San Diego Reader

Stories | City Lights News

No Cure, No Shutdown (Yet)

No Cure, No Shutdown (Yet)

After an agonizing wait of more than 40 years, science may come up with a treatment for lupus. But the two companiesworking together on the promising development are not based in San Diego County. At the ...

More Post a comment

Nine Miles of Nothing

Nine Miles of Nothing

Conflict has surrounded the South Bay Expressway, the southern extension of State Route 125, since its inception. Prior to groundbreaking in 2003, the privately held four-lane toll road was opposed by community and environmental groups. Since ...

More Comments (2)

Can Feds Thwart Runaway Pay?

Can Feds Thwart Runaway Pay?

The pay of American top corporate executives is obscene. About the only people who don’t agree with that statement are the executives themselves. In 1980, chief executives made 42 times what the average worker made. Last ...

More Comments (85)

East Village Lowdown

East Village Lowdown

Lured in by the promise of large-scale development in East Village, to be anchored by a state-of-the-art baseball stadium and filled with high-rise luxury condominiums, ... More Comments (9)

Local Fish Eat Our Sunblock, Deodorant, and Valium

Local Fish Eat Our Sunblock, Deodorant, and Valium

The dolphin skimmed down the face of a cresting wave mere feet from where I sat on my surfboard. Then, circling around, it joined up ... More Comments (3)

Did Dominelli Study Ponzi?

Did Dominelli Study Ponzi?

J. David “Jerry” Dominelli is famed in San Diego lore for one thing: his 1980s Ponzi scheme that bilked Southern Californians of $80 million. A ... More Comments (89)

The Scariest Part of Halloween

The Scariest Part of Halloween

On a blustery afternoon, just down the road from a Mission Valley lot that’s already advertising Christmas trees, costumed sign bearers point the way to ... More Post a comment

More Ballpark Lies

More Ballpark Lies

The Portland Beavers are a triple-A minor-league baseball team affiliated with the San Diego Padres. The Beavers want taxpayers to kick in bundles of money ... More Comments (39)

San Diego’s Loss Is…You Know

San Diego’s Loss Is…You Know

Economists say the United States should export its expertise. Scam Diego is doing just that. A couple of rascals who honed their skills in San ... More Comments (2)

Moving Out Is Hard to Do

Moving Out Is Hard to Do

A few years ago, after moving out of a condo in a desirable San Diego neighborhood, Jacquelyn and Dave Quinonez found themselves in a bind. ... More Comments (2)

Poles Apart

Poles Apart

Everybody knows that Democrats and Republicans are barely speaking these days. But two political scientists at the University of California at San Diego are statistically ... More Comments (150)

Nowhere To Go

Nowhere To Go

While San Diego’s homeless people wait for the City to provide winter shelter, they need, among other things, to go to the bathroom. And there ... More Comments (12)

Dogs’ Deathbed Gift

Dogs’ Deathbed Gift

At 2:00 a.m. on August 26, Donna Liebrich left San Diego and headed east on I-8 for the Mexican border. Mexicali, her destination, is a ... More Comments (4)

Make the Victim Pay

Make the Victim Pay

Comic Woody Allen once postulated that murderers should be given the death penalty before they commit the crime, thus sparing the life of the victim. ... More Comments (14)

Pop Goes Pop Warner

Pop Goes Pop Warner

It’s Saturday morning, August 29. A crowd has gathered at Crawford High School’s football stadium for the San Diego Youth Football League’s season opener. On ... More Comments (2)

Vegas Pays Do-Gooders Well

Vegas Pays Do-Gooders Well

In San Diego, those who do good do not do well — from an income standpoint, that is. The professions devoted to helping people down ... More Comments (12)

All Aboard for the Fairgrounds

All Aboard for the Fairgrounds

"This story isn’t about me!” Richard Eckfield, who’s been on a three-year crusade to get a train stop built at the Del Mar Racetrack, is ... More Comments (6)

Experts

Experts

The world’s experts on all topics are huddling in Washington, D.C. One chap proclaims that he is the world’s ranking expert on goldfish. Inquires a ... More Comments (68)

But After All, He Was a Man

But After All, He Was a Man

I’m standing in front of a real human body at Body Worlds and The Brain — Our Three Pound Gem, currently on exhibition at the ... More Comments (29)

If We're the Best, Imagine the Worst

If We're the Best, Imagine the Worst

Mark-Elliott Lugo, who is an energetic-looking 59 years old, might well be the poster child in the San Diego public transit system’s campaign to increase ... More Comments (118)

Chargers Won’t Fulfill Desires in San Diego

Chargers Won’t Fulfill Desires in San Diego

Experts say the San Diego Chargers could make the Super Bowl this year. However, the team’s desire to build a new stadium in San Diego ... More Comments (84)

PUC Loves SDG&E

PUC Loves SDG&E

Wall Street absolutely loves the state’s Public Utilities Commission (PUC). That’s a major reason why backcountry folks may have to swallow San Diego Gas & ... More Comments (16)

They Have No Concrete Proof

They Have No Concrete Proof

On April 12, 2007, I did some concrete work in the backyard of my Rancho Peñasquitos home with the help of my wife, son-in-law, and ... More Comments (8)

Clearing the Bases

Clearing the Bases

Back in 1998, then–Padres majority owner John Moores promised that if taxpayers would pour more than $300 million into a ballpark, he would produce teams ... More Comments (273)

I Blow Smoke on Your Law

I Blow Smoke on Your Law

Sitting on a park bench at Prescott Promenade on a hot July afternoon, John stares at a brawny tattooed man in his 50s smoking a ... More Comments (65)

An End to the Evil Euc

An End to the Evil Euc

In 1909, newspaper magnate Edward Willis Scripps began planting eucalyptus on the San Diego ranch he’d bought 11 years earlier. Those trees and their descendents ... More Comments (2)

Get the Union-Tribune — For Almost Nothing

Get the Union-Tribune — For Almost Nothing

How would you like to buy a whole year’s home-delivery subscription to the Union-Tribune, Thursday through Sunday,for $29.95? That’s particularly enticing, because if you want ... More Comments (12)

The Park After Dark

The Park After Dark

Asking that her name be withheld, a woman emailed us a few months ago about a liquor store that was “bad, bad news for the ... More Comments (34)

Tijuana Tailspin Hurting San Diego?

Tijuana Tailspin Hurting San Diego?

It wasn’t so long ago that the Convention and Visitors Bureau, hotel marketers, and San Diego ad agencies “would utilize Tijuana in advertising,” recalls Jack ... More Comments (29)

Swine Fear

Swine Fear

Dina is 11, slight in her turquoise hoodie, and dark-haired. She’s finishing up the fifth grade at a private North County middle school where, she ... More Post a comment

Unappealing Banana Trucks

Unappealing Banana Trucks

On a Tuesday afternoon in June, Barry Jung, Dole Food Company’s general manager of West Coast operations, drives his white Ford pickup toward a green-and-black ... More Post a comment

Was Andrew Nice to You?

Was Andrew Nice to You?

May 10 must be the year’s hardest day for Mary Ann. In 1997, her son, Andrew Cunanan, went on a killing spree that ended with ... More Post a comment

Sticky Finger Season

Sticky Finger Season

Recessions always bring out the vultures, and these days they are a step ahead of technological trends, as scam haven San Diego is learning once ... More Comments (49)

Bang! Bang! Pay Up

Bang! Bang! Pay Up

"Looking better dead than alive.” Morticians boast of it. So do Mafia hit men. Now, it appears, holders of some corporate bonds are secretly putting ... More Comments (8)

Big Agency Burns Little Volunteers

Big Agency Burns Little Volunteers

The history of wildfires in San Diego’s backcountry has yielded a vigorous volunteer firefighting subculture. Its foundations are self-reliance, strong community involvement, ingenuity, independence, and ... More Post a comment

If You Use This, I'll Sue

If You Use This, I'll Sue

If you go to the website of the Los Angeles law firm of Lavely & Singer and click the bio of cofounder Martin Singer, you ... More Comments (38)

Who's Harassing Whom?

Who's Harassing Whom?

There is no question that executives at Platinum Equity won’t back down from a fight. The Beverly Hills–based buyout firm, which is willing to purchase ... More Comments (35)

What’s Wrong with Family Visitors?

What’s Wrong with Family Visitors?

Visitors to downtown hotels are a piddling few. Residents of downtown condos are a piddling few. But that won’t stop the establishment from diddling taxpayers ... More Comments (72)

Eat Here and Get Towed

Eat Here and Get Towed

Call it blind loyalty, if you like. For a place to tell me his story, Clark Waters chose the Denny’s restaurant at the corner of ... More Comments (8)

Will Generations X and Y Buy?

Will Generations X and Y Buy?

As the recession grinds on, how much will Generation X and Generation Y spend? Will it be Z, as in zilch? It looks that way ... More Comments (8)

The American Board of Nonexistence

The American Board of Nonexistence

You know those framed certificates and diplomas that hang in your doctor’s office? It’s reassuring to see them, isn’t it? It’s nice to know that ... More Comments (51)

Fallbrook’s Mine — A Hit or the Pits?

Fallbrook’s Mine — A Hit or the Pits?

A pristine wilderness area northeast of Fallbrook is at the center of a heated controversy, pitting local residents against a multibillion-dollar Fortune 1000 construction company. ... More Comments (2)

Sticking with Stocks

Sticking with Stocks

How do you rebalance when the economy is so unbalanced? That is the question facing all money managers and particularly the fiduciaries that run pension ... More Comments (10)

Stomp Off-Leash Park Romp

Stomp Off-Leash Park Romp

Bella, Jeff’s five-year-old Labrador mix, crouches five feet from her owner at a park in San Carlos. She stares at the rubber ball inserted in ... More Comments (15)

Penny Foolish

Penny Foolish

The old aphorism “penny wise, pound foolish” has been revised to “penny-stock wise guys get pounded.” San Diego has reams of penny stocks: don’t get ... More Comments (2)

Convention Liars

Convention Liars

The sugar daddies that could be expected to bankroll the convention center expansion are on the sidelines. But watch out: the backers of the proposed ... More Comments (115)

Keep on Truckin' That Gas

Keep on Truckin' That Gas

If ever a scheme needs a good euphemism, it’s the Beneficial Use of Digester Gas. Nevertheless, the plan passed its first smell test. The City ... More Comments (6)

El Cajon Scam

El Cajon Scam

Matthew “Beau” La Madrid, no longer a registered investment adviser with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), nonetheless convinced 300 people that he had a ... More Comments (22)

Cold Case Gets Hot

Cold Case Gets Hot

It was shortly after 2:00 a.m. when Gerald Jackson finished his closing shift at the Barbary Coast, a downtown gay bar at the corner of ... More Comments (4)

Portraits of the Perps

Portraits of the Perps

A mural at the San Elijo Retail Center in Cardiff-by-the-Sea has gone away. Local artist Kevin Anderson completed the four-by-seven-foot painting a year ago at ... More Comment (1)

Obama: Waiting for the Sunrise?

Obama: Waiting for the Sunrise?

What began as a local backcountry struggle over San Diego Gas & Electric’s proposed Sunrise Powerlink is now a national issue, one that opponents of ... More Comments (21)

Californians Get Less Gas

Californians Get Less Gas

There was a moment, or at least it seems like a moment now, when you could roll into the filling station as the gauge fell ... More Post a comment

Search

New & Improved Coupons

Classifieds

Contests

Win Movie Passes to Armored!

A crew of officers at an armored transport security firm risk their lives when they embark on the ultimate heist ... More

Subscribe & Win!

Enter your e-mail: