Oakland families get homes for the holidays - SfGate.com

Oakland families get homes for the holidays: “Santa paid an early visit to East Oakland on Saturday, when nine low-income families received keys to homes they helped build themselves.

"I know I was somebody before, but now I've got a piece of the rock," said Lynette Knight, 58, a Wells Fargo manager who now owns a three-bedroom home on Edes Avenue. "I told the kids, 'We're going home. This is ours.' "

The homes are part of a 54-home Habitat for Humanity development on a former auto junkyard near the San Leandro border. So far, 26 homes in the development - the largest Habitat for Humanity project ever in the Bay Area - have been completed, and the rest are due to be finished next year.”

Undercurrents: The Bay Area’s Lack of Local Day-to-Day Media Reporting. Category: Columns from The Berkeley Daily Planet - Thursday June 19, 2008

Undercurrents: The Bay Area’s Lack of Local Day-to-Day Media Reporting. Category: Columns from The Berkeley Daily Planet - Thursday June 19, 2008: “By J. Douglas Allen-Taylor
Thursday June 19, 2008
One of the great ironies of these times—something historians in our grandchildren’s time will probably better be able to understand and explain—is that we are experiencing an explosion of information and internet discussion concerning local events while simultaneously seeing a drying up of direct news media reporting on those events.

The Berkeley Daily Planet, bless our hearts, has two reporters covering Berkeley city government, and another to cover the Berkeley Unified School District and the various dealings of the Berkeley School Board. But that is a rarity. Across the border in Oakland, no media outlet—aside from the East Bay News Service’s Sanjiv Handa—regularly covers Oakland City Council or Oakland city government, no media outlet at all regularly covers the Oakland Unified School District, or the Peralta Community College District, or the Alameda-Contra Contra Costa Transit District, and so on, and so on. Reporters are sent out to these entities only when there is the chance that news is being made. Unfortunately, that gives both a skewed view of the activities of local governmental bodies as well as causes media misinterpretations as reporters and editors—on the fly—try to catch up with the impact and meaning of actions and events, without the context that comes from regular observation.
”
--- I could not have written that better myself. Oakland has a huge news problem but there's a void that can be filled here.

Oakland Raiders' losing becoming historic - Inside Bay Area

Raiders' losing becoming historic - Inside Bay Area: “The Raiders went 33-15 in their 48 regular-season games from 2000-02. They enter today's game against the New England Patriots enmeshed in a 22-71 tailspin that isn't losing much, if any, of its momentum. By comparison, the Patriots are 74-19 during the same period.

A loss today by the 3-10 Raiders, or in any of their final three games, would cement their place in the annals of the
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NFL as the first team with six straight seasons of at least 11 losses.”

-- The Raiders are an organization in search of true leadership. The problem starts in the front office and from what I'm told, a culture that fosters fear and backbiting.

Yusuf Bey IV embraced guns long before editor's killing - Inside Bay Area

Bakery leader embraced guns long before editor's killing - Inside Bay Area: “OAKLAND — Yusuf Bey IV was heavily involved in guns and gun violence well before the killing of journalist Chauncey Bailey last year — a killing he is suspected of ordering — despite his claims to police that he didn't allow weapons at Your Black Muslim Bakery and disavowed their use.
Recorded jailhouse telephone calls and three statements given to police before and after Bailey's Aug. 2, 2007, killing implicate Bey IV in a 2006 shooting of a car belonging to the former boyfriend of a woman with whom he was involved and a June 2007 shootout at a San Francisco nightclub. He was not charged in either incident.”

Barack Obama Outed Rod Blagojevich - Gov Punished By Obama

llinois Governor Rod Blagojevich paid the price for defying President-Elect Barack Obama. In setting-up a pay-to-play scheme for Obama's vacated Senate seat, he rejected Obama's choice Valerie Jarrett and in doing so, caused Obama to pull the strings to have Rod Blagojevich arrested.