San Diego Free Press

Grassroots News & Progressive Views

You are here: Home / Archives for Media

Excerpt From Sunshine Noir II: My Days at the Door

by

Editor’s Note: We’ll be publishing excerpts from Sunshine/Noir II: Writing from San Diego and Tijuana, an anthology of local writing about San Diego over the coming weeks, starting with the chapters written by SD Free Press writers. As City Works Press co-editor Jim Miller says in his introduction: “…San Diego is still a city in need of a literary voice, a cultural identity that goes beyond the Zoo, Sea World, Legoland, and the beach.  With Sunshine/Noir II we persist in our romantic, perhaps Sisyphean, effort to address this need and expose the true face of “the other San Diego.”  To buy a copy of Sunshine/Noir II or any other San Diego City Works Press book go here.

By Doug Porter

The San Diego Door and its antecedents were a big part of the alternative media scene in America’s Finest City over a eight year period starting in October,1966 when the Good Morning, Teaspoon published its first edition.

By December, 1971, when I first climbed up the steps of the paper’s Victorian stick mansion at 2445 Albatross Street just north of downtown, the paper had gone through ‘free love’, hippie druggie and counterculture phases and a half-dozen names. It had evolved to become a publication with anti-establishment news and alt-culture reviews, featuring powerful graphics and color.   [Read more…]

Hey, Here’s An Idea! Let’s Sexualize A God-Awful Disease That Kills and Maims Thousands of Women!

by

By Abby Zimet / Common Dreams

Today we mark the low point of the breast cancer industrial complex’s already sketchy Pinktober – the month wherein insatiable capitalism touts spending money on all things pink “for the cure” – with National No Bra Day, the semi-pornographic, useless, entirely counter-intuitive “holiday” that calls for women to let their (blessedly healthy) breasts flow free in the name of ill women who are “scarred, radiated, burned, nauseated, and fighting for their lives.” No Bra Day, notes one observer, is “the latest way to do nothing about breast cancer.”   [Read more…]

Here’s Sanders in Your Eyes

by

By Bob Dorn

Time for another look at politics 2015.

No, no, no, don’t go back to Ultimate Fighting, or The Kardashians, or wondering whatever became of Justin Bieber, Justin Timberlake or that kid on Via Amnesia named Justin whose pants keep falling below his crack.

Forget the distractions for a moment and try to focus on wtf is going on.

Let’s look at the S-words, and the J-word.

One S-word is Sanders, short for Bernie Sanders. Another S-word is Socialist, that’s the elephant in the room.   [Read more…]

The Democratic Presidential Debate’s Big Winner Was…

by

By Doug Porter

The consensus view as expressed in the mainstream media I read this morning was Hillary Clinton as “winner” of the October 13th Democratic Presidential debate, hosted by CNN.  Not so fast… There’s more to this story…

Polling, social media, and focus groups told a different story, hailing the performance of  Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders. We’ll take a look at some of the commentary on the events of the evening. I’m happy to report the debate was informative and not boring at all.

The contrast with earlier Republican contests was the most obvious takeaway. The Democratic candidates stuck to issues, passing up opportunities to create personal controversies. The wonkiness of the proceedings made the GOP’s debates look like episodes of the Jerry Springer show.   [Read more…]

Debate #1 for Democratic Presidential Candidates: Please Be Boring

by

By Doug Porter

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know.  I’m supposed to breathlessly predict something sensational will happen in tonight’s Democratic Debate. Maybe Bernie Sanders will rip off his mask, revealing that he’s actually Karl Marx reincarnated. Maybe Hillary Clinton will let it slip that her private email account was all about keeping her orders from the Illuminati hidden.

I, for one, hope none of that happens. The best possible contrast with the Republicans would be for an actual discussion of actual programs based on this crazy little thing called reality.

I think a successful debate tonight will be, as The Donald has already warned us, boring. Instead of hearing about Mexican rapists, maybe we can hear point and counterpoint on how much (not if) the minimum wage should be increased. Or something about how NOT bombing brown people somewhere might be a good idea.   [Read more…]

California Rises Above the Republican Madness

by

By Doug Porter

We are six years into the Obama administration. The dire predictions made for the United States of America by the prophets of the right have failed to occur. If this were baseball instead of politics, their batting average is so low they wouldn’t even qualify for the minor leagues. This is the kind of madness passing for normal in the GOP.

Yet somehow these very same voices continue to be treated as credible. A leading candidate for the highest office in the country says–with a straight face–that German Jews could have stopped the holocaust if they had a few real men with guns. Fox News finds some clown who agrees. And now we have a “debate”, based on a fantastical assumption.

Messages of fear continue to contaminate the political process, thanks to a press dependent on access and an ever-growing pile of Dark Money. According to an article in the New York Times, a mere 158 American households coughed up nearly half of all the money donated to 2016 presidential campaigns thus far. That’s more money–including inflation–than was spent on the entire 2000 presidential campaign.   [Read more…]

California Here We Go: $15 Minimum Wage Headed for Statewide Ballot

by

By Doug Porter

California advocates for a statewide $15 per hour minimum wage are marshaling their forces in support of a November 2016 initiative. The mayors of San Francisco and Oakland, cities which have already passed increases, appeared at a press conference on Tuesday to announce they will be leading the effort. The measure was submitted to the state by the Service Employees International Union-United Healthcare Workers West.

The Fair Wage Act of 2016 will raise the minimum wage for all California workers by $1 annually, effective January 2017. Once the minimum wage reaches $15, it will automatically go up each year to match the cost of living. The state’s minimum wage is currently $9 an hour and is set to rise to $10 on Jan. 1, 2016. Cities will continue to have the option of setting higher local minimum wages.

San Diego events related to the Fight for $15 movement are already planned as part of the build-up to next year’s election. A regional wage hearing set for October 17th will hear testimony from workers, economists, academics, students, and labor leaders as a prelude to garnering commitments from local political leaders. A Day of Action in November will see protests on college campuses, at fast food restaurants, and in downtown San Diego.   [Read more…]

Ta-Nehisi Coates, ‘Unflinching’ Voice on Racism, Declared MacArthur Genius

by

‘Writing without shallow polemic and in a measured style, Coates addresses complex and challenging issues such as racial identity, systemic racial bias, and urban policing,’ declared the MacArthur Foundation.

By Sarah Lazare / Common Dreams

Journalist, author, and leading voice on anti-black racism in America, Ta-Nehisi Coates, was revealed Tuesday to be one of 24 recipients of the 2015 MacArthur Genius awards.

“Writing without shallow polemic and in a measured style, Coates addresses complex and challenging issues such as racial identity, systemic racial bias, and urban policing,” declared the foundation. “He subtly embeds the present—in the form of anecdotes about himself or others—into historical analysis in order to illustrate how the implications of the past are still experienced by people today.”   [Read more…]

Nuclear Shutdown News for September 2015 – the Costs of San Onofre

by

Disaster Capitalism and the Shutdown of the San Onofre Nuclear Plant

By Michael Steinberg /Black Rain Press

This story starts with a clandestine dinner in Warsaw, Poland. Present are Michael Peevey, president of the California Public Utility Commission, and Stephen Pickett, a high ranking official with Southern California Edison, a major electrical utility.

It is March 2013, the same month SCE announced the unexpected permanent shutdown of its San Onofre Nuclear Power Station.

No nukers were elated. But their joy later turns to disappointment and then outrage when the CPUC subsequently hands down a decision that leaves us on the hook for billions of dollars in costs supposedly related to the shutdown of San Onofre.

How did this happen, and so relatively quickly?   [Read more…]

Congressional Values: “Zippidy do-da, zippidy day.”

by

By Doug Porter

Speaker of the House John Boehner was singing the classic Disney ditty as he walked in for a Friday morning press conference where he shocked just about everybody by announcing his resignation.

While Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) is considered a probable successor to Boehner as Speaker, it’s worthwhile to look at the recently concluded 10th annual Value Voters Summit for some context about the changes taking place.

It was, after all, the crowd at the political conference for American social conservative activists that gave a standing ovation after hearing news of the Ohio congressman’s resignation.   [Read more…]

How Our Stadium Saved Hilton’s Ego & Other Chuckles To Cry Over

by

As published by the original San Diego Free Press (circa 1968), we reprint the rundown on the Stadium in Mission Valley. Outside of the names and a few little details, you’ll be surprised how little has changed. Part Two & Three of Two…
Transcribed by John Lawrence / Original byline “Jim Knastick”

Hi sports fans. Big Jim, again.

Well, fans, last issue – – when we looked into that great muskmelon in Mission Valley – – we found a bill for $52 million addressed for the little taxpayer in San Diego and nothing but profits for local sports czars (your druggist knows them as merchants, financiers and industrialists).

Current vignette, fans: Taking Care of Barron.
  [Read more…]

Jade Helm 15 Ends and #IStandWithAhmed Begins, Deep in the Heart of Texas

by

By Doug Porter

Today, two examples from the Lone Star State strike me as indicative of a sort of mass paranoia that has become all too commonplace. I’m mindful of these stories in thinking about the CNN Republican Presidential debate, with unhinged ideas likely to be touted as reality.

Example #1 is a revisiting of an older baloney sandwich. The Jade Helm 15 training exercise, alleged to be cover for a military takeover has ended. This delusion was used for political gain by three of the Republican candidates for president and a plethora of right-wing acolytes. Nothing happened.

Example #2 is a heartbreaking story about a 14 year kid in Irving, Texas who wanted to show off his science skills. He ended up being arrested, fingerprinted, and held incommunicado after he brought a home made clock to school. Oh, and he has brown skin. And his name is Ahmed Mohamed.   [Read more…]

©2010-2017 SanDiegoFreePress.org

Code is Poetry