San Diego Free Press

Grassroots News & Progressive Views

The Starting Line – Walmart Walkout Widens to 12 States, Black Friday Walkout Threatened

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Walkouts at the worlds’ larger retailer spread to at least twenty eight stores in twelve states yesterday, with unprecedented protests against company treatment of employees and working conditions expected to continue today at the annual Walmart investor meeting in Bentonville, Arkansas.

Dan Schlademan, director of the United Food and Commercial Workers’ Making Change At Walmart campaign, said job actions took place in Dallas, Seattle, the San Francisco Bay area, Miami, the Washington, D.C., area, Los Angeles, Sacramento, Chicago and Orlando.  There were also reports of walkouts in Kentucky, Missouri and Minnesota.

The New York Times has posted an article saying that disgruntled Walmart employees, joined by labor unions and community groups, might stage a combined protest and educational campaign the Friday after Thanksgiving, the traditional start of the holiday shopping season.   [Read more…]

Homelessness Myth #25: Here a Homeless, There a Homeless

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For some time now, we have been aware of homelessness in our midst. In the 50’s, we called people without homes, “hobos.” The hobos were generally men who we believed chose the free and easy lifestyle of riding railroad cars and doing odd jobs for housed country folk in exchange for sandwiches.

In fact, the lives of hobos were romanticized through movies, including “Emperor of the North,” staring Lee Marvin and Ernest Borgnine.

Today, the fastest growing segment of the homeless population is families, including single mothers with their children. I don’t know anyone who believes that families choose a homeless lifestyle. There is nothing free and easy about their homelessness. And there are no romantic movies being made about their plight.   [Read more…]

The Scramble for Parks, Street Repairs, Fire Station, Street Lights and Sidewalks: City Heights Capital Improvements in the Time of Austerity

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The list does not include the pressing infrastructure need for wireless hubs throughout City Heights. Councilman Tony Young stated in a budget committee meeting earlier this year that he would like to see wireless access made available to the surrounding communities using our public libraries as a broadcasting source. He quickly discounted the possibility unless the City found a private partner.

Councilman Young knows that his district as well as the other low income districts constitute the have- not side of the digital divide. While the city as a whole ranks high in internet connectivity, there are whole sections of the city in which families do not have computers or are unable to afford monthly internet access fees. There are large swaths of the population who are not computer literate. City Heights is one of these communities.   [Read more…]

DeMaio and Co. Gin Up Pension Controversy

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Local Republican cabal refuses to take “Yes” for an answer in attempt to refight pension battle they’ve already won.

Republicans in this town must be getting desperate. How else do you explain Republican strategist Tony Manolatos putting together a press conference to bash Democratic mayoral candidate Bob Filner on something that has been settled policy for quite some time, and to my knowledge has not changed since the primary election last June.

I’ve covered the issue here and here. Filner had his own pension reform plan that he touted during the primary campaign. That plan included refinancing the city’s pension debt in order to take advantage of historically low interest rates and to lower the city’s debt payments, thereby freeing up funds for other vital city functions. But ever since Prop B won at the ballot box in June, Filner has accepted defeat on that measure and assured the voters of San Diego that he would follow their will and implement Prop B.   [Read more…]

Occupy San Diego: A Year Later

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By Nadine Abbott

Occupy San Diego reached an important milestone this weekend. Occupy San Diego is now one year old, and like all children, it has learned a lot this year, but also achieved quite a bit.

The weekend saw a series of events, some low key, some going back to it’s roots in the streets, celebrating the fact that OSD is still here. The first event was at Balboa Park on Saturday afternoon.

When I reached the Park I was no longer surprised to see San Diego Police coming in to talk to an Occupier. Well, so what is new? Same old, same old – right? This time, the officers had cause. No, not the usual we saw over the course of last year. They had a call, from another occupier, reporting what can best be described as a domestic dispute. Given the Occupier in question wore a Guy Fawkes costume with knives (which I could not tell at a distance were plastic either), the cops showed up in force. This is standard.

Moreover, while the Police kept an eye on Occupy, like they do on every demonstration that happens in this town, they also kept their actual contact to a minimum, and kept their distance.
  [Read more…]

The Starting Line –It’s Official in California; Let the Voting Begin

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Today marks the official start of ‘election month’ here in California. Mail in ballots are being mailed to people who have opted into voting by mail, something that 65% of voters did in this year’s primary elections.  I don’t care how or when you do it, but you need to vote.

I do care who or what you vote for.  Here’s a shameless plug for our Guide to the Ballot Propositions that explains why you should agree with me. And we have a easy-to-use link that will take you to all of San Diego Free Press’s election news & opinions.

The best reason to vote by mail… If you think you see soon-to-be Judge/Birther Gary Kreep lurking near your polling place, you’re not hallucinating.  Kreep is donating his legal skills to the Election Integrity Project, the local tea party front group seeking to ‘prevent fraud at the polling place’.

Now if we could only come up with an ‘app’ that turns off all those paid political ads once you’ve voted…   [Read more…]

Why didn’t she just leave?

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By Kit-Bacon Gressitt

Picture a sere summer night in Phoenix, Arizona, circa 1982.

I lay on a crinkly table in a cluttered ER, joking with the doc, bribing him with a promise of homemade shortbread if he could fix my face without leaving scars, looking anywhere but in his eyes, and I noticed a police officer nearby.

When I was all stitched and tidied up, I went to the cop and heard a quavering voice tell him that I wanted to press charges against my husband for assault.

The cop looked across the waiting room at him, sitting with his face buried behind his bloodied hands, his tiny mother, herself a victim, standing next to his chair, her arm around him while she stroked his head and kissed his fevered brow.

The cop looked back at me and said, “You don’t want to do that. You’ll just make him angry all over again, and it’ll be worse the next time.”   [Read more…]

Our Readers Write: Thoughts on the Anniversary of Occupy

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The day many Occupiers in San Diego had been anticipating. The one-year anniversary.

I reflected on the past year. I did not know about OSD when they did their first rally, so I missed it. But I attended every rally since. Though I did not ever camp overnight, I participated as often as I could. Donated so many items and food, as many other supporters did, only for them to be confiscated by the police during raids. Donated some more items and food again and again. Police raided the camp again and again.

I was never able to attend a General Assembly, but spent many hours watching the Livestream of it in the early days. I indirectly participated. I became familiar with the issues and the people involved. Though many of them were unfamiliar with me. I recognized them at the rallies, but often felt as an outsider because they did not know me. I spoke at City Council meetings after I witnessed the force used by the police. Never knowing that would be the first of many trips to City Council. My voice trembled as I spoke because I was so nervous. Now I think back on how all my words fell on deaf ears.   [Read more…]

The Starting Line – Polticos Seek to Spin California Gasoline Price Spike

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While the increases in the price of gasoline in California are setting records, politicians of every stripe are looking for ways to gain an advantage with voters. The fact is that there is no magical solution to the crisis, which has consumers paying well over $5 a gallon in parts of the Golden State. A little fairy dust from the GOP’s free market wand isn’t going to solve the problem. Sen. Diane Feinstein’s letter to the Federal Trade Commission won’t help either.

Of course, if you’d like the smog to return and don’t mind the asthma and respiratory diseases associated with air pollution to increase, we could dump some of those environmental regulations the righties are always complaining about. Or we could find ways to decrease our dependence on fossil fuels. And don’t hold your breath (pun intended) waiting for anyone to get busted for profiteering. Step inside to read all about it.   [Read more…]

Connecting the Dots Between Props 30 and 32: What’s the Union Busters’ Real Agenda for Education?

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Last week in the New York Times Adam Nagourney noted in his article on Proposition 32, “California Is Latest Stage in the Battle Over Unions,” that:

By design or not — and some union officials said they believed it was by design — the fight has forced unions to divert money from what had been their top priority: winning approval of an initiative by Gov. Jerry Brown to pass temporary tax increases to head off nearly $6 billion in new cuts in state spending.

“Labor has to stop everything it is doing to defend against this,” said Peter Dreier, the director of the Urban and Environmental Policy Department at Occidental College. “It’s pretty effective in forcing the unions to spend a lot of their resources to stop this from passing.”   [Read more…]

This Week In the War on Women: If You Don’t Want to Get F’d This November …

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Daily Kos / By Kaili Joy Gray / Oct. 6, 2012

Are you sick and tired of being sick and tired of the Republicans’ War on Women? Sick and tired of being told we’re “not ladylike” when we challenge them? That we “neuter” them when we stand up for our rights? That we shrink their penises with our feminism? (Well, okay, that one’s actually kind of fun, amirite, ladies?)

Come on inside for an It’s the Law… video and a list of cry-out-loud laws intended to restrict women’s rights and access to healthcare. Some of this is not safe for work.   [Read more…]

Advertising on Television Reaches $5 Billion as Super PAC Spending Skyrockets

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Alternet / By Steven Rosenfeld / Sept. 27, 2012

After the votes are counted in November, there will be a big winner in the 2012 election who is not Mitt Romney, Barack Obama nor their top donors. This winner does not want to change anything about how America’s latest national election was run.

The unadvertised victors are media businesses that are seeing political advertising profits reach into the billions. There is no one estimate that combines all of 2012’s campaign advertising across all media, but one of the biggest winners clearly will be local TV stations and regional TV networks in 10 presidential swing states—and in California because of its costly statewide ballot measures.   [Read more…]

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