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Politics Blog

Do falling jobless numbers mean we're smart and focused, or rich and exclusive?

05.17.13 - 3:12 pm | Steven T. Jones |
(73)

The unemployment rate continues to drop in San Francisco and all over California, according to new numbers released today by the California Employment Development Department, which were trumpeted by Mayor Ed Lee as vindication for his economic development policies.Read more »

Forget Bay to Breakers -- it's time for a Thong Parade!

05.17.13 - 2:38 pm | Marke B. |
(39)

Well, OK -- if you're a nudist you'll probably be doing Bay to Breakers on Sunday. It's one of the few sanctioned city events you're allowed to attend in your birthday suit.

On Saturday, however, in order to draw attention to the absurdity of banning nudity in the city while still keeping it legal on its most crowded and family friendly days, the organizers of "Bare as You Dare: Thong Parade" are encouraging people to don their best mankini or panties and join them at Jane Warner Plaza in the Castro, noon-2pm tomorrow, Sat/18. "Come hang out with us!" Press release after the jump:

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Can't a guy even smoke crack in peace any more?

05.17.13 - 2:24 pm | Tim Redmond |
(7)

Okay: Yes, it's really funny that the mayor of Toronto, who is an odd guy at best, was apparently caught on a cell-phone video sucking on a crack pipe. Insert jokes here. Go ahead.Read more »

The Ro Khanna party

05.17.13 - 11:11 am | Tim Redmond |
(17)

When Ro Khanna, a young, energetic intellectual property lawyer, ran for Congress against Tom Lantos, he was the candidate of the progressives. I liked Khanna, and appreciated his willingness to take on the almost unheard-of task of challenging a longtime incumbent in a Democratic primary. At that point, in 2004, the big issues were the war and the PATRIOT Act, and Khanna was against both. Read more »

The "Do Nothing" Solution to "Illegal Immigration"

05.17.13 - 11:06 am | Johnny Angel Wendell |
(109)

Both sides of the political aisle have made a major issue out of the problem of the 11 million people inside the US illegally or presently undocumented. The president has said this is a priority and Florida senator Marco Rubio has agreed. Read more »

“Privacy? Screw that.”

05.17.13 - 9:45 am | Rebecca Bowe |
(8)

At a party the other night, somebody convinced me to try out Google Glass. I let curiosity get the better of me, succumbed to peer pressure, and put the frames on my face for a few seconds.Read more »

Is Larkin Street Youth Services using public funds to fight a union organizing drive?

05.16.13 - 12:03 pm | Steven T. Jones |
(55)

Larkin Street Youth Services does great and important social work with homeless youth in San Francisco, for which it receives generous support from city taxpayers, as well as federal grants. That’s why its employees and some prominent local officials are questioning the organization’s aggressive, deceptive, and anti-union resistance to the request by a majority of its 88 employees to be represented by Service Employees International Union Local 1021.Read more »

Cryin' wolf

05.16.13 - 10:56 am | Johnny Angel Wendell |
(127)

This has been a wretched stretch of brutal press for Barack Obama lately. Battered over and over by revelations of IRS malfeasance, aggressive assaults on press freedom at the AP and Benghazi ad infinitum, the hits keep on coming, amplified by the dual forces of the "Conservative Entertainment Complex" (as exemplified by this great pundit) and a "liberal media" that has realized that Internet hits are their most likely saving grace and revenue stream. It has reached such fevered pitch that the media is making a chilling analogy commonplace! Read more »

Why is the SF housing market "positive?"

05.16.13 - 9:32 am | Tim Redmond |
(80)

It's been a long, long time since anyone said that traffic is terrific. When there are too many cars on the road, it's considered bad, not healthy -- even if the boom in single-occupant auto travel is a sign of a recovering economy and lots of job creation.Read more »

Campos to Pride: City funding requires transparency, meeting about Manning decision

05.15.13 - 4:23 pm | Marke B. |
(44)

Over the weekend, Pride posted a Facebook note saying that, despite its promises, it would not be holding a public meeting to address its horrible handling of the Bradley Manning for Grand Marshal scandal until after Pride, and that "SF Pride’s decision concerning the election process of Bradley Manning as Grand Marshal being consistent with SF Pride’s long-standing Grand Marshal election policy is firm. Thus, the discussion of that matter is closed for this year."

People were not very happy about this. Last night a well-attended "mock Pride board meeting" protest was held, with a row of empty chairs symbolizing Pride's absence of leadership.

Now Supervisor David Campos has issued a stern letter to the Pride Board, citing Pride's status as a city-funded organization and its failure to operate with transparency, and advising them to meet with the public before the festival at the end of June.

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