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Representatives Peters, Davis Disappoint on Trade Bill

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By Doug Porter

On Friday the House of Representatives used a legislative maneuver to block President Obama’s path to fast track legislation on the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP).

One good thing about Friday’s vote is that we now know where Representatives Susan Davis and Scott Peters stand on the issue. Both voted to advance the measure despite weeks of intensive citizen/grassroots/labor lobbying for a no vote. Both did so knowing they’d face the wrath of the coalition opposed to TPP in future elections.

For Davis, this may not mean much; for Peters, the consequences look to be serious–a labor-backed search committee is already looking at alternative candidates to run in the June 2016 primary. The word is that there’s a million dollar war chest to be spent defeating him.   [Read more…]

How California Drivers Get Screwed at the Pump

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By Doug Porter

Corporate greed on the part of fossil fuel companies in the era of trickle down apparently knows no bounds. If you live in California you’ve undoubtedly heard the stories about why we pay more for gasoline at the pump than elsewhere: our eco-conscious gas blend, higher taxes, yada, yada.

Research from Consumer Watchdog shows just how much these claims are exaggerated. Californians are paying more for gasoline because we’re being gouged, plain and simple.

The group points to abnormally large profits in the first quarter of 2015, with Valero, one of the state’s largest refiners, reporting $82 million in West Coast profits, compared to a $25 million per quarter average.   [Read more…]

Showdown! Trans Pacific Partnership Fast Track Authority Vote Set for Friday

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Republican leaders in the House of Representatives have set a Friday deadline for a vote on a bill giving the President fast-track authority on commercial treaties currently being negotiated.

The legislation would allow the executive branch to submit trade agreements to Congress for an expedited, up-or-down vote without amendments was passed by the Senate last month. President Obama has said he wants to complete a 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership and send it for approval under that procedure.

House Speaker John Boehner and Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi have reportedly agreed to replace a plan, opposed by Democrats, that would have funded some trade programs with about $700 million in Medicare cuts.   [Read more…]

A Passionate Defense of Cory Briggs

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By Reverend Richard Lawrence / sandiegans4opengov

Editor Note: In recent months inewsource.org has published a series of controversial stories concerning activist attorney Cory Briggs, questioning his ethics and motives. Rev. Richard Lawrence penned this reaction for the San Diegans 4 Open Government blog.

I said in a deposition some time ago that I thought Cory Briggs was to the environmental justice movement in California what Dr. King was to the civil rights movement. Recent events cause me to think some more about that.   [Read more…]

After Hours Demolition Angers LGBTQ and Preservation Activists

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Shortly after 5pm on Friday one of San Diego’s two remaining historic Saltbox houses was bulldozed by contractors working for developer HG Fenton. Adjoining properties were left untouched. And what some consider the birthplace of the local LGBTQ movement became a pile of rubble.

Local LGBTQ activists and the Save Our Heritage Organization (SOHO) had hoped to work out a deal to save the property, either by incorporating architectural details into the finished development or by moving the house to another location.  A Friday morning conversation between representatives of the Lambda archives and the developer made no mention of the building’s impending destruction.

Activists weren’t concerned about demolition because they had an email from City of San Diego Development Services specifically stating that if a demolition permit is applied for the subject property would be reviewed for historical determination as a 5 year period had passed since the original permitting.   [Read more…]

Making Mountains Out of Molehills at KPBS/inewsource

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I have yet to be convinced that San Diego’s hoteliers and their doppelgangers in the management of America’s Finest Tourism Plantation have the best interests of the citizenry at heart.

For just about a year or so, the non-profit inewsource has been investigating San Diego attorney Cory Briggs. This week their latest report claims the organizations serving as plaintiffs in the environmental lawyer’s many lawsuits “flout state, federal laws.”

These inewsource stories are given much play at KPBS and follow a now predictable format: seeming contradictions, omissions and/or errors found in documents associated with Briggs are presented to various persons with impressive sounding titles and deemed to be something just short, maybe, of something illegal.   [Read more…]

The Perfect Primer on FIFA Corruption for the Non-sports Fan

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By Adam Johnson / Alternet

On Wednesday, the US Department of Justice, in concert with the US Internal Revenue Service, issued a blistering 47-count indictment against fourteen FIFA officials including nine high-ranking vice presidents. Charges included money laundering, fraud, and international racketeering that date back decades and, according to the DOJ, implicates dozens more.   [Read more…]

California Attorney General Locks Down Wiretap and Other Criminal Justice Data

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By Dave Maass / Electronic Frontier Foundation Deep Links Blog

The California Attorney General’s office is required every year to compile details on each state-level wiretap order filed by local prosecutors.

Mandated by the legislature as a transparency measure in the highly secret process of electronic surveillance, the annual California Electronic Interceptions Report is a wellspring of information for criminal justice research. But this year, the California Department of Justice (CADOJ) says that, from here on out, these reports—and potentially all of its criminal justice data—will only be issued as locked PDFs, significantly limiting the public’s ability to analyze the information in alternative formats.

California Attorney General Kamala Harris’ new policy is a slap in the face to transparency and is a step in the opposite direction of the nationwide trend to embrace open data.   [Read more…]

California is Finally Getting Serious about Police Reform

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By Chauncee Smith / ACLU of California Center for Advocacy & Policy

On a daily basis, Americans now see people of color unjustifiably killed by law enforcement. Particularly disheartening is that many of these homicides border on the edge of horrific.

Whether it be Maryland, South Carolina, New York, or our home state, these “lapses” of justice have become all too familiar. Indeed, it seems as if our system of public safety produces fixed results which dictate that black and brown males must die, regardless of what they do.   [Read more…]

The War on Love

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By Peter Montgomery / OtherWords 

A lot of conservative religious leaders say people of faith are being “silenced” or “persecuted” here in the United States.

They’ve sung that refrain for decades. It’s especially common in their losing battle against the growing public support for the legal equality of gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people.

As more Americans have seen their LGBT family, friends, and neighbors come out of the closet, the claim that gay people are out to destroy faith and freedom has lost its punch. So some anti-gay leaders are reaching for more extreme rhetoric.   [Read more…]

California’s Lopsided Proposed Computer Crime Task Force

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By Dave Maass / Electronic Frontier Foundation

Whenever lawmakers congregate to discuss computer crime, you can reliably predict that the debate will gravitate toward expanding police powers, leaving the realistic concerns of everyday Internet users by the wayside. After all, fearmongering around the film War Games helped fuel the passage of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, one of the most egregious laws the digital world has ever faced.

This legislative session, California lawmakers have proposed creating the California High Technology Crimes Task Force, which would be assigned to reevaluate the laws governing prosecution of identity theft, credit card fraud, and unspecificed “Internet crimes” that would presumably include copyright infringement. The body would issue recommendations for future legislation, as well as identify funding opportunities for law enforcement and victim assistance.

Reforming computer crime statutes isn’t necessarily a bad idea, as long as the group were to take a balanced approach. Unfortunately, the make-up of the proposed task force is anything but balanced.   [Read more…]

Gloria Works to Get the Bugs Out of San Diego’s Referendum Process

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As the San Diego City Council contemplates whether or not to put the future of the One Paseo development on the ballot, City Councilman Todd Gloria is seeking to reform the referendum petition process that brought them to this point.

The current dilemma over the mixed use development proposal in Carmel Valley represents the fifth time council actions have been blocked by referendum petition drives over the past eighteen months.

None of the changes proposed by Gloria at this time require affirmation by voters, but they do require councilmembers to take actions that will make the local political consultant types unhappy. First and foremost among that “low hanging fruit” would be a requirement that petitions include information about who’s paying for the effort.   [Read more…]

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