San Diego Free Press

Grassroots News & Progressive Views

Closing the Deal for David Alvarez: Your Vote Will Make a Difference

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Perhaps out of the summer of scandal and the fall of discord, new hope can be born

By Jim Miller

With less than 24 hours to go until the polls open, San Diego’s special election for mayor has turned into a contest to see who will face Republican Kevin Faulconer in the run-off. A Datamar automated poll last Wednesday showed Faulconer at 44% with Alvarez pulling in at 25.3%, way ahead of Fletcher’s 15.9%. This was followed by yesterday’s UT poll that showed Faulconer ahead as well but with Fletcher up by two over Alvarez, 24% to 22%, a statistical dead heat.

The American Federation of Teachers’ (AFT) final internal polling has the race to make the run-off at 20% for Alvarez and 14.3% for Fletcher with a big pool of undecided voters still waiting to make their call at the last minute. Thus, taking all of this into account, it’s mostly likely a dead heat leaning Alvarez heading into Tuesday. Alvarez can make the primary and win, but his voters have to show up for that to happen.

Bottom line: your vote matters a lot this time. We’ll either have a race between plutocracy and plutocracy-lite or we’ll have an opportunity to keep a bold progressive agenda alive in San Diego. It’s your choice.   [Read more…]

Readers Write: Time for a 21st Century City

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By Christian Ramirez

Three generations of my family call the 8th District of the City of San Diego home. We love San Diego but could never live far from Tijuana; in fact, our clan has an unspoken rule that to live north of I-8 is akin to falling off the face of Earth. Our roots are intertwined with the border; we are proud fronterizos, borderlanders.

America’s Finest City has not always embraced our border identity; in fact many of us who live in the southern part of San Diego have always had the uneasy feeling that City Hall had its back turned towards us. That is until we elected David Alvarez as our councilmember. As soon as he took office David got to work, he understood that the border region is an economic engine and celebrated our unique cultural heritage.

When we learned that David was running for mayor, my family knew that we could finally have the opportunity to fully be engaged in the civic life of our city. A mayor that understands us, can you imagine!   [Read more…]

Readers Write: An Impassioned Plea for ‘Proposition F’

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By Matt Valenti 

What do school bathrooms have to do with San Diego’s mayoral candidates?

Well, some of the same people who brought us Proposition 8 are at it again, having gathered enough signatures to place an initiative on the 2014 ballot that would repeal California’s transgender students’ rights bill. That law is to take effect in January and will provide transgender students with equal access to school programs and facilities.

But if there’s to be a law meant to prevent people from passing themselves off as something they’re not, perhaps it should be a law to prevent conservative Republicans from passing themselves off as progressives. This is a phenomenon that San Diego has seen a lot of lately.

What we need is a local ballot initiative we could call “Proposition F,” after the two mayoral candidates who are the worst offenders: Nathan Fletcher and Kevin Faulconer.   [Read more…]

Groovin’ on a Sunday Afternoon

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By Ernie McCray

A little while ago while kicking back in a park with a few members of my family tree, I found myself humming the Rascal’s catchy tune, “Groovin’ on a Sunday Afternoon,” because that’s what we were doing. Grooving. Cruising. Schmoozing. Amusing. Aka enjoying ourselves.

On a Sunday afternoon.

As we laughed and talked about what’s going on now with us and what went on in our past, individual thoughts about each precious one of them would rise in my mind.   [Read more…]

Average Car Costs $9,000 Annually; What Else Could You Buy With That Much Money?

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By John P. Anderson

In May my family moved to North Park and we promptly had our bicycles stolen from our garage, including the trailer we used to transport our young daughter.  Bummer, big time.  One plus side was the encouraging messages and help I received from many sources in San Diego, including the Free Press.

Although it’s not fun to have a bicycle stolen it’s some comfort that having bicycles has made it possible for us to avoid the costs of owning a second vehicle.  My bicycle cost about $650, which is a pretty nice bicycle, but I could buy 14 bicycles per year for the annual costs of one car.  This got me thinking, what else could I buy for the annual cost of a car?   [Read more…]

For the Love of Food: Spinach with Bacon and Pomegranate

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By Melissa Phy / For the Love of Food

‘Tis the season for pomegranates! I used them in a salad a couple weeks ago and was trying to find a way to use up the other pomegranate I had in an equally delicious, but more creative, way.

My good friend (we’ll call him D) told me he made spinach with pomegranate seeds in it, and I deemed him the genius of our time. It adds a nice crunch and sweetness to an otherwise soft and bitter green. And, as we all know, bacon makes everything delicious.   [Read more…]

Tío Emilio and the Secrets of the Ancestors: Chapter 26 — Changes

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That was the power that Don Emilio was telling us about. The simple powerful truth of our ancient Mexican culture—which is, everything in the Universe is made up of energy, and energy helps us to create our own reality if we focus on increasing our energy, and allow that energy to make magical connections to people, things, and events.
 

By Richard Juarez

I had just come out of City Hall after getting information about a student internship when I heard a familiar voice.

“Hey, homie, need a lift?”
  [Read more…]

Democrat in Republican Clothes

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Nathan Fletcher was always a member of the Republican Party, but he wasn’t really one of them.

By Andy Cohen

It’s the subject of much consternation and speculation. It was a move made out of pure political expediency, insist some in the local political sphere. An act of blatant opportunism, plain and simple. A cold, calculated move to set up for his next run for office. The GOP hates him, the ubiquitous “They” say about the former Republican State Assemblyman-turned-independent-turned Democrat. So now he’s trying to pull a con job on everyone else to convince them he’s “changed” and now he really is one of “you.”

That’s the narrative Nathan Fletcher’s political opponents would like you to believe. Fletcher’s switch to the Democratic Party was made simply because he could find no home elsewhere, but he doesn’t really mean it. He’s still a Republican in a blue suit, whether or not the GOP will lay claim to him.

The truth, as Fletcher tells it, is nowhere near as sinister, far more complicated, and was almost as surprising to him as it was to his critics, on both the left and the right. It was a move he was prodded, even courted into by prominent Democratic elected officials and Party representatives. It wasn’t something he sought to do, but rather something that was sought of him.

You’re a Democrat, Nathan. Might as well make it official.   [Read more…]

Scott Peters Joins GOP’s 47th Effort to Scuttle Obamacare

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…the hilariously hypocritical attempt by Republicans to “fix” a law that everybody knows they would much prefer to burn on the steps of the Capitol while eating great balls of hashish and doing a frenzied goat-dance with their faces painted purple. 

By Doug Porter

Representative Scott Peters, who represents California’s 52nd Congressional District, is a moderate Democrat determined to prove to his borderline Republican district that he can play the bi-partisan game.

I get that. It’s just that you’ve got to draw the line somewhere. And Obamacare is that place.

Peters chose on Friday to join with House Republicans in passing legislation proposed by Rep. Fred Upton (R.-MI) that House Speaker John Boehner characterizes as a step towards repealing the Affordable Care Act.  Others call it the 47th vote to repeal Obamacare.   [Read more…]

Analyzing the Responses: Virtual Mayoral Forum—Transit and Walkable, Bikeable Communities

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Civic leaders have a renewed focus on a bikeable city, but transit still falls woefully short of serving San Diego’s needs.

By SDFP Staff

Part 4:  Walkable/ Bikable Neighborhoods and Public Transit

Here’s our question to the candidates:

What is the importance of walkable/bikeable neighborhoods and public transit in San Diego? 

World class cities have world class transit.  In San Diego, we have a world class, and often overcrowded, freeway system and city streets that are often pocked by ruts and cracks, and sometimes suspension-bending potholes.  But we are a city that is dependent on our cars, so we continue to climb behind the wheel simply to get to the grocery store 3/4 of a mile away.  Our public transit system is almost entirely inadequate to act as a replacement for cars, leaving San Diegans who don’t live on the trolley line or on one of the major bus routes little choice but to drive to their destination in order to arrive in a timely fashion.

So in this regard, San Diego has a long way to go to be able to consider itself world class.   [Read more…]

CNN Joins the Cover-Up of the Kennedy Assassination

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By Frank Gormlie

This may not be a surprise to hardcore corporate media watchers, but CNN has joined the ranks of those establishment outlets that are continuing the cover-up of the assassination of John F Kennedy. The news station has jumped on the bandwagon that is making a lot of noise these days due to the 50th anniversary of the President’s murder.

It was a real disappointment however, in viewing CNN’s “The Assassination of President Kennedy” because one of my favorite actors, Tom Hanks, was one of the producers and I was looking for some truth. Alas, it did not come through.

The show promised a look at the Warren Commission Report, and it started out with a lot of television footage from those crazy days in Dallas, November 22nd through the 24th when Lee Harvey Oswald was killed by Jack Ruby. The old TV scenes in black and white gave the film authenticity, which were followed up by interviews of some of the major researchers and book authors on the killing of Kennedy.

It started off fairly balanced, with old scenes of Jim Garrison – the New Orleans DA who brought the only trial involving the assassination to life in America – , interviews with Mark Lane – the original critic of the Warren Commission, and also interviews with those who back the “3-bullet theory” and think Oswald did it and did it alone.   [Read more…]

National Security Agency’s Secret Role in City Heights Somali Case Upheld by Judge

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By Doug Porter

 U.S. District Court Federal Judge Jeffrey Miller denied a motion yesterday that would have granted a new trial for four Somali men convicted of aiding terrorists.

At the heart of their appeal were defense assertions that evidence collected by the National Security Agency violated the Fourth Amendment Rights of the defendants.

You might think this was an open and shut case: the government’s “big ears” caught some bad guy terrorists and they were brought to justice. But you’d be wrong.

The implications of this case go far beyond the common media portrayal of some African immigrants wiring money to a shady militia back home.   [Read more…]

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