Month: September 2020

by Ernie McCray

When I think of love,
I think of how
it has safely
taken me through
life’s dark clouds
and drowning seas
as well as through life’s joys
and well-earned victories;
I think of how love
has been sung
as “the only thing
that there’s
just too little of”
and being that that’s one thing
I’m truly certain of
I feel compelled
to speak to
all the madness
and sadness
I see to the right and left of me
in a society,
falling behind

By Colleen O’Connor

When will the chaos all end? Will democracy survive the tumult?

Heady questions.

No need for polls or op/ed pieces to divine the answers. Nor even a need to read Shakespeare, eloquent tho’ he be.

“The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars,
But in ourselves, that we are underlings.”

Rather, look to the scientists. Sometimes scientists are amazing. No, not the ones currently fighting COVID-19; or rushing for live-saving treatments and effective vaccines. They are very good. Even now, they are writing Agatha Christie-worthy descriptions of the epidemic.

By Jim Miller

This weekend we celebrate Labor Day, but how many of us have any idea where the holiday came from or what it celebrates?

The first Labor Day was celebrated on Tuesday, September 5th, 1882 in New York City and was proposed by the Central Labor Union (CLU) at a time when American workers were struggling for basic rights such as the eight-hour day. The CLU moved the “workingman’s holiday” to the first Monday in September in 1883 and urged other unions to celebrate the date as well. The movement grew throughout the 1880s, along with the American labor movement itself with 23 states passing legislation recognizing Labor Day as a holiday. By 1894 Congress followed suit and Labor Day became a national holiday.

Hey, as part of your Labor Day read, check out what was happening in Ocean Beach exactly 5 years ago. The following was originally posted on September 9, 2015. December 2015. Photo by Albert C Elliott.

OB Historical Society – Sept 17 – Kummeyaay On the Coast

The OB Historical Society presents Professor Richard Carrico, on Kumeyaay on the Coast –

Annual OB Pier Pancake Breakfast – Sept 19

Friends of OB Library Book Sale – Sept 26 – In front of the OB Library

SD Police Chief: Release of Video of Cop Shooting Could Cause Violence

Largest Fish Farm in America Planned Off OB and Mission Beach

Bank Robber of Midway Store Sought

Driver Slams Brick Wall in Point Loma

Mission Beach to wait longer for new lifeguard tower

Brazen Taggers Piss OBceans Off

Nuclear Shutdown News September 2020

By Michael Steinberg

Nuclear Shutdown News chronicles the decline and fall of the nuclear power industry in the US and beyond, and highlights the efforts of those who are working to create a nuclear free world.

Midwest ‘Derecho’ Storm Forces Shutdown of Iowa Nuke Plant

On August 8, Nagasaki Day, a violent storm with hurricane force winds knocked out power at the Duane Arnold nuclear plant, 11 miles from Cedar Rapids, IA. The Star Tribune reported that the plant “lost connection with the electrical grid and declared an Unusual Event, the lowest of four kinds of nuke plant emergencies.”

“The loss of power triggered an automatic shutdown” of the plant’s reactor, the Star Tribune reported. “It also “damaged the plant’s cooling towers, which are used to cool steam after it emits from the plant’s turbine.”

versus

Citizen Report Shines Light on Corruption

From Preserve Wild Santee

A new report, “A Money Laundering Web: Who is Buying Santee City Council Votes” traces the flow of funds from the development industry through intermediaries with the intent of purchasing favorable decisions.

The report documents substantial flows of money from Fanita Ranch and Carlton Oaks Golf Course Development interests flowing directly to Santee elected officials campaign and allied PACs.

The report reveals hundreds of thousands of dollars in “unitemized receipts” in need of explanation.

“City Council votes should not be for sale,” stated Van Collinsworth, PWS Director.

The Holy Trinity shall not be desecrated.

There exists in my house a sacred triangle: it’s composed of the TV, couch, refrigerator. This is where all philosophical thought originates, where argument adheres to strict rules of conduct. Rules inviolate.

Take Myles Doughty’s (Slightly Stoopid) rules regarding monkey rolls in the wrestling room at Pt. Loma High School and multiply times ten. I am that strict regarding the Holy Trinity.

First, if I am on the couch, then anytime is beer time. Second, whiskey consumption begins after 5 p.m. (or 3 p.m. if there was a recent full moon) Third, there shall be only 12 paces or less from couch to refrigerator.

When the California legislation closed up their session for the year the other night, and after press reporters described the “chaos” at the Capitol, it became clear that state law enforcement had helped block any police reform bills that had been initiated in the shadow of the Black Lives Matter protests. Meanwhile, police keep shooting and killing Black people.

On the day that the legislators ended their business, LA County Sheriffs shot and killed Dijon Kizzee in the South Los Angeles neighborhood of Westmont. Najee Ali, a community activist, was quoted by the LA Times: “The deputies essentially executed a man riding his bicycle.”

“They’ll say he had a gun, but what they won’t say was that he was not armed with the gun. He did not point the gun. … There was no reason for deputies to shoot a running man.”

After the killing, deputies said that Kizzee was riding his bicycle in violation of the vehicle code.

The Director of National Intelligence Is Providing Cover for Putin

By Editorial Board, The Washington Post / September 3, 2020

After the intelligence community briefed members of Congress in late July about threats to the upcoming election, Democrats expressed alarm about what they had learned — and about the fact that the information had not been shared with the American public. “The warning lights are flashing red. America’s elections are under attack,” wrote Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) in a Post op-ed, without disclosing any specifics.

It got a little testy at the August 26 online Zoom meeting of the Ocean Beach Town Council when the two candidates for City Attorney spared. City attorney Mara Elliott and candidate Cory Briggs took verbal swings at each other over issues that concern people at the coast, such as short-term rentals and sidewalk vending.

(We must rely on Steven Mihailovich’s report on the meeting in the Point Loma-OB Monthly, a publication of the San Diego Union-Tribune, and on Dave Schawb’s article in the Peninsula Beacon, a member of the San Diego Community News Group – as the OB Rag does not have a reporter who can sit for three hours and write a report for minimum wage. – If you know of one, let us know.)

Both candidates gave introductory – and closing – remarks and answered questions from “audience” members.

by Thomas D. Elias / The Coast News / September 2, 2020

Never before in California’s long experience with power blackouts have systematic, preplanned outages been as short as the 20-minute to 30-minute electric shutdowns inflicted on about 3 million homes and businesses around the state in mid-August.

Without doubt these blackouts were pre-planned. “(We will have) excessive weather conditions and a persistent shortage of electric supply for the California grid,” said a warning texted to electric customers hours ahead of the first outages.

There was a lot odd about this, aside from the short span of the blackouts. Gov. Gavin Newsom said later he didn’t learn of the shutdowns until just beforehand,

By Budd Titlow

I get it.

I love all dogs and I know they need a special place to romp and splash. Dog Beach in Ocean Beach — at the western end of the San Diego River Channel—is just such a place. Created in 1972, it has a long history of providing the perfect playground for pooches— with no leashes restricting their activities.

But I’m also a serious birdwatcher and photographer. Since moving to the San Diego area 2 1/2 years ago, I’ve found that the San Diego River Channel — centering around Smiley Lagoon — offers the best birding opportunities of any place I’ve ever lived.