Category: Health

SAN DIEGO – A San Diego County Superior Court today denied medical marijuana patient Donna Lambert’s request for dismissal. Ms. Lambert’s supporters urged District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis not to pursue the case, to uphold the state’s medical marijuana laws and to turn law enforcement’s attention to matters of public safety not politics.

“I’m disappointed at today’s ruling, but I am resolved to fight this egregious case against me,” said Ms. Lambert, who faces seven felony counts for providing medical marijuana to another qualified patient.

OCEAN BEACH, CA. Something’s fishy in Ocean Beach. Or at least the recent stench that has seemingly permeated the community has a fishy source (not literally). Where is it coming from?

SDG&E reports that they received 500 calls about a gaseous odor. 25 technicians were sent out to investigate.

by Frank Gormlie

By 6:00 pm, there was a long line that stretched from the gym’s doors almost all the way to the main road, lining the school’s parking lot as it crept up the small hill. Doug and I were at Rancho Buena Vista High School for Congressman Darrell Issa’s Town Hall meeting on health care. We had driven to southern Vista – a land of new suburbs, condos and malls – from the southern reaches of the county. Everything in sight seemed to have been built in the last ten to twenty years or so.

It had been a long drive from San Diego, and so we had a while to muse about was in store for us … in conservativeland.

By E.J. Dionne Jr. / The Washington Post / September 3, 2009

Health-care reform is said to be in trouble partly because of those raucous August town-hall meetings in which Democratic members of Congress were besieged by shouters opposed to change.

But what if our media-created impression of the meetings is wrong?

Local Congressman Darrel Issa appears to be trying to capture the right-wing momentum sputtering here and there at town hall meetings across the nation. He all of a sudden announced that he, too, is holding a health care reform town hall meeting – this one is tonight in Vista.

A line wrapped down the block and around another one in Hillcrest Tuesday morning. If you didn’t know, you would think they were handing out free money not free nectarines and bread.

One after another, young and old collected plastic bags filled with fresh produce — bread, cantalope, nectarines, bananas and potatoes — from volunteers.

by George Mitrovich

At the tribute to Senator Ted Kennedy Friday night at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library, Senator Chris Dodd of Connecticut, Mr. Kennedy’s closest friend in the Senate, told a story of how he recently underwent prostate cancer surgery and when he came out of recovery his first phone call was from Mr. Kennedy, who said, “Given the choice between prostate cancer surgery and going to town hall meetings, you made the right choice.”

It is beastly hot in my tiny house eight miles inland from Ocean Beach and I have just spent a number of hours culling through the news online and I am really really grumpy.

I’ve printed out a copy of Robert Reich’s recent posting The Guns of August: How the Republican Right Fired on Health Care …

OCEAN BEACH, CA. We were finally able to meet Chris Bowd after all this time. Patty and I went to his OB home and presented him with this OB Rag T-shirt that a friend had bought him. Chris is the OBcean knocked unconscious July 4th during a mystery assault.

by Anna Daniels

Over 700 people in yesterday’s town hall meeting with Susan Davis chanted “Health Care for All,” while another 300 people chanted “Just Say No!”

Doesn’t that say it all—that the majority of people want health care coverage extended to all citizens? President elect Obama campaigned on this issue, was elected for his position and is now addressing it. That’s called moving forward.

The “Just Say No” minority is frozen in time, …

by Frank Gormlie

SPRING VALLEY, CA. I knew I was in trouble with that phone call from ace OB Rag reporter Doug Porter. It was noon. “Where are you?” he asked impatiently. I stumbled for words. We were finishing up our morning business when he called, and I felt like a busted teenager. “We’ll be there real soon,” I mumbled, trying to brush away my hang-over.

Your OB Rag news blog had planned to send our troops to the Spring Valley Town Hall meeting, …

Photos by Patty Jones

SPRING VALLEY, CA. Throngs came out to chant, yell, wave signs and discuss health care reform. Both the left-wing and the right-wing sent their legions to fill the auditorium in Spring Valley. Congresswoman Susan Davis had called the town hall meeting – the only event of its kind in Southern California.

These photos were taken by Patty Jones.