California Here We Go: $15 Minimum Wage Headed for Statewide Ballot

California Here We Go: $15 Minimum Wage Headed for Statewide Ballot Posted: 07 Oct 2015 10:37 AM PDT By Doug Porter  California advocates for a statewide $15 per hour minimum wage are marshaling their forces in support of a November 2016 initiative. The mayors of San Francisco and Oakland, cities which have already passed increases, appeared at a press conference on Tuesday to announce they will be leading the effort. The measure was submitted to the state by the Service Employees International Union-United Healthcare Workers West. The Fair Wage Act of 2016 will raise the minimum wage for all California workers by $1 annually, effective January 2017. Once the minimum wage reaches $15, it will automatically go up each year to match the cost of living. The state’s minimum wage is currently $9 an hour and is set to rise to $10 on Jan. 1, 2016. Cities will continue to have the option of setting higher local minimum wages. San Diego events related to the Fight for $15 movement are already planned as part of the build-up to next year’s election. A regional wage hearing set for October 17th will hear testimony from workers, economists, academics, students, and labor leaders as a prelude to garnering commitments from local political leaders. A Day of Action in November will see protests on college campuses, at fast food restaurants, and in downtown San Diego.    [Read more...]

shared from San Diego Free Press Doctors Without Bullets Posted: 07 Oct 2015 07:04 AM PDT

Killer Robots: Coming Soon to a Battlefield Near You Posted: 07 Oct 2015 06:50 AM PDT "If there is not a pre-emptive ban on the high-level autonomous weapons then once the genie is out of the bottle it will be extremely difficult to get it back in." By Nadia Prupis / Common Dreams The U.S. and UK are undermining attempts by the United Nations to negotiate over the future of autonomous weapons—or "killer robots"—talks which, if delayed further, could come too late to prevent so-called "robot wars." Technology and human rights experts have been pushing for the UN to preemptively ban machines that can kill on the battlefield without human operators, citing a greater risk to civilian life and a broader lack of accountability for military officials. But Christof Heyns, UN special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary, or arbitrary executions, said Tuesday that the negotiation process is in danger of getting "stuck."   [Read more...]

Escondido’s Secretive Appearance Committee Decides What’s Art and What’s Not Posted: 07 Oct 2015 06:48 AM PDT By Wendy Wilson “There is no Federal constitutional issue more grave than the effort by government officials to censor works of expression and to threaten the vitality of a major cultural institution, as punishment for failing to abide by government demand for orthodoxy,” said U.S. District Judge Nina Gershon in the case, Brooklyn Institute of Arts and Sciences vs. City of New York. When the City Manager of Escondido, Clay Philips, turned a city committee called the “appearance committee” into his own personal censorship group, First Amendment advocates started to pay attention.  This committee was originally created to regulate what color downtown business owners could paint their buildings in the downtown historic district.   Under Clay Phillips office, with the consent of Mayor Abed and council people Gallo, Morasco and Masson, this closed committee has transformed into a tool for city censorship.  This taxpayer funded city committee meets to decide city regulations with no publically elected officials and no publically posted or published meeting times.   [Read more...]

The TRUTH will set you FREE.

Why Free College Tuition Makes Sense for America

Why Free College Tuition Makes Sense 

for America

Posted: 06 Oct 2015 05:29 AM PDT

By Bernie Rhinerson / FreeCollegeNow.Org 

Ever since President Obama announced Americas College Promise, his plan to make community colleges tuition free, the debate and conversation about making colleges free has been building with many productive ideas coming forward. This month, the San Diego Community College District may have become the first community college district in the country to approve an endorsement resolution supporting these efforts to make a community college education more affordable.  That is just one step of many that we need to take down the road to a future where a college education is expected, accessible and affordable for all young people in our country. More than 100 years ago, America began to acknowledge that to be successful, our younger citizens needed more education.  During the “high school movement” from 1910 to 1940, high schools were established to expand educational opportunities for students.  In 1910, only 9% of 18-year-olds graduated from a secondary school.  By 1940, 73% of high school age Americans were enrolled in a secondary school.  That educational explosion has been credited with the success achieved by our country in the 20^th century in the growth of the middle class, and scientific and technological achievements.   [Read more...]

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SANDAG, Water Agencies Faith Based Planning Posted: 06 Oct 2015 10:48 AM PDT By Doug Porter Two incredulous tales about the agencies entrusted to look out for the public good opting for short-sighted policies grabbed my attention this morning. Apparently climate change is a mere bureaucratic hurdle and the drought is soon to be forgotten. I guess we just gotta have faith, baby. Our regional transportation planners are set to approve a proposal no better than the one already rejected by the courts for failing to meet state-mandated greenhouse gas reduction goals, according to the group that took them to court in the first place. Ten local water agencies are, according to a story in Voice of San Diego, questioning state regulators about the need to continue restrictions on water use. They’re banking on a return to normalcy with the advent of El Nino conditions this winter, and are apparently ignorant of long term trends due to climate change.   [Read more...]

Effective Altruism: Is It Up To Rich People To Save the World? Posted: 06 Oct 2015 05:41 AM PDT By John Lawrence Peter Singer has written a book The Most Good You Can Do: How Effective Altruism Is Changing Ideas About Living Ethically (Yale University Press, 2015). Singer has been called "the world's greatest living philosopher" and is currently a Professor at Princeton so we must take his work seriously. Yet I'm bothered by the implications of his work as condensed in an essay: How You Can Do the Most Good: It's Not as Simple as You Think. He tells about one of his students who, though caring to extreme about the plight of poor people in the world, nevertheless, chose to go to work on Wall Street when he graduated. His reasoning was that he could help the most poverty stricken by dedicating a large amount of his considerable salary to helping them rather than going to work as a volunteer working directly with them in Africa, for instance. A huge amount of money contributed to the right charities would alleviate the conditions of more people than would be helped by a person of meager resources who devoted his working efforts to their cause.   [Read more...]

ReformCA Files Its California Pot Legalization Initiative Posted: 06 Oct 2015 05:39 AM PDT By Phillip Smith / AlterNet The California Coalition for Cannabis Policy Reform, also known as ReformCA, has filed a draft marijuana legalization initiative with state officials, the group announced Sunday. The long-anticipated move means the campaign best-placed to bring legalization to the Golden State can finally get underway. The Control, Regulate and Tax Cannabis Act of 2016 would allow people 21 and over to possess and cultivate limited amounts of marijuana and it would set up legal marijuana commerce overseen by a pair of new state agencies, the California Cannabis Commission and the Office of Cannabis Regulatory Affairs.   [Read more...]

Why Free College Tuition Makes Sense for America Posted: 06 Oct 2015 05:29 AM PDT By Bernie Rhinerson / FreeCollegeNow.Org Ever since President Obama announced Americas College Promise, his plan to make community colleges tuition free, the debate and conversation about making colleges free has been building with many productive ideas coming forward. This month, the San Diego Community College District may have become the first community college district in the country to approve an endorsement resolution supporting these efforts to make a community college education more affordable.  That is just one step of many that we need to take down the road to a future where a college education is expected, accessible and affordable for all young people in our country. More than 100 years ago, America began to acknowledge that to be successful, our younger citizens needed more education.  During the “high school movement” from 1910 to 1940, high schools were established to expand educational opportunities for students.  In 1910, only 9% of 18-year-olds graduated from a secondary school.  By 1940, 73% of high school age Americans were enrolled in a secondary school.  That educational explosion has been credited with the success achieved by our country in the 20th century in the growth of the middle class, and scientific and technological achievements.   [Read more...]

The TRUTH will set you FREE.

A Defining Issue for the 2016 Elections Will Be the Trans Pacific Pact (TPP)

A Defining Issue for the 2016 Elections Will Be the Trans Pacific Pact (TPP) Posted: 05 Oct 2015 10:57 AM PDT By Doug Porter  The United States and 11 other Pacific Rim nations have agreed to the largest regional trade accord in history, one promising to set international commerce standards affecting 40% percent of the world’s economy. The deal culminates years of negotiations setting up mechanics for a global economy as the basis for future prosperity. These negotiations never involved questioning the premise of neo-liberal policies as the foundation for economic development in the years ahead. In a nutshell, this means “marketplace” will be the final arbiter in the global economy. The rules of the economic game, as laid out in previous trade-pacts, are seen by the left as driving forces in the widening of economic inequality. This, along with parochial and nationalist concerns on the right, sets up the Trans Pacific Pact (TPP) as a defining political battle as the US heads into an election year.   [Read more...]

shared from San Diego Free Press Do All “Black Lives Matter?” Posted: 05 Oct 2015 05:46 AM PDT By Ernie McCray Damn. One day I'm writing a piece concerning discrimination against lesbians and gays, making a pitch for us to let the now proverbial Adam and Steve or Alanna and Eve feel at ease in just being themselves. And the very next day, to my dismay, I hear of a little 5-year-old black girl who is kicked out of a school, the Mt. Erie Christian Academy, because she has two moms. Whoa, right back where I started from. Another story about "beliefs." Christian beliefs. But I just have to say I can't see Christ turning some child away from a school with some lame excuse like "The Bible says homosexuality is a sin," making that little girl, in essence, a victim of her mothers' sins.   [Read more...]

US Bombing of Afghan Hospital Called a War Crime by Doctors Without Borders Posted: 05 Oct 2015 05:43 AM PDT By Nadia Prupis / Common Dreams Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) on Sunday called the U.S. military's Saturday airstrike on its charity hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan a war crime and announced it was withdrawing all staff from the beleaguered area. MSF said 22 people, including medical workers and patients, were killed in the bombing, which occurred around 2:10 am local time and reportedly lasted for at least half an hour. "Under the clear presumption that a war crime has been committed, MSF demands that a full and transparent investigation into the event be conducted by an independent international body," said MSF general director Christopher Stokes in a statement on Sunday.   [Read more...]

San Diego Democrats to Progressive Base: We’re Just Not That Into You Posted: 05 Oct 2015 05:41 AM PDT By Jim Miller Last week over at the San Diego Union-Tribune, Logan Jenkins had some fun pondering what might happen if the “Dems go dark” this upcoming mayoral election.   His conclusion?  It would push Faulconer to the top-tier of Republican candidates for Governor in 2018: And, it should be deduced, a cakewalk sweetens Faulconer’s prospects in Sacramento. In 18 months or so, Republicans will be looking for a governor candidate who can appeal to Latinos and independents as well as the conservative base. The Democrats have a long electable bench. Republicans? Not so much. If Faulconer is re-elected by a landslide in a major Democratic city, he’s going to rise to the top tier of the GOP’s A+ list.   [Read more...]

The TRUTH will set you FREE.

As Secret Trade Talks Reveal Cracks, Demonstrators Aim Death Blows at TPP

As Secret Trade Talks Reveal Cracks, Demonstrators Aim Death Blows at TPP Posted: 03 Oct 2015 09:13 AM PDT Pacific trade deal opponents hope that if Atlanta round fails, pro-corporate TPP could be knocked off track indefinitely By Deidre Fulton / CommonDreams  As trade ministers from around the world continued meeting in Atlanta on Thursday for final-stretch negotiations on the corporate-friendly Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP), civil society groups demonstrated on the streets in a final salvo against a deal they describe as "a wholesale auction of our rights, our freedoms, and our democracy to multinational corporations who put profits over people." "They're getting close, but we can stop them," reads the Citizens Trade Campaign's call-to-action. "If we do, and the Atlanta round fails, many believe the TPP could be knocked off track indefinitely."   [Read more...]

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San Diego Free Press Diary of a Refugee: Finding Hope In Art and Education Posted: 03 Oct 2015 09:44 AM PDT By Vanessa Ceceña Burma is a country in Southeast Asia that has been torn by civil war, unrest and a regime that instills fear in its people. After nearly 50 years of military rule, the country is currently in a process of renovation, but there are still accounts continued human rights violations. Like in many countries that have experienced unrest and a level of genocide, many in Burma fled their country and entered refugee camps in neighboring Thailand. Here is the story of Eh De Gray. De Gray identifies as Karen, one of the ethnic groups in Burma. He is the oldest of 5 and at the young age of 11, he decided to leave his home country and family to enter a refugee camp on the Burmese-Thai border. He wanted an education, an opportunity, something that he would not get if he remained in Burma.   [Read more...]

The TRUTH will set you FREE.

North Of The Fence: South Bay Politics and Events

North Of The Fence: South Bay Politics and Events Posted: 02 Oct 2015 11:42 AM PDT By Barbara Zaragoza Immigration and Crime You might be surprised to learn that border cities continue to be among the safest in the country. Imperial Beach was ranked the second safest city in San Diego County.(Poway came in first.) Also, you are least likely to be murdered in the two border cities of El Paso, TX and San Diego in comparison to 23 other cities in the U.S. Take a look at the FBI data that ranks cities by murder rate. The Pew Research Center found that Asians have supplanted Hispanics as the largest group of newcomers. The organization also reports that views of immigrants are largely split along party lines in America. 71% of Republicans say immigrants in the U.S. are making crime worse, compared with 35% of Democrats.   [Read more...]

shared from San Diego Free Press Oregon College Massacre, More Gun Nut Excuses Posted: 02 Oct 2015 11:15 AM PDT By Doug Porter A very disturbed 26-year-old man killed nine people and injured seven others at a community college in Oregon on October 1st. He was killed in a gunfight with police officers responding to 911 calls. The President made his 15th appearance to address the nation following a mass shooting. He was obviously very angry and frustrated. The blowback from the right edge of the flat-earthers was, as usual, both ignorant and infuriating.   [Read more...]

Are Charter School Directors Bending Pension Rules? Posted: 02 Oct 2015 08:55 AM PDT By Rick Mercurio / Alianza North County Teachers and administrators in California’s public schools earn pensions based on several factors. For some, like Dennis Snyder, the founder of three charter schools in Escondido CA, it adds up to a healthy lifetime benefit, even though his final employer was not a public school district, and even though he found an apparent loophole in the regulations. Snyder’s situation Dennis Snyder worked as a teacher and football coach at Escondido High School starting in about 1965. In 1986 the principal fired Snyder as coach, citing the reason that he was not cooperative with the parent booster organization. Snyder appealed the firing to both the superintendent and the school board, and he lost both appeals. Although he was let go as head football coach, he retained his teaching position. However, in the early ‘90s Snyder switched jobs, becoming executive director of the Escondido Charter High School, which he founded. Heritage K-8 Charter School and Heritage Digital Academy were later founded by Snyder as well. Snyder’s salary as executive director eventually rose to almost $111,000.   [Read more...]

SANDAG’s Gary Gallegos: ‘Transit is not going to work for every person in the region’ Posted: 02 Oct 2015 08:54 AM PDT By Sam Ollinger / BikeSD “We are not going to put everybody on a bike, we are not going to take everybody out of their car, transit is not going to work for every person in the region.” – Gary Gallegos, executive director of SANDAG, San Diego’s Metropolitan Planning Organization. January 8, 2014. “the SANDAG plan is to spend more than half the $204 billion on mass transit, adding five new Trolley lines, 32 new rapid bus lines and 275 miles of new bikeways, as well as 160 miles of freeway lanes intended to help transit and encourage carpools and van pools. The net effect would be to reduce county greenhouse gas emissions by considerably more than state targets.” – UT Editorial Board I don’t know what sort of drugs the UT Editorial Board is consuming, because if they bothered to read SANDAG’s own analysis they would have seen that implementing the existing Regional Transportation Plan (scheduled for a SANDAG board vote on October 9th) in its current form is going to increase the region’s greenhouse gas emissions.   [Read more...]

Geo-Poetic Spaces: Taken Posted: 02 Oct 2015 08:53 AM PDT Lashing out of imperial robes at Saint Paul's pillar where the founder of Christianity was whipped by its father Sun striking me with its scorpion tail One soft drink from heatstroke and Parousia when, "A fisher of men," limped toward me rattling small change in a paper cup   [Read more...]

The TRUTH will set you FREE.

University Contract Workers Wages –Or Lack Thereof– in the Crosshairs

University Contract Workers Wages –Or Lack Thereof– in the Crosshairs Posted: 01 Oct 2015 10:06 AM PDT By Doug Porter  Today (Oct 1), some contract employees working on University of California facilities will be seeing a pay hike to $13 an hour. The university system is California’s third largest employer and the largest employer in San Diego. Earlier this year UC President Janet Napolitano announced a plan to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour over a three-year roll-out for all workers, including contract ones, and today's bump is just the first stage.   Or maybe they won’t be seeing that raise. The Los Angeles Times reports the Department of Labor has launched an investigation into long-time contractor Performance First Building Services failure to pay overtime to workers cleaning up after sporting events at UC Berkeley.   [Read more...] shared from

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Return to Delano: the 50th Anniversary of the Delano Grape Strike Posted: 01 Oct 2015 07:14 AM PDT By Maria E. Garcia A few weeks ago, when the United Farm Workers (UFW) posted that there would be a celebration commemorating the 50th anniversary of the Delano Grape Strike, I posted a simple sentence on Facebook: ” San Diego is anybody going?” Within a few minutes my friend Gloria Serrano-Medina responded with a simple “vamos” and with that one word a decision to be part of that celebration was made. This would not be my first trip to the Forty Acres, the parcel of land in Delano, California that in 1966 became the headquarters for the United Farm Workers of America, the first permanent agricultural labor union in the United States.  [Read more...]

Random Acts of Kindess Posted: 01 Oct 2015 06:55 AM PDT By Jeeni Criscenzo

Thoughts while enjoying the super moon during the lunar eclipse of Sept. 27, 2015

Although raised Roman Catholic and indoctrinated with 12 years of Catechism classes in parochial school, I decided, even before graduating high school that neither Catholicism nor any religion, was for me. When the Sisters of Charity taught that faith is a gift, I responded that I didn’t get the gift and didn’t want it. Long before I was “expelled” from the church for marrying a second time, I had decided that I could be a good person without following rules written by men who “believed” the earth was flat. So as I followed the coverage of Pope Francis’ recent visit to the United States, I kept in mind that he was the leader of a faith that will not relinquish power to women to make their own medical decisions or to give them access to leadership as priests, bishops or the papacy.   [Read more...]

Ta-Nehisi Coates, ‘Unflinching’ Voice on Racism, Declared MacArthur Genius Posted: 01 Oct 2015 06:42 AM PDT

'Writing without shallow polemic and in a measured style, Coates addresses complex and challenging issues such as racial identity, systemic racial bias, and urban policing,' declared the MacArthur Foundation.

By Sarah Lazare / Common Dreams Journalist, author, and leading voice on anti-black racism in America, Ta-Nehisi Coates, was revealed Tuesday to be one of 24 recipients of the 2015 MacArthur Genius awards. "Writing without shallow polemic and in a measured style, Coates addresses complex and challenging issues such as racial identity, systemic racial bias, and urban policing," declared the foundation. "He subtly embeds the present—in the form of anecdotes about himself or others—into historical analysis in order to illustrate how the implications of the past are still experienced by people today."   [Read more...]

To Cut Costs, College Students Are Buying Less Food and Even Going Hungry Posted: 01 Oct 2015 06:39 AM PDT By Sara Goldrick-Rab, University of Wisconsin-Madison and Katharine Broton, University of Wisconsin-Madison / The Conversation Studies have long shown that a college student’s odds of achieving financial security and a better quality of life improve when he or she earns a degree. But what are some of the obstacles that prevent degree attainment? At the Wisconsin HOPE Lab, we study the challenges that students from low- and moderate-income households face in attaining a college degree. Chief among these are the many hurdles created by the high price of college. Paying the price of attending college, we find, changes who attends and for how long, as well as the college experience itself – what classes students take, the grades they earn, the activities in which they engage and even with whom they interact. Our recent research shows an alarming trend on college campuses: an increasing number of students tell us that they are struggling in college, sometimes even dropping out, because they can’t afford enough of life’s basic necessity – food.   [Read more...]

The TRUTH will set you FREE.

Disaster Capitalism and the Shutdown of the San Onofre Nuclear Plant

Disaster Capitalism and the Shutdown of the San Onofre Nuclear Plant By Michael Steinberg /Black Rain Press  This story starts with a clandestine dinner in Warsaw, Poland. Present are Michael Peevey, president of the California Public Utility Commission, and Stephen Pickett, a high ranking official with Southern California Edison, a major electrical utility. It is March 2013, the same month SCE announced the unexpected permanent shutdown of its San Onofre Nuclear Power Station. No nukers were elated. But their joy later turns to disappointment and then outrage when the CPUC subsequently hands down a decision that leaves us on the hook for billions of dollars in costs supposedly related to the shutdown of San Onofre. How did this happen, and so relatively quickly?   [Read more...] shared from San Diego Free Press School Board Trustee Praised, Defended and Investigated, All in a Day at San Diego Unified Posted: 30 Sep 2015 11:18 AM PDT By Doug Porter School Board Trustee Marnie Foster is at the center of several controversies in the San Diego Unified School District. A meeting of the trustees yesterday featured numerous TV trucks lined up outside, partisans and opponents inside, along with three distinct actions and enough drama for a cable mini-series. Documents released by the district answered many questions raised concerning the School of Creative and Performing Arts, at the center of the current controversy. Responding to charges that Trustee Foster had intervened in school affairs on behalf of her son, the district’s documents amounted to a master class in how to respond to a political controversy: hit’em [critics] hard and hit ‘em long. This situation is far from resolved, however. Also, the school board authorized an investigation into Trustee Foster’s involvement in a fundraiser on behalf of her son’s college fund and a claim filed against the district allegedly by the child’s father. And they passed a resolution praising Foster for her work promoting equity in the district.  Confused yet? It is complicated, to be sure.   [Read more...] I Hope We Can Finally Just Let Adam and Steve Be Posted: 30 Sep 2015 07:02 AM PDT (No Matter What our Beliefs Happen to Be) This Kim Davis situation is just too familiar for my liking, too much like it has always been in this country based on what I've seen in 77 years. I mean I have no idea what this woman's work entails in a day. But one of her tasks seems, to me, like a dream job, where all she'd have to do is a little soft shoe with jazz hands and a big smile and sing: "Howdy do. Congratulations, you two. Here's your marriage license. Toddle-oo!" But she can only do that for "Adam and Eve." "Adam and Steve" or any woman whose honey is a she has to be insulted by her for all the world to see because of what her scripture has taught her to believe.   [Read more...] Does the Pope Smoke Dope? Posted: 30 Sep 2015 07:01 AM PDT By the Ol’ OB Hippie Does the Pope smoke dope? Does Pope Francis imbibe in the inhalation of medicinal cannabis? No, really – I wanted to know if the Pope smoked dope. I have heard rumors to that effect – for years actually. And I wanted to find out. I knew he was coming to the U.S., so I had to figure out a way to meet up with him.   [Read more...] The U.S. and Mexico Dance to the Same Tune Posted: 30 Sep 2015 06:48 AM PDT Nuclear Shutdown News for September 2015 – the Costs of San Onofre Posted: 30 Sep 2015 06:42 AM PDT Disaster Capitalism and the Shutdown of the San Onofre Nuclear Plant By Michael Steinberg /Black Rain Press This story starts with a clandestine dinner in Warsaw, Poland. Present are Michael Peevey, president of the California Public Utility Commission, and Stephen Pickett, a high ranking official with Southern California Edison, a major electrical utility. It is March 2013, the same month SCE announced the unexpected permanent shutdown of its San Onofre Nuclear Power Station. No nukers were elated. But their joy later turns to disappointment and then outrage when the CPUC subsequently hands down a decision that leaves us on the hook for billions of dollars in costs supposedly related to the shutdown of San Onofre. How did this happen, and so relatively quickly?   [Read more...]

The TRUTH will set you FREE.

The Movement for a Balanced Transportation Future In the San Diego Region

The Movement for a Balanced Transportation Future In the San Diego Region

Posted: 28 Sep 2015 05:36 AM PDT

By Monique López, policy advocate at Environmental Health Coalition 

We all need to move, and how we move influences our quality of life. The time of our commute, the safety of our sidewalks, the quality of our air and the type of transportation options we have determine how well we live our lives. On October 9, 2015, the San Diego Association of Governments (SANDAG) will decide how to invest $204 billion into our region’s transportation infrastructure. This decision is critical to our livelihood. That much investment will have a tremendous impact on the lives of everyone in our region, particularly the lives of those in San Diego’s urban core where freeways intersect neighborhoods and transit, biking and walking infrastructure is scarce. How these funds are invested will determine whether our region takes a step toward becoming a forward-thinking, sustainable place or whether we remain driving in circles, stuck in the incessant traffic jam that is our car-first mentality.  [Read more...]

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Congressional Values: “Zippidy do-da, zippidy day.” Posted: 28 Sep 2015 10:30 AM PDT By Doug Porter Speaker of the House John Boehner was singing the classic Disney ditty as he walked in for a Friday morning press conference where he shocked just about everybody by announcing his resignation. While Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) is considered a probable successor to Boehner as Speaker, it’s worthwhile to look at the recently concluded 10th annual Value Voters Summit for some context about the changes taking place. It was, after all, the crowd at the political conference for American social conservative activists that gave a standing ovation after hearing news of the Ohio congressman’s resignation.   [Read more...]

Taking the Leap: Imagine a New World Posted: 28 Sep 2015 05:37 AM PDT By Jim Miller Last week the Pope came to America and delivered his groundbreaking message about the interrelated problems of climate change and economic inequality as well as the moral imperative to act to address them.   We heard this message at the same time we learned that we have lost half the world’s marine animals since 1970 and that Exxon’s own research had confirmed the human role in climate changedecades ago even as they were heavily funding efforts to block solutions.  During all of this, we were also reminded that every GOP candidate for President has absolutely nothing to offer in the face of this deadly threat.   Clearly we need to change the game and do it quickly.  But how?     [Read more...]

Carlsbad Referendum Signatures Stun Caruso, City Council Pals Posted: 28 Sep 2015 05:37 AM PDT

Strawberry Field Owner's Campaign Donations Revealed

By Richard Riehl It must have been quite a shock for L.A.'s Caruso Affiliated executives to see the stack of signed petitions delivered to the Carlsbad city clerk's office last Thursday. The 9,000 signers of the referendum petition are calling for a public vote on the developer's plan for a lagoon-view shopping center, as promised in the title of the initiative, Measure to be Submitted Directly to the Voters. When the Carlsbad city Council unanimously approved his plan on August 25, Caruso had already spent nearly $3 million on signature gatherers and a blizzard of glossy, full-color mailers to persuade 20,000 Carlsbadians that his plan to build a shopping mall was all about saving the Strawberry Fields. The day after the council voted, a grassroots group, Citizens for North County, announced its plan to launch a referendum drive. Caruso had to redouble his marketing campaign. But this time his mailers, accompanied by daily prime time TV ads, featured headshot photos of and quotes from all five city Council members, as well as the owner of the Strawberry Fields. Each repeated the lie that signing the referendum would destroy the Strawberry Fields, despite the promise of Prop D to preserve them, passed by voters in 2006. The Caruso mailer included a detachable, postage-paid card to return to the city clerk for signers of the referendum to have their names withdrawn.   [Read more...]

The Movement for a Balanced Transportation Future In the San Diego Region Posted: 28 Sep 2015 05:36 AM PDT By Monique López, policy advocate at Environmental Health Coalition We all need to move, and how we move influences our quality of life. The time of our commute, the safety of our sidewalks, the quality of our air and the type of transportation options we have determine how well we live our lives. On October 9, 2015, the San Diego Association of Governments (SANDAG) will decide how to invest $204 billion into our region’s transportation infrastructure. This decision is critical to our livelihood. That much investment will have a tremendous impact on the lives of everyone in our region, particularly the lives of those in San Diego’s urban core where freeways intersect neighborhoods and transit, biking and walking infrastructure is scarce. How these funds are invested will determine whether our region takes a step toward becoming a forward-thinking, sustainable place or whether we remain driving in circles, stuck in the incessant traffic jam that is our car-first mentality.  [Read more...]

California’s Renewables Progress Commendable But Emission Of Global CO2 Still Exponential Posted: 28 Sep 2015 04:51 AM PDT By Frank Thomas California continues its remarkable legislative breakthroughs in going green under the SB 350 Clean Energy and Pollution Reduction Act of 2015. Legislation just passed sets two goals for 2030: 50% of state utility power from renewables and a 50% increase in energy efficiency of buildings. The provision for a 50% reduction in petroleum use for cars and trucks failed to pass as did the SB 32 bill that sets GHG emission targets for 2030 and 2050. Still, the sweeping new mandates passed call for DOUBLING energy efficiency and using renewables for HALF of California’s electricity generation by 2030. It is uncertain how fast and to what extent transportation electrification will proceed California's aim to step up its commitment to clean energy acknowledges the scientific reality we humans don't have the luxury of lots of time to transition FAST to renewable energy and much improved energy efficiency.   [Read more...]

The TRUTH will set you FREE.