Mendocino County Today: Saturday, Nov. 3, 2018

• Red Flag
• Time Change
• Haschak Letter
• Yokayo Bowl
• Supes Notes
• Little Dog
• Beer&Shrooms
• Harvest Celebration
• FB Website
• Swan Rescue
• Jesus Wanted
• Salary Caps
• Yesterday's Catch
• FrankenTrump
• Barackstitution
• Cohen Memories
• Only One
• Rent Control
• Jack o'Cat
• National Tragedy
• Sufficiently Despise
• Dem Rhetoric
• Death
• Words/Deeds
• Fear/Hate
• Survival
• HST Book
• Well Trained
• Dem Platform
• Will Trade
• Midterm Endgame
• Hobgoblin
• Marco Radio
• Corruption
• Unblock Yaz
• Nazi Advice
• H&P

RED FLAG WARNING ISSUED FOR NORTH BAY MOUNTAINS

The combination of high winds and warm weather across the North Bay this weekend amid a dry start to fall have increased the threat poised by wildfire, leading forecasters and fire officials to raise a now all-too-familiar alarm. Winds out of the northeast were expected to kick up starting late Friday into early Saturday, with speeds up to 30 mph and gusts up to 60 mph at the highest elevations, said Anna Schneider, a National Weather Service meteorologist.

pressdemocrat.com/news/8905567-181/red-flag-warning-issued-for

HASCHAK’S APPEAL

Editor,

Open Letter To Voters Of The Third District

As I have campaigned this past year for Third District Supervisor of Mendocino County, I have had the great privilege of meeting many amazing people with a wide range of talents and opinions, discussing with them key issues facing our district and county, and sharing our dreams and visions for a better future. I am constantly in awe of this place we call home.

I believe we have many strengths to face the daunting challenges ahead. As a public school teacher for 28 years, I look at what we are doing well, what needs fixing, and always how can we do things better. Our economy, emergency preparedness, and governance are areas where we can do much better. You can find my specific platform positions on these issues at haschakforsupervisor.org.

I believe that when we work together, we are better, stronger, and can do so much more. At this time of limited county revenues, I will work with the other Supervisors to figure out creative ways to do more with less and deliver improved public services to all the residents of Mendocino County. My experience chairing the Budget Committee of the California Teachers Association’s $200 million budget will serve me well in prioritizing how taxpayer dollars are used.

My opponent has attacked me for being supported by the working women and men of the In Home Health Care, County Employees, and Teachers unions. Of course these rank and file workers support me. I have pledged not to take the 40% raise the Supervisors voted for themselves while raises for 80% of the county employees who actually deliver county services have been repeatedly put on hold. The Ukiah Daily Journal has endorsed me, recognizing my union connections as a positive that could be a healing force on the Board of Supervisors.

My promise to the voters of the Third District is to listen to your concerns and to work as hard as I can to act for the benefit of all. Together we can strengthen our communities. I have been endorsed by Congressman Jared Huffman, State Senator Mike McGuire, State Assemblyman Jim Wood, Willits Mayor Madge Strong, Brooktrails President Rick Williams, Richard Wilson of Covelo, Dennis Hogan of Laytonville and many others because they all see me as honest and sensible, a hard worker, and ready to take on the responsibilities of this position. I ask for your vote on Nov. 6.

John Haschak

Willits

* * *

MARK SCARAMELLA NOTES: Mr. Haschak’s platform is light on specifics. He wants economic and job opportunities, road improvements, natural resource protection, common sense cannabis regulation, and sound fiscal management and transparency — but no specifics, no references to existing shortfalls that need improvement, no suggestions for how to fund any of it…

There’s one relatively specific idea: development of “a strong disaster preparedness plan,” but Haschak doesn’t say who would be responsible for doing that. Off hand, while we agree with the idea in the abstract, we have no idea who might even be asked to do it. If Mendo can’t even figure out how to handle its existing emergency services administration responsibilities, what makes Haschak think that they could assemble a comprehensive disaster preparedness plan?

Haschak’s platform is generic motherhood with clichés passing as actual proposals.

PS. The prominent placement of endorsements from the lightest of lightweight local pols — State Senator Mike McGuire and Assemblymember Jim Wood — makes Haschack sound like a Democratic Party candidate for an office that should be non-partisan. If Haschak thinks that endorsements from these two constitutes a reason to vote for him, then the bar for County Supervisor has gone way to low.

Haschack’s other “endorsements” are all empty references to things like “he listens,” “he cares,” he’s “honest,” he has “skills that will translate seamlessly into the job of County Supervisor…” He’s probably a nice guy too, although no one seems to employ that one.

In his official campaign statements Haschak has carefully avoided taking positions on things like water policy, juvenile hall, law enforcement in Covelo, Measure B and Old Howard Hospital, the Mental Health Service monopoly, housing, executive pay, and a number of other issues which might distinguish him from Pinches or other supervisors.

In short, he’s perfect for a large chunk of Third District voters and knows how to be as neutral as the electorate wants him to be.

Spare the Lanes

(via MendocinoSportsPlus)

SUPES NOTES

* * *

BRINGING BACK MARCIA

Supervisors Agenda, November 6, 2018

Agenda Item 5b

(Something tells us this has more to do with drawing down grant funds than it does with helping people with substance abuse problems.)

Discussion and Possible Approval of the Appointment of Marcia Bonnette as Temporary Help to Fulfill Critically Needed Duties after Her Retirement, Pursuant to Government Code (GC) 7522.56 (Sponsor: Health and Human Services Agency)

Honorable Board of Supervisors

County of Mendocino

RE: Extra Help Need

Dear Board Members:

Substance Abuse Treatment Supervisor, Marcia Bonnette, retired in June 2018, leaving a position vacant within Substance Use Disorders Treatment (SUDT) that increased the count of already-existing SUDT vacancies to seven. Vacancies of this kind are troubling for the Health and Human Services Agency for several very important reasons: First, due to a shortage of SUDT Counselors, Mendocino County has residents seeking help whom the Health and Human Services Agency cannot serve. This is particularly concerning because SUDT Counselors deliver services that help clients address substance use disorders, which allows clients to move toward creating and maintaining a healthy, balanced lifestyle free of alcohol and other drug use. Without ready availability of SUDT services, clients do not have access to resources that could positively impact their lives.

In addition to the human costs, vacancies within SUDT affect the Health and Human Services Agency's ability to fulfill grant deliverables. This ultimately results in decreased revenue for SUDT programs, many of which are grant-funded.

Unfortunately, SUDT vacancies have historically been difficult to fill. This plight continued in the last round of hiring when, despite extensive recruitment, there were few applicants. To address this issue, the Health and Human Services Agency and Human Resources are looking at revision of mandatory SUDT Counselor qualifications to ensure recruitment of the maximum number of applicants who meet California's Drug Medi-Cal billing regulations.

Hiring challenges aside, the Health and Human Services Agency's ongoing goal is to fill existing vacancies quickly. To that end, the Health and Human Services Agency requests approval for Marcia Bonnette to return as an extra help employee prior to the 180-day waiting period. This request is made in accordance with Government Code Section 7522.56.

Thank you,

Anne Molgaard, Chief Operations Officer

Health and Human Services Agency

* * *

POT PERMIT UPDATE (from the agenda packet for the November 6, 2018 Supes Meeting)

Commissioners Report-2

(Note again that they’ve stopped including the number of permits applied for or approved since the last report.)

* * *

HERE’S A BIT OF SERIOUS IRONY from Mendo’s “Leadership Team.”

Agenda Item 5f on Tuesday’s Board of Supes agenda: Discussion and Possible Action Including Acceptance of Informational Presentation of the County Leadership Initiative by Representatives of the County Leadership Team (Sponsors: Executive Office and Human Resources) Recommended Action: Accept the informational presentation of the County Leadership Initiative by representatives of the County Leadership team; and provide direction as appropriate.

With attachments entitled:

communication

customer service

economic development

employee engagement

operational processes

performance plan

recruitment

leadership history

leadership philosophy

Leadership Presentation 11.6.18

In spite of the agenda title — “Informational Presentation” — the list of fancy titles has no “information” in it at all. It’s just a bunch of lists of county employees who have been assembled under the subject heading. The last one is our favorite.

Under the even more ironic title “Work of Leadership,” we find that their “work” is:

Leadership Reading Group

High Performance Organization Training

Leadership Development Regional Training

Expanded Leadership Quarterly Meetings

Leadership Webpage

Development of Mendocino County Executive Leadership Team (MCELT)

Development of 7 Work Teams

Keynote Address- David Marquet

Hey! They left off a few!

• Leadership Leadership
• Leadership wine tastings
• Leadership Lunch
• Leadership Promotions and Pay Raises
• Leadership Retirement Planning
• Leadership Benefit Packages
• Leadership Travel Expenses
• Leadership Responsibility Avoidance
• Meaningless Leadership Buzzwords

* * *

JUST WHEN WE THOUGHT we might get through a Supervisors agenda package without seeing an unexplained retroactive contract approval we came across Item 4p:

“Approval of Retroactive Revenue Agreement with the U.S. Army Corp of Engineers in the Amount of $618,513.40 for a Four Year Term Effective September 26, 2018, for Law Enforcement Patrols at the Lake Mendocino Campgrounds and Recreational Areas”

Not that this is a problem per se, but all retroactive contracts should at least have an explanation. But it is interesting that Mendo is farming out Lake Mendo Law Enforcement to the Army Corps. You’d think that before it was approved the Sheriff and/or Ukiah Police might have something to say about it in advance. But we see no evidence of that; no indication that the terms of the contract are satisfactory to the DA or the Sheriff. (Although the agenda item is listed under “Sheriff-Coroner.”) It looks like the item is actually for about $137k per year for year one, then increasing for up to four years. In addition, we can’t tell if there’s a comparable reduction in the Sheriff’s budget to cover the contract cost. On its face, it looks like yet another expense without revenues to cover it. And again, there’s no explanation why this couldn’t have come before the board before it was approved.

* * *

MENDOCINOSPORTSPLUS filmed the Thursday meeting at the Manchester Community Room where Sheriff Allman and County Transportation Director Howard Dashiell. At one point MSP’s Paul McCarthy, calling it a “rumor” — not attributing it to Third District Supervisor candidate John Pinches (who made the claim), asked Dashiell if it was true that the County had raided the road budget to make up the cannabis permit program deficit (the program is at least $1 million in the red). Dashiell replied that “core” road funds cannot be reallocated to any other purposes, but that perhaps some “discrectionary” funds that had been provided for road maintenance previously were not being provided this year because of the several budget deficits that the County has incurred (not just in the pot program). Dashiell said that Mendo gets 0.003% of the gas tax which must be spent on road maintenance, adding that if State Proposition 6 passes next Tuesday Mendo would suffer a cut of as much as half of that.

(Mark Scaramella)

LITTLE DOG SAYS, “Skrag is bad mouthing my new relationship. ‘You got a real Mutt and Jeffella going there, LD. Good luck’!"

5PM SATURDAY: BARS, BORDELLOS, MUSHROOMS & ALE!

Please join us tonight (Saturday) from 5-7PM for "Bars, Bordellos, Mushrooms & Ale." Enjoy artisan mushroom appetizers like candy cap glazed nuts and Boletus sauerkraut, complimentary wine, a wild mushroom presentation, beer tasting of the award-winning Frolic Scottish Wee Ale, and a performance by Madame Kate and her entourage that will make you laugh until you cry. Admission for adults only is $25. For more information or to get your tickets, drop by the Kelley House Museum today until 5pm or call 707-937-5791. Advance tickets recommended. Tickets available at the door until capacity is reached.

Bars, Bordellos, Mushrooms & AleSaturday, November 3, 5-7pm

https://www.kelleyhousemuseum.org/mushrooms

FORT BRAGG’S NEW WEBSITE:

city.fortbragg.com/ArchiveCenter/ViewFile/Item/890

SAVING THE SWAN

Editor,

Halloween festivities with friends started in FB, and after dinner at Over Time Brewing it was time to head to Mendocino for circus-mecca and fire dancers. The skies were still glowing with glimmering layers of pink and blue swirls, but it was definitely dusk. As we approached Jug handle, I noticed a bird flying right over the highway - my friend Rebecca mentioned that she had seen that before. Apparently birds will often follow the lines on the road. The wing span on this creature was huge which made it both fascinating and surreal at the same time. There wasn't hardly any traffic, and I'm guessing I was going around 50, when in the blink of an eye, this magnificent creature came pummeling out of the sky and landed, hard, right in front of my car. It wasn't more than another few seconds than both Rebecca and I realized it was a Swan. She was out of the car before I had completely stopped - I put on my emergency blinkers and thus began the rescue of this Creature from Heaven. It was badly stunned and obviously in total shock - it had hit the power lines traveling, I'm guessing, somewhere between 45 and 50 miles an hour. Once we were able to herd it to safety in the grasses, I got a blanket and Rebecca wrapped it up. It was still trying to catch it's breath and had it's head tucked into that classic arch. We were completely perplexed as to what to do. I tried to call Ronnie James, but didn't have any service - so it was decided we'd try to load it into the back of my car and take it to a friends that had some pens where it should be safe from predators. Nope, it didn't want to be picked up. It stood up again after resting for about 20 minutes and started walking, albeit very wobbly, toward the driveway just off the Caspar exit. We noticed another pair of eyeballs glowing in the dark and felt so much fear and concern for this beautiful Animal. It was huge by the way, absolutely breathtaking to be so close. It didn't seem alarmed to be stroked and cared for....I'm sure it sensed the love and compassion We stood and waited another 15 or twenty minutes when all of a sudden it took flight! We both gasped sighs of relief but stood clutching our hearts as it flew below the power lines toward the Jug handle Farm, and then South until we could no longer see it. We knew it was out of it's element and could not understand where it would be flying at dusk. From where was it coming and to where was it headed? The Caspar Pond - of course, that must be it! We jumped back into the car and through the misty early evening darkness, with the assistance of my large mag-lite, did see one lone swan. We stood there quite a while trying to understand just what had occurred, and were we imagining this Swan on the pond or did he really make it? P.S. Thank you listers, apparently there is a lone swan that makes it way between a small pond on Simpson Lane over to the Caspar Pond. Sometimes it only stays or a day, sometimes for a week or two. Now it is all making better sense. I'm guessing he left the pond close to the round-a-bout and was headed to the Caspar pond when he so tragically had his accident. The good new is that I just spoke to a woman that saw the swan yesterday, fed him, and felt that while he did seem to be tired or weak, was swimming and eating. It seems my Halloween Nurse's costume, along with a stethoscope around my neck was meant to be. Thank you to all my wonderful neighbors for responding to my swan inquiry. I plan to drive over and see him today - if you see him, at either pond, do keep us posted, please!

Vanna K. Freeberg, Proprietor, Elope Mendocino

ART YOUNG'S CLASSIC JESUS CHRIST

SALARY CAPS

Editor,

There have several instances of big raises for the already generously paid management employees of the City of Ukiah and Mendocino County. These studies and been skewed by comparison with the salaries of Santa Rosa and Sonoma County—much bigger governments with bigger responsibilities. At the same time salary increases for rank and file employees are put off. The solution to this inequity would be to put on the ballot resolutions to place a maximum limit on the ratio between the management salaries and rank and file salaries.

Janet Freeman

Ukiah

CATCH OF THE DAY, November 2, 2018

DONALD BOWMAN, Fort Bragg. Controlled substance for sale, conspiracy.

ROBERT BRITTON, Ukiah. DUI-drugs & alcohol.

TRISHA BURRIS, Eureka/Ukiah. Refuse disposal in state waters, disobeying court order.

MASON COGGINS, Kona, Hawaii/Ukiah. Vandalism.

GONZALO GUIJARRO-GARCIA-DELEANIZ, Madrid, Spain/Ukiah. DUI.

KYLE JENNINGS, Hamilton, Montana/Willits. DUI.

ISAIAH LOPEZ-MIRANDA, Ukiah. DUI, suspended license, controlled substance.

RENEE OLIVER, Covelo. Disobeying court order.

JONATHAN ZACK, Ukiah. Disorderly conduct-alcohol, probation revocation.

THE REAL TRUMP

To the editor

Our collective tolerance for and acceptance of the current atmosphere of political extremism is nurtured and molded by what we hear and see on the nightly news. The owners of these national news outlets are, after all, businessmen and a little fascism is always good for business.

They believe that they're adequately managing the situation, but it's beginning to escape their control. What these media based king-makers should pause to consider is that, despite their indisputable influence, all of their power and profits are ultimately derived from a system of laws that have been carefully crafted to serve their own interests. If an out of control demagoguery succeeds in collapsing the rule of law, their empires will fall with it. It has become time for our corporate media to cease enabling a raging demagogue of instability by continuing to portray him within the context of the political norm. He is not just a rashly inept and ill-informed executive floundering amid the chaos of a failed Presidential administration.

They need to begin reporting him for what he has actually become, the public face of a dangerously vicious and lawless White Supremacy Movement who is operating from a position of power outside of the legitimate Constitutional constraints of his elected office. He can still be stopped, but only by the same people who created him.

Michael DeLang, Coal Creek Canyon, Colorado

PS. to Mr. Philbrick: You are clearly very frustrated and angry. So am I. But you should slow down a bit, dial down the anger and hatred, and try to think things out more clearly. I suspect that you're too decent a man to actually want all of the actions you've been saying you want. Your man, Trump, is really neither the solution nor the problem.

“Just tell me which part Obama wrote.”

PRESIDENT TRUMP once told his former personal attorney Michael Cohen that he thinks black people are “too stupid” to vote for him, Vanity Fair reports. Cohen told the magazine that shortly after Trump was elected, he pointed out to his then-boss that the crowd at a recent rally was mostly white. “Trump responded, ‘That’s because black people are too stupid to vote for me’,” Cohen said. Cohen also claimed that after Nelson Mandela’s death, Trump asked him to “Name one country run by a black person that’s not a shithole.” During another conversation, Cohen said Trump remarked that “only the blacks could live like this” as they drove through a “rougher” Chicago neighborhood in the early 2000s. In addition, Cohen claimed Trump said he denied investment manager Kwame Jackson the win on The Apprentice’s first season because there was no way he could “let this black fag win.” The White House did not respond to the magazine’s requests for comment.

(TheDailyBeast)

YES ON RENT CONTROL

Editor:

As a Montgomery High alumnus currently studying housing policy at UCLA, I was disappointed with the recent editorial in the Press Democrat opposing Proposition 10.

The housing crisis cannot be reduced to a simple problem of insufficient supply. Millions of Californians are unable to pay the rent. This affordability crisis won’t be solved with an influx of market-rate units.

Renters make up more than 60 percent of the population of our largest cities and are receiving untenable rent increases at an alarming rate. Displacing renters (including teachers, nurses and most millennials) destabilizes local economies, as workers are pushed farther away from jobs, and exacerbates the homelessness crisis.

Increasing the housing supply remains a priority, but in cities with majority renter populations, ensuring the protection of these residents requires urgent action. The leaders of San Francisco, Oakland, Berkeley and Los Angeles support Proposition 10 because they are restricted by Costa-Hawkins from enacting meaningful tenant protections. It is a failed, one-size-fits-all law obstructing local action.

Rent control may not be a priority for most Sonoma County voters, but we shouldn’t prevent larger cities from protecting renters and addressing homelessness in their communities. Voting yes on Proposition 10 is an essential step in addressing our state’s housing crisis.

Meg Healy

Los Angeles

OAK STREET BLUES

by Bruce Brady

My father worked from Roosevelt to Reagan as a civilian employee (GS-15, finally) until he retired and moved to the relative peacefulness of nearby Georgetown, not far from California's gold discovery site. While working, he was concerned enough by appearances that he once explained patiently to me that I'd need to stop leaving 'Daily Worker' newspapers on the coffee table in case his boss ever stopped to say `Hello' and came to some dark and unjustified conclusion. I don't remember that his boss ever did stop by, but I wonder how that conversation might go should I somehow find myself trying to explain what the hell, in the intervening seventy years or so, had happened.

My dad maneuvered a Caterpillar tractor on a series of Pacific islands, 'dozing landing strips on the beaches while the troops were still at it just beyond the treeline. His ship was staging in Leyte harbor, in the Philippines, for the expected invasion of Japan when it was hit by a kamikaze near Hiroshima, interrupting a Sunday morning poker game, and earning him a Purple Heart. As most others (on both sides, I am pretty sure) this was not especially heroic. It was just what you did when you fought for your version of The Man.

So I imagine trying to explain how we got into the present discordant mess since he died thirty years ago. Preparing for this, I listened to Rachel Maddow to check in, as it were. Across the country, in large ways and small, the Nazis are . . . well . . . being Nazis, waving flags and being total in-your-face assholes who threaten us all. And the worse part is that our current national karma has us 'led' by an obviously mentally ill, uneducated moron. I made it for twelve minutes before I turned Rachel off in favor of the dinnertime traffic outside.

The America of easy, Norman Rockwell patriotism which bouyed the self-proclaimed Greatest Generation into the suburbs newly building for them is crumbling before our eyes. In fact, it is being beaten and gang raped and brutally dismembered with a half-assed, rusty chainsaw, and the daily realities are awful to watch. About half and hour ago, I spent a few minutes again listening to the news, this time CNN, in preparation for getting back to this journalistic masterpiece. The news is, predictably just like every other morning, even worse than it was last night. President Cheeto is now threatening to alter our basic (and simple) definition of who gets to be an American; he is sending a few thousand troops, some of them armed, to close off our southern border against the hoard of approaching brownish people fleeing the chaos we have largely caused, and he is today forcing himself on most of the citizens of Pittsburgh, awkwardly mirroring Bill Cosby. Again -- this is not the America my father risked his life for seventy years ago, and it is not the America I came over time to love.

We are (or at least I am) virtually forced to re-examine the thing itself: the many facets of our concept of our country and our place in it. An interesting and useful way to do this is to contemplate The Star Spangled Banner, the bombs bursting in air and so on. The America called forth by the expensive (a reported $60k/hour per plane) flyovers before kickoff brings forth a slight increase in height and proud, sentimental tears in many. This is a radically different conception of where the Creator has landed us than that called forth by Woodie Guthrie's This Land Is Your Land, and the dramatic contrast between the two exquisitely lays bare the extent of our present, our absurd national tragedy.

Those (like me) who lean rather strongly toward Woody's song to his America are responding to -- usually unnoted -- the words and tune of a vagrant, an itinerant who survived and (for awhile) flourished on the innate goodwill and broad vision of its poorest people. This vision was familiar to Lewis and Clark, John Wesley Powell, Johnny Appleseed -- even the racist John Muir. This is our land, and the vision that commonly arises is expansive. Generally, it abhors sidewalks in favor of grand landscapes, wild rivers instead of dams. I have singled out John Muir, genocidally dismissive of those 'Digger Indians' who had the final misfortune to live where he loved, but in fact his is arguably one of the four or five generations most responsible for one of the world's most brutal (and successful) genocides. At least to date.

The Star Spangled Banner celebrates none of this. Instead of the various versions of natural beauty in Guthrie's anthem, we get bombs bursting in air (not to mention them bursting amidst all the people down there) and all the rest of it, pretty exclusively drawn from the drama of the martial. In its way, the perfect pre-game blending of a blood sport and a certain kind of patriotism. Sixty thousand dollars an hour. Per plane. And it is, of course, thrilling.

In a very superficial way, it may be possible to hold both of these visions, but this kind of belief is as thin as preferring crunchy rather than a creamy no matter how much the granola eaters might long for it. In this case though, real consequences inconveniently ensue. To grab the low hanging fruit here, think of the folks who marched in the street and occupied offices and were a collective butt-rash to those who were more-or-less pleased to help clear the world of chinks. Most of those marching would, I suspect, vastly prefer Woody's as the lone tune to hear while waiting for rescue on that desert island. For one thing, it's easy to sing.sMany -- likely most -- of those voluntarily in southeast Asia became ensnared in the visions (happy supplied by every branch of the military) of all those sparkly bombs bursting in air.

The present horror show wrought by the results of the last election have been almost all wrought by those with visions of bursting bombs in their eyes, the current of anti-semitic vomit which has floated to the surface violates our most fundamental sense of right and wrong. As an, um . . . person of mature years (three kids, seven grandchildren, three great-grandkids) I can't imagine the challenge of trying to protect one's kids from the news.

It may have been the result of often unwatchable deep-rural television reception, but my kids were kids while the War in Vietnam was right there nightly on the barely watchable television. Huts bursting into flame, napalm incinerating, children screaming, the whole nine yards, so to speak. It may certainly be that I was a reprehensively bad father who paid no attention (or who merely didn't care) to what my kids were exposed to. But I don't think so. Nor do I remember a single time it ever crossed my mind. I also understand that I don't get any votes. Truth to tell, it is also quite another story.

So, especially in these days of 'helicopter parenting,' how do parents deal with the daily, even hourly spewing of national vomit from their four-foot flatscreens; do high schools even try to teach what used be called 'Civics' anymore? How? One option is that young grow up with role models which encourage them not to pay attention at all, just keep playing basketball, show up on time, and be glad you even have a job or maybe a class to go to. In our hyperspace age, the Internet is ubiquitous. Trying to hide from what is happening is, in practical terms, impossible.

So I have no idea in the world of how I might at least account for the evident ghastly fate of what I used to think of as 'my country'. Once again echoing the plaintive call of centuries, what the hell is happening here? Where is everybody going?

ONE CANNOT sufficiently despise all of this.

– Nietzsche

THE LOYAL OPPOSITION: Nancy Pelosi reassured the Democrats’ corporate investors not to worry, after the elections on Tuesday “we’ll tone down the rhetoric.” How many times will desperate Democratic voters fall for this bait-and-switch, even as they tell you exactly what they’re going to do (i.e., nothing)…

— Jeffrey St. Clair, CounterPunch

I KNOW that I am cowardly and am unable to act. Therefore I confine myself to words. But I do not think my words are needless. Someone else will act. But my many words—the words of a coward—will facilitate their deed. My words clear the ground.

– C.P. Cavafy, October 1902

ON LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY

Where I live, in central western NJ, there is a large majority I believe that are so self centered, so uncaring for others, so hell bent on consumption and entertainment that I realize that my perception is naturally slanted towards despair. On the other hand, it is a big place out there and I know that people do not all behave so badly, or at least I hope they do not. I do not feel the need or claim to have the right to bash people, even if they do act badly, but I do feel obligated to at least point it out. Perhaps someone will listen, reconsider their actions, and maybe even try to change. I know that I have and I continue to strive to do so. In the end, it is not the strongest nor the smartest that survive, it is those that are the most able to adapt to change that move on.

INSIDE HUNTER S. THOMPSON’S BATTLE AGAINST AMERICAN FASCISM

New book chronicles 10-year fight against Richard Nixon and the far right — which in 2018 may give you a strong case of deja-vu

rollingstone.com/culture/culture-features/hunter-thompson-fascism-nixon-freak-kingdom-politics-749623/

IF THE DEMS TAKE CONGRESS, they’ll launch dozens of investigations about Trump, clamor for wars, bitch about why the US isn’t involved in multiple globalist trade agreements, and generally act as mouthpieces for their multinational corporate masters. That’s what they’ll do.

— on line comment

MIDTERM ENDGAME

by James Kunstler

Back in the last century, when this was a different country, the Democrats were the “smart” party and the Republicans were the “stupid” party. How did that work? Well, back then the Democrats represented a broad middle class, with a base of factory workers, many of them unionized, and the party had to be smart, especially in the courts, to overcome the natural advantages of the owner class. In contrast, the Republicans looked like a claque of country club drunks who staggered home at night to sleep on their moneybags. Bad optics, as we say nowadays.

The Democrats also occupied the moral high ground as the champion of the little guy. If not for the Dems, factory workers would be laboring twelve hours a day and children would still be maimed in the machinery. Once the relationship between business and labor was settled in the 1950s, the party moved on to a new crusade on even loftier moral high ground: civil rights, aiming to correct arrant and long-lived injustices against downtrodden black Americans. That was a natural move, considering America’s self-proclaimed post-war status as the world’s Beacon of Liberty. It had to be done and a political consensus that included Republicans got it done. Consensus was still possible.

The Dems built their fortress on that high ground and fifty years later they find themselves prisoners in it. The factory jobs all vamoosed overseas. The middle class has been pounded into penury and addiction. The Democratic Party split into a four-headed monster comprised of Wall Street patrons seeking favors, war hawks and their corporate allies looking for new global rumbles, the permanent bureaucracy looking to always expand itself, and the various ethnic and sexual minorities whose needs and grievances are serviced by that bureaucracy. It’s the last group that has become the party’s most public face while the party’s other activities – many of them sinister — remain at least partially concealed.

The Republican Party has, at least, sobered up some after getting blindsided by Trump and Trumpism. Like a drunk out of rehab, it’s attempting to get a life. Two years in, the party marvels at Mr. Trump’s audacity, despite his obvious lack of savoir faire. And despite a longstanding lack of political will to face the country’s problems, the Republicans are being forced to engage on some real issues, such as the need for a coherent and effective immigration policy and the need to redefine formal trade relations. (Other issues like the insane system of medical racketeering and the deadly racket of the college loan industry just skate along on thin ice. And then, of course, there’s the national debt and all its grotesque outgrowths.)

Meanwhile, the Democratic Party has become the party of bad ideas and bad faith, starting with the position that “diversity and inclusion” means shutting down free speech, an unforgivable transgression against common sense and common decency. It’s a party that lies even more systematically than Mr. Trump, and does so knowingly (as when Google execs say they “Do no Evil”). Its dirty secret is that it relishes coercion, it likes pushing people around, telling them what to think and how to act. Its idea of “social justice” is a campus kangaroo court, where due process of law is suspended. And it is deeply corrupt, with good old-fashioned grift, new-fashioned gross political misconduct in federal law enforcement, and utter intellectual depravity in higher education.

I hope that Democrats lose as many congressional and senate seats as possible. I hope that the party is shoved into an existential crisis and is forced to confront its astounding dishonesty. I hope that the process prompts them to purge their leadership across the board. If there is anything to salvage in this organization, I hope it discovers aims and principles that are unrecognizable from its current agenda of perpetual hysteria. But if the party actually blows up and disappears, as the Whigs did a hundred and fifty years ago, I will be content. Out of the terrible turbulence, maybe something better will be born.

Or, there’s the possibility that the dregs of a defeated Democratic Party will just go batshit crazy and use the last of its mojo to incite actual sedition. Of course, there’s also a distinct possibility that the Dems will take over congress, in which case they’ll ramp up an even more horrific three-ring-circus of political hysteria and persecution that will make the Spanish Inquisition look like a backyard barbeque. That will happen as the US enters the most punishing financial train wreck in our history, an interesting recipe for epic political upheaval.

(Support Kunstler’s writing by visiting his Patreon Page.)

MEMO OF THE AIR: GOOD NIGHT RADIO TONIGHT!

Friday, 9pm to 5am, I'm reading Memo of the Air by live remote from Juanita's apartment, not from the back room of the KNYO performance space at 325 N. Franklin, next door to the Tip Top bar, so make plans to show-and-tell there /next/ week, Nov. 9, when I'll be there for you, and also the week after that, Nov. 16, because I'll be staying on the coast to help with the /live-with-studio-audience radio drama Destry Rides Again from Helen Schoeni Theater on KNYO, 7pm Wednesday Nov. 14!/ Find info about getting your cowboy butt in a fancy theater seat for that at MendocinoTheatre.org (look under Reading Series).

Deadline to get your writing on the air tonight is around 7pm. If you're still working on it then, just email it when you're done and I'll read it on the show next time. Or save it and come in and read it yourself in person next week (or sing and dance or otherwise express it), see above.

Memo of the Air: Good Night Radio: Every Friday, 9pm to 5am on 107.7fm KNYO-LP Fort Bragg, and 105.1fm KMEC-LP Ukiah. And also there and anywhere else via http://knyo.org and click on Listen.

Also you can always go to https://MemoOfTheAir.wordpress.com and hear last week's show, and shows before that, and read and watch and futz with all sorts of other edgily educational materials. By Saturday night, tonight's show becomes last week's show, so if you wait till Saturday night to look you'll find that too. It'll be right on top.

Meanwhile, enjoy film of Alberto Santos-Dumont demonstrating his No. 4 airship in Paris, France, September 19, 1900.

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

An honest government ad.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xqegTsi6SiE

Time-lapse plants. https://boingboing.net/2018/11/01/trippy-timelapse-of-two-plants.html

And a morphed time-lapse of a cat growing up from a mewling infant to a full-grown beast and then back down again.

https://imgur.com/cxDzkef

Marco McClean, memo@mcn.org

https://MemoOfTheAir.wordpress.com

UNBLOCK YAZ

Friends,

If you believe that our "community", "Public" radio station should not block any voices of people in our communities, especially someone who helped midwife the station 29 years ago, is a Voting Rights Activist and a Progressive Cultural Worker, I ask you for your support. I was a Programmer/Host on kzyx/z for many years, did some very wonderful, radical and intelligent programs, such as Paul Robeson, Leonnard Peltier, Malcolm X, Women's Herstory, Black Farmers, Black History, Women In Prison, Mumia Abu-Jamal, Indigenous Peoples Day, and so many more educational, informative programs, as well as playing hundreds (thousands?) of hours of Sweet Reggae Music, interviews with hundreds of Reggae Artists and many activists, raised thousands of dollars on pledge drives, was a Team Player, and have supported OUR station financially for 29 years, although admittedly, pledging at the "Low Income Membership Rate" of $25.00, (Yes, they have one!), as I am a Low Income person,! but pledging none-the-less at every drive, contributing to The Discussion with thoughtful, intelligent commentary and positive insights.

Now, because they are mad at me, they have blocked my phone number, the 2nd time in the past 6 weeks, so that I am prevented from calling any of their phone numbers, including the pledge drive number., and their Comment Line. Wow.

I feel that this is a Freedom Of Speech issue as well as a Discrimination Issue. If you agree that my voice should be allowed over our Community Radio Station airwaves, I ask you to please support me by emailing Jeff Parker at gm@kzyx.org and Alice W. at pd@kzyx.org, and/or phoning them at 707-894-2324. I have apologized to them for my "sins", whatever they may be, and have requested Mediation with them. I have also attempted to contact the Board of Directors (bod@kzyx.org) to no avail. Is this Democracy and Public Access? I think not. I have been a Mendocino County resident for almost 50 years, so know the history of our region, as well as knowledge about the history of our radio station, since I was there from Day One. Thank you for your support, if you can offer it. I am glad to speak with anyone on the phone (only a Land Line), at 707-884-4703, let it ring 5 times for my voicemail.

Peace, Love and JUSTICE,

DJ Sister Yasmin

Gualala, 884-4703

HEROES AND PATRIOTS HAS A NEW HOME!!!

Hear the program stream live the first Thursday of each month, 9-10 a.m., on KMUD Community Radio. kmud.org The program is co-hosted by John Sakowicz and Mary Massey. Listener call-ins are welcome and encouraged.

Heroes and Patriots will continue to bring great guests speaking on national security, intelligence and foreign police. Archived podcasts are available at: kmud.org, Archives Page. Edited programs will be uploaded to both Facebook and Youtube. More soon.

You can write John and Mary at: You may reach KMUD at: 707-923-2513

To all who have supported our efforts in the past, we thank you. John, Mary and the KMUD Team look forward to bringing great programming with national guests on KMUD Community Radio.

Thanks, John and Mary