The American Academy of Dermatology is launching a new campaign to get girls from 16 to 29 years old (and boys in the same age range who live in district 5) to stop using indoor tanning beds. The campaign is called, fittingly enough, "Indoor Tanning is Out." How so? Because: a) only trash uses indoor tanning facilities, and b) indoor browning is associated with a significant increase in the risk of melanoma. (Though we......

After a federal judge blocked "a key provision of a new city program providing basic health care to uninsured residents, City Attorney Dennis Herrera is scheduled to petition the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals today for an emergency stay pending appeal to help SF maintain the "Healthy San Francisco" program. The program, which would help uninsured San Franciscans receive health care, was scheduled to begin on January 2, 2008. According to CBS 5: U.S.......

Yesterday, presidential hopeful Joe Biden released details of his plan for the health care system, and coincidentally, we spotted this sign in an area of San Francisco that our 2001 Muni map calls "Apparel City." Political candidates have asked us to help them before: we’ve voted for them, given them money, put posters in our window, walked the precincts… and we’re certainly willing to loiter for a worthy candidate. But we’ve always felt these......

-- Magic Bullets: Along with Bonde do Role and JuiceBoxxx, this local outfit (heavy on the bass lines, rhythmic keyboards, and melancholic vocals) performs tonight at 9 p.m. at The Independent, 628 Divisadero; $13. -- Queen Christina (1933): Young Swedish queen ends up kissing another dame as well as a dashing John Gilbert. Greta Garbo stars in this classic starting at 9 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive Theater, 2575 Bancroft Way. -- Downy......

Man, we can tell how long we've been doing this by the number of Zagat posts we've amassed! The 2008 edition is out: your nice alphabetical list of restaurants with a grade for food, decor and service, as rated by the users of Zagat. This year, it is going 2.0, with the introduction of such spiffy new things as colors, as in two of them, black and red! Post-it "love it" tags to customize your......

At 4:30 p.m. today, a rally and march led by a cast of security officers will take place in the financial district. (We'll try to grab some shots of the officers getting all Norma Nae-y.) Unionized security officers of the Service Employees International Union Local 24/7 are in a huff and not taking it anymore. According to the Chronicle: The union said it is seeking to boost compensation for security officers so that it equals......

That idea of congestion pricing in San Francisco, meaning charging people to drive in certain places around the city, has moved from crazy pipe dream stage to crazy pipe dream planning stage. Recently, the city was awarded $180 million to study the idea and there are already two potential places being mapped out by the people mapping it out. Instead of charging cars to go downtown, the idea would be to take it to the bridge as it were. The first place would be on Doyle Drive, one of the roads that takes you to the Golden Gate Bridge . In fact, one of the conditions of all this money is that the city would just have to do such a thing. Another spot being considered is right outside of Treasure Island. They're thinking up the idea of maybe charging $1 or $2 a car and it could work by having people use the FastTrak system, or at least we hope so as being from the East Coast, having to stop constantly for tolls gets kind of tedious. Also a bad place to be if you've just started a mob war against the Tattaglia and Sollozzo families. ...

Tom Ammiano announced a plan yesterday to give city IDs to those who don't have IDs, mainly immigrants-- legal or otherwise. The idea, pushed by immigrant advocates, will allow those without an ID to be given access to a whole range of city services they would not normally be open to, including health care, library privileges, and the ability to use municipal golf courses. Ammiano also said he's going to work with financial institutions to let people use the Ids to open accounts. ...

Someone else viewed as unbeatable has a hail-Mary opponent from the progressive left -- and we're not just talking about Gavin Newsom and Chris Daly! That's right -- the stridently anti-war soldier's mom Cindy Sheehan has declared her candidacy against San Francisco's House representative, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi. Sheehan says she's running because Pelosi didn't move to impeach Bush by July 23. She's running as an independent and, along with the anti-war thing,......

Gay marriage, GLBTQQGQQ$#@ discrimination, HIV issues, queers in the military, Donna McKechnie (we can only assume), health care, and more are what's on tap for tonight's presidential debate. Disgusting, we know. But 84% of eligible gays voted in the last election, so why not? (Who knew gays could even vote? Huh.) And who better to breakdown and break through all of the rhetoric than SF Bay Guardian's Marke Bieschke (AKA Super Ego). He'll be......

Just passing along the latest news on Roisin Isner, the 17-year-old drummer hit by a firecracker in Dolores Park on July 4. The 17-year-old boy the SFPD arrested has been released by the juvenile court to home detention, but remains a person of interest in the case. They have videotape footage confirming that he was on the scene, and he admitted to anarchist activity and to throwing firecrackers in the park and in a phone......

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......

Now, you could either watch the trailer for Michael Moore's new movie Sicko (about HMOs and universal health care) here on your computer (above)... OR, you could go outside and watch it projected onto the side of buildings in downtown SF and Oakland tonight! Michael Moore has arranged for the Sicko trailer (with full sound and subtitles) to screen at the corner of Broadway and Montgomery from sundown to 1 a.m. tonight. That'll be......

Everyone knows the Saturday of Pride Weekend is the Dyke March! Put on your motorcycle helmet and take off your top. The theme this year (for the 15th anniversary) is "Healthcare for All," so there's going to be a mammogram truck on site, as well as the usual diverse array of religions, performers, and peoples. The rally and stage show starts at 3 at Dolores Park; the women go marching at 7. Other events:......

There's Wal-Marts is California? Apparently so -- and we paid about $50 million for them to be built, according to Wal-Mart Subsidy Watch. We're lucky enough to live in a city with lots of locally owned businesses and healthy jobs, but not so in such Steven-Kingishly named towns as Covina, Lake Elsinor, and Redlands. According to WMSW, California ponied up about $50 in taxpayer-funded gifts to the Arkansas company, in exchange for which those......

At a conference yesterday hosted by people trying to find a solution to the increasing amount of families leaving the city, Gavin said things were improving. In the speech, he rattled off a bunch of things the city is doing to help families stick around, including new housing, tax credits, the improving school district, and the upcoming attempt at universal health care. Also: free ice cream!...

Uno, dos, tres, quatro!: the mayor's office has announced the fourth installment of his traveling lecture series, or, as he prefers to call it "the town hall open meeting where the public is not actually permitted to ask direct questions." Or -- as we prefer to call it -- FOURTH FAKE QUESTION TIME!!! Guess Gavin's still not going to do Actual Question Time before the Board of Supervisors, huh? Were all those sweet words......

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. ...

Our feelings regarding the sneaky scheduling of Gavin Newsom’s Third Fake Question Time this Monday can best be expressed through American Idol runner-up Katharine McPhee’s latest single, “Over It.” The purple halter dress she wears in this video is pretty cute, too. However, just because we're over it doesn't mean we're not secretly putting together a special Fake Question Time ensemble in the hopes of running into some chick dating some dude (not to......

Man, we can't believe Team Newsom scheduled Third Fake Question Time at the last minute like that -- your Political Junkie is out on vacation so we can't make it to the Cesar Chavez Elementary School on Monday the 26th at 6 p.m. to discuss health care with the residents of District 9. (825 Shotwell (between South Van Ness and Folsom, cross street 22nd). Man, and we were hoping to see Han Shin and......

Remember how members of the Golden Gate Restaurant Association have been whining about increases in minimum wage and the newly mandated health care initiative? Well, they're talking about turning whining into action and the association is threatening to go on strike. ...

Late word: What? Gavin Newsom lied to us! At the last Fake Question Time, Gavin clearly told us that the next "town hall meeting" would be in April and address the issue of crime in District 5. So color us surprised when we start hearing word on Monday that Third Fake Question Time is going to be next Monday, March 26, at Cesar Chavez Elementary in District 9 on health care. (note: there's a......

Everybody dance now! Take in a "thought provoking" dance/theater performance with CounterPULSE's Under the Radar tiny caberet featuring an international cast of disabled and non-disabled performers. Consider what it means to be normal. Jess Curtis directs, and the performance takes place at 1310 Mission (at 9th Street). Since it's the first week, tickets are only $10 - 15. Reservations and info, call 415-435-7552 or email info@counterpulse.org . Spot Francis Ford Coppola, maybe. We'll take......

Oh, you Taxi Cab Commission-- first you whisper sweet nothings to us and add fifty new cabs, telling us that you get it, you really, really get it. But now that we've finally sat back and relaxed in the knowledge that some sanity had come to all things cabs, you announce that you just might need to raise the "flag-drop" by fifty cents, meaning it would cost $3.60 just to get into a cab. And for those of you keeping score, that would make our cabs the most expensive in the country. Oh, we're so proud. ...

-California is leaving a lot of children behind. -Hillary doesn't care about ethnic reporters....

Haight Ashbury Free Clinics' ribbon cutting ceremony for the new Integrated Care Center...

The Chron today has an interesting story about all the effects of recent laws being thrown on small business, mainly restaurants. The recent laws in question are the rise in the minimum wage, sick paid leave, and the new health care initiative. All these laws sound great, but restaurateurs are not quite thrilled about them and so they've been particularly aggressive in fighting the resolutions, even getting in Chris Daly's grill about it. Ha! We made a pun. Anyways, they've sued over the health care bill to keep it from taking effect. ...

Not everybody is screaming for Gavin to resign or telling him that shame, shame, everybody knows his name as there's a Facebook group out there called "Gavin Newsom is a P.I.M.P" You can see the bio above. And, of course, no Facebook entry would come complete without the always fun comments. This entry has such comments as "he can cheat on me any day" or "he pimped me so good last summer. ill never forget it." At this point, there's fifty-one members but expect that to shoot up at in a bit, especially as we post on it. ...

A photo of S.F. Mayor Newsom at UCSF children's hospital...

So your Alex Tourk. Everything is fine and honky dorky until your wife, out of the blue, admits to having a fling with not only your boss but one of your best buddies. Even worse, it appears the everyone in the city (except us) knew about it but you didn't. Man, that's one hell of a bad week. Whenever we see these storylines on TV or in the movies, it always ends badly, like in people being shot and killed badly. So where are we with all of this? Well everybody is still loving the story. It's in this week's Newsweek and Time. Wonkette finally weighed in on it (says a commentor: "Oh this is SF. They love making mountains out of mole hills at every perceived ethical lapse.") and the story even made Perez Hilton....