Jeff Pelline's Sierra Foothills Report

“There is growing controversy over a Mississippi specialty license plate that would honor a former Ku Klux Klan leader,” according to a Jackson, Miss., television news report.

“The group pushing for plates honoring general Nathan Bedford Forrest wants them available to the public in 2014. The Mississippi division of the Sons of Confederate Veterans wants to sponsor five state-issued license plates.

“They would commemorate the 150th anniversary of the Civil War. One of the plates would feature Forrest who was a confederate general.”

“The state NAACP says Mississippi shouldn’t honor a man who was an early leader of what they call a terrorist group.

“‘Because it says we haven’t progressed others say Mississippi hasn’t come that far so why give them an instance to say that while still celebrating the past,’ Vanessa McDowell told WJTV.

“Since its part of the past others say it shouldn’t really matter.”

The rest of the article is here.

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Editor’s note: Mother Jones magazine has launched a three-part series on the tea party patriots. This is the first. I will link to the others when they run later in the week.

“Two years ago, Tea Party Patriots got its start as a scrappy, ground-up conservative organization. Its rowdy activists demanded more transparency and less business-as-usual in the nation’s capital, and they worked hard to elect candidates who they believed wouldn’t succumb to the ways of Washington.

“But it didn’t take long for the grassroots tea party organization to embrace the DC establishment—and some of its more questionable practices. Lately, Tea Party Patriots (TPP) has started to resemble the Beltway lobbying operations its members have denounced.

‘”Tea Party Patriots? I can’t attribute one victory to them at all,’ Laura Boatright, a former TPP regional coordinator in Southern California who has become an outspoken critic, told the publication. ‘Where’s the success with what they’ve done with all this money? My view is that it’s just a career plan’ for its national leaders—namely Jenny Beth Martin, who in 2010 was named by Time as one of the 100 most influential people in the world, and Mark Meckler, now a regular commentator on Fox News. (Meckler and Martin did not respond to a request to comment for the Rolling Stone story.)

The rest of the article is here.

TOMORROW: TPP says it’s a nonprofit political charity. “News to us,” says the IRS.

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Editor’s note: I received this email about Nate Beason holding a town hall meeting — that’s at least one more than his former colleague and staunch conservative John Spencer held! It got me wondering again if Beason is going to run for a third term when his latest one expires in 2012.

As I’ve written many times before, Nate’s replacement would likely to be more liberal, riling some locals (including our “wingnut” blogging contingent) up in the foothills surrounding Nevada City. They haven’t always been very kind to him. Two of our five supervisors have a college degree, and Nate is one of them. He also has a master’s.

Supervisor Beason to Hold Town Hall Meeting in Chicago Park

Nate Beason, Nevada County Supervisor for District 1, will hold a town hall meeting to present information on the County budget, its impact on County services, and other issues affecting Nevada County. He welcomes the opportunity to meet constituents, answer questions and listen to concerns. The meeting will be held at 6:30PM on Thursday, February 24th at the Chicago Park Elementary School library, 15725 Mt. Olive Road, Chicago Park.

The Board of Supervisors is the legislative and executive body of County government. The County serves as an arm of the state in providing critical health and human services such as public assistance, public health, child and adult protective services, child support services, Medi-cal, housing programs and veterans services. Other core services include infrastructure, roads, jail, law enforcement and land use and development within the unincorporated areas.

District 1 serves the areas of Peardale, Chicago Park, Cedar Ridge, Banner Mountain, Cascade Shores, Nevada City and the Highway 174 corridor. If you are not sure which district you live in, please contact the Board of Supervisors office at 265-1480.

WHERE: Chicago Park Elementary School library, 15725 Mt. Olive Road, Chicago Park.
WHEN: Thursday, February 24, 2011, 6:30 PM.

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“One of the things that I have been thinking about is that News Corp. (probably) gets far more tax subsidy than NPR through tax writeoffs. If Rupert Murdoch agrees to forgo any tax writeoffs than maybe we can talk about removing public funding from NPR,” as one observer notes.

Throughout the years, The Economist and others “dug deeper” to “out” Murdoch: “A (1999) report in the Economist newspaper offers an intriguing update. It states that in the four years to 30 June last year, Mr. Murdoch’s News Corporation and its subsidiaries paid only A$325m (£128m) in corporate taxes worldwide. That translates as 6% of the A$5.4bn consolidated pre-tax profits for the same period.

“By comparison another multi-national media empire, Disney, paid 31%.
…
“However, analysts suggest Mr Murdoch’s team broadly employ three strategies:

Tax relief claimed on debt interest repayments.
A reliance on off-shore tax havens.
Exploiting global differences in accounting standards.
The first principle, which effectively allows companies to off-set profits against previous losses, is well established, says Iain Stewart, a partner with the accountancy firm KPMG.”

The articles are here, here and here.

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Editor’s note: Reposted from late Friday in case you missed it.

Here’s a small-town scoop: World-famous singer/songwriter Judy Collins is expected to come to Grass Valley this fall, according to my sources.

Collins is slated to perform in late September, courtesy of the Center for The Arts. This is another coup for the Center in landing world-class entertainers, such as Ani DiFranco, Kris Kristofferson (who has a place in Truckee), Paula Poundstone, Chubby Checker, The Kingston Trio, Ricki Lee Jones and Smothers Brothers.

Learning this brings back memories: I saw Collins perform at Carnegie Hall in New York in 1985 in her annual post-Thanksgiving concert. My girlfriend (then) and I flew up from Miami for the weekend on Eastern Airlines. I covered Eastern under Astronaut Frank Borman for the local paper and N.Y. Times, dictating stories via telephone!

I’ve been a fan of Collins’ forever. She has bridged generations, outlasting Eastern Airlines and Life magazine! She’s now 71 years old.

Collins’ planned appearance comes as the Center is working on a “facility master plan” to upgrade its facility at 314 W. Main Street to better serve as a regional performing arts center. Some of the “big name” performers have held their concerts at the Grass Valley Veterans Hall. The details of the master plan — part of the effort to enhance tourism — are here and here.

Judy Collins has thrilled audiences worldwide with her unique blend of interpretative folksongs and contemporary themes, as her website notes. Her career has spanned more than 50 years. A timeline is here.

“Judy Collins is also noted for her rendition of Joni Mitchell’s ‘Both Sides Now’ on her 1967 album, Wildflowers which has since been entered into the Grammy Hall of Fame. Winning ‘Song of the Year’ at the 1975 Grammy Awards was Judy’s version of ‘Send in the Clowns,’ a ballad written by Stephen Sondheim for the Broadway musical ‘A Little Night Music.’

At 71, Collins is still writing and performing. She plays 80 to 100 dates a year around the country.

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