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By David Bentley Hart
$11.56
By Elia Kazan
$19.80
$23
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web.mac.com/middlebrook
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By Paul Von Blum — Willie Middlebrook’s untimely death at the age of 54 on May 4 brought an end to the work of one of the finest and most socially conscious artists of our times.
Posted on May 22, 2012
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UggBoy?UggGirl [ PHOTO // WORLD // TRAVEL ] (CC BY 2.0)
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A Public Policy Institute of California report shows that amid soaring tuition costs and diminishing state government support for higher education, large numbers of students are surrendering the quest for a four-year degree because they simply can’t afford it.
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Bill Moyers begins his latest show by saying, “There is no stretch of territory in the world quite like the borderlands between the United States and Mexico. ... ” And he’s right.
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Wikipedia
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Ernest Callenbach, author of the beloved 1975 utopian novel “Ecotopia,” died of cancer last month at the age of 83. Days later, a sort of farewell detailing his hopes for the world he left behind was discovered on his computer.
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Lucas Penati (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)
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Mexican immigration to the United States has slowed after four decades of the largest rush of migrants from a single country in American history and may even be declining, a report by the Pew Hispanic Center says.
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Photo by (CC-BY)
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Californians headed to the polls to elect our next president will have another big decision to make: Should the state abolish capital punishment and commute all death sentences to life in prison?
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Olle Johansson, Sweden —
Posted on Apr 3, 2012
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AP / Jeff Chiu
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Here’s some real progress and some good news: On Tuesday, a federal appeals court in San Francisco decided, in a 2-1 ruling, that California’s infamous Proposition 8, the same-sex marriage ban approved by voters in 2008, was unconstitutional. Now, on to the Supreme Court.
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AP / Mary Ann Chastain
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By Deanne Stillman — California may be a blue state in terms of voting patterns, but it’s very involved in red state politics, if you consider the role of evangelical voters.
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Brad Montgomery (CC-BY)
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California Gov. Jerry Brown has suggested steep cuts to social programs that benefit parents and children on the verge of homelessness. Brown is hoping to close a $9.2 billion hole in the budget (and drum up support for tax hikes) by asking the state’s most desperate families to do without.
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Christian Peralta (CC-BY-SA)
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Friends tell the Los Angeles Times that Itzcoatl “Izzy” Ocampo returned from Iraq a changed man. The ex-Marine from Orange County, Calif., is accused of killing four homeless men, each stabbed more than 40 times. “He’s a veteran who did not get the help he needed,” said a fellow Marine, adding that she had trusted Ocampo with her life.
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As Campaign 2012 marches inexorably onward, we might pause to consider the game-changing impact upon the ritual of campaigning that the Supreme Court’s notorious Citizens United decision of two years ago is bound to have.
Posted on Jan 5, 2012
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Esparta Palma (CC-BY)
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As of late last year, a Fremont, Calif., man had donated his sperm 328 times to would-be parents who found him on the Internet. The Food and Drug Administration has told the donor, whose self-described “service to help the community” has produced 14 children, to stop.
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Poster by R. Black
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Protesters successfully shut down some operations in three major ports spanning the Western United States on Monday. Coordinated action in Washington, Oregon and California was designed to interfere with commerce, bolster the spirits of the evicted and—why not?—inconvenience Goldman Sachs.
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California Democratic Party Chairman John Burton has a certain way of talking that is familiar and even entertaining to those who know him, but “The Daily Show” seemed genuinely shocked to discover a politician who doesn’t give a shit about our Victorian sensibilities.
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Joe Wolf (CC-BY-ND)
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By Juan Cole — University students, who face tuition hikes and state cuts to public education, find themselves victimized by the same neoliberal agenda that has created the current economic crisis, and which profoundly endangers democratic values.
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sushiesque (CC-BY)
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The sponsors of Proposition 8 and other contested laws are entitled to defend such measures when the state refuses to do so, the California Supreme Court declared Thursday afternoon. The ruling could push the long argument over same-sex marriage—which has wearied its proponents and adversaries—to the desks of federal judges, including those on the U.S. Supreme Court.
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WELS.net (CC-BY)
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Father Eduardo Samaniego, the Jesuit pastor of Most Holy Trinity Catholic Church in San Jose, Calif., protested foreclosures by Bank of America against those in his flock and beyond by moving $3 million of his parish’s funds to a local credit union. (more)
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AP / Ric Francis
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By Bill Boyarsky — The U.S. attorneys who have declared war on California’s medical marijuana industry remind me of the prohibition agents in the HBO show “Boardwalk Empire.”
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Although his cover was blown in a video circulated last month, Oakland cop Fred Shavies says in this interview that he didn’t see his job as “infiltrating” the Occupy Oakland movement—at least not in a bad way. He does criticize his fellow officers, though, in terms of ... (more)
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Alberto.. (CC-BY)
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In one part of Southern California, if you do the crime, there’s a chance you’ll pay both the time and the price of imprisonment. Due to a measure passed Tuesday by Riverside County’s board of supervisors, county jail inmates deemed able will be forced to pay $142.42 per day during their stay in the clink. (more)
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AP / Damian Dovarganes
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By Robert Scheer — There is no three-strikes law for crooked bankers, who usually get off with a fine and a promise not to do it again, and again and again.
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Carlos Puma / California Watch
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By Patricia Leigh Brown —
Arsenic-tainted water, raw sewage that backs up into the shower and other horrors make one end of Avenue 54, where residents of the eastern Coachella Valley’s roughly 125 illegal trailer park sites make their home, a place of grim housekeeping.
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Brian Auer (CC-BY)
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For those who live there, life at the wrong end of Avenue 54 in Southern California’s eastern Coachella Valley is a hot, rotting hell. As you head east, the “Bermuda shorts, putting greens and picture-window champagne dinners” found in abundance near the Arnold Palmer Golf Course give way to … (more)
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Alejandro Forero Cuervo (CC-BY)
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With the Obama administration threatening to seize medicinal marijuana dispensaries in the state, the California Medical Association voted Friday to support the decriminalization of marijuana. The association, the state’s largest physician organization, originally opposed California’s 15-year-old medical marijuana initiative. (more)
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Flickr / Monica's Dad (CC-BY)
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Gov. Jerry Brown announced Saturday that he has signed the California Dream Act, making state financial aid available to undocumented immigrants who choose to attend California universities and community colleges. (more)
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AP / Jason Redmond
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By Leilani Albano — A new union contract has been hailed as a “win-win,” but a closer look at the agreement shows that it fails to provide decent wages and benefits for most grocery workers.
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woodleywonderworks (CC-BY)
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The Wall Street Journal recently profiled Nicolas Berggruen, a billionaire who has apparently become fascinated with political gridlock and enamored with the smoke-filled room. What makes Berggruen interesting is his ability to summon personalities such as Arnold Schwarzenegger, Joseph Stiglitz, Tony Blair and Condoleezza Rice. (more)
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Flickr / planetc1 (CC-BY-SA)
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Amazon.com struck a deal with California on online sales taxes Friday, agreeing to create thousands of jobs in exchange for a one-year reprieve from collecting state sales taxes. (more)
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AP / Charles Dharapak
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By Robert Scheer — In my own experience as a journalist covering this issue, the vast majority of politicians who defend capital punishment do so out of rank opportunism.
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Flickr / BKLYN guy (CC-BY)
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Attorneys general from California, Illinois, Massachusetts, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Washington have all come out in support of the U.S. Department of Justice’s lawsuit to block AT&T from acquiring T-Mobile.
Posted on Sep 17, 2011
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Flickr / thisisbossi (CC-BY-SA)
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California legislators cut a tentative deal with Amazon.com Wednesday night that would allow the online retail giant to postpone collecting sales taxes from Californians until September 2012. (more)
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Flickr / MikeBlogs (CC-BY)
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Amazon.com proposed to job-strapped California on Thursday that it would hire 7,000 people and build distribution centers in the state if Sacramento would agree to suspend a recently approved online sales tax policy for two years. (more)
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Beatrice Murch (CC-BY-SA)
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By Amy Goodman — What does the police killing of a homeless man in San Francisco have to do with the Arab Spring uprisings from Tunisia to Syria? The attempt to suppress the protests that followed.
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Flickr / james.gordon6108 (CC-BY)
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By Deanne Stillman — While much of the coverage of the end of the space shuttle age has focused on Florida, the launching pad for many missions, it should be recalled that another region of the country was equally important: the Antelope Valley of Los Angeles County and, in particular, the Mojave city of Lancaster.
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Monte Wolverton, Cagle Cartoons —
Posted on Jul 23, 2011
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Illustration based on a U.S. Census graphic
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By the Los Angeles Times’ count, there have been more than 220 attempts to divide California, and all have failed. A new proposal by a Temecula politician would split off the conservative counties south and east of Los Angeles to form a Republican-dominated South California that would be home to 13 million people (minus those who flee after secession). (more)
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YouTube
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By Bill Boyarsky — Succeeding against all odds certainly describes Ana Ponce, chief executive officer of Camino Nuevo Charter Academy, which runs five charter schools, the majority in the most crowded, impoverished and gang-ridden section of Los Angeles.
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Truthdig political reporter Bill Boyarsky explains why Michele Bachmann could win Iowa, tells us about Mitt Romney’s advantage and says “The impact of [California’s] budget is going to be felt negatively for generations.”
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Illustration from a photo by Jeffrey (CC-BY-SA)
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Amazon.com abruptly ended its Associates Program for California residents Wednesday, cutting off roughly 10,000 individuals and small businesses, including this one, from a vital source of income with less than a day’s notice. Like a handful of states, California is trying to force Amazon to collect sales tax. (more)
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AP / Paul Sakuma
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By Robert Scheer — Scalia’s opinion is actually quite thrilling in enunciating an extremely broad definition of the free speech rights of minors. But it is simply bizarre in dismissing the claimed harmful effects of violent depictions while still insisting on the strictest puritanical view of the dangers of sexual imagery.
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Freedom to Marry (CC-BY)
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Californians made it easier for their lawmakers to pass a budget, but you might not be able to tell from all the drama. Perhaps you heard that Gov. Jerry Brown (above) vetoed a budget passed by his own party, Republicans managed to block voters from approving new taxes and the state controller stopped paying legislators. (more)
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The Supreme Court overturned California’s ban on violent video games; social networking sites may be effectively enhancing our social lives; and a case of public urination in Oregon forces a city to flush its reservoir. These discoveries and more after the jump.
Posted on Jun 28, 2011
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AP / Todd Goodrich
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In a second major ruling Monday, U.S. Supreme Court justices split along ideological lines to reject an Arizona campaign finance law that offered public funding to candidates unable to raise the enormous sums of money needed to run for political office. (more)
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Monte Wolverton, Cagle Cartoons —
Posted on Jun 24, 2011
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Photo illustration from an image by Colin Grey
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On this week’s episode of Truthdig radio in collaboration with KPFK: Unconstitutionally crowded prisons, battlefield medicine, a very special segment on the Marines who collect their dead in Iraq, and just a little bit of Jesus. Plus: Reese Erlich reports from Egypt.
Posted on Jun 15, 2011
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On this week’s episode of Truthdig Radio in collaboration with KPFK: Unconstitutionally crowded prisons, battlefield medicine, a very special segment on the Marines who collect their dead in Iraq, and just a little bit of Jesus. Plus: Reese Erlich reports from Egypt. Update: Full transcript.
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By Richard Reeves — Forget the midnight ride of Paul Revere, Callista Gingrich’s jewelry collection and Anthony Weiner’s ... well, you know. The most important political people right now are 14 Californians you don’t know.
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Wikimedia Commons
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Last year, U.S. District Court Judge Vaughn R. Walker ruled California’s Proposition 8 to be unconstitutional. Shortly afterward, opponents of same-sex marriage called the ruling invalid, arguing that Walker’s homosexuality made him unfit to adjudicate the case. On Tuesday, another federal judge threw that argument out.
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