Month: November 2011

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Sour Grapes

Well the election is over and while John Avalos refuses to issue a concession speech I have to say that I don’t think the rank choice voting method is a good thing. Moderates hate it, Progressives love it yet it turns out my prediction yesterday was off. We had to go through 11 rounds to elect Ed Lee who will probably still have to face up to voter fraud that of course was no fault of his own, but the fault of his supporters who helped elderly Chinese voters vote for him.

I’m not sure if you can really consider an area that occupies roughly an eight block radius as the tipping point for vote. While one third of San Francisco is Chinese, not all of them are U.S. citizens with a right to vote. I’m sure that the majority of Chinatown has less U.S. citizens which would make them have even less voting power. You have more Chinese U.S. citizens in the Sunset and Richmond district, so to me the Chinatown vote to get Chinese voters is irrelevant. If anything the Chinese voter power play should have been in the Sunset district which is the largest district with the largest Chinese population.

The appointed mayor who is now an elected mayor has done a decent job. Once he decided to run things changed in my opinion. Of the 850,000 people in San Francisco only 16.6% voted for mayor. That is a dismal turn out especially when you have groups of people literally forcing people to vote and telling them how to vote. At this point I’m almost thinking that we need a Tony Hall ass kicking to change this city.

I have in the past been attacked by people who back RCV trying to show me that it’s a good thing, but we still have people working to count the last remaining ballots to determine that indeed there is no one else that is going to beat Ed Lee’s 61% lead. If so that would mean more than 100% of the people voted which we already know isn’t possible when only 16.99% of the population voted. I suppose I should feel honored when people from the other side of the country are writing to me telling me my thinking is wrong. Actually, I do. That means I have some real clout in the United States. Not like Klout on the internet.

Now that the election is over I would like to ask our newly elected Mayor Ed Lee to step up and lead the people…all of the people and not show any partisanship to any particular racial group in San Francisco. I also think that he should consider using John Avalos as an advisor since he pulled 38% in the end and you certainly want the thoughts of 38% of the San Francisco voters on your side. Yes, I admit that I was one of the #AnyoneButEdLee group and that’s a large number of people in San Francisco, but I guess we were all split on who to vote for so we watered down a battle waged on 16 fronts.

Rose Pak, Willie Brown, let’s sit down and have some tea and talk about San Francisco I have a lovely dim sum place in Chinatown in mind. 😉

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The Election!

Yesterday was election day and now due to ranked choice voting [RCV] we still have no idea who the new Mayor is. Ed Lee taking 31% has started to hint at a victory, but he doesn’t realize that RCV favors the far left more than the conservative democrats in this city. If you look at the list the bottom is pulled and the second and third choice are added to the ballot. Most of the bottom rung candidates are what San Francisco likes to call, Progressives.

In some cases I think anarchists might even be better. There are eight write in candidates and I haven’t heard of even one of their names. My biggest shock was that Terry Joan Baum actually got more votes in the first round than Mr. Reset San Francisco Phil Ting. I guess we like things just the way they are. As the far left is weeded out we’ll eventually start to see the far left moving a little more to the right and my prediction is that Supervisor John Avalos’ name will start to pop up.

I believe this to be especially true when the second and third choice votes for Cesar Ascarrunz are divided up. I was surprised to see that Cesar was running again after all the years he’s consistently run and lost. He has pulled a bit of the latin vote in SF over the years and the fact that our number two in the first round has a last name of Avalos and is a latino will probably help him out. Avalos came in second in the first round with only 18% of the votes. This was surprising to me even though I offered my endorsement to him since I did not receive one piece of political junk mail from him which makes him very green so I’ll assume that several of Terry Joan Baum’s second and third choice voters will go to him.

Dennis Hererra sent out an email yesterday that almost read like a concession speech. As I mentioned in my last post that initially I liked Dennis until the smear campaign started. Again, I don’t like smear campaigns because they don’t focus on the candidate, but more on what the other candidates are doing wrong. John Avalos took the high road. Ed Lee has acted like a rockstar without a band. He took a Ted Nugent attitude and just assumed because he was the mayor he would get the spot. Senator Leland Yee who was all over the place talking about how wonderful he was until he found it better to stop talking about himself and start focusing on how Ed Lee was a traitor to the cause came in the first round with very disappointing 8.93%. I guess I won’t be seeing him at the Tennesse Grill anytime soon.

I do not like ranked choice voting because of the fact that it is now the day after the election and we still have people counting votes in overtime. We still don’t know who the mayor is as well as the sheriff or district attorney. We may not know for up to a week as people work overtime to count and recount the ballots and then when it is announced we’ll have people crying foul! which could carry this on for over a month. If we had the standard voting method with a run off it would take a couple of days for the decision. Granted, there would be time in between, but then people would be able to get on with their lives. San Francisco needs a fix and we need it fast. So now I unofficially ask you to vote in a run off. Ed Lee or John Avalos. Who would you choose. Any other comments will be deleted.

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Voting Day Is Tomorrow!

Tomorrow is voting day in San Francisco and the big focus is on who to vote for for mayor. Everything else is kind of gravy, but everyone want to know who the next mayor will be. As you know I am fully in favor of John Avalos and I’d like to talk about politics in San Francisco for a minute.

San Francisco is an odd city, especially if you look at this election. We have democrats, independents and progressives. Democrats we know, but in San Francisco they tend to be more moderate almost leaning to the Republican side of things, but Republican or GOP isn’t a word you want to mention in San Francisco. Tony Hall, is registered as an independent, but at the Irish Cultural Center he said he was a Republican. In San Francisco, that takes some cohones. In some ways, I like Tony Hall because he’s an old school Republican, before the Tea Party screwed them up. He has a rockstar voice and he’s also a singer. I can imagine him singing Sinatra and I’m sure he has. The other Independent is wealthy entrepreneur Joanna Rees. While I’m sure she would never admit it, she’s wealthy and an independent which usually says Republican. Alice Cooper, the antithesis of the image of the right wing in appearance is wealthy and a Republican. I can respect that since he’s puts it up front and admits it. He’s not running for Mayor of San Francisco, but I think it might be interesting if he did.

Then you have the progressives. Well they call themselves progressives in my mind because they want to distance themselves from the conservative Democrats who are looking more like Republicans. They stand up for the shrinking middle class and growing poor people in the city. They’ve had money problems like the rest of us and don’t own a Mercedes or BMW. They drive, say, a volvo and not one of the S90 volvos, but those ugly, boxy, safe things. They aren’t like a Matt Gonzales progressive who had to have a suit bought for him, but are more cleaned up and not afraid to talk to the people of San Francisco.

I’d like to think I had a hand in it, but I’m sure I didn’t. John Avalos did not jump in on the smear campaign against our interim Mayor Ed Lee. He let the others do the talking [in a bad way] and kept to the point. John had his people at the enrollment fair Saturday where parents were there to find out information about the schools in San Francisco they’d like to send their children to. Leland Yee posted a piece of paper on my door telling me how much he had done in the past for schools. I wasn’t at the fair, but my wife was and described a man who sounded like it could have been John Avalos, but I can’t say for sure, but at least his people where out there and talking to the public.

Dennis Herrera was a man who at the beginning was my first choice, but that ran downhill quickly since he wouldn’t talk with me at any of the meet ups he planned and when he took the low road with the ads against Ed Lee I had to drop him like a hot coal. I don’t like smear campaigns because the people who run them focus on how bad someone else is and not on what they are going to do. I didn’t like the push for the importance of the Chinatown vote when most people in Chinatown aren’t voting U.S. citizens. 15.7% of San Francisco and most of them are of Chinese ethnic origin. This isn’t to say I have a problem with Chinese. I have a great many friends who are Chinese and of other Asian decent. I do have a problem when people focus on one ethnic race over others. This race like all others is about the Mayor of the people of San Francisco, not who’s going to help out a certain ethnicity within San Francisco. That’s the job of the Supervisors to deal with in our still somewhat segregated neighborhoods.

So I now urge you to take a serious look at John Avalos as a choice for Mayor. While not a requirement, John was born in the United States and focuses on the U.S. and it’s needs as well as that of San Francisco as a whole and not a segmented group. He is for improving our school system which is in a horrible state at the moment. He also was at the forefront pushing for local hires on all San Francisco contracts. This is a man who is a part of this city and is working hard to bring this city back to where it should be. If he’s not your first choice then at least make sure that he’s on your second or third.

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The General Store

I like living in the Westside. We’re starting to change the Sunset district and Richmond over to the Westside because we both have Ocean Beach in common. Once you pass Sunset Boulevard the vibe changes and you just get a laid-back beach vibe from the things you encounter. You see it most down on Judah street with Noriega and Taraval starting to get into the game and Judah street was where I ended up yesterday.

There’s a little parklet across from the 7-11 that made me stop and take a look and I noticed a new store that I hadn’t seen before. It’s called the General Store, yes I agree it could have a better name, but it’s a well, general store. It carries thing you would need like clothes and flashlights and books, etc. They tend to be a bit more on the upscale side of things, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. They’ve been in business for a year and a half which is good by business standards in the Westside because businesses don’t usually last too long as you get near the beach. At least in the past.

The beach area used to be a no man’s land that the only thing that lasted more than a year was the corner liquor store. Restaurants out there were pretty beat up looking and you would want to choose them unless you had to. I’m glad it’s changing. Judah street from 44th Avenue down to Great Highway is becoming a vibrant place to visit. The General Store just adds to this.

When I walked in I was surprised at the artistic quality of many of the items for sale. There was a calendar that  had each month printed in a spiral showing the phase of the moon each day and was printed using an old method called letterpress wherein metallic versions of the letters are actually pressed into the paper after being coated with ink. It gives a debossed look even though the printers tried to avoid this when they first started doing it.

There were wooden handmade implements that upon further inspection turned out to to be flashlights. They were pretty impressively made and if you had one sitting on a table you wouldn’t even know what it was. There were also a collection of handmade soaps and jewelry for those so inclined. The books and notecards available while few had a distinct Westside vibe.

All in all it was a nice place to visit and with the parklet outside the two blended in together quite nicely. It’s a warm and inviting place that makes you feel welcome when you step inside. You should stop by and take a look. It’s a nice place to visit.

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I Am Ozzy!

I did something for Halloween that I haven’t done in years. I actually put a costume together, no not just slapping together a few random items, but I came up with an idea for an actual person to become for Halloween and on Halloween, I was Ozzy Osbourne.

I forgot how much fun dressing up for Halloween can be and when I was out and walking around, not going from home to home, but actually walking around in the commercial areas of the city it was almost magical. People were stopping me and taking pictures of me as well as taking pictures with me. Of course no one really believed I was Ozzy, except for the people working at the local taqueria I went into which was pretty surreal.

I can imitate Ozzy fairly well so I went in and asked for a bat burrito. Some of them looked horrified at my request and others laughed. All of the patrons got a big laugh out of it and I finally picked up a couple of steak burritos and headed home. I had forgotten how much fun I used to have dressing up on Halloween and this brought back to me that no matter how old you get, you’re never too old to have fun on Halloween.