You guys are THE BEST. Thanks for all the great pictures of today's Ed Jew rally outside City Hall! more ›

Now here's a story we haven't mentioned in awhile, the poor saga of Amy Lee. Lee, if you remember, was the former head of the Building Inspection Department who was opposed by Joe O'Donaghue and his Residential Builders Association gang. During her confirmation hearing, members of the RBA got down and dirty and criticized her for all sorts of things, including the fact that she was pregnant and had "pregnancy brain." more ›

Last week's winner, the Guardian (which now has no pictures of the current cover on its site for us to use to illustrate this post -- this is a picture from Sonic Reducer): How Tim Redmond set up wifi in his home. Robert Haaland, subject of the latest poorly-scanning Joe O'Donoghue poem, pens an op-ed on the Gap. Background on the (now-averted) school strike. Doesn't Janet Reilly kind of look like Tori Spelling? [picture is not online] NoJANETrious! Cover: motorcycling around the world. A life coach named Pat Murphy, who does not run the SF Sentinel. [we like the new web design but it's awfully hard to find articles on it; you'll have to read it on paper.] Annalee Newitz gets called fat on Slashdot. We need better indie rock DJs. And the sex columnist on sock fetishes and fire fetishes. more ›

Well, somebody at Casa de Ted y Molly is writing about this crazy February warm weather. If you're looking to meet girls, avoid propositioning them to pose for Suicide Girls. Trust us, it's creepy, especially if you're wearing "bright, striped pants." And Halsted at Cygnior's Quill has an interesting idea -- why not "archive the homeless?" $20 their political commentary is more interesting than DailyKos. more ›

All this over the protests of Joltin' Joe O'Donoghue and his buddies because of her pregnant condition. With job finally assured, she promptly celebrated by going out on maternity leave where we all thought things would go happily ever after. But no. Now, her entire family is basically living in the living room of their duplex apartment in Upper Haight because she was hit with a late appeal on an already given out permit to re-do her top floor. A re-do that had already been started and now can't be worked on until at least a hearing on Dec. 14th. 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 ›

Note to Selves: next time we try and get one of our buddies elected to run a commission, don't attack an entire sex. Two weeks after the infamous meeting of the Building Inspector Commission in which Gavin's candidate Amy Lee was attacked for being female and pregnant, the Commission voted 4-3 to install Lee as the Head of the Department of Building Inspectors. The 3 ½ hour hearing was as fun as the previous one as it included members of the commission attacking each other, women's rights groups testifying in defense of Lee, and a whole parade of women testifying that the RBA really does love their women. The whole thing moved Monique Moyer, the head of the Port Department, to say that the hearing "has made a farce of our great city and of our departments." Made a farce? This city has passed farce years ago. We’re post-farce. Anyhoo, at the end of the hearing, defeated head of the Residential Building Association, Joe O'Donoghue, told the Commission "you're all just a bunch of political hacks, but not very bright ones at that." O'Donoghue also vowed to continue the fight by filing lawsuits against the Commission. more ›

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There's an interesting little battle going on over who is going to run the Department of Building Inspectors. No wait! Don’t go! We swear this will be interesting! Trust us! Anyhoo, earlier in the week the Building Inspection Commission decided to hold off on voting in Gavin's appointment to run the Department, Assistant Director Amy Lee. Gavin wants Lee to replace the acting Director, James Hutchinson, who recently replaced outgoing Director Frank Chiu (and no, not that Frank Chu). Hutchinson, however, has friends in high places, including the powerful head of the Residential Building Association, Joe O'Donoghue, who are all fighting to save him. Gavin wants to replace Hutchinson because he says the DBI has had a reputation for favoritism and being in O'Donoghue’s pockets while O'Donoghue and his allies are claiming that Gavin is meddling in things he shouldn't and that Lee is unqualified for the job. Because she's pregnant. See, we said it was interesting. more ›

The Newsom tributes roll on in the wake of the Chronicle's hard-hitting Passion of the Gavin article. Kneeling before the emperor, BeyondChron offers its laurels through the eternal voice of poesy. Joe O'Donaghue, the residential developer recently embraced by San Francisco's fickle left, has penned the stirring "Encomium to Gavin." Yea, it brings a tear to the eye and stirs the soul as only fine poetry can. An excerpt follows:

And great it is that you had the skill Illustrating to us how to get a thrill, Kimberly the banana did pop to array Your sexual prowess in ardent display, This courageous act which better than dope, Helped bind us together in one act of trope.

roundup of the Bay Area weeklies more ›