Leno celebrates tough winLime on Market Street near Castro was crowded with Mark Leno supporters when the candidate took the microphone just before midnight. He had already taken the concession calls from Carole Migden and Joe Nation and was primed to celebrate his victory over an incumbent senator, whom Leno supporter Bevan Dufty had just taken a couple subtle digs at as he introduced Leno, suggesting that Migden didn't listen to her constituents or play by the rules.
Leno then gave a speech that demonstrated the unique package of issues, enemies and allies that he has turned into a winning coalition. "Tom Ammiano, it's gonna be a helluva lot of fun serving with you," Leno said of the man who will succeed him with his endorsement. "I just heard Prop. E passed," Leno continued, referencing the measure that will submit the mayor's SFPUC appointments to Board of Supervisors approval. "As an early supporter, I was happy to see that." That stand was already a hopeful sign of his independence from Mayor Gavin Newsom and PG&E, but then he really went after the company, which had funded a hit piece mailer by a group calling itself Californians to Protect Children, trotting out some old sleaze about Leno being soft on pedophiles because he resisted right wing efforts to capitalize on crime fears.
"When you attack one gay man like this, you attack all gay men," Leno said. "All gay men should be outraged with PG&E tonight." He thanked Dennis Kelly of United Educators of San Francisco for giving his campaign early credibility. Then Leno returned to the LGBT community, promising to heal the rift his challenge of Migden opened by leading the fight against the fall ballot measure that would ban same sex marriage. "I invite you to join together to defeat the religious right," Leno said.
He then thanked a long list of leaders who endorsed him, from Mayor Gavin Newsom and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to District Attorney Kamala Harris and former SFPUC director Susan Leal to members of the late night entertainment community, which rallied for Leno with signs on nightclubs all over town. And then he thanked his campaign consultants, the downtown darlings BMWL, affectionately naming a list of people from there and saying of the campaign they created: "It was clean, it was smart, it was effective."
And Leno's final name check was to the presidential candidate he supports, who also had a good night: "The winds of change are blowing tonight. Let me congratulate Barack Obama on his victory."
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Comments (9)
Steve, maybe it's just late and I'm getting delirious ... but I don't recall introducing Mark Leno at tonight's party. At least not formally. I wasn't up on stage giving him an intro. Very strange. What the hell are you referring to?
Posted by Paul Hogarth | June 4, 2008 03:31 AM
Here's an abbreviated version of Newsom's argument against Prop. F in the voter handbook:
Chris Daly .... playing politics ... Chris Daly .... Chris Daly ... playing politics ... playing politics ... Chris Daly ... politics ... taking politics out of good government ... Chris Daly ... Chris Daly ... Chris Daly ... politics ... playing politics ... if you don't like playing politics, then vote No on F.
Posted by expatriate | June 4, 2008 07:14 AM
Bevan Dufty introduced Mark Leno, referencing the rules.
Posted by O | June 4, 2008 10:03 AM
I was thinking of a good, albeit small, way of raising taxes while also scaring Ichabod's office into not cutting the budget for essential services (i.e. homeless programs, AIDs programs, affordable housing programs, etc.):
The budget for essential services (like the ones mentioned above) should be earmarked for protection and every time the budget for such programs is cut, the personal income of the people directly in charge of cutting the budget for these services (i.e. Ichabod and his over-payed cronies) should take a hefty cut in pay. In turn, the money generated by this cuts in pay would be immediately diverted to funding these earmarked programs.
Posted by expatriate | June 4, 2008 11:55 AM
Confusing Bevan Dufty and Paul Hogarth. I love it!
Posted by be_devine | June 4, 2008 03:57 PM
My bad, sorry all. I couldn't see very well from where I was, but I'll correct the post.
Posted by Steven T. Jones | June 4, 2008 07:08 PM
If the budget were protected against this annual ritual of service cuts, where nonprofits swarm on the budget committee while most San Franciscans are at work, then we might actually have a discussion about the budget independent of the funding needs of any nonprofit.
Not that nonprofit services are not important, but they do not directly serve a majority of San Franciscans. And nonprofits, the product of struggles from decades past, are tied to the CIty economically and, like unions, have a finite dollar amount buy out point. It is this imperative to fold which keeps the swells, moderate electeds, and their patrons in power.
Neither the electeds, unions or nonprofits would cotton to a budget process where all San Franciscans who are not normally at the table--the non-rich---so we are relegated to this annual ritual and remain structurally constrained with deficient city services/
-marc
Posted by marc salomon | June 6, 2008 07:05 AM
I thought of a way to combat crime and ensure police accountability:
Why not tie police pay and benefits to the homicide rate and how closely they follow the rules regarding the beat-walking program. I think that the beauty of this is that it wouldn't make the Supervisors (Ichabod certainly wouldn't try to push a program like this) look bad or that they are somehow sacrificing a sacred cow. People are fed up with crime and this would be aimed at the police in a way where they can't play the victim (as they usually do whenever they are looking for an increase in pay and benefits) and argue that decreasing police pay would increase crime.
Posted by expatriate | June 6, 2008 05:48 PM
Uh, expatriate, the POA MOU came up last year. It was known for some time in advance. The progressive supervisors were aware of this. Yet none of them managed to take the steps required to get a better MOU where they could have. Ross called a hearing and gave it a once over. But at the end of the day, only Chris voted the right way.
There are ten supervisors and one Mayor who are responsible for authorizing a loss-leader raise for cops who are not doing the job we need them to do, but find the resources to harass San Franciscans seemingly at will. Heather Fong should not be taking a fall for a firearms training violation, rather Fong should be disciplined for sitting by while her command staff are taking orders from the POA.
We are locked into this contract for 3 more years. Will the sitting supervisors in the spring of 2011 have the guts to get involved and participate in negotiating for a change rather than sitting aside passively while the biggest gang in town bum rushes the public coffers while not correlating their enforcement priorities to demonstrated criminal public health threats?
We treat our public employees very well. But this city is not a jobs program, it is a service delivery operation.
-marc
Posted by marc salomon | June 6, 2008 06:33 PM