Mendocino County Today: Friday, Apr 22, 2016

• V Benefit
• Ukiah Bathrooms
• Courthouse Costs
• Definitely Drunk
• Shelter Websites
• Midnight Puncher
• Fed Felony
• Embezzlement Case
• Native Artist
• Yesterday's Catch
• Harridan
• AI
• Chinese Investors
• Public Stoning
• Guillits
• Hillary Cult
• Weather Modification
• Prince
• ExtortionCare
• Moral Challenge
• LSD 1943
• Jewish Donors
• Continuing Education
• Nye Ranch
• Global Capitalism

MEASURE V BENEFIT – Today, Friday at the Caspar Community Center is a Measure V benefit from 4:30 to 10 p.m. Come learn why standing dead trees are a public safety and health issue. Speakers, info, world music, and organic food from Taste Buds in Ukiah. A fun and informative evening.

TRAVEL ADVISORY: The crypt-like Ukiah Conference Center on School Street is almost completely empty save for the seemingly vacant offices of Assemblyman Wood and State Senator McGuire which, it's not unfair to say, are also vacant when the two Healdsburg hustlers are present. It's a creepy kind of building with little natural light and dark corridors leading to dark, vacant rooms labeled after grapes.

The sole amenity offered by the bunker-like structure are the perfectly antiseptic restrooms, handy to the transient public. The building is open most of the day but, beware! no smoking within 20 feet of the back door! The idea years ago was that if our county seat offered an under-sized auditorium, conventioneering merry makers would flock to town. Didn't happen, won't happen, can't happen because, well, Ukiah isn't a desirable destination for the reasons often enumerated here.

TURNS OUT, Judge Faulder is more receptive to new information about the new courthouse project than his abrupt phone system lead us to believe last week. On Thursday, after handing us a package of printouts about the new courthouse project and insisting that his opinions were based on that, not on a discussion with Judge Dave Nelson, Faulder agreed that if the state judicial admin office causes fiscal impact on the County and the City of Ukiah by forcing a new courthouse onto the railroad depot site, the state should at least pick up the cost of that impact. And it's nearly shocking that they haven't done much to deal with it so far.

FAULDER SAID HE HADN'T FULLY APPRECIATED all the impacts the new courthouse would have on ancillary offices like the District Attorney, the Public Defender and probation and would "make sure that's brought up in any future discussion" of the project. Faulder said that the County should be bringing the various other judicial system departments affected by the new courthouse in now and put them to work defining what the new courthouse impact will be and what it might cost.

FAULDER ARGUED that one of the problems the judges have with the current courthouse is all the delays and confusion associated with secure prisoner transport to and from the Courthouse. We agreed that's a problem, but that it'll only be worse in the new courthouse when lawyers, witnesses, cops, experts etc. — and defendants — have to find their way to the new courthouse several blocks from downtown where the other offices are on time since they will no longer be in the same building — and there are lots of other people who don’t like to wait, not just their robed honors.

THE NEW COURTHOUSE MAY BE UNSTOPPABLE at this point, but the County and the City of Ukiah have to do a lot more to make sure they’re not stuck with a multi-million dollar bill when they belatedly realize — probably years after the fact — that a new courthouse is much more disruption than upgrade.

ONE GOOD IDEA Faulder said he'd implement if elected is a juvenile arraignment court at juvenile hall to reduce the juvenile defendant transportation to and from the Courthouse. He also agreed that an arraignment court once or twice a week at the Jail would put a dent in the prisoner transport problems too.

SO WE'RE GLAD TO HEAR that the Candidate was not personally in favor of the "You're now being transferred to listen only mode" declaration we got after last week's phone-in campaign meeting.

THE FOLLOWING WAS POSTED by the Mendocino County District Attorney office Wednesday:

UKIAH, Wed., April 20. -- Jury Trial Result: A jury returned from its deliberations yesterday with two out of three guilty verdicts against William Gordon Barry, age 52, of no set address in Ukiah. Barry was charged with three counts of misdemeanor public intoxication, also known as disorderly conduct, occurring on January 13th, January 16th, and January 19th. This defendant has been arrested for this charge 17 times since January of 2005. He was on court probation at the time of the most recent offenses from a separate conviction for the same offense in June 2015. Barry will be formally sentenced by Mendocino County Superior Court Judge Richard Henderson, the judge who presided over the trial, on April 25, 2015 at 9:30 a.m. in Dept. G. Any person interested in this matter is invited to attend. The prosecutor who presented the People's evidence to the jury was Deputy District Attorney Houston Porter. The investigating law enforcement agency was the Ukiah Police Department.

GIMME A GROWL!

Mendocino Animal Care Services shelter has a new website, and we would love for all your dog n' cat loving readers to take a look, and bookmark! The site is under construction, but we are up to date with dog and cat listings, and you can link from the website to the "official" Facebook page, where we are posting lost animals, and lots of other information and updates on our current and former guests. The facebook page is facebook.com/mendoanimalshelter.

Our new webpage address is mendoanimalshelter.com.

Thanks!

NOTHING GOOD HAPPENS AFTER MIDNIGHT

On April 20, 2016 at approximately 1 A.M. MCSO Deputies were dispatched to a residence in Covelo regarding an assault. Upon arrival Deputies contacted a female adult who advised that she had been assaulted by Suspect Kenneth Frazier Whipple, 21, of Covelo. According to the female victim Whipple had grabbed her by the hair and pinched her in the back of her head several times. While speaking to the female victim Deputies observed numerous injuries on her that were consistent with her statement. Deputies then responded to Whipple's residence, located at 202 Little Lake Rd at which time Whipple was placed under arrest without incident for domestic violence and violation of probation. Whipple was transported to the Mendocino County jail where he is currently being held on $25,000 bail. It should be noted that the female victim did not require any immediate medical assistance.

JUDGE CANDIDATE KEITH FAULDER told us Thursday that pot growers who apply for licenses under California’s new pot law should be careful about what they write in their applications. Apparently, it’s possible that the federal government could use the pot growing application as tacit admission that the applicant is committing a federal felony — cultivation of a controlled substance.

FAULDER said that at present the feds do not seem to be pushing this angle, but that no one knows where the feds might go in the future. A hard-line administration could use the application to bring a federal case against a grower.

CLERK ACCUSED OF EMBEZZLING $500,000 from Laytonville market claims she was framed by other store employees.

http://www.pressdemocrat.com/news/5524397-181/willits-clerk-takes-stand-in

LOCAL NATIVE AMERICAN PAINTER featured artist at the Mendocino County Museum

An exhibit of abstract paintings by Pete Ethan Castro is now on display at the Mendocino County Museum.

Castro has deep roots in Mendocino County; he was born in Ukiah and is a member of the Wailaki Tribe of Round Valley. For the past three decades he has worked as a traditional Native American scholar, California Indian Basket Weaving artist and contemporary painter — using acrylic, mixed media and abstract forms.

Castro’s striking work reflects his own deeply personal journey and depicts Mendocino County Native American segregation, co-evolution, assimilation, enculturation, art and influence.

As children, both of Castro’s parents were sent to the Round Valley Indian School. His father attended high school at the Sherman Institute of California in Riverside.

One of his paintings, “School Daze — Outside The Box” (36”x48” acrylic on cradled panel board) represents his parents’ experience of forced assimilation. This piece is currently on display at Sacramento’s California Museum, part of its Signature Exhibits.

Some of the paintings that will be on display at the Mendocino County Museum further explore the tension of assimilation, including “Take Off Your Feather and Come Inside” (12”x12” acrylic on canvas), which features an Indian man wearing a fluffy pink apron, posing with a “bulls-eye” lollipop and a red balloon.

In “Evictions & Obituaries” (12”x12” mixed media on canvas), a solitary Native American figure stands in front of blocks of obituary news text, evocative of tenement apartments, recalling the widespread displacement caused by forced relocations and tribal disenrollments.

Three blocks of color fields form “Merge With Caution” (48”x60” mixed media on panel board), Castro’s attempt at reconciling dueling cultural and personal identities.

In 2014, Castro contributed work to the Oakland Museum of California for its California Native Exhibit (deer antler awl with dogbane cordage and abalone shell ornament), and in 2012 his paintings were featured in a solo exhibit at the Risk Press Art Gallery in Sebastopol.

He has partnered with the Cultural Conservancy as the lead builder on the California Canoe Project (traditional Tongva Ti’iat), and his current focus is developing a native grasses/fibers garden to harvest for basket-weaving materials for community artists, tribal elders and himself.

Since returning to Ukiah two years ago, Castro has been sharing his native Wailaki language and offering prayer at community events. He was recently a keynote speaker at Howard Memorial Hospital’s annual Prayer Breakfast and at Ukiah Valley Medical Center’s first and second annual Survivors Reunion.

“Reservations Not Required — Returning Home” is an extension of Woven Worlds, the Museum’s exhibit of Native Peoples of Mendocino County. There is a special space in the exhibit dedicated to showcasing the work of contemporary, local Native American artists.

It is important for any exhibit about California Native Americans to convey that Indians are part of our community today. Native American art is not something only from the past. Highlighting these artists ensures that we help keep traditions and cultures very much alive.

The Mendocino County Museum is at 400 E. Commercial St. in Willits. For more information, call 459-2736, Info@MendocinoMuseum.org, or visit www.MendocinoMuseum.org. The museum is open Wednesday through Sunday, 10 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

CATCH OF THE DAY, April 21, 2016

KENNETH FRAZIER-WHIPPLE, Covelo. Domestic assault, probation revocation.

NICHOLAS HALVORSEN, Fort Bragg. Drunk in public, probation revocation. (Frequent flyer.)

LOUIS HERRERA, Potter Valley. Drunk in public.

RAYMOND JONES, Ukiah. Ex-felon with firearm, ammo possession by prohibited person, loaded firearm in public, concealed weapon, controlled substance, smoking-injecting device, under influence.

INOCENTE MALDONADO, Chicago/Ukiah. Pot cultivation, possession for sale, armed with firearm.

CHERRI MAVIS, Willits. DUI, probation revocation.

RONALD MIHALOVICH, Ukiah. Failure to appear, probation revocation.

CHRISTOPHER THOMAS, Ukiah. Controlled substance, paraphernalia, dirk-dagger.

HARRIDAN

by Jeff Costello

"A vicious and scolding woman, especially an older one." - Online Instant dictionary

"A worn-out horse. A haggard, disreputable shrewish old woman." - Webster's

This is the word that comes to mind on hearing/seeing Hillary speak on the hustings. The raw, hoarse sound of her voice. The nasty finger jabbing. She, in her vast public career, obviously has had many role models and influences as to a speaking/campaigning style. With this, I contend we are seeing beyond merely smug to the "real" Hillary. She gives me the creeps.

With Bernie sinking, and HRC as the "presumptive" nominee (she has always been such from the start as though it was already fixed), I'm again reminded of McGovern in 1972. He was against the war and therefore doomed from the start. It was the last time I cared about voting, and my choice was buried in a Nixon landslide. Things got worse for McGovern when his daughter fell in a snow bank and froze to death after getting drunk at Dick and Dave's Crystal Corner bar in Madison Wisconsin. I used to drink there myself.

In 2004, I voted for Kerry only at the insistence of a friend in Madison. He was so freaked about a second W Bush term, the poor guy went door-to-door until the last minute imploring people to vote for Kerry. He gave me a computer in exchange for my promise to vote Kerry. Fat lot of good that did, but the old Mac was useful while I was shut-in recovering from cancer and severe radiation.

I would vote for Bernie. Otherwise, never mind.

Hillary and the chocolate chip cookies. I think the term "first lady" was repellent to her, and she couldn't help but say so by declaring she wasn't any Tammy Wynette with that "Stand By Your Man" crap. Wynette and her huge fan base were insulted by this, and HRC had to apologize with a recipe for chocolate chip cookies probably right off a Nestle's package. This was too phony for words, but maybe it sort of placated the housewives of the bible belt. I can't say.

Her ambitions, while not entirely clear to the public, were definitely there. A quote from the Clinton white house in the 90's: "I'm not going to have some reporters pawing through our papers. We are the president." Do we have to do this again? I'm not sure there is a lesser evil if Bernie is pushed out.

READY FOR LEGALIZATION: A Chinese corporation just bought a farm with several huge commercial greenhouses in Redwood Valley. It used to be an organic produce and garden nursery. Chinese investors also bought a ranch in Willits because it has a large warehouse for production. We're going to see big money buy up local land, suck up even more of our finite inland water, and send the money home. Supervisor Hamburg, not so incidentally, has hosted delegations of Chinese investors. When furriners buy up a host country the practice is ordinarily resisted as imperialism.

SLOBS MOB GOLDEN GATE PARK FOR 4/20, report from an eyewitness

I was there at around 3:00 pm and here is my take. This is now just one big snapchat or facebook post for the new stoner generations. It seemed most were overweight, liked looking at each other smoke, were not environmentally conscious and most likely didn't have jobs. A bunch of baggy pant, gangsta vibe east bay folks complete with pit bulls, bbqs, beer, booze and the one day of 365 where you can legally smoke in GG park.

Why do you need to be on tv, show everyone your smoking pot on snapchat with thousands of others while in a park is actually making pot looking boring now. In the old days you worked to smoke pot, usually with 1-2 others etc. You would never take off work to go and burn pot while looking at all sorts of folks walk into each other and light up at same time. Well, maybe at a Who concert or something.

Should we have a 3:20 day to where everyone can go smoke a cigarette together and eat up 100K in taxpayer money. Or how about a 5:50 day when everyone goes to the park and drinks beer at the same time.

That's right! What was I thinking? You can do that at the Giants game.

Smoking pot is fine, puff or edible your darn self until your mind is content. I was there to do just that!

But, I would never go back. It should be shut down as it serves no purpose, the taxpayer cost is apparent starting a mile away and you can smoke in your own home or backyard and litter till you drop.

Legalizing it means, there is need to flaunt it, nor smoke it around kids, wreak havoc with a little part of nature in the city, or in a public place full of tourists who spend much more money in the city than any people there etc.

It was stupid. I think the lazy stupid majority of the stoners actually make me want to never smoke it again and that has been 40 years.

WHAT'S WITH THE HILLARY CULT?

As a lifelong Democrat who will be enthusiastically voting for Bernie Sanders in next week’s Pennsylvania primary, I have trouble understanding the fuzzy rosy filter through which Hillary fans see their champion. So much must be overlooked or discounted — from Hillary’s compulsive money-lust and her brazen indifference to normal rules to her conspiratorial use of shadowy surrogates and her sociopathic shape-shifting in policy positions for momentary expedience.

Hillary’s breathtaking lack of concrete achievements or even minimal initiatives over her long public career doesn’t faze her admirers a whit. They have a religious conviction of her essential goodness and blame her blank track record on diabolical sexist obstructionists. When at last week’s debate Hillary crassly blamed President Obama for the disastrous Libyan incursion that she had pushed him into, her acolytes hardly noticed. They don’t give a damn about international affairs — all that matters is transgender bathrooms and instant access to abortion.

I’m starting to wonder, given the increasing dysfunction of our democratic institutions, if the Hillary cult isn’t perhaps registering an atavistic longing for monarchy. Or perhaps it’s just a neo-pagan reversion to idolatry, as can be felt in the Little Italy street festival scene of The Godfather, Part II, where devout pedestrians pin money to the statue of San Rocco as it is carried by in procession.

There was a strange analogy to that last week, when Sanders supporters satirically showered Hillary’s motorcade with dollar bills as she arrived at George Clooney’s luxe fund-raiser in Los Angeles.

The gushy indulgence around Hillary in the Manhattan media was typified by Vanessa Friedman’s New York Times piece, “Hillary Clinton’s Message in a Jacket,” after last week’s debate. Evidently oblivious to how she was undermining the rote sexism plank in the Clinton campaign platform, Friedman praised Hillary for “playing the clothing card” against Sanders: Hillary’s long white jacket made her look like “New York’s white knight,” riding to the rescue.

Gee, that sure wasn’t my reaction. My first thought was: “Why is Hillary wearing a lab coat?” My second was: “Isn’t this a major gaffe—reminding people of abortion clinics?” My third was: “The big belted look is not recommended for those broad in the beam.” For all the complaints about an alleged higher scrutiny suffered by women candidates, affluent politicians like Hillary can afford glam squads of stylists and an infinite range of clothing choices, hairstyles, and cosmetic aids. Male candidates with their boring cropped hair and sober suits fade into the woodwork when the queen bee flies in.

The protective major media phalanx around Hillary certainly extends to her health issues, which only the Drudge Report has had the courage to flag. In assessing possible future occupants of the White House, the public has an inalienable right to know. I was incredulous at the passive gullibility of the media, including the New York Times, last July, when a woman internist, identified as Hillary’s doctor, released a summary letter about her health that was lacking in the specifics one would normally expect in medical records. Does anyone really think that world-renowned Hillary, whose main residence for years has been in Washington and not Chappaqua, has as her primary physician an obscure young internist in Mount Kisco, New York? It’s ludicrous on the face of it.

And what about that persistent cough? “Allergy season,” the hacking Hillary claimed on a New York radio show this week. (“You all right? Any mouth to mouth CPR?” joked a host.) I’m just a Ph.D., not an M.D., but I’ll put my Miss Marple hat on here. Am I the only one who noticed Hillary’s high-wrap collar, pallid, puffy face, and bulging eyes during her choleric New Hampshire primary concession speech in February? (Another unusually high collar followed the next morning.)

My tentative theory is that Hillary may have sporadic flare-ups of goiter, worsened under stress. Coughing is a symptom. High collars mask a swollen throat. In serious cases, an operation may be necessary. Is this chronic thyroid condition disqualifying in a presidential candidate? Certainly not in my view, but I don’t like being lied to—by candidates, campaign staffs, or their media sycophants.

Hillary’s road map to the Democratic nomination was written by “Tricky Dick” Nixon, who after his acrimonious defeat in the 1962 California gubernatorial race doggedly restored his standing in the GOP by doing the “rubber-chicken circuit,” building up the grass-roots connections that allowed him to win the White House six years later.

Similarly, Hillary has spent the years since her 2008 loss to Obama in deepening and tightening her relationships with state and local Democratic politicians, community leaders, and urban ministers nationwide — for whom she has assets of infinite largesse.

When pro-Hillary media taunt Bernie Sanders about what his campaign has or has not financially contributed to lower-level Democratic races, they are foolishly exposing Hillary’s modus operandi. Nixon’s rubber chicken has turned into one mighty gilded bird.

— Camille Paglia

WHO OWNS THE WEATHER?

Editor,

I don't know why you are so adverse to acknowledging some things. But straining my memory I googled "By 2020 we will own the weather" and came up with this official military report published in 1996.

If you don't want to open it here is the executive summary:

Executive Summary

In 2025, US aerospace forces can “own the weather” by capitalizing on emerging technologies and focusing development of those technologies to war-fighting applications. Such a capability offers the war fighter tools to shape the battlespace in ways never before possible. It provides opportunities to impact operations across the full spectrum of conflict and is pertinent to all possible futures. The purpose of this paper is to outline a strategy for the use of a future weather-modification system to achieve military objectives rather than to provide a detailed technical road map. A high-risk, high-reward endeavor, weather-modification offers a dilemma not unlike the splitting of the atom. While some segments of society will always be reluctant to examine controversial issues such as weather-modification, the tremendous military capabilities that could result from this field are ignored at our own peril. From enhancing friendly operations or disrupting those of the enemy via small-scale tailoring of natural weather patterns to complete dominance of global communications and counterspace control, weather-modification offers the war fighter a wide-range of possible options to defeat or coerce an adversary. Some of the potential capabilities a weather-modification system could provide to a war-fighting commander in chief (CINC) are listed in table 1. Technology advancements in five major areas are necessary for an integrated weather-modification capability: (1) advanced nonlinear modeling techniques, (2) computational capability, (3) information gathering and transmission, (4) a global sensor array, and (5) weather intervention techniques. Some intervention tools exist today and others may be developed and refined in the future.

— David Severn, Philo

"I'VE ALWAYS CONSIDERED SLY STONE the greatest musician of the rock/funk age. But I never got to hear the real Sly live. Prince was the living reincarnation of Sly Stone, and probably even more talented.

Like Ray Charles, he could play any instrument and could play in any style. A terrific songwriter, an unparalleled guitarist and the greatest live performer of our time."

— Jeffrey St. Clair

ON LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY

My wife and I shovel $1135 a month down the rathole called ‘Affordable Care’ which features a $6,000 deductible and 50% after that. Clearly a government sanctioned extortion scheme that the Mob would be proud of.

Thankfully she is Swiss and we are moving there very soon. We have simply had enough of this ridiculous bullshit and are voting with our feet.

God only knows what the endgame here will be like. The worst outcome is that it continues in this cynical way.

A RETURN TO FAIRNESS: THE VATICAN SPEECH

by Senator Bernard Sanders

I am honored to be with you today and was pleased to receive your invitation to speak to this conference of The Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences. Today we celebrate the encyclical Centesimus Annus and reflect on its meaning for our world a quarter-century after it was presented by Pope John Paul II. With the fall of Communism, Pope John Paul II gave a clarion call for human freedom in its truest sense: freedom that defends the dignity of every person and that is always oriented towards the common good.

The Church’s social teachings, stretching back to the first modern encyclical about the industrial economy, Rerum Novarum in 1891, to Centesimus Annus, to Pope Francis’s inspiring encyclical Laudato Si’ this past year, have grappled with the challenges of the market economy. There are few places in modern thought that rival the depth and insight of the Church’s moral teachings on the market economy.

Over a century ago, Pope Leo XIII highlighted economic issues and challenges in Rerum Novarum that continue to haunt us today, such as what he called “the enormous wealth of a few as opposed to the poverty of the many.”

And let us be clear. That situation is worse today. In the year 2016, the top one percent of the people on this planet own more wealth than the bottom 99 percent, while the wealthiest 60 people – 60 people – own more than the bottom half – 3 1/2 billion people. At a time when so few have so much, and so many have so little, we must reject the foundations of this contemporary economy as immoral and unsustainable.

The words of Centesimus Annus likewise resonate with us today. One striking example:

Furthermore, society and the State must ensure wage levels adequate for the maintenance of the worker and his family, including a certain amount for savings. This requires a continuous effort to improve workers’ training and capability so that their work will be more skilled and productive, as well as careful controls and adequate legislative measures to block shameful forms of exploitation, especially to the disadvantage of the most vulnerable workers, of immigrants and of those on the margins of society. The role of trade unions in negotiating minimum salaries and working conditions is decisive in this area. (Para 15)

The essential wisdom of Centesimus Annus is this: A market economy is beneficial for productivity and economic freedom. But if we let the quest for profits dominate society; if workers become disposable cogs of the financial system; if vast inequalities of power and wealth lead to marginalization of the poor and the powerless; then the common good is squandered and the market economy fails us. Pope John Paul II puts it this way: profit that is the result of “illicit exploitation, speculation, or the breaking of solidarity among working people . . . has not justification, and represents an abuse in the sight of God and man.” (Para 43).

We are now 25 years after the fall of Communist rule in Eastern Europe. Yet we have to acknowledge that Pope John Paul’s warnings about the excesses of untrammeled finance were deeply prescient. Twenty-five years after Centesimus Annus, speculation, illicit financial flows, environmental destruction, and the weakening of the rights of workers is far more severe than it was a quarter century ago. Financial excesses, indeed widespread financial criminality on Wall Street, played a direct role in causing the world’s worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.

We need a political analysis as well as a moral and anthropological analysis to understand what has happened since 1991. We can say that with unregulated globalization, a world market economy built on speculative finance burst through the legal, political, and moral constraints that had once served to protect the common good. In my country, home of the world’s largest financial markets, globalization was used as a pretext to deregulate the banks, ending decades of legal protections for working people and small businesses. Politicians joined hands with the leading bankers to allow the banks to become “too big to fail.” The result: eight years ago the American economy and much of the world was plunged into the worst economic decline since the 1930s. Working people lost their jobs, their homes and their savings, while the government bailed out the banks.

Inexplicably, the United States political system doubled down on this reckless financial deregulation, when the US Supreme Court in a series of deeply misguided decisions, unleashed an unprecedented flow of money into American politics. These decisions culminated in the infamous Citizens United case, which opened the financial spigots for huge campaign donations by billionaires and large corporations to turn the U.S. political system to their narrow and greedy advantage. It has established a system in which billionaires can buy elections. Rather than an economy aimed at the common good, we have been left with an economy operated for the top 1 percent, who get richer and richer as the working class, the young and the poor fall further and further behind. And the billionaires and banks have reaped the returns of their campaign investments, in the form of special tax privileges, imbalanced trade agreements that favor investors over workers, and that even give multinational companies extra-judicial power over governments that are trying to regulate them.

But as both Pope John Paul II and Pope Francis have warned us and the world, the consequences have been even direr than the disastrous effects of financial bubbles and falling living standards of working-class families. Our very soul as a nation has suffered as the public lost faith in political and social institutions. As Pope Francis has stated: “Man is not in charge today, money is in charge, money rules.” And the Pope has also stated: “We have created new idols. The worship of the golden calf of old has found a new and heartless image in the cult of money and the dictatorship of an economy which is faceless and lacking any truly humane goal.”

And further: “While the income of a minority is increasing exponentially, that of the majority is crumbling. This imbalance results from ideologies which uphold the absolute autonomy of markets and financial speculation, and thus deny the right of control to States, which are themselves charged with providing for the common good.”

Pope Francis has called on the world to say: “No to a financial system that rules rather than serves” in Evangeli Gaudium. And he called upon financial executives and political leaders to pursue financial reform that is informed by ethical considerations. He stated plainly and powerfully that the role of wealth and resources in a moral economy must be that of servant, not master.

The widening gaps between the rich and poor, the desperation of the marginalized, the power of corporations over politics, is not a phenomenon of the United States alone. The excesses of the unregulated global economy have caused even more damage in the developing countries. They suffer not only from the boom-bust cycles on Wall Street, but from a world economy that puts profits over pollution, oil companies over climate safety, and arms trade over peace. And as an increasing share of new wealth and income goes to a small fraction of those at the top, fixing this gross inequality has become a central challenge. The issue of wealth and income inequality is the great economic issue of our time, the great political issue of our time, and the great moral issue of our time. It is an issue that we must confront in my nation and across the world.

Pope Francis has given the most powerful name to the predicament of modern society: the Globalization of Indifference. “Almost without being aware of it,” he noted, “we end up being incapable of feeling compassion at the outcry of the poor, weeping for other people’s pain, and feeling a need to help them, as though all this were someone else’s responsibility and not our own.” We have seen on Wall Street that financial fraud became not only the norm but in many ways the new business model. Top bankers have shown no shame for their bad behavior and have made no apologies to the public. The billions and billions of dollars of fines they have paid for financial fraud are just another cost of doing business, another short cut to unjust profits.

Some might feel that it is hopeless to fight the economic juggernaut, that once the market economy escaped the boundaries of morality it would be impossible to bring the economy back under the dictates of morality and the common good. I am told time and time again by the rich and powerful, and the mainstream media that represent them, that we should be “practical,” that we should accept the status quo; that a truly moral economy is beyond our reach. Yet Pope Francis himself is surely the world’s greatest demonstration against such a surrender to despair and cynicism. He has opened the eyes of the world once again to the claims of mercy, justice and the possibilities of a better world. He is inspiring the world to find a new global consensus for our common home.

I see that hope and sense of possibility every day among America’s young people. Our youth are no longer satisfied with corrupt and broken politics and an economy of stark inequality and injustice. They are not satisfied with the destruction of our environment by a fossil fuel industry whose greed has put short term profits ahead of climate change and the future of our planet. They want to live in harmony with nature, not destroy it. They are calling out for a return to fairness; for an economy that defends the common good by ensuring that every person, rich or poor, has access to quality health care, nutrition and education.

As Pope Francis made powerfully clear last year in Laudato Si’, we have the technology and know-how to solve our problems – from poverty to climate change to health care to protection of biodiversity. We also have the vast wealth to do so, especially if the rich pay their way in fair taxes rather than hiding their funds in the world’s tax and secrecy havens- as the Panama Papers have shown.

The challenges facing our planet are not mainly technological or even financial, because as a world we are rich enough to increase our investments in skills, infrastructure, and technological know-how to meet our needs and to protect the planet. Our challenge is mostly a moral one, to redirect our efforts and vision to the common good. Centesimus Annus, which we celebrate and reflect on today, and Laudato Si’, are powerful, eloquent and hopeful messages of this possibility. It is up to us to learn from them, and to move boldly toward the common good in our time.

(This is the prepared text of the address that Senator Bernard Sanders delivered on April 15 at a meeting of the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences.)

ALBERT HOFFMAN TAKES THE FIRST LSD ACID TRIP

73 years ago yesterday, Albert Hoffman discovered LSD — or rather experienced its effects after an accidental dose:

“Last Friday, April 16, 1943, I was forced to interrupt my work in the laboratory in the middle of the afternoon and proceed home, being affected by a remarkable restlessness, combined with a slight dizziness. At home I lay down and sank into a not unpleasant, intoxicated-like condition characterized by an extremely stimulated imagination. In a dreamlike state, with eyes closed (I found the daylight to be unpleasantly glaring), I perceived an uninterrupted stream of fantastic pictures, extraordinary shapes with intense, kaleidoscopic play of colors. After some two hours this condition faded away.”

After intentionally taking the drug again to confirm that it had caused this strange physical and mental state, Dr. Hoffman published a report announcing his discovery, and so LSD made its entry into the world as an hallucinogenic drug.

Rob Anderson (Courtesy, District5Diary)

THE TRUTH IS THE TRUTH

AVA,

What you won't read in the mainstream and most of the alternative media, including Democracy Now!

Besides the Palestinians and Lebanese, how many people have had to die, or have had their careers destroyed in order to appease "Jewish sensibiities?" The truth about the truth it seems is that it is "antisemitic" to tell it.

Jeff Blankfort, Ukiah

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Mondoweiss April 19, 2016

'Forward' columnist and Emily’s List leader relate ‘gigantic,’ ‘shocking’ role of Jewish Democratic donors

Philip Weiss

This is important, and a lot of people are passing it around: video of two political veterans describing the overwhelming role of Jewish money on the Democratic side of US politics.

The scene was a J Street panel Sunday night about the 2016 election at the Sixth and I Synagogue in Washington, and the dialogue began when Roger Cohen of the New York Times asked J.J. Goldberg of the Forward (at 44:00) to explain the importance of “funding” to pro-Israel politics.

Video: Opening Night: Pundits, Pollsters And Politicos

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DnJrYrBhR9s

“Funding?” Goldberg gave a little uncomfortable laugh then said:

“Up until recently I was under the impression that the Democrats had to go to Jews. You ask a Democratic fundraiser, where do you get the money from? “Well from trial lawyers, from toys, from generic drugs, from Hollywood. From Jews.” Those are all essentially Jewish industries… When you are raising money, you need to find rich people who are not right wing, and there are not – pardon me for saying this, there are not many rich /goyim/ who are not right wing. Forgive me for saying that.”

Then Goldberg said he had just read something “that knocked my socks off.”

The Center for Responsive Politics

<https://www.opensecrets.org/outsidespending/summ.php?disp=D>

issued a list of the top 50 donors to 527’s and super-PACs, and eight of the 36 Republican bigs were Jewish, and of the 14 Democrats, only one was not Jewish.

EARN CONTINUING EDUCATION UNITS

27th Annual Mendocino Coast Writers Conference

August 4-6, 2016

Classroom teachers who attend MCWC may opt-in for 2 or 3 CEUs while you learn strategies to write, revise, and publish your literary work. Attend 20 hours of workshops and seminars with visiting authors and publishing professionals. To earn 2 CEUs, you will turn in a log sheet of your activities. If you want to earn 3 CEUs, you’ll also create a brief self-evaluation and prepare a lesson plan based on writing strategies learned during the conference. This assignment is due not later than 10 days following the conference. All units will be awarded on a P/F basis. Questions? info@mcwc.org. Registration is open March 15 thru July 25: www.mcwc.org Work closely with award-winning authors: Jessica Piazza, Reyna Grande, Lori Ostlund, Jordan Rosenfeld, James W. Hall, Les Standiford, Laura Atkins, Emily Lloyd-Jones, Marian Palaia, Heather Mackey, Hi-Dong Chai. Agents and editors: Lisa Abellera, Andy Ross, Grant Faulkner (NaNoWriMo), and Brooke Warner (She Writes Press). Intensive morning workshops, afternoon craft seminars, manuscript consultations, pitch panels, open mic, contests, and social events. Most meals included! Develop your craft at the Mendocino Coast Writers Conference, where emerging and established writers find expertise, encouragement, and inspiration in a fabulous coastal setting. Financial aid applications due by May 15. Take your imagination to summer camp at the Mendocino Coast Writers Conference! www.mcwc.org

NYE RANCH!

Nye Ranch Farm Stand open Sat/Sun!

Mendocino Coast community, come visit the Farm Stand at the Nye Ranch (2 miles north of Fort Bragg on Highway 1)!!! My partner and I have been busy since October shaping a new small farm on the beautiful soil at the historic Nye Ranch. We will be attending Fort Bragg and Mendocino Farmer's Market starting in May, but we have some delicious early greens available now! Green Garlic, Red Russian Kale, Toscano Kale, Scarlet Red Kale, Redbor Kale, Pac Choi/Bak Choi, Hon Tsai Tai(mustard greens), and Tatsoi! As the weeks progress we'll have more vegetable varieties as well as Cut-Flower Bouquets. Open Saturday & Sunday 10am-6pm. The Farm Stand is a self-serve honor system, but if you have any questions we'll be close by in the field. Thank you, we are so excited to be providing nutritious local vegetables for the community! https://www.facebook.com/thenyeranch

Kyle Forrest Burns & Melanie MacTavish
Nye Ranch
23300 N. Hwy 1 Fort Bragg
NyeRanchFarm@gmail.com

CRAIG SEZ, 'DON'T BE FOOLED BY THE BIG SHOTS.'

Example: Form Letter for Emergency Eco-Defense Fundraising

Warm spiritual greetings to all sincere planet earth eco-defenders. Sometimes, I do wonder if you are really, really straight up with your own senses. How could anyone keep trusting people, and at the end lose the hard earned money? Are you being deceived by their big names? They impersonate on many levels, claiming to be Governors, Directors/Chairmen of one agency or another. Their game plan is to extort your hard earned money. Now, the question is how long you will continue to be deceived? Sometimes, they will issue you a fake check, introduce you to fake diplomatic delivery, UN-existing on-line banking and they will also fake wire transfer your fund with Payment Stop Order and even send you a fake ATM card. Anyway, by the virtue of our unique position we have been following this from its inception, and all your efforts towards realizing ultimate satisfaction is our concern too. More often than not, we sit down and laugh at your ignorance and at those who claim they are assisting you. It is very unfortunate that in the end you always lose. Although I don't blame you because you are not here in the Manhattan wilderness to witness the processing of your targeting, the problem you are having is that you have been told the whole truth about a certain transaction, and it is because of this truth that the anthropomorphics decided to extort your money. The most annoying part is that even gas-frackers have taken advantage of this opportunity to enrich themselves at your expense. Those whom you feel are assisting or working for you are your main problem. I know the truth surrounding any scheme of a payment, and we really are the only tendency who will deliver you from this long suffering, if you will abide by our advice. I also know that recently you have been dealing with people claiming to be the FERC. They claim that they are helping to enlighten you and get your cooperation for the good of the world economy. At the end they do nothing about the energy companies. Do not keep paying any money to them in taxes, because they are only interested in assisting energy companies with keeping the overseas market shares. It's all in service to global capitalism, which requires more and more inflation and regional wars for its own growth. You must understand this. You will never see a re-stabilized global climate by cooperating with them. Stop smoking your homegrown, turn off the television, and take a plunge in a cold river, okay? And if you are nearer to saltwater, even better. ~wake up while you still have time to do something spiritually wise for mother earth~ Please, I beseech you to stop the pursuit of shadows and being deceived by earth rapers and their venture capitalist partners. Feel free to contact Earth First! immediately as you receive this electronic message. Read the current 88 page Earth First! Journal, and share it with your friends. Contact the annual summer gathering organizers, this year in Michigan, and obtain updates at the Earth First! Newswire. Do not panic, and be rest assured that you will be guided by your inner core Spiritual self.