San Diego Free Press

Grassroots News & Progressive Views

Remembering Pearl Harbor and WWII Vets in the Time of Trump

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World War II Vets Would Not Have Stood for President-Elect

Remembering this December 7th – Pearl Harbor Day – has special significance for us today in this new Era of Trump. The 75th anniversary of the attack by Japanese forces on US air and naval power in Hawaii in late 1941 finds few surviving members still with us. And our collective memory of “the day of infamy” – as President Franklin Roosevelt declared it the next day before Congress – which pushed the country into World War II – has all but faded.

But yes, we need to remember this day – and all that it represents – all the contradictions of that historic moment and context. And all the parallels from that day to ours today.   [Read more…]

One Million People Demand Republicans Keep Their Hands Off Medicare

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This morning Democratic party leaders from the House and Senate, along with representatives from seniors and activist organizations, delivered more than one million petition signatures demanding that President Elect Donald Trump, House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI), and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) keep their hands off the American people’s earned Medicare benefits.

Medicare and Medicaid provide health insurance to one-third of all Americans.

Although Donald Trump ran on a pledge not to touch Medicare, House Speaker Ryan has already announced plans to abolish the program through privatization. Rep. Tom Price (R-GA), one of Ryan’s closest allies and an ardent foe of Medicare, has been nominated to be Health and Human Services Secretary.   [Read more…]

Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs) Don’t Result in Better Crop Yields

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They Just Increase Amount of Poison We’re Exposed To

The controversy over genetically modified crops has focused on whether or not they were safe to eat. We have to ask ourselves what was the purpose for genetically modifying them in the first place. That was so they could be sprayed with Monsanto’s Roundup and they wouldn’t die. Only the weeds would die. But this leaves the crops, mainly corn and soybeans, with a nice coating of poison. It won’t kill them, but it might kill you.

The next promise of the chemical corporations was that the use of GMO sprayed with weed killers would lead to a significant increase in crop yields, but that hasn’t happened either. The promise was that GMOs would “feed the world”. Monsanto and others pointed to the fact that the world’s population was increasing so we needed a far more abundant food supply, and the only way to get there was by means of GMOs liberally sprayed with RoundUp, the main ingredient of which is glyphosate.   [Read more…]

The Election of President Donald Trump: A Historical Chicano Perspective

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By Herma Baca / President of the Committee on Chicano Rights

After the presidential elections, I received phone calls from persons in San Diego, Tijuana, Los Angeles, Fresno, New Mexico, Arizona, Colorado, Texas, etc. asking me four basic questions:

  1. What I thought about Trump being elected President?
  2. Why & how was Trump elected?
  3. What will happen to us?
  4. What can we do to protect ourselves?

Some callers expressed concern, fear, dismay, alarm, horror, panic, & terror. Others simply stated, “I am going to arm myself & defend my family!”

  [Read more…]

The Armenians of California: Challenges and Achievements

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A tour of one of the 200 different ethnic groups who live & contribute to our California

While exploring Los Angeles one weekend during the summer, I stumbled upon the district of Little Armenia. The community intrigued me, so I dove deeper, traveled further and found a large, diverse Armenian culture in California.

The most moving tribute to Armenians is located in the park outside the Fresno Courthouse. Donated to the County of Fresno by the people of Armenian descent of the San Joaquin Valley, the statue was dedicated on August 11, 1970 and was created by sculptor Varaz Samuelian. The plaque reads:

“David of Sassoon is the legendary folk-hero of the Armenians who rid their land of foreign conquerors single-handedly. It is an epic based on historical events dating back to the seventh century A.D. Troubadours, poets and sculptors have immortalized him for it gives eloquent expression to man’s undying love of freedom and justice for all. This statue, by Varaz Samuelian of Fresno, represents a thousand Davids in a thousand lands where throughout all of history man has sought to sustain his freedom against overwhelming odds.”   [Read more…]

California Legislators, School Boards Brace for Trump’s Assault on Immigrants

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President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration may be six weeks away. Elected officials in Sacramento and San Diego are already taking actions aimed at shielding those who may be victimized by the new administration.

Newly sworn in lawmakers at the State capitol proposed legislation providing attorneys to immigrants in the country illegally, refusing to aid any proposed registry of Muslim immigrants and requiring voter approval for any wall built along the Mexican border.

This evening San Diego Unified School Board will likely approve a resolution to protect all of its 130,000 students and staff in the district.   [Read more…]

Numbers Tell the Story of Standing Rock

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The federal government on Sunday denied the easement needed to complete the Dakota Access pipeline’s route under the Missouri River.

The announcement by the Army Corps of Engineers came as veterans streamed into the camps over the weekend in cars and buses to offer their support to the tribe in its months-long battle. The veterans event had raised more than $1 million dollars in response to violent assaults on the demonstrators by law enforcement. The veterans said they would shield the demonstrators.   [Read more…]

Fake News, Conspiracies, and No News is Good News

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How and where we get information informing our outlook on the world has become an issue in the wake of the most recent presidential election. People’s lives, reputations and even democracy itself can be endangered.

A cottage industry, some of which masks bigger players with malevolent agendas, is taking advantage of opportunities afforded by social media to mold public opinion.

An analysis in BuzzFeed published shortly after the election revealed “top fake election news stories generated more total engagement on Facebook than top election stories from 19 major news outlets combined” from August through Election Day.   [Read more…]

Will the Trump Presidency be an Extinction Level Event for Labor? We Better Hope Not

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Last week in the bluntly titled “Trump Presidency Could Kill Labor Unions,” distinguished journalist Harold Meyerson ponders the possibility that the 2016 Presidential election was “an extinction-level event for American labor.” Noting the sad fact that a high percentage of union households (about 43 percent nationally) went for Trump, Meyerson wastes no time in outlining what the costs will be for working class folks in America:

Now, Trump, the Republican Congress, and the soon-to-be Republican-dominated Supreme Court are poised to damage unions—and the interests of working people, both union and not—even more. Indeed, within the GOP, the war on unions engenders almost no dissent. Since Republicans were swept into office in a host of Midwestern states in the 2010 elections, Indiana, Michigan, and Wisconsin have all effectively eliminated collective-bargaining rights for public employees and subjected private-sector unions to “right-to-work” laws that enable workers to benefit from union contracts and representation without having to pay their union any dues. Previously, such laws were largely confined to Southern states, whose respect for worker rights has improved only somewhat since they were compelled to abolish slavery. As the GOP has become steadily whiter and more right-wing, those Southern norms have become national.   [Read more…]

How to Be a Democratic Party Insider: California ADEM Elections

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By RL Miller / Daily Kos

Want to get more involved with the party, and know that the deadline for California Assembly District Delegates is December 8? Or, want to get involved but didn’t even know that this Thursday is the deadline?

First, why be a party insider? Officially, you’ll be a delegate to the California Democratic Party convention, meaning that you get to go to Sacramento May 17-19 and mingle, drink, schmooze, network, and — importantly — vote on resolutions. If you want to change the party from the inside, you need to become a party insider — by getting elected. The cost is $20. Elections are January 7 and 8, one in each of the state’s 80 Assembly districts. Seven men and seven women will be elected from each district — that’s 1120 people — and they are commonly known as ADEMs.   [Read more…]

Media Complicity Is Key to Blacklisting Websites

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By Norman Soloman / Common Dreams

We still don’t have any sort of apology or retraction from the Washington Post for promoting “The List” — the highly dangerous blacklist that got a huge boost from the newspaper’s fawning coverage on November 24. The project of smearing 200 websites with one broad brush wouldn’t have gotten far without the avid complicity of high-profile media outlets, starting with the Post.

On Thursday — a week after the Post published its front-page news article hyping the blacklist that was put out by a group of unidentified people called PropOrNot — I sent a petition statement to the newspaper’s executive editor Martin Baron.

“Smearing is not reporting,” the RootsAction petition says. “The Washington Post’s recent descent into McCarthyism — promoting anonymous and shoddy claims that a vast range of some 200 websites are all accomplices or tools of the Russian government — violates basic journalistic standards and does real harm to democratic discourse in our country. We urge the Washington Post to prominently retract the article and apologize for publishing it.”   [Read more…]

Victory at Standing Rock! Department of Army Says No to DAPL!

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By Dave Archambault II, Standing Rock Sioux Tribal Chairman

“Today, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers announced that it will not be granting the easement to cross Lake Oahe for the proposed Dakota Access Pipeline. Instead, the Corps will be undertaking an environmental impact statement to look at possible alternative routes. We wholeheartedly support the decision of the administration and commend with the utmost gratitude the courage it took on the part of President Obama, the Army Corps, the Department of Justice and the Department of the Interior to take steps to correct the course of history and to do the right thing.   [Read more…]

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