope of these impacts, which we believe is the best option.
That being said, protective measures may still be necessary to limit harms to native fish in the river during the initial sediment flush. We will maintain a critical eye to ensure those plans are in the best long-term interest of the Eel’s fish. As we’ve learned from the Klamath, these fish are resilient and we need to give nature the best chance for recovery.
As far as a potential wet-season diversion from the Eel to the Russian is concerned, those negotiations are still underway and the details of any such plan are still uncertain.
We remain hopeful dam removal will happen swiftly and that the Eel’s native fish will once again return to the hundreds of miles of excellent habitat in the upper basin blocked off for the last century.
For the fish,
Alicia Hamann, Executive Director
MARJORIE TAYLOR GREENE KNOCKS ON NPR'S DOOR
Congressional Subcommittee Plans Hearing on Federally Funded Radio and TV
National Public Radio sent member stations including KZYX the following message on February 3:
Colleagues,
This morning, NPR received a letter from Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, Chairwoman of the Subcommittee on Delivering on Government Efficiency (DOGE), in the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. Chairwoman Greene states that the subcommittee is “planning a hearing on federally funded radio and television, including its systematically biased content.”
The letter requests NPR President and CEO Katherine Maher’s availability to testify at a hearing in March. We have confirmed that PBS received a similar letter, and we are coordinating with them.
NPR welcomes opportunities to discuss the critical role of public media in delivering impartial, fact-based news and reporting to the American people. You can read our full statement here:
Since its inception, NPR has collaborated with local nonprofit public media organizations to fill critical needs for news and information in America’s communities. We constantly strive to hold ourselves to the highest standards of journalism, as evidenced by our publicly available standards and ethics guidelines, the presence of a Public Editor—a position relinquished by all other major news organizations—that allows the public to inquire directly about NPR’s journalism, and strong editorial processes that provide oversight of the entire newsgathering process, including a final review of the nearly 2,000 pieces of journalism aired or published by our newsroom every month.
Today our President and CEO Katherine Maher received a request to testify before the Subcommittee on Delivering on Government Efficiency in March. We welcome the opportunity to discuss the critical role of public media in delivering impartial, fact-based news and reporting to the American public.
Please be assured we are giving this matter close attention. We will work in close consultation with the NPR Board, PBS, APTS, CPB, and other partners and stakeholders.
The NPR letter concluded with a list of resources and supports for member stations.
Dina Polkinghorne, KZYX’s Interim General Manager, commented, “The Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) provides KZYX with an annual Community Services Grant. (CPB is a private nonprofit corporation, fully funded by the federal government, that provides partial funding through direct grant support to NPR and other public media.) Although the CPB grant isn't a lot of money in the grand scheme of things, it is a precious source of operating funds for our small station—about 25 percent of our revenue. Small community stations around the country in both conservative and progressive regions rely on this funding to keep their local public safe and informed.
“Regrettably, we are currently experiencing unprecedented chaos and disruption in Washington that may put this critical funding at risk. In the coming weeks on our social media platforms and newsletter, KZYX will provide information on ways for listeners to join the growing collective of resistance to these potentially devastating budget cuts.”
"MAGA-BY-THE-SEA" ON KMUD, Thursday, Feb. 6, at 9am.
OUR SHOW
President Donald Trump's comments suggesting the U.S. will take "ownership" of Gaza and that displaced Palestinians will be permanently resettled outside the war-torn territory, clearing the way for a Trump-style resort on beachfront property, have been met with derision and ridicule. Our guest is Jennifer Lowenstein.
JENNIFER LOEWENSTEIN,
Loewenstein is former associate director of Middle Eastern Studies and senior lecturer at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and has lived in and reported extensively on the Mideast.
Her work appears in academic journals such as The Journal of Palestine Studies, and she is a regular contributor to the CounterPunch magazine.
Lowenstein is the 2010 recipient of the Rachel Corrie Award. She is currently the Special Correspondent on Middle East affairs at KPFT Radio/San Francisco.
UPDATE ON CLASS ACTION LAWSUIT
At the end of our show, we'll get an update on the class action taxpayer lawsuit against our congressman, Jared Huffman, for his unconditional and unrestricted support for U.S. military aid to Israel, even as Israel continues to commit genocide in Palestine.
Our friend, Norman Solomon, writes: “Like other plaintiffs in the Northern California case, I believe that our lawsuit is on solid ground of justice."
Solomon continues: “The arms shipments to Israel’s military have violated the Constitution, the U.N. Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide and U.S. federal laws – including the Leahy law, which prohibits the government from ‘using funds for assistance to units of foreign security forces where there is credible information implicating that unit in the commission of gross violations of human rights.’ The namesake of the law, former Sen. Patrick Leahy, says his namesake law is being violated."
Over 1000 constituents in Huffman's district, including myself, have joined the lawsuit. We are hoping the lawsuit will be a strong stand against genocide and will foreshadow a primary challenge for Huffman.
KMUD
Our show, "Heroes and Patriots Radio", airs live on KMUD, on the first and fifth Thursdays of every month, at 9 AM, Pacific Time.
We simulcast our programming on two full power FM stations: KMUE 88.1 in Eureka and KLAI 90.3 in Laytonville. It also maintains a translator at 99.5 FM in Shelter Cove, California.
We also stream live from the web at https://kmud.org/
Speak with our guest live and on-the-air at: KMUD Studio (707) 923-3911. Please call in.
We post our shows to our own website and Youtube channels. Shows may be distributed in other media outlets.
Wherever you live, KMUD is your community radio station. We are a true community of informed and progressive people. Please join us by becoming a member or underwriter.
— John Sakowicz
YORKVILLE IS NOW A FIREWISE COMMUNITY
What does that mean for YOU?
What is A Firewise Community?
A Firewise Community is a national recognition that acknowledges the time, labor and money we’ve put into making Yorkville more fire-prepared. Recognition comes from a nation-wide organization called National Firewise (NFW). The Yorkville Firesafe Council – your roadshed coordinators are members – applied for the recognition. For more information on Firewise, NFPA Firewise, CALFIRE Firewise
What Does This Mean for Us?
• Many homeowners’ insurance carriers (including the Fair Plan) give discounts to communities that are NFW recognized. Here is Yorkville’s certificate and area map, which your insurance broker or company will likely need as proof of being a Firewise Community.
• You’ll see more information and opportunities for fire preparation planning, such as road clearing, chipper days, home assessments, etc. See “More on Yorkville Firewise Resources” below for more information and how to participate
• Yorkville is joining 11 other Mendocino County communities that are also Firewise, making Mendocino more prepared. Fire does not respect property lines – we all need to work together to reduce our collective fire risk in Yorkville, and beyond.
What Do We Have to Do To Maintain Firewise Status?
As part of becoming Firewise, we collaborated with our fire department to develop a 3-year plan that Yorkville will need to achieve. We’re sure we can do it! Here is a link to the plan:
Critical to maintaining this recognition is that each of us track hours of work and costs we incur to make our homes and land more fire-prepared. This demonstrates that Yorkville is doing the necessary fire mitigation work.
How do I track my hours and expenses?
Tracking means recording your hours and expenses into an aggregate database.
• You can use the online, anonymous Yorkville-specific tracking tool from Mendo County Firesafe Council: Click here to view form. It’s easiest to bookmark this page – it will calculate and then clear each time you submit your work.
• You can keep a list or spreadsheet on your own computer or a paper copy to enter the information into the database later. Download worksheet to track hours
• The work isn’t dated, so entering it at a later time is fine.
What to track: Track any time and expenses (materials, work crews, etc.) spent on fire mitigation within the 100 foot radius of any building on your property that you would want to save in a fire. Our tracking year is November 1, 2025 – October 31, 2025.
• Examples: new roof, double pane windows, vents, screening, clearing of vegetation, debris removal, landscaping for fire, chipping, burning, mowing, weed-whacking, etc.
• Don’t get hung up on the word “volunteer” – just think total hours of anyone who did the work.
• Use your best estimate on the size of vegetation removed.
• Your burn piles can be included in the section quantifying truckloads of removed debris. If you feed your burn pile, estimate how many truckloads of debris you burned over the course of the fire.
What about work beyond 100 feet from the house? For work beyond your 100 feet radius, briefly describe it under miscellaneous in Part Two, saying you are on a larger parcel and vegetation work beyond 100 feet is important to maintaining a safe perimeter. In Yorkville, we know how important fire mitigation work is beyond the 100-foot radius of our structures. Firewise is a national program, and its forms cover urban and suburban areas as well as rural.
Questions? Ask your Roadshed Coordinator for help. If you don’t know who your Coordinator is, reply to this message and we’ll let you know.
More on Firewise Yorkville Resources
• Vents are a focus for this year – watch for a survey soon. Vents and screening are a critical area for keeping sparks from igniting inside your house. Our goal: everyone has the resources needed for their vents to meet firesafe recommendations.
• Want a free, confidential assessment of fire-risk for your home and keeping it safe? Sign up at https://www.firesafemendocino.org/home-assessments
• We’ll continue to advertise free chipper days. https://www.firesafemendocino.org/chipper-day
• We’ll be sponsoring fire education at the Ice Cream Social and other YCBA events.
• We will also conduct info campaigns, targeting specific areas where you can reduce your fire risk-decks, gates by houses, etc.
• We hope to work on targeted road clearing through grants in collaboration with CalFire
• We will support more prescribed burns
• We will continue Emergency notifications, through Watch Duty and Dial My Calls texts
More Information
The Mendocino County Firesafe Council website has many useful resources. https://www.firesafemendocino.org
As a start, check out these excellent materials on home hardening: https://www.firesafemendocino.org/homehardening
We are here to help. Reach out to us at theYCBA@gmail.com
ED NOTES
SCENES from the city: The bus was jammed, so jammed the driver, a jolly black guy who'd amused us sardines by singing out the stops operatic style, was no longer opening his front door to let on more passengers. At Hyde, a nicely dressed woman, who looked like a manager of something, a woman unaccustomed to being denied, pounded on the bus door. “Open it, goddammit!” she yelled. The driver shouted back that he couldn't. “I'm full,” he explained. “The rules say no more.” “Don't give me that rules bullshit,” the woman shouted back. “I know the rules.” The driver said, “I know the rules better than you and you're not getting on.” We drove off. A bunch of us applauded. “I wouldn't let her on an empty bus,” the driver laughed, and more people applauded.
A YOUNG MOMMY wrote to the Chronicle with a child-rearing question: “How do I explain to my children why that man is allowed to pee on the sidewalk, and that man is allowed to yell at people and be drunk without getting in trouble?”
SHORT ANSWER: They're just having a real bad day, Timmy.
LONG ANSWER: Collapse of Western Civ.
INTERMEDIATE ANSWER: Nobody is “allowed” to pee on the sidewalk and nobody is “allowed” to menace passersby. There are laws against it, but it happens a lot because standards of public behavior have disappeared and the cops are so overwhelmed by so much seriously bad public behavior of all kinds they can hardly be bothered.
I'M OLD ENOUGH to remember when women wore hats and gloves downtown, and the men wore suits. Everyone looked very cool, like George Raft and Betty Davis. Even the bums wore suits and fedoras. Public drunks were confined to a couple of blocks on Third Street, and people living in tents on the sidewalk was simply unthinkable.
TODAY? The cops are asked to arrest people for the kind of bad public behavior that didn't exist until… the hippies, the non-artistic illegitimate sons and daughters of a handful of pioneer North Beach beatniks, when they began flaking out and spare changing on Haight Street's sidewalks.
THERE WERE CALLS for the cops to “clean up the area,” and the cops duly tried to clean up the area, and a good time was had by all during the ensuing riots. The Haight Street sweeps were led by a legendary cop named, as I recall, Art Gerrans, easily the Bay Area's all-time hippie hater. Gerrans was both a rhetorical and literal hippie basher. “The hippies are ruining the city,” Gerrans told the Chron.
GERRANS would personally lead the Tac Squad's charge down Haight, promiscuously swinging his fungo bat baton at everyone slow to move. “Going, going gone! Yer outtahere!”
THE GUY was a case, so extreme his kids probably all grew up to be hippies.
THE SPIRITUAL grandchildren of the original 1967 exhibitionists are still out there. It was a tired act in ‘67, but to most us nothing more than other minor urban irritants like gratuitously rude bus drivers, 40-year-old skateboarders, the tubercular loogies of Chinatown, and the people who pick whole bouquets out of the public parks.
MANY TIMES, I've stepped over six-packs of yellow-fanged street oafs; a couple of times when fights seemed imminent the always nearby bicycle cops swooped down to make arrests. It all seems rather quaint now, with true desperation and harder drugs on the streets and America undergoing a quasi-fascist coup run out of the White House.
I TAKE the long view. I lived in the Haight in 1963 when it was quiet and cheap and convenient to the rest of the city, and I lived there again in ’67 during The Summer of STDs, when the cheap rents and convenience gave way to the hippies.
BY ’67 Haight Street was a round-the-clock mob scene. Which it has been ever since. Nothing has changed except the demographics. The city is both a lot richer than it was, and a lot poorer than it was, as Trump unwittingly mobilizes the mother of all American resistance. Or wittingly, hoping for the ultimate showdown. This summer is going to be a wild one.
BUT HOW prevalent is Slob-ism to begin with? About as prevalent as the traveling urinator and the doorway defecator, I'd say. It happens but not enough to pass new laws against it. Anyway, given that the jails are full, and given that the cops are usually busy with more menacing criminal behavior, Slobbism is here to stay.
THE PEOPLE lying around the city these days are drop-fall drunk or immobilized on dope, or they are untreated crazy people. But on Haight from Ashbury on west into Golden Gate Park all the way to the tennis courts, you run a long gauntlet of people you'd just as soon greet with a flame thrower. The cops, by simply being visible, can instantly dry up the whole show, or at least send it scurrying into Golden Gate Park’s battered bushes.
WHAT'S NEW about the homeless discussion, though, is that some of San Francisco's supervisors, the so-called “progressives,” argue that enforcement of laws aimed at tidying up the streets are unfairly aimed at the poor and the homeless. Not true. It's aimed at people who have destroyed public spaces.
THE COPS in San Francisco these days strike me as a polyglot, multi-ethnic, gender-diverse mix of 5’7” chubbies. I haven’t seen a large, psycho-looking, psycho-acting cop in San Francisco for many years, but then I'm not out at night much.
THERE WAS A TIME in America when there was a national consensus on standards of public behavior, but these days the slightest misdemeanor interference with the publicly obnoxious is so aggressively resisted by “progressives” you don't have to wonder why they're absent on the big stuff, like who has all the money and power.
ANYWAY. Why is there even an argument about a hostile kid with a barely controlled dog blocking a sidewalk so everyone else has to walk around his fetid self?
THE REAL ISSUE in the city, apart from the fundamental one of power arrangements, is the large number of visibly insane people wandering around. What kind of society doesn’t take care of the deranged? Ours, for one.
EXAMPLE: The other morning on Clement Street between 7th and 8th, a crazy guy, about thirty I guessed, was walking rapidly west. Every few yards he shouted obscenities at invisible provocations. Crazy Guy was angry, and he was large enough to make him doubly menacing, although he was clearly oblivious of his surroundings and seemed unlikely to pause long enough in his forced march to the Pacific to choke anybody out.
OLD LADIES, most of them Asian, are out early shopping the fresh fruit and vegetable bins of Clement. They immediately took cover from the bummer-in-transit, shrinking into doorways, and we all watched him go his bellowing way to make sure he stayed gone before we resumed pawing through the snap peas.
OBJECTIVELY, that brief episode wasn’t a big deal, but multiply that guy by a few thousand doomed souls wandering San Francisco’s finite neighborhoods, a few pitbull punks sprinkled in, the usual street criminals on the prowl for soft targets, and prevalent bad public manners… What you get is a frightened general population, and when people get scared bad political things happen, like the ultimately bad thing underway today.
FROM THE ARCHIVE…
Boaz V. The Untutored & Malicious
by Bruce McEwen (June 2010)
Dennis Boaz is erudite and urbane, a man of varied and laudable experience – teacher, historian, lawyer, writer, civil rights advocate… So when Bryan Barrett, the toadying assistant superintendent of Ukiah Unified School District, wrote a memorandum calling Boaz a racist, Boaz sued for defamation of character.
Boaz, who taught at Ukiah’s South Valley High School at the time, had been representing the teachers union in salary negotiations with the Ukiah Unified School District.
The libel suit arose from the now retired history teacher’s use of the word “niggardly” in a memo to the school district about union negotiations.
Boaz’s case was heard Friday in Mendocino County Small Claims Court presided over by Judge Leonard LaCasse. Boaz filed a small claims suit last year against district Assistant Superintendent of Personnel and Student Services Bryan Barrett, and another action against Paul Tichinin of the Mendocino County Office of Education and several small district superintendents affiliated with Tichinin.
Boaz said he’d been defamed by these haphazardly educated school administrators, that his reputation had been damaged when Barrett wrote a letter characterizing Boaz’s use of the word niggardly in his memo to the district as “racism” or “suggested racism.”
Barrett had written to Ukiah Teachers Association president Sherry Sandoval and other involved officials: “This memo is formal notice to [the Ukiah Teachers Association] that Mr. Boaz’s communication is insulting and unacceptable … [and] racism or suggested racism has absolutely no place in this district.”
Boaz is not a racist, and he wasn’t going to be libeled by a group of malicious know-nothings.
He sued.
A libel is a false and malicious published statement that damages somebody’s reputation. Barrett’s memo libeled Boaz by calling Boaz a racist for using the word “niggardly” to describe Ukiah Unified’s response to the teacher’s union’s demands for fair compensation. Barrett called Boaz a racist knowing full-well, as Boaz said in court, that the word had no racist meaning.
Barrett and his shot-callers at Ukiah Unified were not only trying to get rid of the effective Boaz as union negotiator, they were trying to destroy him.
Barrett said Boaz’s alleged slur had been aimed at Ukiah Unified School Superintendent Lois Nash, who is black.
“The more I thought about it,” Boaz said, “the angrier I got. My blood pressure went up and I couldn’t sleep.”
When the case was called early last Friday morning, Judge Leonard LaCasse told the parties to attempt a mediation and he would get back to them after he heard some other matters.
Mr. Barrett immediately declined the mediation, so there was nothing to do but wait for the judge to return.
During the break, Mr. Boaz immediately found himself surrounded by the local press corps. With his eyes dancing merrily, he fielded a barrage of questions about himself and his case against Barrett and Ukiah Unified. He was pleasant and patient, his voice soft and his good humor infectious. A couple of reporters had learned that Boaz had been convicted-murderer Gary Gilmore’s lawyer; the man who pled Gilmore’s case for execution. Gilmore, you may recall, demanded execution by firing squad. Boaz helped him get it. Boaz was extensively interviewed by author Norman Mailer for Mailer’s prize-winning book, “The Executioner’s Song,” and he played himself in the subsequent movie.
Boaz showed the reporters a marvelously written report he’d prepared in which he used an extended metaphor to portray the school board as Draconian. Not only was the report artfully written, it was irrefutably accurate and effective in damning the district’s negotiation tactics as applied to major issues like health benefits, sick leave, vacation, and so on.
Unable or unwilling to address the charges in the report, the school district bureaucrats decided, instead, to besmirch its author’s reputation, and came up with racism: “The tenor of the negotiations have become increasingly negative and niggardly,” Boaz wrote.
They immediately Googled the word, Barrett said.
In recent years efforts to ban niggardly have emerged on the PC agenda, and Barrett and his team of slanderers would have found this news on Google. In 1999 a white aide to the black mayor of Washington, D.C., resigned after a black colleague complained about use of the word; a teacher in North Carolina was reprimanded for teaching the word to her class; and the Dallas Morning News banned the word after readers complained about its appearance in a restaurant review; a Boston reader complained to Britain’s “The Economist” magazine about the word, but the British editors just laughed at the Yank. “Where else in the English-speaking world could this happen?
Mr. Barrett said, “There are thousands of words he could have used other than niggardly.”
Really. Thousands?
“I was hoping,” Boaz said, “to build some fighting spirit in the union.”
When the commotion over the word broke out, a commotion deliberately begun by Barrett and his fellow intellectuals in Mendocino County school administration, there was speculation that the word was used as a slur aimed at Lois Nash. Boaz immediately wrote a letter to Dr. Nash stating that that was not his intent and apologizing for any inferences that she may have drawn. At the time, Dr. Nash said she hadn’t taken Boaz’s choice of words personally nor had she thought he’d intended to insult her.
Boaz is also suing County School Superintendent Paul Tichinin. Tichinin’s letter accusing Boaz of racism was endorsed by all his subordinate superintendents, from one end of the county to the other (excluding Nash herself), marking them forever as either sycophants or dummies or both.
Paul Tichinin is the superintendent of the Mendocino County Office of Education. To put his rank in bureaucratic perspective, consider this: His pay scale and scope of influence is roughly equivalent to a colonel in the military. They command a similar size staff to manage the personnel of a mission that involves roughly comparable numbers of people, whether it be a regiment of US troops, or a domestic school district.
The comparison is essential because the salary and rank was established in order to attract a qualified individual, someone with the leadership abilities and intelligence necessary for such a posting. The job pays $120,000 a year and includes perks most Americans can only dream about.
Colonel Tichinin’s signature appears dependably as clockwork on a great many paychecks in Mendocino County. He has been flattered often by those who are beholden to his mighty and highly lucrative pen, but always in the vaguest terms such as wonderful, great, and, especially, nice. Personally, I would describe him as cute. Especially when he was holding that sign “CUTS HURT KIDS” out in front of the courthouse a couple months ago, essentially using children as human shields to protect his own sweet salary.
Exquisitely cute. Despite his many admirers, a constitutionally protected source told this reporter on Friday that a state budget expert has encountered something extraordinary at Col. Tichinin’s office. Apparently, deep in the bowels of the colonel’s bunker, the experts stumbled into a vault full of riches.
Bryan Barrett is the second in command at one of the battalions that make up Col. Tich’s regiment, a mere major, serving directly under Lt. Col. Lois Nash, but also serving as Col. Tich’s personnel officer, known as S-1 in the military command structure.
Col. Tich has presently withdrawn from the battlefield. He’s in retreat, digging in, having got his court action postponed to September. He’s on vacation, you see, no doubt deeply engaged in study and prayer. He probably also wants to see how his S-1 officer, Bryan Barrett, does in the present skirmish.
After a couple hours of delay, the skirmish finally began in earnest.
It was a small claims action, with a $7500 limit, and Judge LaCasse conducts these things with a minimal formality. Mr. Boaz, to his credit, didn’t pose as a lawyer — he’s retired from that profession.
Mr. Barrett, on the other hand, immediately made a fuss. He wanted to submit a legal brief prepared by the school district’s general counsel, Margaret Merchat, of the Santa Rosa contracted attorney office that specializes in dubious but expensive advice to school districts. Boaz chuckled mildly over the pretentiousness of this formality, but Judge LaCasse accepted it, saying Barrett was within his rights.
(We wonder about that. Small claims actions are supposed to be free of lawyers, just the two parties representing themselves as best they can. And where do Barrett and Merchat get off using school money to defend gross stupidity and malice?)
Judge LaCasse told Boaz, “You’re saying this is defamation. I want to know what was said.”
Boaz responded. “I worked as lead negotiator with UUSD. On March 3rd of ‘09 I wrote a sarcastic bargaining report, criticizing the board, calling it Draconian. Then in a report written to my boss, Sherry Sandoval, from Bryan Barrett, Mr. Barrett stated that Mr. Boaz was inciting racism or suggested racism.”
Judge: “Is that the statements that are defamatory?”
Boaz: “Yes.”
Judge: “Who’s it addressed to?”
Boaz: “Sherry Sandoval. I was the lead negotiator. As a teacher, I volunteered.”
Judge: “When was the alleged defamatory statement made?”
Boaz: “March 17th, ‘09.”
Judge: “Saint Patrick’s Day?”
Boaz: “That’s right.”
Judge: “How were you damaged by the statements?”
Boaz: “Well, economically, I felt I should no longer be the lead negotiator. It didn’t seem appropriate. So I received a reduction of $1,200 — I would have received $2,400. I was shocked, then I became angry. As a teacher I vigorously teach about the importance of civil rights. Racism has no place in my classroom. I am not a racist. My wife and daughter are Jewish. We attended the inauguration of President Obama. But as a writer and a teacher my reputation is important to me, and I was put in this position where teachers were clamoring for my resignation.”
Judge: “How many teachers?”
Boaz: “About 20 teachers, following the memorandum by Mr. Barrett.”
Judge: “How do you attribute that to Mr. Barrett?”
Boaz: “Sorry, your honor,” having shuffled through his papers, he found a page and passed it to the bailiff. “This goes to malice, written against me. Entitled, ‘To All Employees’ wherein I am singled out for criticism by Mr. Barrett. The purpose was to single me out and criticize me. It only goes to the intent of Mr. Barrett.”
Judge: “Okay. Tell me more about your damages.”
Boaz: “I kept waking up at night. My blood pressure was up. The turmoil of discussing this with several teachers. I was very upset with Mr. Barrett — for someone who knew me, to treat me like this.”
Judge: “Anyone else?”
Boaz: “Yes. A teacher came up to me and seemed to suggest that Dr. Nash was upset by all this.”
Judge: “Did you give her a dictionary?”
Boaz : “No. I apologized to Dr. Nash in a letter.”
Judge: “To be defamed implies a loss of, well, support, respect, whatever…”
Boaz: “I got support from teachers who said, ‘We know you’re not a racist,’ but this incident was creating a spirit in the union and in the fall of last year I resigned.”
Judge: “Anything else?”
Boaz said he wanted to question Barrett as an adverse witness.
Judge: “What does your other witness have to say?”
Shannon Bradford, the liaison to the executive board took the stand.
Boaz (Holding up a page): “This is the Welcome to Draconia document that set everything off. Last year in March, you were privy to a memo. We discussed potential fallout and how people might react. Did you discuss the issue with other teachers?”
Bradford: “I did, but I don’t recall exactly who.”
Boaz: “What did they say?”
Bradford: “They were surprised that you would use racist language.”
Barrett had no cross-examination questions. Boaz wanted to ask Barrett some questions.
Judge: “Go ahead.”
Boaz: “Mr. Barrett, you and I have been doing grievance negotiations for how long, now?”
Barrett: “I’ve been in that position for four years.”
Boaz: “During the year-and-a-half that I’ve been there did you ever hear me use any racist epithets toward any person?”
Barrett: “No.”
Boaz: “Ever hear me criticize Dr. Nash?”
Barrett: “Yes. Something about top-down management, but nothing recent, if that’s where you’re going.”
Boaz: “So you never heard me so much as suggest that anyone was inferior to me?”
Barrett: “There was nothing that would make me think you would… well, misuse words.”
Boaz: “But you called off a meeting because of my presence.”
Barrett: “Yes.”
Judge: “Look, I don’t want to get into any of that. I want to know if you knew what the word meant. That it meant stingy, miserly, et cetera.”
Barrett: “Yes, I knew what it meant.”
Boaz: “So you must have drawn an inference…”
Barrett: “I’m not arguing that I drew an inference. What I was thinking was that we have the only African American superintendent, so my questioning of the use of the word was the time and place.”
Boaz: “Was Dr. Nash at the negotiating table?”
Barrett: “No. But she’s the head of the district, so when you say the district, she is the district. You could have used other words.”
Boaz: “How does that make me a racist?”
Barrett: “I said racism or implied racism.. My memo referred to tactics.”
Boaz: “But Dr. Nash was not at that table.”
Barrett: “She was at the table. She gives us our directions on what to do.”
Boaz: “Did you go to my principal and ask if I’d ever used racist language before?”
Barrett: “You admitted that someone might be able to take it the wrong way!”
Judge: “Again, I don’t want to get into that.”
Boaz: “Who’s idea was it to write that I was a racist?”
Barrett: “That would have come from Dr. Nash, myself, and the attorney, Margaret Merchat, who was very involved in the memo.”
Boaz: “What was your purpose?”
Barrett: “We wanted to have negotiations that were very professional.”
Boaz: “Weren’t you trying to get rid of me? You said my integrity was at issue.”
Barrett: “I can’t answer that. We had other teachers coming and saying ‘We gotta get this guy off the negotiations board.’ We took directions from our attorneys before we penned the letter.”
Boaz: “Did you ever think of discussing it with me before calling me a racist?”
Barrett: “There was no reason for me to contact you.”
Boaz: “Don’t you think that since you knew what the word meant, you should have contacted me to see what I meant?”
Barrett: “I don’t know what your intent was – maybe you could ask yourself that!”
Judge: “Gentlemen. I think I get it. There’s only so much time. I’ve got other cases to hear today.”
Barrett submitted his trial brief and began his testimony: “This is a non-actionable opinion. An opinion is different from a fact–”
Judge: “Okay. You knew what the word meant when you wrote the memorandum?”
Barrett: “Yes, we” –
Judge: “Not we: You! You wrote the memo.”
Barrett: “Like I said, we Googled it and went to the principal.”
Judge: “Anything else?”
Barrett: “When I think about the situational circumstances, the time and place – these words were thrown out there and used! It’s how people take them! It was the improper time and place to use that kind of word!”
Judge: “Okay. Well…”
Boaz: “When someone’s called a racist, if that’s provable it’s not a matter of opinion. They jumped to the worst possible conclusion and decided to call me a racist. So I maintain that when you do call someone a racist, especially a teacher, it’s going to undermine that teacher’s reputation.”
Judge: “Okay, the facts are clear. One thing I’m not clear on was whether any of these are privileged communications. That’s an issue I’ve got to research. And the point of whether it’s an opinion. I want to do some further research on that. These things are in a state of revision. Decades ago being called a racist might have been considered an opinion that was not particularly harmful to someone’s reputation. Today it can be devastating to a person’s career. But the facts are known, the nuances and context are understood. Malice is implied if it’s in writing, so I’m going to take it under submission. This is an area where the courts advise us to tread cautiously.”
Judge LaCasse has 60 days to reach a decision.
Mr. Boaz later said this was the first he knew of Dr. Nash’s involvement.
Boaz’s case against Tichinin and all the other school superintendents who also signed the letter calling Boaz a racist was postponed to September 3rd because Tichinin told the court he couldn’t make it to court on Friday.
Tichinin signed that letter, as did Gary Barr of the Potter Valley Unified School District, Mark Iacuaniello of the Point Arena School District, J.R. Collins of the Anderson Valley School District, Don Armstrong of the Fort Bragg Unified School District, John Markatos of the Laytonville School District, Catherine Stone of the Mendocino Unified School District, Dennis Ivey of the Round Valley Unified School District, Cindy Biaggi-Gonzalez of the Manchester School District and Debra Kubin of the Willits Unified School District.
Your children are being educated by these people.
MIKE SWEENEY at Stanford, as editor of the Stanford ‘Chaparral,’ Sept 1969 to Feb 1970, when he was kicked out.
https://chappiearchives.org/doku.php/1969-70
CATCH OF THE DAY, Wednesday, February 5, 2025
ROYCE FULTON, 41, Ukiah. Disorderly conduct-alcohol.
BENJAMIN KEATOR, 43, Willits. County parole violation.
CHERRAL MITCHELL, 41, Ukiah. DUI, controlled substance, paraphernalia, probation revocation.
DENA MORRIS, 63, Ukiah. Paraphernalia, parole violation. (Frequent flyer.)
MIGUEL SIMON-CRUZ, 40, Ukiah. Controlled substance, failure to appear.
PLASTIC HOUSES
There were at least five or six plastic houses that I know of in Whale Gulch back in the day, and probably more. The floors were usually wood and some plywood backing was used behind the stove and stovepipe. It was ideal for squatting with a limited investment and I lived in one in the summer of ‘75, with a creek running next to it. When it was laundry time I put my clothes in the creek with a rock holding down each item and the next day hung them up to dry. Country living…
— Paul Modic
MONARK FROM IOWA
by Doug Loranger
The Editor’s recent musings on Greg and the Bike Hut on San Francisco’s Embarcadero brought to mind my own bike experiences when I arrived in the City in 1995 – from Iowa – with a one-speed bicycle with balloon tires that had been manufactured in Chicago in the late 1940s by the Monark Silver King Company.
I acquired the bicycle during my days as a graduate student and teacher in Iowa City. Purchased for $5 from a tenant who was moving out of one of the other apartments in the building where I first resided, the bicycle was a two-tone light blue and white. The logo in front beneath the handlebars bore the image of crown and the words “Monark” and “Chicago, U.S.A..”
During my last year in Iowa, it provided my daily transportation to and from the family-owned organic vegetable farm on the city’s southern perimeter where I worked throughout the summer and fall of 1994 in exchange for free access to the vegetables the farm’s owner, a few farmworker tenants, local residents and I planted, tended and harvested as part of a Community Supported Agriculture project.
When I was preparing my move from Iowa City to San Francisco, I began to disencumber as many of my possessions as possible, as there was a limited amount of storage space in my 1974 Dodge Dart. My Fender Stratocaster went to my friend Ottilie. My Peavey amplifier went to Greg Brown sideman Bo Ramsey. My book collection was boxed and shipped to Oakland via Amtrak. And I pedaled off on the Monark to Greg the Bike Hut’s spiritual confrere in Iowa City, Ed the Hippy Bike Guy, with plans to sell it.
When I arrived at Ed’s, I was barely off the bike before he started to tinker with it using a wrench. I told him I was leaving town for good and would let him have the Monark for whatever he thought it was worth. Ed said, “I could give you $20 for it, or I could give you this bike rack” – he pointed to a somewhat decrepit metal frame lying nearby on the grass – “and you’d be riding in style in San Fran’.” The only thing missing from the rack was a protective rubber stopper that would prevent the rack from scratching the trunk of my car when strapped in place. Ed said I could probably find one at the Salvation Army store on the outskirts of town.
Armed with the bike rack and my new-found plan to take the Monark with me across the plains to California, I arrived at the Salvation Army emporium. Behind the counter sat a bearded man with one leg in a cast and a pair of crutches propped up against the wall. I told him I was looking for a rubber stopper, something akin to the ones that were attached to the bottom of his prosthetic devices.
“I heard you was comin’ by,” he remarked in a Deliverance-inflected drawl. “They’re over on the shelf.”
After I found one that looked like it would work, I brought it to the counter and asked the price.
“What’s it worth to you?,” he asked.
“Whatever you think is fair,” I answered.
“How about twenty-five cents?”
From my top-floor flat in an 1889 Victorian in the Western Addition (the cost of a private room obtained via the then-still extant Haight Ashbury Roommate Referral Service with several roommates: $375 per month), I would descend the stairs and unlock the basement where the Monark resided when not in use. Over the course of several months, I made the counter-intuitive and somewhat astonishing discovery that despite San Francisco’s precipitously hilled topography, if you choose your route carefully, many if not most of the city’s neighborhoods were accessible with a one-speed bicycle. The Marina was a notable exception, but then the relatively affluent Marina in those days was not a destination high on my list of priorities. More amenable, and featuring a more interesting cross-section of humanity, was JFK Drive during the Sunday closures to traffic in Golden Gate Park.
Traveling through the City on the Monark on the cusp of the first dot.com upheaval, San Francisco residents were outspokenly vocal in their admiration for the bike. The Monark I rode was technically a women’s bike – i.e. it had an open or step-through frame – but the accolades it elicited were not limited to the City’s lesbian population.
“I like that shit you’re ridin’,” was one response from a black male pedestrian on the sidewalk as I pedaled one day south up Divisadero.
In 2007, I learned that the private prep school next door to the Victorian where I had resided since my arrival in the City had purchased the building from its oddball Italian owner in Vacaville and planned to demolish it to make way for an assembly wing. As I prepared to move out, the long-time tenant in the second-floor flat (“In the 1970s, I was accused of being responsible for bringing 70% of the marijuana into this country – they underestimated it”) asked me if there were any of my possessions stored in the basement that I wanted to keep, as he had agreed to oversee the process of clearing it out. If so, he would set them aside.
I said the only thing I wanted to save was the Monark and he replied that he would. I might have realized that when communicating with ex-drug kingpins you can’t always take them at their word.
In due course, the building was dutifully demolished and with it the Monark and my bicycling days in San Francisco.
LEGENDARY ANCHORMAN:
Legendary KTVU anchorman Dennis Richmond, the quintessential newsman of four decades – an anchor still most associated with Channel 2 long after his retirement, died Wednesday at the age of 81.
OUR DAILY ‘SIDESHOW’
Editor:
You can love sideshows or hate them, but they’re a part of our zeitgeist. The bad: noise, chaos, smoky tar from tires, etc. The good (?): sideshows are time-limited; the cops show up, the sideshow breaks up. Kids (?) are having fun. (Your definition of fun may differ.) Once they’re over, only the cleanup is left.
Ongoing, everyday traffic, on the other hand — noise, pollution, chaos, smoke and grit from burning fossil fuels, accidents (there are “accidents” at sideshows, but they wouldn’t happen if there weren’t sideshows) and deaths, way too many deaths.
It would be nice if we could somehow compromise. Could we ask nicely if the sideshow people would go away, (“away,” like we ask homeless people to “go away”), if in turn we, the people who drive, would drive as if other human beings mattered? People drive as if they were in a bumper car parade, with no thought at all about how they are affecting other drivers (and the habits of other drivers).
By the way, I’ve always hated sideshows, but today’s drivers are making me long for big changes. If we don’t watch ourselves, one of those changes might be a police state.
Jack Jackson
Sebastopol
GROUPS URGE GOV. NEWSOM TO DEFEND ‘CA’S PEOPLE, ENVIRONMENT & LAWS’ IN MEETING WITH TRUMP
by Dan Bacher
A coalition of fishing and environmental groups released a joint statement in response to media reports that Governor Gavin Newsom will meet with President Donald Trump and Republican leaders today, February 5, in Washington, D.C., to discuss the Los Angeles fires and California’s water management.
The groups urged the Governor “to defend California’s people, environment, and laws in these discussions.”…
ED OVERWIESER
The corruption and takeover of the U.S government by the obscenely wealthy. Is nothing new. They worked to overturn the Franklin Roosevelt In 1933.
Business Plot, also called the Wall Street Putsch[1] and the White House Putsch, was a political conspiracy in 1933, in the United States, to overthrow the government of President Franklin D. Roosevelt and install Smedley Butler as dictator.[2][3] Butler, a retired Marine Corps major general, testified under oath that wealthy businessmen were plotting to create a fascist veterans' organization with him as its leader and use it in a coup d'état to overthrow Roosevelt. In 1934, Butler testified under oath before the United States House of Representatives Special Committee on Un-American Activities (the "McCormack–Dickstein Committee") on these revelations.[4] Although no one was prosecuted, the congressional committee final report said, "there is no question that these attempts were discussed, were planned, and might have been placed in execution when and if the financial backers deemed it expedient."
Early in the committee's gathering of testimony most major news media dismissed the plot, with a New York Times editorial characterizing it as a "gigantic hoax".[5] When the committee's final report was released, the Times said the committee "purported to report that a two-month investigation had convinced it that General Butler's story of a Fascist march on Washington was alarmingly true" and "… also alleged that definite proof had been found that the much publicized Fascist march on Washington, which was to have been led by Major Gen. Smedley D. Butler, retired, according to testimony at a hearing, was actually contemplated".[6] The individuals involved all denied the existence of a plot.
While historians have questioned whether a coup was actually close to execution, most agree that some sort of "wild scheme" was contemplated and discussed.
REBECCA SOLNIT
This may not sound shocking, but it is one of the most shocking parts of this coup: why would you shut down all the federal offices unless you're nihilists who've decided we don't need a government? (Naturally every bit of mainstream media will make it sound like another boring bureaucratic thing you wouldn't really want to give much thought to, rather than the end of the world as we know it, and this AP story is no exception. The stories on Tuesday the 28th about the stoppage of all federal payments was also made to sound nerdy, technical, uninteresting by the news until we raised hell.)
The other shocking thing here is: the person giving these commands is a Musk employee and not a part of the federal government, aka does not legally (so far as I understand it) have the power to do so. It's getting harder to tell if they want to take over the government or just wreck it altogether, but it looks more and more like the latter. Maybe Congress, or the non-coup part of it, needs to communicate that all this is not exactly coming from the legitimate federal government.
"Last week, regional managers for the General Services Administration, or GSA, received a message from the agency’s Washington headquarters to begin terminating leases on all of the roughly 7,500 federal offices nationwide, according to an email shared with The Associated Press by a GSA employee. The order seems to contradict Trump’s own return-to-office mandate for federal employees, adding confusion to what was already a scramble by the GSA to find workspace, internet connections and office building security credentials for employees who had been working remotely for years. According to the employee who spoke to the AP, the initiative is being led by Nicole Hollander, who has been embedded in the GSA’s headquarters in recent days. On her LinkedIn profile, Hollander describes herself as an X employee with a background in real estate, in the Washington area."
EATING IN THE 50S
Pasta was not commonly eaten.
Curry was a surname.
A takeaway was a mathematical problem.
A pizza was associated with a leaning tower.
Crisps were plain; the only choice we had was whether to add salt or not.
Rice was only served as a milk pudding.
A raincoat was what we wore when it rained.
Brown bread was considerd food only for the poor.
Oil was for lubricating; fat was for cooking.
Tea was brewed in a teapot using tea leaves, and green tea was unheard of.
Sugar was highly regarded, considered "white gold," and cubed sugar was seen as luxurious.
Fish didn’t have fingers.
Eating raw fish was seen as poverty, not sushi.
None of us had ever heard of yogurt.
Healthy food consisted of anything edible.
People who didn’t peel potatoes were viewed as lazy.
Indian restaurants existed only in India.
Cooking outdoors was called camping.
Seaweed was not recognized as food.
"Kebab" wasn’t even a word, let alone a type of food.
Prunes were considered medicinal.
Surprisingly, muesli was available, but it was called cattle feed.
Water came straight from the tap; if someone had suggested bottling it and charging more than petrol, they would have been laughed at!
And the things we never, ever had on our table in the 50s and 60s: elbows or phones.
— Marie Kavindi
BILL KIMBERLIN:
"Laffing Sal (sometimes incorrectly called "Laughing Sal") was produced by the Philadelphia Toboggan Company (PTC) of Germantown, Pennsylvania during the 1930s. PTC subcontracted fabrication of the figures to the Old King Cole Papier Mache Company of Canton, Ohio.[1]
The figure stood 6 feet 10 inches (2.1 meters) high, including a 12-inch (30-centimeter) pedestal. It was made of papier-mâché, consisting of seven layers of pressed card stock with horse-hair strengthener, mounted over steel coils and frame. It did not come with a hat — hats were added by the purchaser — but wore an artificial wig and was missing an upper incisor tooth.[3] The head, arms, hands and legs were detachable and were held together with fabric, staples, pins, nails, nuts and bolts. When activated, the figure waved its arms and leaned forward and backward. A record player concealed in its pedestal played a stack of 78 RPM phonograph records of a woman laughing. When the records finished, an attraction operator re-stacked and restarted them.[1] A woman named Tanya Garth performed the laugh." (Wiki)
THE SUPER BOWL WILL BE A SPECTACLE OF BLACK EXCELLENCE, BUT YOU’LL NEED TO TUNE OUT MAGA’S WHITE WHINE
by Dave Zirin
Sad-boy billionaire Mark Zuckerberg thinks he can find his “masculine energy” by sucking up to a 78-year-old autocrat slathered in orange. But for all the alleged “masculine energy” surrounding Trumpists, there has never been a bigger group of babies. This administration and their acolytes are part of what I call “the cult of the white whine.” Well grab a goblet, because the white whine will be flowing this Sunday.
The Super Bowl, of course, is this weekend in New Orleans and will be the most watched event of the year. It is still one of the few shared experiences left in this divided country. The day, as programmed by the NFL, was set to celebrate New Orleans’s incredible history of Black music and culture. Yet, given the current climate of voluntary surrender to Donald Trump’s “anti DEI” (anti-Black) obsession, it would not have surprised me if the NFL pulled the plug and just showed a hologram of Hank Williams, Jr. on a loop. But when I contacted the head of NFL PR, Brian McCarthy, he not only affirmed that the show would go on but seemed downright excited. I’ve written about the NFL’s issues with institutionalized racism—in coaching, in management, in the treatment of Black players’ health—for years, but this time the league appears to be standing firm.
The people trying to silence Black voices and erase Black history won’t be happy about it. The white whine will pour before the game even starts when New Orleans–born recording artist, the brilliant Ledesi, performs “Lift Every Voice And Sing.” With lyrics written by early civil rights activist and NAACP leader James Weldon Johnson, it is called both lovingly and derisively—depending upon who is doing the talking—the Black national anthem. That it is even performed at all is an outgrowth of the anti-racist struggles of NFL football players between 2016-2020—struggles that in 2017 provoked Trump in front of a packed audience in Huntsville, Alabama (a vineyard of white whiners) to curse these almost exclusively Black players as “sons of bitches” and call for them to be fired. (Trump never played football but likes to whine that the game is no longer sufficiently violent for his tastes.) Whenever “Life Every Voice” is played, the very people scratching out Black history from our textbooks have raging tantrums, only proving its necessity. These are people who don’t want voices lifted; they want them silenced.
The rest of the day will be filled with New Orleans’s musical legends like the legendary Trombone Shorty and Jon Batiste. New Orleans is the cradle of Black music—meaning all “American” music. In the eyes of the people in power, it must be DEI and anti-white prejudice that is keeping reality-show singer Carrie Underwood or the shower-allergic Kid Rock off the big stage.
And speaking of Black excellence, the game itself will pit two Black quarterbacks against one another—Patrick Mahomes vs. Jalen Hurts. A driving obsession of this baldly racist administration is that inferior Black candidates—who according to their Health and Human Services nominee, RFK Jr., need fewer vaccinations due to their Blackness—are stealing jobs from the white man. Yet here are the quarterbacks—the field generals, the thinkers, the leaders. They are living rebukes to Vice President JD Vance’s belief system. If Vance was coaching the Chiefs, he’d bench Mahomes for Carson Wentz.
But that’s not all. The halftime act this year will be hip-hop’s supreme being, Kendrick Lamar. It was a shocker to many when Lamar was tapped for the coveted halftime spot. He had spent the year releasing raw battle rhymes aimed at Drake, one of history’s top selling artists. Tracks such as “Not Like US” and “Meet the Grahams” eviscerated Drake and became massive global hits, winning a slew of Grammys on this past Sunday. He can do a “pop-out” concert in Los Angeles and draw 16,000 people and have gang members tying their bandanas together and dancing as one on stage.
Lamar was the perfect choice. I just didn’t think the NFL, with its coterie of billionaire Trump supporters in the owners’ boxes, would sign off on it. Perhaps, in part, it was because Lamar performed a section of the Dr. Dre-produced Super Bowl halftime show in 2022 and was criticized by his own fans for performing the Black Lives Matter anthem “We Gon’ Be Alright” but leaving out lines that were critical of the police. Maybe they think Lamar will play ball: drawing in his massive audience while leaving out his politics. (He certainly did not dip into political waters at the Grammys.) But no one but Lamar, an improvisational genius, knows what he’ll say once he has the mic and the world is watching. Maybe he’ll say nothing, which would be fine. It’s a hell of a weight to ask him to carry: to be the voice of the unheard under the brightest possible lights. But when you think of the lyrics “They not like us" and Lamar’s penchant for the unexpected, it raises some hopes that he may point that “they” (a Nazi-saluting oligarch and his minions) are not like us.
Lamar’s appearance is already causing a gush of white whine from a group of GOP New Orleans state legislators who issued a preemptive statement against what they fear will be a “lewd” and “offensive” halftime show. Toxic scoundrels such as this, who uncritically support a cabinet of alleged and adjudicated rapists yet lecture us about “lewd” behavior from a Black artist are giving the game away. On Sunday, they’ll all be drunk on grievance, fragile as porcelain, choking on their tears—their “masculine energy” exposed as buzzwords for an agenda to oppress and remove those with whom they are scared to compete.
UPDATE: After the publication of this article, which gives the NFL credit for not prematurely surrendering to Donald Trump’s baldly racist agenda, news broke that for the first time in four Super Bowls, commissioner Roger Goodell will not have “End Racism” stenciled behind the end zone. Some are divining that the league made this decision because Trump will be in attendance. I reached back out to Brian McCarthy, the NFL’s vice president of communications, and he said, “This is a bullshit narrative. [Written the end zone] will be ‘Choose Love’. Teams have used on the field this year, ‘Vote,’ ‘End Racism,’ ‘Stop Hate,’ and ‘Choose Love.’ This is part of the NFL’s Inspire Change. We started the field stencils in 2020. For the championship games a couple weeks ago, the Chiefs had Choose Love and Eagles had End Racism. … ‘Choose Love’ is appropriate to use as our country has endured in recent weeks wildfires in southern California, the terrorist attack here in New Orleans, the plane and helicopter crash near our nation’s capital and the plane crash in Philadelphia.”
EMOTIONAL DISTRESS
Intentional infliction
Of Emotional Distress
Fearing the future
Filled with duress
.
Demands to resign
Or even retire
Failure to sign
Means You’re Fired!
.
Tear it all down
And set it afire
The orange faced clown
And his billionaire buyer
.
The nation be damned
As the laws are ignored
While oligarchs jam
Democracy’s doors
— Elvin Woods
“A POEM begins as a lump in the throat, a sense of wrong, a homesickness, a lovesickness. It is a reaching-out toward expression; an effort to find fulfillment. A complete poem is one where an emotion finds the thought and the thought finds the words.”
— Robert Frost, Letter to Louis Untermeyer
ON-LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY
Ever since some incautious journalist referred to J. Edgar as a sissy boy (we’re going w-a-a-a-y back) and he panicked and adopted that tough bulldog pose, the official stance of his federal monster has been brutal and heavy. The style of the J. Edgar Hoover Building, aka “Johnny ‘n’ Clyde’s Joint,” is best characterized as “architorture.”
EYESORE OF THE MONTH: FEBRUARY 2025
We pause in the usual cavalcade of horrors for a brief lesson.
by James Kunstler
Concerning President Donald Trump’s executive order requiring new federal buildings to show a preference for "classical architectural style" which includes Neoclassical, Georgian, Federal, Greek Revival, Beaux-Arts, and Art Deco, referencing the architectural traditions of Greek and Roman antiquity. . .
Behold (above) the federal building and courthouse in Tuscaloosa, Alabama by HBRA Architects. And, no, it was not conceived when Andy Jackson was fighting the Battle of Emuckfaw against the “Red Stick” Creek Indians in 1814. Rather, it went up in 2012, a rare example of neoclassical design executed in our time.
For the most part, though, the decades-long trend in American civic architecture has been for sui generis one-off, tortured-genius, para-metaphysical, high-tech, in-your-grille stunt buildings commissioned to shock and confound the middle class (Épater le bourgeois, as the French dubbed this maneuver).
These generally horrified the public (as intended), as well as perplexing and confusing them, making their interaction with the building a form of punishment. Often it was difficult to even discern where the entrance of the building was, or where to go once you managed to get inside. For instance, the recent San Francisco Federal building by Tom Mayne of Morphosis Architects, below, designed in the style of a dashboard from an alien spacecraft:
At its worst, you got the conjunction of malign form and evil function, as concretized in Washington’s J. Edgar Hoover Building, home office (mother ship) of the FBI, below:
Kind of looks like a giant stroopwafel jammed under a coffee table. You can be sure that little good came out of it, especially the past four years, and probably the whole six decades of its miserable existence. FBI-Director nominee Kash Patel went so far as to propose it be turned into “a Museum of the Deep State.” Well, yes. Perfect!
Below, see another new-ish civic structure dressed in neo-Georgian formality: the Alpharetta, GA, City Hall by David M. Schwartz architects — granted, not a federal building, but proof that trad proportions and details can be done well, where there’s a will to get’er done. Nice, huh. Dignified. Serene, confident, legible. . . reflecting what is to be desired in a polity, sanity and grace.
Why trad design, you might ask? Initially, with our nation’s founding, there was a wish to express our national ethos in architecture that denoted the democratic spirit of Ancient Greece melded with the order of the early Roman republic. And so, you got this bold neoclassicism for over a hundred years, climaxing in the US Supreme Court’s headquarters, completed in 1935, below:
There are hidden charms in this neoclassicism. You may notice that the building is organized with a base, a middle and a top (or capitol). Indeed, not just the whole, but its parts ( e.g., the columns) express this tripartite organization. This expresses the organization of the human body, with feet and legs, a trunk, and a head. Thus, it reflects our essential humanness back at us and confers dignity in the works of man and mankind itself.
Sure there are other ways of making buildings, but are they expressing what we want to say about ourselves? Might we want to suggest that there is a sacred order to the human project, and be reminded of it forcefully in our monumental buildings?
(kunstler.com)
LEAD STORIES, THURSDAY'S NYT
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Trump Administration Deepens Pressure on Federal Workers to Resign
Trump Officials Walk Back Plan to Take Over Gaza
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BODYBAGS FROM GAZA: IS THE SECOND MARINE DIVISION GOING TO PALESTINE?
by Matthew Hoh
The future ain’t what it used to be.
~Yogi Berra
My initial thoughts on one of this century’s most alarming and potentially consequential press conferences.
First and foremost:
Will American soldiers take part in deliberate crimes against humanity and come home in body bags for the benefit of Israel and Jared Kushner’s real estate developer friends?
Along with that question and the spectacle and significance of the President of the United States standing next to a wanted war criminal, President Trump offered three key policy announcements that may dictate US, Middle Eastern and world affairs for decades to come.
- The President’s commitment to the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians in Gaza, his certainty that the ethnic cleansing will occur with the assistance of other nations, and his announcement that the US would take over Gaza – whatever that means* – ensures an end to the ceasefire and nascent peace process in Gaza.
How can Hamas and the Palestinians continue with the ceasefire and peace process after such statements? Of course, the US and Israel will blame Hamas and the Palestinians for a resumption of the violence. That will justify a return to the genocide and will satisfy both President Trump and Prime Minister Netanyahu’s domestic political interests. It’s also a sure thing that the majority of the Western corporate press will willingly go along with that storyline.**
Furthermore, we need to note that the commitment of the United States to the ethnic cleansing of a population has many historical American precedents. None perhaps ever stated as boldly or brutally as President Trump did tonight.
- President Trump hinted at a coming US recognition of Israeli annexation of the West Bank, which has always been Israel’s priority and ultimate goal. In the last month, we have likely seen the opening phases of annexation.
Can we expect to see a direct US role in the annexation? If it’s possible for a direct US role in Gaza, including ground troops, as President Trump made clear tonight, then why would it not be possible in the West Bank? I have stated continually that the Israelis cannot carry out their ethnic cleansing of Gaza at the same time as their annexation of the West Bank. They can do that, however, if the US plays a direct role on the ground.
- The joint declaration by both leaders that Iran will never possess a nuclear weapon is nothing new. However, the determination of President Trump and Prime Minister Netanyahu to achieve their aims, regardless of reality, international law or history, makes it seem possible that an attack on Iran will occur at some point, quite possibly using manufactured intelligence to justify war, as was done more than twenty years ago by the George W. Bush administration to invade, occupy and destroy Iraq. That no one was ever held accountable for the deliberate mendacity of that war allows a similarly catastrophic war with Iran to be possible, just as President Biden’s and the Democrat’s support and protection of Israel’s genocide in Gaza for 16 months allows now for President Trump’s actions.
Yesterday, on Dialogue Works, I said twice to Nima that after the first two weeks of this kleptocracy, I’ll never again think or say anything is impossible. Now, I am contemplating US troops, not just in Gaza but in the West Bank, alongside a years-long air and naval campaign against Iran. These were fantastical thoughts up until just a few hours ago. It doesn’t take much fantasy to imagine the horrors that may come.
(CounterPunch.org)
FRIENDS OF THE EEL RIVER: WORKING FOR THE RECOVERY OF OUR WILD AND SCENIC EEL RIVER, ITS FISHERIES, AND COMMUNITIES
Good luck. With trumples in charge along with the greedy wine farmers and the yuppie “settlers” thirsty beyond belief, it’ll be a battle.
The Prime Minster of Norway offered a noteworthy perspective, ‘We take President Trump seriously, but not literally.’ That puts Trump ahead of his predecessors, and Congressional associates who can’t be taken seriously, or literally.
With the comma moved that statement could be interpreted differently…
We take him seriously but, not literally.
Which is likely the case for most folks
EYESORE OF THE MONTH: FEBRUARY 2025
“Classical” architecture sucks, sort of like living in the past, you know, when tyrants of the various empires existed. I can see why right wingers, with their overwhelming desire for power, gush over it…they may succeed this time, given the so-far mild response of the US citizenry to the fascism of the current “administration”. Glad I’m old.
RE: Prunes were considered medicinal.
—> Still are.