Wow, there's a tough stand The best quote of the week, by far, comes from Rennie O'Brien, the chiropractor who is running for supervisor in District Seven. After telling the Bay Guardian that he wants to completely eliminate school desegregation and require all kids to attend their neighborhood schools, and that he supports higher housing density (but not in District Seven), the talk turned to Mayor Gavin Newsom's push for same-sex marriages. O'Brien said that while he personally supports same-sex marriage, he thinks most of his district doesn't and that the move had "cooked Newsom's goose" there. So we asked him how he would have responded if he'd been in office at the time. Would he have spoken out in support of Newsom? He paused for a moment. "I think," he finally said, "I would have been very quiet." (Tim Redmond)

Politics vs. the kids The divide on San Francisco's school board is shaping the November race for four seats on the board, with challengers already lining up with one faction or the other. The majority flank, which tends to support Superintendent Arlene Ackerman, is endorsing its veteran leader Jill Wynns, recent Gavin Newsom appointee Heather Hiles, and David Weiner, the principal of Alvarado Elementary School. The other side, which is more critical of the way the superintendent makes decisions, is focusing on reelecting Mark Sanchez and Eric Mar but also touting newcomer Jane Kim and, to a lesser extent, James Calloway and Norman Yee, who've been on the local education scene for decades.

In endorsement interviews with the Bay Guardian, all the challengers played down their allegiances and emphasized how they could help break up the gridlock on the board, where the tensions run so high that you can accurately predict a resolution's fate based on the author's name. "The school board has become black-and-white," Weiner said. "I've joked that Mark Sanchez could come up with the one way that you could totally change public education and it would never be listened to – because of the way it's set up."

It's a frustrating situation, particularly because the incumbents, by their own admission, share the same basic interest in educational equity. But a couple candidates had a strange way of talking about the divide: they promised they would focus not on "politics" but on "what's good for kids."

Hiles, for instance, listed a number of times when she disagreed with the board's other flank and then summarized, "They don't care about that stuff because they're just trying to make a political point." Later she said, "I think it's important that you get more people who are putting children ahead of politics on the board."

It's hardly the first time we've seen "politics" turned into a dirty word – it's commonly used disparagingly on the national campaign scene. But it made us wonder: when did the term become inherently anti-kid in San Francisco, an unabashedly political town? It's shorthand for many things these days, including, it seems, "personal strife," "something I disagree with," even "immaturity."

We don't dispute that these things are at play on the school board. But the politics-versus-the-kids dichotomy is a false one. History is full of examples of pro-kid policies with very political roots. (Head Start, anyone? The Children's Amendment?) Criticism of federal education policy is frequently political. We'd even argue that an elected official should weigh political concerns.

After all, that's what Wynns, Mar, and Sanchez did a few years back when they had some very serious (and now clearly prescient) objections to having school privatizer Edison Schools involved with the district.

And come to think of it, at the time they were slammed for putting "ideology" before "what's good for the kids." (Tali Woodward)

Liar, liar If you had only George W. Bush's televised convention speech and the suspiciously frequent camera pans of nonwhite people to go on, you'd think everyone was invited to the Grand Old Party. You might also suppose Bush has been a competent and effective leader these past four years.

Let's recap some of the things we saw at the convention. There was Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who gave Bush a ringing endorsement – omitting the fact that Bush has totally ignored California's multibillion-dollar losses from the energy crisis. There were some gay Republicans – despite the fact that the party platform explicitly opposes recognizing their relationships in any way whatsoever. And there were loyal members of the military, standing by the man who cut their overtime pay and extended their service repeatedly

About the rationale Bush gave for the war in Iraq ... well, that wasn't directly addressed at the convention. But if you're still wondering what happened to those weapons of mass destruction, you might want to consult with the Pants on Fire-mobile, which was stationed in New York last week following a three-month tour of swing states around the country.

By far the most creative expression of dissent (as far as this writer is concerned), the Pants on Fire-mobile is a 12-foot-tall Bush statue with "flames" shooting out of its butt, mounted on a flatbed and towed around town by a 1997 white Ford Crown Victoria. At the rear is a telling precaution: "Don't get burned again." For more information go to www.pantsonfire.net. (Matthew Hirsch)

Talk about unholy alliances We spotted a pickup truck parked on Mission Street Sept. 3 with a big "Renee Saucedo for Supervisor" sign in the back. No surprise there – Saucedo, a Green Party member running in District Nine, has plenty of support in the Mission District. But there were also several posters on the side of the truck supporting a candidate in District Seven who has slightly, well, different politics. They read, "Corrales against the machine."

Huh? Someone supports Saucedo, who has made a career of clashing with the cops in the Mission, and Mission precinct Capt. Greg Corrales, who has made a career of being a tough (some would say thuggish) cop? Who owns that truck, anyway? (Redmond)