∙ The City Council has unanimously voted to consider a map that would slightly change how the city’s seven council districts are drawn. The first reading of an ordinance to adopt the map will be on Feb. 28. The changes between the current districts and proposed future districts are minor to rebalance population growth based upon the latest census.
Every 10 years, local governments use new data from the census to redraw their district lines to reflect how local populations have changed. Ventura residents can view and provide comments on the map before Feb. 28, as well as give comments during the virtual meeting.
For more information and to see the map, visit cityofventura.ca.gov/redistricting.
∙ We have had some very spectacular, beautiful sunsets as the earth rotates. It almost seems as if the sun is actually setting, even though it doesn’t move. The sun appears to rise and set because of the Earth’s rotation on its axis – the Earth makes one complete turn every 24 hours.
∙ February is Black History Month, which is an annual celebration of achievements by African Americans and a time for recognizing their central role in U.S. history. Also known as African American History Month, the event grew out of “Negro History Week,” the brainchild of noted historian Carter G. Woodson and other prominent African Americans. Since 1976, every U.S. president has officially designated the month of February as Black History Month. Other countries around the world, including Canada and the United Kingdom, also devote a month to celebrating Black history.
∙ I enjoyed watching the NFL’s championship game. Very exciting and another 3-point victory – the way a championship game should be. It was almost super.
∙ Watching curling at the Olympics is almost as exciting as watching cornhole, but without the beer.
∙ When William Herschel discovered the 7th planet in 1781 his colleagues thought that he was an idiot. They said to him, “William, ur an anus” and this is how the planet Uranus got its name.
∙ In his theory of general relativity, Einstein predicted something called time dilation: the notion that two clocks under two different gravitational pulls will always tick at different speeds. The effect has been observed in many experiments since, but now scientists have recorded it at the smallest scale seen so far.
Two atomic clock readings were taken from the same cloud of atoms, in a highly controlled energy state. In fact, the atoms ticked between two energy levels in perfect synchronization for 37 seconds, a record in terms of quantum coherence.
While the difference in redshift across this tiny distance was just 0.0000000000000000001 or so, that’s in line with predictions made by general relativity. Those differences can make a difference when you get out to the scale of the entire Universe, or even when you’re dealing with systems that need to be ultra-accurate, such as GPS navigation.
I knew that.
∙ A Manhattan judge called Donald Trump “just a bad guy” in a scathing rebuke to a lawyer arguing that the former president was being unfairly singled out for investigation by New York Attorney General Letitia James.
At the end of the hearing, state Supreme Court Judge Arthur Engoron ordered Trump, along with his daughter Ivanka Trump and son Donald Trump Jr., to comply with subpoenas and testify under oath in a civil investigation launched by James into suspicious Trump Organization business practices.
Chris Christie did not hold back in his criticism of how former President Donald Trump has sought to depict the deadly attack against the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. “Let’s face it. Let’s call it what it is. Jan. 6 was a riot that was incited by Donald Trump in an effort to intimidate Mike Pence and the Congress into doing exactly what he said in his own words last week: Overturn the election.”
Former Vice President Mike Pence finally said, “President Trump is wrong. I had no legal right to overturn the election.” In response Trump stated, “Just saw Mike Pence’s statement on the fact that he had no right to do anything with respect to the Electoral Vote Count, other than being an automatic conveyor belt for the Old Crow Mitch McConnell to get Biden elected President as quickly as possible.” Of course, Pence had no legal basis for changing the results of the election.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell stated, “We all were here. We saw what happened. It was a violent insurrection for the purpose of trying to prevent the peaceful transfer of power after a legitimately certified election, from one administration to the next. That’s what it was.”
Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas) said he does not agree with the Republican National Committee’s characterization of Jan. 6 being “legitimate political discourse” if it applies to those who committed violence that day. He said, “I do not agree with that statement if it’s applying to those who committed criminal offenses and violence to overtake our shrine of democracy.”
I might add, those who also went there to hang Pence.
∙ A man who identified himself as a believer in the QAnon conspiracy theory was sentenced to three years and eight months in prison for assaulting police officers at the Capitol during last year’s riot. Nicholas Languerand called himself a patriot, but the judge who sentenced him said the rioters who invaded the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, don’t deserve that description.
∙ Guns In the News
One person was killed and at least one other wounded in a morning shooting inside a Richland Fred Meyer store.
A 15-year-old boy was seriously injured and a bus driver was wounded in north Minneapolis in two separate shootings.
A 911 call that a woman had been shot at a home in southwest Phoenix turned into a barricade standoff where nine officers were injured in a hail of gunfire. Two people inside the house died.
Three people were injured in a shooting outside a West Los Angeles restaurant frequented by celebrities following a Justin Bieber concert.
Police are ramping up the pressure to find the person who shot a 9-year-old girl in an apparent road rage incident in Houston.
One person was killed and five were wounded in a shooting at a park in Portland. Social media flyers showed there was a planned march for Amir Locke, a Black man who was fatally shot by police in Minneapolis.
∙ IAC/Interactive Corp. has announced it is ending print editions of Entertainment Weekly, In Style and four other titles turning them into digital only properties. I’m afraid that print media is really suffering. We certainly are as well, but because we are Ventura’s only local newspaper, it’s important to us that we continue to publish to inform our readers about local news and happenings.
∙ Bullet train officials have reported the cost for the high-speed system between Los Angeles and San Francisco is now estimated to be $105 billion, just a bit more than in 2008 when voters approved a bond to help build the railroad that estimated that the system would cost $33 billion. Oh well, $72 billion is not much these days. Perhaps this is why some people vote against bonds for most anything. Maybe they’re right.
