San Diego Free Press

Grassroots News & Progressive Views

Trump’s ‘Military Operation’ Against ‘Bad Dudes’

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In a meeting with corporate executives this morning, President Donald Trump took time out to extol the virtues of his administration’s immigration policies, saying his effort to ramp up deportations is a “military operation” aimed at ridding the U.S. of “really bad dudes.”

The reality of what’s happening is divorced from the administration’s portrayals. Mexican authorities say they’ve seen no increase in deportations. What has increased are public relations efforts to justify the new policies.

Locally, the suicide of Guadalupe Olivas Valencia, less than an hour after he was deported has impacted the immigrant community. The 45-year-old Mexican citizen jumped to his death from a pedestrian bridge spanning the border in San Ysidro.   [Read more…]

Climate Change: An Islander’s Experience

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By Shanty Asher / SanDiego350.org

I am a proud Pacific Islander. Over the years, I have witnessed and stood alongside many of my fellow islanders and leaders, combating climate change and its impacts on the islands. Though the percentage of people in the U.S. who believe that climate change is real and human-caused is rising, it still only amounts to around half. I have no doubt that if Americans had seen what we have seen, had lived what we have lived through, I believe that percentage would be higher. Much higher.

Today, I will share that story with you through an islander’s lens and maybe, just maybe, my story will paint a different picture of climate change, one that you may not have heard before, one that you can relate to because it is not a scientific prediction, but based on actual events.   [Read more…]

My 10 Core Social, Political Beliefs

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By Anne Haule / Musings of a Boomer Feminist

The election of Trump has caused me to focus on my core beliefs and work toward advancing them. I recommend this exercise for everyone. It is a useful way to clarify where you stand and to focus your energies.

So, in no particular order and subject to further additions, here they are.   [Read more…]

CalPERS Joins Investors Calling on Banks to Address Concerns About Dakota Access Pipeline

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By Dan Bacher / Daily Kos

On February 17, California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CalPERS) officials announced they are joining over 100 fellow investors asking major U.S. and international banks backing the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) to address the concerns of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe of North Dakota.

The statement endorsed by CalPERS supports a rerouting of the pipeline, but doesn’t call for halting DAPL, a project that poses enormous harm to the drinking water supply for 17 million people and to many fish and wildlife species on the Missouri River.

The announcement came four days after 150 people from a coalition of environmental and Native American Groups held a march and rally in front of the CalPERS office in Sacramento to tell the retirement fund to divest from its investments in banks backing the Dakota Access Pipeline.   [Read more…]

Nationwide Indivisible Movement Challenges Issa, Other Elected Officials

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‘This is Democracy. You Should Come Try It.’

By Doug Porter

Pressure from citizens groups continues to mount nationwide, as elected representatives grapple with political blowback over health care, immigration, environmental, and other issues raised by Republicans seeking to dismantle America’s social contract.

Nearly 2000 people came to what was billed as an ‘Emergency Town Hall’ in Vista on Tuesday night, even though the guest of honor, Congressman Issa, made it clear he had no intention of showing up.

The Jim Porter Recreation Center quickly filled up to its legal capacity of 350 people; the remaining attendees rallied outside. Midway through the proceedings, which included speakers from faith-based and healthcare organizations, the room was emptied to allow a new group of constituents in to hear speeches.   [Read more…]

Why The Left Should Worry About Russian President Vladimir Putin

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By Ed Merta

In the age of Putin and Trump, the left is divided over what to think about reports of Russian interference in the 2016 elections and the new U.S. President’s ties to the Kremlin. Are the reports credible? What do they mean for those who’ve always been skeptical of U.S. actions toward Russia? Should the reports be dismissed, given the U.S. record of (among other things) sabotage in foreign elections, pervasive cyber-intrusions around the world, support for needlessly provocative NATO expansion into Eastern Europe, and complicity in robber baron plunder of Russia after the collapse of Communism?

Understanding possible answers to these questions requires first looking at the history behind them. Learning from that history depends on an act of faith: believing in whatever truth emerges, even when it conflicts with what our faith has taught.   [Read more…]

Alternative Fact: There Ain’t No Such Thing as Global Warming

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2016 Breaks 2015’s Record Which Broke 2014’s Record

For the third year in a row planet Earth has set records for hottest year as the planet warms due to global warming. It is the first time in the modern era of global warming data that temperatures have blown past the previous record three years in a row. Meanwhile, President Trump took down the White House climate change website. He has called global warming a hoax and a Chinese plot, and staffed his administration with global warming deniers.

The heat extremes were especially noticeable in the Arctic region where temperatures are running 20 to 30 degrees Fahrenheit above normal. Sea ice is melting at a rapid pace and coastal communities are dealing with rapid beach erosion. Polar bears are losing their habitat and starving.   [Read more…]

OB Rag Editorial in 1973 During the Days of Nixon and Watergate

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The following is an OB Rag staff editorial from October 1973. It was published during the time of the Nixon administration and the Watergate scandal. As Nixon didn’t resign until August 1974, there were fears of what he would do in the months prior to the resolution of the Constitutional crisis. In reading this editorial written 44 years ago, many of the themes resonate with us today.

tyranny at home …

We of the OB Rag staff are appalled at Richard Nixon’s latest moves at establishing one-man rule n America. Nixon has stepped outside the bounds of his constituted authority … again. He has usurped the powers of the courts by refusing to comply with a court order to release the tapes. More, he has fired the one man, Archibald Cox, who had the legal authority to investigate the White House’s involvement in Watergate.   [Read more…]

Trump Still Won’t Say the Words: ‘Radical Anti-Semitism’

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“The President’s sudden acknowledgment is a Band-Aid on the cancer of anti-Semitism that has infected his own Administration.”– Anne Frank Center

For the second time this month, The Lawrence Family Jewish Community Center in La Jolla was evacuated in response to a bomb threat. San Diego Police searched the facility following a 6am phone call on Tuesday.

On Monday there were 11 new bomb threats against Jewish community centers, from New York to New Mexico. Over the weekend, vandals toppled and damaged as many as 200 headstones at a St. Louis-area Jewish cemetery.

Prior to Tuesday morning’s threat, the Jewish Community Center (JCC) Association of North America has documented 69 incidents at 54 centers in 27 U.S. states and one Canadian province since the start of 2017.   [Read more…]

The MOXIE Theatre production of Blue Door

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Exploring Self-Identity through Conversations with Ancestors 

By Yuko Kurahashi

The MOXIE Theatre production of Blue Door by Tanya Barfield, directed by Delicia Turner Sonnenberg, portrays a middle-aged African-American mathematics professor Lewis’s search for his identity and history by bearing witness to the paths of his great-grandfather, grandfather, and father.

Set in the bedroom of his apartment in 1995, Lewis opens the play with a monolog about his wife of 25 years (she never appears on stage) who has just left him, asking for a divorce. According to Lewis, his wife, who is white, is divorcing him because he would not participate in the Million Man March. This historical march held on October 16, 1995, was led by the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan who called for black men to gather in Washington, D.C. to reflect and change their roles both in the private and public spheres. Lewis explains his unwillingness to participate in this historical event disappointed his wife.     [Read more…]

Mayor, Mayor on the Wall

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We’ll start with a trick question: Is Mayor Kevin Faulconer the mirror image of President Donald Trump?  No, of course not! you’d probably say.

Kevin Faulconer is a pleasant, if unremarkable, go-along-to-get-along San Diego city councilman turned mayor:

“…born and raised in Oxnard California… learned to speak Spanish in grade school…  San Diego State University… member of the Kappa Sigma fraternity… one year as Student Body President of Associated Students. He and his wife Katherine, a small business owner, live in Point Loma with their two children. Before running for office… executive with the public relations firm NCG Porter Novelli and volunteered  on the Mission Bay Park Committee…” (see Wikipedia)

You might say that Kevin Faulconer is a lightweight Republican who goes down nice and easy in a city like San Diego.  He is decorum incarnate – never an unguarded sneer, never an unscripted rant.   [Read more…]

Happy So-Called President’s Day: The Administration Spins On

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Here we are, just over one month into the Presidency of Donald J. Trump, [Insert your favorite descriptive phrase here]. Things aren’t going well for the current administration.

It’s leaking so much that ‘false leaks’ — like the story about the National Guard being mobilized to aid in deportations — are now part of White House strategy designed to portray the press as the “enemy of the American people.”

Based on a misunderstanding of a Fox news show, our government is now at odds with the government of Sweden. Rather than admit the error, the administration is doubling down on it. (If they want to declare war, I’m willing to negotiate terms of surrender!)

Most importantly, resistance against the policies and proposals of the administration and its Republican allies continues to spread.   [Read more…]

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