NRA to Make Its Next Santa Barbara Visit on June 7, Two Weeks After UCSB Shooting

 As a student of the University of California system any death among my colleagues is tragic. The senseless shooting spree that took place this weekend near UC Santa Barbara will no doubt inspire each student to hug their loved ones more as this Memorial Day will have a different meaning for all families touched by this tragedy.

The alleged shooter who caused this harm was seen on video websites detailing his diabolical plans for mass murder. No fame should be granted for a person who causes harm to people with cowardly instruments like a gun. There is no doubt that this event will reinvigorate a national discussion about gun control. However, unfortunately for the families of this horrific tragedy 2014 is an election year and legislating business will resume November 5^th when those on their way out can vote with their hearts and no longer worry about their reelection strategy.

On Saturday morning after perusing through the front pages of Reddit I was made aware of the shooting that happened as a speeding vehicle with weapons hanging out the window met the party scene that UCSB is legendary for. On Saturday morning Richard Martinez father of one of the slain victims, 20 year old Chris Martinez, gave a statement regarding the events that involved his son and called out the politicians and the National Rifle Association (NRA), partially placing the blame on the death of his son on the doorstep of the organization.

-- Why did Chris die? Chris died because of craven, irresponsible politicians and the NRA. They talk about gun rights. When will enough people say, Stop this madness! Too many have died. We should say to ourselves, Not one more! --

I was a student in high school in Pomona, Ca, that ranks high on homicide rates, when I attended my fourth funeral of a friend who died at the hands of a person wielding a gun and changing the course of history for someone that I cared for. It was also around this time that the mass shooting in Littleton, Colorado occurred and the nation came to care about gun violence and the death of young people after senseless gun violence came out of the ghettos of where I grew up and affected the affluent suburbs where defense manufacturers and their kids became targets.

Even after the bombastic barrage of bullets and explosives destroying the soul of Columbine High School in the 1990’s the NRA came to remind the residents of the area that guns didn’t harm people, the people holding the weapons did. The NRA also made the argument that Marilyn Manson and violent video games were culprits behind the murders not the accessibility to deadly weapons and the NRA’s fight to cut restrictions as a lobbying group that is the ultimate invisible hand of government. Inevitably the NRA will point out that the culprit also stabbed his roommates excluding their lives from the shooting tragedy and will be able to downplay the rest of the events where the shooter still had 400 unused rounds in his car to cause further harm.

So now we are here in Santa Barbara, or Isla Vista to be exact and six defenseless people are dead with many more injured as Friday night wrapped up. Almost serendipitously the NRA is on tour in California. On Saturday June 6, The Friends of NRA will be hosting an event at the Santa Barbara Elks Lodge on 150 N. Kellog Ave. I called John McCormack the chapters contact and he assured me that the event was still going to occur as scheduled. I asked if he felt whether or not the event would be hectic because of the horrible shooting that took place 4.5 miles away from the tragedy that occurred only hours ago. Mr. McCormick assured me that he expected the event to occur without trepidation. 

The Friends of the NRA are currently in San Diego and will be making their way through the San Joaquin Valley then the Central Coast raising funds for the mother ship by selling tickets to the event starting at $50. The tour stops will also help support lobbying efforts to make sure that the words of Richard Martinez, the father of murdered UCSB honors student Chris Martinez, resonants nothing in the halls of congress and Sacramento. The people of California and the nation now have another heuristic memory between gun violence, tragedy, and politics.

www.laprogressive.com

Luckily in an election year, the people can ask candidates running to represent them how they land when it comes to gun control. As hard as it is to look beyond this tragedy we should take this moment remind ourselves that next week we have an election. Every day before Tuesday June 3^rd , we Californians have the opportunity to make the decisions on who writes the laws on gun safety. Will the slain lives of gun victims tip the scale to the coffers 
of the gun rights organizations like the NRA?

California: South versus North versus North North

        As a resident growing up in "Southern California", that is by Carey McWilliams' definition in Southern California Country: An Island on the Land, by living south of the Tehachapi Mountains, I noticed that northern transplants always mentioned that they were from "NorCal", which quite obviously is Northern California.  But as geography will tell you the absolute center of California lies near the small city of North Fork in Madera County. For those unfamiliar where The County of Madera is located its really north of LA and almost next to Sacramento and east of San Francisco. So if the exact center of California is in a region that is far away from Los Angeles and a seemingly endless commute up the 5 freeway from San Diego how in the world can nearby San Francisco or residents of Sacramento claim to be be Northern Californians?

Wikipedia

         I was recently invited to take a visit to Berkeley's J School so that I could get a feel for the environment and understand what I would be committing to when I accepted their offer to attend the school for my master's degree. And in a few conversations with folks from outside the state it was difficult to dispel their understanding of Northern California after people from the Bay Area labeled themselves as living in NorCal. But as I pointed out if one was to drive north from the Bay Area there is hours upon hours of California driving before hitting the Oregon border. Humboldt County, Mt. Shasta and the Modoc Mountains are the true and absolute Northern California, a Northern Northern California if you will. In a recent road trip to Northern Northern California I basked in the beautiful scenery and walked in the footprints of California legends like Captain Jack in the Modoc's last fight.

Photo by Eriverto Vargas

     I also mentioned that folks in the great northern boundary near Oregon have long ago had their patience grow thin with the pretentiousness that they feel comes from Middle and Southern Californians when it comes to claiming the state.
     We must look at the area that is sometimes referred to as Jefferson and understand the necessity to include the water rich and mostly rural ranching areas of the north. California is said to be divided by geography and culture that is played out in the media as north versus south. The geography of the Golden State split is easier to define by not using a map per say but by asking where the masses of San Francisco Giants supporters ends and where the ocean of Dodger Blue begins.
      By questioning where the borders of the cultural differences start and stop in the nation's greatest state I am asking where do we draw the line? Where can we say definitively that this is Northern California. Santa Barbara is slightly south of San Luis Obispo and SLO is just a jump from Monterey and so on. Folks from the Bay can and should utilize the Bay Area as a representation of their hometown, but it does not qualify them to absorb the northern pristine qualities and timelessness of North North. The following image is a map provided by the State Parks and Recreation agency. Their map shows where the strongest concentration of redwoods begins and as you may notice, San Jose, Palo Alto and Walnut Creek are not located on this map. The first point that is shown here of the northern redwoods is Admiral William Stanley State Recreation 

CA Department of Parks and Recreation

Area located in Westport. The city of Westport, California is located in Mendocino County the bottom third piece of the infamous Emerald Triangle world renown for its harvested crops. 

     So by using the region where the highest concentration of California's Redwoods begins and ends within our borders we can establish that this is Northern California. From Sonoma County to El Dorado County, where California's elbow is, should be just about where Northern and Middle California meet. This should not be confused with the Central Valley, that reaches from Sacramento to to the Tehachapi Mountains. So to give proper credence and respect to the north we should practice proper geographic prefixes when referring to the beautiful part of California that we come from.

The Octopus People of California

During the Progressive Era in California, the time surrounding 1900ish -1920ish, reformers from around the country were standing up to state governments that had a hold on local power. No state in the union was as corrupt and in need of reform than California in the 1860's when Leland Stanford was the Governor of California and the Big Four were consuming land via government sanctioned eminent domain laws for their precious rail road industry. The tyrannical rule of Governor and then Senator Stanford lasted for decades until a lawyer from San Francisco, Hiram Johnson and a doctor from Los Angeles development a period style political action committee to end the far reaching tentacles of what author Frank Norris called The Octopus.                                                                
                                                                              G. Frederick Keller The Wasp  1882
In 1910 Hiram Johnson and Dr. William Randolph Haynes worked to inform the people of the candidates who were not in one of the eight clutches of the Southern Pacific Railroad. Luckily those candidates running as Progressives made an impact on the state government and indicated the following three tools for democracy. The initiative, the referendum and the recall. The referendum, which offers veto power to the people and the recall which allows the removal of judges and representatives were key tools for the California in 1910 as they are in 2014.

But the initiative process is an amazing thing. On the city and local level the initiative is a great tool for making happen what local council members and mayors may be to afraid or unable to do. But in California the state wide initiative system completely undermines the capabilities of the state legislature and creates pipe dream  laws with no existing sources of funding. We may be progressives at heart but we as a Californians do not have the tools to disect or time to read about the small print and invented pork that private citizens and state officials feed themselves when they misconceive the people. In its own ironic state after passing the great reforms to help end the reign of the railroads, the initiative is used to build the state's biggest railroad, the high speed rail which was passed by the people in 2010 on the 100 year anniversary. In our own way we have become the Octopus People using direct democracy to budget at the ballot box and avoid the utilizing the people we already pay to do the job.

It is too easy for an initiative to get passed with the states initiative industrial complex and the mistrust of govenrment that is embedded in every Californian's DNA. Scholars at USC's Initiative & Referendum Institute  have issued reports saying that in the big picture all the money we spend on elections or have missed on because of initiatives like Prop 13 have not had a completely detrimental effect on the state's economy in the periods that the studies observed. But I and others question if the initiative system as is stands today is worth all the negative amplitudes that it creates.

In order for the state to function more constitutionally, shouldn't initiatives and constitutional changes be scrutinized as federal amendments and need a ratification process from a majority or 2/3s of the states 58 counties? We pass initiatives by playing on fear like the Bush administration did with its colored alert sysyetm. We lie to ourselves then rob existing state funded programs set out by an elected legislature to do things like make sure chickens can open their wings while the toiling in their death cages.

I feel that with an upcoming election Californians should look to their ballot and find those who will work on the constituents behalf not an industry posing as a organization to help make our lives better by selling their case to the low percentage of voters in the state. No one has explained this better that former legislator John Burton.

gabriel j sanchez
All In 58                                                                                                                                                                     
                                                                                                                                                                                         
                                                                                                                                                                                    

A 2018 Prediction, Year of the Lady Part 2 in California?

Kamala Harris

Condoleezza Rice

With the excitement of possibly having our first female president after having our first African -American president, I look to the future of California and other states after the major presidential election of 2016. As an astute observer of California politics I am interested into looking at who may be staging themselves for the 4 year campaign after what looks to be a Jerry Brown victory in 2014.

Without a doubt the top contender for the future vacant gubernatorial position will be our current California Attorney General Kamala Harris. She is currently in the role previously occupied by the current governor and no other statewide figure is as visual and respected as Kamala Harris. I concede that their are many qualified potential candidates on the Democrat side like the new Los Angeles Mayor or even the party's leader the unpredictable John Burton. Lieutenant Governor Gavin Newsom is very qualified and well known but sits in a political deadzone that may however, allow him to run for a future US Senate seat. But no other member of the Democratic organization is as trustworthy as the state's top cop, nor does any other Democrat have the national exposure that Attorney General Harris has.

But to other side, which Republican can match up to all the qualifications and experience needed to be seen as gubernatorial? Well I think we should look at the dynamic of Kamala Harris a little more to compare. She is a woman of a mixed race marriage, a new dynamic to the state's top office and but she posses the features that are more representative of the state compared to every governor before beside Romualdo Pacheco.

Well the Republicans just might have a candidate that is no secret and in fact she was considered for the position prior to September 11, 2001. Former National Security Advisor to the President and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is a bit of a phenotypic replica of Harris and is well established in California and with the national party. The Stanford University professor and former White House official could actually make a race out of 2018 by using the national party resources like Karl Rove and mobilize a campaign that could generate interest in the race.

Imagine how impactful to the young ladies of California and states around the nation to have a female President and then two extremely qualified women of color running for the country's most important gubernatorial post. 2016 could possibly be Hillary's year, but 2018 in California and around the nation will be the sequel to the 1992 smash hit, The Year of the Woman.

gabriel j sanchez
All In 58