Today's Headlines

Fighting over alcohol’s ‘benefits’

SF Chronicle. The US could soon declare alcohol unsafe; the wine industry says the process is rigged.
Synopsis. Study after study, recently, has refuted the long-held belief that a glass of red wine with dinner reduces the risk of heart disease and impacts of stress. But after all those more recent studies, nearly 40% of adults eschew all alcohol consumption. The alcohol industry is starting to fight back, calling such studies “neo-prohibitionist” and insisting they use cherry-picked data. This is important because the US will revise its Dietary Guidelines in 2025, and it could recommend no alcohol consumption. Winemakers point out that this isn’t a fair fight, since they are prohibited from pointing out wine’s health benefits. Reporter Esther Mobley does an extensive look at this issue, including who sits on the Interagency Coordinating Committee on the Prevention of Underage Drinking, which has morphed from its stated purpose into something much more influential. It is stacked with anti-alcohol advocates.
MAD Take: Setting aside any affinity for a big zin, winegrapes are one of mankind’s oldest crops. Neolithic people made wine 6,000 years ago. The first miracle of Jesus was turning water to wine. Can it really be all that bad?

Getting resources for the Valley

Valley Solutions: About Adam Gray – Rusty Areias.
Synopsis: The former State Assemblymember introduced Congressional candidate Adam Gray during a recent fundraising stop, telling residents that Gray was spectacular at bringing resources to the Valley. “Adam Gray is the best,” Areias said on the same day that UC Merced broke ground on a medical arts building that Gray helped make possible. “it wasn’t (Tony) Coelho, not (Dennis) Cardoza, not (Jim) Costa. Not Areias. It was Adam Gray.”

SJ Sheriff getting more eyes

KCRA. More than $800,000 given to San Joaquin County Sheriff’s office for new tool to track crime.
Synopsis: The Real Time Crime Center was purchased with federal and state funds, putting surveillance cameras throughout Stockton. Pat Withrow is excited, says his deputies and others will arrive on scene having seen the crime unfold. Another $300,000 is headed to Tracy for a similar system. Story makes no mention, but it’s entirely likely the region’s congressman (Josh Harder) had a hand in delivering that funding. It’s what good representatives do.

Growing agave in the Valley

Fresno Bee. Can Central CA become an agave hub? A peek inside this farmer’s big bet.
Synopsis. Reporter Erik Galicia talks to Stuart Woolf, one of the more forward-thinking (and largest) farmers in CA. He is farming 20,000 acres near Huron, including 340 planted in drought-loving blue agave, the raw material for mezcal. He’s getting help from lots of folks – UC Davis, The CA Agave Council and the state. While almonds require 48 inches of water in western Fresno County, agave uses less than 3 inches. That’s great, but is there enough demand? “As we scale up, there’s going to be other challenges related to economics,” says Woolf.

Does heat justify screwing Valley?

LA Times. Don’t worry, it was only the second-hottest month ever.
Synopsis. Columnist Sammy Roth notes that July 2024 was NOT the hottest month ever worldwide. That distinction belongs to July 2023, which was 0.004 degrees hotter than this July – the second-hottest month on record. But in CA, the news is more grim. July was the hottest month ever, by almost 2 degrees. Sammy concludes his story by saying it’s hard for him to feel sorry for those who complain that their electricity bills have gotten too high. “Keep that in mind the next time you hear someone say that transitioning from planet-warming fossil fuels to clean energy is too expensive.”
MAD Take: Hey Sammy, what about those elected leaders who insisted we “transition” away from the cleanest energy ever devised – falling water – to far more costly solar power? Those politicians passed a law — fought by Adam Gray — that wouldn’t allow Valley utilities to count their hydropower as renewable until 2045. That change meant Valley utilities had to buy more solar power, which resulted in a 20% bump in the electricity bills of California’s poorest residents – those living in the Central Valley. So please keep that in mind before critiquing those of us who complain about our damned electricity bills.

A host of new rules for schools

Ed Source. New laws impacting education go into effect as the school year begins.
Synopsis. Better access to mental health care, free menstrual products and providing more “information about climate change” are among the changes mandated by the state for classrooms this year. Oh, and you can no longer suspend a student for “willful defiance” in a classroom.
MAD Take: You want to make saving the environment uncool? Mandate teaching it.

Casting farmers as villains

Modern Farmer. Factory farms make bad neighbors, folks are fighting back.
Synopsis. Reporter/activist Lena Beck says that any CAFO – confined animal feeding operation -- “seriously harms our health and environment” due to “myriad problems” of ”air pollution, water poisoning, light pollution and plummeting property values.” In this long, long story, Beck focuses first on a woman who fought Foster Farms’ expansion plans in Oregon. Now, her county requires a one-mile setback for any animal-feeding operation near residential property — including neighboring farms.
MAD Take: After seeing several stories over the past month about CAFOs, it appears the latest crusade – cloaked in this instance as helping small farmers – will be to label any large ag operation a “factory farm” and insist they all are comparable in harm to a landfill. Never mind regulations in CA that require testing of ANY water that leaves a farm. Or vigorously prosecuted rules that protect streams from any manure contamination. Or rules that have produced the safest, cleanest, most pesticide-free vegetables found anywhere in the world. Oh, I’m also wondering about the 160 million servings of chicken consumed each day in America; how many of those chickens were raised in backyards?

In praise of orange melons

Ag Net West. Voices of the Valley: Cantaloupe 411 with Westside Produce’s Garette Patricio.
Synopsis. Firebaugh cantaloupe grower Garrette Patricio is interviewed by Michelle Rivera and Julie Nellis to learn what goes on behind in the fields. Oh, and there are tips for telling if a cantaloupe is really ripe. Fun fact: CA grows 75% of cantaloupes sold in the US.

Stimulating brain waves

Modesto Bee. Brain stimulation therapy may be offered to police, fire personnel in Turlock.
Synopsis. Ken Carlson takes a closer look at “magnetic wave stimulation,” which the city of Turlock is considering providing to the city’s first-responders. The city would pay the $650,000 in charges from Turlock’s portion of the American Rescue Plan Act. It’s called PrTMS and purportedly improves sleep. The provider is a company called Genesis, which has clinics in Modesto, Elk Grove, Stockton, Sacramento and Merced. The doctor who runs the clinics was involved in a court case against UC San Diego.

Study: God made you do it

Central Valley Voice. Psychological bias links good deeds with religious belief, UC Merced says.
Synopsis: This press release from UC Merced says a grad student has linked the doing of good deeds to a person’s belief system. And those who do those good deeds just for the sake of doing them are much more likely to be believers than atheists. And it’s not just here, but across the planet. So any God will do, apparently. Grad student Alex Dayer published his paper on “serial helpers” in Scientific Reports. Like all experienced researchers, he feels his results are inconclusive and will require more research.