I discovered this for myself one day about two years ago when I was looking to write a blog attacking Novak, who died of a cancerous brain tumor today. In searching around I stumbled on a photograph featuring a group of African American kids and adults holding what looked like a plaque and an elderly Caucasian man dressed like...Robert Novak. This photo:
I fell out of my chair.
See, Novak has a well-cultivated and well-deserved reputation as a muckraking "Prince of Darkness" all the way down to the black three-piece suits he wore on television. I saw Novak as the kind of conservative one loves to hate, but I never thought of him as racist, just cold blooded, especially in the way he outed Valerie Plame. But that photo, and this one:
..changed my view of him - Novak has a heart - and then more so when I learned that these picts were from Youth Leadership Foundation (YLF) events, and that Novak was more than just a visitor, he was on the board of directors. Moreover, Novak contributed not a small amount of money to YLF. At their 2005 awards gathering he contributed $50,000.
Now, even if that may not have been all his own money - some board members get credit for causing others to donate - the effort required to raise $50,000 for any non-profit organization is considerable. Plus, the contribution was just for that event; Novak has been involved with YLF almost since its creation in 1997.
What does YLF do? It's based in Washington DC and has the charge of helping young people from DC's poorest neighborhoods between 8 and 15 years old who are "just passing" and need some attention and guidance to help them make the extra effort in school and in life to reach their potential.
Novak was as involved in YLF as he was in giving Washington politicians a headache. Today, you'll read a lot of blogs and columns about Novak, almost all of them referring to his work as a columnist. Well, that's not all there was to Novak. The "Prince of Darkness" as it turned out, was his stage name. It's not surprise that donations in Novak's name are to be directed to YLF, because in reality Robert Novak was a community leader who cared about kids and their growth into the leaders of tomorrow.
In the wake of my interview with Chevron employee Dennis Roos I've gotten a number of email and calls updating me on the matter of the negotiations to restart the stopped construction of the improvements to the Richmond refinery.
One of them was this "Meet The Mayor" community meeting held Friday, August 7th at 5:30 PM. Here, one could ask questions of Richmond Mayor Gayle McLaughlin for one hour, but my intent was to attend, film residents who were concerned about the project, pro and con, and after it was over, get the Mayor's direct point of view if she would give it to me. (Take note of that.)
To review, Chevron's planned upgrade of their giant Richmond oil refinery was stalled because environmentalists sued them in court regarding what was viewed to be an inadequate environmental impact report (EIR) regarding how emissions were going to be lessened over current levels. Contra Costa County Superior Court Judge Barbara Zuniga agreed with their view and ordered planed construction stopped until Chevron could create a "better" EIR. The judge's decision threw over 1,000 construction employees out of work and threatened the future of Chevron in Richmond.
So I did arrive and sat next to a white-haired gentleman who as it happened gave me a copy of a letter I'd not seen from Richmond's Mechanics Bank. The letter stressed the importance of keeping Chevron in Richmond and arriving at a settlement to get the plant project going again.
So the meeting started and as the Mayor listened to people introduce themselves I explained that I was a video-blogger who wanted to ask her about the plant matter after the meeting was over if I could. She did say that was fine.
There were only two people who came to the meeting to talk about the refinery issue. The first person, an African American man, said that the Mayor seemed not to care about the people who need jobs and more about her own agenda (this is in the video). The Mayor said that she does did support a support a substitute to the the resolution voted on by the Richmond City Council two weeks ago calling for settlement talks (with California Attorney General Jerry Brown involved) so that all the workers can get back to their jobs and she's working to make that happen. The Mayor said doing this is important because Richmond has a 17 percent unemployment rate.
A few minutes later, and after a number of residents expressed concern for and presented programs to stop the violence plaguing young African Americans in Richmond (which was heart-breaking to see, no matter how many times I am presented with this issue), the man I was sitting next to, who's name was Richard Lompa, asked the Mayor about the bank letter, and explained that he didn't understand "why do we continuously bash Chevron" and quoted the letter written by Mechanics Bank President and CEO Stephen Foster which said the reason given for opposing Chevron doesn't stand up to scrutiny . He said no one would support Chevron putting out more pollution, and that it was as if she was plunging a dagger in the heart of the city.
The Mayor's response was that the judge made the decision and then she threw in that Chevron does not pay its fair share of taxes and talked about the company's court battle against Measure T which imposed a new tax structure for manufacturers like Chevron. She also pointed to Chevron's appeal of its property tax assessment.
After the meeting and people left the room, the Mayor did give me her time and put to rest the idea some have expressed that she was not talking to Chevron, stating that she talks to representatives of the firm every day.
Mayor McLaughlin then essentially repeated her claim that Chevron doesn't pay its taxes in response to my question that as a person trained and who's practiced economic development, tax reductions are a normal part of negotiations to make it easier for employers to maintain their business in a city. She asked if I was referring to the Measure T issue, and repeated what she said before regarding the firm not paying its fair share of taxes. Then, weirdly and after presenting herself well on camera but before I could deactivate it, suddenly turned and said "I have a community meeting" but I turned the camera to show that the meeting had ended long ago. Moreover, the Mayor agreed to give me just a moment of her time, and I gave her a platform to present herself; the Mayor didn't say she had more people to meet when we started the interview. She didn't have to essentially rain on her own parade but that's what happened as one can see and I'm really disappointed that she did that. I turned off the camcorder.
As I went outside, Mr. Lompa was talking to another person, but after he finished gave me his view. "The Mayor," he said, "was being shallow and not grounded with reality" regarding her repeating of the idea that Chevron has a $24 billion profit. He also said that he appeals his tax bill if he thinks it's not valid.
I agree with Mr. Lompa, but I'm really concerned that the good Mayor seems to have more of a personal agenda that may cloud her ability to effectively negotiate with Chevron. It's common practice for businesses to want and ask for tax reductions and its equally normal for city economic development officials (and that includes the Mayor) to structure rates that help businesses.
In all of my years in the public sector I've not seen or met a Mayor that didn't understand that, but Mayor McLaughlin's a new breed of activist city official. That's all well and good for getting elected but it seems to cloud one's ability to conduct the business of maintaining a municipality's economy. One can have their personal beliefs but when a city's unemployment rate is at almost 20 percent as is the case in Richmond, its a recession, and the job base has decreased by over 50 percent in the last two years, it's time to be more pragmatic and less antagonistic.
What started as a calamity threatening to divide America has seemingly ended in a planned beer bust at the White House, courtesy of President Barack Obama himself. The ill-advised (in my opinion) arrest of Harvard Professor Henry Lewis Gates by Cambridge Police Officer Sgt. James Crowley four days ago caught the attention of the nation, but it was President Obama's comment that the Cambridge Police "acted stupidly" and the rather terrible response by the Cambridge Police Union at its press conference , which created a much-needed national conversation about race, law enforcement, and American culture.
Regardless of where you stand on this issue, there's no doubt that it has been the political talk of the day, even if much of it was disjointed, nasty, and ignorant, especially online. My first video blog, which asserts that Professor Gates was arrested for being an "uppity black man", has drawn over 355 comments on YouTube.com alone within one day, pushing it to over 2,700 views and the 14th most commented on video in the "News and Politics" section of the giant video-sharing site as of this writing. While demographic data is not yet complete, I can say just by combing through all of the comments that the viewers were overwhelmingly male, and about 80 percent white and 20 percent "of color" at first, then on the second day more people identifying themselves as black (who really knows in the comment section, right?) pushing the result to about 60 percent white to 40 percent of color.
Some of the comments were nasty and some were excellent, but the one I liked best of all was not on YouTube, but on Facebook and made by my long-time friend and Oakland, Bret Harte Junior High School classmate Lars Frkyman (who stared with my other long-time Oakland friend from the same school and from Skyine High School, Bill Boyd, in my "Star Trek Review" vlog), who wrote (and I reprint this with his permission):
You keep fighting that good fight against prejudices. As a white guy growing up in Oakland I was beaten several times cause of the color of my skin by a bunch of ignorant angry...fill in the blank.Later in life I've been hassled by white cops because of the length of my hair and my unshaved face. I think it must be human nature to exert power over anything, whether it be pit bulls, gray hounds, the homeless, gays, women, men you name it, humans will abuse it. I guess the sad fact is there's a bully in every crowd. We've come a long way but we sure do got a long way to go eh?
ps Obama's right..stupid cop! No apology necessarry
Lars
Lars is right. The Crowley / Gates incident was one of institutional racism on the part of Crowley, versus classism on the part of Gates. Crowley keeps saying "I went by the book" which opens the door to the kind of racial profiling African Americans and others are just plain tired of. "Going by the book" just means that Crowley didn't use his own judgment in the matter, plus he let his ego get in the way when he realized this "black man" was yelling at him and not following his orders. Gates' was angry that Crowley entered his house (without a search warrant) and from his point of view did not show him his police ID or look at the professor's identification, and so was going to "inform Crowley of who he was".
Two yaks ramming heads. Only one of the yaks, Gates, represented a group of people who'd had it. Racial profiling has been the bane of the African American existence for too long, and Obama's comment that the "Cambridge Police acted stupidly", even if his words may have been poorly selected, was right on and struck a cord from sea to shining sea. For Crowley to behave with the proper judgment in this case, many agree, would have been to make no arrest at all. But some officers are hard-wired to feel (not think) they have to make an arrest if the person's black, at least that's the perception of most African American (especially in the wake of the Oscar Grant shooting) and many whites too, like this commenter on my first YouTube video on this issue:
ALL of you are blaming everyone but whos responsible. First the media was the first person to play the race card to be exact it was CNN. Why because it will sell they know it why dont you? I am irish and white my family came to america in the 1910's we where hated by EVERYONE but my family overcame and if you want to blame someone blame the press they are the ones who plaster black men on the news every damn day and now you wonder why people are scared of blacks. All of us need to put this down.
Or just have a good, ice-cold beer or two! In fact, that's what President Obama, Sgt. Crowley, and Professor Gates plan to do at The White House. According to Obama, it was Crowley's idea, and Gates accepted the invitation. In a statement provided to "The Root" , a website covering news from a black perspective where Gates is editor-in-chief, he wrote:
"..if we can all use this to diminish racial profiling and to enhance fairness and equity in the criminal justice system for poor people and for people of color...After all, I first proposed that Sgt. Crowley and I meet as early as last Monday. If my experience leads to the lessening of the occurrence of racial profiling, then I would find that enormously gratifying. Because, in the end, this is not about me at all; it is about the creation of a society in which 'equal justice before law' is a lived reality."
Ok, fine, now what beer should they drink?
The Beer Poll
Having gotten past the arguments, we can watch Obama, Gates, and Crowley have a beer, but what brand? You can pick the beer in my poll below:
As of this writing, Budweiser has the lead over Pabst Blue Ribbon by 12.5 percent. No one picked Miller, while my favorite, Japan's Sapporo beer is even with Pabst Blue Ribbon beer, and 12.5 percent picked "Other" beers. In the interest of real diversity, pick Sapporo! But that written, the day Obama, Gates, and Crowley meet for a beer should be called "National Raise a Glass for Diversity Day."
Seriously.
I think it should be a day that people of different stripes deliberately get together to just get along, get to know each other, and have fun. Considering how far America's come in being a true melting pot, it's not hard to do at all. But the rule should be to have a beer with someone who's of another background and race from your own. That would be huge!
I've got to admit, I'm not a fan of South Carolina Republican Governor Mark Sanford and mainly because of his refusal to use the stimulus money to help the people of his state and due to his constant "I'm better than you" approach to President Obama. I'd hoped Sanford would get what's coming to him. I was more than a little annoyed that Sanford allowed himself to be considered a 2012 Presidential candidate just for going against President Obama and nothing else (in fact the GOP's really lacking in leaders, ya know?) and hoped he'd trip.
Well, he did.
When the news about Sanford's disappearance came out, I assumed he just flew the coup, but when I learned that his wife had not got a call from him, I tweeted NBC's David Gregory - who was conversing about the matter on Twitter - that it smelled like an affair.
Bingo, I was right.
But I've got no joy in from seeing this latest train wreck this week. Earlier, on Monday, we had Perez Hilton's video meltdown and Sanford's press conference was Wednesday. While Sanford didn't tell anyone to go do something with themselves, given the gravity of what he did, the people he hurt who trusted him, and his wife, it was every bit the train wreck we saw.
But I feel sorry for him.
I do because of his honest presentation. I mean he just plain said, "Look, I screwed up. I hurt people and I'm sorry." He also explained that the affair was last year and he and his mistress Maria - with a name like and living in Brazil she's got to be a looker - have known each other for eight years. Yes, Sanford was critical of President Clinton during the Lewinsky matter. Yes, Sanford's reportedly not well-liked by some of his associates. But he was well-liked enough to become governor of South Carolina.
The only part of Sanford's press conference that bothered me was the statement "I spent five days crying." Well, come on, Governor Sanford was crying because he was leaving his mistress and all that fun you he had and returning to a life that he's not happy with. Look, he missed his four boys on Father's Day! What does that say?
Sanford is a man with a lot of issue to work out, but heck we all have them. I really do hope he gets a chance to right his ship without dire consequences. If there's anything we've learned from all these media show train wrecks, it's that no one's perfect and I get no joy in learning this about anyone.
Gov. Mark Sanford of South Carolina, who's resistance to the use of Stimulus funds to help his high-unemployment state made headlines, had me thinking he was stupid, and had many thinking he would challenge President Obama in the 2012 presidential race, admitted to cheating on his wife today after he was spotted at Atlanta Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport coming from Buenos Aires.
What does this do to his political fortunes? Well, he's already resigned from the Republican Governor's Association today. I think he can kiss any future presidential ambitions goodbye for now.
As the song says, "it's getting hot in here", or more like hotter. According to Reuters, Iran Minister Mohammadreza Habibi has issued a statement threatening death to protesters. That's a lot of people, several million, including now (according to the Huff Posts Nico Pitney) Iranian soccer stars who wears green in solidarity with the protestors, which makes him a protester.
On the matter of the Huffington Post, it's blocked in Iran as the government continues its efforts to stamp out the impact of the Internet. I'll bet there's a proxy for it somewhere...
Meanwhile, Iran blames Washington for the protests siting "Intolerable" meddling. They missed the mark; they should blame San Francisco, the capital of New Media.
Tuesday, May 26, 2009 will go down as an eventful San Francisco day, sunny, and yet dark, and one that saw a lot of people marginalized who didn’t want to be. But then, who does. Before I turn to who said what, and who got arrested, I stick my head right into the belly of the beast, the California Supreme Court’s decision.
Today, in first upholding Proposition 8, the voter-approved initiative to make same-sex marriage illegal that passed in November 2008, and yet protecting the 18,000 same-sex marriages that were done before the passage of the initiative, the California Supreme Court successfully stood logic on its head. I’ve just read the Court’s entire 167-page decision, and while I understand the reasons given by the majority of justices (six supporting the decision, one against it and even then the six judges that agreed were not perfect in their union) I’m concerned with the logic behind them.
To cut to the chase, the Court has placed the 18,000 same-sex marriages in a legally questionable second-class status of rights that, even though the Court claims to protect their rights under marriage, didn’t even consider if those rights would be maintained if the couples elect to divorce or remarry each other for the sake of the children they have.
First, even though I’ve read the full document, I encourage you to do so as well. Even if you think you can’t understand what’s there, challenge yourself, read it, talk about it with your friends. And most of all learn from it.
A Three-Pronged Decision
The California Supreme Court based its decision on three considerations, if the initiative was a constitutional amendment or revision, the validity of the initiative process itself, and if Proposition 8 itself is retroactive, applying to existing same-sex marriages.
In upholding Proposition 8, The California Supreme Court tried to get itself out of a legal pickle created in early 2008, when it protected same-sex marriages in a case called “The Marriages Cases”. To recap, the Court determined that marriage was not limited to a man and a woman.
But later in the same year, Californians passed Prop 8, which earned 52 percent of the vote. Then, California Attorney General Jerry Brown challenged Prop 8 in the California Supreme Court, most famously. (Brown used the observation that “natural law” was over the California Constitution, and since Prop 8 eliminated the rights of a group of Californians, it was in violation of the “unalienable rights” granted by the California Constitution and “natural law”. In today’s decision, The Court wrote that while Brown’s argument was creative, and I would add logical, it was “without merit.”)
And there we have the Court’s pickle: upholding their own decision protecting existing same sex marriages, and yet protecting the initiative process of which Proposition 8 is a part.
In the Decision the majority of judges argue that the initiative process itself is part of The California Constitution and thus can’t be considered something that alters and is outside of the California Constitution. Moreover, the Court writes that Proposition 8 itself is not a constitutional revision, but just an amendment. Why? Because the Court’s majority claims it only concerns marriage and doesn’t call for a large number of word additions or changes. The decision outlines a number of case examples where the Court’s decision backed the idea that an initiative was an amendment and not a revision to the California Constitution, as some of Prop 8’s attackers have claimed.
Finally, the Court majority asserts that even though the framers of Prop 8 may have intended otherwise, the way it was written itself prevents it from being retroactively applied. Thus, existing same sex marriages are upheld.
But here’s where the problem starts, even if one agrees with the other aspects of the majority’s decision. The Court writes “a retroactive application of the initiative would disrupt thousands of actions taken in reliance on The Marriages Cases by these same-sex couples, their employers, their creditors, and many others” (p. 134) and then goes on to mention that such would result in “undermining the ability of citizens to plan their lives according to the law as it has been determined by this state’s highest court.”
But I argue in upholding Prop 8 and existing same-sex marriages, the Court has placed the rights of the existing married couples in disarray and damaged the California Constitution in the process: it’s not for all Californians. If same-sex married couples chose to divorce, they can’t then marry someone else of the same sex, or remarry the same person even if it would be to the benefit of the family they established! There’s no evidence in the Court’s decision – and I looked for it - that this was taken into account.
The dissenting opinion by Justice Moreno focused on the stripping of rights to a minority group, but since the reality is that being gay or straight is really more fluid than fixed and the choice of the individual, the Court’s decision impacts a much broader group of the population and one that’s hard to quantify.
Peaceful Protests in San Francisco
The decision left a lot of people scratching their heads in and around San Francisco City Hall and the California Supreme Court building just next door. While a peaceful protest complete with pre-arranged arrests amassed on Van Ness Avenue between the City Hall and Davies Symphony Hall, a large press conference was held in the South Light Court in City Hall.
California Supreme Court There, many of the lawyers who worked to combat the passage of Prop 8 shared their observations with the audience. San Francisco City Attorney Dennis Herrera, who played a key role in the battle against Prop 8, said I’m disappointed... I think the Court in my view focused on procedure rather than arguments. And that fundamental rights are part of the debate.” He said it was back to the ballot box, a view shared by the Court itself in the decision issued today.
A Shameful Intellectual Display
The Court’s majority decision was shameful, to say the least. I told someone that people will develop an intellectual argument to support their raw emotions, and this California Supreme Court did just that. The Court’s emotional bent is to protect what was decided by it and by the voters in the initiative process rather than challenge it, even if such an alteration would protect the full state constitutional rights of all Californians.
Some conservatives have interpreted the California Supreme Court’s decision as the Court defining marriage as between “a man and a woman”, but that’s wrong. The Court is protecting the initiative called Proposition 8 which claims marriage is between a man and woman because it interprets the California Constitution as consisting of these constitutional amendments and the Court has stated that its job is to interpret the state constitution and that it’s not above it. That distinction is important because should voters pass a new initiative that overturns Prop 8, the Court would be legally inclined to protect it as well.
Oakland, CA - I went to my stepfather's burial place today. Even though I was really ill, I forced myself to go and place flowers at his grave site as I've made it a habit to visit him on Memorial Day each year. He fought in World War II.
But this time, I took my biological father's burial flag with me. Both my father and stepfather died in 2005.
To some who are anti-war, the title of this video-blog will upset them. It should not. I'm against war and always have been, but the reality of my life is that both my late father and stepfather fought in World War II, and in my father's case, Zenophon Abraham Sr. of is his name (he lives in Chicago), I am the proud owner of his neatly folded burial flag and two bullets wrapped in them. I've never unraveled it.
Chester Harding Yerger III of Oakland is my late stepfather and he often talked of his time in the service and of attending "Officer Candidate School", and being taught how to kill. While the stories were never ones I looked forward to, I learned that sometime people go to war not because they want to harm people but because they feel their duty to protect America. I used to question this "duty" but now I honor it, even as I disagree with the idea of war.
Why? I frankly can't explain the reason as well as I'd like to but I'll try. I think as I reach deep it's because I now know some people don't feel its their job or "place" to question authority, yet, those same people made it ok for me to question authority. That was my father and my stepfather, especially as they aged.
I think it's also because people who have taken the lives of another in a time of war generally have an appreciation for life that can't be measured. At times my stepfather would think back to the war and cry. That was hard to witness. My father never talked about the war, so I never asked him about it.
My dad talked about Chicago architecture, planes, trains, and automobiles. Not the war. It wasn't until he died and his funeral that I understood his role in the war; he received a 21-gun salute that October day in 2005 and I can feel the noise from the gun fire pass through me today.
It's those memories that cause me to thank a soldier when one is in my presence. I did that on a plane ride as I was standing next to a Army officer in uniform. I asked him where he was going and he responded "Home. And I'm so happy." I said "Hey, thanks for your service"; he said "I tell ya, I really appreciate that."
I got what he was saying. He was telling me, "You know, what we do isn't appreciated by a lot of people and believe me I understand why. But I'm glad you see that I'm carrying out my duty to my country, even if I may not agree with what we're doing all the time."
Thank a soldier today. Even though you may be anti-war, don't blame them for our foreign policies of the past or present. They're doing the best they can in an impossible situation.
Thank a soldier today, or any day. Even though you may be anti-war, don't blame them for our foreign policies of the past or present. They're doing the best they can in an impossible situation. They're serving our country and could die doing so.
Like other supporters, I received this email letter from U.S. Senator Barbara Boxer, but this one was pointed right at one of my favorite subjects: "Who should be Justice David Souter's replacement on the Supreme Court?"
After not much stewing on the matter, I would guess, Senator Boxer wants it officially known: President Obama's choice must be a woman and she's taking to the Internets to make it known. I still favor Kathleen Sullivan for the job so no harm there; this is what Senator Boxer wrote:
Dear Zenophon,
Women make up 51% of our nation's population.
Yet only 17% of the seats in Congress are held by women. Only 3% of corporate CEOs are women. And just one out of nine Supreme Court justices is a woman.
President Obama can change that.
Send an email to the White House now — and urge President Obama to nominate a woman to the U.S. Supreme Court!
Since Sandra Day O'Connor's retirement from the Supreme Court four years ago, Ruth Bader Ginsburg has been the sole female Justice.
Now, with Justice Souter's recent retirement announcement, President Obama has a chance to nominate an intelligent, well-qualified person to the Supreme Court — and I believe that person should be a woman.
We need a Supreme Court that is more representative of all Americans, so that its decisions better reflect the diversity of life experiences and points-of-view in America.
Send an email to the White House now — and urge President Obama to nominate a woman to the U.S. Supreme Court!
Many pundits have warned President Obama to make his choice based on merit — and I agree. In fact, there are many highly qualified women to choose from.
When 96 percent of all Supreme Court Justices throughout our history have been men, clearly it is evident that we need another woman on the Court.
Send an email to the White House now — and urge President Obama to nominate a woman to the U.S. Supreme Court!
When asked recently how it felt to be the only woman on the Supreme Court, Justice Ginsburg simply replied, "Lonely."
It's time to change that.
Thanks for your help.
In Friendship,
Barbara Boxer
U.S. Senator
Did you get that you're supposed to email President Obama?
I think its important to add that in a diverse society we must have a diverse Supreme Court that can make a contemporary set of laws rather than laws from another less diverse time in America. That written, we have the battle between Latinos, African Americans, women, and according to TIME Magazine's Mark Halperin, white men.
So what to do?
Obama should pick the person who has the best set of qualifications and I just can't see anyone better than Kathleen Sullivan. Period.
Last weekend's installment of "The Blog Report with Zennie62" features the 16th District Delegate Election that was held in Alameda in January. The show segment, which is shown here, covers the election process and why its important to the political future of the Democratic Party in the Bay Area.
But the real stars of the show are Oakland's young political activists who are bringing a new energy to the scene here. East Bay Young Democrats President Frieda Edgette, union leader Dan Rush, and Peralta Community College Trustee Abel Guillen are just some of the faces interviewed in the second Episode of "The Blog Report."
Personally, I think Frieda Edgette's the one to watch. The leader of the East Bay Young Dems and "MixitUp East Bay" has a unique combination of energy, intelligence, empathy and direction to rise to the level of congressional representative or senator, and I'm not writing anything here I've not personally told her. In fact, once Frieda learns to ignore the voices that say either directly or indirectly "she can't", she will.
I don't make that statement lightly. The Oakland / East Bay Area political establishment is not known for growing and mentoring future leaders; that happens by the next generation of voters elevating its own officials for the future. In Edgette's case she and others in her organization and many who were former Obama volunteers but not in the East Bay Young Dems have formed new groups of friends and other informal alliances that go out and do everything from raise money for causes to gain votes for delegate candidates like Edgette and Rush; both won the January election.
Take one look at the slate cards made by the organizations aligned with Senator Don Perata last year and one would be hard pressed to find a young political star in the group. Nothing against Senator Perata but it's a wake up call to him that there's a powerful anti-establishment wind blowing and people like Frieda are being carried by it. Perata should get on the right side of it.
In a video that's just plain fun to watch President Barack Obama hosts the National Champion University of Connecticut Women's Basketball Team at The White House and in an impromptu game of P-I-G, hits three straight shots from about 17 feet out.
What's so cool about President Obama is he's one of us,not the staid person that we've come to expect our leaders to be. He's a much needed breath of fresh air.
Yep, you read this right. According to AdAge.com Atlanta Falcons former quarterback Michael Vick is reportedly "in talks" to be a spokesperson for PETA. He's ready to do a series of ads for People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals when he's released from jail later in May. Vick wants to clean-up his image as a dog-killer and reenter society with the problems stemming from his dog fighting business a thing of the past.
You know, as silly as it reads and sounds, Vick may just be able to do it. It depends on the commercial and how it's done. If it comes off as Vick just proclaiming his love for dogs, I'm not so sure. (See my video) But if it's done as more of a documentary style, then yes. That would work.
Everyone deserves a second chance, and that's certainly true for Vick. But let's be honest, too. Michael Vick is very concerned he will not be able to achieve the lifestyle he once enjoyed again. He wants the bling. He also wants to play football and knows that's the only way he's going to have even a snowballs' chance in the hell he's created for himself to do that.
I root for Vick because I met him at a 1999 EA Sports Super Bowl party in Atlanta and when Vick was still in college but a star, and I was really shocked at how much a fish-out-of-water he seemed to be. I really believe he surrounded himself with the wrong kind of people at a very young age and didn't know any better.
Now he does, but what a price he's paid over the last two years.
It has been an honor to have served for thirteen years as Chairman of the most incredible state Democratic Party in the nation. Together we have made great strides in improving our Party by registering voters with the Bounty program, by grassroots activists opening up offices and creating a sense of community and service to many, and by electing Democrats to the Assembly, Senate and Congress who are protecting the values we all cherish in our state.
Our Party has also embraced our young people and they have joined with us as never before, creating a new generation of Democratic voters and activists. We have elected the first woman Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi of California -- one of the highest offices in our country. And of course, California proudly provided a strong margin of victory to elect President Barak Obama.
We are all proud of what President Obama has accomplished during his first 100 days, giving our nation strong initiatives to renew and reinvest in our economy and improve the quality of our lives in the most difficult of times. He is a President who will provide great leadership for our country and our world.
Since 2004, we have added six blue counties with the help of dedicated folks in Alpine, Stanislaus, San Bernardino, San Diego, San Joaquin, and Ventura. We also increased our numbers in Orange County to nearly 34% Democratic registration. These are not small achievements! This is the result of a huge amount of hard work by very dedicated Democrats.
In short, I leave the new Chair and Party leadership a healthy Democratic Party, both politically and financially, as I move to another chapter in my life -- the Vice Chairmanship of the Independent Citizens Oversight Committee of the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM), which was created by the voters as Proposition 71 in 2004.
As a colon cancer survivor, I will also be a patient advocate for CIRM in my new role. I join a team of dedicated scientists and policy makers to help raise the more than $400 million needed to fund the research necessary to target diseases that have plagued so many California families. Every day I spend at CIRM headquarters, I sense the excitement of a field of science moving forward rapidly, in fact more rapidly than anyone on the science staff there imagined possible even a couple years ago. When CIRM adopted a scientific strategic plan in October 2006 the scientists there envisioned reaching a stage this year where they could fund “disease teams” that would combine basic researchers and clinicians to work together to develop a therapy ready for clinical trials three-to-four years from now.
In 2006 they predicted funding one or two such teams that would be ready for this challenge today. But when the initial grant applications for the Disease Team Awards were counted a couple weeks ago, there were 73 of them. That is 73 California research teams that think they can get a stem-cell based therapy ready for clinical trials within four years. These teams are targeting a broad array of diseases from osteoarthritis and blindness to cancer and a host of neurodegenerative diseases. Only a subset of these applications will make it through CRIM’s rigorous grant review process, which strives to bet on only the very best science in which to make California’s investment, but no matter the outcome of the grant reviews, this represents a tremendous acceleration toward reaching the promise of stem cells.
The California research community has been able to get to this point in large part because of three years of sustained funding from CIRM. Since the agency issued its first training grants in April of 2006 it has been able to provide consistent support for its new cadre of stem cell researchers. All the scientists I talk to tell me that this type of sustained funding is what science requires to get the results that create new therapies and even cures and, in turn, the jobs that the fast growing biotech industry will provide for Californians. CIRM’s ability to continue this sustained funding is linked to the budgetary health of the state and the state’s ability to issue bonds that support CIRM’s work. So the health and well being of patients in California – and around the world – is one more thing to keep in mind as we vote on the budget initiatives May 19.
This letter is not a goodbye for me, but rather a fulfillment of new path ahead – as we all continue to make a difference in the lives of Californians.
God speed my fellow Democrats!
Sincerely,
Art Torres
Sen. Art Torres (Ret.)
Chairman, California Democratic Party
Warning. If you're conservative, you're not going to like this post, ok? But the fact is President Barack Obama was correct in his act of bowing to Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah. It's called - drumroll please - the right protocol. What it does reflect, is the end of American Machismo in foreign affairs. You know what I mean. The desire to show we're better than someone else, (because they're different) which could be thought of as a kind of racism since the basic idea is to put someone down because of their race. President Obama is a breath of fresh air here. He seeks to make partnerships around the World, not line up new candidates for industrial exploitation.
Conservatives are upset because many it seems want Obama to show America as tough. OK. That got us September 11th 2001, or what we call "9-11." Yes, much of our foreign relations have been tied to America showing its military or economic muscle over the decades, but now the era of Pax Americana is over. We have to use another approach. It's called diplomacy. But the general, accepted rule is Royalty outranks heads of state. The idea is a President is only such for a few years, but Kings and Queens are that for life.
Obama not only did the right thing, even if his press secretary is trying to make it go away, but Obama signaled a major shift from how America has dealt with the Arab world, and he did it at the right time. We need to have a better image around the World.
Also, bowing is considered a move of affection in East Asia and Obama was expressing just that. What masks an appreciation of Obama's act is simple, pure, American ignorance. The xenophobic idea that one who's of the USA doesn't need to know about another country or its customs, but that everyone should know about ours. It explains why so many of us don't know another language let alone english, or embrace the themes of other cultures. Here, the San Francisco Bay Area is different from America (come to think of it, so is Manhattan and Seattle and LA, and Miami). We don't have that problem to as great a degree as in, say South Carolina, and at least in what I call the "Inner Bay Area", which is between the Pacific Ocean and the Hayward Fault line.
But other parts of America need a whole sale intellectual cleanup. And yes, we have a lot of appologizing to do around the World because we've screwed up so much of late -- that's what created 9-11. Remember our ill-advised President Clinton-directed 1993 Somalian incursion under the idea of a humanitarian mission, when it was really an occupation? It was Osama Bin Ladin's group that got us out of there. And successful, they were emboldened to consider an attack on America which led to 9-11.
The Chicago Sun Times ran a shameful opinion piece on this matter and Sun Times Columnist Steve Hunley wrote a column that represents the macho, non-thinking American more concerned with being tough than being smart. I just hope he's not that way.
Frankly, Rambo was a dumb movie and an even dumber idea. Best to leave him where he belongs -- in the past.
From Digg.com"Reporting from Istanbul, Turkey, and Ankara, Turkey -- When President Obama declared Monday that the United States "is not, and will never be, at war with Islam," he was addressing Turkey's parliament. But his audience was the wider Muslim world.
The president's ringing affirmation of partnership with Turkey, which he described as a vital bridge between East and West, was interwoven with a highly personal appeal for a change in the tone of discourse between the United States and the world's Muslims."
The above headline will catch you by surprise, but the wind is blowing in that way. The point is that several people behind the scenes, in touch with the ownership group, and around the Bay Area are talking about how Oakland Athletics Managing Partner Lew Wolff has, as one person put it "blown $20 million" on the effort to find a new home for the Oakland Athletics. Another contact told me one would be "fired" if they lost even $8 million on such a development project so early into the process.
But the concensus for now is to let Wolff continue to do his work, but he's on a short leach. The main problem is Wolff fell in love with the "baseball village" concept, where the ownership has to buy a lot of land not just for a baseball stadium but for residential development in the hope that the improved land sells for more than the group bought it for. That works in a credit-health, prosperous economy, but in today's recessionary and deflationary world its a terrible strategy.
And there's where a lot of the money was lost; in land acquisition. As has been reported, Wolff was not-so-quietly buying land in Fremont with the idea of implementing the village strategy. But now, with the credit crunch that blew up in his face. I explained to the other member of the A's ownership team Don Fisher not too long ago (at a party) that such a move was risky because of the economic bet, but hey, no one listens to me except Alameda County Supervisor Nate Miley.
Maybe that will change.
Perhaps in calling Mayor Dellums for a meeting, Wolff has seen the light of a possible new approach involving redevelopment funds and whatever stimulus money can be gotten from the federal government. It's a better gambit now than it was even a year ago, when the word "stimulus" wasn't in the American lexicon.
When I use the term "rumor" in this case, it's not to be taken as something I "overheard"; this possible letting go of Wolff was told to me by two different sources, which I will not reveal, but frankly do want the news out there. So am I saying "the knifes are out"? Yes. They are. And they're sharp ones.
People in the A's organization will wonder who the person's are, but the unfortunate fact is I talk to a lot of people, even folks there. Zeroing in on who it is? Impossible.
Wolff's on notice. Perform and stop losing money. Or else. Of course, now that Major League Baseball's committee on the need for a new A's stadium is in place, it could be said that Wolff's college buddy Commissioner Bud Selig saved him from almost certain doom.
Washington, D.C. – U.S. Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA) today sent the following letter to Major League Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig:
March 31, 2009
Allan H. (Bud) Selig, Commissioner
Major League Baseball
245 Park Avenue, 31st Floor
New York, NY 10167
Dear Commissioner Selig:
I appreciate the announcement you made yesterday that you are forming a committee to review the various proposals regarding the future of the Oakland Athletics. As your committee does its work, I urge you to do everything possible to keep the team in Oakland.
As you may know, Oakland has recently gone through some difficult times and families there deserve some good news. As someone who splits her time between Washington, DC, southern California and Oakland’s Jack London Square neighborhood, I have seen first hand that Oakland is teeming with new young families and major developments that present endless possibilities. My children learned to love baseball through the Oakland A's and our family was so fortunate to develop that common bond. We must give a new generation of families that same chance.
Oakland is witnessing a downtown renaissance, with new residences, restaurants, art galleries and entertainment venues opening weekly. Two new office towers are in development and the Port of Oakland recently announced a private investment of close to $1 billion. Major League Baseball can play a key role in continuing this momentum by working to keep the A's in Oakland.
Through their rich history and shared experiences, the identities of the City of Oakland and the Athletics are forever linked. For more than 40 years, the people of Oakland have backed the Athletics during good times and bad. In the 1970s, Oakland celebrated the Athletics' glorious run of three consecutive World Series victories. And, together, the city of Oakland and the Athletics mourned the devastation caused by the Loma Prieta earthquake that took place during the team's 1989 championship run.
Now that the team has ended its consideration of Fremont as a possible home, the time is right to renew the focus on keeping the Athletics in Oakland.
It is critical that Major League Baseball and the A's ownership do everything possible to keep the A's in Oakland and I stand ready to help in any way possible, including attending and setting up meetings for you and the Committee. Please do not hesitate to call me at 202-XXX-XXXX to discuss this issue.
more at SFgate.com GM's CEO Rick Wagoner is reported to step down effective this week, as President Barack Obama -- according to sources -- is giving GM just two months to get its' act together and restructure.
One of the ways GM's reported to do this is the Chevy Volt, the electric car. But other than the Volt, there's no "wow" car GM can point to signaling a turn-around in their direction.
On May 19th Alameda residents will be able to assure the economic future of the City of Alameda by voting for the Alameda Point Development Plan for the redevelopment of Alameda Naval Air Station as planned by the Alameda Base Reuse Committee and its subsequent evolutions to the Alameda Reuse and Redevelopment Commission of today.
The plan consists of a mix of uses and an ambitious plan adding over 4,000 much-needed housing units.
But the most important fact is the plan will mark the begining of the replacement economic development we have worked to achieve for so long.
Opponents point to Measure A as the reason why the plan should be defeated, but the fact is Measure A was passed in 1973 and represents a time when Alamedans were interested in restricting development and maintaining Alameda from people of color.
Those days are long gone.
Now, Alameda needs jobs and the region wants to see The City of Alameda have an economic development project that replaces the closed Naval Air Station. This is that project.
More from Washington Whispers: “She said she was done and would not return to the media. But that didn't stop California's first lady and former NBC journo Maria Shriver from dipping her toes back in recently when it involved a topic she cared intimately about. Shriver produced a new HBO documentary series, The Alzheimer's Project, which includes four longer films and 15 short ones detailing different aspects of the disease. She also appears in one, Grandpa, Do You Know Who I Am? based on a book she wrote several years ago. For Shriver, Alzheimer's is personal. Her dad, Sargent Shriver, is suffering from the disease.”
