Mendocino County Today: Sunday 4/6/2025

Rain Tonight | Widespread Protests | Short-Term Rentals | Fort Bragg Storefronts | Ed Notes | Brother Joe | Pet Pedro | Boontling Classic | Farrer Store | Shala Week | Greenwood Creamery | Yesterday's Catch | Red Flag | Kick-Start Chopper | Just Anger | Donation Records | Cow Palace | Marco Radio | Giants Win | Gangbanker | Logging Increase | Our End | Musk Dissent | Used Up | Lead Stories | Mass Protests | Three Amigos | Bailed Out | Folk Festival

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STEPHEN DUNLAP (Fort Bragg): 40F under clear skies this Sunday morning on the coast. A chance of rain this afternoon then rain likely tonight. Maybe a shower on Monday then a mix of clear skies & clouds the rest of the week. No more rain in sight at the moment.

A QUICK MOVING frontal system arrives this morning, bringing gusty south wind and moderate to heavy rain to Del Norte and Humboldt counties. (NWS)

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LARGEST DEMO EVER IN UKIAH SATURDAY

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UKIAH PROTEST PHOTOS (by Karen Rifkin)

The most recent source said there were at least 1000 people showing up.

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VIDEO: Hands Off demonstration turnout in Ukiah (by Mike Jamieson): https://youtu.be/GnfyxZ0kPwA?si=hKqDx1LVw7o7Tnw3

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POINT ARENA (photos by Paul Andersen)

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FORT BRAGG

Yes in Fort Bragg today we had a beautiful heartfelt protest against the Trump policies and quite illegal actions as of late.

Hundreds of original signs and banners, no two alike attended by our community members.

Very successful and I think the 1000 estimate is close; estimates at the peak are at 1000 or 1500.

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SHORT-TERM RENTALS

by Justine Frederiksen

Mendocino County is hosting the first of five “stakeholder meetings to discuss current and future policies on short-term rentals and their impacts to local communities, real estate, and tourism” on Wednesday in Fort Bragg.

The meeting is scheduled to start at 6 p.m. April 9 at the Veterans Hall, located at 360 N. Harrison St., and is the only one of the five public meetings scheduled on the Mendocino Coast, which is where the vast majority of short-term rentals are located.

According to a map on the county’s website showing the locations of officially recognized short-term rentals marked with yellow dots, at least half of them are located along the coast. Most of the dots are clustered near Mendocino and Fort Bragg, but there are also significant clusters in the south coast near Gualala and Point Arena, and a reasonable amount around Hopland and Talmage.

When asked why there were no meetings scheduled in the southern section of the Mendocino Coast where his jurisdiction is, 5th District Supervisor Ted Williams explained that the ordinance being

discussed was focused on inland areas, not coastal. When asked why the first meeting was being held in Fort Bragg then, Williams explained that while “Fort Bragg has development that most would consider coastal, it is not in the coastal zone.”

When asked if cities like Point Arena and Gualala then are considered coastal, Williams said “mostly yes, (but in) some places (the line is) a block or two from the ocean, and in others it is two miles inland.”

Second District Supervisor Maureen Mulheren said that the official zoning designations can be confusing, especially for Ukiah Valley residents who consider anything over the mountains to be coastal, and that much of the same issues regarding the inland-coastal boundaries were brought up during discussions regarding regulations for short-term camping.

One Point Arena resident who operates a short-term rental expressed surprise that no upcoming meetings were planned in or near the south coast, but was even more surprised about the fact that only the last meeting being held in Ukiah could be attended virtually via Zoom.

When asked why only the meeting in Ukiah could be attended virtually, Mulheren said she could not speak to that, and that Planning Department Director Julia Krog was not available to ask. No county staff could be reached for comment on how the meeting locations were chosen, and why attending virtually via Zoom would only be offered during the Ukiah meeting.

As to why there are meetings planned in the city of Willits and Covelo, which are both areas that show little to no short-term rentals on the county’s map, Mulheren said that it likely was in part due to the expected increase in such offerings after the “future buildout of the Great Redwood Trail” through the northern part of inland Mendocino County.

After the Fort Bragg meeting next week, the other meetings are:

Anderson Valley: Monday, April 14, 6 p.m. Boonville Veterans Hall, 14470 Highway 128, Boonville

Willits: Wednesday, April 16. 6 p.m. Mendocino County Museum, 400 E. Commercial St., Willits

Covelo: Wednesday, April 23. 3 p.m. Round Valley Library, 23925 Howard St., Covelo

Ukiah: Wednesday April 30. 6 p.m. Conference Room C Mendocino County Administration Center, 501 Low Gap Road, Ukiah and virtual participation via Zoom: https://mendocinocounty.zoom.us/j/86173760912

According to county staff’s description of the upcoming meetings, “planners will provide a brief presentation with information on current short-term rental policies, adjacent jurisdictions’ policies, and common concerns, followed by a round-table conversation to elicit ideas for a future ordinance. Meetings are in-person events” with the exception of the last in Ukiah.

Just some of the “discussion guidelines and police considerations” listed on the county website regarding the short-term rentals ordinances are: protect long term rental housing and available housing; discourage long-term rental properties from being converted to (short-term-rentals); prevent housing on the market from being sold to corporations; balance short term rentals in residential neighborhoods to preserve residential character; prevent residential neighborhoods from being “overtaken” by guests to the detriment of the neighborhood and residential feel of a neighborhood.

Staff also notes that “the (short-term rental) market is consistently in flux, meaning any ordinance adopted may have to change to meet the market and evolving community needs, (and that) county staff will regularly revisit the ordinance, once adopted, to ensure that it still aligns with the community’s goals. For example, adjustments to the cap on the number of STRs allowed may merit a revisit.”

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ED NOTES

ONE OF THE MANY ironies of public life in Mendocino County is the volume of rightly indignant demands for government “transparency” put against the local reality of every public body in Mendocino County, from the supervisors down through school boards, behaving with less transparency than Stalin's Politburo. (Uncle Joe at least got out regular scraps of misinformation via Pravda.) The local libs, of course, are the most sensitive to criticism and, around here, don't get any, so, sigh, it's been up to us. But for lib treachery lately, see the Chamise Cubbison case. DA Eyster is no lib but the Supervisors are self-identifying libs — all five of them — and their treachery is costing the county plenty.

ANOTHER PROB with local government is the transient nature of our populations. You have people new to the area sitting on the various boards who have no knowledge or even curiosity about the institutional history of the agency they are allegedly supervising, supervising unto permanent paralysis and death, in many cases.

WHY DO PARENTS have to be assured that some guy's talk will be “non-judgmental”? Mendo once invited a guy was an alleged expert on teen drug use. Non-judgmental is a big part of the teen dope prob, isn't it? Young people should not be smoking marijuana. Period. It makes them stupid and slow, and makes a lot of them permanently stupid and slow, as a glance around Mendoland makes obvious. Or permanently schizophrenic if they've been born with a genetic predisposition to mental illness.

THE CONFUSION around here comes from adult stoners who always manage to make it sound as if pot is simply one more harmless high, kinda like a double Red Bull or a can of Bud Light when in living fact it's a strong drug, as hazard-inducing as alcohol, although you still hear people say, “Well, hell, I'd rather have my kid smoking pot than drinking.”

AND I'D rather be shot than hanged. So what? The little dummies should be emphatically ordered, “Don't smoke this crap unless you want to wind up like…” Pick a name of your preferred local pothead. If your aspiring dope head has any brains he'll choose not to do it.

WHY I'LL always love Jim Harbaugh. When Chron sports writer Eric Branch asked Harbaugh how he felt after the 49ers’ overtime loss to the Giants a few years ago, Harbaugh answered, “Is it just California that everybody just wants to know how you feel? Care about what you thought, what you did, how you felt, how your pinky feels. Is that just a California thing? Back where I come from, nobody really cares. In my opinion, it is a California thing.” No, coach, it's an idiot thing, not specific to the Golden State. A couple of weeks later I heard a radio sports guy tell Harbaugh that the coach needed to spend more time with his family! Worse, the radio jock phrased this preposterously intrusive statement with, “Dude, you need…”

VIOLET CARPELLO RENICK enjoyed the reminiscences of the late Maurice Tindall collected from his columns in Homer Mannix's Anderson Valley Advertiser. Tindall, the valley old, old, old timer, also served as our justice court judge. Violet, among the few native people remaining in Mendocino County who grew up in a Pomo-speaking home, this one on Anderson Creek across the road from Evergreen Cemetery, remembers as a child shopping at the old Tindall Market in Boonville where her grandfather, Frank Luff, spoke a dialect of Pomo with Tindall.

“Maurice Tindall was the only white man my grandfather knew who could speak our language,” Violet recalls. I will always enjoy Violet's remark to an uppity old timer who was bragging about her seniority in The Valley. “Well,” Violet said in a quiet voice of ultimate triumph, “my family has been here for 10,000 years.”

WHILE we're working the ethnic beat here, this from the January 29, 1887 edition of the Mendocino Beacon: “China New Years was celebrated by the Celestials of this place in a very enthusiastic manner. From Saturday morning until Monday night there was almost a constant fusillade of fire-crackers and bombs.”

IT WAS THESE “Celestials” who hand dug the Navarro Cistern which provides the perfectly sweet and pure water enjoyed by several Deepend households to this day. Chinese also hand dug the Skunk line tunnel outside Fort Bragg and, with Jim Armstrong, the Eel Diversion Tunnel at Potter Valley.

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ANDERSON VALLEY VILLAGE List of Events

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MIKE GENIELLA:

Brother Joe On My Mind…

We were as different as night and day, two brothers bound together under the iron fist of a father whose intolerance for childhood mischief kept all kids in line, family, friends, or visitors.

Joe and I were the best playmates. We worked together to get our chores done so we could seek refuge out back by the small barn. It had room for two milk cows and was nestled below the old Western Pacific railroad tracks. The gully in between was full of blackberry bushes and brush, the perfect place to create tunnels leading to hidden forts. We spent hours there, along with cousins who lived not far away.

Joe and I drifted apart in our high school years. He ignored classroom demands to focus on chasing girls and working part-time in a butcher shop for spending money. A motorcycle was Joe's goal, and by gawd, he achieved it.

Joe went in and out of relationships, marriages, and fatherhood. Joe loved his two daughters, but could never commit to being a father who was present for them in all ways. We reunited in later years, mainly out of shared concerns for our aging mother. Joe lived with her on and off, a recipient of her generosity. It was okay because his presence made her happy. Joe was her handyman.

We drifted apart again in later years, mainly because my work and family life demanded attention, creating conflicts with his laissez-faire attitude about such matters. Joe was closer to our older brother, who lived in Ohio. Bill had left home when I was about 10, so we never had much in common. Although my contact with Joe was minimal in his last years, I was with him when he passed in 2016 in Sacramento. I joined his daughter, Sarah, and family when Joe's ashes were scattered from a boat meandering down the Sacramento River. I was at peace because it was the perfect tribute for Joe. I am grateful for our shared childhood.

Happy Birthday, Joe.

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UKIAH SHELTER PET OF THE WEEK

Pedro is a charming adult dog with a heartwarming and sweet personality. He’s a loving companion who enjoys spending time with his favorite humans. Pedro may be a little shy at first, but he warms up quickly once he feels comfortable with you. Unfortunately, we do not have enough information about Pedro's history with other dogs, and it will be best to introduce him slowly to other dogs and monitor his behavior. Overall, Pedro is a delightful buddy who will undoubtedly bring joy and love to his forever home. Our little grey tank is a Pittie mix, 3 years old and 65 pounds.

To learn more about Pedro, and all of our canine and feline guests, plus the occasional goat, sheep, or tortoise, and for information about our services, programs, and events, visit: mendoanimalshelter.com.

Join us the first Saturday every month for our Meet The Dogs Adoption Event at the shelter.

Please share our posts on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/mendoanimalshelter

For information about adoptions please call 707-467-6453. Making a difference for homeless pets in Mendocino County, one day at a time!

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RUN FOR A CAUSE in Anderson Valley at the 40th Boontling Classic 5k

by Matt LaFever

The 40th Annual Boontling Classic 5k Footrace will be held on Sunday, May 4, 2025, at Anderson Valley Elementary School in Boonville, CA, starting at 10:00 a.m. This scenic race through Anderson Valley invites runners of all ages to join in the fun and support a great cause.

Race director Zane Colfax shared that the event is a beloved tradition in the community, with all proceeds benefiting the Anderson Valley Foodbank. “We would love it if you could help spread the word about our lovely community race,” Colfax said.

The race features several categories of entry, with fees as follows:

• Adults (18+) – $15.00
• Youth (6-17) – $5.00
• Kids (0-5) Family – Free
• NCS members receive a $2.00 discount on the entry fee

T-shirts are available for an additional $15.00 per person. Participants can register online at runsignup.com or sign up in person on race day, starting at 8:30 a.m.

Awards will include plaques for the top man, woman, and non-binary finishers, and ribbons for the top three in each of the ten age divisions. A post-race drawing will offer prizes, generously donated by local businesses.

https://runsignup.com/Race/CA/Boonville/BoontlingClassic

(mendofever.com)

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THEY WALK AMONG US

This Week at the Shala, Mendocino

Come to one or both - each gathering is designed to help you return to the wisdom of your breath, body, and inner knowing.

Space is limited - reserve your spot today

With love and steadiness,

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MENDOCINO COUNTY HISTORY (Chuck Ross)

On this date in 1901 the Ukiah Dispatch Democrat reports that the Greenwood Creamery is going up fast and should be in operation soon. This was located right in the middle of the present intersection of Hwy 1 and Boonville Avenue (the Greenwood-Philo road)

Created by the L.E. White Lumber Co. the creamery operated sporadically, depending on the availability of buttermilk, which it purchased by the pound from local dairymen. Large tubs of butter were shipped to San Francisco by steamer.

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CATCH OF THE DAY

CODY CALDWELL, 25, Willits. Controlled substance, personal ID possession with intent to defraud, concealed dirk-dagger, probation revocation.

JENNY COSTELLO, 48, Ukiah. DUI.

OCTAVIO DIAZ-RUIZ, 31, Ukiah. DUI, evasion, probation revocation.

JAMES DODD, 64, Ukiah. Paraphernalia, resisting.

LESS HOUSTON, 41, Ukiah. Failure to appear.

TAMARA HUBBARD, 53, Arcata/Laytonville. DUI.

DEANNA RENFORT, 49, Willits. Vandalism.

ERIC SEALE, 49, Fort Bragg. Resisting, probation revocation.

RACHAEL WILSON-ANGE, 54, Willits. Disorderly conduct-alcohol, resisting, failure to appear.

SABRINA ZINK, 46, Piercy. DUI-alcohol&drugs.

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ON-LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY

21,000 out of a population of 140,000 in Eureka (HumCo) needing food support is a red flag that something has gone really astray. Either in reality, attitude or perception, we have a big problem. The nationwide average of people unable to afford healthy food in the US is under 2.5%. People using the Food Bank here is over 6%. And in California especially food costs are lower than average nationwide. And percentage of income needed for food in the US is among the lowest in the world. Big, big red flag.

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ONLY ANGER

To the Editor:

In elections, I get one vote. Billionaires like Elon Musk can buy them in bulk (even though his strategy didn’t work in Wisconsin). I pay about 30 percent in taxes; wealthy hedge fund managers pay less. I can’t afford some medications; pharmaceutical companies spend millions on lobbyists. Private universities have tens of millions of dollars in endowments that they hoard and watch grow. They pay a minuscule tax on these vast sums. Private equity funds buy blocks of houses for cash, driving up prices.

If our society were a bar at happy hour with just the middle-class workers there, the average income would be about $80,000. If Elon Musk walks in, the average goes up to several million. But no one gets richer.

A more equitable tax structure has to be part of the conversation. In this unequal and unjust country, there are no “politics of anger.” There’s just anger.

Jennifer LaMond

Portsmouth, Rhode Island

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CARMAKERS & TRUMP

Editor:

I have been a Tesla owner since 2018 and a Toyota owner since 2014. They are both economical cars and the right choice at the time of purchase. As for those who would harass Tesla owners because of their choice of automobile, I say take a look around.

Toyota was one the largest donors to Donald Trump’s campaign in 2016 and joined Ford, General Motors and others as seven-figure donors to the latest Trump campaign.

I haven’t researched other auto companies’ donation records, but I would hazard a guess that they all have attempted to feather their nests by contributing large amounts. Whichever “side” you’re on, you are probably driving a vehicle made by a company who has supported this administration — Elon Musk and all.

Martha Johnson

Santa Rosa

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MEMO OF THE AIR: A shmo at the gate.

"Imagine if I had done any of this." -Barack Obama

Marco here. Here's the recording of last night's (2025-04-04) 7.5-hour-long Memo of the Air: Good Night Radio show on 107.7fm KNYO-LP Fort Bragg (CA) and also, for the first three hours, on KAKX Mendocino, ready for you to re-enjoy in whole or in part: https://tinyurl.com/KNYO-MOTA-0638

Coming shows can feature your own story or dream or poem or essay or kvetch or announcement. Just email it to me. Or send me a link to your writing project and I'll take it from there and read it on the air.

Besides all that, at https://MemoOfTheAir.wordpress.com you'll find a fresh batch of dozens of links to not-necessarily radio-useful but worthwhile items I set aside for you while gathering the show together, such as:

Marcia Ball – Louella. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=74_WsLSE6iY

How to defend against robot dog soldiers. https://theawesomer.com/how-to-disable-a-robot-dog/767369/

And click to see all 126 photos. Imagine being on the crew of smudge-nosed barefoot orphans who have to dust all this stuff. And God help the one who lets a priceless bauble slip through its weak-from-hunger fingers and chip a corner off. The whipping and the whimpering and the pitiful splatters of blood. But that night you get together under the stairs, talk it over in urgent whispers, determine that you never had to put up with this shit, and you’re not going to put up with this shit anymore, and formulate a plan of glorious revenge for every humiliation on the list, and it’s a long one. When next The Mistress appears, sees the damage, demands to know the meaning of this, is menacingly encircled, takes out her quirt and pistol and finds them limp and empty, respectively! Oh, I can’t wait. Try to sleep. We’ve done all we can now. Big day tomorrow. It’s all finally happening. https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/16070-Sainte-Marie-Ct-Hamilton-VA-20158/121975792_zpid

Marco McClean, memo@mcn.org, https://MemoOfTheAir.wordpress.com

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GIANTS’ JUNG HOO LEE playing with ‘no fear’ as Giants start 7-1 for first time since 2003

by Susan Slusser

Any questions about Jung Hoo Lee appear to be answered, and just a mere eight games into the season.

Lee, the San Francisco Giants’ dynamic center fielder, missed most of last year after injuring his shoulder slamming into the wall at Oracle Park in May, and many wondered if he needed this season, or a good chunk of it, to learn how to hit big-league pitching. The Giants knew what they had, though: He’s hit third since Day One, he’s batting .321, he’s stealing bases and even handling drives to that wall without hesitation.

Saturday, he delivered his second career three-hit game, combining with Matt Chapman on back-to-back doubles in two different innings to spur San Francisco’s 4-1 victory over the Mariners and push the Giants’ record to 7-1 for the first time since 2003, a year the team won 100 games.

“I waited for this moment, a very, very precious moment,” Lee said of his return to playing, with Justin Han interpreting. “Every day coming into the ballpark is amazing right now.”

A brief back issue during the spring didn’t slow Lee either; he added another stolen base Saturday, taking third with ease in the fourth inning. He has three, and the Giants have 11 steals through eight games for the first time since 1982. More important, though, is his play in center, especially after last year’s injury — he isn’t shying away from anything and he’s showing a particular knack for handling tough drives to the wall with the sun in his eyes.

“Yeah, no fear going back there on defense,” Lee said, adding that the warning track was widened and more padding added in center. “I’m going all in over there right now.”

After only 37 games last year, Lee’s hot start wasn’t a given, but Chapman said, “I never had a doubt. I know how hard it can be to come back after missing a whole year, so it is impressive that he’s been able to just be so consistent right away, but when you look at his swing and the way he works in the cage, his swing can handle big-league pitching. He stays inside the ball. He’s on time. He’s got a short swing and has power. It’s really fun to hit behind him, he gets on base a lot.”

Chapman pushed Lee across twice — and since the start of last season, the Giants are 39-12 when Chapman supplies at least one RBI. Mike Yastrzemski and Wilmer Flores also drove in runs; Flores’ 11 RBIs lead the team.

On the pitching end, Robbie Ray’s night wasn’t quite the flirtation with perfection he constructed his first outing of the season, when he retired the first 15 Reds batters he faced. Saturday, he walked five and gave up four hits in six innings, but he deftly avoided trouble, allowing just one run and that on a homer by Dylan Moore, his former Seattle teammate.

“The offspeed stuff was really good, my curveball was sharp tonight, the slider was good, changeup was really good,” Ray said. “I think that allowed me to pitch with my fastball when I really needed it. … I think for the most part, I was just able to keep them off balance.”

Ray was kicking himself for a second pitch-clock violation in as many starts, especially because it cost him a walk. “I just had a slip up to pre-pitch clock (times), shaking to a pitch that was already called, not really paying attention to the pitch clock in that situation. So that one is on me.”

After the Giants used everyone in the bullpen except Hayden Birdsong in a 10-9 11-inning win the day before, Ray’s ability to fight through six and Birdsong’s two scoreless innings were much needed. Ryan Walker worked the ninth for his third save in three tries.

Before the game, Chapman and Patrick Bailey were presented with their Gold Glove awards; the giveaway Saturday evening was a Chapman Gold Glove bobblehead and thousands of fans were lined up more than three hours before the game in order to snag one. Chapman then made a bang-bang play on a slow roller by J.P. Crawford to end the game.

“It was definitely tough,” Chapman said. “I kind of had a feeling it was coming; with Walker on the mound, lefties sometimes hit soft dribblers down the line because it’s tough to pick up his ball and it moves a lot. I actually moved right before that pitch, I kind of felt like the ball was going that direction. It was a fun way to fun way to end that game.”

Bailey’s Gold Glove was his first and came in his first full big-league season.

“That position, you’ve got to take defense first,” Melvin said. “There were times he had some really good offensive spurts and times had to go through a little bit of a difficult time offensively, but it never affected his defense, and even in the second half of the year, when we started paying attention to runners a little bit more, the throwing shows up because he’s got such good pop time. There’s a lot to like about him behind the plate, the framing’s off the charts, understanding his pitchers now, too.

“For a young guy who hasn’t been doing this that long, it’s very impressive.”

Bailey played in the first nine innings of Friday’s 11-inning game before being lifted for a pinch runner, and Melvin decided to give him Saturday’s start off. Sam Huff caught Ray’s start and several during the spring “and Robbie had a good spring so there’s some confidence on both sides with that,” Melvin said.

Huff, in limited time, has yet to get his bat going. He went hitless in two at-bats and is now 0 for 10 overall with five strikeouts; Bailey pinch hit for him in the sixth and flied out with two on.

Jesse Hahn, who spent three seasons with the A’s under Melvin, appeared in his first big-league game since April 11, 2021; he had shoulder impingement surgery that season. He was called up Saturday with Seattle’s bullpen as thin as San Francisco’s after Friday’s game and threw two scoreless innings.

“This is just pure joy,” the 35-year-old said. “I’ve worked really hard for this. This is what I wanted to do, so I just worked and waited. It took me off guard — I’ve got all the emotions.”

(sfchronicle.com)

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TRUMP ADMINISTRATION ISSUES EMERGENCY ORDER TO INCREASE LOGGING IN CALIFORNIA FORESTS

by Aidin Vaziri

In a move that could substantially reshape California’s natural landscape, the U.S. Department of Agriculture issued an emergency order Friday to accelerate timber harvesting across nearly 113 million acres of national forests.

The directive, announced by USDA Secretary Brooke Rollins, mandates a 25% increase in timber quotas nationwide, with particular focus on areas of California, including the Los Angeles, San Bernardino, Los Padres and Cleveland national forests.

The order is part of a broader initiative to address what the Trump administration has called a “forest health crisis.”

“National Forests are in crisis due to uncharacteristically severe wildfires, insect and disease outbreaks, invasive species and other stressors,” Rollins said in her directive.

The emergency designation spans 176,000 square miles, primarily across the West, with additional areas in the South, around the Great Lakes, and New England — an expanse larger than California.

Many of these forests face significant wildfire risks and suffer from the effects of insect infestations and disease, according to the USDA.

Rollins argued that streamlining logging permits would help mitigate wildfire risks and bolster the resilience of forests against future threats. Notably, she did not mention climate change in the announcement.

Logging trade groups, including the American Forest Resource Council, have supported the directive, asserting that it will help reduce wildfire risks.

“This industry needs a raw supply to remain competitive and keep the doors open,” Travis Joseph, president of the Oregon-based American Forest Resource Council, an industry group, told the Associated Press. “We’re not even reaching half of what forest plans currently call for. Let’s implement our forest plans across the country, and if we did that, that should increase the volume that’s available to American mills and create American jobs and create revenue.”

However, environmental organizations have strongly opposed the move, arguing that the plan prioritizes the financial interests of the timber industry over ecological preservation.

“Don’t be fooled: The Trump administration and its allies in Congress aren’t trying to solve the wildfire crisis or protect communities threatened by it,” Josh Hicks with The Wilderness Society said in a statement. “Instead, they are aiming to deepen the pockets of private industry to log across our shared, public forests, while sidestepping public review.”

(SF Chronicle)

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TRUMP ADMINISTRATION ROLLS BACK FOREST PROTECTIONS IN BID TO RAMP UP LOGGING

by Matthew Brown

BILLINGS, Mont. — President Donald Trump's administration acted to roll back environmental safeguards around future logging projects on more than half of U.S. national forests under an emergency designation announced Friday that cites dangers from wildfires.

Whether the move will boost lumber supplies as Trump envisioned in an executive order last month remains to be seen. Former President Joe Biden's administration also sought more logging in public forests to combat fires, which are worsening as the world gets hotter, yet U.S. Forest Service timber sales stayed relatively flat under his tenure.

Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins did not mention climate change in Friday's directive, which called on her staff to speed up environmental reviews.

It exempts affected forests from an objection process that allows outside groups, tribes and local governments to challenge logging proposals at the administrative level before they are finalized. It also narrows the number of alternatives federal officials can consider when weighing logging projects.

Logging projects are routinely contested by conservation groups, both at the administrative level and in court, which can drag out the approval process for years.

The emergency designation covers 176,000 square miles (455,000 square kilometers) of terrain primarily in the West but also in the South, around the Great Lakes and in New England. Combined, it is an area larger than California and amounts to 59% of Forest Service lands.

Most of those forests are considered to have high wildfire risk, and many are in decline because of insects and disease.

“National Forests are in crisis due to uncharacteristically severe wildfires, insect and disease outbreaks, invasive species and other stressors,” Rollins said in her directive, echoing concerns raised by her predecessor under Biden, Tom Vilsack.

Those threats — combined with overgrown forests, more homes in wild areas and decades of aggressive fire suppression — add up to a “forest health crisis" that could be helped with more logging, said Rollins, a former conservative legal activist and president of a Trump-aligned think tank.

Concerns about lost safeguards

Environmentalists rejected the claim that wildfire protection was driving the changes to forest policy.

In response to the new directive, Forest Service officials at the regional level were told to come up with plans to increase the volume of timber offered by 25% over the next four to five years. In a letter from Acting Associate Chief Chris French, they were also told to identify projects that could receive “categorical exclusions,” which are exemptions from stringent environmental analyses.

“This is all about helping the timber industry,” said Blaine Miller-McFeeley of the environmental group Earthjustice. “It's not looking at what will protect communities. It's about the number of board feet, the number of trees you are pulling down.”

The Forest Service has sold about 3 billion board feet of timber annually for the past decade. Timber sales peaked several decades ago at about 12 billion board feet amid widespread clearcutting of forests. Volumes dropped sharply in the 1980s and 1990s as environmental protections were tightened and more areas were put off limits to logging. Most timber is harvested from private lands.

Under Biden, the Forest Service sought to more intensively manage national forests in the West, by speeding up wildfire protection work including logging in so-called “priority landscapes” covering about 70,000 square miles (180,000 square kilometers).

Much of that work involved smaller trees and younger forests that add fuel to wildfires but are less profitable for loggers.

Biden proposed more protections for old-growth forests, drawing backlash from the timber industry, but that plan was abandoned in the administration’s final days.

Timber industry wants more trees available

Industry representatives said they hope the Trump administration's actions will result in the sales of more full-grown stands of trees that are desired by sawmills. Federal law allows for the harvest of about 6 billion board feet annually — about twice the level that’s now logged, said Travis Joseph, president of the Oregon-based American Forest Resource Council, an industry group.

“This industry needs a raw supply to remain competitive and keep the doors open,” he said. “We're not even reaching half of what forest plans currently call for. Let's implement our forest plans across the country, and if we did that, that should increase the volume that's available to American mills and create American jobs and create revenue.”

Trump last month ordered federal officials to investigate the possible harms of lumber imports to national security. The administration said Canada and other countries engage in lumber subsidies that disadvantage the United States. Canadian timber was left out of the president's latest round of tariffs.

(AP)

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MUSK OUT

Elon Musk has split with Donald Trump on tariffs in the latest sign the billionaire is distancing himself from the White House.

The president's special adviser told a political rally he hopes to see a 'zero tariff situation' between the US and Europe to create a free trade zone.

On Wednesday, Trump introduced a controversial 20 percent tariff for Europe along with even higher tariffs for other global trading partners as what he dubbed 'Liberation Day'.

But while the president has been pushing US isolationism, Musk espoused a more collaborative approach.

'I hope that the United States and Europe can establish a very close partnership,' the Tesla CEO said during the virtual rally of Italy's Deputy Prime Minister, Matteo Salvini.

'I hope it is agreed that both Europe and the United States should move ideally in my view to a zero tariff situation, effectively creating a free trade zone between Europe and North America,' the SpaceX founder continued.

Earlier Saturday, Trump appeared to distance himself even further from the tariffs plan as he ripped a top Trump trade advisor in an extraordinary outburst on X.

Musk's dissent comes just days after it was announced he would be stepping down from the newly established Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).

— DailyMail.uk

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In going where you have to go, and doing what you have to do, and seeing what you have to see, you dull and blunt the instrument you write with. But I would rather have it bent and dulled and know I had to put it on the grindstone again and hammer it into shape and put a whetstone to it, and know that I had something to write about, than to have it bright and shining and nothing to say, or smooth and well oiled in the closet, but unused.

— Ernest Hemingway, Preface to 'The First Forty-Nine Stories', 1944

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LEAD STORIES, SUNDAY'S NYT

Trump’s Tariffs Will Wound Free Trade, but the Blow May Not Be Fatal

Small Businesses Face a ‘Tornado’ of Challenges: Cuts, Freezes and Now Tariffs

For Republicans, Tariffs Pose a Risk Like No Other

Vietnam Offers to Drop U.S. Tariffs to Zero. Will That Be Enough for Trump?

Musk Says He Hopes Europe and U.S. Move to a ‘Zero-Tariff Situation’

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MASS PROTESTS ACROSS THE COUNTRY SHOW RESISTANCE TO TRUMP

by Shaila Dewan, Minho Kim & Katie Benner

Demonstrators packed the streets in cities and towns to rail against government cutbacks, financial turmoil and what they viewed as attacks on democracy.

They came out in defense of national parks and small businesses, public education and health care for veterans, abortion rights and fair elections. They marched against tariffs and oligarchs, dark money and fascism, the deportation of legal immigrants and the Department of Government Efficiency.

Demonstrators had no shortage of causes as they gathered in towns and cities across the country on Saturday to protest President Trump’s agenda. Rallies were planned in all 50 states, and images posted on social media showed dense crowds in places as diverse as St. Augustine, Fla.; Salt Lake City and rainy Frankfort, Ky.

“Pouring rain, 43 degrees, biting wind, and people are still here in Albany in the thousands,” said Ron Marz, a comic book writer who posted a photo of the crowd at the New York State Capitol on X.

While crowd sizes are difficult to estimate, organizers said that more than 600,000 people had signed up to participate and that events also took place in U.S. territories and a dozen locations across the globe.

On Fifth Avenue in Manhattan, the protest stretched for nearly 20 blocks. In Chicago, thousands flooded Daley Plaza and adjacent streets, while, in the nation’s capital, tens of thousands surrounded the Washington Monument. In Atlanta, the police estimated the crowd marching to the gold-domed statehouse at over 20,000.

Mr. Trump, who was playing golf in Florida on Saturday, appeared to be largely ignoring the protests. The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Some of the demonstrators waved American flags, occasionally turned upside down to signal distress. Many, especially federal workers and college students, did not want to speak on the record for fear of retaliation. Right-wing slogans like “Stop the Steal” were co-opted in defense of Social Security, medical care and cancer research.

“I’m tariffied. Are you?” one placard read. Global financial markets tumbled this week at Mr. Trump’s announcement of tariff increases, which many economists warned would raise prices for U.S. consumers. Republicans in Congress wrestled over budget proposals that included cuts to Medicaid and SNAP food benefits.

Rob Ahlrichs, a Baltimore resident who attended the protest in Washington with his two sons and his wife, Katherine Sterner, put out a sign with a graph depicting stock market indexes plummeting that read, “Did you vote for this?”

In Chicago, Marilyn Finner, 65, who works in customer service, said she had never attended a protest but that she felt compelled to take part on Saturday because she was concerned about threats to retirement benefits.

The mass action, with the deliberately open-ended name “Hands Off!,” was planned at a time when many Democrats have bemoaned what they see as a lack of strong resistance to Mr. Trump. The president has moved aggressively to punish people and institutions that he views as out of step with his ideology.

Don Westhoff, a 59-year-old accountant, was another first-time protester. He voiced outrage at the administration but had words for Democrats as well, saying they needed an infusion of younger leaders to oppose the president.

“We want to let the elected Democratic officials know that good is no longer good enough,” he said. “They need to fight.”

Multiple concerns prompted Katrin Hinrichsen to drive six hours from her home in Tolland, Conn., to Washington to attend. She held a sign with names of legal residents with foreign passports whom the Trump administration has moved to deport for allegations of antisemitic speech and gang activities.

Her 18-year-old son is transgender, she said, and she feared his losing access to gender transition care. “Now suddenly he’s a hate object, just because that’s politically convenient,” she said. “I’m just furious.”

The rallies were organized by Indivisible, MoveOn and several other groups that led protests about abortion rights, gun violence and racial justice during the first Trump administration. Organizers said they hoped to shift the emphasis to pocketbook issues like health care and Social Security, with the message that Mr. Trump is making life harder for the average American while benefiting his richest allies.

They also moved away from focusing on massive demonstrations, like the 2017 Women’s March on Washington, to instead plan hundreds of local gatherings in communities large and small.

Concerns varied by location. In Ketchum, Idaho — population 3,555 — cuts to the Forest Service generated deep concern, said Fiona Smythe, 56, a resident who attended a protest that she said drew more than 500 people. One sign showed Smokey Bear and read, “Only you can prevent forest fires. Seriously. We’ve been defunded. It’s just you now.”

Some demonstrators had specific issues, while others opposed the Trump administration and MAGA movement in general. “Hands off my money, rights, democracy,” one sign proclaimed. “Make lying wrong again,” said another. Elon Musk, the billionaire heading Mr. Trump’s slash-and-burn attack on the federal bureaucracy, was a popular target.

“I feel like the MAGA people have corrupted and co-opted the American flag and the idea of patriotism,” said Barbara Santarelli, 77, a retired health care worker draped in a flag who participated in the New York City rally. She described herself as a Jewish centrist who was concerned about her retirement benefits, attacks on universities and freedom of speech, the war in Gaza, and due process rights.

Before the event, she recounted, her daughter expressed concern for her safety. But she said attending the protest was something she had to do. “The soldiers, they go to war to defend democracy,” she recalled saying. “At my age, this is how I go to war to defend democracy.’”

In Chicago, Glynn Tipton, a 45-year-old pharmaceutical professional, said he was attending to make friends feel safer.

“I’m a generic white guy, so they aren’t coming for me,” he said. “There’s a lot of my friends who are Jewish, trans, in the military or sick, and they’re not doing OK. It’s OK for me to stand out here, so I should for the ones who are afraid.”

Many protesters said they had been directly affected by cuts to federal jobs and grants. In Atlanta, Johnny Johnson, 34, said he had been hired by the Internal Revenue Service, moved, fired and rehired in a matter of months.

“I dipped into my 401(k) because I didn’t know what was going to happen,” he said.

In Denver, veteran Trump protesters said there was a noticeably smaller Latino presence on Saturday than there had been at demonstrations during the first Trump term. “You notice there’s not a lot of Chicano people out here? It’s because people are scared,” said Brian Loma, 49, an environmental organizer who set up a tent in the snow selling hot chocolate. The government seemed to be “ripping up green cards,” he said. “It’s crazy.”

Among the demonstrators in New York City was Melissa Jackson, 41, a former special education teacher and the mother of a 3-year-old on a specialized learning plan for students with disabilities.

“I think it’s ridiculous. New York, the United States, is the melting pot. Like, what do we want? Like, not diversity, not inclusion?” she said, adding that she was also concerned about cuts to public education. “We’ve come too far to take so many steps back.”

(New York Times)

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TARIFFS, THE BATTLE IN SEATTLE, AND THE TRIUMPHANT RETURN OF THOMAS

Taibbi & Kirn

Matt Taibbi: Walter, we’re very matchy-matchy today.

Walter Kirn: Well, we are. We’re wearing matching County Highway hats. It’s County Highway Magazine, you can subscribe online, because the logos are not particularly prominent on our hats. If you’re wondering what it is, it’s the newspaper I help edit, and Matt has kindly agreed to be twins today.

Matt Taibbi: Well, I mean, I’m always supportive of County Highway, so I think everybody should have a copy. Also, you and I, Walter… It’s a dissident publication, and you and I have both had personal difficulties this last week, and we can’t share fully today what they are, but we will be able to next week. At least partially.

Walter Kirn: Yours was on TV.

Matt Taibbi: Mine was on TV, so that one’s not so much of a mystery, but the other shoe dropping to it is a little bit.

Walter Kirn: Oh, no. Okay, I can’t wait.

Matt Taibbi: Well, no, no, no. It’s not necessarily bad news.

Walter Kirn: Well, mine was on TV too. We actually had video of a criminal doing something to me, and you’ll have to wait until next week. This is going to be a serial drama.

Matt Taibbi: In fact, we may need the audience’s help to get some movement on Walter’s situation at least, because it’s so weird, but we’ll get into it probably next week. Look, obviously a lot going on in the world. There’s a lot of things we could get into, but Walter noticed a tweet that we both thought was fascinating, and that leads us down what Adam Entous would call a Warren. In other words, a rabbit hole, and it’s our old friend, Lee Fang. The first thing he says is, “There’s absolutely no way a time traveler could explain to a 1999 Seattle WTO lefty protester how the era of globalization and American support for free trade would come to an end.” Now, we’re going to have to cut away from this for a second to talk about what he means, and what he means is a series of tariffs that were announced this week. Trump is calling them reciprocal tariffs. If we could just play the beginning of this.

Donald Trump: If you look at that China, first row. China, 67%. That’s tariffs charged to The USA, including currency manipulation and trade barriers. 67%, I think you can, for the most part, see it. Those with good eyes. With bad eyes, we didn’t want to bring… It’s very windy out here, we didn’t want to bring out the big charts, because it had no chance of standing. Fortunately, we came armed with a little smaller chart, so it’s 67%. We’re going to be charging a discounted reciprocal tariff of 34%. In other words, they charge us, we charge them, we charge them less, so how can anybody be upset?

Matt Taibbi: Essentially, Trump is slapping tariffs on the whole world. The whole world is currently freaking out about this, but if we go back in our Wayne’s World time machine, Walter, what did it look like in 1999 when the political establishment then led by Bill Clinton was pushing for China to be put into the WTO, given most favored nation trade status, and brought into this community of free trade that was going to cause this worldwide explosion of global wealth…

Walter Kirn: And peace, love, and understanding.

Matt Taibbi: Peace, love, and understanding as well. That’s a key part of that. We’re going to get into what some of the rhetoric was at the time. People have naturally forgotten what that was, but that 1999 decision to not only beef up the World Trade Organization, but bring China into it. A plainly undemocratic, highly repressive country was being welcomed into the fraternity of Western democratic nations for reasons that didn’t seem to make a whole lot of sense to a lot of people, but particularly the American left at the time.

Walter Kirn: Then the American left then pledged to the robust protection and wellbeing of the American worker.

Matt Taibbi: Right. Right, yeah. The American left that supposedly had a sacred bond with the American worker, suddenly didn’t have a problem with all of America’s jobs being moved over to China, and we’ll get into what some of those excuses were at the time, but it led to-

Walter Kirn: Well, they did have a problem on the streets of Seattle, but…

Matt Taibbi: Exactly, exactly.

Walter Kirn: The cops and others got a hold of that one.

Matt Taibbi: Yep. In fact, let’s give a brief… Let’s do our Wayne’s World time machine and go back to 1999, and if we could just see the battle in Seattle footage.

Protester 1: Our world, our state. Our world, our state.

Protester 2: For the most part, it was the police, it was tear gas, it was rubber bullets that were provoking all the chaos in the streets.

Proterster 3: The criticism of the protesters right now, it’s being portrayed that there is a whole bunch of anarchists that came here just to have fun and smash stores, and there’s very few people that do that. That a lot of people are seriously working to prevent protesters to prevent violence.

Matt Taibbi: All right, all right. We can stop there. The battle in Seattle was massively propagandized at the time as a ruckus drummed-up by leftist/communist agitators who were breaking glass and doing all these horrible things, and they hugely represented what those protests were about. Most of what the WTO battle in Seattle protesters were upset about was this idea that we were entering into trade agreements that would effectively undermine a century of pro-labor agitation in places like the United States by helping move our labor environment to unfree places where workers without rights would suddenly be competing with workers in the United States. Is that an accurate summation, Walter?

Walter Kirn: I think it is. There were other deleterious effects to this move. We were going to not only be moving to these jobs to low-wage unfree countries, but to countries which didn’t observe the same niceties of environmental protection-

Matt Taibbi: Exactly, pollution.

Walter Kirn: … and so on. But Bill Clinton, in his wisdom, made sure that goon squads, unseen even during any Trump administration, moved into the streets to get rid of these rats, these anarchists, these communists, these so on.

Matt Taibbi: It’s really an amazing story, because the Clinton administration began… Remember, the Democratic Party before Clinton was almost entirely beholden to big labor. Big labor was how they organized, big labor was how they raised money. What happened after Walter Mondale got creamed is the party got together and said, “We can’t compete this way. We need some other source of funding,” so they went to Wall Street, and they basically cut a deal and said, “Hey, can we get some of that good nice Wall Street cheddar?” In return, they got some policy changes, the biggest one being Democratic support for a Republican-crafted law called NAFTA, right? Clinton entered the office with a huge betrayal of labor, like a historic one, passing NAFTA, and ended with a subjugation of labor protesters over the WTO in general, and the idea of China getting most favored trading nation status in particular. Now we can zoom back out.

Walter Kirn: China, not all that many years after Tiananmen Square.

Matt Taibbi: Right, yeah. I mean, I feel like we had just watched that when this happened. Another thing that Lee tweeted, in addition to saying it would be difficult to explain to a lefty back then, that the end of this arrangement would’ve been fomented by a person that they probably hated more than anybody else in Donald Trump, or they at least would’ve been led to believe they hated. He then linked to a conversation between two political polar opposites. Pat Buchanan, who was one of the first ever… I don’t know. Not one of the first ever, but he was one of the first insurgent nationalist candidates who made hay on the big stage. Is that accurate, Walter?

Walter Kirn: Yeah, he was. What year again was this covered?

Matt Taibbi: This would’ve been 2011, so it was way after that,

Walter Kirn: Right, right.

Matt Taibbi: Yeah.

Walter Kirn: Pat Buchanan, you know him by the insults hurled at him, “Isolationist, nativist-”

Matt Taibbi: Racist.

Walter Kirn: “Racist, nationalist.” I won’t adjudicate the fairness of any of those. I did meet him once, I did interview him once as a journalist when he tried to take the Reform party. I think he did get the Reform Party nomination in 2000 when he ran against…

Matt Taibbi: Donald Trump.

Walter Kirn: Well, no, he ran against Bill Clinton and George Bush.

Matt Taibbi: Right, yes, but-

Walter Kirn: I mean, Al Gore and George Bush, excuse me.

Matt Taibbi: Yep, yep. Trump considered that nomination.

Walter Kirn: Trump considered that, and that’s when I first met Donald Trump, too. Donald Trump and Jesse Ventura in a motel ballroom in Minneapolis or St. Paul, Minnesota when they were considering running. It ended with Pat Buchanan as the nominee, and I went to his convention down in Arlington, Texas and had a very off-the-record, explosive interview with him in which he just railed against the degenerates and the globalists and the people who were selling the US and the US worker to the lowest bidder. He was quite a character, and one thing that can be said, I think, fairly of him was that he was an enemy of what they call the rules-based international order now.

Matt Taibbi: Exactly. He was, to his core, a nationalist. I think that is an accurate thing to say.

Walter Kirn: He’s a guy who doesn’t think we should have gotten into World War II, necessarily.

Matt Taibbi: Yes, and that’s another question, but there are ups and downs to nationalism.

Walter Kirn: Right, right.

Matt Taibbi: He explored all of those vigorously, but he’s having a conversation with another figure, Ralph Nader, who is one of the most significant third party figures in this country. He’s famous for being a consumer advocate. We have seat belts in our cars because of Ralph Nader.

Walter Kirn: Who, ironically, in some minds, would decide the 2000 election in which Pat Buchanan ran and Al Gore and George Bush. Would decide it not intentionally, but perhaps on a practical basis for George Bush, in that he is thought to have sucked votes away from Gore.

Matt Taibbi: He sucked my vote away from Gore.

Walter Kirn: Interesting.

Matt Taibbi: Yeah. Nader went on to become one of the first symbols of what we now call Lawfare. In his subsequent runs for president, he was continually litigated against. Every signature that he ever collected was challenged, he was struck from the ballot or disallowed from ballots over and over and over again, the Democrats did everything in their power to make sure he could not run. He has some bitterness about it, but he and Buchanan, ideologically, would seem to be opposites. In 2011, in the middle of the Occupy Wall Street protests, they have a discussion. They start to talk about things, including the battle in Seattle, and there is a moment where they both entertain the possibility that, yes, the left version of populism and right version of populism might have found middle ground.

Patrick Buchanan: I don’t think we’ll be a country in the sense that John Jay and Federalist too described us as one unique separate people.

Ralph Nader: Yet, you know this Occupy Wall Street effort that’s proliferating in hundreds of communities, it’s marked by a great diversity of background, cultures, religions, race united against the power of Wall Street and Washington in a desperate search for a more democratic society. Not just political, but economic. How do you explain that? That seems to be against the…

Patrick Buchanan: That’s what I’m saying.

Ralph Nader: Yeah.

Patrick Buchanan: Well, I do think, I think that the measure of unity that they have, I think one of the reasons they have it is because they’re not defining their demands. I’ve seen some of their 13 demands, and I’m sure some of those folks who are Tea Party types would not be in favor of those demands. I think there’s no question about it. Well, I agree with the fundamental premise of the Occupy Wall Street folks, which is, “Look, these fellas up here played the highest stakes poker game in the world, they had a great time, they made billions of dollars, and then all of a sudden, they were wiped out, and they ran to Uncle and said, ‘Give us back our chips,’ and Uncle gave them back his chips. Now they’re playing again, and they got the bonuses, and everybody out in middle America is suffering. You got 9% unemployment and 16% probably active, unemployed, and those searching for work.” I share the exasperation and the anger and the rage at that inequity and injustice.

Matt Taibbi: I mean, Walter, that’s a pretty significant moment, don’t you think?

Walter Kirn: It’s a very significant moment, because there was the ability to agree on that simple premise, that the financial interests and the working interests of the country were opposed. Now, that’s pretty basic going back in American political economic history, but it has since become muddied and controversial, but there was that clear moment where they could both agree that the wellbeing of America and the American working class middle class and lower-middle class was to be esteemed at least as highly as the wellbeing of the financial class, which had one benefit the working class doesn’t, which is they can be bailed out…

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