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Civility? We don’t need no stinkin’ civility

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by Norma Damashek
Mayor Jerry Sanders has betrayed the public. How? by refusing to separate the communal public agenda from the financial agendas of the people who brought him to power – the heavy-hitting fraternity of property developers, hoteliers, bankers, sports team owners, and financiers. They took up residence in the mayor’s office 7 years ago and should have been evicted. He never showed them the door.

By climbing into bed with Carl DeMaio’s campaign and supporters, our avuncular Mayor Sanders revealed one of his least endearing charms – the broken ethical/moral compass he uses to justify a long history of political ineptitude, questionable judgment, and cover-ups.   [Read more…]

National Organization for Marriage (NOM) Pans My Nice Little Hetero Marriage

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By Kit-Bacon Gressitt
The National Organization for Marriage (NOM) emailed a link to its two new campaign advertisements this week. The ads support Minnesota’s Amendment 1, which would amend the constitution to restrict marriage to “only a union of one man and one woman.” What the ballot measure fails to note, but NOM makes evident in the first of its new ads, is that the woman had better be fertile, because, “Marriage is more a commitment between two loving people. It was made by God for the creation and care of the next generation.”   [Read more…]

Ocean Beach Group Formed to Educate Women About Sexual Assaults – “Citizens’ Patrol” to be Established

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There was barely a seat available at last night’s meeting called by the OB Woman’s Club to discuss the recent sexual assaults in Ocean Beach. Nearly 50 people – over a quarter of them men – crowded into the building at the corner of Muir and Bacon – just yards from a violent sexual assault that took place during the wee hours of August 25th.

Becky Sorensen, vice-president of the club, opened the meeting and welcomed everyone. The meeting had been set up out of frustrations, apparently, at the weak response women had received when they brought up their concerns about the assaults and peeping tom at the OB Town Council meeting recently. A number of individuals approached the leadership of the Woman’s Club that night out in front of the Masonic Hall after the Town Council and asked if a meeting could be held there. Becky and Celeste McClure jumped into the task and printed up a flier and began distributing them around town.   [Read more…]

Prop 37: 8 Reasons for Voting Yes for Labeling GMO Foods

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The French prime minister announced on September 15, 2012 that France would maintain a ban on Monsanto’s MON810 maize, the only genetically modified organisim (GMO) currently allowed in Europe. Thanks to activism by French citizens and serious political outcry, Monsanto is now effectively blocked from Europe’s gigantic marketplace. This is even more true when you consider that France is the largest agricultural producer in Europe.

But that’s not all. Following the ground-breaking French study that graphically linked the lifetime consumption of Monsanto’s GMO corn in rats to massive tumors and direct organ failure, Russia’s premiere consumers rights organization has suspended both the importation and use of Monsanto’s GMO corn within the nation’s borders.
  [Read more…]

San Diego Residents: Keep San Onofre Shut Down

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By Michael Steinberg

A recent poll of Southern California residents found that most of them want to keep the troubled San Onofre nuclear power plant shut down . The poll also found that the residents don’t trust its majority owner and operator, Southern California Edison, to keep safety as its first priority at the nuke plant.

” A strong majority of Edison customers want to keep San Onofre shut down and almost half don’t trust Edison to put safety before profit,” environmental group Friends of the Earth reported on October 1.

Friends of the Earth (foe.org) commissioned David Binder Research to carry out the poll. The company talked to 700 registered voters in the counties San Onofre provides electricity to.

The results: “58% of respondents said they oppose reopening the plant…Only 32% said San Onofe should reopen,” Friends of the Earth reported.   [Read more…]

Eyewitness Account: Man Dies After Fatal Stabbing in Sherman Heights

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by Remigia (Remy) Bermúdez

According to witnesses, passers-by and police officers, at approximately 5:30pm on Monday (October 1st) an altercation that started in Logan Heights at 22nd Street and the southern side of Imperial Avenue resulted on a man stumbling down at the corner of 22nd and L Streets in Sherman Heights bleeding from repeated stab wounds. According to a SDPD press release, sent to this San Diego Free Press’s (SDFP) contributing writer, the man died en route to the hospital.  Homicide detective Lt. Duran added, “The deceased victim has been identified, but his name will be withheld until his family can be notified.”

 It was like a scene from a movie, as the SDPD corded off the area with yellow plastic tape, topping fences of surrounding properties in the eastern and western sides was 22nd Street from L Street heading southerly through what appeared to be Commercial Avenue. The area remained cordoned off from around 6pm Monday evening through Tuesday’s morning hours of October 2nd to protect evidence from being disturbed, according to SDPD officers.

The first media on the scene was the San Diego Free Press, as this contributing writer lives nearby.    [Read more…]

Vigil for Valeria “Munique” Alvarado – Young Mother Killed by Border Patrol

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Question is raised – is this our ‘Trayvon Martin’?

Nearly two hundred people attended the vigil for Valeria “Munique” Tachiquin Alvarado in Chula Vista Monday early evening. Family, friends, supporters and strangers – and the media – gathered at the intersection of Moss Street and Oaklawn Avenue – where she was shot to death by a plainclothes border patrol agent on Friday afternoon, September 28th, while in her car.

The 32 year old mother of 5 had been fatally killed during some kind of interaction with the agent. Reports of what happened differed wildly. And during the at times emotional vigil family members, including the young woman’s father, called for answers and justice.

Speaking first, Christian Ramirez of the American Friends Service Committee spoke about the evening being a sober one. He said the community vigil “was called by the family to remember her life and bear testimony to the tragedy that occurred 72 hours ago. They demand justice.”   [Read more…]

The Starting Line – Want to Make San Diego More Bike Friendly? Lose the Helmets!

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There’s been a lot of discussion in San Diego lately about making the city more bike friendly.  Mayor Sanders held a media event not long ago touting a public “bike sharing’ program, a low cost rental system that could encompass downtown, the beach areas and midtown by next spring.  Three bike ‘corrals” that allow riders to safely park their bicycle in crowded urban neighborhoods have been opened recently. And it would appear that the people in charge of the area’s roads are starting to take a more serious look at making the streets more user friendly to riders.

From the venerable New York Times Sunday Review comes an article suggesting that, if we truly want to succeed in making the San Diego area more bike-centric, we should look at what many will consider a heretical idea: lose the helmets.   [Read more…]

The Starting Line –GOP Voter Registration Fraud Program Continues to Unfold; Is There a San Diego Connection?

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Does anybody remember the Fox News generated story about voter fraud allegedly perpetrated by ACORN during the 2008 election cycle? The sum total of their evidence was that individuals were attempting to scam the voter registration system by turning in falsified forms. No monies from the Democratic Party were ever tied to ACORN, nor was there proof that any of the fake voters actually attempted to vote.

It should be noted that actual voter fraud (where somebody casts an illegal vote), despite regular histrionics by right wing zealots, is exceedingly rare.

Now there is a nation-wide voter registration scandal unfolding involving companies directly funded by both State and National Republican Party groups, and over at Fox News there’s not a peep to be heard.   [Read more…]

GREGG ROBINSON: Candidate for County Board of Education

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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…]

Get Out the Vote with Sarah Silverman and Samuel L Jackson: Nana, Guns and a Wake Up Call

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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…]

The Starting Line —Hey San Diego! Don’t Miss Out on an Opportunity Called Politifest

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Those of us who are active in politics rarely acknowledge the reality that, regardless of our views, we are a distinct minority. It is all too easy to make the jump from, say, knowing that the quality of life is an important consideration for San Diegans, to the assumption that everybody actually has an opinion or gives enough of a damn to think about the issue.

So when an event occurs whose purpose is to raise consciousness about getting out and actually doing something, I think it’s a Big Deal. Voice of San Diego’s Politifest, at Liberty Station (Point Loma) this Saturday starting at about 10 am, is a one stop no risk opportunity for anybody that grasps the importance of citizenship to get involved. There will be eighty plus organizations with people willing to expound about their cause, give you a brochure or two and, if you’re willing, sign you up for future activities.   [Read more…]

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