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- Written by: Lake County News Reports
Nutmeg is evil. Call your congressman, congresswoman, congressbeast; we have to enact laws against nutmeg. Nutmeg “mules” sometimes working under the guise of “spice importers” need to be captured at the boarder and deported. (Please, don’t really call your congressional representative ... )
Nutmeg has spent years quietly positioning itself into key areas of our culinary repertoire, and even a key part of many pharmaceuticals. Our recipes are defiled by its presence. Eggnog, baked goods, and even recipes for meatloaf – once pure and all-American – have all been sullied with nutmeg.
The pharmaceutical companies aren’t interested in nutmeg for its flavor; they use it because nutmeg is a known antibacterial, natural preservativ, and hallucinogenic! Myristicin is the active ingredient in the illegal drug called “Ecstasy” and is a major component in nutmeg. Elemicin is another compound found in nutmeg and is also a known hallucinogen.
Both Myristicin and Elemicin have chemical structures similar to Mescaline, another illegal drug. Nutmeg also contains a weak carcinogen called safrole, which has been named as a contributor to the overall incidence of cancer, so much so that it has been banned as a food additive by the Food and Drug Administration.
Nutmeg is considered by most authorities as a pseudo-hallucinogen. People who attempt to get high with nutmeg generally report that the negatives far outweigh the positives of abusing the “spice.” Not only is nutmeg filled with dangerous hallucinogenic but in ancient Rome priests used nutmeg as incense in their depraved heretical worship rituals.
Small amounts (measured in teaspoons) of freshly grated nutmeg can cause dry mouth, euphoria, nausea, increased heart rate and feelings of impending doom. Moderate amounts can, in addition to the previous, cause hallucinations, dehydration, vomiting, stomach cramps and feelings of being disconnected from reality. And if a person consumes too much nutmeg, permanent psychosis can occur. If this weren’t bad enough nutmeg is so toxic to the human body that if it is injected intravenously it causes DEATH!
Connecticut has the unofficial designation of “The Nutmeg State,” a tradition which sprang from rumors that unscrupulous merchants carved nutmegs shapes out of wood and sold them as actual nutmegs.
A corresponding story tells of people who didn’t understand the proper use of nutmeg that was being imported with sailors to Connecticut was to be grated into foods, but thought that nutmeg was cracked open like a nut and so believed they were swindled. When opened like a nut, nutmeg does resemble wood.
Some gamblers sprinkle nutmeg on gambling tickets for luck. Inmates in prisons have been known to sell nutmeg stolen from the prison kitchen for cigarettes and money. Upon discovery of this illicit trade, nutmeg is now banned from most prisons. Malcolm X wrote in his autobiography that before his conversion to Islam he paid for nutmeg in prison and it was better that marijuana.
Nutmeg is the seed pit of the tree Myristica fragrans. This seed pit is surrounded by a net-like covering called an arillus that is removed and then becomes the spice “mace.” The mace is covered by a sweet pericarp (aka, fruit) that is made into candies and jams. The exterior fruit doesn’t ship well, so it typically is only seen in the nutmeg’s native areas of Indonesia, India and the Caribbean. Or is this just a great conspiracy for these cultures to enjoy the sweet fruit of their local trees and then ship the dangerous nutmeg to pollute our society?! Evil, I say, evil!
Small, damaged or worm-infested nutmegs are processed into nutmeg oil. The scent of nutmeg is strong so it should be used sparingly. It is said to resemble the fragrance of myrrh. Over 8,000 tons of nutmeg is shipped annually around the world. Nutmeg is also widely believed to be an aphrodisiac.
I, for one, do not want to have to worry about leaving nutmeg unlocked in my home. How do I protect my daughter from dealers pushing nutmeg on street corners?! With its grubby little hands in illegal drugs, prisons, gambling and non-Christian worship practices, how much longer can we afford to let nutmeg freely move through our culture!?
Don’t even get me started on the evils of dill!
If you absolutely must use nutmeg, always use fresh ground.
Fairly Traditional Eggnog (with my own unique twists)
Ingredients:
2 large eggs
2 Tablespoons plain white sugar
½ cup heavy cream
1 or 2 shots of your favorite rum, brandy, or whiskey
1 dash of cayenne powder or tiny dash of hot sauce (you won’t be able to taste it in the finish product but it acts as a natural flavor enhancer)
Freshly grated nutmeg
Separate the two eggs, reserve the whites and put the two yolks in your favorite pickle jar, cover and shake until the yolks lighten in color. Add the sugar, cream, liqueur, hot pepper and shake a few moments until combined. Whip the egg white into soft peaks and then gently fold the egg yolk mixture into the whites. Pour into glasses and grate the nutmeg right on top of the drink.
Ross A. Christensen is an award-winning gardener and gourmet cook. He is the author of "Sushi A to Z, The Ultimate Guide" and is currently working on a new book. He has been a public speaker for many years and enjoys being involved in the community.
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- Written by: Elizabeth Larson
NICE – Late last month, the Robinson Rancheria Band of Pomos Citizens Business Council informed several dozen members of its intent to remove their tribal membership, an action taking place not just locally but around California and the nation.
Between 60 and 74 members have reportedly been told they will be removed from the tribe's rolls unless, as a result of a half-hour appeal hearing granted to those who request it, the council chooses to let the members remain.
The appeal hearings to determine the future for these potential disenrollees began this week.
Tribal Chair Tracey Avila said this week that questions surrounding these tribal members and their entitlement to be included among the band's number have been an issue for years, going back to 1990.
This is the largest disenrollment action the tribe has ever taken, she concedes, as the tribe prepares for a January election to determine who will be tribal chair, as well as two other seats.
A June 14 election was decertified, and the tribe's election committee – dominated by Avila's family – has ruled that her challenger for the seat, EJ Crandell – who won the June election – has been disqualified from running.
Crandell and other tribal members, including potential disenrollee Luwana Quitiquit, say the disenrollments are purely political and retaliatory.
The tribe's own enrollment ordinance states that disenrollment is possible on three grounds: the person obtained enrollment by error, fraud, deceit or misrepresentation; they became a fully recognized member of another tribe without relinquishing their Robinson Rancheria membership; the person is a descendant of a disenrollee and doesn't otherwise meet membership requirements.
The ordinance doesn't allow for disenrollment due to adoption, which traditionally has been a common practice among American Indians.
However, the tribal council has passed a resolution to strike the adoption process, which Quitiquit and Crandell say is an ex post facto law, which is prohibited in the tribe's 1980 constitution, just as it is the US Constitution.
If it's truly the case that Robinson's disenrollment is born out of politics and animosity toward rival families, the Robinson band wouldn't be unique. That's because attempts to reduce tribal membership through these types of actions aren't new to Lake County, California or the nation.
On Nov. 10, 2007, 25 members of the Elem Colony were removed from that tribe's rolls, including the last native speaker of the tribe's language. Then-chairman, Ray Brown Sr. acknowledged the move to County News in a previous interview, saying that the move was justified because many of the people were adopted into the tribe and weren't blood relations.
To date, an estimated 2,000 Indians have been disenrolled by 15 California tribes – not including those currently proposed at Robinson, according to John Gomez, president of the American Indian Rights and Resources Organization (AIRRO), a group that focuses on human and civil rights issues.
Bureau of Indian Affairs Deputy Regional Director Dale Risling, based in Sacramento, said “quite a few” tribes are going through disenrollments currently.
He said his agency hears about most of them through the media, and not directly, since they don't usually have a role in settling the disputes because of tribal constitutions. “The ones that we really get are the ones that require our involvement.”
Tony Gonzales, spokesman for the American Indian Movement-West, said gaming tribes decertifying members has become a big problem nationwide as well.
That's because a lot is at stake, with gaming tribes across the nation generating revenues in the realm of $46 billion.
“Unfortunately, in the process to gain more money for themselves, they are decertifying members,” said Gonzales. “The irony, too, is they're adopting non-Indians into their tribes.”
Some blame gaming for disenrollments
In California, Gomez said the vast majority of disenrollments have occurred since the passage of Proposition 5, the Tribal Government Gaming and Economic Self-Sufficiency Act of 1998 that allowed gaming on tribal lands, and Proposition 1A, passed in 2000, allowing tribes to operate slot machines and banked and percentage card games.
He said it's mostly the gaming tribes who carry out reducing membership in this way. “I don't believe it's just about greed. I think it's about greed and retaining political power.”
Gomez was among 200 people disenrolled by the Pechanga Band of Luiseno Indians in 2004. Two years later, as many as 175 more Pechanga tribal members saw their membership disappear. “Both times it just happened prior to regularly scheduled elections for tribal council.”
The Redding Rancheria's first tribal chair, Bob Foreman, and his family – all 76 members – were disenrolled in 2002 after their lineage was questioned. Despite providing DNA samples to prove their ancestry, Foreman – who had been tribal chair for 20 years – was pushed out of the tribe.
Gomez said Foreman, who incidentally was born in Nice, went on to be a founding member of AIRRO.
Foreman died Nov. 19, and Gomez and other AIRRO members are traveling to Redding for his funeral this weekend, at which time they're expected to discuss possible action in response to Robinson's disenrollment move.
He said disenrollments often evolve around election disputes, as in Robinson's case. Similarly, Gomez said the Mooretown Rancheria of Oroville reclassified 30 percent of its membership and denied them voting rights so they couldn't participate in an election planned four days later. “The tribe still counts them as members but they're members without rights.”
Many tribal members will attempt to justify disenrollment actions saying that there is a question about ancestry, but he points out that such questions didn't arise when the tribes were counting members for federal government assistance.
As tribal rolls dwindle, federal funding also can go away, he said. However, the larger gaming tribes can afford to fund their own programs.
Quitiquit and some other tribal members facing disenrollment, many of whom asked that their names not be used at this time due to fear of retribution, said they felt Robinson Rancheria's casino and gaming had given rise to many of their current problems.
Rather than helping Indians get a leg up, they say that gaming is leading to expulsion of tribal members – among them veterans and elders – who may face a life on welfare without the support of their tribal communities.
Some Indian activists have even gone so far as to call disenrollment the “new Indian genocide.”
The problem is such a concern in Indian Country that last year, American Indian Movement activist Dennis Banks said that the Bureau of Indian Affairs needed to intervene to stop the California disenrollments.
A Government Accountability Office report issued last month, titled “Confirmation of Political Appointees: Eliciting Nominees' Views on Management Challenges within Agencies and Across Government,” also recognizes the problem.
The report urged political leaders to ask the following question of nominees for the Secretary of the Interior, which includes the Bureau of Indian Affairs: “Tribal membership disputes and tribal leadership disputes seem to be occurring more and more frequently. What experience do you have in working with tribal leadership and trying to resolve these types of disputes or in trying to prevent them?”
Far-reaching implications for loss of tribal membership
Gomez said AIRRO is seeing the same thing happening around the state – Indians stripped of lawful citizenship and all of the associated rights – from housing to education to health care to jobs.
When membership in a federally recognized tribe is lost, federal help goes away, he said. “It cuts across everything that has to do with their lives.”
The affects aren't just social or economic, but emotional and psychological as well, said Gomez. Being put out of a tribe has serious implications about identity for people who are being told they are no longer Indian.
If Robinson Rancheria goes through with its proposed membership reduction, Quitiquit said the implications could be devastating.
Among the first acts she expects is for disenrolled members to be banished from the rancheria. That would mean leaving their homes; Quitiquit's own family stands to lose two of an estimated 10 homes at stake.
Being cut off from the land also would mean they could be prevented from visiting the graves of their family members at the rancheria's cemetery, said Quitiquit. Gomez said that's happened in other areas.
There would also be a loss of education opportunities and funding, as well as Indian health services,which are critical due to the high number of tribal members suffering from diabetes and chronic diseases, particularly elders.
Those who hold jobs with the tribe also could be fired. She said some of the members in question already have been put on administrative leave from their jobs. A “no gossip” memo also was reportedly issued by Avila to staff, warning that discussion about the disenrollments would result in termination.
Quitiquit, who recently left her job as a cook for a program that provides meals to 24 homebound elders, said 20 of those elders are facing disenrollment. The four who would be left would not be enough to justify continuing the federally funded meals program.
Elders would lose their monthly retirement payments of $400, said Quitiquit. “All the elders are suffering right now because we don't have it.”
All members currently on the disenrollment list have had their payments suspended, including the $300 per capital payment plus a $2,000 Christmas bonus, funded through federal grants and revenues from the tribe's casino on Highway 20.
One elderly woman who is a caretaker for her grandchildren told Quitiquit she won't be able to make ends meet outside of the tribe.
Quitiquit said the tribal council, in its attempt to maintain power, can take these actions under the guise of sovereignty. “Forget about our civil rights.”
In the last election, many people voted for Avila because she said she was not for disenrollment, said Quitiquit. “We were completely fooled.”
She added, “If this is what happens to us, then down the road it's going to happen to the other tribal members they don't like.”
Tomorrow: Avenues of redress, government involvement and what the Bureau of Indian Affairs might do in the Robinson Rancheria case.
E-mail Elizabeth Larson at
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- Written by: Elizabeth Larson
On Tuesday, investigators with the multiagency Boulder County, Colorado's Drug Task Force reported that they completed an investigation into the transportation and distribution of high-grade marijuana from California to Boulder.
The investigation, which concluded in an unincorporated area of Boulder County, resulted in the arrests of Robert Weldin, 47, of Lakeport; Kevin Reed, 45, of Santa Rosa; and Timothy Dabrowski, 27, of Boulder.
Investigators also seized 32 pounds of high grade marijuana – priced by Weldin at $3,500 per pound with a grand total of $112,000 for the 32 pounds – along with US currency, and the vehicle used to transport the marijuana from California to Boulder.
The three men were taken into custody without incident, officials reported.
Sgt. Nick Goldberger of the Boulder County Drug Task Force said the investigation was still under way and he couldn't discuss more of the circumstances at this point. “It's kind of developing,” he said.
Goldberger also couldn't discuss if they were working with Lake County authorities to investigate if the men were part of a larger distribution ring, or where the marijuana originated in California.
The Boulder County Jail reported that Weldin remained in custody on Friday afternoon, with bail set at $50,000.
E-mail Elizabeth Larson at
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- Written by: Lake County News Reports
LAKEPORT – A memorial fundraiser that honors a local artist while supporting the building of a local domestic violence shelter will continue into 2009.
Gail Salituri of Inspirations Gallery created the LaForge Memorial Fund earlier this year in memory of her friend Barbara LaForge.
Along the way, Salituri has garnered some important support from local organizations and members of the business community.
The Lake County Arts Council has joined the effort, providing space for the raffle sales at the November Friday Night Fling at their Main Street Gallery in Lakeport.
Raffle tickets were sold for John Clarke's custom framed “Cable Car” lithograph. The winner is Sabrina Rogers. The winning tickets were drawn by Kathy Fowler at Inspirations Gallery and winners were notified by phone.
Lyle Madeson's photography of a boat on Clearlake was won by Lakeport Police Officer Mark Hommer of Lakeport.
The signed and numbered “Cable Car” lithograph brought in several bids and the final winning bidder was by Diane DeBartolo.
"Every dime we collect will be presented to the Lake Family Resource Center to help them build the shelter,” said Salituri.
“I first learned about this shelter from a local news article and realized it would be the perfect beneficiary,” she said. “Kathy Fowler has been right by my side in every way you can image when it comes to assisting this project, it makes this such a delightful and heartfelt cause and event."
Salituri said her goal is to generate $5,000, but in the struggling economy she is only halfway there.
“So this means, we continue,” she said. “It does not end here, we will take this event right into 2009. I will continue to paint for this project until we reach our goals.”
Salituri offered her gratitude to those who come to her with donations or who buy raffle tickets.
This month they will begin selling raffle tickets for a beveled mirror valued at $600, a silver tray donated by the Kitchen Gallery, a gift certificate from Main Street Pizza and a very exciting new Giclee, "Pomo Basket" from Salituri's archived collection, "Pomo Artifacts." This Giclee is 11x14 in size and valued at $375.
Various auction items are on display at Inspirations Gallery. They have several 8-inch by 10-inch originals of vineyards with opening bids of $99, with suggested retail at $400. All custom framing is donated by Sheri Salituri. Winners will be announced on Valentine's Day.
Donations can be made to the LaForge Memorial at any Westamerica Bank, or contact Gail or Sheri Salituri at 263-4366 or www.gailsalituri.com.
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