San Diego Free Press

Grassroots News & Progressive Views

Is Bank of America ‘Just Following Orders’ by Asking Citizenship Status Questions?

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It’s not just ICE and local bigots harassing immigrants and people who they think might be immigrants anymore.

Activists are claiming U.S. financial institutions, encouraged by the Department of Treasury, are including citizenship status as part of the Customer Identification Program provision of the USA Patriot Act, even though it is not legally required.

What this means in practical terms is that existing customers, like Josh Collins and wife Jessica Salazar Collins who thought envelopes from Bank of America were junk mail, are having their accounts suspended until such time as questions about citizenship are answered.
  [Read more…]

Astroturfing: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver | Video Worth Watching

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John Oliver of Last Week Tonight presents an update on the practice of astroturfing. San Diego’s own Juan Vargas has a brief cameo during a discussion of the California flame retardant legislation lobbying.   [Read more…]

California Kids Meal Soda Ban: Would You Like Water, Milk, or Truth With That?

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If you were anywhere near the State Approved media lately, no doubt you heard about California’s upcoming ban on restaurants serving sodas to children. It must be true because Faux News and The Hill (among others) have made this assertion in headlines.

Except that it’s not true. Today’s headlines are based on an August 16 story in the Sacramento Bee which said no such thing   [Read more…]

Trump Tweets While California and the World Burns

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The world just keeps getting hotter, and California burns ever-more-furiously as one epic blaze after another strain not just our resources, but our ability to cognitively adjust to the fact that this is the new normal.  As I wrote in response to the huge fires in Los Angeles last December, “Reality is exceeding the capacity of our dystopian imaginations.”  

Temperatures broke records worldwide this summer prompting the Washington Post to run a startling headline about our “red-hot planet”, while the New York Times observed how “Scorching Summer in Europe Signals Long-Term Climate Changes.”  Here in California, Governor Jerry Brown visited the devastation in the wake of the Redding fire and bluntly commented that the problem behind these horrifying disasters was that, “We’re fighting nature with the amount of material that we’re putting in the environment, and that material traps heat.”  

That fire was then followed by the largest blaze in state history in Northern California and another big fire in Orange County, both coinciding with the huge inferno shutting down Yosemite, and others still.  Earlier in the summer, San Diego suffered through the Alpine fire and its own series of heat waves and freakishly warm, record-setting ocean temperatures in early August.  

The list goes on and on.     [Read more…]

Matt Brower for Judge | Candidate Profiles for the November 2018 Ballot

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Editor’s Note: The San Diego Free Press has asked three dozen candidates in key electoral contests from throughout the county for submissions explaining why they think progressive-leaning voters should consider voting for them. Many of these candidates are running in down-ballot contests often overlooked by voters.

I am challenging Gary Kreep in the upcoming November election for Seat 37 – California Superior Court Judge. This race stands out as the only one of six county-wide races from the June primary to advance to the general election in November. No matter where you live in San Diego County this race will appear on your ballot.

I began running for this seat when I saw the Commission on Judicial Performance had censured Judge Kreep in August of 2017 for committing over two dozen violations of the Cannons on Judicial Ethics that govern the behavior of judges in our local courts. Though these ethical violations were varied the ones that caught my attention were those involving unprofessional and disrespectful treatment toward women and minorities in court by Judge Kreep. I was already aware that Judge Kreep had participated in a lawsuit to prohibit President Obama’s name from appearing on the ballot in 2012 premised on the debunked theory that our nation’s first black president’s birth certificate lacked authenticity. This was known commonly as the birther movement. Once I became aware of the nature of Judge Kreep’s ethics violations it confirmed my suspicions regarding his worldview and made it clear to me he needed to be removed from his position of authority in our community.   [Read more…]

Marijuana, Opioids, and Alcohol: It Is Time to Change the Paradigm

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By Egberto Willies / Daily Kos

America needs a paradigm shift when it comes to how it deals with products that affect our moods, psyche, and our overall well-being. We must do so based on data instead of ideology, and deprogramming many will be difficult. But marijuana must be completely decriminalized.

Houston cannabis activist Ashley Miller appeared on Politics Done Right to bring awareness to many issues about marijuana, aka weed, aka cannabis. Her first goal was to dispel the notion that there are any valid reasons why marijuana is illegal. Second, she hoped to activate Americans both locally and throughout the country. As one listens to all the arguments and discourse about marijuana, there can only be one conclusion: the product should not be illegal.

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Beto O’Rourke’s Straight Answer to a Tough Question: Kneeling in the NFL | Video Worth Watching

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Beto O’Rourke fields a tough question during a town hall type meeting. And he does it with grace and sincerity. (h/t to Doug P.)

BONUS VIDEO: This 37 minute Facebook campaign video starts off with a minute or so of Beto skateboarding in the parking lot of a Whataburger. The dude can move.   [Read more…]

Looking Back at the Week: August 12-18

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This week’s edition of Looking Back at the Week contains articles, commentaries, columns, and other work by San Diego Free Press regulars, irregulars, columnists, cartoonists, at-large contributors, and locally and nationally sourced writers on freedom of the press, Prop 13, local GOP losing, stopping Trump’s SCOTUS pick, Judge Roy Cazares, SD’s shattered establishment, thhe Queen of Soul, and lots of other grassroots news & progressive views from San Diego’s feisty, all volunteer, slightly funky, community news site   [Read more…]

‘AMERICA’- A Musical Parody of the Classic ‘West Side Story’ Scene | Video Worth Watching

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I love Leonard Bernstein; I love the spirt, the sensibility, the music and dance of West Side Story. BUT! Anyone who has been to Puerto Rico, or has even a slight familiarity with Puerto Rican culture knows that the music and dance of the ostensibly Puerto Rican community of West Side Story is completely off-base.

News of a collaboration between Steven Spielberg and Tony Kushner for a remake of the musical, motivated actor/comedian Suni Reyes to call attention to this egregious misrepresentation. Her method is to parody one of the key musical scenes in a clever, timely and pointed skit. She even manages to briefly get in some authentic Puerto Rican music! Latino Rebels features an interview with Suni where she discusses some of the issues she wrestled with while creating the number.   [Read more…]

Judge Roy Cazares: From Shelltown to the Bench (With a Stopover at Harvard)

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On March 31, 1942, Roy Cazares was born in San Francisco del Oro, Chihuahua, Mexico. Roy Cazares is one of ten children born to Carlos and Norberta Cazares. When Roy was two years old, his family moved to San Diego and lived in Frontier Housing, located in Pacific Beach. His father Carlos had taken a job as a mechanical engineer in wartime San Diego. Roy was much too young to remember living in Mexico; however, he does remember that, while living in Frontier Housing, he and his brothers collected aluminum and rubber tires for war-focused San Diego.   [Read more…]

The World Mourns the Loss of the Queen of Soul, R.I.P. Aretha | Video Worth Watching

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With the passing of Aretha Franklin, the Queen of Soul, we look back over her legacy and remind ourselves of her incredibly rich and powerful history. Digby’s Hullabaloo has the fascinating story (with additional video) of how her iconic interpretation of “Respect” came to be.   [Read more…]

Stop Trump’s Supreme Court Choice! #UniteforJustice | Progressive Activist Calendar August 17 – 27, 2018

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It’s time to make some noise. The fix is on. Republicans have stacked the deck in ways never seen before to enable the confirmation of Brett Kavanaugh on the Supreme Court.

On August 26, in more than 100 cities across the country, people will be attending rallies and protests against a nominee with ultra-conservative legal views on a range of issues. He has repeatedly argued the Supreme Court should put the president above the law. Given that Donald Trump is at the center of a criminal investigation he should not be allowed to pick his own judge and jury.

Kavanaugh’s vote on the court would enable reactionary policies on reproductive freedom, health care, the environment, voting rights, workers’ rights, LGBTQ rights, and immigrant rights for generations.   [Read more…]

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