OB Rag

There’s a series of reports by Voice of San Diego reporter Emily Alpert published over the weekend that states that schools within the San Diego Unified system – including Point Loma High and Dana Middle School – misspent federal monies earmarked for disadvantaged students.

Seven years ago today I was sitting on the tarmac in Los Angeles waiting for my plane to take off. I had booked a red eye flight to San Juan Puerto Rico, where I would spend the month studying bomba, a popular dance form, and immersing myself in all things Puerto Rican.

I was traveling post 9/11, meaning that the country was on alert this particular 4th of July for possible terrorist attacks. The thought gave me pause as I imagined my fellow countrymen and women gathered at cookouts, watching parades, and celebrating a national holiday. I also imagined myself, a tiny creature, strapped inside a relatively small metal object flying across the continent and then out to sea for the next seven hours of my life.

Progressives can love our country without loving the Empire built in our name; we can celebrate the day as a day of revolt against the rich and powerful.

Can progressives be patriotic? The short answer is: yes, but it really depends on how you define “patriotic” and “patriot”.

According to Merriam-Webster, “patriot” is “one who loves his or her country and supports its authority and interests.”

If that’s the definition we go by, then the answer is ‘no.’

So we need to redefine what “patriot” means in this new world of instant communications, of empire, tea parties, the Arab Spring, failing eco-systems, of US soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan, of millions of unemployed, of ecological disasters that affect us all.

Every 4^th of July, I make sure to fit in a few minutes to put on one of my favorite Dave Alvin songs, “4^th of July” (which is better known as an X song). It’s a bittersweet tale of two lovers trying to make their way through life. After pulling a holiday shift, a man comes home from work to find his lover crying in the dark and he ponders their fate:

On the lost side of town
In a dark apartment
We gave up trying so long ago.
On the steps I smoke a
Cigarette alone.
The Mexican kids are shooting
Fireworks below.
Hey, baby—it’s the fourth of July.
Whatever happened
I apologize
So dry your tears
And baby—walk outside
It’s the 4^th of July

by Howard Zinn

On this July 4, we would do well to renounce nationalism and all its symbols: its flags, its pledges of allegiance, its anthems, its insistence in song that God must single out America to be blessed.

Is not nationalism — that devotion to a flag, an anthem, a boundary so fierce it engenders mass murder — one of the great evils of our time, along with racism, along with religious hatred?

Yes, it is true. Baseball great David Wells has been hired as a pitching coach for Point Loma High School and its baseball team. The former Padre and Yankee player, PLHS Class of 1982, was a big star while at our local high school, and named as the CIF Player of the Year.

MINNEAPOLIS — Minnesota began what is expected to become the broadest shutdown of state services in its history early Friday, after Republicans and Democrats there failed to agree on how to solve the state’s budget woes in time for the new fiscal year.

And so, on the eve of a holiday weekend, residents were likely to find the state’s parks, historical sites and the Minnesota Zoo closed, hunting and fishing licenses no longer being issued, and that state’s lottery system and racetracks unavailable.

by George J. Janczyn / Groksurf’s San Diego / July 1, 2011

The City of San Diego’s IPR (indirect potable reuse) study, now officially referred to as the Water Purification Demonstration Project by the Public Utilities Department, just passed a major milestone: the Advanced Water Purification Facility needed for the project is completed and operations have begun.

by Lucas O’Connor / Two Cathedrals / July 1, 2011

Right on cue after a full week of discussing the complex issues facing the San Diego Democratic Party and the media’s struggles to wrestle with complexity, CityBeat chimes in, again criticizing Democrats for trying to compete on even footing in San Diego politics.

Presumably, this is an attempt to light a fire under Durfee, if rather ham-handed.

A decade later, unofficial boycott of Starbucks continues among OBcians

This is the final segment of my four part series on the tenth anniversary of the anti-Starbucks campaign in Ocean Beach.

Plan A – the Formula Ban

The passage of Prop A – the Formula Ban of chain restaurants and other corporate-type businesses in Ocean Beach at the OB Planning Board elections on March 12th, 2002, had been a major boost for activists boycotting Starbucks. It had passed with more than three-quarters of the vote (77%) at the annual election – in a near record turn-out of voters.

Mayor’s Proposition Depends on Breaking State Law In Order To Achieve Lion’s Share of Projected Savings

The Republican ballot measure to leave city workers without Social Security or any other retirement safety net includes a maneuver that Mayor Sanders claimed was illegal just a few months ago.

According to the ballot measure’s supporters, the section of the proposition requiring the city to freeze pensionable pay for 5 years accounts for up to 87% (or $1.1 billion) of the savings heralded by supporters. It is against California state law to impose a pay freeze for that long without bargaining in good faith with employees first.

By Karla Adam / Washington Post /  June 30, 2011 LONDON– Airports, courts and more than 10,000 schools were among…