By Patricia Staley
I’m getting sick of stump speeches and I have a deep-rooted distrust of politicians, in general.
How many leaflets can you bear to pull out of your mailbox?
Every branch of government is at stake and it makes you feel like a sap if you don’t vote.
The grass roots movements have lost momentum. It seems like everything is supported by hedge funds and other big financial off shoots.
By Anne Haule / Women’s Museum of California
The year was 1970, I was to graduate with a BA, the Kent State killings had just occurred and campuses all across the nation, including mine, were shut down. Never having to take our last set of final exams, my class was graduated – some of us walking down the aisle to receive our diplomas wearing black arm bands to signify opposition to the war in Vietnam. Having financed my education, my parents congratulated me and quickly let me know that I was now on my own as far as money was concerned.
So, since I had to pay rent, I went about the task of finding a job. I soon learned that my degree in English didn’t matter a damn but my halting ability to crank out 45 words per minute on the typewriter did– a skill I tried to learn in high school since I thought it’d be easier than trigonometry. [Read more…]
In Buddhist economics there is the concept of “right livelihood.” Work is considered an essential component of human life just as play and leisure. Work of a craftsmanlike nature, work which is satisfying–not work that is stultifying, of an assembly-line nature. Work that nourishes the soul; this kind of work results in right livelihood.
By the same token, there is “right consumption.” This is as contrasted with the unlimited consumption advanced Western societies and pushed on their citizens through advertising and other means in order to have economic “growth” and to increase GDP. [Read more…]
Let’s begin this article by acknowledging that I am not a believer. I am agnostic at best; still looking for answers that I haven’t yet found. With that in mind, three things have happened over the past few years that I can’t explain, and the latest still gives me goose bumps in thinking about it. Let’s start at the beginning.
Seven years ago my husband Bob died. I joined a widow support group and one of the things we decided to do was to see if a “Medium” could bring our husbands messages back to us. There were nine of us going to Harmony Grove to find out.
As we were all coming from different parts of San Diego, we met at a central location, and I drove with Rosey to meet the others. On the way there, she mentioned that she was always puzzled why she had such a bad relationship with her mother. She said it was as if her mother didn’t like her; liked her sister and her brother, but she was always the “odd one out.” Rosey and I were the only ones in the car. [Read more…]
San Diegans don’t have a general election contest for mayor in 2016, and four of the five seats up for grabs on the City Council are already taken. But we do get to vote on City Attorney, and this happens to be an important contest.
The June primary winnowed down the field to Mara Elliott, currently serving as Chief Deputy City Attorney under CA Jan Goldsmith and Robert Hickey, a Deputy District Attorney under County DA Bonnie Dumanis.
Elliott has been endorsed by her Democratic primary opponents and has the support of the party apparatus. Hickey has the active support of Republicans in town save one: his boss. [Read more…]
By Jill Richardson / OtherWords
Some people love to hate government regulations. Many believe they’re just bureaucratic barriers that waste our time. But the Food and Drug Administration just passed a new regulation that’ll actually protect us, and may save you a few bucks and an unnecessary purchase at the store.
If you’re one of the millions of Americans who buys antibacterial soaps, you’ve been, at a minimum, duped. But more importantly, you’ve been exposed to harmful chemicals.
Antibacterial soaps sound good. After all, no one wants to imagine their hands teeming with bacteria. [Read more…]
What was supposed to be an epic, high-dollar struggle for the partisan upper hand on the San Diego City Council never came to pass. Odd-numbered districts elect representatives in 2016, and Republicans were hoping to gain a majority on the theoretically non-partisan body.
Of the five City Council districts having primary contests in June, only one will have a meaningful contest for the general election. In three (3,5,& 7) of those districts, there won’t even be a choice on the November ballot.
The city’s rules, giving an automatic win to any candidate with more than 50% of the vote in the first outing, are up for reconsideration via Measure K, which would allow the top two primary finishers to compete in November.
Today we’ll look at what’s left of the City Council contests. [Read more…]
By Jim Miller
President Obama’s recent stops in Lake Tahoe and Hawaii highlighted his conservation efforts, and while these activities have not received as much coverage as they deserve, one might reasonably argue that conservation and the preservation of endangered wilderness is the President’s most impressive legacy.
As the New York Times reported, “Obama has visited more than 30 national parks and emerged as a 21st-century Theodore Roosevelt for his protection of public lands and marine reserves. His use of the Antiquities Act of 1906, which gives a president unilateral authority to protect federal lands as national monuments, has enabled him to establish 23 new monuments, more than any other president, and greatly expand a few others.” [Read more…]
Originally published with the headline: “Dispatches from the drug war: Or, why are Americans subsidizing the Europeans?” Given all the ads trying to scare voters into paying more for lifesaving drugs lately, we’ve retitled this story along with some of big pharma’s anti-Prop 61 propaganda for readers to contrast and compare.
By Susan Grigsby / Daily Kos
Let’s talk about other drug war: The one being waged against the American consumer by the pharmaceutical companies who benefit from our tax dollars that fund basic scientific research and make up the difference in the tax relief they receive for their own research and development. [Read more…]
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, and sourced writers on: California’s US Senate race, Applegate vs Issa, state legislature ballot choices, Labor day Cali style, displaying patriotism, #NoDAPL, defending the water, no respect in America, anti-Bobism, Black Uhuru, Jill Stein, SANDAG twisting enviro laws, and lots of other grassroots news & progressive views from San Diego’s friendly, neighborhood, all volunteer, slightly funky, community news site. [Read more…]
The progressive run
through Yosemite’s gridlocked valley:
a modulation of the redwoods and granite
slide-slipping down Tioga Pass
The diving elevation
composed as haiku on paper bags–
a sure sign poets were at the wheel [Read more…]
