Location Details: 1187 Franklin Street, San Francisco, CA 94109, corner of Geary Blvd
Ten years ago one of the most uniquely organized economic justice campaigns exploded inside a little park in New York City. Before national pundits could typecast the phenomenon, Occupy Wall Street had spread like wildfire, city after city, across America. In San Francisco Occupy Wall Street became the longest standing of all the protests in the United States. Mr. Paulson was asked to write a reflection of his and the San Francisco Labor Council’s role steering resources and strategies with the myriad of partners and spontaneous leaders that emerged during this 2013 revolt. His article in 48 Hills can be read here: https://48hills.org/2021/09/occupy-san-francisco-was-a-game-changer/ Tim Paulson recently retired as Executive Director of the San Francisco Labor Council and Secretary-Treasurer of the San Francisco Building and Construction Trades Council. Mr. Paulson and the San Francisco Labor Council have partnered in economic and social justice campaigns including: Raising the Minimum Wage, Securing Universal Health Care, Get Out The Vote. and expanding Immigrant Rights. Mr. Paulson currently serves as a San Francisco Public Utilities Commissioner. Attend in person, or via Zoom: https://zoom.us/j/97140437863?pwd=Y010MjNjbjB0bVBQWFFyRS9QMGFuUT09 Meeting ID: 971 4043 7863. Passcode: 666316
The just released study on the extreme danger humanity and all living beings on earth now face as a result of climate change frankly ought to command the attention of every politician in the world, and it should be at the top of every nation’s agenda. But it does not, and is not. In the United States, for instance, I did not see a single television corporate media channel even mention this report. Today’s news was about how Hunter Biden five years ago when he was a cocaine addict, bought a gun, which he never used, or even loaded and in buying it falsely answered a form question as to whether he was using drugs when he bought the gun. A gun he owned for a total of 11 days. How many Red state gun owners who smoke marijuana, which is illegal in their states, as well as federally, do you think have done the same, when filling out the form? A hundred thousand, two hundred thousand, a million? The point of this drill is obviously to create counter programming about the Biden’s to counteract and take up media time so there is less coverage of Trump’s criminality.
Six of nine planetary boundaries are currently transgressed. The length of the wedges symbolizes what the current state of the corresponding process is, in relation to the distance from the planetary boundary (end of the green area) and the Holocene baseline (origin of the diagram). The color symbolizes the risks associated with each. For example, a wedge may be very long because the current state is already very far from the planetary boundary and the Holocene. But it may still not be purple, because that is not yet associated with very high risks in this particular case. In other cases already a “small” overshoot (short wedge) results in a big risk: Then the color further inside already changes to purple. Illustration: Richardson et al., Science Advances, 2023 (CC BY-NC 4.0)
Scientists behind a new study on the crossing of the Earth’s “planetary boundaries” on Wednesday likened the planet to a sick patient, warning that six out of nine barriers that ensure the Earth is a “safe operating space for humanity” have now been […]
United Auto Workers members picket and hold signs outside of the UAW Local 900 headquarters across the street from the Ford Assembly Plant in Wayne, Michigan on September 15, 2023.
(Photo: Matthew Hatcher/AFP via Getty Images)
“The money is there, the cause is righteous, the world is watching, and the UAW is ready to stand up,” said Shawn Fain, the union’s president.
The United Auto Workers union kicked off historic strikes against the Big Three U.S. car manufacturers early Friday morning after the companies failed to meet workers’ demands for adequate pay increases and benefit improvements.
The initial wave of strikes hit select Ford, General Motors, and Stellantis facilities, with the union deploying a tactic it has described as a ” stand-up strike.”
UAW members at General Motors’ Wentzville Assembly in Missouri, Ford’s Michigan Assembly, and Stellantis’ Toledo Assembly in Ohio were the first to walk off the job on Friday, and additional locals will be called on to strike in the coming days as negotiations continue.
Those who remain on the job will be working under an expired collective bargaining agreement, though they still have status quo protections.
The labor actions mark the first time the UAW has ever gone on strike against all three major automakers simultaneously.
“We’ve been working hard, trying to reach a deal for economic and social justice for our members,” UAW president Shawn Fain said in a speech late Thursday, just ahead of the midnight strike deadline. “We have been firm. We are committed to winning an agreement with the Big Three that reflects the incredible sacrifice and contributions UAW members have made to these companies.”
“The money is there, the cause is righteous, the world is watching, and the UAW is ready to stand up,” Fain added. “This is our defining moment.”
night shift is leaving the plant at GM Wentzville, with jubilant honks, the UAW strike has begun!! pic.twitter.com/WHQ7Ms1HQa
The companies’ latest publicized offers to the UAW included raises of up to 20% over the course of a four-year contract, but the proposals thus far have fallen well short of the union’s demands on wages, cost-of-living adjustments, retiree benefits, and other key issues.
Ford CEO Jim Farley, who brought in nearly $21 million in total compensation last year, told CNN that the UAW’s push for a near-40% wage increase would “put us out of business,” a claim that Fain dismissed as a “joke.”
“The cost of labor for a vehicle is 5% of the vehicle,” Fain said from the picket line outside Ford’s Michigan Assembly plant. “They could double our wages and not raise the prices of vehicles, and they would still make billions of dollars. It’s a lie like everything else that comes out of their mouths.”
Between 2013 and 2022, according to an Economic Policy Institute analysis released this week, the Big Three automakers saw roughly $250 billion in total profits—an increase of 92%—and the companies’ CEOs received a 40% pay increase. The automakers also rewarded shareholders with $66 billion in dividend payouts and stock buybacks.
U.S. autoworkers’ wages, meanwhile, have declined by over 19% since the car industry’s 2008 crisis, during which workers gave up cost-of-living adjustments and other benefits to help keep the major automakers afloat.
“As a single parent, I’m working paycheck to paycheck,” Adelisa LeBron, a striking Ford worker, toldThe Washington Post. “I love the way Shawn is fighting for us, how he’s not going to settle.”
In his address late Thursday, Fain urged locals that are not currently on strike to “keep organizing” to “show the companies you are ready to join the stand-up strike at a moment’s notice.”
“This strategy will keep the companies guessing,” he said. “It will give our national negotiators maximum leverage and flexibility in bargaining. And if we need to go all out, we will. Everything is on the table.”
On Friday evening, the UAW is planning to hold what Fain dubbed a “mass rally” outside of a Ford building in downtown Detroit, where U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) is expected to appear.
“We must show the world that our fight is a righteous fight,” said Fain.
Our work is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). Feel free to republish and share widely.
This is part two of an exclusive Occupy.com series examining the hyper-partisan Supreme Court and solutions to reining it in. Click here to read part one.
The Supreme Court of the United States’ (SCOTUS) six-member conservative majority has cemented itself as a steadfast opponent of democracy and voting rights, organized labor, and civil rights for marginalized communities. Following the court’s overturning of the Roe v. Wade decision, paving the way for states to criminalize the termination of pregnancies once again, NPR deemed the Roberts court the most conservative in 90 years. And that was before the latest term, in which SCOTUS struck down President Joe Biden’s student debt cancellation program and ruled in favor of a plaintiff who sought to discriminate against LGBTQ+ individuals.
The situation seems even more dire when considering that a full third of the court was appointed by a president who is currently facing 91 felony counts in three separate jurisdictions – and whose 2024 eligibility has come under scrutiny given his role in the January 6 insurrection. SCOTUSBlog publisher Tom Goldstein said America is likely “stuck with” this current court for the next quarter of a century. NPR’s Nina Totenberg broke down how extreme the nation’s highest legal body has become:
In overturning Roe v. Wade, the court erased a half century of court precedents and eliminated the constitutional right to abortion. Just weeks after the shootings in Uvalde, Texas, the court issued a broadly worded opinion making it more difficult to regulate guns. In a major environmental case, the court curbed the EPA’s ability to deal with climate change, and in so doing signaled that other government assertions of regulatory power in the name of health and safety could be on the chopping block. In two religion cases, the court barely mentioned the concept of separation between church and state; rather, it expanded public funding options for religious schools and ruled in favor of a high school football coach who wanted to pray on the 50-yard line, a significant expansion of teachers’ rights to public, even ostentatious, religious expression while on the job.
But despite the seemingly omnipotent power of the current Supreme Court, SCOTUS’ immense power could ultimately be reined in by reimagining the way we conduct presidential elections. While that may seem like a tall order, it’s a goal that’s far more in reach than we may realize.
SCOTUS WOULD BE FAR LESS PARTISAN WITHOUT THE ELECTORAL COLLEGE
It’s important to note that the only reason the Supreme Court has become so extreme is because of the electoral college. Of the six members of the conservative majority, five were appointed by presidents who lost the popular vote; George W. Bush (R) appointed Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito, and Donald Trump (R) appointed Justices Amy Coney Barrett, Neil Gorsuch – who is sitting in a stolen seat that should have been filled by President Barack Obama (D) – and Brett Kavanaugh. Had popular vote winners Al Gore and Hillary Clinton been the ones to make those appointments, the Supreme Court would have an 8-1 liberal majority.
To most foreign observers, the US’ process of electing presidents can seem incredibly confusing. In a democracy, it stands to reason that the candidate who wins the most votes would win the election. But despite Donald Trump losing the popular vote by nearly three million ballots, he became president by winning a majority of the 538 total electoral college votes divvied up among all 50 states based on each state’s population. This means that because Trump won just 77,744 more votes across Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, he was able to secure the 270 electoral votes needed to become the chief executive of the third most populous country in the world, and put enough justices on the Supreme Court to ensure a conservative majority for decades.
Even when considering the 10 other countries that have electoral college-type systems, the US stands alone in choosing its chief executive in this way. Other electoral colleges like Estonia, Madagascar, Myanmar, and the Vatican either use the system to elect members of their respective legislature, use that system in lieu of the population voting at all, or, like India, use it to elect a figurehead with no real executive power. The US is the only developed democracy to use the electoral college to elevate someone to our highest political office.
If it seems like such a system is designed to foster inequality, that’s because it is! As the Brennan Center for Justice explained, the electoral college was implemented as a compromise to give the five Southern states that housed nearly all of the country’s slaves (who could not vote) proportionally more representation:
Behind [James] Madison’s statement were the stark facts: The populations in the North and South were approximately equal, but roughly one-third of those living in the South were held in bondage. Because of its considerable, nonvoting slave population, that region would have less clout under a popular-vote system. The ultimate solution was an indirect method of choosing the president, one that could leverage the three-fifths compromise, the Faustian bargain they’d already made to determine how congressional seats would be apportioned. With about 93 percent of the country’s slaves toiling in just five southern states, that region was the undoubted beneficiary of the compromise, increasing the size of the South’s congressional delegation by 42 percent. When the time came to agree on a system for choosing the president, it was all too easy for the delegates to resort to the three-fifths compromise as the foundation. The peculiar system that emerged was the Electoral College.
Given its racist origins, it’s entirely fair to say the electoral college has outlived its welcome. Because the electoral college is written into the Constitution, the most direct way to get rid of it would be to pass a Constitutional amendment. However, that process requires approval by 38 states, both chambers of Congress, and the president. This process can often take decades, if not centuries: The latest amendment – the 27th, pertaining to compensation for members of Congress – took more than 200 years to ratify. But there’s a far simpler solution that effectively provides an end-run around the Constitutional amendment process: Voting in state legislative elections.
HOW VOTING IN LOCAL ELECTIONS COULD ABOLISH THE ELECTORAL COLLEGE
The phrase “all politics is local” may sound like a tired cliche, but in regard to the electoral college, the most important elections may very well be elections for state lawmakers. This is due to the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact (NPVIC), in which signatories to the agreement bind their states’ electoral college votes to whomever wins the national popular vote. Currently, 16 states with a total of 205 electoral votes between them have signed onto the NPVIC. The latest state to do so was Minnesota, in May of 2023. This means that the NPVIC is just 65 electoral votes away from effectively abolishing the electoral college without having to amend the Constitution.
The easiest states to do this would be in Democratic trifecta states, where Democrats control both the House and Senate as well as occupy the governor’s mansion. According to Ballotpedia, the Democratic trifecta states of Maine and Michigan have yet to sign onto the NPVIC. If they joined, that would mean only a handful of states with 46 more electoral votes would need to join in order to fulfill the NPVIC’s goal. Those 46 votes could come from a variety of places – either states where Democrats control the legislature but not the governor’s mansion (like Nevada, which has six electoral votes), states where partisan control of a legislature is evenly split between the House and the Senate (like Pennsylvania and Virginia, which make up 33 electoral votes), or states where one party controls the legislature and the other controls the governor’s mansion (states like Arizona, Louisiana, North Carolina, and Wisconsin, which make up 44 electoral votes).
A coordinated campaign could focus organizing resources on flipping key legislative seats in states like these and on winning competitive gubernatorial races. And in off years, this campaign could pressure state lawmakers at town halls and in primaries to support the NPVIC. Because state lawmakers’ districts are often small, they are far more accessible and much more sensitive to public pressure than members of Congress and the US Senate. It’s not hard to imagine how this campaign could build up enough momentum to get a half dozen more states to join the NPVIC and effectively leave the electoral college in the past where it belongs.
This is a lofty goal, to be sure, but the prospect of electing presidents by national popular vote – and subsequently making sure the SCOTUS’ partisan makeup is more representative of the will of the people – is worth the work involved. Identifying key legislative districts and mobilizing voters in those ZIP codes to vote for legislators who support the NPVIC could save us decades of time that would otherwise be spent chasing a Constitutional amendment.
Carl Gibson is a freelance columnist whose work has been published in CNN, USA TODAY, the Guardian, the Washington Post, the Houston Chronicle, Barron’s, Business Insider, the Independent, and NPR, among others. Follow him on Bluesky @crgibs.bsky.social.
On the eve of the 60th anniversary of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King’s march on Washington, a 21-year-old gunman using a rifle emblazoned with swastikas opened fire at a Dollar General store in Jacksonville, Florida, targeting Black people with an AR-15-style rifle he purchased legally.
The shooter, who initially tried to attack the campus of a historically Black college before being turned away by security, yelled racial slurs during the attack and wrote a racist manifesto before carrying out the shooting. While addressing Jacksonville residents, Governor Ron DeSantis – a top contender in the 2024 Republican presidential primary – called the shooter a “scumbag,” though the crowd booed him during his remarks.
To his credit, DeSantis is right to describe the gunman – who ended his own life before police could apprehend him – in this way. But before attempting to speak on the tragedy, both DeSantis and Florida’s Republican-controlled legislature should instead listen to people of color and reflect on how their prior actions and rhetoric as public officials have emboldened and encouraged people like the Jacksonville shooter to act on their hate.
NAACP: DESANTIS’ FLORIDA IS ‘OPENLY HOSTILE’ TO AFRICAN AMERICANS
Now in his fifth year and second term as Florida governor, DeSantis has made Florida a place “where woke goes to die,” as he declared in his victory speech after his 2022 reelection. Florida Republicans increased their majorities in both the House of Representatives and the Senate in 2020 and 2022, and have used their power to enact sweeping new laws regulating public education in the Sunshine State, particularly as it relates to discussions of systemic racism and slavery. The “Stop WOKE Act,” signed into law in 2022, essentially halted discussions of race in public schools, and threw discussions about the contributions of African Americans to society and culture into question.
That same year, DeSantis signed the Parental Rights in Education law, which is also known as the “Don’t Say Gay” law. This bill prevented discussions about LGBTQ+ issues between kindergarten and third grade, though that has since been expanded all the way to eighth grade. That law, compounded with the “Stop WOKE Act” and House Bill 1467 – which dictates that all books be subject to review before being available to students – led to widespread book bans that effectively emptied library shelves across Florida. And in May, DeSantis signed another bill defunding Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) programming at the state’s public universities, arguing that DEI education distracts from “the core mission” of universities.
These actions, among others, led the NAACP to issue a very rare travel advisory, in which the organization warned that Florida has become “openly hostile” to African Americans, people of color, and the LGBTQ+ population.
“Under the leadership of Governor DeSantis, the state of Florida has become hostile to Black Americans and in direct conflict with the democratic ideals that our union was founded upon,” NAACP President Derrick Johnson said in the travel advisory.
“Once again, hate-inspired state leaders have chosen to put politics over people. Governor Ron DeSantis and the state of Florida have engaged in a blatant war against principles of diversity and inclusion and rejected our shared identities to appeal to a dangerous, extremist minority,” Leon Russell, chair of the NAACP board of directors, stated.
Even after that travel advisory, DeSantis doubled down. In July, the Florida governor defended changes to the state’s middle school curriculum, which now requires history teachers to tell students that slavery taught enslaved people skills “that could be applied for their personal benefit.” Vice President Kamala Harris accused Gov. DeSantis of “wanting to replace history with lies.”
“How is it that anyone could suggest that in the midst of these atrocities that there was any benefit to being subjected to this level of dehumanization?” Harris said.
RON DESANTIS’ OVERTURES TO VIOLENT RIGHT-WING EXTREMISTS
Russell’s description of DeSantis as appealing to a dangerous, extremist minority is accurate: The Florida governor’s actions have consistently attracted support from neo-Nazis, white nationalists, and fascist-adjacent elements within the GOP. In June, Florida state representative Anna Eskamani (D) tweeted photos and videos of a group of neo-Nazi demonstrators waving swastika flags and pro-DeSantis signs that read “Make America Florida” outside of Disney World in Orlando. The targeting of Disney World is likely due to DeSantis’ attacks on Disney in response to the company’s criticism of his “Don’t Say Gay” law.
It should be easy for DeSantis to publicly distance himself from supporters who harbor hateful ideologies. However, he’s done the opposite: In late July, DeSantis fired communications staffer Nate Hochman for posting a video that showed the Florida governor’s face imposed on the Florida flag and the sonnenrad – a neo-Nazi symbol often used in conjunction with the swastika – while soldiers marched. The video contrasted Donald Trump’s statements in support of LGBTQ+ individuals with DeSantis’ draconian record targeting that population. Republican operative Rick Wilson of the Lincoln Project told the Guardian that DeSantis only fired Hochman because “he got caught.”
Hochman wasn’t simply a fringe extremist, but a rising star with the GOP. He was a staff writer for the National Review, wrote a guest essay for the New York Times, and was an occasional guest on Tucker Carlson’s Fox News program. His LinkedIn profile shows he worked at multiple prominent conservative think tanks and policy shops, and he has past involvement in the influential Claremont Institute and Federalist Society. Hochman referred to Holocaust denier Nick Fuentes as “a good influence,” and he even once tweeted favorably about fascism, saying it was comparable to “mainstream conservatism.” It could even be argued that DeSantis and the institutional right hired and elevated Hochman not in spite of his warmth toward fascism, but because of it. And as of this writing, DeSantis still employs Christina Pushaw as his press secretary, an alt-right social media personality who openly cheered a study about LGBTQ+ Florida residents fleeing the state for fear of harassment and bullying.
It’s important to note that DeSantis’ enabling of far-right extremism goes far beyond his attacks on DEI programming and LGBTQ+ rights. In April of this year, Gov. DeSantis signed a bill allowing gun owners to carry a concealed weapon without a permit, and without having to undergo training classes or pass a background check. The Jacksonville gunman bought his weapons just prior to that law taking effect, but had no issues buying either the handgun or the AR-15, despite being involuntarily committed to a mental institution under Florida’s Baker Act in 2017. And as Occupy.com previously reported, DeSantis signed a bill in 2021 allowing drivers to run over protesters without facing any legal consequences. The Florida governor has given numerous winks and nods to those who wish to carry out right-wing political violence, so he shouldn’t be surprised when his words and actions are followed by bloodshed.
VIOLENT RIGHT-WING EXTREMISM REMAINS A NATIONAL AND GLOBAL ISSUE
The escalation of right-wing political violence isn’t exclusive to just Florida: In May of this year, a 33-year-old Texas man used an AR-15-style rifle – one of eight legally purchased firearms – to kill eight people at a Dallas-area outlet mall before he was shot dead by police. Investigators later found that aside from the man’s neo-Nazi tattoos and insignia, he was also active on white supremacist websites like the Daily Stormer and VDare, and had roughly 10 years of racist and anti-Semitic diary entries. And like Ron DeSantis, Texas Governor Greg Abbott has enabled violent outbursts like these with his relentless antagonization of marginalized communities and lackadaisical attitude toward firearm regulations.
It’s incumbent on political leaders to denounce and discourage political violence at every opportunity, especially when considering that right-wing extremism is the biggest domestic terrorism threat, according to a 2022 memo from the Department of Homeland Security. But this problem has lingered for years: In 2019, the New York Times analyzed some of the most notorious mass shootings of the decade, and found that nearly all of the perpetrators were affiliated with white supremacist and neo-Nazi causes. Mass shooters in Charleston, South Carolina; El Paso, Texas; Roseburg, Oregon; Oak Creek, Wisconsin; Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and elsewhere were all white men who targeted ethnic minorities. This is also a global problem, with right-wing extremist mass shooters killing 77 in Norway in 2011, and 51 in Christchurch, New Zealand in 2019.
If Gov. DeSantis is truly wishing to stop attacks like the Jacksonville shooting from happening again, he should not speak, but rather listen to members of marginalized populations, who he has directly harmed with his policies and rhetoric. If not, the problem will only worsen.
Carl Gibson is a freelance journalist and columnist whose work has been published in CNN, USA TODAY, the Guardian, the Washington Post, the Houston Chronicle, Barron’s, Business Insider, the Independent, and NPR, among others. Follow him on Bluesky @crgibs.bsky.social.
Bob T Jul 4, 2013 On February 13th, 1983 Marvin Gaye sang the National Anthem at the NBA All-Star game in Los Angeles. Gaye’s rendition is one of the most legendary performances of The Star Spangled Banner in sports history. The performance unconventionally made use of a drum machine, and Marvin made it work like no one else could have.
Last year, students missed school for lack of healthcare
by ANNIKA HOM SEPTEMBER 15, 2023 (MissionLocal.org)
Dr. Aarti Vala and Jose Lopez from Mission Neighborhood Health Center pose in front of the new clinic at John O’Connell High School. Photo by Annika Hom, taken Sept. 14, 2023.
On a wet January evening, students from John O’Connell High School trekked to the San Francisco Board of Education meeting, pleading for help. The high school had entered its second semester without a school nurse, due to staff shortages, a situation that meant even a scrape or two threatened students’ ability to learn, students said.
“We get injured, but instead of getting medical attention, we get sent home,” said Henry Cruz, then a junior at O’Connell, speaking from a podium in-person at the Jan. 10 meeting. “My family doesn’t have time to take me to get medical attention.”
“I have missed almost 10 days” of school, added another student, Danny Landaverde.
No more. The district had hired a nurse for this year, but John O’Connell has upped the ante: For the first time, O’Connell opened a clinic staffed with physicians and nurses who can prescribe medicine and perform specific examinations — an uncommon resource among high schools.
The medical facility is thanks to Mission Neighborhood Health Center, which will fund and run the health clinic on campus until at least June 2026, with permission and appreciation from the school district. Since the clinic opened Aug. 24, numerous students have already poked their heads in to check out the facility.
“I’m surprised about how many kids come, and are interested,” said pediatrician Dr. Aarti Vala, dressed in blush scrubs and masked ahead of her Thursday student clinic shift. She credited John O’Connell for “getting the word out.”
“I love my teenagers!” Vala beamed.
Subscribe to our daily newsletter and have the latest stories from Mission Local delivered directly to your inbox.
A glance around the new clinic revealed familiar medical tools: An exam table, a dual height and weight scale, a fridge for vaccines. Students can request anything from treating sexually transmitted diseases to managing asthma to vaccinations, which are needed for several internships and will be required for in-school attendance in California starting next January.
All San Francisco public schools have a wellness center “where students can access counselors, school social workers, nurses and other wellness staff,” said district spokesperson Laura Dudnick. The Mission Neighborhood Health Center offers “complementary” care, Dudnick said.
About 90 percent of O’Connell students have visited the Wellness Center at least once, Ryan said, and for years has been and continues to bemany students’ trusted health source.
While John O’Connell’s Wellness Center has two therapists, a Wellness Coordinator, engagement staff, and now a nurse, the school was still limited in the care staff could provide, according to principal Susan Ryan. Often, center staff referred students to get treatment elsewhere.
For example, the clinic solved a common challenge at the high school: student physicals. Before hitting the court, student athletes need a doctor’s sign-off. O’Connell loaded students on a bus to request one at San Francisco General, said Ryan. “It was amazingly challenging.”
Now, several students can — and have — received them at the new, on-campus clinic.
For years, the Mission Neighborhood Health Center at 240 Shotwell St., a short walk from the high school, saw students referred by school staff itself, those who required more extensive care.
But research has found geographical proximity to services improves health outcomes. While the main clinic is close to the school, sometimes “even a few blocks” can be an obstacle to care, said Mission Neighborhood Health Center CEO Anna Robert.
On-campus services are significant at a “community school” like John O’Connell, where students often spend the majority of their time. Many students rely on O’Connell to address problems of homelessness, food insecurity and health. Data from local health collaboration Unidos en Salud suggest the majority of their patients, most who are Latinx and many who are undocumented, don’t have access to primary care.
“We’ve noticed our students do access medical care from our nurse, however it’s a limited amount of care that can be provided if you’re not a physician,” said Ryan. “This clinic could be that trusted medical source where you can go get good primary care.”
Indeed, the ultimate goal is for the clinic to become a “medical home” for students, especially those without primary care doctors. Eventually, the clinic may provide help to students’ families, too.
During the nurse shortage, when O’Connell staff discussed nascent clinic plans with former Mission Neighborhood Health Center CEO Brenda Storey, they realized the center and school’s existing relationship would be a plus.
“It was a no-brainer to move it forward and to see what more we could do here,” said Jose Lopez, Mission Neighborhood Health Center’s director of programs and HIV Services, who is heading the clinic rollout.
Health benefits for students
Beyond physical treatments and preventative care, Mission Neighborhood Health Center eventually wants to address other issues pertinent to adolescent health. Particularly, social media’s role in teens’ mental health, said Lopez.
Additionally, mental health has always been a prominent issue, amplified especially in the wake of a recent alumnus’ death: Damien Gonzalez, an 18-year-old former student, was shot and killed just blocks away from the school in August.
In that case, the Wellness Center swiftly organized a healing circle and resources for staff and students following the news.
Numerous studies show how a school-based health center reduces unwanted teenage pregnancy and improves adolescents’ access to mental health care. Beginning in 2020, accidental overdose deaths among adolescents have increased as they take drugs laced with fentanyl. Thus, it’s important to offer resources for alcohol and drug addiction, too, Lopez said.
Presently, students need to register with Mission Neighborhood Health Center to access the clinic. It runs Tuesday afternoons and Thursday mornings, but may soon be open all day and after school.
“We hope to support John O’Connell in any way we can in healthcare,” Robert said. “We’re committed to being here. It’s part of our mission.”
REPORTER. Annika Hom is our inequality reporter through our partnership with Report for America. Annika was born and raised in the Bay Area. She previously interned at SF Weekly and the Boston Globe where she focused on local news and immigration. She is a proud Chinese and Filipina American. She has a twin brother that (contrary to soap opera tropes) is not evil.
Children scavenge scrap metals in Kabul on July 26, 2022.
(Photo by Daniel Leal/AFP via Getty Images)
Two decades ago, Congress failed to fully do its constitutional duty to not just vote but fully debate going to war. The good news is that in the weeks ahead, Congress will have the best chance in years to finally get it right.
Like so many, we vividly remember where we were 22 years ago this week as the horrific attacks of Sept. 11 unfolded. We still mourn the 3,000 lives lost that day and will never forget the irreparable damage the attacks on 9/11 had on our community. We remember the people taken too soon and pray for the families and communities forever changed.
In the days after 9/11, the president requested and Congress authorized a 60-word blank check for a war that continues to this day. In the weeks and months ahead of us, Congress is preparing to embark on its biggest reassessment of that war authorization, and in doing so, we must ask the hard questions and do the difficult work that we did not do all those years ago.
Twenty-two years ago this week, one of us cast the lone vote against that 2001 war authorization and agonized over the vote, but came to grips with it during the very painful yet very beautiful memorial service. As a member of the clergy so eloquently said, “As we act, let us not become the evil that we deplore.” Yet, that is exactly what we did. The last thing the country needed was to rush into war after 9/11, or ever, without proper deliberation by the people — represented by Congress — as the Constitution intended.
The other of us co-leads an organization founded in opposition to the invasion of Iraq, authorized just one year after 9/11. While more members of Congress voted against that war, the debate was similarly rushed, and did not ask the necessary tough, hard questions.
Part of the genius of our Constitution is its system of checks and balances. One of the most essential is the separation between the president as commander in chief and Congress as the body that decides where and when our nation goes to war. Unfortunately, in 2001 and 2002, those checks and balances did not work as they should have. Instead of putting constraints on presidential war-making, Congress passed war authorizations that amounted to a blank check, enabling four successive presidents to wage a global war at a cost of trillions of dollars and countless human lives.
Two decades ago, Congress failed to fully do its constitutional duty to not just vote but fully debate going to war. The good news is that in the weeks ahead, Congress will have the best chance in years to finally get it right.
Congress is on the cusp of repealing the 2002 Iraq War authorization (and an earlier authorization for the 1991 Gulf War). Earlier this year, a large bipartisan majority passed its repeal in the Senate, and there is clearly a similarly large bipartisan majority in the House to do the same. Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) should put the Senate-passed bill on the floor immediately, where it will pass and go on to President Biden, who has pledged to sign it into law.
The harder work will come on the 2001 war authorization. Congress hasn’t made up its mind about how to handle the 2001 authorization for use of military force (AUMF) — and that’s OK. Publicly debating issues of war and peace is what Congress is meant to do. What is unacceptable is that we have allowed this debate to go on endlessly while an absurdly broad war authorization remains in place indefinitely, waiting to be abused and further stretched beyond its original purpose. The Constitution intends that our nation’s default stance be peace, and that to change that requires an act of Congress. Yet today, the situation is the complete opposite, and it’s time to fix that.
If Congress cannot agree we should be at war, then we ought not to go to war.
These questions are not academic. Twenty-two years ago, Congress voted to go to war without asking how long this war would go on, where it would be fought, how it would end and if there were other means to bring the perpetrators of the 9/11 attacks to justice that risked fewer unintended consequences. Before Congress gives this or any president such awesome power again, it must ask the questions we failed to ask then and weigh the hard lessons of what has and has not worked since 2001 to genuinely increase our, and others, security.
What remains then, is how we ensure that happens. Unfortunately, Congress has shown time and time again that while some may genuinely want to debate and do the hard work of deciding what, if any, war authorizations may be necessary, far too many are happier instead to live with the status quo of our endless wars. Thankfully, there is a ready-made option to finally force Congress to do its job: repealing the 2001 war authorization with a time-limited sunset.
Without the forcing mechanism of repeal, there is no powerful incentive to ensure Congress has the debates and asks the hard questions it has so long avoided. It also gives Congress time to demand the president, as commander in chief, make clear where we are already at war, against whom, and exactly what specific authorities he would like moving forward. It can be forgiven that the president lacked this specificity in the hours after 9/11, but there is absolutely no excuse for not having it now, 22 years later.
Some will say that you cannot repeal the 2001 AUMF without already having passed a replacement. But the last two decades have shown that without first repealing the 2001 AUMF, there is no urgency to force a decision on what comes next. And while there is a possibility that, after careful consideration and thorough debate over many months, Congress may not come to agreement on a new war authorization. But we should remember that such a possibility is exactly why the Constitution gives Congress this power. If Congress cannot agree we should be at war, then we ought not to go to war. And of course, in case of any truly imminent attack, the president would retain the right to defend the country. Failing to pass a new war authorization would not be the system failing. It would be our nation’s most fundamental system of checks and balances working exactly as it was designed.
There’s also a tremendous opportunity in turning the page on decades of endless war. We could reorient our national security to confronting the threats of today and tomorrow, not yesterday. From climate change to infectious diseases to the global rise of autocracy, few of these threats are served with a military-first war footing. We could also redirect some of the trillions being spent at the Pentagon towards a more balanced federal budget that invests in our communities and secures them against all threats, not just those that can be bombed.
Twenty-two years ago, our country endured a terrible attack, and Congress responded by going to war. Now, all these years later, it is time for Congress to finally restore our basic checks and balances and do its constitutional duty.
Congresswoman Barbara Lee is a Democrat representing California’s 13th Congressional District. In 2001, Lee was the only member of Congress to vote against the original AUMF which authorized President George W. Bush to invade Afghanistan and has served as the legal basis of the so-called “Global War on Terror” ever since.
Stephen Miles is the Advocacy Director for Win Without War, a diverse coalition of 40 member organizations formed in opposition to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and the underlying national security strategy that created them.
Activists gather to protest outside of Citigroup’s headquarters on September 14, 2023 in New York City. The activists, some whom are members of New York Communities for Change and Stop the Money Pipeline, participated in the protest over the bank’s financial backing of the fossil fuel industries.
(Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images)
“There are nicer ways to do it. But the nice ways always fail.”
The 1960s folk singer Malvina Reynolds wrote a song: “It Isn’t Nice,” singing, “It isn’t nice to block the doorway. It isn’t nice to go to jail. There are nicer ways to do it. But the nice ways always fail.”
Keep Malvina in mind as you read about the climate protests next week and in the days to come, including Climate Defiance blocking the doors to Citigroup because of their financing of new oil and gas projects. Prepare to witness a militant escalation of tactics aimed at the fossil fuel industry and their role in delaying society’s response to climate change.
After a summer of floods, fires, droughts, record heat, and weather disruption, we are clearly moving into the “new abnormal,” fueled by increased greenhouse gas emissions.
Yet even President Biden can’t seem to mouth the words “climate emergency.” As part of the June budget deficit deal, Biden approved an expedited Mountain Valley gas pipeline project along with an unprecedented legal shield against delaying lawsuits.
There are still avenues and pressure points for humanity to avert the worst outcome of climate disruption, which is an extinction event. But this will require bold action in what scientists call the critical decade ahead.
A new United Nations global climate report card finds countries need to catch up in meeting their Paris Agreement goals in reducing emissions. We would be making more progress if an unrepentant fossil fuel industry wasn’t using its considerable clout to block the transition to a clean energy future.
As global leaders gather in New York City for Climate Week and other United Nations meetings, hundreds of thousands will join the March to End Fossil Fuels. Some of them will be “blocking the doorways.”
Their focus on fossil fuel corporations makes sense. Investigative reporting has revealed that the largest fossil fuel companies, including Shell and ExxonMobil, have known about the dangerous repercussions of burning coal, gas and oil for decades. And this week The Wall Street Journal offered its own expose about Exxon’s internal strategy to downplay climate risk.
If governments and the public had known what these corporate leaders knew four decades ago, we could have moved more quickly to a safe energy transition. Instead, the industry has “run out the clock”—making low-hanging fruit adjustments impossible and putting our planet on a trajectory towards ecosystem collapse right up until the present moment.
Awkward confrontations between Citi employees and climate protesters.
This lady tried to force her way inside.
Other @Citi employees stuck outside are lost/confused
The leaders of a couple dozen global energy corporations are making conscious decisions to build new infrastructure to extract and burn billions of tons of carbon and methane presently sequestered. AGuardian expose identified 195 carbon bomb projects that would each burn a billion tons of carbon over their lifetime. Private airports are making plans to expand capacity for private jet travel, one of the least defensible forms of luxury excess.
In this context, more people are abandoning our political system as the arena for making change, focusing on private sector responses, such as carbon capture technologies, and militant direct actions to block new oil, gas, and coal infrastructure.
Disruptive direct action, such as efforts by Extinction Rebellion and Climate Defiance, are critical to drawing attention to the fight, an urgency that will only grow as ecological stability unravels. On Earth Day last year, a Colorado activist, Wynn Bruce self-immolated himself on the steps of the Supreme Court as they handed down a decision undermining climate protections.
More people are abandoning our political system as the arena for making change, focusing on private sector responses, such as carbon capture technologies, and militant direct actions to block new oil, gas, and coal infrastructure.
The collision course between ecological realities and our insufficient societal responses will only intensify. The coming decade will see more Wynn Bruce acts of desperation and eco-sabotage, like that depicted in the dramatic new film,How to Blow Up a Pipelineand the nonfiction book by Andreas Malm with the same name.
Works of future fiction may be preparing us for what may lay ahead. InMinistry for the Future, Kim Stanley Robinson depicts a murky “black ops” group that leads to private jets falling from the sky and hostage-taking.
In my novel, Altar to an Erupting Sun, a group of terminally-ill grandmothers calling themselves the Good Ancestors self-immolate themselves in the lobby of ExxonMobil, a wake-up call that mobilizes humanity. Other fictional activists focus on preparing their New England communities to face a disrupted future by building local food resilience, mutual aid, and the capacity to welcome climate refugees. In The Deluge, author Stephen Markley describes the radicalization of right and left-wing activists to rising sea level rise and economic collapse.
There are still avenues and pressure points for humanity to avert the worst outcome of climate disruption, which is an extinction event. But this will require bold action in what scientists call the critical decade ahead. What we need is a bold “just transition” program that ends fossil fuels as soon as possible, including a declaration of a climate emergency, a moratorium on new fossil fuel infrastructure, and the elimination of government subsidies for oil, gas, and coal, and its timely phase-out.Until this program can move forward, be prepared to find people blocking the doorways.
Our work is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). Feel free to republish and share widely.
On Wednesday, the California State Assembly passed SB 770, a bill that threatens to delay CalCare.
We don’t need more studies that lead nowhere. The legislature must pass legislation establishing a single-payer health care system. We know that CalCare will save Californians’ money and ensure guaranteed health care for all.
Our last chance to stop this bill from becoming law is by demanding Governor Newsom veto it.
No matter what happens with this bill, we will NOT stop our fight to pass CalCare early next year and create real, lasting solutions to our broken health care system. Californians have waited long enough, and the costs of delaying for years to come are far too high. Legislators must act with the urgency and expediency that’s needed to address this crisis, and we intend to hold them to that.
In solidarity,
Nurses’ Campaign to Win CalCare
Help Outreach Working Group lift the fog of corporate media. Donate to help us maintain this website and distribute literature on the street.
THURSDAY, JUNE 29, 2023 AT 2 AM – 4 AM PDT How to create trust in a group? Details Event by Extinction Rebellion Empathy Circles online EMPATHY CAFE Duration: 2 hr Public · Anyone on or off Facebook How to create trust in a group? This is the question that arose in our... Continue reading →
Phone Bank Force Calls Virtual Phone Bank Time Sundays, Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays 6:30 – 9pm EST Location Virtual event Join from anywhere About this event Sign up to make calls with the Our Revolution Phone Bank force. The calls can be for candidates or issues! Get involved in... Continue reading →
Concerts at the Cadillac: James Washington At the Cadillac Hotel | 380 Eddy St. SF, CA 94102 Friday April 26, 2024 | 1:00 – 2:00pm Free! All welcome! No registration required! Pianist James Washington performs a set of jazz standards and improvisations for a special Concert at the Cadillac, presented in... Continue reading →
Intro Empathy Café: Find out how to listen to others and how it feels to speak without interruption or fear of interruption. Meet people from around the world. Mondays at 10 a.m. Pacific time. Zoom Room: https://zoom.us/j/9896109339 How-To: Basic Empathy Circle In a Circle of 3 to 5 Participants 1. The first... Continue reading →
True to Blue IN-PERSON Phone Bank for VA, OH, and CA: Saturday, September 23 (and every Saturday), 10:00–12:00 PM at 541 Castro Street. Join an in-person phone bank with the Bay Area Coalition to make calls to voters in key states for critical elections in 2023 and 2024. RSVP here.
Take action with Call 4 Change Check out these ways to get involved! Map Filters More filters… Highest-priority events This weekend Sun, Oct 8 @ 3pm PDT Go to: mobilize.us/call4change VIRTUAL PHONE BANKS: VA HOUSE OF DELEGATES & KENTUCKY GOVERNOR’S RACE & CA-HELP FLIP THE HOUSE! Virtual · Join from... Continue reading →
Phone Bank Force Calls Virtual Phone Bank Time Sundays, Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays 6:30 – 9pm EST Location Virtual event Join from anywhere About this event Sign up to make calls with the Our Revolution Phone Bank force. The calls can be for candidates or issues! Get involved in... Continue reading →
Phone Bank Force Calls Virtual Phone Bank Time Sundays, Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays 6:30 – 9pm EST Location Virtual event Join from anywhere About this event Sign up to make calls with the Our Revolution Phone Bank force. The calls can be for candidates or issues! Get involved in... Continue reading →
by 
