OB Rag

Before the California Democratic Convention ended yesterday, delegates bucked the Party leadership on the May 19th ballot measures – by securing a “no endorsement” on Propositions 1A, 1D and 1E. State legislators and Party operatives pushed “yes” on all six measures, but enough of the grassroots who stayed for the tail end of the session refused to go along.

by Rocky Neptune

Otay Mesa, Tijuana, Mexico……Juanita couldn’t hold her balance. The policemen pursuing her were waving guns and shouting. She tried to re-tie the shawl that held the baby to her breast while darting through the moving traffic, but her six month old fell forward, skidding across the filthy asphalt, his lower lip ripped by the jagged edge of a pothole.

by Steven Heller

Even before Shepard Fairey’s Barack Obama “Hope” poster became the focus of legal and ethical scrutiny — for Fairey’s use of Mannie Garcia’s A.P. news photo as the basis of the now ubiquitous image — some design critics and practitioners had already questioned the street artist’s habit of “sampling” existing imagery. A scolding essay by Mark Vallen, entitled “Obey Plagiarist Fairey,” which was published online in 2007, accused Fairey, who created the “OBEY GIANT” project in 1989, of “expropriating and recontextualizing artworks of others.”

By Ali Soufan

FOR seven years I have remained silent about the false claims magnifying the effectiveness of the so-called enhanced interrogation techniques like waterboarding. I have spoken only in closed government hearings, as these matters were classified. But the release last week of four Justice Department memos on interrogations allows me to shed light on the story, and on some of the lessons to be learned.

by Jon Carr

Last night (4/22/09) on Faux News, Conservative Right Wing pundit Sean Hannity engaged in a debate with Charles Grodin over the hot topic of torture or as the right wing prefers to call it, “enhanced interrogation.”

by Anna Daniels

Just an FYI. I voted this morning to approve our MEA union two year contract. The results aren’t in but I suspect it will pass. It includes over one week of mandatory unpaid furlough, a 3% pay reduction or an equal reduction in our supplemental pension.

Twenty years ago today, Colleen Dietzel and Kip Kruegar and other local environmentalists opened The Green Store on Voltaire Street for the first time. It was Earth Day 1989 – April 22nd.

Ever since, the iconic ecology store has steadfastly held its ground, offering books, magazines, bumper stickers, buttons, posters and other green products and mementos, while also serving as an anti-corporate space, a meeting site for area groups, and the headquarters for any thing green in OB.

The carbon footprint of the average San Diegan — including residential energy use and transportation — is larger than that of the average resident of Los Angeles, a review of available data shows. San Diego lags behind LA in policies and programs to reduce energy use.

The Supreme Court put a new limit on police searches of cars Tuesday, saying that “countless individuals guilty of nothing more serious than a traffic violation” have had their vehicles searched in violation of their rights.

by Frank Gormlie

Jeff McDonald of the Union-Tribune staff reported this afternoon on a “plan” that the County Board of Supervisors just today unanimously approved to get more people on food stamps. Hot damn! And it’s a 3 year plan at that, too.

by Lane Tobias

As a lifelong sports fan with allegiances to various East Coast sports teams that garner hatred amongst competitor fan bases (I won’t go into all of my favorite teams as to not draw the ire of the many native San Diegans who read the OB Rag) I have been encouraged on an emotional and philosophical level by the early season success of the San Diego Padres.

Dozens of city and county workers descended on Sacramento’s tent city on Thursday, and within hours cleared the area of all signs of the sprawling homeless encampment.

PLUS

Over the past few months, reporters from around the world have flocked to the now-famous tent city in Sacramento, Calif. When they find out that 55-year-old John Kraintz has been living in a tent for almost seven years, they turn around and walk away.