By Doug Porter
Sometime over the next few days San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer will veto a proposed ordinance raising the local minimum wage in three steps and allowing for earned sick days.
I get it that Hizzoner adheres to Republican principles about giving advantages to the wealthy. If he wants to believe in unicorns and trickle-down economics that is his right as a citizen.
But the way San Diego got to the point where this veto is necessary is where his political cowardice is revealed.
If you’d told me a year ago (in the midst of the Fall of Filner) that Councilman Todd Gloria would be a commanding general in an epic conflict of this sort, I wouldn’t have believed you. I’ve been critical of the council president for not having enough backbone in the past; now it’s been made clear to me in conversations with well-placed sources that he’s willing to bet his political future on this fight.
In the run up to the City Council passing a minimum wage ordinance, Gloria tried to be reasonable (too reasonable I thought), offering business owners a chance to modify or mitigate the potential impacts on their bottom line. Gloria also tried to draw in our feckless mayor, who made it clear that there was nothing to negotiate and wouldn’t get personally involved.
A Fundraiser in La Jolla
Kevin Faulconer could have helped negotiate a compromise; he could have been a leader. Instead he walked away. Now the mayor is going to be sublimated to the role of nodding his head in agreement as the local plutocrats spread fear about employees getting actual sick days.
Instead the Mayor and his wife were honored guests at the La Jolla home of Tom and Cookie Sudberry on July 24th at fundraiser for the Chamber of Commerce Political Action Committee. With a minimum donation of $500 guests got to “Join Us for a Festive Summer Evening featuring live Latin jazz.” I should note that County Supervisor Dave Roberts was in attendance at the fundraiser, something that organized labor folks around town were mighty unhappy to learn about.
A cover note emailed with the invitation from former Mayor Jerry Sanders said:
With your help, and only your help, the Chamber will lead the coalition to elect Chris Cate in D-6 (critical for a balanced City Council) and a referendum on the misguided Minimum Wage Ordinance.
Music by the Freddie A Trio…. Have a craft beer or Mai Tai….. Watch the sunset…. Wish Mayor Faulconer and Kathryn a Happy Anniversary !!!
The following day (July 25th) Mayor Faulconer met with a delegation of minimum wage increase advocates.
From Raise Up San Diego:
Low-wage workers and faith leaders met with Mayor Kevin Faulconer today to share stories of life on the city’s economic margins and call for his support for the soon-to-be-passed earned sick days and minimum wage ordinance. At the close of the conversation the Mayor stated that he still intended to veto the earned sick days and minimum wage measure. The measure would provide 279,000 San Diegans access to earned sick days and 172,000 minimum wage earners with an incremental raise.
Faulconer was non-committal when asked if he would halt a rumored referendum effort.
I guess he conveniently forgot about being the guest of honor at a fundraiser the night before to support the referendum.
Just watch what happens over the next few weeks. If you thought the Fall of Filner was unsettling, wait ‘till you see the ugliness following the third attempt by the local ruling class wannabes to subvert democracy with cash.
The Slave Wage Jobs Coalition has already amassed a war chest while they “consider their options.” They have already hired a nationally known company to collect signatures for a referendum. They will have 30 days starting from the day after the City Council overrides the Mayor’s veto to collect 34,000 (or so) signatures. If they are successful in qualifying for the ballot, the ordinance increasing the minimum wage will be suspended until the results of the June, 2016 elections are certified.
UT-San Diego promised an ugly fight on this matter. For once, they are right.
The War on White People
Alabama Congressman Mo Brooks forgot his GOP codewords book yesterday and started blathering about the “War on White People”, a phrase usually reserved, as Matthew Yglesias pointed out, for use by Klansmen and their ilk on social media.
From Huffington Post:
Rep. Mo Brooks (R-Ala.) doesn’t think that the hardline stance Republicans have taken on immigration could hurt the party’s standing with Hispanic voters. Instead, he thinks Democrats are hurting their prospects with white voters.
“This is a part of the war on whites that’s being launched by the Democratic Party. And the way in which they’re launching this war is by claiming that whites hate everybody else,” he said during an interview Monday with conservative radio host Laura Ingraham.
“It’s part of the strategy that Barack Obama implemented in 2008, continued in 2012, where he divides us all on race, on sex, greed, envy, class warfare, all those kinds of things. Well that’s not true.”
Brooks was responding to comments made by National Journal’s Ron Fournier, whotold Fox News host Chris Wallace on Sunday that “the fastest growing voting bloc in this country thinks the Republican Party hates them. This party, your party, cannot be the party of the future beyond November if you’re seen as the party of white people.”
Twitter users quickly turned the congressman’s declaration into a snarky condemnation of privilege:
the Japanese ice cream place near my house is cash only. I only had a card. #WarOnWhites
— Dan Arel (@danarel) August 5, 2014
How many more white men have to endure the pain of controlling the power structure in this country? #WarOnWhites
— Ziggy Daddy™ (@Ziggy_Daddy) August 5, 2014
Polling Hits New Low
Congressman Brooks and his fellow Republicans will have more reason to be upset should they read the results of the latest ABC/Washington Post poll, taken on August 3rd. Among other things, the survey found that 70% of non-whites have unfavorable opinion of the GOP.
From Langer Research:
Three months before the midterm elections a record number of Americans in the latest ABC News/Washington Post poll disapprove of their own representative in Congress – a potentially chilling signal for incumbents that marks the depths of the public’s political discontent.Insult, moreover, follows injury: Both political parties, for their part, are near their all-time lows in popularity.
Just 41 percent in this national survey approve of the way their own representative in the U.S. House is handling his or her job, the lowest in ABC/Post polls dating back a quarter century, to May 1989. Fifty-one percent disapprove – more than half for the first time.
It’s too bad Democrats don’t vote in off year elections.
Because They Need to Be Afraid
Now that “border crisis” is fading from Fox News, it’s been replaced by fearmongering over the Ebola virus.
Republican congressmen (two, so far) who can combine the old crisis and the new cris in media statements are, I’m told, entitled to extra support from Teahadists.
Now mind you, there has never been a case of Ebola contracted in the Western hemisphere.
Back in July Georgia Congressman Phil Gingrey wrote the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to express his concern about “illegal migrants carrying deadly diseases such as swine flu, dengue fever, Ebola virus and tuberculosis.” Politifact rated his claims to be “pants on Fire” untrue.
Monday Congressman Todd Rokita joined the fear-mongering club.
From The Hill:
Rep. Todd Rokita (R-Ind.) on Monday suggested that unaccompanied children who have crossed illegally into the United States from Central America might have Ebola, according to a report in The Times of Northwest Indiana.
On WIBC-FM’s “Garrison” radio show, the paper quoted Rokita referencing a recent conversation he had with Rep. Larry Bucshon (R-Ind.) in which they agreed the children could pose as a public health risk if they’re placed in Americans’ homes.
It’s only a matter of time now until this fabrication get repeated enough times so it’s recognized as “truth” by Fox News and their ilk. (UPDATE: Fox News did it this morning, bringing up the subject and then mumbling ‘never mind’…)
Which is why the hospital in Atlanta where two US citizens who contracted the disease in Africa have been flown felt the need to issue a plea for understanding and compassion in response to threatening email they were receiving.
Run Rand Paul Run, the Mexicans Are Coming!
I’m just gonna repost this entire bit from Jen Hayden at Daily Kosbecause it’s priceless.
DREAMers Erika Andiola and Cesar Vargas stopped by a fundraiser in Okoboji, Iowa to introduce themselves to Senator Rand Paul and Iowa’s Rep. Steve King, who is also known as an ultraconservative crazy person and rotten human being.
Erika introduces herself as a DREAMer and you simply cannot believe how fast Rand Paul gets up to run away from the table. He is taking his first bite of his sandwich when his aide hears the DREAMer introduction and he bolts from the table, with a mouth full of food, rather than face the questions that he senses are coming. Instead, he leaves crazy person Steve King to fend for himself.
Erika hands Steve King her DACA card and challenges him to tear it up on the spot since he seems so intent on getting rid of Erika and the millions like her. The confrontation becomes heated, with Steve King saying numerous highly offensive things to the Arizona State University graduate and her companion, law school graduate Cesar Vargas, such as “you’re very good at English.” Even more offensive, toward the end of the discussion, people can be heard in the background yelling “go home! Take care of your own!”
You really have to see the entire confrontation for yourself, beginning with Rand Paul’s cowardly and lightning-fast sprint from the table:
On This Day: 1931 – Using clubs, police routed 1,500 jobless men who stormed the plant of the Fruit Growers Express Co. in Indiana Harbor, Ind., demanding jobs – 1964 – U.S. aircraft bombed North Vietnam after North Vietnamese boats were falsely accused of attacking U.S. destroyers in the Gulf of Tonkin. 1980 – The Osmonds split up.
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Doug Porter
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Kevin Faulconer is showing himself to be the nice, white bread Republican that hobnobs with the rich La Jollans at fundraisers in order to raise money to make poor peoples’ lives worse – all the time with his mild mannered smile on his face. How Nice! Don’t expect him to stand up for anything any time soon. The rich La Jolla money will speak for him and do his dirty work along with Jerry Sanders and his cohorts in the Chamber of ComicCon Commerce. Money talks and speaks loudly so K-Faulk can sit back and enjoy his Latin Jazz and be congratulated on his anniversary.
This just in from Ebolica, Ted Nugent’s newsletter:
Obama is importing the Ebola virus in Red Bull cans.
“Mayor” Who? There’s no “there” there. Strongly reminds me of one of those Doonesbury cartoon characters, back in the day, who were always quite invisible – and represented in the strip only by a symbol; eg, an asterisk.
White feather, anyone?