Linda Atkins’ sparkling personality continues to light our path

Pretty in Pink (photo credit: The Eureka Times-Standard)

Aah, Linda Atkins, gracious even in victory. Humboldt County’s most unlikable politician demonstrates yet again why a man no one ever heard of before came within 300 votes of unseating her miserable ass.

According to the Times-Standard, while being sworn in Tuesday for her second term, Atkins said she was glad the “hideous campaign” was over. She followed this up with some equivalently tone-deaf remarks about the superiority of her campaign.

She apparently didn’t say anything about her former opponent’s nefariously round signs, but we’re sure that continues to stick in her throat, along with all of the expressions of human warmth and decency she can’t bring herself to utter.

Happy Thanksgiving USFWS!!!!

WHOOPS: Bugs misread election results, not that it matters…

Evidently when reading election results, one should read the entire line, not just one part. For a few minutes there, we thought and reported that Joe Bonino was up by 50, when as one anonymous noted, he’s actually down by 208 as the Times-Standard reported last night.

That whole contest, though, kind of left me scratching my head. Why does it matter? Key votes will continue to be 4-1, whereas if Bonino had won they would instead be 5-0. I believe the term for this is functional equivalency.

That said, is the race over? Are all the votes counted? Even if there was a sack of uncounted votes somewhere, it seems like a deficiency of 208 would be a hard corner to turn.

Anyway. Maybe Linda Atkins’ “She’s Disagreeable” platform resonated with voters after all.

Report: Atkins would suspend campaign, if she had one

In a show of solidarity with East Coast Democrats hit hard by Hurricane Sandy, City Councilwoman Linda Atkins announced today that she would suspend her re-election campaign, if she had one.

Linda Atkins stole this jacket from Virginia Bass.

“Yeah, big whoop, I know,” Atkins said. “I could actually give a shit about New York, but fuck. I had to do something to get my name in the paper, you know?”

Atkins explained. “Everyone’s all, ‘Oh yeah, Linda, run for re-election, Linda, we need you,’ but then no one gives me shit for money and my dumb ass is out there raffling off the six fucking lawn signs I could afford to make and having to fabricate BS stories so people will remember I exist.”

Atkins previously made headlines by stating that Sandy would make a “direct hit” on Eureka after annihilating Des Moines, Salt Lake and Carson City. She pointed to predictions by federal weather officials that temperatures in Eureka would likely plunge into the low- to mid-40s around Humboldt Bay overnight. Residents would also battle “perfect storm” conditions as winds — expected to gust upwards of 14 mph — combined with as much as .14 inches of rain. Micro-flooding and damp vegetation would impact many low lying areas or lawn with poor drainage.

“Okay, whatever,” Atkins said. “I would just like to point out to all the people out there who say I don’t do nothing but grandstand around and bitch about whatever the other councilmembers do that, okay, there’s some truth to that, but there’s also some truth to there hasn’t been a single hurricane to hit Eureka since I was elected, okay?” she said. “So suck on that.”

Uh… guys?

Let’s see. Divide by n… carry the one… scooch that decimal point a couple places to the left… Could it be worth four million dollars? Wait–That can’t be right.

“Wonder L” Atkins feeding re-election campaign with superhero-size diet of bullshit

“Wonder L” Atkins

Holy irony Batman!

Eureka City Councilwoman Linda Atkins is launching her re-election campaign with a ruse that it will take a concerted effort from “all of us” to make a change in the Eureka community.

(By “all of us” she kinda sorta means a minority of the progressive people she represents and one particular businessman willing to throw tens of thousands of dollars anywhere in the county every few election cycles to make sure Eureka’s landscape remains economically friendly to his bottom line.)

Atkins’ campaign website says the “2010 elections reminded us that money CAN really buy elections, but in our small city; Linda Atkins thinks that PEOPLE can and will begin to take our city back this year.”

Shit yeah! No doubt she’ll be counting on two particular “PEOPLE” in 2012 to pay for her re-election.

A Times-Standard article published a month before she was elected in 2008 highlighted “how a few big donors could change the dynamics of an election” and “show how money from outside city limits can play a sizable role in the race for Eureka’s council seats.”

The T-S pointed out that it was Atkins and failed progressive candidate George Clark who were the biggest beneficiaries of said money. There was $9,000 from Pierson Building Supply owner Bill Pierson and $2,250 from McKinleyville resident Ken Miller.

Go figure.

Kirk Girard’s GPU Monkeyfuck dies with a wimper

What? General Plan shocker!! Who saw this coming?

Other than everyone, of course.

We saw it coming, and we’re not even smart.

Anyone who thought this board was going to blithely accept the Kirk Girard General Plan Update needs to be issued an encephalitic helmet so he or she can walk down that hall without further injury to the brain. Elections have consequences. The progs flogged the dog on the GPU for more than a dozen years in a process that was, most of the time, laughably fucked, and now they’ve lost control of the process. This is commonly referred to as the will of the voters, the way of the world. Sometimes one side wins, sometimes another. And anyone who can’t hack that basic political fact should go back to working for Ken Miller. He’s always just about one idiot shy of a quorum, and it looks like in this case there are two up for grabs.

Bugs thrilled to learn they’re in the economic elite

Yay us!!

The things you learn in the Times-Standard these days. According to a letter to the editor today from Pam Service, we’re effing rich! Check this out.

Pam says:

• People voting for someone other than Linda Atkins are “moneyed.” This is terrific news! We thought we were kind of middle class, what with the blue-collar jobs and just squeaking by. But obviously that’s about to change. Does anyone know when we’ll get our checks?
• Candidates able to quickly muster support are “questionable.” I’ll say. Remember how long it took for anyone to give a shit about Atkins? She must be the real deal.
• Anyone who wants to vote for a candidate other than Linda Atkins is a power-crazed control freak who is subverting the democratic process. I know, right? The obvious solution is for no one to run against Atkins, so that through the absence of a democratic process Democracy itself can be saved.

Get with it, Eureka! Keep Democracy alive by stopping people from voting for candidates they support.

Thank you.

Dean Singleton honored in Harper’s Magazine for being a complete douche

The September issue of Harper’s Magazine contains a fascinating story about Dean Singleton, owner of MediaNews Group, the privately held media behemoth that currently owns 56 daily newspapers including our very own Times-Standard.

According to “The Only Game In Town,” David Sirota recounts instances when Singleton:

• Ignored or killed stories critical of candidates he supported
• Concealed evidence that would hurt his friends and allies
• Strong-armed endorsements from his editorial boards
• Ran competitors out of business and then gutted staff

The article states that Singleton also, “without a hint of modesty,” allowed the Denver Post which he owns to run an article labeling himself “the Superman of the American newspaper industry.”

Aw, shucks!

Since forcing the Post‘s competitor the Rocky Mountain News out of business, Sirota writes, “Singleton has become even more blatant in his embrace of Charles Foster Kane’s famous dictum: People will think ‘what I tell them to think.'”

What a guy. While he cuts newspapers to the bone, Singleton brags about how many ranches he has, and how good the view is from his new $85 million headquarters building in Denver.

Meanwhile, we’ve got three news reporters at the Times-Standard, an editor determined not to stick her head out of the hole for any reason, and a citizenry that knows almost nothing about what goes on around it.

As for prospects for the future, Sirota holds out little hope:

But with newspaper monopolies hanging on for now, using their trusted brands to tilt the political and cultural terrain, things will almost certainly get worse before they get better.

Times-Standard editorial even dumber than most

It’s amazing the things we can learn from the Times-Standard. Take the editorial from the Sunday edition, in which we are informed that the problem with prosecutions in Humboldt County is not that Paul Gallegos is a dumb, unethical pile of butt-stink–it’s that his office doesn’t have enough money, so we should give him more. Great idea. Maybe while we’re at it, we can give bad drivers more cars, and lousy farmers more land. Hey–let’s give child molesters more dicks, because for sure that’ll make everything better.

Previously we’ve been told that all Gallegos needed was time. Then it was experience. Then it was staff. Now, evidently, it’s money.What Gallegos actually needs is 50 IQ points and a conscience. What he has that serves him almost as well is the editorial board of the county’s only daily newspaper spending a full decade making excuses for him.

Times-Standard staffers forget what city, state they live in

Yoo-hoo, friends! Remember Humboldt County? That place with the burgeoning pot industry and crap daily newspaper?

There’s no place like… wherever.

Some rain, mostly Mark Lovelace contain Trinity’s Flat Fire

Third District Supervisor Mark Lovelace announced Tuesday that the low pressure system that moved across Northern California that dropped nearly 1 inch of rain contributed somewhat to his efforts to get the upper hand on the Flat Fire in Trinity County.

The wildfire burned 1,688 acres and interrupted east-west traffic on U.S. Highway 299.

As of the Board of Supervisors’ meeting start Tuesday the fire was approximately 80 percent contained, according to the Times-Standard.

The Flat Fire was sparked last Wednesday and its cause is still under investigation. Lovelace believes it is most likely the result of severely unregulated development in Timber Production Zone lands.
In related news, Lovelace also helped the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office bomb squad recover and destroy a 60-year-old 155mm artillery shell found on Eureka’s waterfront yesterday. Lovelace, who recently handily defeated challenger Karen Brooks in the far-left leaning Third District’s June primary, said he will remain vigilant to respond to and vanquish any emergencies in any jurisdiction during his term in office.

Court rules Caltrans not planning to go all crazy on big trees

If the Progs felt the end of the world was nigh when Walmart opened in the area’s largest retail mall last month, today’s revelation is all four Horsemen of the Apocalypse giddyupping right over their tree-hugging backs.

Although there is some federally ordered remapping of trees to be done, the Humboldt County Superior Court ruled in favor of Caltrans and gives the go ahead for the Richardson Grove Improvement Project to move forward. It might be the final straw that forces the environmental and job-hating groups to commit a Heaven’s Gate-style mass suicide. Oh no, slightly larger trucks are coming!!!

We kid. But seriously. In his 30-page decision, Judge Dale Reinholtsen said the court determined that Caltrans isn’t the Devil and doesn’t hate trees. Particularly really big, old redwood trees. And not surprisingly, he found that Caltrans followed California’s environmental laws just fine. Desperate appeals from oddly named people or groups to follow no doubt.

Times-Standard likely to suck even more

It’s official. (Well, it’s probably official. It’s coming from the North Coast Journal, right?)

Rumors are afloat that the area’s longstanding daily newspaper the Eureka Times-Standard, only a wispy shell of what it was a few years ago, will be outsourcing more of its content or production. Or both. Local jobs might be lost.

Will the last one out please turn the lights off?

It’s a sad day for newsfolk and yet another blow from the T-S’s corporate schmucks.

This means many Humboldt County residents will probably have to get vital news and important information in the near future from the area’s next two biggest media outlets: Charles Douglas’ Humboldt Sentinel and Humboldt State University’s The Lumberjack newspaper.

Both are stoked, but couldn’t be reached for comment. The Lumberjack’s editor graduated in May and Douglas’ mom had the phone in her basement removed because of budget cuts.

The Arcata High Journalism Club will also jockey for a piece of the pie.

Still reeling from the shock of a retail outlet in a shopping mall, NCJ now dumbfounded to learn policies at a Catholic hospital may be Catholic

Yeah. Emphasis on “dumb.”

I guess the Sisters of St. Joseph of Orange forgot to have their religious beliefs vetted by the astute moral arbiters at the North Coast Journal.

I’m hoping the NCJ can put out an entire issue telling us where we shouldn’t shop, who we shouldn’t vote for, and what we shouldn’t believe.

Oh–wait. That’s right. They do that every week.