Alternet / By Joshua Holland (Originally published Sept. 21, 2012)
Conservatives talk a lot about “dependency,” but it’s not clear that they know what the word means. Consider, for example, the right’s bizarre reaction to a rather benign online campaign the White House pushed briefly earlier this year called “The Life of Julia,” a slide-show featuring a fictional Everywoman that was meant to highlight how Obama’s policies might improve the lives of average Americans.
Alternet / By Sarah Jaff (Originially published Sept. 27, 2012)
Americans love nothing more than a good Red-State-Vs.-Blue-State argument, especially during election time.
So a new story in USA Today, looking at the changes in income, state by state, since the beginning of the Great Recession, of course breaks down the results into “red,” “blue” and “swing” states. It declares that red states have seen incomes grow 4.6 percent since 2007, adjusted for inflation, while blue states have only seen incomes grow 0.5 percent. In swing states?
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Despite the financial difficulties that came with trying to fund a big cultural event featuring books during hard economic times, the San Diego City College International Book Fair continues to deliver excellent literary talent for San Diego. Director Virginia Escalante has put together a lineup that features a little bit of everything with emerging writers, like Reyna Grande, alongside established talents such as Susan Straight and Gustavo Arellano.
This year’s Politifest saw a smaller crowd than 2011 as people came to partake in some local political activity. The event, which ran Saturday from 10 a.m. until 2:30 a.m., showcased dozens of booths at the Ingram Plaza in Liberty Station, as well as debates among mayoral candidates Bob Filner and Carl Demaio, and also candidates for the San Diego Unified School District board.
While I missed the mayoral debate, Frank Gormlie reports that Demaio presented himself “as crazed as he ever was.” Gormlie says the quote of the day came from Filner: “Reform that Carl wants is real estate for Manchester.”
Alternet / By Kristin Rawls
Just weeks into the 2012-2013 school year education issues are already playing a starring role in the national conversation about America’s future. Because it’s an election year, the presidential candidates have been busy pretending there are many substantial distinctions between them on education policy (actually, the differences are arguably minimal). [Read more…]
ProPublica / By Suevon Lee (Originally published Sept. 27, 2012)
As Nov. 6 approaches, the efforts of True the Vote, a Texas anti-voter fraud group recently profiled by the New York Times, are gaining national attention.
Despite scant evidence of voter fraud, the group is laser-focused on weeding it out. It has pushed for voter-ID laws, voter roll purges and other controversial voting-related measures in a host of states. (Here is our guide to the voter ID controversy, where we note that evidence on both sides of the issue is lacking.)
This past Thursday was a mellow day for me, mainly due to a visit I made to a ribbon cutting ceremony for the grand opening of the Veterans Service Center at San Diego City College.
But I was already feeling pretty good before I got there, starting with being picked up by my girlfriend, if that’s what a 74 year old has. Anyway the ride, with that beautiful woman, on such a nice warm sparkling soothing easy San Diego day, had me ready for a good time.
Colin took the Tenth Avenue exit, heading into Downtown, south past Broadway. He came to a stop at Tenth and G Street. Looking west, he saw at least twenty police cars barricading G Street — four about mid-block, six at the intersection with Seventh Avenue, the remainder at the intersection with Eighth Avenue. All but two or three of the units had the red, blue and amber overhead lights activated, bouncing colors off the windows and walls of the surrounding buildings; something akin to an outdoor disco.
The scandal surrounding heavy handed tactics by San Diego businessmen backing a football stadium proposal continued to spread yesterday as Port Commissioner Scott Peters released what appears to be a threatening email from UT-San Diego CEO John Lynch.
The August 9th email from Lynch, asks Peters about his stance on a proposed long term lease at the 10Th Avenue Marine Terminal, and warns of a campaign led by San Diego’s daily newspaper to disband the Port Authority should backers of the proposed stadium not approve of his vote. The UT-San Diego, owned by downtown developer Doug Manchester and operated by John Lynch, has made construction of a football stadium at the port site one of its top editorial priorities. [Read more…]
By Mel Freilicher
Gregg Robinson is running as a candidate for the County Board of Education. He has dedicated his life to addressing, and working toward redressing, the growing inaccessibility of educational opportunities due to poverty. This is reflected in his scholarly research and publications, his career as a teacher as well as his ongoing involvement in community organizations.
Gregg’s Ph.D. is from UCSD: he has spent the last 22 years as a sociology professor at Grossmont College. Before that, he worked at UT San Antonio; Austin State; University of Maryland at Eastern Shore, and as a substitute teacher for the SD Unified school district. So while he speaks from experience, eloquently and directly, about issues concerning income gap and educational access and success, he also easily cites major studies from schools like Stanford or UCLA to substantiate his positions. [Read more…]
(Editor’s Note: We received this letter in response to a story that we ran this week about Bridgepoint Education/Ashford University laying off hundred of employees here in the San Diego area. Our premise for the original story was that Bridgepont/Ashford was just another in a long series of morally bankrupt corporations that have been touted as the darlings of the San Diego establishment. Our correspondent, who for obvious reasons wishes to remain anonymous, certainly does a good job of making the case for us.)
As a former employee of Ashford University, I am very upset with the way we were treated, lied to and disposed of by a company that found legal loop holes in the system that allowed them to take advantage of 450 people.
I was hired early in the summer and was told that we should not worry about the Western Association of Schools and Colleges (WASC) denial of the company’s application for accreditation, and that Ashford had already started making corrections to get the approval the next time around.
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WARNING: The following videos are not safe for the work place.
The past few weeks have provided a gold mine of incisive, laugh out loud political analysis of the election season. SNL has taken on the war against women, undecided voters, and Ann Romney, and we are left looking forward to so much more.
Sarah Silverman’s Let My People Vote and Samuel L Jackson’s Wake the F**k Up are political satire with an unequivocal message … [Read more…]
