DCCC

Losing hope

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Losing hope

news@sfbg.com

In the back room of Tommy’s Joynt, more than a dozen members of the antiwar group Code Pink gathered Dec. 1 to watch television coverage of President Barack Obama’s speech announcing that 30,000 more U.S. troops would be sent to fight in Afghanistan, his second major escalation of that war this year.

“This is not the hope you voted for!” read a flyer distributed at the event.

Yet even among Code Pink’s militant members, reactions ranged from feeling disappointed and betrayed to feeling validated in never believing Obama was the agent of change that he pretended to be.

Jennifer Teguia seemed an example of former, while Cecile Pineda embodied the latter. “Right down the line, it’s been the corporate line,” Pineda told us, citing as examples Obama’s support for Wall Street bailouts and insiders and his abandonment of single-payer health reform in favor of an insurance-based system. “For serious politicos, hope is a fantasy.”

Throughout the speech, Pineda let out audible groans at Obama lines such as “We did not ask for this fight” and “A place that had known decades of fear now has reason to hope.” When the president promised a quick exit date, Pineda labeled it “the old in and out.” And when Obama made one too many references to 9/11, she blurted out, “Ha! 9/11!” and “He sounds just like Bush!”

But Teguia just looked saddened by the speech, and maybe a little weary that after nearly eight years of fruitlessly fighting Bush’s wars, the movement will now need to reignite to resist Obama’s escalation, which will put more U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan than Bush ever deployed.

“People are feeling tired and overwhelmed. We’ve been doing this year after year, and it’s endless. People are feeling dispirited,” Teguia told me just before the speech began.

She and other Obama supporters were willing to be patient and hopeful that Obama would eventually make good on his progressive campaign rhetoric. “But people are starting to feel like this window is closing,” Teguia said. “Now it’s at the tipping point.”

Obama has always tried to walk a fine line between his progressive ideals and his more pragmatic, centrist governing style. But in a conservative and often jingoistic country, Obama’s “center” isn’t where the antiwar movement thinks it ought to be.

“Obama is trying to unite the establishment instead of uniting the people against the establishment,” Teguia said.

That grim perspective was voiced by everyone in the room.

“Not only is he not clearing up the mess in Iraq, he’s escautf8g in Afghanistan,” said Rae Abileah, a Code Pink staff member who coordinates local campaigns. “I think people are outraged and frustrated and they’ve had enough.”

Perhaps, but the antiwar movement just isn’t what it was in 2003, when it shut down San Francisco on the first full day of war in Iraq. And the fact that Obama is a Democrat who opposed the Iraq War presents a real challenge for those who don’t support his Afghanistan policy and fear that it will be a disaster.

Democratic dilemma

Obama’s announcement — more then anything Bush ever said or did — is dividing the Democratic Party establishment, and the epicenter of that division is in San Francisco.

Rep. Nancy Pelosi is the Speaker of the House, second in command of the Democratic Party, essentially the person most responsible for the success or failure of a Democratic president’s agenda in Congress. She also represents a city where antiwar sentiment is among the strongest in the nation — and many of her Bay Area Democratic colleagues have already spoken out strongly against the Afghanistan troop surge.

Lynn Woolsey, the Marin Democrat who chairs the Progressive Caucus, issued a statement immediately following Obama’s speech in which she minced no words: “I remain opposed to sending more combat troops because I just don’t see that there is a military solution to the situation in Afghanistan,” she said, adding that “This is no surprise to me at all. I knew [Obama] was a moderate politician. I’ve known it all along.”

Woolsey told the Contra Costa Times that she thinks a majority of Democrats will oppose funding the troop increase — and that it will pass the House only because Republicans will vote for it.

Barbara Lee, (D-Oakland), the only member of Congress to vote against sending troops to Afghanistan eight years ago, has already introduced a bill, HR 3699, that would cut off funding for any expanded military presence there.

George Miller, (D-Martinez), has been harsh in his criticism. “We need an honest national government in Afghanistan,” Miller said in a statement. “We don’t have one. We need substantial help from our allies in the region, like Russia, China, India, and Iran. We are not getting it. We need Pakistan to be a credible ally in our efforts. It is not. We need a substantial commitment of resources and troops from NATO and our allies. While NATO is expected to add a small number of new troops, other troops have announced they are leaving. We need a large Afghan police force and army that is trained and ready to defend their country. We don’t have it.”

So where’s Pelosi? Hard to tell. At this point, she’s refused to say whether she supports the president’s plan. We called her office and were referred to her only formal statement on the issue, which says: “Tonight, the president articulated a way out of this war with the mission of defeating Al Qaeda and preventing terrorists from using Afghanistan and Pakistan as safe havens to again launch attacks against the United States and our allies. The president has offered President Karzai a chance to prove that he is a reliable partner. The American people and the Congress will now have an opportunity to fully examine this strategy.”

That sounds a lot like the position of someone who is prepared to support Obama. And that might not play well in her hometown.

The San Francisco Democratic County Central Committee has been vocal about criticizing the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and on July 22, 2009, the committee passed a resolution demanding an Afghanistan exit strategy. There’s a good chance someone on the committee will submit a resolution urging Pelosi to join Woolsey, Lee, and Miller in opposition to the Obama surge. “I’ve been thinking about it,” committee member Michael Goldstein, who authored the July resolution, told us.

That sort of thing tends to infuriate Pelosi, who doesn’t like getting pushed from the left. And since there are already the beginnings of an organized effort by centrist Democrats and downtown forces to run a slate that would challenge progressive control of the local Democratic Party, offending Pelosi (and encouraging her to put money into the downtown slate) would be risky.

Still, Goldstein said, “she’ll probably do that anyway.”

And it would leave the more moderate Democrats on the Central Committee — who typically support Pelosi — in a bind. Will they vote against a measure calling for a withdrawal from Afghanistan? Could that be an issue in the DCCC campaign in June 2010 — and potentially, in the supervisors’ races in the fall?

In at least one key supervisorial district — eight — the role of the DCCC and the record of its members will be relevant, since three of the leading candidates in that district — Rafael Mandleman, Scott Wiener, and Laura Spanjian — are all committee members.

Tom Gallagher, president of the Bernal Heights Democratic Club and author of past antiwar resolutions at the DCCC, acknowledged what an uphill battle antiwar Democrats face.

“The antiwar movement today is a bunch of beleaguered people, half of whom have very bad judgment,” he said. “I’m afraid a lot of people have just given up.”

On the streets

The day after Obama’s speech, Code Pink, the ANSWER Coalition, and four other antiwar groups sponsored a San Francisco rally opposing the Afghanistan decision — the first indication of whether Bay Area residents were motivated to march against Obama.

ANSWER’s regional director Richard Becker told us the day before, “I think we’re going to get a big turnout. The tension has really been building. We may see a revival.”

But on the streets, there wasn’t much sign of an antiwar revival, at least not yet. Only about 100 people were gathered at the intersection of Market and Powell streets when the rally begun, and that built up to maybe a few hundred by the time they marched.

“I’m wondering about the despair people are feeling,” Barry Hermanson, who has run for Congress and other offices as a member of the Green Party, told us at the event. He considered Obama’s decision “a betrayal,” adding that “it’s not going to stop me from working for peace. There is no other alternative.”

As Becker led the crowd in a half-hearted chant, “Occupation is a crime, Afghanistan to Palestine,” Frank Scafani carried a sign that read, “Democrats and Republicans. Same shit, different assholes.”

He called Obama a “smooth-talking flim-flam man” not worthy of progressive hopes, but acknowledged that it will be difficult to get people back into the streets, even though polls show most Americans oppose the Afghanistan escalation.

“I just think people are burned out after nine years of this. Nobody in Washington listens,” Scafani said. “Why walk around in circles on a Saturday or Sunday? It doesn’t do anything.”

Yet he and others were still out there.

“I think people are a little apathetic now. Their focus in on the economy,” said Frank Briones, an unemployed former property manager. He voted for Obama and still supports him in many areas, “but this war is a bad idea,” he said.

Yet he said people are demoralized after opposing the preventable war in Iraq and having their bleak predictions about its prospects proven true. “Our frustration was that government ignored us,” he said. “And they’ll probably do the same thing now.”

But antiwar activists say they just need to keep fighting and hope the movement comes alive again.

“We don’t really know what it is ahead of time that motivates large numbers of people to change their lives and become politically active,” Becker told us after the march, citing as examples the massive mobilizations against the Iraq War in 2003, in favor of immigrants rights in 2006, and against Prop. 8 in 2008. “So we’re not discouraged. We don’t have control over all the factors here, and neither do those in power.”

Antiwar groups will be holding an organizing meeting Dec. 9 at 7 p.m. at Centro del Pueblo, 474 Valencia, SF. Among the topics is planning a large rally for March 20, the anniversary of the Iraq War. All are welcome.

The battle for the DCCC is on

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By Tim Redmond

The battle over the future of the Democratic Party in San Francisco is underway in earnest. The Building Owners and Managers Association (BOMA), which represents downtown property interests, is holding a forum Dec. 11 to talk about the Democratic County Central Committee — and, perhaps, kick off organizing for a downtown-backed DCCC slate.

The forum is in the board room of the Chamber of Commerce, which is also sponsoring the event.

Mayor Gavin Newsom and the downtown business community have been decidedly unhappy with the state of the panel that controls policy for the local party since a progressive slate led by Aaron Peskin took control in 2008. The DCCC often seems like a political footnote, but it has considerable influence: the committee decides on local party endorsements, putting the stamp of the Democratic Party behind candidates for local office. And the San Francisco Democratic Party slate card has been largely in the progressive camp the past two years.

The BOMA forum will feature two DCCC incumbents, Mary Jung and Scott Wiener, who are both in the moderate-centrist camp. Wiener told me he sees this just as an informational event, “to let people know what the committee does.” He said he knew of no political agenda behind the discussion. (Although, interestingly, Peskin — the chair of the local party — wasn’t invited to speak.)

Ken Cleaveland, BOMA’s director of governmental affairs, also said he was only out to educate his constituents. “Most of the business community doesn’t know what the DCCC does and doesn’t know why it’s important,” he told me. “We need to be aware of the influence it has.”

But he’s certainly not against using the meeting as an organizing platform: “I would love to see a pro-business slate happen,” he said. “The business community hasn’t been as organized as the progressives have in fielding slates.”

We all knew this was coming — but it’s a sign that the progressives will have to mount an even-more-serious campaign to hold onto control of the DCCC against what could be a well-funded assault in June.

Fireworks at the DCCC

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By C. Nellie Nelson

The San Francisco Democratic County Central Committee heard a resolution urging city agencies to not privatize city services last night. It’s the sort of measure that would normally pass without much debate — the local Democratic Party has always taken the side of the unions on contracting-out disputes.

But in the midst of the budget mess, the head of the firefighters’ union, John Hanley, showed up to berate the committee members, some of whom are also supervisors, over the latest budget moves.

As Hanley raged about putting firefighters’ lives on the line, committee chair Aaron Peskin and other members tried to make the point of order that this resolution was about privatizing city services, not changes to the budget. Hanley raised his voice louder yet, and, with his face a deep shade of red, he waved a pointed finger around as he yelled about $80 million in cuts.

At that point DCCC member and supervisor Chris Daly rose from his chair and pointing his finger at Hanley demanded, “Don’t point at me!” Hanley became even further agitated, and some committee members demanded that both Daly and Hanley leave. Both then ultimately quieted down, and neither was forced to leave.

In spite of the jarring display and repeated attempts to bring the focus back to the privatization of city services, commenters continued to speak on budget concerns. Former DCCC member and Deputy Sheriff David Wong said the Democratic Party should be for working people, and asked to not have the sheriff’s budget cut. Committee member Robert Haaland asked him if he supported or opposed contracting out sheriff services, but Wong didn’t answer.

Several SEIU members and Department of Public Health workers followed, speaking of seniors missing meals, nursing-to-staff ratios at SF General that result in less skilled workers doing responsibilities above their level of training, and even clients who had just been killed while on a wait list for city services.

When public comment closed, committee members addressed the hotly contended budget decision in a general way. Peskin began, “I want to refute the politics of fear and demagoguery,” referring to Hanley’s intimidating style of speaking. “There’s no question the pie has shrunk,” he continued, reiterating that in a fundamental notion of fairness, all departments must share the pain.

Haaland noted that 1,500 people would be laid off in the Department of Public Health, and that just wouldn’t be true of all departments. He said that cutting the DPH by $100 million would gut the Healthy San Francisco program, and result in $4 million cut from HIV services.

Peskin followed, declaring flatly, “I don’t want my house to burn down either.” He urged everyone to be part of the solution.

The members moved to take out language referring to specific professions that might be privatized, and with those changes, overwhelmingly passed the resolution against privatizing city services.

Sorry, Nate, but you’re wrong

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It’s too bad that Mayor Gavin Newsom’s communications director Nathan Ballard doesn’t seem to understand due process. At least not from an immigrant’s perspective.

I don’t say this lightly.

Ballard’s biography states that he is a former deputy city attorney, with a law degree from the University of California, Hastings. Whereas I’m just a lowly immigrant, who is under the impression that, in the United States, folks are assumed innocent until proven guilty.

But then along comes Ballard and tells me, yesterday, that I’m “wrong” in claiming that referring juveniles to federal Immigration Custom and Enforcement (ICE)—which is happening in San Francisco to youths are merely suspected of committing a felony and of being undocumented—raises due process questions.

If you don’t believe me–and I don’t blame you if you don’t, because it is hard to believe that this is happening in San Francisco with its huge immigrant communities–read the transcript of our exchange, which took place following the DCCC’s March 25 passage of a resolution that commits San Francisco to due process for all.

Phelan: “Nathan, following up on last night’s DCCC resolution in support of a Sanctuary City ordinance: Does the policy direction that Newsom ordered in 2008 guarantee due process for all?”

Ballard: “Yes. It was thoroughly vetted by the city attorney.”

Phelan: “I know the policy was vetted by the city attorney. But, as I understand it, juveniles are being referred to ICE without a hearing of any kind, which means, does it not, that due process is being denied?”

Ballard: “You’re wrong. Referral to ICE alone does not give rise to due process issues.”

If that’s not enough, check out the Examiner’s Ken Garcia, whose only source appears to be Ballard, framing the DCCC’s resolution as “one that demonized Mayor Gavin Newsom” and the more watered-down version as “one that said legal protections should not extend to people who commit violent felonies.”

But—and this really is the crux of the matter, folks—the problem with Newsom’s current policy is that it does not target folks who have been proven of committing a felony.

Instead, it targets folks suspected of, or charged with a felony.

DCCC supports sanctuary & due process for all

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The Democratic County Central Committee voted last night by an overwhelming majority (20 ayes, 5 abstains, I no) to support Debra Walker’s strong resolution, recommitting “support of the Constitution and our city’s Sanctuary Ordinance for all,” and rejecting Scott Wiener’s watered-down version (19 noes, 3 abstained, 5 ayes).

Walker, who plans to run for District 6 supervisor, when incumbent Chris Daly is termed out next year, says DCCC’s vote made her, “ feel good about the party.”

“It’s been way too long that this has been happening and we have done nothing substantive, on the part of the party,” said Walker, noting that a companion resolution asking President Barack Obama to stop the ICE raids will be introduced next month.

Last night’s vote came after several dozen immigrant residents attended the DCCC hearing and testified about the impact of San Francisco’s new policies toward immigrants.

As Angela Chan, staff attorney for the Asian Law Caucus told the Guardian, “One teenage girl bravely stood before the DCCC and said that as a result of the change in climate in San Francisco toward immigrants, she lived in fear each day that she would come home to find that her parents had been taken away by ICE. Another immigrant resident said that if the DCCC takes a stand to support immigrants, he would raise his children to become proud Democrats. Another immigrant resident, who was a mother and a child care provider for many families in SF, said it is difficult to know that the image of criminality is being projected onto her and her community, when most members of the community are hardworking, law-abiding, and family-oriented people.”

Chan says she appreciated the supportive comments she heard from Sups. David Campos, Daly, Robert Haaland, Michael Bornstein, and resolution co-sponsors Walker and Peskin.

“They demonstrated a strong commitment to upholding immigrant rights and a deep understanding of the contributions of immigrant residents to San Francisco,” Chan said. “I hope Mayor Newsom will take the cue from his own party (and his own residents), and swiftly move to rescind his undocumented youth policy and work with the immigrant community to develop a more thought-out and balanced policy that respects the due process rights of youth and the goals to the juvenile justice system.”

That vote confirms that Mayor Gavin Newsom’s decision to do an about face last summer on San Francisco’s long standing sanctuary city ordinance is coming back to haunt him, as the gubernatorial race heats up.

Asked if the policy direction that Newsom ordered in 2008 guarantees due process for all, Newsom’s communications director Nathan Ballard did a classic obfuscation, telling the Guardian, “Yes. It was thoroughly vetted by the city attorney.”

But according to the City Attorney’s office, the original ordinance never did assure due process, “ if an individual was arrested for felony crimes.”

As for the revised policy direction, it directs police officers to report any juvenile “suspected of being present in the United States in violation of immigration laws,” and “booked” for commission of a felony” to federal immigration authorities,

The language, which is contained in the juvenile probation department’s policies and procedures section, directs officers to take into consideration, amongst other things, prior criminal history and “presence of undocumented persons in the same area where arrested or involved in illegal activity.”

To Walker’s mind, such direction amounts to a, “slippery slope.”

“It puts a lot of discretion in the hands of the police on the streets, and can end up with juveniles being referred to ICE and taken back to their country of origin, without any representation,” Walker said.

Immigration battle at the DCCC

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By Tim Redmond
The issue before the Democratic
County Central Committee tonight is immigration, and delegates will face a pair of conflicting resolutions. In reality, though, the two resolutions are a referendum on the city’s — that is, mayor Newsom’s — shift in immigration policy.

The milder, watered-down measure is sponsored by Scott Wiener, one of the centrist leaders on the DCCC, and more-or-less endorses what Newsom has been doing. His consponsors are Connie O’Connor, Mary Jung, Arlo Hale Smith, and Matt Tuchow.

The competing measure takes not-so-subtle issue with City Hall’s position and urges greater respect and tolerance for immigrants of all legal status. It’s backed by Aaron Peskin, Debra Walker, David Campos, Robert Haaland, Rafael Mandelman, Chris Daly, Joe Julian, Michael Goldstein, Hene Kelly and Michael Bornstein.

You can read both resolutions and the politics of this after the jump.

The Chron misses the dirty money story

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By Tim Redmond

I’m glad to see that the San Francisco Chronicle is covering the downtown-money campaigns in District 1, 3 and 11. But the paper misses the real point. Not only is downtown spending a lot of money, it’s creating fake political groups and promoting outright lies.

Take this fake “San Francisco Democratic Club” that Sue Lee’s campaign consultants have fabricated in D1. A serious daily newspaper would be all over this story, but since the Chron has missed it, the San Francisco Democratic Party ought to force the issue. Chair Aaron Peskin has made good, strong comments, but why not pull together a press conference with all of the progressive members of the DCCC denoucing this fraud>

If we don’t stop it here and now, it’s going to keep happening.

UPDATE FRIDAY 10/31: Heather Knight at the Chron emailed me to say that the paper did cover the fake Democratic Club.I stand corrected. I still don’t think lies and bullshit coming out of downtown have gotten enough Chron attention, though. This is ongoing, big-story stuff, not small items for the insider column.

Downtown’s planner

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> amanda@sfbg.com

The battle for the district 1 supervisor’s seat is being framed largely by politically conservative groups, funded by real estate and development, that are spending thousands of dollars supporting former planning commissioner Sue Lee over school board member Eric Mar.

An incestuous web of independent expenditure and political action committees have collectively spent enough against Mar to blow the $140,000 cap off the voluntary expenditure ceiling that all the candidates in that district agreed to.

The money’s coming from the Building Owners and Managers Association, Plan C, the Coalition for Responsible Growth, and the San Francisco Association of Realtors. Although these groups can’t legally work directly with candidates, they typically swap funds among each other and receive outside support from the deep pockets at the Chamber of Commerce, Committee on Jobs, and Pacific Gas and Electric Co.

According to Ethics Commission executive director John St. Croix, the $140,000 cap was lifted on Friday, Oct. 24, which means the candidates are now free to spend up to their individual campaign limits, which are different for Lee, Mar, and Alicia Wang, the other major contender for the seat.

All three are receiving public financing — but so much outside money is being spent in support of Lee that, to keep pace, the individual spending caps for Mar and Wang have been raised and are now higher than Lee’s.

AGAINST THE NEIGHBORHOODS


Lee, who worked for Willie Brown’s mayoral administration and was public relations director for the Chamber of Commerce, now runs the Chinese Historical Society of America. Her voting record on the Planning Commission has been consistently pro-development and anti-neighborhood. Some examples from her final months on the commission:

•<\!s> On April 10, 2008, she approved a mixed-use development at 736 Valencia St. and removed community benefits and below-market-rate unit requirements — against the wishes of community members and housing rights activists.

•<\!s> On March 27, 2008, she was the only commissioner to vote against modifications to a rooftop remodeling project at 1420 Montgomery St. that would have pacified neighbors concerned about the scale and character of the plan.

•<\!s> On March 13, 2008 she supported a conditional-use permit for a formula-retail paint store at Cesar Chavez and South Van Ness despite concerns about its effect on nearby small businesses.

•<\!s> On Feb. 28, 2008, she approved a remodeling of a two-story flat on Potrero Ave. that opponents, including the next-door neighbors, characterized as a demolition in disguise.

"Her voting record for the past three years is crystal clear," one lawyer who represents neighborhood interests at the commission told us. "Given a choice between supporting neighborhood interests, long-term residents and the interests of the little guy or supporting development interests and the big- money people who are busy in our residential neighborhoods, she chooses the latter every time."

The lawyer, who regularly appears before the planning panel and asked not to be named, added: "She has supported big-box retail in our neighborhoods over the objections of neighbors. She has supported the destruction of rent-controlled housing and low-scale, more affordable housing that is being remodeled out of existence."

"She’s a total pay to play," said Robert Haaland, a labor activist with Service Employees International Union Local 1021, which is deeply vested in independent expenditures supporting Mar. "Her donations can be tracked back to decisions she made as planning commissioner."

For example, Lee voted in favor of a plan by Martin Building Company to convert a city-owned building on Jessie Street into 25 luxury condos that now rent for about $3,000 a month. Martin’s owner, Patrick McNerney is a Lee campaign donor. Also contributing to Lee is Eric Tao of AGI Capital, which helped finance the Soma Grand development, a project opposed by sustainable growth organizations like Livable City, the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition, Walk SF, and the Sierra Club. Lee voted in favor of it.

In 2006, Lee approved lifting the downtown height restrictions from 150 feet to 250 feet for a 189-unit building with ground level retail on Howard Street. The project sponsor, Ezra Mercy, gave Lee’s campaign the maximum legal donation of $500.

In fact, her campaign has received thousands of dollars in individual contributions — and according to our analysis, more than half has come from real estate developers, attorneys, and builders, including some who appear frequently before the Planning Commission, such as executives from Wilson Meany Sullivan, CB Richard Ellis, and Millennium Partners.

Lee did not return a call seeking comment.

MISLEADING THE VOTERS


The same day the spending cap was lifted, Mar alleged the local Democratic Party’s name was being improperly used by a new group calling itself the "San Francisco Democratic Club." First reported by Paul Hogarth on the online news site BeyondChron, the club is apparently composed of Democratic County Central Committee defectors who disagreed with the party’s endorsements for the Nov. 4 election.

The group’s treasurer, Mike Riordan, is also a deputy political director of PG&E’s Stop the Blank Check Committee, which is mounting the $10 million campaign against the Clean Energy Act. PG&E gave $30,000 to this new democratic club, the members of which have not been revealed.

Riordan hired DCCC member Tom Hseih’s firm to send robocalls in Cantonese to Asian voters urging support for Lee over DCCC-endorsed Mar. The endorsement script referred to the group as the "San Francisco Democratic Party Club." Mar said it was a misleading way to align this new club with the DCCC.

When asked if the club’s use of the Democratic Party name and membership to support candidates and issues that haven’t received the party’s vote was their intention, Hsieh told the Guardian, "Yeah, and you know what? That’s covered under the First Amendment."

Sup. Aaron Peskin, who chairs the DCCC and spoke on its behalf in support of Mar at two recent rallies, said, "at minimum, it’s misleading. At maximum it’s a violation of the party rules and punishable by removal." He said there was a credible argument and evidence supporting Mar’s allegation, but that it’s something the DCCC would have to deal with in its own house, likely after Nov. 4.

The nonsense about Daly

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By Tim Redmond

And while I’m raving about the D1 race: The attempts to link Eric Mar to Chris Daly would be laughable if they weren’t so toxic.

This ad

despite its pretty lame graphics and production values, suggests that the three progressives in the swing districts are all Daly “puppets.”

A little reality here:

Chris Daly is not much of a power broker these days. You could argue that Aaron Peskin, board president and chair the Democratic Party, is pushing a slate of candidates, and that would be accurate. But Daly’s off in the wings. He’s termed out in two years, he knows he’s not that popular outside of his district and, while I like and respect Chris, none of these candidates (except possibly John Avalos, his former aide) would owe him anything.

Peskin, the DCCC and the Labor Council are the ones pushing Avalos, Mar and Chiu. But nobody wants to run ads in San Francisco saying that a candidate would be a puppet of the Democratic Party or the Labor Council. So they’ve picked a guy who polls badly in those districts.

I had this argument with Eric Jaye the other day. He kept telling me that there’s a “Peskin Machine” and that the DCCC is now Peskin and Daly’s personal political operation. Nobody who understands the San Francisco left would ever believe that.

The left is notoriously fractious. We fight with each other, we fight with our elected leaders – and most of us never do what we’re told unless we want to. Peskin has very little ability to enforce his will on the DCCC or the progressive movement; his constituents in both areas are just too independent.

That’s the problem with building a left machine. The left in San Francisco doesn’t follow orders.

Obama and the SF DCCC

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So Kos reports that Obama now has so much money he’s thinking about sharing it with Democratic Party committees to help expand the majority in Congress. I’m good with that; 60 seats in the Senate and a strongly Democratic house and Obama (like FDR in 1933) would have the ability to take immediate direct action to get the economy going again — the right way.

Of course, if he has that much money, maybe he could toss some of it toward the San Francisco Democratic Party to help elect progressive supervisors, build affordable housing and pass the Clean Energy Act.

Endorsements 2008: San Francisco races

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SAN FRANCISCO RACES

Board of Supervisors

District 1

ERIC MAR


The incumbent District 1 supervisor, Jake McGoldrick, likes to joke that he holds his seat only because Eric Mar’s house burned down eight years ago. Back then Mar, who has had a stellar career on the school board, decided to wait before seeking higher office.

But now McGoldrick — overall a good supervisor who was wrong on a few key votes — is termed out, and progressive San Francisco is pretty much unanimous in supporting Mar as his successor.

Mar, a soft-spoken San Francisco State University teacher, was a strong critic of former school superintendent Arlene Ackerman and a leader in the battle to get the somewhat dictatorial and autocratic administrator out of the district. He’s been a key part of the progressive majority that’s made substantial progress in improving the San Francisco public schools.

He’s a perfect candidate for District 1. He has strong ties to the district and its heavily Asian population. He’s a sensible progressive with solid stands on the key issues and a proven ability to get things done. He supports the affordable housing measure, Proposition B; the Clean Energy Act, Proposition H; and the major new revenue measures. He’s sensitive to tenant issues, understands the need for a profound new approach to affordable housing, and wants to solve the city’s structural budget problems with new revenue, not just cuts.

His chief opponent, Sue Lee, who works for the Chamber of Commerce, doesn’t support Prop. H and won’t even commit to supporting district elections. She ducked a lot of our questions and was either intentionally vague or really has no idea what she would do as a supervisor. She’s no choice for the district, and we found no other credible candidates worthy of our endorsement. Vote for Eric Mar.

District 3

1. DAVID CHIU


2. DENISE MCCARTHY


3. TONY GANTNER


The danger in this district is Joe Alioto. He’s smooth, he’s slick, he’s well funded — and he would be a disaster for San Francisco. Make no mistake about it, Alioto is the candidate of downtown — and thanks to his famous name and wads of big-business cash, he’s a serious contender.

Two progressive candidates have a chance at winning this seat and keeping Alioto off the board. David Chiu is a member of the Small Business Commission (SBC) and the Democratic County Central Committee (DCCC) and is a former civil rights lawyer who now manages a company that sells campaign software. Denise McCarthy ran the Telegraph Hill Neighborhood Center for 25 years and spent 7 years on the Port Commission.

Tony Gantner, a retired lawyer, is also in the race, although he is running well behind the others in the polls.

We have concerns about all the candidates. Chiu has a solid progressive record as a commissioner and committee member: He was one of only two SBC members who supported the living-wage ordinance and Sup. Tom Ammiano’s city health care plan. He backed Sup. Aaron Peskin, his political mentor, for chair of the DCCC. He backs Prop. H, supports the two revenue measures and the affordable-housing fund, and wants to give local small businesses a leg up in winning city contracts. He has some creative ideas about housing, including a community stabilization fee on new development.

He’s also a partner in a company that received $143,000 last year from PG&E and that has worked with Republicans and some nasty business interests.

Chiu says he doesn’t get to call all the shots at Grassroots Enterprises, which he cofounded. He describes the firm as a software-licensing operation, which isn’t exactly true — the company’s own Web site brags about its ability to offer broad-based political consulting and communication services.

But Chiu vowed to resign from the company if elected, and given his strong record on progressive issues, we’re willing to take a chance on him.

McCarthy has a long history in the neighborhood, and we like her community perspective. She supports Prop. H and the affordable-housing measure. She’s a little weak on key issues like the city budget — she told us she "hadn’t been fully briefed," although the budget is a public document and the debate over closing a massive structural deficit ought to be a central part of any supervisorial campaign. And while she said there "have to be some new taxes," she was very vague on where new revenue would come from and what specifically she would be willing to cut. She supported Gavin Newsom for mayor in 2003 and told us she doesn’t think that was a bad decision. It was. But she has by far the strongest community ties of any candidate in District 3. She’s accessible (even listing her home phone number in her campaign material), and after her years on the Port Commission, she understands land-use issues.

Gantner has been a supporter of the Clean Energy Act from the start and showed up for the early organizing meetings. He has the support of the Sierra Club and San Francisco Tomorrow and talks a lot about neighborhood beatification. But we’re a little nervous about his law-and-order positions, particularly his desire to crack down on fairs and festivals and his strong insistence that club promoters are responsible for all the problems on the streets.

But in the end, Chiu, McCarthy, and Gantner are all acceptable candidates, and Joe Alioto is not. Fill your slate with these three.

District 4

DAVE FERGUSON


What a mess.

We acknowledge that this is one of the more conservative districts in the city. But the incumbent, Carmen Chu, and her main opponent, Ron Dudum, are terrible disappointments.

It’s possible to be a principled conservative in San Francisco and still win progressive respect. We often disagreed over the years with Quentin Kopp, the former supervisor, state senator, and judge, but we never doubted his independence, sincerity, or political skills. Sean Elsbernd, who represents District 7, is wrong on most of the key issues, but he presents intelligent arguments, is willing to listen, and isn’t simply a blind loyalist of the mayor.

Chu has none of those redeeming qualities. She ducks questions, waffles on issues, and shows that she’s willing to do whatever the powerful interests want. When PG&E needed a front person to carry the torch against the Clean Energy Act, Chu was all too willing: she gave the corrupt utility permission to use her name and face on campaign flyers, signed on to a statement written by PG&E’s political flak, and permanently disgraced herself. She says that most of the problems in the city budget should be addressed with cuts, particularly cuts in public health and public works, but she was unable to offer any specifics. She refused to support the measure increasing the transfer tax on property sales of more than $5 million, saying that she didn’t want to create "a disincentive to those sales taking place." We asked her if she had ever disagreed with Newsom, who appointed her, and she could point to only two examples: she opposed his efforts to limit cigarette sales in pharmacies, and she opposed Saturday road closures in Golden Gate Park. In other words, the only times she doesn’t march in lockstep with the mayor is when Newsom actually does something somewhat progressive. We can’t possibly endorse her.

Dudum, who ran a small business and tried for this office two years ago, continues to baffle us. He won’t take a position on anything. Actually, that’s not true — he’s opposed to the Clean Energy Act. Other than that, it’s impossible to figure out where he stands on anything or what he would do to address any of the city’s problems. (An example: When we asked him what to do about the illegal second units that have proliferated in the district, he said he’d solve the problem in two years. How? He couldn’t say.) We like Dudum’s small-business sentiments and his independence, but until he’s willing to take some stands and offer some solutions, we can’t support him.

Which leaves Dave Ferguson.

Ferguson is a public school teacher with little political experience. He’s a landlord, and not terribly good on tenant issues (he said he supported rent control when he was a renter, but now that he owns a four-unit building, he’s changed his mind). But he supports Prop. H, supports Prop. B, supports the revenue measures, and has a neighborhood sensibility. Ferguson is a long shot, but he’s the only candidate who made anything approaching a case for our endorsement.

District 5

ROSS MIRKARIMI


Mirkarimi won this seat four years ago after a heated race in a crowded field, and he’s quickly emerged as one of the city’s most promising progressive leaders. He understands that a district supervisor needs to take on tough citywide issues (he’s the lead author of the Clean Energy Act and won a surprisingly tough battle to ban plastic bags in big supermarkets) as well as dealing with neighborhood concerns. Mirkarimi helped soften a terrible plan for developing the old UC Extension site and fought hard to save John Swett School from closure.

But the area in which he’s most distinguished himself is preventing violent crime — something progressives have traditionally had trouble with. Four years ago, District 5 was plagued with terrible violence: murders took place with impunity, the police seemed unable to respond, and the African American community was both furious and terrified. Mirkarimi took the problem on with energy and creativity, demanding (and winning, despite mayoral vetoes) police foot patrols and community policing. Thanks to his leadership, violent crime is down significantly in the district — and the left in San Francisco has started to develop a progressive agenda for the crime problem.

He has no serious opposition, and richly deserves reelection.

District 7

SEAN ELSBERND


We rarely see eye to eye with the District 7 incumbent. He’s on the wrong side of most of the key votes on the board. He’s opposing the affordable housing measure, Prop. B. He’s opposed to the Clean Energy Act, Prop. H. It’s annoying to see someone who presents himself as a neighborhood supervisor siding with PG&E and downtown over and over again.

But Elsbernd is smart and consistent. He’s a fiscal conservative with enough integrity that he isn’t always a call-up vote for the mayor. He’s accessible to his constituents and willing to engage with people who disagree with him. The progressives on the board don’t like the way he votes — but they respect his intelligence and credibility.

Unlike many of the candidates this year, Elsbernd seems to understand the basic structural problem with the city budget, and he realizes that the deficit can’t be reduced just with spending cuts. He’s never going to be a progressive vote, but this conservative district could do worse.

District 9

1. DAVID CAMPOS


2. ERIC QUEZADA


3. MARK SANCHEZ


The race to succeed Tom Ammiano, who served this district with distinction and is now headed for the State Legislature, is a case study in the advantages of district elections and ranked-choice voting. Three strong progressive candidates are running, and the Mission–Bernal Heights area would be well served by any of them. So far, the candidates have behaved well, mostly talking about their own strengths and not trashing their opponents.

The choice was tough for us — we like David Campos, Eric Quezada, and Mark Sanchez, and we’d be pleased to see any of them in City Hall. It’s the kind of problem we wish other districts faced: District 9 will almost certainly wind up with one of these three stellar candidates. All three are Latinos with a strong commitment to immigrant rights. All three have strong ties to the neighborhoods. Two are openly gay, and one is a parent. All three have endorsements from strong progressive political leaders and groups. All three have significant political and policy experience and have proven themselves accessible and accountable.

And since it’s almost inconceivable that any of the three will collect more than half of the first-place votes, the second-place and third-place tallies will be critical.

Campos, a member of the Police Commission and former school district general counsel, arrived in the United States as an undocumented immigrant at 14. He made it to Stanford University and Harvard Law School and has worked as a deputy city attorney (who helped the city sue PG&E) and as a school district lawyer. He’s been a progressive on the Police Commission, pushing for better citizen oversight and professional police practices. To his credit, he’s stood up to (and often infuriated) the Police Officers’ Association, which is often a foe of reform.

Campos doesn’t have extensive background in land-use issues, but he has good instincts. He told us he’s convinced that developers can be forced to provide as much as 50 percent affordable housing, and he thinks the Eastern Neighborhoods Plan lacks adequate low-cost units. He supports the revenue measures on the ballot and wants to see big business paying a fair share of the tax burden. He argues persuasively that crime has to become a progressive issue, and focuses on root causes rather than punitive programs. Campos has shown political courage in key votes — he supported Theresa Sparks for Police Commission president, a move that caused Louise Renne, the other contender, to storm out of the room in a fit of cursing. He backed Aaron Peskin for Democratic Party chair despite immense pressure to go with his personal friend Scott Weiner. Ammiano argues that Campos has the right qualities to serve on the board — particularly the ability to get six votes for legislation — and we agree.

Eric Quezada has spent his entire adult life fighting gentrification and displacement in the Mission. He’s worked at nonprofit affordable-housing providers, currently runs a homeless program, and was a cofounder of the Mission Anti-Displacement Coalition. Although he’s never held public office, he has far more experience with the pivotal issues of housing and land use than the other two progressive candidates.

Quezada has the support of Sup. Chris Daly (although he doesn’t have Daly’s temper; he’s a soft-spoken person more prone to civil discussion than fiery rhetoric). If elected, he would carry on Daly’s tradition of using his office not just for legislation but also as an organizing center for progressive movements. He’s not as experienced in budget issues and was a little vague about how to solve the city’s structural deficit, but he would also make an excellent supervisor.

Mark Sanchez, the only Green Party member of the three, is a grade-school teacher who has done a tremendous job as president of the San Francisco school board. He’s helped turn that panel from a fractious and often paralyzed political mess into a strong, functioning operation that just hired a top-notch new superintendent. He vows to continue as an education advocate on the Board of Supervisors.

He told us he thinks he can be effective by building coalitions; he already has a good working relationship with Newsom. He’s managed a $500 million budget and has good ideas on both the revenue and the spending side — he thinks too much money goes to programs like golf courses, the symphony, and the opera, whose clients can afford to cover more of the cost themselves. He wants a downtown congestion fee and would turn Market Street into a pedestrian mall. Like Campos, he would need some education on land-use issues (and we’re distressed that he supports Newsom’s Community Justice Center), but he has all the right political instincts. He has the strong support of Sup. Ross Mirkarimi. We would be pleased to see him on the Board of Supervisors.

We’ve ranked our choices in the order we think best reflects the needs of the district and the city. But we also recognize that the progressive community is split here (SEIU Local 1021 endorsed all three, with no ranking), and we have nothing bad to say about any of these three contenders. The important thing is that one of them win; vote for Campos, Quezada, and Sanchez — in that order, or in whatever order makes sense for you. Just vote for all three.

District 11

1. JOHN AVALOS


2. RANDY KNOX


3. JULIO RAMOS


This is one of those swing districts where either a progressive or a moderate could win. The incumbent, Gerardo Sandoval, who had good moments and not-so-good moments but was generally in the progressive camp, is termed out and running for judge.

The strongest and best candidate to succeed him is John Avalos. There are two other credible contenders, Randy Knox and Julio Ramos — and one serious disaster, Ahsha Safai.

Avalos has a long history of public-interest work. He’s worked for Coleman Advocates for Children and Youth, for the Justice for Janitors campaign, and as an aide to Sup. Chris Daly. Since Daly has served on the Budget Committee, and at one point chaired it, Avalos has far more familiarity with the city budget than any of the other candidates. He understands that the city needs major structural reforms in how revenue is collected, and he’s full of new revenue ideas. Among other things, he suggests that the city work with San Mateo County to create a regional park district that could get state funds (and could turn McLaren Park into a destination spot).

He has a good perspective on crime (he supports community policing along with more police accountability) and wants to put resources into outreach for kids who are at risk for gang activity. He was the staff person who wrote Daly’s 2006 violence prevention plan. He wants to see more affordable housing and fewer luxury condos in the eastern neighborhoods and supports a congestion fee for downtown. With his experience both at City Hall and in community-based organizations, Avalos is the clear choice for this seat.

Randy Knox, a criminal defense lawyer and former member of the Board of Appeals, describes himself as "the other progressive candidate." He supports Prop. H and the affordable-housing fund. He links the crime problem to the fact that the police don’t have strong ties to the community, and wants to look for financial incentives to encourage cops to live in the city. He wants to roll back parking meter rates and reduce the cost of parking tickets in the neighborhoods, which is a populist stand — but that money goes to Muni, and he’s not sure how to replace it. He does support a downtown congestion fee.

Knox wasn’t exactly an anti-developer stalwart on the Board of Appeals, but we’ll endorse him in the second slot.

Julio Ramos has been one of the better members of a terrible community college board. He’s occasionally spoken up against corruption and has been mostly allied with the board’s progressive minority. He wants to build teacher and student housing on the reservoir adjacent to City College. He suggests that the city create mortgage assistance programs and help people who are facing foreclosure. He suggests raising the hotel tax to bring in more money. He supports public power and worked at the California Public Utilities Commission’s Division of Ratepayer Advocates, where he tangled with PG&E.

We’re backing three candidates in this district in part because it’s critical that Safai, the candidate of Mayor Newsom, downtown, and the landlords, doesn’t get elected. Safai (who refused to meet with our editorial board) is cynically using JROTC as a wedge against the progressives, even though the Board of Supervisors does not have, and will never have, a role in deciding the future of that program. He needs to be defeated, and the best way to do that is to vote for Avalos, Knox, and Ramos.

Board of Education

SANDRA FEWER


NORMAN YEE


BARBARA LOPEZ


KIMBERLY WICOFF


Two of the stalwart progressive leaders on the San Francisco School Board — Mark Sanchez and Eric Mar — are stepping down to run for supervisor. That’s a huge loss, since Mar and Sanchez were instrumental in getting rid of the autocratic Arlene Ackerman, replacing her with a strong new leader and ending years of acrimony on the board. The schools are improving dramatically — this year, for the first time in ages, enrollment in kindergarten actually went up. It’s important that the progressive policies Mar and Sanchez promoted continue.

Sandra Fewer is almost everyone’s first choice for the board. A parent who sent three kids to the San Francisco public schools, she’s done an almost unbelievable amount of volunteer work, serving as a PTA president for 12 terms. She currently works as education policy director at Coleman Advocates for Children and Youth. She knows the district, she knows the community, she’s full of energy and ideas, and she has the support of seven members of the Board of Supervisors and five of the seven current school board members.

Fewer supports the new superintendent and agrees that the public schools are getting better, but she’s not afraid to point out the problems and failures: She notes that other districts with less money are doing better. She wants to make the enrollment process more accessible to working parents and told us that race ought to be used as a factor in enrollment if that will help desegregate the schools and address the achievement gap. She’s against JROTC in the schools.

We’re a little concerned that Fewer talks about using district real estate as a revenue source — selling public property is always a bad idea. But she’s a great candidate and we’re happy to endorse her.

Norman Yee, the only incumbent we’re endorsing, has been something of a mediator and a calming influence on an often-contentious board. He helped push for the 2006 facilities bond and the parcel tax to improve teacher pay. He’s helped raise $1 million from foundations for prekindergarten programs. He suggests that the district take the radical (and probably necessary) step of suing the state to demand adequate funding for education. Although he was under considerable pressure to support JROTC, he stood with the progressives to end the military program. He deserves another term.

Barbara "Bobbi" Lopez got into the race late and has been playing catch-up. She’s missed some key endorsements and has problems with accessibility. But she impressed us with her energy and her work with low-income parents. A former legal support worker at La Raza Centro Legal, she’s now an organizer at the Tenderloin Housing Clinic, working with immigrant parents. She’s fought to get subsidized Muni fares for SFUSD students. Her focus is on parent involvement — and while everyone talks about bringing parents, particularly low-income and immigrant parents, more directly into the education process, Lopez has direct experience in the area.

Kimberly Wicoff has a Stanford MBA, and you can tell — she talks in a sort of business-speak with lots of reference to "outcomes." She has no kids. But she’s currently working with a nonprofit that helps low-income families in Visitacion Valley and Hunters Point, and we liked her clearheaded approach to the achievement gap. Wicoff is a fan of what she calls community schools; she thinks a "great school in every neighborhood" can go a long way to solving the lingering issues around the enrollment process. That’s a bit of an ambitious goal, and we’re concerned about any move toward neighborhood schools that leads to resegregation. But Wicoff, who has the support of both Mark Sanchez and Mayor Newsom, brings a fresh problem-solving approach that we found appealing. And unlike Newsom, she’s against JROTC.

Jill Wynns, who has been on the board since 1992, has had a distinguished career, and we will never forget her leadership in the battle against privatizing public schools. But she was a supporter of former superintendent Ackerman even when Ackerman was trampling on open-government laws and intimidating students, parents, and staff critics, and she supports JROTC. It’s time for some new blood.

Rachel Norton, a parent and an advocate for special-education kids, has run an appealing campaign, but her support for the save-JROTC ballot measure disqualified her for our endorsement.

As a footnote: H. Brown, a blogger who can be a bit politically unhinged, has no business on the school board and we’re not really sure why he’s running. But he offered an interesting idea that has some merit: he suggests that the city offer free Muni passes and free parking to anyone who will volunteer to mentor an at-risk SFUSD student. Why not?

Community College Board

MILTON MARKS


CHRIS JACKSON


BRUCE WOLFE


There are four seats up for the seven-member panel that oversees the San Francisco Community College District, and we could only find three who merit endorsement. That’s a sad statement: City College is a local treasure, and it’s been badly run for years. The last chancellor, Phil Day, left under a cloud of corruption; under his administration, money was diverted from public coffers into a political campaign. The current board took bond money that the voters had earmarked for a performing arts center and shifted it to a gym — then found out that there wasn’t enough money in the operating budget to maintain the lavish facility. It’s a mess out there, and it needs to be cleaned up.

Fortunately, there are three strong candidates, and if they all win, the reformers will have a majority on the board.

Milton Marks is the only incumbent we’re supporting. He’s been one of the few board members willing to criticize the administration. He supports a sunshine policy for the district and believes the board needs to hold the chancellor accountable (that ought to be a basic principle of district governance, but at City College, it isn’t). He wants to push closer relations with the school board. He actually pays attention to the college budget and tries to make sure the money is spent the right way. He is pushing to reform the budget process to allow more openness and accountability.

Chris Jackson, a policy analyst at the San Francisco Labor Council, is full of energy and ideas. He wants to create an outreach center for City College at the public high schools. He also understands that the college district has done a terrible job working with neighborhoods and is calling for a comprehensive planning process. He understands the problems with the gym and the way the board shuffles money around, and he is committed to a more transparent budget process.

Jackson is also pushing to better use City College for workforce development, particularly in the biotech field, where a lot of the city’s new jobs will be created.

Jackson was president of the Associated Students at San Francisco State University, has been a member of the Youth Commission, and worked with Young Workers United on the city’s minimum-wage law. His experience, energy, and ideas make him an ideal candidate.

Bruce Wolfe attended City College after a workplace injury and served on the Associate Students Council. He knows both the good (City College has one of the best disability service programs in the state) and the bad (the school keeps issuing bonds to build facilities but doesn’t have the staff to keep them running). As a former member of the San Francisco Sunshine Ordinance Task Force, Wolfe is a strong advocate for open government, something desperately needed at the college district. He told us he thinks the college should agree to abide by the San Francisco Planning Code and is calling for a permanent inspector general to monitor administration practices and spending. He wants City College to start building housing for students. He has direct experience with the district and great ideas for improving it, and we’re happy to endorse him.

Incumbents Rodel Rodis and Natalie Berg are running for reelection; both have been a key part of the problem at City College, and we can’t endorse either of them. Steve Ngo, a civil rights lawyer, has the support of the Democratic Party, but we weren’t impressed by his candidacy. And he told us he opposes the Clean Energy Act.

Vote for Marks, Jackson, and Wolfe.

BART Board of Directors

With rising gasoline prices, congested roadways, and global warming, it’s now more important than ever to have an engaged and knowledgeable BART board that is willing to reform a system that effectively has San Francisco users subsidizing everyone else. That means developing a fare structure in which short trips within San Francisco or the East Bay urban centers are cheaper and longer trips are a bit more expensive. BART should also do away with free parking, which favors suburban drivers (who tend to be wealthier) over urban cyclists and pedestrians. San Francisco’s aging stations should then get the accessibility and amenity improvements they need—and at some point the board can even fund the late-night service that is long overdue. There are two candidates most capable of meeting these challenges:

District 7

LYNETTE SWEET


This district straddles San Francisco and the East Bay, and it’s crucial that San Francisco—which controls just three of the nine seats—retain its representative here. We would like to see Lynette Sweet more forcefully represent the interests of riders from San Francisco and support needed reforms such as civilian oversight of BART police. But she has a strong history of public service in San Francisco (having served on San Francisco’s taxi and redevelopment commissions before joining the BART board in 2003), and we’ll endorse her.

District 9

TOM RADULOVICH


Tom Radulovich is someone we’d love to clone and have run for every seat on the BART board, and perhaps every other transportation agency in the Bay Area. He’s smart and progressive, and he works hard to understand the complex problems facing our regional transportation system and then to develop and advocate for creative solutions. As executive director of the nonprofit Livable City, Radulovich is a leader of San Francisco’s alternative transportation brain trust, widely respected for walking the walk (and biking the bike—he doesn’t own a car) and setting an example for how to live and grow in the sustainable way this city and country needs.

>>More Guardian Endorsements 2008

Extra! Hearst blacks out the word progressive

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“Ultra liberal?” “Far left political factions”? In San Francisco? Hearst, Mayoral Press Secretary Nathan Ballard, and an “ultra liberal” supervisorial candidate from the Excelsior District comment on this astounding election development

By Bruce B. Brugmann

Audrey Cooper, assistant metro editor of the Chronicle/Hearst, has admitted that the Chronicle “has decided to stop using the word ‘progressive’ to describe the more liberal of San Francisco’s political factions.” (See my previous blog).

Does this mean that supporters of the Clean Energy Initiative are suddenly and unexpectedly given the derogatory terms “ultra liberal” and “far left.” Does this mean Aaron Peskin and a majority of the board of supervisors? Assemblyman Mark Leno? Former PUC General manager Susan Leal? Former Mayor Art Agnos? A majority of the Democratic County Central Committee? A batch of supervisorial candidates? Labor leaders? The Sierra Club?

Here’s the email Cooper sent me this afternoon responding to questions from the Bruce blog and the Guardian. Cooper, let us stipulate upfront, has one of the toughest jobs going, trying to explain why Hearst suddenly banned the word progressive in the middle of a PG&E offensive against the Clean Energy Act. More: Hearst banned the word progressive in one of the world’s most progressive cities, in a city that spawned the famous progressive Hiram Johnson and his successful fight against the Southern Pacific Railroad, and on the newspaper founded by a publisher who called himself at one time a progressive and ran for mayor of New York on a platform of municipal ownership of utilities. In San Francisco, Hearst campaigned vigorously on a pro-Hetch Hetchy public power, anti-PG&E platform until he reversed himself in the late 1920s because of a PG&E loan from a PG&E-controlled bank. Hearst’s pro-PG&E, anti-public power position has remained in effect to this day. (See previous Bruce blogs, Guardian stories, and David Nasaw’s authoritative biography, “The Chief.”)

Cooper wrote:

“Hi Bruce.
I’m Wyatt Buchanan’s editor — he passed your e-mail along to me. Sorry that it took me a day to get back to you. In general, feel free to ask anything about our coverage. I’ll always answer as quickly as I can (that is, when it’s an issue I have control over).

I’ve also sent versions of this explanation to others who have inquired. (I’m only telling you that in case you get a similar e-mail forwarded to you — it’s just easier for me to explain it the same way to everyone.)

In short, just because a label is embraced by a political group does not mean it’s the best way to report a story. As you’ve probably noticed, we generally eschew political labels when possible. In some stories (such as the fight for the DCCC and Board of Supes), this is not as easily done. In those cases, we choose adjectives we think are as politically neutral as possible.

We decided to stop using the word ‘progressive’ to describe the more liberal of San Francisco’s political factions because it is a politically loaded term that doesn’t mean much to our readers. And while ‘progressive’ may be the preferred term of some politicians — and, of course, they are free to use it to describe themselves — it doesn’t describe where they sit on the traditional political spectrum.

We believe using adjectives such as ‘far left’ and ‘ultra liberal’ more accurately describe city politicians and policies in that broader context.

Thanks for your time. Feel free to call me if you have any questions.

Sincerely,
Audrey”

Reliable sources told us that the mayor’s campaign had complained to the Chronicle about the use of the word progressive and that means Eric Jaye, who runs the Newsom’s gubernatorial campaign at the same time he works for PG&E as a paid consultant to PG&E.

Cooper and Nathan Ballard, the mayor’s press secretary denied this. Cooper said:

“Also, I should tell you that we did not make this change in response or after complaints from anyone in the mayor’s office. The mayor’s office does not dictate what words we use.

“Nobody from the mayor’s office has ever contacted me about this issue as far as I can honestly remember. And I can’t recall them saying anything about it over the last two weeks, either.”

Ballard said:

“Personally I’ve never really complained to the Chronicle about this subject. It just wasn’t very high on my to-do list. In fact I don’t recall ever having any conversations about this topic with anyone from the Chronicle until after Heather Knight’s article about the far-left takeover of the DCCC ran.

“I have to admit that I’m pleased to learn from you that the Chronicle will no longer be using the term ‘progressive’ to describe politicians who aren’t. It always struck me as Orwellian doublespeak to describe somebody who wants to legalize sex trafficking and force lobbyists to wear badges as ‘progressive.'”

Executive Editor Tim Redmond responded to Ballard:

“Well, it’s true that the progressives of the early part of the century tended to be against prostitution and drugs and were prohibitionists, a description that I don’t think would accurately describe, say, Aaron Peskin. But over time the term has evolved, and most progressives today are at least open to the idea that sex work should be legalized. Almost all progressives support the legalization of marijuana (and I think Mayor Newsom does, too.)

“I don’t think far-left even remotely describes people like Peskin, whose economic views are pretty close to the mainstream of the liberal wing of the Democratic Party. Jake McGoldrick clearly isn’t ‘far left.’ I’m not sure even Tom Ammiano could accurately be called ‘far left.’

“I say this as someone who has been called all sorts of names, including Communist, because I advocate higher taxes on the rich and government spending on social services for the poor. At one time, that was pretty much the mainstream opinion of the Democratic Party.

“So who in SF government do you really believe is ‘far left?'”

Ballard responded back to Tim:

“Tim, do us all a favor and count me out of this dorm-room style debate. I never really cared that much whether the Chronicle called these guys progressives, just like I never really cared that much that CW Post calls them Grape Nuts even though they are neither grapes nor nuts.”

George Avalos, a supervisorial candidate in the Excelsior District, also asked Cooper about her designation and sent us her answer and then his comment to her answer. Question: how did Avalos and other progressive candidates in other districts suddenly become “ultra left” and part of a “far left faction?”

Subject: Dude, the preferred nomenclature is . . .

Dear Audrey:

“Thank you for your reply. I was throwing in a little humor here, albeit obscure — a reference to the Big Lebowski.

“Having said that I do believe the Chron’s use of ‘ultra left’ and ‘far left’ is completely biased. After all, who’s the arbiter here about what ‘ultra left’ and ‘far left are?’ What standard are you using and where did it come from? Seems pretty made up to me. Very rarely or better yet, never do I hear progressives talk about themselves in these terms. The Chron’s making it up out of whole cloth.

“It’s unbelievable, that you would even try to justify your use of this language.

“Lastly, if any term is completely meaningless it’s ‘moderate.’ I don’t recall there being a moderate political movement or ideology. A Classical Greek philosophy maybe, but not a political movement like the Progressive Movement. Progressives established labor laws, the women’s right to vote and regulations of our workplaces and food production.

I don’t believe Moderates can claim any such movement or transformation of our government institutions. If there’s something they can champion it’s ameliorating the effects of change or fighting against perennial progressive issues such as single payer health care, taxing high profits and rent control.

Thank you for your response. I really appreciate your sharing with me the Chronicle’s rationale, however shakey it may be.

Sincerely,

John Avalos”

B3 sums up this historic announcement:

So there you have it: a timely snapshot of Hearst double standard ethics: Let Willie Brown do a featured political column on Sunday without disclosing that he is a paid PG&E lobbyist ($200,000 last year alone). Brand all clean energy politicians opposed by PG&E as “ultra liberals” and “far left factions.” And for God’s sake, don’t cover the election in an honest and professional manner and tell us who PG&E is buying off. (See Amanda Witherell story, “PG&E’s blank check, who’s the utility buying off Start with Newsom, Feinstein, and Willie Brown.”) Question: so what will Hearst call the politicians who PG&E buys off? We call Willie PG&E’s Secret Agent Man.

B3, who insists to Cooper he is still a Rock Rapids (Iowa) liberal, and she says she will not challenge it.

Pelosi: is she punting on SF Clean Energy Act?

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Is Pelosi for clean energy in Washington and Denver but standing with PG&E and punting on supporting the Clean Energy Act in San Francisco? Is she investing with T. Boone Pickens and his Clean Energy Fuels Corp. in Texas and punting on clean energy in San Francisco?

By Bruce B. Brugmann

Paul Hogarth, the agile staff writer and columnist for the Beyond Chron website, asked a key question of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi at a press conference this morning on the first day of the Democratic Convention in Denver.

Hogarth reported on Beyond Chron that he had asked Pelosi that, “because she endorsed Al Gore’s ambitious goals of energy independence by 2019, does she support San Francisco’s Clean Energy Act (Prop H)–which calls for energy independence by 2040.”

“I haven’t see the text,” she told Hogarth, but I support going in that direction. This timetable of energy independence is a path we hope to go on.”

Hogarth made the proper point: Maybe, he noted, she should have sent a proxy to the Democratic County Central Committee endorsement meeting, referring to the recent vote by the DCCC approving the Clean Energy Act. She did not send a proxy to vote and her quote to Hogarth is her only known public response to the measure. The head on Hogarth’s story made his point more direct: “Pelosi Schools Traditional Media; Punts on SF Clean Energy Act.”

Meanwhile, the punting question was raised again for Pelosi by a major story in the Wall Street Journal (8/23/08). The Journal reported that Pelosi and her husband Paul invested between $50,000 and $100,000 in T. Boone Pickens’s Clean Energy Corporation in Texas. The Journal said the investment “could benefit from legislation the California Democrat favors to boost U.S. use of natural gas.”

“The investment is a small fraction of the Pelosis’ net worth. But it highlights the unlikely alliance evolving between Mr. Pickens, an old man with a long history of support for Republican causes, and powerful Democrats who have welcomed Mr. Pickens’s recent campaign for developing alternatives to oil.” (B3: Pickens was a major funder of the Swift Boat Veterans For Truth, which helped defeat John Kerry in the last presidential election.)

Drew Hammill, a Pelosi spokesperson, told the Journal that the investment “does not raise any direct conflict of interest issues” or violate any ethics rules of the House of Representatives. “The speaker has been an advocate for increasing our country’s energy independence and for renewable energy for years, long before this purchase.”

Pelosi has always been a PG&E ally in San Francisco and Washington, notably in her move to help PG&E and the development gang privatize the Presidio and set the precedent for privatizing the national park system.

So the question for her is even more tantalizing: will she go for clean energy in Washington, Texas, and Denver but stand with PG&E and punt on the Clean Energy Act in San Francisco? We’ll try to get the questions to her. But I suggest that others work on it as well. She’s tough to pin down when it comes to PG&E, clean energy, and renewables back in her home district. B3

PS: How much are the Pelosis worth? Anywhere from $15 million to $156 million (including real estate), according to the The Journal. The investment amounts to less than one per cent off the Pelosis’ total 2007 public and private investment assets, which, not including real estate, are estimated at between $15 million and $52 million, based on the Speaker’s disclosure record, according to the Journal. Including real estate and bank account assets, the Pelosis’ net asset value is estimated at between $35 million and $156 million, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

Money for nothing

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› gwschulz@sfbg.com

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi seems to be feeling pretty confident in her reelection prospects this November, despite an independent challenge by high-profile peace mom Cindy Sheehan.

But that hasn’t stopped the San Francisco Democrat from raising big bucks from scores of interest groups who are contributing to her campaign committee and to the political action committee she controls, known as PAC to the Future.

Most of the money she’s raising is going toward assuring her continued power in Washington by giving it to the campaigns of other Democratic members of Congress, particularly those facing tough election battles that could threaten the party’s House majority.

Pelosi’s reelection committee has raised $2.36 million over the past two years, hundreds of thousands more than the average House member, according to federal campaign disclosure records and data maintained by the Center for Responsive Politics.

Her PAC raised an additional $585,000 during the current election cycle and spent $769,000, much of which has also gone to other candidate committees in payments of $5,000 and $10,000.

Many newly elected Democrats in the House represent conservative constituencies, and with her blessing they sometimes vote with Republicans to distance themselves from the party’s perceived liberal leaders like Pelosi, according to a new book published this month, Money in the House: Campaign Funds and Congressional Party Politics (Perseus, 2008). Democratic leaders in the meantime have continued a phenomenal fundraising spree to help protect those House members.

"Speaker Pelosi’s extraordinary financial commitment to her party, and especially to her party’s vulnerable members, illustrates the overriding emphasis congressional parties and members place on money," writes author Marian Currinder, a senior fellow at Georgetown University’s Government Affairs Institute. "And her encouragement of selective ‘opposition votes’ demonstrates the complexity of governing in a highly partisan and highly competitive political environment."

Even the day-to-day reelection expenses of Washington’s unrivaled leading lady are outsize, as Pelosi’s spending records show. In June 2007, she celebrated her 20th year in Congress with a glitzy fundraiser held in the capital’s Union Station that cost at least $92,000 and featured a performance by soul singer Patti LaBelle.

The bill included $25,393 for a slick video production; $61,105 on catering, rentals, and securing the site; $2,000 for hairstyling and wardrobe assistance insisted on by LaBelle; $2,824 on flower arrangements; and $1,396 for chocolates from a Pennsylvania-based confection maker.

Pelosi spent at least $650 from her campaign on makeup for the steady string of appearances she made after being sworn in as House speaker in January 2007. An annual fundraiser held this year at the Westin St. Francis in San Francisco cost $23,454 for catering and other expenses.

As for the top contributors to Pelosi’s reelection committee, they include several members of the Gallo family, proprietors of the E&J Gallo Winery, who gave a total of $23,000 through maximum individual donations of $4,600. The Modesto-based company has long made contributions to both parties, particularly enriching candidates who show a willingness to scale back or even throw out the federal estate tax, which affects the inheritances of the wealthiest American families.

The Corrections Corporation of America gave $2,300 to Pelosi and $2,700 to her PAC. CCA is part of a storied group of for-profit privatization companies in Nashville, Tenn. that are closely tied to former Republican Senate majority leader Bill Frist and includes the Hospital Corporation of America and Ardent Health Services.

Just this year, the state of California hired CCA to house 8,000 inmates at six of the company’s facilities; a significant portion will go to a new $205 million CCA complex under construction in Arizona.

The nation’s largest private jail company suffered bad publicity during the 1990s due to a series of high-profile escapes and inmate killings inside its prisons. It teetered on the edge of bankruptcy after overbuilding jails without having enough inmates available to fill them, but the George W. Bush administration helped save the company with a new homeland security agenda that called for confining rather than releasing undocumented immigrants while they awaited deportation or asylum-request proceedings. The company’s revenue jumped nearly a half-billion dollars over the last five years and its lobbying activities in Washington, DC have increased similarly.

The entertainment industry has ponied up its share to Pelosi as well. The maximum $4,600 donation came from Aaron Sorkin, powerhouse writer behind the long-running TV series The West Wing and the 2007 film Charlie Wilson’s War. Christie Hefner, a regular donor to Democrats and heiress to Playboy Enterprises, contributed $1,000.

Steven Bing, a Hollywood producer who inherited a real estate fortune, and billionaire Las Vegas developer Kirk Kerkorian gave thousands to Pelosi over the last two years. Kerkorian has given to both parties, but he and Bing share a special relationship after having fought a nasty tabloid war.

Kerkorian allegedly hired private investigators to sift through Bing’s trash in search of DNA evidence that would link him to a child borne by Kerkorian’s ex-wife, whom he was divorcing, according to a lawsuit filed by Bing. Vanity Fair in July described Bing as part of a skirt-chasing entourage that ran with Bill Clinton and threatened to tarnish Hillary Clinton’s presidential bid with its freewheeling bachelor reputation.

The wealthy Herbert and Marion Sandler, major supporters of MoveOn.org and other social justice causes, gave Pelosi a combined $9,200. The couple presided over the meteoric rise of Oakland mortgage lender Golden West Financial, which sold to Wachovia for $24 billion in 2006. The housing crisis led Wachovia to post staggering multibillion-dollar losses this summer, and some business writers have attributed its declining fortunes to the Golden West purchase.

In June, George Zimmer of Fremont, founder of the Men’s Warehouse, gave $2,300. Notable husband and wife political team Clint and Janet Reilly, both active as candidates and donors, contributed a total of $19,200 to Pelosi’s campaign and PAC.

"Essentially, raising money for the party and its candidates is required of leaders," Money in the House author Currinder told the Guardian. "Pelosi wouldn’t have been elected speaker if she wasn’t a stellar fundraiser."

So where is Pelosi’s money going if not to television ads for her own campaign? She divided $250,000 among the campaigns of approximately 70 congressional candidates, and disbursed about $532,000 more to them through PAC to the Future. The beneficiaries included $14,000 to Democrat Chet Edwards of Texas, whose district includes President George W. Bush’s Crawford ranch. Pelosi has publicly recommended him to Barack Obama as a possible running mate.

In addition, about half of the money Pelosi has raised since the beginning of 2007, slightly more than $1 million, went to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee in Washington, DC. She also gave to the Democratic parties of key battleground states including Indiana, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Ohio. She singled out Democrat Travis Childers of Mississippi for extra cash totaling $21,000. In May, Childers stunned observers by defeating a Republican in a special election held when a representative vacated his House seat to take over for conservative icon Sen. Trent Lott.

"She has had prodigious success raising funds for individual Democratic candidates, for the DCCC, and for her own campaign and PAC," Thomas Mann, a congressional scholar at the Brookings Institute, told us. "Most party leaders represent safe seats but nonetheless try to set a high standard for raising money to advance their party’s broader objectives."

Pelosi’s Capitol Hill and San Francisco offices directed our questions to her fundraising operations at the DCCC. Her political director there, Brian Wolff, called the war chest "another vehicle for her to communicate with constituents in California." But he conceded that the pressure is on, "especially now that we have so many candidates and incumbents that need help. It definitely falls on her to be able to have a very aggressive fundraising campaign."

Wolff insists, too, that the Democrats revolutionized fundraising by seeking out smaller donations from large numbers of people instead of returning to the same short list of affluent contributors they had in the past.

In general, top donations to Pelosi still have come from lobbyists and lawyers, the real estate industry, insurance companies, banking and securities firms, and Amgen, a major biotech researcher based in Thousand Oaks. Officials from the labor movement’s biggest new power broker, the Service Employees International Union, also gave substantial sums, as did other major unions. But they fell far behind the contributions of large business interests.

Art Torres, chair of the California Democratic Party, told us that health care reform failed in 1990s at least partly because of political spending by drug companies. But he said that Democrats winning the White House and expanding their majorities in Congress would create a greater mandate to overhaul the health care system.

"It’s always been about issues" rather than fundraising, Torres said. "When I’ve talked to her, it’s always been about ‘How can we get this or that legislation through?’<0x2009>"

It’s worth pointing out, however, that the nation’s largest drug wholesaler, McKesson Corp., is based in San Francisco, and donors from pharmaceutical companies gave Pelosi more than $85,000 this cycle. Drug companies have given freely to Democrats in the past, but Democratic officeholders "still voted against their interests every time," Torres said.

Pelosi’s campaign spending on everything but her own reelection shows she doesn’t regard Sheehan as much of a threat. But the antiwar candidate did make it onto the ballot Aug. 8 and the Sheehan campaign has raised approximately $350,000 since December in small contributions after refusing to accept money from PACs and corporations.

"We didn’t have the party infrastructure going into this," said Sheehan campaign manager Tiffany Burns, adding that Pelosi’s campaign expenditures are "just another example of how Pelosi believes she is entitled to this seat."

JROTC is not a choice

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OPINION To hear proponents of the Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps (JROTC) talk, it’s a matter of personal choice for 14- and 15-year-olds to sign up for the Pentagon’s military recruitment program, which is being phased out of San Francisco’s public schools June 2009. The San Francisco Board of Education also recently voted to remove physical education credit from the program this school year. It had to: the retired military officers who teach the course don’t meet the educational standards of state law, and the course doesn’t meet state physical education standards.

Supporters of JROTC are taking the issue to the November ballot. Their initiative, albeit non-binding, would put San Franciscans on record as in support of the military program.

As Democratic clubs and other political organizations begin their endorsement process, progressives need to understand the importance of defeating this initiative. It’s not a harmless measure. If it passes, the new school board can use it to reinstate JROTC. If it loses, it’s less likely the board will change its course. Thankfully, last week the San Francisco Democratic County Central Committee (DCCC) voted overwhelmingly not to endorse the measure.

JROTC is not summer camp or a harmless after-school activity. It is one more way the military finds bodies for its illegal wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Denisha Williams can tell you that. The African American high school senior in Philadelphia told the City Paper that she left JROTC and opted out of the military having her contact info. It hasn’t made any difference: “I have received phone calls, e-mail, three letters and a 15-minute videotape. I even received a phone call from a female recruiter asking if I was still interested in the Navy. I told her I wasn’t and hung up. A week later I received another letter and the tape.”

Capt. Daniel R. Gager, commander of the US Army recruiting station in south Philadelphia, said he and other recruiters were ordered by the US Recruiting Command to put more time and energy into recruiting high school upperclassmen such as Williams.

In San Francisco, at least 15 percent of the cadets have been placed in the program without their consent. It seems the military will do whatever it takes to get in front of our youngsters in our public schools.

Pressuring kids to join the military is wrong. International law says kids under 18 should not be recruited at all, and the ACLU agrees (see www.aclu.org/intlhumanrights/gen). Recruiters in every high school and at every mall in this country break that law every day.

Nationally about 40 percent of JROTC kids end up in the military. In San Francisco, proponents claim only 2 percent go on to military careers. They are wrong. According to the school district, no tracking of JROTC students is done.

Please work to defeat Proposition V, the pro-JROTC initiative.

Mark Sanchez and Tommi Avicolli Mecca

Mark Sanchez is President of the San Francisco Board of Education and an eighth grade science teacher. Tommi Avicolli Mecca is a radical queer activist and writer whose regular columns appear at beyondchron.org.

Editor’s Notes

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› tredmond@sfbg.com

The San Francisco Chronicle has come up with a new name for the broad spectrum of political leaders and activists who make up the San Francisco left. We’re now "ultra-liberals."

The term first appeared in Heather Knight’s Aug. 15 article on the changes in the local Democratic County Central Committee. Her lead sentence was almost breathtaking in its drama: The party, she wrote, "has veered dramatically to the left, telling voters that on Nov. 4 they should elect a raft of ultra-liberal supervisorial candidates, decriminalize prostitution, boot JROTC from public schools, embrace public power, and reject Mayor Gavin Newsom’s special court in the Tenderloin."

There’s no question that the progressives made significant advances in winning control of the DCCC in June. And I think it’s entirely fair — and a good thing — that the party has veered to the left. It’s "dramatic," though, only because for so many years the Democratic Party in one of the world’s most liberal cities wasn’t particularly liberal at all: it was controlled by political machines and friendly to real estate developers and big business.

It shouldn’t really surprise anyone that San Francisco Democrats support public power and decriminalizing sex work and oppose military recruiting in the public schools. Those are pretty basic San Francisco values. What’s surprising is that it took a wholesale organizing effort and a huge battle to get the party to where it is today.

But I still cringe at the term "ultra-liberal."

David Campos, a Police Commission member (and generally a fairly even-minded guy) who is running for supervisor in District 9, called me this weekend to tell me he was laughing about the new tag: "It’s a badge of pride," he said. And of course, on one level, I agree with him.

But there’s something more to the story here. The way the Chron uses it, "ultra-liberal" is supposed to be a derogatory term, just a bit short of "radical" (or in another era, "commie." It suggests candidates who are out of touch with the mainstream, who don’t represent the majority, who can’t entirely be trusted.

I asked Knight what she meant by that term, and she had no comment. But here’s what I think is happening: Newsom’s political operatives are mad that the progressives have seized control of the term "progressive" — which is, in fact, an accurate and historically valuable term. They’d like to call Newsom a progressive mayor — which is inaccurate and historically invalid. But since they can’t get away with that, they’ve pushed the Chron to use another term for people like Chris Daly and Aaron Peskin, and the best the editors could come up with is "ultra-liberal."

Weak.

Speaking of progressive issues: the move to reinstate JROTC in the public schools is really a wedge campaign that will be funded by downtown interests and used against progressives like Eric Mar, who is running in a more moderate district. The issue itself is a no-brainer. Do we want military recruitment programs in the public schools? The progressive candidates for school board need to stand up on this one and make it clear that they aren’t going to back down — JROTC has to go.

PG&E and a Rock Rapids, Iowa, liberal

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By Bruce B. Brugmann

I confess. I am an old-fashioned Rock Rapids, Iowa, liberal. For starters, that means I grew up in a little town in northwestern Iowa that has had public power since 1896 and so i know personally that public power is cheap, reliable, and accountable.

In San Francisco, where PG&E private power is expensive, unreliable, and unaccountable, I was startled to find that I am suddenly an “ultra liberal,” along with a host of other progressives and independents who support the Clean Energy Initiative and public power.

Yes, according to PG&E and the San Francisco Chronicle, we are all suspicious characters and ought to be kept under watch for the duration for advocating such “ultra-liberal” things as clean energy, renewables, public power, mandates for making San Francisco a world leader in renewables, and kicking PG&E out of the mayor’s office and the DCCC.

As Tim Redmond points out in his Editors notes (8/20/08), the term first appeared in Heather Knight’s Aug. 15th article on the changes in the Democratic County Central Committee (DCCC), for decades the unassailable bastion of the Burton/ Brown machine. Her lead, he noted, was “almost breathtaking ” in its drama. She wrote that the party “has veered dramatically to the left,” and that it would be telling voters to vote for a raft of “ultra-liberal politicians supervisorial candidates” and, among other things, to “embrace public power.” (The Clean Energy Initiative, as it is appropriately known, mandates aggressive goals for renewables but PG&E gallops swiftly by this point and loves to say without evidence that the initiative is a $4 billion takeover of PG&E, which is yet another Big PG&E Lie.)

Meanwhile, the new Chronicle columnist Willie Brown, who ran endless errands for PG&E as mayor and as a private attorney on the public payroll, and collected a nifty $200,000 in “consulting services” in 2007 from PG&E, wrote without gulping:

“It was quite a week for local politics, with the certified takeover of the San Francisco Democratic County Central Committee by outgoing Board of Supervisors President Aaron Peskin and Chris Daly…But what’s really going on here behind the headlines is a move by the ‘progressives’ to take over the central committee a la Tammany Hall or Richard Daley’s Chicago. The goal is to control the party money and endorsements–and that way be able to pick candidates for office as well.

“In other words the central committee will be Peskin’s shadow mayoralty, allowing Peskin to keep calling the shots even when he leaves office.”

Tammany Hall? Richard Daley’s Chicago? Why didn’t Wiillie just say what the facts are: that the Burton/Brown machine, and Mayor Newsom and PG&E et al, are no longer calling the shots on the DCCC and that a group of real progressives are cutting the umbilical cord to machine politics and calling the shots with real progressive issues and initiatives, such as the Clean Energy Act. Willie also couldn’t say of course that PG&E got much of its influence through his office as mayor and the Burton/Brown machine, which never put as much as a pebble in PG&E’s monopoly path. Thus, until now, the machine-dominated DCCC has been a safe haven for PG&E and even this time around the real progressives only won through a major organizing effort and tough battle.

Tim wrote that he thinks Newsom’s political operatives are mad that “the progressives have seized control of the term ‘progressives.’ which is in fact an accurate and historically valuable term. They’d like to call Newsom a progressive mayor, which is inaccurate and historically invalid. But since they can’t get away with that, they’ve pushed the Chronicle to use another term for people like Chris Daly and Aaron Peskin and the best the editors could come up with is ‘ultra liberal.'” The Chronicle, which appears to be once again revving up for PG&E, tosses a juicy T-bone to PG&E and its campaign theme that only the loony left would support such dread issues as clean energy and public power.

Maybe we have a new insight into the term progressive. A real progressive supports the Clean Energy Act and public power, while a phony Willie Brown/Gavin Newsom ‘progressive,’ in quotes, supports PG&E and opposes the Clean Energy Act. In short, there is a big difference between a real progressive and a PG&E ‘progressive.’

And me? I’m still just an old-fashioned Rock Rapids, Iowa, liberal.

More to come on this illuminating subject, B3

P.S. 1:Hearst ethics policy: If Hearst wants to present Willie Brown as a “legitimate” journalist and featured political columnist, making value judgments and ethical pronouncements on who is and is not a real progressive and whether the DCCC has been taken over by clean energy progressives playing Tammany Hall/Richard Daley machine politics, the Chronicle ought at minimum to require disclosure of his “consulting services” for PG&E and other private interests that would conflict his column? What specific “consulting services” did he provide for PG&E in 2007? What is he doing now for PG&E and for how much in the November election? Is he writing a political column for the Chronicle and working for PG&E at the same time? Is he advising PG&E on how to “steal” another election?
(I left a message for Willie at the Willie Brown Institute and I put out an email to Hearst corporate for comment on Willie’s PG&E/editorial role.)

It was Mayor Willie, as the public power campaign was winning in the 2001 public power election, who ordered that the ballots be moved from City Hall to the Civic Auditorium because of an anthrax scare. I remember standing with Angela Alioto about l0:30 p.m. on election night when then Elections Director Tammy Haygood, announced the anthrax move. “Angela,” I said, “we’ve lost the election.” She didn’t believe me and kept saying, “No, no, we couldn’t lose the election now.” Alas, I was right.

We raced over to the Auditorium where there was only minimal security. There was no evidence then or later of an anthrax scare. PG&E came from behind and won by a bare 500 votes. Several days later, several tops of the election boxes were found floating in the bay. There was no explanation from Willie nor his election director and no real investigation. The gallows humor was that the campaign should hire divers to go into the bay and find the missing ballots.

PG&E’s big payments: PG&E discloses the $200,000 payment to Willie Brown for “consulting services” in 2007 in its annual report to the California Public Utilities Commission. In a key section of this report (called page 257), PG&E is required to list every payment that it made to an outside company or consultant. This amounts to billions year.
PG&E has the entire annual report posted on its Investor Relations website, but, significantly, page 357 is missing.
PG&E’s statement explaining the omission says: “Details of this page are filed with the California Public Utilities Commission.” Reporter Amanda Witherell formally asked the CPUC press office for it and they said they’re “trying to track it down.” But she did get a copy.

Willie Brown complains about political power

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Okay, this is incredibly ironic: Former Mayor Willie Brown, now a Chronicle columnist, is suddenly complaining about the use of political power. From his piece yesterday on the changes at the Democratic County Central Committee:

But what’s really going on behind the headlines is a move by the “progressives” to take over the central committee a la Tammany Hall or Richard Daley’s Chicago. The goal is to control the party money and endorsements – and that way be able to pick candidates for office as well.

In other words the central committee will be Peskin’s shadow mayoralty, allowing Peskin to keep calling shots even when he leaves office.

Willie, Willie, Willie — YOU were the one who took Chicago-style machine politics to a new level in San Francisco. You were the one who controlled the money, the endorsements, the DCCC, the Board of Supervisors … Now you’re complaining?

DCCC endorses….

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The newly elected progressive block of the local Democratic Party flexed their muscles during tonight’s endorsements. It was a full house, with only Rep. Nancy Pelosi’s seat empty. She neglected (perhaps purposefully) to send a proxy.

Many of the supervisors’ measures passed — including the Affordable Housing measure and the Clean Energy Act. All of the items put on the ballot by Mayor Gavin Newsom failed, despite a small consistent cabal following his centrist party line. Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s proxy cast steady abstentions on many local issues, with notable “no” votes against Affordable Housing, Clean Energy, and decriminalizing prostitution. She did, however, support Newsom’s Community Justice Center, which some pointed out had already been funded and should have been taken off the ballot.

All the progressive candidates handily won top seats, with David Campos beating out Eric Quezada in the hot district nine race. Nods went to incumbents Elsbernd and Chu. There was a lot of debate over whether to select second and third choices for ranked choice voting in the district supervisor races. Though there were attempts to get second and third seats filled, there was too much division among candidates and enough progressives stuck with “no endorsement” for those seats to keep solidarity behind the top seeded candidate. After some talk about the need to have at least one woman on the slate, Denise McCarthy, running in district three, was the only candidate to receive the second billing, getting votes from Debra Walker and Michael Goldstein, who stepped outside the progressive contingent that was urging a “no endorsement” vote to keep loyalty lined up behind Chiu.

The Clean Energy Act received a healthy majority of 22, with more choosing to abstain than cast a “no.” Tom Hsieh, Joe Julian, Megan Levitan, Mike Tuchow, Dianne Feinstein, and August Longo, voted against it while Laura Spanjian, Scott Wiener, Jackie Speier, Leland Yee, and Fiona Ma, abstained.

The complete rundown, after the jump:

Editor’s Notes

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I didn’t expect much from NBC’s prime-time Olympics coverage, but Jesus, it’s bad.

Forget the all-America, all the time, which is only to be expected. Forget the fact that only the sports that have prominent American contenders get much attention. It’s the reporting and commentary that’s making me sick.

I don’t watch the Olympics on TV to hear for the 12th time about Michael Phelps growing up with a single mother and a driven coach. I buy trashy magazines to learn that kind of stuff. I want to see the games. (I don’t watch football on TV to learn about Brett Favre’s emotional unretirement; I want to see him throw the ball. And if they interrupted the game to give me an "NFL moment" I’d stop watching altogether.)

There are hundreds of events going on, and with the tape delay, we could see all kinds of stuff. The network could be switching from swimming to gymnastics to boxing to swimming … but no: more than half the prime-time show is devoted to truly awful little video clips about the lives of the players, or the age of the Chinese gymnasts (now there’s a hot new story) or someone’s personal tragedy.

Folks: I don’t care. Like most of us, I want to watch sports. Save your trashy specials for 60 Minutes.

And the comments, overall, are just horrifying. Did you know that the Romanian women’s gymnastics team just isn’t the same now that they don’t brutally abuse the children? I mean, look at those errors, that sloppy attitude! The athletes were actually smiling and talking to each other before they took the balance beam, and when one woman fell, she still got a hug from her coach. Back in the days of Nadia Comaneci, that would never have happened. Tragedy what’s happened to that team.

(I’ll give Bob Costas a break — if you get an interview with the president of the United States, you break away from the gym to air it. And he actually asked some professional questions. But watching Bush there, grinning like some kind of nervous idiot with a caffeine twitch, was so creepy it was almost unbearable.)

IN OTHER NEWS: Police Commission member David Campos is making a big stink about Mayor Gavin Newsom’s willingness to violate the Sanctuary City law. His point: if immigrants won’t contact the police for fear of getting deported, the cops can’t do their jobs. That, by the way, was one of the reasons San Francisco became a sanctuary city. He’s asking for a special hearing on this, and I hope it leads the commission to stand up to the mayor and say that it’s more important for SF cops to be able to work with immigrant communities than for Newsom to look tough on immigrants in his campaign for governor.

The Democratic County Central Committee is preparing to endorse candidates for supervisor, but so far, there’s little indication the panel will adopt ranked-choice voting recommendations. In District 9, that seems a shame — there are three good candidates (Campos, Mark Sanchez and Eric Quezada), and two (Quezada and Campos) are Democrats. Voters can choose up to three candidates in ranked order; the DCCC ought to consider doing the same.

Pelosi and the Clean Energy Act

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Paul Hogarth at BeyondChron raises an excellent question: Will Nancy Pelosi, who says she supports Al Gore’s ambitious renewable-energy goals, support San Francisco’s Clean Energy Act?

Pelosi can’t easily duck it, since the Democratic County Central Committee will vote tomorrow night on whether to endorse the Charter Amendment, and Pelosi is a member of that panel. She never goes, of course, but she has a proxy, who presumably will be voting the way the Speaker has instructed. So we shall see.

We shall also see where FIona Ma, Leland Yee, and Betty Yee, all members of the DCCC, are on this landmark measure.

Breaking: Leno endorses Sanchez

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Just got word that state Assemblymember (and Senator-elect) Mark Leno is going to endorse School Board member Mark Sanchez for supervisor in District 9. “We’ve got his endorsement,” Sanchez just told me by phone. “We’re putting out the press release today.”

That makes two Green Party members the Democratic lawmaker is backing; he’s also endorsed Ross Mirkarimi in D5. Good for Leno not to let the irrational fear of Greens that so many Democrats harbor influence him; this is, after all, a nonpartisan race.

It’s a tough choice in D9 — Sanchez, Police Commission member David Campos and housing activist Eric Quezada are all good progressives and any of the three would be a great supervisor. Quezada, I think, never had much of a chance with Leno; he’s pretty close to Sup. Chris Daly, who was a strong backer of Carole Migden in the bitter Migden-Leno senate race. Campos is close to Sup. Tom Ammiano, who was neutral in the Leno-Migden brawl — but Campos, who is on the Democratic County Central Committee, voted for Aaron Peskin as chair. Leno’s candidate (and he was pusing him hard) was Scott Weiner, who narrowly lost.

Quezada also ran for DCCC, but didn’t win.

Sanchez, as a Green, was able to stay out of both the Migden-Leno fight and the Peskin-Weiner contest. Oddly enough, not being a Democrat may have helped him here.

Campos, by taking the stand he thought was right and voting for Peskin (despite immense pressure), may have scotched any chance of getting Leno’s endorsement. “That’s politics,” he told me. Yes, it is.

(UPDATE: Sanchez corrects me: He endorsed Leno for state Senate months before the election. So the Leno endorsement is even less of a surprise.)

Peskin wins DCCC chair

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Before the San Francisco Democratic County Central Committee voted tonight on its new chair, Chris Daly told me the vote was going to be 18-16 in favor of Aaron Peskin, the progressives’ pick. I didn’t doubt him. The play was going to be to elect Peskin temporary chair as the first order of business, before the public comment or chair election agenda items, and make it clear from the get-go where the votes were.

There was a mild and brief parliamentary scrum before the names of Peskin and Scott Wiener, last term’s chair and the pick of the moderates, were put up for vote. Peskin won on a 18-16 vote.

“You have my word that I’m going to work my butt off and I’m going to do it with Scott,” Peskin said during his acceptance speech before Wiener supporters reminded him he was only temporary chair and the real vote was still coming up. But I didn’t doubt it was over.

I listened to the first speaker during public comment, Senator-to-be Mark Leno, sound conciliatory notes and praise the soon-to-be vanquished candidate he supported. And then I left as the speakers lined up at the microphone to make the case for their respective candidates, telling Daly to call me if the official vote wasn’t 18-16.

Letters

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PARTY PROMOTERS


The following two comments appeared with a July 21 posting to SFBG’s Politics blog, "DCCC vote: Does Peskin have it?"

We need a strong leader in our local Democratic Party that will call out our elected leaders on their BS. For example, [Nancy] Pelosi and her continued "do nothing but throw more monies at the war" approach. I have sat by and watched the DCCC leaders do nothing but carry the party line toward the right. It’s time for a change and to bring our party back to the left. Chris Daly would be the best one to make that happen, but unfortunately he is backing Peskin for that. I trust Chris, so I will have to go along with it for now. In 2010 you will have a chance to put your name on the next DCCC race if you don’t like how things are going.

Jerry Jarvis

Sup. Daly, never a fan of your brand of politics. I believe that San Franciscans will for years be harmed if your friend and colleague Sup. Peskin is elected chair of DCCC.

You will see my letter in this week’s Bay Area Reporter quoting both you and Mr. Peskin on your intent to change the way things are done on the DCCC and how you’re being termed off the Board of Supervisors seems to have energized you to find new ways to continue legisutf8g from beyond City Hall.

I fear for everyday San Franciscans, I fear for your children, I fear for businesses (who will pay taxes to support all that you and Sup. Peskin want to do?), and I fear for the survival of a united San Francisco.

Similar to the recent Leno vs. Migden race, I am deeply dismayed at the vitriol and partisan nature this race has taken.

Mark Murphy

WHAT IS JEWISH MUSIC?


The following comment appeared with a July 15 posting to SFBG’s Noise blog, "Shining a light on Diamond Days ’08 music fest."

Heeb magazine repeatedly demonstrates that it is pretty clueless when it comes to Jewish culture outside of a narrow set of tired shticks. When [publisher Josh] Neuman comments that "Jewish music" is "a murky moniker that generally signifies some sort of backwards gaze at a mythical, ‘authentic’ past," he’s demonstrating that he has no idea what’s going on in the Jewish music scene. Jewish music has never been so forward-looking as it is now. There are artists all over the country (and world) exploring what Jewish music can become. They are, with no more lofty goal than making great music, creating a new American Jewish culture that is as vibrant as anything that has come before. But Heeb hasn’t noticed and isn’t interested. In Heeb‘s world, being Jewish is nothing more than wearing a hip "tribe" T-shirt while laughing at your grandparents. Who’s looking backward?

Jack Zaint

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