BACKGROUND
I use two mate-panels at the same time - one on the lefthand side of my desktop, one on the right. Occasionally I will move both panels over to the same side and they will coexist side by side. Two nights ago, I moved the left mate-panel to be next to the right and this time it seemed to sit below the other one. Then the computer froze. The CPU began running at 98% and computer temperatures ran high. I shutdown and rebooted a few times... same results after rebooting.
Four years ago, I solved mate-panel issues, while using Maya MATE, by removing the following hidden files from my /home folder (i.e. renaming):
.mateconf
.mateconf.d
.config/mate
.config/mate-session
This solution and these files no longer exist! (Now I use Rebecca 17.1 MATE)
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After spending a couple of days researching mate-panel issues I have tried many things, which have not fixed the problem:
1) In terminal: mate-panel --reset
apt-get install mate-panel
2) Working from a live Rebecca DVD I have tried the following, each step in isolation:
Removed the following files... and when no results, ultimately replacing:
a) /usr/bin/mate-panel (At least this removal lets me boot up, but without any mate-panel or mintmenu to use. I'm doing this right now.)
b) /usr/bin/mate-panel-compiz-restart (removed by itself or with both /usr/bin/mate-panel-screenshot and /usr/bin/mate-panel-test-applets at the same time.)
c) home/.config/mate/panel2.d/default/launchers (I removed the panel2.d folder; if /usr/bin/mate-panel is still in the system, the computer boots up, but still just churns and churns although less hot. I tried to find a fresh file from the live DVD to replace this file in my home folder, but no success after a lot of searching.)
3) I finally did a complete reinstall of Mint Rebecca OS and thought for sure mate-panel would finally rebirth and work. Total failure.

While on the icon-empty, hot desktop environment, I went to the shell prompt (alt-F1/F2) and tried the various the terminal commands above, and also:
a) mateconftool-2 --recursive-unset /apps/panel (I was told .mateconf does not exist.)
b) rm -rf home/.mateconf/apps/panel (also told .mateconf does not exist)
c) pkill mate-panel (This command did kill and remove the panel, but desktop still stuck with no icons and CPU still running hot and at 98%.
Reinstalling Mint/Rebecca and reformatting the Mint related files and partitions - "/" and "/boot" and "/swap" - did NOT solve the problem

Please, any suggestions or insight related to current mate-panel issues on Rebecca MATE would be much appreciated.
Thank you for your time and attention.