Day Around The Bay
-- Are you ready for the genius that is Peaches Christ and her Midnight Mass cult-film series? [Bay Area Reporter] -- Television -- glorious, warm, loving television! -- on BART cars? Hmm. [Inside Bay Area, Oakland Tribune] -- Matt Stroud takes a brief, much-needed break from his Rocky-like boxing bootcamp training. [The Snitch] -- Affordable housing advocates get pinched by the fuzz. Remember, purveyors of justice: don't drop the soap! [Fog City Journal] --...
The Bolt-Cutters Are Back
If at first you don't succeed, try, try again: the civilly-disobedient affordable housing gang finally either climbed over or clipped open that fence at the corner of Cesar Chavez and Mission yesterday morning, bust in on the lot, and set up tents.
'VideoGate' Officer Andrew Cohen Doesn't Hold Back
Officer Andrew Cohen made headlines in recent years for the videos he produced spoofing the SFPD. The videos were intended to be a humorous sendoff to former police captain Rick Bruce and poke fun at the officers at his station. They were also intended to be internal -- but they got out, and things got out of hand. We wanted to take this opportunity with Cohen to ask about more than the "VideoGate" scandal, rather than just rehashing what most of us already know. We sought the 12-year-vet's opinion on the state of policing in the city, his perspective on local politics and political figures, and what comes next for him.
Day Around The Bay
--Spot (at least) four problems with this picture! [zippy_monster on Flickr, from the SFist Flickr stream.]
Don't Hate Esther Because She's Beautiful
Esther Hwang picked a bad day for a press conference -- normally, the media would be all over the former Willie Brown secretary turned cheesecake model turned San Francisco Law School student discussing the $1 million lawsuit she's filed against the SFPD for alleged brutality against her outside a North Beach bar -- but with everyone distracted by Ed Jew's flight from the law, Carole Migden's cancer-related bad driving, and in a city that now expects out of its mayoral girlfriends underage drinking, sordid affairs with best friends' wives, and/or misjudged blog commentary, Ms. Hwang's press conference seemed like a quaint trip in the San Francisco wayback machine to the last century.
Joe Joe Alioto Alioto District District 3 3
Ah, the Aliotos -- they run this town! Patriarch Joseph Alioto was the mayor of San Francisco from 1968-1976, in office not only during the building of the Transamerica Pyramid but also through the Zodiac murders -- while daughter Angela Alioto is a former Board of Supervisors president (and chicken-suit renter), while granddaughter Michela Alioto-Pier is a current Board of Supes member (and Hottest Supervisor emerita -- hm, maybe it's time for us to do another Hottest Supervisor poll!), and the rest of them are all lawyers.
Third Fake Question Time
Gavin Newsom was all raspy voice and bulletproof hair at last night at Cesar Chavez Elementary in the Mission. Despite somebody's command to "Go back to Nob Hill!" Gavin asserted "I'm not going away." He's used that phrase a couple times now. Is that your campaign slogan, homie? We hope not, because you're not exactly the underdog. It's almost April and you still don't have an opponent.
More Police Walking the Streets.
In a big press conference yesterday, city officials announced plans to have police officers start patrolling four projects in the Western Addition. Up until now, police weren't able to patrol those places due to issues concerning who had jurisdiction over them-- San Francisco or the Federal Government. The Federal Government had supported community policing in those areas, but the money dried up years ago. After looking through what Ross Mirkarimi called a "Khafka-esque" relationship between HUD and the SFPD, a solution was reached.
Matt vs. Gavin: the Rematch?
Fog City Journal is reporting that Matt Gonzalez has been in talks with a campaign manager, Nicole Derse, about running. We're all guessing it's for Mayor but who knows with Matt? We've heard speculation that he might be going for Kamala's job. Or maybe he's doing his patented "wait for the right moment" thing to try and snag a spot on "American Idol?" We hear his rendition of Christina Aguilera's "Beautiful" is pretty amazing.
Today in Crime
Hey, here's some shocking news, but the SFPD actually have a bunch of people in custody for the shooting of a13 year old girl several weeks ago. Police had arrested two men and a third gave himself up to officers. They are being charged with a whole host of bad things, like attempted murder and aggravated assault.
Gavin Speaks!
The Gavin Newsom Mea Culpa tour continues on as he put on his hair shirt on (with matching blue tie) and sat down with CBS 5's Hank Plante to talk about his rather crappy past couple of weeks.
Everybody (Still) Loves Gavin
ABC 7 is the latest people to do a survey on Gavin and all the recent Gavin news and found out that the dude is still pretty popular in town, all to the tune of 75% approval ratings. That's five percent higher than the poll Matier & Ross wrote about last weekend.
Checking in on Gavin's Re-election campaign.
Lest we forget, the Gavster is also up for re-election this year and there's a few stories taking the temperature of his campaign, not least of which is Matier & Ross' story that Gavin still has 70% approval ratings, even after l'affiare du Tourk.
Saturdays Are Healthy Too
Let's take you back on the Wayback Machine to last spring when the Board of Supervisors wanted to close down Kennedy Drive like it is on Sunday. They voted for it, Gavin vetoed it, then sought a compromise on the issue by asking for a study. The study was to see if closing the street down on Saturday's would hurt museums attendance, make life miserable for neighbors, and make it more difficult for people to get to the museums. Well, on Valentine's Day, the report came out and said the effect of closing down Kennedy Drive on everything would be pretty much nothing. In fact, it said that attendance went up on Sundays. How you like them apples?
Gavinwatch Watch
We come back from Second Fake Question Time and.... WHERE'S GAVINWATCH???? Emails to the anonymous blogger/videohounds' gmail account were bouncing, their YouTubes clips were gone, and their website had crashed. What th---? It wasn't like Blogger was down, and even if it were, why would that affect the gmail and the YouTubes? , we thought. Then we went out for dinner with some friends.
Update on SFistGate!
KCBS is reporting that Peter "Byorn" Ragone has finally copped to using all those fake names and admitted that all the postings as "John Nelson" and others was him. He also said he wouldn't do it again and would only post under his real name. We wonder if that means he'll go as "Peter Ragone" while posting on MTV's "Sweet Sixteen" message boards.
Day Around the Bay
-The Governator has a health care plan and the Chron breaks it down. Arnie's actually getting good press from this, except with these guys. Or these guys.
Day Around the Bay
-Man who shot Officer Bryan Tuvera is said to have allegedly (allegedly) killed himself and was not killed by Tuvera's partner.
Did the Lawyer Leak?
Late last night, Yahoo! of all sites was reporting that the leak in the BALCO case was Victor Conte's defense lawyer. Or at least that's what the FBI is thinking as they've launched an investigation.
Day Around the Bay
-The San Francisco Unified School District is still trying to figure out what to do

