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Tin Foil Hats Disappear from Amazon.com as Jade Helm Exercise Begins

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By Doug Porter

Desperate citizens in Texas, Utah and California are taking to social media this morning to alert their fellow patriots about a shocking lack of Tin Foil headgear…

Welcome to July 15th, the day when right wing conspiracy theorists have been predicting  a military take-over cleverly disguised as the Jade Helm 15 training exercise.

Given that the conspiracy theorists will no doubt claim their warnings have averted Armageddon when things don’t happen, let’s take a quick look at what we’ve been saved from.   [Read more…]

Facing Dire Threats, Greek Voters Reject Austerity

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“And I shall wear the creditors’ loathing with pride.”–Minister of Finance Yanis Varoufakis

By Doug Porter

US newspapers today are telling readers about a “shocking rebuff” or a “stunning rejection” by Greek voters of a deal offered by international lenders to refinance that country’s debt.

The overwhelming “No” vote may be stunning for bankers and neo-liberal economists as it flies on the face of the presumption holding there was only one way out of the current crisis. The Greek people saw their vote as rejection of blackmail; they’ve had enough austerity, thank you.

Today, I’ll offer readers some viewpoints not commonly seen in coverage of the Greek financial crisis. The No vote is not the end of the world. Much of what we’ve been told/sold paints an incomplete picture. And anybody (Carl DeMaio, for instance) who’d like you to believe that Greek pensioners are at the root of the problem is selling snake oil–they are a symptom, not a cause.   [Read more…]

Fun, Fear and Fireworks on the Fourth of July

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By Doug Porter

America’s most patriotic holiday is a complicated event. What was once a day set aside for pontificating, picnics and patriotism is too often filled with fear, loathing and enough fireworks to scare the cilia off paramecium six states away.

By ignoring the merchants of faux patriotism–an admirable, if difficult goal–many Americans do manage to make the day special. So let’s take a look around at what is and is not happening on the Fourth of July, 2015.

In San Diego County there are (at least) seventeen fireworks shows, eight parades, eight concerts, one flotilla and assorted performances. And that’s not counting the ad hoc displays of patriotic bang-bangs and boom-booms. Listings for events can be found at KPBS, the Times of San Diego, and the Union-Tribune.   [Read more…]

Protecting Mauna Kea: This Is A War

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By Will Falk

Sitting outside the 10 by 20 foot makeshift tent that has served as my home for the last 34 days on Mauna Kea, I watch the tent poles shudder to the concussion of US Army howitzer cannons firing live shells at their training grounds below. When the wind blows just right, from the south, the rattle of automatic rifle fire reaches the occupation. There’s no denying it: A war rages in Hawai’i.

It’s a war on native peoples, a war on women, a war on the land, a war on life itself. The war did not start in Hawai’i. The war began thousands of years ago with the dawn of civilization when some humans chose to live in population densities high enough that they overshot the carrying capacity of their homelands and turned to dominating other peoples in other lands. Imperialism was born, and one-by-one land-based, truly sustainable human societies were either eradicated or forced into assimilation.   [Read more…]

La Jolla Playhouse’s ‘Come From Away’ is a Different Take on 9/11

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By Mukul  Khurana

On 9/11 of 2001, Gander was discovered by America. To put it correctly, this small Canadian town on the island of Newfoundland was rediscovered by America. It is the location of Gander International Airport.

Here comes an important fact—it was, by virtue of its geography, an important refueling site for transatlantic aircraft as they had to stop somewhere after crossing the ocean.

Here is another fact—most of the streets in Gander are named after aviators—Earhart, Lindbergh, Yeager, and the like. To this day, Gander International Airport still serves as the airport of choice when it comes to medical or security emergencies–hence the 9/11 connection.   [Read more…]

NSA Collection of American Phone Records Ends – Thanks to Edward Snowden

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Halt to Records Collection Probably Temporary As Senate Expected to Pass Reform Measure

By Frank Gormlie / OB Rag

As of today – June 1st – the National Security Agency is no longer legally allowed to collect Americans’ phone records in bulk.  The NSA massive collection of telephone records ended at 11:59 p.m. EDT Sunday, right after the Senate failed to pass a measure to extend the controversial program, part of the Patriot Act.

And Americans can thank Edward Snowden for it. Snowden was the one who heroically revealed the massive surveillance program to the American public and is now sitting in Russia for his punishment.   [Read more…]

Remember the Dead

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Memorial Day wouldn’t be a holiday if not for the Civil War.

One version of the birth of Memorial Day pegs it as beginning in April of 1866 when four women in Columbus, Mississippi got together to decorate the graves of Confederate soldiers. Then, as Deborah Fallows tells it in The Atlantic, “They also felt moved to honor the Union soldiers buried there, and to note the grief of their families, by decorating their graves as well. The story of their gesture of humanity and reconciliation is now told and retold in Mississippi as being the occasion of the original Memorial Day.”

Another version of the story has it that Memorial Day was the invention of black freedmen who gathered on May 1st to decorate the graves of soldiers—Union soldiers—who had died in Charleston, South Carolina as prisoners and “Martyrs of the Race Course.”   [Read more…]

Protecting Mauna Kea: Talking Story

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Looking up at the still, lingering morning stars from the best stargazing location in the world early on the third day since my arrival at the occupation on Mauna Kea, my personal velocities catch up with me and I listen. I stand at 9,200 feet above sea level. North and above me, Mauna Kea’s shoulders broaden as they rise into the heavens. Down and to the east, a thick cover of clouds hides the valley below and deadens the rattle of rifle fire coming from the US military training center on the Mountain. Wind scatters the volcanic dust at my feet.

I have never been to a place like this, never looked down on the clouds from any where other than a plane seat, never marveled at the feel of lava pebbles in my palm and I wonder what it all means. Dawn’s thin air only offers my own reflections back to me.   [Read more…]

The History of Neighborhood House in Logan Heights: The Korean War Years

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Veterans of World War II returned home deeply changed by their experience. They found that Logan Heights and San Diego had also been changed by the war. The effort to find a new normalcy would be interrupted by the Korean War.

This is part I of the Korean War and the 1950s, viewed through the experiences of Johnny Leyva who grew up in Logan Heights.
   [Read more…]

Geo-Poetic Spaces: Teufelsberg (Devil’s Mountain)

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For the Trümmerfrauen of Berlin

A single mountain
in Berlin

On its summit
the Cold War melts
into marching trees

Clouds
high jumped over
the Olympic Stadium
where Jessie Owens ran   [Read more…]

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