Santa Barbara News-Press: November 19, 2022

saving animals’ lives

Ribbon cutting takes place at Wendy McCaw Wildlife Hospital

By JARED DANIELS NEWS-PRESS STAFF WRITER

A Friday ribbon cutting in the foothills of Goleta marked the realization of a goal held by the Santa Barbara Wildlife Care Network since its inception in 1988: opening a dedicated hospital to provide wildlife the care they need to get back on their paws, claws or talons and return to the wild.

The new Wendy McCaw Wildlife Hospital, which services Santa Barbara and Ventura counties, features 5,500 square feet of space that includes an oil response room, mammal enclosure, animal kitchen to prepare feedings for the hospital’s furred and feathered patients, songbird and mammal

nurseries, shorebird pools, and spaces dedicated to the Goleta hospital’s human workers and volunteers.

Ms. McCaw, who was a major contributor to the wildlife hospital that now bears her name, is the co-publisher of the News-Press.

“We’re just a completely different animal now,” Gretchen Lieff, the vice president of SBWCN’s board of directors, told the News-Press. “When the hospital wasn’t there, we had just one building and trailers, and (it) was a very challenging work environment. Now we can do much more to help the animals, and that’s just so gratifying after years of not having the facility that we needed. It’s very emotional

Roots Cannabis gets approval

County finds no reason to object to dispensary on Santa Claus Lane

By KATHERINE ZEHNDER NEWS-PRESS STAFF WRITER

Children’s library reopens in Santa Barbara

By KATHERINE ZEHNDER NEWS-PRESS STAFF WRITER

The Children’s Library has reopened on Anapamu Street.

Construction at the Santa Barbara site has progressed to the point that on Friday, the Central Library started allowing families to have access again.

Families and their children can again browse for books and other materials and use the library’s furniture. Families also can gather to read, study and participate in self-directed learning activities. Kids can use educational toys again.

Some weekly youth services

programming, which has continued off-site in parks during construction, will return to Central Library’s Faulkner Gallery in December. Among them are the Wednesday morning early literacy classes: “Wiggly Storytime” at 10:15 a.m. and “Baby and Me” at 11 a.m.

The 11 a.m. Saturday “Library Lab” will move from Eastside Library to the Central Library Faulkner Gallery.

Library staff will also add a weekly Thursday early literacy class: “Music and Movement” at 10 a.m.

According to the Santa Barbara

Please see LIBRARY on A6

KENNETH SONG / NEWS-PRESS PHOTOS

Wendy McCaw, whose financial support helped Santa Barbara Wildlife Care Network build a new hospital, celebrates with a ribbon-cutting of the Goleta hospital bearing her name on Friday.

Please see WILDLIFE on A2

Raccoons mingle about inside their enclosures at the Santa Barbara Wildlife Care Network in Goleta.

A cannabis dispensary proposed for Santa Claus Lane in Carpinteria has received Santa Barbara County’s approval despite the nearby location of surfing

camps for youths. In fact, 1st District Supervisor Das Williams sees the business as a positive alternative to the black market. Roots Cannabis dispensary received a nod of approval

KENNETH SONG / NEWS-PRESS

The site of a proposed cannabis dispensary is at 3823 Santa Claus Lane in Carpinteria.

saving more animal lives because of this facility’

to me. We’re saving more animal lives because of this facility.”

Executive Director

SBWCN

Ariana Katovich echoed Ms. Lieff’s sentiments during her remarks at the ceremony, expressing that the new wildlife hospital marked a new and improved era in the organization’s mission.

“We have a new foundation from which to build, which is just the most exciting thing,” Ms. Katovich said. “When I came to this property in 2017, I was astounded at how much was being done in one room and one little space (and) watching the staff take their lunch breaks on milk crates, I just really couldn’t believe it.

“Our impact collectively will be reflected and honored in every single animal rescued, rehabilitated and released in our community for decades to come.”

The new facility can host between 300 and 600 animals at a time depending on the type of animals being treated, according to Ms. Katovich, and will service every type of wildlife found in the region with the exception of marine mammals, bears, and adult cougars and deer, which will continue to be handled by other

FYI

To learn more about the Santa Barbara Wildlife Care Network, and to contribute to and get involved with the organization, visit sbwcn.org.

partner organizations.

The new facility’s capacity was quickly tested after the wildlife hospital became operational in February when it hosted and rehabilitated 270 pelicans in May and June in response to a massstarvation event that caused over 700 of the seafaring birds to wash up on the shores of Southern California. The cause of that event is still under investigation by wildlife officials.

Friday’s ribbon-cutting ceremony gave the opportunity for

attendees to see the organization in action as staff and volunteers began moving a family of raccoons from the facility to be released back into the wild — a fitting event given that the animals were known to be a favorite of the late Lady Leslie Ridley-Tree, who was another generous backer of the project.

In a video message recorded prior to her passing on Oct. 4 of this year, the beloved Santa Barbara philanthropist expressed her elation for the new facility and

the impact it would have today and for future generations.

“I’m so excited about this project, can’t wait for it to be finished,” she said during the video. “This (wildlife hospital) is a blessing to the community, to the animals and to everyone. It is for the future, it’s for now, it’s for children, it’s for adults. It’s for the community. It’s a joyous, happy beginning … It’s been a long time coming, thank goodness it’s here!” email: jdaniels@newspress.com

Williams: ‘The appeals issues were not significant’

Continued from Page A1

from the Santa Barbara County Board of Supervisors, which denied the appeal of the approval of the proposed business at its Nov. 1 meeting.

Supervisor Bob Nelson made a motion to deny the appeal of the project, make the required findings for approval of the project, determine that the Programmatic Environmental Impact Report is adequate, and grant de novo approval of the project.

“The project was actually appealed to the Coastal Commission,” Travis Seawards, deputy director of Development Review Division for the county Planning and Development Department, told the News-Press. “So Planning & Development takes no further action until that process is completed. We turn over the administrative record to the Coastal Commission, and then they run their process.”

The dispensary is in the district represented by Supervisor Williams, who noted the Coastal Commission typically decides not to hear most of these cases.

“De novo is a new review of a project,” Mr. Seawards said. “The entire project is reviewed, and the action by the decision maker is a standalone decision.The PEIR is a California Environmental Quality Act document completed when the county adopted new ordinances that allowed cannabis cultivation. The PEIR analyzed the new proposed uses, including commercial cannabis cultivation and retail, among other uses.”

The primary issues brought up by the appellant Steven Kent are parking, coastal access and proximity to youth centers — the surfing camps.

The Roots Dispensary site is at 3823 Santa Claus Lane.

Surf Happens, which operates surfing camps for kids at the beach there, is based at 3825 Santa Claus Lane. (Surf Happens declined to comment for this story.)

During its investigation, the county Planning Department has determined that parking is sufficient, coastal access is not impeded and proximity to youth centers is beyond the required 1,000 feet.

Additionally, according to the Planning Department, “surf shops” do not qualify as “youth centers.”

And according to the department’s investigation, the surf camps are 1,580 feet away from the dispensary, which the department says is well beyond the legal distance requirement. The department also

noted coastal access is not impacted.

“There were a number of appeal issues raised, none of which I think will be a problem,” Supervisor Das Williams told the News-Press.

“This establishment has more parking than other businesses,” Supervisor Williams said. “It is a better situation and provides more parking than pre-existing businesses have.

“I knew this would be a controversial location,” Supervisor Williams said. “But I wasn’t going to vote ‘no’ because it was controversial. The appeals issues were not significant.

“It was a particularly mean-spirited campaign against the dispensary,” Supervisor Williams said. “I thought it was the wrong way to have a public discussion. For a while I was leaning against, and I would have been easy to convince to vote (‘no’) if there were legitimate issues.”

The proposed location of the Santa Claus Lane dispensary is in the C-1 Zone district. Cannabis retail is principally permitted in the C-1 district.

“At the end of the day this is about zoning, zoning, zoning,” Supervisor Nelson said during the Nov. 1 Board of Supervisors meeting. “And we don’t have a family-friendly zone, in the code, as far as I know,”

The county found the applicant has sufficient parking at 12 spaces in the back parking lot, including one ADA-compliant space.

“The establishment is fully parked, meaning more parking than we would expect of any other business in the area, as well as some informal parking,” Supervisor Williams told the News-Press.

Luis Castaneda, the dispensary’s owner and operational manager, spoke at the Nov. 1 meeting.

“The Roots Carpinteria will be a high performing cannabis retail store that will provide legally sourced and tested cannabis products to meet the medicinal and recreational needs of our customers. The Roots have been in a similar position like this in the past,” he said. “We were dispensary No. 5 to open in Lompoc, but in my opinion, we were the first to do it right. In an extremely competitive market, we consistently remain one of the favorites. But this wasn’t overnight; it took a lot of time and patience.

“Our goal has always been to remove the negative stigma associated with cannabis and show that a dispensary can operate with integrity and be a positive member of the community,” Mr. Castaneda said. “We had to earn our reputation by staying disciplined and

TRAFFIC, CRIME AND FIRE BLOTTER

Man burned during rollover

A man with critical burns was transported by ground to Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital after his car rolled over and caught on fire on State Route 154.

The rollover and fire, which spread to brush along the highway, happened near Paradise Road.

The driver was pulled from the vehicle by a female bystander who was also transported for smoke inhalation, according to Capt. Scott Safechuck, the public information officer for the Santa Barbara County Fire Department.

The California Highway Patrol

reported the crash around 6:30 p.m. Thursday.

The rollover led to a 50-foot by 50-foot vegetation fire that resulted in the closure of State Route 154 in both directions. The forward progress of the fires was stopped shortly after 7 p.m. by County Fire, which responded with three engines. About two hours later, the highway reopened.

Firefighters and paramedics assisted with critical patient treatment and transported the man to Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital.

Capt. Safechuck said County Fire remained on-site for mop-up.

— Katherine Zehnder

staying consistent, and we plan to do the same in Santa Claus Lane.”

The News-Press asked Supervisor Williams what role the tax revenue played in this decision.

“We definitely want to hurt black market. Some did it for the revenue, but that was not my primary reason. The black market continues to thrive in counties and cities where cannabis is not legalized,” he said. “The black market has been hurt in counties where there is legalized cannabis. I could have voted against it in my own district, but even so there would have been other supervisors voting for it.”

During the public comment period at the Board of Supervisor meeting, there were more supporters of the dispensary than opponents by a large margin.

“I think it reflects the mood of the community as a whole. The majority thinks there is a need for legalized cannabis,” said Supervisor Williams. “I want to hurt the black market. It is an evil force in the world. Some are just supportive of legalization. The people against it can be very intense. I don’t think fears will come to pass.”

The News-Press asked Supervisor Williams if the aroma from the dispensary was a concern.

“If it was, it was not one articulated by anyone I can remember. These places discourage people from consuming closely,” he said. “Someone could break the rules and smoke anyway, but they would be actively discouraged anywhere by staff.

“I wish there were more young people in there. The people walking into these places are like baby boomers,” Supervisor Williams said. “Young people are buying black market marijuana, which could be supporting cartels contributing to trafficking. My hope is that young people buy less black market weed and those eligible will buy from a legal dispensary so as not to contribute to a cycle of human pain.”

“I think it is good to get into the bigger issue,” Supervisor Williams said. “For folks like myself that do believe that there are crime issues related to drugs, there is a real policy reason to support legalization, and that is the black market. We have not hurt the black market enough.

“Some cities and counties are not permitting legal dispensaries,” he said. “If people only have the option to buy black market cannabis, that is what they will buy. Legal dispensaries give them a choice to buy legal cannabis, and we can hurt the black market where we can.”

email: kzehnder@newspress.com

Route 154.

COURTESY PHOTO

A man suffered critical burns after his car rolled over near State

KENNETH SONG / NEWS-PRESS PHOTOS

Wendy McCaw, center, celebrates the opening of a new hospital in her name with the Santa Barbara Wildlife Care Network board and team members.

If you have been reading this column long enough, you have a sense of where we’ve been and what we’ve done.

Along the way we devised a master set of rules that we call Spymaster Rules.

1. Don’t stiff your spymaster. He probably knows too much.

A spymaster knows the deepest secrets of the leader of the country for whom he work, as well as the secrets he and his operatives have uncovered at the request of their boss — secrets that might be embarrassing if ever revealed.

2. Nothing is more cutthroat than a royal court.

Through the ages and worldwide, courtiers and relatives of a sovereign king or prince have regularly murdered one another for closer access to him/her — or to replace him/her as sovereign.

The Principality of Monaco is one of the last absolute monarchies in the world, and today it provides a strong example of Machiavellian backstabbing within a royal court.

Royal relatives, courtiers, government ministers, subjects and residents of the principality play an endless game of “who can attain the brownest nose” by ingratiating themselves with the prince through flattery, compliments and gifts.

Everyone wants the ear of the sovereign, whether for social prestige or financial gain or both. They want to be his best friend and/or chief adviser. Their seating positions at social events involving the sovereign attest to others their importance or lack thereof.

Murder and mayhem have given way in modern times to vendetta and character assassination.

Courtiers content with the criminal status quo conspire to quash those retained to clean up corruption. Such was the case in Monaco with Prince Albert’s first chief of staff following the prince’s enthronement.

With the assistance of the prince’s spymaster, the prince’s new chief of staff attempted to implement, at the prince’s direction, a new code of ethics for his principality.

Corrupt courtiers and government ministers were mortified by the advent of such change and, fearing the worst for their livelihoods, conspired to oust the chief-of-staff from his palace perch.

The metaphorical knives were plunged, the chief-of-staff cast out and a new ethical code became only a cover for more corruption than ever before.

3. There is history — as well as her-story, your story and my-story. Truth exists only in the moment. Keep a journal and document the moment.

Rarely does anyone agree on exactly what is said and done.

Courts seek to get at the truth by dissecting contracts, hearing testimony under oath and studying documents from all parties and witnesses in an attempt to establish what really happened.

Memories fade with time. But if you keep a regular journal and jot down interaction with others as it occurs, this record becomes both a memory-jogger and a document from which others may attempt to discern truth between quarreling parties.

4. Embrace all. Trust none.

Sidney Reilly is reputed to be the greatest spy of all time and is celebrated as the Ace of Spies. It was Mr. Reilly who coined this motto: Trust no one. (Mr. Reilly eventually got himself killed, by the Bolsheviks in Russia, for trusting someone running something called The Trust.)

The only real secret is one that you know and tell no one else.

The FBI’s National Security Division operates by this dictum: “Tell one, seven find out.”

5. Never miss an opportunity to keep your mouth shut.

People like to talk. Listen to them.

Not only will you learn much about them, but they will also adore you for listening. (People love to talk about themselves.)

This is how you learn secrets. People eventually get around to telling you what you want to know. Don’t push; they will get there on their own.

And if you feel tempted to tell them about yourself?

Don’t.

But what if there’s suddenly silence?

Keep your mouth shut. The person talking to you will fill it if only out of nervousness because human beings are

Here are spymaster rules

generally frightened of silence in conversation.

6. Do not share the secrets of one liaison partner with another.

This is known in the intelligence business as Third-Party Rule.

These days, good intelligence is about international cooperation i.e., liaisonrelationships between special services.

The Monaco Intelligence Service was created on a shoestring of a budget, but with much wit and resourcefulness. As a small service, it needed valuable intelligence from those willing to provide it.

So we created liaison relationships with the CIA, the British MI6 and many other foreign special services strategic to the MIS mission.

The ironclad Third-Party Rule is this: You do not, under any circumstances, share what a foreign intelligence service tells you with a third party — i.e., another intelligence service (or anyone else).

Liaison relationships were extremely important to MIS. Monaco’s population comprises 125 nationalities. Through foreign intelligence services, MIS was able to run traces on suspect foreign residents and prospective residents and investors.

Foreign intelligence services provided such intelligence to MIS at no cost. It was a brilliant deal for Monaco. Upon request, 20 intelligence services stood ready to send a representative to Monaco at a few days’ notice to brief the prince and his spymaster on any subject of their choosing.

7. Never trust anyone with a secret that has entertainment value

We got this one from Miles Copeland, a founding officer of the CIA and author of several books on intelligence.

Miles got it from Nicholas Elliot, a senior officer with MI6 renowned within the business for two things: 1) unmasking Kim Philby as a traitor and 2) writing a book about his career, “Never Judge a Man by His Umbrella,” without once mentioning that he was an intelligence officer.

Nick Elliot was apparently great at one-liners, once telling Mr. Copeland that Israel’s Golda Meir was really President Lyndon Baines Johnson in drag.

Boring secrets are easy to keep to yourself. The real challenge is holding onto secrets so entertaining, so funny, it would make you the star of any social occasion.

8. Sometimes a bark is more effective than a bite. But keep your teeth sharp.

Most people perceive barking as a bluff. It sends them a warning signal, which defeats the essential element of surprise. If an enemy can be frightened into submission, go for it. But be scary. Be mental. People are frightened of “mental.”

Carry a weapon just in case. G. Gordon Liddy recommended that women alway carry a hatpin or a sharpened lead pencil.

I recommend pepper spray and/ or a stun gun, preferably one with over a million volts.

9. The enemy will give away 98% good intelligence to induce you to swallow 2% disinformation.

We once believed the equation was 90-10.

MI6 set us straight. “It is amazing what the Russians will give away just to get you to believe something they want you to believe.”

Hence, no matter how much truth emanates from a source, especially a defector, you cannot take for granted that all is true because of a source’s track record for veracity. Everything must be validated.

10: Steer clear of anyone with a James Bond complex. (The spy biz attracts sociopaths.)

When people think of espionage they naturally think of James Bond, the super-suave creation of Ian Fleming.

So naturally, the intelligence business attracts would-be James Bonds. However, the intelligence business does not welcome such persons.

Intelligence work is patiently determined by committee and carefully executed by teamwork.

Intelligence services endeavor to recruit team players, not mavericks.

Occasionally someone with a James Bond-complex slips through. This is the individual who disappears for three days, believes he has license to do as he pleases and returns gleefully trumpeting whatever success he single-handedly imagined.

But even if his success is genuine, it is overshadowed by his complex — and he will be shown the exit ramp.

11. Beware duplicate sources. Endeavor to uncover your source’s

sources.

You learn something. You yearn for it to be true, perhaps because it fits your hypothesis. And then, from another second source, you hear the same thing.

So you think it must be true.

Then it arrives from a third source — making it even truer?

Think again.

From where are your sources getting their information? Is it possible that if your sources do not know one another, they are getting their information from the same source?

Before you believe anything, you must identify your source’s sources.

12. Play the skeptic with sources to determine their motivation. (It is almost always money or revenge. Ideology and conviction are like rubber bands.)

This I learned directly from Maurice Buckmaster who, during World War II, was leader of the French section of Britain’s Special Operations Executive.

You’ve got an authoritative source in front of you, and you believe everything he says because it fits with what you already believe to be true.

Don’t show it. Instead, poohpooh it. Push for the source to fully explain how he got the information and why he believes it to be true. Make him convince you.

There are only two motivations for betraying secrets: Money and revenge.

As Johnny Staccato, a fictional creation of jazz critic Mike Zwerin, used to say, “Reality is money.” Everyone needs it. If the price is high enough and the risk diminished, people will sell.

Revenge is another story. If a person is mistreated, it is natural for him to want to strike back.

We recruited a former palace insider who refused to be paid. He wanted only to settle a score with another palace insider who caused his expulsion.

People think they have conviction. But they allow it to be stretched when they need money or revenge.

13: Stay in motion.

If you stay in place, you are a sitting target.

Learn from Cuba’s Fidel Castro: Never more than three nights in the same Place — his key to survival in the country he ruined.

Very few people knew that Prince Albert of Monaco employed a spymaster. But those who were aware might have told others, who might have had reason to squirm based on their misbehavior.

To be “invisible,” I traveled constantly, motioning in and out of Monaco, to London, Paris, Brussels, Luxembourg, San Marino; Washington, D.C., and elsewhere.

I did not tell assets when I would arrive in Monaco. Upon arrival they would be summoned.

By the time word got around that I was in town — figure three days — I’d be gone. No one knew where.

14. Saturate and dilute. You cannot in this age erase your footprints. So instead, create many false sets leading in all directions.

Your whereabouts are easy to discover in computerized records and savvy investigators can penetrate much deeper.

Furthermore, you have no control over what exists about yourself on Google and other search engines. Cyberspace has become the domain of anonymous cowards.

That said, only fools believe what is posted anonymously, and there is nothing to fear from fools. But you can confuse whoever is trying to track you down by using subterfuge.

Create a bunch of addresses for yourself in multiple cities. The investigator’s job is made more difficult when faced with multiple addresses, and it increases the cost of his service to the client, who may be unwilling to spend beyond a certain budget.

As for the internet: Don’t bother trying to get the garbage about you deleted. Instead, dilute search engines with positive data. No one has the patience anymore to look beyond the first page of hits.

15. Arrive early for a rendezvous, scout the setting, remain in control of your environment — and have an exit ramp.

When you arrive for a meeting with a source, anything can go wrong. A two-timing source could set you up. Or you could be set up by a rival intelligence service. In other words, it is dangerous. The solution is situation awareness.

Do not accede to a source’s choice of location. Choose your

own for arendezvous, ideally somewhere in public, chosen for its appropriateness based on security and contingency options.

Arrive 30 minutes before a scheduled meeting. Observe the meeting place from an obscured position. Watch for anything unnatural or suspicious. When your source has arrived, approach with caution.

Know in advance, if you must flee, how best to do so. Any back exits? Do buses pass by? Where is the nearest subway station? Any department stores or hotels with elevators and staircases you can slip into?

16. The best intelligence is not packaged in a glossy report but derives from a single sheet of crucial information in someone’s back pocket.

The biggest and best secrets do not need detailed explanation or embellishment.

You’ve seen them before: Slick, glossy reports padded with fluff and statistics. All that really mattered was its first and last few paragraphs.

Anything that is truly important and sensitive does not belong in a report, whose circulation you probably cannot control.

The best way to impart a secret is by telling it directly to your client. And if you need help remembering: A single sheet of notes in your back pocket.

Such notes should be in your own handwriting, which, of course, is so bad nobody can decipher it. And when your briefing is done, the notepaper goes back into your pocket to be torn into 33 pieces and dumped into a public garbage bin (not your own) after ensuring you haven’t been tailed.

17. Never follow your first reaction. It is what the opposition expects.

This gem came from the director of an intelligence service of a micro-European country. Chances are that rival spymasters are almost as smart as you. They certainly didn’t get their

jobs by being stupid. When your adversary does something and you are expected to react, think long and hard about why they did what they did it — and what they anticipate you are going to do about it.

They are probably chess players looking three moves ahead. Do not fall into their trap by making the move they expect of you.

18.If it is not today’s problem, sleep on it. Assess tomorrow with fresh eyes. Then act because problems do not improve with age.

This is a rule about life in general that extends to intelligence.

19: True character is revealed under pressure. Welcome pressure: It is a true test of your own character.

It is easy to display character when all is going well. True character is revealed when the sky is falling.

Do you flip out, lose your head, blame others?

Robert Eringer is a longtime Montecito author with vast experience in investigative journalism. He welcomes questions or comments at reringer@gmail. com.

ROBERT ERINGER

Editor’s

Cate girls basketball wins season opener over Nordhoff

The Cate girls varsity basketball team won their season opener on Wednesday, defeating Nordhoff 44-19.

Both teams struggled to score early in the game, with the first field goal, a three-pointer by Cate sophomore Sam Jimenez, coming nearly three minutes into the first quarter. Cate would not relinquish their lead for the remainder of the game, leading 23-9 at the half and out-scoring their opponents in each quarter.

“We had outstanding performances across the board and our post player in particular dominated,” said Cate Coach Laura Moore.

Sophia Ospina scored 14 points for the Rams in only 21 minutes of play, while Lilli Whelan turned in her first double-double with 13 rebounds and 10 points. Emerson Evans and Mary Foster each contributed eight rebounds, with Foster adding seven points.

“We could not have asked for a better overall effort from our team in their opening game of the 2022-

SPORTS ROUNDUP

23 season,” said Moore. “We are excited to see all that this group can achieve this year.”

Cate will return to action will come on Nov. 30, when the team will face St. Bonaventure in the Bishop Diego tournament.

Cate soccer falls to Nordhoff

The Cate boys soccer team lost their season opener, falling to Nordhoff 4-1 in an away game.

Cate surrendered an early goal to the Rangers, but responded by tightening up their defense to finish the half down 1-0. The Rams also pushed on offense in the first half, creating a number of scoring opportunities, but were ultimately unable to capitalize.

The second half saw the teams trade goals, with the Rangers scoring in the 55th minute, while the Rams got on the board in the 65th on a goal by Suhuyini Abdul Nafeo. Things went downhill from there for Cate, however, as two more Nordhoff goals placed the game out of reach.

“Even though the scoresheet was not in our favor tonight, both Coach Molina and I are very impressed with the effort, grit and fight our

young team showed tonight,” said Coach Jorge Reynoso.

Cate will return to action on Dec. 2, hosting the Stevenson Pirates.

Cate boys basketball overcomes

Dunn

The Cate boys basketball team dominated Dunn, beating their opponents 51-33.

Cate was led by Babacar Pouye, who powered the team’s effort with 34 points and 28 rebounds.

“Incredible team effort and a great start to the season, allowing our young guys to get an understanding of the pace and speed of a varsity game,” said Coach Andy Gil, singling out the defensive effort of Jacob Gabbay, Josh Butler, Chase Meyer, Peter Lehman, Marley Joseph and Jack Higgins.

“Babacar’s 28 boards is the most rebounds I have seen in a game from a player in my 8 year tenure at Cate,” said Gil. “(I’m) most impressed with his poise and growing into a senior leader and ability to alter shots.”

Cate will next play on Nov. 30 at the Nordhoff Invitational against Villanova Prep.

- Matt Smolensky

Sokhela earns All-American honors at NAIA National Championships

By JACOB NORLING WESTMONT SPORTS WRITER

Westmont Men’s and Women’s Cross Country capped off their season on Friday morning after competing in the NAIA National Championships in Tallahassee, Florida. The men ran first and ended the day in 17th place out of 34 schools, while the women followed up with a 15th place finish out of 36.

The individual highlight of the day for Westmont was in the men’s race, when Zola Sokhela earned his 13th career NAIA All-American honor, after finishing 36th overall with a time of 24:53.6.

“It was a bit of a subdued race, but he did what he needed to do to earn the accomplishment,” reflected Westmont head coach Russell Smelley. “Zola told us he didn’t feel great today and it wasn’t his best race of the season, but that happens sometimes. Still, he did what he needed to do.”

Coming in after Sokhela was senior Danny Rubin, who finished the race in 56th place with a mark of 25:07.7. The next Warrior to finish was Adam King with a time of 25:52.7, in 142nd, and Jack Vanden Heuvel with a time of 26:18.5, in 191st.

Rounding out Westmont’s top-five was senior Garrett Miller, who came in 198th with a time of 26:21.9.

“A good team made it to nationals and did alright,” summed up Smelley. “They didn’t do as well as they could, but that happens, and it’s not a failure either. You can’t always run your best race.”

“Danny and Jack had a strong and assertive race,” added the All-American Sokhela, “but we

know there’s room for improvement.”

On the women’s side, sophomore Landon Torres came across first for Westmont, finishing the race in 82nd place with a season-best time of 18:42.8. Kari Anema was next to finish with a time of 18:50.8, in 97th, followed by Annie West in 104th place, with a time of 18:56.8.

Captain Madden Hundley was Westmont’s fourth finisher, posting a time of 19:01.2 in 113th place, while Anneline Breytenbach was Westmont’s fifth, posting a time of 19:25.1 in 158th.

“They ran their team-spread of 43 seconds, which is really nice,” noted Smelley. “Landon got after it today, chasing the All-American spot. She had a really fine two, to two and a half miles before fading, but still ran her best time of the season.

“The rest of the team kept coming behind her and ran hard.”

“Westmont’s women ran a hard race today,” echoed Captain Hundley. “The race was competitive and fast, and we had a few who battled to be in the top-40, but just couldn’t quite make it. It was still a great experience. This team is tight, and I’m so grateful for each of them!”

The Warriors will return home to Santa Barbara and rest up, before beginning preparation for the NAIA Indoor Track and Field season.

Jacob Norling is the sports information assistant at Westmont College.

email: sports@newspress.com

MORe INSIDe

For more sports coverage, see page A7.

PARKER, William

William Parker passed away at his home in Goleta on November 12th. Bill was born to Roland Wayne Parker and Frances Margaret Parker on March 12, l930 in Willows, Ca. His father was a banker, and his mother was a teacher. He was the oldest of three, and while his youngest sibling Tom, has passed, he has a ninety-year-old sister named Roberta who lives on the island of Oahu in Hawaii. Bill lived in Willows for the first seven years of his life, and then in Salinas until he reached young adulthood. He served in the U.S. Navy from 1953-1957; there he flew in aircraft carrier based airplanes as an equipment operator. At age 27 he was Honorably Discharged and completed his degree in engineering at Caltech. He married his wife Jeanette in l954, while in the navy. After living with her in San Diego, Los Angeles, Arizona, and Pennsylvania, he moved with her to Goleta in l970. He worked for Burroughs, Delco, and Litton as an electrical engineer for many years, even past retirement age. Bill lost his beloved wife to a battle with leukemia in 2018, after 63 years of marriage. Bill loved the Lord for much of his life and served many years at Trinity Episcopal Church on the vestry, and also as a pianist who traveled to rest homes in this general area to put on church services with his friend Dr. Tom Paul. In addition he served many years at Christ the King with finances, in partnership with Vicki Kennedy. He also sang in the choir as a baritone. After serving at this church for many years, he was happy to be a recipient of thoughtful friendship and birthday cards, especially from Sue Frietag, and Father Anchan. He was grateful for this community of believers’ continuing prayers for his healing. For years he helped heal others by displaying great generosity through donating over ten gallons of blood to the blood bank. All who knew him, especially his four children and eleven grandchildren, lived richer lives because of his faith, kindness, patience, great intellect, and deep musical knowledge. On reflecting on his full and blessed life, the majority of it spent here, in the crown jewel of the south coast, he said many times, “The Lord has been wonderfully good to me.”

WIMBERLY, Karen Crate

On Wednesday, October 26, 2022, Karen Crate Wimberly (née Karen Marie Crate), loving mother, grandmother, and friend passed away in Austin, Texas. She was 74. Karen is survived by her loving sons, Cory, Mac and Daniel and her grandchildren, Hudson, Cael, Wilder, and Mars. Karen will also be dearly missed by her brothers Thomas and Daniel, sisters Mary and Therese, and a wealth of close friends too numerous to count.

Karen was born in Joliet, Illinois to John and Rosemary Crate. She taught elementary school in Romeoville and represented her teacher’s union as a negotiator until moving to Santa Barbara, California in 1987. Karen worked for the California State Disability Insurance Office until 2011.

Not one to settle down, Karen spent her retirement years on the go, often traveling. In her time at home, she loved getting together with friends for a drink by the ocean, exercising, meeting with her book club, and volunteering for the Assistance league of Santa Barbara.

In early January 2022, Karen was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and spent these past months fighting the numerous physical and emotional battles that came along with her diagnosis. Throughout her ordeal, Karen never lost her irreverent sense of humor and playful wit. Karen had an unbelievable ability to make friends and bring people together, even in the last phases of her life. In honor of Karen, please visit a friend or make a new one. If you can do so on a patio or over a cocktail, it would be ideal.

Karen’s celebration of life is Sunday December 11, 2022 at 11:00am-12:00 noon at the Carousel House at 223 East Cabrillo Boulevard in Santa Barbara. She wanted people to wear bright colors and share their favorite stories of her. She was adamant that it truly be a celebration of her. All her family, friends, and acquaintances are invited. Please RSVP at https://everloved.com/life-of/karen-wimberly/funeral/.

NIELSEN, Roger Axel,

On Sunday, November 13 Roger Axel Nielsen, loving husband, father and community leader, passed away at Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital at the age of 84. He was just two days shy of his 85th birthday. Longtime Valley native, Roger was born November 15, 1937 to Axel and Margaret Nielsen. His grandparents Marcus and Andreas Nielsen were among the first settlers to move to the new Danish-American colony of Solvang in 1911. Roger attended Solvang School and Santa Ynez Valley High school. He got his business degree at Grand View College, Des Moines, Iowa. At 24 Roger served as a Cryptographer in the U.S. army. He was stationed in San Juan, Puerto Rico during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Shortly thereafter, Roger flew to Norway to marry his sweetheart Anlaug Meland. They were married in the Stavanger Cathedral (Domkirke) in 1964. Roger was a key figure and member of the Solvang business community for many years. He gave generously of his time, energy and resources. He was a member of the Solvang volunteer Fire Dept., local grocery man, and Developer. Roger was a lifelong Rotarian and past president. He served on numerous boards including the Solvang Lutheran Home, American National Bank Advisory Committee, and the Solvang Businessmen’s Association. He was also a member of the Danish Brotherhood and served as Co-chairman, Chairman, and Grand Marshall of Danish Days. During his Chairmanship of Danish Days in 1971, Roger sought to bring live theater to the Danish Days celebration. With the efforts of Donovan Marley and PCPA productions ‘Hamlet’ was performed in Han’s Christian Anderson Park that Danish Days. This sparked an initiative by the local community to build a permanent theater space. Fostered by Roger and a group of local enthusiasts, by 1974 The Solvang Festival Theater was constructed. Roger was an avid tennis player and played many years with his Wednesday buddies. He was also a remarkable ringer in horseshoes. He enjoyed a yearly fishing trip, with his friends and family, packing in with horses, to the back country of the Los Padres National Forest. Roger is survived by his wife Ann Nielsen, his two children Rodney Nielsen (Nicole), Betina Heron (Paul) and his five grandchildren: Natalya Nielsen, Andrew Nielsen, Angelique Powers, Gabrielle Heron, and Christiana Heron. A service is scheduled for 11 a.m. Monday, Nov 21st, at Bethania Lutheran Church in Solvang. In lieu of flowers the family asks that donations be made to the Solvang Theaterfest, or any charity of your choice. Loper Funeral Chapel, Directors

ELLIOT, Margaret E., Dr.

January 24, 1933-October 16, 2022

Dr. Margaret E. Elliot, 89, passed away on October 16th at her home in Yorba Linda, California after a short illness. With her ready smile and unforgettable charisma, she was an inspiration to all who crossed paths with her. Margaret had a unique ability to make every person she met feel important and understood.

She received her Bachelor’s degree from UC Santa Barbara, Master’s Degree from State University of New York at Brockport, and her Doctorate Education from Claremont Graduate School.

Margaret’s passion was her teaching. Her first years were spent teaching Elementary Physical Education at Santa Barbara City Schools. During this time, she collaborated with Dr. Marian Anderson and Jeanne La Berge to write the elementary textbook, “Play with a Purpose.” This text was used in many school districts as a reference for classroom teachers to develop age-appropriate elementary physical education lessons, and as a college textbook in teacher education courses.

Margaret began her collegiate teaching career in the Kinesiology Department at State University of New York, Brockport. She continued her college teaching at California State University, Fullerton, as an integral part of the Teacher Education Program.

Margaret spent the last ten years of her career as the Executive Director of Physical Education and Health Project for the State of California.

Margaret will be missed by Ann, her partner, and her nieces Robyn (Jim) Small of Lompoc, Kim (Chris) Holmes of Templeton, and Lisa (Greg) Dellinger of Palmer, AK, and her nephews Kevin Elliot (Sharon Knoeppel) of San Miguel, Dennis Elliot (Wendy Cronin) of Atascadero, Dan (Janis) Elliot of Blue Springs, MO, and Kelly (Debi) Newbury of Dade City, FL.

A Scholarship in the Kinesiology Department for an outstanding student teacher has been established in her name at California State University, Fullerton.

FIXX, Catherine “Kitty” Pricilla Salina, Kansas

Catherine “Kitty” Pricilla Fixx was born on September 18, 1934 in New York City. She and her brother, James “Jimmy” Fixx, bestselling author of “The Complete Book of Running,” grew up in a loving home in Jackson Heights, NY. Her father, Calvin Fixx, was an editor at Time Magazine and their mother, Marlys Fuller Fixx, had been a ballerina. Kitty grew up surrounded by her parent’s friends, influential journalists, poets, artists, and creative thinkers, (dubbed the “interstitial intellectuals” by Robert Vanderlan in his 2010 book), who inspired her lifelong interest in painting, drawing and poetry. As a young girl, Kitty studied portraiture under the tutelage of the prolific artist, Boris Chaliapin.

Chaliapin encouraged her to pursue her artistic talent, and at the young age of 11, Kitty rode the train into NYC weekly to study at The Art Students League of America. Her love of tennis was born at the Garden Country Day School in Queens where she and her brother, Jimmy, developed a friendly rivalry that lasted well into their adulthood.

Her father died when she was 13, and she and her mother moved to Oberlin, Ohio where Kitty pursued a degree in early education. After graduating from Oberlin College, she taught in Venezuela and Florida before marrying Walter Davis and moving with him to Verona, New Jersey, and then Santa Barbara, California. Her children, Martha and Tom, were added to the family in Santa Barbara before moving to Winchester, Massachusetts. After divorcing, Kitty remarried and moved back to Santa Barbara.

She was a creative person with a lifelong passion for painting, drawing, and writing. She loved tennis and running and was into healthy eating before it was in vogue. She served on the board of the Inherited High Cholesterol Foundation, for many years.

She was an equally fervent activist, going door to door in the ‘70s to petition for school integration through the METCO program. She loved God and worshipped at the Episcopal church, where she was often a lay reader. She was an amazing mother who loved her children unconditionally and sacrificially. She lived many adventures and enjoyed deep friendships with kindred spirits. After the difficult loss of her 96-year-old mother with whom she shared a deep and abiding bond, some cognitive issues began which resulted in the diagnosis of dementia in 2009. After living with her daughter in Los Angeles, she later moved to Kansas to be closer to her son with whom she lived surrounded by her son, daughter-in-law and four grandchildren. Kitty passed away peacefully in Salina, Kansas on Sunday November 13, 2022.

She is survived by her children: Martha Davis of Los Angeles and Tom Davis of Salina, KS; her daughter in law, Kat, grandchildren: Kara, Kate, Calvin, Summer, and Zachariah, as well as her niece, Betsy and nephews, Paul, John and Stephen. She was preceded in death by her Father, Calvin Fixx, her mother, Marlys Fuller Fixx and her brother James Fixx; also by her husband, Walter Davis and her second husband, James Bower.

Funeral services will be held privately at a later date. To send an online condolence, visit www.carlsonfh.net or on Facebook. A Carlson-Geisendorf Funeral Home and Crematory service, Salina, Kansas

Obituary notices are published daily in the Santa Barbara News-Press and also appear on our website www.newspress.com

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Dream location on State Street

Fashion designer Catherine Gee opens new location for her boutique

By KATHERINE ZEHNDER NEWS-PRESS STAFF WRITER

Fashion designer Catherine Gee has celebrated the opening of her eponymous brand’s new boutique, which is located at 1114 State St., Suite 24, in La Arcada Plaza.

The grand opening celebration for Catherine Gee Boutique took place Friday evening at the Santa Barbara store.

“We started in a smaller, 1,000 square-foot store on Haley Street,” Ms. Gee told the News-Press. “To have a pre-eminent beautiful spot downtown on State Street is a dream.

“For any fashion designer, opening a brick-and-mortar is the best,” the Santa Barbara fashion designer continued. “I think for any dream, you have to put in the work. I have had the brand for seven years. I go to 13 trade shows a year. You are so engrossed in the journey you realize it is time to go to the next phase.

“That is where I found myself in the last year. This is a gorgeous loft — 2,400 square feet. It feels welcoming and like a home,” she said. “It doesn’t feel like walking into work everyday.”

Launching her fashion line in 2015 as an all-silk collection, Ms. Gee became known for her core slip dress style. She has since grown the brand into full readyto-wear with an emphasis still on silks: printed blouses and dresses with luxe velvets, high quality cottons and bold eye-catching jacquards.

Ms. Gee holds a bachelor’s degree in fine art and art history from Sewanee: The University of the South, which is in Sewanee, Tenn.

The News-Press asked Ms. Gee about the origin of her fashion line.

“To begin with, I am an artist,”

she explained. “My father is a career painter. I have learned to illustrate from a young age. I worked in museums and art galleries. I was curating and writing grants.

“I became adept at running a small business. I have wanted to be a fashion designer since I was 10 or 11. I always knew I wanted a silk line, and I started working on it.”

She said the Catherine Gee brand includes “anything from denim to cotton twill pants to signature silk blouses, high

quality pima cotton T-shirts, jackets, jumpsuits and some accessories including: purses, shoes, sunglasses, perfume and even candles.”

Ms. Gee said the prints are what make her designs unique.

“I am a trained artist. I create my prints from ideas, visions, street art, Paris and more,” she explained. “The prints are very different. I have applied my prints to my silk on classic timeless silhouettes, and it’s succeeding and selling very well. Over the years, I have realized my job is

FYI

Catherine Gee Boutique is open 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Mondays through Saturdays and 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Sundays at 1114 State St., Suite 24, in La Arcada Plaza in Santa Barbara.

For more information visit catherinegee.com or follow on Instagram @ CatherineGee.

a wardrobe builder. The goal is to create high quality timeless pieces that women will reach for season after season in 10 years or 20 years.

“I’m not following trends,” she said. “I’m trying to create pieces women can wear at 30 years old and 20 years later at 50.”

Ms. Gee won industry recognition when she became the winner of WWD and Galeries Lafayette (Paris) Creme de la Creme Emerging Designer competition in 2016.

Over the years, her designs have attracted a flattering list of smart, beautiful A-listers including Halle Berry, Charlize Theron, Naomi Watts, Mila Kunis, Kate Bosworth, Olivia Wilde, Alessandra Ambrosio, Debra Messing, Jessica Alba and Rebecca Gayheart.

“The brand was birthed in Santa Barbara, and we are sold in over 200 retail stores nationwide,” Ms. Gee said. “I design classic collections for all four seasons and a resort collection every year.”

email: kzehnder@newspress.com

Homebuyers in California cities lost hundreds of thousands in purchasing power

By MADISON HIRNEISEN THE CENTER SQUARE

(The Center Square) – Homebuyers in several California cities lost hundreds of thousands of dollars in purchasing power when comparing affordable home prices in 2021 to 2022, according to new data analysis of the nation’s largest 100 cities.

Potential buyers in the Bay Area city of Fremont topped the analysis as the city with biggest losses in purchasing power this year compared to 2021, according to new data from Point2, an international real estate search portal. The analysis estimates that buyers in Fremont lost over $243,000 in purchasing power.

Buyers in other California cities were also found to lose significant purchasing power –potential buyers in San Jose lost over $200,000 and buyers in San Francisco lost over $198,000, according to the report. San Jose and San Francisco ranked as the second and third

among the top 10 cities with the biggest losses in purchasing power.

“Aggressive rate hikes (after the latest increase, the average mortgage rate hovers around 7%), coupled with sky-high home prices mean buyers are bleeding money,” the analysis states.

The report comes as state officials and lawmakers are seeking ways to address California’s housing crisis and growing affordability issues. This year’s budget includes $500 million to establish the California Dream

For All program, a program to assist first-time California homebuyers with state funds toward the purchase price of their homes.

The analysis by Point2 found that Irvine, Anaheim and Los Angeles have zero homes priced within an average buyer’s budget.

The report also analyzed the amount of space the average homebuyer could afford in 2021 compared to what they can afford now.

In the span of just a few months, the analysis

estimates buyers in the 100 largest cities lost between 92 square feet and 1,140 feet of square space from the home that they could afford.

Within California, Bakersfield was one of the top cities that lost affordable square footage between 2021 and 2022, with an estimated 592 square feet lost. Fresno was estimated to lose 491 square feet, Chula Vista was estimated to lose 428 square feet and Riverside was estimated to lose 424 square feet.

While these losses were smaller than other cities across the nation, the report notes that the average size of a U.S. bedroom is 132 square feet.

“When the interest rate was hovering around 3%, the pain of soaring home prices was just a dull ache compared to the major burden it has become,” the analysis states.

“Now, with rates crossing the psychological barrier of 7% (a level not seen in more than two decades) the consequences for homebuyers are crushing.”

Perfumes are among the accessories at the boutique.

KENNETH SONG / NEWS-PRESS PHOTOS

“To have a pre-eminent beautiful spot downtown on State Street is a dream,” said Santa Barbara fashion designer Catherine Gee, who celebrated the opening of the new site for her boutique Friday. It’s located in La Arcada Plaza.

“The goal is to create high quality timeless pieces that women will reach for season after season in 10 years or 20 years,” Catherine Gee said.

The old and the new

Kyle’s Kitchen helps Alpha Resource Center

By KATHERINE ZEHNDER NEWS-PRESS STAFF WRITER

Kyle’s Kitchen has announced its latest Kyle’s Gives Back partnership with the Alpha Resource Center.

Customers dining at any Kyle’s Kitchen location in Goleta or Santa Barbara will help the restaurant raise funds and awareness for ARC, a leading Santa Barbara County nonprofit dedicated to empowering individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities. Founded in 1953, ARC does that by creating opportunities, fostering belonging and supporting families.

“Kyle’s Kitchen has become a symbol in our community of what it means to do good while doing well,” said Joshua Weitzman, the ARC executive director. “Their generosity brings to light the value of individuals with special needs. It is a perfect partnership with the mission of Alpha Resource Center. We are grateful for their ongoing support of organizations like Alpha and are excited to be partnering with them in this important cause.”

ARC offers Lifespan Support Services, which begin the moment a child is born or diagnosed with an intellectual or similar developmental disability. The services continue the rest of their life.

Known for helping thousands of lives, ARC also provides Adult Day and Youth Social-Rec services.

In addition to its centerbased services, ARC established Slingshot/Alpha Art Studio in 2013 to create a dedicated space

FYI

To support Alpha Resource Center, go to alphasb.org.

for studio art practice. Slingshot provides access to production, representation and community collaboration to advance the cultural and creative life of each Slingshot artist.

Holiday cards created by Slingshot artists will also be on sale at all Kyle’s Kitchen locations, with all proceeds benefiting not only ARC but the artists as well.

“We have been longtime supporters of Alpha Resource Center, and are honored to partner with them again and help share how important their work is for our community,” said Deena Ferro, who co-owns Kyle’s Kitchen, with her husband Jay.

“Our son Kyle inspired us to be advocates and to do everything in our power to help people

with special needs reach their potential, and we’re proud to be able to support all the incredible work that Alpha does.”

As part of its core mission to build a business that supports people with special needs, Kyle’s Gives Back has donated more than $250,000 to many local organizations.

To support Kyle’s Kitchen’s efforts to help ARC, customers can dine at any of the restaurant’s locations — in Santa Barbara on Chapala Street or at the Goleta locations at Calle Real and Hollister Avenue, as well as Kyle’s Taproom (inside the Hollister Avenue location). Kyle’s Kitchen offers dine-in, delivery and takeout options at all locations.

email: kzehnder@newspress.com

Construction on three projects at library began in July

LIBRARY

Continued from Page A1

Public Library, weekly early literacy classes and schoolage programming at parks will continue, including “Friday Stay and Play’ at 10 a.m. at a different park location each week and the Thursday morning “Music and Movement” class at 10:30 a.m. at Shoreline Park.

Weekly Science in the Park programs for school-age children will continue on Thursdays at 3:30 p.m. at Bohnett Park.

Construction work at the library includes three projects that began in July. They include the renovation of the Library Plaza, the construction of a new accessible elevator in the center of the library, and a new modern staff workspace on the lower level.

According to the library, grading work continues on the Library Plaza project, and the retaining walls are in process. As part of the

FYI

For more information, see library.santabarbaraca. gov/classes-events/libraryevents.

new elevator design, there will be a new mural spanning three floors that depicts the ocean, mountain and landscape of the town. It will include illustrations of landmarks, people, places and other elements.

Next year, the Santa Barbara Public Library plans to offer opportunities for members of the public to suggest details to include in the mural. They’ll be able to make suggestions in person at the library and on social media.

In the lower-level staff work

area, new data and phone lines are being added to accommodate a modern workspace. Once the lower-level staff area is complete, the public will be able to access the upper level and additional space on the main level of the library. This is anticipated to be completed in late spring 2023.

All three projects are expected to be completed in late summer or fall 2023.

email: kzehnder@newspress.com

KENNETH SONG / NEWS-PRESS

The Sears sign was recently removed from the chain’s former location at La Cumbre Plaza, and a new sign went up to reflect one of the Santa Barbara building’s current occupants: Miss Daisy’s Consignment & Auction House. In the left part of the photo, you can see the imprint left by the old Sears sign. The building’s other occupant is Mattress Mike, and the building is being identified as Furniture Gallery by Mattress Mike. When the News-Press photographer stopped by on Friday, the Mattress Mike sign was still a temporary banner, but plans call for a giant sign saying “Furniture Gallery by Mattress Mike.”

COURTESY PHOTO

Kyle Ferro visits Slingshot/Alpha Art Studio, which the Alpha Resource Center established to create a dedicated space for studio art practice.

KENNETH SONG / NEWS-PRESS

The Santa Barbara Public Library has reopened its Children’s Library, which is part of the Central Library at 40 E. Anapamu St.

By RON SMITH WESTMONT SPORTS WRITER

Westmont Women’s Basketball (5-0, 1-0 GSAC), ranked second in the NAIA, posted an 81-53 win over Arizona Christian (1-3, 01) in the Golden State Athletic Conference opener on Thursday night in Murchison Gymnasium.

Stefanie Berberabe notched the fourth triple-double in program history, recording 11 points, 13 rebounds and 12 assists. She also had five steals. Berberabe is the only Warrior to have recorded two triple-doubles in her career. The first came in the quarterfinals of the 2022 GSAC Championship when she tallied 12 points, 11 rebounds and 10 assists against San Diego Christian.

“Stef was all over the court on both ends,” said Westmont head coach Kirsten Moore. “A tripledouble and five steals as well. She is such a special player that leads our team not just in her stats but most importantly with her heart, passion and grit.

Sydney Brown produced a double-double of 16 points and 11 rebounds by going seven of nine from the field, including one from long distance.

Both teams came out strong in the first quarter with Westmont’s first 15 points all coming from behind the arc. Kate Goostrey started the long distance

bombardment for the Warriors with an opening salvo. Then Laila Saenz scored the Warriors’ next 12 points on four triples.

In the game, the Warriors drilled 14 shots from 3-point range – six by Saenz and three by Isabella Pearson. Saenz made six of 11 attempts from long distance on her way to a game-high 22 points. She also notched three steals. Pearson made all three of her 3-point attempts to total nine points.

The first quarter ended with the Warriors holding on to a narrow one-point lead (19-18). In the second frame, the lead would change hands eight times before Westmont took control. Down 3129 with three minutes remaining before the intermission, Westmont produced a 13-3 run.

Layups by Brown and Aleena Cook (8 points, 5 rebounds) started the run. Brown then scored on a jumper and Cook made another layup to make the score 37-31. Then Pearson connected for her first three and Berberabe scored on a layup at the buzzer to give Westmont a 42-34 advantage headed to the locker room.

The third quarter belonged to the Warriors who outscored the Firestorm 22-8. Westmont led by as much as 27 points (64-37) in the penultimate period and took a 6422 advantage into the final frame.

In the last 10 minutes, Westmont

led by as much as 32 points, so the outcome was not in doubt. What was in doubt was Berberabe’s triple-double. Headed into the final minute, she had just six points. At the 30 second mark, the senior guard scored on a layup, making her point tally eight.

Arizona Christian’s Madison Kekic scored with 16.0 seconds left in the game, and Berberabe quickly brought the ball down the floor. Her drive down the lane was thwarted but the ball went out of bounds off a Firestorm player with 10.1 seconds to play.

Haylie Dermer inbounded the ball to Berberabe who again was stopped trying to penetrate the lane. Instead, Berberabe passed the ball back to Giulia Abraham outside the arc, then made her way over to the right corner.

Abraham passed it back to Berberabe who was unguarded. With 2.7 seconds remaining, Berberabe unleashed a three. The ball passed through the net with 1.1 seconds remaining.

Eleven points. Triple-double. Celebration.

The Warriors are back in action today when they host Ottawa at noon.

Ron Smith is the sports information director at Westmont College.

email: sports@newspress.com

Westmont men’s basketball upsets Arizona Christian

By JACOB NORLING WESTMONT SPORTS WRITER

In an instant classic, Westmont Men’s Basketball (7-1, 1-0 GSAC) upset #1 Arizona Christian (4-1, 0-1) in overtime to open up the GSAC season. After the first 40 minutes was not enough to crown a victor, the Warriors erupted to outscore the Firestorm 22-9 in overtime.

“It’s been a while since the number one team in the nation played in The Murch,” reflected Westmont head coach Landon Boucher. “We came into tonight very loose, very confident. Our guys came in ready to go. Not only did they come ready to play hard, but they came ready to play smart, and with poise.

In the first half of action, Westmont held the first bit of momentum thanks to both stellar defense and cold shooting from ACU. At the 10:00 mark, the Firestorm had scored only 11 points, when at the same time, Amir Davis converted a layup to put Westmont up 22-11.

With 7:30 to play in the period, another finish at the rim by Davis put Westmont up 27-14, their largest lead of the half. Then, Arizona Christian began to shoot like the top-ranked team in the NAIA.

After missing their first six shots from beyond the arc, ACU drained five of their next seven, including four sorely out of the hands of Paul Hayden. After trailing by 13 at the 7:30 mark, it took the Firestorm less than three full minutes to go on a 15-2 run, tying the game at 29.

The Firestorm cooled down once again as the half came to a close, but still led Westmont 38-36 going into intermission. In the second half, ACU looked to be pulling away after hitting a 3-pointer that stretched their lead to 44-38 at the 16:34 mark.

However, the Firestorm did not score another point for seven minutes. In the meantime, Westmont did not set the scoreboard on fire either, but still, the Warriors’ lock-down defense allowed them several opportunities to draw even. Finally, with just-under 10 minutes to

play, a layup from Cly Griffith knotted things at 44.

The two sides stayed neck-and-neck for the next several minutes, with both teams having a four point lead at one point. First, ACU led 59-55 with four minutes to play, before a pair of highlight-reel baskets by Cade Roth sparked an 8-0 run by Westmont. Up 63-59 with under two minutes to play, the Warriors were unable to hold off the Firestorm, who eventually converted a game-tying layup with 18 seconds to play.

Thirty seconds into overtime the Warriors forced an ACU turnover in the paint, leading to a go-ahead layup by Westmont’s Tone Patton Sr. After a steal from Anthony McIntyre, the Warriors put the ball in Patton’s hands again. On this occasion, in his Murchison Gym debut, Patton blew the roof off the place by draining a shot from beyond the arc to put Westmont up five.

After a third ACU turnover, the gym only grew louder when a fast-break layup from McIntyre sent a shocked Firestorm squad into a timeout. At that point, Westmont had built their lead to 70-63 less than 90 seconds into overtime.

With 2:46 to play in OT the Firestorm got back within three to make it a one possession game, but then, Westmont brought an end to the contest with a 10-0 run going into the final minute.

McIntyre led Westmont with 21 points, while Roth was close behind with 20. Davis, who had 18 points, finished with a near triple-double as he also recorded a team-high 12 rebounds and seven assists. In his home debut, Patton contributed with 17 points off the bench to go along with four rebounds.

Westmont returns to GSAC play this afternoon when they host Ottawa (Ariz.) at 2 p.m.

Jacob Norling is the sports information assistant at Westmont College.

email: sports@newspress.com

UCSB women’s volleyball drops thriller to Aggies

By KRISTEN KELLER UCSB SPORTS

The UCSB women’s volleyball team was back in action this evening in their final road trip of the season as they took on the Aggies of UC Davis. The last time these two teams faced, the Gauchos were the ones to come out with a three-set win in The Thunderdome.

However, Thursday’s match did not come as easily for UCSB as this match took five sets to decide.

Despite their efforts, the Gauchos were not able to come out with a win, losing 3-2 to UC Davis with scores of 28-26, 25-22, 40-38, 25-22 and 15-9.

HOW IT HAPPENED

At the start of the match, the Gauchos came out a little slow. The Aggies took advantage, going up by five points at multiple points in this set. This didn’t stop UC Santa Barbara from fighting. The Gauchos came back to tie the set with the first set going into extra points. Despite their best efforts, the Gauchos dropped the first set 28-26 to the Aggies.

From there, UCSB came out with a new fire. The Gauchos were swinging from the start of the second set, keeping control despite the efforts from UC Davis. With the help of the team’s .432 hitting percentage, the Gauchos were able to take the second set 25-22.

Once these two teams came back on the court, the Aggies were ready to battle. Instead of one team having control, both teams battled throughout most of this set, tying with one another 22 times. This resulted in one of the longest sets in UCSB history as these two teams went into extra points and then some. Although the Aggies ended up taking the

third set, it didn’t end until the score hit 40-38.

With UC Davis up and the match on the line, the Gauchos kicked it into gear. This didn’t come without a fight from each side. Briana McKnight went on a service run in the beginning of this set to take an early lead. UCSB was able to build on this success, putting themselves in a spot to take this fourth set 25-22.

Heading into the fifth and final set, it was the Aggies who came out with the momentum. UC Davis came out with a four-point run in this abbreviated set, giving them an advantage over the Gauchos. UCSB could not get their offense in rhythm, preventing them from scoring at key moments. The Aggies took advantage of this as they closed out the set and won with the biggest margin of victory with a score of 15-9 to take the set 3-2 over the Gauchos.

LOOKING AT THE NUMBERS

• Michelle Ohwobete led the team in two different statistical categories. Her 21 kills along with 18 digs was good enough to add another doubledouble to her resume. She also added on four blocks to contribute with a total of 23.5 points.

• Two other Gauchos ended the game with double-doubles, and they were Mehana Ma’a and Briana McKnight. Running a 62, Ma’a still managed to rack up 38 assists on the evening while securing 16 digs. McKnight, on the other hand, contributed 10 kills while adding on 14 digs. She also led the team in aces with two.

• Tallulah Froley and Tasia Farmer also had double-digit kills. The two opposites had 17 and 10 kills, respectively, to help their team from the right side of the court. Froley also added two blocks to the stat sheet.

UP NEXT

The Gauchos will play their final road game of the season as they travel to Riverside to take on the Roadrunners of UC Riverside. First serve is scheduled for 7 p.m. tonight, with a live stream available through ESPN+.

Kristen Keller is the associate athletic director for communications and digital strategy at UCSB.

email: sports@newspress.com

Managing Editor Dave Mason

Life theArts

CALENDAR

Great horned owl

Johann Leonhard Frisch, “Vorstellung der Vogel in Teutschland (Representations of the Birds of Germany), Berlin, hand-colored engraving, 1733-63.

“Johann Leonhard Frisch was a theologian, naturalist and philologist.

“His first great German color-plate book, ‘Vorstellung der Vogel,’ featured European and exotic birds including parrots drawn from the family collection of preserved specimens. The birds were divided into 12 classes with more than 300 figures . . . The illustrations seem unsophisticated and even amusing, but there is a unique charm in the expressive and confident drawing. Frisch’s sturdy owls are in a class by themselves for the various techniques employed to portray the plumage with dots, dashes and criss-crosses.”

Snowy owl

Prideaux John Selby, “Illustrations of British Ornithology,” London, hand-colored engraving, 1821-1834.

“Born into a wealthy aristocratic family, Prideaux John Selby spent his boyhood pursuing his interests in natural history on his family’s estate. Educated at Oxford, he matured into the life of a gentleman naturalist with a” passion for ornithology … Selby’s work is underrated, as he was a conscientious and painstaking artist. His drawings have an austere beauty. Every feather is clearly visible, and details of the large flight feathers and the softer plumage stand out in immaculate precision.”

Who-o-o knew?

By MARILYN MCMAHON NEWS-PRESS STAFF WRITER

Agroup of owls is called a “parliament.”

Who-o-o- knew?

Linda Miller, for one. She is curator of the John and Peggy Maximus Gallery at the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History, where she has

arranged “A Parliament of Owls,” a display of original antique prints tracing 300 years of owl illustrations.

“Owls have been popular subjects throughout the recorded history of many cultures.

Prominent members of the avian family, owls have been thought to possess wisdom, a sense of mystery and solitude,” said Ms. Miller, who wrote the information

that accompanies each image in the exhibit that is on view through Feb. 25. (Her writing accompanies each image that is being published with this story.)

“Their striking features lend themselves to a variety of interpretations. A skilled artist was able to manifest a bird’s special character — its form, markings and coloring — in a way that a verbal description alone

‘A Parliament of Owls’ gathers at Natural History Museum

could not.

“These images by important French, English, German, Dutch, Italian, and American artists fascinate us with their range and diversity, from crude and eccentric to fully realized and naturalistic,” said Ms. Miller. “Seeing them displayed together invites comparison of how they’ve been portrayed over the centuries.”

email: mmcmahon@newspress. com

FYI

“A Parliament of Owls” is on view through Feb. 25 in the Maximus Gallery at the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History, 2559 Puesta del Sol Road, Santa Barbara. For more information, visit www.sbnature.org.

The calendar appears Mondays through Saturdays in the “Life & the Arts” section. Items are welcome. Email them to Managing Editor Dave Mason at dmason@newspress.com.

TODAY 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.: The Santa Barbara Sea Glass & Ocean Arts Festival “Holiday Pop-Up” will take place at the Lynda Fairly Carpinteria Arts Center, 865 Linden Ave.,. Carpinteria. For more information, go to santabarbaraseaglassand oceanartsfestival.com.

11 a.m. to 6 p.m. The NEW Santa Barbara Antique, Decorative Arts and Vintage Show and Sale (formerly known as the CALM Show) will be held at Earl Warren Showgrounds, 3400 Calle Real. Santa Barbara. Admission is $8, $6 with a flier: sbantiqueshow.com/discount-flyer. Children under 12 are free, and so is parking.

7:30 p.m. Santa Barbara City College theater students are performing “The Importance of Being Earnest” at the Jurkowitz Theatre on the West Campus in the 900 block of Cliff Drive, Santa Barbara. To purchase tickets, go to www.theatregroupsbcc. com.

7:30 p.m. The Santa Barbara Symphony will perform “Wisdom of the Water, Earth and Sky,” featuring music by composer and preservationist Cody Westheimer, at The Granada, 1214 State St. The concert is a salute to the Chumash heritage. To purchase tickets, go to granadasb.org.

SUNDAY

10 a.m. to dusk: The Santa Barbara Arts and Crafts Show takes place at Chase Palm Park, 236 E. Cabrillo Blvd., Santa Barbara. The show is located along the boulevard from Stearns Wharf to Calle Cesar Chavez.

11 a.m. to 4 p.m. The NEW Santa Barbara Antique, Decorative Arts and Vintage Show and Sale (formerly known as the CALM Show) will be held at Earl Warren Showgrounds, 3400 Calle Real. Santa Barbara.

Admission is $8, $6 with a flier: sbantiqueshow.com/discount-flyer. Children under 12 are free, and so is parking.

3 p.m. The Santa Barbara Symphony will perform “Wisdom of the Water, Earth and Sky,” featuring music by composer and preservationist Cody Westheimer, at The Granada, 1214 State St. The concert is a salute to the Chumash heritage. To purchase tickets, go to granadasb.org.

TUESDAY

8 p.m. Guitarist Joe Bonamassa and his band will perform at The Granada, 1214 State St., Santa Barbara. Tickets cost $79 to $199. To purchase, go to granadasb.org.

THURSDAY

Little owl

Eleazar

Barn owl

“Artist and author Eleazar Albin produced a three-volume illustrated history of birds in the early 18th century. His field drawings were etched onto small copper plates. They set the standard for the ‘bird and branch’ style of illustration. Albin’s lengthy descriptions are charming in their detail listing weight and size, feather structure, stomach contents, nesting habits; and instructions for keeping caged birds.”

“During two extended stays in the American Colonies, the young Englishman, Mark Catesby, made a survey of the plants and animals he encountered while collecting for patrons back home. He became adept at field observation and made careful notations on such things as plumage, diet and migratory habits of North American birds and portrayed them more naturally than before. He made drawings of the ‘curiosities’ not seen before by English naturalists.”

Short-eared owl

John Gould, “The Birds of Europe,” London, handcolored lithograph.

“John Gould was the leading publisher of ornithological books in Victorian England, possessing both an entrepreneurial personality and a keen interest in birds. Most were imperial folios, depicting birds in their full size. He drew rough sketches which were refined and translated into lithographs, first by his wife, Elizabeth, and then by a succession of talented artists including Lear and Josef Wolf.”

7 p.m. Ukulele virtuoso Jake Shimabukuro will perform his “Christmas in Hawaii” concert at The Granada, 1214 State St., Santa Barbara. Mr. Shimabukuro will play a mix of his signature favorites, holiday classics and selections from his recent “Jake & Friends” album. Tickets for the UCSB Arts & Lectures concert cost $16 to $61. To purchase, go to granadasb. org.

DEC. 3

7 p.m.

Westmont College ensembles will perform during the Westmont Christmas Festival at The Granada, 1214 State St., Santa Barbara. The 18th annual festival will feature the Westmont Orchestra, College

COURTESY PHOTO Grace Fisher is shown outside The Granada, where “A Winter Music Showcase” on Dec. 9 will raise funds for the Grace Fisher FoundatioN.

COURTESY IMAGES

Albin, “A Natural History of Birds,” London, handcolored engraving, 1731-1738.

Mark Catesby, “The Natural History of Carolina, Florida and the Bahama Islands,” London, hand-colored engraving, 1731-1743.

A Thanksgiving like no other

This last year has been tough for a lot of people, and it goes way beyond COVID as we all know.

Here are some things you can be grateful for, even in the middle chaos.

First, having people gathered around your table under your own roof is something to be hugely happy about. Right now, many would-be buyers are priced out of the housing market. And if you don’t own your home, you can still be grateful for the roof over your head. For all too many people, that’s simply a luxury they can’t afford.

Your domain, no matter how humble, is a place to call home. It shelters you from the cold and allows you to feel safe. It’s a place to create and enjoy a meal with others. Acknowledge that feeling of gratitude and let it run through you.

Even if you are homeless, Thanksgiving is an opportunity

to gather with other people and share a holiday meal. You can join others for dinner at one of many meals that are available at local shelters or houses of worship. And if you have a home, may I suggest that you volunteer your time to serve those who are in need? Isn’t that the essence of Thanksgiving? I have done it many times and always end up having fun and feeling blessed.

Gas prices are the highest ever seen, and it’s hurting most everyone, but if you have a car and can afford to get to work every day, be grateful. Even if you’re driving an old clunker, you can feel good about it.

If you equate your status with what you drive, consider reordering your priorities. Our current vehicle is going on 15 years, and with a few recent tweaks at the mechanics, it’s

running fine. It’s getting us through “Carmageddon,” so I’m grateful. You’ve probably gotten through worse times than these too, and that’s something else to feel good about.

Are you going to get several days off of work?

What an amazing gift! Be grateful not only for the holiday but for the job that you have. If you like your work and your colleagues, that’s a real bonus. And now you can enjoy some time off to be with your family.

Kindness is the new normal in management. Many people have decided to slow down, to quell their ambition in favor of a softer lifestyle. Nothing wrong with that.

If you are not working and want to be, the good news is that there are still many gigs available.

Finally, be grateful if you aren’t sick. If you did get COVID, then take extra good care of yourself.

Many people have had COVID more than once, and no one knows about the new variants yet. I am grateful that we have medications and a better standard of care than in 2019 when all this started. Recently, I got cocky and didn’t follow the protocols for just a few days, and bam! Keep up whatever it is you are doing to stay healthy. We can all still find things to complain about, but this holiday is about remembering the good in our lives and expressing our gratitude in the ways that mean the most to each of us.

Barton Goldsmith, Ph.D., is an award-winning psychotherapist and humanitarian. He is also a columnist, the author of eight books and a blogger for PsychologyToday.com with more than 28 million readers. He is available for video consults worldwide. Reach him at barton@ bartongoldsmith.com. His column appears Sundays and Tuesdays in the News-Press.

Contestants prepare to ‘Deck the Hulls’ for Parade of Lights

By DAVE MASON NEWS-PRESS MANAGING EDITOR

The 36th annual Parade of Lights will take place Dec. 11 in the Santa Barbara Harbor.

Leading up to the parade is the Winter Wonderland, which families can start visiting at noon at the City Pier in the Santa Barbara Harbor, according to a news release.

The attraction will feature holiday elves, 10 tons of snow, festive music and photos with Santa Claus.

The parade competition will start at 3:30 p.m. with the humanpowered category. Standup paddlers and kayakers dressed in seasonal attire will paddle through the harbor and around Stearns Wharf.

At 5 p.m., a holiday tree lighting ceremony will take place on Stearns Wharf, next to the Sea Center.

Then, at 5:30 p.m., approximately 30 illuminated watercraft, decorated according to this year’s theme, “Deck the Hulls,” will light up the night as they make their way from Leadbetter Beach down the coast to the Cabrillo Arts Pavilion. The vessels will then come back along the coast to the

Continued from Page B1

wharf.

After the parade, there will be a brief fireworks show. Organizers say the best locations to see the parade and fireworks include Stearns Wharf, the breakwater, West Beach and East Beach.

Registration for the

Choir, Chamber Singers and Choral Union. Tickets cost $22. To purchase, go to granadasb.org.

DEC. 4

3 p.m. Westmont College ensembles will perform during the Westmont Christmas Festival at The Granada, 1214 State St., Santa Barbara. The 18th annual festival will feature the Westmont Orchestra, College Choir, Chamber Singers and Choral Union. Tickets cost $22. To purchase, go to granadasb. org.

LENGTH-ENING

BY MICHAEL LIEBERMAN / EDITED BY WILL SHORTZ

competition is now open. There’s no entry free. Participants can enter one of five categories: human-powered, power, sail, commercial fishing, or commercial/other. There will be thousands of dollars in prizes.

You can pick up an entry form in Santa Barbara at the Harbor

Market, 125 Harbor Way, No. 8; or the Harbor Fuel Dock or waterfront offices, both located at 132-A Harbor Way. Forms are also available at santabarbaraca.seamlessdocs. com/f/ywly1n2xieqh.

email: dmason@newspress.com

DEC. 7

4 p.m. The Hoodlum Friends will perform at 4 p.m. at Stearns Wharf in Santa Barbara. The concert is free.

DEC. 9 7 p.m. The Grace Fisher Foundation will present “A Winter Music Showcase” at The Granada, 1214 State St., Santa Barbara. The fifth annual showcase will feature everyone from the Santa Barbara Folk Orchestra to Jackson Gillies, WIll Breman, State Street Ballet Professional Track Dancers, the Westmont Chamber Singers, UCSB Maurice Faulkner Quintet and more. Tickets cost $18 to $60. To purchase, go to granadasb.org.

— Dave Mason

COURTESY PHOTO

Santa Claus leads the way on this Parade of Lights entry. This year’s parade will take place Dec. 11 in the Santa Barbara Harbor.

Diversions

Thought for Today

HOROSCOPE

Horoscope.com

Saturday, November 19, 2022

ARIES — The day ahead may bring a storm of individualism and independence. You usually tolerate the quirks and minor shortcomings of your friends or family members, but today they present real obstacles to your relationships. The only way to remedy the situation is to go on vacation. Spending some time alone will keep you out of trouble.

TAURUS — If you want to make the best of the day ahead, Taurus, try to convince your team or family to work together. This is tricky to do, what with everyone’s schedule being so demanding right now. Hard as it is to coordinate their efforts and orchestrate harmony, the strength of your character and your team spirit will make it all work out.

GEMINI — The day ahead won’t be easy, Gemini. A glimpse at your love life reveals that you will be bridling at certain inhibitions. You long for peace and stability, and at the moment everything is in suspense. Use the day ahead to gain some perspective on the situation. Until the ice melts and the flow of events resumes,

CANCER — Lately, you’ve been nursing a feeling that your partner is inattentive. The tension has been building up and today, Cancer, you’re likely to boil over with the rage that comes from one too many doubts and suspicions. The forecast for love is stormy, without a doubt. But making up after the quarrel promises to be lots of fun.

LEO — Some days it’s better to be on vacation! That’s what you’re liable to think today. All your projects are mired in quicksand, and you feel like you’re spinning your wheels. But even if things are momentarily stuck, don’t lose faith. Your inner self is gaining stability. When the time is right, it will be strong and reliable.

VIRGO — Deep inside, don’t you have an urge to breathe new spirit into your love life? Of course, some things are more easily said than done. Currently, you don’t have much time to devote to yourself, much less your partner. Affection could thrive if given half a chance.

LIBRA — It’s time to get what

you need, Libra. Your desires don’t always go in a direction that does you the most good, and this can cause tension. You feel as though it’s impossible to combine your desires with what is good for you, notably in your love life. You wrestle with whether you should remain in your “creative” cave or share your life with someone.

SCORPIO — Take cover, Scorpio, because today promises to be an emotional roller coaster! Something seems to be askew with your relationships, and you feel torn in opposite directions. One force is pushing you to enrich your inner universe and another force is pushing you into the arms of someone you’ve recently met. Stay busy to avoid confrontation.

SAGITTARIUS — People are going to think you’re a star today, Sagittarius! Although you may not feel that way about yourself. What’s gotten into you lately? Have you lost confidence in yourself? Are you now compensating for it? Do you feel a need for more success in your life? All this is possible, but you will have to take some risks if you’re going to progress.

CAPRICORN — Stop asking if you’re gifted, Capricorn. This definitely isn’t the time for such questions. Now is the time to work on something concrete. You will need the help of others if you’re to succeed, so get to work convincing them to ally with you. You may have to reveal more of yourself than you normally do in order to sway people to your side.

AQUARIUS — A partner for life or a brief encounter, which will it be? This is today’s question. Why not choose both? Can you imagine being your partner’s lover while keeping your independence? Don’t be influenced by old models that force you to choose between these two ideas. Don’t forget that in our modern world, your choices aren’t as limited as you might think!

PISCES — You can never be anyone other than who you are, Pisces! That’s the way it is, and you can’t change it. Other members of your family may have dreamed of getting free of a duty or a moral lesson, but these dreams don’t apply to you. Your dreams of being someone else are like phantoms that have come back to haunt you. Simply brush them away!

DAILY BRIDGE

By FRANK STEWART

“Do you think there is someone for everyone?” a club member asked me in the lounge.

Having been married to a good woman for 45 years, I had to admit I believed that might be true.

“Well, my partner says the right person for me is a psychiatrist — or maybe someone who can teach defense.”

My friend showed me today’s deal. He had been West, defending against four spades.

“I led the king of clubs,” he said. “Dummy played low, and my partner signaled with the deuce. I knew he suggested a shift, but to which suit?”

HELP NEEDED

“I led a diamond, and declarer won, led a club to dummy’s jack, threw a heart on the ace and started the trumps. He lost a trump, a heart and a club, and my partner said I was in need of help from somewhere.” West had an aberration. At Trick Two, he must lead the ace of hearts. East will encourage with the ten, and West will lead a second heart to assure four defensive tricks. But if East signaled with a low heart, West could shift to diamonds.

10 7 4. The dealer, at your

left, opens one spade. Your partner doubles, and the next player bids two spades. What do you say?

ANSWER: You certainly must compete. Bid three hearts. Partner is likely to have good support for the other major suit, and if you have a game, it is probably the 10-trick heart game. If you held 6 3, A Q 7 3, 6 4, K Q 10 7 4, you would jump to four hearts or cue-bid three spades. North dealer Both sides vulnerable

INSTRUCTIONS

SUDOKU

Fill in the grid so every row, every column and every 3-by-3 grid contains the digits 1 through 9. that means that no number is repeated in any row, column or box.

Sudoku puzzles appear on the Diversions page Monday-Saturday and on the crossword solutions page in Sunday’s Life section.

CROSSWORD PUZZLE

CODEWORD PUZZLE

Answers to previous CODEWORD

How to play Codeword

Codeword is a fun game with simple rules, and a great way to test your knowledge of the English language.

Every number in the codeword grid is ‘code’ for a letter of the alphabet. Thus, the number 2 may correspond to the letter L, for instance.

All puzzles come with a few letters to start. Your first move should be to enter these letters in the puzzle grid. If the letter S is in the box at the bottom of the page underneath the number 2, your first move should be to find all cells numbered 2 in the grid and enter the letter S. Cross the letter S off the list at the bottom of the grid.

Remember that at the end you should have a different letter of the alphabet in each of the numbered boxes 1- 26, and a word in English in each of the horizontal and vertical runs on the codeword grid.

PUZZLE

“The traveler sees what he sees, the tourist sees what he has come to see.” — Gilbert K. Chesterton

Kitchens Don’t Just Happen... They Happen by Design.

Vials of mercury helped old clocks to tell time accurately

Ihad a question from Deb, and it is a question that is way over my head, but here we go. Bear with me because the physics of anything is not my strong suit.

Deb writes me, “My grandmother had a Mercury clock. It was a famous brand, so ‘Mercury’ was not the brand name.”

Why did she call it “Mercury?” This is because these clocks, usually called regulators, did contain sealed vials of mercury. And if it happened to break. you had a problem.

NYT CROSSWORD SOLUTION

Regulator clocks have pendulums that slow down in the summer and speed up in the winter. These antique regulator clocks had metal pendulums, with a weight (I am sure you have seen that). And even though you might not be able to see it, the length of the pendulum gets longer in the summer, which lowers that weight (the center mass) of the pendulum. And you end up with a slower timepiece.

A little vial of the dangerous heavy metal mercury compensated for the change in the pendulum.

Two little sealed vials of mercury are sometimes spotted on the pendulum itself, and the level of mercury would rise with a temperature increase, which compensates for the summer lengthened pendulum.

The regulator pendulums were designed to compensate for temperature variations. As metal gets warm it expands down. The metal (mercury) sealed in the vial

has nowhere to expand but up. This was supposed to keep the center of oscillation constant.

This type of clock was invented in the 18th century by two Englishmen (1760-1780), and the great thing about these clocks was the accuracy.

They run with a swinging pendulum that had compensation in the form of one or two mercury vials, so they were the most accurate clock heretofore. Even though they were invented in England, the English didn’t fall for them with the same fervor as the Germanic folks did, and by the 19th century, the Viennese Regulator was the clock of choice. It was in just about every train station. Gustav Becker was the most celebrated Vienna Regular clockmaker, and his carved walnut wall mounted regulators were ubiquitous 1850-1890. If you have a good one, it can be worth in the $800 range.

The trouble was that back in the 19th century, if your clock ran slower or faster, someone in the household could open the sealed vials of mercury and add more or take out some drops. And perhaps at that time, the man of the house who was doing the fiddling with the clock may not have known that mercury is toxic!

Thus, American clockmakers who made those wall-mounted regulators for, say, the office, were interested in saving money. Therefore, the mercury in the vials was replaced by steel slugs. Thus, the more expensive clocks

Clocks such as this one were called “Mercury” because they used sealed vials of mercury to compensate for changes in the pendulum.

with four sides of beveled glass and pendulums with little weights could still hold mercury.

Many of the early crystal regulator clocks were fitted with mercury compensated pendulums. All of the French clocks were.

The clock is called a “crystal regulator” because it has glass on all four sides and is driven by a swinging pendulum that is weighted. (In this case, all the glass is beveled.)

The pendulum is the regulator and is in this clock. The pendulum contains two glass vials with mercury. If damaged, these glass vials must be replaced with faux ones as mercury is no longer readily available.

American-made crystal regulators used plated, or very highly polished steel slugs inserted into glass tubes to simulate this look.

Here are a couple great websites if you love clocks: ClockHistory.com, and the Virtual Museum “National Watch and Clock Museum (google.com/maps/@40.0369878,76.5019409,2a,75y,59.53h,82.13t/da ta=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1scvTUtu0U4fY mDxpbbomwPg!2e0!3e2!7i13312! 8i6656).

My favorite website is the Detex Watchman’s Clock Album (watchclocks.org), where the story of watchmen’s clocks is told and illustrated. These are clocks used to make sure the watchmen (guards) were watching in the places they should be at the correct time. They recorded time and place in the 19th century on this little strange looking portable clock with record-keeping notches.

And finally, a funny thought: Those of us who have grown up with digital timepieces might not know what the term “Quarter to” means! Yes, we might understand 11.45 and not quarter to twelve. And the clock face might go the way of the Regulator clock that uses mercury for accuracy.

Dr. Elizabeth Stewart’s “Ask the Gold Digger” column appears Saturdays in the News-Press.

Written after her father’s COVID-19 diagnosis, Dr. Stewart’s book “My Darlin’ Quarantine: Intimate Connections Created in Chaos” is a humorous collection of five “what-if” short stories that end in personal triumphs over presentday constrictions. It’s available at Chaucer’s in Santa Barbara.

Shelters seek homes for pets

Local animal shelters and their nonprofit partners are looking for homes for pets.

For more information, go to these websites:

• Animal Services-Lompoc, countyofsb.org/phd/animal/home. sbc.

• Animal Shelter Assistance Program in Goleta, asapcats.org.

ASAP is kitty corner to Santa Barbara County Animal Services.

• Bunnies Urgently Needing

Shelter in Goleta, bunssb.org. BUNS is based at Santa Barbara County Animal Services.

• Companion Animal Placement Assistance, lompoccapa.org and facebook. com/capaoflompoc. CAPA works regularly with Animal ServicesLompoc.

• K-9 Placement & Assistance League, k-9pals.org. K-9 PALS works regularly with Santa Barbara County Animal Services.

• Santa Barbara County Animal Care Foundation, sbcanimalcare. org. (The foundation works regularly with the Santa Maria Animal Center.)

• Santa Barbara County Animal Services in Goleta: countyofsb. org/phd/animal/home.sbc.

• Santa Barbara Humane (with campuses in Goleta and Santa Maria), sbhumane.org.

• Santa Maria Animal Center, countyofsb.org/phd/animal/home.

sbc. The center is part of Santa Barbara County Animal Services.

• Santa Ynez Valley Humane Society/DAWG in Buellton, syvhumane.org.

• Shadow’s Fund (a pet sanctuary in Lompoc), shadowsfund.org.

• Volunteers for Inter-Valley Animals in Lompoc: vivashelter. org.

— Dave Mason

COURTESY PHOTO

“Republicans need to unite and pick the best candidates if they want to start winning again,”

Republicans must unite to win elections

the “presidential penalty.” No matter how good or bad the country is doing, people use the midterms to let the party in charge know they expect more. This election didn’t fit the mold, and the GOP wonders why.

In an attempt to get back into the good graces with the Medici family in the 16th century, Niccolò Machiavelli wrote a book called “The Prince.” In his book, he praised the Prince’s power to conquer the people by dividing them into discontented groups. That was 500 years ago and every successful politician has read it. Why? It still applies today because people let them do it to them.

In 1768, a song published in both the Pennsylvania Journal and Pennsylvania Gazette newspapers helped to inspire and unite the colonies in their fight for independence. Scribed by founding father John Dickinson, it became known throughout the colonies as “The Liberty Song.”

Dickinson told the colonies to “Join hand in hand, brave Americans we all! By uniting we stand, by dividing we fall!”

Midterm elections follow a predictable script. The party who occupies the Oval Office always loses seats in the Senate and especially in the House. Historically this has been called

For weeks, Republicans predicted a “red wave” in the midterms that would carry them back into power in Congress. They believed voters would repudiate Democratic policies that have caused runaway inflation, a rise in violent crime and an ominous border policy that threatens their security.

As Republicans lick their wounds, they fail to see the forest through the trees in their historic losses.

Despite the fact that 70% of the country thinks progressives are taking America down the wrong path, two-thirds think we’re in a recession and are pessimistic about our future, and many Americans believe Biden’s policies are destroying capitalism, the GOP midterm red wave turned into a ripple.

“Voters showed they believe our party is leading the country in the right direction.”

— Nancy Pelosi

Although the nation is in a mess from top to bottom, voters

chose status quo over change that they could believe in because they didn’t have faith in many candidates that ran against the incumbents.

The GOP themselves lost this election in the primaries, and they don’t realize it or want to admit it.

Republicans are now the party of average America. Democrats are the party of factions, identity groups, liberal white college grads, wealthy left coast kooks and liberal media. If the GOP doesn’t retool its message to serve their average voter, it’ll soon become an antique political dinosaur.

The Grand Old Party is living in the past using antiquated weapons to fight a modern campaign war. The new liberal far left has adapted and changed and has a tool box of new weapons to use against Republicans and use them freely to take out anyone who is a threat to their dominance.

“Unlike Republicans, we Democrats never lie or deceive voters to win elections.”

– Hillary Clinton

Since all politics are local, that is where the GOP continues to fall flat on its face. While Democrats have hand picked their candidates for the primaries, Republicans fight each other for months over

who is the best candidate, which exposes their weaknesses and liberal media exploits it for the left. Democrats remain united since that easily out-duels a divided Republican army.

Political strategists claim races considered “toss-ups,” “leaning” or “too close to call” were won by the left because of weaker candidates on the right. They contend that was the key to so many victories by the left.

Successful politicians profit from their mistakes. If a party’s favorite son becomes damaged goods in the eyes of the media, they distance themselves from the public for the good of the party. They are willing to work “out of sight and out of mind” to help elect other qualified candidates for their party.

Our founders envisioned patriots like Donald Trump would step forward and run our nation out of dedication for maintaining the principles established in our Constitution. And he did that and more. He was the only president since George Washington who was not a politician but a patriot to serve.

And it was for that very reason the liberal media went out of their way to turn America against him.

Republicans have a long history of shooting themselves in the foot criticizing their own candidates during the primaries, which turns into critical talking points used by

the Democrats and the media.

“To anger a conservative, lie to him. To anger a liberal, tell him the truth.”

— Theodore Roosevelt

It is sad but true the liberal media has used Mr. Trump to divide the Republican Party as well as America. And the more Mr. Trump fights back to protect his reputation and false charges waged against him by Democrats and media, the more they discredit him in every form of media.

A recent Pew Research poll shows only 22% of Republicans say they would like Mr. Trump to continue to remain a major political figure within the GOP but prefer that he did not run again for president in 2024. A third of Republicans, 32%, say for the good of the party, Mr. Trump should retire from politics and 25% are undecided. Only 21% feel that Mr. Trump should run again for president.

No matter what your opinion is about Donald Trump, he was a very successful president. But that is in the past, and it is time to move on. No matter how much he is admired as a patriot, Republican strategists blame his endorsement of marginally qualified candidates for many

e tarnishing of Santa Barbara

Did you know that in 2018, the Santa Barbara City Council considered a grant proposal for $6 million to put 40 tiny (trailer) homes on the Carrillo/ Castillo commuter lot? It would have only been for 30 months, and it was the first time we heard of City Net.

At this meeting, I asked this man from City Net if he knew that the homeless were being dropped off in Santa Barbara. His answer was yes. but when I asked him if he would tell the city, he just walked away.

City Net came to Santa Barbara from Orange County, and now five years later, where are we? Santa Barbara County has approximately 3,500 homeless people, and the city count was 882 in April. We are confident that if done today, the city count would be more than 900. The problem grows and grows.

When we look around Santa Barbara, we see lots of activity, many committees, tons of meetings, oodles of money spent and a lot of spinning around, with much time wasted and few concrete results.

We have already spent a heck of a lot of time and money trying to decide on the future of the city, with no results. Here we are, again spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on yet another consultant to tell the city council and city administration what to do, as we have to wait until the end of 2023 to find out the latest version. There is a survey out right now they want you to fill out. Go to statestreet. santabarbaraca.gov.

As for homelessness, it doesn’t get solved, it just gets bigger. Again, millions of dollars down the drain with pitiful results. Why does the city of Santa Barbara continue to give our taxpayer money to groups that haven’t given a report on how it worked? Why isn’t anyone stopping the import of the homeless to Santa Barbara so we can see that our money did help?

Last week Did You Know? published a letter from Kelly Brown, owner of The Natural Cafe on lower State Street, in which he informed his landlord and the Santa Barbara City Council why he was closing the restaurant, after 30 years in business.

Soon after our column was published, we received via the Internet, from a third party, a copy of a letter to Kelly Brown from Robin Elander, executive director of Downtown Santa Barbara. Just to make the point, this letter is already in the public domain. Its contents are a matter of public interest because the organization Robin Elander represents is partly financed from city funds, Business Improvement District fees, and other sources, such as event sponsorships.

It’s the economy, stupid.

Well, kind of.

Over the past five decades, at least since 1965, when President Lyndon Baines Johnson’s “Great Society” legislation began to be enacted by an overwhelming Democratic majority in both houses of Congress, the U.S. government has been in a battle against poverty. Here’s what that legislation was supposed to do: End poverty, reduce crime, abolish inequality, improve the environment, and eradicate racial injustice. Nearly 200 separate pieces of legislation were signed between 1965 and 1968 in furtherance of creating that Great Society. The results have been less than overwhelming. Ending poverty was big on the

list so we can start with that. In 1965, the official poverty rate was 15% or so. After subsidizing a great number of “poor” people with government handouts — oops, I mean “hands-ups”; oh wait, that’s for taxpayers. No, I mean a “helping hand.” (Yeah, that’s it). Well, after the “helping hand,” all of those impressive Great Society programs barely moved the needle. The result of adding hundreds of billions of dollars to our national debt in the fight against poverty is that 50 years later, the number and share of Americans who live below the poverty line went from the aforementioned 15% (give or take) to — wait for it — 15% (give

or take)!

Voila. This is what passes for success in government terms.

PURELY POLITICAL

Oh, but within that same half a century, the number of people living below half the poverty line (surviving on less than $11,157 annually for a family of four) reached its highest level on record. According to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, that figure was 6.7% of the population.

Big whoop, right?

Want more?

How about “reducing crime?”

Yeah, that’s it. Aggravated assaults, for example, went from 215,330 in 1965 to a peak of 1,099,210 in 1995.

Vehicle thefts in 1965 amounted to 496,900; by 1995, it had jumped

to 1,472,400. Property crimes went from 4,352,000 to 12,063,900. Etcetera.

All crimes began to abate after the passage of things such as “Three Strikes and You’re Out” legislation, “Broken Windows” policing, placing more and better law enforcement in high-crime areas, and other programs. The anti-crime legislation and similar measures that President Bill Clinton signed and now makes apologies for finally put a halt to what was surely a nationwide crimewave.

And now, in the words of Monty Python, for something completely different.

We really can begin to right our economic ship. Divided government, for example, is with us and will probably remain

for the next few election cycles (though anything can happen). So, while we have this political stand-off, Republicans should be brainstorming new strategies for the 2030s.

To save real money, we should start by doing away with truly unnecessary spending by abolishing the Departments of Energy, Education, and Transportation for starters.

The Department of Energy was established during the Carter years for one specific purpose: to reach energy independence. We got there during President Donald Trump’s last year in office but as soon as President Joe Biden came in, he reversed that often-touted and much-desired independence.

However, when Did You Know? approached Ms. Elander about her letter to Mr. Brown, she responded that it was a private letter, and she refused permission for us to publish it. Well, we won’t publish her letter, but, as it is already in the public square, through the internet, we shall refer to it.

First, what does she have to hide? She complained that Mr. Brown should have come to her because his allowing his landlord to go to the press tarnished the brand of downtown. We don’t believe going to the press tarnished the brand of downtown. We believe not taking care of the issues people have been complaining about for years has tarnished the brand.

For example, she said she

‘America only stops being great when its people cease cooperating and start blaming each other. These divisions have been ruthlessly created and exploited in recent years.”

— Stewart Stafford

DID YOU KNOW? Bonnie Donovan

according to columnist William

Social Security’s impending bankruptcy doesn’t resonate with voters, yet

Iam not a constitutional lawyer, but I see nearly zero chance that funding Social Security out of the general fund would be allowed for any significant length of time. It is at best a fool’s errand to hold out hope that Congress will be able to float the program’s imbalances out of the general fund.

The highest payment goes to the man or woman who had the best job over the longest period. It is very difficult to explain taking money from the working poor to provide a stipend to the wealthy retiree particularly when many of our poorest seniors are not even eligible for benefits.

Arthur von Wiesenberger Co-Publisher Co-Publisher

Wendy McCaw

The merger of big government and evil empires

In nearly every midterm election, historically the party that is not in power picks up a sizable number of representatives in Congress.

In this current election cycle, the utter failure of “Dementia Joe” Biden’s empty promise to build back better and to unify America, along with historic inflation, and the political embarrassment known as Kamala Harris, all indicated the Democratic Party was dead in the water for all practical purposes except in very blue states.

Thereby, nearly every conservative political pundit in America was predicting a red wave, or maybe even a red tsunami in the midterms, but as my friend Joe Armendariz quipped, “The GOP’s red tsunami turned out as partly sunny with a 10% chance of sprinkles”! How could that be? What happened?

Well, conveniently so, many of these same political pundits are now scapegoating Donald Trump as the kiss of death of the Republican red wave. As pollster Frank Luntz said on CNN, for every one person who loves Donald Trump, there is one and onehalf persons who thinks he is horrible even though he is still the No. 1 Republican in America.

The ugly truth? Whereas the one person who hates Donald Trump is certainly a Democrat, the one-half person is an establishment Republican!

This division in the Republican Party is nothing new. It goes back some 30 years ever since the Ronald Reagan era passed, as his statesmanship uniquely served to unite the various factions of the Republican Party to fight against big government domestically and evil empires abroad.

However, much has happened in the world in between the Reagan and Trump eras, and that is the emergence of a truly global economy and the promise of a new world order via the socalled Great Reset.

Mr. Trump sought to reverse course via his Make America Great Again campaign at the expense of these global interests long since entrenched in both parties in Washington, D.C., on Wall Street, not to mention the Silicon Valley, the media

including Hollywood and social media, the education establishment, the European Union and China — all of whom are in bed together.

Therefore, Mr. Trump’s egotism, bombast and narcissism, which surely turns off a great number of Americans, is not the true reason the American and global political and economic establishment is still going after him with pitchforks. They hate him because he poses an independent threat to their agenda. What is their agenda? To simply stay in power as they broker political and economic deals around the world.

And truth be told, these same people will go after Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis if he won’t do their bidding if he emerges as the next major contender for the White House.

America is not in trouble because of Donald Trump. Neither did the red wave fail because of him. It is in trouble because the proponents of a global economy and a new world order are out to destroy our spirit by eroding our foundations and fracturing our union. It is as simple as the notion: to divide to conquer. They weakened our economy via the COVID-19 shutdowns and obscene levels of out-of-control spending, our criminal justice system by accusing it of being racist, and our foundations including our Judeo-Christian heritage and Western Civilization as if that is a euphemism for white supremacy.

Gov. DeSantis is popular because he is fighting the establishment in a more civil and demur manner than has Mr. Trump. Nevertheless, some of the biggest supporters of Gov. DeSantis are from the same Republican establishment that sought to destroy Mr. Trump from day one.

Gov. DeSantis had better watch his back because unlike Mr. Trump, he will need to reach into the establishment’s pocketbook to succeed, while they implement an age-old strategy among the elite power broker class to “rent to own” him.

Andy Caldwell is the COLAB executive director and host of “The Andy Caldwell Show,” airing 3 to 5 p.m. weekdays on KZSB AM 1290, the News-Press radio station.

Brenton Smith

The author is with the Heartland Institute

This thought comes to mind because of the 2022 midterms and the inherent contradiction between the importance of Social Security and the weight that voters have placed on the program on Election Day despite two decades of continuous financial decline.

No group should be more interested in the prospects of the program than women who are over 50 years old. Yet, an AARP poll revealed that Social Security placed a distant fifth in voting priority in the 2022 midterm elections among people in this segment of the population.

At this point, a woman turning 77 today expects on average to outlive the system’s ability to pay scheduled benefits. If that voter doesn’t care, no one does.

The only explanation for the indifference to the program’s ability to keep its promises that I can imagine is voters have reached the conclusion that Congress will simply never allow Social Security to fall into crisis.

Apparently, Americans have faith in politicians that would make the Pope covet.

To provide an example, one of my readers wrote to me, “And, as I pointed out, the general fund is already going to be on the hook for the SS shortfall, one way or the other.” The reader reasons that no matter what happens, he will get paid. Hence, he has nearly zero interest in the prospects of the system.

It is a misplaced faith. The general fund is not on the hook, and likely never will be. Funding Social Security from the general fund would likely be deemed

Carbon-free reality

Chaos is the foundation of the climate change agenda.

The dire sacrifices that the population will have to endure to effect the desired transformation would be soundly rejected, especially after we had not only survived but managed to thrive through a pandemic and after we had felt the freedom and faith of Making America Great Again.

Tyranny is the only way we could be debased into hating ourselves and each other enough to comply with deconstructing and denying

According to writer Brenton Smith, it’s not realistic to expect Congress to use the general fund to solve the financial problems for Social Security.

unconstitutional in court.

Yes, Social Security was determined to be constitutional in 1935 in Helvering v. Davis. That doesn’t mean that a legislative change in the way that the program is financed would be exempt from judicial review.

Just because the law is called the Social Security Act does not grant the pieces and parts of the law a special status.

The Supreme Court is not interested in the wisdom of how the power is exercised. Rather it deals with deciding whether that power is granted by the Constitution to Congress. In the Helvering case, the Supreme Court held that “Congress may spend money in aid of the ‘general welfare.’” Further, the court held that the “concept of welfare is shaped by Congress, not the states.”

The court added a caveat that earns your attention: “The (definition of welfare) belongs to Congress, unless the choice is clearly wrong, a display of arbitrary power is not an exercise of judgment.”

Here is the problem. Social Security is not universal nor equal.

When the money for benefits comes from the general fund, someone is going to ask whether giving money to the idle rich is a sound way to aid the general welfare of the nation. The benefits formula works when the money comes from workers who are contributing to a plan that pays them a future benefit. It is very different when we take money that could be spent on other priorities.

Back in 1935, the Supreme Court indicated that it wasn’t terribly interested in the wisdom of the benefits arrangement.

According to the court, the law was a well-researched solution to a well-established problem.

In its decision, the court cited congressional studies, presidential commissions, advisory councils and extensive public hearings.

The Supreme Court ruled, “A great mass of evidence was brought together supporting the policy which finds expression in the act.”

Imagine if this standard were applied to an annual subsidy from the general fund. Funding would require a similar exercise of judgment demonstrating that Congress thoughtfully valued this expense against every other expense that money might have served. That is every year, where the reasoning is we are spending the money today because the politicians of the past didn’t do their job. In the coming years, it would behoove voters of all ages to take this issue more seriously.

In 1935, the Supreme Court allowed Congress the power to provide a legislative solution to a well-documented problem that threatened a growing number of Americans. Today, the Court would be tasked with considering whether Congress should be given the power to deal with a very different problem: Voters have not paid attention.

Business as usual will get us nowhere

Ineeded some time to absorb and watch the snail-paced results of some of last week’s election debacle and see what happened next.

One thing I don’t understand is, and find it a bit odd, was that the three most critical states were also the three states that didn’t know how to count. And statistically, when an election count draws out, for some reason, the Democrats win, and that was proven to be the case again. Makes you wonder a little.

America is getting what it deserves — though about half of us don’t agree we deserve more taxes, higher costs for everything, the world population moving into our country. We didn’t vote for that, but we’re stuck with it.

The other thing that really yanks my chain is that the Republicans aren’t doing me any favors either.

Don’t get me wrong, I would never vote for a progressive “thinker.” But my party is letting us down.

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has watched for two years his state being invaded beyond anything this country has ever seen. How come he allows it? Does the federal government have such a hold on him? I don’t get it. Now he’s being wishy-washy about declaring an invasion so his state can actually do something.

On the other hand, Kari Lake was ready to take action as soon as she was in office.

our history and future for the present of carbon-free barren reality.

Why get God out of schools, out of the courts, out of the government unless you are terrified of oversight? Why foster racism, encourage cartels with limitless slavery and hungry drug market opportunities, sic the FBI on citizens, arm the IRS and cancel any opposition?

Why flood the country with millions of criminal foreigners, cede the streets to butchers and madmen, teach children not to trust their parents and to hate

their father’s father’s father?

No matter how many lies they tell when they get caught, they aren’t interested in climate change. Their obsession is population change.

Intentional imposition of chaos is impossible to defend as anything but a recipe for a fall. It’s how to divide the house against itself.

We the people have won by a small margin (in the House), but we have oversight back.

Derrick Harrison Hurd Santa Barbara

John Fetterman and a universe with anti-senators

Sometimes the optimal way to describe something is to describe what it is not.

The opposite for a person could be labeled “anti,” which is defined as a “person opposed to a particular policy, activity or idea.” To review the concept of “anti-senators,” we will begin reviewing “senators,” before discussing whether “antisenators” exist in the Meta Universe — a virtual world that is parallel to the real world and that is always online — and/or the real world, and/or in the questioning mind of this writer.

Article I of the U.S. Constitution defines the qualifications for U.S. senators as being at least 30 years old, a citizen of the U.S. for at least nine years and an inhabitant of the state that elected them. There is no requirement that the candidate be a resident of that state.

Senators are required to swear (or affirm) “that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic, that I will bear faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and I will faithfully discharge the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God.”

Can Pennsylvanian Sen.-elect John Fetterman have no “mental reservations” since he alleges that his mental condition from a stroke caused his failure to understand the speech of others or to compose complete thoughts or sentences? Would these characteristics qualify as “mental reservations?” Are they temporary?

He refused to permit his physician from discussing whether these failures were temporary, or if not, to describe the possible longterm limitations of his stroke that kept him off the campaign trail until Aug. 13.

The facts are that his physicians inserting stent(s) indicates that his problems began with a blood clot in his heart that traveled to block some blood flow in his brain. Hence the stroke. Recoveries can be partial, or total, depending on the individual and the extent of

the problems. Unfortunately, the slowness of Sen.-elect Fetterman’s recovery is not a good sign.

The Senate accomplishes its objectives by “meeting to discuss, write, support and vote on bills” that represent the people of their states. Examples are Sens. Joe Manchin, D-West Va., and Rick Scott, R-Fla..

The qualifications for an antisenator would be the opposite of those listed above. Based on his history and campaign, the question arises: Is John Fetterman an example of an “anti-senator?”

Mr. Fetterman’s history of not “meeting, discussing, writing, supporting or voting” began when he was mayor of Braddock. Pa. (2006-2019).

Braddock is a town of 1,721 residents, where Mr. Fetterman

Unfortunately, a sharp and extremely articulate candidate was eked out by the delayed vote count for governor of Arizona. However, during her campaign she outlined some very clear proposals she would do if she were elected.

“The core of this framework starts with Arizona leading a coalition of like-minded states in drafting an interstate compact to secure the border,” Ms. Lake said. “The federal government guarantees protection to the states under Article IV, Section 4 of the U.S. Constitution. However, Washington is outright refusing to hold up their end of the bargain.

“Therefore, under Article I, Section 10 of the U.S. Constitution, Arizona will invoke our inherent power to fend off the invasion at our southern border in the absence of federal protection.”

Now that sounds like a good plan, and how come no one has done it yet?

If you’re not part of the solution, Texas, then as the saying goes, you are part of the problem. Get to it!

We’ve also turned Election Day into Election Month, and the Democrats have so stacked the process I’m not even sure anymore what the rules are. Numerous ideas have been suggested on how to reign in the voting mess, but like all government agencies, once they get a taste of power and realize there’s no one to stop them, they get bigger and bigger, more bloated and greedier and ultimately more corrupt. That’s what’s happened to the process that used to keep America set apart from the rest of the world: how we vote.

The Democrats and their media lackeys were posing themselves prior to the election that if the Democrats lost, it was going to be because the Republicans were cheating, or some such nonsense. They were laying the groundwork and covering their butts for the red wave.

Afterward, while gloating, they’re telling us how great and honest the election process was. I can’t believe what they get away with. And then guess what? It was Donald Trump’s fault. But maybe for the first time

Andy Caldwell

Henry Schulte

The author lives in Solvang

Brent E. Zepke

The author lives in Santa Barbara.

COURTESY PHOTOS

Donald Trump Ron DeSantis

COURTESY PHOTOS

Sen.-elect John Fetterman Dr. Mehmet Oz

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This provided an opportunity for direct though informal interchange between the heads

Tensions between Beijing and

Washington have been steadily rising over a range of issues, from human rights to economic and military conflicts. The U.S. is planning to deploy six B-52 strategic bombers to Australia in part to represent opposition to China’s expansionist moves, in particular threats over Taiwan.

Not surprisingly, Beijing has reacted with strident outrage.

Just before the encounter with President Xi, President Biden stopped in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, to join meetings of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations as well as the East Asia Summit. His agenda included discussions with leaders from Japan and South Korea, two particularly important U.S. allies.

On Tuesday and Wednesday, Indonesia hosted a summit of the Group of 20 (G20) — a forum of industrialized nations plus the European Union. The G-20 provides a structure for policy discussion and coordination on a wide range of matters, including international security.

The G20 began in 1999, spurred by the Asia financial crisis of 1997. Rapid response led by the United States mobilized public and private capital to relieve nearly disastrous financial pressures on Asian economies.

President Bill Clinton led this effective crisis management.

In 2010, G-20 meetings took

place in two South Korean cities — Gyeongju, then Seoul. The selection of this nation aptly, and appropriately, symbolized the exceptional economic development of their powerhouse economy – and stable political democracy – during the years following the devastating Korean War (1950-53).

Japan was a participant in the initial, predecessor G-7 organization of economically advanced nations. The successor G-20 has developed a wider arena to include China, along with Brazil, India and other rapidly industrializing large economies of the world.

The fact that worldwide very poor people are becoming prosperous is good news for everyone. They represent new competitors, but also are potential new consumers of our products and potential investment partners. Wars are on balance less likely.

Washington now has an opportunity to highlight Indonesia, and neighboring nations, as success stories of expanding political stability, modernization and the rule of law. In 1998, opponents forced Indonesia’s long-time autocratic president and former general Muhammad Suharto from power. Since then, the nation has had a representative government.

Indonesia’s external conflicts today are largely technical and legal, notably the maritime disputes that generally involve the nations of East and Southeast Asia. Dictatorship has ended, but corruption remains a problem. The situation used to be quite different. During the height of the Cold War, Indonesia was a pivotal leader among developing nations. Flamboyant nationalist President Sukarno played the Soviet Union and United States against one another. CIA efforts to bring the president down failed, greatly weakening U.S. standing.

In consequence, cooperation between Indonesia and the Soviet Union expanded. This development was extremely important in the decision for large-scale U.S. military intervention in Vietnam in 1965. Today, we largely have forgotten this history.

British forces, with Australian and New Zealand allies, defeated Indonesia attacks on Malaysia. Earlier, Britain defeated a Communist insurgency in Malaya, today part of Malaysia. Their strategy remains highly germane. Today, the Cold War is over, though the potentially explosive conflicts between China and the United States show utopia has not yet arrived.

For more information, read Former UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s memoirs,

“Resolved”.

Arthur I. Cyr is author of “After the Cold War - American Foreign Policy, Europe and Asia” (NYU Press and Palgrave/Macmillan).

He is also the director of the Clausen Center at Carthage College in Kenosha, Wisc., and a Clausen Distinguished Professor.

He welcomes questions and comments at acyr@carthage.edu.

What I learned running as a Republican in California

Pull up a chair and I’ll tell you a story. It’s not about Little Red Riding Hood or houses built out of straw.

But there are pigs and wolves.

I’m a fifth-generation Californian who grew up on a cattle ranch and went to MIT. So I’ve looked back at the old and looked ahead to the new. I have training in real estate, law and finance. I work as an investment adviser and an investment banker.

I have four daughters and am a baptized Episcopalian.

I have served on many nonprofit boards, though I prefer being on horseback. This year, I bucked the advice of many friends and ran as a Republican for the Board of Equalization. I’m in District 2, which covers 19 counties that cling to the coast from the Oregon border down to Ventura County.

What’s the BOE? It was created in 1879 to ensure that counties charged property taxes uniformly. It collects alcohol and pipeline taxes. Perhaps most unique to the Board is its Taxpayers’ Rights Advocate Office. Some want the BOE folded under the governor’s office. Those wary of consolidating power have argued otherwise.

As a “top two” candidate, I made it to the general election. To my surprise, I beat one of Gavin Newsom’s former hand-picked replacements. (He appointed her to the San Francisco County Board of Supervisors when he jumped to his next gig.)

The good news? Our campaign bumped up the district’s California Grand Old Party’s percentage of votes by over 16% versus the last election cycle. They’re still counting the votes.

So far, 573,786 voted for yours truly — almost 2.5 times the number of Republicans in the State of Wyoming!

The bad news? I still lost decisively to a hard-left progressive. It makes you scratch your head and take stock.

Here’s what I learned, running as a commonsense Republican in California:

• Running for office is expensive.

Candidate statements and filing fees for the primary and general elections in California will set you back over $12,500. (That’s before you pay for a treasurer, buy lawn signs, web hosting, email service or social media.)

The state of California is a vacuum with an insatiable hunger for taxes and fees. Even for its elections.

Ask not what the California Grand Old Party can do for you. Ask what you can do for the CAGOP.

The CAGOP will provide you training but may not provide you dollars. Many of the central committees need financial help getting their slates out. So, as a candidate for a district office, expect to give rather than get.

• Sacramento’s bureaucracy thrives on complication. It’s job insurance.

Form 410. Form 501. Form 700. Forms, forms and more forms from Sacramento. The place lives and breathes bureaucracy.

Candidates are issued a handbook on the complexities they’re supposed to follow. And, you’d better hire a treasurer so

you don’t step on landmines. The irony? Our tax money underwrites this political shop of horrors.

• Do not expect most of the traditional media to be fair in interviews. Ever.

Despite sending the two large newspaper chains specific information related to what I planned to do to make the BOE better, none of it made the press.

Despite discussing basic economic issues in a clinical way in two major media interviews, not a word was printed. So, don’t expect most of the traditional media to give you fair coverage.

Two worthy standouts which ARE willing to stand up to the Left: the Santa Barbara News-Press and the nonpartisan Opportunity Now Silicon Valley.

• It takes a lot of courage to run as an underdog.

Running for a statewide office as a Republican in California builds character. Not just the ordinary kind. More akin to what you might find in “Killer Angels”: “The civilians have fled and the houses are dark.”

• True believers don’t care about the facts.

California is in a world of hurt. Highest gas prices in the country. Crappy schools. High crime. Highway off ramps sheltering drug addled zombies. Terrible fire prevention practices on government-controlled land. Billions voted on for water infrastructure but no new reservoirs. $105 Billion trains to nowhere.

Common sense candidates continue to hope a majority of

voters will have an epiphany. The wisest, some observe, have already voted.With their feet. Wagon trains of corporate HQs and middle-class Americans continue to head to Texas, Nevada and Utah.

The Leftists who stay? Many are true believers. The nihilists that Eric Hoffer warned us about in his seminal book that inspired Ronald Reagan to give him a Medal of Freedom.

God-fearing counties in California do exist — like Trinity and Del Norte — where I garnered a decisive majority of the vote. Heaven holds a special place for them. If Californians voted by acreage, I would have won.

• People will ask you questions completely irrelevant to the office you’re seeking.

As a candidate for the BOE, I found myself peppered with questions which have nothing to do with the office. Are you “prolife”? Do you support Donald Trump? What is your position on vaccines? School curriculum? Election integrity?

These have nothing to do with taxing practices or why the BOE is an important part of our state’s checks and balances.

• You’ll have little or no staff, so be prepared to be chief cook and bottle washer.

Delivering lawn signs? Updating your website? Writing out a speech? Preparing ad copy? If you’re watching every nickel, chances are, you’ll be doing these things yourself.

If you want sympathy in politics, it’s a lot like Wall Street. Buy a dog.

• You’ll learn who your true friends are.

When you run for office, you’ll discover who your true friends are: who’s willing to endorse you, put up a lawn sign, or write a check.

I’m humbled and in awe over the encouragement and support that I received for my campaign. Our campaign had more than 95 donors. I was so amazed at the generosity that I wrote each donor a personal “thank you” note.

• Postpartum blues. After you’ve given a campaign your all, you may feel ready for a blood transfusion or a bender. I settled for a walk in the woods and a can of sparkling water. As they say, to each his own.

What did I learn as a Republican running for office in California? A hell of a lot, that’s for certain. Though it’s tempting to lament, I’ll just rather settle for old-fashioned gratitude.

In conclusion, I do have a confession.

One of my vices is collecting cowboy belt buckles. I have too many of them, but they remind me of rides and rodeos. They remind me of heading and heeling calves. They remind me of when California was freer and had less asphalt. I have one buckle dedicated to the proposed State of Jefferson. The double-cross “X’s” feature prominently in its design. Perhaps next time I visit Trinity and Del Norte, I’ll wear it.

As Thomas Jefferson said, “I predict future happiness for Americans, if they can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them.”

© 2022 by Peter Coe Verbica

After 2022 setback, GOP race for 2024 Is wide open

The 2022 midterm elections were, by any objective measure, tremendously disappointing for Republicans.

As has already been discussed ad nauseam, the “red wave” that so many — yours truly included — had predicted simply did not materialize.

The reasons for that are numerous; no one individual, one institution or one specific systemic failure is to blame. There is, in short, a lot of blame to go around here.

Because while Republicans actually won the national popular vote by roughly four points, there is no way to describe their historically awful firstpresidential-term oppositionparty midterm performance, in which the GOP lost almost every high-profile state-level “swing” race, as anything other than disastrous.

One clear reason for Republicans’ setback is the extent to which they were thoroughly outcompeted by Democrats when it comes to the most bare-bones, brass tacks elements of modern politics. Specifically, when it came to party and candidate-specific fundraising, as well as early vote/ vote-by-mail mobilization and the mechanics of ballot harvesting/

get-out-the-vote operations, the GOP was outperformed, outclassed and left in the dust. It is pretty embarrassing that one of America’s major two political parties seems clueless about how to execute 21st-century American politics, but here we are.

Moving forward, the Republican National Committee and the various other organs of the Republican Party establishment would, if they were remotely serious about winning elections, engage in deep introspection and enact concrete changes.

Alas, early signs are not promising. The milquetoast Rep. Tom Emmer, R-Minn., won his bid for House majority whip.

Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., was retained as Senate minority leader.

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Bakersfield, appears on track for the House speakership come January.

Republican National Committee Chair Ronna McDaniel is poised to remain ensconced in her sinecure. As the perhapsapocryphal bon mot often attributed to Talleyrand goes, “They have learned nothing, and they have forgotten nothing.”

To an extent, the GOP needs to figure out how to fundraise better and implement a better voter targeting/ballot harvesting operation before any other conversation becomes pertinent. To wit, there is perhaps little point in discussing 2024 unless and until the GOP makes the necessary operational changes to give its presidential candidate a viable chance at winning.

But the reason that the topic of 2024 must be broached is that one of the reasons — not the sole reason, but very much a reason — for the GOP’s lackluster 2022 performance has himself already done precisely that.

I speak, of course, about former President Donald Trump, who announced his 2024 presidential candidacy Tuesday evening at his Mar-a-Lago estate.

Mr. Trump announced his candidacy, in uncharacteristically subdued fashion, precisely one week after he indisputably harmed Republican electoral prospects across the country.

An analysis from The New York Times’ Nate Cohn, based on underlying data from The Cook Political Report’s primary scoreboard data, concluded that the “Trump effect” at the ballot

box this cycle amounted to a fivepoint penalty compared with other Republicans.

Specifically, while Mr. Cohn showed that Republicans nationwide ran an average of 5.6% ahead of their 2020 vote margin, what he dubbed so-called “MAGA candidates” ran only 0.7% ahead — thus, a 4.9% differential. Any number of high-profile statewide races anecdotally bear this out.

In New Hampshire, Gov. Chris Sununu outperformed Republican Senate candidate Don Bolduc by 13 points. In Pennsylvania, “ultra-MAGA” Republican gubernatorial candidate Doug Mastriano got blown out by Josh Shapiro, and underperformed (fellow Trump endorsee and 2022 loser) Dr. Mehmet Oz. In Georgia, Republican Senate candidate Herschel Walker ran well behind Gov. Brian Kemp, who cruised to re-election.

In Arizona, Republican gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake underperformed the statewide Republican voter share by six points. Mr. Trump lost many other high-profile House races as well, such as Bo Hines in North Carolina, John Gibbs in Michigan and Joe Kent in Washington State.

True, there are other competing data points, such as anti-Trump Joe O’Dea’s huge defeat in

Colorado, but the bottom-line conclusion is clear enough: Mr. Trump did the GOP no favors this election.

Republicans lost the national independent vote, astonishingly lost even those voters who told pollsters they “somewhat disapprove” of President Joe Biden, and were simply annihilated in the “unmarried women” demographic.

The GOP has many other problems right now, but it is still clear that the latest incarnation of Trump-style politicking, focused as it is on relitigating the 2020 presidential election to an unhealthy extent and fighting petty personal battles, was rejected by the electorate in what should have been a breakthrough “red wave” year.

That a huge “red wave” was likely never in the offing due to the aforementioned structural reasons does not negate the fact that Mr. Trump still brought down the party, relative to what the results might have still otherwise been. Trump fatigue, in short, is real.

Crucially, that fatigue effect is not limited to independents, other middle-ground “persuadables” and donor class types. Large swaths of the Republican base

Magic cars

Politicians praise electric cars. If everyone buys them, they say, solar and wind power will replace our need for oil. But that’s absurd.

Here is the rest of my list of “inconvenient facts” about electric cars.

“The future of the auto industry is electric,” says President Joe Biden. He assumes a vast improvement in batteries. Better batteries are crucial because both power plants and cars need to store lots of electric power.

But here’s inconvenient fact 3: Batteries are lousy at storing large amounts of energy.

“Batteries leak, and they don’t hold a lot,” says physicist Mark Mills.

He thinks electric cars are great but explains that “oil begins with a huge advantage: 5,000% more energy in it per pound. Electric car batteries weigh 1,000 pounds. Those 1,000 pounds replace just 80 pounds of gasoline.”

But future batteries will be better, I point out.

“Engineers are really good at making things better,” Mr. Mills responds, “but they can’t make them better than the laws of physics permit.”

That’s inconvenient fact 4. Miracle batteries powerful enough to replace fossil fuels are a fantasy.

“Because nature is not nice to humans,” explains Mr. Mills, “we store energy for when it’s cold or really hot. People who imagine an energy transition want to build windmills and solar panels and store all that energy in batteries. But if you do the arithmetic, you find you’d need to build about a hundred trillion dollars’ worth of batteries to store the same amount of energy that Europe has in storage now for this winter. It would take the world’s battery factories 400 years to manufacture that many batteries.”

Politicians don’t mention that when they promise every car will be electric. They also don’t mention that the electric grid is limited.

This summer, California officials were so worried about blackouts they asked electric vehicle owners to stop charging cars!

Yet today, few of California’s

C4

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Direct questions to Managing Editor Dave Mason at 805-5645277 or voices@newspress.com.

On Monday, Presidents Joe Biden of the United States and Xi Jinping of China met in Bali, Indonesia.

of the governments of two very powerful nations.

John Stossel

Josh Hammer

Peter Coe Verbica

Arthur I. Cyr

COURTESY PHOTOS

President Joe Biden

President Xi Jinping

works with people who could have helped with the homeless. Here are the names of those people: City Net and SBACT. She states that Mr. Brown could participate in meetings called RAP (regional action plan) to get results with the homeless.

Well, we have participated in our area RAP where around 78 businesses/residents started attending the weekly meetings. Yet after no results and people feeling like it was a waste of time, the last one I attended featured only two neighbors on Zoom. And the meetings were no longer weekly.

We reported a woman living in her car and a man in his truck on Montecito Street. The city has their garbage cleaned up weekly. She was the homeless person breaking into hotel rooms and private residences. Yes, it’s years later, and they still live in the same spots.

Right now we have a young man living in his chair under the Garden Street bridge — for the last five months now.

At one point , one of these employees of SBACT, City Net or city staff could have reported this.

We have a hundred more of these stories so why do you think it would help Mr. Brown or the future tenant?

Did You Know? submitted a public records request on how much the city of Santa Barbara pays Robin’s group Downtown Organization a year.

According to the records, “the city allocates $310,000 per year to the DSO for Marketing & Promotional Services.”

The Santa Barbara City Council just approved an agreement with SBACT for coordination and collaboration of homeless services and providers for $100,000 for fiscal year 20222023 (which is a decrease of $50,000 from the previous fiscal year). This includes the monthly

and weekly RAP meetings and neighborhood site visits...”

Four years later, what’s the total cost?

According to the city, “City Net is our primary homelessness outreach and case management provider in the City of Santa Barbara. Their current contract is $618,920.”

Five years later, what’s the total cost? All the above numbers are per year.

Furthermore, as her job is indirectly funded by public money, how can Robin Elander’s official letter be private from public interest? We are not dealing with the official secrets act here.

Can it be her assertion to Mr. Brown, that the publication of

the details in his letter in both the News-Press and other local papers has in the opinion of many of his peers, tarnished the brand of downtown, which will take some time to recover from? How does this help Mr. Brown?

It seems to Did You Know? that Mr. Brown was only speaking truth to power, as he sees it. He revealed his distress and sorrow in closing down a 30-yearlong endeavor appreciated by thousands of diners. He did this both in his letter and in making the very difficult decision to close down his restaurant after so many successful years.

Those of us who frequented The Natural Cafe through the years feel not only a sense of loss but also, a sense of helplessness

in reaction to the reasons he stated.

What we are getting for our money is a block party in exchange for our annual Christmas Parade.

I was out of the state two weeks ago, and when people heard I was from Santa Barbara, a few asked what happened to our city. They said they used to vacation here yearly but stopped due to the homeless and how dirty Santa Barbara has become.

Who is responsible for this tarnishing?

Bonnie Donovan writes the “Did You Know?” column in conjunction with a bipartisan group of local citizens. It appears Saturdays in the Voices section.

In Europe: ‘They’re going back to burning coal’

to get that electricity from 100% renewable sources, the rationing would be deadly.

cars are electric. Gov. Gavin Newsom ordered that all new cars must be electric by 2035! Where does he think he’ll get the electricity to power them?

“Roughly speaking, you have to double your electric grid to move the energy out of gasoline into the electric sector,” says Mr. Mills. “No one is planning to double the electric grid, so they’ll be rationing.”

Rationing. That means some places will simply turn off some of the power. That’s our final inconvenient fact: We just don’t have enough electricity for all electric cars.

Worse, if (as many activists and politicians propose) we try

“Even if you cover the entire continent of the United States with solar panels, you wouldn’t supply half of America’s electricity,” Mr. Mills points out.

Even if you added “Washington Monument-sized wind turbines spread over an area six times greater than the state of New York, that wouldn’t be enough.”

This is just math and physics. It’s amazing that supposedly responsible people promote impossible fantasies.

“It’s been an extraordinary accomplishment of propaganda,” complains Mr. Mills, “almost infantile ... distressing because it’s so silly.”

Even if people invent much better cars, wind turbines, solar

panels, power lines and batteries, explains Mr. Mills, “you’re still drilling things, digging up stuff. You’re still building machines that wear out ... It’s not a magical transformation.”

Even worse, today politicians make us pay more for energy while forcing us to do things that hurt the environment. Their restrictions on fossil fuels drive people to use fuels that pollute more.

In Europe: “They’re going back to burning coal! What we’ve done is have our energy systems designed by bureaucrats instead of engineers,” complains Mr. Mills. “We get worse energy, more expensive energy and higher environmental impacts!”

I like electric cars. But I won’t pretend that driving one makes me some kind of environmental

hero.

“There’ll be lots more electric cars in the future,” concludes Mr. Mills. “There should be, because that’ll reduce demand for oil, which is a good thing.

“But when you do the math, to operate a society with 5 or 6 billion people who are living in poverty we can’t imagine, when you want to give them a little of what we have, the energy demands are off the charts big. We’re going to need everything.”

That includes fossil fuels.

Every Tuesday at JohnStossel.com, Mr. Stossel posts a new video about the battle between government and freedom. He is the author of “Give Me a Break: How I Exposed Hucksters, Cheats, and Scam Artists and Became the Scourge of the Liberal Media.”

How did John Fetterman win the Senate race?

words of his opponent.

missing so many meetings and only voting once caused the council to threaten to impeach him from a job that nobody wants that only pays $150/month.

Prior to his return to his own campaign on Aug. 13, out-ofstaters spent $32 million flooding the voters with false allegations that his opponent, Dr. Mehmet Oz, was anti-abortions, when the truth was that Dr. Oz agreed with the U.S. Supreme Court and the Constitution that abortion polices must be handled by the state: U.S. senators have no vote in the policies.

When Mr. Fetterman returned to his own campaign, he ran a Bidentype campaign, meaning he rarely made public appearances, gave no interviews, had staffers issue a few releases and refused to debate until Oct. 25, after many voters had already cast their mail-in ballots. During the debate, he strained for words, bungled lines even though he had a screen that listed the

Mr. Fetterman’s adviser, Rebecca Katz, tweeted that as a senator “lingering auditory problems” will prevent him from answering questions, so questions must be submitted in writing and “will be returned as soon as his wife has had time to answer.” Apparently he also cannot think or write.

The preamble to the Constitution outlines what must be “supported and defended” as establishing justice, ensuring domestic tranquility, providing for the common defense, promoting the general welfare, and securing the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity.” (emphasis added).

What does Mr. Fetterman’s record indicate about his record and willingness to defend “justice, defense, tranquility, and welfare?”

As a member of the Parole Board of Pennsylvania, he frequently was the only vote to parole convicts, and he said his goal was to release one-third of all criminals from Pennsylvania prisons.

Mr. Fetterman said he wants to

“decriminalize across the board’ (2015) for all drug-related crimes as he sees them as “public health issues, not criminal ones.” Nice idea but how will this protect the public when last year 72,210 people were sent to federal prisons and 171,300 to state prisons, for “drugrelated’ crimes, not simply drug use or possession.

He supports supervised drug injection facilities, which will harm the ability of the U.S. to defend itself since an estimated 77% of the age group of 18-23 do not qualify for the military based on their drug use and disabilities, both mental and physical.

How will his working with the Sierra Club to ban new oil and gas drilling on federals and waters while saying “I don’t support fracking and I never will” (2018) while 600,000 Pennsylvanians are employed in fracking that produces $261 billion for Pennsylvania help the general welfare of his state?

How did a Fetterman win?

Studies indicate that 56% of Pennsylvanians did not vote for Sen.-elect Fetterman based on his

qualifications, but against Dr. Oz because of the false ads saying the doctor and TV celebrity favored abortions.

The founder and head of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg, believes so strongly in the existence of the Meta Universe that he changed the name of his company from “Facebook” to “Meta Platforms.” This writer is unaware of whether “antisenators” exist in the Meta Universe, but is aware that it does exist in his questioning mind and will watch to see if Rebecca Katz gave an example in the real world. Why don’t you also watch?

Brent E. Zepke is an attorney, arbitrator and author who lives in Santa Barbara. His website is OneheartTwoLivescom.wordpress. com. Formerly, he taught law and business at six universities and numerous professional conferences. He is the author of six books: “One Heart-Two Lives,” “Legal Guide to Human Resources,” “Business Statistics,” “Labor Law,” “Products and the Consumer” and “Law for Non-Lawyers.”

‘A house divided against itself cannot stand’

win elections.

losses this election.

“Beware who endorses you. Media picks up on it quickly and uses it to bury you.”

— Herman Cain

Abraham Lincoln told us, “A house divided against itself cannot stand.” Republicans are the party of working class Americans who believe in the traditional values that made this a great nation and want to see it remain that way.

It is time the GOP realizes they are playing into the hands of the left with divided loyalties to Mr. Trump. As long as liberal media can vilify Donald Trump to benefit the left, they will. Republicans need to unite and pick the best candidates if they want to start winning again and use Donald Trump’s business acumen to work behind the scenes to finance and

With so many independent voters today, it is vital for the GOP to avoid as much controversy and ridicule of their candidates as possible if they want to win support from the independents. These people are “independents” because they wish to avoid political controversy or won’t admit they support either political platform, even if they do. This group can deliver any party a win or a loss.

It is time the GOP unites under one banner to support candidates that have a broad appeal to the average voter rather than one segment of the party. This is what the GOP must do to win elections.

“Jesus knew their thoughts, and said unto them; every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation; and every city or house divided against itself shall not stand.”

— Matthew 12:25

Substantive issues usually take a backseat

HAMMER

itself have, at this point, simply had enough of the constant drama.

Poll after poll taken since the election shows Republican voters moving in droves away from Mr. Trump and toward his top perceived (though yet unannounced) rival for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who did oversee a legitimate (Florida-wide) red wave this month.

An Economist/YouGov national poll released Wednesday shows Gov. DeSantis up 46%-39% over Mr. Trump among Republicans, and various other post-Election Day statewide Republican polls show Gov. DeSantis similarly up over Mr. Trump in Texas (43%-32%), Iowa (48%-37%), New Hampshire (52%-37%), Florida (56%-30%) and Georgia (55%-35%).

Mr. Trump’s inner circle appears to be of the belief that other possible 2024 candidates must yield to the former president, and that doing otherwise would be “disloyal.” They maintain this while Mr. Trump himself throws schoolyard insults at the extraordinarily popular DeSantis, mocking

him repeatedly as “Ron DeSanctimonious,” and veers off on other diatribes against popular Republicans, including a truly bizarre social media post about Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s (entirely normal) surname.

All the while, substantive issues usually take a backseat to an intense focus on “stop the steal” and other flavors of “doomerism,” more broadly.

Shaming the Republican base into blindly standing by a past president with such a checkered electoral record, no questions asked, is not going to cut it. The 2024 Republican presidential race, which currently features precisely one declared candidate, is wide open.

And according to most post-Election Day polls, the Republican electorate is embracing a different vision for the GOP’s future: one that is, like the “Florida model,” based on a positive, affirmative vision of fighting the relevant issues of our time and improving the lives of the citizenry.

Who can blame them?

To find out more about Josh Hammer and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit www. creators.com.

Copyright 2022 by Creators.com.

Trump had his day

SCHULTE

in my life since I’ve grown up, I’m going to agree with the left. I don’t want Mr. Trump to run for president. It’s over. Had he stayed in office, this country would be in fantastic shape right now. No inflation, no open border, affordable gas prices. But two years from now things will be so much worse.

Mr. Trump had his day. His reappearance will just make it worse, and the left will lose their minds all over again.

Though the media has long given up being a reliable unbiased news source, with Mr. Trump back in the game, we’ll be lucky to catch the weather because all their energy will be focused back on him again, 24/7. Even I don’t think I can deal with that anymore.

President Joe Biden is a non-issue. He’s fading before our eyes, and for that I have sympathy. I wouldn’t want my mental laundry airing all over the world. But should President Biden hang on another two years and try and make another run, his corrupt handlers will pull out all the stops running his campaign while he’s napping at his desk.

people there are not putting up with a corrupt election. (Those darn, evil election deniers.)

We all know the claim by the Democrats — showing IDs to vote disenfranchises certain people — is pure bogus political mumbo jumbo. If you don’t have an ID to prove who you are, you don’t get to vote. Period.

Because if you’re that stupid or lazy not to get some piece of paper proving who you are, you’re not qualified. And who are the professional signature checkers deciding they don’t think a signature meets their satisfaction? My signature changes every year.

Let’s revert to what used to work just fine; Vote on election day! Or as some suggested, consider three days. If you can’t find 10 minutes over three days to vote, you don’t deserve to. Have voting start on Saturday, and by Tuesday the ballots are all in. Then all that’s left is finding people who can count. Cuts way down on the time Democrats get to cheat.

So who needs a Department of Energy? Oh, wait, that would be the secretary of energy, former Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm, who basically knows nothing about energy.

Department of Transportation? What did and/or does Pete Buttigieg, the former mayor of South Bend, Indiana, know about transportation? Little or nothing, so who needs him?

Department of Education? All I know is that the average grade of public-school students has gone

down considerably since 1965. And that standards have been so reduced that, rather than trying to cram actual useful material into distracted youths’ brains, teachers have been amusing themselves by crafting “lessons” on each of the holy educational trinity subjects of “Diversity! Equity! Inclusion!”

Johnny can’t read? So what? None of his classmates can either (and his teacher isn’t particularly good at it)!

Jill can’t do math? Who cares? All her friends and classmates know how to use a credit card! (And they also know that Uncle Government will help them out if they overspend.)

Johnny can’t put two coherent sentences together? What of it? Neither can President Brandon or Vice-President Harrison or Lincoln (or whoever)!

Speaking of math …

It was a very expensive proposition to reduce the poverty level from 15% of the population to … 15% of the population. We now have a national debt of $31 trillion and climbing.

Every U.S. person owes $72,217 (2021 estimate).

However, even at these astronomical heights, the U.S. is not the most indebted of first world nations. The United Kingdom’s per capita debt is an

astounding $129,203; France’s is $107,245, and poor Switzerland’s national debt comes in at $213,100 per capita. India, curiously, stands out as one of the most frugal spenders among nations: per capita, each resident there owes just $437 (though that may be a year’s salary. Who knows? Not Johnny!).

James Buckley is a longtime Montecito resident. He welcomes questions or comments at jimb@ substack.com. Readers are invited to visit jimb.substack.com, where Jim’s Journals are on file. He also invites people to subscribe to Jim’s Journal.

This country needs one huge flush. For both parties.

I wish there was a way we the people who are supposed to be in charge, could have a mandate and term out every federal politician and then hold job interviews for their replacements. It would be made very clear upfront to the replacements if you step out of line by doing something stupid, it’s automatic termination. You don’t get to spend months trying to lie your way back into office and then do nothing once you’re there.

See what Brazil is doing. The

We are stuck again with the same old, same old, and at the moment I don’t have much faith in the Republicans doing anything with control of the House. Please prove me wrong. The IRS agents will sharpen their shooting skills, the billions of billions of dollars of COVID unemployment funds that were stolen will never be recovered, illegal immigrants will be treated better than our veterans and soldiers, Ukrainian politicians will purchase additional homes in Switzerland with our money, and the list of stupidity just goes on and on.

The “business as usual” bullet train will continue on the tracks to nowhere.

Schulte welcomes questions or comments at hschulteopinions@gmail.com.

Henry

NEWS-PRESS FILE PHOTO