By Steven T. Jones
When the How Weird Street Fair last month barely survived the city permit process to get the OK for one final gathering on Howard Street on May 6, I warned that they were likely to have a hard time with the cops. After all, Southern Station Capt. Denis O’Leary, the guy charged with setting their police fees, had come right out and sided with the handful of neighbors who were trying to kill the popular event. O’Leary promised to be fair. But now, How Weird organizer Brad Olsen tells the Guardian that the cops have more than doubled his fees, demanding $17,700 for beefed up patrols. That’s despite the fact that this year’s event ends two hours earlier than last year (another city demand), has never had significant law enforcement problems, and it’s fee last year was $7,700. O’Leary hasn’t yet returned my telephone call asking what this is about, but it doesn’t sound like he’s living up to his comment to me, “I’m very fair.” Meanwhile, the newly formed Outdoor Events Coalition is pushing City Hall to ease the administrative crackdown on street fairs. Stay tuned.
SFBG Blogs
How Weird gets walloped…again
Eek, she’s back
By Steven T. Jones
Like a bad movie that gets turned into a worse sequel, actress Jennifer Siebel has returned to the pages of another Bay Area corporate daily for another vapid puff piece filled with lines that will make grown women groan.
But conspicuously missing from this profile of Mayor Gavin Newsom’s girlfriend are gratuitous (and possibly libelous) shots that she took at her boyfriend’s controversial former fling, Ruby Rippey-Tourk, sins that Siebel magnified with over-the-top comments she posted on the SFist. That incident earned the blog more than 600 comments on a single thread, and they today return to that comment-cow with a funny post. But aside from priceless quotes, such as “I grew up in a very beautiful, magical bubble,” Siebel this time manages to avoid politics, character assassination, or, really, anything of substance. I suppose that’s progress.
People do
By Steven T. Jones
Do people really praise a company for polluting the planet and local ecosystems, exploiting indigenous people and propping up corrupt regimes around the world, and making $17 billion in annual profits in the process? People do, and those people write for the business pages at the San Francisco Chronicle, which has just named Chevron its company of the year.
This is astonishing beyond words and surely a sign that the Chron doesn’t hold anything close to San Francisco values, which extend far beyond just corporate bottom lines. Consider that Chevron is a company that helped get us into the disastrous war in Iraq. It is a company waging economic warfare against people around the world. It is a company that has gouged American consumers to reap record profits and spend them against the public will.
This is the best company in the Bay Area? It’s closer to the worst.
People do
By Steven T. Jones
Do people really praise a company for polluting the planet and local ecosystems, exploiting indigenous people and propping up corrupt regimes around the world, and making $17 billion in annual profits in the process? People do, and those people write for the business pages at the San Francisco Chronicle, which has just named Chevron its company of the year.
This is astonishing beyond words and surely a sign that the Chron doesn’t hold anything close to San Francisco values, which extend far beyond just corporate bottom lines. Consider that Chevron is a company that helped get us into the disastrous war in Iraq. It is a company waging economic warfare against people around the world. It is a company that has gouged American consumers to reap record profits and spend them against the public will.
This is the best company in the Bay Area? It’s closer to the worst.
International Ms. Leather: “A stick of gum, a SuperBall, and a frog”
Well, I didn’t get to go to any Cat Circus like Ms. Cheryl Eddy (see previous post), but I DID get to attend the fantastic International Ms. Leather competition at the Holiday Inn on Van Ness on Easter Vigil Saturday.
The contestants — a little blurry cuz the lens was steamy
(All pics by Hunky Beau)
The leather community still manages to amaze, and pump out enough fetishistic mojo to keep cultural critics scratching their spinning heads. The International Ms Leather contest — IMsL, or “imzel” — is only a small part of a grand weekend for leather women (and admirers — there were a lot of men and pansexuals in attendance) that’s been going on annually for 10 years. This year, it was also accompanied by the Internal Ms. Boot Black competition — or “imzbuhbuh.”
One weird Easter
I blame the cats. The Russian cats. The Moscow Cats Theatre. First of all, when the cat circus comes to town, I’m pretty sure there’s a law on the books that you don’t miss it under any circumstances. Actual performing cats! Kitties in little sparkly ruffs, scampering across high wires and jumping through hoops! Who passes that up??
Pretty much everyone I happen to know, it seems. I was already in a grumbly mood because I didn’t get a scrap of ham all day, nor did I even come near any sort of ham, or even spam — dude, I didn’t get corned beef on St. Patty’s, either, so the holiday-meat-deprivation pity party is only getting worse. On Thanksgiving I fully expect to be hunched over my Hello Kitty toaster, jar of Smuckers in hand, weeping over birds that are going uneaten. Yeah, I’m bitter. Feed me a cheeseburger, I’ll get over it. Anyway, the point is, I was already in a grumbly mood, like I said, when I hauled my carcass down to the Palace of Fine Arts. Alone. To see performing cats. Once I got there, I actually ran into some folks I knew — but the off-kilter tone of the day was already set.
Gore speaks, conveniently
Intern Sam Devine snuck into Al Gore’s recent local event. Here’s his report
On Tuesday night Former Vice President Al Gore appeared at the Nob Hill Masonic Center in an event sponsored by City Arts and Lectures and the California Academy of Sciences. He spoke in discussion with John McCosker, Chair of Aquatic Biology at the Academy, on the recently championed topic of global climate change.
Copies of Gore’s books, including “An Inconvenient Truth”, were for sale in the lobby. A few minutes after 8p.m. the lights went down in the sold-out Masonic Auditorium. Greg Farrington, Executive Director of the California Academy of Sciences, gave a brief introduction; noting that the Academies’ soon-to-be Golden Gate Park building will be one of the first publicly owned “green” buildings in the nation.
Gore and moderator McCosker took the stage and sat down in the artificial living room habitat – cushy red chairs and a round wooden coffee table with tulips. Gore wore a blue suit with the standard democrat blue tie and choice Tennessee footwear – cowboy boots. It’s safe to say that no one can recall the clothing McCosker wore -– his black-and-white Wicked-Witch-of-the-West socks eclipsed all else.
Ranting Gore
Photo from uglydemocrats.com
‘WHEN WE WERE YOUNG’: Gen Xers don’t wanna be cops ‘cause they’re fat and lazy, says Gary Delagnes — PLUS! Police commissioner David Campos responds to the POA’s call for his resignation
By G.W. Schulz
There’s never a shortage of bitching over at the San Francisco Police Officers Association. And the best place to find it lying exposed, unshaven and clad in patent-leather stirrups without so much as a single blush is in the cop union’s monthly newsletter, the POA Journal.
As attorney Mark Schlosberg at the ACLU of Northern California will tell you, there’s no better place than the POA Journal for an honest assessment of what the SFPD’s rank and file is really thinking. And leading each edition of the Journal is a scribe from outspoken union president Gary Delagnes that’s sometimes funny but mostly unsettling.
Without further ado, ladies and gentleman, welcome to another edition of “What’s the city’s cop union bitching about now?”
This past year actually treated the POA quite well, what with the state Supreme Court’s Copley decision sealing off police disciplinary records from public scrutiny, Berkeley losing a subsequent legal challenge to the ruling and the SFPD’s general success in slowing down the implementation of a program designed to track and flag lunatic cops.
The dark prince of SF elections
By Steven T. Jones
Why does attorney Jim Sutton seem to be involved in every major campaign finance scandal in San Francisco? In the latest, Sutton’s firm reportedly advised a local motorcycle training company on how to allegedly launder money into a City College bond campaign (Sutton isn’t mentioned in the story, but in a letter the company wrote to the Ethics Commission that the Chron featured on today’s front page). Shouldn’t the State Bar take an interest in this at some point?
Missive from Whiskeyville
From the files of our cocktail sniffer Jonathan Beckhardt
Dear Mom,
I am sorry that I only contact you when i need something, but I was wondering if you could send me my whiskey-shoes. I imagine they’re on the bottom shelf of my dresser, since I haven’t worn them since Jim Holt’s barbecue last summer. If you could get them in the mail this week, that would be great, as I need them for next Saturday. I am covering the Whiskeys of the World Expo on Saturday, April 14th. Whiskey vendors from all over will be serving samples from across two ballrooms of the Palace Hotel (yes, the same Palace Hotel where pneumonia got the best of Warren G. Harding). All that, while we get to listen to the Peninsula Scottish Fiddlers, and hopefully even check out some great speakers, like Lorne Mackillop, from MacKillop’s Choice Whisky. This is my chance to be something more than a Jim Beam hack, and I don’t want to blow it. Thanks mom,
I hope everything else is well with you,
Love,
Jonathan
Final word
By Steven T. Jones
Why is the Chronicle having such a hard time understanding this Critical Mass incident? In my televised discussion with four Chron reporters last night (City Desk NewsHour, Comcast Ch. 11, replaying tonight at 8:30 and Saturday and Sunday nights as well…sorry, not Internet availability) and in today’s Chron story, they just can’t seem to grasp the meaning of one key fact or smell-test their original version of the story. Here’s the key fact, from today’s story: “After finding herself in the middle of the ride, she said, she nervously made her way through the bicyclists, carefully watching them.” Translation: she used her SUV to nudge her way through a group of bikes. That’s not legal, it’s not safe, and it’s why the bicyclists became upset. Hell, she even admits that her car made contact with a bike, and still she kept driving.
2nd Anniversary flyer illustration by Jim Swanson
Free Josh Wolf from the Media spin
by Sarah Phelan
“What will everyone do now?” asked a fellow Guardian-ista, when freelance videojournalist and blogger Josh Wolf was released. She was referring to those who fought to get Wolf freed after the feds locked him up last summer. Don’t worry, I thought, the war over why Josh Wolf has been freed is about to begin.
Sure enough, war broke out that afternoon.
With Wolf set to speak on the steps of San Francisco City Hall on April 3, after 226 days inside, everyone was asking “So, what’s changed?” Had Wolf, tiring of prison food, thrown in the towel and told the feds everything they always wanted to know about anarchists? Or had the feds, weary of the fired US Attorney General scandal, decided it was time to score Brownie points in Nancy Pelosi’s home town by letting Wolf go, no questions asked?
Sup. Tom Ammiano, fresh from Giants opening game told the crowd, “Josh Wolf did what the Giants failed to do today: he hit a home run!”
Josh Wolf vs. Howard Kurtz
Read the full Josh Wolf vs. Howard Kurtz, the Washington Post, and the inside-the-beltway gang blog here.
Feinstein Resigns
by Amanda Witherell
Looks like Senator Dianne Feinstein has stepped down from her seat on the Military Construction Appropriations subcommittee, where she’s spent the last six years as chairperson and ranking member.
While serving on that committee, which is tasked with reviewing and supervising federal military contracts, her hubby Richard Blum was making millions of dollars on the same deals his wife was overseeing.
No statement or press release yet from Feinstein on why she quit, and the right-wing bloggers are going nutty for an investigation, perhaps to vindicate their champ, Dick Cheney, who made a pretty penny with Halliburton. What can we say: greed is a universal human ailment and war profiteering is certainly a non-partisan sport.
Demonizing bicyclists
By Steven T. Jones
Despite finally getting the bicyclists’ perspective into today’s story, the Chronicle continues its misleading and irresponsible effort to demonize Critical Mass and bicyclists in general. And the result has been dozens of angry and menacing online posts by overentitled car drivers who threaten the lives of those opting for a more environmentally friendly transportation option.
Unlike the more reasonable Examiner account, the Chronicle seems to have lost all sense of proportion, with its reporters trying to push Mayor Gavin Newsom (who was also fairly measured in his reaction) into cracking down on Critical Mass. As I mentioned in my post yesterday, I sought a reaction from the Chron’s Andy Ross, which I’ve now received and am posting below followed by more discussion.
Queens of Eurovision pt. 2
And another for the great and apparently tranny-infested Eurovision Song Contest! This one’s called DQ (which used to mean something pretty scandalous in the Midwestern gay underground) and the song is ….. DRAMA QUEEN
Dana International has really opened doors! And speaking of Passover ….
Queens of Eurovision pt. 1
Three words: Ukranian drag queen. In the Eurovision Song Contest, on May 12.
Her name is Verka Serdjuchka and she’s awesome …. babushka power! (You can get better quality — Ukranian TV? Forget it — at the Eurovision site.
You want more?
Leno and Ma Scrutinize Alcatraz
by Amanda Witherell
Did poo get washed into the bay or not? Mark Leno and Fiona Ma really want to know. They’ve written another letter to the National Park Service’s Superintendent, Brian O’Neill, calling for an independent investigation, and essentially telling him his excuses and explanations hold no water.
Back in January, the two California State assembly members asked O’Neill to look into allegations that a sewage holding tank on Alcatraz Island overflowed and was hosed into the bay rather than wiped up properly.
O’Neill wrote back that an internal investigation had been done and all claims were false — except according to our elected officials, his evidence doesn’t support his claims. In addition, one of the whistleblowers who saw the spill, a National Parks Conservancy employer named Dan Cooke, has been fired, apparently for speaking up.
Hand it to Wovenhand
Ex-16 Horsepower member David Eugene Edwards conjures an eerie blend of banjo, concertina, piano, and Biblical references – unequal parts Gira ‘n’ Cave – via his latest project WovenHand, which has a new, third album out, Mosaic, on Daniel Smith’s Sounds Familyre label. More quality Christianity-tinged music-making from that Clarksboro, NJ, imprint.
WovenHand weaves its way through the Bay with shows tonight, April 4, at 12 Galaxies, SF; Thursday, April 5, at the 750 Club, Stanford; Friday, April 6, at the Attic, Santa Cruz; Saturday, April 7, at Starry Plough, Berk.
Did Critical Mass really go crazy?
By Steven T. Jones
The Chronicle’s Matier & Ross would have us believe that Critical Mass riders went nuts on Friday and started attacking a poor innocent family. I was on the ride and know how ridiculous that story was so I wrote Andy Ross (a colleague of mine on the City Desk NewsHour cable television program) the following e-mail. I’ll let you know how he responds.
Did Critical Mass really go crazy?
By Steven T. Jones
The Chronicle’s Matier & Ross would have us believe that Critical Mass riders went nuts on Friday and started attacking a poor innocent family. I was on the ride and know how ridiculous that story was so I wrote Andy Ross (a colleague of mine on the City Desk NewsHour cable television program) the following e-mail. I’ll let you know how he responds.
Compromising position
By Steven T. Jones
With the Healthy Saturdays measure headed for an April 9 hearing by the Board of Supervisors’ Land Use and Economic Development Committee, Mayor Gavin Newsom has decided to step in and try to broker a compromise. Mediating between the two sides will be his chief of staff and former labor negotiator Phil Ginsburg, who has asked Sup. Jake McGoldrick to delay the committee vote by a week to accommodate his planned vacation. McGoldrick agreed. Newsom had signaled his plans to veto the measure, which would close some Golden Gate Park roads to cars on Saturdays as well as Sundays, but swing vote Sup. Bevan Dufty might be willing to override the veto this year. Advocates on both sides had called for Newsom to get involved to avoid another fight at the ballot box — where whoever loses was likely to try to take it. Some fear this is just a last minute stall tactic by a mayor who expects consensus on an inherently polarizing proposal. But press secretary Nathan Ballard said that’s not the case, telling the Guardian: “The Mayor has asked Phil Ginsburg to try to broker a compromise in this matter. He has already had productive meetings with both sides. We’ve asked
Supervisor McGoldrick to delay the final committee vote until the negotiations are complete. The Mayor is cautiously optimistic that the parties will be able to reach a good result.”
6 great sandwich shops
The sandwich has both moral turpitude and spiritual strength in its legendary origins. It was named for John Montagu (1718-1792), the fourth Earl of Sandwich and member of the infamous cabal of whoring, hammered, pseudo-satanic noblemen known as “The Friars of Saint Francis of Wycombe,” but better known as “The Hellfire Club.” Montagu, who had a fondness of deflowering virgins, was also fond of eating cold roast beef between bread so he could continue gambling at cribbage without getting the cards greasy. The treat itself, however, can be traced back to the Jewish Rabbi Hillel the Elder, who lived in Jerusalem in the time of King Herod and is said to have placed Passover lamb between matzos as a reminder of the slavery of the Israelites in Egypt. At this point, though, they’re pretty damned international. And that’s what this piece is about: a bringing together of world’s disparate peoples through the common enjoyment of meat between bread. Of course, there are meat-free sandwiches as well, but my olive branch only extends so far. (Duncan Davidson)
HOT PASTRAMI
In honor of Hillel the Elder, and his noble matzo-munchies of the Pre-Sandwich Era, I’ll start with a classically Jewish sandwich: the hot pastrami. A favorite nosh in New York, the HP, like tattoo work, is one of those “get what you pay for” items. At Katz’s Deli in the Lower East Side, they go for $13.45, with the following rejoinder written on the menu: “Ask for mayo at your own peril.” What is pastrami? It’s a beef brisket, cured with salt and spices in a brine (i.e. corned beef), then smoked. Some fancier pastrami-makers skip the brine and employ a dry salt cure followed by smoking. For the layman, you need only know the following about pastrami: it’s magic.