OB Rag

Here are the choices that faced Mayor Jerry Sanders at the end of last week.

Which costs more?

4 portapotties cleaned out weekly for $300 a month or over-time pay for 110 law enforcement officers, cost of gas and vehicles to transport the 51 arrestees to Vista or Las Colinas?

NBC San Diego / October 31, 2011

A local man whose body was found under the Ingraham Street Bridge was the victim of an accident according to officials.

A family sailing on Mission Bay discovered the body of Steve Marquez on Aug. 30. The San Diego resident had been missing for several days when his body was discovered according to his brother-in-law, Mark Jimenez.

Group to march from Balboa Park to the Gaslamp to highlight frightening facts about corruption in America’s financial and political systems

SAN DIEGO, Calif. – On October 31, 2011, Occupy San Diego will lead a Halloween march through downtown San Diego to promote social justice, honesty, and generosity.

With costumes, street theatre, and candy, Occupy San Diego will rally at 5:00pm at the Haunted Trail Entrance in Balboa Park (6th & Juniper, just south of the Laurel Street Bridge).

March starts at 5:30pm from the Haunted Trail Entrance and will walk to the Civic Center, to Children’s Park, the Haunted Hotel, and ending in the Gaslamp Quarter.

Despite mutual frustration, it was a friendly meeting with the new Harbor Police Chief, John Bolduc and several members of the waterman community a week ago last Monday, October 17, at one of the Starbucks at Liberty Station (of course there is more than one…). He had agreed to meet with John Decker, an avid stand up paddler (SUP) and representative of Kings SUPs, Randy Peterson of the Kanaka outrigger club, and Scott MacLaggen, longtime area water activist, and me. At issue was a small waterway, 54 acres, which runs between Liberty Station and the San Diego International Airport and is bordered on the north by the United States Marine Corp Recruit Depot.

By John Hoeffel / Los Angeles Times / Originally published October 29, 2011|

Medical marijuana advocates want a federal court to halt the recent raids and threats of prosecution that have significantly stepped up the Obama administration’s assault on dispensaries and growers.

Americans for Safe Access, an advocacy group based in Oakland, has sued U.S. Atty. Gen. Eric Holder and Melinda Haag, the top federal prosecutor in Northern California, accusing them of violating the Constitution’s 10th Amendment by using coercive tactics to interfere with powers delegated to the states.

By J. Harry Jones / SignOnSanDiego / Originally published October 28, 2011

The Los Coyotes Indian tribe can evict the military training center that has been operating on its remote North County reservation since last year, according to a ruling a federal judge issued Friday.

U.S. District Court Judge William Q. Hayes refused to grant a temporary restraining order against the tribe, which would have barred it from evicting ERTC LLC, formerly known as the Eagle Rock Training Center. The business, which caters to the military and law enforcement, insists it has a valid 25-year lease to conduct business on virtually the entire 25,000-acre North County reservation.

The city of San Diego is anticipating $1.1 billion in general revenue funds this fiscal year. According to the city’s Office of the Comptroller, those revenues are deposited in Bank of America accounts. This is just one more sweetheart deal, with no strings attached, for a Wall Street bank that got bailed out while we got sold out.

Bank of America—Poster Child for Insatiable Corporate Greed

Bank of America took our $230 billion in federal subsidies (TARP+), paid no federal taxes in 2009 or 2010, and continues to pay out excessive bonuses and salaries while planning to lay off 30,000 workers.

RIYADH, SAUDI ARABIA – I think most Americans have little idea of the climatic conditions here in Saudi Arabia. We, with the exception of those who have experience in small desert towns, have nothing with which to compare this environment in Riyadh. It is stark, barren, bright, superheated, and dry to the nth degree. It is unforgiving, mean, murderous, virtually without plants, animals, water or shade. Somehow, Saudi Arabs have managed to adapt to and survive in this ultra-difficult setting for, I’m guessing, 5,000 years. It seems fair to say that’s worth a tip of the hat.

As we watch the Occupations from New York to San Diego fight for the right to exercise free speech and occupy public space, it is worth noting that we have been here before. Recently, it was my pleasure to do a small teach-in at Occupy San Diego with the OB Rag’s own Frank Gormlie on the history of civil disobedience in San Diego. For my part, I outlined the story of the San Diego Free Speech Fight in 1912 when the Industrial Workers of the World and other local labor and community activists struggled against the San Diego’s elite for the right to speak on a soapbox at the corner of 5^th and E downtown. As the homepage of the San Diego Free Speech Fight 100 Year Anniversary website notes:

2012 is the 100-year anniversary of the San Diego Free Speech Fight, one of the most important moments in the history of the city of San Diego. During the winter and spring of 1912, members of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) and their allies in labor and the community engaged in a pitched battle against a city ordinance that banned public speaking in the area around 5th and E Streets in downtown San Diego.

This afternoon, San Diego Police re-erected barricades at the Civic Center Plaza in an apparent effort to control access to the Plaza. Barricades have been re-set to control access from Third Avenue.

Occupy San Diego activities are due to begin around 5:30 pm with committee meetings and the General Assembly at 7pm. Hundreds of demonstrators and supporters usually show up for these meetings.

The biggest story of the week is the number of arrests made at Occupy encampments large and small across the whole country and the late night/early morning police raids that have generated so many of those arrests.

The most gripping example was the early morning dismantling of Occupy Oakland by police with riot gear. The whole world was watching as Iraq War Vet for Peace Scott Olsen was dragged to safety at a protest later that day after being left bloodied and prostrate on the ground by a police projectile. The image of someone in a wheel chair maneuvering through a cloud of smoke and tear gas was no less gut wrenching. Mayor Jean Quan decides to make nice with the occupiers the following day.

DENVER — The simmering tension near the Colorado Capitol escalated dramatically Saturday with more than a dozen arrests, reports of skirmishes between police and protesters and authorities firing rounds of pellets filled with pepper spray at supporters of the Occupy Wall Street movement.

Officers in riot gear moved into a park late in the day where protesters were attempting to establish an encampment, hauling off demonstrators just hours after a standoff at the Capitol steps degenerated into a fight that ended in a cloud of Mace and pepper spray.