Reihan Salam kicked off Politifest with a Q-and-A with Voice of San Diego’s Scott Lewis, where they talked about the presidential race and the future of the Republican Party.

One of the biggest crowds at Politifest was at the debate over Measure C, the Chargers’ plan to build a convadium in East Village. City Councilman Chris Cate, architect Rob Quigley and former San Diego Economic Development Corp. CEO Julie Meier-Wright argued against the measure; while Chargers adviser Marcela Escobar-Eck, the San Diego Stadium Coalition’s Jason Riggs and Save Our Bolts’ Thomas Powell made a case for it. For more background, check out: A Chargers Loyalty Test Courses Through San Diego Business Community, Lands at Mayor Op-Ed: The Urbanist Case Against a Downtown Convadium Op-Ed: The Convadium Is an Opportunity for San Diego to Do a Big Thing. We Should Take It. Padres Chairman Lays Out Concerns with Chargers’ Plans Op-Ed: The Convadium May Just Be a Con A Hotel Tax Hike Has Been in the Chargers’ Playbook for a Long Time East Village Developers Say an East Village Stadium Would Ruin East Village Assembling the Properties for a Downtown Convadium Not Nearly the Obstacle It Seemed

Raging debates about changing the way city elections work, intense talks about the future of San Diego's downtown, brutally honest conversations about race and the gaping political divide – Politifest happened two weeks ago, but can you blame Scott Lewis and Andrew Keatts for bringing it up again? In this weeks podcasts, the hosts piece together some interesting moments from Voice of San Diego's all-day political affairs festival that went down at San Diego State University on Sept. 24. Measure K was by far the most fiery debate of all. The proposal would change the way the city of San Diego's elections work by requiring races to go to runoffs in the November general election. A lot less registered voters show up to cast their votes in June Primaries than in November. Those opposing it say they're not against changing the election, but they're against the process that was used to decide on how to change it and they're not sure this particular change is the best solution. "We should have had a public discussion to talk about whether this is the right system for San Diego," said Councilman Chris Cate. Labor leader Mickey Kasparian, who's in favor of Measure K, said arguing about the process misses the point. "First and foremost it should be about democracy and full voter participation," Kasparian said. "Why would we want the smallest amount of voters to decide the people who lead us? It makes no sense at all." You can watch the full debate here. The debate over Measure C was, of course, popular and packed. Measure C is the Chargers-backed initiative that would raise the hotel-room tax in the city of San Diego to pay for the construction of a joint stadium and convention center in San Diego’s East Village. San Diego architect Rob Quigley opposes Measure C. He lives in the East Village and he said the convadium would kill the character its in the middle of developing. "The east village area is on fire, there are 3,260 ... living units, homes under construction, within two blocks of the stadium site and not many people want to live next to a football stadium," he said. "Football stadiums are not the same as baseball stadiums." On the other side of the great stadium debate was Chargers adviser and land-use expert Marcela Escobar-Eck. She said that the argument that the stadium and convention center annex will create blight in the East Village isn't factual. "To say that somehow building the stadium downtown brings blight but building it in Mission Valley does not just doesn't make sense from a land-use perspective," she said. Watch the full Measure C debate here. Lewis and Keatts also dug up clips from both keynote speakers, activist DeRay Mckesson and conservative political commentator Reihan Salam. Watch Mckesson and Salam's keynotes here. If you're wondering about the Politifest debate about Measure A, a proposal from the San Diego Association of Governments that would levy a half-cent sales tax to fund transportation and infrastructure projects throughout the county, don't worry: Lewis and Keatts are working on something for a future episode. Faulconer Watch Big news, ya'll: it's over. Faulconer Watch is donesies. Mayor Kevin Faulconer has ended his silence on the big issue and announced his decision to endorse and fully support the Chargers bid to build a convadium in the East Village and fund it with a hotel-room tax. He said what won him over were the promises he was able to get from the team. Lewis put Faulconer's decision into context by digging up some of the mayor's past thoughts on promises related to tax hikes. He also explained how the convadium isn't actually for the Chargers..

On this week’s podcast, we tried to get a sense of the little bit of information that’s come out about the shooting of an unarmed man in El Cajon that’s led to days of protests. This was before the El Cajon Police Department’s mid-Friday release of video footage of the shooting, after previously releasing only a still image from the video. Plus, we went over a debate between competing economic consultants from the tourism industry and the Chargers over the reasonable expectations for what a new convadium might mean for local hotels, and the tax revenue it translates to for the city. There’s no interview this week, as we try to pull together some of the best clips from last weekend’s Politifest for a wrap-up show next week. Instead, we’ve included the latest episode of the San Diego Decides podcast, our weekly show on everything you need to know about the overstuffed November ballot. Our hero this week was all the volunteers who showed up and made Politifest a screaming success. The goat this week was the San Diego State University athletic department, which lost a wrongful termination suit brought by former women’s basketball coach Beth Burns. The court determined the real reason for her firing was retaliation for her complaints about possible Title IX violations.

Brandy Zadrozny's Daily Beast story about a rape ring in the Gaslamp Quarter and he shady pickup-artist industry behind it all is shocking. Zadrozny joins hosts Scott Lewis and Andrew Keatts this week to discuss some of the issues the story unearthed. She describes how men have turned picking up women into a money-making pyramid scheme, and explains the role of the so-called "manosphere," a corner of the internet where the philosophies and strategies of pickup culture are touted. In her story, Zadrozny notes that since 2010, the San Diego district attorney has only filed charges of rape by intoxication just 28 times, rejecting 80 percent of all the cases that have come across her desk. She says it's a stat that's likely similar in cities across the country. It's a hard crime to prosecute, she says, but that doesn't mean law enforcement officers should be let off the hook. "This did become not only a look at this crime, but also a look at the pickup industry," she said. "And then moreover, a look at the way that San Diego – an it's not unique in this way – but the way that San Diego handled rape by intoxication charges in the report, which is to say it doesn't handle them very well, and it doesn't do much of an investigation and when an investigation is complete even then most of those cases aren't ever prosecuted." Also on the podcast, Lewis and Keatts go through a lighting round of topics covered by VOSD this week. They discuss the Wonder Bread factory and the owner of the building who could be forced to sell her property if Measure C passes. They bemoan the death of a program at Lincoln High that lets students take college classes. They note the city's big climate plan doesn't include limiting natural gas, and how San Diego Gas & Electric is pushing a new $600 million pipeline to bring us more natural gas.   Lewis also admits that turning 40 wasn't as easy as he thought and extols the healing powers of cheesesteaks. Faulconer Watch Still nada from Mayor Kevin Faulconer about Measure C, the Chargers' plan for a new East Village convadium. The mayor has taken public stances on other measures  but he remains silent on the giant proposal to increase the hotel-room tax and change downtown forever. Hero of the Week The San Diego International Airport declined the donation of a bronze statue of retired basketball player Bill Walton. There are a lot of public agencies and public land out there, which means there are a lot of places you could put a statue of Walton. Keatts offers a pre-emptive hero award to whichever agency steps up to make a home for the bronze Bill Walton. Goat of the Week County Supervisor Dave Roberts, who’s running for re-election, grabs the goat this week for not being bold enough to offer an opinion on SANDAG’s proposed sales tax increase.

In an unruly and bewildering presidential campaign, Reihan Salam sees some clear lessons and takeaways for the Republican Party. The conservative author and executive editor of National Review joins Scott Lewis this week to give a quick preview of the Politifest keynote talk he's delivering at 9 a.m. Saturday, Sept. 24. Salam talks about the past and future of conservatism and why he thinks Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump has garnered such wide appeal and proven that its time for the Grand Old Party to rethink itself. Trump has veered from the traditional wisdom and conservative talking points of Republican party leaders – leaders Salam says have lost touch with the majority of voters anyway. "The truth is that most people vote on the basis of their identity," he said. "What is the the group that I belong to? What kind of person am I? And so which party is basically going to defend the interest of my kind of person....?" Salam says the Republican Party needs to connect with more people, particularly the immigrants Trump has been alienating, if it wants to stay relevant. "There are a few different paths Republicans can take," he said. "One of which is to try to become a whites-only party that represents affluent as well as working-class whites. Another path is for it to be the part of the middle, including the Hispanic middle and some component of the black middle as well. ... Then there's another view that we can stick with the Neo-Reaganite, quasi -Libertarian Party and hope for the best. I believe that that middle-oriented Republican Party is the way of the future but there's going to be a lot of resistance to that over the next 10 years." Also on the podcast, hosts Lewis and Andrew Keatts discuss the U-T's story about the new developments in the long-running lawsuit over the city's 2012 City Council-approved hike of the hotel-room tax to help fund the future expansion of the Convention Center and the possibility of a future consumer fraud class action lawsuit connected to the hike that was levied without a citywide vote. Lewis also gets into why he's been feeling so somber about the state of journalism lately, but cheers up a bit when he mentions all the big names who'll be participating in the big stadium debate at Politifest. Faulconer Watch Mayor Kevin Faulconer still hasn't taken a position on whether he thinks a hotel-room tax increase to help pay for a new East Village stadium for the Chargers is a good or bad idea. Lewis lays out a slow and steady case for why he thinks the mayor isn't saying anything. The paralysis over the issue, Lewis says, might be related in part to the Faulconer Doctrine, which Lewis and Keatts have described as the mayor's tendency to wait in the wings before going with the side that seems to have the most political force. That approach seems to have failed Faulconer on this issue. Hero of the Week The PangeaSeed Foundation, a nonprofit that uses art to promote environmental awareness, rounded up local and international artists to paint 16 new outdoor murals across the San Diego region. Goat of the Week This week's goat goes once again to the San Diego Unified School District. The district closed three child development centers relied on by parents who work or attend school, plus one preschool serving families that meet strict low-income requirements. The closures come on the heels of the district's Preschool for All initiative, which is being pitched as an expansion but appears to be mostly a publicity stunt.

In the carefully crafted messages that surface in the wake of corporate buyouts of craft breweries, several creative explanations for the sales have been floated to appease fretful indie beer fans. Jacob McKean, founder of San Diego craft brewery and coffee roaster Modern Times, says anyone who says a sale is about more than money isn't being straight. In a scathing blog post about the rising trend of corporate acquisitions of craft breweries and some of the rationale that follows, McKean pokes holes in some of the most popular claims. "Here’s the truth: selling to a macro-brewer is the fastest, simplest way to turn equity in a craft brewery into cash. That’s the only reason to sell to them. Anyone who claims otherwise is full of shit." McKean joins co-hosts Scott Lewis and Andrew Keatts this week to talk more about the points he made. He said post-acquisition, the main goal of the corporations that buy small breweries is to suffer as little blowback as possible from the craft beer crowd and keep sales up. He said he hopes journalists will stop buying the spin and start scrutinizing big beer's intention, because their entry into the craft beer market is dangerous to actual craft breweries that can't compete with big beer business tactics. "The one thing macro beer can do that small breweries can't is lose money," McKean said. "And that's the weapon they're deploying." Also on the podcast, Lewis makes good on a lost bet with Keatts, the duo talks about Measure K, the proposal that would change how city elections work and how the debate about it at Politifest will likely be one of the most heated, and they parse a claim by Measure C proponents about the amount of money the city can save by mothballing Qualcomm Stadium. Faulconer Watch In this week's #FaulconerWatch, Keatts and Lewis note that Mayor Kevin Faulconer got a letter signed by local business leaders asking him to oppose the proposed East Village stadium. The mayor, though, continues to stay mum on the matter. Hero of the Week The San Diego Opera gets a thumbs-up for its new Opera on the Tracks series that takes free shows to venues on and around the trolley lines and the organization's continued work reshaping itself into an opera company that serves more people. Goat of the Week The city of Del Mar wants the North County Transit District to stop slamming folks with hefty fines for illegally crossing tracks to get to the beach. The city gets the goat this week for not actually dealing with the problem of accessing the beach. The city of Encinitas, for example, built its residents a nice underpass leading to Swami's Beach.

Last week, Mayor Kevin Faulconer's office sent out an email saying the mayor would be appearing the next day with leaders of the San Diego Unified School District to launch a “game-changing education initiative.” The announcement, it turned out, was that the district was launching a Pre-K for All program. It sounded just like New York City Mayor Bill De Blasio's Pre-K for All program, which made preschool free for some 65,000 children. So is that what happened in San Diego? Nope, not at all. That is not what happened in San Diego. On this week's podcast, hosts Scott Lewis and Andrew Keatts explain just how the different the initiative Faulconer and school officials described is going to be. The program would be more accurately titled something like You Can Pay Us for Preschool. The school district and the mayor get a big-time goat award this week for making the initiative sound like a much bigger, better deal than it is. Experimenting With Affordable Housing Architect and developer Jonathan Segal, the guy behind the North Parker building at the corner of Upas and 30th and several other projects in San Diego's urban neighborhoods, joined the show this week to talk about a new project in Little Italy that's breaking some regulatory molds. Segal said the project won't include any parking. That's a move that will help keep construction costs down, resulting in savings he said he'll pass on to tenants. He said they hope to charge around $1,000 to $2,000 a month for small units that are about 350 to 400 square feet. He said that's a lot less than nearby rents. The city, though, does require new projects to include parking. Segal said his firm used the state's density bonus law, which allows developers to build more homes on a property than city restrictions allow if they agree to build some low-income homes in their project. The law also allows developers other exceptions, and Segal used his to waive the parking-garage requirement. He calls the project "experimental micro-housing" and said he thinks it's a model for building affordable housing downtown. He said if developers continue to pack downtown with nothing but luxury condos, it will lead to a homogenized population. "If you want to push all the real people out of downtown living, just keep cramming that parking requirement in and you'll find out it'll be all the highbrows that are living down here versus a great mixture," he said. Also on this week's podcast, Lewis and Keatts digest all the Chargers news and opinions on our site this week and they debut the "Faulconer Watch," a weekly look at whether the mayor has decided to take a position on the stadium, the biggest decision facing the future of the city he leads. They also worry about climate change and connect it to the ongoing debate about the Carlsbad Desalination Project, and discuss more of the week's biggest news.

The San Diego Association of Governments touts its proposed ballot measure as a tool to solve many of the region's transportation and infrastructure problems. Relieving congestion is among the things the proposed half-cent sales tax would purportedly do, if passed by voters in November. Podcast hosts Scott Lewis and Andrew Keatts dig in to VOSD reporter Maya Srikrishnan's recent fact check of that claim. They discuss the nuances behind what SANDAG actually means when it talks about traffic and congestion relief and explain why the claim is a stretch. This rest of this week's podcast is a little different than usual. Lewis and Keatts essentially craft an audio digest of several recent VOSD stories. Keatts talks about the documents he got from the civil case against San Diego Police Officer Neal Browder, the officer who shot and killed an unarmed, mentally ill man last year. The files provide a rare look into how SDPD evaluated and disciplined the officer (spoiler alert: they didn't). They also touch on the San Diego Unified principal with questionable credentials and the trend of moving problem principals into special assignments, the big disappointment that was District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis' testimony in the trial of the Mexican businessman accused of making illegal campaign contributions and the week in Chargers news. There's also a Chargers bet involving a cheesesteak. Mary Walter-Brown, the publisher and chief operating officer of Voice of San Diego, also joins the show to talk about VOSD's current fundraising campaign and her role in raising money for journalism. "It's an interesting challenge, but one I think is a worthy one," she said. " It's difficult for philanthropists and corporate funders to think about funding journalism. We're viewed as being controversial and Voice especially is irreverent and not afraid of tipping any sacred cows." Hero of the Week The San Diego County Bicycle Coalition gets a big thumbs-up for bringing back CicloSDias after a two-year hiatus. The event clears city streets to celebrate biking and walking. Goat of the Week The newly elected board trustees for the San Diego County Office of Education want a say on who should fill the county superintendent role if Randy Ward, who's currently on paid leave after a lawsuit alleged he illegally paid himself $100,000, is ultimately let go. There's a logic to their point, but Keatts and Lewis dinged incoming board member Mark Powell for his awkward comparison to the current stalemate over the U.S. Supreme Court.

Lewis Keller lived in his van, even while working a full-time job. The Navy veteran said when he made the decision to live in his vehicle, he was making about $40,000 a year. But after taxes, child support and other bills, the only rent the recent divorcé could afford was moving in with a roommate. He opted for living solo in his van instead. Keller's situation isn't uncommon. This year's annual survey by the Regional Task Force on the Homeless found that almost 21 percent of homeless respondents reported being employed. Keller, who now lives in an apartment at Alpha Square, the Alpha Project's downtown complex that houses formerly homeless and very low-income people, joined hosts Scott Lewis and Andrew Keatts on the podcast this week to offer his take on the city's growing homeless problem. He said he puts the brunt of the blame on San Diego's limited housing stock. "The primary issue seems to me is there just isn't enough housing," he said. "I don't think we can fix this problem overnight. ... There's a need to bring on about 10,000 units per month to even make a dent in the homeless issue that we're facing." He said some people opt to live on the streets because they don't like the rules or hurdles that come with tapping into the shelter system or other government support programs. For folks like him, he said if affordable apartments were available, they'd no longer be homeless. "How can we address this issue and get better results?" he said. "Because the efficacy we're experiencing right now is failure." Also on this week's podcast, Lewis and Keatts discuss just how hard it's going to be to get a subsidized football stadium built in this town, and they praise the Homeless Awareness Day efforts, including VOSD's coverage of the spike in homeless in the East Village despite the ongoing gentrification and a look at the problems with housing vouchers. They're also excited about Politifest's upcoming awesomeness. Hero of the Week Hats off to the city of San Diego and Mayor Kevin Faulconer for quickly responding to criticism about long 9-1-1 emergency call wait times. The city rolled out a series of policy changes to help solve the issues and, a few months into the changes, average wait times have fallen and the percentage of calls answered within 10 seconds has gone up. Goat of the Week An audit of the state gang database, CalGang, outlined the many failings in the system, including not ensuring individuals' right to privacy, major flaws in how names are entered and purged from the system and an error that resulted in 42 people in the system recorded as being younger than age 1 at the time of entry.