Jon’s Weekend Reading Recommendations! Articles, Charts, Videos & More… A Rant On The New $239m Education Center at San Quentin Prison... and Happy Birthday to Kelsey Grammer!

I am perusing the web all week, and I write about some of the things I find. But I there is so much great stuff that I do not write about, but I collect for this Saturday column. Enjoy.

This Saturday feature, which is a labor of love for me, is packed with amazing content. It’s very popular. For those of you who subscribe ($70/year, $7/month), this column is a thank you for your support of my independent work. There are a couple of items above the paywall and a bunch below and today above the paywall is my rant on the brand new world class upgrades to San Quentin Prison Hotel & Resort.

THANK YOU for being part of this project and for putting a spotlight on California politics!

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You Can’t Make This Up…

California taxpayers just got the ribbon-cutting photo op. The price tag? $239 million to transform San Quentin — yes, that San Quentin — into something that increasingly resembles a campus renovation project.

Let’s be clear about what San Quentin is. It is not a community college or a tech incubator. It is where individuals convicted of murder, rape, child molestation, and other violent crimes are sent after conviction. It exists for punishment, incapacitation, and justice — not lifestyle upgrades.

What exactly did $239 million buy? A Technology and Media Center with podcast studios, television production facilities, recording spaces, and coding instruction. An Education Hub partnering with Cal State LA, UC Berkeley, and Mt. Tamalpais College, complete with expanded libraries and college-level classrooms. A Community and Workforce complex featuring a gathering hall, café, store, and even outdoor classrooms overlooking the Bay — scenic views many inmates have heard and smelled for years but not seen. How, exactly, does any of that comfort the families of victims who will never again see their loved ones?

Yes, most inmates will eventually reenter society. Yes, programming can reduce recidivism. But there is a difference between offering basic educational opportunities and turning a maximum-security prison into a flagship political showcase.

Victims’ families don’t get nine-figure reinvestment packages. Law-abiding taxpayers don’t get relief from the high taxes that funded this. And you wonder why we have a structural deficit. Another “gift” from Newsom on the way out the door. Gross.

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Reading/Watching Recommendations!

TWO COMPLIMENTARY CURATED LINKS FOR ALL READERS:

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RADIO INTERVIEW WITH JOHN PHILLIPS

Jon Fleischman hops on the John Phillips radio show to talk about who the California Democratic Party might get behind, Pelosi backing Newsom - what’s up? And more…

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GAVIN NEWSOM GOES GLOBAL: WHY U.S. VOTERS SHOULD BEWARE

In an opinion piece in the California Post, Assemblywoman Ali Macedo lays out why…

Gavin Newsom’s global travel itinerary looks more like that of a foreign minister than the governor of a state in crisis. Newsom was just in Munich, hobnobbing with world leaders, rather than working from home to make life more affordable for those who elected him. The foreign photo-op is part of a pattern: The governor is all show, no action when it comes to delivering for Californians.

Read the rest here.

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Want More?

OK, this column is like an iceberg. You can see 10% of it above the water line. Below the paywall is SO MUCH MORE. I curate a BUNCH of articles, a great chart, a great video, a great long-form story, and much more. And what did Jacqueline Kennedy do on this date in 1962 that had never been done by a First Lady?

There’s a free trial - try it out, and read all kinds of stuff, curated as a special thank you to our hundreds of paid subscribers!