San Diego Free Press

Grassroots News & Progressive Views

Merle Haggard and the Politics of Salmon

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By Dan Bacher / Daily Kos

During the battle to save the pristine salmon and steelhead habitat of Headwaters Forest in 1998, I got a phone call one morning from Mike Sherwood, then the California Director of the Sierra Club. He told me that country legend Merle Haggard (who passed away on his birthday, April 6, this week) and actor Woody Harrelson would be appearing at the State Capitol for a noontime rally.

“Thanks for the information,” I told Sherwood and drove from Elk Grove to the Capitol to check the event out. I arrived about a half hour early, so I went to a small circle of a dozen activists standing around and talking on the capitol lawn.   [Read more…]

Protest Ted Cruz Monday at 4PM in Mission Valley

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By Matthew Rice / Veterans Democratic Club of San Diego

The strongest right we as Americans have is our freedom of speech. On Monday 11 April 2016 at 4pm, we plan to use that speech to PROTEST TED CRUZ in San Diego! He is speaking from 6-8pm at:

Town and Country Resort
500 Hotel Circle North
San Diego, CA 92108   [Read more…]

Looking Back at the Week: April 3-9

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By Brent E. Beltrán

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: the Panama Papers, 2016 California Primary, Cruz coming to SD, rooting for losers, housed to homeless, the passing of a local jazz legend, the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, PP helping a friend, a new era of feminism and lots of other inspiring (and sometimes depressing), grassroots news & progressive views from San Diego’s friendly, neighborhood, all volunteer, slightly funky, community news site.   [Read more…]

Geo-Poetic Spaces: Personification of Wind

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Smoke
hangs over the globe

Blame it on winds
personified by names
originating in uncrossed deserts
howling: seas

Winds
that are said
to carry
a sandstorm of maladies misfortunes   [Read more…]

Wall Street Should Pay a Sales Tax, Too

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When a high-rolling trader buys millions of dollars’ worth of stocks or derivatives, there’s no levy at all.

By Sarah Anderson / OtherWords

In case there was any doubt, the presidential election fight has confirmed that blasting Wall Street, even eight years after the financial crisis, is still a vote-getter.

Hillary Clinton has said she’d like to jail more bankers. Donald Trump has skewered the hedge fund managers who are “getting away with murder.” And Bernie Sanders has made Wall Street accountability a centerpiece of his campaign.

Of course, financial industry lobbyists aren’t about to take this lying down. In recent weeks, they’ve turned up the heat on lawmakers to block one particular measure that Sanders has mentioned in nearly every stump speech: taxing Wall Street speculation.   [Read more…]

A New Era of Feminism: Women Continue to Inspire Women

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By Leah Schroeder

March was a month for deep reflection for a lot of us women on the question, “how far have we come?” A plethora of articles and books are available that discuss this question, and dissect the variety ways in which women are still subjugated in all societies. There are so many controversial, frustrating, and generally negative circumstances I could write or rant about.

It’s easy to become angry at how “The System” (patriarchy, misogyny, menstrual cycles, racism, you catch my drift) has been set up against marginalized groups for millennia. Sometimes, this anger is consuming. For example, when reading about how an African American woman was (allegedly) gang-raped by men on the lacrosse team at a prestigious, majority white university (cite). Among other things, gender-based violence occurs all over the world, a lot more often than many people think.

The historical and deeply systematic subjugation and de-humanization of women that still prevails in many ways today can really get you down. However, there’s also a growing sensation of power that comes with education and the knowledge gained from women in the past and present.   [Read more…]

Why the Panama Papers Are a Feminist Issue

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By Chiara Capraro, Francesca Rhodes / OpenDemocracy.Net

The world is talking about tax this week, so here’s another tax story for you. Asana Abugre has a small shop in Accra, Ghana where she makes and sells batiks and tie-dyed textiles. Asana pays her taxes regularly. Women like her, working in markets across the city, sometimes pay up to 37% of their income in tax. Tax collectors come to their shops to collect taxes, and there is no chance of them not paying, regardless of how little money they might have made that day.

Of course, this isn’t the tax story that everyone’s been talking about. The release of the Panama Papers by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists is the biggest data leak in history, and this time it’s some of the world’s most powerful people who have cause to worry, with the spotlight finally falling on their own secretive tax arrangements.

But the two stories are linked. When those at the top of the economic pyramid find ways to pay little or no tax, the impact is felt hardest by those at the bottom – people like Asana.   [Read more…]

Better Ted Than…? Cruz Stumps San Diego Monday

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Given Senator Ted Cruz’s fundamentalist leanings, there’s no small irony in the growing assumption among Republicans that he is ‘the devil they know’ and Donald Trump is the devil they don’t.

Yesterday the Cruz campaign announced appearances in Irvine and San Diego on Monday. Locally, the Texas Senator will appear from 6-8 pm at the Town and Country Resort in Mission Valley. Pre-registration will be required for those wishing to attend.

The latest Field Poll has Cruz just 7 points behind Donald Trump in California, a state with a winner-take-all lode of 172 GOP delegates. Former Republican state chair Ron Nehring, who hails from San Diego, is now a national spokesman for the Cruz campaign.   [Read more…]

Father Wakes Up To Vandalism, Includes Racial Slur

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San Ysidro Has Only 40% Of The Parks They Need, and Sweetwater Union High School Denies Transfer For Student In Eastlake, Despite Promises

By Barbara Zaragoza / SouthBayCompass.com

CV Community Group Crossroads II came out with their 4-page annual report. They wrote, “Crossroads II believes that over the last several decades, the Chula Vista City Councils have mismanaged the affairs of Chula Vista, particularly with respect to land-use issues… Chula Vista City Councils have consistently encouraged more land devoted to residential and less land available for commercial and industrial. We have become a giant “bedroom community.”   [Read more…]

OB Planning Board: Harris and Saldaña Blast Faulconer, Ambert Re-elected as Chair, and Del Mar Project Approved

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By Frank Gormlie / OB Rag

A lot going on at last night’s OB Planning Board meeting. As nearly two dozen people crowded into the Community Meeting room at the OB Rec Center, they were witnesses to a type of mini-mayoral candidate debate, when candidates Ed Harris and Lori Saldaña addressed the meeting.   [Read more…]

Beyond Panama: What the World Really Needs is the #DelawarePapers

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That giant sucking sound you hear? It is the sound of money rushing to the U.S.A.

by Nika Knight / CommonDreams

Panama saw populist protests on Wednesday in response to Panama Papers revelations that the nation’s lax tax laws are providing a haven for the world’s wealthiest to stash their cash. But in the United States, where observers note that corporate greed is surely not lacking, the leak has yet to produce such a grassroots display of outrage.   [Read more…]

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