Last week, California Attorney General Rob Bonta sent a letter to El Cajon Mayor Bill Wells warning him that he was violating state and federal housing laws when he threatened to fine them for participating …
Back to profile
Stories by Walter Mencken
Len on the Lam: last known photo of the man known as Fat Leonard, here seen sprinting through the streets of Tijuana.
Statement from Father Gerald Riptide, Navy Chaplain for San Diego, regarding the military branch’s announced and then retracted decision to cancel Catholic Masses at North Island Chapel: “As Christians, we believe that our prayers are …
On September 14, California Governor Gavin Newsom signed the Community Assistance, Recovery and Empowerment (CARE) act into law. The law will allow courts to order treatment plans for mentally ill homeless individuals for up to …
“Look, nobody’s suggesting that our team uniforms and school mascot actually led anybody to commit a gang rape,” says SDSU Football Brand Manager Sarah Booster. “But the descriptions that are coming out about the alleged …
“It’s sad, but not surprising,” said SEALs Director of Cleanup Ray Warcost of frequent performance-enhancing drug use on the part of Navy SEAL candidates, discovered in the wake of successful candidate Kyle Mullen’s death just …
“Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. was an American Hero who championed the rights of the oppressed, one who is rightly honored with the naming of a Freeway passing through a traditionally POC part of America’s …
Two weekends ago, the Jalisco drug cartel shut down the city of Tijuana in retaliation for the capture of a high-ranking cartel member. They blocked roads by setting fire to vehicles, and posted warnings for …
A recent seizure of 238 pounds of fentanyl-laced drugs at the San Ysidro border checkpoint produced an unexpected bit of paperwork: documents suggesting that the epidemic, which claims more and more lives every month in …
Excerpt from address of Old King Coal to San Diego City Council, August 19, 2022: “Right now, California gets fully 37% of its electricity from natural gas, compared to just 34% from renewables and a …
Last week, as case numbers in San Diego County continued to rise, San Diego public health officials declared a public health emergency in response to the recent monkeypox outbreak. In a speech praising the move, …
Last week, conservative social activist Christopher Rufo — who attracted national attention with his crusade against Critical Race Theory in public school curricula before pivoting to what he terms “radical gender theory” — published a …
“People have to understand,” a frustrated President Biden said to a frustrated public during a recent address, “many of the problems we’re facing today are inherited from the previous administration. Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, record …
Last week, the San Diego Padres joined with several other Major League Baseball organizations by unveiling their City Connect uniforms, which were designed to capture the city’s character in new and exciting ways. The team’s …
“Ever since the Supreme Court overturned Roe vs. Wade and handed the issue of reproductive rights over to the states, we’ve seen a huge uptick in people interested in traveling to California in order to …
“Many prestigious universities are experiencing a moment of reckoning in this moment,” says Wanda Buttert, Chief Officer of Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Purging at UCSD. “Yale, for instance, is wrestling with the fact that its …
San Diego’s Diversionary Theatre is famously “the third oldest LGBTQ+ theatre in the United States, providing quality live theatre that aims to amplify the diverse voices of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender communities while …
Happy Trumpsgiving Hunter P. Thompson: "Sure, everybody here agrees that Trump is a fascist hatemonger with no sense of respect or decency. That just means he’s just like the rest of us. Those protesters who …
Last week, San Diego’s Department of Environmental Health and Quality once again closed the Imperial Beach shoreline due to sewage-contaminated runoff from the Tijuana River, prompting federal immigration officials to make the following statement: “While …
Last year, California became the first state in the country to make ethnic studies a high school graduation requirement (starting in 2026), and San Diego Unified was one the first districts to implement its model …
Last week, the Encinitas city council gave its unanimous approval to the city’s Environmental Commission’s proposal to ban the sale, use, or distribution of lighter-than-air balloons within city limits, including its airspace. “We need to …
BLM Spokeswoman Rachel Justice: “It’s true that covid-19 has, in the past, exhibited racist behavior, hitting black and brown populations much harder than whites. But we have always believed that change is possible for those …
A man calling himself the QAnon Shameless frolics in the fountain outside the County Administration Building in commemoration of the January 6 riot at the Capitol. Said Shameless: “Vice President Harris compared 1/6 to 9/11 …
Last week, the Contrad Prebys Foundation announced that it was donating $330,000 to aid in the restoration of the Junipero Serra Museum, home to the collection of the San Diego History Center. Given the controversy …
None of this actually happened. Except, of course, there was that Board of Supervisors meeting back in August… [Intrepid reporter Walter Mencken is enjoying a morning stroll along the strand in Ocean Beach when he …
The Hotel Del Coronado has many claims to fame — there are those who say that Wallis Simpson met the man who would become England’s King Edward VIII at a ball held there in 1920. …
On December 6, San Diego District Attorney became the first DA in the country to take on the anti-fascist organization Antifa, focusing on its role in the violence surrounding at the January 9 Patriot March …
Until recently, abortion was illegal in Mexico. And yet, there were still women who desired abortions. And even if motherhood was not seen as a necessity of pregnancy, necessity remained the mother of invention. An …
Protest sign displayed over San Diego freeway in wake of Not Guilty verdict for Kyle Rittenhouse, who was charged with murder after shooting and killing two people in Kenosha, Wisconsin during the riot that followed …
Last week, thousands of San Diegans endured major traffic delays following the flooding and closure of a portion of I-5 North near the downtown area. At the time, blame was placed on a ruptured water …
“We won’t restrict the people who can submit their material for consideration. We won’t look back at people’s history.” That was Recording Academy CEO Harvey Mason, Jr. last week, defending the Academy’s nomination of both …
San Diego Police today issued an All Points Bulletin for Raven Briarpatch, a local witch who may prove to be the key in the case of missing woman Maya Millete. “Up to now,” explained the …
Last week, Flora Avian, lead researcher for the San Diego Zoo Alliance’s California Condor Preservation Project, announced that two of the birds in her care had been spawned via parthenogenesis, that is, asexually. “We did …
“Racism can no longer be swept under the rug or considered as normal,” said Lincoln High football coach David Dunn, explaining his decision last week to cancel his team’s game against Cathedral Catholic. “What are …
Max Whiteman, addressing the California Republican Convention last week at the unveiling of the organization’s new logo: “If you tilt Texas a little to the right — get it, to the right? — the state …
“Over 150 years ago, the island nation of Hawaii found itself in a crisis: an outbreak of the horrific, highly contagious, and then-untreatable disease of leprosy,” says San Diego Health Supervisor Winifred Wutan. “The authorities …
“Really, we couldn’t be happier,” said Bud Zero brand manager Sid Craven following the Padres disastrous conclusion to their 2020 season. “A full season in the basement would have meant minimal exposure for our brand. …
“From Peyton Place to Melrose Place, the P-word has always been code for Protected Private Property,” says Black Lives Matter spokesperson Natasha Trigger-Warning. “And what it’s protected from is the Street — as in, the …
A fully masked and socially distant county employee reassures an uncooperative Lakeside resident who read on the internet that the vaccine may affect fertility that while President Biden’s patience may be wearing then, he has …
“It started with racism, because it had to,” says County Supervisor Nathan Fletcher-Ram as he looks back on his Supreme Council’s ever more complete triumph over evil. “We here in San Diego simply had to …
“Honestly, this was [ex-Mayor] Faulconer’s mess; I just inherited it,” says Mayor Todd Gloria of the Taliban’s takeover of the United States’ cottage in Balboa Park’s International Cottages section. “He’s the one who made the …
“We had a great story,” says San Diego Sheriff Bill Bore. “We had body cam video — you know, the stuff that’s supposed to clear up confusion about police business — showing Deputy David Faviiae …
“Love is blind,” said baseball great Yoga Berry, “but it still knows which team its rooting for.” Which makes it all the more mysterious how Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Trevor Bauer, recipient of maybe the …
“Everybody talks about how gay bars are disappearing all over America,” says Dan Butterman, self-appointed historian of Hillcrest’s history as San Diego’s gay district. “But what’s less discussed is the disappearance of an even more …
Yesterday, San Diego Mayor Todd Gloria spoke out against a plague of faked vaccination cards that seems to be spreading among the unvaccinated community in San Diego even faster than covid-19. “Even as San Diego’s …
Last week, a SurveyUSA poll revealed that more than half of likely voters would vote to recall Governor Gavin Newsom from office, a clear sign that many Californians are unhappy with Toothsome Newsom’s handling of …
“When I first suggested that China’s decision to share its pandas with the San Diego Zoo might be a fur-op, everybody said I was crazy,” says local conspiracy theorist Saul Openmind. “That was what, 27 …
Statement from San Diego Unified’s Department of Doing Better: “Junipero Serra was an easy one: no religious figure has any business having their name on a public school, including the Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. …
The UCSD Watermelon Drop, in which the melon is dropped seven stories from Urey Hall in an effort to create the largest possible splat, is the school’s oldest tradition. But not every tradition is worth …