It's crab season: Claws for a cause
As you may not know, crabs don't walk in a straight line; instead, they walk sideways swaying back and forth to make forward progress. It is how and where their legs are attached.
With crabbing season in full force, those legs have to work harder to escape the crabbers looking for them. Turns out those legs are very tasty, and if we can catch some of these dancing crabs, they will be served up at the second annual crab feast hosted by the Assistance League of Amador Valley.
Not to sideline the crabs, but they -- and those of you who join us -- are helping a bigger cause. This crab feast will raise funds for programs that help raise up others in our community.
Beneficiaries include Tri-Valley Haven, which receives food twice a week from our fundraising, Title I schools participating in back-to-school shopping for over 300 local children, and birthday bags for children in shelters/foster care. The generous nature of individuals like you make it possible for us to help local people in need move in a forward direction.
Come join us on Saturday, Feb. 4 at the Pleasanton Senior Center for a night of good food, good company and a good cause. It will be a fun evening with opportunities to win gift baskets, desserts, and dance the night away. Tickets are available until Jan. 20 at www.assistanceleague.org/amador-valley.
-- Anna Schaller, via Town Square
Record numbers attend Make A Difference Festival
Early last Saturday morning, exhibitors got drenched while unloading their cars, but by 10 a.m. when the festival opened, the rain stopped and the community came, resulting in the most successful Make A Difference Festival ever. The clicker showed 886 attended, 400 shopping bags from the Community of Character were all passed out to the attendees.
Nonprofits reported that more people were volunteering than ever before. The Special Olympics booth had 80 people sign their sheets of those interested in helping at the coming basketball tournament. Sleep Heavenly Peace, who makes beds for children had two pages of volunteers, it was their first time at the festival.
The senior center was crowded and noisy, but that just added to the excitement of the Festival as nonprofit leaders explained their volunteer opportunities to those who stopped by. The JustServe booth explained how to find service opportunities through JustServe.org.
There were opportunities to help seniors, the homeless, babies in need, those who have cancer, those with mental illnesses, even dogs and other animals, as well as recreational leagues, cultural arts and museums. The Emergency Preparedness section of the festival was busy also.
At the end of the day, nonprofit exhibitors were happy with numbers of new volunteers, those who came looking for ways to give back through community service were excited about their new opportunities and in these days of heavy rain and flooding, everyone could learn ways to protect their families.
Many thanks to sponsors of the festival: Accusplit: Make a Difference Programs, Community of Character Collaborative, Pleasanton Unified School District, city of Pleasanton, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and Karlson-Lane.
-- Ken Mano, via Town Square
The apology Livermore is owed
Now that the bruising, over-bloated and no-holds-barred mayoral and City Council race is concluded, and we've entered a new calendar year with new -- and returning -- members to these entities, Livermore is owed an apology by the very multi-headed organizations and people who have purported to "save Livermore," throughout the past three years.
Here's one suggestion on how this apology can take place: all the money spent -- literally millions of dollars -- on baseless and obstructionary lawsuits, candidate financial "profiles" that are abject lies and mistruths, disinformation published as free press and countless strawman narratives that are our own local version of Hillary Clinton's, "But, the emails..." should be doubly matched by these same people and organizations and given over to the city of Livermore for the acquisition and long-term management of conservation land.
Nothing else demonstrates a greater commitment to the city than by helping keep our lands and wildlife for the next generation and those to follow. This is absolutely the saving that Livermore deserves, and the apology we are owed.
-- Tracy Kronzak
Dems lie, cheat and steal
Now that the Twitter files have been made public, we all know about the collusion between the FBI, DNC and the Biden administration to suppress the truth about the Hunter Biden laptop. Twitter, Biden administration and Fauci also colluded to spread lies regarding COVID.
This is on top of Facebook, NY Times and CNN being part of this same collusion to kill democracy and spread lies about the success of the Biden administration. The truth is that Biden has caused the severe inflation and economic woes of America -- overtaxation and regulations, the reduction of oil and natural gas production, the failed green energy policy, a southern border crisis and the reduction of all American's net wealth.
It is time for America to wake up and accept the truth and rid ourselves of the party that steals democracy and is ruining America.
-- David Ott
The new House majority will threaten our rights
Last year, the American people rejected extreme election deniers in key races. But we were unable to win every fight and a tremendous threat to our democracy remains: new Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy and the MAGA extremists he leads.
According to the Washington Post, over 70% of all House Republicans are themselves election deniers -- and these extremists now have McCarthy in the palm of their hands.
McCarthy had to give up tremendous concessions to appease the most outlandish members of his party to win the gavel. Extremists like Matt Gaetz, Lauren Boebert and Jim Jordan will have all the power they need to enact their agenda: sow chaos, waste taxpayer dollars on sham investigations, and ignore their constituents.
In their first act, Speaker McCarthy's MAGA majority gutted the nonpartisan Office of Congressional Ethics -- hamstringing future investigations into corrupt members like the serial fabulist George Santos. That speaks volumes.
It's up to us to call out this new MAGA majority and fight back against their extreme agenda. I hope others will join me.
-- Dexter Gonsalves
