The Pioneer Newspaper May 5, 2016

THE PIONEER Covering the East Bay community since 1961

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THURSDAY MAY 5, 2016

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Celebrate Cinco de Mayo the right way

By Elizabeth Avalos

Spring 2016 Issue 5

Reclaiming Latino and Latina

STAFF WRITER

SEE OPINION PAGE 3

BERNIE WON'T QUIT ON SUPPORTERS

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WATER POLO LOSE CONFERENCE CHAMPIONSHIP

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NEWS

Faculty approve contract agreement

Cinco de Mayo is upon us again which means tequila shots, margaritas, chips, salsa and guacamole are served in more copious amounts than usual. This is because most of America and it’s advertisers know no better way to commercialize and celebrate this historically Mexican holiday.

The fifth of May, which is the English translation for Cinco de Mayo, is a holiday that commemorates Mexico’s victory over French forces in Puebla, Mexico in 1862, according to an article by the History Channel.

A common misconception about Cinco de Mayo is that it is designed to celebrate Mexican Independence Day, but this is false. Aside from being celebrated with much less fanfare in Mexico than in the United States, Cinco de Mayo also holds much less significance than Mexican Independence Day, which is commemorated on September 16.

In Mexico, Cinco de Mayo is not known as that, but rather as the day of La Batalla de Puebla, which means The Battle of Puebla.

According to the History Channel’s website, Mexico’s triumph in the Battle of Puebla gained immediate historical significance due to the unlikely victory; an outnumbered, poorly equipped Mexican army of about 2,000 men defeated a strong, fully prepared French army of about 6,000 men backed by heavy artillery.

This triumph quickly became a symbolic moment of resistance, courage and determination against European domi-

PHOTO COURTESY OF MARIQUIS JARAMILLO

Poet Erika Vivianna Céspedes.

By Marquis Jaramillo CONTRIBUTOR

Trump turned his attention immediately to Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton, as his campaign began seriously considering vice presidential running mates.

“We’re going after Hillary Clinton, she will not be a great president, she will not be a good president, she will be a poor president,” he told supporters.

Cruz, the last best hope of Republican insiders desperate to stop Trump, was a beaten man Tuesday. He put everything he had into Indiana, picking Carly Fiorina as a running-mate, getting rival John Kasich to stop campaigning in the state and securing the backing of Gov. Mike Pence.

Nothing worked. Network exit polls showed Trump winning among men and women, virtually all age groups, even among the born-again and evangelical voters Cruz had courted so assiduously. Just as he had in states across the nation.

“Together we left it all on the field in

At a recent “Una Noche de Poesia” event in the Diversity Center at Cal State East Bay, the aroma of café y pan dulce — coffee and sweet bread — filled the dimly-lit room.

The evening was dedicated to the work of a unique group of poesia y artistas — poets and artists — who are part of a sub-community within the Latin community, who identify as “Chicanx” or “Latinx.”

Members of this group use the terms “Latinx” and “Chicanx” to identify those of Latin descent who are gender neutral, gender non-conforming, gender fluid, agender or genderqueer. The “Latinx” and “Chicanx” movement is a reclamation of the terms Latino and Latina, census terms introduced in 1997 by the federal Office of Management and Budget as an alternative to the term “Hispanic.” It is a reclamation because the terms Latino and Latina are both gender binary, and the world is no longer strung strictly to those two binaries.

Bay Area Latin poets like Suzana De Jesus Huerta, Joanna Villegas, Yosimar Reyes and Erika Vivianna Céspedes told stories about their ancestors and offered personal reflections during the “Una Noche de Poesia” event, which was hosted by student Mariela Esquivel from the Diversity and Inclusion Center on the CSUEB campus.

At the event, each poet brought a different perspective to the stage about the intersectionality of being gay and Latin in a culture where being a part of the LGBTQ community is frowned upon. They shared their personal narratives about identity, citizenship, family relationships, romantic relationships and sexuality.

Yosimar Reyes, 27-year-old San Francisco State graduate with a degree in creative writing, talked about his relationship with his family and loved ones as a gay and undocumented citizen in the United States. However, he brought a comedic flare to the serious topics, revealing that while he struggled at times, he was able to battle stereotypes, like the time he got into his first fight. “So here I am, about to get into my first fight being coached by a chola,” Reyes recalled. “They couldn’t believe that the little feminine boy beat the bully’s ass.”

Another young poet, Erika Céspedes, a 29-year-old pursuing a master’s degree in ethnic studies at SFSU, spoke about her relationship with her family, who chose not to deal with her sexuality. She recalled awkward moments at family reunions, and nights where she and her friends ran wild in the streets of San Francisco.

“For years it felt like my family

SEE POLITICS PAGE 10

SEE FEATURES PAGE 4

PHOTO COURTESY OF DBKING

Dancers at the annual Cinco de Mayo Festival in Oakland last year. nance — especially as Mexico’s battle of resistance continued.

Although Cinco de Mayo is a day that symbolized Mexican pride and patriotism, it is not recognized as a federal holiday in Mexico. Students get the day off from school, but banks, stores and offices remain open.

So this leads to one major question: why does the United States make such a big deal out of Cinco de Mayo? Accord-

ing to The Daily Dot, an online newspaper that covers Internet culture and life, Mexico’s improbable victory over the French was favorably seen by the United States because they feared having France in such close proximity to the Confederacy.

The History Channel’s website further explains that Chicano activists first raised awareness of this holiday in America in the

SEE OPINION PAGE 6

By Louis LaVenture EDITOR-IN-CHIEF The “Fight for 5” looks like it could be coming to an official end for faculty and staff of the California State University system.

On Tuesday, the California Faculty Association, the union that represents the CSU staff and faculty members, announced that its members approved a tentative agreement through an online ballot conducted from April 22 to 29.

According to the CFA, 63 percent of the faculty and staff voted, with 97 percent voting in favor of the agreement.

“CSU faculty are in the classrooms, facilitating student learning and achievement, which is the whole point of a public university,” CFA President and Cal State East Bay professor Jennifer Eagan said in a statement through the CFA on Tuesday. “This agreement is an important step toward normalizing salaries for public state university faculty.”

On April 8 the CFA and CSU averted a planned strike for April 13 to 15, 18 and 19 when the tentative agreement was first reached.

Now that it has been approved by the CFA, the CSU Board of Trustees must ratify it and are scheduled to meet on May 24 and 25, according to the CFA. The agreement includes three general salary increases for all faculty. The first is a five percent increase on June 30, the second is a two percent increase on July 1 and the last is a three and a half percent increase on July 1, 2017.

The agreement also includes a 2.65 percent service salary increase for eligible faculty and an increase in promotion for tenure-track faculty up to nine percent from seven and a half, according to the CFA and CSU.

PHOTO COURTESY OF JIAHE WEI

Donald Trump protesters collide with police in Burlingame on Friday when he spoke at the Hyatt Regency.

Analysis: Now, nothing between Trump, and GOP title, and Clinton

By David Lightman

MCCLATCHY WASHINGTON BUREAU (TNS) Once unthinkable, Donald Trump now is the Republican Party’s presumptive nominee for president.

That became a certainty Tuesday as he crushed rival Ted Cruz in Indiana, drove the Texas senator out of the race, and set the course to clinch the needed delegates in the next few weeks.

The nomination of the brash man with no political experience sets the party and the nation on a collision course with all-but-certain Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton, herself an unprecedented choice of a major party.

And it will be a jarring campaign, underscored anew Tuesday as Trump lashed out at his last GOP rival even en route to defeating him, accusing his father of playing some role in the assassi-

nation of JFK. Now assured of a first ballot nomination at the GOP convention in July, Trump has shattered the rules of how a prospective president should look, talk, behave and campaign _ making the general election run, likely against Clinton, unpredictable, vicious and volatile.

There’s never, in modern times, been a candidate such as Trump. He’d never run for elective office. He largely funded his own effort. He spewed gaffes and lived _ and proudly boasted about _ the sort of glamorous, amorous lifestyle that for years had doomed other candidates.

He unapologetically insulted and offended women, Mexican-Americans and the leaders of his own party. Democrats were almost giddy Tuesday at the prospect of running against the billionaire businessman. “Trump spreads hate,” tweeted Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Democratic Party chairwoman, “and we will defeat him in November.”

2 OPINION

THURSDAY MAY 5, 2016

THE PIONEER EDITORIAL STAFF EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

Louis LaVenture

louis.laventure@csueastbay.edu

MANAGING EDITOR

Kali Persall

kali.persall@csueastbay.edu

COPY EDITOR

Wendy Medina

wendy.medina@csueastbay.edu

ONLINE AND SOCIAL MEDIA EDITOR

Casey Peuser

casey.peuser@csueastbay.edu

VISUAL EDITOR

Tam Duong Jr.

tam.duong@csueastbay.edu

ILLUSTRATORS

Ariana Gonzalez

ariana.gonzalez@csueastbay.edu

STAFF WRITERS

Erik Khan erik.khan@csueastbay.edu

Elizabeth Avalos ILLUSTRATION BY ARIANA GONZALEZ/THE PIONEER

Twenty-fun: Coming of age

By Wendy Medina COPY EDITOR When the magical age to legally buy what I’ve already been drinking since middle school finally came upon me this April, it was as if the magic in it had disappeared.

I always felt so anxious every time I’d walk into a liquor store with a friend to buy beer, partly because I didn’t know what to expect if we got caught. But partly because in the past I’d been asked to show my I.D. even though I wasn’t buying anything, and was refused service. And apparently I don’t even look 18: not one liquor store or gas station has failed to card me for cigarettes.

With all this in mind, I never tried to just walk in and buy my bottle of Jack.

I would search through my contacts, try

to remember who was at least 21 and if they were nearby to make my purchase.

I’m sure I speak for countless under-21year-olds who don’t have fakes and go through the same process: all of this is unbelievably annoying.

Of course I’d had opportunities to get a fake I.D., but the “Get your passport picture taken here” fronts spotted all over the city didn’t sell me at all, and frankly I’d rather use that money for the booze. At dire points, my friends and I could barely scrape together the few bucks needed for some 40-ounce beers: we are broke college students, after all.

It’s too much of a hassle to call up someone for an alcohol run, especially if your last-resort-contact for booze, who you don’t really wanna hang out with, wants to stay and drink. Or I’d rather also not put up with scolding looks from the randoms you shoulder-tap outside

the liquor store. Like a couple of beggar kids, my friends and I have had to shoulder tap as many as 10 people before getting the wrong bottle from a pair of tweakers. All this time and energy was put into acquiring alcohol anytime I just wanted to kick back with a few brews.

The struggle was real.

When the day came that I could legally get trashed, I didn’t even get carded the first couple rounds, which was the most annoying thing ever. After constantly being carded for cigarettes, I wanted to triumphantly slam my I.D. on the checkout counter. All too quickly, a lot of the magic of the big two-one dissipated, and it’s just become one of those things in which I think, “Okay, I can do that now.”

It’s only been two weeks since I graduated into real adulthood, so I realize it can be too soon to be over it, but two

week’s worth of liver damage will make anyone feel over it, for now.

What I am excited for, however, are all the concerts, nightclubs, bars, casinos and strip clubs that I can now walk into, legally. Even though the unnecessary drinks at any of those venues will be ridiculous, it’ll totally be worth it, just because I can.

It’s felt like an eternity to hit 21 ever since turning 18, and now that I’m here, I’ll try to slow down; since I’ve been warned about progressively worse hangovers in the coming years.

And I guess it’s good news for another of my bad habits since California just raised the legal age to buy tobacco products to 21.

Ultimately, it’s that bit of zeal lost when you finally have permission to do something after waiting so long for it to come.

elizabeth.avalos@csueastbay.edu

Marissa Marshall marissa.marshall@csueastbay.edu

VISUAL JOURNALISTS

Kristiana Federe kristiana.federe@csueastbay.edu

Melody Platt melody.platt@csueastbay.edu

Erika Fernandez erika.fernandez@csueastbay.edu

Crystal Jeffers

crystal.jeffers@csueastbay.edu

SPANISH EDITOR

Pavel Radostev Pushina pavel.radostevpushina@csueastbay.edu

EDITORIAL PRODUCTION ASSISTANT

Marina Swanson

marina.swanson@csueastbay.edu

FACULTY ADVISOR

Gary Moskowitz gary.moskowitz@csueastbay.edu

FACULTY COORDINATOR

FROM THE WIRE

Dr. Katherine Bell

A first: BottleRock sells out in advance

By Richard Freedman TIMES-HERALD Almost as soon as tickets for the BottleRock Napa Valley went on sale Jan. 7, David Graham popped the wine corks in victory.

“We realized that we would be selling the show out during the first day of the ‘on-sale,’” Graham said Thursday with the announcement earlier this week that the May 27-29 music festival was sold out.

Though no attendance figures were given, roughly 40,000 humans a day are expected to the event that features headliners Stevie Wonder, Red Hot Chili Peppers, and Florence + The Ma-

chine.

“The biggest surprise has been the demand for VIP passes, which went really fast,” said Graham, one third of the production team at Latitude 38 Entertainment.

“When we did a survey after our 2015 festival, one of the questions went specifically to VIP pass holders asking if they would be buying a VIP pass for the 2016 BottleRock festival.”

Some 96 percent responded affirmatively, “which is a fairly unheard of percentage in the festival world,” Graham said.

Despite no longer fretting about peddling tickets, Graham said it doesn’t change BottleRock’s marketing strategy.

“It really doesn’t,” he said. “We are going to continue to put together a robust marketing plan with a robust marketing budget. We are taking nothing for granted.”

Not that Graham isn’t tickled at the festival’s apparent popularity that complements the headliners with about 60 other bands plus a culinary-celebrity experience.

“It means that there is demand for the kind of festival/customer experience that we offer, which is very different than what is offered at other music festivals,” he said. “It also means that we have tapped into a new festival customer -- one that very much appreciates experiencing everything that the Napa Valley has to offer but within a music

festival.”

It also means, continued Graham, “that you can book a lineup that is very attracting to a 20-something customer but still very approachable to those in the 40s or older. Mostly, it means that we need to stick with what we are doing while realizing that we also need to continue to make huge improvements to our festival every year like we have been doing.”

Securing the early sell-out and proving the event’s popularity gives the producers more leverage in snagging high-profile sponsors, Graham said.

“It provides an opportunity to continue to be even more selective about who we work with,” he said.

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OPINION 3

THURSDAY MAY 5, 2016

THE PIONEER

Bernie Sanders will not stop the ‘Bern’

By Louis LaVenture EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Despite urges from Hillary Clinton for Bernie Sanders to concede the Democratic Party Presidential nomination over the weekend, the 74-year-old pledged to his supporters he would not take that path.

Why would he? Sanders has won several states like Washington, Idaho and Alaska in March and even if Clinton sweeps the remaining primaries, which is unlikely since Sanders has a strong pull for the liberal western states, she still may not have enough delegate votes to mathematically eliminate Sanders.

With just 10 primaries left, Sanders will need all of the votes he can get to make a comeback.

At a press conference on Sunday, Sanders said that no matter what the outcome is of the upcoming primaries, he will not drop out of the race despite the math that suggests he has no chance to win the nomination. This means that the Democratic National Convention scheduled for July in Philadelphia, “will be [a] contested contest,” according to Sanders. He will not concede his party’s nomination despite whatever the gap in votes may be, which will make Clinton’s potential nomination contested by Sanders.

The outcome is irrelevant at this point, what matters is what Sanders has done.

Sanders has given hope to longshots and underdogs, and who doesn’t root for the underdog? Clinton was supposed to run away with this election and Sanders has

PHOTO COURTESY OF DENNIS TRAINOR JR.

managed to stop that with his progressive ideas and proposals, like increasing jobs and focusing on the environment, as well as issues politicians tend to stay away from, like guns and weed.

Sanders doesn’t just want to increase jobs, he wants to do it for all ages and not put the health of the environment on the line to do so. His potential jobs are intended to be environmentally friendly through means of keeping the world green, something many politicians have never even mentioned. He also doesn’t just support the legalization of marijua-

na, he actively wants to make it happen, another issue no politician will take a firm stand on. That, coupled with his involvement with the Civil Rights Movement since the 1960s, highlights his differences from the other vanilla candidates.

It is this progressive attitude that has led to the support of his campaign, which has received $182.2 million, roughly $74 million less than Clinton, according to both candidates’ websites. Sanders has also raised this money “grassroots” style, with more than 65 percent of his dona-

tions being $200 or less. Sanders has also denied a lot of money from big enterprises and organizations with 99.98 percent of the money raised coming from himself or donations, while more than 30 percent of the $256.2 million Clinton raised has come from big businesses and super PACs, a far cry from that of Sanders, according to both candidates’ websites.

Sanders has entrenched himself as the people’s candidate with his unwillingness to do things the way they have always been done. Sanders could have

done things the Walmart way and turned his campaign into big business like Clinton or Donald Trump have, but he didn’t.

He chose to keep his campaign and issues for and about the people, something that most politicians lose sight of in hopes of getting elected.

Instead of lobbying for money from big companies, Sanders has taken the more personable approach, attempting to connect with individuals rather than appeal to the masses with crazy statements. When Sanders ran for mayor of Vermont, he went door to door to hear what people wanted changed and also what they expected from their representative, according to the political memoir “Outsider in the White House,” which he co-authored with former Chief of Staff Huck Gutman, in 2015.

He has stuck true to his main platforms of rebuilding America’s infrastructure and is in the process creating environmentally friendly jobs for adults and youth. Sanders has turned this nomination on its head, it’s just too bad America hasn’t fully recognized it enough to get him the necessary votes to get elected.

Sanders has staged sit-ins and boycotts since the 1960s. He marched with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and he fought for civil rights and equality throughout the 60s, and continues to do so even now. This is a man who not only deserves, but should be given a chance to run our country. He knows what it was built on and for, and he learned it from the ground up, starting as a mayor in a small state to someone on the verge of their party’s presidential nomination.

SF Maternity Law: A baby step to progress

By Kali Persall MANAGING EDITOR If you’re a parent-to-be living in San Francisco, congratulations! Come January 1, 2017, you’ll no longer have to choose between your baby and a paycheck; at least for six weeks. On April 21, San Francisco Mayor Edwin M. Lee signed a law that will grant new parents six weeks of fully paid family leave.

It’s no secret that San Francisco has led the state with some bold initiatives.

To start, the city’s $12.25 minimum wage eclipses California’s current $10, and will reach $15 four years before the rest of the state catches up in 2022. Now San Francisco will be the first city in the U.S. to mandate family leave that is fully paid.

Against the backdrop of one of the only nations in the world that lacks a federally-mandated leave law, the city sticks out like a sore thumb. The way I see it, it’s a thumbs-up to the rest of California.

Under the state’s current Paid Family Leave (PFL) law, California employers are required to pay up to 55 percent of a parent’s wages for six weeks. However, Gov. Jerry Brown signed legislation on April 11 that will increase the state paid wages to 60 percent and 70 percent, depending on the employee’s weekly wages, starting in January 2018.

The PFL is a provision of the State Disability Insurance program, which is funded through payroll deductions and is offered by the Employment Development Department (EDD). The money owed to employees under the San Francisco law

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For businesses with at least 50 employees, the San Francisco law will take effect on January 1, 2017; with 20 or more, the law will be phased in by January 1, 2018, according to the San Francisco Office of Labor Standards Enforcement. Employees must work at least eight hours per week and must have worked at least 180 days prior to the start of the leave period.

“Our country’s paid parental leave policies are woefully behind the rest of the world, and San Francisco is leading on pushing for better family leave policies, as we have on other basic worker rights like requiring paid sick leave and raising the minimum wage,” said Jeff Cretan, Legislative Aide to the Office of Supervisor Scott Wiener.

Still, California is light years ahead of the majority of the country. According to the California Employment Development Department, California became the first state in the United States to enact Paid Family Leave (PFL) in 2002.

California, New Jersey, Washington and Rhode Island were the only states in the nation to provide family leave policies in 2014, reports the Presidential Council for Economic Advisors. Most recently, New York’s Gov. Andrew Cuomo signed legislation that will grant parents 12 weeks of paid family leave to New York citizens in 2018. The cap will be at 67 percent of a person’s wages and will be funded through a payroll tax, according to a press release from the Office of the Governor. Keeping pace with San Francisco, ironically this was part of the law that will raise New York’s minimum wage to $15 by 2018.

The only current federal leave act in the nation, the Family Medical Leave

Act of 1993, allows parents up to 12 weeks off through protected leave to care for their child. The catch: The company must have 50 or more employees, and it’s unpaid.

The costs associated with motherhood are still nationally outrageous. According to a UCSF study published in 2014, a healthy vaginal birth free of complications, can cost anywhere between $3,296 and $37,227. This doesn’t include the estimated $12,940 the United States Department of Agriculture has calculated to be the cost of caring for a child in its first two years of life.

Indeed, the situation still looks grim for many soon-to-be parents who are waiting for national legislatures to catch up. Sorry American moms and dads, it looks like you’re still stuck with the either food stamps or daycare for the time being.

Take your pick.

“In this time of income inequality, it is lower income workers who have less flexibility in taking time off to take care of their newborns, so this requirement will allow them to take off these precious few weeks without having to worry about paying rent or putting food on the table,” said Cretan. “This ordinance makes paid family leave a more realistic option for low-income parents.”

Critics of the bill argue that full paid leave for both parents will be rough on employers and will take a toll on businesses. To support this concern, San Francisco’s Office of Economic Analysis found that San Francisco businesses could lose $32.3 million dollars annually and increase hiring costs, according to an article by USA Today.

However, according to the Economic Advisors Report, out of 253 businesses affected by California’s current leave law, over 90 percent of employers reported no

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negative effects on business. Instead, they noted increased profitability and positive effects on turnover rates and morale.

Still, the United States’ maternity laws trail those of the majority of other countries in the world. In his January 2015 State of the Union address, President Barack Obama addressed these shortcomings: “The United States is the only advanced country on Earth that doesn’t guarantee paid maternity leave to our workers.”

Among the countries that offer paid leave, on average, new mothers are entitled to 18 weeks of paid maternity leave, according to a 2015 report from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). Twelve countries offer full compensation and the United States is one of a handful of countries that doesn’t guarantee any pay to new parents.

Even Mexico or Israel, two countries commonly perceived as less progressive than the U.S., both offer 12 and 14 weeks of 100 percent paid leave, respectively.

It has been proven time and time again that these benefits serve both employers and employees well, by minimizing costly turnover rates and maximizing morale and worker productivity.

“It has doubled the average length of leave new mothers take, particularly among women with lower levels of education, unmarried mothers, Latina mothers, and African American mothers,” said Cretan. “Men who take two or more weeks after birth of a child are more involved in direct care of their children after nine months than fathers who take no leave.”

So why can’t the U.S. seem to unify over maternity benefits?

Some companies already understand this, like Netflix, which offers unlimited paid parental leave within the first year after a baby is born or adopted, and Apple, which grants mothers four weeks off before birth and 14 weeks afterward, completely paid.

Six weeks is progress, but it still isn’t enough time. If California can take a hint from San Francisco, we can truly call this a step in the right direction. Still, it’s a baby step; probably about the same size of the tiny, yet monumental one parents will watch their baby take a few months down the road. That is, if baby’s not in daycare when it happens.

4 FEATURES

THURSDAY MAY 5, 2016

THE PIONEER

Hardcore Henry: Old concept, new experience

By AJ Luna CONTRIBUTOR Have you ever sat through a movie and felt your adrenaline pumping?

That’s what I felt after watching “Hardcore Henry,” an action movie shot entirely from a first person perspective.

Directed by Ilya Naishuller, the movie premiered on April 8 in theaters. The premise is that Henry, who the viewer is made to identify as, goes on a journey to save his wife after she is kidnapped, accompanied by Jimmy, your guide throughout the film. Henry has super powers and robotic limbs that make him indestructible.

The first person perspective provides an intense experience. All you see of Henry are his hands, so that’s how you insert yourself into the movie. You don’t see a face which makes it a lot easier to view yourself as that character.

It’s one thing to watch an action movie and watch somebody else accomplish extraordinary feats, like destroying an army of robots, but it’s another to watch an action movie and have characters come at you with knives and guns. It gives you a new kind of rush because you’re a part of the action. Plus, it’s pretty cool to imagine yourself doing all these impossible things, such as punching people miles away and wrapping barbed wire around your hand to do more damage.

The movie was shot almost entirely on a GoPro Hero 3 camera. The movie looks stunning visually, with explosions and fight sequences witnessed as if you were there in those moments. The only thing missing is the gust of air and smell of debris after the explosion.

You would think, based on the quality of action, that the filmmakers used CGI or special effects when it came to

PHOTO COURTESY OF FORBES

The film poster for “Hardcore Henry,” a movie shot entirely in the first person point of view. the intense sequences — such as chase scenes and explosions — but they didn’t. Throughout the movie, Henry was represented by different actors and stunt people with the GoPro strapped to their heads, rather than a computer generated avatar. That’s pretty impressive because some of those scenes, like the running scene where you’re chasing down a criminal, look exhausting.

While I did enjoy this movie, it had some faults. At times when the camera

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moves too quickly, I got a bit dizzy and my friend said he experienced some motion sickness.

At times, “Hardcore Henry” felt more like a videogame than a movie. Different scenes resembled missions in video games where you have to accomplish a task before moving on to the next one.

The further you go, the closer you get to the final boss. In addition, Jimmy is the non-playable character who gives you instructions and weapons in order

to help you progress further, something you see in video games.

“Hardcore Henry” follows a rendition of the classic “saving the princess” trope, and there wasn’t anything new in terms of storytelling to accompany this perspective. Before watching, I had assumed that there would be more complexity to the story, rather than just jumping from action scene to action scene.

There seems to be a lack of original-

ity within the movie industry. Hollywood is taking more and more inspiration from comics, books and video games and modifying them for the big screen. It’s understandable, as superhero and comic book movies have proven popular, so the thought is that the success can be recreated in cinematic form. “Hardcore Henry” was originally a concept taken from a music video “Bad MotherF-----” that Naishuller was working on for his band, Biting Elbows.

That concept was expanded into a feature film. I think if done justice, that the formula works. Just look at Marvel and what they’ve done with superhero movies. The same can be said for Disney and the successful way other stories have been adapted. It all depends on the interpretation of the director.

Although the video game comparisons in “Hardcore Henry” were noticeable and sometimes a distraction, it was still a new visual experience to have in a movie theater. Critics said the video game comparison was a detriment to the overall movie. People expected a new type of movie with more interaction, but got a video game on the big screen. However, a bit more of creativity could have taken it to the next level in terms of film quality. I expected more of a complete storyline and more interaction amongst other characters, rather than the characters constantly telling you what to do, like in video games.

I hadn’t experienced anything like this in a movie theater before. I enjoyed being a part of the movie as opposed to watching another generic action movie, which is what this would’ve been if shot traditionally. While the story wasn’t the most original, it was still a lot of fun to watch because it provided a new experience. Just be sure to carry a doggy bag if you get easily sick.

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didn’t try to know anything about us,” Cespedes said. “So I never tried to help them along in that process. I never mentioned any updates, good or bad. I wanted to tell my family about a lot of things, but it gets tiring when you feel like you have to process and heal in secret. We didn’t have any safe places or groups of people to run to.”

Laughter and a sense of peace filled the room at different moments. The poets were allowed to be vulnerable and opened up to the room, filled with at least 35 students. Esquivel plans to host an event of this nature twice a school year. She wants to shed more light on the experiences her community goes through.

“I was looking for something that really encompassed and exemplified what the Chicano/Latino community is like when it’s very intersectional with gender identity, sexualtiy, presentation, and basically all over the intersectional spectrum,” Esquivel said.

PHOTO COURTESY OF MARIQUIS JARAMILLO

Poet Mariela Esquivel.

“I wanted to tell my family about a lot of things, but it gets tiring when you feel like you have to process and heal in secret.”

—Erika Vivianna Céspedes, Poet

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6 OPINION

THURSDAY MAY 5, 2016

THE PIONEER

Phoneless Friday: A day disconnected

By Christina Bleakley CONTRIBUTOR A whole day without your cell phone. It’s a scary thought, right? Can you imagine: no Instagram, no Twitter, no emails, no texting and you have to make actual phone calls. Sounds like a living hell to any millennial. But I did it.

I chose a Friday, but preparations started the night before. I had to search for my old alarm clock, it was gone. The struggle to not use my phone for 24 hours was already starting off horribly, and the actual day hadn’t even begun yet.

I called my aunt, who is in her 40s, to see if she had an alarm clock I could use, and luckily she did. After I picked up the alarm clock from her, I put my phone on “Do Not Disturb” mode so I wouldn’t hear it go off all day on Friday. I told all my friends to call my house phone, or to email me on Friday.

I then had to charge my iPod the night before because I wouldn’t be able to take my phone with me to the gym for music. I hadn’t updated my iPod in a year or so because I use Spotify on my phone all the time, so my playlists were going to be at least a year old.

But there was no turning back: I was going phoneless on Friday.

Friday morning, I wake up late because I set my new alarm clock incorrectly the night before. At 8:30 a.m., my first mini-internal panic attack hit when I got out of my car, walking into the gym because I am assuming that I lost my phone. “Nope,” I reminded myself, “It’s at home in your desk.”

Normally, I stop to check emails and texts while I work out, stretching my gym time to about an hour and 15 minutes. But without the phone distractions, I finish in 45 minutes.

The fact that I woke up late didn’t even matter anymore — I had just made up for lost time with an uninterrupted workout.

Americans now spend an average of 4.7 hours a day on their smartphones, according to a Seattle-based Informate Mobile Intelligence group, reported the Washington Times, and that fact seemed correct when I was

at the gym. Probably 50 percent of the people at my gym had their heads down, focused on their phones.

After I returned home, the urge to grab my phone and check is almost too much to bear. But, I open up my laptop and answer my emails — most of them from my friends saying how crazy I am for not using my phone and to call them in the early afternoon. However, I couldn’t just call them. I didn’t have their phone numbers written down and don’t have them memorized. I email them back, and tell them to call me or give me their numbers so I can call them.

The struggle is real.

Apparently, everyone hates phone calls. And no one seems to answer a number they don’t know. A friend of mine and I set a tentative time to meet later that day. The instructions went as follows: She will pick me up at around 5:00 p.m. We go out to dinner, then we watch the Stanley Cup Playoff hockey games that evening. I would wait by the phone, literally, for her to call me to tell me she is on her way.

While I wait for the evening to roll around, I decide that this day would be the best day to get caught up on reading for my classes and finish up some homework so I could enjoy my weekend. I finish reading a book and writing a subsequent summary for a class, finish my online work for another and read up on current events for yet another class. Since the forecast was rain all day, it was all adding up and making perfect sense; it is unbelievable how much work one can get done if they just put their phone away.

In a 2015 study, Dr. Larry Rosen, a research psychologist and a professor of psychology at California State University Dominguez Hills, asked 263 students to go into their normal study environments. They became distracted by their phones in the first two minutes while working on a school assignment. The students spent only sixty-five percent of their time on schoolwork, according to Rosen’s study.

When lunch time rolls around, I didn’t bother to ask anyone to join me because I don’t want to wait around for them to email me back. If I wait even for just one person to answer

GRAPHIC BY KRISTIANA FEDERE/THE PIONEER

their phone, I feel like I would have to wait around forever.

I sit down at Mr. Pickles and notice how everyone around me has their necks hunched over, staring at their little screens — even those with people sitting at the table with them. They converse, but don’t make eye contact.

They keep their heads down, only to look up occasionally when one would want to show the other something on their phone. The average American spends practically every waking minute using some type of electronic device, according to a 2010 study by the Kaiser Family Foundation, reported The New York Times.

Insert second mini-internal panic attack when I get home from lunch. I think I left my phone in the sandwich shop. I almost Google the phone number to call and ask if anyone turned a

phone in, but then realize, “Nope, it’s in your desk.” I would go on to mutter this mantra to myself 50 times throughout the day.

Fast forward to me sitting next to my mom’s landline phone, waiting by to be picked up to go grab dinner and to watch hockey. At 5:30 p.m. I call up my girlfriend, but no answer.

Three phone calls later she picks up: “Oh hey! Did you get my text? I said I was going to be there at six instead of five. And what number are you calling me from?”

Me: “I don’t have my phone all day, remember? We talked about this earlier. This is my house phone.”

Her: “Oh yeah. Girl get your phone when I pick you up. This is too hard to communicate with you! See you soon!” *Click* It’s not too hard. It’s just not as

Cinco From Page 1 1960s because they identified with the victory of indigenous Mexicans over European invaders.

But while the United States may have valid reason to honor Mexico’s symbolic victory on May 5, this does not mean the current celebrations of Cinco de Mayo in the United States are favorably seen by all.

Some of the largest issues presented by American celebrations of Cinco de Mayo are the offensive portrayal of Mexican stereotypes and the commodification of the holiday, especially on behalf of alcohol companies that lose sight of what May 5 actually honors.

As a day that represents Mexican resistance and pride, Cinco de Mayo is more than “Cinco de Drinko,” which is basically considered an “excuse” for Americans to drink. Frankly, why is an excuse necessary?

In 2014, CNN published an article online on “How Not to Celebrate Cinco de Mayo,” and included resisting the urge to wear sombreros and fake mustaches, as this reinforces Mexican stereotypes.

Although sombreros and mustaches may seem like fun and games, they actually reduce cultural and traditional costumes to a caricature, the article explained. The article also encouraged people not to try to speak Spanish if they do not actually know how to

PHOTO COURTESY OF S. PAKHRIN

A performer dances, wearing a mask, at the 23rd annual Cinco de Mayo Festival in Washington D.C. last year. speak it, or get drunk since the holiday celebrates a victory in a battle where lives were lost.

But this last suggestion goes against everything advertisers of this holiday commonly ask consumers to do, which is to get intoxicated. This repeated idea that Cinco de Mayo is nothing more than a perfect opportunity to drink and eat Mexican food inspired

the strong use of the hashtag #CincodeCultura, which directly translates as “fifth of culture,” across Twitter on May 5 of last year.

Many users called for people to educate themselves on what the day actually represents, rather than using it as an excuse to wear a fake mustache and sombrero, drink excessive amounts of tequila and speak with a fake accent.

Apparently somewhere along the lines it was decided that tequila, tacos, mustaches and sombreros are what represent Mexican culture, and this could not be any more inaccurate or disrespectful.

The celebration of Cinco de Mayo in the United States has always confused me. Not only does my very traditional, Mexican family hardly ever go out

convenient for you, I think to myself.

We head out to dinner and meet up with the group. I notice that when I go to hug everyone, they all have their phones in their hands. After we sit, everyone’s head is down in their phones, but yet, still having conversation with one another.

I think, “Hey guys. I’m here. Want to make eye contact when speaking to me?”

The term “text neck” comes to mind at dinner. Spine-Health, a group of medical professionals that focus on helping those with constant neck and back pain research, describes “text neck” as one of the most common causes of neck pain and soreness.

Looking down at your phone too much can lead to upper back pain that ranges anywhere from a chronic, nagging pain to a sharp upper back spasms, according to Spine Health.

Insert a third mini-panic attack during our night out. I think I’ve lost my phone yet again. One of my friends reminds me I’ve gone “phoneless” and laughs at me.

I feel like I forgot something all night. I feel left out because all my friends are talking about what was happening in the social media world, a world I had left behind for a day. But then I also hate that I can’t hold a conversation with any of them because all they are talking about is what is happening on their phones.

I want to talk about what was happening during the live hockey games, or if anything exciting happened during their day. To have an actual conversation and make eye contact.

But they want to talk about what soand-so said about the hockey games, what someone is posting on Instagram or what this person said on Twitter.

By the end of the night, I feel more annoyed than relieved to go back home and check my phone at midnight. Instead of grabbing it instantly, scouring all my social media apps and checking my phone to see everything that I “missed out” on, I set my aunt’s alarm clock and left my phone in the drawer. I will check it when I wake up.

What would it hurt to wait a few more hours before becoming addicted all over again?

of its way to celebrate Cinco de Mayo, but we actually rarely ever mention it, even on the day.

This is not because we do not care, but because my Mexican-born parents were never accustomed to celebrating the holiday in their homeland.

Of course we never make it through the day without realizing that it is Cinco de Mayo, because it has been shoved down our throats through the alcohol advertisements on television and in stores, but we never arrange specific plans to celebrate the holiday.

However, for a couple years as a kid, I did attend the Cinco de Mayo festivities that took place in the Fruitvale district in Oakland.

These festivities have always been authentic and family-oriented, and include parades that feature live Mexican bands, traditional Mexican dances, mariachis, horses and more.

Many of the women who attend dress in traditional Mexican dresses and for the most part, people understand what they are there to celebrate.

There is essentially no harm in drinking on Cinco de Mayo, as long as it is done responsibly, but it is important to understand that the current celebrations that take place on this day may not be entirely appropriate and can often make a mockery out of Mexican culture.

Instead of playing into the stereotypical portrayals of Mexican culture, drop the Party City sombreros, fake mustaches and ponchos, and learn the true meaning behind the commemoration of Cinco de Mayo.

FEATURES 7

THURSDAY MAY 5, 2016

THE PIONEER

Crystal meth: The moral inhibitor

By Vanessa Pineda CONTRIBUTOR My mom began using drugs when I was about six or seven years old. At first, I didn’t really know what was going on.

By the time I was in fourth grade, I was living with my grandma since my mother could no longer take care of us. We lived in an apartment in downtown San Jose.

One day my mom came over; she had used crystal meth earlier that day. Crystal meth is the common name for crystal methamphetamine. The substance comes in clear crystal chunks or shiny blue-white rocks.

She started to act crazy and became angry. She grabbed tissue that was on the couch cushion in our living room, opened the tissue and began to call out for my older brother and dad. It was as if she thought they were inside the tissue, and kept telling them to get out. After that she grabbed a knife, walked into my grandma’s room, looked in the mirror and thought she saw ghosts. She wanted to break the mirror to keep the evil ghosts away.

My grandma was so scared, she called a family friend to come get my sister and I. My mom yelled so loud all the neighbors could hear what was going on. By the time our ride showed up, so did the police. As we were walking away, the police tried to arrest my mom. She did not go down without a fight. It took about eight cops just to get her down the stairs.

She kicked and screamed, unwilling to go with them.

My parents were still married when my mom first started using. I noticed they were having disagreements — they would always argue and yell at each other, and the police made trips to our house on more than one occasion; their marriage was rocky.

My mom’s friend introduced her to crystal meth when I was six. At that age I

had no idea what drugs were or what my mom was doing. At first she tried to hide her drug use from us, until I was about eight years old. My family explained that my mom was addicted to drugs and needed help.

Eventually the drug took over and several years later, she became homeless.

Crystal meth is a drug that can be snorted, smoked, injected or taken orally. Jimmy Isch, program coordinator at the Second Chance Hayward Recovery Center, and ex-crystal meth user for 20 years, explained that people continue to use meth because it is the most powerful energy mood booster in the world.

“It releases huge amounts of pleasure chemicals into the brain and makes you feel powerful, not hungry, and lies to you in your own voice and you believe it,” Isch said.

Methamphetamine increases the amount of the dopamine in the brain, the high levels of that chemical is what creates that “rush” feeling for users.

These pleasure chemicals are normally and naturally released through sports, sex or accomplishments. Addicts use the drug to feel good about themselves; they become obsessed with things such as sex, collecting or dumpster diving. They learn different ways they can survive and become focused on this one thing, according to Isch.

Isch also said the drug is a moral inhibitor. As users become more and more dependent on the drug, it forces them to escalate to things they wouldn’t normally do just to get it.

“Meth addicts get with the person that can get them high in order to feed their addiction,” Isch said. Life becomes nothing but an obsession to get it and use it more.

Isch was previously a functioning addict. He was able to maintain jobs on and off. He would snort meth or put it in his coffee. It wasn’t until he started smoking the drug that he gave into the

Some short term effects of meth are loss of appetite, dilation of pupils, disturbed sleep patterns, nausea, bizarre, erratic, sometimes violent behavior, hallucinations, hyperexcitability, irritability, panic and psychosis, according to the nonprofit group, Foundation for a Drug-Free World. Some long term effects are permanent damage to blood vessels of heart and brain, liver, kidney and lung damage, respiratory problems if smoked, malnutrition, weight loss, psychosis and depression.

As Isch talked, I started to realize that many of the things he talked about connected to my mom. My mom smoked crystal meth, she became addicted to it, she craved it and did anything in her power to get it — when I was nine years old, my mom started dating a drug dealer. Over time, she lost a lot of weight and there were occasions when she hallucinated.

When I was young, I used to be upset that my mom used the drug. At about 11 years old, I asked her, “You don’t love me or my brothers and sister more than you love the drug?” She said she loved us, but I didn’t understand how she could choose the drug over us.

Many meth users go through the same deception that the drugs create.

When using the drug, former relationships become problems.

“If the people in your life would leave you alone about drugs, everything would be great,” Isch said. “You tell yourself lies.”

My family used to pressure my mom to quit and go into recovery. She probably thought we were the issue and not the drugs, and that is probably why she isolated herself, denied help and became homeless.

Isch said that nobody can make an addict get clean, “They must surrender to the process.”

I hope one day my mom will be ready to change and surrender. I would love to see her healthy, happy and safe again.

PHOTO COURTESY OF MILES CAVE

disease, and simply lived to use.

“Smoking it gets you higher, but it doesn’t last as long, you build a high tolerance and need more of it,” Isch said.

He has now been clean for 13 years and 11 months. He lived in Fresno while using, then moved to Fremont and went through 16 months of treatment.

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8 FEATURES

THURSDAY MAY 5, 2016

THE PIONEER

Islamophobia is not the answer

By Sean McCarthy CONTRIBUTOR Republican Presidential frontrunner Donald Trump continues to assert his position to ban all Muslims from entering the country. His stance has aroused the violent vigor of many Americans, which has forced our Muslim citizens to live in a constant state of fear.

“I’m not really worried about Donald Trump, I’m worried about the people who support him,” Cal State East Bay student Adam Ismail said. “When you’re showing your inner racism, your hidden racism, it shows that this country never fixed their issues in the past.

That’s what’s scaring me more.”

Ismail says that someone spit on his sister’s face recently while she waited for a train at a BART station. She wears a scarf — a hijab — so she’s visibly Muslim. “I know it’s not from Donald Trump, but that’s just an example of what it could lead to and what other crimes are going on,” Ismail said.

Many Muslim-Americans make it a point to say that they are ‘from here’ when introducing themselves, as if to reassure people that they are safe. Muslims often must face an American mindset that a person is either ‘with us or against us,’ that a Muslim-American cannot have dual cultures.

“There’s like this weird baggage where people expect you to be one or the other, and you can’t be both,” said Anum Ahmed, Muslim Student Association President at CSUEB. “It’s a weird caveat of having to go between these two identities and having to refer to both at the same time for different groups of people.”

Muslims practice the Golden Rule, which states, “None of you have faith until you love for your neighbor what you love for yourself.”

The concept is the same as Bible passage, Luke 6:21: “Do unto others as you would have them do to you.”

America is called the melting pot because

we are a convergence of cultural backgrounds and nationalities, not because we are meant to draw lines in the sand. At the end of the day, Muslims-Americans are as American as sliced bread, albeit whole wheat rather than white.

In America, we have baseball, barbeque and Bernie Sanders. We have the strongest military in the world, capable of detonating enough nuclear bombs to destroy the world 70 times over, according to Global Zero, an international movement to eliminate nuclear weapons. We also have a long standing issue with segregating groups of people dating back to the colonial period. Not so fantastic.

On September 11, 2001, Al Qaeda attacked America in a horrific event that will never be forgotten. In response, lawmakers passed the Patriot Act, which gave the executive branch of the government the ability to freely conduct surveillance on those deemed a physical threat to the safety of the public.

The law sounds straightforward and acceptable, but the application of the law served to infringe on the civil rights of Muslims, Arab Americans, and South Asians, according to Arshad Ahmed in his report, “The US Patriot Act: Impact on the Arab and Muslim American Community.” The law was used as an excuse to surveil Muslim American finances and personal lives.

Hate crimes against Muslims shot up 1600 percent immediately after the attacks of 9/11, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center.

“After school I would experience some hatred. I got jumped one time in the third grade by people in middle school. I wouldn’t say that I’m visibly Muslim, more so just because of my name. So once people know my name, they’re just taken back a little,” said Osama Abdel, student at Cal State East Bay. In the wake of the San Bernardino shootings, hate crimes against Muslims tripled from 12.6 to 38 instances a month, according to Eric Lichtblau of The New York Times. First, we destroyed the Native American population, and

PHOTO COURTESY OF CHRIS HOLDEN

then made Africans our slaves. We proceeded to make Catholics second-class citizens, marginalized the Irish, killed the Chinese railroad workers to avoid paying railroad construction fees, forgot to recognize women as actual citizens until the 19th

Amendment passed, and placed the Japanese into internment camps.

America continues this tradition as it humiliates its Muslim-American citizens by grouping them with radical, terrorist extremists.

Earth week highlights campus progress

By Christina Urbina CONTRIBUTOR The sun was out and the weather was perfect. The band rang out loud and energetic over the campus and plants were sold in celebration of Earth Day. Last month, eight different departments and clubs at Cal State East Bay hosted programs, speakers and events that culminated on April 20 during Earth Week, an annual celebration that focuses on environmental awareness and sustainability.

Each year, CSUEB celebrates Earth Day with a one-day festival hosted by campus organization Associated Students Inc. However, this year, CSUEB hosted a weeklong celebration from April 18-22.

The celebration included a cooking demonstration by local Hayward restaurant The Cannery Cafe, a clothing swap, yoga classes and sustainability workshops.

According to Jeff “Da Chef” Rosen from Cannery Cafe, working in a zero waste business is not only good for the environment because it reduces the amount of waste sent to landfills, but can inspire people to make healthy food decisions. During the demonstration, Rosen made falafel and pickled vegetables using organic local products. “It isn’t about [eating] low-calorie foods, it’s about [eating] healthier foods,” explained Chef Rosen.

Information booths provided by ASI and the Zero Waste Team also informed students about zero waste, a sustainability strategy that aims to reuse and recycle all consumer products, according to East Bay’s Facilities Development and Operations department.

Joanna Giron, a fourth year biology major, said that by educating students on what zero waste means, “we can all help make a difference [at] not only the East Bay campus, but in the environment.”

Instead of all waste being automatically sent to landfills and incinerators, trash is sorted out into landfill, compost and recyclable receptacles.

Jillian Buckholz, Director of Sustainability at East Bay, plans to continue using events like Earth Week to educate students on sustainability and social justice issues such as climate neutrality. Climate neutrality means living in a way which produces no net greenhouse gas emissions, which contribute to the greenhouse effect by absorbing infrared radiation, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.

In 2005, Buckholz became the first director of sustainability in the entire CSU system when she started at CSU Chico. In 2014, she was hired as the first director of sustainability for the East Bay campus. Fourteen of the 23 CSU campus have a dedicated sustainability officer, however not all of these positions are directors.

According to Buckholz, all sustainability efforts on campus are a collaboration of faculty, staff and students with support by the administration. She has worked with East Bay officials like President Leroy Morishita to sign the Carbon Commitment to make climate neutrality a part of the curriculum, as well as lower the amount of carbon emissions at the university.

In a 2016 study by the American Lung Association, air quality in the Bay Area ranked number six in the world for the most year-round particle pollution. Particle pollution is a lethal air pollutant made up of microscopic specks of soot, metals, acids, dirt, pollen, molds and aerosols that are tiny enough to inhale, and can trigger asthma attacks, heart attacks and lung cancer, according to the ALA. CSUEB won two awards at the twelfth annual California Higher Education Sustainability Conference this year: The Energy Efficiency in New Construction or Major Renovation award, along with the Sustainability in Academics: STEM program for Social Impact Through Sustainable Solar Design award. The conference included all CSU’s, UC’s and junior colleges statewide and gave out 11 awards.

According to Buckholz, the sustainability programs on campus will continue to grow to achieve the goal of climate neutrality.

FEATURES 9

THURSDAY MAY 5, 2016

THE PIONEER Dear Colleagues and Students, On behalf of your CSU East Bay chapter of the California Faculty Association (CFA) and Students for Quality Education (SQE), I want to thank you for your support and love in the recent Faculty Fight for Five!

As many of you now know, we were able to avert a strike after a last minute agreement with Chancellor White and the CSU that will guarantee CSU faculty including coaches, counselors, and librarians a 7% salary increase for the 2016-17 academic year as well as an additional 3.5% increase for 2017-18.

Faculty will vote to ratify this tentative agreement online April 22-29. The CSU Board of Trustees will vote to ratify the agreement at the end of May. None of this would have been possible without the combined efforts of faculty and students engaged in the fight for a quality education. Our actions were an act of love for our profession, our students, and our university. Together We Are Strong!

During our Fight for Five, students and faculty worked in solidarity with resolve and a willingness to speak truth to power. Students demanded fair treatment for their professors and fought for a quality education. Faculty fought for respect and sought to retain a middle class living in the Bay Area.

This is not only a significant victory for each of us individually and for all of us in the CSU system –The People’s University- collectively, but it is also a significant victory for public higher education, the teaching profession, and even for the union movement generally speaking. At the end of the day, faculty and students alike, we are working people. As faculty we may be highly trained and specialized working people, and as students you are certainly aspiring to acquire specialized training and professional certification. But we are all working people nonetheless who are trying to

maintain a hold on the middle class.

Our struggle is certainly not over, but we have earned a significant victory for the moment. Our movement is spreading across the country. The State University of New York (SUNY), City University of New York (CUNY), Chicago State University (CSU), as well as the City College of San Francisco (CCSF), are all engaged in similar struggles. There is a profound relationship between the exploitation of both faculty and students as our society continues to disinvest in public higher education. If public support for Sen. Bernie Sanders platform of free public higher education is any indication, we are all fighting back, and we will prevail!

Accordingly, your CSUEB CFA chapter and SQE will be devoting its energy to the struggles of other working people, including the struggle of California students to reduce state university fees and tuition. I can guarantee you that CFA and the faculty of California State University East Bay will be on the front lines fighting against increases in student fees in the CSU system. We all believe that our students are precious and that they deserve not only the highest quality education but also an educational experience that will not leave them with tens of thousands of dollars of debt when they graduate.

I want to specifically thank our SQE activists, Emma Burke, Ryan Tayahua, and Erika Jimenez and all of the members of their organization including their fearless leader, Rose Mendelsohn.

I also want to give a shout out to the Diversity Center and its amazing group of students, some of whom are now organizing to provide a food program on this campus for our students.

I want to thank the Feminist Faculty Union and the labor unions on this campus including CSUEU and APC for their support, as well as the Central Labor Council and CTA. CTA activists were there with us all the way, hall walking and attending our meetings and signing up faculty for strike shifts, and were set to be there with us on the picket lines.

I want to express a special thanks for

the support of this Faculty Academic Senate, and Senate Chair Dr. Michael Hedrick and Vice-Chair Dr. Linda Ivey for their steady leadership. This Senate has taken an important social justice position with respect to the strike and student fees, recognizing that these are unprecedented times.

I want to thank all the members of my CFA eBoard and our CSUEB CFA Strike Team, without whom none of our organizing would have been possible, including Mark Karplus (Logistics), Dr. Rachael Stryker (Programming), Dr. James Mitchell (Communications), Dr. Kim Geron (Community and Political Outreach), Dr. Meiling Wu (Chinese Language Media Rep.), Dr. Jesus Diaz-Caballero (Spanish language Media Rep.), Dr. Susan Gubernat (my spiritual advisor!), our CFA organizer Anne Janks, and of course our incredible CFA administrative assistant Mona Dongray without whom absolutely nothing we do would be possible.

Most importantly, I want to thank you, the students of CSUEB for supporting us and for understanding that faculty working conditions are related to student learning conditions. They tried to separate us and divide and conquer, but you were not fooled.

Finally I would like to thank Pres.

Morishita as well as campus police chief Boykins for engaging in open dialogue in the spirit of collegiality with myself and statewide CFA President Jen Eagan.

Thank all of you! CSU East Bay is a remarkable learning community. Together we are producing amazing scholarship and providing students with a quality education, the kind of education that empowers and emboldens our students, the kind of education that makes California a better place. We must all remember that this is the People’s University and that education is a right, not a privilege.

PHOTO BY TAM DUONG JR./THE PIONEER

Dr. Nicholas L. Baham III.

With Love and Gratitude, Dr. Nicholas L. Baham III Professor of Ethnic Studies and CSUEB CFA Chapter President

Afeni Shakur, mother of Tupac dead at 69

PHOTOS COURTESY OF TUPAC AMARU SHAKUR ESTATE

Afeni Shakur, mother of deceased rapper Tupac Shakur, passed away on Tuesday in Sausalito after she suffered a heart attack in her houseboat. The former Black Panther who overcame drug addiction and inspired the work of her son, who mentioned her in several songs including the track "Dear Mama," which was dedicated to her.

10 FROM THE WIRE

THURSDAY MAY 5, 2016

THE PIONEER

Republican candidates’ influence lingers in state

By John Wildermuth and Joe Garofoli SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE The GOP presidential candidates may be gone from the Bay Area, but their influence lingers.

After two days at the center of the political world, the Republican state convention in Burlingame settled back into the typical grind of party business on its last day Sunday, with the usual in-house disputes over bylaw revisions, rule changes and officer elections.

As the nearly 700 delegates engaged in a lengthy wrangle over an obscure point of party rules, party Chairman Jim Brulte noted that there was a bright side.

“Look at it this way,” the former state senator said. “We’re just warming up for Cleveland,” where the Republican National Committee will meet in July for what could be a raucous battle over who will be the party’s presidential nominee.

State’s key role in race Businessman Donald Trump, Texas Sen. Ted Cruz and Ohio Gov. John Kasich all were in Burlingame this weekend to make their cases for the GOP nomination, talking about their plans for the country and pledging undying love and concern for California.

Of course, with the exception of Kasich, who sandwiched his Friday night speech with campaign appearances in San Francisco and San Jose, the only part of the state they visited was the mile or so stretch of highway between the airport and the Hyatt Regency hotel in Burlingame.

By Sunday, Trump and Cruz were in Indiana, stumping in advance of that state’s crucial Tuesday primary.

But as Cruz said in his speech Saturday, “Who’da thunk it?” After decades of near irrelevancy to presidential primary process, this year California could decide the course of the Republican nomination.

The weekend’s big-name appearances, though, may have had less of an effect than party leaders -- and the presidential hopefuls -- had wished.

“This (campaign) has been going on so long, I didn’t hear anything new,” said Bill Jahn of Big Bear Lake (San Bernardino County), who hasn’t picked a candidate yet.

“I just hope when this nomination process is complete, everyone can calm down and work together.”

That concern was echoed by two other delegates, Debra Del Conte of Dublin and Michaela Hertle of Pleasanton.

While neither was willing to go public with her presidential choice, both wom-

en said they would back whoever ultimately wins the nomination.

Similarities on issues The three candidates are really more alike than people want to believe, Hertle said.

“Most of their differences are in personality, but on the issues, not so much,” she added.

What’s just as important as the presidential battle, though, are the California party’s efforts to build a diverse bench of young Republican candidates for local offices, with a look to the future, Hertle said.

“We need to find minority leaders who share our Republican values,” she said. “The face of a 60-year-old Republican male can’t be our face any longer.”

Wealthy Palo Alto physicist Charles Munger Jr. — the bow-tie wearing son of the longtime Berkshire Hathaway vice chairman — has spent millions in recent years backing Latino and female GOP candidates and organizations in California in an attempt to diversify a party long dominated by white men.

Much of the work funded by Munger and carried out by others could be set back years, analysts predict, if Trump is at the top of the GOP ticket.

Trump’s litany of offensive remarks toward Latinos, women, Muslims and others has caused his disapproval rat-

ings among those demographic groups to soar to record heights.

But Munger refused to bash Trump or even to speculate about what his presence on the ballot could mean in the race.

“It’s not helpful if party brass — such as I — are really loud in our statements about the relative merits and demerits of different candidates, because ultimately we may have to support a candidate who is not my personal individual choice,” Munger said. “My job is to unify the party.”

A protest Friday, with hundreds of loud and angry demonstrators surrounding the hotel in an effort to keep Trump from getting inside to give his speech, went a long way toward unifying the delegates.

Burlingame resident Chris Conway, 51, found himself as the star of viral videos Friday when — dressed in pro-Trump “Make America Great Again” ball cap and a blue blazer — anti-Trump demonstrators surrounded him outside the hotel.

One sucker-punched him in the back of the head as he tried to walk into the building.

Conway said he absorbed other blows and was spat upon, but was in otherwise good spirits after listening to Trump. He was a bit miffed the candidate’s speech wasn’t “customized to us in California”

but otherwise liked it.

Primary only for GOP However, as a decline-to-state voter, he won’t be able to vote for Trump in California’s June primary because it’s open only to registered Republicans.

Since he’s a bit dubious of both parties, he’s not planning to change his registration, preferring to wait to vote for Trump in November.

“Both the Republicans and the Democrats like to put you in a box,” Conway said.

“That’s not for me. I just want to vote for Mr. Trump.”

For Jay Taneja, a 36-year-old Riverside businessman, the rowdy protest showed the need for people to recognize First Amendment rights for both demonstrators and Trump supporters.

“It shows the hypocrisy of the other side, which is always talking about the need for safe spaces, but isn’t willing to provide it for people they disagree with,” said Taneja, who said he is leaning toward Cruz.

The antagonism goes both ways, however: In the ballroom where the delegates gathered Sunday, for example, the Wi-Fi password was a nonetoo-subtle “Hilarycantbetrusted.”

“That’s kind of a great password, don’t you think?” said Brulte, the state chairman.

Eradication of ‘sudden oak death’ disease is no longer possible in California

By Louis Sahagun LOS ANGELES TIMES Over the last two decades, California and the federal government have faced harsh criticism for failing to take stronger actions to stop a highly contagious disease that has killed millions of trees along coastal regions from Big Sur to portions of Oregon.

Now, a new computer modeling study suggests that the “sudden oak death” epidemic, which emerged in 1995, has grown too big and is spreading too fast to eradicate statewide.

The analysis is the first to integrate knowledge of the pathogen with topography, weather and resources like government budgets to predict the likely effects of various management strategies over such a large area -- in this case, California’s 163,707 square miles of land.

The results are somewhat hopeful: Because the epidemic’s growth rate increases with its size, focusing on restoring and treating small, local forests is now the most practical and cost-effective option for managing the destructive fungus, Phtophthora ramorum.

The findings were published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

“At this point, we’re going to have to learn to live with it, and try to slow its spread with local management efforts and lots of experimenting,” said UC Davis ecologist Richard C. Cobb, who worked on the study with colleagues from North Carolina State University and the University of Cambridge in England.

“We won’t be able to avoid much of the ecological impacts of losing all these trees,” he said. “But there is still time to avoid the worst possible outcomes of this epidemic by prioritizing trees that

Politics From Page 1 Indiana,” Cruz told supporters Tuesday night. “We gave it everything we got. But the voters chose another path and so with a heavy heart but with boundless optimism for the long-term future of our nation we are suspending our campaign.”

Kasich remains in the race, but as an afterthought. Chief strategist John Weaver tweeted, “CA here we come.” Kasich, though, has 153 convention delegates while Trump has 1,047, or 190 short of the 1,237 needed to nominate.

are most at risk, and taking steps to protect them.”

The team’s computer models predict that sudden oak death will accelerate in California after 2020. “This will be driven by the pathogen reaching the northwestern coast [of the state], where large regions of continuous host and suitable weather conditions facilitate spread,” they wrote in the study.

Billions of tanoak and oak trees spread over 50 million acres of land are at risk, they added.

“The only treatment shown to be effective in reducing pathogen prevalence at the landscape scale is removal of host species,” according to the study.

This strategy has been used in the United Kingdom but is rarely used in North America. The only exceptions are attempts in Humboldt County, Calif., and Curry County, Ore., Cobb said.

The fungus, which is related to organisms that caused the Irish potato blight in the 1840s, was first identified in California in 2000, after a group of Mill Valley homeowners asked horticulturalists for help in determining why dozens of tanoaks on their properties had suddenly died.

Unlike other tree diseases with symptoms that begin with a branch or limb and then spread, sudden oak death immediately involves the whole tree.

Young shoot tips of branches wilt, leaves and twigs die and a dark red sap bleeds from the lower portion of the trunk. New suckers grow from the trunks of some trees, but fail to survive.

Weakened by the fungus, stricken trees are finished off by infestations of tiny ambrosia and oak bark beetles.

Particularly susceptible are tanoaks, trees revered by Native American tribes for their acorns, and once a major source of tannin used for processing leather.

But tanoaks hold little commer-

“He clearly understands where the race is, but until Trump hits 1,237 he’ll be part of the race,” said veteran New Hampshire GOP activist Tom Rath, a Kasich backer.

The party now finds itself in an arranged marriage with Trump, who just hours before was branded by Cruz “utterly amoral,” and a “pathological liar.” Republican 2012 nominee Mitt Romney in March called Trump “a phony, a fraud.”

Yet voters keep embracing Trump. Indiana was Trump’s seventh straight primary win, and he kept gaining strength. Chances were that ball would keep rolling. “Psychologically, people are drawn to a winner and want to be with them,” said Sal Russo, a Sacramento, Calif.-based Republican strategist.

PHOTO COURTESY OF FOREST SERVICE

Some trees in Big Sur near Carmel like these have been diagnosed with “sudden oak tree death,” which causes infections. cial value for foresters because of their crooked growth and porous wood grain -- a major reason why the disease didn’t attract more attention when it was first detected.

In 2002, UC scientists confirmed that two of California’s most commercially valuable trees -- coast redwoods and Douglas firs -- had been infected with the fungus. That raised the stakes for the timber industry significantly.

Government funds were increased to fight the disease statewide, and the two types of trees were made subject to state and federal quarantine rules governing

the movement of plants and tree products affected by sudden oak death.

At that time, according to the modeling study, the disease was perceived to be a potentially serious threat, but there was sufficient data available about the pathogen and its spread to contain it.

“However, the cost in 2002 would have been very high, and practical implementation would have required unprecedented cooperation among agencies and landowners,” the researchers wrote.

By 2014, the epidemic had grown too big and was spreading too fast to control, according to the study.

A version of the model has been calibrated to help devise strategies for managing the disease in the United Kingdom, where it is ravaging stands of larch trees.

UC Davis ecologist David M. Rizzo, who also worked on the study, said the results of the analysis are crystal clear.

“When it comes to the arrival of new diseases, our computer modeling conveys a powerful message,” he said.

“Jump in with both feet, or face the consequences later on.”

Now come new challenges. The first: Can the Republican establishment rally around its nominee? There’s been no candidate in modern times such as Trump, no one who has so consistently infuriated and alienated party officials, no one with virtually no ties to any Republican in Congress or past presidential administrations.

Trump had warmer words for Cruz Tuesday night, saying he was “one tough competitor” with an “amazing future.”

Some insiders have been coming around.

“There’s a lot about Donald Trump that I don’t like, but I’ll vote for Trump over Hillary any day,” said Ari Fleischer, a White House press secretary for George W. Bush, in a tweet.

Political veteran Paul Manafort has

been meeting regularly with Washington insiders, trying to sell Trump as someone they can do business with. Democrats have a different dilemma. Trump’s triumphs have been in every region of the county, suggesting it’s hard to predict where the 2016 battlegrounds will emerge. Hank Sheinkopf, a New York-based consultant who once worked for Clinton, cautioned Democrats from celebrating that Trump will be the Republican nominee. Trump, he said, is a “trend” and not just popular in one or two states.

“It’s a long time between now and November,” he said. Sheinkopf said Democrats need to figure out how to beat him in large industrial states, where he would be likely to do well, such as Pennsylvania, Ohio and

Michigan, as well as other states, such as Democratic-learning New Jersey, that could be in play this year.

The most crucial question: Once people get closer to actually picking a president, will Trump’s freewheeling ways cost him?

In a fresh reminder of his often incendiary approach, he linked Cruz’s father Rafael to JFK assassin Lee Harvey Oswald on Tuesday as Indiana was voting.

He told Fox News Cruz’s father was “with Lee Harvey Oswald prior to Oswald being, you know, shot ... and nobody even brings it up. I mean, they don’t even talk about that.”

Trump has 1,041 delegates to the Republican National Convention. Cruz has 565. Kasich has 153.

SPORTS 11

THURSDAY MAY 5, 2016

THE PIONEER

Water polo loses in conference championship

By Louis LaVenture EDITOR-IN-CHIEF It must feel like Groundhog’s Day for the Cal State East Bay water polo team.

For the third consecutive year, the Pioneers made it to the Western Water Polo Association Conference championship game, only to lose all three times to the same team, the UC San Diego Tritons. This year, CSUEB defeated Gannon University 16-8, and Sonoma State 12-9 in overtime to advance to the championship game against the Tritons at Chabot College in Hayward.

Despite a closely contested match to start that saw CSUEB jump out to an early 2-0 lead, San Diego managed to come back and eventually put away the Pioneers, 9-5.

Last year CSUEB lost to the Tritons 10-8 in the WWPA conference championship, and two years ago, it was a similar fate at the hands of San Diego again, 16-3.

CSUEB senior utility player Sabrina Hatzer led the way for the Pioneers in what turned out to be her final game for

East Bay. The senior finished the match with 3 goals, 2 exclusions, an assist and a steal. Fellow senior utility player Tori Dettloff also had a great game in her final swim for East Bay, as she tallied 2 goals and 3 exclusions.

The Pioneers had several chances to come back, especially when they trailed by less than 3 goals in the third period when two shots hit the crossbar nearly going in that could have cut the lead to 1.

This is the fourth consecutive WWPA Conference championship for San Diego, who will play. The Tritons were led by sophomore utility player Kayla Fedler, junior two-meter Lani Tittle and senior attacker Emma Sasson, who all scored 2 goals in the victory. UC San Diego will host Whittier College in a playin game on May 10, at the Canyonview Aquatic Center on the UCSD campus.

This was the final game at CSUEB for Hatzer, Dettloff, Simonne Call, Casey Rushforth, Nayiri Kechichian and Jenn Lightbody. Fourteenth year Head Coach Lisa Cooper will have a full cupboard next season as the conference champion runner up will have 16 players returning next season.

PHOTOS BY TAM DUONG JR./THE PIONEER

CSUEB and Cal Poly Pomona in action at Pioneer Pool in Hayward earlier this year.

Raiders draft gets respect, questions

By Louis LaVenture EDITOR-IN-CHIEF For the third consecutive year, the Oakland Raiders draft class is being praised.

NFL draft guru and ESPN expert Todd McShay and Mel Kiper Jr. both spoke favorably of the former collegiate players the Raiders added to their squad over the weekend at the 81st NFL draft in Chicago.

There was just one head-scratcher for all analysts and fans alike. The Raiders traded up in the fourth round to draft Michigan State quarterback Connor Cook. Cook was a winner during his time as a Spartan, as he captured multiple Big Ten Conference championships and compiled some gaudy statistics.

However, it was what he didn’t do that caused the stir. Red flags surrounded Cook during the evaluation process that led up to the draft, who during his four years in East Lansing, was never named a team captain. The team captains on the MSU squads are voted on by players only and as a quarterback, the most visible and arguably important position on any football team, it was a red flag that Cook was never given this honor by his teammates.

“Any guy that plays the quarterback position and is never elected a team captain clearly sets off a red flag for me,” McShay said on his ESPN radio show on Sunday.

PHOTO COURTESY OF OAKLAND RAIDERS

NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, left, and former Oakland Raider and hall of famer Willie Brown announce the 2016 Raiders first round pick of Karl Joseph from West Virginia on April 28 in Chicago at the 81st NFL draft.

With third-year pro quarterback Derek Carr clearly the starter and a veteran Matt McGloin a solid backup, it didn’t seem necessary to trade up to take another quarterback, but General Manager Reggie McKenzie thought different.

Cook was projected as a first or second round pick by Kiper Jr. and McShay; there is no denying the value of the pick

in the fourth round, but do we need a guy with red flag character concerns? I’d say no, that pick could have been better spent on a cornerback or a wide receiver, something the team did not address at all in the entire draft.

The Raiders signed veteran cornerback Sean Smith from division rival Kansas City and also got some more

secondary help when they signed veteran safety Reggie Nelson from the Cincinnati Bengals. The secondary was by far the weakest position on the team and after Charles Woodson retired, it got even worse. McKenzie and the team took notice with the free agent signings and then used their first round pick on a safety from West Virginia, Karl Joseph.

CSUEB golf sets pace at NCAA regionals CSUEB junior Jaskaran Sihota chips a shot during a tournament last month.

CSUEB is currently competing in the second round of the NCAA Regionals at New Mexico State University.

PHOTO COURTESY OF KELLEY COX

Nelson and Joseph could both step into starting roles and Smith will instantly become the squad’s number one corner as soon as training camp starts in the summer. The Raiders then filled a pass rusher need vacated by Justin Tuck’s retirement, and the impending suspension of standout defensive end Aldon Smith. The silver and black took Illinois’ defensive end Jihad Ward in the second round and another Spartan in defensive end, Shilique Calhoun.

Critics blasted the second round pick since Ward suffered a knee injury in August and could require arthroscopic knee surgery, depending on a medical evaluation. They added a linebacker and a guard for depth at the positions, but also got starting running back Latavius Murray a backup when they drafted DeAndre Washington, a running back from Texas Tech. At just 5-feet-8-inches and 200 pounds, Ward is a dual threat as he caught 41 passes for 385 yards and two touchdowns. He also averaged 6.4 yards per carry for 1,492 yards and 14 touchdowns last season. The shifty change of pace back may require him to get his feet wet on special teams with Murray slated to get the bulk of the work in the backfield, but it is nice to have a backup luxury running back.

Overall, the Raiders had a solid draft and addressed some crucial needs, especially safety and pass rushers. Let’s just hope they can put it all together and make the playoffs for the first time in over 13 years.

12 SPORTS Warriors win without Steph

THURSDAY MAY 5, 2016

THE PIONEER

Baseball falls to conference rival SFSU Gators

By Marissa Marshall STAFF WRITER

COURTESY OF NHAT V. MEYER/BAY AREA NEWS GROUP/TNS

By Louis Laventure EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Many people thought losing Stephen Curry would spell disaster for the Golden State Warriors’ championship aspirations. For much of yesterday’s second round playoff game against the Portland Trailblazers, they were right.

The Blazers came out on fire and scored 34 points in the first quarter, the most allowed by the Warriors in a first quarter during these playoffs, and led by as many as 17 points in the game. It was also the first time this season that Golden State has trailed at halftime in any of their seven playoff games this year.

Things did not look good. Then the other half of the splash brothers, Klay Thompson, found his stroke and nailed some huge shots to grab some of the momentum back. It wasn’t until 5:33 left in the fourth quarter, when Thompson nailed three of his game-high 27 points to give Golden State their first lead of the game, which led to a 2-0 series lead after the 110-99 victory at Oracle Arena in Oakland.

“We were just locked in on both sides of the ball,” Thompson said in a press conference after the game.

“We can build on this game. That effort there in the fourth quarter is what it’s going to take to beat this team.”

The backcourt for the Blazers had them off to a great start, CJ McCollum and Oakland native Damian Lillard combined to score 47 points, but it just wasn’t enough, even without the reigning MVP Curry who was expected to miss two weeks with an MCL sprain in his right knee. Team officials have mentioned that Curry’s injury has progressed some and his status will be evaluated everyday.

The Warriors went into the final quarter trailing the Blazers 87-76 after Lillard hit a buzzer beating three to end the frame. Thompson hit a three-pointer midway through the fourth quarter that finalized the comeback and caused the raucous crowd to go crazy, which forced Portland Head Coach Terry Stotts to take a timeout.

“It got away from us in the fourth quarter,” Stotts said in a press conference after the game. “It’s disappointing to lose a game you’re competitive and you’re in position to win in the fourth quarter. We’ve got to close it out. It was an opportunity to get a win on the road. We’ve got to learn from it.”

Dubs do-it-all-player Draymond Green had a triple double last game and did not disappoint in game two. Green struggled early, but like Thompson, found his groove about halfway through the game and finished with 17 points, a game-high 14 rebounds, 7 assists and 4 blocks.

Guards Shaun Livingston, Harrison Barnes and Andre Iguodala all scored in double digits in the win for the Dubs.

Golden State is now 5-1 against the Blazers this season, as the series will shift to Portland for games three and four on Saturday at 5:30 p.m. and Monday at 7:30 p.m.

The Cal State East Bay baseball team fell to rival San Francisco State in a game with very little offense on Tuesday afternoon.East Bay was fresh off a road trip in Southern California last weekend, where they faced UC San Diego (29-17 overall, 18-15 conference) in a three-game series winning two, 5-2 and 6-1, and losing one 7-6.

With one day of rest, East Bay was back on the field against SFSU (22-22 overall, 14-18 conference). The game was scoreless until the top of the fourth inning, when Gators infielder Andrew Breen hit a single that scored junior center fielder Jake Faulkner, putting SFSU up 1-0.

East Bay would then tie the contest in the bottom of the fourth inning when sophomore second baseman Dakota Conners grounded into double play to second base, which led to a score by senior third baseman Rudy Navarro.

Unfortunately, that would be the only run scored by the Pioneers in the whole game.

The game stayed tied until the seventh inning, when Gators’ designated hitter Ryan Burke singled to right field, that scored junior outfielder Ryan Taylor for the game-winning run that made the final 2-1.

“It’s disappointing to lose, but we are keeping our heads up high because we know how special our team is,” said sophomore pitcher Jacob Call. “We have to continue to play towards our strengths (the small things).”

PHOTO BY KRISTIANA FEDERE/THE PIONEER

Michael Frantz caught between third and home during a home game against SFSU in Hayward on May 3.

The loss put the Pioneers’ record at 27-17 overall and 18-15 in California Collegiate Athletic Association Conference games, which means they still have a chance to make the postseason.

They face the first place team in CCAA North Division, Cal State Monterey Bay (31-14 overall, 20-13 conference) in a four-game series, their last of the regular season, which starts tomorrow in Hayward at 3 p.m.

“This last series won’t be a walk in the park; we have to bring our A-game,” said Navarro. “It’s going to take all around team effort, starting with pitching, defense and timely hitting when the opportunities present themselves.”

In the win against San Diego in the

first game on Saturday, senior outfielder Myles Babitt went 3 for 4 with 2 runs in the game, and continued his exceptional hitting as in the past few games.

“I just keep putting in the extra work in the cages outside of practice,” said Babitt. “I’m doing my best to consistently have success on the plate, and that only comes from getting as many reps as I can.”

Sophomore pitcher Alex Vesia also had a great game as he pitched 8 innings, giving up just 2 runs on 7 hits in the 5-2 win.

The second game against the Tritons saw East Bay fall in a close game, 7-6 but bounced back in the third game to claim a 6-1 triumph, thanks

to a strong pitching performance from Call.

“I felt great out there,” said Call.

“I have a great defense behind me that made plays. Everytime I step on the mound, my goal is to just give my team a chance to win, game-planning against the hitters and remaining confident.”

The Pioneers didn’t score until the third inning, when Raymond Jones singled to left field, giving Michael Frantz the score.

They would continue to score only allowing the Tritons to put one on the board and secure the 6-1 win. Junior outfielders Marcus Wise and Jones, as well as Navarro, all had 2 hits and RBIs.

Goodell should overturn suspension of quarterback Tom Brady deflated again

By Erik Khan STAFF WRITER Last week, a federal appeals court ruled that New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady must serve the four-game suspension that he received as a result of his role in the Deflategate scandal from January 2015. The decision comes after the original suspension Brady received in May 2015 was overturned in a separate court of appeals by Judge Richard Berman, allowing Brady to play in the 2015 season.

NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell made the decision to suspend Brady for four games. He also fined the Patriots $1 million and took away their first round draft pick in 2016, and a fourth round pick in 2017. After all that has occurred, I strongly feel that Goodell should end this ridiculous witch hunt and overturn Brady’s suspension for the 2016 season.

Deflategate stems from the 2015 AFC Championship Game in which the Patriots defeated the Indianapolis Colts 45-7. Late in the first half of the game, a Brady pass was intercepted by linebacker D’Qwell Jackson. The Colts’ training staff took the ball and found that its air pressure measured below the league minimum of 12.5 psi.

The Patriots have a history of trying to bend the rules (see Spygate, the secret videotaping scandal from a few years back) — so many were outraged by another attempt by the team to gain an advantage.

The NFL appointed Ted Wells to conduct an investigation into the events leading up to the AFC Championship Game and what may have caused the balls to be deflated.

On May 6, 2015, a 243-page document titled “The Wells Report” was released. The report concluded that it was more probable than not that Patriots’ locker-room attendant Jim McNally and equipment assistant John Jastremski deliberately attempted to release air from the gameday balls before the game. Wells concluded that it was also more probable than not that they did so at the wishes of their quarterback, Brady.

Folks, I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: This whole thing is absolutely ridiculous.

The evidence against Brady and the Patriots in this situation is remarkably circumstantial and impartial. The phrases that Wells used in his conclusions that ultimately indicted Brady were, “more probable than not” and “generally aware.”

ILLUSTRATION BY CRYSTAL JEFFERS/THE PIONEER

These allegations are weak and prove nothing at all.

They definitely would not fly in a court of law.

So why did they fly? Because this isn’t a court of law; it’s the court of Goodell. The current collective bargaining agreement in place between the league owners and the players association allows Goodell to be the judge, jury and executioner. The 2011 agreement gives Goodell way too much power, and this is just another example of him abusing it.

However, this thing was over before Judge Goodell even had the chance to review the evidence.

That’s because he appointed Wells to conduct the investigation. In this case, Goodell, who was acting as both the judge and the prosecution, was able to appoint what he called an “independent investigator” to look into this case.

If you think in any way, shape or form that this investigation was conducted independently, you’re a fool. Goodell definitely guided Wells’ findings to support what he believed to be true, shown by the weak allegations made against Brady in the report.

On to the most ridiculous part: The allegation versus the crime. Even if the Brady did instruct McNally and Jastremski to remove air from the footballs, which I believe he did, it’s just a preference, not some incredible advantage that propelled the Patriots to victory.

Before the interception and playing with deflated footballs, the Patriots were leading the Colts 177. After the balls had been filled to regular levels, the Patriots outscored the Colts 28-0. And in the following game Brady played in Super Bowl XLIX versus the Seattle Seahawks, he threw for 328 yards and four touchdowns against one of the best

defenses in league history. Brady was named MVP of the game.

You can be certain the balls were fully inflated during that game. And you can also be sure that the balls were also properly inflated in every game Brady played during the 2015-2016 season. Brady literally had one of the best seasons of his career last year, throwing for a league-high 36 touchdowns and just seven interceptions. This all happened while his top three targets, Julian Edelman, Rob Gronkowski and Dion Lewis, all sat out some portion of the season due to injuries.

While Brady knows his crime was minor at best, he made sure to minimize the damage in case the suspension was overturned by restructuring his contract during this offseason. According to sports writer Will Brinson, under his previous contract, Brady would have lost $2.118 million by missing four games during the 2016 season.

Under his new contract, he only loses $235,000. He did this by converting his old $9 million base salary into a signing bonus on his new contract, changing his base salary to a mere $1 million. Take that, Goodell.

But with Brady, it really has nothing to do with the money. He is no doubt the most underpaid player in the league, and that’s because he would rather give the Patriots more money to spend on talent to surround him, increasing his chances to lift another Super Bowl trophy.

That’s what it’s all about these days with Brady: A shot at Lombardi number 5. And the only thing that this four-game suspension does is lessen the chances of that inevitable fifth trophy coming back to Foxborough sooner rather than later.

At this point, it’s clear that air pressure has no effect on Brady’s play. It’s merely a preference. Green Bay Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers came out and said that he tries to have his equipment guys inflate his balls as much as possible. No witch hunt there.

And for all you Bay Area fans labeling Brady as a cheater, save it. San Francisco 49ers legend Jerry Rice admitted to using Stickum, a glue-like substance, on his gloves during his time within San Francisco.

Please prove to me that a little less air in the football is more of an advantage that putting glue on your hands to increase your catch rate.

At the end of the day, I don’t care what you have to say about Brady or Rice. They are both the greatest of all times at their positions. What I do care about is the fact that this childish suspension has been reinstated, and it will dominate the headlines from up until the start of the regular season.

So, Goodell, the ball is in your court. Do the right thing and call the suspension off. Doing so will do wonders for your already tarnished legacy, and it will give the Patriots justice.