Ed Lee gets frisky

06.28.12 - 2:50 pm | Tim Redmond |

(33)

I knew Mayor Ed Lee was going to be more friendly to developers that I would have liked, and I knew he'd be a tough sell on new taxes, but I didn't expect to see him talking about a program that has racial profiling and civil liberties issues written all over it.

Yeah, we could find some weapons if we simply gave up all rights to privacy. Yeah, if we put a metal detector on Market Street and strip-searched everyone who passed by we'd find some contraband. But seriously -- I don't think even my crazy trolls think this is a good idea.

Comments

I may not be your craziest troll (not that you don't deserve

some) but I'm very comfortable with extra police powers. Search me any time, any where, and you won;t find jack crap. So why should I fear that?

But if even a few illegal guns and drugs are seized, a few felons put away, and the odd terrorist or illegal arrested, then why would any law-abiding citizen object to that?

Posted by Guest on Jun. 28, 2012 @ 3:03 pm

Yes, you've said that before

and I've said that you're lying.

Until you agree to weekly blood and urinalysis tests and allow me to install cameras in every room of your home and your car - as well as your work - I believe you have something to hide. If you don't you have something to hide and are not a criminal then you need to agree to let me watch you at any given moment of the day. You could also go a long way towards proving you're really innocent of wrongdoing if you add in weekly polygraphs along with alpha-brain wave scans too.

Until you give up every single iota of your privacy I don't believe you are anywhere close to a "law abiding citizen."

Posted by Troll II on Jun. 28, 2012 @ 3:17 pm

Lee isn't proposing any of the "powers" you describe.

You are employing the same kind of "slippery slope argument" that opponents of gay marriage employ when they say that allowing gays to marry will mean that midget transexual threesomes will be able to marry small animals and domestic appliances.

Posted by Guest on Jun. 28, 2012 @ 3:30 pm

Why are you afraid?

You've said you have nothing to hide. I'm asking you to prove that. It's very simple - if you're law-abiding then you have nothing to fear.

Posted by Troll II on Jun. 28, 2012 @ 3:43 pm

T2, I'm fine with reasonable search, which is what Lee wants.

I'm not fine with unreasonable search.

You're the one bothered by this, not me. Deal.

Posted by Guest on Jun. 28, 2012 @ 4:21 pm

It's not unreasonable to think you're hiding something

I'd like you to prove you're not. That's all.

Posted by Troll II on Jun. 28, 2012 @ 4:42 pm

The proof was already given - I am happy to comply with Lee's

new rules. If someone else is not, then chances are they're hiding something that I am not.

Posted by Guest on Jun. 28, 2012 @ 4:52 pm

Yeah, Mayor's off his rocker on this one

Between likely racial profiling and basic "due process" concerns, this idea seems like a real stinker. But Chief Suhr (aka The Thing) is clear-eyed and articulate as ever. I love it when the police chief argues against martial law.

One has to wonder what's going on in Room 200 the past week. First, the mayor literally laid the "wife beater" rhetorical trick on Mirkarimi. Slimy, unnecessary and so obtuse it actually made the case for those who think this is a witch hunt.

Now, in Nevius today, this whopper is quoted to him: "They've said for years, 'Get us a job,' " Lee said. "But it's not as simple as that. Are these guys going to talk to a Chinese mayor about getting a job? I don't think so."

Huh?? Did the Thoughtful Person on his staff go on vacation or something? I'm serious.

Note to his honor, you're no longer a bureaucrat. You're the elected leader of our city. That means you have to be practical AND inspirational. You've gotten the practical thing down. Now stretch a little. Give 'em hope. That means all of us.

Posted by Becky Bayside on Jun. 28, 2012 @ 3:59 pm

No, Becky, I'm very comfortable with Lee so far.

He was right on Mrik, right on Twitter, right on 8Wash, right on reasonable search, right on most things because, as a moderate, he reflects the views of the average SF'er.

Posted by Guest on Jun. 28, 2012 @ 4:23 pm

That's my point, he has been right on most things

But this stop and frisk business is a few steps too far and his new tough talk is a turn off. Just because you've been hitting the mark doesn't mean you double down on everything. In my experience, it's the folks with a few win under their belts who start overreaching...

Posted by Becky Bayside on Jun. 29, 2012 @ 12:14 pm

not

not

Posted by Guest on Jul. 03, 2012 @ 1:25 pm

Wow, "Guest" such a powerful counter-argument.

"Not"?

If only I'd thought of that killer refutation.

Posted by Guest on Jul. 03, 2012 @ 2:10 pm

Ed Lee is being directed to

Ed Lee is being directed to put this forth by his conservative patrons as a diversion to rile up the usual suspects, distracting them into a tizzy while he gives away more public resources to the 1%. They will fall for it.

Posted by marcos on Jun. 28, 2012 @ 8:18 pm

Ed Lee is frisky alright. At

Ed Lee is frisky alright.

At the ethics hearing Lee's attorney is pounding Mirkarimi demanding who is conducting the witch hunt.

I'd love to introduce Rose Pak's statement that "politics is a blood sport" into a legal forum. Even call her as a witness to ask under oath what she meant.

By the admission of the Mayor's own close advisors, they feel politics is a "blood sport" - a big heads up what to expect and indeed what is happening.

"POLITICS IS A BLOOD SPORT."

WTF????

Posted by Guest on Jun. 29, 2012 @ 9:36 am

Rose Pak declared their

Rose Pak declared their intent to conduct politics like a "blood sport."

Which is just what they are doing.

Posted by Guest on Jun. 29, 2012 @ 9:38 am

If someone with ties to a

If someone with ties to a single party authoritarian foreign government with nuclear missiles pointed at you and a huge intelligence apparatus and a massive cyberwar unit operating against you says she believes she is engaged in a "blood sport" hell yeah its great to have the sheriff on your side.

Posted by Guest on Jun. 29, 2012 @ 9:42 am

Not only does Pak have ties

Not only does Pak have ties to China, she apparently is a citizen of China.

Posted by marcos on Jun. 29, 2012 @ 9:54 am

It was the honorable thing to

It was the honorable thing to stay and fight.

Resigning would have been the dishonorable thing to do.

Easy answer....

The dishonorable thing to do is overcharge and exaggerate and basically lie and use your "discretion to charge" to attack political enemies and protect political friends in your "blood sport."

Posted by Guest on Jun. 29, 2012 @ 10:11 am

Media strategy my a$$. That

Media strategy my a$$. That sounds like Phil Bronstein talk....

Posted by Guest on Jun. 29, 2012 @ 10:13 am

Ask the Mayor the describe

Ask the Mayor the describe his converstions with Phil Bronstein.

Posted by Guest on Jun. 29, 2012 @ 10:14 am

I think lots of people are

I think lots of people are interested in the Mayor's strategy of portraying the Sheriff as a "wife beater."

Posted by Guest on Jun. 29, 2012 @ 10:22 am

If the shoe fits . . .

Wear it.

Posted by Guest on Jun. 29, 2012 @ 12:28 pm

Rose Pak was an Illegal

Rose Pak was an Illegal Alien, apparently, and it seems that Willie Brown helped her to "smooth matters over," by working his connections to get her legal residency. Nice work if you can get it.

Posted by marcos on Jun. 29, 2012 @ 10:30 am

Ha ha ha the mayor just spent

Ha ha ha the mayor just spent 20 minutes using deliberative process objections to avoid answering who he talked to.

Posted by Guest on Jun. 29, 2012 @ 2:35 pm

You mean like Bill Clinton did with MonicaGate?

The irony is that Lee is probably more left-wing than Clinton.

Posted by Guest on Jun. 30, 2012 @ 2:33 pm

Never underestimate the crazy trolls

I am dumbfounded that anyone in San Francisco would take a program that has proved to be a disasterous failure in New York, and bring it here. I wonder what the thought processes involved in that one were. "hmmm... there were more stop-and-frisks of black men last year in New York than the whole population of black men in New York. Only a tiny percentage of them were ever arrested for anything. Crime has not gone down as a result, but the whole community feels like it's living under martial law and there are massive protests.... oh yeah! That sounds like a GREAT idea to me!"

Maybe some of the same trolls writing on this forum are advising the mayor.

Posted by Greg on Jun. 30, 2012 @ 1:57 pm

You frisk the people statistically most likely to commit crimes.

Frisking white women in Marin over the age of 60 won't net you a lot of criminals.

Posted by Guest on Jun. 30, 2012 @ 2:34 pm

Fully support Stop and Frisk.

Why?

It saves lives - lives of people who don't have a voice in our politics.

Posted by Guest on Jun. 30, 2012 @ 4:36 pm

Opposing "Stop and Frisk" is essentially rejecting any

correlations that LE perceives in how different classes of people commit crimes, and instead replaces probabilistic searches with random searches, which makes all of us less safe.

Call me old fashioned but I believe that the rights of victims of crime are more important than the rights of those who disregard the law.

Posted by Guest on Jun. 30, 2012 @ 4:55 pm

Those "probabalistic searches" in New York

didn't find any contraband on something like 88% of those searched. They did, however, terrorize 100% of those searched.

And of the 12% of those searches that yielded "contraband," if you take out stupid shit like marijuana that doesn't threaten anyone, that probably leaves a miniscule number of searches that actually resulted in taking someone dangerous off the street.

If we were to take a look at the program based on the evidence, rather than through ideological lenses, questions that one might legitimately ask then, might include:
-If they randomly searched white people, would they find more or less than 12% of the people carrying some sort of loosely defined "contraband?"
-Is it worth terrorizing an entire city in order to take a few criminals off the streets?
-Might they have even more success taking dangerous people off the streets, if they spent their time actually solving unsolved crimes, rather than conducting racially motivated stops of innocent citizens?

Posted by Greg on Jun. 30, 2012 @ 8:41 pm

Like poor African Americans?

Poor African Americans don't have a voice in our politics. But if their lives are being saved, then why did thousands of them march in New York to say, "Please don't save our lives this way."?

Posted by Greg on Jun. 30, 2012 @ 8:32 pm

Of course they have a voice.

They just choose not to use it

Posted by Guest on Jul. 02, 2012 @ 11:14 am

the US Constitution was suspended

The US Constitution has been suspended for some time.

We are living in a corporate police state.

Senators Feinstein and Boxer both voted to allow the Government to arrest and detain American citizens indefinatly without due process and Obama signed the law. Obama's administration justified the murder of an American citizen without due process. obama is just another shade of Bush.

Any one of us could just disappear!

There is talk about drones flying the skies of America keeping tabs on Americans.

And the Bay Guardian has endorsed these corporate owned and operated politicians!!!!

And many you have voted for these corporate puppets.

The fix is in!

what u gonna do about it?

Continue not voting or voting for the corporate (1%ers) selected/approved Republican and Democrat candidates and get screwed again?

Look at the ballot, there are candidates on the ballot that the media (including the Guardian) tells you very little if anything about, who might represent the peoples' (the 99%er) interest.

Posted by sf T party on Jul. 02, 2012 @ 9:57 am