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Why the 2016 Race for City Attorney Matters

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There is no more important local electoral contest than the race for City Attorney. This relatively obscure office has been the part of government where dreams come to die, the priorities of the modern-day landed gentry are enforced, and the political will of the city’s business interests is turned into policy.

Incumbent City Attorney Jan Goldsmith, elected in 2008, deserves credit for molding his agency into a politically powerful entity. While his record is far from spotless, the more general thrust of developing a well-coordinated keeper of the flame for business interests has proven to be a valuable asset for the local moneyed classes.

Today we’ll take a sneak peak at the four candidates vying to replace Goldsmith, along with my general assessment of where they stand in relation to preserving the status quo.   [Read more…]

Uber Capitalist, Martin Shkreli, the Most Hated Man in America, Arrested

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The Poster Boy for Corporate Greed

Martin Shkreli, CEO of Turing Pharmaceuticals, who bought the drug, Daraprim and then raised the price from $13.50 to $750. a pill was arrested on December 17 by the FBI on fraud charges having nothing to do with his price gouging with Daraprim. Shkreli seemed to back off on his 5000% increase for a life-saving drug after he received a lot of negative publicity but later said that he wished that he had raised the price of the drug even more. A silent chorus went up all over America, “He’s getting what he so richly deserves!” It does seem like Karma, doesn’t it?

Earlier this month Shkreli talked about his second thoughts at a health care conference sponsored by Forbes. “I probably would have raised the price higher. That’s probably what I would have done. I think health care prices are inelastic. I could have raised the price higher and made more profits for my shareholders which is my primary duty. And again no one wants to say it, no one’s proud of it, but this is a capitalist society, capitalist system and capitalist rules and my investors expect me to maximize profits, not minimize them or go half or go 70% but to go to 100% of the profit curve …”

So the ultimate solution for this capitalist is maximizing value for his shareholders (and for himself, by the way) and if a few people who can’t afford this life-saving drug have to die along the way that’s just the cost of dong business, collateral damage, because what’s most important is profit maximization. The Ultimate Solution becomes synonymous with Hitler’s Final Solution.   [Read more…]

San Diego District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis Spins the News in Quest to Justify Police Shooting Death

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County District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis’ absolution of a San Diego Police officer in the shooting death of 42-year-old Fridoon Rawshan Nehad turns out to have been nothing more than poorly orchestrated spin.

Facing an impending court-ordered release of damning evidence, the DA released a made-for-the-media video and pleaded with the press to use her version of events.

A subsequent release of information by an attorney representing Nehad’s family casts strong doubt on that ‘version’ of the story.   [Read more…]

Barrera Out at Labor Council, SDPD Shooting Video Released, and Other News Ladled Out on Tuesday

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San Diego and Imperial Counties Labor Council Secretary-Treasurer Richard Barrera announced his resignation via a press release on Tuesday.

Barrera simultaneously announced he would be starting at the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) on February 1st as Executive Assistant and Secretary-Treasurer.

ALSO: Earlier today, San Diego County District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis released a private surveillance video capturing the police shooting claiming the life of Fridoon Rawshan Nehad.   [Read more…]

Monsanto Polluted San Diego with PCBs and GMOs

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PCBs Pervade San Diego Bay

A San Diego group of attorneys is suing Monsanto to get millions of dollars for remediation projects to clean up San Diego Bay. Polychlorinated Biphenyls (PCBs) have been linked to cancer, neurological damage, thyroid problems and reproductive complications.

Monsanto is all about the profits even when it has knowledge that what it’s selling is poison. Cases have been filed in Federal Court in San Jose, Oakland and Spokane in addition to San Diego. Dozens more cities across America may soon follow suit.

Municipalities have been forced to shell out millions to clean up rivers, creeks and bays. It has been established that fishing in such places and consuming those fish is dangerous to human health. PCBs have shown up in breast milk and sea lions among other places. They are ubiquitous in our environment.   [Read more…]

Progressive Activism in 2015: No Justice, No Peace for People of Color

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There were no elections in 2015. No candidates or ballot measures competed for our attention. No promises or threats interrupted our TV viewing pleasure.

A lack of voting opportunities allowed other forms of activism to come to the fore. Non-electoral efforts, like demonstrations, rallies, and petition campaigns are, to my way of thinking, critical components of our national discourse. As Howard Zinn and other historians have pointed out, our nation’s history is chock full of agitation and dissent as a precursor to many of the institutions central to our society.

I’ll be looking back at 2015 this week, reviewing many of the issues and causes important to progressives in San Diego and around the nation. Today it’s about fighting the most brutal forms of injustice.   [Read more…]

Central American Refugee Families Once Again Crossing the US-Mexico Border

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It’s only a matter of time until one of the nattering nativists at Fox News ‘discovers’ the latest wave of refugees from Central America showing up in ever-increasing numbers at our southern border.

The number of unaccompanied children crossing the US-Mexico border over the past two months has more than doubled over the same time period in 2014. Health and Human Services Secretary Burwell has notified congress that the Administration for Children and Families — the HHS agency responsible for caring for the migrant children — could face significant funding problems, even with budget numbers requested by President Barack Obama.

The US Border Patrol has already opened shelters in Texas and California. Figures for October and November indicate that 10,588 unaccompanied children along with 12,505 family members crossing together have been apprehended at the US-Mexico border.   [Read more…]

In San Diego and Elsewhere, Increasing Demands for Police Reform

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SDPD Union Contracts Under Scrutiny

Despite promises of increased transparency and action to prevent misconduct, the San Diego Police Department continues to draw criticism. Law enforcement agencies around the country are under increasing scrutiny, as reports about use of excessive force, sexual assault, and abuse of power surface. Today I’ll take a look at recent developments both locally and nationally.

Taking things one step further, activists associated with Black Lives Matter have broadened their Campaign Zero to include researching police union-negotiated labor agreements in many jurisdictions with the aim of flagging provisions delaying the interrogation of officers being investigated for use of force and used in erasing documentation of abuse.

San Diego is one of the cities under scrutiny.   [Read more…]

Dr. Cornel West Comes to San Diego

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By Jess Jollett / Reclaim the Community

On Friday night, the Southeast community of San Diego hosted nationally renowned public intellectual and activist, Dr. Cornel West.

Dr. West came to speak at Lincoln High School after learning of the gang injunction case brought against 33 young, black men using an untested penal code, P.C. 182.5. The case brought national attention to District Attorney’s use of this draconian and obscure code resulting from a proposition passed in 2000.

The event was sponsored by Reclaiming the Community, a coalition of individuals, community leaders, and organizations that embrace the historic, rich, and diverse culture of Southeast San Diego, and recognize its ability to become a leader in community participation.   [Read more…]

Black Lives Matter Makes Powerful Connection With Racist Drug War

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A National Town Hall recently took up the question of how Black Lives Matter fits in with drug reform.

By Phillip Smith / Alternet

The Black Lives Matter movement sprung out of the unjust killings of young black men (Trayvon Martin, Eric Garner, Michael Brown), either at the hands of self-styled vigilantes or police. But as the movement blossomed and matured, BLM began turning its attention to a broader critique of the institutional racism behind police violence against the black population.

While the war on drugs plays a central role in generating conflict between the black community and law enforcement, the critique of institutional racism in policing and the criminal justice system necessarily implicates the nation’s drug policies. The grim statistics of racially biased drug law enforcement are well-known: blacks make up about 13% of the population, but 30% of all drug arrests; blacks account for nearly 90% of all federal crack cocaine prosecutions; black federal crack offenders were sentenced to far more prison time that white powder cocaine offenders; blacks and other minorities are disproportionately targeted in traffic stop and stop-and-frisks despite being less likely than whites to be carrying drugs, and so on.
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Terrorism Bumps Climate Change Off the Front Page

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The United Nations climate conference in Paris has been pushed off the top of the news in the US cycle by stories relating to what now appears to have been an act of terrorism in San Bernadino. Various news agencies are reporting that suspect Tashfeen Malik pledged her allegiance to an Islamic State leader on Facebook.

The current consensus is that the couple were inspired by, rather than ordered to action by the terrorist group. The media narrative is befuddled, I think, because the possibility of a woman being the instigator of the act hadn’t been considered.

Despite the media’s propensity for hyperbole (the so-call flak jackets worn during the attack were actually vests with multiple pockets), enough detail has emerged to conclude the San Bernadino shooting was not a singular act. Most damning are the law enforcement sources quoted about hard drives and cell phones being destroyed in the days leading up to the attack.   [Read more…]

San Bernadino Shooting Kicks Off Holiday Gun Sales

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A man and his wife shot up a San Bernadino county employee holiday party yesterday, killing 14 people and wounding 21 more. Police caught up with them a few hours later driving a black SUV. A gunfight ensued. Both the shooters were killed. A police officer suffered a non-life-threatening injury. CNN is reporting this morning the perpetrators may have been ‘radicalized.’

Another day, another mass shooting, defined as four or more victims wounded or killed by gunfire. Earlier in the day, four people were shot in Georgia, one of whom died. In the past week, there have been six mass shootings. There have been twenty days so far in 2015 with four or more mass shootings. The U.S. has seen 355 mass shootings so far in 2015. Like I said, just another day.

Meanwhile, gun sales are going up, according to NBC News. There were more gun background checks on this year’s Black Friday than any other single day on record: 185,345, according to the FBI. That’s up five percent from Black Friday last year, when there were 175,754 background checks. If past shooting events are any indicator, December will be a very profitable month for the arms industry.   [Read more…]

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