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Trans Pacific Partnership Signing Brings on International Protests

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Representatives of the United States and eleven other Pacific Rim nations are gathered in Auckland, New Zealand this week for discussions and a largely symbolic signing ceremony of the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement. Activists around the world have been staging protests to drive home the point that reshaping international trade cannot be limited to protecting the interests of transnational corporations and their investors.

Events in San Diego, Los Angeles and other cities will echo the Capitol Hill appearance of AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka and Democratic Rep. Rosa DeLauro, joining with MoveOn.org to deliver 1 million petitions calling on Congress to reject the agreement. Protests at the signing ceremony in New Zealand are expect to be muted, given the efforts by local police to visit “known activists” in recent weeks.

The deal still has to be ratified by at least six of its member nations, a process that can take up to two years and must include Japan and the United States. In the US, ratification has been (unofficially) put off until after the November elections meaning it will be voted on by a lame-duck congress. Under the terms of the TPA Fast-track legislation, a yes or no vote with no amendments allowed must take place within 90 days of its introduction in the congress.   [Read more…]

Military In Control From the Start

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Part Three of Seven. Source: History of San Diego by William E. Smythe. All quotes are from this book.

By John Lawrence / From the original San Diego Free Press, circa 1969

After the Spanish settlement had been established in 1769, there followed a period of digging in—trying to make a go of it and becoming self-sufficient.

There is no question that, behind the religious front, it was the military that was firmly in command. We quote Smythe: “With the dedication of the Presidio and the Mission, the first institutions had been established in what is now the State of California. These institutions were typical of Spanish civilization (sic)—the soldier and the priest working side by side, but always with the sword above the Cross in point of authority. It was essentially a military government, and the commandant was empowered to deal out justice, civil and criminal.”   [Read more…]

Andrea Palacio Skorepa: From VISTA Volunteer to Casa Familiar CEO

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Andrea Skorepa has been CEO of Casa Familiar (Casa) since 1980. As we spoke I could not distinguish if Andrea was Casa Familiar or if Casa Familiar is Andrea. Both are so intertwined that it is impossible to separate them.

Andrea was born at Paradise Valley Hospital. The first fourteen years of her life were spent growing up in San Ysidro, then her parents moved to Chula Vista where she attended Castle Park High School. While attending Junior College, now known as Community College, Andrea decided that she would become a Peace Corps volunteer.   [Read more…]

San Diego: Two Expeditions — Enter Father Serra

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Part Two of Seven. Part One can be found here. Source: History of San Diego by William E. Smythe. All quotes are from this book.

By John Lawrence / From the original San Diego Free Press, circa 1969

A land and sea expedition set out from Mexico in 1769. After major navigational difficulties, two ships, the San Antonio and the San Carlos, landed at San Diego on April 11 and April 29, 1769, respectively.

It seems that the incompetent Cabrillo had reported that San Diego was at 34 degrees latitude whereas actually it is at 32 degrees. The result of this bungling was that most of the sailors were sick or dying when they reached San Diego. In fact all the seamen on the “San Carlos” died except for one and the cook. We can see that the plight of sailors in San Diego hasn’t changed much in 200 years.   [Read more…]

Don’t Celebrate This MLK Day: American Oligarchy is Killing the Dream

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Don’t celebrate this Martin Luther King Jr. Day. And please don’t clap for anyone talking about how far we’ve come.

Rather than engaging in the usual empty gestures accompanied by vanilla rhetoric that turns Dr. King into a saint, we should be railing against the fact that last week, by indicating that they are prepared to cripple public sector unions, the Supreme Court of the United States took another huge step in moving the country further and further away from the America that King fought for and eventually gave his life to make a reality.   [Read more…]

The Time Has Come to Address the Killing of Black People by White Police Officers

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Education, Junior High, Police, and Fixing Our Killing Problem

By Ellen Lindeen / Common Dreams

Many are hoping in this new year that the killing of unarmed African Americans by police officers will stop, but the situation does not seem to be improving. For those of us in the Chicago area, for example, it seems to be getting worse, and so we must ask what can be done?

There is a path forward. People are taught to be racist; they are not born that way. The same goes for people who are violent. Humans are naturally more cooperative than violent, despite the myth of our violent ancestors. Racism does not have to exist, and neither does endemic violence. The killing of black people could be stopped with specific additions to education and training. Police officers can be taught about the concept of “race” which is an invented social construct, not a biological reality. Police officers can also be taught conflict resolution strategies that allow them to “keep the peace” rather than add to the disruption of it. These changes could produce incredibly positive results if we simply decide to do what is necessary.   [Read more…]

Supreme Court Case Impacts Teachers, Public Employees

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By Lindsay Burningham / San Diego Education Association

As an elementary teacher I consider it a privilege to work with the students of San Diego. When students are engaged by educators within a climate of trust, we share in their joy when those “light bulb” moments happen and students are achieving at their full potential.

As the president of the San Diego Education Association, I have had the opportunity to expand my professional learning through school site visits throughout the city of San Diego. Irrespective of the amazing work I see accomplished by outstanding educators, paraprofessionals and administrators in those schools every day, I also see the effects of an economic system that has swung out of balance. Hardworking parents of our students are finding it more difficult to get by, even as an economic recovery has increased the fortunes of those at the very top of the economic class.

Now the Supreme Court is poised to hear a case that seeks to make it even worse for workers who want to stand together to have a voice in their workplace.   [Read more…]

Excerpt From Sunshine/Noir II: The Future of Post-Bordernity

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The wall is the materialized representation of this idea of a border. In English people call it a “fence” and in the U.S. that fence means “defense”; something that in American minds brings protection. Interestingly enough you would have to ask them, “Protection from who or what?” And this same wall or barrier or fence means an “offense” to Mexicans.

—Norma Iglesias Prieto

By Perry Vasquez

The U.S./Mexico border is falling apart. Like Chipotle Swiss cheese, it is shot through with gaps, holes, lacunae, erasures, and stretches of emptiness. The border exists—but at times its existence seems to collapse beneath the weight of its own sovereignty.

How does the border both exist and not exist at the same time? How does it manage to appear in strategic locations and disappear in non-strategic ones? Why do we think of the border as having a fixed and permanent national identity instead of a contingent and temporary one?

Like every national myth, the U.S./Mexico border began life as a collective act of imagination.   [Read more…]

With a Spate of New Laws, California May Be the Most Progressive State in the Nation

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By Sonali Kolhatkar / TruthDig

California lawmakers have been extremely busy actually getting work done—unlike their federal counterparts in Washington, D.C. The most populous state in the nation is now arguably also the most progressive. Here are 10 critical issues covered by recently passed laws, from reproductive rights and equal pay to voting rights and health care for undocumented children.   [Read more…]

Excerpt From Sunshine/Noir II: San Ysidro Blues — 30 Years After the Massacre

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By Francisco J. Bustos

I remember playing on the kitchen floor when the shots started firing.
I remember my cousin and I running outside the apartment, like many others did.
The sound of bullets instantly changed everybody’s eyes and nobody could
explain it.
We lived on Sunset Lane, just a couple blocks, de aquel Mac Donals, 30 years ago.
We jumped outside at the sound of more bullets,
if we could make it to the corner, we could catch a glimpse of our San Ysidro
Boulevard.

I don’t know why we tried running to that corner. Something pushed us. With every step that we took, more shots sliced the air,
and more shots and more shots, again and again and again.   [Read more…]

Restraining Order Offers Glimpse into Escondido School Board Follies

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Sometimes big headlines result from big spin. Take Escondido, for instance. Politicians in that north county bastion of reaction have mastered the fine art of drama when it comes to politics.

Whether it’s banning immigrants from renting homes, terminating a social service agency’s contract in retaliation for its speech, and enforcing a restrictive ordinance that stifled rallies and demonstrations, the yokels in America’s 11th most conservative city know how to stand the truth on its head to advance their cause.

From the mindset that imagined refugees from Central America were here to sell drugs, spread disease, and rape their daughters, comes the story of poor hard working Republican school board members being bullied by a mean old Latino Democrat.   [Read more…]

“Those People”

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I just got back from a Paul Laurence Dunbar Junior High Reunion. Dunbar was Tucson’s first-thru-ninth grade school for “colored” kids aka Negroes.

Many of us show up at the school’s auditorium, the Friday after Thanksgiving, every two years. As black people and/or African Americans.

And let me tell you, it’s so nice to be among people who were at your side when you were a kid growing up trying to figure out how to make it in a world where you’re looked at as “Those people.” People to be looked down upon.   [Read more…]

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