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(This article originally appeared at Truthdig, www.truthdig.com/)
All you need to know about Julian Assange’s value as a crusading journalist is that the New York Times and most of the world’s other leading newspapers have led daily with important news stories based on his WikiLeaks releases. All you need to know about the collapse of traditional support for the constitutional protection of a free press is that Dianne Feinstein, the centrist Democrat who chairs the Senate Intelligence Committee, has called for Assange “to be vigorously prosecuted for espionage.”
Writing in the Wall Street Journal, …[Read the details]
Conflict and Contradiction for Fresno’s Nuclear Ambitions
Fresnans looking for some cozy holiday movie watching might consider curling up with two classic California films from the 1970s—The China Syndrome and Chinatown. Both are stunningly relevant now that Fresno Nuclear Energy’s plans for bringing atomic power to the San Joaquin Valley have taken an unexpected turn.
At the outset, the proposed nuclear project was going to generate electric power to help reduce greenhouse gases and meet growing electric demand. To some in the community, this immediately brought to mind the inherent safety dangers of nuclear power, which first garnered national …[Read the details]
Double, double toil and trouble, fire burn and cauldron bubble
The KPFA cauldron continues to bubble away, and as the heat rises in Berkeley it may be the people of the Central Valley who get burned. When local listeners turn their dials to KFCF to catch a favorite KPFA show they may be in for a surprise. Things are changing, and not everyone thinks the changes are for the better.
KFCF, which calls itself Free Speech Radio for Central California, gets about 80% of its programming from the Berkeley station. KPFA, which is in the midst of a deep …[Read the details]
Green! Green! Green! It seems as if green is everywhere.
With the 40th anniversary of Earth Day (April 22, 2010), concern with solar and other forms of alternative energy, global climate change, greenhouse gas emissions, biomass conversion, and a host of environmental problems have proliferated everywhere in the media. Evangelical groups, taking humankind’s stewardship of our planet seriously, have joined the movement. Sales of hybrid vehicles, formerly in only moderate demand, have skyrocketed, and we seem to be reaching a tipping point as citizens and societies all over the world are finally paying attention to these long-festering problems.
Former …[Read the details]
The voting precinct map (below) illustrates why there is a gap between the political power of north and south Fresno. Voters north of Shaw Avenue are more conservative and have a much higher voter turnout than voters in the southern half of the city. Look at the numbers from the November 2010 election. Precinct 315, for example, is in northwest Fresno and had a voter turnout of 74% . They voted for Meg Whitman over Jerry Brown by a 72% to 26% margin.
Precinct 9, in the heart of southwest Fresno, had a 29% voter turnout. They voted for …[Read the details]
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