Santa Barbara News-Press: July 10, 2022

A traitor in Havana

Ukrainian artistry

Columnist Robert Eringer details his time with spy Edward Lee Howard in Cuba - A2

Art by father, son to be featured at exhibition in Santa Barbara - B1

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Dolphin Dive Race and Festival returns to SB

Comer: Biden administration is withholding Hunter Biden documents

By CASEY HARPER THE CENTER SQUARE

(The Center Square) – Ranking Member of the House Oversight Committee Rep. James Comer, RKy., sent a letter to U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen this week alleging that the federal agency is withholding documents that detail the foreign transactions

conducted by the president’s son, Hunter Biden.

Mr. Biden has been the focus of controversy for his foreign business dealings, especially how his father may have been involved. He is currently under investigation by the Department of Justice.

Rep. Comer has called on the Please see BIDEN on A1

Grady Williams sits at his home in Santa Barbara on Friday.

KENNETH SONG / NEWS-PRESS PHOTOS

Above, hundreds of rubber dolphins cascade down a 200-foot course during the Dolphin Dive and Festival at Chase Palm Park in Santa Barbara on Saturday. At right, prizes are listed during the event.

KENNETH SONG / NEWS-PRESS

SB resident does independent volunteer work in Ukraine

By KATHERINE ZEHNDER NEWS-PRESS STAFF WRITER

By KATHERINE ZEHNDER

After a two year hiatus due to the COVID19 pandemic, the Rotary Club of Santa Barbara Sunrise’s annual Dolphin Dive Race and Festival returned to Santa Barbara for the third annual festival on Saturday.

The festival includes a “dolphin race,” involving rubber dolphins that are launched down a 160-foot watercourse. According to Mr. Ryan there were at least 700 dolphins amongst the five races.

“We had several attendees come out during the Please see RACE on A5

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Grady Williams, a 64 yearold resident of Santa Barbara, flew to Ukraine earlier this year where he spent two months doing independent volunteer work. He was recently interviewed during a Wendy P. McCaw Roundtable, a Young America’s Foundation event in Santa Barbara.

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Mr. Williams decided to go and volunteer in Ukraine after hearing President Zelensky’s speech to the European Parliament on March 1.

“I had been watching the buildup of the Soviet military on the border of Ukraine since March of 2020. It worried me that nothing was being done to Please see UKRAINE on A6

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SUNDAY, JULY 10, 2022

Hanging in Havana with an American traitor © 2022 Ashleigh Brilliant, 117 W. Valerio Santa Barbara CA 93101 (catalog $5). www.ashleighbrilliant.com

Lic #0799445

PHOTO COURTESY ROBERT ERINGER

Left to right, clockwise around the table at La Bodeguita Del Medio in Havana are Edward Lee Howard, Robert Eringer, Lena Orlov, Rolando Salup and Salvador Perez. Mr. Eringer was on a mission for FBI Counterintelligence to meet with Mr. Howard, a traitor, and Mr. Howard’s friends in Cuban intelligence.

ROBERT ERINGER

at passing buses whose cramped passengers appeared to be suffocating to death in 82-degree heat and no air-conditioning.

THE HOTEL Hotel Nacional processed me into its eclectic compost of Eurotrash. I ascended with the bellhop to my “suite.” It was drab and dowdy and ... no, let us assess what it was not. With its dirty windows and stained carpet, this was not a five-star deluxe, as designated by Cuba. Yet, all things being relative, it was probably luxurious by contemporary Cuban standards.

The bellhop said with pride that it had hot water.

Red-hot water. Red from rust.

And 30 seconds after settling from a flush, the toilet talked back, a hiccup that sounded like “Fi-delPOOP!” But the oddest feature was its odor. If one could break down the main ingredients of this smell, foremost would be stale tobacco, followed by low-grade building materials (throw in asbestos), and poor ventilation.

The B.O. (in this case, the building odor) of communism.

I washed my hands, gargled mouthwash and went downstairs to look for Grandpa Munster from “The Munsters” (a 1960s TV series), who supposedly lurked in Havana hotel lobbies.

The Nacional’s lobby was a long, high-ceilinged hall, policed at either end by a pair of suited security men on heightened alert to ensure that only foreigners make use of the state-owned hotel and its U.S. dollars-only facilities.

Cubans with pesos (and even Cubans with Yankee dollars) were barred from entering. They were treated like second-class citizens in their own country.

Grandpa Munster wasn’t in the lobby, so I strolled into the Nacional’s serene grounds overlooking the Malecon (sea wall and promenade) and the sea.

Resting my bones in a white wicker chair on the grand portico, I found that even the cushions reeked of rancid tobacco. I sauntered out of the Nacional, one block to Hotel Capri. It was like a drab Intourist hotel I visited in Kharkov, U.S.S.R., in the summer of 1980.

I returned to my shabby suite for a snooze, but it was shortlived, shattered by a snorting phone. Edward Lee Howard,

JUAN HERNANDEZ Mr. Howard’s DGI pals had decreed that an officer named Juan Hernandez should work with me.

Dark-skinned, slender and handsome, Mr. Hernandez had a fast, easy smile and twinkling eyes. He had his hands full with the upcoming Baltimore Orioles exhibition game in Cuba; a subsequent visit to Baltimore by the Cuban all-star team was his operation. (Four years later, posted to the Cuban Interests Section in Washington, DC, Mr. Hernandez would be expelled for “activities deemed harmful to the United States.”)

Juan lit a cigarette and leaned back in his chair. What did I want?

I wanted Robert Vesco, a financier/crook and fugitive from U.S. justice, to write a book (so I could try to arrange a repatriation).

Mr. Hernandez smiled, shrugged. “Vesco is in jail. He stole a million dollars from the Cuban people.” (No one at our Department of Justice yet knew this.).

“OK,” I said, “I want Joanne Chesimard to write a book” (so I could try to arrange a repatriation). She was the Black Panther who in 1979 escaped from prison (for murdering a New Jersey state trooper) and fled to Cuba, which, of course, granted her political asylum.

Juan said he’d try to get a message to Ms. Chesimard.

Now the crown jewels: I wanted Fidel Castro to write a book.

Mr. Hernandez smiled, blew cigarette smoke at the ceiling.

“This one is difficult.”

“Of course,” I said. “The things most worth doing in life often are.”

We moved on from book projects to business opportunities.

“What do you want to do in Cuba?” asked Mr. Hernandez.

“I’d like to own a bar,” I said.

“With him.” I pointed to Ed Howard.

Juan hooted. “I have people come in here and say they want to invest $100 million in Cuba. And you just want to own a bar?” His eyes twinkled. “I like that.”

I hoped he liked it enough to hand me the keys to a bar.

Mr. Howard and I walked back Please see INVESTIGATOR on A7

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“You shouldn’t be going to Cuba, sir.” The check-in clerk at Baltimore-Washington Airport gave me a scorching look after examining my Air Jamaica ticket: Baltimore-Montego Bay-Havana.

“You’re an American citizen.”

I could not exactly tell her it was OK because I was traveling on a secret mission for FBI Counterintelligence.

“I don’t know if I can check you in.” She stalked off to consult a supervisor, returning a minute later wearing a triumphant sneer. “I can only check you in for Montego Bay.” I shrugged.

An Airbus 320 cruised me in just under three hours to Jamaica, where Sangster International Airport issued me a boarding pass to Havana. Inside a firstclass lounge, Wright Valentine, the bartender, recommended Appleton’s V/X Jamaican rum. A belt of this with ginger set me up for the one-hour hop to Havana.

Even from on high, Cuba looked barren and beat up, its roads oddly vacant of vehicles.

In contrast, Jose Marti Airport was fresh, modern, and colorful, if absent of travelers.

As the first passenger to disembark, I traversed Immigration and Customs in five minutes.

My bags were X-rayed, and a young customs agent scanned me with a metal detector. Then he frisked me and gestured at the bulges in both front pockets of my blue jeans. He asked me what was in my pockets.

“Money.”

“Let me see.”

I dug into my pockets and produced two thick wads of Yankee dollars. In my left palm, all hundreds.

His eyes popped. “How much?

(This was more his curiosity than official business.)

“About $4,000.”

He looked at me in amazement.

To him, this was 16 years’ salary.

“Go on.”

Official Cuba welcomed me (and especially my money) into its grubby mix.

State-run dollar taxi drivers hovered everywhere. One scampered to his South Korean car and raced to greet me at the forecourt.

“How much to Hotel Nacional?”

“It’s meter.”

“Do it.”

Beneath a sunny blue sky, I studied the carnival of poverty around me. Giant billboards proclaimed “Socialism or Death!”

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waiting downstairs, looked a lot heavier than when we’d last met, 14 months earlier in Moscow.

Not only was he chunky, with a paunch, but his face was thick and bloated, a picture of poor health.

Since flying in that morning, Mr. Howard had been holed up somewhere in the city with his buddies from the Direction Generale de Inteligencia. He insisted we immediately go meet the chief of some entity called Centro de Prensa Internacional Minrex, whose office was around the corner.

NEWSROOM

Howard was working secretly, as an extension of me, for the FBI. This column is about hanging out in Havana with Ed Howard a year before his death. My mission was to meet his friends in Cuban intelligence, which eventually led to my penetration of espionage operations conducted from the Cuban Interests Section in Washington D.C.

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wenty years ago this July 12, CIA traitor Edward Lee Howard died in Moscow under circumstances that remain murky.

The Russians, who had been hosting Mr. Howard since 1985, the year he fled the U.S. and defected to Moscow on his TWA Getaway Card, claimed that “the spy who got away” fell down a flight of stairs leading to the basement of his dacha and broke his neck.

Problem: His dacha did not have a basement.

The official story got changed a couple of times over the next few days, and, by the time Mr. Howard’s ex-wife, Mary, and son, Lee, arrived on the scene, the Russians had cremated his remains.

We have always believed that Ed Howard was one of Russian dictator Vladimir Putin’s first murder victims.

Why? Context: Going on eight years, I had been conducting a sting operation for FBI Counterintelligence against Mr. Howard. Part of the mission was to glean “Positive Intelligence” from him on his KGB cronies and Cuban intelligence buddies.

Part of it was trying to lure him to a place where he could be “renditioned” — i.e., apprehended and flown back to the U.S. to face espionage charges. (Had we succeeded in the latter — and we would have if the Clinton White House had not chickened out at the 11th hour — he would probably still be alive.)

Mr. Howard was extremely unhappy in Russia. He wanted to make a deal with the FBI to come home, but only on his terms (no prison while awaiting trial).

However, the FBI won’t make deals with international fugitives.

You come home, go through the process, period.

Mr. Howard had a drinking problem. Most of the time he stayed sober. But on special occasions he would have a drink, which always led to a three-to-five day-bender.

On one such occasion — Feb. 15, 1999 — Mr. Howard arrived drunk at 2 a.m. at the U.S. Embassy in Moscow. The Russians, who maintain a guard post at the embassy, inspected his passport and noted his appearance. Inside, when no deal could be hatched with the legat (FBI legal attaché), Mr. Howard became agitated and left, returning 30 minutes later (after purchasing a bottle of vodka from a 24-hour kiosk) to seek political asylum. Declined.

This did not go down well with Russian Intelligence and quite likely sealed Mr. Howard’s fate, along with discovery in September 2001 that he had compromised former KGB Chairman Vladimir Kryuchkov and others by introducing them to me. They may have even believed that Mr.

GENERAL EXCELLENCE 2002

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NEWS

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SUNDAY, JULY 10, 2022

Fiesta costume sale

Stanley & Bette Anne Ratzlaff 65th Anniversary

Congratulations on 65 beautiful years of marriage Married July 14, 1958 in Bakersfield, CA.

KENNETH SONG / NEWS-PRESS PHOTOS

The 2022 Old Spanish Days La Presidente Maria Cabrera, center, stands next to Ecugreen Jewelry & Textiles owner Martha Cantos, left, and Corazon Folklorio owner Nancy Arroyo during a Fiesta costume sale at the Carriage and Western Art Museum in Santa Barbara on Saturday.

2022 Historical Fiesta Parade

Friday, August 5 at noon

TRAFFIC, CRIME AND FIRE BLOTTER Construction Update Northbound Highway 101 Sunday nights from 9 p.m.-7 a.m,. the highway will be one lane from Bailard Ave. to Sheffield Dr. with on- and off-ramps at Bailard Ave., Casitas Pass Rd., Linden Ave., Santa Monica Rd. and N. Padaro Ln. Monday - Thursday nights from 8 p.m.–7 a.m., the highway will be one lane from Bailard Ave. to Sheffield Dr. with on- and off-ramps at Bailard Ave., Casitas Pass Rd., Linden Ave., Santa Monica Rd. and N. Padaro Ln. The northbound on-ramp at Ortega Hill Rd. will be closed for up to 8 months and is anticipated to reopen on Feb. 14, until then drivers can use the on-ramp at Sheffield Dr. The off-ramp at Sheffield Dr. will be closed for up to 6 months and is anticipated to reopen Oct. 3, until then drivers can use the off-ramp

at San Ysidro Rd.

N. Jameson Ln. by Sheffield Dr.

Southbound Highway 101

On the week of July 11 from 9 a.m. - 3 p.m., flaggers will direct traffic on N. Jameson Ln. by the northbound on-ramp at Sheffield Dr. to allow crews to remove temporary safety barriers and fencing. Drivers are reminded to be mindful of sharing the lane with bicyclists during this time.

On S. Padaro Ln. under Hwy. 101, 9 p.m.6 a.m., flaggers will direct traffic as needed during bridge work. Trucks over 40’ will not be able to turn right onto S. Padaro Ln. from Santa Claus Ln. during this stage of bridge construction.

Please note: Consecutive ramps in the same direction will not be closed at the same time (unless where noted) to allow drivers to use a ramp before or after a closure. To view timelines, detours, and maps, please visit www.

SBROADS.com and select the project segment.

Sunday nights from 10 p.m.-7 a.m., the highway will be one lane from Sheffield Dr. to Bailard Ave. with the on- and off-ramps at Carpinteria Ave., Reynolds Ave., Linden Ave., Casitas Pass Rd. and Bailard Ave. Monday - Thursday nights from 8 p.m.– 7:30 a.m., the highway will be one lane from Sheffield Dr. to Bailard Ave. with on- and offramps at Carpinteria Ave., Reynolds Ave., Linden Ave., Casitas Pass Rd. and Bailard Ave. The off-ramp at Evans Ave. will be closed for up to nine months and is anticipated to reopen on Oct. 24, until then drivers can use the southbound off-ramp at Sheffield Dr. The off-ramp at S. Padaro Ln./Santa Claus Ln., will be closed for up to seven months and is anticipated to reopen Oct. 19, drivers can use the off-ramp at Carpinteria Ave. to Santa Ynez Ave., Via Real and S. Padaro Ln.

- Katherine Zehnder

Vernon Winfrey, father of Oprah, dies at 89

By KATHERINE ZEHNDER NEWS-PRESS STAFF WRITER

Vernon Winfrey, father of Montecito resident Oprah Winfrey, died Friday at the age of 89 after a battle with cancer.

Mr. Winfrey was well known as a barber in his community. Vernon was born on Jan. 31, 1933 and was a member of the National Barber Museum and Hall of Fame, according to the Sun. He also served on the Metro Nashville Council for 16 years. Vernita Lee, Oprah’s mother, died in 2018 at the age of 83.

On July 4, Vernon was honored with a

“Vernon Winfrey Appreciation Celebration” and backyard barbeque where he was surrounded by family and friends. The guest list of close friends included Gayle King and gospel singer Wintley Phipps. The celebration was meant to give him “his flowers while he’s still well enough to smell them,” reported CNN. “He seemed to quickly realize everyone was there to celebrate him,” reported the Sun. “I learned from your good work ethic, showing up, being on time—that is why for 25 years of The Oprah Show, I never missed a show,” said Ms. Winfrey during the celebration,

according to USA Today.

“Less than a week ago we honored my father in his own backyard … He FELT the love and reveled in it until he could no longer speak. Yesterday with family surrounding his bedside, I had the sacred honor of witnessing the man responsible for my life, take his last breath. We could feel Peace enter the room at his passing. That Peace still abides. All is well. Thank you for your prayers and good thoughts,” said Oprah in an Instagram post on Saturday announcing her father’s passing. email: kzehnder@newspress.com

The 2022 Historical Fiesta Parade will travel Cabrillo Boulevard from Castillo Steet to the Rainbow Arch.

Enjoy covered Fiesta Parade Seating at the best spot to watch the parade!

Reserved Seating $30 Deluxe Reserved Seating $50 (includes poster) Grandstand $70 (reserved parking, grandstand seating with shade cover, poster, pin, and water)

Fiesta Needs Parade Volunteers!

Be A Part of the Fiesta Family!

Tickets: www.sbÞesta.org 2022

LOYALTY PROGRAM Advertisers, ask about this cost-saving program.

Call today! (805) 564-5230

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OBITUARIES

SUNDAY, JULY 10, 2022

DELORETO, John Robert

cont’d on A5 ROESER, Bonnie Galen

“We love because He first loved us.” - (1 John 4:19) A loving and creative mother and grandmother, Bonnie Galen Roeser passed away June 24, 2022, at the age of 71, in Corpus Christi, TX. Bonnie was born April 1, 1951, to Glen and Addie Hildebrand. Growing up with her sisters Carol and Glenda, she went to school in Los Alamos, California. As a child, she had fond memories of going horseback riding with her best friend, Roberta, and often told stories of helping her dad out on the ranch and climbing eucalyptus trees. She graduated from Ernest Righetti High School in Santa Maria, California.

Bonnie was a generous woman who loved her family.

She met her future husband Leon Roeser Jr. when she came into his store, Roeser’s Pharmacy, to apply for a job. Three months later they were married and were blessed with thirty years together until he passed away. She never remarried. Although she often helped as needed at the family business, Bonnie enjoyed being a wife and mother more. She often told her daughter that life is a smorgasbord and that we should go out and try as much of it as possible. Bonnie saw her role as a mother in helping her children do just that. She was always supportive of their endeavors and they never outgrew the need for her mothering. In all times, good or bad, she was always there for her kids, especially supporting them through the difficulties of life. She was a wonderful mother and a faithful friend who taught her loved ones to be generous and to love your family.

Bonnie saw our Lord in the world around her and marveled at His work in nature.

Bonnie loved all of God’s creation. She especially enjoyed working in the yard, horseback riding, and training her dogs. As she aged, she would often speak of coming home to Him in heaven. Her family is extremely grateful for the Priests of the Diocese of Corpus Christi and St. Mary Immaculate, who quickly came to her side in her final moments.

A very artistic and creative person, Bonnie had a knack for seeing a stick or leaf or rock and being able to turn it into a piece of art. For a time, she loved to build miniature dollhouses and brought them “alive” through all the details of decorating them. Most of all, Bonnie loved Star Trek! Since its debut in 1966, she was a loyal Trekkie and an avid collector of all things Star Trek. Friends and neighbors would marvel at all her displays of Star Trek ships, posters and toys when visiting, bringing back their own fond memories of the show. Since moving to Texas, she had the welcome task of introducing her grandkids to it.

Bonnie leaves behind her four children Kathryn Gulding and her husband Steve, Elizabeth Keefner and her husband John, Patricia Roeser, and Patrick Roeser and his wife Alicia; her grandchildren Teresa Gulding, Madeleine Gulding, Gianna Gulding, Miriam Gulding, Bridget Gulding, Joseph Gulding, Anna Gulding, Matthew Gulding, William Keefner, Owen Keefner, and Aaron Roeser, and her sister Carol Hildebrand.

She is reunited with her husband Leon Roeser Jr, her father Glen Hildebrand, her mother Addie Hildebrand, and her sister Glenda Hildebrand.

Bonnie’s Mass of Christian Burial was held at St. John the Baptist Catholic Church in Corpus Christi, TX on July 1st. She will be laid to rest beside her husband at Oak Hill Cemetery in Ballard, California on July 14th at 11am. Loper Funeral Chapel, Directors

HEIDNER, Rita Elfriede June 8th, 1935 - June 29th, 2022

The world has lost a beautiful and wonderful light that had shone so brightly for so many. Rita Elfriede Heidner passed away peacefully in her sleep in the early morning of June 29, 2022, after a prolonged hospital stay due to complications from a fall in April.

Rita (originally Elfriede Woellmann) was born in the small town of Tostedt, Germany on June 8th, 1935, the youngest of five siblings. She grew up in the family farmhouse, which was thankfully spared from attacks by Allied forces during World War II. Her father, Rudolf, was a very talented musician, playing violin, flute, and several other instruments, including trumpet in the Tostedt Posaunenchor (town band), which is still in existence today.

At age 16, Rita made the bold choice of leaving war-ravaged Germany and moving to Canada with her older sister Selma, who was recently engaged to a German-Canadian.

While that engagement was ultimately called off, Selma and Rita stayed in Canada (first in Calgary and then later in Vancouver). Selma met another German-Canadian, William Rauch, whom she married. William, Selma, and Rita then moved to Santa Barbara, California, once they were granted residence by the U.S. government.

Rita moved into her own apartment on Arrellaga St., and took on several demanding but impressive jobs, including working in the women’s fashion department at Robinson’s (now Macy’s), as well as the hostess and manager positions at Kerry’s Restaurant and the Blue Ox restaurant. She also helped Selma and William raise their children, William Jr. and Thomas.

In 1970, Rita married Philip Heidner, who she met through William’s work, and they bought a house in Goleta. In 1972, they welcomed their only child, Eric. However, the marriage did not last, so Rita raised Eric on her own, with only a part-time job as a cafeteria employee at Dos Pueblos High School to cover the bills and her son’s college tuition. But despite the lack of money on hand, Rita gave Eric incredible support, encouragement, and love that helped him land a successful career as a music educator.

Rita absolutely loved attending all of her son’s concerts--both at Santa Barbara High School, and then later at Santa Barbara City College. She continued to do so until the day of her fall in April of this year.

Rita is survived by her son, Eric, her two nephews, William Jr. and Thomas, and by Thomas and his wife Jill’s two children, Ehren and Daniel, as well as by Ehren’s son, Lukas. A graveside service at Goleta Cemetery will be limited to family members and a small list of close friends.

HEIDNER, Frederick Carl, II

A life well-lived leaves a lasting and positive impact on those who shared in that life, and Dr. Frederick “Fred” Carl Heidner II certainly lived his life well. Fred Heidner passed from this life on July 2, 2022 at the age of 93 from natural causes. Fred’s final residence was at the Valle Verde retirement community in Santa Barbara, California, where he was an enthusiastic and active resident for the past 13 years.

Fred Heidner was born to Dr. Frederick and Esther Heidner in Milwaukee, WI on February 7, 1929 and lived a joyful and carefree youth with his brother and best friend, John N. Heidner. Fred completed his college education and medical school studies at the University of WisconsinMadison. Fred completed his medical resident training in the United States Navy, and in 1961 began his career as a urologist at Sansum Clinic in Santa Barbara, California.

Fred practiced medicine with skill and compassion during what he considered to be the golden age of medicine, until his retirement in 1990.

While in medical school, Fred met the love of his life, Patricia Jean Watzke, whom he married in 1954. Fred and Patricia raised a daughter, Greta, and three sons: Frederick “Fritz,” Hans and Kurt. Fred also experienced the joy of being a grandfather to two granddaughters, Anja and Nicola, and three grandsons, Ryan, Niels, and Eric, all of whom respected and loved him dearly. Fred was also blessed by a special relationship with two individuals brought into his life following the death of his son Fritz. To the day of his passing, Fred considered Matthew Grul and Jeannie Moore to be members of his family. Others dear to his heart include his son-in-law, Russell Greene and his daughters-in-law, Faith Heidner (Hans) and Suzi Heidner (Kurt).

Fred Heidner lived a full and impactful life, and the days that remain for his family and friends will be all the more joyful and meaningful for having shared in that life. Their joy will come from having shared life with a man who radiated positivity and optimism, had a smile for all, and displayed unconditional love and support for his family and friends. They will remember Fred’s keen intellect, his quick wit, and his playful and gentle sense of humor. They will remember a man who modeled the qualities of honesty, integrity, generosity, love and kindness, but rarely spoke of them. They will remember a man who lifted the spirits of others with his cheerful view of life and his welcoming personality. They will remember a man who was confident and humble, and a man who had no interest in measuring himself against others. And they will fondly remember the joy he received from cheering for his beloved Green Bay Packers football team. While we are sad at his passing, we are tremendously grateful for the time we had together, for his example, for the many things he taught us, and for a lifetime of happy memories.

Fred left the world knowing that Patricia, his wife of 67 years, is surrounded by love and will be well cared for by the members of her family.

Fred will be memorialized at a private gathering of family. In lieu of flowers, the family requests that individuals who desire to honor Fred’s life with a donation, to please support a cause that aligns with his values. As a guide, Fred loved the natural world and was concerned about the state of the environment. He loved animals, he valued education, and he recognized the importance of the arts.

Fred and Patricia were devotees of the Music Academy of the West, and for many years attended concerts and Master classes almost daily during the summer. Fred was well aware that he lived a privileged life compared to so many others, and he would have been pleased to know that his friends chose to honor him by supporting an organization with the broad mission of improving people’s lives.

Obituary notices are published daily in the Santa Barbara News-Press and also appear on our website www.newspress.com To place an obituary, please email the text and photo(s) to obits@newspress.com or fax text only (no photos) to (805) 966-1421. Please include your name, address, contact phone number and the date(s) you would like the obituary to be published. Photos should be in jpeg format with at least 200 dpi. If a digital photo is not available, a picture may be brought into our office for scanning. We will lay out the obituary using our standard format. A formatted proof of the obituary and the cost will be emailed back for review and approval. The minimum obituary cost to print one time is $150.00 for up to 1.5” in length -- includes 1 photo and up to 12 lines of text, approximately 630 characters; up to approximately 930 characters without a photo. Add $60.00 for each additional inch or partial inch after the first 1.5”; up to approximately 700 characters per additional inch. All Obituaries must be reviewed, approved, and prepaid by deadline. We accept all major credit cards by phone; check or cash payments may be brought into our office located at 715 Anacapa Street.

The deadline for Tuesday through Friday’s editions is 10 a.m. on the previous day; Saturday, Sunday and Monday’s editions all deadline at 12-noon on Thursday (Pacific Time).

Free Death Notices must be directly emailed by the mortuary to our newsroom at news@ newspress.com. The News-Press cannot accept Death Notices from individuals.

FARMER, Lawrence William June 2, 1934 - June 10, 2021

Lawrence William Farmer, beloved husband, father, and grandfather, passed away on June 10, 2021. He was 87.

Larry was born in Detroit, Michigan on June 2, 1934.

Entrepreneurial from the start, Larry ran a newspaper route as a young boy and was the first in his family to attend college. He graduated from the University of Notre Dame in 1956. Larry served as an officer in the United States Marine Corps before heading west to San Francisco, where he began his career in commercial real estate. In the City by the Bay, he met the love of his life, Susan and started their family.

Larry and Susan raised their children in Pacific Palisades where they enjoyed Larry’s continued success as an executive at Weyerhaueser and, later, the Koll Company. The energy and vision he displayed in business matters was matched by his devotion to Susan and their three children, Nicole, Tyler, and Joelle. Larry and Susan enthusiastically introduced the kids to new cultures and experiences, imparting them with a strong sense of responsibility to the common good. Larry and Susan loved to travel, most frequently throughout Italy where they best loved hiking among the seaside villages along the Italian Riviera. They also developed a special affection for Florence, where Larry taught a business course. Larry had learned to ski at Squaw Valley in the 1960s and loved skiing with his kids. He became a capable scuba diver and sailor and loved the ocean. The family found great joy in frequent visits to Lake Tahoe, Hawaii, and Park City. Larry was an active alumnus of Notre Dame, where he and Susan established a scholarship in 1991.

After Larry retired in 1993, he and Susan moved 90 miles north to Santa Barbara.

While living in Hope Ranch, they especially enjoyed tennis, their involvement with the Old Mission, volunteering at Transition House, walking on the beach, and daily lunch together. As their children spread wings and began their own careers and families across the country, Larry and Susan enjoyed living in Oxford, Maryland, Naples, Florida, and Chapel Hill, North Carolina.

Larry will rest in peace at the Old Mission in Santa Barbara. He is survived by his loving wife, Susan, their children, Nicole Hurd (William), Tyler Farmer (Aniki), Joelle Farmer, and by eight grandchildren, Monica, Matthew, Isabella, Julia, Olivia, Steinar, Talla, and Henrik, in whom he took the utmost pride and joy.

Larry’s life reflects his unwavering belief that anything can be achieved through hard work and education. Therefore, in lieu of flowers, expressions of sympathy are best directed to: Lawrence and Susan Farmer Family Scholarship Fund, University of Notre Dame.

Gifts may be made online at giving.nd.edu, by phone at (574) 631-5150, or by mail: University of Notre Dame, Department of Development, 1100 Grace Hall, Notre Dame, IN 4655.

HARPER-HOWELL, Jennifer Ann “Don’t cry because it’s over, smile because it happened.”

Jennifer Ann Harper-Howell passed away in Solvang, California on June 22 at 65 years old.

Born in Castro Valley, California on September 8th, 1956, she was raised in Solvang by her California Highway Patrolman father Charles Harper and her banker mother, Jane Harper, along with her big brother Reid.

Along the way, additional family members, Beverley Harper and Albert Martin, were added and dearly loved.

Many hobbies of Jenni’s included sewing, reading, animals, country music, the beach, bird watching, and swimming. She traveled to Australia, Tasmania, New Zealand, Hawaii, and Mexico and remembered these trips as great highlights in her life.

A love of people, especially the elderly, led to a career in nursing that was extremely fulfilling. After retiring from nursing, she worked at El Rancho Market and always said it was “the best job ever.”

Special love was shared with her niece Kassidy Martin (Scott Martin), 3 grandnephews, Gabriel, Logan, and Ashton Martin, nephew Christian Fairfax, and sisterin-law Rhandee Lipp.

Memorial Services for Jenni are planned for August 13th at Loper Funeral Chapel, 2465 Baseline Ave. in Ballard at 11:00 am.

Those who wish to donate in her memory, may do so to the Santa Ynez Valley Humane Society, 111 Commerce Dr., Buellton, CA 93427. https://www.syvhumane.org/ Loper Funeral Chapel, Directors

HURST, James W.

After a bravely fought battle with progressive neuropathy, James W. Hurst passed away peacefully on June 28, 2022.

He was surrounded by his family, all of whom loved him dearly and will never quite be the same without him. Jim was a kind man who always took time to really listen to other people, and everyone he met went away feeling better about themselves after spending time with him.

He had a rare sense of humor, and never took himself too seriously. He had a smile and a joke for everyone, which never faltered despite his recent illness. Even the nurses at the hospital fell in love with him and his cheerful disposition. He will be greatly missed by all of his friends and family.

Born on January 30, 1936 to Walter and Hilda (Haase) Hurst, Jim was the youngest of two adventurous boys. He spent an idyllic childhood in Fillmore, CA, where he and his brother Stan had fun, drove tractors, and most importantly, learned the value of hard work. After graduation from Fillmore High School, Jim went to USC to earn his engineering degree. He became a lifelong USC fan, and could often be seen sporting his Trojan regalia as he attended football games. While at college, he became very involved in his Sigma Chi fraternity, as well as in student politics and various student support groups. While at home visiting Fillmore, he began dating Linda Eberly, also from Fillmore. They soon were in a long-distance relationship (Jim at USC, Linda at UCSB), and were married in July of 1958, two weeks after Jim graduated from USC with his BS in Mechanical Engineering. He immediately began working at Raytheon in Goleta, where he worked on a number of crucial defense projects until his retirement 40 years later in 1998. During this time, he and Linda lovingly raised three children.

After his retirement, Jim helped with the Engineering Academy at Dos Pueblos High School. He enjoyed working with the students, and loved that he could help by passing on his love of engineering to a new group of young adults. During his retirement years, Jim and Linda enjoyed traveling to places such as Spain, Scotland and Aruba. Jim also developed a unique irrigation system, and he and his son Bill started their business, Colt Irrigation, LLC. He and Bill continued to work on this together until his passing.

He was also very active in the local Republican Club until his illness made it impossible for him to continue.

Jim is survived by his wife of almost 64 years, Linda (Eberly) Hurst; his three children, Holly Yee (John), William Hurst (Amy), and Jennifer Deming (Jeff); his six grandchildren, Christopher Yee, Courtney Cox (Kory), Matt Yee (Cristina), Jena McCollum (Austin), Julia Deming, and Blake Hurst; and his two great-grandchildren, Joseph and Claire McCollum. He is also survived by his sister-in-law, Beverly Hurst, his brother-in-law, William Eberly (Amanda), his sister-in-law Bonnie Eberly, and many cousins, nieces and nephews. He is preceded in death by his parents, Walter and Hilda Hurst, his brother, Stan Hurst, his in-laws Orin and Betty Jane Eberly, and his brother-in-law James Eberly.

We would like to thank the amazing nurses and staff at Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital for their incredible and compassionate care during the final stage of Jim’s illness. Their support was a comfort to Jim as well as to all of the family.

A celebration of Jim’s life will be held at a later date. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to the GBS | CIDP Foundation International at https://www.gbs-cidp.org or to the University of Southern California Viterbi School of Engineering at viterbischool. usc.edu. Fight on!

PASCUA-AMBRIZ, Theresa “Terri” August 20, 1947 – January 6, 2022

Terri went to be with her lord, January 6, 2022 peacefully at home surrounded by family and friends. Terri was born in Ukiah, California to Honorato “Henry” Pascua and Imogene Taylor (Pascua/Desamito). She was a longtime resident of Santa Barbara moving here when she was a small child. She is preceded in death by her parents and husband Joe Ambriz. Terri is survived by her children Tina Talaugon (fiancé, Mark), Robert “Bob” Talaugon (wife Jill) and Malinda Kai Hardin (husband Steve); her brothers Lani Pasuca (wife Patricia) and Christopher “Chris” Desamito (wife Phyllis); her grandchildren Makenna Hardin, Blake and Chad Talaugon; extended family, aunts, uncles, nieces, nephews and lifelong friends.

She will be remembered for her faith, love of her family, friends, kitty cats, birds, gardening and fishing; and let’s not forget her whistle, smile and favorite phrases “I know you” and “I remember you from the last time.” A gathering of friends and family will be held this summer to celebrate Terri’s life.

John Robert DeLoreto, born in Santa Barbara, CA, on March 30th, 1959, the son of James and Frances Neilson DeLoreto, passed away on June 17th, 2022 at the home of his son Robert James (RJ) in Picture Rocks, AZ after battling cancer. He is survived by daughter Caroline (Adam Taft), RJ; his granddaughters Liliana and Myloh DeLoreto; his ex-wife Camilla La Mer (Victoria); brothers James Jr. and Edward DeLoreto; nieces and nephews and extended family Silvia Biederman, Monique Franco, Alicia Lopez, Ferman Kelly, and godchildren Kate and Max Ruston. He was predeceased by his older brother William DeLoreto June 6, 2011.

John received a lot of attention from his older brothers being the baby. He was a quick learner and had a photographic memory. He enjoyed serving Court in the tree house serving hot dogs. He set up the basement for little plays and short films. While attending Roosevelt and Laguna Blanca schools he made lifelong best friends Lanny Ebenstein, Theodore Gekis, Hilary Ruston & Danielle Greene. He also attended Cate school before enrolling in UC Berkeley where he met fellow student, soon to be wife, Victoria and fell in love. He graduated and they moved to Santa Barbara and married.

While John was attending the Santa Barbara College of Law their daughter Caroline was born. While John was taking the California State bar exam in LA their son RJ was born prematurely. There was no neonatal unit in the Santa Barbara hospitals, and he had to be taken to Ventura. They started the first fundraiser for a neonatal unit for Cottage Hospital.

John loved raising his children and grandkids and took them on many adventures. He served on the board of Access Theater, and was on the Goleta Water Board during the major drought before state water was voted in.

John had many gifts and talents. He had a unique view of life from his colorful personality & quick mind, sometimes bringing challenges, but also seeing many possibilities where others could not. He was inventive, creative, imaginative, & brilliant as a lawyer. John would bring a smile during difficult times & a good laugh at life. He was a firecracker & bright ball of energy, taking this life & everyone who met him by storm. John was loved by many & will be greatly missed.

A service will be held on July 29th at 11:00am at the Mission. For more information go to: www.celebratingjohndeloreto.com

CECCATO, Grappino Andre Angelo

Grappino “Pino” Andre Angelo Ceccato passed away on June 14, 2022 at Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital. Pino “P.C.” was born and raised in Santa Barbara, CA to Italian immigrants. He grew up on Mason St. and attended Franklin Elementary School. He did not speak a word of English on his first day of class, but learned quickly. He is a graduate of SB High School, and attended SB City College with a major in electrical engineering. His true passion, however, turned out to be cars. Fast, fast cars! He held the land speed record in his division at the Bonneville Salt Flats for 20+ years. Pino started his own automotive business, PC Automotive, in 1972 and soon built his own shop on Nopal St. in 1978.

For those who were blessed to know Pino, it was obvious how much he cherished the simplest pleasures in life, including Santa Barbara, his family, his friends and his work.

He was strong, committed, kind, honest, and, most notably, predictable. From cycling to work each morning, to Thursday “garlic runs”, to Sunday truck washing, to nightly jacuzzi soaks or to daily VO & waters, his routine never changed. You could set your watch to his schedule.

Pino was a loving and gentle husband to Mary Ann, his wife of 56 years. He missed her dearly after her death in 2020. He also specialized in being a father and grandfather.

He is survived by his son, Craig (Leslie Cass) Eldridge, his daughter, Debra (James Jervik) Ceccato Faricy, and his 4 grandchildren, Alec and Griffin Eldridge and Stella and Frederick Faricy. He will remain in our hearts always and forever.

Please join us for a celebration of Pino’s life at the Santa Barbara Cabrillo Pavilion (bath house), 1118 E Cabrillo Blvd on Thursday, July 21, 2022 from 4-8:00 pm.

TERRILL, Mary Jo October 18, 1943 - June 29, 2022

Mary Jo Kelly-Terrill began her life in Detroit, Michigan on October 18, 1943, the child of Mary and Stephen Kelly.

She was the oldest of six children and began helping with childcare at an early age. Assisting her veterinarian father awakened her love for medicine and science.

She followed her dream to become a nurse, receiving her RN degree from Henry Ford School of Nursing. She married William Terrill in 1965 and continued to work as a nurse until she gave birth to her first daughter Jennifer.

Two more children followed, Diane (deceased, 2003) and Stephen (deceased, 2021). Mary Jo continued to work part-time as a nurse, developing natural childbirth techniques, as well as becoming an expert in breast-feeding and baby care. She became a natural childbirth teacher and advocate. She went on to earn her Bachelor of Science in Nursing from Madonna College.

Mary Jo was a humanitarian. She was involved in the fight for racial justice in Detroit, in equal rights for women, in community life. She was an active member of the Living Worship community, an off shoot of the Catholic congregation, which supported a more inclusive, liberal approach to religion. This led her to pursue a master’s degree in Social Work which she completed in 1990 from the University of Michigan.

Mary Jo and her husband Bill relocated to Santa Barbara, CA where she worked as a nurse at Goleta Valley Cottage hospital and as a social worker and hospital supervisor.

She was compassionate, caring, and selfless in her devotion to her patient’s wellbeing.

She helped to deliver more than 1000 babies into the world.

She suffered the loss of two of her grown children during her life. But she had been blessed with 8 grandchildren and 3 great-grandchildren whom she loved very much and who were always at the center of her heart.

In 2007 Mary Jo began to pursue her lifelong dream of visiting Africa to provide expert labor and delivery care to those most in need. She supported Network for Africa and the vital humanitarian work of the late Dr. Paul Farmer. Her retirement in 2015 set her free to move to Rwanda where she worked for the Polyclinique Familiale hospital and improved the lives of countless women by share best practices developed over a lifetime of providing care to new mothers and their families. After three rewarding years working and living in Kigali, Mary Jo returned home with a new daughter-in-law and grandchild from Rwanda.

The last two years of her life became a struggle because of various health issues which brought complications of immobility, pain, and exhaustion. It was hard for this lifelong caregiver to finally learn to “receive” care herself. She passed into the Spiritual world on Wednesday morning, June 29th, leaving a legacy of love to those she left behind.

Mary Jo is survived by her daughter Jennifer, her daughter-in-law Blandine, her grandchildren Joshua (Lisa), Christine, Austin, Haleigh, Brandon, Michael, Cameron and Orianna, and her great-grandchildren, Tyler, Mia and Rylee.

The family would like to thank the many doctors and staff at Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital, Valle Verde Health Center and Serenity House who provided care to Mary Jo in her final months.

A Memorial Service will be held at Timbers Roadhouse, 10 Winchester Canyon Rd, Goleta on Sunday, July 17th at noon.

In lieu of flowers please make a contribution to Partners in Health Rwanda. https:// www.pih.org/country/rwanda or Serenity House Santa Barbara 509 E. Montecito St, Suite 200, Santa Barbara, CA 93103

JONES, William J. 5/7/1933- 6/30/2022

William (Bill) Joseph Jones, a longtime resident of Montecito who enjoyed his family, fishing and sailing, passed away peacefully in his sleep at age 89.

Bill is remembered for his wide warm smile, strong core values, sense of humor, and passion for helping others.

Anyone who dealt with him knew that his handshake was a contract.

Bill was born in Altadena, CA, to Helen Rund Jones, of Illinois, and William Ellis Jones, of Wales. Bill played football at St. Francis High School in La Canada Flintridge and earned Eagle Scout honors. When he was 19, Bill met Elizabeth Mary Henry of Glendale, CA. They fell in love and married.

Bill started working in 1959 at Excel-Mineral Company in Vernon, CA, which produced and marketed industrial absorbents (Quik-Sorb) as well as cat litter (Jonny Cat). As sales grew, he was named sales manager, then Vice President, then Senior Vice President of Sales. Bill served on the Excel board of directors and as president of the Sorbitive Minerals Institute as well as the Sanitary Supply Association of Southern California, both trade organizations, for many years.

When he wasn’t working, Bill was with his wife and six children, often taking camping trips that included fishing. After moving to Montecito in 1974, the family became involved in the Santa Barbara Sea Shell Association and the Santa Barbara Sailing Club.

Bill is survived by his wife, Beth, and their children: Douglas Jones and John McGuinness; Kathy Jones and Mark Norum; Brian Jones; Sharon Jones and Stephen Simpson; Marie Jones Rembert and Alex Rembert; and Diane Jones. He is also survived by his brothers, Jack and David Jones, and six grandchildren: Davis and Cailey Rembert, Zia and Lucca Simpson, and Carter and Marisa Jones.

A funeral mass is planned for noon on Saturday, July 16 at Our Lady of Mount Carmel Catholic Church in Montecito. A visitation is planned from 3 to 5 p.m. Friday July 15 at Welch-Ryce-Haider Funeral Chapel in Santa Barbara. Hawaiian shirts are encouraged.

In lieu of flowers, the family suggests a donation to Our Lady of Mount Carmel Church, 1300 East Valley Road, Santa Barbara, CA 93108, or VNA Serenity House (go to VNA Health’s donation page and direct a gift to go to Serenity House).

SANTA BARBARA NEWS-PRESS

NEWS

A5

SUNDAY, JULY 10, 2022

cont’d from A4 STEINMETZ, Leslie Rogers Ackerman

Leslie Rogers Ackerman Steinmetz, age 98, passed away on June 29th, 2022, at her home due to complications from COVID 19. She was born in New York City on March 22, 1924 and graduated from Vassar College (1945-4). Her two former husbands, Lee Ackerman and Fred Steinmetz, and her beloved Companion, Jerry Shore, predeceased her.

Leslie was active in Santa Barbara politics supporting progressive candidates. She was a feminist inspiration to her family and beyond. She was proud of her work as president of the Santa Barbara Peace Resource Center and the board of the Santa Barbara ACLU. She was an avid reader, loved travel, music, art and treasured playing the piano each day.

Her great delight and joy were her family. She is survived by her four children, MaryLee, Byron, Carl and Elizabeth and her seven grandchildren.

#ELEBRATION OF ,IFE RUSSELL DRAKE There will be a Celebration of Life for Russell Drake on Friday, July 22, 2022 at 1pm.

The celebratory BBQ will be at Los Alamos Park, Area A in Los Alamos CA.

remember

Spectators watch rubber dolphins cascade down a 200-foot course during the Dolphin Dive and Festival at Chase Palm Park in Santa Barbara.

your loved one

Kids race expected to return at future events RACE

at www.newspress.com

Continued from Page A1 day. We had a series of five races including a kids race, which we experimented with this year for the first time, where the kids sponsored and decorated dolphins,” Eric Ryan, event organizer, told the News-Press.

The kids’ race was very popular and the organization plans to do it again next year.

“We started early in the morning, starting off with donations in kind from sponsors who donated gift certificates,” according to Mr. Ryan.

The winners of the races, with the exception of the kids race, are as follows: Oscar Zevala, $2500; Kurt Green, $1000; Sue Pilkington, $500; and Michelle Richards, $300.

Event organizers spoke to how it felt to be back in person: “Oh man it was so great we felt like this was just getting traction when we got shut down. This was the relaunch, we have our traction back and we are hoping next year will be bigger,” said Mr. Ryan.

“People were so excited to be back out in person, they were out on the grass having fun and listening to music. All proceeds go to funding volunteer programs and community service projects,” Judith McCaffrey, president of the Sunrise Rotary Club, told the News-Press.

“So every year our club provides dictionaries to every third grade student in the Santa Barbara school district, and our members have a lot of fun distributing dictionaries. We also do scholarships and send a couple

LOCAL FIVE-DAY FORECAST TODAY

MONDAY

INLAND

INLAND

92 56

94 56

73 59

72 58

70 56

71 58

72 59

Children play on the grass during the event.

COASTAL

COASTAL

Shown is today's weather. Temperatures are today's highs and tonight's lows.

Santa Maria 70/54

New Cuyama 97/62 Ventucopa 94/65

Los Alamos 82/55

Lompoc 67/53 Forecasts and graphics provided by AccuWeather, Inc. ©2022

Buellton 76/52

Solvang 88/55

Gaviota 73/57

SANTA BARBARA 73/59 Goleta 76/58

Carpinteria 73/59 Ventura 70/59

AIR QUALITY KEY Good Moderate

Source: airnow.gov Unhealthy for SG Very Unhealthy Unhealthy Not Available

ALMANAC

Santa Barbara through 6 p.m. yesterday

TEMPERATURE High/low Normal high/low Record high Record low

70/59 73/58 87 in 2018 47 in 1944

PRECIPITATION 24 hours through 6 p.m. yest.

Month to date (normal) Season to date (normal)

City Cuyama Goleta Lompoc Pismo Beach Santa Maria Santa Ynez Vandenberg Ventura

Today Hi/Lo/W 97/62/s 76/58/s 66/53/pc 70/52/pc 70/54/pc 92/54/s 66/54/pc 70/59/s

STATE CITIES Bakersfield Barstow Big Bear Bishop Catalina Concord Escondido Eureka Fresno Los Angeles Mammoth Lakes Modesto Monterey Napa Oakland Ojai Oxnard Palm Springs Pasadena Paso Robles Sacramento San Diego San Francisco San Jose San Luis Obispo Santa Monica Tahoe Valley

98/73/s 108/76/s 82/48/s 102/60/s 76/61/pc 94/61/s 87/62/s 66/55/pc 100/73/s 85/63/pc 83/48/s 98/67/s 68/55/pc 91/56/s 75/56/pc 88/60/s 71/59/s 114/85/s 90/63/s 97/55/s 100/65/s 73/65/pc 73/56/pc 86/62/s 76/54/s 75/62/pc 84/46/s

0.00” 0.00” (0.01”) 10.53” (17.17”)

87/71/t 77/63/s 84/68/s 103/81/s 98/64/pc 103/80/pc 90/79/t 88/71/t 81/67/s 84/65/s 112/91/pc 82/61/s 88/70/s 99/70/s 75/58/pc 82/66/s

Wind west 6-12 knots today. Wind waves 2-4 feet with a west-southwest swell 2-4 feet at 8-second intervals. Visibility clear.

POINT ARENA TO POINT PINOS

Wind northwest 7-14 knots today. Waves 3-5 feet; south-southwest swell 3-5 feet at 16 seconds. Visibility under a mile in fog.

POINT CONCEPTION TO MEXICO

Wind northwest 7-14 knots today. Waves 3-5 feet; south-southwest swell 3-5 feet at 16 seconds. Visibility under a mile in fog.

TIDES Mon. Hi/Lo/W 102/64/s 74/56/s 69/54/pc 69/53/pc 72/55/pc 92/55/s 69/55/pc 69/60/pc

SANTA BARBARA HARBOR TIDES Date Time High Time July 10 July 11 July 12

8:29 a.m.

7:22 p.m.

9:26 a.m.

8:10 p.m.

10:15 a.m.

8:59 p.m.

LAKE LEVELS

3.3’ 6.5’ 3.6’ 6.9’ 3.8’ 7.2’

Low

2:07 a.m.

12:38 p.m.

2:55 a.m.

1:33 p.m.

3:42 a.m.

2:28 p.m.

-0.2’ 2.3’ -0.8’ 2.4’ -1.3’ 2.4’

AT BRADBURY DAM, LAKE CACHUMA 105/75/s 109/77/s 84/49/pc 104/60/s 72/58/pc 93/60/s 85/59/pc 67/56/pc 107/73/s 84/62/s 86/51/s 102/67/s 72/57/pc 91/55/s 76/57/s 87/60/s 69/58/pc 115/84/s 89/61/s 97/55/s 102/62/s 74/65/pc 75/58/s 87/61/s 77/54/pc 73/60/s 88/51/s

NATIONAL CITIES Atlanta Boston Chicago Dallas Denver Houston Miami Minneapolis New York City Philadelphia Phoenix Portland, Ore. St. Louis Salt Lake City Seattle Washington, D.C.

MARINE FORECAST

SANTA BARBARA CHANNEL

LOCAL TEMPS

KENNETH SONG / NEWS-PRESS PHOTOS

COASTAL

Maricopa 98/72

Vandenberg 66/54

Volunteers clean up remnants of a dolphin race.

INLAND

89 56

COASTAL

Guadalupe 69/54

email: kzehnder@newspress.com

INLAND

92 55

Pismo Beach 70/52

including a photo booth and face painting. We were really pleased we had so many families having fun. Families were out here playing corn hole and getting their faces painted,” said. Ms. McCaffrey.

“I think that our hope for the future is that it becomes a broader community event and that we have built something that is growing and we are excited to have other organizations be a part of it,” said Mr. Ryan.

INLAND

92 54 COASTAL

they helped us recycle the water between races so we weren’t wasting water and they helped us spray the water onto dry areas of the park after the races. They were really excited about the festival. It was really a fun day,” said Mr. Ryan.

The day featured live music from the Nick Hoffman Band featuring Ally Shiras and SnapShot from the Chase Palm Park stage with Drew Wakefield as emcee. Activities for children were provided by the United Boys & Girls Clubs of Santa Barbara,

WEDNESDAY THURSDAY

Mostly sunny and Areas of fog, then Partly sunny and Mostly sunny and pleasant sun pleasant nice

Sunny and pleasant

student leaders to the Rotary Youth leadership program,” said Ms. McCaffrey.

The club also equipped four graduating seniors of the class of 2022 from La Cuesta Continuation High School with laptops.

These are just a few examples of community service projects done by the Rotary Club of Santa Barbara Sunrise Charitable Foundation.

“Station number five of the fire department came out and brought one of their ladder trucks and tapped into the hydrant and

TUESDAY

81/72/t 85/68/s 87/67/t 105/80/s 83/61/t 101/79/t 90/79/t 83/67/t 84/72/s 86/70/s 114/90/s 92/64/s 95/75/pc 97/72/s 82/59/s 85/71/s

At Lake Cachuma’s maximum level at the point at which water starts spilling over the dam holds 188,030 acre-feet. An acre-foot is 325,851 gallons, equivalent to the amount of water consumed annually by 10 people in an urban environment.

Storage 81,581 acre-ft.

Elevation 705.69 ft.

Evaporation (past 24 hours) 30.0 acre-ft.

Inflow 6.4 acre-ft.

State inflow 22.4 acre-ft.

Storage change from yest.

-86 acre-ft.

Report from U.S. Bureau of Reclamation

SUN AND MOON Sunrise Sunset Moonrise Moonset

Full

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SANTA BARBARA NEWS-PRESS

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Man started Georgian National Legion base in Santa Barbara

Please join us for

UKRAINE

La Recepción del Presidente!

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stop it. President Zelensky made a request for everyone to help who could from anywhere. And I said ‘I have to go,’ knowing what was happening and what kind of people the Ukrainians are and who had been building democracy for so long. I was retired with no excuse not to go.

I was on the plane thinking there was a good chance that I wouldn’t be going back and I was okay with that,” Mr. Williams told the News-Press in an interview.

“The whole time of Russia’s buildup to the invasion, a Ronald Reagan quote was stuck in my head. In 1982 He was talking about freedom and the threat to freedom from global wars involving Russia. He said it would take a march of freedom and democracy to defeat it. And then he asked his audience, ‘What kind of people do we think we are? And let us answer; free people. Worthy of freedom. And determined not only to remain so, but to help others gain their

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freedom as well.’ That was stuck in my head when I made my decision,” Mr. Williams told the News-Press.

“I flew to Kraków, Poland, and got a ride to the border. From there I hitchhiked to Lviv. I spent a few days helping refugees get from trains to buses; the refugees took the buses to cities in Europe,” said Mr. Williams.

“Their luggage was mostly plastic grocery bags of very few belongings. After just a few days the volunteers tripled so I felt I needed to move further in to be of more help. I took a train to Kyiv, which was pretty dangerous, it was pretty interesting in and of itself. After I got there I started asking all the military people if anyone knew where I could administer humanitarian aid.

There was one guy guarding a checkpoint and I told him I wanted to volunteer on a military base,” said Mr. Williams. The man told Mr. Williams to wait there.

When the man returned “a car came up and I was told ‘Get in the car and go with him.’ During the drive I started seeing bombed out Russian military vehicles.

Outside Kyiv we went through an industrial area and they told me to get out. When I got out I was standing at a fence, a gate opened and an officer drove up. He said ‘get in’. They did a background check on me and took me to the commander of the base, Mamuka Mamulashvili, Commander of the Georgian National Legion. He had several guards with machine guns posted around the office. I saw handwritten sentences all over the office walls. I saw just enough to be able to read them. They were mostly quotes from Rondald Reagan.”

After talking with the commander for quite awhile, the commander said of Mr. Williams “Anytime he wants to come to my office, just let him in.”

“From there I went into military training programs, which was a couple weeks worth of training. I ended up being about the best shot they had at the time. The Georgian National Legion has three primary missions: sabotage, reconnaissance and training new recruits,” said Mr. Williams.

He volunteered primarily with reconnaissance and training new recruits. Mr. Williams largely provided hand-to-hand combat training.

He also did humanitarian aid distribution, including organizing an entire warehouse of donated goods.

“When I left Kyiv, I remained a member of the Georgia National Legion and started a base in Santa Barbara. My mission is, in general, to give awareness of who the Georgian Legion is and what their purpose is, as well as to raise funds. The Georgian National Legion is a 100 percent volunteer, all equipment and support comes from funds raised,” said Mr. Williams.

He learned while volunteering that they could revolutionize the operation quite simply.

“I am an engineer and have been a motorcycle rider since I was 13. They need electric motorcycles to quadruple productivity, the land they work on is quite open, largely agriculture fields. They will drive as far as they need to, to do reconnaissance, but still have to walk to their target. Sometimes when they leave an area they need to do it stealthily, and other times it doesn’t matter if they make a lot of noise, according to Mr. Williams, but both are accomplished with electric motorcycles.

KENNETH SONG / NEWS-PRESS PHOTOS

Grady Williams shows his military fatigues at his home in Santa Barbara on Friday.

“The funding I am raising will go to fund the Silent Cycle Squadron, a unit of six individuals. The squadron will be built from scratch including raising the money, procuring bikes and getting them retrofitted to meet needs in the field.

The funds will also go towards recruiting operators, getting them trained and bringing them to Kyiv, to integrate them into the rest of the legion,” said Mr. Williams.

“I learned what Zelensky was like after hearing his impassioned speeches but I never realized until I got there what a perfect reflection he is of the Ukrainian people. All they wanted was to live life in freedom and democracy and they look up to the U.S. very much in that.

They couldn’t believe what was being done to them. There is no people that is more deserving of freedom and democracy that I can think of than them … The real reason Russia attacked is about how the Ukrainian people are becoming so successful in creating democracy on the Russian border and Putin feared that the Russians would see that and he would be thrown out of office. Ukraine became an existential threat to Putin,” said Mr. Williams.

Aside from his family, his passions include Harley motorcycles, rifle

marksmanship, mixed martial arts and being a docent at the Reagan Ranch, all of which he engages in at least once a week. Mr. Williams holds a B.A. from Walla Walla University in Washington and a Master of Science in Engineering from Virginia Tech.

“I stay in contact daily with my squadron on the frontline, and about every other day with Mamuka. My thoughts are still so strongly with the people of Ukraine that I still hear the air raid sirens that go off in Kyiv, thanks to a Ukrainian app I still have on my phone,” Mr. Williams told the News-Press.

“With all the places in the country I could have ended up, or no place at all, I believe it was a higher power that took me to Mamuka Mamulashvili and the Georgian National Legion. They are some of the most authentically loving, sincere, honest people I’ve ever met, and their wish to help the Ukrainians is unparalleled in my experience,” said Mr. Williams.

Those who wish to donate to the fund for the Silent Cycle Squadron can do so at the following link: https://www. gofundme.com/f/electricmotorcycles-for-ukraine.

Donations can also be made via Paypal: @georgianlegion2022. email: kzehnder@newspress.com

Some of the combat gear worn by Mr. Williams during his time in Ukraine.

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Mr. Williams, center, is shown with some of his compatriots in Ukraine.

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At seven o’clock, I planted myself at the bar of Salon de la Historie and sipped a mojito while Cuban mariachis strolled and strummed and sang, with a power and passion unique to this people.

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I awakened as dawn cracked, a clear sunrise over the sea. I parked myself in the Nacional’s cafeteria for complimentary breakfast, soon joined by Mr. Howard.

The coffee wasn’t bad. But I stopped drinking after it stained my fingers.

The buffet was abundant, if unappetizing. Mr. Howard gorged himself, making the most of the Nacional’s bedlam-and-breakfast deal.

Suddenly, a surprise: Lena Orlova appeared.

Next morning, Ed Howard and I strolled through Old Havana for a final chat. Occasionally, we passed a dog in the street, and I was struck by how awful and peculiar the canines looked in this town: Diseased or sick with worry.

“The FBI will know you were here,” warned Mr. Howard. “You may get a knock at your door, wanting to know what you were doing in Cuba.”

“What should I do if that happens?” I played along.

“Just tell them you can’t afford to talk because it would cause complications with the Cubans on future trips. They can’t do anything to you.”

I bought a red star revolutionary

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

26

A DAY IN HAVANA

DEPARTURE

beret from a market stall. “I’ll wear this when the G-men come aknocking,” I said.

Mr. Howard laughed. Then he unveiled his new book idea: “How not to do business in Russia.” All the kinds of swindles the Russians pull and are good at. Mr. Howard had learned the hard way.

“My KGB friends won’t like it,” he added. “But I don’t give a damn.”

I encouraged Mr. Howard to get cracking despite the Russians.

(I still have his manuscript — the writing of which was another reason the Russians no longer enjoyed the pleasure of his company.)

Back at the Nacional, I settled my account with Mr. Howard. He was on my payroll, an FBI asset, if unwitting. The irony.

After settling my tab with Hotel Nacional, I killed an hour on a wicker chair in its garden, sipping one final mojito. A lone peacock strutted the grounds, occasionally piercing the serene setting with a terrifying shriek.

“Yeah, I’d feel the same way if I was stuck here” I muttered under my breath, one eye peeled for Grandpa Munster.

Leaving Cuba was as easy as arriving, if a greater pleasure. No traffic leaving the city (few cars), no line at first-class check-in.

The only hiccup was a rip-off “exit Cuba fee” of $20 (worth a thousand times that to Cubans who risk their lives to flee, sometimes in a rubber tire).

And at an airport shop I finally found something with Fidel Castro’s image on it: A half-ounce commemorative gold coin. It was overpriced at $375 (worth far more now), but I sprang for it, a gold medal awarded to myself for a job well done.

Waiting for my jet to board, I plucked the proof coin from its protective case and mixed it with the other coins in my pocket.

I wanted Fidel to get knocked around by Jefferson, Lincoln and Washington. I wanted to tell people, tongue-in-cheek, that I had The Bearded One in my pocket.

Wright Valentine, bartender, was right where I’d left him in the first-class lounge of Sangster International Airport in Montego Bay. He poured me another belt of Appleton’s V/X rum and ginger.

80

to the Nacional. I glanced around the lobby, checking out sofas.

“Looking for someone?” asked Mr. Howard.

“Yeah. Al Lewis.”

“Who?” “He was Grandpa in ‘The Munsters.’ I read two books that say he’s a fixture here.”

“Sounds scary,” said Mr. Howard. “C’mon, I’ll buy you a drink.”

He led me through the back portico to a bar adjacent to the Salon de la Historie, whose walls celebrated colorful characters who’d stayed at the Nacional during less austere, more convivial times, including Mafia bosses Meyer Lansky and Santo Trafficante.

We occupied a pair of stools at the bar: A mojito for me, an orange soda for Mr. Howard.

“Mind if I smoke?” Mr. Howard produced a pack of Salem cigarettes. “Busy day,” he added.

“I was with Senor Deema, chief of the North American division,” Mr. Howard said. “He’s jet-black, trained in Leningrad. They all did back then. His first love was a Russian girl. I don’t think he ever got over her.

“Deema asked me lots of questions about you. I told him about your working with (former KGB Chairman Vladimir) Kryuchkov and (KGB.Col. Igor) Prelin, that the Russians like you.

It didn’t seem to matter. They don’t care much about the Russians anymore. They want to know you for themselves. Deema has an idea for a book.”

(Everyone has an idea for a book.)

I sipped my mojito. “Yeah?”

“In 1989, the Cubans rolled up a CIA spy ring. Every one of the 28 agents the CIA recruited turned out to be doubles, working for the Cubans. The DGI is disappointed nothing big ever came of it in the media. They consider it one of their major coups and would like to see more made of it. Maybe a book.”

I shrugged. “That’s what I’m here for. What did they want to see you about?”

“Oh,” said Mr. Howard. “Most of today was spent on all the exams and interviews you have to take if you want to join the CIA. They wanted to know every detail.”

“Why?” “Obvious, isn’t it?” said Mr. Howard.

(Of course. But I had to hear him spell it out.)

“They’d like to get one of their people, somebody from Miami, into the agency. I told them everything I knew. They laid on a nice buffet. Surprisingly good food.”

Mr. Howard was exhausted from flying Aeroflot coach overnight, then jumping straight into a daylong debrief. But he agreed to join me for dinner in Old Havana at El Floridita, which refused to seat us in their main restaurant, a wiggy affair, because Mr. Howard’s shorts defied their dress code. Instead, we grabbed a bar table and ordered the Cuban Sandwich: Ham, cheese, pork, butter, mustard, with a garnish of nearrancid coleslaw.

The daiquiri, supposedly invented here by Ernest Hemingway, tasted weak and bland. I pushed it aside and ordered a mojito.

At the next table, a repugnant 60-something Spaniard held hands with a teenage Cuban girl.

Mr. Howard told me that a KGB officer first introduced him to Havana 10 years earlier. Vladimir Popov, who’d spent six years in Cuba after getting booted from Washington for spying, taught Ed the lay of the land.

My sleep that night turned manic, punctuated by sudden awakeness and odd sounds: A drumbeat at 3 a.m., probably produced by a power generator outside. Later, two synthesized female voices holler, “We don’t understand ... noooo!”

Then a strobe light penetrated my brain.

The mojitos? I still haven’t figured it out.

something band leader was a heart surgeon by day who moonlighted in tourism to put food on the table; could only feed his family (if there was any food to buy) because, in the absence of their Russian Big Brother, Cuba now catered to tourists by commercializing Che Guevara on T-shirts and keychains made in Spain.

The music, aye, Cuba … It was all they had left.

Next, a taxi with Ed Howard and Lena Orlova to La Bodeguita del Medio, Hemingway’s haunt in Old Havana.

A crowd of people were queued in front.

“Damn, a line,” I said.

But the maître d’, recognizing Americanos, reached out and hauled us into the bar.

“What about them?” I said, motioning at the throng, now behind me.

“Them’s Cuban,” he replied.

“These tables are reserved for foreigners. We have only few tables for Cubans.”

If Mr. Cuban Restaurateur thought this situation ironic, he did not let on. Hell, at least he was making a little brazhort.

In Bodeguita’s small, graffitibedecked bar Mr. Howard and Ms. Orlova bickered. She wanted a gin-and-tonic; he made a face and snidely said they don’t do that kind of thing in Cuba. (Meaning: too expensive; Ed was a bit of a tightwad). She stormed out; he went after her. They returned with Rolando Salup and his “former” DGI pal Salvador Perez.

The maître’ d escorted us to a corner table upstairs, handed us menus, all priced in dollars.

“For someone who hates the United States,” I commented, “Fidel sure likes their monetary system.”

“He not dislike United States people,” explained Rolando. “He dislike U.S. government. You like nice traditional Cuban meal?”

I deferred to Mr. Salup’s judgment: pork, rice, black beans, fried bananas, and a cucumber salad.

The 33-year-old Salvador Perez made his pitch to me: You want to make money? Embargobusting!

“We need things all the time,” said Salvador in good English.

“One day it might be rice; the next day, paint; the day after, something else. If we’re there to meet the market, to fill the gap, we make money. I call you, tell you what’s needed, you find it, and we make the deal.”

Mr. Perez told me that one reason foreign investment into Cuba stinks is because foreign investors are not allowed to hire their own labor force. Labor is provided by the state and paid state-controlled wages. Thus, a Cuban labor force is a waste of time because it has no incentive to be productive.

Roland Salup nodded in agreement.

“Are you saying...” I leaned forward conspiratorially “...that socialism doesn’t work?”

“No, no, no!” Both men shook their heads, mortified, eyes popping from their heads.

“So how do we commence trading?” I asked.

The embargo-buster laid it out thus: First step, establish a business entity, a trading company, in Panama or Mexico.

Cost? A few hundred dollars.

Second step, register the entity in Cuba. Perez could handle that.

Cost? A few hundred dollars.

Third step, open a bank account in Cuba. Cost? Nothing.

Then start trading.

I asked why Che Guevara’s likeness is everywhere (statues, murals, t-shirts, keychains), but The Bearded One’s face is nowhere to be seen?

“Ah,” said Rolando. “Fidel is against cult of personality. That is why no statues. For Che, it is OK because he’s dead.”

I had another theory but kept it to myself: Mr. Castro long ago decided that the best way to instill fear among Cubans, and to stay alive, was to remain mysterious and elusive, address unknown.

CA

Continued from Page A2

Turns out, Ed Howard’s “assistant,” whom I’d first met in Moscow, had flown in with Ed and slept through the day before.

She said this was her first time in Cuba.

Mr. Howard seemed sheepish about Lena’s presence. He mumbled something about it being a “bonus” for her work.

Mr. Howard and I talked about travel, always my favorite subject with him. Where had he been?

Where would he go?

Howard had visited Santiago and “got Chile out of my system.”

He’d also visited Egypt and took a cruise down the Nile with his son.

He’d spent Christmas in Vienna with his ex-wife Mary and son; and he had been to Germany, Luxembourg and Paris.

“I go anywhere in Europe,” Mr. Howard boasted. “Except the U.K.” (Through a Russian agent in the FBI — presumably Robert Hanssen, later convicted of espionage — Ed’s KGB crowd had a good grasp on where he could or could not travel safely.)

Next, we would meet his friend Rolando Salup, a DGI (Cuban intelligence) officer who had spent seven years in New York City under U.N. diplomatic cover and six years as intelligence chief in Moscow. Ed knew Rolando from Moscow; they had become personal friends.

Rolando appeared at 11 a.m. sharp. He seemed easygoing, with an edge. I sensed he had a mission, probably as simple as taking a cut for brokering a deal as I had expressed an interest (to Ed) in native art.

Gallery No. 1, in Old Havana, was a mishmash of overpriced, low-quality contemporary schlock and bric-a-brac masquerading as antiques.

We cruised over to “gallery” No. 2, a hub of middle-aged men who brokered Cuban family heirlooms to moneyed foreigners. Up and down the squalid street, private enterprise flourished. Stalls outside residential houses hawked ice cream, pizza and, in the back alleys, young women.

Next, the home of a deceased Cuban artist, allegedly of some renown. An elderly woman fixated on an ancient blackand-white TV set as her family tried to sell their few remaining possessions of value. I liked a few watercolor paintings, but begged off a decision, feeling sadness for this family, silently cursing Fidel Castro for the indignity he had forced upon his people.

Mr. Salup calmed down because I was at least considering a purchase.

Time for refreshment, the Copacabana, aside the pool, Cuban sandwiches all round.

Rolando told me that he’d spent much of his childhood around the Copacabana because his family had owned it before Castro took it away from them and turned it into housing for medical students and never paid Rolando’s family a single peso.

I asked Roland if he felt bitter about this.

“No, no.” He looked both ways.

It was now valued at $35 million, he whispered.

We returned to Hotel Nacional.

I glanced around for Al Lewis of “The Munsters.” No luck.

Up in my room, the B.O. of communism seemed to have dissipated, but truth was, it had seized me and now I was part of it.

I’d barely washed my hands when Mr. Howard called. “We’re going back to see Hernandez,” he said. “He’s got news.”

I grabbed a bottle of Macallan scotch whiskey, one of three I’d brought along to gift helpful Cubans. I gave one to Mr. Hernandez, who asked me why I was giving it to him.

“Because you’re such a nice guy.”

Mr. Hernandez laughed. He leaned forward. “I have something interesting. A friend of mine has written a biography of Fidel Castro.”

We thrashed this around.

Apparently, Castro had cooperated with the project.

The manuscript had not been published anywhere.

“When can I see it?” I asked.

It would be sent, said Mr. Hernandez, by diplomatic pouch to the Cuban Interests Section in Washington.

As we walked back to the Nacional, Mr. Howard told me that the scotch whiskey I’d given to Mr. Hernandez represented a month’s salary.

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Professional

CONTRACTS AND GRANTS ANALYST Computer Science

Responsible for developing and submitting research proposals, awards and/or transactions related to contract and grant management and maintains contract and grant records in compliance with institutional and research sponsor policies. Works on proposals of moderate scope such as single investigator NSF proposals where analysis of financial information or reports require review of a variety of factors (e.g. budgets, salaries, expenses, etc.) Receives assignments and analyzes problems, gathers data and information, and recommends solutions. Completes transactions for signature by manager or authorized institutional official. Maintains effective working relationships and coordinates closely with the Principal Investigator, department staff, Office of Research, other campus central and academic departments. Is independently responsible for gift processing. Reqs: Bachelor’s degree or/and equivalent work experience. Ability to establish and maintain priorities, multi-task and meet deadlines while balancing a high volume workload. Analytical and problem-solving skills. Excellent attention to detail and communication skills. Ability to exercise independent judgment. Ability to perform financial analysis and customized reporting. Proficiency with Microsoft programs such as Excel, Word, Powerpoint, etc. Proficiency with Google software programs such as Sheets, Docs, Gmail, chat.

Must be comfortable explaining guidelines and policies. Notes: This position is funded through June 30, 2024 pending further funding. Satisfactory conviction history background check. $27.68 - $30.45/hr.

The University of California is an Equal Opportunity/ Affirmative Action Employer, and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability status, protected veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by law. Application review begins 7/20/2022. Apply online at https://jobs.ucsb.edu Job # 38663

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05",)# ./4)#%3 NOTICE OF FILING AND HEARING ON REPORT OF SEWER SERVICE CHARGES LEVIED BY THE GOLETA SANITARY DISTRICT

COURTESY PHOTOS

A crowd packs the Sunken Gardens at the Santa Barbara County Courthouse Friday evening for the start of the annual UCSB free summer movie series. Since the first movie was “American Graffiti”, set in 1962, classic cars were nearby.

NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that, pursuant to Section 5473 of the California Health and Safety Code, there has been filed with the Secretary of the Goleta Sanitary District, a report containing: (a) a proposal to have sewer service charges for the Fiscal Year 2022-23 collected on the tax roll, (b) a description of each parcel of real property receiving services and facilities furnished by the Goleta Sanitary District in connection with its wastewater system, and (c) the amount of the sewer service charge to be levied upon each parcel for the Fiscal Year 2022-23, computed in conformity with the charges prescribed by an ordinance duly passed and approved by the Governing Board of the Goleta Sanitary District; and that the time and place for a hearing on said report has been set for Monday, August 1, 2022 at 6:30 p.m., at the office of the Goleta Sanitary District, One William Moffett Place, Goleta, California 93117.

DATED: July 6, 2022 GOLETA SANITARY DISTRICT

By____________________________ Robert O. Mangus Secretary of the Governing Board JUL 10, 17 / 2022 -- 58488 REQUEST FOR BIDS BID SUBMITTAL: Please provide your written bid (on the attached forms) to the Santa Ynez River Water Conservation District, Improvement District No.1 (District), before 10:00 AM on August 10, 2022.

SUPERINTENDENTPM CREW Facilities Management

Responsible for Facilities Management Preventative Maintenance Area. Supervises crew comprised of HVAC Mechanics, Skilled Trades Mechanics and Sr. Building Maintenance Workers. May supervise other Skilled Trades workers, such as Electricians, Plumbers, Carpenters, Painters and Locksmiths, as necessary to complete the assigned tasks of the PM Crew. Carries out inspections of work assignments and communicates work requests to trades staff. Works to train staff in correct technical practices, safety, efficiency and professionalism.

Responsible for correct execution of campus maintenance projects.

Reqs: Solid knowledge and skills in the specialty craft supervised. Solid supervisory skills to include organization, scheduling, assigning work and ensuring quality standards are met. Solid financial skills to accurately project costs of potential jobs and to consistently complete work within established budgetary and time constraints. Skills to actively promote and maintain safety standards. Solid skills to effectively select and evaluate staff, and to appropriately handle disciplinary issues. High School Diploma. Notes: Certification in a specialty skilled trade. Journeyman Level in HVAC, Electrical or Plumbing. Satisfactory completion of a criminal history background check. Must maintain valid CA DL, a clean DMV record and enrollment in DMV Pull-Notice Program. Satisfactory criminal history background check. $75,800.00 - $106,000.00/yr. The University of California is an Equal Opportunity/ Affirmative Action Employer, and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability status, protected veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by law. Application review begins 7/20/2022. Apply online at https://jobs.ucsb.edu Job # 38586

Got Something To

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Let Us Help You Sell It! Email: classad@newspress.com or for additional information Call 805-963-4391

to place your classified ad

TODAY!

BID SECURITY: Each bid shall be accompanied by a certified or cashier’s check or bid bond in the amount of ten percent (10%) of the total bid price, payable to the District as a guarantee that the bidder, if its bid is accepted, will promptly execute a Contract with the District and provide the required submittals for approval, all within ten (10) calendar days of the date of written Notice of Award. A bid shall not be considered unless one of the forms of bidder security is enclosed with it.

DESCRIPTION OF WORK: The purpose of this project is to upgrade, replace, and/or install new motor control equipment at five remote pumping facilities within the District’s distribution system. Two booster pump stations and one well site will be outfitted with modernized motor control equipment, including solid state “soft” starters for pump/motor sizes ranging from 30 to 100 hp in size. New equipment will integrate with the existing SCADA PLCs located at each site.

Newly upgraded 4-wire utility power feed will be integrated into the new and existing power panels at all five sites. Upgrades at 4 of the sites will include the addition of a new portable generator connection cabinet and manual transfer switch (MTS). One site with an existing generator hook-up will be upgraded to the new cabinet and MTS. The Contractor will supply all materials required to complete the work.

SITES OF WORK: The five sites of work are located within the District service area, in rural areas near the towns of Santa Ynez and Solvang. Two sites are located on District-owned property. Three sites are located within easements on private property.

COMPLETION OF WORK: Project work will begin as soon as possible following Contractor selection and issuance of a Notice of Award. All work must be completed in an expeditious manner.

No liquidated damages will be imposed under the Contract, but the District reserves the right to terminate the Contract if the work is not being pursued diligently and expeditiously, in accordance with the Contractor’s submitted and approved schedule. All work must be completed and accepted by the District before final payment is issued to the Contractor.

PAYMENT: Payment shall be made by the District, to ninety-five (95) percent of the work completed in monthly progress payments and a final payment. The five (5) percent retention will be paid 35 days following final acceptance of the work by the District.

FORM OF BID: The bid shall be made on the Bid Forms bound herein (unless modified by an addendum).

MANDATORY PRE-BID MEETING: All bidders are required to attend the pre-bid meeting at the District office (3622 Sagunto St., Santa Ynez) scheduled for July 27, 2022, at 9:00 AM. The pre-bid meeting will include inspection of the sites of work.

INSPECTION OF SITES OF WORK: Inspection of the sites of the work is required in order for the Contractor to understand, by personal examination, the location of the proposed work and the actual conditions of the sites of work. If during the course of the examination, a Contractor finds facts or conditions which appear to conflict with the letter or spirit of the Contract Documents (including Drawings and Specifications), or with any other data furnished by the District, the Contractor may contact the District for additional information and explanation before submitting a bid; provided, however, that the bid submittal date shall not be extended.

The submission of a bid by a Contractor shall constitute the acknowledgment that, if awarded the Contract, the Contractor has relied and is relying on its own examination of (a) the sites of the work, (b) the access to the sites, and (c) all other data, matters, and things requisite to the fulfillment of the work and on the Contractor’s own knowledge of existing services and utilities on and in the vicinity of the sites of the work to be constructed under the Contract, and not on any representation or warranty of the District. No claim for additional compensation will be allowed which is based upon a lack of knowledge of the above items.

DIR REGISTRATION REQUIREMENTS: The Department of Industrial Relations (“DIR”) requires that: (a) No contactor or subcontractor may be listed on a bid proposal for a public works project unless they are registered with the DIR; (b) No contractor or subcontractor may be awarded a public works contract unless registered with the DIR; and (c) Work performed on the public works project is subject to compliance monitoring and enforcement by the DIR. AWARD OF CONTRACT: Bids will be evaluated and the Contract awarded when the District has received bids from solicited Contractors showing interest and knowledge of the described work.

The award is scheduled to follow the District’s Board of Trustees meeting on August 16, 2022. Upon written Notice of Award, the Contractor shall promptly execute all necessary Contract Documents, provide the required insurance submittals, and furnish a satisfactory performance bond and payment bond, both in the amount of 100 percent of the bid price.

SUBSTITUTION OF SECURITY: The Contractor may elect to receive one hundred percent (100%) of payments due under the Contract Documents at the completion of the work, without retention of any portion of the payment by the District, by depositing securities of equivalent value with the District in accordance with the provisions of section 22300 of the California Public Contract Code.

WAGE RATES: As required by the California Labor Code, not less than the general prevailing rates of per diem wages and not less than the general prevailing rate for overtime and holiday work in the locality in which the work is to be performed for each craft or type of workers needed to execute the work contemplated under the Contract, shall be paid to all workers employed on said work by the Contractor or by any subcontractor performing any part of said work. A list of the prevailing wages, as determined by the Department of Industrial Relations can be found on the internet at the following link http://www.dir.ca.gov/DLSR/PWD/index.htm and shall be posted at each job site by the Contractor.

The Contractor shall comply with all applicable provisions of section 16100 of Title 8 of the California Code of Regulations, which require the Contractor to keep accurate records of the work performed as provided in Labor Code section 1812, to allow District to inspect Contractor’s payroll records pursuant to Labor Code section 1776 and section 16400(e) of Title 8 of the California Code of Regulations, and to comply with all other requirements imposed by law.

CONTRACTOR’S REQUIREMENTS: The District has determined that the Contractor shall possess a valid California Class C-10 electrical contractors license at the time of bid submittal, when the Contract is awarded, and for the duration of the Contract. Failure to possess the specified license at the time of submittal and award shall render the Bid as non-responsive.

PRESUMPTION OF SATISFACTORY QUALIFICATIONS OF SURETY: All bonds shall be in the form prescribed by the Contract Documents except as provided otherwise by law or regulation, and shall be executed by such sureties as are named in the current list of companies holding certificates of authority as acceptable sureties on federal bonds and as acceptable reinsuring companies as published in Circular 570 (amended) by the audit staff, Bureau of Government Financial Corporations, U.S. Treasury Department. A certified copy of such agent’s authority to act must accompany all bonds signed by an agent.

DISTRICT’S RIGHTS RESERVED: The District reserves the right to reject any or all bids, to waive any informality in a bid, and to make awards to the lowest responsive contractor as it may best serve the interests of the District.

Contract Documents are available at the District’s web site (http://www.syrwd.org).

JUL 10 / 2022 -- 58490

Comer says Treasury has fallen short on boasts of transparency BIDEN

Continued from Page A1 Treasury Department to provide suspicious activity reports and other documentation “regarding Hunter Biden and other Biden associates and family members’ suspicious foreign business transactions flagged by U.S. banks” but says he has not received them.

“The Biden Administration is restricting Congress’ access to SARs, and Committee Republicans are investigating whether this change in longstanding policy is motivated by efforts to shield Hunter Biden and potentially President Biden from scrutiny,” Rep. Comer wrote in his letter, not his first to the agency on this issue. “Though the Committee requested documents and information ‘no later than June 8, 2022,’ the Department of the Treasury has provided no documents or information.”

Mr. Biden attended a ceremony in the East Room of the White House for Medal of Freedom recipients Thursday.

Rep. Comer argued that the

Treasury has publicly boasted of its transparency, making this refusal worse.

“According to the Wall Street Journal, the Biden Administration claimed, ‘Treasury has made SARs available for every request we’ve received, regardless of party, and will continue to do so,’” he wrote. “This is not true.

During a phone call on June 13, 2022, Treasury officials informed Committee Republican staff that they will not provide SARs to Committee Republicans unless Democrats join the request.

It is troubling that the Biden Administration is willing to provide a false story to the media to create the appearance of transparency while continuing to thwart congressional oversight.

“The American people deserve to know whether the President’s connections to his son’s business deals occurred at the expense of the United States’ interests and whether they represent a national security threat,” he added.

The Treasury Department and the White House did not respond to a request for comment in time for publication.

PAGE

B1

Managing Editor Dave Mason dmason@newspress.com

Life

INSIDE

Busy concert season at Lobero Theatre - B3

S U N DAY, J U LY 10 , 2 0 2 2

Ukrainian artistry

Talent runs in the Zinovyez family interview.

He graduated from the Krupskaya Art University in Moscow with a degree in art fter a harrowing escape from her home design. His work has been exhibited in art museums in in Ukraine, Tatiana Ukraine, Poland, France, Turkey Zinovyez has been and Belgium. reunited with her He works with a variety of styles family in Santa Barbara. and techniques, playing with She arrived June 25, which shapes, symbols and colors. His gives her enough time to enjoy work expresses a “sophisticated their reunion and look forward yet unfiltered often poignant view to the exhibition of artwork by of current affairs, always true to her talented husband, Olexandr himself.”

Zinovyez Sr., and son, Olexandr Between 2011 and 2013, Zinovyez Jr. The show takes place from 3 to 5 he organized three popular p.m. July 14 at Alexander Gardens, international caricature contests in Ukraine, using caricatures to 2120 Santa Barbara St., Santa bring visual humor to political Barbara. context. His “My wife’s caricatures departure from eventually the occupation struck a nerve was dramatic,” “Zinovyez and Zinovyez,” an art with proMr. Zinovyez Russian officials show by father and son artists, will Sr. told the forcing Mr. News-Press, take place from 3 to 5 p.m. Thursday Zinovyev Sr. to answering at Alexander Gardens, 2120 Garden move to the U.S. questions by St. For more information, go to www. in 2015. email. alexandergardensal.com.

“Caricature “A convoy of is a humorous, cars tried three concise transfer times to take of information in an easily different routes to the territory accessible form of perception controlled by Ukraine, and only throughout the spectrum of for the third time under highhuman life in any country. It is speed shelling did their cars slip through. Some cars were damaged very effective, especially on very by shrapnel and bullets of racists,” sharp topics of life. I like the language of caricature, especially explained Mr. Zinovyez Sr., who without words, only in the image,” left Ukraine in 2015 “due to said Mr. Zinovyev Sr. conflicts with local and regional He said he was inspired to authorities, which are closely become an artist as a child when linked as a political force with a he was surprised to find “that criminal and such a hybrid was fully supported by Russian special something is painted on a white canvas, and it begins to excite services and already had very people who look at it all and they threatening signs of collaboration are pleased — joyfully or on the with Russia. contrary, irritates, forces people “I had a persecution — a to discuss. Some people want to ban on exhibitions, dismissal, hang it at home and admire it. threats, beatings and inaction of This is such a creative illusion, law enforcement,” Mr. Zinovyez Sr. said during the News-Press Please see ARTISTRY on B4

By MARILYN MCMAHON NEWS-PRESS STAFF WRITER

A

FYI

KENNETH SONG/NEWS-PRESS PHOTOS

Olexandr Zinovyev Sr. stands among his artwork at his Santa Barbara home. He and his son, Olexandr Zinovyez Jr., will show their work in the “Zinovyez and Zinovyez” art show at the Alexander Gardens. The exhibit will include the large painting closest to Mr. Zinovyez in this photo.

Olexandr Zinovyez Sr. looks at a couple of the paintings that will be in his and his son’s exhibit. The one at the right is titled “Octopus.”

COURTESY IMAGE

“The Ladder of Power” is among the paintings in the exhibit.

B2

PUZZLES

SANTA BARBARA NEWS-PRESS

JUMBLE PUZZLE

No. 0703

Matthew Stock works for a math-education nonprofit in East St. Louis, Ill. Next month he’s moving to Florida, where he’ll be teaching eighth-grade math. Finn Vigeland is a transportation planner in Washington, D.C. They met at a crossword competition in 2018 and have been in touch ever since. This is their first collaboration. When you’ve finished the puzzle, look for an appropriate hidden word. — W.S.

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1 Partitions between nostrils 6 Place to park a boat 10 Malt-drying kiln 14 Gave a look of ‘‘Can you believe that?!’’

15 Smaller than small 17 Rub it in 19 What you’ll hear after-hours at a sports car sales lot?

23 Cry from a boxing coach 24 Swimmer’s assignment 25 RC, for one 26 Fayetteville school, informally 27 City that neighbors Ann Arbor, for short 28 Rodeo Drive uprising?

32 Janelle of ‘‘Moonlight’’ 34 Loire contents 35 Per person 36 Twisted jeans legs?

42 Religion of the Maldives 46 Mission statement’s inspiration 47 Expected 48 Bounces around a pool table 51 Antagonist in ‘‘Hop-o’My-Thumb’’ 52 Drink with crumpets 53 South Asian crepes 55 Thrill 57 Mini manufacturer

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SOLUTION ON B3

Horoscope.com Sunday, July 10, 2022 ARIES — Summer is heating up, Aries, but you’re in the mood to make money when Mars enters Taurus on Monday.

Especially since you’ve already spent a lot of it by making impulse purchases and trying to be the life of the party.

TAURUS — As we get into the heat of summer, you’ll have more passion and energy than ever after Mars enters your sign on Monday. This is a great time to get what you want, from rocking your beach body to scoring a new lover.

GEMINI — The next few weeks could be very frustrating after warrior Mars enters slow Taurus and your subconscious zone on Monday. While everyone else is having fun, you’re totally drained of energy. As you sulk in private, CANCER — Dreams really do come true. At least that’s how it feels when Mars enters Taurus and your social zone on Monday. Over the next six weeks, getting what you desire will be easier than you imagined, especially in financial matters.

LEO — Begin the week on an ambitious note when Mars enters Taurus on Monday, moving through your career zone for the next six weeks. Instead of hitting the beach, you’ll be hitting the grind as you work harder than ever to achieve your goals.

VIRGO — Start July on an adventurous note when Mars enters Taurus on Monday. Mars will be moving through your expansion zone, motivating you to discover new things. Whether you’re planning on taking a trip or taking a culinary tour in your kitchen by trying new recipes, it’s time to break out of your comfort zone and live a little.

LIBRA — Your week begins on a very sensual note when Mars enters Taurus and your intimacy zone on Monday. There will be plenty of fireworks in the bedroom and your personal life. From forming intimate bonds in private to fighting over bills, your life is changing and you need to decide if the changes are right for you.

SCORPIO — The next six weeks will feel like a balancing act after Mars enters Taurus on Monday. With your ruling planet moving through your partnership zone, you’ll need to learn to work with others.

SAGITTARIUS — Summer is supposed to be lazy, but you’ll discover that you’re busier than ever when Mars enters Taurus and your productivity zone. on Monday.

CAPRICORN — It’s all about having fun when Mars enters Taurus on Monday and moves through your pleasure zone for the next six weeks. Actually use your vacation days to chill and unwind, Capricorn.

Spend some time lounging by the pool, going to a nice restaurant, enjoying art or having a steamy love affair.

AQUARIUS — You’ll be sticking close to home and your old ideas over the next six weeks after Mars enters Taurus and your home zone on Monday. It’ll be hard to open your mind to any new ideas, so spend your time, energy and passion fixing household issues, from making repairs to defusing drama.

PISCES — Monday brings plenty of fireworks in more ways than one when Mars enters Taurus and your communication zone. Mars in this sign makes honesty your new policy, so you’ll be telling people exactly how you feel over the next six weeks. While it’s important to be straightforward, Pisces, don’t hurt anyone’s feelings.

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Online subscriptions: Today’s puzzle and more than 4,000 past puzzles, nytimes.com/crosswords ($39.95 a year).

58 Chihuahua, por ejemplo 61 Staunch dedication to one’s upper leg exercise routine?

65 Country whose name together with its capital city has only eight letters 67 [I’m a cow!]

68 Take for a spin 69 Winter wear for a stegosaurus?

75 ‘‘I have my ____’’ 79 Understand 80 Palestinian political party 81 Some feds 83 ‘‘Look, fireworks!’’

84 Diver’s destination 86 Labor class?

89 Airport code for a Delta hub 90 It’s a small world 92 Bracket buster’s victory 94 Tire-puncturing way across a river?

97 Region 100 Musician whose name sounds like an exclamation 101 Message written on a Wonderland cake 102 Introduction to a chiropractor’s makeshift tool kit?

110 Ankle-length dress 112 First automaker to conduct crash tests (1938) 113 E.R. imperative 114 Pair in an ellipse 115 Capital on the Atlantic

116 Campaign to persuade British P.M. Tony to change parties?

121 Like sailors’ language, stereotypically 122 Operator of the Valley Flyer and Coast Starlight 123 Urge strongly 124 Wranglers alternative 125 Make 126 Rulers until 1917 DOWN

1 Top of a range?

2 Enter smoothly 3 Proper partner?

4 Number on a bus. card 5 First songwriter to win an Oscar for a James Bond theme 6 One in the driver’s seat 7 Head of Eton?

8 Global finance org.

9 Word before or after perfect 10 Tribe whose flag features a circle of tepees on a red background 11 French menu word 12 To such an extent (that) 13 Game with a card that might say, ‘‘Lawyer: court judge legal crime case’’ 14 Swabs, say 15 Target for salicylic acid 16 Fourth-most-common surname in Korea (after Kim, Lee and Park)

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66 Arthur Ashe Stadium org.

69 Wrangler maker 70 Great Basin natives 71 ‘‘Macbeth,’’ but not ‘‘Hamlet’’ 72 Burn a little 73 Vegetable that’s massaged before eating 74 Mythical ship that sailed to Colchis 76 Odds fellows?

77 Specifically

78 ‘‘____ All That’’ (1999 rom-com) 79 ‘‘Despicable Me’’ antihero 82 Half-____ 85 Within reach, as a goal 87 Utah’s ____ National Park 88 ‘‘Hairspray’’ mom 90 Fig. on a transcript 91 One with a storied education, informally?

93 Race in which one begins in a wet suit, for short 95 Shade that one might find on the links?

96 ‘‘What did I tell you?’’

98 Some writing samples 99 Source of Italian bubbles 102 Heart on one’s sleeve, for short?

103 Verbal shrugs 104 Perfect 105 Prefix with legal

106 Exclamation while seeing oneself on the Jumbotron, perhaps 107 Tick follower 108 German lament 109 Lab dropper 111 N.Y.C. subway inits.

115 Capital of Qatar 117 Inits. on a cellphone 118 Sports org. founded

by Billie Jean King 119 Like the verb ‘‘to be’’: Abbr.

120 Scripts

SUNDAY CROSSWORD PUZZLE

18 Stinky ____ (popular Chinese street food) 19 ‘‘Your’’ of yore 20 ____ system (GPS device) 21 Vogue rival 22 April fool target 28 ____ Paese cheese 29 Secular 30 One-named singer with the 2016 hit ‘‘Crush’’ 31 High school dept.

33 Follower of smart or wise 36 Comic Davidson 37 Big whoop 38 Go over 21, say 39 ‘‘What she said’’ 40 Nonkosher 41 Hindu Festival of Colors 43 Community celebrated in June, in brief 44 Name of BTS’s fan base 45 Kitten’s sound 49 Anti-D.U.I. org.

50 Mounts 53 Kind of fin 54 One offering intense but unrequited affection, in modern usage 56 Red Muppet 59 4/ 60 ____ Studies (Gallaudet University department) 62 Indian state on the Arabian Sea 63 Mellophone, e.g.

64 Debtor’s note

SOLUTION ON B3

CODEWORD PUZZLE

HOROSCOPE

7/10/2022

BY MATTHEW STOCK AND FINN VIGELAND / EDITED BY WILL SHORTZ

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BONUS FEATURES

SUNDAY, JULY 10, 2022

9

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

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

All puzzles come with a few letters to start you off. Your first move should be to enter these letters in the puzzle grid. If the letter S is in the box at the bottom of the page underneath the number 2, your first move should be to find all cells numbered 2 in the grid and enter the letter S. Cross the letter S off the list at the bottom of the grid. Remember that at the end you should have a different letter of the alphabet in each of the numbered boxes 1 - 26, and a word in English in each of the horizontal and vertical runs on the codeword grid.

BRIDGE PUZZLE

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PUZZLES

SANTA BARBARA NEWS-PRESS

NYT CROSSWORD SOLUTION

I

The emotional costs of inflation

practice positive psychology with both my clients and myself.

I am very honest about the struggles that we have been going through, but I can also almost always find a silver lining. With inflation on the rise and the market in bear territory, right now the best I can do is give you economic insecurity and emotional survival techniques.

Like a lot of people, you may have just started venturing out again, wanting to do more things, have fun and maybe spend a little of your hard-earned income.

That’s great, and life would almost seem normal, except that everything has gotten so much more expensive. Inflation has a negative effect on how we look at life.

Should we go to that concert now that tickets and gas have tripled, or should we be more financially conservative and subscribe to a streaming service?

CROSSWORD SOLUTION

B3

SUNDAY, JULY 10, 2022

Do we go out to dinner or eat at home to save money — because with everything going up, our disposable income is going down?

First, economic weather forecasters were predicting financial “storm clouds.” Now they’re saying we better get ready for a “financial hurricane.” But exactly what does that mean, and how do we prepare for it?

Some people are selling their homes to secure the profit they have made with the last housing boom, which by all accounts has slowed to a crawl. Other people are cutting back in smaller ways, which makes sense to me. Once people at the top of the financial food chain start making noises, it’s time we all start listening.

Of course, you can’t just live in fear, but you also can’t just

live your life in the same way.

Here in Southern California, gas prices near the airport are $8 a gallon and going up. How can you think of taking a summertime crosscountry drive or even a trip to Disneyland?

Tickets aren’t cheap, but I bet they are less than the cost of getting there these days.

Facing your fears will decrease your anxiety.

Saving money is a good idea, and finding a way to secure your income and savings is another. It looks like we are in for a recession. We survived one just over a decade ago, so the struggle will be familiar. Realizing this can help you see that you have the ability and fortitude to get through yet another worldwide shake-up.

Knowing that you avoided or survived COVID-19 should also

give you some confidence. Adding financial security to your list of “things to watch out for” will help you get your head and heart into the right place to get through this next difficult time.

Hey, hopefully I’m wrong, but we all see prices going up and up. It’s on the news every single night. Is that mentally getting us used to the idea? It has been my experience that once prices go up, they seldom come down anytime soon.

Barton Goldsmith, Ph.D., is an award-winning therapist and humanitarian. He is also a columnist, the author of seven books, and a blogger for PsychologyToday.com with nearly 27 million readers. He practices in Santa Barbara and Los Angeles and is available for video sessions. Reach him at barton@ bartongoldsmith.com. His column appears Sundays and Tuesdays in the News-Press.

Busy concert season at Lobero Theatre

Lobero LIVE to present everyone from The Blasters to Leo Kottke and Suzanne Vega

By KATHERINE ZEHNDER NEWS-PRESS STAFF WRITER

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The Blasters and guest Dave Alvin will perform at 7:30 p.m Aug. 6 at the Lobero Theatre 33 E. Canon Perdido St., Santa Barbara.

The Blasters are known for expressing the diverse musical legacy a news release said is best described by the title of the band’s first album: “American Music.”

From early days growing up in Downey under the tutelage of T-Bone Walker and Big Joe Turner, to their emergence as central figures in the eclectic Los Angeles punk/rock scene of the early 1980s, The Blasters now enjoy their current status as internationally-renowned influences in their own right.

The band’s 1980 debut album has been hailed as a powerful collection of fresh, distinctive performances that shattered the artificial boundaries between blues, rockabilly, country, R&B and roc k’n roll. Blasters’ concerts have been described as “a cross between Creedence and the Clash.”

“Fun On Saturday Night (Rip Cat Records),” the Blasters’ sixth studio album released in 2012, featured 12 tracks, which extended the band’s legacy of classic recordings.

Today’s Blasters include vocalist/guitarist Phil Alvin, drummer Bill Bateman, bassist John Bazz and guitarist Keith Wyatt. The band reflects influences that range from George Jones and Carl Perkins to Howlin’ Wolf, James Brown and Bo Diddley.

Since forming The Blasters with his brother Phil in 1979, Dave Alvin left the band in 1986 to embark on a long, critically acclaimed solo career, but will be reuniting with the group for this rare 40th anniversary concert.

Tickets cost $49 for Section A and $106 for VIP seats, which include a pre-show reception with drinks and hors d’oeuvres. To purchase, go to www.lobero.org or call the Lobero at 805-963-0761.

The program is presented by Lobero Live and Earl Minnis.

Here’s the schedule for other Lobero LIVE shows from now through early October.

July 13: Corinne Bailey Rae, with guest star Jensen McRae, will perform at 7:30 p.m.

The two-time Grammy winner

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shot to stardom with her No. 1 British debut album, featuring the global hits “Put Your Records On” and “Like A Star.” Ms. Bailey Rae continues to collaborate and perform with artists across musical genres, including Mary J Blige, Al Green, Herbie Hancock, Paul McCartney, Stevie Wonder and more. See www.lobero.org/ events/corinne-bailey-rae.

July 30: Leo Kottke will perform at 7:30 p.m.

The famed solo acoustic guitarist is known for a fingerpicking style that draws on blues, jazz and folk music, and for syncopated, polyphonic melodies.

Mr. Kottke has recorded more than 30 albums that showcase his barnstorming fretwork and quirky songwriting. The two-time

Grammy nominee is a master of the guitar, and his playing has influenced generations of musicians and listeners. See www. lobero.org/events/leo-kottke-2.

Aug. 11: Hot Tuna Acoustic will perform at 7:30 p.m.

Jorma Kaukonen and Jack Casady started Hot Tuna as a side project during their Jefferson Airplane days. The band members were honored with Lifetime Achievement Awards at the 2016 Grammys. And three-time Grammy winner Justin Guip lets the song dictate his drumming style. See ww.lobero.org/events/anevening-with-hot-tuna-acoustic.

Sept. 2: Benoit will perform at 7:30 p.m.

The Grammy-nominated singer, songwriter and guitarist

email: kzehnder@newspress.com

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COURTESY PHOTO

Acclaimed acoustic guitarist Leo Kottke will perform July 30 at the Lobero Theatre.

has built a 30-plus year career on the foundation of his gritty and soulful Delta swamp blues.

Along the way, he has acquired a devoted legion of fans as well as five blues awards, including BB King Entertainer of the Year (twice) and an induction into The Louisiana Music Hall of Fame.

See www.lobero.org/events/tabbenoit.

Sept. 28: “An Intimate Evening of Songs and Stories with Suzanne Vega” will take place at 7:30 p.m. Sept. 28. Ms. Vega’s songs have tended to focus on city life, ordinary people and realworld subjects. The program is presented by Lobero LIVE and Earl Minnis Presents. See www. lobero.org/events/suzanne-vega.

Sept. 30: Get The Led Out will perform at 7:30 p.m.

The Philadelphia-based band, which consists of six veteran musicians, is known for its highenergy concerts of Led Zeppelin music. See www.lobero.org/events/ get-the-led-out-2.

Oct. 7: The Wallflowers will perform at 8 p.m.

The Wallflowers are known as one of rock’s most dynamic and purposeful bands. “Exit Wounds,” the group’s latest studio offering, finds the Grammy-winning band’s signature sound intact, even as Jakob Dylan, Bob Dylan’s son, surrounds himself with a fresh cast of musicians.

The program is presented by Lobero LIVE and Earl Minnis Presents. See www.lobero.org/ events/the-wallflowers-2.

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The Lobero LIVE series will feature a variety of musicians this summer and fall at the Lobero Theatre.

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To Advertise in the Automotive Dealer Directory call 805-564-5230!

B4

NEWS

SANTA BARBARA NEWS-PRESS

ARTISTRY

Continued from Page B1

­

­

SUNDAY, JULY 10, 2022

YOU’RE INVITED!

the magic of color and I wanted to learn and become such a ‘magician.’ “ His son, who was born in 1999 in Ukraine, studied graphic design at the Zaporizhzhya National University, graduating in 2020.

He is a prolific calligraphy artist specializing in creating murals in public buildings and community spaces. He also has more than 1,000 works on canvas.

As Russia was positioning for invasion, Mr. Zinovyev Jr. left Ukraine through Poland and joined his father in Santa Barbara in April.

Tatiana Zinovyez, a graduate of Pedagogical University, taught violin and piano before leaving the occupation.

“When I came to the United States, she remained in Ukraine to take care of the weak — my mother without legs and her father without legs. I am working as a caregiver in Santa Barbara, apparently to pay off a karmic debt if not to my parents, so to other seniors here in America,” said Mr. Zinovyez Sr. “Before moving to Santa Barbara, I lived and worked in Los Angeles, worked as an assistant cook, then a cook and also taught Ukrainian and drawing at a Ukrainian school on Saturday.”

Although he would like to return to Ukraine some day, Mr. Zinovyez Sr. said the “issue is very difficult for me. My grandfather once said to me the words that I now understand, ‘Sasha, where there are Ukrainians, there is Ukraine.’ But I do not have a final answer to your question now.

Sorry.”

Asked about his impressions of Santa Barbara, good and bad, he said, “I am from the small town of Vasylivna in the Zaporizhia region of Ukraine, and I am very comfortable in Santa Barbara — a quiet, cozy town with nice people and a pleasant climate.”

Proceeds from the art sale will be used for Ukrainian necessities such as first aid kits, helmets, body armor and walkie-talkies.

“We want to help as much as we can as we remember the millions of compatriots who are at the front with weapons in their hands and in the rear as well as in the occupied territories, resist and liberate our homeland,” said Mr. Zinovyez Sr.

The exhibit includes this painting, “Bird.”

“Hooligan” is among the art in the exhibit.

email: mmcmahon@newspress. com

Return to the fabulous ’50s!

SOCK HOP FRIDAY, JULY 15TH • 2:00PM Dust off your poodle skirts & saddle shoes and tap your toes to your favorite tunes.

Join us for ’50s-themed appetizers and refreshments.

While you’re here take a tour of our beautiful community. To make your reservation,

KENNETH SONG/NEWS-PRESS

Tatiana Zinovyev, who arrived June 25 after escaping the war in Ukraine, has reunited with her husband Olexandr Zinoyvez Sr. in Santa Barbara.

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PAGE

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Voices SANTA BARBARA NEWS-PRESS

IDEAS & COMMENTARY

GUEST OPINION ANDY CALDWELL: Supervisors and its accounting Board of Sgimmick/ C2

SUNDAY, JULY 10, 2022

DID YOU KNOW? Bonnie Donovan

Mayor Rowse provides great leadership

W

KENNETH SONG/NEWS-PRESS

Gas prices are displayed July 1 at the Speedway gas station at the corner of Castillo and Carrillo Streets in Santa Barbara. A week later, the average price in Santa Barbara County was $6.17 a gallon, according to Friday’s numbers from the American Automobile Association.

Gloomy U.S. economy and events of June 30

I

n Santa Barbara, “gloomy’ was the operative description for the foggy morning of June 30 — and the word fit the Biden economy in the U.S. What would end these “glooms?”

What happened on June 30?

Before 6 a.m., a spokesman, not important enough to be with the Biden delegation in Madrid, said there was a constructive meeting last Brent E. week in the Zepke White House The author with some lives in Santa leaders from Barbara. oil companies.

Was there another meeting besides the one that according to the executives accomplished nothing? The one where President Biden was too busy meeting with the “windmill” group to even walk down the hall to welcome them? The one where Energy Secretary Jennifer

L

ast week I wrote about what a great country the United States is, and it’s true. We are a great nation.

But this week I’m going to list 10 reasons we’re rapidly circling the drain toward becoming not the America our forefathers had envisioned. None on the list can be considered the very worst cause because they all contribute to our destruction.

1. Ask yourself, do you feel comfortable should our shores be invaded that our military would be strong enough to fend off a full-scale assault? This is in no way disparaging the men and women in our military. I have no doubt they would do all they can to protect the country they swore to serve.

What I’m concerned about is how our top generals are spending more time on military critical race

COURTESY PHOTOS

President Joe Biden

Interior Secretary Deb Haaland

Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm

Granholm ignored the list of suggestions sent by the American Petroleum Institute. The one that informed the secretary that many of the regulations promulgated in 2021, which set the record for the most ever number of new regulations, were preventing the production of oil?

At the NATO Summit in Madrid, President Biden said Americans would have to pay the high price for gasoline for as long as the Ukrainian war continued. (He blames everyone but himself for inflation.) Later White House economic adviser Brain Dees said on CNN (where else?) that high

prices at the pump are a price Americans will have to pay for the future of “liberal world order.” Did CNN ask him to define a “liberal world order?” The president not talking to oil executives’ part of his plan to end fossil fuels?

In Madrid, President Biden saying the U.S. had lower inflation

than any other country must have puzzled the Spaniards as in May their inflation of 8.3% was the same as the U.S. and below many, such as Turkey at 70%; Argentina, 58%; the Netherlands, 9.6%; the United Kingdom, 9%, and Venezuela, 222% (which should make Mr. Biden’s request for oil from the country interesting).

President Biden read from his script that he was “proposing” to put a cap on the price that countries would pay for Russian oil that, of course, private companies would enforce. What happened to his proposal to ban Russian oil?

He “announced” that he will continue to release the oil from the Strategic Oil Reserve without mentioning that President Trump had refilled it after the ObamaBiden years had decreased it.

He repeated that he will “ask” Congress to “temporarily end the tax on gasoline at the pump.” (Did he forget Congress had declined?).

Is President Biden aware that Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat, is increasing our state Please see ZEPKE on C4

10 things wrong with America theory and playing white privilege crime because you’re just going through a difficult period. Crime ranks. Instead of trying to jumble and murder have reached levels the heads of the enlisted, they where it’s safer to live in Mexico, should stay focused on creating a (and Americans are moving there). fighting force, not a PC force.

The insane “wokeness” 2. The same holds true ideology trumps all for our schools. I never common sense, and skin hear school boards color circumvents laws. I talk about education. would never have thought Instead, they’re teaching you could kill someone white kids are bad, we and not be charged with need gender-neutral murder. bathrooms, or that at 4. America used to be age 12, you have no idea Henry called a superpower. what you want to be in Schulte We were No. 1 in every life, but you’re already department. But we’ve certain you want to be The author another gender. And lives in Solvang allowed a handful of cultist activists to worm when parents voice their their way into government concerns, the highest and impose their hate for oil law enforcement agencies place companies. moms on the same level as the When this superpower struggles Taliban. to keep the lights on because “the 3. If you’re a real criminal, sky is falling” propaganda carries you’re coddled, released and more weight than the security allowed to continue your life of

of the nation, our “leaders” are failing at their jobs. Fire them.

5. Liberal privilege is so prevalent; it makes the term white privilege meaningless. From Hillary Clinton to Hunter Biden, no crime is too big that it won’t get buried and ignored because the top law enforcement agencies are just as corrupt as the rest of the government.

If you’re a leftist, progressive, Antifa, BLM, Democrat, son of the president, “you’re in the clear.”

No laws apply to you. But if you’re a conservative and you break wind, the FBI will place you in handcuffs.

6. Which segues to one of the worst flaws in America today, the liberal media.

The media is beyond corrupt and only answers to the left.

They manage and manipulate the news, lie, do whatever it takes to hide the truth and/or create their

own truth if that helps to bring down anyone with whom they disagree. Our mainstream media is a communist organization bent on the destruction of the country, making even China or Russia and Ukraine for that matter, look good. The media is the worst thing plaguing America today.

7. If we’re such a superpower, how come our streets are filled, riddled, overwhelmed with homeless people? And we allow it to happen and continue.

Billions of dollars have been tossed toward the homelessness problem, and the only ones benefiting are the corrupt homeless organizations who pay themselves fortunes while the streets fill up with human feces.

Money has not fixed a thing.

Nor the endless lip surface from politicians, who are part of the Please see SCHULTE on C4

e certainly applaud the much needed leadership that carries a vision for the long-term future instead of the reactionary Band-Aids we have suffered with over the last decade in city government.

Thank God for Santa Barbara Mayor Randy Rowse, who said the ad hoc committee comes with no ideas to enhance State Street and just kicks the can down the road.

They are between a rock and a hard place. They cannot reconcile themselves to meeting the practical demands of the citizens of Santa Barbara with the mandates of the Democratic National Committee.

Any restaurant with a parklet wants to keep it for the obvious reasons: It doubles their seating capacity and enhances their income. But we cannot let their interests supersede the needs and the shared traditions of the people of Santa Barbara.

As Mayor Rowse says, we can incorporate what is good for restaurants with the prevailing greater good. But we are now graced with a mayor having the common sense of a longterm successful business owner who understands both sides of any issue that the city faces — from homelessness to State Street vacancies. And he understands how the issues are interconnected.

Mayor Rowse duly notes the mayhem that presently occurs on State Street as a holdover from the previous leadership, whose neglect of the problems allowed this condition to exist.

Pedestrians are being hit by EBikes, and skateboarders are illegally present in the downtown corridor.

Thankfully our mayor is addressing these problems and insisting on real solutions.

He expresses his disappointment with the lack of resolve from the Ad Hoc committee, “for not doing its job by providing concrete proposals and performance timelines based on ideas generated by staff.”

He went on to say during a News-Press interview last week, “… I do not think the council should bounce around concepts. We are supposed to receive and ratify and modify those concepts, not brainstorm.”

Mayor Rowse says that continuation of the status quo does not make any sense to him. We could not agree more. At least our mayor has mustered the courage and went on record dissenting over the Santa Barbara City Council’s decision to kick the can down the road when it comes to the issue of State Street and parklets. Maybe we have finally found someone in local government worthy of a position in politics.

We have determined two major ways that lead us down the road to destruction whether that be on a local, state, or a national level.

All too often, misguided and potentially unlawful or overreaching unilateral decisions are being made Please see DONOVAN on C4

James Buckley IS TAKING A BREAK

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SANTA BARBARA NEWS-PRESS

VOICES

SUNDAY, JULY 10, 2022

LETTERS TO THE NEWS-PRESS

Wendy McCaw Arthur von Wiesenberger

Co-Publisher Co-Publisher

GUEST OPINION

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Fred Rogers

What would Mr. Rogers say?

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County supervisors’ ginormous accounting gimmick

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he Santa Barbara achieved a 90% funding level County Board for the pension fund. The of Supervisors outstanding returns included recently received what many believe to be an alla status report on time whopping 25% return last the Santa Barbara County year.

Employee Retirement System, So that is the good news. also known as SBCERS. The bad news is that what SBCERS is a semigoes up must come down. autonomous agency that covers For the moment, the pension the 4,300 employees (and 4,906 fund appears to be 90% current retirees) of the county funded, but that doesn’t tell the in addition to the employees whole story. Back in 2008, the and retirees of a few stock market took such local special districts. a deep dive the fund There are a few lost over $1 billion! things you should Since 2008, the know about our county county has had government pension to invest several system. First, it hundred million guarantees government dollars more than Andy Caldwell employees a percentage they would normally of their final average contribute to keep the salary for the rest of beneficiaries whole. their lives. The amount of the And they won’t be done with pension is a function of the those payments for another employee’s years of service and eight years, that is, unless the the final highest year’s salary market tanks again! multiplied by 2-3% depending What is bothersome here on the terms of the employee’s is that because the fund is union contract. temporarily at 90%, county On the surface, it appears supervisors are asserting that sheriff deputies and that the pension plan is firefighters get the highest “sustainable.” That statement pensions (which I am is based on nothing less than a supportive of). But that is snapshot accounting gimmick. misleading because many of If the plan was sustainable, the rank-and-file employees the county would not have of the county also get Social had to augment the fund with Security in addition to their hundreds of millions of dollars county pension (I don’t believe over a 20-year period. they should get both!).

It is noteworthy that 23 Added together, Social department heads, including Security and a government five who are elected, can pension put most all employees make up to $244,572 per year on par with sheriff deputies and they want a raise! Their and firefighters with respect to salaries are so high, that many pensions. will have a retirement that is Another thing you need the envy of millionaires! to know is that the pension Somebody in the private payments are mostly sector would have to sock away dependent upon stock market millions to get the same payout returns. The employees rarely they will receive. Accordingly, pay more than a few percent our elected leaders are of their current salaries into enmeshed both personally and the pension fund. The bulk ethically in the unsustainable of the payout comes from salary-pension predicament. investments.

It is a tragedy and travesty However, over the long that our elected leaders are term, returns have been more committed to county insufficient to cover the longemployees than they are to term liabilities. This requires the interests of the taxpayers that the county (the taxpayers) who elected them in part cover investment shortfalls by to safeguard the peoples’ contributing an average of 41.4 finances. cents towards pension costs for The system is clearly every dollar in regular payroll. unsustainable, and county All told, the average cost, services and infrastructure fully loaded, of a county are being shortchanged as a employee is $160,000 per year. result.

The total cost of salaries and benefits is now $760 million per Andy Caldwell is the COLAB year. executive director and host of The report, which the county “The Andy Caldwell Show,” supervisors received, indicated airing 3 to 5 p.m. weekdays on that several outstanding years KZSB AM 1290, the News-Press of investment returns have radio station.

emember “Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood,” that wonderful program for children by a man who truly understood and cared for them? If he could see what is happening with the indoctrination of our children today, his heart would be broken.

The destructive agenda that divides children by the color of their skin, to make them oppressed or oppressors. Creating an endless list of pronouns and making youngsters doubt the reality of their birth identities.

Trying to separate children from their parents who love them, by secretly encouraging rebellion and dissatisfaction with who they are.

Daniel, the tiger hand puppet, said, “I’ve been wondering if I was a mistake.” How many children are being taught this today? Lady Evelyn replied, “I think you’re just fine exactly the way you are.”

They then sang a duet as she encouraged him. Those who would make them feel less than who they are make the greatest mistake.

Also from Mr. Rogers: “What’s

essential in life is invisible to the eye. Let’s make goodness itself attractive.” He respected childhood and in times of tragedy did his best to help children cope with the pain they witnessed and felt.

Where are parents and teachers whose duty is to teach, train and encourage children in truth?

Children are a gift from God to be cherished and raised with love, respecting each one. As our companies and culture bow down to the destructive woke agenda, it is time to restore the values we used to hold dear.

Come on, parents, our only legacy is our children, and they are the only ones who may be able to restore our nation someday.

Gretchen Kieding Solvang

Supreme Court should do away with separation of church and state

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ith the overturning of previous decisions by the

current Constitutionalists in the SCOTUS, the Everson Supreme Court precedent from 1947 should be the next one to go. The Everson case created the nonexistent “separation of church and state” concept, which is not in the Constitution.

The only issues with regards to religion addressed by the Constitution are 1) Government cannot force one to join a religion, 2) government cannot keep one from practicing the religion of your choice, 3) there can be no religious test for holding public office. That is it. Sometimes it is advantageous for the government and religious institutions to interact.

Example: In 1782, Congress realized that there were not enough Bibles for the citizens of the U.S.A. So Congress commissioned a team to publish a Bible in Philadelphia. The Congress ended up distributing/ selling 20,000 Bibles to the citizens of the U.S. because there was a need identified by the Congress.

If the founders who wrote the Constitution could provide for the distribution of Bibles, then all of the present day “separation of church and state” concept is not constitutional. Hopefully the SCOTUS will soon realize this and do away with the “separation of church and state” nonsense.

Greg Hammel Goleta

The Biden legacy

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hat will be Joe Biden’s legacy as the 47th president of the United States? Did he put America first? Or did he put America last? Did he do what is best for America? Or did he do what was bad for America?

Some pertinent questions come to mind. Why is Biden allowing the southern border to be invaded?

Why won’t he let America be energy independent? Why is he causing increasing inflation by massive overspending? Why won’t he stand up to China, who wants to destroy us? Why does he want to make a deal with Iran, who wants to obliterate the U.S. and Israel? Why is he sending our oil reserves overseas when there are record setting costs for gas in the U.S.A.?

Time for a reality check, America. Will Joe Biden’s legacy be that he wanted to destroy America and all that it stands for? If so, what are we going to do about it? Is it time to impeach?

Diana Thorn Carpinteria

Democrats don’t understand their policies are the problem Editor’s note: Dr. Bradley Allen is a pediatric heart surgeon, visiting clinical professor of surgery and the Republican candidate running against U.S. Rep. Salud Carbajal, D-Santa Barbara, in the Nov. 8 election.

admit that raising the cost of transportation affects everything, since all those products we buy now cost more to produce and get from wherever they’re made to our homes and store shelves on wheels that cost more to run.

But back to the gas-tax holiday ou know how you for a moment as an instructive know that Democrats example of the Democrats’ have no idea that cluelessness about what their own policies ordinary Americans face every created the worst day. Neither the president nor inflation in more than 40 years anyone in Washington apparently and that they have no idea how to understands that the federal combat it? Because every excise tax is about 18 cents solution they propose is, a gallon, so the savings on in practice, inflationary. an average fill-up would Take, for example, total $2.50. Given that the an idea President Joe price of gas has more than Biden’s White House has doubled since he took sent up as a trial balloon: office, a 10 buck-a-month a gas-tax holiday. This is savings is as laughable as the same president who the White House’s bragging on his first day in office last year that the average canceled completion of July Fourth barbecue a pipeline that would would cost 16 cents less have gushed oil here than the previous year. from Canada, while (It was $12 more this year Bradley simultaneously removing than last.)

Allen sanctions against Still, for the sake of Russia’s Nord Stream 2 argument, let’s say that that The author pipeline, a gigantic gift savings did indeed make lives in to Russian President Summerland a difference in people’s Vladimir Putin at our pockets. The result would expense. be inflationary, because President Biden also canceled lowering the cost of something oil leases in Alaska and the Gulf raises demand for it, which is of Mexico, increased regulations how we got here in the first place: on existing leases, and made trillions of dollars printed by the clear that his long-term goal is to federal government — money we destroy the fossil-fuel industry. He don’t have and will be paying back said exactly those words on the for hundreds of years — chasing campaign trail, and was cheered too few goods is the textbook on by every elected Democrat. So cause of inflation. It’s Econ 101, naturally the price of gas began and you’d hope our Democraticrising literally the day he and elected betters in Washington the Democratic Congress was would know that. elected. Those additional costs When the gas-tax-holiday trial were quickly reflected in higher balloon crashed on take-off, overall energy costs, from natural President Biden then tweeted a gas to electricity. Yet he and the plea to gas station owners to lower Democrats wonder why the price of their prices. We’re in a time of everything has gone up and blame war, he said, and their implied everyone but themselves, from Mr. lack of patriotism was hurting Putin to “greedy” corporations. the country. That nonsensical They don’t understand or can’t thought was greeted by the

Y

official Communist Party of China Twitter account as a righteous takedown of capitalism. What Mr. Biden appears not to know is that the average gas station’s owner typically clears about two cents a gallon — or one-ninth what the federal government takes per gallon.

Of course, that one-ninth is nothing compared to what taxes and fees cost car owners in California: almost $1.20 per gallon.

Which explains why Californians pay the highest price in the country for gas.

Here’s how that breaks down: federal excise tax of 18 cents; a state excise tax of now 54 cents, raised three cents on July 1; state sales tax of, on average, 8+%; plus three different environmental fees that total 39 cents per gallon. And this doesn’t include the additional sunk costs for refining according to California’s standards unique to the state, and probably now obsolete, that already raise the cost of gas here.

Which takes us to Gov. Gavin Newsom, who expects to be reelected in November before running for president as a progressive Democrat’s Democrat soon thereafter, notwithstanding that the quality of life in our state has declined by every metric since he took office. The governor could, with the stroke of an executive order’s pen, lower the price of a gallon of gas in this state by a dollar. But instead of that tactic, he decided to send out checks to most Californians of as much as $1,050 in a program he’s calling inflation relief.

Do I need to point out that sending people money like that is to inflation relief what gasoline is to firefighting?

Folks, the time has come to elect representatives who understand how the real-world works, aren’t beholden to special interests like public employee unions, and won’t be afraid to stand up on behalf of ordinary Americans.

Josh Hammer

Biden discovers realistic case for U.S.-Saudi alliance

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resident Joe Biden, who faces four-decadehigh inflation and record-high gasoline prices, is set to depart for the Middle East next week.

As part of his trip, he will visit the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. He may not explicitly beseech the kingdom’s precocious crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman (MBS), for an increase in oil output, but the timing of this trip — amid consumer jitters at the pump and destabilized global commodities markets — is surely more than mere happenstance. Oil production, and perhaps the simmering Iranian nuclear threat, will surely dominate the conversation.

It seems President Biden has had a change of heart. After all, Mr. Biden’s trip comes two years after a presidential campaign in which he pledged to make the Saudis “pay the price, and make them in fact the pariah that they are.”

At the time, President Biden was channeling the ginned up indignation directed against the Saudis, and MBS in particular, due to the fact that Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi — a Saudiborn journalist who had a falling out with Riyadh and subsequently fell under rival Qatar’s sprawling ambit of influence — was killed in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, Turkey, in 2018. (While Mr. Khashoggi’s death was tragic, it is still worth pointing out that he was a former Osama bin Laden comrade, a supporter of Hamas’ jihad against Israel and a lifelong unrepentant Islamist.)

Now a year and a half into his tenure, President Biden’s lofty campaign rhetoric decrying Riyadh, intended to woo devotees of the Obama-era effort to “realign” America’s Middle East involvement away from our traditional regional allies and toward Iran and the Muslim Brotherhood, has met an immovable object: reality.

Inflation is through the roof.

Prices at the pump are gouging low- and middle-income consumers already bedeviled by stagnant wages. What’s more, on the geopolitical stage, Tehran’s revolutionary theocrats race ever closer to a nuclear weapon. Confronted with these particular domestic and foreign crises, who better to call for help than the House of Saud?

President Biden’s trip comes not a moment too soon. The kingdom has cozied up of late, in the absence of a steady American hand, to our Chinese archfoe. Yet many loud voices within Mr. Biden’s own party disagree with his attempted rapprochement with Saudi Arabia. Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Burbank, said last month, no doubt focusing on L’Affaire Khashoggi: “Until Saudi Arabia makes a radical change in terms of (its) human rights, I wouldn’t want anything to do with him.”

Others on the party’s Tehranmollycoddling far-left, such as Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., have criticized President Biden’s trip by invoking the Saudis’ involvement in the current conflict in Yemen against Iranfunded Houthi rebels.

The cornucopia of hostile anti-Saudi rhetoric on the liberal internationalist Left, combined with no small degree of similar animus emanating from some on the neoconservative Right, is predicated upon the presumption that a Western conception of “human rights” ought to play a leading role in U.S. diplomacy and statecraft.

There is no other intelligible reason to object to cordial U.S. relations with the reformed, MBS-era kingdom, which has come a very long way from the Islamist-supporting, Wahhabist Please see HAMMER on C4

SANTA BARBARA NEWS-PRESS

VOICES

C3

SUNDAY, JULY 10, 2022

America, the globalist grift

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hate to snuff out any postIndependence Day fervor that you still might be enjoying. Oh, well. “Wet Blanket” is my middle name. All the annual Old Glorywaving rituals and public displays of patriotic affection can’t change this bitter fact: Our once-sovereign nation has become nothing more than a morbidly obese cash cow for what the Biden administration now openly calls the “liberal world order.”

Higher gas prices are just the tip of the iceberg. It’s our posterity paying the globalist pipers. In the new “liberal world order” (which is really just the same old Bush family “New World Order” of more than three decades ago), homegrown children’s needs are subjugated to the hopes and dreams of the children of the rest of the world.

Stick with me and follow an open-borders bouncing ball that demonstrates how multinational elites exploit America Last — with the brazen complicity of our own U.S. government, nonprofits and corporations. As always, we must follow the money to find the truth. Let’s dig deeper behind this headline: “Former American Hebrew Academy will house unaccompanied immigrant children.”

According to WFMY-TV news day of large muscle activity,” in Greensboro, N.C., a failed “structured leisure time activities,” international school venture called psychotherapy and lawyers. Lots of the American Hebrew Academy lawyers. entered into a lucrative five-year HHS now operates a network lease agreement this of 100 state-licensed week with the U.S. shelters in 17 states and Department of Health has provided care to a and Human Services’ whopping total of over Office of Refugee 340,000 illegal alien Resettlement. The children. (For perspective: plan will turn AHA’s That’s a population roughly sprawling campus into equivalent to the city of a tax-subsidized shelter Anaheim or Aurora, Colo.)

Michelle Malkin In 2017, the budget was for illegal alien youth.

The “unaccompanied $1.4 billion. In 2022, the children” will be Biden administration has shipped from Mexico starting requested an astronomical $3.2 this month and will be treated billion in funding for the program. to a comprehensive array of Fun fact: The Biden benefits exclusively showered on administration rerouted $2 billion the offspring of southern border in COVID-19 funds for Americans violators. to the illegal alien youth housing I exposed the HHS/ORR kiddie boondoggle. catch-and-release racket in my Those tax funds will subsidize a 2019 book, “Open Borders Inc.” panoply of for-profit and nonprofit Thanks to a liberal Bill Clintonventures serving foreigners’ appointed judge in Southern children on American soil, which California and convoluted classin turn provides bottomless action litigation dating back to 1997 inducements for countless on behalf of illegals spearheaded hundreds of thousands of other by the American Civil Liberties families around the world to fork Union, the feds created new rights over coyote fees to send even more and standards for illegal alien unaccompanied minors across minor shelter care. our borders, who then move into Clinton immigration bureaucrats the HHS/ORR facilities, which agreed to provide food, clothing, are served by nearly 50 other personal grooming items, organizations at a cost of over medical and dental care, family $34,000 per child, according to the planning, “at least one hour a Capital Research Center.

So while you’re worrying about formula, diaper and food shortages for your own kiddos, rest assured: Open Borders, Inc. is hard at work spending your money on everyone else’s babies, toddlers and teens.

Let us peer further into the defunct “American Hebrew Academy,” which is now reinventing itself as part of the Biden leasing scheme as the “Greensboro Piedmont Academy Influx Care Facility for UC (unaccompanied minors)” and the “Greensboro Global Academy.”

The AHA was in a “financial death spiral” for years after its profligate founder and aviation reinsurance mogul, Maurice Sabbah, threw $100 million down a black hole pursuing his dream of building a world-renowned boarding school in 2001 that he envisioned as “an international destination in elite Jewish education,” according to The Forward.

But that year, an arbitration panel ruled that Sabbah’s aviation reinsurance business had committed fraud and “willful and deliberate misconduct” by skimming off hundreds of millions of dollars for its founders, leaving Japanese insurance companies high and dry when 9/11 happened.

The decision yielded a $400 million settlement. The ripped-off companies then sued and settled with AHA to recoup purloined funds. The operators of the

academy tried to salvage the 100acre campus — replete with an $18 million athletic field, 22-acre lake, 16 dorms, 34 staff resident apartments, natatorium, climbing walls and high-tech gadgetry in every classroom — by rebranding as an “international school” targeting Middle Eastern and Asian students.

The goal: bringing “globalization” to Greensboro.

The “American Hebrew Academy” turned to a “private” education company called Puxin in communist China for a $26 million loan in 2019 for help. In May 2022, the New York Stock Exchange moved to suspend trading in Puxin and delist it amid longstanding allegations of fraud. As Judicial Watch notes, “the money HHS is paying in rent will likely be used to pay back the Chinese company.”

God bless America? God help us from the globalist grifters making bank off whatever is still left of this country, if that is what you call it.

Michelle Malkin’s email address is michellemalkinInvestigates@ protonmail.com. To find out more about Michelle Malkin and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit www. creators.com.

Copyright 2022 by Creators.com.

Hong Kong illustrates terrible truth about China

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e must all hang together, or, most assuredly, we shall all hang

separately.”

With those words, Benjamin Franklin urged Americans to remain united in the face of Great Britain’s enormous power.

July 4, American Independence Arthur I. Day, resonates Cyr in the grim “celebration” of the 25th anniversary of China receiving authority over Hong Kong from Britain.

On July 1, China President Xi Jinping briefly visited Hong Kong, praising the agreement on “one country, two systems” by which Britain ceded control.

Actually, China has been ruthless in obliterating political freedom.

Knowledgeable Benedict Rogers of The Wall Street Journal has detailed the brutal, bloody continuing repression.

Franklin was a newspaper publisher, among many enterprises, and his inspiring words apply directly to the media.

In August 2020, police arrested influential entrepreneur and freedom advocate Lai Chee-Ying (known by the name Jimmy Lai), founder of the popular Hong Kong newspaper Apple Daily and media company Next Digital. Beijing forced these companies out of business. Earlier, Mr. Lai created the successful clothing company Giordano.

Police seized Mr. Lai at his home, then took him to his newsroom in handcuffs, a calculated public display involving 200 officers. Simultaneously, authorities arrested others.

These thugs echo the repression

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by the Nazi Party in Germany and the communists of the Soviet Union, in an earlier era.

However, this is not Germany in the 1930s, or even the Cold War in the Soviet Union. Twentiethcentury totalitarians did not have to face pervasive public media.

Today, anyone with a cell phone can disseminate information.

Almost immediately, witnesses transmitted the shocking Hong Kong events worldwide.

Pointed editorial commentaries accompanied visual imagery.

The employees of Mr. Lai’s

publications were not silenced, quite the reverse. As police rifled through desks and seized files, their police-state tactics unfolded in real time on Facebook Live.

This is stark evidence of Beijing’s extreme repression in Hong Kong. In June 2020, China made public a harsh new national security law. The law was moved through the rubber-stamp national legislature and signed in secrecy.

The United States opposes this despicable, disturbing dictatorship. In 2020, the Trump

administration ended Hong Kong’s favored trade status.

The Biden administration has continued this policy In July 2019, Mr. Lai visited the United States. He met with Vice President Mike Pence and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.

Meanwhile, Britain’s government announced Hong Kong residents holding British passports and their dependents may seek citizenship. The British colony became a “semiautonomous administrative region” of China in 1997. Beijing

today has ended that freedom, and President Xi’s hypocrisy is obvious.

Other governments should penalize China enablers, and public discussion of their business practices is essential. In 2019, Google announced termination of Project Dragonfly, a China censorship tool, after tremendous criticism, including from within the powerful corporation. Other U.S. companies, including Cisco Systems and Microsoft, have also aided China’s dictatorship.

In terms of economic influence and military power, vastly larger China dwarfs both Hong Kong and Taiwan. Yet economic realities provide opportunities for positive leverage on Beijing.

U.S. government leaders must reinforce actions to date with a sustained strategy to restrain China’s repression, and expansion. The NATO summit in Madrid for the first time has included government heads from Asia, specifically Australia, Japan, New Zealand and South Korea.

Beijing has been deterred before. Today, global commercial as well as political tides are moving in the direction of freedom.

Ben Franklin and associates would support Jimmy Lai and his courageous associates, and so must we.

Arthur I. Cyr is author of “After the Cold War - American Foreign Policy, Europe and Asia” (NYU Press and Palgrave/Macmillan). He is also the director of the Clausen Center at Carthage College in Kenosha, Wisc., and a Clausen Distinguished Professor. He welcomes questions and comments at acyr@carthage.edu.

An ex-monk sheds light on striking down of Roe v. Wade

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aving spent 10 years the concept of “reverence for the as a Catholic monk, book”. Muslims call themselves I may have a unique “people of the book,” the Koran. perspective on the Christians and Jews revere the U.S. Supreme Court Bible. decision to strike down Roe v.

Since “the book” is “sacred,” Wade. many believe that every word Following up on my recent in it is literally true. Many have article, here I look at never read these books, possible causes for such nor confronted the parts a cruel decision. My in them that specifically conclusion is that the contradict other parts. judges who favored this Some especially favor decision are trapped the passage from Paul: by a commitment to the “Women, be subject to your concept of “the sacred husbands,” a remnant of book” or “sacred text” male dominance over the rather than to simply eons.

Frank make decisions that are I suspect that this Sanitate kind. concept of “sacred text” The repeal was is a model for the “strict The author passed by a court lives in Santa constructionist” judges of consisting of six the Supreme Court as well.

Barbara Catholics, two These are the judges who Protestants and one limit their interpretation Jew. The imbalance of Catholics, of the law to the exact wording of especially conservative Catholics, the law, the Constitution. Many of is not an accident. It was part the Supreme Court judges seem of the Republican plan to stack to be advocates of both texts — the court with judges who the Bible and the Constitution. would be likely to repeal that However, just because someone law. The purpose is to get more says a document, or a book, or a conservative Republicans voted pope is infallible, it doesn’t mean into office. It may be that this they are. tactic ends up doing just the The Constitution is a great opposite.

Many religions are based on Please see SANITATE on C4

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John Stossel

Change the Constitution?

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atching people fight over what the Constitution means, I ask people, “If you could change the Constitution, what would you change?”

“The forefathers knew what they were doing,” said one woman.

But the Constitution originally accepted slavery. It’s good that we can amend it.

So what should we change?

“Add a balanced budget amendment,” suggests Glenn Beck.

David Boaz of the Cato Institute recommends 18year terms for the Supreme Court. “Maybe confirmation fights would be less bitter and partisan.”

Others suggest term limits for Congress.

Stossel TV’s Mike Ricci takes the idea further. “If your father, mother, siblings, uncle, cousins were elected to federal office, you can’t be.” That would curb Kennedy/Bush-like dynasties.

Several people said they want to eliminate the commerce clause. It gives the government virtually unlimited power over the economy, complains tech journalist Naomi Brockwell, “forcing people to participate in federal pension programs ... enabling the War on Drugs.”

Some want an amendment to stop the growth of Washington regulatory agencies like the Food and Drug Administration, Environmental Protection Agency, and Federal Communications Commission.

Economist Don Boudreaux calls them “a grave threat to Americans’ liberties and prosperity.”

The U.S. Supreme Court took a small step in restraining their power last week when it ruled that EPA bureaucrats can’t set emission rules all by themselves. Congress has to vote on that.

Rep. Ro Khanna, D-Calif, proposes overturning Citizens United. He says that would stop those who “spend millions of dollars corrupting elections (and) would return our democracy to the town halls and citizen involvement that our founders envisioned.”

I doubt that. Limits on political speech increase insiders’ power.

Christina Martin of the Please see STOSSEL on C4

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Without a border, we don’t have a country SCHULTE

Continued from Page C1 problem.

8. Since when has changing your sex become such a central focus? How has trendy-to-be trans dominated our society so rapidly?

Since when have males decided to compete as a girl become normal?

And why have we allowed it to happen? This is not an attack on transgender people, but rather on who’s changing the rules of basic biology. Go back to school.

9. And speaking of girls, our newest addition to the Supreme Court, Justice Ketanji Jackson Brown, could not define what a woman was. The left went quiet, women’s rights groups put on hoodies. But boy, when the Supreme Court did away with Roe v. Wade, suddenly everyone was a woman. No one questioned what a female was.

Posters and the media distinctly defined female body parts making it pretty clear what a woman is. And where was the support for the men who could have babies and are they entitled to abortions?

10. The border. There’s no country on the entire planet who

DAVE MASON/NEWS-PRESS

Mayor Randy Rowse

DONOVAN

Continued from Page C1 by our leaders. The other one, equally destructive, is a dearth of leadership or the unwillingness to be proactive. One does not contradict the other.

An example of this unilateral decision-making is Gov. Gavin Newsom, who is moving to provide benefits to all Californians regardless of immigration status.

We imagine that he will be using our surplus that he garnered in this year’s budget and spending it on this agenda rather than addressing issues that affect our (legal residents;) quality of life present and future: homelessness, repairing infrastructure, building a meaningful statewide water distribution system, and/or returning it to the lawful abiding citizens of his state.

Here’s another overreaching decision. Gov. Newsom is at it again. Before it was his own dining experience at the French Laundry while the rest of us were given orders to stay home during COVID-19. Now it’s banning travel to states that don’t support his political position, while he goes to a state for which he has forbidden other Californians to go: Montana.

ZEPKE

Continued from Page C1 tax on gasoline? Is President Biden aware that “proposing,” “announcing” and “asking” are not action verbs?

Deb Haaland, the interior secretary that the president touted as the first Native American at the cabinet level, failed to meet the congressionally mandated program outlining proposed offshore lease sales over the next five years — the same program she promised the Senate on May 19. She also missed the deadline to plan future oil and gas leases sales. The next day, the Department of Interior submitted a plan to ban all drilling in the Atlantic and Pacific oceans.

Is the president “doing all that he can?”

In Madrid, President Biden announced that “what started as the Build Back Better notion (a “notion” because Congress

Is he buying property?

Besides ignoring our infrastructure and the sanctity of our borders, Gov. Newsom is now forbidding state employees to travel to any state in the union that is restricting LGBTQ+ legislation.

We agree with Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey, who responded, “It’s unfortunate California state employees won’t be able to travel here and visit all the businesses that have fled their state.”

Look for a ricochet to all these restrictions. That is the law of human nature. Americans will not be subjected to travel restrictions in general. If their ultimate goal is to control the populous, the pendulum will swing.

Did you know Carpinteria will now bill you for owning property above ground water? They keep adding fees to private property owners and wonder why rents go up. Yes, this will only be 10 or $20 depending on the size of your land, but the city of Carpinteria does this on many things: water and trash hikes, school bonds etc.

It’s another version of making property owners relinquish their mineral rights. They can tax you right off your property, and price you into the street and into government housing all done by

exorbitant increases in utilities.

Another huge issue right now facing Santa Barbara and other high-profile communities up and down the state is this fiasco called Pacaso. City Attorney Ariel Colonne, who is unwilling to step up and follow suit with other local communities to keep out Pacaso, refrains from taking action. What is Pacaso, you ask? It is fractional ownership in an estate, perhaps too costly for the normal family to own. It is an oversized, overaggrandized timeshare much like a vacation rental. Advertised as the modern way to own a second home, responsibility shared, eight owners perhaps.

For example, here in SB, a $12 million property in Montecito was advertised as an investment opportunity for a fractional timeshare. Strongly objecting neighbors placed “No Pacaso” signs everywhere, and the owners backed out of the deal. This is a fine example of community standing its ground and gleaning good and fair results to protect and preserve traditional neighborhoods.

Based upon discussion with several legal scholars and lawyers, the Roe vs. Wade decision that was made by the U.S. Supreme Court was the correct decision.

Rather than accepting the judicial branch’s decision on the matter, AOC, Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Gov. Newsom, and U.S. Rep. Salud Carbajal, D-Santa Barbara, have gone into protesting and whining mode. A dangerous precedent to set as the high court should always remain free of lobbying and influence.

Instead, they could have accepted the decision graciously and turned their attention to the fact that this simply returns the authority over these matters to the states. Exactly what Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg believed, that the states were the governing body to oversee this life and death issue.

never approved it) “morphed into the Partnership for the Global Infrastructure and Investment, to offer developing and middleincome countries better options to meet their infrastructure needs.” Removing any doubt of the funding, he continued “When the United States and the G-7 countries put skin in the game.”

Gosh, once again, like with the Paris Climate Accord, the president is end-running congressional approval or oversight to send money abroad for others to manage. Same theme in announcing a commitment for “$2 billion for a solar farm in Angola,” where he added “When I speak of ‘climate,’ I think of ‘jobs.”

Is he aware that solar panels are made in China?

President Biden announced that multiple countries were going to meet their contractual obligation to fund the NATO forces with at least 2% of their Gross Domestic Product. Is he aware that his party criticized President Trump when

he pushed for this?

President Biden promised more military aid to the Ukraine from a defense budget that he had not increased and from which he had “gifted” $85 billion, or 12% of the defense budget, to the terrorists in Afghanistan. The president said Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin “pledged” to send more military equipment to Ukraine in the next few days and that the U.S. “intends” to announce a commitment for more money for Ukraine. Is he aware that “pledges” and “intentions” cannot stop bullets or rockets? Or that our also buying Russian oil means we are funding both sides of the war?

The president used the NATO Summit to criticize the Supreme Court case Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Healthcare Organization that reduced the federal control, a no-no for Democrats, over abortions by returning it to the states. While this may be an important issue to him, speaking about it at the NATO Summit is

like the pastor I heard using the pulpit to tell his congregation about all his wife’s faults that were important to him. This was not his first time as previously from Scotland he interjected his complaints about Republicans.

What happened to his campaign theme of “being the great uniter?”

On June 30, it took the sun to eliminate the gloom in Santa Barbara. Will it take an election to eliminate it in the U.S.?

“Liberty, when it begins to take root, is a plant of rapid growth.

Life without liberty is like a body without spirit. Freedom is the open window through which pours the sunlight of the human spirit and human dignity.”

— March 2,1788, letter from George Washington to James Madison.

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

Brent E. Zepke is an attorney, arbitrator and author who lives in Santa Barbara. His website is OneheartTwoLivescom. wordpress.com. Formerly, he taught law and business at six universities and numerous professional conferences. He is the author of more than 100 articles and six books: “One Heart-Two Lives,” “Legal Guide to Human Resources,” “Business Statistics,” “Labor Law,” “Products and the Consumer” and “Law for NonLawyers.”

‘We’re all a micro government in our own way’

STOSSEL

Continued from Page C3 Pacific Legal Foundation wishes the Constitution did more to protect the rights of the individual. “How about a right to earn a living? How about a right to not have the government steal from you?”

But some young people told us they want to eliminate rights already in the Constitution, like free speech.

“Being able to speak your mind is important,” said one, “as long as it’s not in a way that is going to be long-term harmful to people.”

Ouch. Who decides what is harmful? Will he get to censor my videos?

The Bill of Rights also includes

the right to bear arms. Babylon Bee’s Kyle Mann would add some lines to clarify that “you can’t pass laws restricting ownership of firearms.”

Others want to get rid of the Second Amendment. “We have police officers. We have a military,” said one woman in Times Square. “So do we really need them (firearms)? No.” I’m glad another person corrected her. “The only reason we stand on freedom is because we got the right to bear arms!” he says. “(Because of the Second Amendment) we’re all a micro government in our own way.”

We are all “micro governments?” I like that.

The Goldwater Institute’s Tim and Christina Sandefur would add “protections against the abuse

of eminent domain” and “ban subsidies to special interests.”

I like changes that might limit government power, and I wonder: How did the government grow so powerful when the Constitution was created to limit the government’s power?

Podcaster Michael Malice says it’s because the Constitution is often ignored.

“The First Amendment says the right of people to peaceably assemble shall not be infringed, (but) not even libertarians bothered to invoke that to fight the lockdowns and quarantining.” Mr. Malice is an anarchist who says he’d put the Constitution “in the trash, where it belongs.”

I disagree. So did most people we asked.

“Our founders wrote documents

... designed to give you life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness,” says podcaster Dave Rubin. “Perhaps they should’ve done it in bold so more people would’ve paid attention.”

More people should. My short videos are my attempt to let young people know that our Constitution limits government power, and that rights belong to individuals. Most simply don’t know that.

John Stossel is creator of Stossel TV and author of “Give Me a Break: How I Exposed Hucksters, Cheats, and Scam Artists and Became the Scourge of the Liberal Media.”

For other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit www. creators.com.

Copyright 2022 BY JFS Productions Inc.

has given up its sovereignty like President Joe Biden has done, eliminating America’s southern border. There are no words to describe how bad the situation is and how it so undermines us as a nation.

Without a border, we don’t have a country. We’ve demolished national security, and we’ve slapped the faces of law enforcement and told Americans your citizenship is worthless. This is a colossal problem destroying America today and there appears to be no end in sight.

I’ve said it before and I’ll keep saying it, how have we allowed this to happen, and why do we allow it to continue?

All the issues listed above ruining our country have one thing in common. They are instigated, supported and perpetuated by liberals and democrats. And it’s only a partial list. Fortunately, most of the country has “woken” up and sees how liberalism is a failed doctrine, and in a few months we have a chance to turn things around.

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

The Saudi regime is far from a paragon of righteousness HAMMER

Continued from Page C2 cleric-outsourcing Saudi Arabia of yesteryear. (Of course, these same critics of warm U.S.-Saudi ties also tend to be all too eager to seek a new nuclear accord with Iran, which is not exactly “forward-thinking” in its own approach to human rights.

Curious, that.)

The reality is that the reformed, MBS-era kingdom of Saudi Arabia shares core regional enemies — namely Iran, but also the Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamist movements — with the United States. The kingdom also has many of the same key strategic allies — namely, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Egypt, and to a more limited extent, Israel — as does the United States.

As far as a brutal region of the world such as the Middle East is concerned, that ought to be more than enough for a prudent American foreign policy to deem Saudi Arabia a friend.

That the Saudi regime is still far from a paragon of righteousness or virtue is perhaps relevant as one criterion of diplomacy — but no more than that. The transactional benefits from amiable U.S.-Saudi relations are legion. As the most important Sunni Arab country for geographic and myriad

historical and religious reasons, the kingdom’s imprimature was necessary before the Emiratis and Bahrainis signed onto the path-breaking Abraham Accords peace agreements with Israel in 2020.

Indeed, as the kingdom deepens its own security and intelligence ties with Israel, Saudi Arabia joining the Abraham Accords itself no longer seems out of reach. More generally, in both diplomacy and military posture, the Saudis play an indispensable role in Iranian deterrence and containment. All of this makes the Saudis natural American friends — even more so as a mutual enemy, Iran, marches ever closer to the bomb.

Joe Biden, floundering like a fish out of water and doddering in his palpable senility, faces historically low job approval ratings. His party is set for a veritable drubbing this fall. But on the issue of Saudi Arabia, Biden’s recent about-face is uncharacteristically sober and cogent. All Americans should wish him well as he embarks for Riyadh on this attempted rapprochement with a key strategic ally.

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

Copyright 2022 by Creators.com.

We can’t read into the future

SANITATE

Continued from Page C3 document. It is not infallible. It can’t say everything all at once, and it can’t predict the future.

The current judges seem to have forgotten that besides the right to life, it gives us the right to liberty and to the pursuit of happiness as well. They imply, “We’re not looking at those words right now.”

Many tragic consequences will happen to women because of the repeal of the case law in Roe v. Wade, and to men who will be forced to be fathers as well. However, there is one consequence I haven’t read much about, and it may be the worst of all.

This decision will put many unwanted and uncared-for children in the world.

The court, I presume, wants parents to pretend to love a child who is unwanted.

Unwanted children intuitively understand that. Unwanted children also raise unwanted children. It makes me wonder if any of those judges were unwanted children.

Beyond that, it isn’t really the Constitution or the Declaration of Independence that gives us these rights. I have a right to my life, liberty and happiness whether the Constitution or Declaration of Independence says so or not.

I think the writers understood that, and that’s why Thomas Jefferson used the words “self-

evident” to describe these truths in the declaration.

To paraphrase what I believe Jefferson and others meant: “Trust your intuitive self as to what is right and good and kind.

We are not gods. We can’t read into the future. We trust you to do the right thing, the kind thing.

That’s why we are inventing judges and a Supreme Court.

They should be wise men (they weren’t enlightened enough then to use the word ‘people’) who will look into their hearts and ask what is best – what is kindest for people.”

We need individuals who can take the responsibility to decide what kindness calls for here and now. I can’t believe that those who are slavish to texts and make decisions that are hurtful to so many people really understand the texts.

The court decision is based on the premise that life begins at conception. That is not true. A sperm and an egg are living things; they are not dead things. If they are living things, shouldn’t we be required to protect the life of every sperm and egg? Should we demand that every egg be fertilized? Should we fine a man for each of his sperms that doesn’t fertilize an egg?

Judges, stop blaming texts, whether 200 or 2000 years old, for your decision on what human kindness calls for. If you don’t believe that is the overriding principle to judge by, why are you even on the court?