Last week the editor of our sister newspaper, the Turlock Journal, made a quick in and out of our shared office, explaining that she was off to a memorial service for the anniversary of the death of Cpl. Ronil Singh. Singh was murdered by a dirt bag – who also happened to be the country illegally – during a Dec. 26, 2018 car stop in Newman.
It’s hard to believe that his murder was five years ago but it was. The death was mentioned by President Trump at the White House: “A wonderful young police officer… I spoke to his wife yesterday. Where he was shot, viciously shot, for simply stopping a person who came over the border illegally. Shot, killed...he took the most beautiful picture just hours before, Christmas picture. We don’t want that happening.» The death is still remembered in Newman on his anniversary.
The world is not in short supply of evil people because one also did his dirty deed in Ceres on Jan. 9, 2005.
Ceres’ own tragedy is less fresh but the anniversary of the shooting death of Ceres Police Sgt. Howard King Stevenson is coming up next Tuesday. In the passage of 18 years, sorry to say, some have either forgotten, were too young to remember or were not around when Stevenson met his tragic demise.
A 19-year-old AWOL Marine named Andres Raya (also a 2003 graduate of Ceres High School) carried out his murderous plot. He stood in front of George’s Liquors which no longer looks the same as it did back then because of the buildings (including the tire shop) have been torn down and replaced by George’s Glass and Grill. Raya was high on drugs as he stood in front of the store on that cold night. Underneath his rain poncho he was holding an SKS assault rifle. He had a false report called into Ceres Police dispatch about a man with a gun. Officers Sam Ryno and Chris Melton approached from the northwest behind the Jiro Tires Plus shop. Raya saw them and boldly approached, mowing down Ryno by strafing his legs with bullets. Melton pulled Ryno to safety, saving his life.
Meanwhile, Stevenson came in from the west behind the block wall and engaged Raya with gunfire. Stevenson was hit and Raya moved in to deliver two fatal head shots, ending the life of a good man, husband and father.
It was one of the darkest, most depressing times in this newspaper editor’s career.
I had limited conversation with Howie, was present at his promotion as sergeant in the basement of the police headquarters and so his loss left personal to me.
When the day came for his funeral, I shall never forget the somber grey that was matched by the somber looks on the faces of those who came out to pay tribute as his hearse and police motorcade rolled down North Street, to Third Street in front of the police headquarters. Old veterans stood and saluted as Sgt. Stevenson rolled down the street one final time. Others choked on tears.
I was touched as I watched Megan Farrell and father Mike holding the American flag as the hearse rolled by. In that girl and father I saw something good and decent about our future, which countered the ugliness of the actions of one demented soul.
Raya was later gunned down in an alley not far from the murder scene.
I recall being repulsed by how some Latino youth came out in solidarity for Raya, who had Norteno gang affiliations despite being in the military. They treated him as some kind of martyr, and made further threats against police.
With the passage of time, Stevenson’s memory is growing dim. But the world is no safer today than it was in 2005 – except today Democrat politicians continue to make life harder on police, easier on criminals.
I’ve heard a number of retiring law enforcement personnel in recent year say they are getting out because the California continues to pass laws that make their job tougher. Plus the national media has vilified police – rather unjustly, in my opinion – in a number of high profile police deaths (Michael Brown, George Floyd, Stephon Clark, Breonna Taylor and Daunte Wright). Half the country believes in the false narrative of systemic racism.
* * * * *
I received an interesting letter to the editor last week (published on page A5). It was from a liberal named Dorie Dakin Perez. For someone purporting to have earned a Ph.D., it seemed immature for her closing salutation to be “Merry effing Christmas.”
Perez’s rant addressed my Dec. 20 column in which I questioned the politics behind the new Ebony Alert system. In that column I mentioned how the disintegration of the black family is what has led to many troubled youth and the high incarceration rate. I cited facts about the high rate of fatherlessness in the black community. Black fathers are more than twice as likely as white fathers to live apart from their children (44% vs. 21%), while Hispanic fathers fall in the middle (35%). Among fathers who never completed high school, 40% live apart from their children. This compares with only 7% of fathers who graduated from college.
She didn’t counter the facts I presented, but chose to attack me for “some of the oldest, most bigoted social science thinking about black family life” and have you believe it’s all about racism.
In his 1993 book, “LA Justice,” LAPD Assistant Police Chief Robert Vernon reflected on what went wrong during the LA riots and the root causes for inner city crime. In the book he talks about how materialism and hedonism – the pursuit of pleasure (yes, including drug use) – has caused many folks to value things over life.
Vernon noted that Urie Bronfenbrenner, a Cornell University professor of Human Development, Family Studies and Psychology, had this to say: “Children growing up in such (single-parent) households are at greater risk for experiencing a variety of behavioral and educational problems, including extremes of hyperactivity or withdrawal, lack of attentiveness in the classroom, difficulty in deferring gratification, impaired academic achievement, school misbehavior, absenteeism, dropping out, involvement in socially alienated peer groups, and especially, the so-called ‘teenage syndrome’ of behavior that tend to hang together-smoking, drinking, early and frequent sexual experience, a cynical attitude toward work, adolescent pregnancy and, in the more extreme cases, drugs, suicide, vandalism, violence and criminal acts.”
Liberals don’t want people taking responsibility for moral failures; they pull the race card – every time.
* * * * *
Cynicism expressed in social media must be at an all-time high.
A man named Russell Lamb posted this message on the Stanislaus News Facebook page: “Good morning people it’s been a few years since I been home in the Modesto area and not leaving until tomorrow, kinda bored so help me out , what’s there to do around here now people?”
Most of the responses were not helpful, offering jabs and snickers about how little the area offers. I suppose those folks used to spending their time in exciting San Francisco or LA should not talk down Stanislaus County where they CAN afford rents or mortgages.
Some responses referenced things to do in Ceres. Alyssa Ann Figueroa suggested he check out River Bluff Park in Ceres, saying it offered “beautiful hiking path, clean fresh pond. One of my favorite spots.”
Joan Miller Thornton recommended going to Sam’s Café in Ceres for a “killer breakfast.”
However, Valerie Guerrero threw in: “Ceres has built their 100th gas station at this point so maybe get some gas and a coffee.”
Janet Magruder said Modesto is “outdated and boring” and that he needed to get out of town to have fun, suggesting the wineries, Jamestown, Sonora even Turlock.”
Annette Borges wrote: “Well leaving Modesto is a smart move. Crazy drivers, people running red lights, hit and runs leaving others seriously injured or dead. It’s become too crowded everywhere here. Theft everywhere you go. Staying home and tolerating one more day best bet.”
Funny thing is I bet the same sentiments are commonly expressed by locals in Sacramento or Fresno or Buena Park or Salinas or Lodi (you get my drift).
Gary and Phyllis McManus positively pointed out the things offered in Modesto, like “check out the murals in downtown Modesto, catch a beer and lunch at Food Fix on 11th street and go next door to the bakery for a sweet treat. Or go to the Grub Hub, ride bikes on the Dry Creek Trail from the Claus Road Bridge to La Loma. Also, the Graffiti Car Museum is open at Ninth & Caldwell.”
The couple finished up with “I am sorry so many wrote negative ideas/thoughts! Our town has grown & with large growth comes not great things, but we still have a beautiful town.”
It’s too bad that so many disregard their own community. If they want excitement, maybe pack the bags for Las Vegas.
* * * * *
By their very nature, lack of life experience, shortage of wisdom, young people are continuing to do stupid things like racing and sideshows and DUI crashes.
On Dec. 16 deputies in Patterson twice broke up illegal sideshows at the former NASA Crows Landing Naval Air Station in Crows Landing. This is a re-occurring problem where young people knowingly trespass and drive recklessly in large numbers. On that day, 12 were arrested, one juvenile cited to parents and eight cars and a trailer towed. Deputies also recovered a gun taken without permission from parents.
Stupid is as stupid does.
It’s like Sheriff Jeff Dirkse says in the video we mention in this edition: “…if we had good quality family units, 90 percent of my job goes away.” The fact is, there are a lot of parents who shouldn’t have been parents for lack of skills to raise children the right way.
Parents, get out of your phones, and be involved with what your kids are doing.
* * * * *
The Latino Community Roundtable recently suggested that Stanislaus County officials aren’t doing enough to translate English into Spanish, blaming government for so many unable to participate.
This came from a Modesto Bee article: “Despite comprising half the population, the county’s Latino community encounters obstacles in accessing information due to a shortage of translation services.” I would be just as right to say the county’s Latino community encounters obstacles in accessing information due to the failure to learn the English language.
No other nation on earth is expected to cater to those who come ill-prepared and unskilled like the USA. Millions have snuck across the border under Biden.
If the Latino community wants to be included in discussions, perhaps the Latino Community Roundtable could turn its focus into setting up folks to learn the predominant language spoken here and set up English lessons.
* * * * *
Since Biden took office, possibly 16 million illegal aliens have been allowed to flood into the country and we’re all seeing the effects. Now Sanctuary City mayors like Chicago’s Brandon Johnson and New York’s Eric Adams are screaming about the quality of life being eroded and services stretched to the limit, not to mention fiscal impacts. I hate to say it but they asked for it. They wanted their cities to be sanctuaries for refugees and illegal immigrants – until it began to hurt.
Blue city mayors want Biden to fork over the bucks to help them deal with a problem they invited instead of the real solution of mass deportation.
Johnson faults Texas Gov. Abbott for flying in migrants to his city but why should Texas shoulder the burden as a border state? These Democrats wanted to give sanctuary, so let them get what they wished for. It should hurt.
Donald Trump became president on this very issue and he may coast into the presidency again on the same issue. That’s why the machine is working overtime to eliminate him.
* * * * *
When you have a state led by a Democrat governor and ruled by a state Legislature where Democrats hold a super majority in both houses like California, they do as they please and are doing a great job screwing business. In their view, businesses are to be screwed because they are profiting from the laborer. The Democrats, however, have little concern for the common man and only using him to hold onto power. They get the votes of the “small man” by continuing to pass laws that take money away from business and put it in the pockets of the unskilled.
On April 1 – April Fool’s Day of all days – the state will jump the minimum-wage for fast-food workers to $20 an hour. Think about that. You can wrap burgers and dip fries in oil for more money than my daughter who is devoting her time as an aid to a disadvantaged student in the Hughson school system.
Of course, this will only drive away customers because fast-food is already prohibitively expensive for many already.
Democrats generally have never been in business so they don’t comprehend how their laws that meddle into private enterprise have rippling negative effects.
Take Pizza Hut, for example, which announced it will lay off 1,200 delivery drivers in anticipation of the $20-an-hour wage mandated by state lawmakers. The fleet no longer makes business sense so 1,200 jobs go up in smoke just like that.
Have you been to Chipotle lately and gasped at their prices? Guess what? They are raising their prices more because of the state. How many folks will that impact who will no longer be buying food there? How many workers will be laid off because of fewer customers?
Have you noticed how the new McDonald’s are built with a very small order counters? Two cash registers max! That’s because the chain cannot afford paying more clerks taking orders, hence you have self-serve kiosks which are frustrating to use and baffle senior citizens who might be able to afford coffee now but not food.
Let’s not forget how products like candy bars are shrinking while prices continue to rise. At a point, you’ll stop buying candy bars, the company will scale back production and workers will be sent home to collect unemployment – the perfect recipe to expand social programs.
It’s also been reported that Starbucks, Dominoes and Chipotle are intending to use automated food service technologies as they cut the cost of labor. So eventually that may mean that that metal gloved worker who is dicing chicken on the cutting board at Chipotle may be replaced by a machine that does the same thing.
Our public schools need to educate the new generation of the realities of the “free” market place and how minimum-wage laws may sound good to them but they are greatly harmful.
It’s sad that Democrats don’t get it. Fast-food work was never intended to support a person’s living expenses in California. They were basically the first jobs for teenagers still living at home and aging citizens looking to supplement their income or wanting something to do after retirement. They give teens valuable life experiences – and teach them that to get ahead one must obtain skills for higher pay, not necessarily college degrees. Plumbers can still make six figures a year if they want to work hard.
* * * * *
Why do we keep hearing about labor shortages? Ceres has an unemployment rate of 7.3 percent, meaning about 1,600 are jobless. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce claims there are over 10 million job openings for which there are no workers yet there are 15,700 out of work in Stanislaus County? Some have criminal records which prevent them from getting hired but what about the rest?
If you ask the socialist Robert Reich there is no labor shortage; companies just aren’t paying workers what they want.
When the government unnecessarily shut down the economy due to COVID and began to expand the welfare system to pay able-bodied people who had so-called non-essential jobs – what a horrible thing to say someone’s job isn’t essential – to sit on their butts, it created laziness, in my opinion. Reich doesn’t believe that, saying “most unemployed people are hard up.” Are they? Who is paying their bills as they sit as home? Are they all young people living with Mommy and Daddy, a failure to launch kind of thing? Seems to me that “hard up” folks would be willing to take any job that maybe they initially would have rejected as being a job beneath them.
As Mike Rowe of Dirty Jobs has pointed out, millions of men in their prime are not working.
In 1953, 98 percent of men in the age category of 25 to 54 were working or looking for work. Today 7.2 million men aged 25 to 54 have dropped out of the work force and are content spending all day on their cell phones, playing video games or watching TV.
How can they get away with that? Here’s what Mike Rowe had to say earlier last year: “It’s almost as though some entity is paying them. It’s almost as if somebody is not letting them fail. It’s as if some giant parent somewhere has … could be a rich uncle, a wealthy uncle.” Don’t miss the cryptic reference to Uncle Sam.
As Gayle King of CBS Mornings program aptly said: “An able-bodied man who can work but doesn’t is not attractive.”
I agree with Rowe that to correct the problem the government safety net needs to be curbed to force these men back to work. He also believes that the education system needs to engage students about the importance of filling skilled manufacturing jobs, much like what is being done in the Ceres Unified School District.
This column is the opinion of Jeff Benziger, and does not necessarily represent the opinion of The Ceres Courier or 209 Multimedia Corporation. How do you feel about this? Let Jeff know at jeffb@cerescourier.com
