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Author: Leslie Eastman

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Leslie Eastman

I am an Environmental Health and Safety Professional, as well as a science/technical writer for a variety of news and professional publications. I have been a citizen activist since 2009, and am one of the co-founders of the San Diego-based group, Southern California Tax Revolt Coalition.

Posted by Leslie Eastman on July 17, 2014 18 Comments
While eyes are turned to Gaza and the Ukraine today, I wanted to offer some information about attempts to deal with a man-caused disaster on our own soil. Citizens across the country are organizing a series of protests addressing the immigration surge of supposed "refugees" swamping our border control resources. Over 250 events are being organized over the next new days, which include 41 locations in California, 34 in Texas, and 20 in Florida.
The purpose of the protest is to raise awareness of the impacts of illegal immigration and to show opposition to the administration's handling of the recent border surge of illegal alien youth. The events will take place in various cities around the country on the July 18th and 19th. Deemed the "National Days of Protest against Immigration Reform Amnesty & the Illegal Immigration Surge," the more than 300 protests currently scheduled nationwide will target state capitals and the offices of policy makers in support of amnesty programs and increasing levels of legal immigration. Political activist Paul Arnold is the organizer of this movement, and has received help in launching these protests from numerous grassroots organizations across the country.
In my home state, the 41 events include many small cities and Central Valley communities impacted by the surge directly. The ones in the Golden State's bigger locales are are follows:

Posted by Leslie Eastman on July 02, 2014 27 Comments
Thousands of unaccompanied minors have flooded across our border, overwhelming border agents leading to immigration officials opening processing centers around the country. In the San Diego area, protesters force buses carrying undocumented immigrants to leave Murrieta, the local border patrol processing site designated to handle these arrivals.
Protesters gathered in Murrieta on Tuesday where around 140 undocumented immigrants, including lone children, were brought to be processed at a Border Patrol office. And when the buses arrived carrying the immigrants, the drivers ended up turning around and leaving when the protesters refused to let them pass. The buses instead headed for another border patrol station. The immigrants had arrived in San Diego earlier in the afternoon at Lindbergh Field.
The Desert Sun has additional details with a timeline (and a video at the link):
3:21 p.m.: Union representative Ron Zermeno tells The Desert Sun that the Murrieta Border Patrol station will not resume normal operations but instead send its entire staff to the San Diego area to help with the processing of the re-routed immigrant families. "It's just a matter of time," he said. 3:09 p.m.: With the protest too much in Murrieta, Border Patrol union representatives confirm the buses are heading to a San Diego County processing center. 2:55 p.m.: The crowd of protesters in Murrieta blocked buses from entering the Border Patrol station. Officials did not immediately say where they were going to be detoured.
The Desert Sun report also noted that 3 more flights of immigrants were slated to follow. Between the gross violation of law and risk of infectious diseases, Californians aren't the only ones unhappy with the crisis. For example, fellow blue staters in New York are also complaining.

Posted by Leslie Eastman on June 24, 2014 14 Comments
While America's attention has been focused on Iraq, it is easy to forget the month before we were concerned about Russian interventions in the Ukraine and Crimea. On another one of his #SmartPower/vacation tours, President Obama in early June went to Poland to promise that he would send aidto address tensions in the region.
U.S. President Barack Obama promised ...to beef up military support for eastern European members of the NATO alliance who fear they could be next in the firing line after the Kremlin's intervention in Ukraine. Under attack from critics at home who say his leadership on the world stage has not been muscular enough, Obama unveiled plans to spend up to $1 billion in supporting and training the armed forces of NATO states on Russia's borders. The White House also said it would review permanent troop deployments in Europe in the light of the Ukraine crisis -- though that fell short of a firm commitment to put troops on the ground that Poland and some of its neighbors had sought.
This is in addition to the U.S. Army paratroopers who were sent to Poland in April for a series of military exercises in four countries across Eastern Europe to counter the crisis in Ukraine. However, it seems that in some quarters of that country, Polish opinion of our assistance is on par with the substantially decreased popularity of our Commander-in-Chief. A Polish news magazine provided excerpts of a secretly recorded conversation with Foreign Minister Radek Sikorski, during which he called his country's ties with the US "worthless".
According to a transcript of excerpts of the conversation that was published by Wprost on its Internet site, Sikorski told Rostowski: "You know that the Polish-US alliance isn't worth anything." "It is downright harmful, because it creates a false sense of security ... Complete bullshit. We'll get in conflict with the Germans, Russians and we'll think that everything is super, because we gave the Americans a blow job. Losers. Complete losers."

Posted by Leslie Eastman on June 17, 2014 16 Comments
It looks likes one of the global flashpoints I mentioned earlier this year is heating up. While Iraq descends rapidly into chaos, tensions may be building in another section of the Asian continent. India is poised to double its forces along the border with China.
The new BJP government is keen to send out a strong signal to Beijing regarding border disputes by nearly doubling the deployment of Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP) personnel on the India-China frontier. Top government sources said the ITBP will very soon have more boots on the ground to effectively guard the border that has witnessed several Chinese incursions in the past few years. The previous UPA government was often criticised for being "soft" on the issue of Chinese incursions. The Home Ministry has approved the construction of 54 new border outposts along the disputed frontier with China. A proposal in this regard was made by the ITBP before the polls but the previous government did not go ahead on it. With the new outposts, the number of troops on the ground too will increase. Currently, there are close to 40 outposts and nearly 15,000 troops guard the sensitive zones. Sources said the number could now go up to 30,000. "There were critical gaps regarding security on the China border that need to be filled up," said a senior Home Ministry official. "The increase in deployment should not be construed as an aggressive approach on our part. We are only securing out territory," a top government official said.
What is most interesting is the new prime minister's inauguration is also sending another message to China -- one I suspect it will not much like:

Posted by Leslie Eastman on June 06, 2014 14 Comments
I recently reported on the plight of former US Marine Sergeant Andrew Tahmooressi, who has been languishing in a Mexican jail while authorities hold him on assorted weapons charges for the 3 guns he was carrying in his vehicle. The backlash against the release of 5 Taliban terrorists from Gitmo in exchange for Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl has dramatically increased dissatisfaction with how President Obama is performing. Combining elements of these new items together, one Texas gun store owner proposes a prisoner swap that should be much more satisfying (see Featured Image): Meanwhile, William A. Thien, the Commander-in-Chief of the Veterans of Foreign Wars, has written directly to Obama in an effort to free Tahmooressi:

Posted by Leslie Eastman on June 04, 2014 4 Comments
When I voted in California's June primary, I chuckled when I turned to the "Secretary of State" race and found a familiar name: Leland Yee. Yee  did not make it to the general election (under California's rules, the top two regardless of party compete in the general election). But it's a sad commentary on the quality of California politics that Yee managed to pull nearly 10 percent of the vote! California Secretary of State Primary results 6-3-2014 Legal Insurrection fans may recall that Yee is California's former state senator who was recently charged in a federal gun-trafficking case. As I mentioned that Mexican authorities were reported to be giving former US Marine Andrew Tahmooressi the legal treatment reserved for gun-runners, I thought it was time to check up on what was happening to a potentially real one. The federal judge handling the case issued a gag order on the evidence:

Posted by Leslie Eastman on June 04, 2014 10 Comments
Despite the fact that when half-Asian Elliot Rodger went on his murder spree, he knifed three of his victims to death, the response of progressives has been primarily focused on two topics: "White Male Privilege" and "Gun Control". Legislation to outlaw either being white or male cannot be proposed...yet.  However, one of the most progressively activist of all of California's elected representatives offers a new set of gun control rules: The "Pause for Safety Act". Fascinating, I think, that "gun" does not appear in the title of Senator Barbara Boxer's latest masterpiece. Her proposed rules would do the following:
• One, it would help ensure that families and others can go to court and seek a gun violence prevention order to temporarily stop someone close to them who poses a danger to themselves or others from purchasing a firearm. • Two, it would help ensure that families and others can also seek a gun violence prevention warrant that would allow law enforcement to take temporary possession of firearms that have already been purchased if a court determines that the individual poses a threat to themselves or others. • Three, it would help ensure that law enforcement makes full use of all existing gun registries when assessing a tip, warning or request from a concerned family member or other close associate.
According to Boxer: “We have a function here not to allow someone who is unstable or violent to get a weapon." So, how would this legislation have prevented Rodger from gaining access to knives? And, by the logic that produced this chestnut, perhaps we should regulate the distribution of hot coffee?:

Posted by Leslie Eastman on June 02, 2014 9 Comments
The release of Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl  in exchange for 5 top Taliban terrorists held at Gitmo has led to some mixed and hostile reaction. Meanwhile, across the Mexican border near my home town of San Diego, another American sergeant is languishing as a prisoner. The border crossing is undergoing construction, and the warning signs that indicate you are entering Mexico are not terribly visible. So when former active-duty U.S. Marine Sgt. Andrew Tahmooressi wanted to head back home with several guns in his vehicle, he actually began a now two-month journey into the Twilight Zone of Mexican justice.
As Tahmooressi explained, out of a parking lot, "I just made one wrong turn, and then that one wrong turn that I thought was going to take me north to San Diego was actually an on-ramp that swooped around back to the south and to Mexico." ... According to Jill Tahmooressi, her son immediately disclosed to the border guards that he had weapons and requested that he be allowed to turn around, she said. "The first thing he said to the first person that stopped him was, 'I got here accidentally; please let me turn around. I have three guns in my truck,' " his mother said. A 911 tape released by U.S. Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-California, appears to support his version of events.
FNC's Greta Van Susteren had a heart-wrenching interview with the mother, who indicates that American bureaucrats are not moving and shaking the Mexicans to get the decorated serviceman back home. According to the reports, Tahmooressi has been subjected to punching, slapping, deprivation of food and water, and being chained to a bed with a "four-point restraint for almost a month." It appears that the Mexican officials are treating him as a gunrunner.

Posted by Leslie Eastman on June 02, 2014 3 Comments
California Tea Party groups (CTPG) are showing that they are not only alive and kicking, but actively seeking to make a difference in Tuesday's upcoming gubernatorial primary election. "Our groups have now made an exception to their longstanding no endorsement rules," explained Dawn Wildman, long-time state coordinator and co-fonder of the SoCal Tax Revolt Coalition. "The tea party groups in CA have built consensus on so many issues and candidates that we are poised to become a big player in the upcoming elections.” As Wildman points out, since the IRS doesn't seem to be in a rush to give Tea Party groups tax exempt status, the organizers thought that it was time to take advantage of that fact.  So, they have named specific candidate preferences in this cycle, which has not been their policy before. "We still encourage everyone to do their own research," Wildman said.  "But we have had so many requests for a guide, and many of our groups are very tired of the GOP establishment hand-picking candidates, that we felt it was time to name names.  Interestingly, the leaders from California Tea Party organizations across the state came together on choices fairly quickly." Click HERE for the complete list of California Tea Party Groups' recommendations. As California's crazy often seeps over onto other states, I thought I might hit a few points of interest to Legal Insurrection fans elsewhere.  The governor's race in November is a foregone conclusion no matter which of the two leading GOP candidates (Tim Donnelly or Neel Kashkari) wins. Right now, the race between the two leading GOP contenders is a dead heat.
Republicans Tim Donnelly and Neel Kashkari are locked in a statistical dead heat in the Republican race for governor, according to a new USC/Los Angeles Times poll. Eighteen percent of likely voters support Kashkari and 13 percent support Donnelly, with 10 percent undecided, according to the poll. Both Republicans remain far behind Gov. Jerry Brown. The Democratic incumbent registered 50 percent support among likely voters.

Posted by Leslie Eastman on May 31, 2014 8 Comments
In the wake of Tea Party's initial phases of success and media attention in 2009, progressive counterparts astroturfed their own version: The Coffee Party. For me, the most troubling aspect of development is that the organizers usurped the beverage that powers my Tea Party activities. But, I digress. Recently, many elite pundits were gleefully pronouncing that the "Tea Party is dead", once again. For example, the Washington Post's Jennifer Rubin points to various Senate primaries where Tea Party candidates couldn’t raise money and couldn’t win. Nice to see such concern, Jennifer! Especially touching, as the Texas Tea Party just arranged a replacement for a 34-year-incumbent during the Republican primary runoff. As an analysis of the Tea Party's defeat of Lieutenant Governor David Dewhurst pointed out: The GOP, once dominated by business interests and Beltway insiders, is now driven more by local activists far from Washington watching their members like hawks. This got me to thinking: What ever happened to "The Coffee Party?" The last time I checked in on them (in 2011), the progressive version of the Tea Party had a schism so bad, that one group split up into two different booths at an event. Legal Insurrection's archives contain a few old grinds, too: Here is the latest statement from "Coffee Party USA". Frankly, I don't see much life left:

Posted by Leslie Eastman on May 29, 2014 37 Comments
In the annals of news I have personally covered, I have rarely been so embarrassed by some members of my own sex as I have been this week, in the wake of the spree killing that took the lives of six young students attending the University of California - Santa Barbara. Among the most egregious examples of inanity offered as sophisticated opinion on this tragedy: These pundits would like to ignore several salient points in their mad scramble to promote their toxic worldviews.  However, they seem to ignore the fact that four talented young men, guiltless of any race or gender sin these women decry, are dead. I would like to take a moment to remember them. Christopher Ross Michaels-Martinez [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="384"] [From Facebook][/caption]
Michaels-Martinez was a 20-year-old sophomore at UC Santa Barbara. His parents told the LA Times that he was planning on becoming a lawyer and would soon be going abroad to London. As well as an avid reader, Michaels-Martinez is also remembered as an impressive athlete who played soccer, football, basketball.

Posted by Leslie Eastman on May 27, 2014 39 Comments
This year's Memorial Day weekend was filled with tragedy for Californians -- a tragedy that might have been prevent if  parents' warnings about their mentally ill son had been pursued. Six University of California Santa Barbara students were killed Friday in a spree murder.  The school has cancelled classes in mourning for the profound loss.
UC Santa Barbara canceled classes for Tuesday as the campus mourned six students killed in a rampage on Friday. The school, however, said faculty and staff will be on campus to offer support and counseling to students.
The dead students have now been identified as:
  • Veronika Weiss, 19, from Westlake, CA
  • Katherine Breann Cooper, 22, from Chino Hills, CA
  • Christopher Ross Michaels-Martinez, 20, from Los Osos, CA
  • Cheng Yuan Hong, 20, from San Jose, CA
  • George Chen, 19, from San Jose, CA
  • Weihan Wang, 20, from Fremont, CA
Authorities have  determined that the killer was a troubled off-and-on student at Santa Barbara City College named Elliot Rodger. Rodger shot and killed himself at the end of the shooting spree.
Authorities have identified the killer, who left various video and written manifestos saying that he was seeking to kill sorority women and others at the university as revenge for the way women had rejected him. The killer -- who subsequently shot himself -- has been identified as a student who enrolled but frequently dropped out of classes at Santa Barbara City College. Rodger posted a video on YouTube prior to the killings. In it, he outlined what he was going to do and said that the women deserved it for rejecting him. The Los Angeles Times published a transcript of the video. "On the day of retribution, I am going to enter the hottest sorority house at UCSB and I will slaughter every single spoiled, stuck-up, blond slut I see inside there. All those girls I've desired so much. They have all rejected me and looked down on me as an inferior man if I ever made a sexual advance toward them, while they throw themselves at these obnoxious brutes," the video says. "I take great pleasure in slaughtering all of you. You will finally see that I am, in truth, the superior one, the true alpha male."
The YouTube video of one of Rodger's many disturbing dialogs is below.

Posted by Leslie Eastman on May 24, 2014 11 Comments
Now that I am back to my normal schedule after a week's worth of blazes in San Diego County, we seem to have another kind of wildfire breaking out in the state. Over the past few months, it looks like nearly 1,500 Californians have complained to state regulators about their Obamacare coverage purchased through California's insurance exchange (Covered California).
New data reveal the biggest category of complaints centers on getting confirmation of health plan enrollment and basic issues such as getting an identification card to obtain care. Many consumers have also encountered difficulty finding a doctor who accepts their new coverage, as well as frustration with inaccurate provider lists, according to the California Department of Managed Health Care. "If you have a medical condition and can't get care that is a very serious issue," said Marta Green, spokeswoman for the managed healthcare agency. "We are still working to resolve many of these cases." Health insurers and officials at the Covered California exchange say they are working hard too to address consumers' gripes. They say some problems are inevitable from such a massive overhaul and that the number of complaints is a small fraction of the more than 1 million Californians who signed up under the Affordable Care Act.
So, let me get this straight: The problems that the 1,500 people have reported are "inevitable" and because it is a "small fraction" we shouldn't worry. When should I start worrying, then? When someone in my family dies waiting for an appointment?

Posted by Leslie Eastman on May 23, 2014 8 Comments
Professor Jacobson just reported that a ponderous tome explaining why black Americans are entitled to reparations has just been published. In other news, hundreds of Chinese families are suing Japan for compensation related to World War II enforced labor.
As relations between China and Japan plumb a new low, the descendants of hundreds of of Chinese men forced to work in wartime Japan are taking big, modern-day Japanese corporates to court. They are seeking millions in compensation. ...In possibly the biggest class-action suit in Chinese legal history, about 700 plaintiffs lodged a case against two Japanese firms at a courthouse in eastern Shandong province in April, said Fu Qiang, a lawyer representing the families. Among the plaintiffs are several forced labourers, now in their 80s and 90s, and this might be their last chance to seek redress. The suit was filed against Mitsubishi Corp (Qingdao) Ltd, a subsidiary of Mitsubishi Corp, and Yantai Misubishi Cement Co, a joint venture between Mitsubishi Corp and construction firm Mitsubishi Materials Corp, Fu said. The plaintiffs are each seeking 1 million yuan ($160,100) in compensation, a public apology in several prominent Chinese and Japanese newspapers, as well as the erection of a memorial and monument in remembrance of the forced labourers, Fu said, adding that they also want the companies to fund their legal expenses.
Perhaps they would settle for control of a certain set of islands called the Senkakus in Japanese (and the Diaoyu in Chinese) that both countries have been vying to control and which have become a source or regional tension?
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