I don't get it

oke up this morning to a gloomy sky and a peevish cat.

After Meet the Press, etc., Sunny had had it with those lyin' Bush apologists, I guess, and so she lobbied for going outside to puke. I let her out.

I followed her outside, taking my camera with me. Here are a coupla snaps of the ridge above my house. Gloomy, man.

As I called Sunny in and walked back inside with her, I noticed a weird reflected image in my study window. Check it out. Who is that fellow? Creepy.



f you've been following the Sheriff Mike Carona saga, you know that his administration is almost as scandal-ridden as the President's. It seems like every week there's a new scandal.

So, this morning, the LA Times' Dana Parsons opined as follows:

One of Orange County Sheriff Mike Carona's election opponents suggests in so many words that the sheriff has hit rock bottom and should resign.

Ralph Martin called for the resignation after a photo in the alternative press OC Weekly [Dirty, Stupid, or Both] showed a Las Vegas strip club owner with his arm around the sheriff. A Nevada grand jury in 2005 characterized the strip club as a racketeering enterprise and indicted a shift manager but not the owner.

Martin may think the sheriff has lost it, but it looks to me as if Carona is having the time of his life as the county's top cop. Controversy follows controversy and allegation follows allegation, but he keeps on smiling. He's been accused of personal indiscretions and managerial shortcomings, and look what it's gotten him: an endorsement from the county's GOP Central Committee.

In another magical moment (and my personal favorite), a photo surfaced earlier of Carona next to a young woman wearing what apparently was his uniform jacket [Sex, Bribes and Jailhouse Scams]. She was identified as the Russian translator on his 2002 trip to Moscow. That photo also appeared in the Weekly, which seems to have become Carona's unofficial photo album site.

Young Russian translator wearing his clothing. A photo op with a strip club owner. In defending Carona a few months ago against naysayers in general, a former state GOP official said, "Mike is a very, very popular guy."

No doubt that former official was Mike Schroeder, one of Trustee Fuentes' best pals and the "most powerful man in the county." I'm not surprised that the pious-and-married-and-completely-outa-control Carona is popular among Fuenteans such as Schroeder. Being corrupt or ruthless seems to be a membership requirement for their little club.

A friend of mine--yet another Mike--has first-hand experience of some of Fuentes' crew's tactics. Remember proposition 187? Well, my Mike was involved in organizing protests during the anti-187 campaign. Those protests comprised lots of folks with connections to south of the border.

Remember how people got pissed off at those protesters? What set them off was especially one thing: their habit of waving Mexican flags. That really pushed people's buttons.


Well, Mike has often told the story of how he personally witnessed Fuentes' crew (Fuentes was county GOP chief at the time) amiably mingling among the protesters and passing out "free" Mexican flags! That's right. Mike did all he could to prevent the flag-waving, but, in the end, some of it ended up on the evening news.

Another friend is a player in local politics, and he has many contacts in the OC Sheriff's Department. He claims that it is a big open secret that Mr. Carona is a total hound. Using the department's copter for a tryst? Yeah, that's just standard operating procedure for Mikey the Hound. There's nobody over there who doesn't know that Mikey is the Bill Clinton of Sheriffs.

Can somebody explain to me how it is with these ultra-pious Republicans? They lie and cheat and scheme all day long, and then their eyes roll back in their head while they declare their love of God. They pray. They condemn gays and liberal busybodies and other forms of supposed atheistic scum. They champion morality and speak of love. They pray some more. Without missing a beat, they go back to cheating and scheming and lying and hating.

I don't get it. Do you get it? I don't get it.

Parsons notes that Carona managed to get the endorsement of the local GOP. What he doesn't say is that, at first, the local central committee voted not to endorse Carona. A month later, after much arm twisting (God only knows what they've got on some of these Repubs) and rule-bending by Schroeder and the Machine, the central committee reversed itself and endorsed Carona for Sheriff.

But how on earth can these people endorse a man who is so manifestly unsavory? Well, says, Parsons, if you ask 'em, they'll tell you that they're fair-minded people who are willing to give a guy the benefit of the doubt:

"We support incumbent Republicans, as a general rule," [party chief Scott] Baugh says. "That's what we're doing. That's not to say there wasn't some controversy and debate [before endorsing Carona]…. I think the body is giving him the benefit of the doubt and believe he's the best man for the job."

That strip-club owner? According to the Weekly, he's a mob associate. Those photos of Carona with the Russian cutey? Carona has not denied that they are genuine (i.e., undoctored). Hiring, and supporting many of the outrageous projects, of George Jaramillo (before he was canned)? Carona can hardly deny it. Screwing around? Again, no denial.

But none of this stuff matters to these pious GOPers. I don't get it. Do you get it? I don't get it.


SUNDAY EVENING:

My bro stopped by with his kids, Sarah and Adam. She's 3 years and 4 months. He's maybe 21 months. She already reads and he counts everything that can be counted and some things that can't. Took some snaps:


v

A festival for the likes of us

Today, I attended the LA Times Festival of Books at UCLA, accompanied by my old friend the Janster, a full-time lawyer and part-time writing teacher at CSUF. On our way up there, the weather was gloomy, but we weren't.

Red Emma had his usual booth--he edits a respected literary journal--and so we checked that out and visited. Gary Stewart--formally top A&R guy at Rhino--dropped by. Lots of great people came around.

Right next door was the L. Ron Hubbard booth. Despite warnings from Red, I wandered over there and inspected the lively and garrish (and, indeed, impressive) covers of Mr. Hubbard's numerous sci-fi books.

The two people in the booth--they were disturbingly clean-cut, like Young Republicans--wouldn't leave me alone. I kept sayin' that I didn't need any help, but they kept asking. Finally, they handed me a small box of playing cards. "Hubbard" cards, I guess. They said it was free. They seemed to want me to go.


At 11:00 a.m., we attended the panel discussion on disasters, which featured Timothy Egan (cute, but probably gay, a gal there opined), Philip Fradkin (uncute, but funny, said the same lady), and Scott Gold (I dunno). The discussion was moderated by public radio's own Larry "Earnest" Mantle. (One gal offered this appraisal of the fellow: "I cannot imagine a less sexual being." Ouch!)

Egan was there to talk about the Oklahoma Dustbowl disaster, which was caused by the systematic destruction of prairy grass. You see, after the war, there was a huge demand for wheat, and so they tore out the grass in and around Oklahoma to farm the land. Then all hell broke loose, smack dab in the middle of the Depression.

It took but two generations to ruin the land. Sheesh. They saw it comin', but that didn't slow 'em down one little bit. Lemmings!

Fradkin was there to discuss the San Francisco earthquake, which happened at a time when the feds and the state did exactly zip to help people during disasters. San Francisco pretty much had to fend for itself, although it did manage to attract international assistance.

Anybody looting--including, sometimes, those who were told to take whatever they needed--were shot on sight. Good grief!

Gold was there to talk about Katrina. He was mighty glum. He talked about just how bad it was in New Orleans, during the first few days of that disaster. He explained about looting--he himself was forced to steal gasoline and other things. There was no avoiding it, he said. Most people had no way to leave before or after the hurricane. There was no way to eat if one did not take what one needed wherever one could find it.


These speakers were compelling. They said lots of the expected things: we're not prepared for disasters; if the "big one" hits, it'll make Katrina look like a day in the park; everybody failed in the case of Katrina; people are mighty stupid, etc.

--And unexpected things. The "cute" guy explained that those Okies were often heroic, despite messing up the grasslands (at the urging of the federal government). You wanted to hate 'em, he said, but you ended up admiring lots of 'em.

At one point, a mob grabbed a banker (a foreclosing rat bastard!) and took him out to the dust for a neck-tie party (I don't think they went through with it; whew!). But mostly people behaved well, and two-thirds stuck it out. Amazingly, the land is now returning to its original condition, now that small farming is nearly dead. Towns are dying there. Only old people remain, with their memories.

UCLA sure is a beautiful campus. And they take good care of it, too. Here are some snaps:



At 1:00, we headed over to magnificent Royce Hall to see Joan Didion. We were accompanied by Rebel Girl, who showed up to the festival with Limber Lou in a little red wagon.


Royce Hall is one of my favorite buildings. It was named after the idealist philosopher Josiah Royce, who was born in a California mining camp (in the 1850s) and went on to become one of the most influential intellectuals of his time.

Royce wouldn't be pleased by the corrupt fools who are messing up our college district. I learned about him at UCI, back in 1976, from Frederick Will, a philosopher, and the father of George Will.


Fact is, I really liked that old man, despite his stuffed-shirt son, and I remember everything he said. He'd sit behind a table in front of class and kind of think out loud. Sometimes, he'd think in silence for maybe a minute or two before saying something, but he made every word count. I was the only kid in the room who thought Will's method was cool.

Silence is powerful. Sometimes I use silence just like that old man did.

The Janster and I always seem to end up in the balcony at Royce Hall, and that's just swell by me, because the interior of Royce Hall is as impressive as its exterior, and the view from the balcony is tops. Here are some pics (of the stage and the balcony and the ceiling):




Here's a detail of the ceiling:


Joan Didion was interesting, I suppose, but she sure is soft-spoken, and I'm kind of deaf, and so I didn't hear much.

Every once in a while, she'd say something funny. I know this because people laughed. I stared at the ceiling. "Wow," I said.


Royce Hall is cavernous, and so a tiny woman in a chair on the stage is hard to see. To help out, they set up a big screen--just behind Didion--which projected her image. That lady is thin. Her hand looked like it was all sinew and bone, and it was wrinkly and incredibly long.

I guess anything will look weird if you blow it up to the size of a wall. Mostly, Didion is unweird.

Later, with Red Emma, we showed up again at Royce Hall for an interview of Gore Vidal by Ariana Huffington. On my way into the hall, Ariana ran past and nearly ran me down. She's tall. She sounds like she's from Transylvania. I think she said "Dahling" to me.

They rolled Mr. Vidal out in his wheelchair, and that inspired a standing O. As always, Vidal was funny and clever and actorish. Occasionally, he'd find himself on a rhetorical roll, and then he'd pull out all the stops (incidentally, there's a huge organ in Royce Hall) with that great voice of his. The old guy was shameless. The audience gobbled it up. Me too.

Huffington did a great job, though she didn't need to add much, cuz Mr. Vidal makes his own sauce. He noted that there's considerable evidence that the 2004 election was stolen. How come the New York Times is ignoring this? he asked. It's a pretty undemocratic democracy, he said, when people can steal elections and then get away with it. And they're getting away with it.

Ariana proclaimed that Mr. Bush is the most incompetent and corrupt president ever, and Mr. Vidal did not disagree. Neither did the audience. It was lovely being among such people for once!

Mr. Vidal explained that the media have really dropped the ball on reporting the Bush Administration's scandals and outrages. W is getting away with murder, he said. It'll be at least two generations, he added, before we will recover what we've lost. It took but two terms for these creeps to ruin what took many years to build.

We soon left Royce Hall and emerged to a beautiful day of bright sunlight and cool breezes. Perfect!

On our way out, we ran into a lady with anti-Bush signs, who insisted that there's gotta be a revolution. I nodded, wondering what kind of revolution she had in mind.


It's great hangin' out all day with tens of thousands of people--they're called readers--who, it seems, without exception agree that the President of the United States is a phenomenally evil and stupid man.

It's impossible to have that experience in the O.C. But we went back there anyway, smilin'.

In a possible world

"I'm a taxpayer"

grandstanding: to play or act so as to impress onlookers

Nobody loves grandstanding as much as Trustee Fuentes. At Monday's special meeting, despite the meeting's purpose--responding to the Accreditors' recommendations to the colleges (trustees must cease micromanaging, etc.)--Mr. Fuentes pursued a very different purpose: pandering to his right-wing constituency by expressing a plaintive hope to hear the lonely voice of the poor "taxpayer."

But Mr. Fuentes' dig at employees turned into something else. In the audio clip below, you will hear many members of the audience--faculty and classified--respond to Fuentes' red-meat tossage by proclaiming, "I'm a taxpayer."


Fuentes pressed on. The board had come to the meeting with its draft of how it conceives the duties and responsibilities of the trustees (in a revised draft of Board Policy 101: Authority and Powers of the Board of Trustees). For some reason, Mr. Fuentes sought to modify that draft further, for, he said, it is "too neutral." He suggested the following insertion:


Evidently, the president of IVC's classified senate could take no more of Mr. Fuentes' employee-bashing grandstanding. She told him in no uncertain terms that she has worked for the district for twenty years, advising some 30,000 students, and, she said, he needs to trust that she has always acted on behalf of "taxpayers."

Ian, Diane, and Barbara vs. board micromanagement

At Monday's big district powwow, Ian Walton, Diane Woodruff, and Barbara Beno tried to help the trustees understand how they might avoid further micromanagement. (These three were critiquing the board's draft of how it conceives its "duties and responsibilities.")

In the following audio clip, Ian Walton (of the State Academic Senate) expresses pessimism. He refers to recent board remarks--no doubt he is thinking of Mr. Fuentes' defiant squawkings--as an indication that some in the room are not disposed to make the needed changes:

In this next audio clip, Diane Woodruff (of CCLC) notes that the board's draft of its "duties and responsibilities" comprises legal Ed Code language. She suggests that such language is inadequate, for it potentially implies that the board may take roles and responsibilities that are excessive. She urges the board to modify the draft so that it refers to Board Policy 2100.1, which defines those areas in which the board must rely primarily on the Academic Senates (i.e., on faculty):

In this next audio clip:

1. Ian Walton also comments on the Board's draft of its responsibilities. He, too, notes the draft's reliance on legal language, which really is not adequate, since it fails to indicate the importance of delegating to relevant experts (faculty), etc.

2. Barbara Beno (of ACCJC) explains that the "current" policies are inadequate in that they speak of the board's "supervising" the colleges. (She is responding to Trustee Wagner's suggestion that the current policy--as opposed to the draft--is unproblematical.)

3. Diane Woodruff (of CCLC) suggests that the draft of Board "duties and responsibilities" should be written so that it would guide a new trustee. She notes that the board should be accomplishing the tasks listed in the Ed Code "collegially"--i.e., with appropriate input from relevant faculty experts, etc.

Trustee Fuentes picks cherries with his ears

cherry-pick: to select the best or most desirable from

At Monday's big powwow among the various "constituent groups" of the district, Barbara Beno, President of the ACCJC, gave a Powerpoint presentation in which she spelled out the nature of accreditation (the presentation was entitled "What Every Board Should Know"). Her presentation was made that night as part of an effort to facilitate overcoming problems that the Accreditation agency (i.e., ACCJC) found with our two colleges. Foremost among them were (a) trustee micromanagement and (b) an institutional climate of fear and despair.

Below, I present two audio posts. The first is a series of excerpts from Ms. Beno's presentation. I'm afraid that it is a bit choppy, in part because I worked from an incomplete recording. Still, by listening to this post, you will get a pretty fair sense of what she came to communicate.

That audio post is followed by another: Trustee Fuentes' remarks in response to Beno's presentation. As you'll hear, Mr. Fuentes seemed to find in Beno's presentation an emphasis that, arguably, she did not give, for, though she said virtually nothing about the board's "independence," Fuentes seems to suggest that it is the board's independence that she came to emphasize.

Judge for yourself.

ACCJC President Barbara Beno (excerpts from her presentation):

(about 5 minutes)

Trustee Tom Fuentes (responding to Beno's presentation):

(about 1 1/2 minutes)

Mathur: "we're not here to serve our egos"

At the start of yesterday's powwow among leadership of the district's "constituent groups," Chancellor Mathur offered some remarks. I present a complete audio post below (unedited).

Some of his remarks:

* "We're all taking the Accrediting team's recommendations seriously."

(In fact, trustee Fuentes has responded to the Accreds' recommendation that the board cease micromanagement by asserting that the trouble with the district is not so much micromanagement by trustees as the "macromanagement" of "others." In fact, the Accreds made no mention of, and did not find, "macromanagement" by anyone. To hear Fuentes' "macromanagement" remark, go to the end of this blog)

* "[At the February meeting] over 90 suggestions were identified in terms of how we can enhance institutional climate....[including] 'respect people' [and] 'address issues without attacking individuals'."

(At a recent district administrative meeting, Mathur repeatedly excoriated the IVC Academic Senate President, falsely asserting that she was "behind" the senate's decision to pursue a complaint regarding the district's violation of BP2100.1)

* "[The board members] no longer are interested in micromanagement."

(During the open session that followed this special meeting, the board acted to explore a recent decision, at IVC, to discontinue the tennis teams, despite an explanation of how that decision was arrived at by the appropriate parties. I.e., the board once again engaged in micromanagement.)

* "We're not here to serve our egos."

Faculty speak out about Accreditation and the ALA

Before the start of yesterday's powwow of district "constituent groups," facilitated by the trio of Diane Woodruff of the CCLC, Ian Walton of the State Academic Senate, and Babs Beno of the ACCJC, the public was allowed to address the group. Three faculty took that opportunity. I offer their unedited remarks in audio posts below:

Anna Maria Cobos:
* "[By inserting language about the "macromanagement" of "others" in a resolution] the board and district leadership undermined the intention of the ACCJC recommendation regarding micromanagement directed at the board."
* "The Chancellor stated that faculty members are involved in generating negative press coverage, that they express concern of losing accreditation. As a result faculty leaders are [supposedly] spreading hostility and fear...[Such remarks are a] public attack [on faculty]...."
* "In my opinion, members of this board manipulated the ALA institutional membership for personal purposes...."

To hear trustee Fuentes' infamous "macromanagement" remark, go to the end of this post

Margot Lovett:
* "...I am deeply worried by and I'm profoundly saddened at the current state of affairs in our district...."
* "I cannot adequately express my frustration with a chancellor and a board of trustees that stubbornly refuse to take seriously the report of the accreditation commission and address recommendations...that detail the changes that must be made at the district level...."

Bob Cosgrove:
* "...a healthy debate involves various sides. And the debate that I've been hearing has become less of a debate and more finger-pointing and accusation...."
* "We cannot get people to serve on our committees any longer, and what I see at this college is a lapse into mediocrity...."

Snoozefest

ell, the big shootout at the OK corral turned out to be the big snoozefest at the collosal waste of time.

Things started out OK, with spirited remarks from the likes of Anna Maria C and Margot L, but that was followed by the nauseating self-important drone of Mr. Goo, who now sports a haircut that seems designed to scare children.

What's-her-name from the CCLC (representing, I guess, the trustee POV) seemed to be in a perpetual state of discombobulation. Actually, I think she was there to represent cluelessness. She did a heck of a job.

Ms. Beno, the big cheese of the Accreds, offered a Powerpoint presentation, featuring the obvious and sleep-inducing. I do believe that, at one point, she looked around and noted our high class digs. We all groaned and thought, "lady, this is the only decent building in the district, and it's the only one you'll ever see."

Ian Walton, of the State Academic Senate, actually managed to bring an edge with him for once. At one point, he seemed to say that, based on what he's heard or read about recent board meetings, we don't have a snowball's chance in hell of overcoming our dire crapulosity. It was like he had come expecting to see a board comprising incorrigible blackguards, and, sure enough, when he got here, that's just what he saw. He seemed struck by some horror.

I do believe the fellow wanted to flee from the building ASAP. I caught him glancing at the exit. At the end of the meeting, he was in such a hurry to flee that he barely acknowledged my "good job" and he very nearly knocked me down. He actually jogged across the grass to wherever the hell he was goin'. I bet he's drunk by now.

During her dronage, Beno said that the Accreds look for ethics and such. She said that we serve students. She said that the Accreds don't like trustees interfering with something. She noted that multi-college districts are generally a pain in the ass. She had us look at page 27. Her stuff went on like that for an hour or so. I was dyin'.

What's-her-name, Beno, and Walton took turns critiquing each constituent group's draft of their homework. The homework was supposed to be an attempt to define each group's roles, governance-wise. What's-her-name said that the classified got an A+, and she even seemed to say that the union's stuff was first rate. She offered some weak criticisms of the trustees' draft. She didn't seem to get the Academic Senates' draft. She seemed pained by it.

There was some yammering about the grid, offered by the faculty, that indicates the roles and authorities of the academic senates. There were complaints--from what's-her-name, I think--that the grid failed to indicate how other constituent groups were involved in the tasks mentioned on the grid.

Faculty were kinda pissed, cuz our homework was to define our own roles, not somebody else's. That what's-her-name is a real whatchamacallit.

There was some yammering about how the faculty were trying to be "equal" to the district, and, hey (she seemed to say), that's not cooperative. Wendy had to point out that we (i.e., the senates) had to go to court, owing to the district's absurd interpretation of "joint agreement," and, now, if'n you know anything about the law, then you know that we've got an appellate decision that trumps all this fussing about the uppity faculty and their "equality" guff. Cuz the appellate decision goes, and it says EQUAL baby. EQUAL, EQUAL, EQUAL.

Don Wagner sniggered.

It makes me smile to think that, owing to our clueless and defiant board, all over the state, senates are makin' moves to get equality--not just substantial input, but equality or better--where, before, they just got the back of blackguards' hands.

Anyway, this went on for a while, and then, suddenly, at twenty minutes to 5, it all stopped. People stared at each other. It was like going to a movie, and then, 2/3 of the way into it, the ushers are pushin' you outa the room and into the bright sunlight.

Some of us went to Boosters across the street and tried to get blitzed.

We staggered back for the 7:00 regular meeting, and it was so unbelievably dry that i nearly died.

Once again, there were some spirited public remarks (especially about the "ALA" issue and the discontinuation of IVC tennis teams--you'd swear that tennis is some kind of communion with the Deity), but then it was strictly drone time. I was nearly in a coma at 9:00 or so, when I got the hell outa there, even faster than that Ian Walton.

I'll have a more detailed account and AUDIO files maybe tomorrow. Now, just leave me alone to my Becks.

P.S.:

(4/27/06) Since Monday, I've had occasion to review the tapes of Monday's meeting, and it does seem to me now that, in the above post (written briefly after the meeting) I was too hard on Diane Woodruff of the CCLC. It does seem to me that each of the three "facilitators" sought to guide the board toward ceasing its pattern of micromanagement.

It does still seem to me, though, that the meeting did little to move the board in the right direction. With Engineer Fuentes at the handle, the district is headed for a trainwreck. -CW