Mendocino County Today: Thursday 1/22/2026

STEPHEN DUNLAP (Fort Bragg): A mostly cloudy 44F this Thursday morning on the coast. Our forecast has changed to mostly sunny thru the weekend, we'll see. It looks like some light rain returns later next week, stay posted for more details.

DRY WEATHER and above normal daytime temperatures will continue through the early next week. Overnight and morning temperatures will remain chilly with patchy dense fog along the river valleys and around Humboldt Bay. Chance of precipitation increase by mid next week. (NWS)

MISSING PHILO TEEN FOUND SAFE IN SAN FRANCISCO

by Sydney Fishman

Sara Gene Keene, a 17-year-old from Philo who went missing earlier this month, was found in San Francisco by authorities Tuesday.

According to Mendocino County Sheriff’s Office spokesperson Capt. Quincy Cromer, the San Francisco Police Department contacted the Sheriff’s Office at 7:18 p.m. Tuesday to report that the teen was found in San Francisco and was no longer missing.

Cromer said no other information was available about where the teen was found.

(mendovoice.com)

UNMARKED PURSUIT WITH UNCLEAR AUTHORITY RAISES ALARM AFTER COVELO CHASE

by Lisa Music

On Monday, January 19 multiple residents reported seeing a high-speed vehicle pursuit through Covelo involving an unmarked vehicle displaying red and blue emergency lights while pursuing a fleeing vehicle through Covelo—despite no recognized law-enforcement agency reporting involvement.

Round Valley Tribal Police, the Mendocino County Sheriff’s Office (MCSO), and the California Highway Patrol responded. MCSO deputies ultimately located a matching vehicle in the Longvale area near the Highway 162 and Highway 101 intersection. The vehicle yielded to a law enforcement stop, and three plain-clothed occupants of an unmarked car outfitted with emergency lights, wearing tactical gear and carrying weapons were contacted and questioned before being released at the scene pending further investigation.

According to scanner traffic, interviews, and official statements, the pursuit involved three young men who had been previously employed by the Round Valley Indian Tribe and were now associated with efforts to establish a tribal police department for the Sherwood Valley Band of Pomo Indians near Willits. Sources say the program is still being developed. At present, our sources say, it is operating in a security capacity on Sherwood Valley tribal land, focused on removing trespassers and providing basic security under the leadership of Austin Walrath, a former Mendocino County correctional officer sworn into that role in 2024. Sources tell us the individuals involved had no jurisdiction or authorization to operate on the Round Valley Indian Tribe reservation.

Round Valley Tribal Police Chief Carlos Rabano said his department was not notified before the three men—who reportedly refer to themselves as the Sherwood Marshalls—entered Round Valley territory and initiated a pursuit after allegedly spotting a wanted felon.

Rabano said the presence of armed individuals in an unmarked vehicle created confusion and alarm within the community and among responding agencies. “We got these unmarked… units with unknown individuals… running around with guns in a vehicle pursuit, which is… against the law,” he said, emphasizing that there was no written memorandum of understanding (MOU) authorizing the activity. “We definitely are not a part of them. They’re not a part of us.”

He explained that while it was later determined a preliminary conversation had occurred between the Sherwood Valley group and a Round Valley council member about the possibility of placing an MOU discussion on a future agenda, no agreement was brought before the tribal council prior to Monday’s incident. Rabano also said he was never contacted directly about an MOU request involving his department. “They didn’t contact me, the chief of tribal police,” he told Redheaded Blackbelt in a phone interview on Tuesday. “You have to go to the tribal office, get on the agenda… They didn’t do that.”

The pursuit—reported to have reached speeds of up to 80 miles per hour through Covelo and past school grounds—raised serious safety concerns and threatened to undermine long-standing community trust in the Round Valley Tribal Police Department, while also potentially complicating the development of the Sherwood Valley program. Rabano said his department has spent years working to build trust in the rural, predominantly Native community with deep mistrust of outsiders and government. In the course of the unauthorized pursuit, fears of federal agents speeding through tribal land spread through the community along with rumors of tribal authorization of an MOU with an outside agency, though no MOU exists.

Rabano explained that Round Valley Tribal Police prioritize major crimes—such as burglaries, domestic violence, and wanted felons—over aggressive enforcement of minor infractions that can inflame tensions. “We’re interested in help,” Rabano said, noting longstanding working relationships with MCSO and CHP already in place. “But for the time being… I would appreciate it if they just stayed on their jurisdiction. This is our territory.”

Tribal police departments are structured based on decisions made by the tribal government itself. Some tribes pursue federal certification, which requires officers to meet federal training standards and operate under additional oversight. Others choose to keep their departments fully under local tribal council control. In either case, tribal police authority is generally limited to that tribe’s own land unless formal agreements are in place.

Sources say the Sherwood Valley program has not reached that stage. Its policies, they say, have not been fully approved by the tribal council, and the individuals involved do not meet the training, certification, or oversight requirements associated with sworn tribal or federal law enforcement.

Rabano said the three individuals had previously worked briefly with the Round Valley Tribal Police in limited, non-sworn roles and were not academy trained. He explained that one of the previous employees was under 21 and legally unable to attend a police academy or carry a firearm, and that none had completed the background checks, psychological evaluations, or field training required for sworn law-enforcement officers. Rabano said that while they conducted traffic stops during that period, their actions ultimately strained community trust. “When those guys worked here last time… that just… created a firestorm,” he said. “Folks were just really upset and angry.”

MCSO Sheriff Matt Kendall confirmed that the Sheriff’s Office is actively investigating the incident. He said he has been in contact with a Sherwood Valley representative who indicated they had no prior knowledge of any attempt to formalize an agreement with Round Valley authorities.

“[Chief Rabano] has a tough enough job, and he doesn’t need to be having to apologize for the actions of another department,” Kendall said, adding that Rabano has worked hard to build trust in the community and partners closely with MCSO and CHP as issues arise on the remote tribal land.

The incident has raised potential legal issues, including questions about impersonating a peace officer, given reports of red and blue emergency lights, tactical gear, firearms, and conduct consistent with a law-enforcement pursuit despite the absence of recognized authority, certification, uniforms, or mutual aid agreements.

Officials involved said the incident caught local agencies and tribal leadership by surprise.

Redheaded Blackbelt contacted Austin Walrath for information about the Sherwood Valley program and the reported actions of his recruits. Walrath said he had no comment at this time. It remains unclear whether he was aware of or authorized the actions taken in Covelo.

As of publication, no charges have been announced. The investigation remains active and is being led by the Mendocino County Sheriff’s Office.

(Redheaded Blackbelt, Kymkemp.com)

LEW CHICHESTER (Covelo):

Thank you for the accurate and timely information about this confusing event. Who were these guys? The Sheriff has a regularly scheduled community meetings on the third Wednesday of the month (that’s today) at the Covelo Recreation Center, next to the rodeo grounds and near the airport, at noon. Perhaps a bit more information will be forthcoming.

UKIAH CHP’S NEW BOSS

Please join us in welcoming Captain Billy O’Connor as the new Area Commander for the CHP Ukiah Area Office!

His leadership and dedication to public safety will be a great asset to the Ukiah team and the communities we serve. We also would like to congratulate Lieutenant Gabriel Parker on his new command in Garberville and extend a sincere thank you for his leadership and friendship. We wish him continued success as he takes on this new role serving the northern Mendocino and southern Humboldt areas. Congratulations to both, and thank you for your continued commitment to public safety!

SUPERVISOR MADELINE CLINE:

Happy 2026! This year is off to a busy start. The Board of Supervisors held a planning workshop last week with the goal of strategizing and aligning priorities.

All five Supervisors presented three district priorities and three county-wide priorities. What do you think of the listed priorities?

District Priorities

District 1: Supervisor Cline
Long term water supply reliability and storage infrastructure
Improve road maintenance
Proactive emergency preparedness and response

District 2: Supervisor Mulheren
Completing a smooth and transparent annexation and service coordination process
Housing production tied to economic stability
Community wellness and public safety through prevention and care

District 3: Supervisor Haschak
Economic Development
Cuts to the Safety Net
Emergency Preparedness

District 4: Supervisor Norvell
Continued support of public health, developing a structurally sound budget
Support social services and behavioral health with improving outreach to those suffering from street level homelessness
Assessing the barriers between planning & building, and environmental health, creating an easier and less costly path for the public

District 5: Supervisor Williams
Roads (requires more money or a different approach)
Staff time for in-district maintenance/projects
Fair share of meetings in district (especially the coast) based on population/revenue

Mendocino County Priorities

District 1: Supervisor Cline
Improve government operations, fiscal strength, and transparency
Invest in economic development and empower local businesses through efficient permitting
Increase coordination of both enforcement and services for those experiencing homelessness

District 2: Supervisor Mulheren
Housing and economic development across the county
Strengthening the continuum of care for mental health, homelessness, and substance misuse
Sustainable infrastructure and public safety funding

District 3: Supervisor Haschak
Economic Development
Budget and Transparency
Cuts to the Safety Net

District 4: Supervisor Norvell
Continued support of public health, developing a structurally sound budget
Support social services and behavioral health with improving outreach to those suffering from street level homelessness
Assessing the barriers between planning & building, and environmental health. Creating an easier and less costly path for the public

District 5: Supervisor Williams
Fix the accounting software/system/architecture to end the excuses
Accurate, complete, transparent, and timely tax collection
Modernization of internal processes, tools (paperless)

Check out the recording of our workshop, including our state of the district reports and priorities discussion here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kIUoLHMfdd4

NORTH COUNTRY REAL ESTATE IS GROWING!

by Anne Fashauer

North Country Real Estate is excited to announce that David Starkey is joining the office.

David comes to us after spending the last ten plus years in wine industry sales here in the Anderson Valley. David also comes from a real estate family and brings that experience as well. We are very excited to have David join us!

Please check out David’s bio on our site; a fun fact is that David was once a client of North Country, purchasing his home with his bride a few years back. We think his experience with the home buying process with be a bonus to buyers and sellers alike.

The weather certainly has been beautiful this new year; we had some crazy storms over the holidays but since then we have had days in the 70’s and even two in the low 80’s. This is bringing more activity to the Valley including some folks who are looking at real estate. Unfortunately, the market locally remains quiet as compared to a year ago; we’re all hoping this Spring will see an increase in traffic. The roads around the area showed the results of the storms for several weeks but I am starting to see crews out cleaning things up. We lost a large oak across our driveway on Christmas Eve so we spent part of that day clearing that up. I heard from several folks about trees coming down in the high winds we had at that time. While we definitely need more rain, I hope we get it without all the crazy winds.

CHERISSA JOHNSON:

Calling All Gardeners

Anderson Valley Elementary School is having a seed fundraiser, and my son Cash is selling seeds to help support his school. If you’d be interested in purchasing through him, please reach out and I’ll get you the order info! I can accept Zelle, Venmo, or Apple Pay. Thank you so much for supporting Cash and our school (Facebook)

BOONT TRIBE COMMUNITY SCHOOL

Calling all contractors!!! Our school is looking into expanding and we are trying to write out a budget to start acquiring funding. We will purchase metal buildings, but will then need to frame in classrooms and other rooms. I have found a ballpark Northern California framing price range. I am wondering if anyone can get us a bit closer to a cost per square foot. There is nothing out of the ordinary framing, plumbing, electrical-wise. All standard. And we are looking at standard insulation and 2x6 framing. I found $11-$30 per square foot. Where is Anderson Valley on that scale? Thank you for your help! (facebook)

SAFEWAY VIEW: Room for rent in downtown Ukiah. $800 Monthly includes utilities and laundry and wifi. I am in downtown Ukiah, you can see Safeway from my front yard. I have a very friendly cat and cannabis smoking in the house is OK (no tobacco please), Very comfortable friendly environment. Central heating/ac in house and all utilities are included. I am willing to trade labor for rent at $20/HR to work on or clean the house. Wi-Fi is included, you would be the third person in the house. (Rick Schroeder, Facebook)

SHORT-TERM RENTALS, AGAIN

Mendocino County Planning will be presenting the results of stakeholder meetings and the online Short-Term Rentals survey to the Mendocino County Board of Supervisors on February 3, 2026. At that time, staff will be seeking direction from the Board for the development of a Short-Term Rental Ordinance.

You are encouraged to attend the February 3rd meeting either in person or via Zoom to provide comments. You may also provide written comments. The agenda and Staff Memorandum will be posted in the coming days.

Thank you for your continued interest.

Mark Cliser, Senior Planner, County of Mendocino, Department of Planning & Building Services

THE NOYO BIDA TRUTH PROJECT kicks off their Fourth Annual Essay Contest

February 1 with $3,000 in prizes. Deadline March 31, 2026, 5 p.m.

The Noyo Bida Truth Project, a 501(c)(3) educational nonprofit registered in the state of California is sponsoring their Fourth Annual Essay Contest and is opening it to every resident of Fort Bragg over the age of 18 years rather than to only high school students as in years past.

The intent of the contest is to get get local people thinking about and researching their City name and its history. Submissions will be graded on criteria of creativity, research, and genre skills and not on the specific argument they choose to pursue.

Each of the two distinct contest offers a $1,000 First Prize and $500 Second Prize. Folks may submit to either contest

First Contest: Yes, the name Noyo Bida (The Fishing Place in Northern Pomo) should be returned to the City of Fort Bragg

Second Contest: No, the name Noyo Bida (The Fishing Place in Northern Pomo) should not be returned to The City of Fort Bragg

Submissions for the contests will be received February 1 through 5 p.m. March 31. They will be judged in April and prizes awarded in May.

While The Noyo Bida Truth Project supports changing the name of Fort Bragg, a name which currently memorializes a genocidal fort and a Confederate General and slave master, they have enlisted three judges for the contests who are respected in their fields and who are unaffiliated with The Noyo Bida Truth Project.

This essay contest is solely a project ofThe Noyo Bida Truth Project and is not affiliated with any other entity.

Complete contest rules can be found at https://thenoyobidatruthproject.org/events and a list of some important research tools can be found at https://thenoyobidatruthproject.org/history

LOCAL EVENTS (this weekend)

AN AMERICAN IN PARIS Part 2

by Terry Sites

As a first time visitor with only a week in France deciding where to spend your precious Paris hours is a serious challenge. There is just so much to see. As my cousin was treating me to the trip, she did all the planning, ticket buying and worrying. As soon as I put a foot on our plane in Los Angeles I was basically stepping onto a magic carpet. All I had to do was show up and ride. Part of our time was spent with a tour group, but we did many activities on our own.

Arriving at the Eiffel Tower, the sheer size of it was a big surprise. Standing underneath its straddled legs looking up it was BIG. Mr. Eiffel really had a vision. He planned for elevators (which were relatively new in his time) because he knew people would want to go up, up, up. He also knew that not all of them would be game to climb the 647 steps that visitors are allowed to climb (although there are actually 1,665 in total). He installed a small apartment for himself at the top. We saw a photo of Thomas Edison sitting with him in the apartment, two amazing visionaries sitting together side by side. There is an elevator that runs all the way to the top. We saw a life-sized mannequin next to the elevator shaft and learned that in the early days an operator rode on the outside of the elevator driving it up and down using huge pistons (still in use today). That must have been a chilly ride as when we were there it was in the 30s. Paris is relatively flat and from the Tower you can see for miles. Like so much I saw in Paris it is an unforgettable view.

As a stained glass artist I knew that Sainte-Chapelle a small cathedral completed in 1248 (no typo 1248) was unsurpassed for the beauty of its windows. Happily it was on my cousin’s list. Standing inside was like being in a box filled with glowing jewels. This cathedral was completed 100 years before Notre Dame. It is unbelievable how little support surrounds the glass. Many years of stained glass artisans and stone masons perfecting their craft led to a technology that makes these windows as delicate a lace. It is impossible not to feel humbled by the level inspiration that drove human beings so many years ago to create such beauty.

Beauty is everywhere in Paris. We visited the Musee d’Orsay, a former train station transformed into a light filled museum. Wonderful statuary fills the central court. There were two pieces I really loved. One was the god Pan communing with a wild boar. The statue that really won my heart was a bust with two heads kissing. They melted into each other melding completely into one passionate embrace. There were smaller galleries on both sides of the central hall. These galleries are filled with priceless art in intimate sized rooms dedicated to specific artists.

I fell head over heels in love with the post-impressionist Toulouse Lautrec. He is famous for his bold posters of Parisian nightlife, but it was the pastels that knocked me out. Dashed off with great spontaneity, his subjects seemed to wink, strut and even sleep with such vitality. I would give a lot to be able to capture the spirit of people the way he did. How sad that he died at only 36 years old.

Everyone wants to see Versailles, the grand palace that was the home to many Louises — Louis XIII, Louis XIV, Louis XV and Louis XVI — and Marie Antoinette. The palace became a world heritage site in 1979 honored as a center of power, art and science. This includes the extensive formal gardens that surround the palace buildings. I did not like the feeling of Versailles. It seems to be an example of what happens when the wonderful facility the French have for design, ornamentation, and style is given unbridled rein. It is so ornate and excessive that it actually made my teeth hurt. Unlike more subtle examples of French taste, Versailles struck me as just awful with it’s layer upon later of “wedding cake” gold, tapestries, murals and carvings. If you’ve never been and are curious about the place watch Sophia Coppola’s movie “Marie Antoinette” which was filmed on site. Poor Marie, what a life!

Montmartre is described as hilly with the famous Sacre-Coeur Basilica at the top. Our Uber driver dropped us at the top right by the basilica and we walked down. The view from the top was lovely and we were there at the “golden hour.” Looking down at the people below so many were dressed in black and from a distance they looked like an impressionist painting from the Belle Époque.

I was looking for cobblestone streets but somehow we missed them. My cousin was in a hurry to get to the Moulin Rouge where we had tickets for that night’s performance. We passed a sad little carousel and found ourselves on a tourist street that reminded me of Fisherman’s Wharf in San Francisco. I think we missed the boat on Montmartre, as it really wasn’t charming as we walked.

Finding the theater we were too early and had to kill time. We found a small sidewalk café and rented space by ordering a string of a la carte items including Crème Brulee, frites (French fries), haricot verts (Green beans) and hot chocolate. We stayed outside for a while to watch the passersby. A young couple stepped under the awning together just next to us. They only had eyes for each other. I have to say the French do know how to make love. The longer they stayed kissing and staring deeply into each other’s eyes the more they began to look like the statue of lovers I had seen at the D'Orsay. I think of the French and France as being romantic and they really did not let me down.

(Next week: Part 3 and a final Paris story including: The Moulin Rouge, dinner in a French home, a food tasting walk, nighttime on the Seine River cruise, and a fabulous meal at Le Train Bleu.)

CATCH OF THE DAY, Wednesday, January 21, 2026

JOSE ANGUIANO-SAUCEDO, 27, Redwood Valley. More than an ounce of pot, cultivation of more than six marijuana plants, unspecified offense.

RANDAL DICKINSON, 34, Santa Rosa/Ukiah. DUI.

SCOTT MAINGI, 50, Ukiah. Controlled substance, unspecified offense.

JOHN MARKS JR., 57, Ukiah. Petty theft with two or more priors, offenses while on bail.

EVAN NELSON, 28, Ukiah. Disobeying court order.

ROGER ROTH, 54, Willits. Controlled substance with two or more priors, paraphernalia, false personation of another, failure to appear, probation revocation.

KORY WHIPPLE, 21, Ukiah. Reckless evasion, vandalism, probation revocation.

MARIN-SONOMA NARROWS PROJECT COSTS CLIMB AS WORK GOES ON

by Adrian Rodriguez

All lanes of a Highway 101 widening project between Marin and Sonoma have been open since late September, but construction isn’t over and costs are creeping up.

Since the final phase of the Marin-Sonoma Narrows project got underway in 2022, inclement weather and unplanned work have challenged the crews, according to the California Department of Transportation. The last phase, called the “MSN B7” project, installed carpool lanes on 3.5 miles between Novato and the Sonoma County line.

With construction cost overruns and change orders, the final phase is expected to increase about $2.5 million to nearly $108 million.

The most significant increase is because of cross-slope correction on the highway where the new pavement meets the asphalt that was installed in an earlier phase. The job will smooth out the drive by grinding the pavement to level the grade, which was misaligned because of unforeseen site conditions. The cost of the unexpected work is estimated at $1.3 million.

“Essentially, the new road is being blended with the existing road,” said Marin County Supervisor Eric Lucan, chair of the Transportation Authority of Marin board. The agency is a partner in the Caltrans project.

“Any cost increase is a cost increase, right?” Lucan said. “When you put this much money into a project, we really appreciate folks in the field doing these checks to make sure it’s going to stand up in the long run, making sure they’re getting these details right.”

Another factor for the increase is that as winter approached, crews pushed off the final paving for a section of the highway until the spring, officials said. Temporary lane striping was needed in the interim.

Traffic flows along Highway 101 north of Novato, Calif., on Monday, Dec. 22, 2025. (Alan Dep/Marin Independent Journal)

Other remaining tasks include electrical work for ramp metering and traffic monitoring infrastructure; drainage improvements; erosion control; the installation of a concrete barrier near San Antonio Road; and the installation of signs.

“Completing the remaining MSN B7 components is a high priority,” said Matt O’Donnell, a Caltrans representative.

“The ramp metering and traffic monitoring systems are expected to help alleviate the operational issues currently affecting the corridor,” O’Donnell said. “In addition, the final asphalt lift, permanent striping and signage are necessary to complete the pavement structural section, accommodate existing traffic volumes and ensure roadway safety.”

Daytime and nighttime closures will be required, officials said. Work is expected to wrap up this spring.

An executive committee of the Transportation Authority of Marin has recommended approving a contract amendment, authorizing an allocation of up to $2.5 million to Caltrans to support the project. The TAM board is expected to approve the amendment at its meeting on Thursday.

“This will probably not be the final amendment,” said Dan Cherrier, a project manager at the Transportation Authority of Marin.

Construction support costs for the project are $17.35 million. Cherrier said he expects that to increase.

“At this time, the project remains within the currently allocated $17.35 million,” O’Donnell said. “However, Caltrans will coordinate with project partners should an increase become necessary.”

In whole, the Marin-Sonoma Narrows widening project was estimated at about $762 million. The actual cost will be determined once agencies close out contracts, officials said.

The corridor gained the “Novato Narrows” nickname years ago because the road contracted to two lanes in each direction, creating daily traffic jams. The widening project added a third lane north and south on the 17-mile stretch between Novato and Petaluma. Now there is a contiguous stretch of carpool lanes for about 50 miles from the Richardson Bay Bridge in Marin to Windsor in Sonoma County.

Another change to the corridor is expected soon: reduced carpool lane hours.

Caltrans had imposed expanded carpool hours in September to coincide with the completion of the Marin-Sonoma Narrows project. However, drivers complained the expanded hours created chokepoints that never existed before.

The carpool hours were expanded to 5 to 10 a.m. and 3 to 7 p.m. on weekdays in both directions. The intent was to make restrictions consistent in both counties and to align with the hours on the state-owned bridges.

Previously, carpool hours in Marin were 6:30 to 8:30 a.m. southbound and 4:30 to 7 p.m. northbound. In Sonoma County, the hours were 7 to 9 a.m. and 3 to 6:30 p.m. in both directions.

Last month, Caltrans, under pressure to implement shorter carpool restrictions, said it came to an agreement with its partners in the two counties and the Metropolitan Transportation Commission to make the change.

The exact hours will be determined after a traffic analysis, due to be completed this month. Once finalized, the new hours for high-occupancy vehicles, or HOVs, could change in February, transportation officials said.

(marinij.com)

OAKLAND'S BEAUTIFUL CHILDREN - WORDS OF DR. KING

Honoring the birthday of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King

by David Bacon

Every year in Oakland parents and teachers organize a children's village as part of the celebration of the birthday of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., to help their children understand our history of struggle for equality and rights. Kids will be kids, though, and easily move from chalking sidewalks to sliding down the bannister into the amphitheater. One parent said to me, "They're who it's all really for, isn't it? I'm not just fighting against the deportations and the terror. It's for the better world we want for all of these kids."…

https://davidbaconrealitycheck.blogspot.com/2026/01/photos-from-edge-26-oaklands-beautiful.html

HOW ABOUT HYDROGEN?

Editor:

Six tons of hydrogen are being produced every day at the K2 Pure Solutions facility in Pittsburg. Hydrogen is a byproduct from making bleach-type chemicals. The hydrogen is currently vented to the air — unused, wasted. K2 plans to transition from venting hydrogen to distributing it to the Northern California market in 2026. The opportunity to have readily available hydrogen fuel for automobiles in Sonoma County is finally here.

There is only one hydrogen fueling station north of the Golden Gate, and it’s located in Mill Valley. There are none in Sonoma County. We need hydrogen fueling stations. Currently Toyota, Hyundai and Honda produce hydrogen-fueled automobiles, and BMW is slated for mass production for 2028.

Benefits of a hydrogen-fueled automobiles include zero tailpipe emissions, rapid refueling (three to five minutes), extended driving range (the 2026 Toyota Mirage is rated for 402 miles), cold weather resistance and hydrogen is twice as efficient than combustion engines.

The Board of Supervisors is required to provide administrative, expedited review for hydrogen fueling station permits to streamline their construction. Is Sonoma County going to take advantage of the available hydrogen and promote one of the most efficient and climate-friendly modes of transportation?

Norman Vachon

Windsor

CALIFORNIA COUNTIES MUST JUMP THROUGH NEW HOOPS TO GET HOMELESSNESS FUNDS

by Marisa Kendall & Ben Christopher

Gov. Gavin Newsom has threatened many times to withhold state homelessness funds from cities and counties that aren’t doing enough to get people off the streets.

This year, those threats seem more real than ever.

Gov. Gavin Newsom helps cleanup a homeless encampment along a freeway in San Diego, on Jan. 12, 2022. File Photo by Mike Blake, Reuters

Newsom’s administration and the Legislature are adding new strings to that money, which they hope will help address one of the state’s most obvious policy failures: Despite California’s large recent investments in homelessness, encampments are still rampant on city streets. But cities and counties already are chafing under the tightening requirements, which they worry will make it harder to access crucial state funds without directly improving conditions on the street.

To access state Homeless Housing, Assistance and Prevention money, cities and counties are being pressured to enact a policy regulating homeless encampments that passes state muster – a potential challenge in a state where local jurisdictions’ rules on encampments vary greatly, and many localities have no policy at all. The state also wants localities to get a “prohousing designation” – a special status awarded to places that go above and beyond to build housing. It’s a distinction that only 60 of California’s 541 cities and counties (home to just 15% of the state population) have achieved so far.

Newsom, the Legislature, local officials and other stakeholders likely will spend the next several months fighting about those terms, and hashing out the conditions for the $500 million in homelessness funding proposed in this year’s budget.

Until those details are resolved, exactly what standard cities and counties will be held to – and what will happen to those that don’t comply – is unclear. But one thing is clear: The state is done freely handing out cash.

Some counties are already feeling the heat. They report increased scrutiny as they apply for the homelessness funds already approved in the 2024-25 budget (which, thanks to lengthy bureaucratic delays, have just been made available.)

“They’re holding the counties’ feet to the fire,” said Megan Van Sant, senior program manager with the Mendocino County Department of Social Services.

Newsom’s administration and legislators in favor of the new accountability measures say cities and counties for too long have been scooping up state funds without proving that they’re using them wisely. The new message to locals is clear, said Assemblymember Sharon Quirk-Silva, a Democrat from La Palma in Orange County: “The state has been moving forward, not only with the investment in dollars, but also with legislation. Now it is your time to show that if you want these dollars…you have to show us what you’re doing.”

But the new requirements may make it more burdensome to access crucial homelessness funds.

“I worry that, one, we may leave more cities out,” said Carolyn Coleman, executive director and CEO of the League of California Cities, “and, two, that we may cause delays in the ability to get more people housed sooner, which I think is the goal.”

A Tougher Application Process

Applying for state homelessness funds “absolutely” feels different now than it did last year, and the state is asking tougher questions, said Robert Ratner, director of Santa Cruz County’s Housing for Health program.

Fortunately, the county just approved an encampment policy in September, and has started working on getting a pro-housing designation, he said. But the state still returned the county’s application with plenty of notes.

“It has felt, at times, like the goal post keeps moving a little bit,” Ratner said.

The county’s application still hasn’t been approved, but it seems to be getting close, Ratner said.

In Mendocino County, the state appears to be holding funds hostage until the county can explain its plans to pass an encampment ordinance, said Van Sant. The county board of supervisors is working on such an ordinance, though it hasn’t come up for a vote yet.

But the state’s requirement puts Van Sant and her team in an awkward position. As housing administrators, they have no say in any rules the county passes that regulate or prohibit encampments on local streets.

“I wanted to stay out of it,” Van Sant said. “I still want to stay out of it. We’re housing providers. We try to figure out how to provide people housing. We don’t want to weigh in on enforcement. At all.”

This year, the requirements may get even stricter. Under the current rules, the state seems to be satisfied as long as a city or county can show how it plans to get a prohousing designation or pass an encampment policy. In the next round of funding, local leaders worry the state will withhold funds unless cities and counties have actually achieved those benchmarks.

It’s All About Accountability

At issue is the state Homeless Housing, Assistance and Prevention program, which provides the main source of state money cities and counties use to fight homelessness.

Though Newsom introduced the first round of funding, $650 million, as a “one-time” infusion of cash for local governments in 2019, it became a recurring feature of his administration’s strategy to reduce homelessness over the next five years.

For four years in a row, the state awarded $1 billion a year to be divvied up between counties, big cities and federally-recognized regional homelessness funding groups known as Continuums of Care. Each round of funding was described as “one-time.” Even so, at least a quarter of the money has gone to day-to-day operating programs, according to data collected by the state.

Last year, things changed. The budget lacked any extra cash for grant funds, and the state’s main homelessness program received no new money. Instead, the Legislature committed to spend $500 million — a 50% reduction from the last round of funding — in the coming fiscal year contingent on “clear accountability requirements.”

Those requirements for localities, spelled out in a follow-up budget bill signed into law last fall, include:

Having a state-approved housing plan, known as a housing element
Having a “Prohousing Designation” from state housing regulators
Having local encampment policy “consistent with administration guidance”
Ponying up some local funding to match the state contribution
Demonstrating “progress” and “results” on housing and homelessness metrics

These new demands didn’t come out of left field. For several years now, “accountability” has been one of Newsom’s favorite words when discussing homelessness funding. “People have just had it,” he said in 2023. “We want to see these encampments cleaned up.” He has repeatedly threatened to withhold funds, and has gradually ramped up the strings attached to homelessness dollars.

But the current list represents an especially stringent set of requirements for locals hoping for a cut of what has been one of the state’s signature funding sources to combat homelessness.

Quirk-Silva noted that the current list of requirements is not final. She expects the administration to release additional legislative language in February. Legislators will fight over the details through the June budget deadline.

She expected particularly fierce pushback over any kind of “prohousing designation” requirement.

Revoking funds from areas of the state that lack such a designation would be “penalizing service providers for something that is outside of their control,” said Monica Davalos, a policy analyst with the California Budget and Policy Center, a left-leaning think tank.

San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan wishes the state would focus on more concrete measures of success, such as the number of people housed using state dollars, instead of things like a “prohousing” stamp.

“We’re making this way too complicated,” he said.

Some of the more than 11 tons of trash removed in Lakeport at a local homeless encampment in 2022

(Santa Rosa Press Democrat)

HOMELESSNESS CRISIS REMAINS ONE OF NEWSOM’S BIGGEST POLITICAL LIABILITIES

by Dan Walters

While delivering his final State of the State address and proposing his final state budget last week, Gov. Gavin Newsom clearly sought to neutralize an issue that has haunted his political career for more than two decades and could torpedo his hopes of becoming president: homelessness.

First, a bit of history.

Just months after being elected mayor of San Francisco in 2004, Newsom unveiled a plan he said would clear city streets of homeless people in 10 years. Fourteen years later, while running for governor, Newsom declared that homelessness in San Francisco had “never been worse.”

He said eradicating homelessness would be a high priority and promised to appoint a homeless “czar” who could cut through red tape and intergovernmental friction to get the job done. Later, when pressed by reporters over the czar pledge, he snapped, “You want to know who’s the homeless czar? I’m the homeless czar in the state of California.”

Despite that self-appointment and devoting almost all of his 2020 State of the State address to homelessness, the number of unhoused Californians continued to rise to record levels. As it did, Newsom began blaming local governments for not spending state homelessness grants effectively and threatened to withhold annual funding.

However, in 2024 State Auditor Grant Parks excoriated Newsom’s own California Interagency Council on Homelessness for failing to effectively monitor and coordinate homelessness programs — even though the state had spent more than $20 billion during Newsom’s governorship.

He later reorganized the council and last year it issued a glossy “Action Plan for Preventing and Ending Homelessness.” Newsom hailed it as “not just a report of our investments, but a directive for continued accountability and action towards specific quantifiable goals.”

It listed multiple things that should be done to alleviate the homelessness crisis, but never mentioned how its lofty goals should be achieved nor said anything about how the state’s deficit-ridden budget would pay for them.

In last week’s State of the State address, Newsom sang the political version of the World War II tune, “Ac-Cent-Tchu-Ate the Positive,” cataloguing his accomplishments during the last seven years, including progress toward eliminating homelessness.

Some mushroom bills backfired when their true impacts became known, embarrassing legislators who voted for them, and forcing them to backtrack. Having been burned, legislators indirectly refused to allow some issues to be handled through trailer bills, forcing Newsom to deal with them more or less in public.

Two years ago, for example, they balked at Newsom’s effort to include an overhaul of the California Environmental Quality Act in a trailer bill, leading to two years of negotiations that culminated last year in a CEQA reform measure.

Nevertheless, the trailer bill syndrome continues. The Capitol is waiting to see what Newsom has up his sleeve for the final budget of his governorship.

Even without the trailer-bill sideshow, forging a new budget will be difficult because Newsom has declared that the version he unveiled last week is basically a placeholder — an updated semi-clone of the current year’s budget — that must await more revenue data, particularly the all-important personal income tax returns due in April.

“When I began as governor, there was no homeless plan, no mental health plan and certainly no housing plan,” Newsom told legislators. “There was no accountability and little investment. The responsibility fell to cities and counties, with little interest from Sacramento.”

Newsom ticked off the efforts he had made and bragged that, “Early data, just compiled, shows that the number of unsheltered homeless people in California dropped 9 percent in 2025,” while “the nation saw an 18.1 percent overall increase in homelessness. Our investments are paying off.”

He could not, however, resist another jab at local officials, saying he is “providing counties what they’ve been asking for: the predictable funding for housing and substance abuse treatment. No more excuses — it’s time to bring people off the streets, out of encampments, into housing, into treatment. Counties need to do their job.”

Newsom projects that the state will gain an extra $42.3 billion in revenue over three years, but faces doubt, especially from the Legislature’s budget analyst, Gabe Petek. In an initial appraisal of Newsom’s budget Monday, he continues to warn that the state could take a serious revenue hit if the high-flying stock market stumbles.

“These risks are severe enough that not incorporating them into this year’s budget, as the governor proposes, would put the state on precarious footing,” Petek wrote. He also reminded the Legislature that even if Newsom’s rosy scenario comes to pass, the state sill still face hefty deficits, saying “the state’s negative fiscal situation is now chronic.”

With a dead-on-arrival draft budget, deep differences over revenues, chronic deficits and pressure on Newsom and legislators to offset the effects of major cuts in federal aid — not to mention looming trailer bill issues — it’s hard to even find a starting point.

(CalMatters.org)

49ERS GM FANS THE FLAMES ON ELECTRICAL SUBSTATION CONSPIRACY THEORY

The vast majority of experts have dismissed the theory in recent weeks

by Alex Simon

Despite multiple experts dismissing the conspiracy theory that the electrical substation next to the San Francisco 49ers practice facility is leading to more injuries, Niners general manager John Lynch said the team is spending time looking into the possibility.

Lynch and head coach Kyle Shanahan met with the media on Wednesday to wrap up the 2025 season and preview the offseason ahead. About 25 minutes into the nearly 40-minute news conference, Eric Branch of the San Francisco Chronicle asked a question about the topic that’s gone viral on social media in recent weeks. (The Chronicle and SFGATE are both owned by Hearst but have separate newsrooms.)

The theory is that low-frequency radiation from an electrical substation near Levi’s Stadium and the 49ers practice fields might have contributed to the team’s significant number of injuries. Experts in radiation told SFGATE last week there’s no proof to back up that theory, with one expert going so far as to say, “It’s just not possible.”

Several other outlets followed up SFGATE’s story with their own reporting on the matter later in the week, including the Chronicle, the Washington Post, Front Office Sports, Bay Area News Group and KRON-TV. The vast majority of experts quoted in these pieces dismiss the possibility. And even the conspiracy theory’s leading proponent told the Washington Post he has not seen any research specifically about how electromagnetic fields impact muscles or tendons but that he instead, as the Post wrote, “drew connections from other studies and his own observations as a clinician.”

The 49ers had not commented on the conspiracy theories up until Wednesday’s news conference, when Branch brought it up — drawing a smile and chuckle out of Lynch when he started his question. The reporter said, “I assume you guys think there’s nothing to that,” addressing Lynch and Shanahan, but highlighted how some players appear to think there’s something to the theory. Branch was referencing social media comments from ex-49ers and even the Post story that included anonymous agents saying players they represent had concerns about signing with the team. Branch finished the question by asking if the Niners leaders felt they needed to address the topic in the locker room.

When Lynch responded, though, he sure didn’t sound like a guy who think there’s nothing to it, as Branch initially assumed.

“Because it deals with, allegedly, the health and safety of our players, I think you have to look into everything,” Lynch said. “Our guys have been. We’ve been reaching out to anyone and everyone to see, ‘Does a study exist?’ Other than a guy sticking an apparatus underneath a fence and coming up with a number that I have no idea what that means, that’s what we know exists. We’ve heard that debunked. So yes, we will look into it. We have.

“The health and safety of our players is of the utmost priority. We pour into it. Our ownership, Jed [York], tremendous in terms of resources. We’ll always be cognizant of things. I know a lot of games have been won at this facility since it opened. But yeah, we aren’t going to turn a blind eye. We’ll look into everything.”

It’s a rather confounding answer from Lynch, one that has set social media ablaze again. Beyond the obvious jokes that come out of the situation, it’s also encouraging the people who truly believe in the theory. The exact same proponent has already chimed in, saying the 49ers haven’t talked to him yet and offering his services to the team. And it’s not like the 49ers can claim Lynch was blindsided by the topic, given the attention it received in recent weeks and the national coverage on the issue.

Lynch and the 49ers had a chance to put the conspiracy theory to bed on Wednesday. Instead, Lynch’s answer is going to fan the conspiracy flames — and make this a topic that the team will have to keep answering questions about.

“THERE WAS NEVER A DAY when I was as good as Joe DiMaggio at his best. Joe was the best, the very best I ever saw. Joe DiMaggio was the greatest all-around player I ever saw. His career can not be summed up in numbers and awards. It might sound corny, but he had a profound and lasting impact on the country.”

— Ted Williams

ONCE THEY FED THE WORLD, NOW AMERICAN FARMERS ARE ON THE BRINK, WITH DECLINING FEDERAL AID

by Peter Simons

President Donald Trump appears to have upended an 85-year relationship between American farmers and the United States’ global exercise of power. But that link has been fraying since the end of the Cold War, and Trump’s moves are just another big step.

During World War II, the U.S. government tied agriculture to foreign policy by using taxpayer dollars to buy food from American farmers and send it to hungry allies abroad. This agricultural diplomacy continued into the Cold War through programs such as the Marshall Plan to rebuild European agriculture, Food for Peace to send surplus U.S. food to hungry allies, and the U.S. Agency for International Development, which aimed to make food aid and agricultural development permanent components of U.S. foreign policy.

During that period, the United States also participated in multinational partnerships to set global production goals and trade guidelines to promote the international movement of food – including the U.N.’s Food and Agriculture Organization, the International Wheat Agreement and the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade.

When U.S. farmers faced labor shortfalls, the federal government created guest-worker programs that provided critical hands in the fields, most often from Mexico and the Caribbean.

At the end of World War II, the U.S. government recognized that farmers could not just rely on domestic agricultural subsidies, including production limits, price supports and crop insurance, for prosperity. American farmers’ well-being instead depended on the rest of the world.

Since returning to office in January 2025, Trump has dismantled the U.S. Agency for International Development. His administration has also aggressively detained and deported suspected noncitizens living and working in the U.S., including farmworkers. And he has imposed tariffs that caused U.S. trading partners to retaliate, slashing international demand for U.S. agricultural products.

Trump’s actions follow diplomatic and agricultural transformations that I research, and which began with the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991.

Feed The World, Save The Farm

Even before the nation’s founding, farmers in what would become the United States staked their livelihood on international networks of labor, plants and animals, and trade.

Cotton was the most prominent early example of these relationships, and by the 19th century wheat farmers depended on expanding transportation networks to move their goods within the country and overseas.

But fears that international trade could create economic uncertainty limited American farmers’ interest in overseas markets. The Great Depression in the 1930s reinforced skepticism of international markets, which many farmers and policymakers saw as the principal cause of the economic downturn.

World War II forced them to change their view. The Lend-Lease Act, passed in March 1941, aimed to keep the United States out of the war by providing supplies, weapons and equipment to Britain and its allies. Importantly for farmers, the act created a surge in demand for food.

And after Congress declared war in December 1941, the need to feed U.S. and allied troops abroad pushed demand for farm products ever higher. Food took on a significance beyond satisfying a wartime need: The Soviet Union, for example, made special requests for butter. U.S. soldiers wrote about the special bond created by seeing milk and eggs from a hometown dairy, and Europeans who received food under the Lend-Lease Act embraced large cans of condensed milk with sky-blue labels as if they were talismans.

Another War Ends

But despite their critical contribution to the war, American farmers worried that the familiar pattern of postwar recession would repeat once Germany and Japan had surrendered.

Congress fulfilled farmers’ fears of an economic collapse by sharply reducing its food purchases as soon as the war ended in the summer of 1945. In 1946, Congress responded weakly to mounting overseas food needs.

More action waited until 1948, when Congress recognized communism’s growing appeal in Europe amid an underfunded postwar reconstruction effort. The Marshall Plan’s more robust promise of food and other resources was intended to counter Soviet influence.

Sending American food overseas through postwar rehabilitation and development programs caused farm revenue to surge. It proved that foreign markets could create prosperity for American farmers, while food and agriculture’s importance to postwar reconstruction in Europe and Asia cemented their importance in U.S. foreign policy.

Farmers in the Modern World

Farmers’ contribution to the Cold War shored up their cultural and political importance in a rapidly industrializing and urbanizing United States. The Midwestern farm became an aspirational symbol used by the State Department to encourage European refugees to emigrate to the U.S. after World War II.

American farmers volunteered to be amateur diplomats, sharing methods and technologies with their agricultural counterparts around the world.

By the 1950s, delegations of Soviet officials were traveling to the Midwest, including Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev’s excursion to Iowa in 1959. U.S. farmers reciprocated with tours of the Soviet Union. Young Americans who had grown up on farms moved abroad to live with host families, working their properties and informally sharing U.S. agricultural methods. Certain that their land and techniques were superior to those of their overseas peers, U.S. farmers felt obligated to share their wisdom with the rest of the world.

The collapse of the Soviet Union undermined the central purpose for the United States’ agricultural diplomacy. But a growing global appetite for meat in the 1990s helped make up some of the difference.

U.S. farmers shifted crops from wheat to corn and soybeans to feed growing numbers of livestock around the world. They used newly available genetically engineered seeds that promised unprecedented yields.

Expecting these transformations to financially benefit American farmers and seeing little need to preserve Cold War-era international cooperation, the U.S. government changed its trade policy from collaborating on global trade to making it more of a competition.

The George H.W. Bush and Clinton administrations crafted the North American Free Trade Agreement and the World Trade Organization to replace the general agreement on trade and tariffs. They assumed American farmers’ past preeminence would continue to increase farm revenues even as global economic forces shifted.

But U.S. farmers have faced higher costs for seeds and fertilizer, as well as new international competitors such as Brazil. With a diminished competitive advantage and the loss of the Cold War’s cooperative infrastructure, U.S. farmers now face a more volatile global market that will likely require greater government support through subsidies rather than offering prosperity through commerce.

That includes the Trump administration’s December 2025 announcement of a US$12 billion farmer bailout. As Trump’s trade wars continue, they show that the U.S. government is no longer fostering a global agricultural market in which U.S. farmers enjoy a trade advantage or government protection – even if they retain some cultural and political significance in the 21st century.

(This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.)

DAVID FOSTER WALLACE: Look man, we’d probably most of us agree that these are dark times, and stupid ones, but do we need fiction that does nothing but dramatize how dark and stupid everything is? In dark times, the definition of good art would seem to be art that locates and applies CPR to those elements of what’s human and magical that still live and glow despite the times’ darkness. Really good fiction could have as dark a worldview as it wished, but it’d find a way both to depict this world and to illuminate the possibilities for being alive and human in it.

BLUESKY BRAIN, X BRAIN: Two Viral Stories From Minnesota

The social media divide means audiences are no longer obsessing about the same video outrages. Episode 1: the arrest of ChongLy Thao versus the Cities Church

The Fine Print

In 2019, then-Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey backed an independent innovation called Bluesky. The idea: instead of relying on one central hub like Twitter, social media posts would function like e-mail, with an infinite number of carriers whose users could communicate no matter what system they used.

In the half decade since, Bluesky fully spun off, Elon Musk acquired and renamed Twitter, and the platforms became partisan mirror sites, leaving America’s social media brain in schism. Audiences on X/Twitter and Bluesky now frequently pour attention into viral stories without knowing about mirroring tales gobbling eyeballs on the other platform, even if the topics are related. We might not have had a more glaring example of this than in the last days.

Since Sunday, Twitter/X generated 3.4 million posts about ICE protesters bursting into the Cities Church in St. Paul, Minnesota. Meanwhile, a story about a 57 year-old Hmong-American named ChongLy Thao who was led by ICE agents onto a snowy street in boxers and Crocs generated about 2,600 posts in the same time period. On the smaller Bluesky platform the situation reversed: the #Hmong story generated enormous heat, while traffic about the Cities Church affair was minimal, only what was there was nearly all negative.

Dorsey was a prominent early presence in Bluesky, but two summers ago left the company board to focus on Nostr, a fully decentralized platform. When asked what (if anything) could be done to incentivize social media users to look outside their editorial comfort zone, he wasn’t optimistic. “I believe it has to be intrinsic to the individual, and generally it’s not,” he said. “This isn’t unique to social media, it’s been all media as long as it’s existed. People chose their filter bubble and rarely pop out.”

Both of the viral St. Paul stories centered on video from Sunday morning. Both inspired heavy commercial news coverage. As an insight into who sees what and how gulfs in perception form about politics, it’s instructive. Details from different visions of America on opposite platforms:

Bluesky: ICE “KIDNAPS” ELDERLY “HALF-NAKED” HMONG MAN

STORY IN CAPSULE: A Laos-born naturalized Hmong-American named ChongLy (Scott) Thao was taken from his home in St. Paul by “10-15” ICE agents Sunday morning, and led outside in a blanket and underwear in 14-degree temperatures. He was returned later in a story covered by NBC, ABC, CBS, Reuters, USA Today, AP, BBC, the Chicago Tribune, and others. Video:

MAINSTREAM NEWS SAID: ICE officers “broke down [Thao’s] door with guns drawn” (NBC), searched and detained him “without a warrant” and then took him outside in “subfreezing conditions” (AP), claiming he “fit the description” of wanted sex offenders (Pioneer Press). They wrapped him in a “blanket belonging to his 5-year-old grandson” (ABC) and drove him around for an hour before returning him without “explanation or apology” (NBC).

BLUESKY USERS HEARD: “These fucking animals” at ICE “kidnapped an elderly Hmong man” using the “racist claim that he fit the description,” part of a “sub-ethnic cleansing” campaign in which ICE is “wantonly abusing minorities” and “turning cruelty into policy” by “randomly” targeting Hmong.

WHAT COULD AN ICE SUPPORTER LEARN FROM THIS STORY? ICE Agents knocked a door down and made an arrest without a warrant — not allowed — and reportedly denied American Thao time to look for ID or get dressed despite the cold. After the error, the DHS published wanted posters for two convicted sex offenders from Laos said to be the real targets, but compounded optics problems by saying, “The US citizen lives with these two convicted sex offenders,” which may not be true. Neither offender looked much like Thao, either. DHS Deputy Secretary Trisha McGlaughlin’s comments were defiant — why not apologize to an American? — and the incident is being covered in publications and Facebook groups for Asian-Americans, who voted for Trump in large numbers in 2024, moving 5 points from 2020. The story could have significant political ramifications.

STORY IN CAPSULE: Anti-ICE demonstrators entered the Cities Church in St. Paul Sunday and amid chants of “ICE Out!” accused worshippers of being “fake Christians” and “comfortable white people” who aren’t “standing with your Somali and Latino communities.” The pretext involved pastor David Easterwood’s status as acting director of the ICE Field Office in St. Paul. Trump Department of Justice Civil Rights chief Harmeet Dhillon signaled an intent to investigate under the FACE Act, passed to protect access to abortion clinics but also observance at “a place of religious worship.” Heavily covered by Fox News, the New York Post, and CBN, the Washington Post and New York Times also weighed in with creative perspectives.

MAINSTREAM NEWS SAYS: The “frequently fired” (New York Post) Don Lemon, who gave a pre-event standup explaining he was only with “so many white people” who might seem “MAGA-coded” with “the American flag or whatever” because “white allies” were needed to pull off “the operation we’re doing today.” After activists led by civil rights lawyer Nekima Levy Armstrong entered, Lemon told pastor Jonathan Parnell the operation was covered by the First Amendment, which Gregg Jarrett (FOX) had to remind “does not extend to private property and certainly not to churches.” Lemon added, “It is traumatic for the people, and that's what protesting is about.” When put “on notice” by Dhillon about the FACE Act probe, Lemon (per National Review) pivoted and said he had “no affiliation” with protesters, but told podcaster Jennifer Welch the churchgoers deserved the intrusion because they are “entitled white supremacists,” adding that he was targeted for being gay and black.

X USERS HEARD: Lemon, who “says the American flag is ‘MAGA-coded,’” should “go to prison for this.” Meanwhile, “Inside Politics on CNN played exactly one second of the audio from the church protest,” which is “just shameless,” and by the way, “terrorizing church attendees is not a ‘protest,’ legacy media.” Minnesota AG Keith Ellison declared the protests are protected, saying “none of us are immune to the voice of the public,” to which one user replied, “You heard him. We can now protest in Somali mosques for stealing our money.”

WHAT COULD AN ICE PROTESTER LEARN FROM READING THIS STORY? Some posters wondered about targeting a church in the city where “less than 6 months ago, kids at a Catholic school were shot during a chapel service,” with religious media denouncing the “disordered assertion that your politics matter more than their devotion to God” (Christianity Today). Outside X, though, the Cities Church action was positively covered. The New York Times noted that at a Black Lives Matter event at Saint Paul College, “cheers went up when the incident at Cities Church was mentioned,” and quoted a protester who came from Cleveland to join, saying participation “felt meaningful… particularly given the celebrations of Dr. King’s life.” Meanwhile the Washington Post quoted spiritual leaders who denounced Easterwood while also speaking to a former ACLU legal director, who declared the FACE Act should not apply, provided Cities Church members were not “barred from taking Communion or some other religious activity.” The ACLU has been silent on whether or not the Cities Church action constitutes protected First Amendment speech.

MISCELLANY: Nicky Minaj, ripped on Bluesky for “straight raccooning,” had a real feud with Lemon over this incident. She did not however make a widely circulated parody diss track, which featured lines like “You ain’t Peter, you ain’t Paul/Those are just the guys you cracked at the mall.” That was @Not_Firestine, and Louder With Crowder:

The January 18th stories have already been followed by tough talk from officials, with the Trump administration sending out subpoenas to Governor Tim Walz (one of very few politicians to say he didn’t support the church action), Ellison, and Mayor Jacob Frey, who on Sunday described Minneapolis events by saying “This is not just about resistance here in Minneapolis. It’s about love.”

With separate platforms audiences don’t even accidentally engage with stories from the “other side.” Is it fixable? Even if we had a fully decentralized system like Nostr, says Dorsey, that wouldn’t “change people’s desire to challenge their ideas and opinions.” This, he says, “is a societal norms thing.” Only, the norms aren’t normal. We’ll be looking for ways to quantify this siloing effect in the future. What crazy times!

(Racket News)

ON-LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY

ICE should apologize to the wrongly identified man. None of us know why the man was not allowed to put clothes on. Maybe he didn't want to, who knows? Regardless, ICE should just be honest and say they made a mistake and apologize. I notice the family has a GoFundMe. And, barging into churches to pass your moral judgment while children are actively hiding their faces and crying and then Following Them To Their Cars is beyond reprehensible and it says a lot about Minnesota that they have not been arrested or charged with state crimes. It bothers me that we have no control over what we see. Because no one wants to tell the whole truth from every angle, no one knows anything. The professional journalists are gone.

PHENOMENAL WOMAN

Pretty women wonder where my secret lies.
I’m not cute or built to suit a fashion model’s size
But when I start to tell them,
They think I’m telling lies.
I say,
It’s in the reach of my arms,
The span of my hips,
The stride of my step,
The curl of my lips.
I’m a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.

I walk into a room
Just as cool as you please,
And to a man,
The fellows stand or
Fall down on their knees.
Then they swarm around me,
A hive of honey bees.
I say,
It’s the fire in my eyes,
And the flash of my teeth,
The swing in my waist,
And the joy in my feet.
I’m a woman
Phenomenally.

Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.

Men themselves have wondered
What they see in me.
They try so much
But they can’t touch
My inner mystery.
When I try to show them,
They say they still can’t see.
I say,
It’s in the arch of my back,
The sun of my smile,
The ride of my breasts,
The grace of my style.
I’m a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.

Now you understand
Just why my head’s not bowed.
I don’t shout or jump about
Or have to talk real loud.
When you see me passing,
It ought to make you proud.
I say,
It’s in the click of my heels,
The bend of my hair,
the palm of my hand,
The need for my care.
’Cause I’m a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.

— Maya Angelou (1978)

DEATH OF VLADIMIR LENIN (21 January 1924)

Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov; alias Lenin (22 April 1870 – 21 January 1924), addressing Vsevobuch troops (general military training) during a parade in May 1919. The event took place in Sverdlov Square (now Theatre Square) in Moscow, not Red Square as is sometimes mistakenly reported.

102 years ago today. Lenin's ideology was built upon the philosophy of Karl Marx. Lenin remains a controversial and highly divisive historical figure. Admirers view him as a champion of working people's rights and welfare, while critics see him as a brutal dictator who carried out mass human rights abuses.

Bertrand Russell concerning his 1920 meeting with Vladimir Lenin:

“I met Lenin in 1920 when I was in Russia, I had an hours talk tête-à-tête with him. And, he spoke English much better than you would have expected, the whole conversation was in English. I expected it to have been in German, but I found that his English was quite good. I was less impressed by Lenin than I expected to be. He was of course a great man. He seemed to me a reincarnation of Oliver Cromwell, with exactly the same limitations that Cromwell had. Absolute orthodoxy, he thought a proposition could be proved by quoting a text in Marx, and he was quite incapable of supposing that there could be anything in Marx that wasn’t right, and that struck me as rather limited.

I disliked one other thing about him which was his great readiness to stir up hatred. I put certain questions to him to see what his answer would be, and one of them was “You profess to be establishing socialism, but as far as the countryside is concerned you seem to me to be establishing peasant proprietorship which is a very different thing from agricultural socialism.”

And he said, “Oh dear me no, we’re not establishing peasant proprietorship”, he said “You see there are poor peasants and rich peasants, and we stirred up the poor peasants against the rich peasants, and they soon hanged them to the nearest tree, ah hah hah HAH HAH.” I didn’t much like that.”

— Bertrand Russell, Speaking Personally: Bertrand Russell Interview with John Chandos (12 April 1961)

Russell concludes:

“Lenin and his early colleagues were actuated by a wish to benefit mankind, but from errors in psychology and political theory they created a Hell instead of a Heaven.”

— Bertrand Russell, Portraits from Memory and Other Essays (1950), Essay. VI: From Logic to Politics, p. 35

“There can be no real and effective ‘freedom’ in a society based on the power of money, in a society in which the masses of working people live in poverty and the handful of rich live like parasites.”

— Vladimir Lenin, Party Organization (1909)

"SOME BOOKS are undeservedly forgotten, none are undeservedly remembered."

— W. H. Auden

“THE SUM OF HUMAN WISDOM is not contained in any one language, and no single language is capable of expressing all forms and degrees of human comprehension.”

– Ezra Pound

LEAD STORIES, THURSDAY'S NYT

Trump Says He Has Framework for Greenland Deal as NATO Mulls Idea of U.S. Sovereignty Over Bases

Trump’s ‘Board of Peace’ Would Have Global Scope but One Man in Charge

Few Voters Say Trump’s Second Term Has Made the Country Better, Poll Finds

Trump Administration Starts Immigration Operation in Maine

House Panel Votes to Hold Clintons in Contempt in Epstein Inquiry

Iran’s Protests Have Been Completely Squashed, Government Says

Job Applicants Sue to Open ‘Black Box’ of A.I. Hiring Decisions

A READER WONDERS: How big is Greenland? It’s so big it covers up 99% of the Epstein files.

(illustration by Yann Kebbi for *High Country News*)

ZIONIST BILLIONAIRES OPENLY ACKNOWLEDGE MANIPULATING THE US GOVERNMENT

by Caitlin Johnstone

Speaking together at the Israeli-American Council Summit on Saturday, billionaire Zionist megadonors Miriam Adelson and Haim Saban strongly implied that they are engaged in some extremely shady activities to manipulate the US government in advancement of Israeli interests.

There’s a guy I follow on Twitter named Chris Menahan who’s always posting clips from Zionist events which might otherwise go unnoticed, frequently turning up jarring admissions from pro-Israel operatives who tend to loosen their lips a bit when addressing an audience of like-minded individuals. I recently cited a clip he spotted featuring former Obama speechwriter Sarah Hurwitz decrying the way social media has allowed the public to view evidence of Israeli atrocities in Gaza.

Menahan has spotlighted some very revealing moments from Adelson and Saban, both of whom are dual US-Israeli citizens, and both of whom have provided funding to the Israeli-American Council (IAC). In 2014, The Nation’s MJ Rosenberg wrote that Saban and Miriam Adelson’s late husband Sheldon were using influence operations like the IAC to become “the Koch brothers on Israel.”

Here’s a transcript of a very revealing interaction between Adelson and event host Shawn Evenhaim:

Evenhaim: Miri, you and Sheldon created a lot of relationships over the years with politicians, at the state level, and especially at the federal level. I want you to share with everyone why is it so important and how you do it, and again, writing cheques is a part of it, but there is more than writing just cheques so, how do you do it? Adelson: Shawn, can you allow me not to answer? Evenhaim (shrugs): You choose! Adelson: I want to be truthful and there are so many things that I don’t want to talk about. Evenhaim: Yeah, I mean we don’t want specifics but that’s okay.

Miriam Adelson is here admitting that in addition to the hundreds of millions of dollars that she and Sheldon are known to have poured into the political campaigns of Donald Trump and other Republican politicians, they have also been manipulating US politics behind the scenes in ways that she would prefer to keep secret from the public. Presumably because it would cause a significant scandal if the public ever found out.

Trump, for the record, has repeatedly admitted that he provided political favors to Israel at the urging of the Adelsons during his first term, saying he moved the US embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and legitimized the Israeli annexation of the Golan Heights in order to please them.

And please them he did. He must have, because Miriam Adelson donated another $100 million to Trump’s 2024 campaign to help him become president again. And now he’s spent the first year of his administration bombing Iran and Yemen, working to take control of Gaza, and aggressively stomping out criticism of Israel in the United States.

Back in 2020, before all these blatant admissions, musician Roger Waters was smeared as an antisemite by the Anti-Defamation League and other Zionist groups for saying that Sheldon Adelson was using his wealth to exert influence over US politics.

Saban was even more guarded about his political operations than Adelson in his response to the same question from Evenhaim:

“I want to be cautious how I’m saying… (Pause) It’s a system that we did not create. It’s a system that’s in place. It’s a legal system and we just play within the system. And that’s it! I mean it’s really quite simple. If you support a politician, you, under normal circumstances, should have access to be able to share opinions and try to help them see your point of view. That’s what access grants you, and the contribution and the financial support grants you the access, sooooo… I mean…. (shrugs) those that give more have more access and those that give less have less access. It’s a simple math. Trust me.”

Haim Saban, whose campaign donations focus on the other side of the aisle with Democratic Party funding, has famously said “I’m a one-issue guy, and my issue is Israel.” In 2022 AIPAC’s superpac cited Saban’s financial clout to argue that deviating from support for Israel would cost the Democrats critical funding, saying “Our activist donors, who include one of the largest donors to the Democratic Party, are focused on ensuring that we have a U.S. Congress that, like President Biden, supports a vibrant and robust relationship with our democratic ally, Israel.”

As with Adelson, we can surmise that Saban said he wanted to be “cautious” how he described his influence operations because it would cause a major scandal if the American people understood what he’s been up to.

Some people will look at these clips and claim it’s antisemitic to even share them. Others will look at them and cite them as evidence that the world is ruled by Jews. For me they’re just evidence that the world is ruled by wealthy sociopaths, and that western democracy is an illusion.

I mean, you really couldn’t ask for a better illustration of the sham of American democracy than this. Two billionaires from supposedly opposite political parties publicly admitting that they use their obscene wealth to manipulate US politics to advance the military and geopolitical agendas of a foreign state on the other side of the planet.

And as Saban said, it’s all legal. Corruption is legal in the United States of America. Plutocrats are allowed to leverage their fortunes to manipulate the US government using campaign funding and lobbying for the advancement of their personal, financial, and ideological agendas. If you have a few million dollars to spare you can use them to make criminal charges go away, to roll back environmental regulations or worker protections which hurt the profit margins of your business, or even to get military explosives shipped to a foreign government for use in an ongoing genocide.

And it’s all being done with complete disregard for the will of the electorate. The American people have no control over what their government does under the current political system. They vote for one oligarchic puppet, then they vote for the oligarchic puppet in the other party when that doesn’t work out, going back and forth without realizing that at no point are they changing the actual power structure under which they live.

That power structure is called plutocracy. That’s the only real political system the United States has.

(caitlinjohnstone.com.au)

DENMARK OFFERS TRUMP OWNERSHIP OF ROOM IN ASSISTED LIVING FACILITY IN GREENLAND

by Andy Borowitz

DAVOS (The Borowitz Report)—In a much-praised resolution to a roiling diplomatic crisis, on Wednesday Denmark offered Donald J. Trump “full ownership” of a room in an assisted living facility in Greenland.

The deal was orchestrated by French President Emmanuel Macron and Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, who were seen high-fiving moments after Trump signed the admission form.

Speaking to reporters, Carney said that Trump’s new home was actually located in Iceland, not Greenland, but added, “We’re pretty sure he doesn’t know the difference.”

For his part, President Macron acknowledged that the agreement represented a compromise, noting, “Our first choice was an ice floe.”

(borowitzreport.com)

DECOLONIZING THE WORLD (w/ Amin Husain)

Palestine, Professor Amin Husain says, is the blueprint for a future that embraces traditional colonialism carried out through violence and erasure.

by Chris Hedges

Palestinian professor and activist Amin Husain knows what Western settler colonialism looks, sounds and feels like. Growing up in Palestine, Husain experienced the iron grip of Israeli force and came to understand how important it was to struggle against such a powerful imperial entity, even in the face of defeat.

In the United States, Husain applied his learned experience to organize and educate about how colonialism and imperialism not only exists in the modern world, but is intertwined in the economy and culture of the global capitalist world order. Husain joins host Chris Hedges to chronicle his story and his approach to fighting settler colonialism, which, after October 7th, led to his firing from New York University.

“A lot of people exceptionalize Palestine, but what Palestine does is clarify what is happening in the world. It’s one type of future,” Husain explains.

Some of Husain’s activism work involved organizing alternative tours in museums such as the American Museum of Natural History in New York, where the very layout and structure of the museum was challenged in a way that brought material change.

“You go into a museum and you think that that’s neutral but this is how the nation state narrative gets perpetuated from a very young age so that you think it’s normal. There’s nothing normal about a 36-foot monument that’s about imperialism and white supremacy,” Husain says of the infamous Teddy Roosevelt statue depicting the president riding on horseback accompanied by a colonized Native American and African, each wielding guns.

Husain’s work, which has been censored by the military-contracting Big Tech companies, demonstrates a model of resilience and education that can challenge power and cultivate community.…

https://chrishedges.substack.com/p/decolonizing-the-world-w-amin-husain

AS I WALKED OUT ONE EVENING

As I walked out one evening,
Walking down Bristol Street,
The crowds upon the pavement
Were fields of harvest wheat.

And down by the brimming river
I heard a lover sing
Under an arch of the railway:
‘Love has no ending.

‘I’ll love you, dear, I’ll love you
Till China and Africa meet,
And the river jumps over the mountain
And the salmon sing in the street,

‘I’ll love you till the ocean
Is folded and hung up to dry
And the seven stars go squawking
Like geese about the sky.

‘The years shall run like rabbits,
For in my arms I hold
The Flower of the Ages,
And the first love of the world.’

But all the clocks in the city
Began to whirr and chime:
‘O let not Time deceive you,
You cannot conquer Time.

‘In the burrows of the Nightmare
Where Justice naked is,
Time watches from the shadow
And coughs when you would kiss.

‘In headaches and in worry
Vaguely life leaks away,
And Time will have his fancy
To-morrow or to-day.

‘Into many a green valley
Drifts the appalling snow;
Time breaks the threaded dances
And the diver’s brilliant bow.

‘O plunge your hands in water,
Plunge them in up to the wrist;
Stare, stare in the basin
And wonder what you’ve missed.

‘The glacier knocks in the cupboard,
The desert sighs in the bed,
And the crack in the tea-cup opens
A lane to the land of the dead.

‘Where the beggars raffle the banknotes
And the Giant is enchanting to Jack,
And the Lily-white Boy is a Roarer,
And Jill goes down on her back.

‘O look, look in the mirror,
O look in your distress:
Life remains a blessing
Although you cannot bless.

‘O stand, stand at the window
As the tears scald and start;
You shall love your crooked neighbour
With your crooked heart.’

It was late, late in the evening,
The lovers they were gone;
The clocks had ceased their chiming,
And the deep river ran on.

— W. H. Auden (1937)

9 Comments

Me January 22, 2026

What’s wrong with the Gov Newsome cleanup pic? Notice everyone else doing the cleanup is in proper PPE outfits. Which guy isn’t? The one posing for the camera. He’s not there to clean up or help. His outfit proves it.

Chuck Dunbar January 22, 2026

‘O stand, stand at the window
As the tears scald and start;
You shall love your crooked neighbour
With your crooked heart.’

That’s one stanza that grabs me from Auden’s poem, “As I Walked Out One Evening.” I came across this well known poem for the first time last summer, was struck by its grim truth and beauty. It fits well with the times, and my own growing disenchantment with how the world really works. Read it out loud to myself this morning, smiling at its craft–thanks to the AVA.

- Fred Gardner January 22, 2026
  
  As I strolled out one evening
  To visit with Susan B.
  I came unto her sister
  The fair Elizabeth C.
  She said Why is it you never dare
  To ask me for a game?
  I confessed I’m afraid of losin’ Susan
  And she said But we’re one and the same
  
  I heard that she’d beaten masters
  And I’d been beaten by fools
  I offered a sacrifice castle anyway
  And your interpretation of the rules
  And so we set up our pieces
  They were neither black nor white
  On squares the varying shades of red
  Distinct as morning and light, heavy and right
  
  I tried my old king’s gambit again
  I should have known it was wrong
  The king may wield the power but nowadays
  The queen’s the piece that’s strong
  She looked at me forgivingly
  And said, You can take back your moves
  Who wins this one doesn’t matter as much
  As which of us improves (Oh, God)
  
  There’s war reports in the sports section
  And comics now tell you who’s engaged
  They’ve got movie reviews passing for news
  And chess problems on the women’s page
  And those who suppose that life is a game
  Will never get the moral of this or any song
  Anyway morals are but the rules of life
  Changing as we play along
  
  For as I walked out one evening of late
  To visit with Elizabeth C.
  I came unto her sister, Sue,
  The one and only Susan B
  She said Why is it you don’t come calling
  On me, man, do you feel ashamed?
  I confessed it just got too confusin’, Susan,
  And she said You’re not entirely to blame.
  
  - Chuck Dunbar January 22, 2026
    
    Oh my, that’s a good one, Fred.
    
Kimberlin January 22, 2026

“ON-LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY”….

None of us know why they were barging into churches to pass moral judgment while children are actively hiding their faces and crying Maybe the children wanted to cry, who knows.

- Harvey Reading January 22, 2026
  
  None of us knows why ICE thugs get away with cold-blooded murder.
  
Harvey Reading January 22, 2026

ZIONIST BILLIONAIRES OPENLY ACKNOWLEDGE MANIPULATING THE US GOVERNMENT

Life in freedomlandia…just a place where wealth is worshiped by commoner and elected official alike.

Kirk Vodopals January 22, 2026

I find it ridiculous how ICE agents consistently hide their faces when they were probably the same dudes who made fun of all the “sheeple” wearing Covid masks.
I’m thankful I don’t live in urban Minneapolis

Norm Thurston January 22, 2026

Good reporting by Lisa Music regarding the tribal police activity. I had seen a couple of Facebook posts yesterday by people who were wondering what was happening, and I was afraid it was one of those things you never hear about again. Thanks AVA.

9 Comments

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