Intensely disliked Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich (D) was taken into custody by the feds this morning at his Chicago home; his spokesman initially told a reporter, "Haven't heard anything -- you are first to call." While Blago has been the subject of a three-year corruption investigation, the Chicago Tribune reports the probe has "expanded to include his impending selection of a new U.S. senator to succeed President-elect Barack Obama." More fun: Blago also was angling to be named Secretary of Health and Human Services in the Obama administration AND wanted to get members of the Trib's editorial board fired for, uh, editorials critical of his administration. (Check out Chicagoist for live updates.) more ›

A four-year-old boy drowned to death in the 2-foot deep section of the wave pool at Great America in Santa Clara yesterday. There were six lifeguards on duty at the time, but there are no age limits on who can use the pool. Authorities have not identified the boy, or said whether or not he was supervised at the time of the accident. This is the first drowning at Great America but not the first death -- the Chron lists the other four people who've died since the park opened in 1978 (one person hit by a roller coaster, two people fell out of rides, and one person was killed when two roller coaster trains collided.) more ›

Photo of car with a CHP 11-99 Foundation license plate holder more ›

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We have no illusions anyone's going to read this column today what with all this news about Gavin Newsom's affair with his campaign manager's wife -- but we soldier on nonetheless. more ›

Somehow, the world of -ists managed to make it through the week despite news that Jen & Vince broke up. more ›

Remember that guy who totally hated on Tristan Bettencourt and posted a web site with all sorts of nasty rumors about him? Well, that's nothing compared to what's been put out on Rob Black, one of the candidates running against Chris Daly in District 6. You may think that Rob comes off as one of those aging hipster types who looks like Ted from "Queer Eye", a nice enough guy with an impressive resume of political involvement, but you would be wrong. See, according to the site, Meet Rob Black, Rob Black is actually some deep-undercover ops guy who single-handedly brought oppression, war, and dictatorships to several third world countries. more ›

San Jose City Hall took a break from corruption scandals for love -- two peregrine falcons are nesting on the roof of the city's newest architectural landmark, and possibly mating as well. Mayor Ron Gonzales and the then-City Manager Del Borgsdorf discovered the falcons during a meeting on the 18th floor, where one of them (maybe spacing out during a tedious stretch of administrative agency reports) noticed pigeon feathers floating past the window. Turns out the falcons were having a little lunch. more ›

DCist helps us make more sense of the world this week. Posts like this concert review are the reason for Scott Stapp. DCist also enumerates the reasons for playing ultimate frisbee, Condi's tight buns, their love of a local convenience store, and their jealousy of a person in Seattle calling the city. more ›

We're taking a break from our usual Chron mockery for this irony-free moment: Well done! The Chron splashes the results of its years-long investigation into claims of police brutality in the SFPD on page A1 of today's Sunday papers, and it does not look good. Yow. The Chron put together a database of all the reported use-of-force incidents throughout the city from 1996-2004 (something the SFPD itself has never gotten around to doing), and discovered that 100 officers (about 5% of the force) constitute 25% of the complaints. San Francisco has more brutality claims filed against it than Oakland, San Jose, San Diego, and Seattle combined -- 535 in 2003, for example, as opposed to 91 in Oakland, 83 in San Jose, 62 in San Diego, and 167 in Seattle. To be fair, SF has more officers than any of those other cities do, but the numbers are still out of proportion from what you'd expect. The Chron notes that police officers have a hard job, and that everyone agrees that an officer will have to use force occasionally to quell people resisting arrest. The issue here, though, are officers like the one who broke the arms of an anti-war protestor (and then falsely claimed she was threatening him), off-duty officers who attack motorists honking at them when they take too long at an intersection, and of course, the famous Fajitagate incident. We probably all also agree that something's gotta be done about that too. What's more, Mayor Gavin Newsom -- the guy who hasn't met an interviewer he wouldn't talk to, who'd happily agree to be interviewed by your fourth-grader's school newsletter committee if you asked -- repeatedly refused to comment for the article. The Chron did discover, however, that the SFPD had lodged a complaint against it for discussing this article in the context of a meeting about police protection for possible union strikes -- and that the police department was planning a huge positive PR blitz to "counterbalance" this article once it came out. Well, no wonder Newsom went apes**t over that Bayview video -- gotta protect the rep! (is the Chron's also working on a story about MUNI corruption too? Maybe that would explain the weird cable car thing from last month.) More details from the article after the jump. more ›

The 70s! A decade of stagflation and Republican corruption! Or a number span covering some mighty temperate climates! Or a solid C on the grading scale! But for you, faithful voter, the 70s are the numbers we're up to for this round of the state propositions! As always, SFist is here for you, providing vastly oversimplified explanations of the propositions so you can go to the ballot box more poorly informed than you were when you started! Okay, here's your executive summary. Progressives: Nix The First Six (out of 8). Schwarzenegger supporters: Have a 70's party (uh, except for 79 and 80). And those of you who hate special elections: Vote no on everything. That'll teach 'em! For those of you who want to actually know what the propositions are about (what are you, some kind of Commie freak?), proceed to after the jump. Don't forget to vote on Nov. 8! more ›

A good friend of ours recently moved to San Diego, and has found herself an unintended housewife. Complaining about the bordom of such an exsistence, (while jokingly acknowledging that some folks would kill for such problems), we agreed that "at least (she) has a library card." But it's totally true that the library has gotten us through boring times both long (chronic illness) and short (the N Judah -- wait, that's long, too). The SFPL's online reserve system has helped us prepare for any book needs, and our fine local independent bookstores keep us covered for any permanent-ownership demands that might arise. more ›

The hydrants don't hook up to the hoses, there's fighting over Treasure Island, there's corruption in the Housing Authority -- and what are we all still talking about? This afternoon's Cow Hollow ski jump! The tempers are as hot as the ice is cool, with the homeowners agripe that the ski jump organizers still don't have enough insurance to cover any damage done to homes along the route, "some of which are worth over $10 million." (If your home is worth $10 million, can't you just tap into that equity line and pay for any damage done yourself?) There's also speculation that part of the reason why Mayor Gavin Newsom has been pushing the event so hard is that he might have some marshmallows of his own bobbing in this cup of hot cocoa, as it turns out his Plumpjack Group is a sponsor of the event and some friends of his came up with the idea in the first place. Protective Peter Ragone fires back, "I'm sure the mayor doesn't even know that PlumpJack is a sponsor." Though hey -- if you want to pick up some Moseley gear, they sell it at the Plumpjack Group's Balboa Cafe. Well, temperatures today are expected to be in the 80s, so we'll see if the snow holds up. Meanwhile, they're putting bales of hay along Green Street to try and keep skiers from flying off the ramp and into the blameless 22 Fillmore bus. Thanks to Bill Jennings for the awesome Flickr shots! Check out his pics of Jonny Moseley too! Let us know if you've got pics to share too! more ›

This week, another look at Theater for People Who Hate Theater. more ›

An inspector at the Dept. of Building Inspection has been arrested for accepting bribes. Augustine Fallay is alleged to have accepted money in "red-colored envelopes" to expedite certain developers' applications, and became the target of suspicion when people noticed he kept bragging about his weekend trips to Europe. Fallay claims everything was a loan. Newsom said, "I hope we can continue to send the message that we're not going to put up with the actions of some individuals that are participating inappropriately in the process of favoritism." (cough cough, Joe O'Donoghue.) In response, Joe O'Donoghue told the Chron that "Newsom is a liar. Ninety percent of the department is excellent, and 10 percent is corrupt. The corruption accelerated in the last year and a half since Newsom came into office." Hey, that doesn't rhyme! In other news, a woman from San Mateo was extradited to Wisconsin to stand charges for murder. Turns out Cherie Barnard's ex-husband, who was the DA in their county at the time, killed someone who threatened to kill a sheriff after the sheriff shot his three dogs. (But he didn't shoot the deputy?) She divorced her then-husband about five years later, after he shot a guy she was seeing on the side. As SFist Eve says, "it's totally an Ann Rule book." And DMV workers in Oakland were busted by the feds for selling illegal drivers' licenses to new immigrants for $3000-4500 apiece. Other workers were in on the take, getting money to enter false information about residency into the computers and selling registration stickers to people whose cars had failed smog tests. more ›

Our heart sank when we saw that we were number 664 on the online reserve list for the new , so we were especially happy to receive Jon's detailed (and blessedly spoiler-free) assessment of the book. We told ourselves that we wouldn't break down and buy it (though if we did we would do so at one of our fine local independent bookstores) Until then, we've reserved Jeremy's pick below, which is already "In Transit". Have any other recommendations on how to kill the time until our reserve number is up? Let us know in the comments! more ›

We s**t you not, we just went to the 'Gate to find a link to this brief news item buried in a Bay Area section sidebar about the FBI setting up a hotline for whistle blowers to report corruption and graft in local city, state and federal offices. Of course, we were going to make the inevitable comparisons to the poor, beleaguered staff of Kevin Shelley. "Haha, he's corrupt!" being the implication [], because, of course, we can't say that unless it's true. more ›

This just slipped into our inbox from a mole at the Chron. It was forwarded to the all-staff mailing list by none other than Sharon Stone's former paramour and glurgy TV shill Phil Bronstein: more ›

Yes, at the prodding of the Chronicle Watch, you, the Chronicle Watch readers, have set forth such a furious volley of e-mails, faxes, and phone calls to poor beleaguered Pat O’Brien, the regional general manager of East Bay Regional Park District, to demand your doggy washing facilities that Pat could do nothing else but to listen to the Voice-of-the-People(we wonder if whenever the Chronicle Watch unveils some new thing to fix up and post a picture of some middle-management government lackey, the lackey’s first thoughts upon seeing their mug and phone number in the paper fall somewhere along the lines of “oh no…”). According to the story, the new place consists of “six new tubs with built-in stairs, a large-capacity water heater and retail shelves. There is also a new gathering place for humans: Last month, doors opened at the adjacent Sit and Stay Café.” Hell, we’ve thought about renting places that didn’t sound as nice. more ›