OB Rag

by Mike Davis

“Since everyone is dumping on Mexico these days, you might as well help me do the real thing.”

My friend Marcos Ramirez (aka “ERRE”) isn’t kidding. He’s building a new house in Colonia Libertad, Tijuana’s oldest and most surrealistically colorful neighborhood …

The banks used their power over 12 Democratic members of the Senate to defeat Senator Durbin’s “Helping Families Save Their Homes in Bankruptcy” amendment. And they financed the lobbying of taxpayer representatives with some of the billions of bail-out dollars provided by – taxpayers.

This was a defeat for American democracy.

by Ernie McCray

Now that the hullabaloo is over regarding what Obama has or hasn’t accomplished during his first 100 days, I’m just stoked that he’s still maintaining his cool. I can’t help but be impressed by coolness.

Growing up black in Tucson in the 40’s and 50’s, it sometimes seemed that being cool was …

by Ken Secor

May 1st is observed as International Labor Day by most of the countries of the world. The reason most people believe that May Day is a communist holiday is because corporate America doesn’t want you to even wonder why that day was chosen.

By Mary Mann

Walking down the long row of trailers, I wonder how I will recognize the one that belongs to Daniel Wallace and Judith May. They all look the same. As I near it, though, the ownership of the mobile home is made obvious by a preponderance of what their makers refer to as wobblies, wooden creatures, each with a name and a story. I should have known there would be something.

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.