Mendocino County Today: Thursday, Mar 10, 2016

• Panther Basketball
• Goldeneye Fire
• 1931 Fire
• Sequeira Claim
• Boonville Water
• Pruden Plaque
• Dog Attacks
• Busy People
• Yesterday's Catch
• Seat Hogs
• Plain Evil
• Trump's Allure
• Authoritarianism
• My Turn
• Michigan Bern
• MCBG Events
• Banksters
• Measure W
• Delta Purchase
• Jonestown Connections
• Jazz Pianist
• Reading Therapy
• Discussing Politics
• Toxic Dialogue

THE ANDERSON VALLEY PANTHERS jumped out to a 10-0 lead against visiting Chester High School in the Boonville gym Wednesday night but were unable to overcome the persistent visitors, falling to Chester 58-54. The first-ever Division 6 CIF first-round NorCal basketball championships was close much of the way, and the Panthers missed a flurry of shots in the final two minutes. Chester, led by an agile 6'7" center, was able to hang on for the win. Another enthusiastic capacity crowd turned out to watch the home town boys who, as always, put on a great show, combining speed and tenacious defense that forced the visitors into numerous turnovers. Although the Panther season closes on a losing note, Coach Luis Espinoza and his team will be remembered as among the best in Anderson Valley's long and illustrious basketball history.

GOLDEN EYE WINERY FIRE (Philo)

The fire in Goldeneye Winery’s iconic "Apple Dryer" was reported about 4:00pm Tuesday. The winery is located at 9200 CA-128 in Philo. “Our AVFD firefighters did an excellent job working on this old apple drier structure fire in Philo yesterday,” said AV Fire Chief Andres Avila. “Crews worked late into the night on overhaul and extinguishment. There was an occupant injury reported and the cause of the fire is undetermined at this time. 
Excellent work AVFD crew!!”

As can be seen, the flames seem to have primarily emanated from the laundry room to the right of the dryer proper.

THE GREAT FIRE OF '31

The Comptche Fire of 1931 did not burn from the coast to Ukiah. Smoke from it could be seen from the coast to Ukiah. In September, 1931 the "Great Comptche Fire" started along Big River, many miles inland. It swept up over the hills around Comptche then raced southward, roughly paralleling the eastern side of what is now the Flynn Creek Road, turning westerly near the Navarro River, but stopping several miles east of the mouth of the Navarro. The 1931 fire spared most of the Albion River except for its farthest east branches.

— Malcolm Macdonald

MENDO'S FORMER TOP PROSECUTOR FILES CLAIM AGAINST COUNTY

Notice of Claim Against the County of Mendocino

March 4, 2016

Claimant: Paul D. Sequeira

Date of loss: 9/2011-3/2016

Description: Continuing breach of contract. Entered into an employment agreement with the county and began work in September 2011. The county has failed to pay the compensation set out in the agreement while continuing to represent to me they would take care of it.

Specific injury, damages or other losses: Money.

Amount claimed: $90,000.

Name(s) of County Employees who are alleged to have caused the injury, damage or loss, if known: Mendocino County Executive Officer Carmel Angelo, Mendocino County District Attorney David Eyster.

Signed, Paul D. Sequeira, 2/22/16

WATER CONTAMINATION FOUND IN DOWNTOWN BOONVILLE

by Mark Scaramella

A few weeks ago the Community Services District, as part of their preparation for a grant application for a possible municipal water and sewer system in downtown Boonville, paid Alpha Labs in Ukiah to test about two dozen private wells on small parcels in the Haehl Street area of Boonville. A few more wells on the north end of town around the Anderson Creek Bridge were also tested.

Samples were taken from tap water with the permission of the home owner or renter on site. Most of the small parcels have one, two or three decades old small homes connected to similarly old wells.

Preliminary findings by Ukiah's Alpha Lab indicates that all of the samples tested exceed acceptable levels of nitrates and coliform by what one participant described as a "significant amount."

The test results will be summarized by Alpha Labs in Ukiah soon and provided to the CSD for use in future grant applications.

The water from the 23 wells tested is not fit for human consumption. The wells selected for testing were on small parcels whose structures, wells and septic fields are very close to each other. They were assumed to be the most likely to have contamination problems.

These worrisome results are not a surprise to most locals long aware of contamination problems in these neighborhoods. The residential areas of central and south Boonville are the most densely occupancies areas of the Anderson Valley.

Some residents of the tested parcels said that they do not drink the water, choosing instead either bottled water or water from neighbors, local springs, or commercially purchased water from pristine sources.

Generally, owners of private wells are responsible for testing and taking whatever steps necessary to produce potable water. Some of the residents in the problem area in Boonville are renters and some are owners, so available options vary from parcel to parcel and well to well. According to the Washington State Health Department's private well water brochure for instance, renters are urged to speak with their landlord about getting water tested and assuming responsibility to reverse negative results.

One of the recommendations in the Washington State information includes, "You should also test your water when you hear that a neighbor's water is contaminated" — which obviously means that it would be a good idea for anyone with a well in the vicinity of Haehl Street or on the north end of Boonville along Highway 128 should have their water tested for coliform and nitrates.

Typically, nitrates and coliform contamination is the result of: leaky septic tanks, household wastes, livestock waste, pesticides and fertilizers (and other sources which don't apply in Boonville).

The precise test results for each Boonville parcel are not yet available but will be provided directly to individual residents or property owners by the laboratory. The Community Services District will not receive itemized data about individual well contamination.

Meanwhile, again, according to the Washington State Department of Health, "If your nitrate test shows levels higher than 10 ppm, find a different and safe drinking water supply. The quickest thing to do is to begin using bottled water for drinking and food preparation. Do not boil water with high nitrates. Boiling water contaiminated with nitrates may actually increase the nitrate level. Another option is to install a device designed to remove nitrates from your water. These devices are usually installed on kitchen faucets, where people get their water for drinking and cooking. Nitrates are not absorbed through the skin so it is safe to clean and bathe with nitrate-laden water. Other longer-term solutions include drilling a deeper well into a different groundwater source, connecting to a public water system, or working with others in your community to develop a new public water system to serve your home and nearby neighbors."

Well drilling is quite expensive, and these areas of Boonville do not have a public water system option. The Community Services District hopes to begin a long process that will result in clean, safe water delivery and sewage disposal.

The Washington State Health Department continues, "Coliform tests usually come back as either Satisfactory or Unsatisfactory. An Unsatisfactory report indicates that the water may be contaminated. Do not drink any water which does not test Satisfactory." They then repeat the same recommendations for nitrates adding, "The quickest thing to do is either begin using bottled water or, if the problem is coliform and not nitrates, boil all water for drinking and food preparation. This also includes water used for making ice or coffee, brushing teeth and washing fruits and vegetables that you eat raw. Boiling water rapidly for one minute usually kills coliform bacteria."

It's not yet clear at this point whether all the wells exceeded both nitrate and coliform levels, but obviously there is a significant contamination problem in those two areas.

"Nitrogen is a chemical found in most fertilizers, animal manure and in septic tanks. Natural bacteria in the soil can change nitrogen into nitrate. Rainwater and irrigation water can carry nitrate down through the soil into the groundwater."

Since the Boonville tests were done in the rainy season, it is likely that the levels were higher at the time the samples were taken than they would have been in the summer.

"Coliform bacteria are organisms that are present in the environment and in the feces of humans and animals. Coliform bacteria will not likely cause illness, but their presence in drinking water indicates disease-causing organisms may also be present."

Home water treatment units are available which include filtration systems, reverse osmosis systems, distillation systems, and others, but they are all costly.

The depths and ages of the test Boonville wells is not known. Theoretically, deeper wells have less contamination. Older wells are more likely to have damaged or leaky casings which can compound the contamination problems.

Obviously, the results indicate that either a municipal water or a sewer or combination of both is badly needed for central Boonville. Even these preliminary test results are ample justification for grant and loan applications from state and federal agencies.

ENCOURAGING to see that Ukiah will honor the late Judy Pruden with a commemorative plaque downtown. Often a lone Ukiah voice for preserving Ukiah’s historically significant buildings, she was appointed to the Ukiah Planning Commission in 1994 and helped shape countless city projects including, of all structures, the Safeway at Gobbi and South State. Instead of the usual utilitarian eyesore foisted off on the public everywhere else in the land, thanks to Ms. Pruden, we got a Mission-style structure that isn't bad at all for a building its size. I wish she was here to take on the new County Courthouse — guaranteed to be both a visual and utilitarian disaster — that's being shoved down our collective maw by Mendocino County's Superior Court.

WILD DOGS ON THE LOOSE

(A press release from the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office.)

Last week a meeting was held with local ranchers regarding the destruction of livestock by dogs. During that meeting strategies were discussed on ways to curb these indiscriminate attacks, which includes prosecution and restitution for the double the value of the animal. Sheriff Mike Downey will not back down from his promise to seek prosecution for dog attacks.

On Monday March 7, the Sheriff’s Office received a call from a rancher who had to put down a cow because it was attacked by dogs the night before. A portion of the cows face was mauled by dogs roaming from neighboring property, which resulted in the destruction of the animal by the rancher.

There have been similar dog attacks reported to the Sheriff’s Office recently. The Sheriff’s Office has a zero tolerance for dog attacks and will seek prosecution of dog owners found to have dogs that attacked or killed livestock.

Sheriff Downey stated, “ I believes these dog attacks are the result of the unregulated industry of illegal marijuana cultivation by growers who maintain these dogs to protect their grow sites.” In many cases these animals can be extremely dangerous and vicious. These dog owners feel the need to keep extremely dangerous dogs on their property to protect their harvests but to what cost for neighboring landowners? These dogs are not being contained on their property and are free to roam wherever they want, causing havoc and terrorizing livestock. There are no leash laws in the unincorporated areas of Humboldt County, but the dog owner must be in control of their dogs at all times. If a dog is found on another person’s property and is harassing or chasing their livestock, the property owner has the right to kill the animal.

Owners of dogs that injure or kill livestock are both criminally and civilly liable for their actions. Per Cal. Food & Agric. Code §31501.
“The owner of any livestock or poultry which is injured or killed by any dog may recover as liquidated damages from the owner of the dog twice the actual value of the animals killed or twice the value of the damages sustained by reason of the injuries, as the case may” 
Ranchers are frequently dealing with mauled livestock, which is a drain on cattlemen and their resources. The livestock that are not killed by the roaming dogs are traumatized and difficult to handle. This needs to stop. The Sheriff’s Office has taken a very aggressive stance on this issue and will not stop investigating these senseless attacks until justice is achieved.

The attached image is from the most recent dog attack on cattle. This cow was put down as a result.

Anyone with information for the Sheriff’s Office regarding dog attacks or loose dogs, please contact the Sheriff’s Office at 707-445-7251 or the Sheriff’s Office Crime Tip line at 707-268-2539.

TOO BUSY

Editor:

I was communicating with Bruce Anderson last week about my experience of sending emails in the last several months to a number of authors/psychologists/psychiatrists/psychiatric survivor advocates plugging my recent articles printed in the AVA about my experience as a mental health client, going off psych meds after being on them for 20 years, and a book review by a psychologist about the depression epidemic. I was complaining that not one of these people replied to my emails and that I would've preferred a brief, blunt "We're not interested" to getting "blown off", and Bruce pointed out that most likely these people were too busy with their own work to have time to reply.

This in turn made me reflect on the virtue of busyness in modern American life. Certainly being busy is one of the most esteemed virtues a modern American can have, regardless of what activities one is occupying himself with. I think the #1 reason busyness is glorified is that Americans equate it with being productive, which in an industrial capitalistic society is the predominant honor. Ideally one's busyness is hoped to be economically productive, but for someone like a housewife who isn't employed, taking care of her kids and husband and home is a socially approved form of being productive.

I think there is another reason that busyness is a virtue which is just as significant as productivity but which people are not as aware of and therefore there's not much discussion about, and that is being busy to distract ourselves from feelings, specifically painful feelings. Feelings such as fear, sadness, and anger that are painful or that we know are socially frowned upon or could get us pathologized with a mental illness diagnosis cause the vast majority of Americans to dissociate, meaning basically to distance ourselves from our feelings to not experience them or be aware of them. Alcohol, illegal drugs, and psychiatric drugs are all popular methods of dissociation in America that make money for a lot of people, but food, television, sex, gambling, compulsive exercise, even reading can be used to dissociate.

In a culture where productivity is worshipped and in which the Protestant work ethic has been a significant influence, busyness is an esteemed way to avoid one's feelings. A major challenge for me is to find people who are willing to take time away from their busy lives to give me slots of time in person (or less ideally on the phone), but I honestly feel that being ignored or "blown off", although a reality of modern American life, is not something to tacitly accept.

Keith Bramstedt

San Anselmo

CATCH OF THE DAY, March 9, 2016

DONALD ALEXANDER, Willits. Ex-felon with firearm.

BRUCE BATES JR., Laytonville. Under influence, vandalism.

TIFFANY BOGGS, Nice/Ukiah. Failure to appear.

ANTHONY COBURN, Ukiah. Rape of unconscious or asleep victim, domestic assault.

CAROL CURTISS, Fort Bragg. Camping in Ukiah, probation revocation.

RAIN DARDEN, Kelseyville/Ukiah. Failure to appear, probation revocation.

TIA HIGGINS, Ukiah. Probation revocation.

MARTIN INEZ, Round Mountain/Ukiah. Domestic assault.

CHRISTOPHER LELOUP, Willits. Under influence, probation revocation.

LACEY POWELL, Redwood Valley. Unspecified offense, arrested by Coyote Valley Reservation (Casino) Police.

NOE REYNOSO, Ukiah. Drunk in public, probation revocation.

KIRK RICHARDSON, Ukiah. Pot possession for sale, offense committed while on bail.

LAFAYETTE ROBINSON, Oakland. Failure to appear.

BRIAN STEELE, Fort Bragg. DUI.

PETER TASCIOTTI, Ukiah. Domestic battery.

MICHAEL VICKERS, Fort Bragg. Failure to appear. (Frequent flyer.)

REACTING to stories about seat hogs on public transportation, a reader suggests, "Easy way to get 2 seats on BART without hogging them... wait for someone to sit next to you then say "Hi, have you found Jesus?"

MILLIONS OF ORDINARY AMERICANS SUPPORT DONALD TRUMP. HERE'S WHY

by Thomas Frank

Let us now address the greatest American mystery at the moment: what motivates the supporters of Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump?

I call it a “mystery” because the working-class white people who make up the bulk of Trump’s fan base show up in amazing numbers for the candidate, filling stadiums and airport hangars, but their views, by and large, do not appear in our prestige newspapers. On their opinion pages, these publications take care to represent demographic categories of nearly every kind, but “blue-collar” is one they persistently overlook. The views of working-class people are so foreign to that universe that when New York Times columnist Nick Kristof wanted to “engage” a Trump supporter last week, he made one up, along with this imaginary person’s responses to his questions.

When members of the professional class wish to understand the working-class Other, they traditionally consult experts on the subject. And when these authorities are asked to explain the Trump movement, they always seem to zero in on one main accusation: bigotry. Only racism, they tell us, is capable of powering a movement like Trump’s, which is blowing through the inherited structure of the Republican party like a tornado through a cluster of McMansions.

Trump himself provides rather excellent evidence for this finding. The man is an insult clown who has systematically gone down the list of American ethnic groups and offended them each in turn. He wants to deport millions upon millions of undocumented immigrants. He wants to bar Muslims from visiting the United States. He admires various foreign strongmen and dictators, and has even retweeted a quote from Mussolini. This gold-plated buffoon has in turn drawn the enthusiastic endorsement of leading racists from across the spectrum of intolerance, a gorgeous mosaic of haters, each of them quivering excitedly at the prospect of getting a real, honest-to-god bigot in the White House.

All this stuff is so insane, so wildly outrageous, that the commentariat has deemed it to be the entirety of the Trump campaign. Trump appears to be a racist, so racism must be what motivates his armies of followers. And so, on Saturday, New York Times columnist Timothy Egan blamed none other than “the people” for Trump’s racism: “Donald Trump’s supporters know exactly what he stands for: hatred of immigrants, racial superiority, a sneering disregard of the basic civility that binds a society.”

Stories marveling at the stupidity of Trump voters are published nearly every day. Articles that accuse Trump’s followers of being bigots have appeared by the hundreds, if not the thousands. Conservatives have written them; liberals have written them; impartial professionals have written them. The headline of a recent Huffington Post column announced, bluntly, that “Trump Won Super Tuesday Because America is Racist.” A New York Times reporter proved that Trump’s followers were bigots by coordinating a map of Trump support with a map of racist Google searches. Everyone knows it: Trump’s followers’ passions are nothing more than the ignorant blurtings of the white American id, driven to madness by the presence of a black man in the White House. The Trump movement is a one-note phenomenon, a vast surge of race-hate. Its partisans are not only incomprehensible, they are not really worth comprehending.

* * *

Or so we’re told. Last week, I decided to watch several hours of Trump speeches for myself. I saw the man ramble and boast and threaten and even seem to gloat when protesters were ejected from the arenas in which he spoke. I was disgusted by these things, as I have been disgusted by Trump for 20 years. But I also noticed something surprising. In each of the speeches I watched, Trump spent a good part of his time talking about an entirely legitimate issue, one that could even be called leftwing.

Yes, Donald Trump talked about trade. In fact, to judge by how much time he spent talking about it, trade may be his single biggest concern – not white supremacy. Not even his plan to build a wall along the Mexican border, the issue that first won him political fame. He did it again during the debate on 3 March: asked about his political excommunication by Mitt Romney, he chose to pivot and talk about … trade.

It seems to obsess him: the destructive free-trade deals our leaders have made, the many companies that have moved their production facilities to other lands, the phone calls he will make to those companies’ CEOs in order to threaten them with steep tariffs unless they move back to the US.

Trump embellished this vision with another favorite leftwing idea: under his leadership, the government would “start competitive bidding in the drug industry”. (“We don’t competitively bid!” he marveled – another true fact, a legendary boondoggle brought to you by the George W Bush administration.) Trump extended the critique to the military-industrial complex, describing how the government is forced to buy lousy but expensive airplanes thanks to the power of industry lobbyists.

Thus did he hint at his curious selling proposition: because he is personally so wealthy, a fact about which he loves to boast, Trump himself is unaffected by business lobbyists and donations. And because he is free from the corrupting power of modern campaign finance, famous deal-maker Trump can make deals on our behalf that are “good” instead of “bad”. The chance that he will actually do so, of course, is small. He appears to be a hypocrite on this issue as well as so many other things. But at least Trump is saying this stuff.

All this surprised me because, for all the articles about Trump I had read in recent months, I didn’t recall trade coming up very often. Trump is supposed to be on a one-note crusade for whiteness. Could it be that all this trade stuff is a key to understanding the Trump phenomenon?

* * *

Trade is an issue that polarizes Americans by socio-economic status. To the professional class, which encompasses the vast majority of our media figures, economists, Washington officials and Democratic powerbrokers, what they call “free trade” is something so obviously good and noble it doesn’t require explanation or inquiry or even thought. Republican and Democratic leaders alike agree on this, and no amount of facts can move them from their Econ 101 dream.

To the remaining 80 or 90% of America, trade means something very different. There’s a video going around on the internet these days that shows a room full of workers at a Carrier air conditioning plant in Indiana being told by an officer of the company that the factory is being moved to Monterrey, Mexico, and that they’re all going to lose their jobs.

As I watched it, I thought of all the arguments over trade that we’ve had in this country since the early 1990s, all the sweet words from our economists about the scientifically proven benevolence of free trade, all the ways in which our newspapers mock people who say that treaties like the North American Free Trade Agreement allow companies to move jobs to Mexico.

Well, here is a video of a company moving its jobs to Mexico, courtesy of Nafta. This is what it looks like. The Carrier executive talks in that familiar and highly professional HR language about the need to “stay competitive” and “the extremely price-sensitive marketplace”. A worker shouts “Fuck you!” at the executive. The executive asks people to please be quiet so he can “share” his “information”. His information about all of them losing their jobs.

* * *

Now, I have no special reason to doubt the suspicion that Donald Trump is a racist. Either he is one, or (as the comedian John Oliver puts it) he is pretending to be one, which amounts to the same thing.

But there is another way to interpret the Trump phenomenon. A map of his support may coordinate with racist Google searches, but it coordinates even better with deindustrialization and despair, with the zones of economic misery that 30 years of Washington’s free-market consensus have brought the rest of America.

It is worth noting that Trump is making a point of assailing that Indiana air conditioning company from the video in his speeches. What this suggests is that he’s telling a tale as much about economic outrage as it is tale of racism on the march. Many of Trump’s followers are bigots, no doubt, but many more are probably excited by the prospect of a president who seems to mean it when he denounces our trade agreements and promises to bring the hammer down on the CEO that fired you and wrecked your town, unlike Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.

Here is the most salient supporting fact: when people talk to white, working-class Trump supporters, instead of simply imagining what they might say, they find that what most concerns these people is the economy and their place in it. I am referring to a study just published by Working America, a political-action auxiliary of the AFL-CIO, which interviewed some 1,600 white working-class voters in the suburbs of Cleveland and Pittsburgh in December and January.

Support for Donald Trump, the group found, ran strong among these people, even among self-identified Democrats, but not because they are all pining for a racist in the White House. Their favorite aspect of Trump was his “attitude”, the blunt and forthright way he talks. As far as issues are concerned, “immigration” placed third among the matters such voters care about, far behind their number one concern: “good jobs / the economy”.

“People are much more frightened than they are bigoted,” is how the findings were described to me by Karen Nussbaum, the executive director of Working America. The survey “confirmed what we heard all the time: people are fed up, people are hurting, they are very distressed about the fact that their kids don’t have a future” and that “there still hasn’t been a recovery from the recession, that every family still suffers from it in one way or another.”

Tom Lewandowski, the president of the Northeast Indiana Central Labor Council in Fort Wayne, puts it even more bluntly when I asked him about working-class Trump fans. “These people aren’t racist, not any more than anybody else is,” he says of Trump supporters he knows. “When Trump talks about trade, we think about the Clinton administration, first with Nafta and then with [Permanent Normal Trade Relations] China, and here in Northeast Indiana, we hemorrhaged jobs.”

“They look at that, and here’s Trump talking about trade, in a ham-handed way, but at least he’s representing emotionally. We’ve had all the political establishment standing behind every trade deal, and we endorsed some of these people, and then we’ve had to fight them to get them to represent us.”

Now, let us stop and smell the perversity. Left parties the world over were founded to advance the fortunes of working people. But our left party in America – one of our two monopoly parties – chose long ago to turn its back on these people’s concerns, making itself instead into the tribune of the enlightened professional class, a “creative class” that makes innovative things like derivative securities and smartphone apps. The working people that the party used to care about, Democrats figured, had nowhere else to go, in the famous Clinton-era expression. The party just didn’t need to listen to them any longer.

What Lewandowski and Nussbaum are saying, then, should be obvious to anyone who’s dipped a toe outside the prosperous enclaves on the two coasts. Ill-considered trade deals and generous bank bailouts and guaranteed profits for insurance companies but no recovery for average people, ever – these policies have taken their toll. As Trump says, “we have rebuilt China and yet our country is falling apart. Our infrastructure is falling apart … Our airports are, like, Third World.”

Trump’s words articulate the populist backlash against liberalism that has been building slowly for decades and may very well occupy the White House itself, whereupon the entire world will be required to take seriously its demented ideas.

Yet still we cannot bring ourselves to look the thing in the eyes. We cannot admit that we liberals bear some of the blame for its emergence, for the frustration of the working-class millions, for their blighted cities and their downward spiraling lives. So much easier to scold them for their twisted racist souls, to close our eyes to the obvious reality of which Trumpism is just a crude and ugly expression: that neoliberalism has well and truly failed.

(Courtesy, the London Guardian)

I DO SEE SORT OF A CLEAR DISTINCTION between people who have a larger faith in liberties and rights than they do in states and institutions. And this would be sort of the authoritarian/libertarian axis in the traditional sense. And I do think it’s clear that if you believe in the progressive liberal tradition, which is that people should have greater capability to act freely, to make their own choices, to enjoy a better and freer life over the progression of a sort of human life, you’re going to be pushing away from that authoritarian axis at all times. Because authoritarianism is necessarily about the ordering and control of society. Now they can argue that that will produce a better quality of life, but it cannot be argued that it would provide a freer life.

— Edward Snowden

OK, SANDERS PEOPLE, WANT ME TO EAT CROW? Trust me, I already have. I’ve been writing some pretty tough pieces about Bernie lately because after Hillary Clinton beat him in Nevada, I didn’t see any evidence that he could win an important state. Well, he just won one. After Michigan, the Democratic reality has changed, in a potentially huge way.

Nobody saw this coming. Forget me. Nate Silver, who gave Clinton a 99 percent chance of winning the state, didn’t see it coming. Obviously even Sanders himself didn’t see it coming, or he wouldn't have given his victory speech in front of what was by all appearances an outhouse.

So there are three questions. How did this happen? How could the polls have been so amazingly wrong? And what does it portend?

As for how it happened, the exit polls give us a few answers. Clinton’s problem with young voters held pace as Sanders won four out of five voters age 30 and under. But it expanded — in Michigan, he walloped her by 24 points among those between 30 and 39. Thirty-nine isn’t so young. So her problem now isn’t just with “young voters.” It’s with virtually all voters who weren’t adults when Bill Clinton was first elected.

— Michael Tomasky

VEGETABLES, RHODODENDRONS, GUEST SPEAKERS, BEES . . .

Upcoming events at Mendocino Coast Botanical Gardens:

FREE Guest Speaker Presentation: Mary Jasch of DIG IT! Magazine Topic: Private Gardens of New York, New Jersey, Connecticut and Eastern Pennsylvania MARCH 15 from 12:30pm to 2:00pm in the MCBG Meeting Room

This presentation offers inspiration from the gardens, plants, and people of the Northeast Coast. Take a visual tour of private gardens of all types and sizes from 1/5-acre suburban lot to country estates, classical to cottage, woodland and container gardens, formal vegetable gardens, potagers and a few surprises. Mary Jasch publishes and edits DIG IT! Magazine. Her freelance articles and photography of gardens, horticulture, and nature have appeared in The New York Times, Backpacker Magazine, The Boston Globe and other publications. Her award-winning photography is currently in a nationwide traveling exhibit with the Natural History Field Museum of Chicago. For 23 years, she owned an interior landscape business that designed, installed, and maintained corporate interior plantings, outdoor container gardens, and retention basins as sound ecological habitats. Her combined knowledge of plants in natural landscapes and designed gardens provides her with an expertise she enjoys sharing.

There is no fee to attend but seating is limited; please RSVP to Wendy Roberts at wendy@mcn.org <mailto:wendy@mcn.org> or call 707-937-4702.

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FREE Course Orientation: Sustainable Home Vegetable Gardening Extended Workshop Series MARCH 15 or MARCH 22 from 5:30 €“6:30pm in the Gardens Meeting Room RSVP for one of two free course orientations by phoning The Garden Store at 707-964-4352 ext. 16.

Take your vegetable garden to the next level! This course offers four months of hands-on, brains-on training with MCBG Gardener Jaime Jensen teaching the essential skills to develop a strong vegetable garden for years to come. Learn about soil preparation, garden planning, propagation, and harvesting techniques. Course workshops will demonstrate how to install drip irrigation, how to build a raised garden box, and more. Each class will have a reading and lecture component as well as hands-on training— be prepared to get dirty!

Workshop series meets every other Saturday, March 26 through June 18 (Classes: 9:30am - 1:30pm. Workshops: 9:30am - 3:30pm. Details will be provided to course participants.) Class Cost: $200 for members and Master Gardeners / $260 for non-members

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EXTENDED WORKSHOP SERIES: Sustainable Home Vegetable Gardening Classes/workshops meet every other Saturday, March 26 through June 18 (Classes: 9:30am - 1:30pm. Workshops: 9:30am - 3:30pm. Details will be provided to course participants.)

Attend a FREE Course Orientation: Tuesday, March 15 or 22 from 5:30 €“6:30pm in the Gardens Meeting Room Class Cost: $200 for members and Master Gardeners / $260 for non-members

Take your vegetable garden to the next level! This course offers four months of hands-on, brains-on training with MCBG Gardener Jaime Jensen teaching the essential skills to develop a strong vegetable garden for years to come. Learn about soil preparation, garden planning, propagation, and harvesting techniques. Course workshops will demonstrate how to install drip irrigation, how to build a raised garden box, and more. Each class will have a reading and lecture component as well as hands-on training be prepared to get dirty! To learn more, visit www.gardenbythesea.org or RSVP for the free course orientation on Tuesday, March 15 or 22, 5:30 - 6:30pm, by phoning The Garden Store at 707 964-4352 ext. 16.

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Rhododendron Basics - MARCH 19 10:00am to 12:00pm in the Gardens Meeting Room with ARS Noyo Chapter President, Dennis McKiver

Learn to identify and care for Rhododendrons growing in your yard. Our cool coastal climate, acidic soils, and mild winters allow many beautiful cultivars and species to thrive. Dennis McKiver - president of the American Rhododendron Society €™s local chapter - will teach proper planting and plant medium, fertilizing, pruning, as well as disease and pest control. Expand your collection by learning to choose the right hybrids and species for your area while touring the Rhododendron Collection at Mendocino Coast Botanical Gardens. For more information please visit our Events page on the Gardens website http://www.gardenbythesea.org/.

Class Cost: $20 non-members (Includes Gardens admission for the day!) / $10 MCBG members and Master Gardeners SIGN UP by phoning in your payment at 707-964-4352 ext. 16

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UPDATED DATE: Designing Bee-Friendly Flower Gardens - APRIL 30 0:00am to 12:00pm in the Gardens Meeting Room with MCBG Board Member and noted garden designer, Kate Frey

Flower-filled gardens make us happy and can support many species of bees and much other biodiversity beneficial to our gardens. We all desire our gardens to be full of color and interest for many months of the year, yet what flowers appeal to which bees and why? How can we put them together in compositions that work well with the parameters of our site and in color combinations that suit us, and cater to bee's needs for many months of the year? This class offers many colorful examples of flower filled gardens that support bees.

Kate Frey is a noted garden designer and consultant. She specializes in the creation of sustainable, organic, habitat gardens that reflect the climate conditions, soil and biodiversity of their locations and provide abundant habitat for pollinators through all four seasons of the year. Her recently published book on the subject - "The Bee-Friendly Garden" - will be available to purchase after the class. For more information please visit our Events page on the Gardens' website www.gardenbythesea.org <http://www.gardenbythesea.org/>.

Class Cost: $20 non-members (Includes Gardens admission for the day!) / $10 MCBG members and Master Gardeners SIGN UP by phoning in your payment at 707-964-4352 ext. 16

TOWN HALL MEETING IN REDWOOD VALLEY ON 3/22

The Charter Project of Mendocino County is hosting a series of 9 Town Hall meetings around the county to introduce people to Charter Commission candidates for the June 7^th election, and also to canvass the public about what they would like to see in a county charter.

What is a charter, anyway? What does home rule mean to Mendocino County? Get the answers at one of these Town Hall meetings.

The second Town Hall meeting will be held on Tuesday, March 22, 2016 at the Redwood Valley Grange, 8650 East Road in Redwood Valley from 7pm to 9pm.

The Measure W question will be in the ballot in the June election, "Shall a Charter Commission be elected to propose a Mendocino County Charter?"

There will also be candidates running for the post of Charter Commissioner. You will be able to vote for 15 of them in June.

Meet 2 Charter Commission candidates:

Jed Davis, Aquaponic farmer, has been living in Mendocino County since 2002 and has been active in fighting unlawful foreclosures. He believes the law regarding the recording of foreclosures by the County Recorder is flawed. Jed sees the county charter as an opportunity to correct that error and eliminate most fraudulent foreclosures.

Robin Sunbeam, RN, is a Credentialed School Nurse. Robin is driven to do everything she can to improve the future for all of our children. And the most influence any citizen has is local. Robin believes citizens should have more influence over our local area because we live here and will reap the results of government policies.

We are delighted to feature guest speaker Will Parrish, freelance journalist, local activist and hero of the SOLLV effort to stop the Willits bypass. He will explore issues of water management and how a charter might serve to achieve water distributive justice.

Free admission. Refreshments by donation. Raffle fundraiser. Help us pay for these 10 Town Hall meetings with your financial support.

All registered voters are welcome!

More information is available on our website: http://mendocinocountycharter.org. You can also take the opportunity to donate money online there.

We welcome all contributions of ideas for a county charter at our WindTunneling page: <http://join.windtunneling.com>. Create a login & password, and choose Project Code: MendoCountyCharter.

METROPOLITAN WATER DISTRICT AUTHORIZES PURCHASE OF DELTA ISLANDS

by Dan Bacher

As Delta smelt and other fish species reach record low population levels and fishermen and fisherwomen brace for salmon restrictions this season, the Metropolitan Water District (MWD) of Southern California authorized the purchase of four islands in the San Francisco Bay-Delta for an undisclosed sum at a closed session of their Board of Directors meeting on the morning of Tuesday, March 8.

The Metropolitan Water District is a “regional wholesaler that delivers water,” according to the MWD website: www.mwdh2o.com. MWD, Southern California’s most powerful water agency, is one of the strongest proponents of Governor Jerry Brown's California Water Fix to build the controversial Delta Tunnels. MWD’s 37-member Board of Directors represents 26 agencies in Southern California.

“The deal is highly controversial in Northern California, as it would put Southern California’s most powerful water agency in control of a group of Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta islands that can serve as water storage areas or entry points for the proposed $15 billion Delta Tunnels projects,” observed Barbara Barrigan-Parrilla, Executive Director of Restore the Delta.

For months, MWD has been considering the purchase of islands now used for farming. “The islands mirror the path of the plan for the Delta Tunnels proposal," said Barrigan-Parrilla.

The four island deal includes Bouldin Island, Webb Tract, Holland Tract, and Bacon Island, covering approximately 20,369 acres of the Delta, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.

(http://www.sfgate.com/science/article/Southern-California-water-giant-agrees-to-buy-6878573.php )

Here is a map of the islands in the path of the Delta Tunnels:

http://www.restorethedelta.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/tunnel_overlay9-18-15_S-1.pdf

“It is troubling for the Delta region that Metropolitan Water District is going to acquire such a significant portion of Delta land and Delta water rights,” said Barrigan-Parrilla. “They have the resources to change law and policies statewide to maximize their access to Delta water in their favor. They will own two islands that are directly in the path of the proposed Delta Tunnels project, eliminating eminent domain concerns for that portion of tunnels construction.”

“We believe that having MWD as a neighbor is an existential threat to the future of the Delta and Delta communities,” Barrigan-Parrilla emphasized.

Barrigan-Parrilla noted that after nine years and a quarter of a billion dollars spent on the proposal, Delta Tunnels backers have still has not produced a “legally acceptable plan that can pass environmental standards.”

On October 30, 2015, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued the California Water Fix Draft Environmental Impact Report a failing grade of “Inadequate” due to lack of science about the impacts on the Delta ecosystem and endangered species. This report came on the heels of critical scientific reviews of the project's environmental documents by the Delta Independent Science Board and other panels of scientists.

The “existential threat” to the future of the Delta and its communities that this MWD purchase represents is the last thing that the Delta needs now, considering that the population of Delta smelt has plunged to its lowest level in recorded history, according to the California Fish and Wildlife’s Spring Kodiak Survey.

The January trawl survey produced only seven fish, while the February survey yielded only just seven fish. The Delta smelt, an indicator species that demonstrates the health of the Delta Estuary, was once the most abundant fish on the estuary, numbering in the millions.

(http://www.capradio.org/articles/2016/03/07/delta-smelt-populations-plummet-2nd-year-in-a-row )

As Delta smelt populations near extinction, recreational, tribal and commercial salmon fishermen face restrictions this year, due to the low abundance estimates for Sacramento and Klamath River Chinook salmon. As is the case with the Delta smelt, salmon populations have plummeted due to massive water exports out of the Sacramento-San Joaquin River system and the Trinity River, the largest tributary of the Klamath, along with poor management of northern California reservoirs by the state and federal governments and declining water quality.

( http://fishsniffer.com/index.php/2016/03/03/sacramento-and-klamath-river-salmon-ocean-abundance-estimates-are-down-in-2016/)

The construction of the Delta Tunnels facilitated by MWD's purchase of the Delta islands would hasten the extinction of Sacramento River winter Chinook salmon, Central Valley steelhead, Delta and longfin smelt, green sturgeon and other species, along with imperiling the salmon and steelhead populations of the Klamath and Trinity rivers.

INTERESTING STUFF FROM JOHN SAKOWICZ:

One of the things we discussed on our show last Monday, March 7, on KMEC Radio, with Dr. Jeffrey Kaye, was Jonestown. Was Jonestown a mass suicide or a mass murder?

Connect the dots.

The murder of Congressman Leo Ryan AND the Hughes-Ryan Act (a 1974 United States federal law that amended the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 which required Congressional oversight of the CIA) AND the CIA's MK Ultra mass mind control experiment AND the mass suicide at Jonestown.

Connect the dots. There is a connection. Check out the video below starting at the 49-minute mark.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nus9mnbvflM

We also mentioned that Jim Jones had a big connection to Mendocino County.

We'll post an MP3 link to Monday's show soon. It's groundbreaking stuff.

UKIAH COMMUNITY CONCERT ASSOCIATION PRESENTS GRAMMY nominated jazz pianist Christian Jacob on April 2, 2016

Ukiah Community Concert Association Presents GRAMMY nominated jazz pianist Christian Jacob on April 2. He is described by the New York Times as “phenomenal” and “masterful”. UCCA is thrilled to bring this smooth, soulful private jazz concert to Mendocino College Center Theater, on Saturday, April2, 2016 at 7:30 p.m. There will be a wine reception in the lobby after the concert provided by the Mendocino College Foundation.

“There is a buzz in the jazz world about pianist Christian Jacob and it’s easy to understand why. He’s the all too rare jazz musician who can turn pure technique into something deeply personal.” -The Gazette Christian

Jacob first gained widespread exposure as co-leader, arranger and pianist with the Tierney Sutton Band. While recording eight critically acclaimed CDs with the band, Christian has also built a substantial career as a solo artist and leader of the Christian Jacob Trio. Furthermore, while studying at Berklee College of Music, Christian won several awards, including the Oscar Peterson Jazz Masters Award, the Great American Jazz Piano Competition, and “Downbeat” magazine’s distinction as Top Collegiate Jazz Soloist. From there, Christian began performing and recording with many of today’s jazz legends including Flora Purim and Airto Moreira. Christian has performed around the world, with big bands, symphonies, and for the King of Thailand.

Ukiah Community Concert Association has been presenting nationally acclaimed talent since 1947. This all volunteer nonprofit’s mission is to build and maintain a permanent concert audience and bring great live concerts to Ukiah. It is also their goal to encourage music appreciation in the schools of the community. Advanced tickets available at Mendocino Book Company, Dig! Music in Ukiah, Good’s Stamp Shop in Willits and on our website. Single tickets are $30 (adult) and $5 (youth). For more information call 707-463-2738, or visit the association’s website at www.ukiahconcerts.org. This Concert is being presented in association with Live On Stage, Inc.

READING: THE ANTIDOTE TO LONELINESS

by William McDonald

They don’t ask for much - just a good story now and then. Sometimes, a lot of the time, they may not be able to ask, but you can see it in their eyes. Tired eyes that are saying “I can’t make out the words anymore.” Proud eyes that hate to say, “I’ve had a stroke. I can’t hold a book in my hands.” Quiet eyes that are asking, “Could you take a minute and read me a story?” Usually a love story that might take them back to a time when they were young and in love as only the young can love.

Helen closes her eyes when I read, perhaps to keep me from reading something in them that is for her eyes only. But she cannot hide the smile that dances across her face. She can not hide the way her hands, folded over her chest, sway back and forth to a melody of memories only she can hear.

Rebecca asks me to change the names in every story to Rebecca and Franklin. She does not close her eyes when I read. She stares, beyond the room, beyond the walls, beyond the building – beyond time itself, into a world where a man named Franklin and a woman named Rebecca lived and loved and promised a forever to each other.

John likes me to read to him. Most men don’t but John does. I think it’s because every woman in every story is, in John’s mind, a woman whose heart he once won. He doesn’t say it but … and lost.

I used to wonder if the seniors I read to considered me a time thief, stealing a little of what little they might have left. But no. I have learned that reading to someone is the antidote to loneliness. It is like giving and getting a hug when we need it most.

A good story is a good escape.

A good safe place to hide.

From a step that isn’t quite as strong as it once was, from eyes a little dimmer than just the other day, from a mind not quite as sharp.

A good story can turn today into yesterday, when loneliness was absent, love and respect ever present. A good story is, indeed, a good escape from, as Shakespeare wrote, “second childishness and mere oblivion, sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.”

My grandmother was considered forever lost to Alzheimer’s. The last time I saw her, her eyes were closed. No, they were crushed shut. Her fists were clenched so tightly around her bible I could almost see the blood draining from her veins and she was tap, tap, tapping her feet, faster and faster until the tapping became an angry stomping. She was digging into her mind, trying to remember someone, something, anyone, anything, but the deeper she dug the further down she fell into the abyss that was once a well of golden memories. Every memory that had been tucked away for safekeeping, every moment of love and hope, every dream, every victory, every loss, every moment worth saving – no longer accessible.

I removed the Bible from her grip then sat on the floor and started reading. Before long her hands relaxed, she stopped stomping her feet and the only sound in the room was the sound of my voice. I read to her for about an hour. Finally, sadly, I kissed her goodbye. My hand was on the doorknob when she called to me.

“Billy? Is that you?”

I turned. Saw the recognition in her eyes.

“We had some times, didn’t we, Billy?”

That was all. As quickly as it had come, the light went from her eyes and she was gone again.

Don’t be afraid to read to someone considered forever lost to Alzheimer’s. You might just find yourself in the middle of a miracle.

Gwenna is 93.

In our world.

In hers, she is somewhere between seven and eight and what somewhere between seven and eight-year-old doesn’t like a bedtime story? Gwenna prefers stories about angels. One night, long after the bedtime story had lulled her to sleep, Gwenna woke, saw me sitting at her bedside, book of stories still on my lap and asked, “Are you my guardian angel?”

“Yes, darlin’, I am.”

“And you have a book.”

“And I have a book.”

“I like that.”

Carry a book of stories with you. Read to someone who can no longer read for himself or herself.

A good story will lift your old friends from a life as empty as a weed-ridden patch of dirt into the Garden of Eden.

(William McDonald is the author of Old Friends (Endless Love) Available at oldfriendsendlesslove.com)

ON LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY

I’m not a Socialist. If there’s anything Sanders can still achieve in this charade of a Democratic Party Anointment process, it might be to define the term and de-stigmatize it. Right now “Socialist” means “Whatever I don’t like.” “Fascist” means “My high school football coach.” Neither are accurate definitions, and the falsehoods are not unintentional. Bastardizing our vocabulary prevents us from discussing politics.

However, there’s no honest argument to be made that our system of debt-based finance capitalism can function on a finite planet. We can support local enterprise all we want, but if we don’t flush out the unpayable debt every 20 years or so a cataclysm will ensue.

There’s some imperfect middle ground between the kind of purist theory so popular in coffeeshops, and the cynical self-serving mythology of “Free Markets,” as if there could be such a thing if there’s any asymmetry of information, power or wealth.

Having unattainable ideals and goals is good for people. Gives us something to do. Pretending that we are achieving those goals when we’re not, leads to great evils, however.

TOXICS, A DIALOGUE

On 3/9/2016 12:25 PM Daney Dawson wrote: But I have to read no further than "myth - it is toxic" to understand how disingenuous it is. If glyphosate were not toxic, it would not be one of the most widely used herbicides in the world. It is precisely because it IS toxic that it is used to kill living creatures. In sufficient quantities it kills larger living creatures as well, such as humans. But what about all the other tiny creatures that are necessary for the health of the food chain? They are also ingesting glyphosate. Yes, it is nefarious, and it does accumulate in our systems,

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Daney, have you noticed that you treat everything from the point of view of emotional taint? You fear types and levels of radiation that cause no harm, but it's man-made radiation so it's the devil to you. You imply that glyphosate must be terrible poison to humans if it kills weeds, but that isn't necessarily so. Chocolate is poison for dogs but it's a vitamin for people; it's produced using slave labor but so is much of the seafood we buy. Aspirin can kill a cat and keep you from having a stroke or a heart attack. Citrus fruit can kill Juanita's pet bird and keep your teeth in your head. The way glyphosate controls weeds has no effect on people --we're not weeds-- and it wasn't what killed the monarch butterflies; it killed their food, the weeds that would otherwise strangle our food. Also pesticides kill more bugs than they should, butterflies among them. I'm seeing a case made to blame neonicotinoids for killing bees. But pesticides aren't herbicides. Chess and Monopoly and Snakes-and-Ladders are three different board games; their operating principles have very little in common. And, true, we probably should find a better way to keep crops from being eaten by bugs and being overgrown by milkweed. Genetic engineering comes to mind. Also glyphosate, in the nano-concentrations left in food by the time we eat that food, is entirely safe, or we'd know about it, because we've been eating food rescued from weeds by glyphosate for a long time. Granted, longevity among poor white people has plateaued, but that's not because of the hubris of herbicides or pesticides or cell phones as you so often suggest, it's because of economic factors and stress and drug addiction and, frankly, suicide. In short, the great killer is simply economic injustice and a lack of friends. Plus sloth, and lead, and the prison industrial complex, and endless war, and time itself. And gluten is part of food. Peanuts are food. Milk is food. Pork is food. In many places insects and rats and horses and dogs and monkeys are food. Some of us have a lower tolerance for some of those things and some of us are deathly sickened by them and some are merely squicked out by them because of upbringing and arbitrary taboos, but should they all be banned so the vast majority of people who don't have a problem eating carrion can't enjoy them? I say no. I just read an article about how a picture of Leonardo diCaprio's mother's unshaven armpit has driven thousands of people crazy with anger and fear and disgust. I'm not sure exactly how that fits in here, but it kind of does.

-- Marco McClean
memo@mcn.org
http://MemoOfTheAir.wordpress.com