January 2008

Media Punditry: The Beast Without a Brain

January 21, 2008 by Staff

Why Horse Race Journalism Works for Journalists and Fails Us (This article is from TomDispatch.com Jan. 20th. Here is Tom Engelhardt’s intro:) Let’s see. They were wrong on Hillary Clinton, essentially nominating her for the presidency months before a primary was held. In Iowa, they were wrong on Mike Huckabee and Barack Obama, John Edwards […]

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The Battle To Save New Orleans Public Housing

January 21, 2008 by Michael Steinberg

How a Determined Coalition Beat Back Demolition Plans At a press conference last December 18, 3007, at New Orleans’ City Hall, Martin Suber of the Coalition To Stop Demolition was explaining the purpose of the fight to stop the razing of the city’s four largest public housing complexes (aka “The Big Four”). “There’s been a […]

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Another Old OB Rag — March 1972 — Scanned!

January 21, 2008 by Staff

See the Simmering Pages of the March 1972 Edition of the Original OB Rag! Yes, that’s right! See the issue that uncovered the dastardly tactics of the OB Town Council! Read about the scandal that brought down the Republican Party’s plans to hold their 1972 Convention in San Diego! That’s right, go here.

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A Plutonium Paradise? A Critique of Nuclear Power

January 19, 2008 by Richard Nadeau

I just can’t believe the cheerful propaganda coming from the nuclear power industry and its boosters. They are telling us now that nuclear power is a “clean and safe solution” to the crisis of global warming. Nothing could be further from the truth. In my view, we are being offered a glowing picture of a […]

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In case you missed them … recent stories of note

January 18, 2008 by Frank Gormlie

In case you missed them, I’ve re-hatched a number of local, regional, national and international news stories of note. Here they are (not organized in any particular order, except by proximity to our locale): Local Environmental Groups Sue to Halt the Poseidon Desalination Plant at Carlsbad The local chapters of Surfrider and the Planning and […]

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“I Have a Dream”

January 17, 2008 by Staff

Text of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Speech from Aug. 28, 1963

(transcribed directly from the video)

“I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation.

Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand today, signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves, who had been seared in the flames of withering injustice. It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of their captivity. But one hundred years later, the Negro still is not free. One hundred years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacle of segregation and the chains of discrimination.

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The Hippies Were Right!

January 17, 2008 by Staff

Green homes? Organic food? Nature is good? Time To Give The Ol’ Tie-Dyers Some Respect by Mark Morford Go ahead, name your movement. Name something good and positive and pro-environment and eco-friendly that’s happening right now in the newly “greening” America and don’t say more guns in Texas or fewer reproductive choices for women or […]

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Iraq vets call for Winter Soldier investigation

January 17, 2008 by Staff

By Dee Knight – Published Jan 17, 2008 Iraq Veterans Against the War (IVAW) has announced plans for “Winter Soldier: Iraq and Afghanistan,” from March 13 to 16. The event “will assemble the largest gathering of U.S. veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan in history, as well as Iraqi and Afghan survivors,” IVAW says, “to offer […]

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The Corpse on the Gurney – The “Success” Mantra in Iraq

January 17, 2008 by Staff

By Tom Engelhardt, TomDispatch.com, posted Jan. 17, 2008 The other day, as we reached the first anniversary of the President’s announcement of his “surge” strategy, his “new way forward” in Iraq, I found myself thinking about the earliest paid book-editing work I ever did. An editor at a San Francisco textbook publisher hired me to […]

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How to Rig an Election: Confessions of a Republican Operative

January 17, 2008 by Staff

Allen Raymond, a former Republican National Committee operative, shares secrets from the GOP bunker. By Steven Rosenfeld, AlterNet. Posted January 17, 2008. Allen Raymond worked inside Republican election circles for years, until he was convicted of illegally jamming telephone lines to New Hampshire Democratic Party offices on Election Day in 2002. After serving five months […]

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Huckabee: “… amend the Constitution so it’s in God’s standards ….”

January 16, 2008 by Frank Gormlie

On the eve of the Michigan Republican primary, held Tuesday, January 15th, candidate Mike Huckabee finally showed his true colors. He called to amend the Constitution so that it would have “God’s standards”. Here’s what he said: “[Some of my opponents] do not want to change the Constitution, but I believe it’s a lot easier […]

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Friday, Jan. 18th: Iraq Moratorium- National Day of Actions to Stop the War

January 16, 2008 by Staff

San Diego Rallies Against the War & Occupation. Join peace groups this Friday, January 18th, from 5-6 PM and rally for the Iraq Moratorium at 6th Street and University Avenue. During the primary season, the antiwar movement must be visible. Bring a friend and signs & banners if you can. We will be joining the […]

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Revolution of the Snails – Encounters with the Zapatistas

January 15, 2008 by Staff

By Rebecca Solnit of TomDispatch.com I grew up listening to vinyl records, dense spirals of information that we played at 33-1/3 revolutions per minute. The original use of the word revolution was in this sense — of something coming round or turning round, the revolution of the heavenly bodies, for example. It’s interesting to think […]

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Dispatch From New Orleans: Malik Speaks

January 13, 2008 by Michael Steinberg

Malik Speaks, Part 1 Malik Rahim, founder of Common Ground, spoke today about its past, present and future at the Community Breakfast in the Unitarian Church in New Orleans. New Orleans, January 12-“The name Common Ground came from Robert King Wilkerson,” said Malik Rahim, one of the founders of the Common Ground Collective. Rahim, like […]

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Gross Distortions, Sloppy Methodology and Tendentious Reporting

January 13, 2008 by Staff

How the New England Journal of Medicine Undercounted Iraqi Civilian Deaths By ANDREW COCKBURN Almost five years into the destruction of Iraq, the orthodox rule of thumb for assessing statistical tabulations of the civilian death toll is becoming clear: any figure will do so long as it is substantially lower than that computed by the […]

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1/11, It’s Our Disgrace!

January 12, 2008 by Patty Jones

“As part of the worldwide protest against torture and for the restoration of Habeas/Corpus we stand in solidarity with humans around the US and the world on this anniversary of the heinous prison at Guantanamo.” ~unk4jazz On January 11th, 2002, twenty hooded and shackled men shuffled off a plane from Afghanistan, arriving at the U.S. […]

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What Took Us So Long, and Are We There Yet?

January 12, 2008 by Patty Jones

I started to post this as a comment to Rick Nadeau’s piece, Obama Amazes. His post really had me nodding my head, putting to words many of the feelings I have been having myself. As an almost 50 year old woman, I really want to be able to vote for Hillary, but at this point, […]

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Lessons from the 1970 Student Strike

January 12, 2008 by Staff

(Editor’s Note: This article appeared a year and a half ago, but as it is mainly a history lesson from days of old, I thought it relevant for our continuing discussion on “The Future Direction of the Peace Movement.”) Building a Movement that will be Stronger After the US is Out of Iraq By BILL […]

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An American Tears for Baghdad Snow

January 11, 2008 by Frank Gormlie

I could not help it. Tears welled up in my eyes as I read and viewed stories and photos of the first snow fall in living memory in Baghdad. I saw pics of Iraqi adults and children with smiles as they witnessed the “white cotton” falling like rain over their war scape that is their […]

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A Strategy for Rebuilding the Peace Movement

January 11, 2008 by Staff

After Iowa and New Hampshire By JONATHAN M. FELDMAN Presidential elections, and electoral politics more generally, are often a source for mass confusion. The confusion is based on what Freud termed “the overvaluation of the object.” He was describing the overvaluation of the object of desire, leading to various fetishes that displaced objects of longing […]

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OBAMA AMAZES – More Reflections on 2008 Elections

January 10, 2008 by Richard Nadeau

John Kerry’s endorsement of Barack Obama for President must have shocked the Democratic Party establishment as much as it surprised me. Obama won in Iowa, and then came in a very close second, after pre-election polls had him running first. I listened to both Obama’s post election speeches, and frankly was amazed by his charismatic […]

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2008 San Diego Campaign Contributions Now Searchable Online

January 10, 2008 by Patty Jones

The Center on Policy Initiatives (CPI) has just launched a new service for voters, “Follow The Money.” Find out where local candidates get their money! How much has the tourism industry contributed to the mayoral candidates? Is a city council candidate being funded by a certain company’s employees? Who are the biggest donors to city […]

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Noam Chomsky: We Own The World

January 9, 2008 by Staff

(Adapted from a June 2007 speech) January, 01 2008 You all know, of course, there was an election-what is called “an election” in the United States-last November (2006). There was really one issue in the election, what to do about U.S. forces in Iraq and there was, by U.S. standards, an overwhelming vote calling for […]

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The $100 Barrel of Oil vs. the Global War on Terror

January 9, 2008 by Staff

The Bush Legacy (Take Two) By Tom Engelhardt   Jan. 8, 2008 Consider the debate among four Democratic presidential candidates on ABC News last Saturday night. In the previous week, the price of a barrel of oil briefly touched $100, unemployment hit 5%, the stock market had the worst three-day start since the Great Depression, and […]

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A Retrospective: Interview with Lowell Bergman – Who Inspired the OB Rag

January 9, 2008 by Frank Gormlie

Lowell Bergman: 60 Minutes Producer, Journalist, Writer for San Diego’s First Underground Newspaper, Anti-war Activist, Student of Herbert Marcuse and … inspiration. This is nearly an eight year old interview with Lowell Bergman by journalist Danny Postel which I found on Postel’s website. The reason I found it very interesting, besides the fact that Lowell […]

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UPDATE on Disappearance of the Peace Sign Atop of “Peace Rock”

January 8, 2008 by Frank Gormlie

POINT LOMA / OCEAN BEACH – This is an update on the disappearance of the beautiful, stained-glass peace sign which was attached to the top of “Peace Rock” off Sunset Cliffs – no, the artwork has not been recovered, and no, no one has been caught and no one has ‘fessed up. But as the […]

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Int’l Day of Action to Shut Down Guantanamo

January 8, 2008 by Patty Jones

San Diego’s Observance of Int’l Day of Action to Shut Down Guantanamo Witness Against Torture Friday, January 11th NOON – 1pm In front of the San Diego Federal Bldg and Courthouse 880 Front Street (near Broadway) Map This SAN DIEGO — Friday, January 11, 2008, marks the 6-year anniversary of the first prisoners being brought […]

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January 8, 1912 – This Day In Our Region: The San Diego Free Speech Fight Begins

January 8, 2008 by Staff

On this day in 1912, the San Diego City Council passed an anti-free speech ordinance, banning public speaking in a large section of downtown, in hopes to bar labor, socialist and other organizers from street-corner speaking. The area was bounded by “C” and “F” streets and Fourth and Sixth Streets. And thus began, the infamous […]

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Irony of the 2008 Election: John Edwards, White Man, Is the Best Candidate

January 7, 2008 by Staff

by Maryscott O’Connor – crossposted from My Left Wing What a cruel mockery for liberals it is that in a year wherein we have viable candidates as historical firsts — both a black man and a white woman — the best person for the job just happens to be a white man.I’m hard pressed to […]

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Why Barack Obama Should De-Escalate On Pakistan

January 7, 2008 by Staff

By Tom Hayden, HuffingtonPost.com. Posted January 7, 2008. As predicted, Barack Obama’s advocacy of unilateral military intervention in Pakistan if there is “actionable intelligence” against al-Qaeda is giving legitimacy to the Bush administration’s gathering plan for an escalation.Obama’s position is a revival of John Kerry’s 2004 argument that the U.S. should have pursued Osama bin […]

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