Journalism

Not long after the meltdown at Fukushima, workers at the San Onofre nuclear power plant, north of San Diego, discovered radioactive steam leaking into the air. Hundreds of steam tubes had been banging together and vibrating, until one of them sprung a leak, investigators said. And the tubes had been installed less than two years ago. . .
. . . continued at TheNation.com, HERE.

In L.A.’s Chinatown on Saturday, thousands marched against low-wage jobs.   Tom Morello performed, and Steve Earle sang “I’m thinkin’ ’bout burnin’ the WalMart down”–
. . . continued at TheNation.com, HERE.

Higher tuition, and freedom from the requirement that the school serve the public:  TheNation.com, http://www.thenation.com/blog/168305/ucla-business-school-go-private-blow-public-university.

“Why I’m Voting Against the California Tobacco Tax Increase on Tuesday”: at TheNation.com, HERE
http://www.thenation.com/blog/168208/why-im-voting-against-californias-tobacco-tax-increase-tuesday

In his history of the FBI as a secret intelligence organization, Tim Weiner didn’t need to take up the question of whether J. Edgar Hoover was gay. But he did: on his very first page he condemns what he calls the “caricature” of Hoover as “a tyrant in a tutu, a cross-dressing crank.” When a Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times journalist takes this line of argument, whatever you think of it, it’s news.. . .
. . . continued at the L.A. Review of Books HERE

A May Day warning has been issued to the ten-campus University of California system by office of the president, Mark G. Yudoff: “Avoid all protests.”
. . . continued at TheNation.com HERE

Today we have street art, but we don’t have people fighting in the streets about art.  In 1966, the anti-war Artists’ Tower of Protest on Sunset Strip provoked nightly battles for three months, as pro-war young men attacked the tower, and artists organized a defense squad.  Now it has been re-created as part of Pacific Standard Time. . . .
. . .  continued at the LA Times op-ed page HERE.

The United Farm Workers was once a mighty force on the California landscape, with 50,000 members at the end of the 1970s; today the membership is around 6,000.   What happened? And to what extent was the UFW responsible for its own demise? Frank Bardacke has been thinking about that for a long time. . .  . continued at TheNation.com HERE

Starting with Bill Clinton’s Back to Work: Clinton’s argument about “why we need smart government for a strong economy” begins at the end of his presidency in 2000, when employment was booming. But to understand what has happened since then, you need to understand what Clinton did.
Then comes Chris Matthews’s Jack Kennedy, Elusive Hero — and at the end of the list, Dick Cheney’s In My Time.
… full story at TheNation.com, HERE.

Jon Wiener: You show in your book God Is Not Great how many horrible things men have done because of religion. In Belfast, Beirut, Bombay, Belgrade and Baghdad, men kill other men, and say God told them to do it.  But why blame God for the bad things that men do?
Christopher Hitchens: I don’t blame God.  I blame religion.  I don’t believe there is such a thing as God. Religion makes people do wicked things they wouldn’t ordinarily do. . .
. . . continued at Truthdig.com, HERE