Don's Tuesday Column

THE WAY I SEE IT by Don Polson         Red Bluff Daily News 7/29/2025

    Doggies and clams and Newsom, oh my!

First, I must bear witness to the passing of a beautiful soul in the person of my sister-in-law, Mary Ellen Polson, my brother’s wife of 50 years. The disease that robbed Steve and their children of years of loving companionship and joy, Alzhiemers, must be acknowledged. However, in the “grand scheme of life,” it is a smudge of a comma, a “spot of bother” for a life that, in many ways, enshrined a heart, soul and personality that brightened all whom she contacted, even telling anyone she met in a grocery store or church, that she loved them.

As a wife, a mom, an artist, and an art teacher in Lutheran schools, she came pretty close to the out-picturing of an angel on this earth, whose last moment in a memory care home involved previously dim and unfocused eyes brightening and widely greeting what those with her believed was surely an angel sent to bring her to her Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Rest in peace, “Muffi.” One of God’s angels has gone home.

***

Regarding food trucks in Corning, forcing them 300 feet from existing restaurants, with the products and services food trucks provide customers—may mitigate the very real threat to restaurants that have made investments, paid taxes and cultivated their own loyal customers. They’re already burdened by the casino-subsidized fare across the freeway.

One option would be to designate an area for food trucks sufficiently distant that several of them could use it with nearby parking, while not insulting a restaurant by locating in front or around the corner. In Bend, Oregon (lacking casino competition), there are several food truck areas with such distancing from existing restaurants; all seem to thrive in peaceful competition. Prices seem competitive enough that they’re not undercutting local businesses. Just a thought.

***

The local Republican Central Committee, with the help and support of dinner attendees and auction-bidders, has awarded several local students with sizable scholarships for their community service activities. Well done, students, and thanks to local Republicans.

***

Interesting characters populate campgrounds and RV parks. One fellow from Saskatchewan, Canada was determined to follow Canadian football. Our NFL and college schedules are a month away but the Canadian league is in full force. We conversed and, sure enough, I caught him saying “aboot” where we would say “about.” When we bid goodbye, I got a smile out him when I said “Take off, eh.” He responded “Take off, eh.”

***

Our 2^nd Amendment rights were confirmed by the 9^th Circuit (Really!) in San Francisco. The decision shouldn’t have been necessary due to the inherent common sense of the matter; they ruled California’s background checks for ammo purchases unconstitutional. The right to “keep and bear arms” being severely neutered by checks for each purchase of bullets, we can now purchase them as we would any other consumer item, like eggs (costing more than other states due to the ludicrous cage rules in California). We can now bring our Oregon-purchased bullets home to Red Bluff without legal risk.

***

The “doggies and clams” line has to do with the nearly endless dog-walking at the Netarts Bay RV park. It invites social engagement when asking their names and breeds, and noticing who is leading whom as the “noses with four legs” go by.

“Clamming” occurs with almost every low tide wherever we camp by the ocean. Out they go with their little shovels and buckets. One guy earned a nickname, “the crab hunter,” as he daily walked down to the bay to check his “crab pot,” usually bringing a critter or two back to eat.

***

Given Gov. Newsom’s self-appointed role as California’s political guide and gift to America (his wife: “It's time for America to follow California's lead”), this column will inform readers—who probably pay him little attention and would love to see our state unburdened of his misguided rule—just what he has wrought.

The overturning of the ammo background checks is a judicial rebuke to his (and every gun-hating Democrat’s) wrong-headed, self-defense-denying philosophy. In an interview—four hours of profanity-laced attempts at avoiding straight answers (what is it with Democrats and their potty-mouthed ranting?)—he tried to take both sides of any issue.

He wrongly (I’m sure he believes it) said that states with the most “comprehensive gun safety laws” are the safest. No, of the 12 states with the lowest homicide rates, 8 have “Constitutional Carry” laws, where you are legally allowed to own and carry a gun without a permit (per the CDC).

Governor, you may have broken California’s gun laws by accepting (?) a gift of a SIG Sauer P365 X-MACRO from Shawn Ryan while on his podcast. We can’t receive a gun from anyone without waiting 10 days for the background check, and picking it up at a FFL gun store.