Grass Valley Council Member Yolanda Cookson has a posting on her blog about receiving her first “mean” comment from a blog entry.
“I was taken aback by the anger the author conveyed and was confused by the motivation behind the message,” she wrote.
The message is here: “You make me sick. I don’t know anybody who feels sorry for you. In fact, quite the opposite. It’s business vs. the rest of us and you are on the wrong side. Some other greedy business pricks took your home and you deserve everything that happens to you because of your pro developer/anti affordable housing stance.
“You are an enemy of the working class and at least partially responsible for local homelessness. We know who you are and we will not support you or any of your capitalist shenanigans in this county. Maybe you should move to Placer County. I hear it is the new republican asshole enclave. You should be warmly welcomed there. Good luck, ignorant bitch.”
Welcome to the world of blogging, Yolanda! The responses also were telling.
Wrote one: “It sounds like the ‘Guitar Jesus’ has struck again… He has spewed his vituperation over on Jeff Pelline’s blog. Jeff wrote about him/her.”
Steve Enos’ response was interesting, too:
“It’s sad that some folks hide and attack from the dark. Yolanda, be glad that it’s only a nasty email or rude comment.
“When I was on the City Council it went much farther than that and often still does. One time (while I was a City Council member) I was in the downstairs hallway at City Hall, attending a Planning Commission meeting. A very large man, one that I had never met was also in the hallway. This man started making some very nasty comments directed to me as he stood some 40 ft. away.
“So I approached him and introduced myself, he responded that he knew damn well who I was and said I should go do a few ‘things’ to myself. I stayed calm (I’m a former firefighter, Deputy Sheriff and Federal Drug Enforcement Officer) and asked what his concerns were. All I got was more nasty comments and then the threats started coming.
“This man made a series of comments about knowing where I lived and how ‘we’ are watching you and that I should be very careful and that I should ‘watch out’ or ‘we will take care of you.’ He explained that ‘accidents happen’ and I better be careful. At that point I walked away.
The full response is here.
Filed under: Uncategorized
When I was a regular at city council meetings in GV/NC I used to run into this kind of thing quite a bit. In fact, I happened to be present one night when I personally witnessed an incident involving Steve, so I can verify that he is not exaggerating.
And people wonder why there is such reluctance to enter public life…
Yolanda, Unfortunately, this is what goes with elected office, why we have a U S Secret Service to protect our Presidents and their families. I asked one councilwoman, actually quite attractive, if she would run again, and she said maybe, but she was tired of getting e-mails saying she was too fat. As long as it is just words, shake it off.
I don’t seem to be able to comment on Yolanda’s blog, but could someone please tell her that her RSS feed is very very stale? (it’s at
http://yolandacookson.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default
and the most recent entry is from August)
Thanks -
Anna, Nevada County Voices
never mind, I was using the blogspot feed not her own .com feed