More Right-Wing Threats of Violence; Independent HQ’s Email Is a Mess–Coachella Valley Independent’s Indy Digest: Dec. 5, 2022

Indy Digest: Dec. 5, 2022

I’ve been in the journalism business long enough that I get weird looks when I talk to younger reporters about The Way Things Used to Be.

I had my first newspaper byline in 1995. Back then, a lot of newspapers didn’t even have websites yet. When I needed to research something, one of my first stops was the local library, which kept cutouts of newspaper articles, organized by topic and placed in file folders. And when I wanted to talk to someone, I picked up the phone and called them.

I did have email back then, but I didn’t use it nearly as much as I do now. These days, I use email for, well, everything. It’s how my writers send me stories, how I communicate with most advertisers, and how I conduct most of my other business. When I want to talk to someone, I usually fire off an email to set up a time to chat. Heck, email is how most of you are reading this.

It’s nigh impossible to do my job without email. And that, my friends, is why today has been a complete mess.

We’ve been with the same web-hosting company for more than a decade now, and at first, the customer service was fantastic. In the years since, that company was purchased by a large multinational corporation and merged with all sorts of other bought-out companies (even though the branding remained the same), and the customer service has gone from, say, eight on a scale of 1-10, down to negative 14.

I mention this, because our email server has been down since sometime shortly after 2 a.m. today (Monday) Despite a support ticket that has been open since almost 5 a.m., and a half-dozen or so online chats with tech support, the email remains down as of this writing. This email got out because newsletters go through our “email marketing” company—but if you hit reply, I won’t get that message until our problem is fixed—and I REALLY hope it has been fixed by the time you read this. (If not, I can be reached at jiboegle@gmail.com.)

Bleh. Technology is amazing … but when something goes haywire, boy howdy, it’s a mess.

—Jimmy Boegle

More News

• From the right-wing hate beat comes this horrifying piece, from NBC News: “The hosts of a ‘Drag Queen Story Hour’-style event for children in Columbus, Ohio, on Saturday pulled the plug because of what they described as the intimidating presence of right-wing demonstrators. The scheduled holiday themed ‘Holi-Drag Storytime’ at the First Unitarian Church of Columbus, which runs the K-5 institution behind the event, Red Oak Community School, was canceled at the last-minute Saturday morning following internal discussions, organizers said. Members of Ohio’s Proud Boys organization and other right-wing groups made good on promises to make waves outside the venue Saturday. More than 50 demonstrators, including members of the Proud Boys, gathered near the church Saturday morning and shouted, chanted and held up signs. Some were armed with long guns.” Just a reminder: This is the United States, in 2022, and this is happening.

• Related, probably tangentially but possibly more than tangentially, from The News & Observer (Raleigh, N.C.): “Widespread power outages caused (around 7 p.m. Saturday) by vandalism of electrical substations in Moore County continued on Monday, with electricity shut off to thousands of residences and businesses, and estimates for restoration of power stretching possibly into Thursday, officials say. … (Moore County Sheriff Ronnie) Fields said they have not been able to make a connection to a Saturday night drag queen show at Sunrise Theater in downtown Southern Pines after state and federal investigators looked into the rumor that started online. Earlier in the day Saturday, protesters had gathered outside the theater, upset about a drag show planned for the small venue later that night. The drag show started at 7 p.m. and was underway when the power went out. Emily Grace Rainey, an outspoken opponent of the drag show, posted an invitation on her Facebook page to the protest at the theater. After the lights went out, Rainey … posted on Facebook that, ‘The power is out in Moore County and I know why.’ Without naming her, Fields indicated in Sunday’s press conference that the information Rainey posted online was ‘false.’ He said officers ‘had to go and interview this young lady and have a word of prayer with her, but it turned out to be nothing.’” Some 32,307 homes and businesses remained without power as of this afternoon, according to Duke Energy.

• While last week’s results of Palm Springs wastewater testing for SARS-CoV-2 have not yet been posted as of this writing, The Los Angeles Times offers up two stories showing how serious the season of sickness is getting in the state. First, from today, about COVID-19: “There has been a troubling spike in coronavirus-positive hospital admissions among seniors in California, rising to levels not seen since the summer Omicron surge. Hospitalizations have roughly tripled for Californians of most age groups since the autumn low. But the jump in seniors in need of hospital care has been particularly dramatic. Officials in Los Angeles County have said increases in hospitalizations could lead to an indoor mask order, possibly in early January. Still, there is optimism that any winter surge will not be as bad as those of the last two years. … Only 35% of California’s vaccinated seniors age 65 and up have received the updated booster since it became available in September.”

• Second is a Los Angeles Times story from Saturday about influenza: “The (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) uses five overall levels, from minimal to very high, to measure influenza-like illnesses across the U.S. and its territories. On Friday, the agency’s color-coded map showed California and 10 other states, along with New York City, shaded purple, the worst of the three shades in the very high flu level. … The California Department of Public Health classifies all of Southern California as having high flu levels, while Central and Northern California are rated moderate. Flu is the reason for nearly 4% of hospitalizations each week at Kaiser’s Northern California facilities, the highest in any of the prior four flu seasons. … The flu positivity rate in L.A. County has reached 25%, a level not seen at this time of year in the last four years. ‘Clearly, we’re … off the charts,’ (L.A. County Public Health Director Barbara) Ferrer said.”

• Gay men, take note: The New York Times published a terrifying story this weekend headlined “Druggings, Deaths and Robberies Put New York’s Gay Community on Edge.” The lede: “Julio Ramirez died in the back seat of a taxi in April after he left a popular gay bar in Manhattan with a group of men. They stole his wallet, phone and ID before they abandoned his body in the car with a distressed cabdriver. One month later, John Umberger was found dead in an Upper East Side townhouse after he and a group of men left another popular gay bar just three blocks from the last place Mr. Ramirez was seen alive. Surveillance footage showed Mr. Umberger sandwiched between the men as they guided him into a car. The Police Department and many in the LGBTQ community at first regarded the deaths as isolated drug overdoses: men who partied too hard, quotidian tragedies in a gay nightlife scene that has roared back to life as the coronavirus pandemic has waned. But the men’s families soon discovered something more sinister: Credit cards in the men’s names were maxed out and their bank accounts drained of tens of thousands of dollars. Now, their deaths are being investigated by the Police Department’s homicide unit.”

• Uh, hey, did you hear about a former U.S. president saying he wanted to “terminate” the Constitution, and then denying it, even though the social-media post in which he said it remained online? Politico has the details: “Former President Donald Trump on Monday denied he wanted to ‘terminate’ the Constitution, two days after suggesting ‘the termination of all rules … even those found in the Constitution.’ ‘The Fake News is actually trying to convince the American People that I said I wanted to “terminate” the Constitution. This is simply more DISINFORMATION & LIES,’ Trump said on Monday on his own social media platform, Truth Social. The post seemed to be a complete denial of his post from Saturday, which remained online as of Monday afternoon: ‘A Massive Fraud of this type and magnitude allows for the termination of all rules, regulations, and articles, even those found in the Constitution,’ Trump wrote over the weekend, once again falsely asserting that there was widespread fraud in the 2020 election. Several of Trump’s fellow Republicans were critical of the post, but few condemned Trump himself or said it would be disqualifying for him to earn their vote—a lack of repudiation that has drawn criticism from Democrats.”

• And finally … we’ve linked to more than a few articles in this space about the complete disaster that was California’s unemployment system during the pandemic. Well … is the system ready to handle a possible recession? Our partners at CalMatters report: “If more people are laid off, more Californians will turn to unemployment benefits to help them afford the basics while they look for a new job. It’s a process that buckled under the pressures of the pandemic. Residents sometimes waited months for benefits from the state’s Employment Development Department, dialing the department hundreds of times. On top of that was a string of fraud scandals. … The situation has since improved. But how will the system hold up if there’s a recession? Thanks to ‘the level of testing that the pandemic put us through, we are in such a strong position to weather a typical economic contraction,’ said Gareth Lacy, communications advisor at the department. But not everyone is convinced. ‘There have been some major improvements,’ said Daniela Urban, executive director of the Center for Workers’ Rights. ‘But I think we’re not at the point where if a major crisis hit the unemployment system again, the system would be able to function as it should.’”

Support the Independent!

If you have a few bucks to spare, and want to help us out with the expenses we’ll incur if we have to migrate to a new email server … or if perhaps you just want to buy the addled, email-deficient editor a bourbon to calm his nerves, click the button below to learn more about becoming a Supporter of the Independent. As always, thanks for reading!

Read this Indy Digest at CVIndependent.com!