By Michael-Leonard Creditor
Since SDFP was striking on Wednesday when this happened, I thought I’d take the opportunity to express my outrage in your stead.
He didn’t. He said WHAT? Oh, the man is utterly stupefying and infuriating. A true sociopath, he will say anything in the moment regardless of how his prior actions absolutely give lie to the words. And even when he seems to be trying to say something positive, he simply can’t. [Read more…]
By Dianne Lane
Two activists hosted a Sanctuary House Party/Teach-in at their home in Ocean Beach on Saturday, February 25.
The impetus for the event sprang from a “Teaching Positive Alternatives to Trump Teach-In” last month in Balboa Park. The aim is to build a San Diego network of sanctuary homes in resistance to Trump’s fascism and to corporate capitalism. Over the next few months, a series of neighborhood house parties throughout San Diego will help define and create this vital new network of hope and resistance. The goal is to form real connections during these social /educational events. [Read more…]
The momentum created through movements such as the Women’s March on Washington and the various Indivisible Groups is great and is noticed. All the strategists in the Democratic party – who, by the way, couldn’t excite and capture this level of energy during the last election – are conniving to capture and steer this energy for the Party’s gain. In other words, going forward, what may look like grassroots organizing and politicking will more than likely be a front for the “corporate Democrats” the movements are pushing against. [Read more…]
By Bruce Bekkar, M.D. and Donald Mosier, M.D.
On February 15, our County Board of Supervisors voted against staff’s recommendation to conduct a feasibility study on Community Choice Aggregation (CCA).
An increasingly popular option throughout California, CCAs (also known as CCEs) provide local residents an alternative to investor-owned utilities and a chance to select a mix of less carbon-intensive electricity at competitive prices. A San Diego County CCA program would be a big step towards a cleaner, healthier future for everyone.
Community Choice Aggregation programs came into being in California in 2002 with the passage of AB 117 in the California State Legislature. This Bill created the framework for establishing local, not-for-profit public agencies that would partner with existing utilities to provide additional electricity choices for state residents.
[Read more…]
By Michael-Leonard Creditor
I watched (again) the movie “Lucky Number Slevin” just last night, so as soon as the thought hit me, I called it a Kansas City shuffle.
No, it’s not a card trick. But it is an old jazz tune, originally by Benny Moten, who hailed from there.
But, that’s not it either. It’s more akin to the kind of side-step that Charles Durning performs as a fictional Texas governor in another film, “The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas.”
As used in “Lucky Number Slevin” Kansas City Shuffle is a distraction tactic. When everybody looks one way, you do something else in another direction.
That’s exactly what is going on in D.C. lately, in the administration of 45*. [Read more…]
An open letter to Jessica Hayes, (Chair, San Diego Democratic Party) and Dale Kelly Bankhead (Secretary-Treasurer for the San Diego-Imperial Counties Labor Council), from Sara Kent.
Over the past two months, I have hoped for brave action from each of you. As women who hold positions of power in San Diego who should be stalwarts of fundamental Democratic ideals, instead of being proud of your leadership, I am gravely disappointed.
Not only for you, but for all of us. [Read more…]
By Michael-Leonard Creditor
Our president has a bug up his ass about the Johnson Amendment, part of the Internal Revenue Code of 1954 prohibiting 501(c)(3) non-profit organizations from conducting political campaign activities to intervene in elections to public office. He thinks it unfairly restricts free speech.
But here’s the thing: the Johnson Amendment doesn’t stop church leaders from speaking out. Firstly, political activity is allowed so long as pastors stop short of directly or indirectly endorsing. But, even if pastors do actually endorse a candidate or ballot measure, only one church is known to have actually lost its tax-exemption due to electioneering. Also, some defiant clergy have repeatedly and for years, deliberately disregarded the Johnson Amendment. Some have even sent transcripts of their speeches to the IRS. That one church that lost its exemption, that was back in 1995.
All this rule does is pose a choice for clergy: do you wanna be a church or in politics? If you want the tax-exemption of being a church, you should simply stay out of politics. Can’t do both; choose. And this gets to the heart of the whole separation clause thing. I think the amendment solidifies the separation-of-church-and-state intent of the founding fathers. [Read more…]
Imagine you have had a good life with a stable job and family. Then, imagine that your life turns upside down, be it from war, religious persecution, or social unrest, and you have to start from scratch in a new country with a different language, culture, even alphabet! Welcome to the world of many of my adult ESL [English as a Second Language] students. Despite all that they have gone and continue to go through, they are very grateful to be here
Some people fear the unknown and are suspicious of newcomers, so I’d like to give you a glimpse of my world. I have been both an adult and community college ESL teacher at SDCE Mid-City Center and Grossmont College for over 30 years. I have worked with people from all over the world and their resilience never ceases to amaze me. In one class, I can have students ranging in age from 18 to 65 and from different socioeconomic and academic backgrounds, but they all have a mutual goal. They want to learn English and forge a better life for themselves and their children. For the most part, it is not easy. [Read more…]
By Dave Patterson / Vets for Peace
On a cold night in January I joined Stan Levin and Gil Field delivering sleeping bags to the San Diego homeless, what we call the compassion campaign. Dealing directly with the homeless is painful because there they are in our faces with their cold, hunger and suffering laid bare. What’s surprising is the number of people with just a thin blanket that will decline a sleeping bag because others nearby need it more. How ironic that people with nothing can have more compassion than those of us with plenty. [Read more…]
By Women Occupy San Diego
San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer touts the 640 of 3000 miles of City street repaired during his 32 months in office. Good for you, Mr. Mayor, this shows you can accomplish something when you set your mind to it.
NEXT UP: Get people made homeless by the past 6 years’ replacement of 10,000 units of affordable housing by market-rate housing, vacation rentals, hotels, offices and retail OFF THESE STREETS. [Read more…]
By John Loughlin
Restaurateurs make a political statement by adding a surcharge to ‘cover’ the cost of paying the poorest workers a higher wage.
The Union-Tribune article helpfully provides a list of restaurants to boycott as well as some to support.
Back in May 2016, David Cohn speaking at a CREW event “It is so easy to vote for that [minimum wage] increase, but it is going to really raise your cost of entertainment and spark a new round of inflation that we haven’t seen since the 1970s.” He was reported as predicting that the results could lead to menu prices increasing a minimum of 30% over the next few years. From Jan 1, 2017 the Cohn Restaurant Group is adding a 3% surcharge to cover ‘mandated’ cost increases. [Read more…]
Because America fell to a fascist coup d’etat only a few weeks ago it’s not too early to talk about how it happened.
First and above all others, the Democratic Party was a necessary player in this debacle. Loyalists will be outraged seeing that in print. After all, they’ll say, we need now more than ever to grow more united, to bond again as Democrats because… stronger together. But that mother-loving phrase failed, didn’t it? It was empty of substance, like so many others the Dems put up. No one bought it.
It’s almost pathetic to watch the defeated party grope for explanations having to do with the decrepit Electoral College and Republican gerrymandering, the FBI’s Comey striking a blow at the last minute, the Russians hacking into party emails and releasing excerpts of conversations that revealed—Gasp!—cynicism equaling that portrayed in any House of Cards episode. [Read more…]
