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Letter From the Garden: Produce the World around You

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By Susan Taylor

Artichokes are fun! They grow from a lovely, silver-green plant with fabulous long leaves. You can pick, steam and then eat them. Or you can let the choke stay on the plant till it erupts into a stunning purple flower that lasts a long time. My mother who wasn’t a native San Diegan took artichoke serving very seriously. She would prune off the sharp tips and outer leaves, cook them and serve them at dinner along with little Austrian bowls filled with warm melted butter.

When we got to the thinnest small leaves, Dad would cut the choke out for us so we could put the little meaty section into leftover butter. It was practically religion. One of my artichoke plants just fell over because the growing heads were so heavy. We had them last night.

We’re still planting, people. …   [Read more…]

5 ‘Green’ Products That Aren’t As Environmentally Friendly As You Thought

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Just because a product is marketed as being ecologically sound doesn’t make it so.

By Cliff Weathers / Alternet

“Greenwashing” is a term that is starting to permeate the English lexicon. It’s a form of marketing spin that is applied to products to make them more appealing to environmentally conscious consumers. It takes little to greenwash a product, sometimes changing a label to imply that it’s more environmentally safe is all it takes. Other times, the true intent for a product may be green, but it still may fall short. There are plenty of products out there that actually have some eco-friendly qualities, but on​ closer look, they’re not so environmentally friendly after all. Here​’s five ​that we’ve found.   [Read more…]

What’s at Stake With Propositions B and C?

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“Everyone who wants to preserve community control over the planning process should be afraid because your community will be next!” –Georgette Gomez, Associate Director of the Environmental Health Coalition

By Jim Miller

As we head toward the June 3rd election, the same corporate interests who spent big money to fund a petition drive based on lies  to force a vote on the Barrio Logan Community Plan are now funding an equally dishonest campaign to defeat it.

The only thing that will stop a great injustice from happening in the case of the Barrio Logan Community Plan is if San Diegans stand up against this threat to their local democracy and vote yes on B and C. For that to happen, San Diegans need to be educated. The central organization doing this work in the service of the Yes on B and C Campaign is the Environmental Health Coalition (EHC).

This week, I interview Georgette Gomez, the Associate Director of the EHC to learn a little more about who the folks are who are fighting this good fight and what is at stake in this election.   [Read more…]

The CIA Aided Polio’s Comeback–but Media Have Forgotten the Story

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By  / Fairness & Accuracy in Reporting 

Polio had been battled to near-extinction after decades of effort, but this year the WHO confirmed 68 new cases and declared it an international public health emergency. Nearly 80 percent of those cases are in Pakistan.

Why is this? According to the New York Times‘ Donald McNeil Jr. (5/6/14), “Polio has never been eliminated there, Taliban factions have forbidden vaccinations in North Waziristan for years, and those elsewhere have murdered vaccine teams.” McNeil also quotes a WHO spokesperson towards the top of the piece: “So we’re saying to the Pakistanis, the Syrians and the Cameroonians, ‘You’ve really got to get your acts together.”‘

The Times underlined the emergency today in an editorial, explaining that Pakistan has such high numbers “largely because Taliban factions have forbidden vaccinations in conservative tribal areas and attacked healthcare workers elsewhere.”

  [Read more…]

Marijuana May Heal Health Problems That Come With Old Age: How Can People Living in Senior Homes Get It?

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From pain and trouble sleeping to cancer and dementia, pot can be a godsend for seniors.

By April M. Short / AlterNet 

Sue Taylor, a retired Catholic school principal and grandmother from Oakland, California, was living in Atlanta, Georgia writing a parenting handbook when she got a phone call from her son that would disrupt her life.

“He told me, ‘Mom, I know how you can open up your metaphysical holistic center,’ which had been my goal,” Taylor said. Taylor had earned a degree in divinity in Atlanta and is now a metaphysical minister. “He said, ‘It will be supported by a cannabis dispensary.’”

“Cannabis dispensary?” Taylor asked him. “You talkin’ about that marijuana stuff?”

Yes, he was.   [Read more…]

Ride through National Bike Month with These Local Events

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The SDFP is switching gears from National Poetry Month to National Bike Month. There are several events throughout the month of May for avid and amateur cyclists alike. If you know of an event not listed below, please add it in the comment section.   [Read more…]

National Abortion Rate Sees Huge Drop As More Women Are Using Birth Control

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By Tara Culp-Ressler / ThinkProgress

Between 2008 and 2011, the national abortion rate declined by 13 percent, according to a new report from the Guttmacher Institute that will be published in a forthcoming issue of thePerspectives on Sexual and Reproductive Health journal. That puts 2011′s abortion rate at 16.9 abortions per every 1,000 women of reproductive age, the lowest rate recorded since Roe v. Wade legalized the procedure in 1973.

The anti-choice community celebrated the news, claiming that an increasing number of women are choosing to carry their pregnancies to term. “This is a post-sonogram generation,” Charmaine Yoest, the president of the conservative Americans United for Lifegroup that helps push state-level abortion restrictions, told the Washington Post. “There is increased awareness throughout our culture of the moral weight of the unborn baby. And that’s a good thing.”

“It shows that women are rejecting the idea of abortion as the answer to an unexpected pregnancy,” Carol Tobias, the president of the National Right to Life Committee, agreed.

In fact, that perspective doesn’t actually align with the research in this area.   [Read more…]

May is National Bike Month

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By Staff

SDFP editors, contributors and readers include a sizable group that is passionate about bike riding and bikes. Some of our most popular posts have been on this topic. Here in San Diego we have Bike San Diego and the San Diego County Bicycle Coalition. Check out the Bike Fiesta planned for May 10.

This interest means that there are stories to share about where you bike and why you bike.   [Read more…]

The Best Bicycle Ride Around Mission Bay

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By Frank Gormlie / OB Rag

The tour I now present around Mission Bay is a great one and it is a ride that has been honed by me and a few riding friends over the last three decades – since the early Eighties.

It is a ride along a route that has a minimum of traffic and street exposure, and it is a route that is practically 13 miles round trip from the Ocean Beach Skateboard Park in Robb Field.   [Read more…]

For the Mid-City Community: Three Decades of Broken Promises

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By Sam Ollinger  / bikesd.org

In late 1972, the California Department of Transportation (Caltrans) released a report detailing the impact that would result after the construction of I-15 (from I-805 to I-8, approximately 3 miles) through the heart of Mid-City, specifically the neighborhood of City Heights:

The project is in an urban area. Potential impacts are mainly on people, air quality and noise. Another issue is the use of land from the area known as Park de la Cruz.

The selected freeway design will displace about 650 apartment units or homes [Ed. note: displacing 2,000 people plus about 63 commercial units affecting 110 jobs and $1.5 million in annual taxable retail]. The impact of displacement is borne by the people in the path of the freeway. For some, moving will mean a disruption of life patterns. Others would have been moving away. For many, the Federal Uniform Relocation Assistance and Real Property Acquisition Policies Act of 1970 will bring economic benefits as high as $15,000 for moving costs, replacement housing payments and interest differential payments.

  [Read more…]

Last Call for the GOP Obamacare Apocalypse

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By Doug Porter

It’s no secret the national Republican campaign strategy for 2014 revolves around the demonization of Obamacare. Given the party’s inherent structural advantage (gerrymandering + off year turnouts) in the upcoming midterm elections, problems with the healthcare insurance program could be spun as mandate for repeal.

Now, facing growing public acceptance and a run of good reviews, the GOP is getting desperate. The House Energy and Commerce Committee released a report yesterday asserting only 67% of HealthCare.gov enrollees had paid their first premium. Reuters news is reporting today about  Republican plans to use Senate confirmation hearings for Sylvia Burwell, Obama’s pick to replace Kathleen Sebelius, to “re-energize their election-year attacks on his signature healthcare initiative.”     [Read more…]

Psychedelic Mushrooms Could Cure Anxiety for Cancer Patients

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A New York University study is using psilocybin to help patients overcome the fear of death.

By April M. Short / AlterNet

When O.M. was 21 he was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s lymphoma. He was a pre-med student at the time. His first reaction was denial, followed by an overwhelming and lasting anxiety, as described in an April 22 Atlantic article by Roc Morin. Even after six rounds of chemotherapy helped O.M. kick the cancer, he was plagued with a devastating fear that the disease might return. He checked his lymph nodes so often to see if they’d grown that he developed callouses on his neck.

He experienced this debilitating end-of-life anxiety from the moment he was diagnosed until the day he ingested psilocybin, extracted from hallucinogenic mushrooms while laying on a psychiatrist’s couch during a New York University study. O.M. is one of 35 study participants, all of whom suffered from severe anxiety due to cancer.

The double-blind, placebo-controlled pilot study, which is still ongoing, looks at the potentials for psilocybin to treat anxiety and other psychological distress stemming from  advanced cancer. The second half of the study will look at the effect of psilocybin on “pain perception, depression, existential/psychospiritual distress, attitudes toward disease progression, quality of life, and spiritual/mystical states of consciousness.”

O.M. told the Atlantic that when he ate the mushrooms, it was “like a switch went on.”   [Read more…]

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