Category: Columns

Back in 1942 the narrator of Jim Thompson’s seminal noir account of San Diego, Now and On Earth observed that:

San Diego, prior to the establishment of the aircraft factories, was not inappropriately dubbed the “City of the Living Dead.” There were no industries, there was no construction; the town’s one asset was its climate. If you were young and wanted excitement and had a living to make, why, the town wouldn’t want you and you wouldn’t want it. If you were old and had a small income or pension, you couldn’t have found a more attractive place to live (or die) in.

The countdown to rapture has begun. Should I wear my trousers rolled? Do I dare to eat a peach? Nah. Better make a cake!

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The Mesa College Theatre Company, working with the San Diego Black Ensemble and Vagabond Theatre Project, is producing a series of staged readings, “Pioneers and the Journey: A Festival of African American Plays” to explore the African American Experience – an experience in and of itself based on my experiences within the experience, experiencely speaking if there is such a term (big smile)

In my last column, I ruefully noted that the thought of any revenue increase is verboten in Republican circles, but the same could be said for many Democrats driven by fear of being assailed as a “tax and spend” liberal. Indeed as recent polling suggests, a majority of Californians think the state budget has gotten bigger when, in fact, the general fund spending has shrunk by over $20 billion as taxes on the rich and corporations have gone down. Why the inaccurate public perception? In the final part of “Indy by the Sea” I ask the question:

Where do people get the idea that they are overtaxed in a country where people pay fewer taxes than citizens of most other industrialized countries and have a much smaller “welfare state”?

Come stand with San Diego’s community college students, teachers, and their community allies this Friday, May 13th at 9:00 AM at Assembly Member Nathan Fletcher’s office at 9909 Mira Mesa Boulevard to send a message to Fletcher and his Republican allies that they can’t hold the future of education in California hostage.

Editor: This is Part 2 of Jim Miller’s examination of San Diego as the “Wisconsin of the West”.

While the web of right wing, corporate-funded think tanks are clearly feeling their oats in the Scott Walker era, their rise was a long time in the making. They were, importantly, the intellectual replacements for unreliable “liberal” universities where the state-funded intellectuals could not be counted on to carry the water for the corporate class.

I was just thinking about all the nice moments I’ve enjoyed in life and a little time I spent in Tucson last week ranks up there among the mellower of the refreshing respites from the troubles of the world I’ve had the pleasure of taking part in.

First of all I was in my hometown and that’s always enjoyable, not to mention that I was there for a very special event, wearing the lofty title of “guest speaker,” which I took to mean I was to have a good time so that’s what I did. Why not, I was around some of my favorite people: a bunch of folks wearing sunny smiles…

A couple of weeks ago local Republicans held their unity night at the Kona Kai Resort where notables such as Jerry Sanders and Kevin Faulconer cheered as Carl DeMaio asked if they were ready to make San Diego “the Wisconsin of the West.” They, along with the Chamber of Commerce, the Taxpayers Association, the Lincoln Club and other luminaries of the local right were getting fired up and ready to go for a ballot initiative that would undermine collective bargaining rights for unionized public sector workers in San Diego.

Congressman Allen West (R-FL) is on to the nefarious attempt of Planned Parenthood and Code Pink types to make men subservient. Just as we women were poised to become the Master Gender, our evil unnatural scheme of reducing men to meek yes ma’ams in between abortions has been ruined by this scholar- cum- congressman.

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Posing in a picture on the desktop of my iMac are some of the most brilliant people I’ve ever known, members of MEChA, a Chicano student organization at Mission Bay High led by Luis Villanueva, a remarkable educator who constantly seeks ways to create learning experiences that are relevant to their lives. Each of them is a budding community leader and exemplary American citizen.

This week marks the one-year anniversary of the end of the March for California’s Future, a 48 day, 352-mile march through the Central Valley to the State Capitol. There, on a rainy day in Sacramento, I was one of many union folks, students, and religious and community leaders who spoke to a crowd of thousands gathered to protest the ever-more draconian cuts to education and social services.

All the way from Los Angeles to Sacramento we carried the message that California needs a government and economy that works for everyone, not just the rich.

This video pick is in the key of quirky problem solving solutions. For those of you who will be facing a bumper crop of hard boiled eggs this weekend, here’s a novel way to shorten the time between egg and egg salad. Science! Projectiles! Yes!