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The Starting Line – Mayor Calls San Diego Summit in Response to Sandy Hook Shooting

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Mayor Bob Filner, along with representatives from the San Diego Police Department and San Diego Unified, hosted a sit-down yesterday to talk about local responses and precautions in the wake of Friday’s school shooting in Newtown, Connecticut.

The Mayor cited his own struggle over talking with his two grandchildren about the Sandy Hook tragedy as being a motivation for calling the meeting. Police Chief William Landsdowne mentioned his opposition to legal assault weapons as the video tape from NBCNews7 rolled, quickly qualifying his statement as being a political matter not necessarily germane to the matters at hand.

A video monitoring system installed throughout San Diego schools over the past couple of years will now be interfaced with laptops in police cars, giving them the ability to see situations in real time as they respond to a situation. One thousand cameras are in place, covering hallways, lunchrooms, offices and building exteriors, according to SDUSD police Lieutenant Joe Florentino.   [Read more…]

The Starting Line – We Can Do Better Than Singing Kumbaya and Waiting for America to ‘Come Together’

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Enough of all this talk. We live in the ‘World’s Greatest Country’ and ‘America’s Finest City’ and the best we as citizens can do is, according to our local daily newspaper’s editorial board:

 ** …resist the temptation to see what took place at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., as an indictment of America.

**perhaps we need to have a debate about identifying and helping the mentally ill, or about making schools safer, or about reassuring worried schoolchildren that they are safe.

** This is not the time to take advantage of tragedy. This is not the time for shouting. This is the time for this nation to come together. We have done it many times before in the wake of horrible news. What we need to do is to cherish our children and our families, to reach out to our loved ones, our neighbors and our community. This is the time for the goodness of the American spirit to shine through, to get us all through these sorrowful days and to a brighter tomorrow.

I say horseshit. I’m mad as hell and I’M GONNA SHOUT ABOUT IT. You should, too.
  [Read more…]

The Starting Line— Exposing the Myth of Incentivized Economic Development; It’s Like Crack Cocaine for Politicians

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Today I’ll take a break from breathless headlines and poke my journalistic nose into the mythology bandied about by the Official Press in reference to boosting local economies. This is particularly relevant to San Diego, as we (hopefully) move away from a mode of development that sacrificed neighborhoods in favor of corporate edifices downtown. Of course, we still have stuff in the pipeline and the ‘must have’ stadium scheme being promoted in Lynchesterland…

Three articles on related topics have come to my attention this week that I’d like to share: two debunk the idea that “incentives” given by government to companies are beneficial to local economies; the other pulls back the curtain on the “sports welfare” system in this country.

Here’s the deal: your tax dollars are supporting a system of kickbacks and enticements for corporations and individuals based on empty promises of employment opportunities and economic growth. Thus the rich get richer while the rest us pay more taxes.   [Read more…]

The Starting Line – We’re Number Three! San Diego’s Homeless Population Soars

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A report from the Department of Housing and Urban Development documents San County’s homeless population as the third largest and among the fastest growing in the United States.

While the number of homeless fell by nearly 6% nationally, San Diego’s increased by 6.1% over the past year. The report indicated that there were 10,013 homeless people living in our region. Only New York and Los Angeles had more people living on the streets. And LA showed the largest decrease nationally.

Come inside for more of today’s daily news digest…   [Read more…]

The Starting Line – Will the NRA Advocate Bringing Along Your Weapons While Christmas Shopping?

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The news this morning is dominated by stories about a man in Oregon who wandered into a shopping mall dressed in camouflage and starting firing off rounds, killing two shoppers. Eventually, police told the news media, he was ‘neutralized’, which turns out to be policespeak for ‘he killed himself.’

Enough already, I say. There isn’t much we can do about that young man’s mental illness in retrospect, but there is plenty that can be done about the people enabling unfettered access to firearms. I say its time we scare those cockroaches out from under their rocks and take a close look at the damage they’ve wrought on our society.

Mind you, this little rant is not about gun control. That’s a subject that requires a little more nuanced conversation, one that’s impossible as long as people tolerate the pinheads that make up the leadership of the NRA.

I’m talking about the simply outrageous crap that gets passed off in the name of defending our “Second Amendment Rights”. While the tinfoil set has been stockpiling ammunition and sending mass emails to AOL accounts about the Obama administration’s plans to enforce a mythical United Nations mandate that will take everybody’s guns away, the gun lobby has been busy making sure that there are no reasonable (or discussions about) restrictions on firearms.   [Read more…]

The Starting Line – San Diego GOP Sets Out to Test the Definition of Insanity

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San Diego Republicans, in an attempt to prove that they really aren’t the ‘anti-science’ party are conducting a field trial designed to prove the veracity of the commonly used definition of insanity.  You know, the quip that goes, “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.”

A press release issued yesterday proudly announced that, on the heels of getting their asses handed to them in 2012, the local Republican Party branch is sticking with the same management team.   Heh, heh. Quote:

Preparing to take advantage of mid-term election opportunities, the Republican Party of San Diego County tonight elected its leadership team for the 2014 election cycle.

  [Read more…]

The Starting Line – Potential Supremes Gay Rights Rulings Reverberate

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The decision by the Supreme Court on Friday to hear arguments on two cases relevant to gay rights (Defense of Marriage Act & Calif. Proposition 8) continues to reverberate around the United States. Although no decision is likely until early next summer, talking heads around the nation used the weekend press to contemplate the likely outcomes and their potential impact.

The San Francisco Chronicle highlighted the nervousness many have about any potential decision. The New York Times marveled at the speed that same sex marriage issues were moving through the courts, noting that other major issues had often taken decades to get a hearing. And many newspapers around the country featured articles about couples in Washington State flocking to get married now that a voter approved law is in effect.   [Read more…]

The Starting Line— San Diego Non-Profit Organizations Under the Gun; Police Seeking Payoffs for Permits

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A move by the San Diego Police Department to eliminate an exemption allowing non-profit organizations to throw fundraisers and other entertainment events without having to pay for city permits is drawing fire from charitable groups. They say the local law enforcement agency is trying to balance their budget off local fundraisers.

The cops are hoping to make the case that the fee exemptions provided to non-profits are in violation of Proposition 26, which requires a legislative supermajority to change fees charged for licenses. They claim businesses paying for permit fees are subsidizing non-profit organizations because of the need to provide police protection at events.

The Worldbeat Cultural Center in Balboa Park, non-profit dedicated to African African-American arts and culture has posted an online petition at signon.org looking for public help.   [Read more…]

The Starting Line – Are California Voters Ready to Amend Proposition 13?

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Polling Group Finds Support for Splitting Property Tax Rolls

The Public Policy Institute of California (PPIC) has been asking Californians what they think about issues and politics since 1998. Over time they’re work has become recognized as the gold standard for public opinion polling in the Golden State.

Yesterday they released the results of their 130th survey, taken shortly after the November elections, asking 2001 respondents about their outlook on the future, electoral reforms, potential fiscal, governance, and initiative reforms, the passage of Proposition 30, the state’s public higher education system, water policy, and elected officials’ handling of plans and policies for the state’s future.

And apparently voters are ready to consider a big change to Proposition 13, long considered a sacred cow in California politics.   [Read more…]

Filner Cites FDR on Anti-Poverty Pledge: “I agree with you, now make me do it.”

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Challenged by a local activist at the District 4 inaugural party on Monday night to make fighting poverty a priority in his administration, newly elected Mayor Bob Filner responded by quoting President Franklin Roosevelt’s rejoinder to activists in the early days of the New Deal: “I agree with you, now make me do it.”

And that’s exactly what the Center for Policy Initiatives (CPI) is doing. They’ve launched a letter writing campaign seeking to gather 500 letters over the next week urging the Mayor to make poverty a priority in San Diego.

  [Read more…]

The Starting Line – This is What Winning Looks Like

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Yesterday was the day that the seeds planted by a majority of voters just a month ago began to show signs of bearing fruit.  Here in San Diego we saw a changing of the guard at City Hall. In Washington DC, although newly elected representatives have yet to be sworn in, there were significant moves in terms of influential committee assignments that could well portend a less fractious 114th Congress.

Speaking at yesterday’s inauguration, incoming Mayor Bob Filner gave the overflow crowd at the Balboa Club a couple of clear signals that perhaps things will be different in City Hall.

“The day of vilification of city workers is over.”

“Neighborhoods are the heart and soul of the city,” he said. “They define its character.”

Much more inside!   [Read more…]

The Starting Line – A Day to Celebrate: Filner in as Mayor, Xolos in as Champs

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It’s a day for underdogs to celebrate. After three decades of Republican rule, Bob Filner’s ascension into San Diego’s top spot marks the start of a new era in San Diego politics. At long last our city’s neighborhoods, long considered a red headed step-child in terms of urban planning and economic development will be given the opportunity to have their needs and desires given a fair shake. We hope, anyway.

Meanwhile, in the “missing half” of our metropolis, more than 100,000 residents of Tijuana took to the streets in neighborhoods throughout that city to celebrate victory for Club Tijuana Xoloitzcuintles de Caliente as that team emerged as champions in Mexico’s highest level of soccer.

The nay-sayers are already jumping on both these stories.   [Read more…]

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