Carlton Jones should step down as Mayor of Tulare and resign from its city council. It would be the correct–and decent–course of action. Ask yourself if Jones is a decent individual. Over the years we at the Valley Voice have received numerous complaints about Jones, most amounting to nothing more than gossip. Gossip because people […]
Those of you who remember the novel and movie of the same name, “Deliverance,” I invite to recall the famous scene with the “Banjo Boy” on the front porch of some shack deep in Georgian Appalachia. In the scene, one of four lost tourists, a guitarist, shares something of a showdown with a teen-age […]
How Greene Was My Valley Tony Maldonado, Dave Adalian and I have been hard at the oars now for the better part of two years regarding the doings at Tulare Regional Medical Center (TRMC). It was with some surprise, then–and no small relish–that, before the 7 September issue, I watched the Chief take sudden umbrage […]
This is the 100th edition of the Valley Voice since the Chief and I took ownership of it more than four years ago. I don’t know what–if anything–we’ve accomplished during that time. I’ll let our readers decide. But let me describe the experience. Operating a newspaper during this era of their contraction and decline is […]
The ancient Romans, if you remember your history, had a few kerfuffles with Carthage, a city-state on the north coast of Africa. Cato the Elder famously–and repeatedly–called for its destruction, thus the lingering phrase, “Delenda est Carthago.” Carthage must be destroyed. I’m not calling for the destruction of Tulare Mayor Carlton Jones. That wouldn’t be […]
The Valley Voice has been keenly covering the doings at Tulare Regional Medical Center (TRMC) because the hospital is a public–therefore governmental–entity. When board members are sworn in, for instance, they take an oath to preserve and defend both the national and state constitutions. We reported on the seismic realignment with a new medical executive […]
And now it is revealed that, in a classic dangle, Donald Trump, Jr., his brother in-law, Jared Kushner, and former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort accepted a meeting with Russian operatives last year for the expressed purpose of receiving stolen information damaging to Hillary Clinton’s presidential aspirations. This has been defended as opposition research–which would […]
If we take the last year–from last July to the end of June this year, say, as in a fiscal year–I’d have to acknowledge that the ledger is lavishly splashed with red. The blood-red of injury, of loss, and the blood, sweat and tears of emergency. “How do I love thee? [This past year] Let […]
Three months after Al’s loss the prevailing mood remains bleak. While we “celebrated” the Kid’s graduation, things like birthdays and holidays are as dog meat–served cold, and with the fur still attached. Nobody in this squad is much in the mood for festivities of any description. And then–with Teddy visiting for the graduation–the black topic […]
One thing the Chief and I have learned over the last few years is this legal gem: If you are the Defendant in a civil lawsuit the Plaintiff can play merry hell with your life. If you’re not overly concerned with the trial’s outcome–because, let’s face it: as the Plaintiff you can drop the proceedings […]