Category: Point of View

Dismissing public health metrics, Gallagher says open up

Reporter's Mlog: lawmaker's district torn over path forward
by Leslie Layton | Posted October 3, 2020

photo by Karen Laslo
Assemblyman James Gallagher, who represents most of Butte County and much of the Northern Sacramento Valley, preaches civil disobedience.

Assemblyman James Gallagher (R-Yuba City) preached civil disobedience Thursday in front of the Chico Council Chambers, suggesting to unmasked constituents at an “Open Butte County” rally that opening up for business can be a necessary act of protest.

Speaking to almost 200 people, many of whom waved American flags or “Recall Newsom” signs, some sporting MAGA caps or Reopen T-shirts, the 3rd district assemblyman again said, as he has before, that shops and schools can consider reopening as acts of civil disobedience if they’re in violation of public health regulation.

“If laws are unjust … if we’re under an autocracy which it sure looks it is right now, then we are left with nothing left but civil disobedience,” Gallagher told his cheering crowd. read more

“The End of Oil?” It’s about time!

by Karen Laslo | Posted September 11, 2020

photo by Karen Laslo
2019: Steve Marquadt from Chico’s Sunrise Movement (left) and Mary Kay Benson from 350 Butte County protesting congressional inaction on climate change at a town hall.

For years, environmental activists have been warning us about the most dire existential crisis of our lives: Climate Change. But despite their best efforts, very little has changed as people on all levels continue to behave as if there is no crisis, including many of the elected officials that we depend on for leadership and protection.

As a result of this inaction, all creatures, human and non-human, on this beautiful planet we call Earth, our only home, are in imminent peril of extinction.

And now, another deadly crisis has come upon us: The (Trump’s) Covid-19 pandemic. Trump, who is supposed to be our nation’s leader, made no plans to control the virus. His lies and absolute refusal to acknowledge the reality of how dangerous the virus would become if left unchecked made it much worse. read more

Denial all over

Speaking to the unmasked, addressing "possibility"
by Anna Blackmon Moore | Posted August 25, 2020

photo by Karen Laslo
A sign at a Chico business reminds customers that masks are required in public by the state of California.

My father, who died two years ago, was an alcoholic. When I was a child and he was inebriated, I’d ask him whether he was drunk. He always said no before stumbling off to bed. I watched him go and felt I had been wrong to suspect drunkenness and even more wrong to ask.

I stood in our hallway, balanced unsteadily on a threshold between what my father said and what I knew to be true. It was very uncomfortable, deeply personal, and profoundly difficult for me to understand. My stomach churned; I developed a pre-ulcerous condition; I grew into adolescence an extremely insecure girl.

He might have believed he was neither drunk nor an alcoholic. He might have known he was both and lied because he wanted to drink as much as he pleased without interference from anyone. He did feel like his drinking was precious, a thing that was nobody’s business, something that belonged to him — lots of addicts feel this way about their addictions. I don’t know precisely what he told himself or what he believed, but I know he did not want his routines to change. He did not want his life to be upended. read more

Police use of deadly force? Here’s one solution.

Writer to cops: 'Break the blue wall of silence'
by George Gold | Posted June 1, 2020

photo by Mark Comfort courtesy of Wikipedia
In May 1967, Black Panther members protesting police brutality and a new law marched on the State Capitol.

From The Sacramento Bee’s front page in 1967: “Two dozen armed Negroes entered the state Capitol at noon today and made their way to the back of the Assembly Chamber before they were disarmed and marched away by the state police.”

This happened in the midst of the ‘power to the people’ campaign organized to shine a light on police brutality in the Black community. After more than 50 years, has anything changed?

In Los Angeles, 1991, Rodney King was brutally beaten by cops as the whole country watched; somehow he survived.

Unfortunately, there have been thousands more killed unnecessarily at the hands of our police just over the last decade. Police departments across the country are all too often participating in behavior that shocks the conscience… and we all watch. read more

The last volunteer brigade leaves Tijuana

A border crisis and a global pandemic strand asylum-seekers
by Leslie Layton | Posted March 30, 2020

photo by Leslie Layton
At Chaparral, the Tijuana border crossing to San Diego, a sign shows the website URL that records the last number called. Asylum-seekers are assigned numbers and wait for months for a chance to make their case.

It is 7 a.m. on a cold, grey day in early March at the border crossing that connects Tijuana, Mexico, with San Diego, Calif.

Some 25 migrants have gathered on the sidewalk below the port of entry. These are families on a waiting list, each with an assigned number in the 3,000 range. If any of their numbers are called today, they’ll get a turn to cross to the United States, and at some point — in what will probably be a very brief visit — a chance to make their case for asylum.

Newcomers are also arriving; one I notice immediately. She is a tall young woman with a toddler in tow who strides confidently toward us. She’s just arrived from Honduras, she says, slightly hunched from the weight of a framed backpack. She and her daughter are disheveled. Her large, dark eyes, tired. She is told to add her name to the wait list. Plan on a nine-month stay in Tijuana. Unwelcome news. read more

City Hall rally for public safety creates danger

A tense confrontation is diffused
by Morgan Kennedy | Posted February 21, 2020

photo by Morgan Kennedy
A Trump flag was flown at the so-called public safety demonstration in front of city hall Tuesday.

“Chico First,” “One Chico,” “Safe Chico,” or whatever this group is choosing to call itself this week had a protest in front of city hall on Tuesday.

As a response to a recent escalation in the aggressive language members or supporters of the groups use on social media, some Chicoans – myself included — decided to hold a counter demonstration prior to the City Council meeting.

Most of us arrived shortly after 5 p.m., and their protest — an effort to influence the Council on issues related to homelessness and needle distribution — was well underway. There were throngs of people in highlighter-yellow shirts on the Main Street side of city hall. They had bullhorns, whistles, and a flatbed semi-truck sporting the slogan “save our town.” There was also a large Trump 2020 flag being flown, and several in the group wore MAGA hats or other Trump regalia. read more