Mendocino County Today: Thursday 4/3/2025

Clear Skies | Road Work | Kenneth Stroh | Dog Killed | Scott Dam | Kelisha Guilty | Sako Radio | Swordfern | PVP Meeting | Tubby Tunes | Library Events | Marshall Art | Rental Ordinance | Insurrection Act | Seasonal Flow | Museum Fundraiser | Author Appearance | Yesterday's Catch | PG&E Execs | SMART Windsor | Delta Purpose | Giants Sweep | Tam View | American Spring | GPS Wrong | LA Bailout | Olvera Street | Lead Stories | Police State | Leaven | Tariff Announcements | Felix Kuusmann | Wealth Bunkers | Your Driving | Combustion | Workman's Friend

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FROST ADVISORY remains in effect until 9 am this morning.…Residual instability could result in isolated showers for parts of Northwest California; however, those will diminish completely by this evening as a cold upper low progresses south. Clearing and drying will allow for some colder overnight lows. A sharp warmup with building high pressure can be expected for the end of the week, followed by a chance for rain. (NWS)

STEPHEN DUNLAP (Fort Bragg): 41F under clear skies this Thursday morning on the coast. Clear skies & cool mornings into Sunday then a chance of rain Sunday night. Next week is looking dry, no really.

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KENNETH H. STROH

Kenneth H. Stroh passed away peacefully on March 22, 2025, in Ukiah at the age of 87. He was born in San Francisco to Gerry and Adelaide Stroh, and later the family of six moved to Hillsborough. Ken’s love for the outdoors started at a very young age and was inspired by his father who was an avid pilot and outdoorsman and worked in the sporting goods business. The family spent a lot of time on Bodega Head that was owned by his mother’s family. Many of Ken’s Boy Scout days were happily spent there. He learned how to play the piano and accordion and loved to listen and whistle to music.

Ken attended Burlingame High School from 1952 to 1956, played football and participated in track. His high school days were spent bird and deer hunting with friends and family, driving around in his 1955 Willy’s red Jeep, going to the Rec Center with friends, and spending time with his family at Blue Lakes. Ken knew at the age of 18 that he was going to be a farmer when he filled out a Report on Vocational Interest Test for Men. He ranked farming, engineering, aviation, and carpentry top on his interest list. It didn’t take long for him to accomplish all of them! One day at high school he was seen grinning with his huge Stroh grin at a beautiful freshman named Jeanette. She instantly fell in love and told her close friends that he was the man she was going to marry. Ken remembered their first date when he broke the front door handle on his way into the house and had to hand it over to Jeanette’s questioning father. Their marriage had to wait a bit while she went off to college and he worked for Darcy’s Sporting Goods and Harris & Stroh Sporting Goods. Ken was called into active duty in the Navy in 1958 as an airplane mechanic and worked mostly on F-8 Crusaders. He was stationed at Moffett Field for two years, and then it was finally time for Ken and Jeanette to marry. They were married in May 1960 at the Church of the Wayfarer in Carmel, CA. Ken remained in the Navy in the U.S. Naval Reserve until 1962. In the interim they lived in San Mateo and welcomed their daughter Kathy into their family in 1961. The family later moved to Eureka while Ken sold sporting goods up and down the state, and then the family moved to Vacaville, and San Jose. They welcomed their daughter Debbie into the family in 1966.

Ken’s parents began looking for property in Lake and Mendocino Counties and found their dream ranch in Potter Valley. They purchased the old Burns ranch in March 1967 that included 3200 acres on both sides of Eel River Road. Ken’s dream of farming came true. This was when Ken instantly became the general manager of a cattle feeder operation on the ranch and moved his family there in 1967. They moved into an old cabin, but on the first day had to scare away the skunks and rodents living there. By 1978 the ranch had 300 head of cattle, horses, 7 dogs, and sheep. The family grew sweet corn, melons, and vegetables to sell in their roadside stand and silage and hay for the cattle. Ken was known as a prankster on the ranch. One of his favorite pranks was driving the dune buggy through water and cow patties as it flew up off the tires all over his unsuspecting passengers. Over the years Ken and Jeanette happily spent a lot of time on tractors and in the car driving to all of the girls’ basketball and volleyball games. In addition to his daughters, Ken mentored many young men on farming, equipment repair, and ranch maintenance. He enjoyed sharing the ranch equipment and helping other Potter Valley farmers. He was great at making jigs to help make fixing equipment easier. If he wasn’t farming, he was flying, waterskiing, and sailing. One of his nicknames was “Sparkey” from all of the “control” burns he did that became uncontrolled and the fire department had to come save the ranch. In 1980 Jeanette opened a catering business that changed the ranch’s focus from cattle to growing hay for customers. Ken became the BBQ Tri-Tip King through Jeanette’s Country Cooking. The time after Jeanette’s death in 2005 was difficult, but his family, friends, and new friends helped him through it. He didn’t let his age slow him down . . . he was still growing and bucking hay until he was 80.

Five years ago, he met Verna Schaffer who brought so much joy to Ken’s life. They often talked about how lucky they were to have found each other at their age. Her vision of them continuing to enjoy life together gave him strength to fight cancer. She was the driving force to help him feel and get better, and the family will always be grateful to her for loving Ken and advocating for his healthcare. Ken’s huge grin and his compassion will be missed by all.

Ken loved Potter Valley, and giving back to the community was important to him. In 1975 he became a Director on the Potter Valley Community Services District followed by serving as a board member with the Mendocino County Farm Bureau, Mendocino County Farm Supply, and the Potter Valley Store. He was a volunteer with the Potter Valley Fire Department, and he was a Potter Valley Irrigation board member for 39 years of which he served 36 as President until March 2025.

Ken is survived by his daughter Kathy Williams and her husband Dick; daughter Debbie Reardan and her husband John; granddaughter Shara Sheldon and her husband Chase; grandson Kenny Madigan; granddaughter Amanda Reardan; great-grandson Connor Sheldon; brother Doug Stroh, and several nieces and nephews and great-grand nieces and nephews.

Ken was preceded in death by his wife Jeanette Stroh, brother Marvin Stroh, sister Jean Ingels, and parents Gerry and Adelaide Stroh.

The family is grateful for the end-of-life care given to Ken by Raul Gonzalez, Kim Cavender, and the staff at both Adventist Health Ukiah Valley Hospital and Redwood Cove Healthcare Center.

A Celebration of Life barbecue is scheduled for 2-5 p.m. on May 4, 2025 at the Blue Oaks Barn on the Pauli Ranch in Potter Valley at 12550 Hawn Creek Road. Attendees are asked to bring their favorite dessert to share. Gifts in Ken’s memory are kindly requested to be directed to the Potter Valley Fire Department.

To order memorial trees or send flowers to the family in memory of Kenneth H. Stroh, please visit our flower store.

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ZOE ROSE, Boonville: If it was you who was speeding and just hit my dog on AV Way and killed it in front of my kids and didn’t even stop, I hope you have the day you deserve!!

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FELONY LAKE THEFT

Attention: Dave Eyster Mendocino County District Attorney

My intent of this letter is to expose the largest theft in the history of Mendocino County, and to a lesser degree in Sonoma and Marin: The removal of Lake Pillsbury which is one of the largest freshwater lakes with a shoreline of 31 miles.

The proposal by Dept of Fish & Wildlife, CalTrout, Humboldt County, Round Valley Indian Tribes and the Inland Power & Water Commission is criminal!

In 1906 the tunnel for water diversion was built. This was before the first water right law in 1914. This clearly gives its ownership and control to Mendocino County.

Round Valley Tribes are to collect $1 million dollars per year while taking the water from their relatives in Coyote Valley & Redwood Valley. If this proposal goes forward it can eliminate the water in Coyote Valley & Redwood Valley completely in dry years to include the water for Redwood Valley Fire Department. (Remember the large fire in Redwood Valley in 2017.)

If CalTrout was so interested in the fisheries why don’t they stop the Tribes from completely netting the North Fork of the Eel when the salmon and steelhead are running? Also CalTrout has done nothing to place a single trout in the tributaries of the Eel which are many, Blue Rock Creek, Burger, Tin Cabin, Shell Rock, Bellsprings, Chamise Creek… just to name a few.

Humboldt County’s position is to wipe out our water, but they have the Mad River dammed to create Ruth Lake. They are talking out of both sides of their mouth.

Chuck Bonham, Director of Fish & Wildlife has stated in a February 16 in the SF Chronicle article, “We’ll protect water for 600,000 people in the Russian River Basin.”

In fact this is a lie, actually in a dry year it will eliminate the water for 600,000 residents, businesses, farmers and fire protection.

With PG&E their hydroelectric project at the base of the tunnel they should BUTT OUT.

Why do they call it Inland Water & Power Commission? They don’t have anything to do with power. (Only in their meetings).

Water running down hill is not a new concept. The Potter Valley Project is the most beneficial project in the history of our County. To tear down Scott Dam and eliminate Lake Pillsbury is criminal and needs to be investigated. Putting the water resources in jeopardy for 600,000 residents, businesses, farmers, and devastation to our region’s frail economy is clearly a huge crime.

The Eel River had two hatcheries on it in the late 1800s so Fish & Wildlife policy not to integrate hatchery fish with natural strains is over 100 years too late.

Mr. Eyster please take this issue serious as it is.

For further facts please call me at (707) 216-1482 as I have lived in the Eel River watershed for 73 years. Actually, there are more salmon & steelhead this year than in over 30 years.

Please don’t let a few special interests take down our most valuable resource. Scott Dam was built in 1920. If the dam is not safe then build a new one downstream with a state-of-the-art fish ladder, tearing out the water supply will not help the fish.

The People of California recently passed a $15 billion bond issue for water projects with hardly any of that money used. Let’s keep the water and common sense flowing.

John Pinches

Laytonville

Cc: President Donald Trump; Department of the Interior Secretary Doug Burgum; Congressman Huffman, Assembly Member Rodgers; Mendocino County, Sonoma County Boards of Supervisors; Ukiah, Willits City Councils; Redwood Valley Fire District; Editor SF Chronicle, Anderson Valley Advertiser, Laytonville Observer, Press Democrat.

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DA SHOOTS THE WOUNDED, BRAGS ABOUT IT

Don’t Bring Drug Paraphernalia Into The Jail.

A Mendocino County Superior Court jury returned from its very efficient deliberations Wednesday afternoon to announce that it had found the trial defendant guilty as charged.

Defendant Kelisha Sheree Alvarez, age 36, generally of Ukiah, was found guilty of the unlawful possession of a “crack” pipe that she surreptitiously tried to bring into the Low Gap jail facility, a felony.

After the jury was excused the defendant case was continued to April 25th for a court trial on possible circumstances in aggravation alleged by the DA, as well as an allegation charging the defendant with having suffered a prior violent felony conviction.

Prior to trial, the defendant had already been found in violation of terms of her post-release community supervision, an alternate form of parole overseen by the Adult Probation Department. Sentencing on that PRCS violation is trailing today’s “paraphernalia in jail” case.

Defendant Alvarez has been a long-standing criminal defendant in the local justice system going back to at least 2009, having suffered in Mendocino County alone eighteen prior misdemeanor convictions, four prior felony convictions, seven prior violations of PRCS that were found to be true, and six prior violations of state parole supervision that were found to be true. The defendant has also served two state prison commitments in the past.

The law enforcement agencies that developed the evidence presented at this week’s trial were the Mendocino County Sheriff’s Office and the Ukiah Police Department. Trial support was provided by the DA’s Bureau of Investigations.

The prosecutor who presented the People’s evidence to the jury was District Attorney David Eyster.

Mendocino County Superior Court Judge Keith Faulder presided over the two-day trial, he will preside over the court trial in late April, and he will be the sentencing judge when a sentencing hearing is eventually scheduled.

(DA Presser)

MARK SCARAMELLA NOTES: Kelisha is a problem, for sure. She needs a mental health evaluation. But since she’s “developmentally disabled” (formerly “retarded”) she’s not considered technically “mentally ill.” She shouldn’t be on the streets where she’s dangerous and a nuisance. She should be conserved and committed to a locked mental health institution. Instead, it appears that she’s being forced into prison which will only make her worse. Her only chance is for the state prison authorities to evaluate her and shunt her off into an institution. Judge Faulder knows all this. What will he decide?

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KMUD SHOW: STOP TAXPAYER FUNDING FOR ELON MUSK’S CONTRACTS

On Thursday, we'll have a great show with guest, Sunjeev Bery. We'll discuss a new proposal calling for a halt in federal contracts with Elon Musk’s companies. 

The Freedom Forward organization has launched a national campaign to get U.S. senators to block all taxpayer funding for Musk. See: https://freedomforward.org/2025/03/21/teslaresv1/

Sunjeev Bery 

Bery is a foreign policy analyst and human rights advocate. 

Bery recently stated: “This is a new plan of action. In the world of organizations that are concerned about Elon Musk, there are protests and calls to divest in stock. But there has been no clear call for elected Democrats in the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives to fight to insert language in funding bills that would block any contracts for Musk’s companies. It just hasn’t been talked about as a possibility. 

“This is an opportunity for senators to filibuster and block funding for Musk’s companies. It is also an opportunity for state legislators to introduce legislation affirming that their states will not engage in contracts or buy equipment or services from Musk’s companies, including SpaceX, Tesla, and other ventures. 

“SpaceX in particular has a $350 billion valuation in significant part due to Musk’s relationship to [President] Trump. SpaceX has received billions in federal contracts. There needs to be a push to divest America from SpaceX contracts and to broaden the basket of companies that America relies on for space exploration. We need to end the dynamic where America is heavily funding a billionaire who is using his wealth to destroy the federal government. 

"The U.S. is engaging in a suicidal strategy: funding the very person who is trying to destroy the government. We have an opportunity to cut down that valuation dramatically. Musk stands to lose a lot. We can start holding these billionaire oligarchs accountable… Right now, a billionaire clique is tightening its noose on effective government and free and open public discourse.”  

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 

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NORTHERN CALIFORNIA TOWN HALL ERUPTS OVER PG&E’S ‘DANGEROUS’ RESERVOIR PLAN

‘The plan isn’t just short-sighted. It’s dangerous.’

by Matt LaFever

A packed veterans hall in the northern Sonoma County city of Cloverdale became the latest battleground in Northern California’s escalating water war.

On March 20, Cloverdale Mayor Todd Lands hosted a town hall that brought together community members from across the region to discuss the future of the Potter Valley Project.

For over a century, this water diversion system — including multiple dams and Lake Pillsbury — has channeled water from the Eel River into the Russian River, maintaining its year-round flow. That steady water supply has fueled the growth of agricultural communities in Mendocino and Sonoma counties, as well as the region’s thriving wine, tourism and recreation industries.

Now, with PG&E moving forward with decommissioning plans, fear is mounting that the region faces a future of corporate-driven water scarcity.

Although PG&E announced its plan to give up control of the diversion system a decade ago, the March 20 gathering was the first town hall-style public meeting that invited Russian River officials and residents to question the plan’s impact, voice concerns and demand answers about the path forward. The meeting, which SFGATE attended, drew a strong turnout from Russian River residents critical of the decommissioning plans, reflecting deep community frustration about how PG&E’s plans could fundamentally change water availability throughout the region.

PG&E’s draft application to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to dismantle the project went public in January, sparking a regional sense of urgency among ranchers and property owners, even as some conservationists celebrate the idea of restoring the Eel and Russian rivers to their natural flows. As the March 20 meeting was the first public meeting on the topic, attendees traveled from as far as Trinity County in the north and Richmond in the south to hear Russian River leaders discuss the decommissioning.

Cloverdale Mayor Todd Lands’ opening remarks drew widespread applause: “I, as the mayor of Cloverdale, our entire city council, city manager, and the fire chief all have the same concerns as a community and are extremely worried we will not have a guaranteed, safe and reliable water supply for the future,” Lands began. Removal of the Potter Valley Project would mean the community would “go backwards and destroy the quality of life or even just the basic existence of dozens of plants and animal species,” he added.

Sonoma County Supervisor James Gore was next to take the mic, representing northern Russian River communities. As he downplayed the urgency Lands had expressed about the decommissioning, his remarks were met with a quiet room.

Gore reminded the audience that PG&E’s decommissioning plans stem from the company offloading liability for aging infrastructure and that they are not a deliberate effort to cut off the region’s water supply. “We’re here because PG&E 10 years ago decided that this project was not economical,” he said.

Gore noted that PG&E had attempted to find a buyer but that “nobody stepped up to purchase that liability and the other assets.” This inaction, Gore explained, was the catalyst for him and other leaders to spearhead an alternative Eel-Russian diversion effort, referred to as the New Eel-Russian Diversion Facility, which would allow seasonal water flows but eliminate Lake Pillsbury and Scott Dam.

“That’s the reality of it,” Gore told the crowd. “My goal has always been with our colleagues … to fight to get the best solution that we can on the table.”

Next to speak was David Manning, the general manager of Sonoma Water’s environmental resources division, whose tone indicated he would be grounding the evening’s conversation in facts. His presentation focused on the New Eel-Russian Diversion Facility, which he said aims to balance “two co-equal goals”: improving fish migration on the Eel River while ensuring continued water diversions into the Russian River.

As Manning clicked through a PowerPoint presentation, the room fell silent. River flow charts flashed on the screen, illustrating how the new facility would differ from the current Potter Valley Project by operating only when the Eel River has sufficient water. This seasonal approach would limit Russian River diversions while maintaining fish migration routes and supporting downstream water users, Manning said.

Like Gore, Manning avoided commentary on PG&E’s plans to remove the Potter Valley Project. His only acknowledgment of the potential upheaval for the Russian River watershed was a measured remark: The future holds “a very different paradigm,” he said. The crowd mostly murmured in response.

‘The plan isn’t just short-sighted. It’s dangerous.’

Gore and Manning were the first two speakers — and the only ones who didn’t voice strong opposition to PG&E’s plan to decommission the Potter Valley Project. After them came Chris Coulombe, a former Republican candidate for Congress who lost in a landslide to Democratic Rep. Jared Huffman last November. Coulombe had made preserving the Potter Valley Project a central issue in his campaign. He immediately tried to tap into the crowd’s emotions.

“There is nothing else more important than the water. Everything else emanates from that,” he declared, striking a reverent tone. He dismissed Manning’s presentation as overly technical, quipping, “A lot of graphs, a lot of slides, a lot of big words.”

Coulombe urged Russian River residents to take action to oppose the decommissioning, despite the fact that PG&E has already finalized its plan. “Our community is the one that is responsible for ensuring that this resource is protected and does exist,” he said. Frustrated by what he saw as widespread inaction, he added, “Seventy percent of us have no idea what’s going on.”

The crowd erupted in applause.

The next panelist was Frost Pauli, a fifth-generation Potter Valley resident and volunteer fire captain, who warned of the economic fallout if the project is scrapped. “Our property values are going to decrease. Our property taxes are going to decrease,” he claimed. That, in turn, would shrink county revenue, hurting schools and local services, he said.

He argued that water storage must be prioritized alongside diversions. “We need additional water storage. We can have a diversion, but if we don’t have a way to store it in the wintertime to use it later in summer, having the diversion is useless.” Conversely, he pointed out, “If we don’t have a diversion, having all the storage in the world doesn’t do us any good if there is no water to store.”

Currently, a feasibility study aims to explore the possibility of raising Coyote Valley Dam, which holds back Lake Mendocino, to allow Russian River water users to store more of the limited water diverted from the Eel post-decommisioning

That is a separate proposal from the New Eel-Russian Diversion Facility plan, however. Most panelists had issues with that, too.

Lands, the Cloverdale mayor, pulled no punches in his criticism of the New Eel-Russian Diversion Facility plans, referencing Sonoma Water’s own engineering report released last May to paint a dire picture. “Under the current solution, [we] will be in drought conditions and curtailments at least five out of every 10 years,” he said, adding that the Russian River will dry up for 56 out of every 111 years, leaving the region with almost no water during critical summer months.

Lake County Supervisors Eddie Crandell and Bruno Sabatier voiced their constituents’ concerns about the potential draining of Lake Pillsbury, a man-made reservoir created by Scott Dam in Lake County. If the dam is decommissioned, the reservoir is expected to be nearly emptied. The Lake County Board of Supervisors recently appealed to the Trump administration to intervene in the decommissioning, citing an executive order focused on maximizing California’s water storage.

Crandell, who represents the district including Lake Pillsbury and who is a member of the Robinson Rancheria Band of Pomo Indians, called out what he saw as a misleading narrative around tribal collaboration. While the Round Valley Indian Tribes have signed onto the New Eel-Russian Diversion Facility, Crandell argued that other tribes along the Russian River are being ignored. “They’re only talking about the Round Valley Indian Tribes who are on the Eel side,” he said, adding that numerous other regional tribal interests have been “marginalized.”

Sabatier took the microphone and directly criticized PG&E, calling the utility the “culprit of this whole thing.” He highlighted the contradictions in PG&E’s actions, noting that while the company receives public funding to build infrastructure and was recently approved by the California Public Utilities Commission to raise rates, it simultaneously claims it lacks the money to restore a thriving environment around Lake Pillsbury. “I think that PG&E is trying to cut as many corners as possible,” Sabatier said.

The last two topics to be discussed were impacts on public safety and tourism revenue. Cloverdale Fire Chief Jason Jenkins condemned the proposed water plan as a serious threat to public safety, recalling his deployment to help fight Los Angeles’ devastating Palisades Fire. “Water was the issue,” he said, emphasizing that the lack of available water for responders had allowed the fire to keep burning. He warned that a depleted Russian River could create similar conditions and did not mince words: “Every fire chief in California will be saying the same thing. This is not a plan that protects our community,” adding that it isn’t “just short-sighted. It’s dangerous.”

Meanwhile, Dayna Ghirardelli, the executive director of the Sonoma County Farm Bureau, brought a printed copy of a recent economic impact study that detailed the potentially severe financial consequences of reducing water diversion from the Eel River. She highlighted key findings by reading select passages aloud that concluded even a modest 10% reduction in water supply would result in a roughly $65 million income loss, along with nearly 300 lost jobs and a total drop in tax revenue of well over $2 million.

“If tourism suffers, our economy suffers,” she said.

She also discussed the strain on year-round residents. With rising water costs and limited supply, she questioned, “Why would folks want to come here? Why would they want to live here?”

Lands spoke again at the end to wrap up the panel portion, emphasizing the essential role the river plays in the area, particularly as a venue for recreation in the warmer months. “People can’t afford to get in the car or even just the gas … to drive to the ocean. People can’t afford to have or run the air condition,” he said.

‘Just keep the damn dam we got’

After the panelists had spoken, the public was invited to share their concerns. Over the next hour, more than 25 community members stepped up to the lectern.

A fisherman who spoke out against the plan hit hard, claiming, “None of the people here that are trying to take the dams out are from here. None of them.” He went on to argue that the battle was far from over, declaring, “These people that are in charge will take these dams out, no matter what we say. We have to fight.” Reflecting on his decades of experience on the river, he put the blame squarely on water mismanagement, not the water itself: “The problem isn’t the water, the problem is managing. They’ve mismanaged our water terribly.”

Bronte Edwards, a first-generation sheep rancher from Sonoma County, joined the chorus of criticism, calling the New Eel-Russian Diversion Facility project a setup for failure. “This project in the way that y’all have pitched — this is setting us up for failure,” she said, adding her concern over the lack of true Indigenous consultation. “My Indigenous brothers and sisters … are not on board with this. Y’all are tokenizing them in the name of environmentalism.”

Ken Foster, a sixth-generation resident of Potter Valley, took a different approach. “The most logical thing… instead of building more lakes and more dams and raising the dams, it’s just keep the damn dam we got.”

Donna Gregory, who was born in Fort Bragg and grew up in Cloverdale, shared her lifelong connection to the Russian River. “The Russian River gave me some of my best memories of my whole life. I hate to see anything happen to [it],” she said, expressing her deep concern. “Fix what you guys have. Don’t tear it down.”

Finally, Guinness McFadden, who said he owns the first property on the Russian River in Potter Valley, voiced his frustration over the lack of action on the issue. “I’ve been concerned about this issue for years,” he said. “It thrills me to see that finally, it seems to be getting downriver a little bit and people are becoming concerned.” His message was clear: “Let’s get to our elected officials and get them to slow this headlong rush to take everything down before we have an idea of what’s going to work in the future.”

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APRIL 2025 AT FORT BRAGG LIBRARY

https://fortbragglibrary.org/events/month

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FEATURED ARTISTS: BARRY MARSHALL

April Featured Artist at Cloud Nine

Barry Marshall, an Award-winning plein air painter of coastal impressions, using strong brush work and glazes to capture the contrasting energy of the sea and the luminescence of the sky

Show opening on First Friday, April 4, from 5-7 and continuing through April 30.

Cloud Nine Art Gallery, 320 N Franklin St. in Fort Bragg

Join is on First Friday to see Barry’s amazing work, listen to the guitar music of Joe Pardini, catch up with friends, and see what’s new at Cloud Nine.

We are open Friday, Saturday and Sunday from 12-5 and are pet friendly.

Every 2nd Thursday, we have a Book Lovers get together at 5pm where we share a book we’ve read and choose a book or two to take home. Light refreshments served. All are welcome.

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JOHN TOOHEY (AV Athletic Director):

I don’t want to scare everyone, but April 20 is fast approaching.

That’s the day that Donald Trump will pretend to receive a fake report as to whether he should invoke the Insurrection Act, a fast pathway to martial law, over his fake and fabricated immigration crisis.

If the report says yes, and it will, hold fast.

Expect armed forces in our communities holding us hostage and destroying what’s left of our sense of community. Our sense of America.

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SAVE EEL RIVER DAMS

Editor:

The Eel River diversion project discussed at the Cloverdale town hall meeting on March 20 was enlightening (“Battle lines drawn over Eel River dam removals,” March 24). If destroyed for hundreds of millions of dollars, the toppled dams will make Russian River water flows seasonal. The resulting lack of water during the summer and fall will threaten communities and families along the Russian River — Healdsburg, Cloverdale, Hopland, Ukiah and more.

State and county politicians seem to be fixated on seasonal and intermittent sources of water and electricity through their bad public policy choices. Solar and wind are intermittent, operating for hours of the day, just like a dam removal makes water flow seasonal for months of the year.

It seems obvious that we keep the interbasin dams to ensure consistent water flows, hydroelectric power and a good quality of life. This is akin to keeping natural gas power plants to ensure a consistent and reliable source of power. A return to good public policy, including dams and natural gas, services is warranted.

Robert Koslowsky

Cloverdale

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MENDOCINO COUNTY HISTORICAL SOCIETY 2ND ANNUAL FUNDRAISER

Transport yourself back to a 1920s Speakeasy and learn about bootlegging in Mendocino County. The menu, prepared by Chef Matthew Allison of Ukiah Brewing Company, is fashioned from food favorites of “notorious” bootleggers. The Live and Silent Auction continues to support the opening of the Held-Poage Memorial Home Museum.

Tickets are available until May 2nd. $100/person (or)

$1000/reserved table (eight guests). Reserved tables include special extras.

Requested seating can only be guaranteed at reserved tables.

To RSVP and purchase tickets, contact us at (707) 462-6969 or purchase directly at https://HSMCevent.eventbrite.com

For more information, contact us at info@mendocinocountyhistory.org

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A READER RECOMMENDS:

Susan Swartz daughter: I dimly remember Susan from the old days. But thought this book is probably worth a mention.

https://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/entertainment/samantha-rosa-author-memoir-mother-susan-swartz

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CATCH OF THE DAY, Wednesday, April 2, 2023

KATHERINE BOWES, 34, Covelo. Failure to appear.

JONATHAN CAMARGO, 37, Ukiah. Controlled substance, paraphernalia, failure to appear, probation revocation.

OSCAR CRUZ-SANTIAGO, 23, Covelo. Failure to appear.

MONTE FISK-MCCARTHY, 34, Willits. Failure to appear.

JOHNNIE RADFORD JR., 51, Oakland/Ukiah. Paraphernalia, parole violation.

SILAS YOUNG, 42, Willits. Domestic battery, ammo possession by prohibited person.

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ON-LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY

I paid over $500 on my last ransom notice. That’s for two seniors on fixed income.

I wonder if the PG&E execs pay anything. I bet they don’t, because they might have more incentive to lower the costs if they pay for it.

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BILL KIMBERLIN

The SMART train has reached Windsor and they are testing the trains and various signals. Should be open fairly soon.

They have also secured the money for the next extension to Healdsburg and agreed with the town where the train station will be, just to the West of the Plaza.

Whenever I ride it to Santa Rosa I arrive so relaxed. So Windsor will be even better because by then there is no more traffic. I will leave a car in Windsor, and drive to Boonville from there.

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THE MASK COMES OFF: DEPARTMENT OF WATER RESOURCES REVEALS THE TRUE PURPOSE OF THE DELTA TUNNEL

by Dan Bacher

The Gavin Newsom administration in California has long insisted the primary purpose of the Delta Conveyance Project (DCP) — aka, the Delta Tunnel — is to improve water delivery reliability for California ratepayers.

In its Environmental Impact Report for the DCP, Newsom’s Department of Water Resources stated the purpose of the project is to “restore and protect the reliability of SWP water deliveries…”

“But recent written testimony from a Department of Water Resources engineer submitted to a State Water Resources Control Board hearing on the DCP documents the real intent of the project: maximize deliveries from the Sacramento/San Joaquin Delta, accelerating the death spiral of the already beleaguered estuary,” according to a news release from the California Water Impact Network (C-WIN).…

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2025/4/1/2313868/-The-Mask-Comes-Off-Department-of-Water-Resources-Reveals-True-Purpose-of-the-Delta-Tunnel

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GIANTS FINISH SEASON-OPENING SIX-GAME TRIP WITH A SWEEP OF HOUSTON

by Shayna Rubin

HOUSTON — The road was not the San Francisco Giants’ friend last season. They finished 38-43 away from Oracle Park on their way to a sub-.500 record.

The road in 2025, so far, has been much kinder.

The Giants completed a three-game series sweep with a 6-3 win over the Houston Astros on Wednesday afternoon to round out a 5-1 season-opening trip. It’s the team’s best start since it went 5-1 in 2014.

But in painting the picture for how difficult the National League West will be this season, a 5-1 record puts the Giants in third place in the division as they return to the Bay Area for their home opener against Seattle on Friday. The Los Angeles Dodgers and San Diego Padres remain unbeaten (8-0 and 7-0, respectively). The division’s combined record — even with last-place Colorado — is 25-7.

The difficult road to relevance in their division isn’t front of mind for this team yet. For them, a trip that put them four games above .500 for the first time since Sept. 14, 2023, is a precursor of what’s to come for the next 156 games.

“If you don’t know by now, we’re pretty good,” starter Landen Roupp said. “And we’re going to be good.”

Roupp’s road to Houston for his season debut was full of long flights. He flew to Cincinnati with the team for the season opener and then back to Arizona to pitch on Friday, then was on another flight to Houston. All said, he was pretty good against the Astros. He deployed his eye-popping curveball to rack up a career-high eight strikeouts in four-plus innings. The Astros swung through his curveball for strike three seven times and Roupp got 11 swings-and-misses with the pitch overall.

Roupp went head-to-head with another curveball maestro in Astros starter Framber Valdez, who was inducing plenty of whiffs with that pitch. But the Giants were all over his other offerings, of which he didn’t have his best command, especially early on.

Wilmer Flores demolished a changeup in his wheelhouse for a two-run home run in the first inning. It was his fourth and matched his season total from a year ago, when he was dealing with an injured knee that sapped his lower-half power and required season-ending surgery in August. Flores wasn’t too interested in self reflection, saying he was just happy the home run led to a sweep.

“It’s huge,” Flores said. “We talked last night, we won a series but we’re coming for the sweep. We came in with a good approach and we executed.”

In the second inning, Luis Matos crushed a sinker on the inside half of the plate that bounced off the archway in left field. Initially ruled a double, umpires convened and determined the ball landed above the yellow line. Later, Mike Yastrzemski and Tyler Fitzgerald drew back-to-back walks to bring up Heliot Ramos, who hit a sinker into the center field gap for a double to extend the lead to 5-0.

With the double, Ramos has an extra-base hit in all six games. Felipe Alou, in 1963, is the only other Giant in history to open a season with an extra-base hit in six straight games.

Roupp ran into trouble in the fifth when he walked the leadoff batter and Jose Altuve reached on a popup that landed between him, third baseman Matt Chapman and catcher Sam Huff. Roupp said he thought he heard Huff call for the ball, which caused the confusion. Chapman told Roupp after the play that, unless the third baseman is calling for it, that should be Roupp’s out.

“I think the popup may have kind of, I don’t want to say bit him, but it’s not something you’re used to and all of a sudden, instead of an easy out it’s first and second with nobody out,” manager Bob Melvin said. “Look, he’s a tough kid and maybe without his best stuff and command, he’s out there with a chance to help his team win a game.”

Roupp was pulled after a walk loaded the bases with no outs, giving way for Randy Rodriguez to face lefty slugger Yordan Alvarez.

Alvarez ripped a slider toward first baseman Casey Schmitt — making his first start at the position in the majors — who couldn’t get a glove on it as it seeped into right field to score a pair. Rodriguez stayed the course with runners on the corners, inducing a popup in the next at-bat and striking out Yainer Diaz and Jeremy Peña to strand the pair and keep a two-run lead.

Hayden Birdsong, the last Giant in uniform to get into a game this season, pitched two scoreless innings. He struck out two and walked one.

LaMonte Wade Jr.’s pinch-hit home run in the eighth inning sealed it. Wade had been 0-for-16 with five strikeouts heading into Wednesday’s game.

(sfchronicle.com)

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ANNE LAMOTT:

Now is the time for all good people to come to the aid of their country, even medium-good people with bad feet and attitudes, like me. Now. This week.

Some of you voted enthusiastically for Donald Trump and still believe he has good ideas, but none of you, not a one, voted for Elon Musk. Today, as I write this, there is a bloodbath in process at HHS, NIH, and CDC. Generations of scientists, health care officials and and staff being wiped out because of Musk and Robert Kennedy, Jr. The Department of Education, Social Security offices, the Veterans Administration—the VETS. I mean, for Pete’s sake— pun intended. Children dying of measles—measles! The end of helping the world’s starving children. The National Zoo being torn down and remade because of the woke ideology of the giraffes.

Wait, obviously I need to collect myself. I’ll eat my body weight in carbs, and maybe watch a quick Below Deck Mediterranean, and then I’ll get back to you.

Hey, hi, me again. I’m back. So say you have tiny, tiny anxieties about what we have witnessed in the last two months, let alone the last few days — an innocent man is rotting in a nightmarish foreign prison because Trump made a mistake and now refuses to do anything. All the elements of Fascism…

Sorry, sorry, that was my crazy hysterical twin with TDS. I just gave her a sharing size bag of M&M’s (peanut butter) to distract her. I’m back, nice calm me.

There will be huge national rallies on Saturday — April 5th — against Elon Musk and Doge. It’s happening, some peaceful version of an American Spring. More than half of us will be women, though, so the odds of the violence we saw in the Arab Spring will be very low. Spring, resurrection. In the winter—in devastation, desolation, darkness — we sink down under the ground to stay safe and so we don’t come up too soon. You come up too soon and you get cut off, because the timing of the seasons is precise. It is inside us, too, energetically, and now — now! — when we feel whatever is stirring, we rise, stride out and release what has been crunched up in winter time.

Spring is about new life, much more light to see by. Spring is a time to rebuild.

Some time not too long after the San Francisco earthquake and fire in April, 1906, William James, the author of Varieties of Religious Experience, came up from Stanford where he was lecturing, to visit, and see with his own eyes.

The world had ended. The fire had all but destroyed the city. Everything was knocked down, blown up, burned away, and what does William James see? People had been re-building, spreading out, helping each other, developing plans for raising the city back up. People had been spreading out, helping other, creating.

And James says, “Exactly, that’s how it works.”

Things fall down. Desperation, and hard times are part of the equation. But so is consolation. In a peaceful protest march against authoritarianism and cruelty, you feel part of, instead of that awful sheet metal feeling of isolation. Some consolation is mild, and some is dramatically powerful. The energy of a peaceful protest march is profound and life giving, being part of one big body, a sea of people who believe in goodness and Democracy and that silly old Constitution. The anxious freaked out “I” turns to “We.” We, the people, who, I will point out again nicely, did not elect Elon Musk.

Christians call this putting feet to prayer. There will be singing of the old songs of the Civil Rights movement, the same songs that eventually stopped the Vietnam War. The haranguers will harangue. The sound system will suck. But two things will carry the day: millions of regular people like us, heartbroken and terrified, who care, saying No to power; and a glorious feeling of solidarity, camaraderie.

And if you meet us at one of these rallies on Saturday, this will give you hope, feelings of newness, expansion and visibility. In my Sunday school classes, I taught my kids that Easter means you can bury the truth in the ground, but you can’t keep it there. Friends, Honey Bears, we got work to do. See you Saturday.

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IF STATE BAILS OUT LA’S BUDGET DEFICIT, BEWARE SLIPPERY SLOPE

by Dan Walters

As fate would have it, the very destructive and deadly wildfires that swept through Los Angeles neighborhoods this year erupted as its city officials were struggling to close a large gap in their budget.

At the time, the city’s deficit was estimated to be $600 million, but this month it was updated to nearly $1 billion.

It would be tempting to attribute the larger shortfall to the fires, and they undoubtedly are a factor.

But City Controller Kenneth Mejia has repeatedly warned Mayor Karen Bass and city council members that the city was overspending vis-à-vis revenues, creating a growing structural deficit.

From his first warnings in 2023, Mejia consistently warned city officials and the public about “financial trouble including less-than-expected revenues, increased liability payouts, and increased payroll costs and the effects this has had on the city’s budget, departments, and services,” his office said in a news release last week.

In a letter to Bass and other officials, Mejia noted that years of overspending revenues had drained much of the city’s reserves, leaving it ill-prepared to cope with such volatile factors as fire-related effects on revenues and spending and President Donald Trump’s “radical policies on tariffs, federal spending cuts and immigration.

“Given the city’s ongoing structural deficit and new challenges, there will be a temptation to make more optimistic assumptions in the upcoming budget,” Mejia said in his letter.

“Certainly we hope the actual performance will be greater than our estimates. Given all the uncertainties facing our city, it will be more prudent not to count on positive potential overcoming adverse realities.”

Los Angeles’ background of fiscal imprudence bears a remarkable resemblance to the state budget’s chronic deficits — overly optimistic revenue projections leading to unsustainable levels of spending — and it should be kept in mind as LA politicians try to get a bailout from the state.

This week the city’s legislative delegation formally asked the Legislature’s budget committees for a $1.89 billion appropriation “to address the City of Los Angeles’ urgent disaster recovery efforts following the devastating fires this past January, which displaced thousands, destroyed businesses and damaged critical infrastructure.”

Clearly the request — which must have originated in City Hall — uses the fires as a smokescreen to rationalize a bailout for a deficit that is fundamentally the result of years-long fiscal malpractice.

Gov. Gavin Newsom and legislators will feel tremendous pressure to give Los Angeles what it wants, but doing so would be a step onto the proverbial slippery slope.

Los Angeles, unfortunately, is not the only city or local government feeling the fiscal pinch for roughly the same reasons.

During and after the COVID-19 pandemic public spending soared, in large measure using many billions of dollars in federal disaster aid.

And when Uncle Sam closed his wallet, local governments were stuck with higher salaries and other spending increases they had lodged in their budgets. San Francisco, Oakland, Sacramento and many other cities are facing severe deficits, along with many school districts.

Should Newsom et al bail out Los Angeles, these other local entities will demand similar largesse from a state budget already hemorrhaging red ink and that faces the likelihood of deficits at least through the remainder of Newsom’s governorship and probably longer.

“Our short-term focus on year-to-year balance neglects the need for a multi-year transition to service models that allow the city to live within its means,” Mejia tells other city officials in this month’s letter.

“We have consistently recommended specific budgetary reforms that are even more urgently needed in the face of the manifold challenges confronting us.”

It’s good advice and it is similar in tone to the cautions Newsom and legislators have received from their budget advisors — and often ignored.

(CalMatters.org)

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OLVERA STREET, LOS ANGELES, (CIRCA 1960)

Olvera Street had firmly established itself as a vibrant cultural landmark in Los Angeles, preserving the city’s Mexican heritage amid its rapidly modernizing surroundings. The narrow, tree-shaded walkway was lined with traditional market stalls, restaurants, and historic adobe buildings, creating an old-world atmosphere in the heart of downtown. Visitors strolled past colorful piñatas, handcrafted pottery, and leather goods while the sounds of mariachi music filled the air. As one of the oldest streets in Los Angeles, Olvera Street remained a living museum, celebrating the city’s deep-rooted Spanish and Mexican influences.

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LEAD STORIES, THURSDAY'S NYT

China and Europe Vow to Respond to Trump’s Tariffs

C.D.C. Cuts Threaten to Set Back the Nation’s Health, Critics Say

Kennedy Guts Teams That Share Health Information With the Public

Shingles Vaccine Can Decrease Risk of Dementia, Study Finds

Rare Beatles Audition Tape Surfaces in a Vancouver Record Shop

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UNMARKED VANS. SECRET LISTS. PUBLIC DENUNCIATIONS. OUR POLICE STATE HAS ARRIVED.

by M. Gessen

“It’s the unmarked cars,” a friend who grew up under an Argentine dictatorship said. He had watched the video of the Columbia graduate student Mahmoud Khalil’s abduction. In the video, which Khalil’s wife recorded, she asks for the names of the men in plainclothes who handcuffed her husband.

“We don’t give our name,” one responds. “Can you please specify what agency is taking him?” she pleads. No response. We know now that Khalil was detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, an agency of the Department of Homeland Security.

Those of us who have lived in countries terrorized by a secret police force can’t shake a feeling of dreadful familiarity. “I never realized until this moment how much fear I carried with me from my childhood in Communist Romania,” another friend, the literary scholar Marianne Hirsch, told me. “Arrests were arbitrary and every time the doorbell rang, I started to shiver.”

It’s the catastrophic interruption of daily life, as when a Tufts University graduate student, Rumeysa Ozturk, was grabbed on a suburban street by half a dozen plainclothes agents, most of them masked. The security camera video of that arrest shows Ozturk walking, looking at her phone, perhaps to check the address where she was supposed to meet her friends for dinner that night, when an agent appears in front of her. She says something — asks something — struggling to control her voice, and within seconds she is handcuffed and placed in an unmarked car.

It’s the forced mass transports of immigrants. These are not even deportations, in the way we typically think of them. Rather than being sent to their country of origin, Venezuelans were sent to El Salvador, where they are being imprisoned, indefinitely, without due process. It’s the sight of men being marched in formation, their heads shaved, hundreds of people yanked from their individual lives to be reduced to an undifferentiated mass. It’s the sight, days later, of the secretary of homeland security posing against the background of men in cages and threatening more people with the same punishment.

It’s the growing irrelevance of the law and the helplessness of judges and lawyers. A federal judge ordered flights carrying the Venezuelan men to be turned around and demanded information about the abductees. Another federal judge forbade the government to deport, without notice, Rasha Alawieh, the Brown University medical school professor who was detained on return from a trip to Lebanon. Another judge prohibited moving Rumeysa Ozturk from Massachusetts without notice. The executive branch apparently ignored these rulings.

It’s the chilling stories that come by word of mouth. ICE is checking documents on the subway. ICE is outside New York public libraries that hold English-as-a-second-language classes. ICE agents handcuffed a U.S. citizen who tried to intervene in a detention in Harlem. ICE vehicles are parked outside Columbia. ICE is coming to your workplace, your street, your building. ICE agents are wearing brown uniforms that resemble those of UPS — don’t open the door for deliveries. Don’t leave the house. The streets in the New York neighborhoods with the highest immigrant populations have emptied out.

It’s the invisible hand of the authorities. The media outlet Zeteo reports that Homeland Security employees are revoking foreign students’ status in the database that’s usually maintained by universities. (Normally, once a person has entered the country on a valid academic visa, they have the right to stay as long as they remain in the program for which the visa was granted — this is what university administrators track.) These changes have reportedly been made with no notification and in the absence of any transparent process. Of course, the Department of Homeland Security, when it was created in the wake of 9/11, was meant to function in opaque ways and with broad authority; it was designed to be a secret-police force. Secretary of State Marco Rubio has bragged to reporters about revoking the legal status of upward of 300 people and promised there would be more: “We’re looking every day for these lunatics.”

It’s the shifting goal posts. They are taking not only people who are in the United States without legal status but also those who are here on a visitor’s visa and then also legal permanent residents. They are targeting not only people who have criminal convictions but also those whom they say they suspect of belonging to a gang and also those who participated in or supported campus protests and then also someone, like Ozturk, who merely wrote, with three other people, an opinion essay in a student newspaper.

And then there was a German green card holder at Boston’s Logan Airport who was allegedly stripped and deprived of sleep and his medications by Customs and Border Protection — actions that could fit the legal definition of torture. (The agency has denied the allegations.) And a Canadian with a job offer who was detained at the southern border and held for 12 days. And another German, a tourist, who was detained at the southern border and held for more than six weeks. And a Russian biomedical researcher at Harvard who was detained coming back from France and has been in the infamous detention facility in Louisiana for over a month.

It’s the way we dig down for the details of these stories to reassure ourselves that this won’t happen to us, or that there is some logic to these arrests. The German man had a misdemeanor charge a decade ago. The Canadian was possibly using a crossing not meant for people submitting work visa applications. The other German, a tattoo artist, was carrying her equipment and customs agents might have suspected that she was planning to work illegally. The Russian scientist was bringing in frog embryos that the Department of Homeland Security says she did not declare properly. When the range of factors that can get a person arrested stretches from political speech to a paperwork error, we are in territory described by the Russian saying, “Give us a person and we’ll find the infraction.”

And, as the historian Timothy Snyder has pointed out, if due process is routinely denied to noncitizens, it will be denied to citizens too, simply because it is often impossible for people to prove that they are citizens. This has happened before, when an unknown number of U.S. citizens were caught up in the deportations of hundreds of thousands of Mexican Americans in the late 1920s and 1930s.

It’s the lists. More than anything else, in fact, it’s the lists. A private company has launched an app called ICERAID, billed as a “protocol that delegates intelligence-gathering tasks to citizens that would otherwise be undertaken by law enforcement agencies.” The app promises rewards for “capturing and uploading images of criminal illegal alien activity” and possibly even bigger rewards for self-reporting — for adding oneself to the ICERAID registry if one is “an honest, hard-working undocumented immigrant with no criminal history.” The app, in other words, combines two time-tested secret-police techniques: incentivizing some people to denounce their neighbors and inducing others to add themselves to registries.

It’s the denunciations by concerned citizens. Before there was ICERAID, there were several groups compiling lists of people they consider antisemitic, especially university students and faculty. These organizations include Mothers Against College Antisemitism, a Facebook group with more than 60,000 members; Betar U.S., a Zionist organization so extreme-right that the Anti-Defamation League has denounced it; and several other groups that, since the beginning of Donald Trump’s second term, have been reporting people to government authorities and cheering when they are detained, deported or fired. When Rubio was asked if the State Department is using lists fed to it by these private groups, he said, “We’re not going to talk about the process by which we’re identifying it because obviously we’re looking for more people.”

The state appears to have outsourced surveillance.

A Columbia professor shared an Instagram story by the Chinese dissident artist Ai Weiwei that showed Elon Musk’s “X” symbol rotating and morphing into a swastika. The professor did it on personal time, from a personal residence, to a personal account. An Instagram story lives only for 24 hours; someone was watching. It was reported to the university; three months passed before the professor was cleared. Then the professor’s name and picture, along with a new inventory of ostensible offenses, popped up on one of those lists of supposedly antisemitic faculty members. There was, of course, nothing antisemitic about the Instagram story or the rest of it. The professor, like so many of the people on these lists, is Jewish.

Last Friday, mere minutes after Columbia announced the name of its new interim president, Claire Shipman, an entity that calls itself Documenting Jew Hatred on Campus addressed Shipman on X: “We have identified faculty members” who, the group believes, should be purged. The self-appointed enforcers are vigilant. This, too, is a hallmark of a secret-police state.

The citizens of such a state live with a feeling of being constantly watched. They live with a sense of random danger. Anyone — a passer-by, the man behind you in line at the deli, the woman who lives down the hall, your building’s super, your own student, your child’s teacher — can be a plainclothes agent or a self-appointed enforcer. People live in growing isolation and with the feeling of low-level dread, and these are the defining conditions of living in a secret-police state. People lose the ability to plan for the future, because they feel that they have no control over their lives, and they try to make themselves invisible. They move through the world without looking, for fear of seeing too much.

But while we are still capable of looking, we have to say what we see: The United States has become a secret-police state. Trust me, I’ve seen it before.

(NY Times)

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TRUMP ANNOUNCED WEDNESDAY his decision to level sweeping economic tariffs on foreign countries across the globe, but three significant countries were not on the list.

Mexico, Canada, and Russia were left off of the long list of tariff proposals that the president displayed at the White House.

Trump leveled tariffs on Mexico and Canada prior to his tariff event on Wednesday on select industries, including a 25 percent duty on auto imports.

A White House fact sheet revealed that goods from Canada and Mexico that complied with President Donald Trump’s USMCA trade deal signed in 2020 would continue to have no tariffs but that non-compliant energy and potash would see a ten percent tariff.

‘That stays exempt for now,’ Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent confirmed in an interview with Fox News at the White House after Trump’s announcement.

The treasury secretary explained that Russia was left off of the list because the United States did not trade with them.

‘Well, Russia and Belarus we don’t trade with. Right?’ he said, referring to the ongoing economic sanctions against Russia for invading Ukraine. ‘They are sanctioned.’

Bessent admitted that some tariffs on countries like China were higher than expected, but said they were part of a negotiating process.

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US STOCKS PLUNGED in after-hours trading after President Donald Trump announced broad tariffs starting at 10 percent — with much higher rates for certain countries.

Within minutes of Trump’s announcement, futures tracking America’s flagship S&P 500 fell two per cent, while the Nasdaq dropped three per cent — the kind of falls not seen since the start of the pandemic.

The sharp selloff followed Trump’s fiery remarks, in which he accused foreign nations of “ripping off” the United States and vowed to impose tariffs on imports across the globe. The tariffs were higher than expected.

Wall Street fears the move will stifle economic growth, drive up inflation and further rattle global stock markets when trading resumes in Asia and Europe on Thursday.

Most Americans’ retirement savings, including 401(K)s, are tied to stock market performance. They are invested in shares and funds that track the major indices.

At 6.30pm in after-hours trading in New York, futures that track the S&P 500 were down 2.3 percent, while one that is tied to the Nasdaq-100 fund dropped 4.2 percent. A fund that follows the Dow Jones slipped 2.3 percent.

Stocks of major importers took a hit late Wednesday. Nike plunged 6 percent, and General Motors fell 3 percent. Companies already struggling amid tariff concerns, like Nvidia and Tesla, each lost about 3 percent. Five Below dropped 11 percent, while Gap tumbled 12 percent.

Although Wall Street’s main trading sessions ends at 4pm in New York, traders can continue buying and selling regular stocks until 8pm in after-hours trading.

Beyond that, investors can trade futures contracts around the clock, except for a one-hour break starting at 5pm each day. Futures track the prices of major indexes like the S&P 500, Nasdaq, and Dow Jones, as well as gold and other commodities.

Americans will have already seen their retirement funds take a hit based on after-hours trading and futures. If prices don’t recover, they’ll face a bigger blow when markets open at 9.30am in New York on Thursday.

— DailyMail.uk

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JOHANNES FELIX KUUSMANN (right) was born April 1 in Estonia, 1909. He worked on ships in Brazil and Argentina before he arrived in US in 1929. He worked as a carpenter and joined the CPUSA in 1933. He arrived in Spain on March 1937 and served with ALB as an officer.

Felix was hospitalized several times but often left early to rejoin his unit. One night while hiding behind enemy lines, he pulled the pin of a grenade as fascists passed him, in case he was discovered. They didn’t find him, so he had to hold the grenade overnight for six hours.

Felix returned to the US as a stowaway on September 23, 1938 but was arrested at Ellis Island. He married Yetta Kaufman on January 3, 1939 and was naturalized a US citizen on June 14, 1940. By 1953, he was threatened with deportation again, this time due to his communist politics.

Despite this political repression and continued government surveillance for the next decade, Felix lived in the US for the remainder of his life.

(Abraham Lincoln Brigade Archives)

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CAN THE AMERICA’S RICHEST DODGE THE CLIMATE CHANGE BULLET?

by Sam Pizzigati

Where do you see yourself living the rest of your life? The richest among us are keeping their options all open.

On the one hand, our deepest pockets are buying up new super-luxury abodes as if the gravy trains that their lives have become will never stop running.

On the other hand, our richest are running scared. Or, to be more accurate, our rich are descending scared — into fabulously luxurious underground bunkers.

Should these behaviors leave the rest of us optimistic about what the future may bring? Or pessimistic? Our wealthiest need not choose one or the other. They can easily afford to cover all the bases, and, these days, they’re doing just that.

The bases on the optimistic side — like Manhattan’s hottest new luxury condos — certainly don’t come cheap. The newest luxury lodgings now on sale in the Big Apple, gushes one just-published insider analysis, include a host of new units going for over $10 million each.

“Outdoor living has become a given,” notes Mansion Global’s Rebecca Bratburd, with developers emphasizing at every opportunity “landscaped rooftop spaces for entertaining and relaxation.”

Consider 80 Clarkson, a still-under-construction high-end Manhattan enclave that luxury builders will be opening up next year right along the Hudson. This enclave’s two connected limestone towers — one 45 floors high, the other a mere 37 — will once complete be offering up some 112 luxury units, at prices ranging from $7 million each to over $60 million.

Landscaped roof decks will top both of these towers, and the development’s “complex cubic form of stepped setbacks and pocketed terraces” will keep splashes of greenery outside nearly every unit’s window. This “transformative project,” exults one local realtor, will redefine “luxury living along Manhattan’s Hudson River waterfront.”

Among the project’s many lush amenities: a porte-cochère entrance. Such entrances have been around since the reign of the ridiculously rich French “Sun King” Louis XIV. They’ve become, over recent years, the “hidden perk that New York’s mega-rich now demand.”

Back in Louis XIV’s day, porte cochères — coach gateways — offered royals a private, covered entrance for horse-drawn carriages and their passengers. Modern porte-cochères can run up to triple the size of an average Manhattan apartment, enough space to let chauffeured limousines pick up and deposit well-heeled passengers inside a completely covered entrance way off-limits to prying eyes.

“With New York experiencing a new gilded age,” news reports started noting a half-dozen years ago, “porte cochères are making a comeback in high-end buildings.”

But gilded ages have a nasty habit of collapsing, and these days, as Yahoo! Finance reported last month, “political turmoil, wars, and natural disasters” have our super rich hedging their bets. Many are investing in estates and luxury properties that sit in off-the-beaten-track remote locations.

Our worried wealthy aren’t just buying out-of-the-way properties. They’re digging deep beneath these properties to create what the rich and their realtors like to see as “luxury bunkers.” New Zealand has become a particularly popular bunker locale, and one U.S. company, Rising S Bunkers, has been busy building and outfitting safe havens that can operate quite luxuriously.

That company’s top bunker model comes with everything from a swimming pool and a bowling alley to a sauna and a game room. The cost to park one of these bunkers in a barely populated New Zealand locale: just under $10 million. Bullet-resistant doors and “whole-home air filtration systems” that can whisk away any pathogens add mightily to the Rising S Bunkers allure.

The billionaire Peter Thiel has become an especially vocal advocate of the sanctuary — for the rich — that New Zealand increasingly offers. He’s been working to get local government approval for a hillside “bunker-style compound” that features an “accommodation pod” for himself and a guest lodge for two dozen of his best safety-seeking pals.

Other billionaires have chosen somewhat less off-the-beaten-track hideaways. Mark Zuckerberg, the current holder of the world’s third-largest private fortune, started buying up Hawaiian land back in 2014. His current 1,400-acre compound, WIRED reports, hosts two “sprawling” mansions with a “total floor area comparable to a professional football field.” Underneath the above-ground sprawl: what Zuckerberg calls “a little shelter” that merely amounts to a “basement.”

In fact, notes a WIRED analysis of the plans for that “little shelter,” Zuckerberg’s “basement” just happens to be a giant survivalist bunker with an entry door “constructed out of metal and filled in with concrete.”

The total cost of Zuckerberg’s Hawaiian compound, WIRED adds, “rivals that of the largest private, personal construction projects in human history,” well over a quarter-billion dollars.

Sanctuary-seeking mindsets like Zuckerberg’s, the media theorist Douglass Rushkoff points out, have become common among America’s richest. Our mega-wealthy, Rushkoff observes in his 2023 book Survival of the Richest: Escape Fantasies of the Tech Billionaires, appear to believe they “can live as gods and transcend the calamities that befall everyone else.”

Not all our contemporary super rich see bunkers as their best safe haven. Elon Musk has been famously dreaming of an escape to Mars before things go to hell here on Earth. But in the end the direction the rich take in their search for survival — whether they dig deep below the Earth’s surface or fly off that surface deep into space — makes no difference.

Either way, the escape delusion leaves our richest less invested in working with the rest of humanity on solutions to the existential challenges we now share as a species. These challenges have taken a distinct turn for the worse over the past three-quarters of a century.

Back in the middle of the 20th century, the prospect of nuclear war gave humanity the shakes. That war, people worldwide realized, could destroy us all, as mass entertainments like the award-winning 1959 film On the Beach made dramatically clear.

But that possibility of mass extinction from nuclear war remained only that, a possibility that human decision making could avert and now has averted for going on three generations.

With climate change, by contrast, we’re facing the certainty of disaster unless we make fundamental changes about how we operate as a species.

Can we avoid that disaster? Can we reach a carbon-free future? Not as long as the richest among us continue to harbor delusions about their capacity to survive any catastrophe that might befall the rest of us. They’ll continue to frolic on our Earth’s surface — both profiting from carbon and personally emitting an unholy share of it — so long as they believe they can always escape to hideaways deep below that surface or far above it.

Our Earth, we need to remember, isn’t just heating up year by year. Our Earth is annually becoming ever more economically unequal. For the sake of our human future, both those dynamics need to change.

(Sam Pizzigati writes on inequality for the Institute for Policy Studies. His latest book: The Case for a Maximum Wage (Polity). Among his other books on maldistributed income and wealth: The Rich Don’t Always Win: The Forgotten Triumph over Plutocracy that Created the American Middle Class, 1900-1970 (Seven Stories Press). (CounterPunch.org))

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COMBUSTION

by Witold Wirpsza, translated from the Polish by Ann Frenkel and Gwido Zlatkes

The comparison between man and candle
Has been suggested then as now:
A flame is ignited
And in the end self-annihilates.

This is libel. I am warning you.
I object.

I am neither wax nor paraffin,
Not even self-steering stearin.
I am not a mold impaled by
A cord.

I assume that I lose none of my essence
As I burn. I rather think
I expand, and when I expire
I will leave behind a terrible trove

Of flammable material, un-
Suitable for burning. It will be
Volatile. Hard. Venomous.
Nutritious. Indifferent. I am warning you!

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