San Diego Free Press

Grassroots News & Progressive Views

#NotOurLaborSec: Fast Food Workers Protest Puzder Nationwide

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As protests against Andy Puzder erupt around the country, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) tells labor secretary nominee he has a “sneering contempt” for workers

By Nika Knight / Common Dreams

For the third time since anti-worker fast food CEO Andy Puzder’s nomination for Labor Secretary was announced, fast food workers flooded the streets in protest on Monday.

Days before Puzder’s confirmation hearing on Thursday, hundreds of cashiers and cooks ralliedin front of the St. Louis headquarters of Hardee’s and the Anaheim, Calif. offices of CKE Restaurants, the conglomerate overseen by Puzder that includes Carl’s Jr. and Hardee’s restaurants.   [Read more…]

Love and Compassion through a Spoof: The Coronado Playhouse Production of ‘Altar Boyz’

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By Yuko Kurahashi

Coronado Playhouse is staging Altar Boyz, directed and choreographed by Michael Mizerany, as the first show of its 71st Season. In the intimate 120-seat theatre space adjacent to the Coronado Community Center, audiences are seated at tables to enjoy beverages and snacks before and during the show.

Set in Coronado at the present time, the Christian band members from a small town in Ohio are performing the last night of their national “Raise the Praise Tour.” The Boys—Mathew (Cody Ingram), Mark (SeeJay Lewis), Luke (Peter Armado), Juan (Patrick Mayuyu), and Abraham (Dennis Peters)—parody such contemporary issues as religious and racial tolerance and identity. Using music and dance from rap, hip-hop, funk, jazz, to modern, the Boys make fun of established religion, including the Catholic Church’s rules and customs in “Church Rules.” The show also criticizes, with humor, the impracticality of sexual abstinence for boys.   [Read more…]

Resistance Efforts Turn Towards City Council Over Trump Travel Ban

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On Tuesday, February 14, the San Diego City Council will vote on whether to join the Washington State lawsuit challenging the Trump Travel Ban. Local activists are being asked to support this effort by contacting City Council members and attending a hearing on the matter.

Although a unanimous ruling by a three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a temporary restraining order preventing enforcement of a ban on travel from some Muslim-majority nations, the suit challenging the executive order continues to move forward.

One year ago the very idea of San Diego joining this lawsuit would not have been considered. The election of Mara Elliott as City Attorney has changed the political landscape.   [Read more…]

Hiking as Resistance

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Over the last few weeks I’ve had the pleasure of speaking at a variety of forums along with folks from other activist groups about what needs to be done in the age of Trump. During one of these events at Grossmont College, I was struck by something a colleague of mine who leads nature expeditions for the Sierra Club said about his students and their relationship or lack thereof to the natural world.

Ten years ago, he observed, about half of the students he dealt with had had some experience hiking in the backcountry, roaming the desert, or visiting a state or national park, but that number has been consistently shrinking over the last decade or so.

He told a few stories of students on their first venture into the wild being afraid of getting attacked by mountain lions. Initially many of them are not sure what to do or how to act outside of the city. The experience, he explained, is uncomfortable for them at first, but, after some reassurance and education, they open their eyes to the wonder of the world.   [Read more…]

County Supervisors to Vote on Community Choice Energy and Kill SDG&E’s Monopoly

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By Tyson Siegle, SanDiego350

On February 15th, San Diegans will have an opportunity to take a huge step forward on clean energy.

The San Diego County Board of Supervisors will vote on implementation for some or all of the San Diego County Comprehensive Renewable Energy Plan (CREP).

Many of the steps outlined in the plan save the county money and promote a healthier environment, but one particular piece of the plan could do more to promote clean energy and lower costs than all the rest combined: Community Choice Energy (CCE).   [Read more…]

Privilege and the Wall

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By Ben Allen

Privilege and the Wall

After a long day at school, after dropping the ball on a Chicano Lit essay,
I watched the Frampton-Santa Cruz weigh in, watched those tiny men threateningly flex their muscles,
and I decided to go for a run.
I ran down Utah, past the boxing gym that was under construction and being repainted from white
to something less gaudy, and I watched the fighters skipping rope through the window in the wall,
before I continued on my end of day run, my privilege.
  [Read more…]

Looking Back at the Week: Feb 5-11

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This week’s edition of Looking Back at the Week features articles, commentaries, columns, toons, and other work by San Diego Free Press regulars, irregulars, columnists, at-large contributors, cartoonists, and sourced writers on: Dem Party and Labor’s Kasparian mess, Trump, immigration crackdown, Hershey Felder, Ajisen Ramen, Sunset Cliffs erosion, public transit as social justice, and lots of other grassroots news & progressive views from San Diego’s friendly, neighborhood, all volunteer, slightly funky, community news site.   [Read more…]

Reports of the Destruction of Experience and the Failure of Ecopsychology are Greatly Exaggerated

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This is a response to Will Falk’s article, The Destruction of Experience: How Ecopsychology Has Failed, written on Jan. 10, 2017.

By Thomas J. Doherty

I feel for the author of The Destruction of Experience: How Ecopsychology Has Failed who sounds as if he is truly suffering over the state of their world as he sees it. As a parent, I can identify with his profound feelings of attachment and protectiveness for his nephew. I also appreciate his recognition of some well-known ecopsychology thinkers, such as those represented in the 1995 Sierra Club Ecopsychology anthology. Books like this sit on my shelf as I write, and have been a central influence on my adult life and profession.

But, I fear that the author has drawn too narrow circle around one snapshot of ecopsychology thinking, indeed mainly one book, and one variation on psychologically informed environmentalism, to make such broad and sweeping conclusions as he does.   [Read more…]

Geo-Poetic Spaces: The Wishing Tree

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Need
Is migrating from all four directions

An unbroken procession
of broken lives
that pauses to tie prayers
on the wishing tree   [Read more…]

Weekly Progressive Calendar for San Diego: February 10-22, 2017

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Over Two Dozen Ways to Get Involved and Make Your Voice Heard

Congratulations, resistees! We have survived 1.4% of Donald Trump’s (only) four-year term. It’s more important than ever to remember we’re involved in a marathon, not a sprint.

The latest polling results are out as I write this, and they offer encouragement for those of us involved in this movement. Support for impeaching the president has risen from 40% to 46% in the past week. NBC’s Saturday Night Live comedy now has more credibility than the man in the oval office.

Congress-critters from around the country, even those in so-called safe districts are seeing angry voters whenever they appear in public. And when they won’t appear in public –we’re talking about you, Darrell Issa– congressional town halls sans congress-critters are being organized.   [Read more…]

$16 Million Later, Where Are San Ysidro School District’s Solar Panels?

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“… nine years and $16 million later, not a single solar panel has been installed.” Christine Huard at the San Diego Union Tribune reports this week.

Already back in April 2016, the U-T reported that the project was running behind schedule. A presentation by Manazana Energy had the owner quoted as saying, “November-December 2015: Ribbon Cutting. System Testing and Commissioning. Handover of System.”

In that very same article, the U-T wrote:

“We’re in April and nothing has been done,” said Rose Estevez, who has three children enrolled in San Ysidro schools. “It does concern me and a lot of other parents. We don’t know where this money went. We don’t know why the solar panels are not up yet.”   [Read more…]

In This Post-Filner Era, the Democratic Party and the Labor Council Need to Do Better

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An open letter to Jessica Hayes, (Chair, San Diego Democratic Party) and Dale Kelly Bankhead (Secretary-Treasurer for the San Diego-Imperial Counties Labor Council), from Sara Kent.

Over the past two months, I have hoped for brave action from each of you. As women who hold positions of power in San Diego who should be stalwarts of fundamental Democratic ideals, instead of being proud of your leadership, I am gravely disappointed.

Not only for you, but for all of us.   [Read more…]

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