San Onofre Surf Beach

Starwarz Loy Flying San Onofre

Stawarz with yet another beach pass from above our favorite local surf spot, San Onofre Surf Beach, Soundtrack: Message From Art, Live! by The Joe LaBarbera Quintet

Labels: san onofre

Listen to this post

San Onofre Shark Sighting

SAN ONOFRE SHARK SIGHTING YESTERDAY!!
KEEP YOUR EYES OPEN!

Labels: san onofre, top-ten-shark-infested-beaches

Listen to this post

The Cost Of Freedom Is Always High

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

Labels: san onofre

Listen to this post

San Onofre Nude Beach Still Open

San Onofre Nude Beach Still Open, Homemade Music Video set to to the tune of "Nude Beach" by the Scofflaws that addresses the plight of a nude beach in Southern California that the state park system is still trying to shut down.

Keep Trail 6 San'O Nude

Labels: nude-beach, san onofre

Listen to this post

Soaring Cryptography and Nuclear Weapons

Nuclear weapons are the elephant in the room that almost no one talks about. This presentation therefore approaches the subject from the much less threatening -- actually downright attractive -- perspective of soaring. Risk analysis is the glue that ties the two subjects together, while my experience in developing public key cryptography provides an important lesson on the positive side.

Labels: consciousness, san onofre

Listen to this post

Everybody Got Their Something - Nikka Costa

My face to the sky
Dreaming about just how high
I could go and if I'll know
When I finally get there

Taking of my glasses
Sun pokes through my lashes
And somehow I know
There's a time for every star to shine

Everybody got their something
Everybody got their something
Make you smile like an itty bitty child

People keeping score
Say better hurry up and get yours
Cause somebody else get your spot
Before you even dropped

Seek and you shall find
Everything in my own sweet time
I'll take my chances
With what I believe is only mine

Busy holding on
So the roof don't fly
Keep you from moving on
So get it right
Turn the tide over
Like a love song
Like a butterfly
Believe if you hand it over
You'll come out all right

Everybody got their something
Everybody got their something
Make you smile like an itty bitty child

Illuminate the silly things
Shed some light on all that's wrong
Everybody need it sometime
Sometimes the only thing you got
Is what makes you feel like
You're something else altogether
You have everything don't need
Another reason to be something
I've been on a ride
And caught up in the landslide
But I'm gonna spread my wings and fly...

Everybody got their something
Everybody got their something
Make you smile like an itty bitty child

There's a time for every star
There's a time for every star...

Labels: consciousness, rock and roll, san onofre

Listen to this post

We Saved Trestles! Don't kid yourself, Winning is everything

Word came Thursday Dec. 18, 2008, from our Federal Government in Washington DC,

Trestles is Saved. Saved for Good.

The greedy profiteers who would pave away the soul of everything good, lost. No doubt, they'll gasp and stew and grasp at straws to pave their useless toll road to nowhere somewhere, but not through San Onofre State Beach Park they won't.

To the 10's of 1000's of Trestles lovers and San Onofre lovers, and lovers of State Parks, lovers of wild places anywhere on this blue-green planet – YOU, who went to the wall for Trestles: Uppers, Lowers, Cottons, Church, Sano down to Trails, the whole ball of sandy, rocky wax: San Mateo Creek, San Mateo Campgound, San Mateo Watershed, Cristianitos Creek, Panhe Native American ancestral land, all together the last intact naturally perfect wet & wild coastal habitat left here. Yes the last. Is saved. Because you stood up for Good, and never sat down until we won. And we won.

There was no middle ground. Winning was everything.

There was a merry Christmas at Trestles because of you. As for Trestles, and the rest of San Onofre's wet & wild Yosemite of Surfing, it will be what it's always been; naturally perfect. And it will stay that way. Thanks to you standing up for Good. So the next time you walk the trails down to Trestles, or park at Ol'man's – no matter where you are there, take a long look around. You're part of it. And it's a big part of you, forever.

Good work.

Labels: san clemente, san onofre, TCA

Listen to this post

Warz San Onofre Sunset

Closed beach, the sun goes down alone...

Labels: san onofre

Listen to this post

Check Out All The Videos Of The 2008 Oxbow WLT

Check out all the videos of the 2008 Oxbow "WLT" World Longboard Tour at San Onofre from Oxbow Water.

Labels: Oxbow-World-Longboard-Tour, san clemente, san onofre, WLT

Listen to this post

TCA SUCKS BONG HARDER THAN PHELPS

TCA SUCKS BONG HARDER THAN PHELPS

From the WTF are they smoking over at the TCA file,

Surfersvillage Global Surf News, 5 February, 2009 : - - I want to address misinformation in a Jan. 16 article [Surfrider Foundation puts ‘Bring Back Kirra’ campaign on table] with regard to the Surfrider Foundation’s involvement in the ‘Save Trestles’ campaign. Matt Butel’s statement that Foothill-South will “substantially degrade San Onofre State Beach” is misleading and grossly inaccurate.

Three independent reviews conducted by environmental engineers and noted coastal oceanographic consultants definitively concluded that the 241 Toll Road would have no substantial impact to surfing resources or the beach. The project design includes a roadway runoff system to treat two miles of runoff along Interstate 5 that currently goes untreated, improving water quality in the coastal area.

Project opponents have inaccurately claimed the roadway will destroy the beach when, in fact, the road does not go anywhere near the beach – it connects to Interstate 5 more than a half-mile away.

The U.S. Department of Commerce also refuted claims that the roadway would negatively affect the quality of the famous Trestles surf break. In its December 18 decision, Commerce states “The parties [Surfrider Foundation and TCA] provided competing expert reports on whether the Trestles Surf Break would be altered and, on balance, the record shows that the likelihood that the Project will impact the Trestles Surf Break is low.”

TCA, as a government agency, has always taken care to ensure that the surf conditions at Trestles and our other valuable natural resources are protected.

Sincerely TCA Spokeshole, Lisa Telles

Chief Lier to the People, Transportation Corridor Agencies

Our team replies:

According to February 2008 report compiled by the California Coastal Commission, an independent non-partisan agency whose sole responsibility is to safeguard our beaches and coastlines, the proposed extension to the SR-241 toll road will, in fact, adversely impact the surfing resources at Trestles and associated breaks. The report states in part:

“A review of the TCA’s newly submitted Runoff Management Plan reveals that it is quite probable an increase in fine sediment will occur. Additionally, the flow velocities in San Mateo Creek are likely to be reduced. Either result will impact the continued existence of the cobble delta. Therefore, the Commission concludes that the proposed toll road will likely affect the specific mix of sediments, sands and cobbles thus resulting in an impact to the surfing resources.”

The report then goes on to say, “If adverse effects occurred, they would be unmitigable and irreversible.”

Interestingly, the TCA's own engineering reports have called the project's long-term impacts into question. In his original assessment of the project dated April 2000, engineer David Skelly concluded that future development within the watershed posed significant threat to the surf breaks:

"The cumulative impacts of other future development within the San Mateo Creek Watershed can result in changes in the water flow conditions, the erosion of the soils, and the amount of sediment delivered to the shoreline. The reduction of sediment delivered to the shoreline may result in shoreline retreat and possibly significant impacts to the surfing resources."

Of course there are other concerns as well - primarily impacts upon the near shore water quality. Ms. Telles' assertion that the project would "improve water quality in the coastal area" is laughable. This assumes that there is something to improve, when in actuality the San Diego Regional Water Quality Control Board uses coastal area near the mouth of San Mateo Creek as its baseline measurement for clean water. The TCA are offering to fix a problem that doesn't exist.

As much as the TCA would like for us believe otherwise, the simple fact is that there has never been a paved road built anywhere that hasn't resulted in contributing to runoff. And no amount of magic pixie dust or PR spin will change this fact.

Surfrider Foundation, Matt McClain

twitter.com/SaveTrestles
www.surfrider.org
www.relievetraffic.org

Labels: san onofre, TCA

Listen to this post

Friends of the Foothills Celebration Party Today!

Hi Everyone,

I just wanted to send out a little reminder that our Celebration Party is today, Saturday January 31st from 12-5 pm. It is going to be a beautiful day with great food, great music, great activities and most importantly, great people. You guys have worked so hard to protect San Onofre State Beach and the Sierra Club cannot thank you enough, but we will sure try today!!

The party will be today held at the San Mateo Campground, in the group camping area on the far edge of the park. You can park in the campground, but there is a $10 day use fee. Another option is to park at the Trestles Parking lot and take the beautiful Ancestor Trail down into the campground (we will have signs pointing the way).

Directions: Take the Christianitos exit off the I-5 and head east. To go to the Trestles parking lot, turn left at the first stop sign and right into the first parking lot. To go to the campground, go straight through the stop sign and the campground is about 1/2 mile down on the right hand side.

Please call me or e-mail me if you have any questions. See you there!!

Robin Everett
Conservation Organizer
Sierra Club
Friends of the Foothills
949-361-7534
949-338-5356 cell
949-336-2109 fax

Labels: consciousness, convergence, panhe, san onofre, Thanksgiving, trestles

Listen to this post

The Mainstream Media Serving Koolaid Daily

The Mainstream Media Serving Koolaid Daily

Labels: consciousness, san clemente, san onofre

Listen to this post

Just Hang In There 20 Years, And You Could See 300.

What is genomics? How will it affect our lives? In this intriguing primer on the genomics revolution, entrepreneur Barry Schuler says we can at least expect healthier, tastier food. He suggests we start with the pinot noir grape, to build better wines...

Labels: 2036, san onofre

Listen to this post

Yet Another TCA Boondoggle, or How To Dump Money In a Whole In The Ground

You would think the TCA and its kool aid drinking backers would just go off and DIE after getting told to pound sand. BUT NOOOO!!!! They want to dump BILLIONS into digging a hole thru Sadleback. Here we go again folks...

HOLE LOTA PROBLEMS

Riverside County is the soft spot in a plan to build two almost 12-mile tunnels between Corona and Irvine, but county transportation officials say preliminary findings on the long-discussed mega-project deserve further study.

What the hell its just your tax money right???

Core samples taken last year in the Cleveland National Forest found the rock in Riverside County is potentially unsuitable, said Paul Guptill, engineering geologist for Kleinfelder Inc., the company studying tunnel feasibility.

"It is pretty weak rock," Guptill told the Riverside County Transportation Commission.

While there is stronger rock on the Orange County side of the proposed tunnel, which officials hope can relieve congestion on Highway 91 by giving commuters a four-lane east-west route, the weak ground in Riverside County might mean additional construction or groundbreaking designs will be needed.

"The opinion is these are not insurmountable issues," Guptill said. "...But they could require innovations we have not identified."

Wednesday's discussion was based on preliminary analysis of the core samples, collected between July and November. A final feasibility report should be ready by the end of the year, said Cathy Bechtel, project development director for the county transportation commission.

Going Deeper Into Your Pockets

Bechtel said analysis of the study will require adding to the contract with Kleinfelder, something the transportation commission must approve. An amendment to the contract will also add to the cost, though an estimate won't be ready until next month, she said.

Anne Mayer, executive director of the commission, said no local money has or will be spent adding to the contract. A federal grant secured in 2006 for $15.8 million will fund any studies, she said.

So far officials have spent $6 million, Bechtel said.

But even with no local money on the line, some Riverside County officials said they were wary of going beyond the existing study.

"I wonder how much time and effort and dollars we as a commission want to put into this," said La Quinta councilwoman Terry Henderson. "I'm not sure exactly."

Some in the county doubt the studies will ever lead to a tunnel.

"It won't be in my lifetime," sighed Jack Spall, 57, of Corona.

Deal with it, and PAY for it BIATCHES!

Spall said while another route from Riverside to Orange counties would help ease traffic congestion, a tunnel is a "fantasy" solution to a problem that's really about bringing jobs closer to workers.

"Where's it going to stop?" Spall asked. "Should somebody in Palm Springs work in Orange County? Well, maybe if they want to live in Palm Springs they can deal with the traffic or move."

Many officials say a tough road isn't a reason to trash the tunnel.

"This is our last, best chance to solve the 91 debacle," said county supervisor Jeff Stone, referring to the bottleneck created by having only one Orange County connection to the Inland area.

Rising costs, Lower IQ's

Officials estimated in 2005 the cost of the tunnels at $6 billion, but acknowledge the price is likely higher now. Based on the state's construction-cost index, a $6 billion project in 2005 would be a $7.36 billion project today.

But a higher cost doesn't absolve transportation officials of seeing if the tunnel is an option.

"If we just vacated this idea just for a cost factor without going further, we would not be doing our due diligence," said Corona councilwoman Karen Spiegel.

Pressing forward does not cost either county any money or commit anyone to building the tunnel, Mayer said.

Musta been Smoking a Joint Decision

Riverside County is overseeing the study of the tunnel, but approval of the project, if it happens, must come from both Riverside and Orange county officials. The counties formed a joint Riverside Orange Corridor Authority with Foothill Eastern Transportation Corridor Agency, the agency that oversees the 241 Toll Road in Orange County.

Reach Dug Begley at 951-368-9475 or dbegley@PE.com

Labels: san clemente, san onofre, taxes, TCA

Listen to this post

Learn From Everyone, Follow No One, Watch For Patterns, Work Like Hell

Learn From Everyone
Follow No One
Watch For Patterns
Work Like Hell

In this unmissable look at the magic of comics, Scott McCloud bends the presentation format into a cartoon-like experience, where colorful diversions whiz through childhood fascinations and imagined futures that our eyes can hear and touch.

Why You Should Watch,

If not for Scott McCloud, graphic novels and webcomics might be enjoying a more modest Renaissance. The flourishing of cartooning in the '90s and '00s, particularly comic-smithing on the web, can be traced back to his major writings on the comics form. The first, Understanding Comics, is translated into 13 languages, and along with Reinventing Comics and Making Comics, its playful and profound investigations are justly revered as something like the Poetics of sequential art.

McCloud coined the term "infinite canvas" -- for the new comics medium made possible by web browsers. He's an avid user of the medium: My Obsession With Chess was widely popular online, as was The Right Number. Back on the printed page, he wrote and illustrated Zot!, a colorful response to then-trendy grimness and gore in comic books. (He describes the book as "a cross between Peter Pan, Buck Rogers and Marshall McLuhan.")

"With Scott McCloud’s Understanding Comics the dialogue on and about what comics are and, more importantly, what comics can be has begun. If you read, write, teach or draw comics; if you want to; or if you simply want to watch a master explainer at work, you must read this book."
Neil Gaiman

Labels: Disney-Style-Monorail, san clemente, san onofre

Listen to this post

Rob Forbes: Ways of seeing

Rob Forbes, the founder of Design Within Reach, shows a gallery of snapshots that inform his way of seeing the world. Charming juxtapositions, found art, urban patterns -- this slideshow will open your eyes to the world around you.

Why you should watch,

A decade ago, if you wanted to buy a piece of classic modern furniture for your house -- say, a classic Eames chaise longue -- you had basically two options: make friends with a commercial office designer who could order you a piece from the supplier, or wait until your neighborhood psychiatrist redecorated his office and put all the 1960s-vintage Eames chairs out on the curb. Rob Forbes, a potter with a background in retail, saw a market for clean, modern design made available to regular people, and turned this idea into the brilliant nationwide chain and catalog Design Within Reach.

Along with new and classic home goods, DWR became a platform for Forbes' way of seeing. The early-2000-vintage DWR newsletters were packed with colorful images from Forbes' travels and news about designers he loved. And this is not to forget each holiday's annual champagne chair contest -- in which DWR fans were challenged to create a miniature modern masterpiece from the foil, wire and cork of a bottle of bubbly.

In July 2007, Forbes left DWR to focus on a new project that will blend design and retailing: Studio Forbes. Get details via the link at right -- and yes, you'll also find another wonderful Forbes image gallery.

"He promotes good design, not just as a retailer but as a missionary -- in lectures around the world and in his intelligent and eloquent DWR internet newsletter."
2003 Russel Wright Awards

Labels: consciousness, san clemente, san onofre, trestles

Listen to this post

How Calculus Is Changing Architecture

Greg Lynn talks about the mathematical roots of architecture -- and how calculus and digital tools allow modern designers to move beyond the traditional building forms. A glorious church in Queens (and a titanium tea set) illustrate his theory.

Why you should watch

Who says great architecture must be proportional and symmetrical? Not Greg Lynn. He and his firm, Greg Lynn FORM, have been pushing the edges of building design, by stripping away the traditional dictates of line and proportion and looking into the heart of what a building needs to be.

A series of revelations about building practice -- "Vertical structure is overrated"; "Symmetry is bankrupt" -- helped Lynn and his studio conceptualize a new approach, which uses calculus, sophisticated modeling tools, and an embrace of new manufacturing techniques to make buildings that, at their core, enclose space in the best possible way. The New York Presbyterian church that Lynn designed with Douglas Garofalo and Michael McInturf, collaborating remotely, is a glorious example of this -- as a quiet industrial building is transformed into a space for worship and contemplation with soaring, uniquely shaped and tuned elements.

In a sort of midcareer retrospective, the book Greg Lynn Form (watch the video) was released in October 2008; recently, Lynn has collaborated with the video team Imaginary Forces on the New City installation as part of the MOMA exhibit "Design and the Elastic Mind." In November 2008, FORM won a Golden Lion at the Venice Bienniale for its exhibition Recycled Toy Furniture.

"There are architects who love the Parthenon. Greg Lynn has a thing for the blob."
Time.com's Time 100 2005

Labels: san clemente, san onofre

Listen to this post

Why we do what we do, and how we can do it better

Tony Robbins discusses the "invisible forces" that motivate everyone's actions -- and high-fives Al Gore in the front row. Tony makes it his business to know why we do the things we do.

Why you should watch:

Robbins may have one of the world’s most famous smiles; his beaming confidence has helped sell his best-selling line of self-help books, and fill even his 10,000-seat seminars. What’s less known about the iconic motivational speaker is the range and stature of his personal clients. From CEOs to heads of state to Olympic athletes, a wide swath of high-performing professionals (who are already plenty motivated, thank you very much) look to him for help reaching their full potential.

His expertise in leadership psychology is what brought him to TED, where his spontaneous on-stage interaction with Al Gore created an unforgettable TED moment. It also perfectly demonstrated Robbins’ direct -- even confrontational -- approach, which calls on his listeners to look within themselves, and find the inner blocks that prevent them from finding fulfillment and success. Some of his techniques -- firewalking, for example -- are magnets for criticism, but his underlying message is unassailable: We all have the ability to make a positive impact on the world, and it’s up to us, as individuals, to overcome our fears and foibles to reach that potential.

Robbins has won many accolades for his work -- including his memorable performance in the Jack Black comedy Shallow Hal. (It was a small but vital role.) His Anthony Robbins Foundation works with the homeless, elderly and inner-city youth, and feeds more than 2 million people annually through its International Basket Brigade.

"What Tony delivers is an ever crescendoing call-and-response oratory that often gives the proceedings a teetering, Pentecostal kind of energy. " - GQ

Labels: consciousness, san onofre, trestles

Listen to this post

Surfer Kary Mullis: Celebrating The Scientific Experiment

Surfer and Nobel Prize winning Biochemist Kary Mullis talks about the basis of modern science: the experiment. Sharing tales from the 17th century and from his own backyard-rocketry days, Mullis celebrates the curiosity, inspiration and rigor of good science in all its forms.

Why you should watch,

In the early 1980s, Kary Mullis developed the polymerase chain reaction, an elegant way to make copies of a DNA strand using the enzyme polymerase and some basic DNA "building blocks." The process opened the door to more in-depth study of DNA -- like the Human Genome Project. Mullis shared the 1993 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for developing this technique.

As he tells it, after winning the Nobel Prize, his next career move was to learn how to surf. It's typical of Mullis, whose scientific method is to get deeply curious about a topic, work it out from first principles, and then imagine the next giant leap forward. As he puts it in his Nobel autobiography, revised several times since 1993, "I read a lot, and think a lot, and I can talk about almost anything. Being a Nobel laureate is a license to be an expert in lots of things as long as you do your homework."

Most recently, he's been taking a hard look at immunity; a recent patent from his company Altermune points to his hopes to rethink traditional immunization, by targeting a specific pathogen for an immediate response.

Labels: consciousness, san onofre

Listen to this post

Schwarzenegger's Failure

You can’t really argue with Arnold Schwarzenegger’s political success. In 2002 the California Republican Party, still suffering from the anti-immigrant fervor cooked up by former Gov. Pete Wilson, failed to win any statewide offices for the first time since 1882. Yet just one year later Schwarzenegger led a recall effort against the fiscally reckless and managerially incompetent Democratic governor, Gray Davis, beating out the nearest Democratic challenger for the newly vacated position by a margin of more than 2 to 1. Even as Republicans nationwide took a drubbing in the 2006 elections, losing both houses of Congress and the majority of governorships for the first time in 12 years, the bodybuilder-turned-actor, running in an increasingly blue state, smashed Democrat Phil Angelides by a ridiculous 17 percentage points. (For more on how Angelides still managed to push California closer to fiscal disaster, see Jon Entine’s “The Next Catastrophe,” page 20.)

That the Austrian Oak pulled out such a victory just two years after calling Democrats “girly-men” at the Republican National Convention, and only 12 months after having his pet special-election ballot initiative package decisively repudiated at the polls, cemented Schwarzenegger’s persona as a masterfully adaptive politician, able to bend in the direction of the Golden State’s famously eccentric electorate in a way that his fellow state Republicans, with their emphases on immigration and abortion, could not.

Three years after knee-capping Schwarzenegger with an investigation of his tendency to paw unwilling women, the Los Angeles Times was arguing that the U.S. Constitution should be amended so that the foreign-born governor might one day become president. Time magazine put Arnold and New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg on its cover in June 2007, offering their cosmopolitan Republicanism as the only hopeful future for a party increasingly dominated, and dragged down by, social conservatives. These “socially liberal Republicans who have flourished in Democratic political cultures,” the magazine enthused, are “doing big things that Washington has failed to do.”

Chief among the things Schwarzenegger and Bloomberg have accomplished is winning elections. Republicans took an even worse drubbing in November 2008 than in November 2006, and as I write are neck deep in a civil war over the party’s future, with cultural conservatives rallying behind controversial Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin to represent what is now the largest voting bloc remaining inside Ronald Reagan’s diminished big tent. To the less-than-casual observer who has a distaste for social conservatism (i.e., the average journalist), the only way forward for the Grand Old Party in the 21st century is a kind of moderate Schwarzeneggerism. “Pragmatic Republicans like [Florida Gov. Charlie] Crist, California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, Minnesota governor Tim Pawlenty, Indiana governor Mitch Daniels and even conservative Louisiana governor Bobby Jindal,” Time’s Tim Padgett wrote after the 2008 elections, “will likely be the phoenixes that rise from the GOP ashes of 2008.”

If that’s true, Republicans may be worse off than we thought. It’s not that Schwarzenegger is wrong about de-emphasizing or even rejecting elements of social conservatism. Expending political energy on making sure same-sex couples cannot be legally recognized as married, as Republicans continue to do with short-term success in California and elsewhere, is both bad policy (by consciously restricting the freedom of a disfavored minority) and lousy politics. The under-30 generation does not much comprehend political animus toward gays and ethnic minorities. As a result, voters between the ages of 18 and 29 are abandoning Republicanism in near-record numbers. Forget the youthful, cross-cultural Barack Obama; the 18-to-29 vote went 63 percent Democrat to 34 percent Republican for the House of Representatives. If Republicans aren’t careful, they’ll go the way of newspapers, becoming something only old people are interested in.

The promise of coastal Republicans in Name Only like Schwarzenegger, at least for the limited-government proponents (including me) who have invested hope in him over the years, was supposed to be that the descriptor socially liberal would be followed by another very important phrase: fiscally conservative. And that’s where the Milton Friedman–quoting governor has been an unalloyed disaster.

Schwarzenegger blew into office decrying California’s bloated budget, vowing to “blow up the boxes” of Sacramento’s bureaucracy, and promising to never again let the Golden State go near Gray Davis’ record-setting $38 billion deficit. Five years into the Schwarzenegger era, the budget has ballooned from $100 billion to $145 billion, and the state’s legislative analyst announced in November that California was facing a deficit of $28 billion. Bond market ratings assess the state as a bigger lending risk than Slovakia. And those bureaucratic boxes have remained largely intact.

How does Schwarzenegger defend this sorry record? In part, by blaming Republicans. “I think the important thing for the Republican Party is now to also look at other issues that are very important for this country and not to get stuck in ideology,” he said on CNN five days after the election. “Let’s go and talk about health care reform. Let’s go and…fund programs if they’re necessary programs and not get stuck just on the fiscal responsibility.”

What are some of these “necessary programs”? How about a $9.9 billion bond for a long-dreamed-of high-speed rail project between Los Angeles and San Francisco that is expected to cost at least $45 billion, which even supporters such as the Los Angeles Times editorial board think will require “many billions more” in subsidies? Then there’s the $3 billion bond from 2004 to put California bureaucrats in the stem cell research business, mostly as a poke in the eye of George W. Bush.

How to pay for all this during what the governor has declared a “financial emergency”? Partly by rattling the tin cup outside the White House. Schwarzenegger was one of the first governors to hit up Washington for some of that fat bailout money gushing from the Oval Office.

But the spending splurge also requires new taxes, according to the governor: a “temporary” 1.5-percentage-point increase in the 7.25 percent sales tax, an increase in the number of services covered by the sales tax, higher taxes for alcohol and oil production, and so on. Many analysts believe that the governor who quickly fulfilled his recall-campaign promise to cut the state’s vehicle license fees will soon resort to restoring those charges to at least Gray Davis levels.

Even on social issues, where Schwarzenegger’s more libertarian approach was supposed to avoid the Republican trap of freedom constricting politics, the governor instead has embraced the freedom-constricting policies of the left. To cite one particularly ironic example, in 2004 he signed a law requiring every California employer with more than 50 workers to force upon its managers state-approved sexual harassment training.

Republicans in 2009 are in a mess of their own making. If they interpret the Democrats’ sweeping victory as a clarion call to foray further into religiously inspired, Terry Schiavo–style politics that uses government as a lever to manipulate and control other people’s lives, then they will deserve their exile from power.

But it will take more than just eschewing cultural conservatism and adopting the Democrats’ interventionist economic approach to refresh the Republican brand. There is room right now for an opposition party that emphasizes what the governing party does not: freedom, as both the ultimate goal and the means to achieve it.

Back when he was taping testimonials for Milton Friedman’s Free to Choose, Arnold Schwarzenegger looked like the kind of person who would indeed choose freedom if given a chance to govern. Instead, he punted on the radical, government-reducing reforms offered to him by his own box-exploding California Performance Review and learned to love—or at least perpetuate—the very bureaucracy he was elected to confront. That’s not a blueprint for 21st-century Republicanism. It’s just George W. Bush’s big-government conservatism with a Hollywood face.

Matt Welch is editor in chief of reason.

Labels: san clemente, san onofre

Listen to this post

TCA Gets Panties In Bunch - Must Listen To Public Opinion

From a grassy ridge, Jerry Amante surveyed the upscale enclave of Talegay one recent afternoon.

The U.S. Department of Commerce has suggested that Amante and his colleagues at the Foothill/Eastern Transportation Corridor Agency build their proposed toll-road extension through the master-planned community instead of through San Onofre State Beach to the south.

But don't mention the Talega alternative to Amante while he's standing near the approximately 200 homes that his agency said would have to be razed.

“Beyond the value of the actual structures, there are families that live in there. Those are constituents. I have to tell them, 'I have to bulldoze your home.' And when they say, 'Why?' to me, I have to tell them, 'Because most people think we are going to have to anal rape the pocket mouse, state park, a world class surf spot, and an ancient Indian burial ground for an east west toll road that will not fix our north south traffic problem ” said Amante, chairman of the transportation agency's board.

Amante's preferred path would lengthen state Route 241 by 16 miles – from Oso Parkway in Rancho Santa Margarita to Basilone Road at Camp Pendleton. It pits some of California's highest priorities against one another, including traffic relief versus habitat conservation and new housing developments versus popular surfing and camping sites.

Supporters and opponents of the tollway extension both say they want to preserve or improve the region's quality of life, but they disagree on basic facts of the project and don't appear ready to compromise. Any proposed solution probably will become mired in litigation or political gridlock.

The transportation agency has spent two decades and about $200 million planning and promoting its tollway strategy, but the Commerce Department rejected the agency's favored corridor last month. Its board members will consider the next move during a meeting Thursday, including whether to sue the Commerce Department or pick an alternative alignment.

“We will not falter in our mission,” reads a full-page ad the agency has been running in regional newspapers. Its board comprises elected officials from Orange County.

The agency faces extra pressure to succeed because in some recent months, toll payments on its existing roads have dipped by more than 10 percent year over year.

Amante, who also is mayor pro tem of Tustin, linked the downturn to the recession. He said that doesn't relieve him of his duty to plan for continued growth in southern Orange County.

Over the years, tollway leaders – along with some federal officials – have looked at dozens of ways to extend state Route 241. They have to contend with potential barriers such as wetlands, hilly terrain, the 1,200-acre Donna O'Neill Land Conservancy, and housing and business developments.

The transportation agency winnowed the list of routes to eight, then weeded out alignments that it thought would damage existing and proposed neighborhoods or cause too much environmental harm. In 2006, it officially selected a $1.3 billion route that would cross through the San Onofre park.

Among the spiked alternatives is one that would brush the edge of Talega, where the median home price tops $600,000. That 8.7-mile route was highlighted by the Commerce Department as “available and reasonable.” It would relieve congestion on Interstate 5 by more than 50 percent and reduce arterial delays by 17 percent, federal officials said.

But that route doesn't connect directly to I-5, and tollway leaders said it would provide less than half the traffic relief as their preferred corridor.

Tollway opponents concede that something should be done to improve traffic flow on I-5. An average of nearly 300,000 vehicles use the freeway at Oso Parkway each weekday, about twice the count at Nobel Drive in La Jolla, according to 2007 figures from the California Department of Transportation.

Toll-road officials said that without changes by 2025, it will take an hour to drive about 16 miles on I-5 from the San Diego-Orange county line to Mission Viejo during peak weekday traffic. They said their desired 241 extension would cut travel time on the interstate by more than half.

On the environmental end, the transportation agency's leaders say building a four-to six-lane highway through the land conservancy and state park is the least ecologically damaging choice. They emphasize mitigation features such as wildlife crossings and efforts to avoid impinging on the famous Trestles surf spot.

But in February, the California Coastal Commission rejected the San Onofre alignment.

“It would be difficult to imagine a more environmentally damaging . . . location for the proposed toll road” and one that's more inconsistent with provisions of the Coastal Act, the commission's staff report said.

It said several alternative routes might pass muster with coastal protection rules, and it highlighted the possibility of widening I-5.

The I-5 option is supported by the Save San Onofre Coalition, an alliance of conservationists and surfers that wants to preserve the state park. About 2.5 million visitors camp, surf, sunbathe and hike there each year.

“We are not just interested in stopping this toll road through San Onofre. We are interested in advancing a solution that will solve the traffic problem,” said attorney Joel Reynolds of the Natural Resources Defense Council in Los Angeles, which is part of the coalition.

The transportation agency said expanding I-5 is too costly – at least $3.7 billion, by its estimate – and too disruptive to nearby residents. Making room for a wider freeway would require condemning 1,200 homes and businesses, tollway officials said.

They also hammer the point that there's no foreseeable state funding for major I-5 upgrades.

Reynolds dismissed those objections. “They haven't looked at alternatives in any serious way,” he said. “They decided where they wanted the road to go, and everything they have done since then has been set up to rationalize (their) own preferred alternative.”

The Save San Onofre Coalition said careful planning and better design for an expanded I-5 could reduce the eminent-domain number to about 70 homes and businesses.

“This alternative is equally or more effective than the toll road in resolving traffic congestion, without the huge and permanent loss of irreplaceable environmental and recreational resources,” Vermont-based Smart Mobility Inc. said in a January 2008 analysis of widening I-5.

But in October, the Federal Highway Administration said that based on the project's cost and benefits, tollway officials were correct in eliminating the I-5 option.

Despite the competing studies, San Clemente businesswoman Melinda Stone remains firm in her support of the transportation agency's Route 241 plan. She said residents won't back a corridor that takes out homes “when there are so many alternate routes that go through the wilderness.”

On the opposing side, Mark Rauscher of the Surfrider Foundation said efforts to protect the state park won't wane even if the tollway battle continues for years.

“(We) are ready to fight,” he said.

I WANT MY DISNEY STYLE MONORAIL! - NeoN

Mike Lee: (619) 542-4570; mike.lee@uniontrib.com

Labels: Disney-Style-Monorail, san clemente, san onofre, TCA

Listen to this post

San-O 15 Minute Parking GC1FK2X

The purpose of the 15 minute parking is so you don't have to enter the state beach to see if the surf is up.

The purpose of this cache is not that it's difficult. It's to bring you to a place that's one of the oldest surf spots in Southern California.,San Onofre surf and state beach aka "old mans". Grab the cache, sign the log, and then make sure to walk out to the bluff to check out the surf. It's not like Hawaii's Bonzai pipeline, but I'm sure that some of the locals have felt like they're pipeliners at times.

Make sure to bring your own pen.

Labels: cool shit, geocache, san onofre, the secret

Listen to this post

Why do societies fail?

Why do societies fail? With lessons from the Norse of Iron Age Greenland, deforested Easter Island and present-day Montana, Jared Diamond talks about the signs that collapse is near, and how -- if we see it in time -- we can prevent it.

Labels: consciousness, Disney-Style-Monorail, san clemente, san onofre, surfing

Listen to this post

More TCA Lies! Truth? They Can't Handle The Truth

More TCA Lies! Our chance for the tribe to comment back to the Transportation Corridor Agencies! Truth? They Cant Handle the Truth! Click Here To Read And Respond.

Labels: consciousness, san onofre, trestles

Listen to this post

Twitter Aflutter With Toll Road Talk

Twitter aflutter with toll road talk

Here’s a sampling of what people were saying on Twitter yesterday about the toll road decision:

@dodgemedlin: A win for surfers, environmentalists - federal agency rejects plan for toll road through San Onofre State Beach. http://is.gd/cnGr (12:26:06 p.m.)

@chriscote: We Won!! the fight to Save Trestles is over. Check transworldsurf.net in a few for the whole story. (11:58:13 a.m.)

@Steve_watkins: Awesome! The toll road expansion that threatened Trestles has been killed - http://tinyurl.com/4pbwz5. (
11:54:18 a.m.)

@klenlaundry: is amped on the Trestles Victory! (11:53:25 a.m.)

@sdradio: @hilahil @andrewwp This is a good day: closing Guantanamo prison; and Trestles SAVED.
(11:49:38 a.m.)

@lkilpatrick: @SaveTrestles your going to need to change your name to Saved Trestles!

(11:46:49 a.m.)

@JonathanDuarte: Congrats. Surfrider… another success. Toll road Dead!http://ff.im/kFA9 (11:39:13 a.m.)

@lkilpatrick: WOOT TRESTLES SAVED!!! Finally something good from the credit crunch!http://tinyurl.com/3fm6zv (11:37:50 a.m.)

@UkuleleJammin: Toll road through Trestles DENIED!!! http://tinyurl.com/4bmdfu (via @10News) (11:32:38 a.m.)

@chris949: Trestles has been saved! thank you Dept. of Commerce & Ca. Coastal Commission! http://tinyurl.com/3l7m82 (11:23:24 a.m.)

@degroodt: Totally stoked to see the “people” getting their way finally. Toll Road has run rough shod over OC for years. http://snurl.com/8ud5w (11:15:15 a.m.)

@brianschoening: The Toll Road is dead! Trestles lives to be surfed another day!!http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2008/12/tollroad.html (11:14:46 a.m.)

@tierranet: RT SaveTrestles http://cli.gs/241 South Toll Road Extension STOPPED! WE SAVED TRESTLES!!! Nice work everyone (11:10:00 a.m.)

@nique22: YAY!!! RT @swelldotcom: TRESTLES SAVED! THE HIGHWAY TO HELL CRASHES!: The Trestles toll road crashes today . http://tinyurl.com/3g6lyg (11:08:50 a.m.)

@formatted_dad: @NeonSurfer . Great news. Lets hope this is the end of the toll road plans. (11:07:53 a.m.)

@locustfist: RT @SaveTrestles: http://cli.gs/241 South Toll Road Extension STOPPED! WE SAVED TRESTLES!!! Nice work everyone! (11:07:35 a.m.)

@SaveTrestles: http://cli.gs/241 South Toll Road Extension STOPPED! WE SAVED TRESTLES!!! Nice work everyone! (11:06:07 a.m.)

@scorpusmaximus: WOOT! We saved Trestles! (for now): http://tinyurl.com/4pbwz5(10:55:15 a.m.)

@NeonSurfer: WE SAVED SANO!!! http://cli.gs/241 Toll Road Extension KILLED!!! (10:52:31 a.m.)

@Foa.m.EZ: [What the blank???] Trestles Saved! 241 South Toll Road Extentsion Killed (10:50:42 a.m.)

Labels: san onofre, twitter

Listen to this post

241 South Tool Road Killed! GAME OVER TCA!

Department of Commerce Rules on Foothill/Eastern Transportation Corridor Agency Consistency Appeal

The Department of Commerce today upheld the California Coastal Commission’s objection to a proposal to construct a 16-mile toll road connecting California state Route 241 to Interstate 5 in southern Orange and northern San Diego counties.

The commission objected to the proposed project under the federal Coastal Zone Management Act on the grounds that the toll road was not consistent with the state’s coastal zone management program. Under the CZMA, federal agencies may not issue any permits required for a project if a state has objected, unless the Department of Commerce, on appeal, overrides the objection.

The Foothill/Eastern Transportation Corridor Agency appealed the commission’s objection to the Department of Commerce in February, triggering an administrative review process that involved written briefs and arguments by the parties, input from interested federal agencies, tens of thousands of written comments from the public, and a 10-hour public hearing in San Diego County.

Under the CZMA, the department may override an objection only if no reasonable alternative to the project exists and the proposal is consistent with the objectives of the CZMA, or if the project is necessary in the interest of national security. The department determined that there is at least one reasonable alternative to the project. The department also found that the project is not necessary in the interest of national security.

TCA may pursue another route for its proposed toll road that the commission determines is consistent with California’s coastal zone management program, and TCA is not limited to the alternative proposal described in the department’s decision.

Since the enactment of the CZMA in 1972, the department has acted on 43 appeals, upholding 29 objections by state agencies and overriding 14.

From NOAA understands and predicts changes in the Earth's environment, from the depths of the ocean to the surface of the sun, and conserves and manages our coastal and marine resources.

Labels: consciousness, san onofre, trestles

Listen to this post

We Are The Environment #Cox

We Are The Environment #Cox

For almost three decades, John Francis has been a planetwalker, traveling the globe by foot and sail with a message of environmental respect and responsibility (for 17 of those years without speaking). A funny, thoughtful talk with occasional banjo.

Labels: cox.net, san clemente, san onofre

Listen to this post

WOULD YOU SPEND 15 MINUTES, IF IT MEANT SURFING THE REST OF YOUR LIFE?

Despite being a 1000-year-old sport with a $7 billion industry, surfing has failed to produce the demographic and economic studies to show who we are, where we live, and what we spend. So while other interest groups bolster their arguments with impressive numbers to prove their positions, all-too often, surfers get blindsided and bowled over, unable to offer a single hard number to support their cases or save their breaks.

PLEASE CLICK HERE TO TAKE THE SURVEY!

Labels: san clemente, san onofre, surfers, surfing

Listen to this post

Our priorities for saving the world? Save what we have.

Our priorities for saving the world? Save what we have.

An East West Toll Road Does Not Fix A North South Traffic Issue.

Labels: san clemente, san onofre

Listen to this post

The Lords of Trestles VOL#1 Music Brett Dennen

The Lords of Trestles VOL#1 Music Brett Dennen

Digitalwunderland.com brings you some waves maybe from their spring release....

Some of the best Cali Surfing at one Beach Trestles.....

www.savetrestles.com www.savetrestles.org

Labels: san clemente, san onofre, trestles

Listen to this post

Imagine Change

Imagine there's no Heaven
It's easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people
Living for today

Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace

You may say that I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will be as one

Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world

You may say that I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will live as one

Labels: consciousness, new world order, President of the United States, san clemente, san onofre, soul

Listen to this post

25th Annual Cran & Jam at San Onofre State Beach

Video made from footage of 25th Annual Cran & Jam at San Onofre State Beach in San Clemente, CA.

Save Sano!

Labels: cool shit, san onofre, surfing

Listen to this post

San Onofre Thanksgiving 2008

A Rainy San Onofre Thanksgiving 2008

Labels: san onofre, surfing, Thanksgiving

Listen to this post

Glory at Sea Directed by Benjamin Zeitlin

Glory at Sea Directed by Benjamin Zeitlin

Labels: san onofre

Listen to this post

Surfer Mag Longboard Crew Surf San Onofre

This video was shot at Old Man's in San Onofre during a Surfer Magazine Beach Bar-b-que in honor of Longboard Mag going belly up...

Labels: san onofre, surfing

Listen to this post

San Onofre Surfing USA

Se tutti avessero accesso all'oceano
negli Stati Uniti
tutti si darebbero al surf
come in California
sembrerebbe a tutti che tu indossi i loro 'baggies'
ed anche i sandali huarachi
una foltissima pettinatura bionda
per andare in surf attraverso gli Stati Uniti

Li hai incontrati mentre erano in surf a Del Mar
al confine della contea di Ventura
a Santa Cruz e Trestle
a Narrabeen in Australia
in tutta Manhattan
e giù sulla Doheny Way

tutti stanno andando in surf
attraverso gli Stati Uniti

noi tutti stiamo programmando la rotta
noi la percorreremo presto
noi stiamo stendendo la cera sulle nostre tavole da surf
noi non possiamo aspettare che arrivi Giugno
noi saremo già partiti per l'estate
noi siamo sul surf e ci resteremo
comunica all'insegnante che noi siamo sul surf
e stiamo attraversando gli Stati Uniti

Ad Haggerties e Swamies
Pacific Palisades
a San Onofre e Sunset
Redondo Beach a Los Angeles
o intorno a La Jolla
alla Baia di Wa'imea

tutti stanno andando in surf
attraverso gli Stati Uniti...
.

Labels: san onofre, surfing

Listen to this post

California Fish Face Extinction and Cox Wants To Start The Fish Fry.

California's native salmon, steelhead and trout species face extinction this century without quick action to provide proper habitats. 20 of 31 species of prized fish are in sharp decline, including the Sacramento River winter run of Chinook salmon, coastal Coho salmon and the Sierra Nevada golden trout.

Save The San Mateo Creek Salmon.

Labels: cox.net, panhe, san clemente, san onofre, trestles

Listen to this post

TCA's Toll Road is not in The National Interest, Just Special Intrest.

A U.S. Department of Commerce decision is expected soon regarding a controversial toll road extension that would slice through a portion of San Onofre State Beach, jeopardizing a pristine watershed that is home to 11 endangered species, Panhe a Native American Site, San Mateo A top 5 State Park, and also jeopardizing the world famous Trestles surf breaks.

In case you missed it, the L.A. Times devoted nearly a page in Monday's California edition outlining issues that have made the proposed project so contentious. (HOW MUCH DID THAT COST?)

Personally, I despise the idea as much as I despise heavy traffic.

What the story glossed over were the pros and cons of developing state parks.

Outdoors enthusiasts ought to oppose any project that sacrifices even a portion of any state park. Parks ought to be considered sacred ground and protected against all infringements of civilization. And Sacred ground needs to be thought of as Sacred Ground.

Isn't that the purpose behind them?

San Onofre receives 2.8 million visitors a year and is the fourth-most visited park in California. Reasons: proximity to ocean and wilderness, and aesthetics.

Those visitors would not likely welcome such an unsightly intrusion, which would run for about five miles and consume 320 acres of their beloved park.

San Onofre State Beach is bisected by San Mateo Creek, the last pristine public watersheds in Southern California and home 11 endangered species..

Groups such as the Sierra Club, Surfrider Foundation, Wildcoast, Save San Onofre Coalition and California State Parks Foundation vehemently oppose the project for good reasons.

Even proponents of the toll road project concede this habitat will be damaged.

As for waves at Lower Trestles, one of the world's premier point breaks and home to the only World Tour surfing event in the continental United States, they may not be ruined by the alteration of flow from the creek caused by construction.

Or they could be.

As for traffic, there are no assurances that travelers on Interstate 5 in south Orange County will even detect the slightest difference after completion of an alternative route that would dump motorists onto I-5 at Basilone Road south of San Clemente.

Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez has until Jan. 7 to decide whether to override the California Coastal Commission's rejection of the project last February.

Here's hoping he decides in favor of state parks.

-- Pete Thomas

Labels: san onofre, soul, surfing, trestles

Listen to this post

The Tribe of Surfing

In the late 70s and early 80s I saw The Ramones, The Clash and Black Flag. I didn't know it until a few years later, the small group of people interested in the same bands was a tribe.

During this same time, my brother brought me to my first Grateful Dead show. This was also... undeniably a tribe.

A few months ago at the California Coastal Commission hearing for the proposed toll road through San Onofre State Park, thousands showed up and together let their views be known. They were also a tribe.

So what is a tribe?

A tribe is a group of people that are bound together by a common interest. They may live in the same city or they may be dispersed around the globe. They may all have the same socioeconomic status or they may be as diverse as a package of crayons. Their diversity and origins don't matter. What matters is that they are passionate about one specific thing.

Surfrider is a tribe.

It's been called a tribe for as long as I can remember. Honestly, at first that word, that label seemed a bit over-reaching. Perhaps that's my own sensitivity to the various indigenous peoples around the globe, that's THEIR word. But the more I thought about it the more I warmed up to it as it's a descriptive term and not a moniker for a distinct group of people.

Mark Spalding pointed out to me a new book by Seth Godin called Tribes. I picked it up on iTunes and listened to it on some drives, then I listened to it again.

It's good. Like many books of its kind, it attempts to bottle a phenomenon that existed but is amplified due to the many communication and culture changes brought on by the proliferation of the internet and broadband.

However, the concepts is great.

I encourage everyone that has an inkling to step out and build or lead something to read this book. The entire book rings true to me. It's not just about thinking of new approaches to issues, but also employing any and all new toolsets to achieve related goals.

It's never been about the internet to me. It's always been about what the internet enables: listserves in the early 90s, the mid-90s birth of browser-based applications, and the dot com boom. The internet has always been about an idea, an idea that was independent of the 'net... but an idea that could be approached and amplified because of the new toolsets brought on by the 'net.

Sufrider's 100+ web sites are a direct extension of our 100+ chapters. These both feed and each other... and in turn give more people ways to plug into coastal conservation. These give people onramps to our mission.

So Surfrider Foundation is a tribe.

Rise Above Plastics is a tribe.

Surfrider's San Diego Chapter is a tribe (as is every one of our 100+ chapters).

The group of people knowledgabe and active on sea-walls is a tribe.

The crews focused on monitoring policy changes is a tribe.

Etc.

I encourage you to read this book but more than that I encourage you to understand what we have in front of us... a great set of tools for creating and leading tribes.

The days of power belonging to pyramid, hierarchical power structures is near over. Focusing on management of status quos is a recipe for not just mediocrity, it's a recipe for extinction.

Plug in.

-JIM MORIARTY

Labels: consciousness, san clemente, san onofre, surfing

Listen to this post

San Onofre Surf Beach

About Me

Bloggs I Digg

Last Posts

Recent Comments

Old Stuff