The national anthem protests demonstrated by players using their platform on the NFL gridiron are protests against racial injustice, not the flag or military. I'd argue that if civil rights activists, including athletes like Muhammad Ali and Jackie Robinson, watched the NFL now, they'd applaud these patriotic men.

By Vinny Lavalsiti

Editor, The Summit newspaper, Grossmont College

Photo: Washington Redskins players kneeling in game against Oakland Raiders; cc by Keith Allison

October 11, 2017 (San Diego) -- When sports collide with politics, it's a beautiful thing to see. Well, for me at least. I do realize that there are the average Joes out there with their beer helmets who like to sit in their recliner for eight hours and watch nothing but football. I’ve been there! But please keep an open mind when reading the following.

By Joel A. Harrison, PhD, MPH

October 7, 2017 (San Diego) - According to an article in the San Diego Union-Tribune, “The Trump administration on Friday moved to roll back the federal requirement for employers to include birth control coverage in their health insurance plans, vastly expanding exemptions for those that cite moral or religious objections (Robert Pear. “Birth Control Mandate Rolled Back”, October 7, 2017, page A1). People believe that health insurance is a bonus offered by employers. Not true! To understand this, one has to understand both the history of employer-based health insurance and what a pay/wage packet is.

By Dr. Anthony D. McIvor

September 28, 2017 (La Mesa) --The City Council is understandably embarrassed by its serial fumbles on Little Flower Haven’s future. Having the four lawyers who sit on the dais (three Councilmembers and the City Attorney) publicly schooled by a lone attorney from Silvergate Development must have hurt. Most folks can understand that.

But the peevish attempt to shift culpability for the Little Flower fiasco by discrediting and then threatening to abolish the Design Review Board (DRB) resists all understanding. Burying the DRB in the Planning Commission would be a significant loss for residents. Here’s why.

By Jennifer Mendoza, Mayor Pro Tem, City of Lemon Grove

August 18, 2017 (Lemon Grove) -- Less than a year ago, the voters of Lemon Grove narrowly approved an ordinance to allow Medical Marijuana Dispensaries (MMD) to operate in our city. This ordinance was written by a coalition of MMD businesses and proponents. This same coalition is now unhappy with some of the language and restrictions they wrote into the ordinance. They wish to force the city to hold a special election in 2017, so that they can change the language.

Government, not a corporate cartel, should control the Internet

By Joel A. Harrison, PhD, MPH

August 3,  2017 (San Diego) -- I think the print edition title of a recent article in the San Diego Union-Tribune by Jennifer Van Grove says it all: “Lack of Choice” (July 30, 2017).   

An analogy can be drawn between the Internet, our online superhighway, and our highway system.

By Jerry Fisher, Santa Ysabel

Photo: Power poles stacked in Pauma Valley

July 20, 2017 (Pauma Valley) -- Living in the peace and quiet of San Diego County rural lands has been a great joy since our retirement in 1997. It certainly is a different world from Point Loma. It is like being in heaven having 3-4 deer, within a flock of 20 wild turkeys, greet my wife, myself, our cat and dog in our yard.

In my first summer after high school, my introduction to our forest lands was with the Laguna Hotshots, fighting forest fires in the 1950's. We were re-introduced to fire in the 2003 and 2007 fires near our home.

Seeing the SDG&E steel poles, stacked in a field in Pauma Valley, caused me to reflect. Those wires are potentially dangerous and lethal; similar wires have caused ignition in other places including the 2007 firestorms.

By Pat Landis

June 21, 2017 (Julian) -- Julian-Cuyamaca Fire Protection District is at risk. Choices appear to be (1) Do nothing and persevere until finances force it to dissolve; (2) Voluntarily dissolve and allow the Fire Authority to take over; (3) Increase the Benefit Fee to cover the rising costs and remain viable as an independent/volunteer fire department.

By Dr. James Veltmeyer

Dr. Veltmeyer is Chief of the Department of Family Medicine at Sharp Grossmont Hospital, La Mesa.  In 2016 he was a Republican candidate in the 53^rd Congressional District.

June 8, 2017 (La Mesa) -- Have you or a loved one ever been refused medical treatment because your insurance company refused to pay? Would you feel better if it was a government bureaucrat refusing to pay for your treatment, instead of an insurance company commissar? Of course not. Yet, this is the alternative that the misguided advocates of “single-payer” health care are offering Americans.

By Councilman Steve Goble

May 27, 2017 (El Cajon) -- Renewal (noun). The act of making new again or state of being renewed.  It’s what is happening in El Cajon right now.

For the past few years, the City has been diligently working on creating a new atmosphere, a new vibe, a welcoming spirit for businesses, visitors, and our residents.

By Ryan J. Smith, Executive Director of the Education Trust-West

May 17, 2017 (Washington D.C.) -- Today we rightly celebrate the milestone Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court decision issued on May 17^th, 1954 striking down school segregation. Yet today also marks another anniversary – the annual issuing of statements reminding us that, decades later, we still have not closed the gaps in access and opportunity that segregate our students and limit their ability to learn.

When asked about William Faulkner’s essay urging the nation to “go slow” on integration, Brown v. Board attorney and future Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall pointed out “They don’t mean go slow. They mean don’t go.”

Editor’s note:  We first wrote about Kathleen Hayden’s efforts to restore the Coyote Canyon heritage herd of wild horses locally in January 2013. Read article. But in July 2013, she was served with an eviction notice and forced to  give up the last descendants of San Diego’s wild horses. Despite a 2012  support  letter from Congressman Darrell Issa and a 2014 letter from a genetics expert confirming that the horses are rare and of historic significance as descendants of Spanish Colonial horses,  the U.S. Bureau of Land Management has done nothing to protect or return them--and now is not turning over the deed of transfer, Hayden says  Now she has penned an open letter to  the House Committee on Natural Resources Chairman Rob Bishop questioning the legality of the transfer.

Dear Chairman Bishop,

Please investigate the transfer of the BLM Federal CA Coyote Canyon Wild Horse Herd area (20,000 acres)  to CA Anza Borrego Desert State Park.  In response to Ca State Senator Joel Anderson's request for the deed, Parks claim it doesn't exist.

By Joseph Glidden

How the City Games the System to Keep Its Residents Uninformed, Unengaged, and Uninspired.

April 11, 2017 (La Mesa)--The Strategic Planning Workshop is arguably the city council’s most important public meeting of the year. Police, Fire and city employees are always well represented, but few residents are in attendance. The city does little to promote civic engagement. If anything, it actively discourages community involvement in the following ways:

By Barry A. Treahy, Lakeside

Dear Mayor Faulconer:

March 25, 2017 (Lakeside) -- I am a native San Diego senior, who began my sport exposures at "Lane Field."  I know you were never there and probably can't even relate to that ball field.