It was six years ago today the blogger took a walk through the outer Richmond District.
The neighborhood was quiet, desolated and subdued as people sheltered in place and wore their masks.
The positive which came out of the Pandemic was the movement which resulted in the now permanently car free 1.2 mile strip in Golden Gate Park which is JFK Promenade.
The early days when then JFK Drive was car free. The temporary measure which became permanent.
Israeli Prime MinisterBenjamin Netanyahu is a war making, some would say, ‘war criminal’.
It makes perverse sense that this thuggish politician would push through a death penalty measure aimed at the Palestinians.
Netanyahu is already responsible for the slaughter of tens of thousands in Palestine, Lebanon and Iran already. The death penalty statute just adds to his list criminal and inhumane activity.
Aftermath of Israeli air strike in Gaza resulting in the death of 90 civilians
Excerpted from Deutsche Welle 3.30.2026
Israel‘s parliament, the Knesset, on Monday passed legislation making the death penalty by hanging the default punishment for West Bank Palestinians found guilty of murdering Israeli citizens.
“The State of Israel is changing the rules of the game today,” said Minister of National Security Itamar Ben-Gvir, a West Bank settler whose ultranationalist party introduced the bill and who has popularized the measure with a noose pinned to his lapel.
Israeli media outlets showed images of Ben-Gvir celebrating with his fellow Knesset members in Israel’s parliament.
Critics also say it is unlikely to deter attacks by Palestinian attackers and that Israel has no sovereign jurisdiction over the occupied Palestinian territories.
It stressed that “such laws and measures will not break the will of the Palestinian people or undermine their steadfastness, nor will they deter them from continuing their legitimate struggle for freedom, independence, and the establishment of an independent Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital.”
A large number of Israelis are appalled by Netanyahu’s criminal behavior
The Palestinian presidency strongly condemned the law, saying it “amounts to a war crime,” in a statement carried by the Palestinian Wafa news agency.
A total of 62 of 120 lawmakers backed the bill, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, whose ruling coalition is reliant on the support of far-right parties, for whom the adoption of the law marks a major victory.
“Those who murder Jews will not continue to breathe and enjoy conditions in prison,” he said. “This is a day of justice for the murdered, a day of deterrence for enemies,” Ben-Gvir said after the Knesset vote.
Top photo: Netanyahu and Minister of National Security Itamar Ben-Gvir, a West Bank settler whose ultranationalist party introduced the bill and who has popularized the measure with a noose pinned to his lapel celebrate passage of Palestinian death penalty bill in Israeli Knesset
The hangman for Palestinians in Netanyahu’s Israel
“We’ve always encouraged people to have a break with KitKat,” a spokesperson for the brand said, referring to the product’s advertising slogan. “But it seems thieves have taken the message too literally and made a break with more than 12 tons of our chocolate.”
Swiss food giant Nestle said on Saturday a huge shipment of KitKat chocolate, weighing around 12 tons, had been stolen last week. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kit_Kat
The company also sounded the alarm over the rise in cargo theft incidents.
“Whilst we appreciate the criminals’ exceptional taste, the fact remains that cargo theft is an escalating issue for businesses of all sizes,” KitKat said.
“With more sophisticated schemes being deployed on a regular basis, we have chosen to go public with our own experience in the hope that it raises awareness of an increasingly common criminal trend.”
The company said the truck carrying 413,793 bars of its new chocolate range set off from its production facility in central Italy and was on its way to Poland when it disappeared.
Nestle did not reveal where exactly the truck was lost.
As of afternoon Saturday, the whereabouts of the vehicle and the merchandise remain unknown.
The firm said the heist could result in shortages of the crunchy bars — made of waffles covered with chocolate — on supermarket shelves in some European countries.
It also warned that the missing chocolate bars “could enter unofficial sales channels.” But Nestle said if that happens, it would be possible to trace the stolen goods by scanning the unique batch codes found on each bar.
“If a match is found, the scanner will be given clear instructions on how to alert KitKat who will then share the evidence appropriately,” it said.
The blogger has listened to radio news for a lifetime. One of the first stations was KCBS-740AM in San Francisco. Long before the days of National Public Radio.
The omnipresent CBS Radio News sign on
Make no mistake the shutdown of CBS radio news has nothing to do with money despite what corporate management insists.
Donald Trump has railed against mainstream media which fails to bow down. The death of CBS radio news is another victory over mainstream media free speech for Trump.
The Trump administration approved Mr. (David) Ellison’s purchase after Paramount paid $16 million to settle a suit brought by President Trump against “60 Minutes.” – NYT 3.20.2026
Excerpted from The New York Times 3.21.2026
It transported Americans onto the rooftops of London in the Blitz and into the bleak embers of concentration camps in liberated Nazi Germany, an aural atlas to world events thousands of miles away.
Edward R. Murrow broadcast from Buchenwald Concentration Camp April 1945
In more recent years, it transmitted eyewitness dispatches from world capitals to hundreds of local stations in rural and sparsely populated parts of the country.
CBS News Radio was a pioneer and stalwart of the mass media century, the proving ground of star journalists like Edward R. Murrow, with a distinctive five-tone chime that became synonymous with breaking news — long before the rise of 24-hour cable and the internet.
Now, its venerable airwaves are crackling to a close. Paramount Skydance, the parent company of CBS, announced on Friday that the radio news network would sign off, after 99 years, near the end of May.
Excerpted from the New York Times 3.20.2021
CBS News came under the control of David Ellison, a billionaire tech heir, after his Hollywood studio Skydance absorbed the media giant Paramount last year. The Trump administration approved Mr. Ellison’s purchase after Paramount paid $16 million to settle a suit brought by President Trump against “60 Minutes.”
Mr. Ellison said he wanted CBS News to appeal to a centrist audience, and he installed Bari Weiss, an opinion journalist and critic of the mainstream news media, as its new leader.
CBS News eliminated its century-old radio division, which broadcast Edward R. Murrow’s World War II dispatches from London, amid a round of layoffs on Friday announced by the network’s editor in chief, Ms. Weiss.
CBS radio news journalists on election night November 1936
More than 60 employees, or roughly 6 percent of the news division, are set to be laid off under the plan, according to a person who requested anonymity to share internal details.
“Certain parts of this newsroom need to get smaller in order for us to make room for the things that we need to build to remain competitive in the future,” Ms. Weiss, who started her job in October, said during a newsroom-wide conference call on Friday, according to a recording.
CBS News Radio, which has roots in the Jazz Age, was once among the premier news broadcasters in the country. “CBS News Radio served as the foundation for everything we have built since 1927,” Tom Cibrowski, the president of CBS News, wrote in a memo.
Original CBS Radio news headquarters in New York City- circa 1939
At least the San Francisco City Attorney is displaying a bit of empathy.
Knowing full well the incident resulting in the death of a SFPD recruit Jon-Marques Psalms in 2025 is an embarrassment to the City and the SFPD.This wrongful death litigation will never go to Trial. The City will pay the grieving family.
The buried lede in San Francisco Chronicle article 3.19.2026
“The Code of Silence is alive and well at SFPD,” wrote Brad Gage, an attorney for the Psalms family. “Snitches get stitches and rats are targeted for retaliation.”
Spokespersons for the SFPD said they were precluded from commenting on the lawsuit due to ongoing litigation and referred all questions to the San Francisco City Attorney’s Office. In a statement, city attorney spokesperson Jen Kwart called Psalms’ death “a tragedy.”
“Our thoughts are with his loved ones,” Kwart said. “We will review the complaint and respond in court.”
Excerpted from San Francisco Chronicle 3.19.2026
The family of a 30-year-old San Francisco Police Department recruit who died after a intense training exercise last year sued the city this week, alleging his death could have been prevented with safety protocols — and that his family was misled about the severity of his injuries.
Christina and Marcus Psalms accused the city of battery, assault, wrongful death, negligent supervision and other actions in the August 2025 death of their son, Jon-Marques Psalms.
Psalms, who joined the SFPD academy just three months before his death, died two days after collapsing during an endurance training exercise called a “red man” drill, which involves recruits wrestling in full-body padded suits to simulate hand-to-hand combat.
Vallejo cop Jarrett Tonn murdered 22-year old Sean Monterrosa in June 2020 while he was sitting in his car.
A terrible abuse of police power which the blogger wrote about at the time (see following: Murdered by Vallejo cop)
The cop was never charged. Even worse. Jarrett Tonn was promoted to Sergeant in June 2025 after being reinstated in 2023.
But, six years later Justice of a sort prevails.
Hard to believe that Jarrett Tonn has received a promotion despite murdering 22-year old Sean Monterrosa in June 2020
Excerpted from San Francisco Chronicle 3.18.2026
The city of Vallejo will pay $8.5 million to settle a lawsuit filed by the family of Sean Monterrosa, who was shot and killed by a police officer there in 2020, the family’s attorney said.
“The loss of Sean will forever be with our family, and no settlement can ease our pain,” the Monterrosa family said in a statement on Tuesday. “Nonetheless, we are grateful to have reached a resolution in this case.”
Monterrosa, 22, of San Francisco, was fatally shot by Officer Jarrett Tonn on June 2, 2020, just a week after a Minneapolis police officer killed George Floyd, sparking months of protests against police violence across the country.
Vallejo police were responding to reports of looting and came upon a group of people including Monterrosa outside a Walgreens. Tonn, who was riding in the back of an unmarked police truck, fired through the windshield from the back seat, striking Monterrosa in the back of the head. The 22-year-old was found with a hammer in his sweatshirt pocket, which police said they mistook for a gun.
United Farmworkers leader Cesar Chavez outside Safeway headquarters – 1973
The blogger is shocked and dismayed to read The New York Times and subsequent reports in The San Francisco Chronicle chronicling years of sexual abuse by United Farmworkers icon Cesar Chavez.
Equally dismaying is the Rush to Judgment to destroy Chavez’ legacy. In an SF Chronicle snap poll, over 75 percent of the respondents want his person and accomplishments vanquished from public life.
Mob Mentality in full throated roar– SFChronicle – 3.18.2026
New York Times investigation which set off the firestorm
There’s the old saying made famous by Wes ‘Scoop’ Nisker. “If you don’t like the News. Go out and make some of your own.”https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wes_Nisker
Donald Trump is using all the tools of power to bend the media to pervert the news.
Censorship in Nazi Germany was extreme and strictly enforced by the governing Nazi Party, but specifically by Joseph Goebbels and his Reich Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda. Similarly to many other police states both before and since, censorship within Nazi Germany included the silencing of all past and present dissenting voices. In addition to the further propaganda weaponization of all forms of mass communication, including newspaper, music, literature, radio, and film, by the State,[1] the Ministry of Propaganda also produced and disseminated their own literature, which was solely devoted to spreading Nazi ideology and the Hitler Myth.
Book burning in 1930’s Germany – May 1933
Excerpted from The New York Times 3.16.2026
The president and his allies have sought to vilify the news media since the start of his political rise a decade ago. But this recent denigration of news organizations — including The New York Times — comes as Mr. Trump has appeared at pains to depict his Middle East military effort as a smashing success, despite some facts to the contrary and opinion polls that have revealed widespread doubts among Americans about the war.
In particular, Mr. Trump has zeroed in on accusing American news organizations of disloyalty to their country, as in an official White House news release declaring that CNN had sought “to undermine our decisive victories in Operation Epic Fury.”
Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, said in a statement on Monday: “The media has been undeniably biased and negative in its coverage of President Trump and Operation Epic Fury. Anybody with eyes and ears can see this.”
Last night the blogger explored the Stalin era Soviet Union 1930’s Famine terror against the Russian people.
Tonight a documentary about the current state of Putin political terror in Russia walked away with the Academy Award for Best Documentary feature. ‘ Mr. Nobody Against Putin’.
“Mr. Nobody Against Putin is about how you lose your country. And what we saw when working with this footage, it’s that you lose it through countless small little acts of complicity,” Director David Borenstein said. “When we act complicit, when a government murders people on the streets of our major cities, when we don’t say anything, when oligarchs take over the media and control how we can produce it and consume, we all face a moral choice. But luckily, even a ‘nobody’ is more powerful than you think.”
A documentary about the current state of affairs in Russia walked away with the Academy Award for Best Documentary feature. ‘ Mr. Nobody Against Putin’.
His speech was interrupted by applause from the Dolby Theatre audience. Pavel Talankin, the 34 year old school teacher and the film’s main character, also spoke, his words translated from Russian, making an impassioned plea for peace at a time of war in the Middle East, Ukraine, and elsewhere.
“We look at the sky for shooting stars to make a very important wish. But there are countries where instead of shooting stars, they have shooting bombs and shooting drones,” he noted. “In the name of our future, in the name of all of our children, stop all of these wars now.”
The Academy Awards are upon us and serious movies rarely receive the Red Carpet treatment.
Tonight I watched transfixed the sobering and seriously motivating story ‘Mr. Jones ‘. Gareth Jones, a British journalist, who traveled to Soviet Russia in 1933 and exposed the terror of Stalin’s starvation campaign against his own people. Millions perished while the world remained ignorant the genocideuntil William Randolph Hearst published Gareth Jones harrowing tale.
Mr. Jones fateful and fatal phone call. Jones learns there are really two stories. One is the story the journalist, fictionalized in Mr. Jones as Paul Kleb, was desperately trying to uncover and for which he died.
Mr. Jones met a cruel fate. He was kidnapped and assassinated by Soviet agents in Mongolia one day before his 30th birthday in 1935.Gareth Jones (journalist) – Wikipedia
The film, directed by Agnieszka Holland, is meticulous. Particularly the cinemaphotography as it alternates between black/white and color.
The entire ensemble cast is stellar.
One story lines involves George Orwell and his novel ‘Animal Farm’. Apparently, the inspiration for the story was based on the ‘Holodomor’.
A second story line involves New York Times reporter Walter Duranty who won a Pulitzer Prize for his reporting. It turns out that Duranty was well aware of Stalin’s atrocities against his own people. Yet continued to knowingly spin the fiction there was no famine. Even when the reality was known his Pulitzer was never revoked. Walter Duranty – Wikipedia https://share.google/MdriSCGn68mf9qEoU
Top photo: James Norton portrayed British journalist Gareth Jones
Lee's Perspective 