Several weeks back, Andy Keatts and I joked on the VOSD Podcast that there were something like 437 stories surrounding President Donald Trump’s administration, any one of which would normally embroil a presidency in scandal. A listener angrily wrote in that he’d like to see evidence of the 437 number. At first, I was annoyed that this person clearly didn’t recognize we were making a rhetorical flourish. But then I got annoyed because I believe there truly could be 437 stories out there, if only I had the time to compile them.
That’s the world we’re living in now, in which stories of seemingly astronomical importance pass us by, sometimes several a day. There are just too many to digest. I mean, my God, the biggest mass shooting in American history happened only about eight weeks ago and other news has long since eclipsed it.
I wanted to take a second to revisit some of the truly massive, bananas stories from the past week or so that haven’t gotten much attention.
A convicted war criminal drank poison in open court, killing himself.
Let that sink in for a moment. Among the news about Matt Lauer, Michael Flynn and the tax bill, this barely made a blip.
After a wave of mass shootings, Congress is about to make it easier to carry concealed weapons.
No, seriously, that Las Vegas shooting and another mass shooting in a Texas church just happened.
Hat tip to Keatts for pointing this out to me. It’s once again the kind of story that theoretically should be national news, but is just not on anyone’s radar.
Rep. Blake Farenthold settled sexual harassment claims with taxpayer money.
We’ve heard a lot about Rep. John Conyers and Sen. Al Franken, a little about Rep. Joe Barton and even less about this.
This seems like a big deal, no?
Maybe I’m overreacting and everything is totally fine? Maybe these stories aren’t bigger blips on the news radar is because nothing actually matters anymore? I guess we’ll just have to wait and see.
What VOSD Learned This Week
The city’s struggling to balance its response to the hepatitis A crisis and exploding homelessness with past and pending legal cases meant to safeguard the rights of homeless San Diegans.
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Setting up a CCA, or a government-run power agency, used to be considered an environmentalist pipe dream. Now, it’s actually politically possible in San Diego.
Unlike a CCA, which would represent the city actually doing something big, the city has all but bowed out of deciding what to do with the Qualcomm Stadium land. That means developers essentially get to set a vision, and voters will weigh in on which one they prefer. Scott Lewis laid out the big differences between the SoccerCity plan and the plan from Friends of SDSU.
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San Diego can never seem to get its act together when it comes to any type of buses.
The Rapid bus isn’t all that rapid, for example.
Mario Koran has been writing about the difficulty many families have accessing school buses in San Diego Unified. Many cities have provided free or cheap access to public transit to help students get to school. But when San Diego tried it, it didn’t go well.
Then there’s the mess of a bus terminal at the San Ysidro border crossing. A court ruling this week dealt a blow to MTS in that case.
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Tijuana has the ingredients for a vibrant startup scene, yet it’s never really gotten off the ground. Kinsee Morlan talked with entrepreneurs there about what it will take for startups to flourish across the border.
And here in San Diego, the so-called IDEA District in East Village is also courting startups. Two developers behind the district stopped by this week’s podcast to talk about where the effort is at.
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I’m guessing some of my Oregonian family members wish I had waited and gotten married right about now, as “weedings” in San Diego are starting to take off.
What I’m Reading
- America has a problem with 2-year-olds, and it’s not that they’re prone to meltdowns: “next to nothing is done to provide access to child care for 2-year-olds or to regulate it.” (Slate/Hechinger Report)
- If you’re interested in reading about a Southern politician who is not accused of abusing teenagers, may I present Stacey Abrams’ historic candidacy for governor of Georgia. (Cosmopolitan)
- Sarah Posner, perhaps the country’s best religion reporter, pulls the curtain back on the powerful Alliance Defending Freedom, the group behind the Masterpiece Cakeshop case being heard before the Supreme Court this week. (The Nation)
- This is such crucial reading: Some of the very things we flag as reasons to doubt women’s accounts of harassment or abuse are actually the hallmarks of those cases. (New York Times)
- Ten years ago, the Tampa Bay Times won a Pulitzer for telling the story of a 7-year-old girl found starving and unable to walk or talk – an unimaginable case of neglect. It published a long, in-depth follow-up this week on what’s happened to the girl since then. (Tampa Bay Times)
Line of the Week
“News is a flirty business … ” – This snippet of Geraldo Rivera’s bizarre defense of Matt Lauer keeps making me LOL.