OB Rag

Nov. 3rd:– the Day Americans Take Back Our Country

5:50 pm House Speaker Mike Johnson: “The barbarians are inside the gates.”

House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-Louisiana) –who is about to lose his job– went heavy on fear in his closing argument for Republican Rep. Rob Wittman in Virginia’s closely contested 1st District, which Johnson said is crucial for maintaining GOP control of the House. “Common sense versus crazy is what’s going on,” Johnson said Monday afternoon to about 100 Wittman supporters gathered in a suburban Richmond diner. “The barbarians are inside the gates.”

5:43pm One-third of voters  — and nearly 8 in 10 Democrats — say democracy is top issue. 

Nearly a third of voters and an overwhelming majority of Democrats say the state of democracy is the most important issue facing the country, according to new NBC News exit polling. According to the poll released Tuesday night, 32% of voters said democracy was the top issue, just seven percentage points below the economy. And democracy ranked higher than any other issue among Democrats: 77% of them said it was the country’s most important issue. Democracy Docket

The state of democracy ranked higher than crime, foreign policy, health care and immigration as voters’ top issues. That result is remarkable because economic grievances have been a central theme of the 2026 midterms. According to the poll, 44% of voters said their finances are worse today than they were two years ago, when President Donald Trump returned to office.

5:38pm Democrat Chris Pappas, currently a member of the House, will represent New Hampshire in the Senate and make history in the process: He will be the first openly gay member of the chamber. His husband is Vann Bentley, a lawyer.

Former North Carolina governor Roy Cooper has defeated Republican Michael Whatley, according to the Associated Press, to become the state’s first Democratic senator elected in nearly two decades. Cooper will fill the seat left open by Sen. Thom Tillis (R), who did not seek reelection.

New CNN projection: The GOP saves Florida’s Senate seat. Ashley Moody will beat DSA Democrat Angie Nixon. But it was a lot closer than the GOP wanted.

5:25 pm In a bellweather county in Texas, James Talarico ahead of Paxton by 9 points. Latino voters are coming out heavily for the Democrats, in places like Texas – 60% and Florida 56%.

Florida gain for Dems: At least three House seats in Florida targeted by GOP redistricting will be won by Democrats, CNN projects. Overall, several GOP sources involved in House races are growing worried about the results so far, suggesting Democrats could be in for a good night. .

5:20 pm Jon Ossoff, the incumbent, projected to win in Georgia, 66.4% vs 33.6% for Mike Collins.[ These are projections by NBC News , MS Now]

Several senate races are too close to call, like Florida, Maine, Mississippi. Very close in Florida.

Sherrod Brown projected to win the senate seat from Ohio.
4:24 pm 62% vs 38% Trump approval ratings in exit polls. Worst rating of a president during an election. 

Democrat With Local Roots Outshines Triple-Time Trump Voter and Carpetbagger Richard Bailey

Candidate Nicole Crosby has won the OB Rag’s endorsement for the general election to be held in 30 days. Coming to this stance, I looked at Nicole’s campaign website, my experiences over the last year with Richard Bailey, reviewed candidate debate reports from the U-T, Times of San Diego and our own Rag account.

Bailey has been campaigning for over a year and has polished off a number of campaign phrases — he’s into policies not politics, and the city doesn’t have a money problem, it has a spending problem. Yet, of course, he’s into politics.

Although not perfect, Crosby has a more compassionate heart than Bailey does when you compare their positions on San Diego’s homelessness, rent-control, city staffing,Trump’s immigration policies and the constitutional rights of all citizens in the area.

Of note are Crosby’s local roots — they particularly stand out in heavy contrast to the current District 2 officeholder, Jen Campell. Crosby and her family have lived in Clairemont for many years; she was the president of the PTA for her daughter’s school and was the chair of the Clairemont Town Council. This is also a huge contrast between her and the other candidate, Richard Bailey. Bailey

SDPD Investigating

By Dana Williams / 7SanDiego / Nov. 2, 2026

Two fathers had a frightening experience after their children picked up what appeared to be candy from a porch in Ocean Beach while trick-or-treating, only to discover the packaging identified the treats as psilocybin mushroom gummies.

The San Diego Police Department is investigating the Halloween incident, but questions remain about who left the gummies outside the home and whether they actually contained illegal drugs.

Frank Cary and Cameron Hunter were trick-or-treating with their children and several neighborhood families Saturday night when they made the discovery.

The parents said they were walking just a few yards behind their children when the kids approached a porch with a bowl of what appeared to be candy.

Cary said his 2-year-old grabbed one of the packages before he noticed something unusual about it.

By Natalie Hausmann / Democracy Docket / November 2, 2026
The Supreme Court swiftly rejected the Trump administration’s emergency bid to force California to segregate ballots from more than 20,000 people it alleges may be noncitizens. 

The decision hands the administration its third and final defeat in its effort to intervene in the state’s ongoing election.

The justices denied the administration’s emergency application without explanation, just hours after it was filed Monday. Justice Elena Kagan referred the request to the full Court, which rejected it with no noted dissents. 

By Lindsay Whitehurst / PBS – Associated Press / Nov. 2, 2026

Trump administration appeals to Supreme Court to sideline 20,000 disputed California mail ballots

See Below — Analysis: More than 40% of names on DOJ list of alleged noncitizens not on California’s voter rolls

President Donald Trump’s administration appealed to the Supreme Court on Monday — today, Nov. 2 — in its push to sideline thousands of disputed California mail ballots the day before the pivotal midterm elections.

The emergency appeal came after a divided appeals court rejected the request to set aside ballots from some 20,000 people the federal government suspects may not be citizens. It also came just hours before another federal judge ruled against the administration’s efforts to make last-minute changes in California’s election.

The federal government says those ballots should not be counted until the voters’ status can be verified. California officials say the list is highly unreliable and likely includes many people who are U.S. citizens.

The Republican Trump administration has prioritized identifying noncitizen voters this year, despite them being rare.

A district court judge had previously denied the Justice Department’s request and warned that the demand could disenfranchise citizens in Tuesday’s midterm elections to determine control of Congress.

Impeachment and court reform stand out as the most powerful accountability tools Dems will have

By Bill Blum / Common Dreams – Truthdig / Nov 01, 2026 Truthdig

It’s not enough for the Democrats to win the midterms. Whether they take back one or both chambers of Congress, their overriding objective must be to cripple the remainder of Donald Trump’s presidency and dismantle the MAGA movement he leads. Holding Trump and his key enablers to account for their lawlessness and corruption will be the standard for success. Without accountability, there will be no justice and no end to the growing threat of fascism in America.

Of all the accountability tools that will be available should the Democrats prevail on November 3, impeachment and court reform stand out as the most powerful. Both are implicitly on the midterm ballot, and while neither is a magic bullet for checking Trumpism, they can and must be deployed far more aggressively and urgently than in the past.

The road ahead won’t be easy, but the party may never get another opportunity.

Impeachment
The Supreme Court’s 2024 decision on presidential immunity (Trump v. United States), penned by Chief Justice John Roberts, has made it all but impossible to hold Trump accountable through ordinary criminal prosecutions. As legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin has noted, Roberts’ opinion contains language that “suggests the president cannot even be investigated for his official actions,” much less indicted.

Elections are always split in their results; Tuesday’s could be the same

By Bill Eddy / Substack /  Nov 01, 2026

Over the past few weeks, we have seen a flurry of rallies by President Trump around the country, including this weekend, in desperate support of his troubled Republican candidates. It’s tempting to see this effort as futile for him since his approval ratings have now sunk to 30% according to some polls. However, I believe quite the opposite: by making urgent intense emotional attacks on Democrats he will claw back some of his reluctant followers to turn out the vote and dampen any Democratic wave. Remember that his power is based on right brain emotions rather than left-brain logic. (See last week’s blog: Right Brain Politics II.)

How Splitting Works

In 2012, a psychologist friend, Don Saposnek, and I wrote a little book titled: Splitting America: How Politicians, Super PACs and the News Media Mirror High Conflict Divorce. I was working as a family lawyer at the time and we were struck by the similarities of people with high-conflict personalities in high-conflict divorces to some politicians who were entering politics. People with high-conflict personalities tend to have four key characteristics: blaming others, all-or-nothing thinking, unmanaged emotions, and extreme behaviors. “Splitting” is a psychological term for seeing some people as all-good and others as all-bad, which is common for people with high-conflict personalities. As we wrote then:

Last week we ran Debbie Sklar’s post about Devil’s Pot in the Sunset Cliffs area. At that point, no one was certain where it used to be as it no longer exists, what due to the tremendous erosion the cliffs suffer every year.

Then “Larry OB” or Larry O’Brien responded to the post with this:

“In all fairness to Dave Bunnnell, [ed.:who performed a study of sections of cliffs cited by Debbie] back in 2008 he probably wasn’t aware of this (attached) photo of the early development of Sunset Cliffs.  I think Devil’s Pot was filled and buried out in front of the mansion at Osprey Street.”

The San Francisco-based court also said federal officials must stop demanding that ballots from selected voters be segregated.

Josh Gerstein and Kyle Cheney / rsn – POLITICO / November 2, 2026

A federal judge on Friday ordered the Justice Department to stop threatening state and local election officials with criminal prosecution over their handling of disputes about voter qualifications.

U.S. District Judge Trina Thompson also ordered the Trump administration to cease demanding that election workers remove voters from statewide rolls, refuse to issue ballots to specific voters or segregate ballots cast in the midterms based on the administration’s claims that some voters are ineligible.

November 2nd Monday 12 pm – 1 pm Interfaith Vigil for Earth Justice
November 3rd Tuesday — Last Day to Vote in Mid-Terms; protect the vote — keep in tune; be aware of Trump’s efforts to rig the elections. The OB Rag will have an all-day Live Blog. 

November 4th  Wednesday 6:30 pm – 9:30 pm Monthly Social for Makers, Tinkerers and Creatives

November 4th Wednesday 8 pm – 9 pm No Kings Post-Election Call: What Happened In the event of election interference or sabotage,

November 5th Thursday 6:30 pm – 8:30 pm BikeSD’s Gears & Cheer 2026

November 6th Friday 6 pm – 9 pm Boot Scootin’ Boogie fundraiser for SNAP Spay Neuter Action

November 6th Friday 10 am -1:15 pm  FILM SCREENING : WHAT THE RIVER KNOWscajon/

November 6th Friday 5 pm – 9 Final Market! San Diego Sustainable Night Market

By Staff

The San Diego Community Coalition publishes this email bulletin to keep our members and the general San Diego public informed about important Council hearings and other city public meetings, particularly this week the San Diego Planning Commission.

The full City Council is adjourned this week for elections.

Thursday, November 5:

Economic Development and Intergovernmental Relations Committee, 9:00 a.m.

Agenda:

Item 2: Proposed Revisions to Council Policies 900-20 Naming of City Assets and 000-40 Marketing Partnerships

Why it matters: The proposed revisions appear to strengthen transparency and oversight while maximizing potential revenue. But in a cash-poor city that continues to squander public trust, this issue will always need close scrutiny.

From San Diego Police Department

Shortly before 8:30 p.m., on Wednesday, October 28, 2026, officers from Western Division responded to reports of a fight between two men on the sea wall at 5000 block of Newport Ave. in Ocean Beach.

When officers arrived, they found Jorge Corona Vilchis, 61, critically injured. Officers gave first aid until San Diego Fire-Rescue arrived and took over. Corona Vilchis was taken to a local hospital, where he died.

Local Artists Associated with San Diego Museum of Art Sponsoring Exhibition

A group of local artists associated with the San Diego Museum of Art are sponsoring an exhibit in downtown Ocean Beach starting Tuesday, November 3rd. The exhibition entitled Takeover: Small-Scale Works will consist of fifty-five paintings, sculptures, photographs, prints, and mixed-media works by forty artists, none of which are larger than 16 inches in any direction.

This is all happening at SHIFT Gallery at 4847 Newport Avenue (across the street from Target) by the San Diego Museum of Art Artists Guild. Barbara Sexton, nationally known artist and retired Mesa College art professor, selected the art from 221 entries in a juried competition.

Takeover will run November 3 through November 17 at SHIFT Gallery. SHIFT is open seven days a week from noon to six p.m. and by appointment. The public is invited to meet participating artists at a gallery reception on Thursday, November 5, from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m.