Daily Republic: Friday, July 21, 2023

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More than 650,000 American workers are threatening to go on strike this summer – or have already done so – in an avalanche of union activity not seen in the U.S. in decades.

The combined actors and writers strikes in Hollywood are already a once-in-a-generation event. Unions for United Parcel Service Inc. and Detroit’s Big Three automakers are poised to join them in coming weeks if contract negotiations fall through. One Bank of America Corp. analyst put the odds of a United Auto Workers strike at more than 90%. And while logistics experts and financial analysts expected the Teamsters to reach a deal with UPS, their confidence has dwindled as the July 31 deadline approaches.

“This will be the biggest moment of striking, really, since the 1970s,” said labor historian Nelson Lichtenstein, who directs the University of California, Santa

Barbara’s Center for the Study of Work, Labor and Democracy.

Even before the 100,000-plus actors joined in last week, both the number of strikes and workers on strike were up in the first half of this year, according to Bloomberg Law labor data. Similar trends are playing out in other countries: A costof-living crisis has unions across Europe flexing their muscles, with the the UK losing the most working days to strikes in decades.

The pandemic years have, in some ways, reenergized American labor.

A my m Aginnis-Honey AMAGINNIS@DAILYREPUBLIC.NET

FAIRFIELD — Birds of a feather don’t always stick together.

Residents from Rolling Hills and the flower streets, on the opposite sides of Interstate 80, told city council members Tuesday night of their love, and dislike, for the peafowl, which were to call the Dunnell Nature Park home.

“It’s really a mix of extreme,” said Jeremy Profitt with the Fairfield Police Department. “Others are fed up and others don’t want the peafowl to be bothered. It’s a delicate situation.”

The birds had two supporters. One woman shared about growing up in the area with the peafowl and, after college, purchasing a home in the area.

is unrealistic,” she said. “Trapping them is inhumane and unsafe.”

“We lived in a unique neighborhood where wildlife is expected,” said another woman.

The city acquired the Dunnell property in May 1998 through a family trust deed that stipulated the property be developed as a park. The property was a refuge for a flock of approximately 50 peafowl, which had free roam of the property and the surrounding Rolling Hills neighborhood.

Different population counts were given, ranging from 88 to 120. More than 30 have found news homes thanks to the efforts of city staff.

A biologist, who lives in the Rolling Hills area, said the bird’s sounds rise above the city’s noise limit. The five-year resident said the situation is worse. “I can’t open

my windows.” he said.

“They are as noisy as I don’t know what,” said another Rolling Hills resident. “My sleep is fractured.”

One man reported spending $10,000 on a new driveway to have the peafowl ruin it. “I have been there 22 years. I am fixing my home and moving to Las Vegas,” he said.

A woman who lives across the freeway, in the streets named after flowers, said the birds have destroyed her skylight, stop traffic and squeal loud enough to interrupt her phone calls at home.

“It sounds like a nightmare,” said Councilwoman K. Patrice Williams. “Call me the antipeafowl lady.”

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For roughly a quarter century, U.S. climate envoy John Kerry and his Chinese counterpart, Xie Zhenhua, have sought to make headway in the fight against global warming.

Over seafood in Washington and duck in Beijing, they have set the pace for progress between the world’s biggest greenhouse gas emitters. They’ve brokered agreements for collaboration and hammered out deals that provided a foundation for global climate pacts – from the 2015 Paris Agreement to the Glasgow accord inked two years ago.

“We have a special

relationship” and “great respect for each other,” Kerry said in an interview following days of talks with Xie in China this week. “We share a common interest in winning the battle of this crisis.”

But the seasoned diplomats are up against a closing window to act. The world is set to warm dangerously beyond a critical 1.5C tipping point unless the U.S. and China – the nations most responsible for planet-warming pollution entering the atmosphere today – move swiftly to slash their emissions.

And both statesman

The council directed city staff to get the population down to 20 to 25, put a band on them and start removing them from the flower streets. A

“An ordinance to not feed (them)

SUISUN CITY Travelers on both sides of Highway 12 at Walters Road will soon see the marsh on one side, and marsh mural on the other.

The city council voted Tuesday night to approve Jon Ton’s proposed 22-by-20-foot mural for the future Starbucks on Walters Road. Deputy City Manager Kris Lofthus noted an irony.

Hopeful signs for declining population of gray whales

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The gray whale population along the West Coast showed another year of declines, according to the latest estimates, but scientists say there are some positive signs for the formerly endangered whales.

The population of the eastern north Pacific Gray whale has been sliding downward since reaching a peak in 2016 with an estimated 26,960 whales. This year, scientists put the estimate at 14,526 whales. The estimate is based on counts of migrating whales off the Central California coast and statistical analyses.

In 2019, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration declared a population die-off as an “unusual mortality event.”

While the cause isn’t clear, researchers theorized the decline is partially related to changes to food sources in the Arctic, where the whales spend the summer.

Three dead gray whales found along Washington shores last month showed signs of malnutrition, according to the Cascadia Research Collective.

There are signs of hope for the intrepid species, which migrates nearly 10,000 miles between the Arctic and Mexico. In winter, when the whales spend their time in lagoons, scientists counted more mothers with calves in 2023 than any of the past five years.

Researchers also observed that the conditions of their bodies have improved and that fewer dead gray whales have

Armijo High School Hall of Fame Inductee Carrol ‘Buck’ Bailey

washed ashore in Mexico and along the West Coast since 2019.

All these signs lead researchers to believe “the gray whale mortality event may be slowing,” said Autonomous University of Baja California Sur professor Jorge Urbán Ramírez, who studies the species.

NOAA’s Marine Mammal and Turtle Division director David Weller said the administration will continue to keep a close eye on the whales.

“We want to pick up on any signs or signals of a positive change in the concerning trend the population has undergone recently.”

The eastern north Pacific gray whale is considered a conservation success story because their population has grown consistently after they were protected under the Marine Mammal Protection Act in 1972. They neared extinction in the 1950s due to commercial hunting. In 1964, the species numbered 13,426.

Researchers say a small group of gray whales that stops in Puget Sound on their annual migration, known as “the Sounders,” have been known to teach themselves how to feed on ghost shrimp burrowed in mud flats, often in shallow near-shore waters.

The eastern north Pacific gray whale was removed from the endangered species list in 1994. Since then, similarly large fluctuations in this whale population has occurred before and the species has recovered from a similarly small numbers.

Legendary Armijo High School coach

Ed Hopkins is usually cited as the primary root of a coaching tree that includes about three dozen of his former students from various sports who became coaches themselves. They include Armijo and Vanden High coach Ed Serpas, Vanden coach Jim Boyd and Fairfield High coach Ron Thompson. Boyd and Thompson later had their respective schools’ gymnasiums named after them in honor of their accomplishments.

For his decades of service molding young men into winners in life as well as on the field, court, diamond or track, coach Hopkins was honored by being the namesake for the basketball court at Armijo High as well as the football field at Rodriguez High.

But Armijo’s coaching roots actually go deeper than Ed Hopkins.

Carrol Aubrey “Buck” Bailey, who was Hopkins’ coach when he attended Armijo, is unquestionably one of the most influential coaches in local history, but is largely unknown. That injustice will be partially righted on Sept. 3 at Fairfield’s Downtown Theatre when Bailey will be posthumously inducted with several other notable alumni into the 2023 Armijo High School Hall of Fame.

Bailey was born in College City in Colusa County, California and graduated from Chico State Teachers College. He participated in football, basketball and track at Chico and was on five teams that were champions. His only coaching experience before coming to Armijo in 1929 was as an assistant coach at Chico.

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James Erskine Brownlee, who served as Armijo principal and teacher from 1921 to 1946, was the school’s first ever football coach. In the three years he held the reins, his teams won nine games, lost five and tied four. It was a respectable record, but once he turned control of the team over to Bailey, Armijo became a perennial powerhouse.

They peeled off ten straight winning campaigns in the 1930s, including four undefeated seasons and five Solano County Athletic League (SCAL) crowns. Armijo’s overall record under Bailey’s mentorship was 58-17-10. The

football pinnacle was the 1936 squad.

The 1937 Armijo High School La Mezcla yearbook touted the achievements of its football team for the 1936–37 school year as “the most successful campaign the team has ever made.” The yearbook’s editors likely had no idea that statement would still be true more than eighty years later. The 1936 Armijo football team gave up just 12 points (!) all season, only 6 by the firstteam defense, and had seven shutouts, including five straight to end the season.

The only thing missing from the accounts of each game detailed in the 1937 yearbook is the iconic commanding narration from NFL Films’ John “The Voice of God” Facenda accompanied by majestic symphonic music.

“At the beginning of the season, little was known of the Indians’ strength. The opening game found them battling on fairly even terms with the Vallejo Ramblers for three quarters. Then Coach Bailey’s men put on an offensive drive that netted them two touchdowns in quick succession. The Fairfield boys trotted off the field with a 12–0 victory tucked under their belts.”

They tied the Davis Blue Devils, 6-6, in nonleague play, then beat Rio Vista 7-0. The next week’s victim was Winters, who were defeated 28-6. A Winters running back busted a 60-yard face-saving touchdown run after Armijo had built an insurmountable lead and put in its backup players. It was the second and last touchdown the Indians gave up all season. Armijo demolished Dixon next, 33-0. Then it got serious. Two words: Vaca High. Cue the haunting theme from “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly,” and throw in some more yearbook hyperbole.

“One of the largest crowds ever to witness a grid game in this town packed onto the field to watch the ancient rivals battle. During the first quarter, Vacaville seemed to have the edge over the Indians. However, a tired but happy group of gridders marched off the field on the long end of a 25–0 score. The dream of walloping Vacaville had come true.”

the

The Armijo Alumni Association presents The Armijo High School Hall of Fame

1 to 4 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 3

Downtown Theatre, 1035 Texas St., Fairfield

Tickets: https://bit.ly/ AHSHOFTIX

The county playoff game was against Davis. The Indians ended up with 13 points and, as usual, hung a goose egg on their opponents. The Sacramento County Championships a week later was one of the hardest-fought battles of the year, but “the enthusiastic Armijo warriors” emerged victorious, 6–0.

On November 27, 1936, the Central California Championship game took place against Patterson High School. The yearbook speaks through the years: “The Indians went to Patterson determined not to muff this chance for the highest honors any Armijo team had ever won. Although greatly handicapped by a 90-mile ride and a strange field, the Indians fought valiantly and swamped the Patterson boys with an 18–0 score. Thus ended the campaign of the most powerful football machine Coach Bailey has ever produced at Armijo.”

Eleven starters played most games that season and included right end Kenneth I. Jones (whose father was a Fairfield elementary school namesake), left end Fred Tomasini, left tackle Bob Hance, right tackle Anselmo Tocelli, left guard Manual Campos (later a Fairfield businessman, city councilman and mayor), right guard Bob Spohn, center Bill Brownlee, left halfback Vincent Valine, right halfback Sidney Mack, quarterback Dick Harris and fullback Louie Colla (older brother of former Suisun City mayor Guido Colla).

Buck Bailey was also

a very successful hoops coach, leading Armijo to four Solano County Athletic League titles and a 1939–40 Central Section basketball championship. Then in 1940, Bailey left and went to Woodland High School and built a legacy of greatness there, including having a basketball tournament bear his name, much like his successor at Armijo, Ed Hopkins.

Much of what Bailey was like has been lost to history--such as why he was nicknamed “Buck”-but he was undoubtedly a popular figure on campus in the decade he was at Armijo. In 1934 the graduating class dedicated the La Mezcla yearbook to Bailey citing his “dynamic personality and ceaseless toil that inspired them in sportsmanship and fair play in school games and in the game of life.”

Bailey’s coaching influence and mark on Armijo was carried on and then eclipsed by Hopkins whose tenure was three times as long in Fairfield. But Bailey added an inedible feature to the school in a different way.

In 1929, his first year at Armijo, Buck Bailey organized the Block A Society whose stated goal was to increase interest in sports. One of the first actions by the society that year was choosing the school’s symbol, the Armijo Indian, that remained for 90 years. Fairfield freelance humor columnist and accidental local historian Tony Wade writes two weekly columns: “The Last Laugh” on Mondays and “Back in the Day” on Fridays. Wade is also the author of The History Press books “Growing Up In Fairfield, California,” “Lost Restaurants of Fairfield, California,” the upcoming book “Armijo High School: Fairfield, California” and hosts the Channel 26 government access TV show “Local Legends.”

Tony Wade Back in the day

Courtesy photos Armijo coach Carrol “Buck” Bailey, who will be posthumously inducted into

Armijo High School Hall of Fame, in yearbook photos from the 1930s.

Omar Torres/AFP/Getty Images/TNS file (2015)

A boat operator touches a grey whale in the Ojo de Liebre Lagoon, Baja California Sur State, Mexico, March 3, 2015.

Suisun City man arrested for homicide, other charges

Daily Republic Staff DRNEWS@DAILYREPUBLIC.NET

SUISUN CITY — A

Suisun City resident was arrested Tuesday for homicide, three counts of attempted homicide, attempted robbery, shooting at an inhabited dwelling or occupied vehicle, prohibited person in possession of a firearm, conspiracy and criminal street gang activities.

Jeremiah Thomas, 21, was transported to San Francisco County Jail.

Fairfield council forms subcommittee to explore funding for Markeley Lane

FAIRFIELD — The city council opted to form a subcommittee to pursue finances and support for a new Markeley Lane, off Peabody Road.

Vice Mayor Pam Bertani, who serves the district, and Mayor Catherine Moy are the subcommittee. Moy has been meeting with Solano County Supervisor Mitch Mashburn and Vacaville Mayor John

Carli. “They will do everything they can to help us fund this,” she said. The council asked staff to bring a student population breakdown for the three schools that were affected when the road was closed to build the Peabody Road overpass.

Students from Fairfield comprise 51%; Vacaville, 42%; and Travis Air Force Base, 7%.

Council members were given options to explore

all involving Community Improvement Projects, some medium-level priority; the others were deemed lower priority.

Staff suggested delaying the Peabody Road widening between Air Base Parkway and delay new playground equipment for two parks.

“Time is of the essence here,” Bertani said. “We have been duly warned numerous times. We have to keep this matter at a

high level. It keeps me awake at night.”

Matt Bidou, president of the Travis Unified School District board, praised the council for the efforts. “We need to get a good road in there that is safe,” he said. “I think we are going to get somewhere.”

In early May, a group stood on Peabody Lane, opposite the old Markeley Lane entrance, with signs bringing attention to the issue.

Suisun council approves contract to install fencing at Railroad, Sunset

Daily Republic Staff

DRNEWS@DAILYREPUBLIC.NET

SUISUN CITY — The city council approved awarding a contract to Morgan Fence to install fencing on the southeast corner of Sunset Avenue and Railroad Avenue, near the tracks.

The item was on the consent calendar, requiring just one motion to approve all items.

The city recently completed the purchase of this segment, where the homeless often camp. It will be used in the future for realigning the two sections of Railroad Avenue. The old portion runs from East Tabor to Sunset Avenue. The new portion begins farther south at Sunset Avenue and wraps around to Marina Boulevard.

The fencing will surround the newly acquired right-of-way. It will be funded by the Off-Site Street Improvement Program in the amount

of $65,792.05, which is $57,210.48 plus a 15% contingency of $8,581.57.

“With the purchase of Lot 37 it is now necessary to ensure that this newly purchased parcel is protected, kept as clean and free from homeless as pos-

sible, and from acting as a public nuisance, said a staff report. “To accomplish these goals, it is now necessary to install protective, permanent fencing that will include a gate at (Old) Railroad Avenue end.

“This location is the victim of illegal dumping and homeless camps, among other issues, and having it secured as best as possible as quickly as possible is of paramount importance,” said the staff report.

Model homes construction set Saturdays through Sept. 23 in Suisun City

Daily Republic Staff DRNEWS@DAILYREPUBLIC.NET

SUISUN CITY — In an effort to beat the winter rains, Century Communities will work 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturdays, through Sept. 23.

The company is already working on the Meridian West Subdivision on weekdays. A critical component of this private development is the construction of the model homes at the northwest corner of Cordelia Street and School Street.

There will be no other construction activity on those Saturdays beyond constructing the

model homes.

Construction crew and equipment access will be on Cordelia Street at the main driveway to the project site. Also, all Saturday work will be onsite, which eliminates impacts to vehicular traffic on Cordelia Street and surrounding streets. Meridian West will be a 71-unit single family home community on the west side of Suisun City at the former location of Crystal Middle School.

For questions, or concerns, call Century Communities’ Superintendent, Rich Bean, at 925-392-4978.

obtain search and arrest warrants for Thomas, Malachi Lefiti, 22, Oakland; Marilyn Sahagun-Lopez, 20, Oakland; and Nikeosi Jackson, 22, San Francisco.

With the help of the Oakland Police Department and Solano County Sheriff’s Department Special Weapons and Tactics Unit, SFPD investigators served the warrants in San Francisco, Oakland, Suisun City and Roseville.

On April 23, just before 11 p.m., San Francisco Police officers from Central Station responded to the area of Grant and Columbus avenues for a report of a shooting. Officers arrived and located the victim, a 23-yearold male from Solano County with apparent gunshot wounds, who was declared deceased at the scene.

Officers located two additional shooting victims nearby, both 24-year-old men from Sacramento County. Officers rendered aid and summoned medics to the scene. The two victims were transported to a nearby hospital with nonlife-threatening injuries. Two additional shooting victims were privately transported to a nearby hospital with non-lifethreatening injuries.

The San Francisco Police Department Homicide Detail led the investigation with assistance from members of the SFPD Community Violence Reduction Team.

Through the course of the investigation the suspects were identified, and investigators developed probable cause to

All were arrested on homicide and three counts of attempted homicide.

Lefiti was arrested for attempted robbery, felon in possession of a firearm, conspiracy, shooting at an inhabited dwelling or occupied vehicle and criminal street gang activities.

Sahagun-Lopez was arrested for attempted robbery, conspiracy and gang conspiracy.

Jackson was arrested for shooting at an inhabited dwelling or occupied vehicle, prohibited person in possession of a firearm, conspiracy, criminal street gang activities, for an active and outstanding warrant out of Contra Costa County for carrying a loaded firearm in a public place or vehicle and for another warrant out of San Mateo County Sheriff’s Office for carrying a loaded firearm and not being the registered owner.

While arrests have been made, this remains an active investigation. Anyone with information is asked to call the SFPD 24-hour Tip Line at 415575-4444 or Text a Tip to TIP411 and begin the text message with SFPD. You may remain anonymous. Refer to SFPD Incident No. 230-282-983.

Police: Suspected burglar nabbed on golf course

Daily Republic Staff DRNEWS@DAILYREPUBLIC.NET

FAIRFIELD — Fairfield police hit the links in a golf cart on July 13 to catch a burglary suspect who fled through a local course.

Dispatch received a call at around 4:34 p.m. regarding an unknown man in the backyard of a residence in the 3600 block of Doral Drive. As officers responded, the caller reported that the man was now trying to break into the home.

Two officers, anticipating the route the would-be burglar might use to flee, stationed themselves on the Greenbelt Trail where they soon encountered a man matching the suspect’s description.

The suspect, Michael Salcedo, 36, of Fairfield, spotted the officers as they approached and fled on foot. The officers gave chase and eventually found themselves running through a local golf course. Salcedo gained distance on the officers as they entered the course’s busy

Not wanting to lose him, police asked to borrow a golf cart. The officers were approached by an

unknown golfer, who told them the cart was “good to go” as he handed it off.

One of the officers jumped behind the wheel and quickly caught up to and detained Salcedo, who was arrested and booked into County Jail for burglary and violation of parole.

The golf cart was summarily returned to its rightful owner.

Aaron Rosenblatt/Daily Republic The Suisun City Council approved awarding a contract to Morgan Fence to install fencing on the southeast corner of Sunset Avenue and Railroad Avenue.

Aaron Rosenblatt/Daily Republic Workers build a structure at the Meridian construction site in Suisun City, Thursday.

New votes found; don’t change outcome of Fairfield’s LLMD tally

FAIRFIELD — City council members were told this week there were some issues in June when votes were cast for the proposed Landscaping, Lighting and Maintenance Districts.

City Manager David Gassaway said two ballots

regarding the downtown business district and Paradise Valley were not counted in the final tally. They are now counted and didn’t change the outcome.

The city borrowed a ballot box from the county. When it was returned county employees discovered two ballots

in a cavity. They were in regards to Rolling Hills and North Cordelia. A Rancho Solano ballot was not counted. It has been now and didn’t change the outcome.

Gassaway announced three action steps:

n Disclosing what had happened.

Bevy of fun slated at Parks Make Life Better

as cookbooks.

n Bringing forth a resolution with the revised tallies at an August city council meeting and a request for a “substantial” refund from MBS, the consulting team that worked on the project.

n Hiring an independent consultant to do an audit.

GOP lawmakers release FBI doc at heart of Biden bribery claims

Tribune ConTenT AgenCy

An FBI document released Thursday as evidence of bribes paid by Ukrainian businessmen to President Joe Biden and his son, Hunter, isn’t as clear cut as it has been portrayed by Republican lawmakers.

Republican Senator Chuck Grassley released the document, which is at the heart of allegations that the Bidens took action to aid the energy company Burisma Holdings, on whose board Hunter Biden served.

House GOP leaders claim the document, referred to as an FD-1023 form, is evidence the Bidens were each paid $5 million in bribes when the elder Biden was vice president, to help remove Ukraine’s chief prosecutor who was investigating Burisma.

The document, however, is not as clear cut as Republicans have made it out to be. It contains recollections from late 2015 to June 2022 made to the FBI by a confidential source. The source claimed to have had conversations with Ukrainian businessman Mykola Zlochevsky, who said he was coerced into paying the Bidens.

The FBI and Justice Department didn’t respond

to requests for comment.

The White House sought to discredit the document and noted that the allegations were already investigated by the Justice Department under former President Donald Trump.

“It is remarkable that congressional Republicans, in their eagerness to go after President Biden regardless of the truth, continue to push claims that have been debunked for years and that they themselves have cautioned to take ‘with a grain of salt’ because they could be ‘made up,’” said White House spokes-

Mother charged for seeking hitman to kill 3-year-old son

Tribune ConTenT AgenCy

A young Florida mother was arrested after she allegedly used a parody website to hire a hitman to kill her 3-year-old son, police said.

Jazmin Paez,18, is facing charges of first-degree solicitation of murder and third-degree using a communications device for an unlawful use. She’s accused of logging onto hitmanfor hire.com in search of an assassin, going as far as to submit a photo of her toddler as well as his exact whereabouts, according to court documents obtained by NBC Miami. She allegedly wanted the job done before the week’s end.

Investigators were alerted to Paez’s plot by the website owner, Robert Innes.

According to authori-

ties, the website founder created the platform to catch and curb those looking to hire a killer.

Paez eventually connected with an investigator through the site who was posing as a hitman. She offered to pay him $3,000 to murder her 3-year-old boy, CBS News reported. From there, authorities were able to track down the IP of the computer that was used to make the request and confirmed in belonged to Paez.

After speaking to the child’s grandmother, who confirmed he was the boy featured in the photos, authorities swooped in and arrested his mother. She was booked into the MiamiDade jail but has since been released on $50,000 bond, NBC Miami reported.

Her son is currently safe and being cared for by family.

man Ian Sams.

However, the U.S. attorney in Delaware has said that the allegations are part of an ongoing, active investigation.

The conversations cited by the source took place between 2016 to 2019, according to the document. Zlochevsky said it cost $5 million to “pay one Biden” and $5 million to pay “another Biden,” the document states.

However, the document doesn’t say Zlochevsky specified payments were made directly to Joe and Hunter. According to the

source, Zlochevsky made references only to paying “the Bidens.”

Zlochevsky also told the source he had 17 recordings involving the Bidens, two that included Joe Biden and 15 with Hunter Biden, according to the document.

The source met Zlochevsky in person once and spoke to him twice on the phone and, therefore, “is not able to provide any further opinion as to the veracity of Zlochevsky’s aforementioned statements,” the document states.

Mary Elizabeth “Liz”

Wildberger

Mary Elizabeth “Liz” Wildberger, writer librarian and children’s literature expert, died July 11, 2023 at Pa radise Valley Estat es retirement co m munity in Fairfield, CA, of pulmonar y edema. She was 92.

Born in Baltimore, she grew up in Overlea, MD, where extended family also had homes, and was inseparable from her sister, Carolyn Anne (Welsh) Bodo, now deceased, and her cousin Sr Virginia Ann Brooks, D.C., of Emmitsburg, MD. They played on the homes’ wide porches and dim attics, helped in the gardens full of tomatoes and marigolds, and made summer excursions to go crabbing and swimming on the Severn River She graduated from Seton High School in Baltimore, where she met her husband, August Martin Wildberger (Commander USN and physicist, deceased), at a debate with the Loyola Blakefield team. She received a Bachelor of Arts degree from what is now Notre Dame of Mar yland University, was married the day after graduation, and began the peri patetic life of a Navy spouse. Later, while working full-time as a teacher, she earned a Master of Arts in instructional technolog y from what is now Towson University Ms. Wildberger’s more than 30 years of librarian and teacher positions ranged from working at Enoch Pratt Free Librar y in Baltimore to several navy base and public libraries in California to a super visor y position for the Prince George’s County school system, where she was an early adopter of teaching children to make films and videos as part of language arts curricula.

For several years, she left the education system to work at Mar yland Public Television as children’s literature expert and author liaison for writers including Madeleine L’Engle, Judy Blume, M.E. Kerr, and Laurence Yep. The four reading motivational programs she helped launch there included “Once Upon a Town,” which won a regional Emmy award in 1975.

Returning to a school librarian role, Ms. Wildberger was named 1988 Mar yland

DAily r epubliC STAff

DRNEWS@DAILYREPUBLIC.NET

SUISUN CITY —

Parks Make Life Better is on tap from 10 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Saturday at Heritage Park, next to the Joseph Nelson Community Center, 611 Village Drive. There will be kid’s corner with prize drawings and a kid’s bike rodeo. Free bike helmets will be available as well

All ages are welcome at the free event, which also includes nutrition education, a spa water sampling station and Food is Free distribution. Visitors can participate in stretching, Zumba and yoga. There will also be a blood pressure station, mental health support, guided meditation, breathing exercises, a wellness walk and journaling.

Terry Romans Maes

Sally Irene Rodeen Calbert

Sally, affectionately known as Grammy Sally, or just Grammy, to her grandchildren and great-grandchildren, passed away with her family by her side on July 1, 2023. Born in St Helena CA on June 9, 1945 to Wayne and Dorothy Rodeen. Sally was raised in Napa and graduated from Napa High School in 1963.

She was preceded in death by her husband Joe, known by all as Papa Joe, in 2008, as well as her parents and her sisters, Sherr y and Debby.

Sally was the matriarch of her family She was a devoted mother to her two childr en, Christy Harrison (Dave) and Danny Webb (Missy). She loved her role as Grammy and adored her seven grandchildren: Brittany, A shley (Wiseley), Tanner (Patti Jo), Brittani, Corey (Sophia), Julia and Caleb (Taylor); and he r great-grandchildren: Jocelyn, Bristol, Colton, Ella and Brooks.

Sally started her career first working at Sears and then later began work as a banker with various institutions, finishing her career with Bank of America. As a banker, she loved her co-workers and customers. She always treated them like family and had friendships with many of them well passed retirement

Her passions were the color red, classic cars (Hot August Nights), Relay For Life (Papa Joes Pit Crew) and her dog Jack among other things. She was always sure to include ever yone she knew in her famous Christmas Eve parties. It was said, “If you’re lucky enough to be invited, then you’re lucky enough.

Sally’s family and friends were dear to her heart as she always put them first, even before herself. She was a force of nature and made things happen.

Ser vices will be held at Br yan Braker on August 12, 2023 at 10:00 a.m. Sally requested that instead of flowers, donations be made to the American Cancer Society

Teacher of the Year in Prince George’s County for her work at the public Thomas Pullen Creative and Performing Arts Academy, where she launched what is now the Media Production program. For several years in the 1980s, she ser ved on the team choosing the annual Librar y of Congress children’s book list and in 1983 received the American Librar y A ssociation’s John Cotton Dana award.

After her retirement and move to Northern California, she continued as a mentor and adviser to children’s literature authors and illustrators; wrote reviews and journal articles, including one co-written with her husband on fiction and artificial intelligence; and wrote the textbook Approaches to Children’s Literature Through Authors.”

A lifetime advocate for children’s literature and learning, Ms. Wildberger worked through the ALA and her opportunities to review, promote and purchase books to realize her beliefs in the importance of diversity and wide representation in children’s literature. Her work was guided by the principle that people of all ages and abilities should have free access to high-quality books and media to increase their learning, understanding, wonder and enjoyment

At her retirement community, noting how many people wished to write memoirs, she launched a Writers Workshop, which quickly became popular and required her husband to help teach extra sessions. The two also launched a literar y magazine at the community She is responsible for helping to shape several dozen memoirs and more than 100 short pieces, many by retired militar y, into coherent, humorous and moving works that friends and family would actually enjoy reading.

She and her husband also traveled widely to attend conferences in both their fields – Istanbul and Los Alamos, NM were her favorites – and much time on Maui each year visiting their son Michael and his wife, Tina Wildberger, swimming most days with their two rottweilers. It was her great joy to help in campaigning and be present at Tina Wildberger’s swearing-in as state representative.

Ms. Wildberger and her husband also wrote numerous satirical musical plays performed by and for the community, including one featuring a mafioso named Broccolini called in to handle the abundance of wild turkeys on the property

Her short play written with Pat Williams was chosen for performance in Napa’s “Play-Demic Festival.” She was active at Travis Air Force Base St. Michael’s Chapel, where she composed the weekly Prayers of the Faithful, usually including a plea for the sur vival of democracy. She was also noted for her beautiful, clear and unaccented speaking voice (she could still do a wicked Baltimore accent for fun) and in addition to being a favorite stor y reader at schools performed voiceovers and narrative for various Mar yland educational media and presentations.

Later, Ms. Wildberger became “The Voice of the Solano Winds,” introducing and emceeing performances by the Northern California orchestra. “Always informative and gracious [she] helps bring the music more alive,” the Solano County Daily Record wrote of her role. The position was retired at an honorar y concert she was able to attend just before her death. Before the last year of her life, a small stroke began to rob her of her gifts in writing and speech. At first her extensive vocabular y allowed her often to substitute phrases from literature and scripture when le mote juste proved elusive. Later, her expressive face and eyes communicated her feelings, sometimes with great precision and humor She continued to gain new friends and admirers and ser ved as leader emeritus of the PVE Writers Workshop In the short time she was in hospice care at her community’s Laurel Creek nursing wing, she was continuously a ccompanied by friends and family including great-grandchildren.

Ms. Wildberger is sur vived by five children: Stephen Wildberger (Elinor Gawel); Kate Cullen (Gavin, deceased), Marta Wildberger Graham, Sara Wildberge r (Micah Pollack), and Mike Wildberger (Tina); nine grandchildren: Lauren Thorn hill (Chase), Emily Cullen, Matthew Cullen, Catherine Milward (Nick), Jessica Ratledge (Ed), Allison Graham, Nora Graham, Claire Graham, and Sydney Mayfield Po l lack; and seven great-grandchildren. Memorial donations may be made to Paradise Valley Estates Scholarship Fund (to help the community’s employees and their families further their education), the United States Air Force Chaplains Fund, or Christ Our King Passionists Retreat Center

Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/AFP via Getty Images/TNS file President Joe Biden, with his son Hunter Biden, boards air Force one as he departs from Delaware air national Guard base in new Castle, Delaware, Feb. 4.

THE TAX WATCHERS

California’s unquenchable thirst for our money

As we enjoy our summer vacations, Sacramento lawmakers are working feverishly to tax even more of our hard-earned dollars. Their objective is to eliminate certain taxpayer protections provided by Proposition 13 (1978), namely the requirement that most local bonds and tax increases must be passed by a twothirds vote. California legislators are determined to eliminate that protection and allow new taxes with a simple 55-percent vote requirement.

In 2000, voters approved Proposition 39, which lowered the threshold needed to approve school construction bonds from twothirds to 55 percent. This led to many more school bonds appearing on local ballots, and many of them passing. The impact of those new debts soon appeared on property tax bills. This affected all property owners in those districts, and landlords usually passed those tax increases on to their tenants.

Assembly Constitutional Amendment 1 (ACA1) goes well beyond school bonds and would make it easier to raise taxes by lowering the voter approval requirement for all local bonds and tax increases from the current two-thirds to 55 percent if the money would be used for “public infrastructure” and certain types of public housing projects.

The operative word here is “public infrastructure.” You can be sure that the term, “public infrastructure” will be liberally interpreted by government to include anything they want.

Think about that.

Assembly Constitutional Amendment 3 ( ACA3) would hammer taxpayers even more. Although proponents say ACA3 is just a “wealth tax” on the super-rich, the truth is that it would also allow the Legislature to raise taxes statewide with a simple majority vote instead of the constitutionally required two-thirds vote established by Prop. 13.

Here’s the kicker. ACA3 “would allow the Legislature to define ‘wealth’ to include unrealized capital gains in real estate, meaning the government could create a new annual tax on the current market value of a home or other property. Note that this tax would be based on the current market value, not what you originally paid for it.

Think about the implications of that on your tax bill!

According to Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association, ACA 3 also removes another important taxpayer protection known as the Gann Limit. The Gann Limit generally requires government entities to restrain their spending to conform to the growth of inflation and population. It was intended to prevent runaway government spending. If ACA3 passes, our legislators will enjoy a free rein when it comes to spending, and the tax collector will be coming for all of us.

Our state legislators really won’t be satisfied until they’ve taxed us on everything we have.

There is some good news in all of this. Our Legislature will be on summer break until Aug. 14. This gives “We the People” time to call our representatives’ offices, both Assembly and Senate members, send them an email and or a letter regarding these two terrible Constitution Amendments. Let your voices be heard loud and clear! Now is the time to stand up and speak up. We can no longer sit back and watch.

Find your representative’s contact information at https://findyourrep.legislature.ca.gov/

Learn more about pending legislation at https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov

Colleen Britton is a member of the Tax Watchers and can be reached at vacatpp@gmail.com.

Letters to the Editor

Letters must be 325 words or less and are subject to editing for length and clarity. All letters must include the author’s name, address and phone number.

Send letters to Letters to the Editor, the Daily Republic, P.O. Box 47, Fairfield, CA 94533, email to sebastian. onate@mcnaughton.media or drop them off at our office, 1250 Texas St. in downtown Fairfield.

COMMENTARY

By giving Ukraine cluster bombs, US admitting it’s OK to kill civilians

In 2008, more than 100 nations signed the Convention on Cluster Munitions, a treaty that “prohibits the use, production, stockpiling and transfer of cluster munitions.”

The United States did not accede to the convention. Neither did Ukraine nor Russia, both of whom are using these weapons in their seemingly forever war.

A cluster munition is a weapon that keeps on killing long after its 72 submunitions, or bomblets, are shot in a shell from a 155 mm artillery weapon. Upon explosion in the air, they can litter an area the size of several football fields. If that wasn’t horrible enough, these submunitions have, according to various government estimates, a “dud,” or unexploded rate, of 2.35% to 6%. That means that every time a cluster bomb is employed, two to four of those 72 bomblets do not explode upon impact. But “dud” doesn’t mean these submunitions stay inactive. They can have the same dangerous lingering effect as a land mine. They stay active for decades. Children are often attracted to the colorful objects with disastrous outcomes.

The estimated dud rate is disputable. According to the Congressional Research Service, “There appear to be significant discrepancies among failure rate estimates. Some manufacturers claim a submunition failure rate of 2% to 5%, whereas mine clearance specialists have frequently reported failure rates of 10% to 30%. A number of factors influence submunition reliability. These include delivery technique, age of the submunition, air temperature, landing in soft or muddy ground, getting caught in trees and vegetation, and submunitions being damaged after dispersal, or landing in such a manner that their impact fuzes fail to initiate.”

The United States has a huge

COMMENTARY

stockpile of cluster munitions –4.7 million containing hundreds of millions of bomblets – that it is dusting off to deliver to Ukraine after a “difficult decision” by President Joe Biden. The U.S. last used these munitions in its military excursion in Afghanistan. Trouble was that the little bombs resembled in color and shape the humanitarian aid packets that the U.S. dropped from planes. This confusion, which obviously left many civilians maimed or dead, led to the curtailment of cluster bombs for our next military adventure. This did not stop Israel from using cluster bombs in its 2006 campaign against Hezbollah forces in Lebanon.

According to a March 2022 Congressional Research Service report, Israel used them in the “last 3 days of the 34-day war after a U.N. cease-fire deal had been agreed to – resulting in almost 1 million unexploded cluster bomblets to which the U.N. attributed 14 deaths during the conflict.” Israel’s use of the bombs “supposedly affected 26% of southern Lebanon’s arable land and contaminated about 13 square miles with unexploded submunitions. One report states that there was a failure rate of upward of 70% of Israel’s cluster weapons,” the agency said.

Recently, the international nongovernmental organization Human Rights Watch released a report from Kyiv that found that “Ukrainian forces have used cluster munitions that caused numerous deaths and serious injuries to civilians.” The report also noted that Russians have used cluster munitions, “killing many civilians and causing other serious civilian harm.”

Human Rights Watch also “found that Ukrainian cluster munition rocket attacks on Russian-controlled areas in and around the city of Izium in eastern Ukraine during 2022 caused many casualties among Ukrainian civilians.”

Yes, Ukrainian civilians. Friendly fire. Price of war. Collateral damage.

In announcing the U.S.’s decision to send these horrific weapons of war to Ukraine, Biden’s national security mouthpiece, Jake Sullivan, admitted, “We recognize that cluster munitions create a risk of civilian harm from unexploded ordnance. This is why we deferred the decision for as long as we could.”

So there it is, an admission at the highest level of our government that more innocents will die because of the use of these evil weapons of war. Additionally, large areas of arable land will no longer be able to be farmed because of these de facto mine fields.

In September 2016, Textron Systems, the last U.S. company to manufacture cluster bombs, ceased production of those munitions. For humanitarian reasons? Nope.

“Historically, sensor-fuzed weapon sales have relied on foreign military and direct commercial international customers for which both executive branch and congressional approval is required. The current political environment has made it difficult to obtain these approvals,” the company complained.

The company was most upset that its proposed sale of cluster bombs to Saudi Arabia to use in that country’s scorched-earth campaign in Yemen was blocked by the White House.

But that was about seven years ago, an eternity for a country that routinely ignores history’s lessons. With Biden’s decision to supply these long-lasting instruments of destruction to Ukraine, that political environment has now changed for the worse.

Stephen J. Lyons is the author of five books of essays and journalism. His new book “Searching for Home, Adventures with Misanthropes” will be published in July.

Michigan hate crime law unconstitutional. Full stop

Sarah ParShall Perry THE HERITAGE FOUNDATION

Last month, the Michigan House passed Bill 4474 – legislation that would expand the state’s existing Ethnic Intimidation Act beyond current protections for religion, ethnicity and race, to categories including sexual orientation and gender identity or expression. HB 4474 would make it a felony hate crime offense to cause someone to “feel terrorized, frightened, or threatened” with words – deliberately misgendering someone, for example –subject to a potential penalty of five years in prison and a $10,000 fine.

The Left has been pushing its “words are violence” premise for some time. But Michigan’s willingness to go the extra mile and criminalize genderrelated speech has summoned a ghoul from some dystopian fever dream.

HB 4474 is unconstitutional, and I’m not the only lawyer who thinks so. To argue otherwise ignores two of the U.S. Supreme Court’s newly minted rulings on what speech the First Amendment protects – and what it doesn’t.

In 303 Creative v. Elenis, the Supreme Court held that the First Amendment prohibited the state of Colorado from forcing a website designer to create expressive designs conveying messages on same-sex marriage with which she disagrees. Justice Neil Gorsuch, writing for the majority, recited a long line of precedents establishing that the First Amendment not only protects an individual’s right to speak her mind, but prohibits the government from compelling her to “speak its own preferred messages.”

Yet that’s precisely what Michigan proposes to do. Its preferred messages require affirmation of another’s gender identity on pain of criminal penalty –even if the speaker believes that sex is binary and immutable, and there are only two genders. In Counterman v. Colorado, the

court examined the interplay between the First Amendment and criminal conduct – specifically, making “true threats” that are unprotected speech. The court held that for Colorado to prosecute someone for making a “true threat” of violence, it must prove a defendant had some subjective understanding of the threatening nature of his statements. Writing for the majority, Justice Elena Kagan noted that even though a true threat “lie[s] outside the bounds of the First Amendment’s protection,” prosecution of true threats poses “the prospect of chilling non-threatening expression, given the ordinary citizen’s predictable tendency to steer wide of the unlawful zone.” By requiring a showing that a defendant recklessly disregarded a substantial risk that his words could be perceived as threatening, a speaker would be prevented from – as Kagan wrote –“swallow[ing] words that are in fact not true threats.”

That means a prosecution under Michigan’s hate crime law would require proof that the speaker knew his or her speech on gender identity or expression was likely to be perceived as threatening but acted with that knowledge by issuing the threat anyway. The speaker would therefore be acting “recklessly.”

Yes, as the gender juggernaut sprints ever forward, it’s certainly likely that transgender individuals could perceive misgendering as “threatening.” They are, after all, the fraternity of the perpetually offended. However, to qualify as a prosecutable “true threat,” the speech must convey a threat to commit an act of violence; speech that is hurtful or offensive does not qualify and is protected speech under the First Amendment, regardless of whether the majority of Michiganders agree or not.

Further complicating Michigan’s intention to silence dissent is the fact that at least one federal appellate court has held that gender identity is a “hotly

contested issue,” one on which reasonable people can and do disagree. Indeed, the Sixth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals noted in Meriwether v. Hartop, that “the premise that gender identity is an idea ‘embraced and advocated by increasing numbers of people is all the more reason to protect the First Amendment rights of those who wish to voice a different view.’”

Despite Democratic characterizations that HB 4474 is “common-sense hate crime legislation,” the expansion of hate crimes laws to speech concerning an individual’s subjective self-identification is anything but common. It compels alignment with the state’s preferred orthodoxy, something the Supreme Court has routinely struck down. What’s more, it points the way toward even bolder government efforts to censor unpopular or politically inexpedient speech.

Whether concerning hate crimes, stalking or public accommodations, no law, as Gorsuch wrote in 303 Creative, “is immune from the demands of the Constitution.” A law that prohibits discrimination based on sexual orientation (such as Colorado’s public accommodations law), or establishes criminal penalties for speech based on gender identity or expression (like HB 4474) must still conform to the First Amendment’s protection for the freedom of speech.

The government may not prohibit expression merely because it might prove offensive to some or run contrary to its stated policy objectives. Disagreement is not discrimination, and while Michigan’s House Democrats appear to have forgotten this, their Senate colleagues would do well to remember it.

Sarah Parshall Perry is a Senior Legal Fellow in the Edwin Meese III Center for Legal and Judicial Studies at The Heritage Foundation where she focuses on civil rights, constitutional governance, regulatory policy, and the proper role of the courts.

Stephen J. Lyons

Colleen Britton

(707) 427-1386

Netflix set for worst shares drop this year

BloomBerg

Netflix shares are poised for their biggest drop this year after projecting third-quarter revenue that fell short of Wall Street estimates, suggesting a crackdown on password sharing and a new advertising tier aren’t yet delivering the sales growth analysts anticipated.

The shares fell as much as 8.7% in New York on Thursday morning, the most since Dec. 15. The stock had risen 62% this year through Wednesday on optimism surrounding the company’s new initiatives.

While Netflix grew its subscriber base by 8%, sales rose just 2.7% to $8.19 billion, coming in slightly below analysts’ projections. That was due in part to foreign exchange rates

and to price cuts in some markets. Netflix also generated less revenue per customer in the most recent quarter. The company expects sales of $8.52 billion in the third quarter, compared with the $8.67 billion average of Wall Street estimates. The results were fine “but not enough to move the stock higher given the move in past three months,” LightShed Partners analyst Rich Greenfield said after the results were announced. The shortfall overshadowed a solid quarter by most other metrics. Netflix added 5.89 million customers in the second period, more than doubling Wall Street estimates, and finished the quarter with 238.4 million members. The results marked the company’s best second quarter since the depths of the pandemic.

Pickles Brian Crane

Zits Jerry Scott and Jim Borgman

Pearls Before Swine Stephan Pastis

Darrin Bell

Baby Blues Rick Kirkman and Jerry Scott Baldo Hector Cantú

Crime logs

FairField

TUESDAY, JULY 18

12:44 a.m. Vehicle burglary, 3700 block of LYON ROAD

2:03 a.m. — Battery, 1300 block of HOLIDAY LANE

5:31 a.m. Robbery, 2200

block of NORTH TEXAS STREET

9:47 a.m. Fight with a

weapon, 1800 block of NORTH TEXAS STREET

10:06 a.m. Hit-and-run

property damage, PITTMAN ROAD

10:27 a.m. Brandishing a

weapon, 5000 block of BUSINESS CENTER DRIVE

11:13 a.m. Commercial

burglary, 500 block of PITTMAN ROAD

11:24 a.m. Vandalism, 2000

block of CLIFFWOOD DRIVE

11:34 a.m. Grand theft, 1700

block of NORTH TEXAS STREET

11:36 a.m. Trespassing, 900

block of FIFTH STREET

12:11 p.m. Reckless driver,

BOULEVARD 11 a.m. — Vandalism, 4700 block of BUSINESS CENTER DRIVE 11:28 a.m. — Battery, 1000 block of WEBSTER STREET 12:11 p.m. — Arson, 1900 block of NORTH TEXAS STREET 12:17 p.m. — Vandalism, 3000 block of TRAVIS BOULEVARD

1 p.m. — Residential burglary, 1600 block of PARK LANE

1:12 p.m. — Trespassing, 300 block of SANTA MARIA DRIVE

From Page One

1:19 p.m. Vehicle theft, 200

block of RED TOP ROAD

1:24 p.m. Reckless driver, HEALTHCARE DRIVE

2:50 p.m. Forgery, 2500 block of NORTH TEXAS STREET

4 p.m. — Grand theft, 3400 block of NORTH TEXAS STREET

4:25 p.m. Forgery, 2800 block of CORDELIA ROAD

5:29 p.m. Vehicle burglary, 4700 block of BUSINESS

CENTER DRIVE

6:19 p.m. Forgery, 2000 block of GOODMAN COURT

SuiSun

Emboldened by tight labor markets and agitated after shouldering new risks, workers notched a series of surprising victories at some of the most prominent U.S. companies. Now, wary of soaring corporate profits as major technological changes threaten to upend their industries, unions are ready to test their clout.

“There’s an ambition here that I think is new,” said Lichtenstein. “They’re on the offense.”

The companies, for their part, are facing their own economic realities. In Hollywood, studio profits are down because of a shift to streaming and Wall Street has punished companies for their lagging financials. UPS is confronting difficult headwinds with package demand declining as the country emerges from the pandemic. The carmakers say they already offer generous pay and benefits and need to keep wages competitive with lower-paying rivals like Tesla Inc. as they invest billions into the shift to electric vehicles.

$1

billion Powerball ticket sold in downtown LA

Blocks from the epicenter of the homelessness crisis, one of the most lucrative lottery tickets in history was sold.

After months of anticipation, on Wednesday six numbers were drawn and one ticket, which was sold in Los Angeles’ Fashion District, matched.

At about $1 billion, this prize is the third-largest Powerball jackpot in history and the seventh-largest U.S. lottery jackpot ever. The winner, who remains unidentified, purchased their ticket at Las Palmitas Mini Market at East 12th Street and Wall Street, which is a short walk from Skid Row.

For this latest jackpot, the odds of winning were 1 in 292.2 million. Even getting five right is a rarity. The odds of that were 1 in 11.6 million.

Tribune Content Agency

Mural

From Page One

California contractor with 50 years of experience in graphic design and mural art. He traveled to the marsh and took photos for his inspiration.

The wall will be hardtroweled plaster. Ton will hand paint it at his studio using Nova color acrylic polymer paint. It will be stretched on “canvas” on a very large wood-framed easel constructed just for this project.

The material is called PolyTab and is used widely for mural art. The painted

PolyTab gets transported to the site and adhered with a second Artex product, made by the same manufacturer as the Nova color acrylic, called Nova Gel.

The Nova Gel is an acrylic adhesive and is used widely by muralists for just this purpose. Once the applied mural dries, they will apply a clear coat of catalyzed urethane.

Suisun City resident

Donna LeBlanc said it was the best mural for the first project.

Vice Mayor Princess Washington called it “a very valuable asset for the community.”

Images can be found in the July 18 city council agenda packet.

“It’s very clear that unions are quite alive,” said Michael Lotito, who co-chairs the Workplace Policy Institute at the management law firm Littler. “The jury’s out on how well they are.”

The showdowns could have sweeping consequences, not just for the hundreds of thousands of workers striking, but for the much-diminished American union landscape. The share of the U.S. private sector that’s unionized has fallen from one-quarter half a century ago to just 6% today. Few groups have as much leverage to upend company plans, capture public attention and force concessions as the organized workers who deliver Americans’ packages, make their cars and entertain them.

“In terms of workers

Climate

From Page One

are navigating political dynamics at home that complicate their work, as Beijing and Washington spar over trade controls, human rights and other issues. In the U.S., antiChina rhetoric is set to intensify as the presidential campaign heats up next year, a dynamic Kerry said makes climate diplomacy even harder.

Xi’s stance

Similar challenges were on display in Beijing this week. Even as Xie and Kerry were working to find consensus, President Xi Jinping used remarks at an environmental conference to insist China wouldn’t allow outsiders to dictate its carbon-cutting path. Ultimately, negotiations ended late Wednesday without a

in America who still have the ability to change their conditions, these are three of the top 10,” said Larry Cohen, a former Communications Workers of America union president, who now chairs the advocacy group Our Revolution. If the unions come out on top, it could boost organizing efforts at companies like Amazon.com Inc. and Starbucks Corp. that, despite recent wins, still remain largely union free. Teamsters President Sean O’Brien has said he plans on using the union’s success to win over Amazon workers.

“Hopefully, Amazon employees look at this and go: ‘You know what? We deserve this too,’ ” said Minnesota UPS warehouse worker Rikki Schreiner, who has been at the company for two decades.

Even the launch of strikes could galvanize non-union workers, but the move doesn’t come without risks. Drawnout stoppages can drain members’ finances – and the unions’ – making it harder to fund other efforts. Strikes that lose momentum can leave members divided and disillusioned. If fights end with disappointing deals, they could become cautionary tales. Managers often hold up unproductive and costly strikes as a reason to not unionize.

“Workers are watching each other and trying to learn from each other,” said Sharon Block, who served in President Barack Obama’s Labor Department and now directs Harvard Law School’s Center for Labor and a Just Economy.

The details of the current clashes themselves vary, but one thing they have in common is money. Workers across industries are pushing for a bigger share of corporate profits, particularly as inflation has bitten into their paychecks. Actors and writers want higher base pay and more residuals from streaming shows. The autoworkers not only want raises but to ensure

grand pronouncement –and with far more work to do in the four months before this year’s United Nations climate summit opens in Dubai. Both sides have committed to more negotiations and to “work intensively” to make progress, Kerry said.

Both negotiators are in their 70s. Kerry, a former secretary of state and U.S. senator, has been to many U.N. climate summits since a session in Rio in 1992. Xie was pulled out of retirement when Kerry was appointed the special presidential envoy for climate, and he suffered a stroke earlier this year. It’s unclear how much longer they’ll continue in their current roles.

“The irony is they find bilateral relationship at its worst just when they are about to pass the baton to the next generation,” said Li Shuo, a senior global policy adviser for Greenpeace East Asia. “The Xie-Kerry story goes beyond their personal

the people powering the shift to electric cars get the same pay and benefits as other plant workers. UPS Teamsters members haven’t forgotten how “essential” their work was during pandemic lockdowns, and think they should be compensated accordingly.

“If my work is so important, then why shouldn’t I be properly rewarded for it?” said Portland, Oregon UPS employee Nick Marrapode.

Workers also say past contract deals gave some staff worse terms than peers. One issue in the Hollywood stoppage is that talk show and gameshow writers for streamers – including giants like Netflix Inc. – lack the contractual protections provided to their counterparts working for cable stations, even tiny ones. UAW members are pushing to end “two-tier” arrangements that pay newer employees significantly worse than long-timers, and UPS staff are pushing to close the gap between full- and part-time worker compensation.

“UPS needs to share the billions of dollars that they made with their workers,” said Scott Gove, a 35-year UPS employee in New Hampshire. “I think that that’s a bitter pill for them.”

An undercurrent of major technological and societal changes is driving some worker anxieties, too. Writers’ rallies have been studded with signs about the dangers of artificial intelligence. “Only uncreative people would think that you can replace writers and actors with artificial intelligence and that it would be interesting or any good,” said Chaley Rose, a SAGAFTRA member best known for playing Zoey Dalton in the television series Nashville.

The UAW is pushing to secure a path for electric-vehicle and battery workers to unionize as the industry shifts to greener options. The Teamsters got a commitment to add air condition-

commitment. It represents the sunset of a golden era and our anxiety of not knowing what’s next. All of this is happening when the climate crisis becomes ever more evident.”

Staying focused

To be sure, neither Xie nor Kerry have announced any plans, and instead remain focused on the delicate work of climate diplomacy. Day after day this week they huddled over dinners in the Beijing Hotel and the Grand Hyatt blocks from Tiananmen Square, and spent more than 20 hours across the negotiating table deliberating ways to more rapidly reduce reliance on coal-fired electricity, pare methane emissions and deploy renewable power.

Following these talks, they will continue to try to keep the two superpowers’ efforts on climate walled off from other disputes in the U.S.-China

ing in the iconic brown trucks, a necessity in a warming planet.

The negotiations are testing new union leadership. Both the Teamsters and UAW presidents won their seats in the past two years, in part, by promising to reverse past concessions. One galvanizing issue in the Teamsters showdown was members’ frustration with the prior leadership’s decision to push through a UPS contract deal in 2018 that a majority of the membership had voted to reject.

UAW President Shawn Fain has said he is going to “war” against the Detroit automakers and last week he eschewed the traditional handshake-across-thebargaining-table with CEOs that has marked the opening of auto contract talks for decades, saying he’ll do so “when they come to the table with a deal.”

Hundreds of SAGAFTRA members signed an open letter to union officers including their new president Fran Drescher, star of the 1990s TV show “The Nanny,” saying they were ready to strike and were concerned “that SAG-AFTRA members may be ready to make sacrifices our leadership is not.”

Drescher responded by adding her name to the letter.

Strikes of this scale weren’t always scarce in the U.S. At least 800,000 workers were involved in work stoppages every year throughout the 1950’s. Their cadence has plummeted along with overall unionization rates.

But in recent years, public opinion of unions has ticked up to highs not seen in decades. “Unions are viewed very much as a solution now,” said Seth Harris, a former deputy National Economic Council director under President Joe Biden. “They’re not viewed as a museum piece.” The strikes will now test their power.

relationship, mindful that any misstep could derail progress.

That happened last year when Beijing suspended negotiations after then-U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan. Climate experts say Xie and Kerry were able to draw on their personal ties to resume work despite the timeout – and that could be a buffer against future friction. Environmental advocates insist climate progress between the U.S. and China can’t rest solely on the two men’s shoulders. “The relationship obviously has to extend beyond them,” said David Waskow, director of the World Resources Institute’s international climate initiative. “It can’t just be based on them.” Yet for now, it may be vital.

“In the conduct of foreign diplomacy, relationships are super important,” Kerry said. “We trust each other.”

MaxPreps ranks Armijo star Section’s best

FAIRFIELD — Armijo

High School’s stalwart senior defensive lineman Jericho Johnson continues to receive big attention.

The Royals will be putting on helmets for the first time Monday as practice officially begins for the 2023 season. Johnson is a coveted college prospect who has garnered 20 scholarship offers from some of the nation’s top Division I programs.

On Tuesday, Johnson was named the best player

in the Sac-Joaquin Section by MaxPreps.com in its list of the top 20 in the Class of 2024. The 6-foot-4, 300pound standout is also ranked the 13th best player in the state and 109th nationally by MaxPreps.

JOHNSON

“I’m proud of him,” Armijo head coach Don Mosley said. “His hard work continues to pay off. He is reaping the fruits of his labor.”

Johnson had 36 tackles, nine sacks and two fumble

recoveries his junior season. He has been named to the Daily Republic’s All-Region team and all-Monticello Empire League the last two seasons. The offer list includes Washington, Georgia, Miami, Oregon, Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Auburn, California, Colorado, Georgia Tech, Louisiana Tech, Michigan, Nevada, Oregon State, San Jose State, USC, Utah, Washington State, Wisconsin and UCLA.

The 247 Sports recruiting website lists his interest in Washington, Georgia, Miami and Oregon as “warm,” while the others are “cool.”

Johnson plans to make a commitment once the 2023 season is over. In the meantime, he is also bringing a lot of national attention to the local community. Many head coaches and recruiting assists have visiting the Armijo campus this offseason.

“That’s something he has embraced early on,” Mosley said. “He wants to

Kalani Mcleod excited to be new starting QB with Vanden

M att Miller MMILLER@DAILYREPUBLIC.NET

FAIRFIELD — For the first time since prior the Covid-19 pandemic, the Vanden High School varsity football team won’t have quarterback Tre Dimes under center.

The ball is now in the hands of junior Kalani Mcleod. His job is to pilot the Vikings’ offense and help lead the way after two historic seasons.

Head coach Sean Murphy is confident Mcleod will get the job done.

“We’re excited about Kalani,” Murphy said. “He is really good at reading defenses and taking what the defense gives him. He

can spin the ball and get it to the athletes to let them make the plays.”

Dimes did that for parts of four seasons. He threw for an incredible 6,156 yards and 74 touchdowns. Those remarkable numbers could actually have been even greater had his sophomore season not been cut in half by the pandemic. He also saw limited action as a freshman.

The last two years for Dimes and his teammates ended in a pair of section championships, one state title and a Northern California runner-up finish.

Dimes finished with a whopping 3,262 yards and 46 touchdowns his junior season as the Vikings beat Aquinas 14-13 for the Divi-

sion 3-AA state title in 2021.

But Murphy knows its time to move on. Dimes is now at a prep school in Louisiana continuing to building his resume for college. Mcleod steps in and is learning a new offense under new coordinator Mike Clark.

Mcleod will be surrounded by a talented lineup that should also help make the transition easier as Vanden tries to go for another section title. Much like the San Francisco 49ers had to do when third-string quarterback Brock Purdy took over the bulk of the season, Mcleod needs to just hold his poise and distribute the ball to the playmakers.

See Vanden, Page B8

help put this community on the map. He wants to show character on and off the field.”

Mosley said that Johnson is in good condition and ready for the new season as practice resumes. The coach wants him to “be in a position to start the season strong and finish it strong.”

MaxPrep’s top five runner-up is Manasse Itete of Central Catholic-Modesto. Itete is a 6-foot-5, 290pound offensive tackle committed to USC.

At No. 3 is Kingston Lopa of Grant-

LOCAL REPORT

Sacramento. Lopa is a 6-foot-5, 190-pound safety committed to Oregon.

Sacramento High’s Lamar Radcliffe, at No. 4, is a 6-foot-2, 225-pound athlete with multiple offers. No. 5 is Brooklyn Cheek, another Central Catholic product, who is 6-foot-2, 180-pounds as a safety and Cal commit. Vacaville edge rusher Noa Siaosi, 6-foot-3, 230pounds, checks in at No. 18. Siaosi has an offer from Utah State. Steve Montoya’s full story is available at maxpreps.com.

Fairfield High announces new Hall of Fame class for 2023

FAIRFIELD — The Fairfield High School Hall of Fame induction class for 2023 will feature one of the best hurdlers ever to come out of Solano County and a baseball team that shocked the Sac-Joaquin Section with a championship run.

Daje Pugh earned the state track and field championship in the 300-meter hurdles in 2012, was a sixtime state placer and a seven-time Section Masters champion. Pugh went on to compete collegiately at Washington and Kentucky.

The 1999 Fairfield baseball team won the section title despite entering the postseason tournament as the third seed out of the Monticello Empire League. The Falcons went undefeated in the playoffs and defeated Woodland, with future Boston Red Sox star Dustin Pedroia, in the title game.

The Hall of Fame class also includes 2006 grad-

uate Neelon Greenwood (track and field, basketball), 1998 graduate Lindsey Meeks Crain (swimming, water polo), 2994 grad Bryan Collins (water polo, basketball, soccer), 1994 grad David Yi (wrestling) and long-time swimming and water polo coach Wes Lai.

The Hall of Fame Dinner and Induction will take place Saturday, Sept. 23, at Fairfield High School. Tickets can be purchased online at Fairfield’s GoFan website.

VALL 12U all-stars qualify for NorCals

VACAVILLE — The Vacaville American Little League 12U All-Stars are on a roll and headed to the Northern California State Tournament in Stockton. Vacaville American opens play Saturday with a game against Madera American. The tournament also features teams from McKinleyville, San Ramon, Roseville, Capitola

See Local, Page B8

US women taking aim at 3rd straight World Cup crown

K evin Baxter LOS ANGELES TIMES

evan WeBecK

BAY AREA NEWS GROUP

A fourth-inning double and a solo home run when they were down to their last out were all that prevented the Giants on Thursday from becoming this season’s third no-hit victims.

Luis Matos’ line-drive double, skirting inches over the glove of Reds left fielder Will Benson, amounted to their only hit before Wilmer Flores went deep in the ninth, hardly saving face in a 5-1 loss to the Reds.

After exploding for 19 runs to win the first two games of this series, San Francisco managed

only three over the final two games and had to settle for a split in Cincinnati.

The Giants (54-43) had hoped to make Wednesday’s loss that

snapped their sevengame winning streak a blip with Alex Cobb on the mound in the series finale, but they lost for only the second time in the last 12 games

the 35-year-old AllStar has started. The 12th-year veteran was opposed by a lefthander making his ninth career start, Andrew Abbott, who held San Francisco scoreless for eight innings. The game so happened to be a confluence of Cobb’s worst splits. He has been much better at Oracle Park (1.24 ERA) than away from it (4.63 after Thursday) and so despises early work that he has adjusted his throwing routine to avoid it. His ERA in day games rose to 5.04, compared to 1.83 in evening starts.

For as long as she can remember, Sophia Smith has dreamt of playing for the U.S. in a World Cup. As a young girl growing up in northern Colorado, she planned for it, she practiced it, she even acted it out in her backyard.

“We played World Cup, and I was always the USA,” she said. “I didn’t fully know that this could be me one day.”

Friday it will be, with Smith and U.S. kicking off what they hope will be a drive to a third consecutive world championship against Vietnam. Only now is that reality beginning to sink in.

“We did a welcome ceremony the other day and the other teams in Auckland were there,” Smith said. “Just kind of seeing the other teams, it was like, ‘OK, it’s really happening.’

“It still feels surreal.”

Surreal is a word the Stanford-educated Smith

uses frequently. It’s surreal that she made the World Cup team, she says, surreal that she’s playing alongside women she once idolized and surreal that she’s the leading scorer on the No. 1 team in the world.

But if all those things were unexpected, what’s not surreal are the huge expectations the U.S. carries into the tournament.

With 32 teams, 64 games, two host countries in New Zealand and Australia and a prize-money purse of more $150 million, this will be the largest and most lucrative women’s World Cup ever. For the Americans, however, nothing has really changed.

“There’s only one thing

Giants nearly no-hit in series finale, settle for split with Reds on the road

Dylan Buell/Getty Images/TNS Alex Cobb pitches in the third inning against the Reds at Great American Ball Park in Cincinnati, Thursday.

Courtesy of Joe Gonzalez

Kalani Mcleod led the Vanden High School junior varsity football team at quarterback during the 2022 season. Mcleod now steps up as the Vikings’ varsity quarterback heading into the Aug. 18 season opener.

Maddened by my mother

Dear Annie: My mom has had several strokes and is now living with us. She has problems seeing out of one eye. No one else will step up to take care of her. Our arrangement was that she pays for extra things she wants – nails, haircuts, new clothes. And, oh, yeah, did I mention she smokes like crazy? Which her doctor has told her repeatedly to stop, as have we. They aren’t allowed in the house, so she sits on our front porch and it smells like a cigarette factory. She refuses to do anything around the house. Her bedroom and bathroom are a mess until I clean them on the weekend.

My husband is mad that we ended up having to pay for everything. He’s also mad at the way she treats me. Like, if she wants something, she insists I should get it for her –haircuts, shampoo, the cocoa she drinks. All she does is lay the guilt trip on me. We are now trying to make her understand how and why we feel used. I don’t know what I will do. This has been an ongoing thing. I know she is

ARIES (March 21-April 19).

You much prefer to demonstrate who you are than talk about it. Even when you’re asked about yourself, you’ll let action say everything, and then you’ll savor how impressed people are when they see what you can do.

TAURUS (April 20-May 20).

Is there really “enough to go around”? It depends on how you look at it, but there are clear benefits to an abundance mentality. For instance, it’s easier to like people when you’re not paranoid that they’re trying to take what’s yours.

GEMINI (May 21-June 21).

As the professor Roger Corless said, “Trying to be happy by accumulating possessions is like trying to satisfy hunger by taping sandwiches all over your body.” You’ll satisfy a souldeep craving with something immaterial.

CANCER (June 22-July 22).

No matter how well you know your task, you can’t practice the unpredictable. Luckily your experience has made you quick, flexible and improvisational. The plot twists; then you do, too.

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22).

Because your needs are so specific now, you want to interact with certain people and may feel bothered by others. Try to be open-minded, because it’s

Crossword

my mother, but I feel taken advantage of.

Am I being petty? — Freeloading Mom

Dear Freeloading Mom: You need to have a conversation with your mother and set some clear, definitive rules if she is going to live in your house. No “cigarette factory” smoking areas and keeping a clean living area should be the absolute basics. If she does not agree to your house rules, you can help her to find a different living situation with the care she needs.

Dear Annie: I think that

“Unhappy Wife, Unhappy Life” buried the lede, so to speak, in her letter about her desire to divorce, once again, the ex-husband whom she’d remarried after a 20-year separation. Only at the very end of her letter did she state that she was hesitant to leave him because he might turn violent, as he had the first time they’d divorced.

Yikes! I felt certain that you’d feature that fear as a primary reason why she should get out of the marriage. Instead, your primary response was that she should

by Holiday Mathis

Today’s birthday

Your soul issued a call you were unaware of and now your capacity to love grows to encompass new ones coming into your heart and world this year. More highlights: You’ll be lauded for tasteful extravagance. You’ll contribute to the proud continuance of a legacy. What you were once insecure about becomes the cornerstone of your worry-free existence. Capricorn and Aries adore you. Your lucky numbers are: 10, 6, 3, 33 and 48.

a day when the best help can come from unexpected places.

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22).

To share is to compromise. The gains and losses you experience as a result of bonding with someone will alter your path and ultimately change who you are. You’ll adjust with grace.

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 23).

Can you really discharge emotions from the past by revisiting memories and processing what happened? Today the answer is a resounding yes. You will release a bothersome feeling that’s been holding you back.

SCORPIO (Oct. 24-Nov. 21).

What’s done out of love at first may change to a habit, duty

try to get her husband into marriage counseling. Only at the end of your response did you advise “Unhappy Wife” to call the National Domestic Violence Hotline if she felt threatened. I think that lede got buried as well.

If she feels he might turn violent, that suggests to me that she probably had at least a strong hint of that possible response, perhaps based on current behavior, as well as a history of violence. My advice would have been to run, don’t walk, out the door. — Word of Caution

Dear Word of Caution: Thank you for your response. You are right that while “Unhappy Wife’s” letter focused at first on her husband’s bad attitude and the mediocrity of their marriage, the reference to violence should certainly be treated with great weight. Whether it be for one red flag or another, I hope “Unhappy Wife” is able to safely remove herself from a dynamic that, at its best, no longer serves her, and at its worst, puts her in danger. Send your questions for Annie Lane to dearannie@ creators.com.

or obligation. To get back to your original intent, consider dropping the task for a while. Interrupting a pattern will awaken new awareness.

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22Dec. 21). Different concepts of reality fit different days. Try this rule now: If you ignore it and it doesn’t go away, it’s reality. Also it should be noted that real problems are much more easily dealt with than imaginary ones.

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22Jan. 19). There are many who want your time, money and attention. Of course, your attention and time are the more valuable commodities; you are right to protect them accordingly, maybe by refusing to engage with nonsense.

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20Feb. 18). Little changes along the way are normal in even the healthiest of relationships. Growing doesn’t have to mean growing apart. A spurt could be what makes new points of connection finally possible.

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20). It will be tempting to obsessively review things until you’ve talked yourself out of making a move. But you’re too daring for that today. Instead of “thinking differently,” you’ll make a difference with action.

Holiday Mathis at HolidayMathis.com

Bridge

by Phillip Alder

vulnerability dissuaded West from bidding five clubs.) You win the club lead in hand and cash the spade ace, West discarding a club. Next you try the diamonds, cashing dummy’s ace and king, but again West throws a club. With the heart ace hovering over the king, you seem doomed. But there is a way out of the difficulty. At trick five, lead dummy’s club queen and, if East doesn’t ruff, discard a low heart! If West switches to hearts, it will save you one heart loser. So assume he returns another club. Ruff with dummy’s spade king, discarding your second low heart, and run the spade nine to pick up all of the trumps. You lose only one heart, one diamond and one club.

What happens if East does ruff the club queen to prevent the throw-in?

CAN YOU MAKE A TRICK DISAPPEAR?

On today’s deal, declarer seems destined to lose four tricks: three hearts and a diamond. Do you see how to deflect destiny?

North planned to give a limit raise in spades, but he was pushed into bidding game when West jammed the auction with four clubs. (The prevailing

You parry that thrust by overruffing, drawing trumps (which leaves dummy with one spade), and exiting with a heart – the king if you are flamboyant. The defenders take their three heart tricks, but whoever wins the last heart trick is endplayed. If West, he must lead a club, conceding a ruff-and-sluff so that you don’t lose a diamond trick. If East, he has to lead away from the jack-eight of diamonds into the split tenace of dummy’s nine and your queen. Delightful!

COPYRIGHT: 2023, UNITED FEATURE SYNDICATE

Sudoku by Wayne Gould

On

7/21/23

Fill

the digits 1 through 9, with no repeats. That means that no number is repeated in any row, column or box. Solution, tips and computer program at www.sudoku.com

Difficulty level: SILVER

Yesterday’s solution:

Horoscopes

Annie Lane Dear Annie

Actors strike and the dystopian potential of AI, now on screen

NiNa Metz CHICAGO TRIBUNE

When the union that represents TV and movie actors announced its plans to strike last week, chief negotiator Duncan CrabtreeIreland talked about concerns relating to the use of artificial intelligence. This is what the studios proposed, he said: “That our background actors should be able to be scanned, get paid for one day’s pay, and their company should own that scan, their image, their likeness and to be able to use it for the rest of eternity in any project they want with no consent and no compensation.”

A studio owning and profiting from a person’s image and likeness for the rest of eternity?

It sounds dystopian. Talk about eliminating the need for pesky, annoying, expensive humans altogether, be they actors, writers or anyone else other than C-suite executives.

Something like that outcome is mentioned by a fictional studio executive played by Tim Robbins in 1992′s “The Player,” a scathing Hollywood satire from writer Michael Tolkin and director Robert Altman:

“I was just thinking what an interesting concept it is to eliminate the writer from the artistic process. If we can just get rid of these actors and directors, maybe we’ve got something here.”

Prophetic!

Over the past two decades, occasionally a work of science fiction has grappled with some of these concerns as they pertain to actors. The 2002 film “Simone” – or “S1m0ne,” as the title is sometimes styled – stars Al Pacino as a film director whose lead actress refuses to finish work on a movie. So he reshoots it with a virtual (computer-generated) actress instead. He dubs his nonhuman actor Simone, who gives him the exact performance he wants because Simone is not a person with their own ideas but the equivalent of a digital puppet.

The themes in “Simone” center on issues of control. The desire to control others and control outcomes. But control isn’t always a negative; it’s reasonable to want to control your name, especially if someone else stands to profit from it.

Nearly a decade ago, the comedian Cristela Alonzo created and starred in a sitcom for ABC called “Cristela” that was based on her life. She recently tweeted that her lawyers suggested she trademark her name “because the studio would try to own it because of the show. They tried doing it with Reba McEntire, but she owned hers. So I paid money I didn’t have to do it. A week later … the studio tried! I beat them by a week!”

What if studios didn’t

Daily Cryptoquotes

need actors on a day-to-day basis at all?

The 2013 sci-fi drama “The Congress” stars Robin Wright playing a version of herself. She’s called into a meeting with a studio head played by Danny Huston, who waxes on about her talents and charms. “You were the future, Robin. You were the promise. The answer. You were the whole package. “And now I’m in this situation of offering you the last contract you’ll ever have.”

What do you mean, she asks?

“We want to scan you. All of you. Your body, your face, your emotions, your laughter, your tears, your climaxing, your happiness, your depressions, your fears, your longings. We want to sample you. We want to preserve you. And we want to own this thing called ‘Robin Wright’.”

She’ll be paid a lump sum. And in exchange, she can never act again. Not even obscure dinner theater somewhere, because the studio will now own Robin Wright, the actor, to do with as they please.

Harvey Keitel plays her agent and he merely shrugs: You were always their puppet, so what’s the difference?

You’d think making a movie like “The Congress” might say something about Wright’s own wariness about AI. And yet earlier this year it was announced that she and Tom Hanks are starring in a new film from Robert Zemeckis that will use AI to de-age them with photorealistic face swaps.

Nobody’s pure. That shouldn’t be the bar anyway.

But you can understand why people who aren’t household names and faces like Wright and Hanks are concerned about having far less say about how AI affects their ability to be working actors.

Or imagine if questions of diversity become simply a matter of tinkering with technology that adjusts skin tone or body shape or facial features. As it is, we’re not getting a “full spectrum of humanity,” researcher Sydette Harry told me a few years ago. Why should we expect otherwise if AI becomes the default?

“BoJack Horseman,” the animated Hollywood satire on Netflix, had some choice words about AI in one of its episodes. Sitting in his trailer, BoJack is 3D scanned and casually

informed by a producer that “one day that’s going to be the actor’s whole job, just sitting in a room for five seconds while a machine scans his face – and then six months later plugging a movie on Kimmel.”

What does this mean for the rest of us?

Season 6 of the surrealist anthology series “Black Mirror” premiered on Netflix last month and it includes an episode called “Joan Is Awful” that ponders this question.

A young woman named Joan (Annie Murphy of “Schitt’s Creek”) is a midlevel manager at a tech company. One night, on the couch at home with her boyfriend, they pull up a Netflix-like streaming platform called Streamberry and come across a show called “Joan Is Awful.” The thumbnail image shows a woman with Joan’s exact hairstyle: dark and parted in the middle, with twin blond streaks framing her face.

The series is a replay of her previous day, starring Salma Hayek as Joan – or rather, it’s actually an AI version of Salma Hayek, who has licensed her image to Streamberry.

Joan is livid, but a meeting with her lawyer gets her nowhere. “It’s my name! It’s my career! It’s me! They’re using me,” she says. And you assigned them the right to exploit all that, the lawyer calmly tells her. “What? When?” Terms and conditions, comes the reply.

In fact, Streamberry has even bigger ambitions: Eventually, everybody will get their own show: “(Insert name) Is Awful.”

That doesn’t sound farfetched to actor, writer and director Justine Bateman, who became a household name on the ‘80s sitcom “Family Ties,” She has warned of an eventuality whereby viewers are offered a premium tier of entertainment: Get scanned and you can be inserted into custom films –or even “licensing deals made with studios so that viewers can order up older films like ‘Star Wars’ and put their face on Luke Skywalker’s body and their wife’s face on Darth Vader’s body.”

It’s the digital march to dehumanizing us all in the name of entertainment – and somebody else’s profits.

The irony that “Black Mirror” streams on Netflix –itself the subject of viewer and talent ire – should not be lost on anyone.

I don’t know if Netflix thinks it’s being cheeky or subversive by carrying this episode.

But maybe it’s simpler than that. Maybe the goal is to get viewers to spend more and more of our free time streaming just about anything on the app – even if it’s a harbinger of our doom.

Word Sleuth

Crossword by Phillip Alder

Bridge

And another play that is usually a winner is highlighted in my first deal.”

The students looked at the North-South hands on the first sheet of the notes that the SLM had distributed. You are in six hearts (he proceeded). West leads a low spade to East’s jack and your ace. What is your plan of campaign?

The SLM paused for a few moments. South pushed into the slam (he continued) because North had not used the three-club double negative to show a useless hand.

THE PLAY IS USUALLY RIGHT

“As you are quickly becoming aware,” said the Senior Life Master to his Saturday morning students, “it is rarely possible to use the words ‘always’ and ‘never’ when discussing bridge.

“Are there any examples? Well, to establish a trick in a suit, it is almost always right to lead toward the honors.

South was faced with two losers, his low spade and the club ace. South needed some good fortune – and he got it. First, South was lucky that West didn’t find a trump lead. At trick two, South played his diamond to dummy’s ace. Then he called for the club jack. However, East correctly won with the ace and persevered with the spade nine. South won with the king and cashed his two club winners, discarding dummy’s two spade losers. Next South carefully ruffed his spade three with dummy’s heart nine. South was lucky for the second time when East couldn’t overruff with the 10. South drew trumps and claimed.

If you can take a ruff in the shorter trump hand, which will usually be the dummy, it is virtually certain to be the right play.

COPYRIGHT: 2023, UNITED FEATURE SYNDICATE

Sudoku by Wayne Gould

Bridge

7/22/23

THE PLAY IS USUALLY RIGHT

Fill in the grid so that every row, every column and every 3x3 grid contains the digits 1 through 9, with no repeats. That means that no number is repeated in any row, column or box. Solution, tips and computer program at www.sudoku.com

“As you are quickly becoming aware,” said the Senior Life Master to his Saturday morning students, “it is rarely possible to use the words ‘always’ and ‘never’ when discussing bridge.

© 2023 Janric Enterprises Dist. by creators.com

Difficulty level: GOLD

Yesterday’s solution:

Nick Wall/Netflix/TNS

Annie Murphy stars in an AIinspired episode of “Black Mirror.”

Los A ngeLes Times

LOS ANGELES —

Even as actors and writers have brought Hollywood to a standstill with a historic double strike, movies starring some of the industry’s biggest names – Matthew McConaughey, Anne Hathaway, Paul Rudd and Jenna Ortega among them – are allowed to continue filming.

SAG-AFTRA, the union representing actors and other performers, has been granting waivers, or exemptions, to a select group of independent films and television shows that are not affiliated with the major studios and streaming giants that are members of the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers, according to a list the union released this week.

The waivers give SAGAFTRA members the ability to work on these productions without violating the strike or crossing picket lines, the union said in its strike rules. The exempted projects must follow guidelines that the guild has proposed in bargaining with the studios. The deal is good until the union and AMPTP – which includes Netflix, Warner Bros. Discovery, NBC/ Universal, Paramount and Amazon – agree on and ratify a new contract.

While the list is expected to grow as the union continues processing waiver applications, there are nearly 50 projects that have already received the green light.

Among the first to receive an exemption was “The Rivals of Amziah King,” a crime thriller starring McConaughey.

A24, the studio behind Oscar best picture “Everything Everywhere All at Once,” received waivers for two of its movies: “Death of a Unicorn,” a dark comedy starring Rudd and Ortega, and a drama, “Mother Mary,” starring Hathaway, Michaela Coel (“I Will Destroy You”) and Hunter Schafer (“Euphoria”).

Other titles include

action-comedy “Bride Hard,” starring Rebel Wilson, and “Dust Bunny,” a horror movie starring Mads Mikkelsen and Sigourney Weaver. Gibson’s thriller “Flight Risk,” which stars Mark Wahlberg, was granted a waiver despite its distribution deal with Lionsgate. The studio also has distribution rights to historical drama series “The Chosen,” which follows the life of Jesus. That show, which streams on Netflix and Peacock, was also given a waiver.

Since the SAG-AFTRA strike began last Friday major studio films such as Disney’s “Deadpool 3,” Warner Bros.’ “Gladiator 2” and the second installment of “Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning” have halted production. Actors in the summer’s most anticipated films – think “Barbie” and “Oppenheimer” – haven’t been allowed to promote the projects (meaning a near-empty Hall H in Comic-Con). And the stoppage has meant thousands of actors and crew members are without work.

The interim agreements between SAG-AFTRA and the independent projects, however, are meant to keep the wheels turning for companies “on the outskirts of the primary negotiating” between the union and AMPTP, said Helen Rella, an employment and labor attorney at New York-based firm Wilk Auslander.

“That’s beneficial to these independent companies seeking to continue work, and it allows the people who depend on working these projects in order to get paid.”

“This is a very difficult situation for everybody, primarily for working-class actors and the production crews who depend on these projects to be able to earn a paycheck to feed their families,” Rella added. “This is not just a situation of

ing the cause.”

These projects, including a Mel Gibson movie, can keep filming amid SAG-AFTRA strike

Disclaimer: Fair Housing is the Law!

T h e m i s s o n o f t h e D e p a r t m e n t o f F a i r E m p l o y m e n t a n d H o u s i n g i s t o p r ot e c t t h e p e o p l e o f C a l i f o r n i a f r o m u nl a w f u l d i s c r i m i n ation in employment h o u s i n g a n d p u b l i c a c c o m m o d a t i o n s T h e D a i l y R e p u b l i c w i l l n o t k n o w i n g l y accept any ad which is in violation of the F e d e r a l F a i r H o u sing Act and the Calif o r n i a F a i r E m p l o ym e n t a n d H o u s i n g A c t w h i c h b a n d i sc r m i n a t i o n b a s e d o n r a c e c o l o r n at i o n a l o r i g i n s e x r e l i g i o n s e x u a l o r ientation, age, disabi l i t y f a m i l i a l s t a t u s a n d m a r i t a l s t a t u s D e s c r b e t h e P r o pe r t y N o t t h e T e n

CALENDAR

Friday’s TV sports

Baseball

MLB • San Francisco vs. Washington, NBCSBA, 4:05 p.m.

• Houston vs. Oakland, NBCSCA, 6:40 p.m.

Basketball the tournament

• Teams TBA, ESPN2, 4 p.m.

• Teams TBA, ESPN2, 6 p.m.

Golf • The British Open, USA, 1 a.m.

• Ladies Euro, La Sella Open, GOLF, 4 a.m.

• LPGA, Great Lakes Bay Invitational, GOLF, 10 a.m.

• PGA, Barracuda Championship, GOLF, 2 p.m.

Motorsports

• F-1, Hungary Grand Prix, Practice, ESPN2, 4:25 a.m.

• F-1 Hungary Grand Prix, Practice 2, ESPN2, 7:55 a.m.

• NASCAR Trucks, Brakleen 150, Qualifying, FS1, 10:30 a.m.

• NASCAR Xfinity, Pocono 225, Qualifying, USA, 12:30 p.m.

• ARCA Menards, Pocono, FS1, 3 p.m.

soccer Women’s World Cup

• USA vs. Vietnam, 2, 40, 6 p.m.

• Zambia vs. Japan, FS1, 12 a.m. (Saturday).

X Games

• Summer X Games, ESPN, 6 p.m.

Saturday’s TV games

Baseball • N.Y. Mets vs. Boston, FS1, 1:10 p.m.

• Regional Coverage, 2, 40, 4 p.m.

• San Francisco vs. Washington, NBCSBA, 4:05 p.m.

• Houston vs. Oakland, NBCSCA, 6:07 p.m.

Basketball the tournament

• Teams TBA, ESPN2, 1 p.m.

WNBA

• Atlanta vs. Connecticut, ESPN, 10 a.m.

• Minnesota vs.Las Vegas, ESPN, Noon.

Boxing

• Kambosos Jr. Vs. Hughes, ESPN, 7 p.m.

Football Women’s Football Association

• National Championship, Teams TBA, ESPN2, 10 a.m.

Golf

• The British Open, USA, 2 a.m.

• The British Open, 3, 4 a.m.

• Ladies Euro, La Sella Open, GOLF, 4 a.m.

• LPGA, Great Lakes Bay Invitational, GOLF, 7 a.m.

• LPGA, Great Lakes Bay Invitational, 5, 13, 1 p.m.

• PGA, Barracuda Championship, GOLF, 2 p.m. Lacrosse

pLL

• All-Star Games, ESPN, 4:30 p.m.

Motorsports

• F-1, Hungary Grand Prix, Practice 3, ESPN2, 3:25 a.m.

• F-1, Hungary Grand Prix, Practice 4, ESPN2, 6:55 a.m.

• NASCAR Trucks, Brakleen 150, FS1, 9 a.m.

• IMSA, Euro Northwest Grand Prix, USA, 9 a.m.

• NHRA Northwest Nationals, Qualifying, FS1, 11 a.m.

• IndyCar, Hy-vee Homefront 250, 3, Noon.

• NASCAR Cup Series, HighPoint.com 400, Qualifying, Noon.

• NASCAR Xfinity, Pocono 225, USA, 2:30 p.m.

soccer Leagues Cup

• Philadelphia vs. Tijuana, FS1, 5 p.m.

• Portland vs. San Jose, FS1, 7 p.m.

Men’s International Friendly

• Arsenal vs. Manchester United, ESPN, 2 p.m.

Women’s World Cup

• England vs. Haiti, 2, 40, 2:30 a.m.

• Denmark vs. China, 2, 40, 5 a.m.

• Sweden vs. South Africa, FS1, 10 p.m.

X Games

• Summer X Games, 7, 10, 10 a.m.

Cup

in mind: we’re going into this tournament to win,” coach Vlatko Andonovski said. “I don’t think anyone on our team thinks different.”

The U.S. hasn’t lost a World Cup game since the final group-stage match in 2011, when a penalty kick and an own goal gave Sweden a 2-1 win. Overall, the U.S. has lost just four times in 50 World Cup games, the other three coming in the semifinals. If the Americans run the table again in this tournament, it will give them a third consecutive title, something no team of either gender has ever accomplished.

But the challenge has grown more difficult because the World Cup field has not only grown in size, it’s gotten better as well, with nearly a dozen countries –among them Spain, the Netherlands, England, Germany, Canada, Sweden and Australia –all believing they have a shot at the crown.

“There are some teams that have done incredibly well over the last four years, have made a name for themselves to compete for this trophy,” said Alex Morgan, who will be playing in the tournament for the fourth time. “It by far is going to be the most competitive World Cup.”

What proof? Two years ago in the Tokyo Olympics, the U.S. lost to Sweden and Canada and played to draws against Australia and the Netherlands. And last fall the Americans dropped three straight to England, Spain and Germany, their first three-game

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“You can’t replace a guy like Tre, but Kaloni is under no pressure to try and replace him,” Murphy said. “We’re busy instilling a new offense and will keep that going. We’re excited to see what Kaloni can do.”

Mcleod knows he is in good company on a

losing streak since 1993.

“We keep hearing how the competition is getting closer and how it’s getting tougher,” Andonovski added. “It is our responsibility to push this team for the extra 1% to be the best, to stay the best.”

That won’t be easy because the U.S. not only enters this tournament with a huge target on its back, but with a number of questions about its roster as well.

For starters, the team is relatively inexperienced, with 14 players new to the roster since 2019, the largest-ever turnover from one World Cup to another in U.S. history. Even the coach is new, with Andonovski having replaced Jill Ellis 3 ½ years ago.

Missing to injury is forward Mallory Swanson, the U.S.’s leading scorer the last two years, and captain Becky Sauerbrunn, whose 216 appearances for the national team are the most among active players. In Sauerbrunn’s place the U.S. will use World Cuprookies Naomi Girma and Alana Cook, who have started just eight games together, at center back.

And while midfielders Rose Lavelle and Julie

talented team. He saw limited action last season and spent the bulk of his team as the junior varsity’s starting quarterback. He knows the speed of the game takes a major step up and is ready to show what he can do.

“I think I’m ready for it,” Mcleod said. “It’s a little nerve-wracking been the top quarterback, but it feels good. We’re coming along really well. I feel like I bring a lot of energy

Ertz and forward Megan Rapinoe made the team, their fitness remains questionable since a knee injury has kept Lavelle sidelined since April 8, while Ertz has played just 69 minutes with the national team and 650 overall since the Tokyo Olympics. Rapinoe hasn’t played in six weeks because of a calf injury.

But if that’s the bad news here’s the good: Goalkeeper Alyssa Naeher has given up just five goals in 13 games since coming out of the Olympic semifinal with a hyperextended right knee; Morgan, runnerup for the FIFA world player of the year award in 2022, is playing some of the best soccer of her career; and with Smith, Morgan, Trinity Rodman and Lynn Williams, the U.S. has more firepower up front than any team in the tournament.

“We’re so lucky to have such a deep roster, specifically the front line where we have so much skill and talent,” Smith said. “But at the same time we all want to win and we have that grit, we have that energy.”

However, the spotlight may shine brightest on Smith.

and good leadership.”

Murphy said in Clark as his new offensive coordinator, the Vikings will continue with their spread offense with a few new wrinkles in how the team line ups formation-wise. Clark brings a wealth of knowledge from the high school, college and NFL levels. His last stop was at St. Ignatius in San Francisco. His resume includes stops at the University of Texas, the Sacramento

Cobb navigated traffic on the base paths in all but one of his 4 1/3 innings while issuing four walks, allowing nine hits and not recording a single strikeout. The 13 runners allowed to reach base were a season-high, while the five who came around to score marked his second-most runs allowed in a start this year.

The Reds got a home run from their No. 9 hitter for the second straight game as Luke Maile started the scoring with a two-run shot in the third inning, the damage doubled by walking the previous batter, Will Benson (who provided Wednesday’s decisive homer). Christian Encarnacion-Strand drove in one of the Reds’ three runs in a fourthinning rally that opened a 5-0 advantage. It could have been worse if not for some stellar defensive play.

Catcher Patrick Bailey caught two runners stealing, including rookie phenom Elly De La Cruz for the second time this series, while Wilmer Flores made a diving stop in the first inning and a heads-up play to erase the lead runner attempting to score in the fourth. Bailey’s second victim, Joey Votto, helped Jakob Junis strand both the runners he inherited from Cobb in the fifth, thrown out attempting to advance on Junis’ second straight pitch in the dirt.

Despite Abbott walking two and being forced to throw 106 pitches to complete eight innings, Matos’ double was the only ball that found grass. After Maile’s 423-foot home run, the next seven longest-hit balls of the game were off Giants’ bats.

Mountain Lions, Arizona Cardinals and then-Oakland Raiders.

“The whole team loves Coach Mike’s offense,” Mcleod said. “It’s way better. He has been helping me out a lot. It’s also nice to have a lot of athletes. That will make the game easier.”

The first test comes Friday, Aug. 18 when the Vikings open the season at George A. Gammon Field against Cosumnes Oaks.

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• Summer X Games, ESPN, 5 p.m. and Stockton.

The NorCal champion will advance to the West Region Tournament in San Bernardino Aug. 5-11 with the winner of that tournament qualifying for the Little League World Series in Williamsport, Pennsylvania.

Vacaville American beat out teams from Tiburon, Alameda, Santa Rosa and Sonoma for the Section 1 championship at Centennial Park in Vacaville. The previous week they won the District 64 championship in Dixon against teams from Davis, Dixon, Vacaville, Woodland and Winters.

Logan Murphy is the team manager with coaches Scott Murtishaw and Adam Brearley. The team includes Nick Barlow, RJ Bautista, Jackson Bergantz, Mason Brearley, Jack Cooper, Drake Cuthbertson, Nash Harper, Carson Moore, Conner Moore, Asa Murphy,

Peyton Murtishaw and Jack Wilcox. Vacaville Pony hosting International 9U World Series

VACAVILLE — Vacaville Pony League is hosting the International 9U World Series beginning Friday at Keating Park.

Vacaville’s Pony AllStars are participating along with Simi Valley, Tecolote and Rodeo from California, Kingswood, Texas, Frankfort, Illinois, and international teams Suginaka, Japan and Los Mochis, Sinaloa, Mexico.

Games will be held Friday through the championship game at 6 p.m. Monday.

Friday’s schedule features an 11 a.m. skills challenge and a 3 p.m. opening ceremonies.

Games will be held Friday, Saturday and Sunday at 5 p.m. and 7:30.

Keating Park is located at 1310 California Drive in Vacaville.

Karl Mondon/Bay Area News Group/TNS file Kelley o’Hara, sophia smith and Naomi Girma, left to right, members of the U.s. National Women’s soccer team, attend the san Jose Earthquakes match against the Los Angeles Galaxy at stanford, July 1.