San Francisco psychodrama

Here’s the story. Alex Fagan,an assistant chief of police in SF has a thuggish son, Alex Jr., on the force. Junior apparently assaulted some innocent bystanders one night while off duty. So far so bad. But then the department covered it up. Now most of the top brass of SFPD have been indicted and have stepped down, at least temporarily..

“Thuggish” you say?. Yes. Here’s why..

“It turned out Fagan Jr. had at least 16 violent encounters with suspects in a 13-month period, sending six of them to the hospital, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.”

A friend in S.F. who has followed this story for months tells me even Fagan Jr.’s fellow officers complained about him, saying he needed anger management classes. All for naught. The top brass ignored the complaints.

Enter District Attorney Terence Hallinan, a rival to S.F. Mayor Willie Brown. He begins investigating, a grand jury is called, and, much to everyone’s surprise, returns indictments against the SFPD top brass, including the Chief.

Those indicted are screaming “witch hunt” and “politically motivated”, yet those who have followed this case say the evidence against them is overwhelming.

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California energy market abuses the ‘tip of the iceberg’

“California officials accused 70 energy companies and municipal utilities of using 10 principle schemes to push up prices in the state, and said the findings of a 103-day investigation represented only the “tip of the iceberg” of abuse during the energy crisis of 2000 and 2001.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission also came under mounting political pressure to release evidence contained in the filing.”

And, oh yeah, the average for regular gas here is now over $2 a gallon.

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First we blow you up, then we rebuild you.

“The retired general tapped by the Bush administration to oversee rebuilding of post-war Iraq was, until just a few weeks ago, an executive at a leading defense contractor working on missile systems that would be used to bomb Baghdad.

“It’s very curious,” said Ben Hermalin, a professor at UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business who studies professional ethics. “You have to wonder what the Iraqis will think of this guy and how much trust they’ll place in him.”

He added: “If it’s not a conflict of interest, it’s certainly being tone deaf.“

Or it could be they’re all mad as hatters…

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California bill will allow cities to change voting systems

This is huge. If passed, it will allow cities to choose alternate voting systems, like Instant Runoff Voting (IRV) and Proportional Representation (PR) - something which will greatly aid third parties get their fair share. Hey, if you get 9% of the votes, you should get 9% of the seats.

From a Green email

“We wanted you to know about an important development in the California Legislature. As detailed below, a bill, AB 1039, has been introduced to allow cities (and hopefully counties) to change their elections to much more democratic systems, such as Instant Runoff Voting. This is a crucial beginning to our campaign to democratize elections statewide. But the bill needs help.

Please take a moment now to write a note of thanks to Assemblywoman Loni Hancock who introduced the bill. She is at Assemblymember.Hancock@assembly.ca.gov.

Then, please look up your local Assemblymember and write to them asking that they co-sponsor this bill. The more co-sponsors, the more momentum we have.

We are trying to build this first step into a larger campaign for voting reform.”

So, if you live in California, please let your Assemblymember know you favor this bill!

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Percussive Democracy

Via ProRev

“To test the theory that a good way to bring democracy to a country is to bomb it to smithereens, Vietnam Veterans Against the War offer this list of countries compiled by William Blum where we used tried percussive education.

In no case did a democratic government, respectful of human rights, occur as a direct result

China 1945-46
Korea 1950-53
China 1950-53
Guatemala 1954
Indonesia 1958
Cuba 1959-60
Guatemala 1960
Congo 1964
Peru 1965
Laos 1964-73
Vietnam 1961-73
Cambodia 1969-70
Guatemala 1967-69
Grenada 1983
Libya 1986
El Salvador 1980s
Nicaragua 1980s
Panama 1989
Iraq 1991-99
Sudan 1998
Afghanistan 1998
Yugoslavia 1999″

Coming soon…
Iraq 2003
Iran 2003?
Syria 2003?
North Korea 2003?

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