By Kit-Bacon Gressitt
The National Organization for Marriage (NOM) emailed a link to its two new campaign advertisements this week. The ads support Minnesota’s Amendment 1, which would amend the constitution to restrict marriage to “only a union of one man and one woman.” What the ballot measure fails to note, but NOM makes evident in the first of its new ads, is that the woman had better be fertile, because, “Marriage is more a commitment between two loving people. It was made by God for the creation and care of the next generation.” [Read more…]
Romney Comes Across as the Victor in Round 1
Republican challenger reshapes his image in first presidential debate, but got away with some whoppers in the process.
Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney had a very good night last night in the presidential election’s first head-to-head debate. He was forceful, he was in command, he got all of his points across, and he presented an image of himself as a man of the people.
He also lied through his teeth. Repeatedly. And got away with it unchallenged. [Read more…]
The Starting Line – DeMaio’s Second Calendar Revealed; Private Meetings with Developers Don’t Count
For several weeks now mayoral candidate Carl DeMaio has been at the center of a controversy regarding his relationship with media mogul and developer Doug Manchester in connection with plans for a proposed football stadium at the site of the Tenth Avenue Port Terminal. A news account last week quoted Manchester’s CEO John Lynch bragging in an email about having a mayoral candidate in tow who was favorable towards their plans.
Now it’s come out via a report by KPBS/I-Newsource Investigations Desk that meetings beyond those previously disclosed were held between the developer and the candidate.
This story tool another twist yesterday when Voice of San Diego’s Scott Lewis revealed that UT-San Diego CEO Lynch was now on record as admitting that he’d threatened via email to use the newspaper’s clout to lead a campaign to disband the San Diego Port Authority. The warning was made in the context of an email exchange between Lynch and Port Commissioner Scott Peters regarding a potential lease (since ratified) with the Dole Fruit Company on part of the embarcadero that was included in the UT-San Diego’s proposal for a football stadium. [Read more…]
Proposition 31: Reform the Rube Goldberg Way
Should We Support This Manifestation of Stalinist Treason?
It’s a good thing the weather’s so damn nice in much of California, because if you had to spend anytime actually experiencing what passes for governance up in Sacramento, North Dakota or even Somalia might start looking mighty good. Let’s face it folks, things are mighty screwed up. And we all know it’s somebody else’s fault, right?
So when anybody talks “reform” these days, it strikes a chord with voters. I hear there are politicians in Los Angles (boo, hiss) that can take their dog for a walk, call it animal digestive reform and even raise funds off it.
Proposition 31 is the handiwork of a ‘long view’ reform group calling itself California Forward. It’s a package of measures, many of which sound perfectly reasonable. It is, so its supporters say, intended to bring more transparency to the budgeting process while giving Californians value for their tax dollars. Sounds okay, huh? Except that it isn’t. Step inside while I give you a tour of this mirage that calls itself a reform. [Read more…]
Brian Bilbray and Carl DeMaio: San Diego’s Republican Shapeshifters
By Lucas O’Connor / Special to the San Diego Free Press
If there’s one thing that’s been particularly consistent to campaigns of the far right in San Diego this fall, it’s the unusually desperate attempts to hide the real agenda from voters. It’s one that should be cause for optimism as long as voters pay attention, and betrays an almost impressive self-awareness from the top of the GOP that the party’s agenda has drifted well outside the mainstream.
From the special exemptions of Prop 32 to Brian Bilbray’s teetering re-election bid to Carl DeMaio’s bizarre mayoral campaign, extreme conservatives are doing everything they can to hide their record and who they are.
For the backers of Proposition 32, the deception was part of the design from the very beginning. They surveyed the political landscape and found that, unsurprisingly, nobody wants millionaires and corporations to be able to buy off our political process. Rather than abandon a wildly unpopular idea, they came up with a different plan: fake it. [Read more…]
The Starting Line – ‘Pray the Gay Away’ Seeks to Live Another Day
The ultra conservative Pacific Legal Institute has joined forces with an ordained minister/counselor of Rancho San Diego’s Skyline Church in filing a lawsuit seeking to overturn a newly signed California law that bars licensed mental health professionals from utilizing “reparative therapies”, on teenagers. Also known as conversion therapy, reparative therapies claim to change sexual orientation, and, although they have been widely condemned by medical authorities, are popular with fundamentalist Christian groups and other right-wing religious organizations.
The suit, filed on behalf of Dr. Donald Welch, who is also affiliated with a chain of Christian Counseling Centers throughout the San Diego region, who claims the law, which is scheduled to take effect Jan. 1, violates First Amendment and equal protection rights. A Culver City man who claims to have benefited from the therapies is named as the official plaintiff.
Much of the core of so-called “pray the gay away” therapies is based on scientific work done by Robert Spitzer, who has recanted his conclusions and apologized to the gay community for making unproven claims of the efficacy of reparative therapy. California will become the first to outlaw the practice for people under the age of 18 in America. [Read more…]
Prop 37: 8 Reasons for Voting Yes for Labeling GMO Foods
The French prime minister announced on September 15, 2012 that France would maintain a ban on Monsanto’s MON810 maize, the only genetically modified organisim (GMO) currently allowed in Europe. Thanks to activism by French citizens and serious political outcry, Monsanto is now effectively blocked from Europe’s gigantic marketplace. This is even more true when you consider that France is the largest agricultural producer in Europe.
But that’s not all. Following the ground-breaking French study that graphically linked the lifetime consumption of Monsanto’s GMO corn in rats to massive tumors and direct organ failure, Russia’s premiere consumers rights organization has suspended both the importation and use of Monsanto’s GMO corn within the nation’s borders.
[Read more…]
Eyewitness Account: Man Dies After Fatal Stabbing in Sherman Heights
by Remigia (Remy) Bermúdez
According to witnesses, passers-by and police officers, at approximately 5:30pm on Monday (October 1st) an altercation that started in Logan Heights at 22nd Street and the southern side of Imperial Avenue resulted on a man stumbling down at the corner of 22nd and L Streets in Sherman Heights bleeding from repeated stab wounds. According to a SDPD press release, sent to this San Diego Free Press’s (SDFP) contributing writer, the man died en route to the hospital. Homicide detective Lt. Duran added, “The deceased victim has been identified, but his name will be withheld until his family can be notified.”
It was like a scene from a movie, as the SDPD corded off the area with yellow plastic tape, topping fences of surrounding properties in the eastern and western sides was 22nd Street from L Street heading southerly through what appeared to be Commercial Avenue. The area remained cordoned off from around 6pm Monday evening through Tuesday’s morning hours of October 2nd to protect evidence from being disturbed, according to SDPD officers.
The first media on the scene was the San Diego Free Press, as this contributing writer lives nearby. [Read more…]
Stadium at San Diego’s 10th Ave Marine Terminal Site Potentially a VERY Bad Idea
UT San Diego CEO threatens port commissioner in effort to intimidate local officials into supporting development plan.
San Diego has a stadium problem. I know. You’re shocked—SHOCKED!—to hear this. I mean, after all, it’s been the best kept secret in San Diego this side of peanut butter. We’ve only been talking about a new football stadium to replace the aging and crumbling city owned Jack Murphy/Qualcomm Stadium for the Chargers (and Aztecs) for over a decade now. And yes, it has been that long. It may only seem like yesterday.
The Chargers have long contended that in order to remain financially competitive in the NFL they would need a new football only stadium with all the bells and whistles of the rest of the modern facilities that have cropped up throughout the league. And there have been a LOT of them. Of the 32 NFL teams, almost all of them are playing in new or completely refurbished stadiums. [Read more…]
The Starting Line – Want to Make San Diego More Bike Friendly? Lose the Helmets!
There’s been a lot of discussion in San Diego lately about making the city more bike friendly. Mayor Sanders held a media event not long ago touting a public “bike sharing’ program, a low cost rental system that could encompass downtown, the beach areas and midtown by next spring. Three bike ‘corrals” that allow riders to safely park their bicycle in crowded urban neighborhoods have been opened recently. And it would appear that the people in charge of the area’s roads are starting to take a more serious look at making the streets more user friendly to riders.
From the venerable New York Times Sunday Review comes an article suggesting that, if we truly want to succeed in making the San Diego area more bike-centric, we should look at what many will consider a heretical idea: lose the helmets. [Read more…]
The Starting Line –GOP Voter Registration Fraud Program Continues to Unfold; Is There a San Diego Connection?
Does anybody remember the Fox News generated story about voter fraud allegedly perpetrated by ACORN during the 2008 election cycle? The sum total of their evidence was that individuals were attempting to scam the voter registration system by turning in falsified forms. No monies from the Democratic Party were ever tied to ACORN, nor was there proof that any of the fake voters actually attempted to vote.
It should be noted that actual voter fraud (where somebody casts an illegal vote), despite regular histrionics by right wing zealots, is exceedingly rare.
Now there is a nation-wide voter registration scandal unfolding involving companies directly funded by both State and National Republican Party groups, and over at Fox News there’s not a peep to be heard. [Read more…]
The Obsession of Right-Wing Media With an Imaginary Woman’s Success Story
Alternet / By Joshua Holland (Originally published Sept. 21, 2012)
Conservatives talk a lot about “dependency,” but it’s not clear that they know what the word means. Consider, for example, the right’s bizarre reaction to a rather benign online campaign the White House pushed briefly earlier this year called “The Life of Julia,” a slide-show featuring a fictional Everywoman that was meant to highlight how Obama’s policies might improve the lives of average Americans.
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