April 2010

The Facts … of President Obama’s Tax Cuts

April 14, 2010 by Source
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Some basic facts:

* Obama has passed 25 separate tax cuts.

* Obama’s stimulus package included $300 billion in middle class tax cuts — one of the largest in history.

* The recent healthcare reform law includes tax credits and savings for small businesses and working people.

* Unlike President Bush’s 2001 tax cuts, which went to the wealthiest 2.2%, President Obama’s tax cuts overwhelmingly benefit working and middle class families — 95% of all Americans.

Here are some of the new tax credits available through the Recovery Act alone that you may be eligible for: (SEE INSIDE FOR LINKS)

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On April 15th, Tea Partiers will protest. What are they protesting? Tax cuts?

April 14, 2010 by Source
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April 15th marks the first year of the Tea Party Tax Day protests, brought to you by Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, and Rick “Let’s Have a Tea Party” Santelli. The original purpose was to protest “high taxes and big government”.

On Thursday, a reprise is scheduled to take place across the country, but I can’t help but wonder exactly what they’re protesting. This page lists the average tax cuts for the nation, and then breaks them down by state.

Overall, everyone got a little piece of the tax cut pie this year. In Arizona, home of newly-conservative John McCain and the even more conservative John Kyl, the average combined tax cut was -$1,023. In Oklahoma, that state threatening to declare war on overtaxation, the average tax cut was -$1,098. In Alaska, -$1,096.

98% of working families received a tax cut in this country.

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Message from the people who want us out of Afghanistan: Call your Congress this week

April 13, 2010 by Source
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Spring is here, but the endless, pointless wars grind on. U.S. troops are preparing for an offensive in Afghanistan ‘s Helmand province. As people lose their homes, their jobs, and struggle to make ends meet; as teachers are laid off and libraries are closed across America ; money gushes into the war and military budgets.
*Defund the Afghanistan Escalation!
*National Call-in to Congress Days April 13-15

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California sees increase in earthquakes; seismologists fight Twitter rumors

April 13, 2010 by Source
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The number of earthquakes greater than magnitude 4.0 in Southern California and Baja California has increased significantly in 2010. Scientists are studying the uptick but cannot fully explain it.

Seismologists in California were busy this week fighting rumors apparently floating on Twitter that a major earthquake was likely in the next few days.

Officials at Caltech say that rumor is not true — and that no such prediction can be made. But researchers say there has been an uptick in earthquakes this year.

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Farewell to Mary Mann – A Sample of Her Posts

April 13, 2010 by Mary E. Mann
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One of the OB Rag’s more able bloggers is moving on and out of OB … to grad school … to be a writer. Although we protested – “Hey Mary! You’re already a great writer!” – she is ignoring our pleas to stay in OB.

Mary joined our staff one year ago exactly. Here is a sample of her posts since then:

* An Arch to Build a Dream On
* Keith Kifer – the Blues Wizard: “I’m always on stage.”
* The Kids – the Young and Homeless of OB
* OB Burners and Hoopers Get Busted
* The Hidden Garden of Ocean Beach
* Bars and Clubs of OB – a Review
* Who Was That Naked Swimmer Anyway?

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San Diego Coffee Party Welcomes Bob Filner

April 12, 2010 by Frank Gormlie
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The event was at Queen Bee’s in North Park, and it represented a coming-together of the County’s various Coffee Party chapters. There were reps from Ramona, Oceanside, Escondido, and from the various San Diego areas, “Coastal”, “eastern San Diego”, and “mid-city”.

Representative Filner stressed that the nation needed public financing of elections, in order to level the playing field. This issue has become one of the Coffee Party’s central issues.

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Online Reviewers Rate Local OB Veterinarians

April 12, 2010 by Source
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by Jen Wilbur

We OBceans sure do love our animals. Not only do we have Dog Beach and Dusty Rhodes Dog Park nearby, but also many restaurants, bars and coffee carts have a fresh bowl of water readily available.

There are also no less than 5 veterinary hospitals within a less-than-5-mile radius. So it’s no surprise that folks are vocal about which vets they love, as well as those that made them miserable from time to time.

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Cong. Bob Filner to Appear at San Diego Coffee Party Coming-Out Affair

April 9, 2010 by Frank Gormlie
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The San Diego chapter of the national Coffee Party movement is holding a kind of “coming-out” party in the late afternoon on Sunday, April 11th, and Congressman Bob Filner is the keynote speaker.

This private affair will be at Queen’s Bee, an entertainment venue/ coffee house in North Park from 3:30pm to 5. Stacy Taylor, one of San Diego’s most popular (ex-) radio personalities will also be on hand as a speaker. There is music and poetry, so this could be quite a gig.

The San Diego Coffee Party organization is not even one month old. Its first meetings were on March 13th, and there was so much of a turn-out of kindred spirits that it was organized into 3 to 4 groups. There’s also a chapter in Oceanside, one in Carlsbad, and a small one in Ramona. There are efforts a foot to establish one in the South Bay as well.

About a dozen OBceans are active in the “coastal” section …

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Movers and Shakers – Ocean Beach Comedy

April 9, 2010 by Jon Carr
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Originally posted June 17, 2009

Taggers defacing OB, Iranian election upheaval, Homelessness, Carrie Prejean, Bird Porn. While these are all important issues, except maybe Prejean, the overload of bad news can be enough to make you want to take a nice warm bubble bath with your toaster. So if you start to find yourself overloaded with stressful political, social issues, do yourself a favor. Laugh.

And check out Ocean Beach Comedy.

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Jeoff Gordon, MD: Busy OB doc has time for social justice

April 8, 2010 by Dixon Guizot
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By Dixon Guizot

Though he doesn’t seem like he’s in a hurry, Ocean Beach’s Dr. Jeoffry Gordon gets a heck of a lot done.

In addition to treating patients and managing his practice, Dr. Gordon speaks to local political clubs. He writes articles for medical journals. He works with the national movement for a single-payer health care solution. And along the way, the doctor stays powerfully well-informed in areas like politics, history, and finance. He recommends works by authors such as Kevin Phillips, Niall Ferguson, and Thomas Frank.

You might think a person with all that to keep him busy wouldn’t have a moment to spare, but Dr. Gordon’s demeanor isn’t rushed. He speaks deliberately, choosing his words carefully. And on a recent Monday afternoon, as we walked to lunch at Rancho’s Cocina from his office at the corner of Cable Street and Santa Monica Avenue, he strolled at a relaxed pace, prompting me to slow my normally anxious stride.

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Creeping Big Brother in OB and Beyond

April 7, 2010 by Frank Gormlie
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SURVEILLANCE CAMERA AND POLICE WATCH TOWER COMING TO OCEAN BEACH

Big Brother is creeping into our lives, inch by inch, camera by camera, tower by tower. Recent posts on our blog have described plans by the City of San Diego to install surveillance cameras in and around Mission Bay, including one on the OB Pier, and that the San Diego Police Department dragged out their controversial mobile watch tower for this year’s first Floatopia.

Surveillance cameras, police towers … Big Brother is definitely creeping in … do you remember the origins of Big Brother? He is a fictional character in George Orwell’s novel Nineteen Eighty-Four, the dictator with seemingly absolute control in Oceania, a society that is a totalitarian state.

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Group Seeks To ‘Modernize’ School Board – Democracy Be Dammed

April 7, 2010 by Doug Porter
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A by-invitation-only committee has been holding closed door meetings in recent months at the University of San Diego campus to discuss concerns with the future of the San Diego Unified School District. Attempts by the news media to report on the meetings have been blocked. According to a spokesperson with the District, sitting Board of Education members have also been excluded. In other words, it’s hush-hush.

A crack in the veil of secrecy emerged last week by way of a report in Voice of San Diego:

“A private group of educators, philanthropists, business leaders and others are polling San Diegans about whether they want to see appointed members added to the San Diego Unified school board, according to parents who have gotten phone calls about the new proposal.

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Next earthquake: Do NOT get under the furniture

April 6, 2010 by Source
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Editor: Where were you during Easter Sunday’s earthquake? Patty and I were on the wooden deck and we felt every rock and roll, and went through four aftershocks. The following by Doug Copp will make you forget everything you’ve always learned about surviving earth quakes.
______________
The “Triangle of Life”: Ten Ways to Survive the Next “Big One”

by Doug Copp

My name is Doug Copp. I am the Rescue Chief and Disaster Manager of the American Rescue Team International (ARTI), the world’s most experienced rescue team. The information in this article will save lives in an earthquake.

I have crawled inside 875 collapsed buildings, worked with rescue teams from 60 countries, founded rescue teams in several countries, and I am a member of many rescue teams from many countries…

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Oil drilling — a nasty national habit

April 6, 2010 by Source
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by David Helvarg

President Obama’s decision to have Interior Secretary Ken Salazar open vast new areas of federal ocean waters to offshore oil drilling is no surprise. In his State of the Union address, the president explained that his vision for a clean energy future included offshore drilling, nuclear power and clean coal. Unfortunately, that’s like advocating a healthy diet based on fast-food snacking, amphetamines and low-tar cigarettes.

If the arguments you hear in the coming days for expanded drilling sound familiar, it’s because they’ve been repeated for generations. We’ve been hearing promises about safer drilling technologies since before Union Oil began drilling in the Santa Barbara Channel. And if you don’t remember what happened that time, you should. Soon after the wells were bored, one of them blew out in January 1969, causing a massive oil slick that slimed beaches and killed birds, fish and marine mammals. The resulting catastrophe helped spark the modern environmental movement.

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OB FLASHES – April 6th – News, Calendar and Whatever

April 6, 2010 by Frank Gormlie
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COME INSIDE FOR MORE ….

* “Terriers” Returns to Old Townhouse Restaurant April 6th

*OB Rag Calling for OB Heathens

*OB Comedy Celebrates Fourth Anniversary Show – April 9th

*OB Centric Holds Another “Swap O Rama Rama”

*Rock ’n’ roll academy opens doors in OB

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Excuse Me but There’s Two Teenagers with Weapons in the Room

April 5, 2010 by Ernie McCray
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Now, I’m not a big fan of “State of” kinds of speeches. Most times they leave me with a feeling of “Now, that was some BS I could have spared myself.” But it was a joy the other night listening to Richard Barrera, the President of the San Diego City Schools Board of Education, share his thoughts on schools being community based in a refreshing non-preachy conversational tone as opposed to the usual empty tome that politicians usually read verbatim at such occasions in coma inducing tones.

His rap resonated with me because as an educator I can say, from having been “part of” creating some fairly dynamic learning environments in my time, that it can’t be done with out tons of input from the “hood.” I mean what is the purpose of education if not to empower communities, the stakeholders?

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Cliff Swim Turns Into Cliff Rescue – Photo Gallery

April 2, 2010 by Frank Gormlie
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At first, it looked safe to go in. So, two young highschoolers decided to try swimming at Sunset Cliffs. But Katie Kitchenka and Breyaundra Woods, both 18 years old and from Steele Canyon High School, soon found out it was too cold.

They tried getting back to shore, but couldn’t. Fortunately, an off duty border patrol agent came upon them yelling for help, and he threw them a beach towel and helped get them to a ledge.

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San Diego Online News Site Pokes Fun at OB’s “Purity”

April 1, 2010 by Source
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Editor: If you opened up your computer this April 1st morning to the homepage of San Diego News Network (SDNN) you would find this headline and the following article:

OCEAN BEACH PURISTS UP IN ARMS OVER NEW MCDONALD’S

In a surprise move that flies in the face of every thing the small oceanfront community has been about, Ocean Beach officials announced Thursday that fast-food burger giant McDonald’s will open up a location along Newport Avenue.

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