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The Environmental Blame Game: Time to Look in the Mirror

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By Jeffrey Meyer 

The American public is addicted to carbon products for its energy needs and, despite overwhelming evidence that man-made carbon dioxide (CO2) is a credible threat to everyone, we lack the will to act. We tend to be quick to place blame for this situation, but perhaps it is time to look in the mirror.

There is finger pointing enough for everyone, from conflicting media reports, paralysis of our political system and corporate greed from the carbon industry. But is it really about them or is it about us, immobilized by a simple lack of effort to check out the facts?   [Read more…]

Beats in Peru: A Daily Travelogue Part IX

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San Diego DJ Mikey Beats, and his nurse wife Jenny, decided to take a vacation to Machu Picchu, Peru. For the next few days San Diego Free Press will publish their daily adventures. Read parts I & II, part III, parts IV & IV.5, part V, part VI, part VII and part VIII.

By Mikey Beats

Monday 6/10/13 Day 9

We awoke to our last morning in Cuzco. The Arqueologo Hotel had been very good to us as was the whole city of Cuzco. As we ate our last delicious continental breakfast, we met a couple who were in their mid forties who had hiked the Inca trail and were from Sacramento.

We also met a woman from Tijuana, who heard me mention TJ in a conversation and I thought I had offended her. She mentioned how the running international joke is how the best part of TJ is San Diego. I agreed but I forgot how defensive Tijuaneras could be about their nationalism. She argued a bit about how they have beautiful beaches in Ensenada and so on, so I defused the argument by saying, “somos un pueblo sin fronteras” [we are one people without borders]. That perked her up and our conversation turned positive.

I came to the conclusion after Jenny and I were so impressed that all the travelers we met were such nice people that it was because the destination we all had in common, Machu Picchu.   [Read more…]

Beats in Peru: A Daily Travelogue Part VIII

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By Mikey Beats

Sunday 6/9/13 Day 8

I awoke and rolled over to find Jenny not there and I about fell in between the two beds we had pushed together. She heard the racket and called up to me to get me up for breakfast and I obliged.

We had our usual continental breakfast of yogurt, granola, quinoa and fresh fruit with a couple cups of Peruvian coffee. We decided that we wanted to go explore more of Cuzco, so shortly after our breakfast we were off.

Our first stop was the Museo de Arte Precolombino which was a history lesson of Peru before the Inca. There were the Nasca, Mochica, Huari and the Chimú, all running the land of Peru before the Inca showed up and built their vast empire.   [Read more…]

Beats in Peru: A Daily Travelogue Part VII

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By Mikey Beats

San Diego DJ Mikey Beats, and his nurse wife Jenny, decided to take a vacation to Machu Picchu, Peru. For the next few days San Diego Free Press will publish their daily adventures. Read parts I & II, part III, parts IV & IV.5, part V and part VI.

Saturday 6/8/13 Day 7

My alarm went off at 4:30am. We had to pack our bags before we left while getting ready for a monstrous day of hiking. We planned on hiking to The Sun Gate, which was on the far northeastern side of Mach Picchu, and then trek across the whole city to Huayna Pichu.

We got to the restaurant at 5:35am for breakfast and right at 5:40am, the first of many busses started to drop people off. We jumped in line at 5:50am and were off to the races again by 6:00am. We immediately ditched the rest of the pack as we took a left, opposite the ruins and began our ascent to The Sun Gate.   [Read more…]

Extreme Weather Watch: Two Rare EF5 Tornadoes Hit Oklahoma in May

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By John Lawrence

Two EF5 tornadoes hit the Oklahoma City area in May. The first tornado hit Moore, OK and had winds estimated at over 200 mph reaching a maximum damage width of 1.3 miles. State officials confirmed 24 fatalities due to the twister. The storm injured over 300 others with preliminary damage estimates totaling over $2 billion along its 17 mile, 40 minute path. The twister destroyed two Moore elementary schools, killing seven schoolchildren at Plaza Towers elementary and injuring many others. Moore was hit in 1999 by another EF5, which had the strongest winds ever measured on earth: 302 mph.

  [Read more…]

Beats in Peru: A Daily Travelogue, Parts IV & IV.5

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By Mikey Beats

San Diego DJ Mikey Beats, and his nurse wife Jenny, decided to take a vacation to Machu Pichu, Peru. For the next few days San Diego Free Press will publish their daily adventures. Read parts I & II and part III.

Wednesday 6/5/13

As I awoke to the sounds of droplets coming from the roof onto the street outside my first reaction was, “I thought this was the dry season.”

Eric from “Adventures by Eric” had agreed to send someone to meet me at 8am in the reception area to give the down payment on our ATV Adventure Tour that would last 4 hours. Jenny and I had done one of these in the Yucatan for a tour of the cenotes a few years prior and we had a blast. Today would be no different with the rainy wetness, but there in Cuzco, it was about 30 degrees colder.   [Read more…]

SoCal Edison Pulls the Plug on San Onofre Nuke Plant

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By Doug Porter

Today’s news round up starts with the announcement from Southern California Edison saying that the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station is finished. Kaput. Shutdown. Over.

Citing “continuing uncertainty about when or if it might return to service”, the company concluded that questions over when or if the plant might return to service was not good for customers or investors. Concerns about the environment or planet earth were not mentioned.

Since the shutdown of the nuclear power generating station in January of 2012, there has been an epic struggle over whether the plant could safely be returned to operating status.  A small radioactive leak in faulty steam tubes prompted the closure and subsequent questions over the plant’s processes and procedures have lead to protests, innumerable hearings and calls by California Senator Barbara Boxer for the Justice Department to investigate Southern California Edison and its statements to federal regulators about swapping out generators.   [Read more…]

NYC Launches Largest Bike-share Program in Nation – Will San Diego Ever Get Rolling?

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Start Up Delayed Until March 2014 – No Reason for Delay Given

By John Anderson

New York City launched a bike-share program last Monday, May 27.  The program, dubbed Citi Bike in a nod to corporate sponsor Citibank, had been the subject of much conversation and excitement (both positive and negative) in the months leading up to launch.

Meanwhile, on the opposite side of the country San Diego awaits the arrival of a bike-share program.  Announced in November 2012, the initial projection called for 1,800 bicycles in 180 stations.   [Read more…]

Beats in Peru: A Daily Travelogue – Part III

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By Mikey Beats

San Diego DJ Mikey Beats, and his nurse wife Jenny, decided to take a vacation to Machu Pichu, Peru. For the next few days San Diego Free Press will publish their daily adventures. See Days 1 & 2 here.

Tuesday 6/4/13

From what we could tell, there were no signs of altitude sickness and Jenny didn’t wake up with a hangover. We slept in on purpose to get as much rest as possible. Water and coca tea had been our drinks of choice to stay well hydrated….   [Read more…]

Tony Baloney Says Meatless Mondays in San Diego Schools are Government Coercion

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By Doug Porter

Today’s round up of the news starts with public education. And one of the ways the English language gets mauled by those who have an aversion to the ‘public’ part of it.

The San Diego Unified School District Board of Trustees approved a proposal yesterday to incorporate meatless Mondays into its cafeteria menus for elementary and K-8 schools for the coming school year.

This isn’t some radical notion. The concept started a decade ago, as an initiative backed by the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.  A report by the American Meat Institute in February 2011 found that 18% of American households now participate in Meatless Mondays. Oprah’s endorsed it. School districts in Los Angeles, Baltimore, Oakland and Arlington, Virginia all participate.

Note that the SDUSD policy doesn’t prohibit bringing a baloney and ketchup sandwich (a high school favorite of mine) from home, so if a student wants animal protein they can have it.

INSIDE: Peters to Come Out Swinging for Obamacare, VOSD Jumps the Shark, GOP Defunds (Non-existant) Acorn (Again)   [Read more…]

Beats in Peru: A Daily Travelogue Parts I & II

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By Mikey Beats

San Diego DJ Mikey Beats, and his nurse wife Jenny, decided to take a vacation to Machu Pichu, Peru. Over the next few days San Diego Free Press will publish their daily adventures.

Sunday 6/2/13

We woke up just before 8am to the coffee grinder. All our things were prepped and all my stuff needed to be placed into my travel backpack. That backpack had been to Brazil with me, Ecuador and Panama with Jenny and now it would get me through Peru.

We stopped by Ramiro’s taco shop after a few quick texts to tie down loose ends and we hit the road. My breakfast burrito ended up all over my shirt as I was eating and driving. Just another aroma to remind me of home I guess.

We got to LAX a few hours early and took our time finding a cheap option to park the car for ten days. The garage was called Quick Park….   [Read more…]

San Diego Professor Taking Global Warming Fight to the Markets

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A successful effort to convince CalSTRS to divest in fossil fuel stocks would be first significant economic victory in fight against global warming.

By Andy Cohen

Most people accept that global warming is real and that it’s happening. But even for those who continue to willfully deny the facts right underneath their noses, it is getting more and more difficult to ignore the increased frequency and intensity of the superstorms that have devastated our landscape.

The arguments against global warming are almost nonsensical, ranging from “God would never allow it” theology to ideological orthodoxy. Since global warming is the major threat to the recession proof oil and gas industry—an industry that represents enormous power and influence with the ability to sway policy on a whim—many climate change deniers simply reject the abundance of empirical evidence out of their own economic self interest. The decline of the oil and gas industry, after all, in their mind, is the demise of the Western World’s entire economic existence. Oil provides the energy that makes the world go ‘round. What would we do without it?

To the true believers, fossil fuels are, and will continue to be, the lynchpin to the American and global economies.   [Read more…]

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