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Missouri Students Stand Against Racism, Sexism and Homophobia

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One week ago University of Missouri graduate student Jonathan Butler began a hunger strike as a protest against “a slew of racist, sexist, homophobic, etc., incidents that have dynamically disrupted the learning experience.” His decision to undertake this hunger strike followed months of futile attempts by different groups to get the school to pay attention to what was going on their midst.

This non-violent challenge to the status quo garnered nationwide attention. This morning University President Timothy Wolf announced his resignation as protests on the campus continued to build.

The media caught on to the story when MU football team has announced it would no longer practice or compete. Faculty members called for a walk out, and the student Missouri Student Association executive board joined in Butler’s call for the removal of school president Tim Wolfe, saying he has “enabled a culture of racism and has disrespected and ignored the concerns of students.   [Read more…]

Excerpt From Sunshine/Noir II: A Revolution In Urban Planning, Part I

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The Story of How a Small Working-Class Coastal Community Within San Diego Spoiled the Establishment’s Plans and in the Process Created a Revolution in Urban Planning.

By Frank Gormlie

It was early afternoon on a hot July day in 2014 when then San Diego City Council President Todd Gloria gaveled the Council meeting to order. First on the agenda was a vote on the newly updated community plan of Ocean Beach, a small coastal neighborhood of the city—called simply “OB.” The Council’s action that day should have been a routine procedure, approving the product of a process initiated by the city’s own planning department, ostensibly a process integrating the community plan of Ocean Beach into the larger General Plan of the City of San Diego.

Yet what was going on that day was anything but routine or ordinary.   [Read more…]

The End of the Keystone XL Pipeline (We Hope)

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A major defeat for proponents of dirty energy is in the works, as news reports indicate the Obama administration is set to block the permits needed for the Keystone XL pipeline. Construction of the project has been a political hot potato, with supporters using big-money lobbying and opponents focused on a grass-roots activist campaign.

In 2008 the Canadian company TransCanada applied for approval of a transnational pipeline designed to carry 830,000 barrels of petroleum per day from the tar sands of Alberta province to oil refineries and ports on the Gulf Coast.

Proponents point to estimates of a $3.4 billion dollar contribution to the economy and say it will create jobs. Environmental groups have opposed the project because it would provide a conduit for marketing petroleum extracted from tar sands using methods requiring far more energy and water than conventional drilling.   [Read more…]

Republican Debators Not Demanding Removal of Brown M&Ms

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The latest act taking the center ring in the Republican presidential campaign circus involves a candidate revolt against debate formats, followed by a revolt against the revolt. You could say these are the most revolting developments yet in the revolt against the incumbency of the Black Guy in the White House.

Following a failed attempt by CNBC to spice up a debate format burdened by the reality of a dozen large egos competing for prominence, Republican candidates responded by agreeing to cut their own party out of the negotiating loop.

The campaigns held a summit over the weekend at the Hilton Alexandria Old Town to formulate demands for future debate ground rules, starting off by exempting the Fox Business debate scheduled for November 10th.   [Read more…]

How TV Weather Reporters are Aiding and Abetting Climate Change Eco-collapse

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By Bill Adams /SanDiegoUrbdezine.com

On June 2, 2015, San Diego’s independent TV station KUSI set aside a segment of their weather report to editorialize about climate change.  The message: climate change is minimal and natural – not man made.  The message was delivered by Mark Mathis, KUSI’s weather reporter who has an A.S. degree in meteorology.  Mr. Mathis based his argument primarily on the two following assumptions:

1) That climate change science relies largely on recent weather events and that these events have historical precedent.

2) That there has been no climate change since 1998.

A quick fact-check rebuts Mathis’s claim regarding climate stasis since 1998, as discussed in Forbes, hardly a left-biased media outlet.  And of course, while recent weather events are consistent with climate change predictions, they do not form the basis for those predictions.  (See also Bill Moyer’s excellent Eight Pseudoscientific Climate Claims Debunked by Real Scientists.)   [Read more…]

Propagating the Nameservers, or What’s the Forwarding Address?

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When moving to a new webhost it can take a little time to propagate the nameservers. Basically, our forwarding address needs to spread through the interwebs so people can find us.

Because web browsers using caching to speed things up you may see a representation of a slightly older version of the site and not know it.

This post is to let you (and us) know that this page is being served from the new host.

Please comment to let us know you are here.   [Read more…]

Not-So-Presidential Politics and Football Fantasies Ruled the Night

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By Doug Porter

What a night.

Presidential candidate Ted Cruz was busy calling out Democrats as Bolsheviks and Mensheviks during the Republican debate, which was about as out of control as any debate, ever.

Chargers fans called out NFL executives on a listening tour of cities threatened with franchise relocation. Attorney Mark Fabiani, representing the team’s owners was roundly booed, hissed and even warned about walking around unaccompanied.

It was a two-fer evening of bullshit, featuring occasional factual-sounding words laced with hyperbole and ignorance. Metaphors counted. Reality didn’t. Let’s wander together through today’s punditry for selected insights on what transpired…   [Read more…]

Marijuana, Tax Measures Vying for California 2016 Ballot

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By Doug Porter

As we come down the stretch into the final year before the 2016 general election, there are competing interests backing ballot measures seeking to legalize recreational marijuana use and increase taxes on upper-income earners in California.

The downside in this situation is the possibility of enough confused voters rejecting the choices on the ballot on both issues. And you can bank on opponents of legalization and tax increases will do their best to sow doubt and confusion.

Divisions in the pro-pot camp led to the defeat of Proposition 19 in 2010, despite not having a competing measure on the ballot and polling showing voters favoring legalized marijuana.  Advocates for tax increases in 2012 were divided between competing propositions, but a unified effort on the part of organized labor gave Proposition 30 the votes needed to win.   [Read more…]

Many Faces of Modern Day Racism in the USA

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By Doug Porter

For too long, too many white Americans have viewed racism through the lens of the South. Once again, current events are proving once again this particular brand of fear and hatred runs much deeper in the national psyche than Jim Crow laws.

Two recent media reports about immigration–always a lightning rod for fear of the ‘other’– illustrate the point here. Then there’s the festering sore of state-sanctioned violence directed at people of color and now the push-back about how somehow making videos of people being brutalized is causing crime.

Congressman Paul Ryan is about to take over as Speaker of the House of Representatives. There’s been deal making galore going on as Rep. John Boehner heads out the door. A long-term budget agreement has emerged, something inconceivable just a few weeks ago. Suddenly, a large number of deficit hawks are willing to vote for a  $120+ increase in federal spending.

But there was one particular promise the incoming speaker made to the Republican rebels of the right. It involved a promise to not even consider immigration reform…as long as that Black Guy is in the White House.   [Read more…]

Gretchen Newsom is Running for Mayor. It Ain’t Gonna Be Easy.

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By Doug Porter

Gretchen Newsom announced her intention to run for Mayor of San Diego during the Sixth Biennial County Democratic Convention on Saturday, October 24th. She’s got a tough road in front of her.

Incumbent Kevin Faulconer is a public relations machine. He gets out of bed in the morning, and a press release crediting him with saving the world overnight (hey, the sun rose!) gets emailed. He’s got no major scandals swirling around him, is considered to be a rising star in the GOP, and has a proven ability to sidestep controversy.

Challenger Gretchen Newsom is not well known outside activist circles. She was among those considered as the interim replacement for Faulconer’s city council seat, is President of the Ocean Beach town Council, and works for the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers.  Today I’ll take a look at what else there is to know about the candidate, her values and the implications of her candidacy.   [Read more…]

Guns, Angry People and Mass Murders: The Cycle Continues Until We Stop It

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By John Lawrence

We live in a sick society where little kids play violent video games, you can’t flip through the channels on a TV without seeing drawn handguns, and hunters use automatic weapons to kill innocent animals. It’s a culture of violence in movies and TV, a culture of violence in video games and a culture of violence in terms of unending wars and people blown to smithereens every night on the nightly news.

It was disheartening to me to see a few days after the horrific mass murder at Umpqua Community College, pro gun demonstrators protesting the American President as he landed there to give comfort to the families who had lost loved ones. Where were the anti gun protesters? Where were the ones who protested the taking of innocent lives by sick minds who are bolstered every day of their lives by a sick culture, a culture which glorifies and celebrates gun violence. It’s ubiquitous. It’s celebrated and it’s done in order to make money from “entertainment.”

That’s right. We’re entertained by people killing each other with guns. Is there an action movie in which there are no guns? I don’t think so. How many video games don’t involve the player or shooter not pulling a trigger. We train them up young with hand/eye coordination. Then we send them to schools in which there is no recess so that their energy and anger builds to the point that they feel justified in blowing people away for no justifiable reason.   [Read more…]

Bad News Not Reported: The Drift Toward Global Plutocracy Continues Unabated

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By Jim Miller

Recently Thomas B. Edsall penned an interesting column in the New York Times asking “How Did the Democrats Become the Favorites of the Rich?” where he observed that while the gulf between the two parties is still very wide on many social issues, on economic issues, Democrats have “inched closer to the policy positions of conservatives, stepping back from championing the needs of working men and women, of the unemployed and of the so-called underclass.”

Consequently, Edsall notes that:

Democrats now depend as much on affluent voters as on low-income voters. Democrats represent a majority of the richest congressional districts, and the party’s elected officials are more responsive to the policy agenda of the well-to-do than to average voters. The party and its candidates have come to rely on the elite 0.01 percent of the voting age population for a quarter of their financial backing and on large donors for another quarter.   [Read more…]

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