Patrick McDonnell & friendFor KRCB News Director Bruce Robinson, one of the benefits of having the Charles Schulz Museum open in Santa Rosa is the opportunity to talk with some of the interesting and widely read cartoonists who visit it. The first such conversation, back in the spring of 2005, came as the man behind a then newish strip with a throwback style came to town to help prepare an exhibit at the museum about the history of dogs in comic strips.

Which came first, cartoons or art? That question is explored, if not exactly answered, in a new exhibit at the Charles Schulz Museum that features works by some big names in 20th century art.

Although they were contemporaries, there's no evidence that Charles Schulz ever had any direct contact with such Pop Art figures as Andy Warhol or Roy Lichtenstein, but Michael Schwager, Sonoma Sate Art History professor and co-curator of the exhibit, says the Santa Rosa cartoonist did enjoy a friendship with two of the featured artists, Christo and Jeanne-Claude.

With a theme as broad as the one behind Pop'd from the Panel, there were probably hundreds of artworks that could have been incorporated. Schwager explains that selecting the 28 that are being displayed involved weighing aesthetic merits with pragmatic considerations.

Courtesy of Fine Arts Museum of San Francisco, Museum Purchase, Achenbach Foundation for Graphic Arts Endowment Fund. Used with permission.

Students from Analy High School in Sebastpol pause to pose while working on a reforestation project in Ecuador's La Punta Gorda Nature Preserve.Would you pay to have a summer job? Students working on the international service projects organized by Global Student Embassy are eager to do just that.

Detailed accounts of the ongoing projects in Ecador and Tanzania are posted on the GSE website, along with a history of their other activites in Peru, Argentina and, of course, Northern California. Below, is a view of the community computer lab the group has established for the citizens of Morogoro, Tanzania, and a look from above at an early stage in the garden creation at Windsor High.

Since the Green Party was established in California in 1990, they have elected 220 candidates, all at the local level. With a new director from the North Bay taking charge, they are now out to grow those numbers substantially in the 2012 election.

Marnie GlickmanThe upcoming voter registration campaign will be only the second in the Green Party's 21 year history in California. It will be coupled, says the party's new Managing Director, Marnie Glickman of San Rafael, with efforts to actively demonstrate their alignment with and commitment to progressive concerns in the state.

This emphasis on progressive politics puts the Greens close to the Peace and Freedom party on many issues. Glickman says there are still some important and distinct difference.

The full platform of the California Green Party is posted  and indexed on their website.