By Chuck Doud
The Madera Tribune

The Republicans and Democrats in Congress are not unlike the cat who lives in our garage and backyard. Whenever she comes up to the back door and yowls, she expects to be fed. If the yowling doesn’t work, she begins to pace up and down, looking in the windows of the house. Sometimes she will lie down on the sidewalk, sometimes she will roll over. She will do almost anything to get attention, short of doing any actual work. Eventually, she wins, and I pour some food in a bowl and take it to her. I do it out of a sense of duty. But I can’t say my life is any better because of it. Yes, she sometimes lets me pet her, and sometimes will sit in my lap, but those times are rare.

See how much like Congress that is? When was the last time Congress did anything for you, even though you keep feeding it? Congress basically throws your money around, just like the cat will claw one of the legs of the wooden potting table on the back patio. You say, “Stop that, bad cat!” And the cat will give you a look and slink away. But when your back is turned, it isn’t long before the cat is back to work on the table leg. If won’t be long before the table leg will be too weak to hold the table, and soon you will have to buy another one.

The Republicans have come out with their “Pledge to America,” which they hope voters will think is a remake of the “Contract with America” of 1994. But I don’t think the “Pledge” will get that many votes. At best, it will cut into the Democrats’ majority in Congress, but even with that majority, the Dems haven’t been able to do much. Very little will change.

And that is true of the cat, too, when I think about it.

By Chuck Doud
The Madera Tribune

An interesting battle has been going on in San Francisco over the costs for caring for drunks. The city-county board of supervisors in the city by the bay decided it had had enough of paying millions of dollars every year to scrape drunks off the sidewalks and sober them up, only to see them back on the sidewalk again in almost no time.

The board decided to levy a tax (it was called a fee, but if it walks like a duck …) on alcohol to help pay for services to drunks, but the city’s “hospitality” industry went bats.

“You will kill the city’s tourism industry,” the saloon owners cried.

So San Francisco Mayor and candidate for lieutenant governor Gavin Newsom vetoed the tax. Oh, Newsom also owns some bars, and while he said that didn’t have any bearing on his decision … well, you make up your own mind.

But I guess my question is, Why not raise the fines for public drunkenness? A lot of the people who pass out on the sidewalk, it is true, don’t have money for paying fines — unless you add a tax to the alcohol that they and everybody else drink. But what if the city made them spend a few weeks picking up streets, cleaning out alleys, polishing manhole covers, etc.? They would do that under city supervision, of course, to make sure they did the work and didn’t drink again.

No doubt the ACLU would be all over that if it became law. Maybe it would be thought of as cruel and unusual punishment.

But being an alcoholic who passes out on the sidewalk is more cruelly punishing to a person than doing a little physical labor would be. Alcohol, when abused in its use, continues to be the most troublesome drug with which humanity must deal.

By Denesse Willey
For The Madera Tribune

By way of correcting a few assertions in your “explanation” of why there is a Tea Party on Sept. 18, the National Environmental Policy Act was a bipartisan effort that passed unanimously in the Senate and with only 15 dissenting votes in the House. It was signed into law by Republican President Richard Nixon, who created the Environmental Protection Agency to enforce its provisions.

The law “grandfathered” more than 20,000 existing toxics in use at the time with no requirement that they ever be proved either safe or effective. During the George W. Bush years (near half of the last 20 years of which you write) dramatic weakening of environmental protection took place including raising the acceptable levels of mercury in our air, reducing the mitigation requirements for mountain top-removal coal mining, and dropping retrofit requirements for existing coal burning plants, just to name a few.

My understanding of the Tea Party movement is that people are angry about the exponential growth of our federal government. This is a compelling sentiment, but one that cannot be directed strictly at Democrats. It was, after all, a Republican administration and a Congress controlled alternately by both parties that spent $1 million per hour for seven years looking for non-existent weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

However, were it not for a huge federal effort and large public expense there never would have been surface water delivered to the west side of our valley. It was by the act of a Democratically controlled Congress, led in no small part by our local Democratic congressman, Bernie F. Sisk, in conjunction with the State of California headed by staunch Democrat, Gov. Pat Brown, that the Central Valley Project was conceived and built by the Bureau of Reclamation.

This “federal bureaucracy” was the brainchild of Republican President Theodore Roosevelt. The bureau operates about 180 projects in the 17 western states providing agricultural, household, and industrial water to about one-third of the population of the American west, many of whom might be tea partiers.
Bureau projects provide irrigation water to more than 9 million acres and are a major American generator of electricity. As of 2007, reclamation had 58 power plants online, generating more than 40 billion kWh annually (enough energy for more than a quarter million U.S. homes). All of this delivered for the amazing federal investment of about $11 billion more than a 70-year history of water project construction.

These projects have not come without unforeseen environmental degradation and resulting controversy. But true statesmen and visionaries, through compromise and not demagoguery, once worked for the common good of people in the West.

Our waterways belong to all of us. It is no more or less acceptable for the city of Sacramento to dump minimally treated sewage into the Sacramento River than for farms downstream of Mendota to discharge irrigation runoff laden with pesticides, fertilizers and selenium into the San Joaquin River. It can be said that statesmanship conveys a quality of leadership that brings people together with a spirit of caring for others and for the whole. One asks, where is their kind now?

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Denesse Willey and her husband, Tom, operate Willey Farms, an organic farm southwest of Madera.

By Chuck Doud
The Madera Tribune

You’ve probably been reading about genetically engineered salmon, which we may be eating before too long. These fish, raised on farms, grow twice as fast as regular salmon. And, according to the Food and Drug Administration, they taste great and seem to be safe to eat.

People who oppose putting these fish on the market call the salmon “frankenfish,” which is easier to say than “Lady Gaga Fish,” or any other insulting term they might think of. They say the claims of safety are not backed up by proof.

Most of the people who oppose putting the fish on the market also happen to be people who have fishing boats and catch and sell salmon for the market. And if I had a fishing boat and went out every year to catch enough salmon so I could afford to feed my family, I would oppose the genetically engineered fish. Just like I would oppose fish farms.

The people who are behind the genetically engineered fish hope to make a profit growing the fish and selling them. And if I were them, I would want to get the government okay as fast as possible.

Now, I happen to love salmon, and I have eaten both wild salmon and farm-raised salmon, and I can’t really tell the difference between them.

But here’s something to think about: Whether the salmon are caught wild, or raised on a fish farm, we eventually are going to run out of them.

The people in all nations who catch the wild fish are putting great pressure on the salmon populations. And the people who grow the salmon on farms — well, they are feeding the farmed salmon mostly ground-up fish, which the wild fish would have eaten. See the problem?

The geniuses should genetically engineer rice to taste like herring. Then they would really be in business.

What do the silent majority do, that makes them silent stay?
They eke out their living from the rising of the sun
To its setting at the end of the day.
And some work the night shift ’til the day dawns again.
And they silently drag three tracks home.
Where they pass through the sheets, ’til the noise in the streets
Wakes them up with an irritant drone.

What do silent majority do
When they wake to again start their day?
They stagger to the shower and stay there an hour
’Til their body starts feeling okay.
They then dress their body and head for the table
And gulp down some nourishing bites.
And head for the set, if the news is on yet,
To find out what happened last night.

What do silent majority do.
That makes them more silent still grow?
They tend to their knittin’
And do what is fitten’,
And watch John and Anna Bell grow.
You never hear much from that so silent bunch
For they’re always quite busy, you see.
Sittin’ up straight in church
On their favorite perch,
With a smile on their face,
As they run life’s great race,
And strive to good citizens be.

What do the silent majority do
At the polls when it comes ’lection day?
They vote out the liberal Democrats then,
So Republicans, at last, have their day.

Anyce Ruth Malone Hutchinson,
Madera

All comments are edited for length and content. Because of content or space limitations, some comments may not be published. More than one comment from the same person during the same week will normally not be published. Please limit calls to two minutes or less.

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A woman gave a reason why she “will not shop (in a Madera shoe store) again. Everyone wants us to shop Madera. I bought a pair of shoes on sale and when I attempted to return them, brand new, because they didn’t quite fit right, I wasn’t given any kind of store credit. I didn’t want my money back, but I did expect a credit. They didn’t even do that. So, I will be shopping in Fresno for shoes from now on.”

A lady said “we were very happy that Sherman Thomas Charter School passed their AYP (Adequate Yearly Progress). Parent participation is a big part of it. They participate in all the school’s activities. If the parents do not participate, their children do not go to school there. Their dress codes are strict. Their hair requirements are strict. We need more charter schools.”

A woman read the headline about “the Feds flunking 19 Madera Schools. Are you kidding me? Let’s give the superintendent another raise, and let’s throw in a lifetime (health) insurance benefit. Way to go school board.”

A lady said, “thank you for the information on the MUSD test scores for our schools. It is interesting that MUSD said they never stopped their mandatory home reading program (AR), which is why our students can’t read up to par. Thank you.”

A man read the “report cards for the schools.” He “talked to some parents and found out when the test was given and how the kids were held accountable. It seems like we are constantly holding our teachers accountable to have our kids learn more. Maybe the state should hold the kids accountable, because as of right now the kids have no reason to worry about what their test scores will be.”

A man said “the Madera District Fair needs to look at another service club to run the concession stand in the livestock area. The Breakfast Lions this year did a very poor job. They ran out of merchandise during the course of the fair and on Saturday, the time of the junior livestock sale, long before the sale was over with, they closed early. There were a lot of upset people.”

Another man had a different view. “All the service clubs should be commended for their efforts during the fair. My wife and I patronized the Pan-Am booth, and the Breakfast Lions booth at the livestock area and the Rotary booth during a concert. I found all of them to be friendly and even though real busy, they tried their best. Way to go all the service clubs.”

“You would think ABC (Alcohol Beverage Control) would have better things to do than entrap service clubs trying to raise funds for the community. I say entrapment because at the fair they put a green bracelet that you had to wear to get a drink on an underage person and told them to go bust them. The service clubs had nothing to do with issuing the green bracelets. They had to be gotten at a separate booth either run by the fair, or security or maybe even ABC. The service clubs should fight this. It is not their fault. They saw a green bracelet on a person and that’s who they were told they could serve. I spoke with a couple of former law enforcement people and they agreed it was a case of pure entrapment by ABC.”

A lady had an idea “to create more revenue for the town. They should put a private security patrol in front of the post office where people make illegal turns (across traffic) all day long. It could create more revenue even if they have to hire a rent-a-cop. Give them the authority.”

A woman thanked the (Ciummo) law firm “for putting on the End of Trail Mixer in the park. I’m really going to miss it this year. I hope next year we can get some sponsors to help the law firm and make it possible.”

A gentleman responded to last week’s caller who thanked “the two girls who made all the copies for James Monroe School.” This week’s caller said, “I think all the girls, I think there’s three in the (Madera Unified School) District printing department, should be thanked for a great job. As a teacher, I’ve been taking my work to them for years. They always greet me with a smile, and I know, even though overworked, they get the job out as fast as possible. Good job, ladies, and thank you.”

A man agreed with last week’s caller who said “African Americans can’t get jobs. It’s true, look around. It’s also true about the housing and any other benefits. It’s not just African Americans, it’s caucasian too. It happened to my son and he’s caucasian. When he filled out a job application they asked him if he speaks Spanish. He said no. Later, his friends got the job because they speak Spanish and he didn’t. This shouldn’t happen. To speak Spanish should not be required, or even asked, to get a job.”

Another woman called to say she “was angry, because my son is a college graduate and can’t get a job because he isn’t bilingual. He’s been laid off from his job and can’t get another because he’s not Hispanic. It really irritates me. We have children, he has a child, my husband can’t get a job because we’re not bilingual.”

A lady called about the article and mention of “the Morning Dove. It is not a Morning Dove, it is a Mourning Dove, m-o-u-r-n-i-n-g.”

A woman called “on the article concerning the Bark For Life event that was held in the park. They forgot to mention that Petco was one of the vendors and they were great about giving out samples to the participants there.”

A lady had this to say to “those of you who claim the North Fork casino will be bad for local population. The lack of jobs and opportunities wreak havoc in Madera and the Central Valley. Local unemployement has been nearly double the state average. The casino will create nearly 4,500 local jobs. Bring on the new casino. Find me a community that has a casino and wants to get rid of it. This is Madera’s golden opportunity. It won’t come again. Don’t miss out on it.”

A female responded to the lady last week “who called in about the dress code at a volleyball game. It needs to be clarified that it was not the Madera South coaches; all three teams wore black under their shirts. Yes, there should be dress code. The fact that the students tore up papers and left the gymnasium a mess reflects upon the administration and athletic director of the school involved and something should be done about it.”

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Thank you for your calls. Remember, the Red Line is open for your messages 24-hours a day by calling 674-4478.

By Chuck Doud
The Madera Tribune

President Obama is saying the recession is over, and has been since June 2009, but I suspect a lot of people who remain jobless would disagree.

Obama has two problems. The first, obviously, is the coming election. He has to go around the country saying the recession is over in order to convince voters to cast ballots for Democrats. Nobody says the recession started under Obama, and it didn’t. But for him to say it ended six months after he took office is pretty funny.

His other problem, related to the first, is that the people defining the recession — or, excuse me, former recession — are all people who never have been on the receiving end of a recession. It’s like seeing a lion in the zoo. You will know how one looks and sounds, but you won’t really know anything about lions until one chases you through the jungle.

For example, Larry Summers, who plans to resign as director of the White House Economic Council, is a former Treasury secretary (under Clinton) and a former president of Harvard.

Present Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner is a former president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. He made sure the banks got bailed out with $350 billion before anybody else.

Obama, himself a Harvard Law School grad, former lawyer, former U.S. senator from Illinois, former Illinois state senator, and a successful author, probably can remember no time in his adult life when he wondered whether he could afford to feed his family.

To these three, and to others who are pretending the recession is a thing of the past, bad economic times are matters of statistics.

Obama claims the federal government is creating jobs, but that claim must be taken with a grain of salt, unless you are talking about jobs in Washington, D.C. Here in California, most new jobs, when there are any, are being created by businesses, not by government. In fact, most government agencies have been having to lay people off, contributing to unemployment. Ask the people of the state of California whether the recession is over, and you will get a good laugh in response.

On behalf of the entire Millard L. Henderson family, I wish to take this opportunity to express our deep, heart felt gratitude to the following for making last Thursday night’s football game special event possible.

The collective effort included the time and talent of Madera High School principal Kent Albertson, activities directors Sarah Murrietta and Shane Riddle, work experience coordinator Tim Riche and varsity head coach Scott McKinney.

Our abundant, warm thanks goes to coach McKinney, who suggested that the game be memorialized in Millard’s name. Scott had played high school football at the time Millard reigned as varsity head coach.
Tim Riche conveyed to us that, not being a Madera native, he had never heard the name Millard Henderson. So he began asking around who this guy was. Within a short time he learned of Millard’s great character and commitment to the students of Madera High and jumped on board with Coach McKinney’s recommendation. (Scott’s mother, the late Gail McKinney and father, Don McKinney, were classmates and great friends of Millard’s as well.)

Thanks to Sharon Cloud,  who directed Tim to Millard’s wife, Nadine King, the ball  began to roll.

And last, but certainly not least, we humbly thank Tim Riche for making our entire family feel like royalty — we will fondly and forever remember all those involved and this wonderful night.

Pam Pistoresi,
Madera

By Chuck Doud
The Madera Tribune

My cell phone is getting either too old or two sensitive. The other day, I was talking to someone, and the phone suddenly began blaring the little tune it plays when it is shutting off. I could swear I didn’t press the off button, but off it went. What was I to do?

I turned the phone on again, and called back the person with whom I was talking.

“I think I lost you,” I said.

“No, I think I lost you,” said the person on the other end of outer space.

I have been watching construction of a new cell phone tower near the Harvest Community Church at 2001 National Ave. The builders are fixing up the tower to look like an artificial fir tree — or maybe it is a fake redwood. Mrs. Doud would know better than I what kind of phony tree it is, because she and trees have talks with one another.

She goes outside and talks to the plants, then comes inside and tells me what they’ve said.

“That crepe myrtle needs more water,” she informed me the other day. Naturally, I did not know what she was talking about. Trees and I have never really been on a conversational basis. But the new cell phone tree may change that.

The people who are putting up the fake tree cell tower say it will carry calls for several cell phone providers. This is needed because now people are using their cell phones for just about everything except brushing their teeth, and somebody probably is working on an app for that.

I just want to make clear phone calls that don’t shut off in mid-sentence. Is there an app for that, by chance?

I have tried talking to my cell phone as well as into it, but I don’t think it likes the language I use. In fact, if I keep talking like that, the cell phone company may send someone over to take my instrument away from me.

I’m going to try to get a new phone, but the last time I tried that, the nice lady in the store told me I still had a year to go on my “plan.”

“My what?” I asked.

“Your service plan. It includes the discount you got when you bought your phone.” She said I had to use the phone until the plan ran out. I hope they hurry up with that artificial tree.

This is just a few lines to congratulate the Madera County Historical Society for electing Ed and Wilma Tashjian as Old Timers king and queen, and believe me they couldn’t have selected a better couple.
I know that because I worked with them at Simon Cleaners from 1959 to 1975, and I have good memories of them through the years.

My first memory was seeing both of their girls growing up, and seeing them in the Old Timers Parade in the Madera High School Band.

Another memory was when Mr. Tashjian, told me one day, “You see that 1921 year on top of that building? That was “Wilcox Barber Shop.” That was the year I was born.

Another good memory was when I met his mother, Lydia, and his uncle, who used to visit from Fresno quite often. I also met Mrs. Tashjian’s brother, Jack, in 1948, when I was playing baseball against Jack Lane in Chowchilla. Also playing on that team was John Mato. A few years ago, they named the Chowchilla varsity baseball park John Mato Field.

I also have a few memories about the front of the cleaners. At the entry, there was a button right there by the door and we would press that button so the awning would come down, so the sun wouldn’t shine in the glass and on the clothes.

Quite a few things happened while I was letting the awning down. The first was when Sandra Pisano left her car running at Morris & Hass grocery store, and the car went backward, yes, by itself and was going to hit Mrs. O’Grady’s car. I closed my eyes, and the car went right behind the Madera Theater, without hitting Mrs. O’Grady’s car.

Another memory was when Dr. Quimby was coming out of the cleaners, and he fell down, and his car went backwards by itself and he was going to get run over by his own car. I saw what was happening, and, boy, did I run as fast as I could and step on the brake.

Another thing was when Mr. Frank Bergon left his car running right there in the alley, and Ronn Dominici came by to pick up clothes and saw Bergon’s car running. He parked Bergon’s car in the parking lot, and Bergon said, “Eddie, somebody stole my car;” and it was only Ronn playing a joke. Another memory was when Teresa Ireland, who worked there at Simon Cleaners and lived out there near Bonita Gin, had a chicken riding under her car all the way from home. I finally caught that chicken in the parking lot.

I also remember working with Jennie Del Bono, Margaret Kimmery, Frances Wright, Marian Nacimiento, Wilma Carmichael, Ada Weins, Esequiel Long, Opal McCanless and Nancy Brundy.

And these are all of my good memories of working at Simon Cleaners from 1959-1975.

Eddie Chapa,
Madera