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Landmark Lawsuit Against SANDAG Ends With a Victory for Clean Air

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The San Diego County Superior Court has formally ordered the San Diego Association of Governments to decertify its defective Environmental Impact Report (EIR) for 2011 the Regional Transportation Plan. SANDAG has also agreed to cover attorney’s fees in the amount of $1.7 million for the petitioners in this public interest case.

It has taken six long years to reach this point, with the lawsuit going to the California Supreme Court. The two precedent-setting court opinions arising from this case will guide SANDAG and other agencies in addressing greenhouse gas emissions, air pollution, and public health impacts of regional transportation planning.

“The end of this battle is just the beginning of a brighter future for all San Diego County residents,” said Jana Clark, Cleveland National Forest Foundation Board member. “With this case resolved, SANDAG must now do what it should have done in the first place: plan for a more sustainable future for our region so that we can avoid the worst effects of climate change.”   [Read more…]

Anti-Criminal Justice Reform Group Names San Diego’s Summer Stephan as DA of the Year

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San Diego’s interim District Attorney Summer Stephan has received an award from Crime Victims United as their Southern California District Attorney of the Year on Monday.

Local media coverage at CBS8, the Times of San Diego, and KUSI consisted of lightly edited versions of the press release issued by the public relations staff at the District Attorney’s office.

Not noted in the local coverage of Stephan’s award was the campaign being led by the awarding group to place a measure on the ballot rolling back portions of criminal justice reforms enacted by the legislature and California voters in recent years.   [Read more…]

San Diego Politics in 2018: A Whiff of Racism, the Odor of Misogyny, the Stench of Entitlement

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Electoral contests in San Diego County government are coming into the final stretch. Mail-in voting is just a month away. A politics column and editorial board interviews at the Union-Tribune, along with the release of depositions from the now-settled lawsuits against labor leader Mickey Kasparian, have all contributed knowledge to what I’ll share today.

First up: a column by Michael Smolens on the race for District Attorney. He describes the contest as insider/reformer (Summer Stephan) versus outsider/advocate (Geneviéve Jones-Wright.

Smollens accurately describes Jone-Wright’s candidacy as the local manifestation of a national movement seeking to address the race and class bias of U.S. criminal justice system and notes the differences in style between the candidates.   [Read more…]

Former UFCW Employees Urge Local Democratic Party to Stand With Women

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By Rosy Miner, Isaura Garcia, Odett McAdams, and Debbie Principe

We are former employees who worked under Mickey Kasparian, President of UFCW Local 135. For more than a year, we have stood with our sisters: Sandy Naranjo, Isabel Vasquez, Anabel Arauz, and more recently Melody Godinez, who all filed lawsuits with serious claims involving our former boss.

We have firsthand knowledge of what it is like to work for Kasparian, and we have volunteered for several Democratic candidates over the years.

Our Party has failed us in its handling of – or refusal to handle – him.   [Read more…]

County Sheriff, District Attorney Races Heating Up

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Gore Tells Reporters He Wants to Fire Opponent; Stephan’s Supporters Under Fire

There are developments in the crucial June 5th contests for County Sheriff and District Attorney. Incumbent Sheriff Bill Gore’s management abilities are under the microscope. And appointed District Attorney Summer Stephan’s campaign has its own problems.

I’ll start with the San Diego Sheriff Department, which is turning out to be a real little shop of horrors. Top dog Bill Gore apparently still feels entitled to his job, even as claims against the department mount.

What the Department did or didn’t do after warnings about the San Bruno shooter continues to be a mystery. Los Angeles Times crime reporter Richard Winton posted a Tweet saying, “@SDSheriff remains silent on what the Dept knew about Nasim Agdam and Youtube after father says he warned them about her YouTube issues.”   [Read more…]

“Things That Make White People Uncomfortable”: Michael Bennett’s Essential New Book

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By Jessie Hagopian / Common Dreams

Today, my good friend Michael Bennett, former Seattle Seahawk, and current Philadelphia Eagle, releases his new book, “Things That Make White People Uncomfortable”—the memoir/manifesto that he wrote with my other dear friend Dave Zirin.

I am going to assume my position as a teacher here and officially assign you homework: read this book! Take notes. Report back on it to your community. Then take action. It is indispensable for anyone who wants to understand why so many players today are refusing to just shut up and play and are creating the new national pastime of protest and play. But this book is much more than just an expository essay about the new Black athlete.

This is one of those rare books you read that will change the way you understand yourself and your place in the world. Only a few books have had that kind of impact on me. Books like “The Autobiography of Malcolm X” and “Angela Davis: An Autobiography.” Uncomfortable has me feeling like a kid again, remembering how those amazing autobiographies turned me upside down and inside out.   [Read more…]

Rev. Al Sharpton On MLK: He Had A Vision Beyond His Time | Video Worth Watching

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Reverend Al Sharpton joins Hardball to reflect on the 50th anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.’s death and his mountaintop speech.   [Read more…]

Breast Cancer and Screening Info Removed from Government’s Women’s Health Website

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By Jen Hayden / Daily Kos

A variety of important information about breast cancer and breast cancer screenings has gone missing from the Department of Health and Human Services women’s health website. The Sunlight Foundation tracks changes to government sites and they published a report on the now-vanished information. 

The “Breast Cancer” website and related pages were removed from within the Department of Health and Human Services’ (HHS) Office on Women’s Health (OWH) website. While content about mammogram breast cancer screening remains, informational pages and factsheets about the disease, including symptoms, treatment, risk factors, and public no- or low-cost cancer screening programs, have been entirely removed and are no longer found elsewhere on the OWH site. Among the material removed is information about provisions of the Affordable Care Act that require coverage of no-cost breast cancer screenings for certain women, as well as links to a free cancer screening program administered by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The office did not proactively announce or explain the removals.   [Read more…]

‘They Feed They Lion’ by Philip Levine | National Poetry Month

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The Poet as Witness

During the 1950’s Philip Levine was working in Detroit auto plants and writing poetry. In an interview at that time in Detroit Magazine he described how he found his compelling subject material. “I saw that the people that I was working with…were voiceless in a way. In terms of the literature of the United States they weren’t being heard. Nobody was speaking for them. And as young people will, you know, I took this foolish vow that I would speak for them and that’s what my life would be. …I just hope that I have the strength to carry it all the way through.”

They Feed They Lion was written in 1968, when Levine returned to Detroit following the race riots of 1967. It is one of his finest poems, reflecting the degree to which he found “the strength to carry it all the way through.” The poem is merciless in its judgements and propelled by the rhythmic insistence of the language itself.   [Read more…]

Meet the 16 Candidates Racing to Replace Darrell Issa | 49th Congressional District Election Snapshot

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Not long ago the Big Fear was no Democrats would make it past the primary to the general election. There was some serious infighting going on, and only late-entrant Christina Prejean was willing to take one for the team in the 49th Congressional District, leaving four candidates ready to go the distance.

A disaster was in the making; a general election amid a Blue Wave and two Republicans to chose from. Certainly, things couldn’t get much worse.

Then the Republicans stepped up and said, “Hold my beer.”   [Read more…]

With a Big Endorsement, District Attorney Contest Gets National Attention

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“In the age of Trump, brave reform-minded prosecutors are more important than ever. Geneviéve Jones-Wright will be just that.”

There’s big news to report on the race for San Diego County District Attorney. The cavalry has arrived, namely the Real Justice Political Action Committee. Co-founder Shaun King formally endorsed Geneviéve Jones-Wright on Wednesday.  This means experienced and reform-minded boots on the ground are coming to town. 

Bleating about outside influence began months ago, with appointed incumbent Summer Stephan’s political consultant, Jason Roe, sounding the alarm via Twitter about liberal donor George Soros’ Democracy Alliance taking an interest in the DA’s race.

Real Justice isn’t funded by Soros (it’s Silicon Valley money), but the Greek billionaire has been known to fund similar contests.   [Read more…]

Privatizing the Veterans Administration: A Key Part of the Trump Agenda

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By Mark Sumner / Daily Kos

The replacement of Secretary of Veterans Affairs David Shulkin has two narratives in the media—that Shulkin “embarrassed” Donald Trump with a trip to Europe that included days of sightseeing, and that Shulkin “clashed” with other officials at the VA.

Despite the amount of play the first item has received in the press, and despite some completely justified criticisms of Shulkin’s efforts both slip his wife’s travel costs onto the VA’s dime and indulgence in gifts he should never have accepted, the idea that he was pushed out over travel costs is clearly ludicrous. Scott Pruitt has engaged in far more lavish—and ridiculous—travel policies, hauling along a vast entourage on trips to Italy and Morocco, and the only thing his actions have earned from Trump is a suggestion that Pruitt may get a promotion to some other department ripe for wrecking. Besides, Trump isn’t capable of embarrassment. 

And when the press reports that Shulkin butted heads with officials, what they really mean is that Shulkin was blocking appointees from Trump who were pushing to privatize the VA. Fast. The conflict was simple: Shulkin, the only hold-over in Trump’s cabinet from the Obama administration, was trying to maintain the VA as a viable system of health care for veterans. The Trump appointees that filled all the other VA slots, were actively working to do to the VA what Pruitt has done to the EPA—destroy it.   [Read more…]

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