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As this blogger has written, The (yeah, capital "T") Oakland Mayor's Race is going to get even more interesting and today, Thursday, is proof. Pay attention to this blog post if you enjoy laughter and guffaws, and you know you do. First, Councilmember Rebecca Kaplan phoned to say she called Kent Lewandowski, volunteer Chairperson for the Northern Alameda County Group of the Sierra Club, San Francisco Bay Chapter, and the author of what's still the most awful email in Oakland Politics ever seen by this blogger, to ask him to include all of the candidates. I must admit, this is funny If you're just getting wind of this fart the Sierra Club broke, Kent Lewandowski sent an email to almost every candidate in the Oakland Mayor's Race (except Arnie Fields), to inform them and by "cc" this blogger that because they were not "viable" candidates, they would not be part of the Wednesday, August 25th "Oakland Green Mayoral Forum."

Don Perata  Breaking Oakland Mayor's Race news! This blogger just received a late night email announcing that Former State Senator Don Perata will skip the planned Sierra Club Forum for Wednesday, August 24th. Perata Campaign Manager Rhys Williams explains that... Senator Perata will not participate in forums that aren't open to all candidates. Now that there is an official list of candidates, Senator Perata believes it is only fair, democratic, and respectful that all those voices have an opportunity to be heard. That was one goal of Oakland's new system of voting. Readers of this space will recall that The Sierra Club Volunteer Chairperson Kent Lewandowski, sent what this blogger called an awful email explaining that The Sierra Club was going to exclude candidates it considered "not viable." Again, The Oakland Mayor's Race has thirteen candidates: Tim Brown, Terrance Candell, Arnold Fields, Sharika Gregory, Greg Harland, Marcie Hodge, Counc

Earlier, Kent Lewandowski, volunteer Chairperson Northern Alameda County Group of The Sierra Club, San Francisco Bay Chapter, wrote a rather, and this blogger will state again, stupid email to the Oakland Mayor's Race candidates Kent says aren't "viable." Which is why this blogger's not returning from Georgia in time to attend it: If you've not seen the email from Kent representing the Sierra Club, here, again, it is: from Kent to candell1@yahoo.com, dluvcan@yahoo.com, candidate@macleay4mayor.org, info@arniefields.org, info@harland4mayor.com, mhodge@peralta.edu, LL.Young@prurealty.com cc zennie@zennie62.com date Tue, Aug 17, 2010 at 12:41 AM subject Green Oakland Mayoral Forum - Sierra Club signed-by gmail.com hide details 12:41 AM (21 hours ago) Dear Candidate, Thank you for your interest in participating in the "Green Oakland" forum sponsored by the Sierra Club. We made the decision to invite the 3 candidates who are

In the wake of Oakland police budget cuts and crime rate that's not adjusting for the city's dismal budget, the City of Oakland and neighbors in Cleveland Heights, also known as Haddon Hill, consider private security as a solution. But first, what's Cleveland Heights / Haddon Hill? It's a neighborhood bordered by Park Boulevard, E 18th Street, Lakeshore, and The Mac Arthur Freeway, and contains the now-closed Parkway Theater and The Merritt Bakery. It has an estimated population of over 7,400 people according to City-Data.com . Oakland Coucilmember Pat Kernighan issued this email to the Cleveland Heights Yahoo Group : Dear Cleveland Heights neighbors, I am writing to ask for your input to help out the residents in a nearby area. The north part of Beat 17Y has been hit hard in the last month by very brazen robbers. The neighbors there are interested in hiring a private security patrol. I recall that during one of the earlier crime waves on Haddon Hill,

Terrance Candell's wife is really upset  The Oakland Mayor's Race has thirteen candidates: Tim Brown, Terrance Candell, Arnold Fields, Sharika Gregory, Greg Harland, Marcie Hodge, Councilmember Rebecca Kaplan, Don Macleay, Niki Okuk, Don Macleay, Councilmember Jean Quan, Joe Tuman, and Larry Lionel Young Jr. As of this writing, the next two announced forums will only have three of the 13 candidates able to present their case to be the next Mayor of Oakland. The Sierra Club and The Oakland League of Women Voters forums have some unique, clubby, and frankly discriminatory methods of excluding what it sees as "lesser" candidates running for Mayor of Oakland. Reportedly, from conversations with a number of candidates, the League of Women Voters wants each candidate to have donations from over 400 donors, or 427. What that has to do with being a great mayoral election candidate, I have no idea. In the case of The Sierra Club, they're reportedly taking the

Apparently the news that her Oakland City Council District Two Seat Competitor Jennifer Pae raised over $30,000 has driven her to the bar (just kidding). Oakland City Councilperson Pat Kernighan's hosting a gathering at Era Art Bar on Grand Avenue, just 40 feet from Broadway in Downtown Oakland, where she's buying cocktails for her friends and supporters - uh, with a donation. If you follow this space, you recall the last political event this blogger attended at Era Art Bar: the Blogger Party for Libby Schaaf, who's running for the Oakland City Council District Four seat.  In fact, here's the video: But - not that I'm complaining - you had to buy your drinks, which is great for controlling cocktail consumption!  (And The Era Art Bar's becoming the venue of choice for Oakland political events of late, with Libby, Pat and Oakland Councilmember Rebecca Kaplan holding shindigs there.) Pat Kernighan This news of "Complimentary Drinks" emphasize

Get it?  Huh?   Now that the Oakland Mayor's Race has reached its second season and is heading toward the November election, we have candidates and groups trying to push what they see as "minor candidates" as Oakland Councilmember Jean Quan said Wednesday, out of the way.  But Councilmember Quan is really wrong, and this blogger's disappointed that she made the statement because with New Media and IRV, there are no minor candidates . This blogger is consistently disappointed at the display of the amazing levels of both hubris and, frankly, stupidity that have come to mark the media strategy in the Oakland Mayor's Race. Newspapers are not the number one source of information today in politics: the Internet is. But the people who run their election campaigns in Oakland, as well as those producing the forums, don't seem to get that. They think that by their actions in excluding talking to all of the candidates, or by some campaigners raising a lot of

This blog post was written in the head of this blogger before it was obvious the Oakland Raiders were going to win their first 2010 NFL Preseason game, 17 to 9, against the Dallas Cowboys under the Hue Jackson / Jason Campbell offensive regime. Because, even with dropped and tipped passes, what was most interesting and pleasing about the Oakland Raiders, was the real, timed, precision passing attack. What was impressive was that from the snap of the football, to the quarterback's footwork, to the quarterback's hitch step, to the throw, to the receiver's routes, the Oakland Raiders quarterbacks are obviously drilled in the classic Bill Walsh fashion, with the objective of getting the ball out of the quarterback's hands and to the receiver as quickly as possible as part of a timed set of movements between passer and catcher. Yes, Jason Campbell completed 7 of 13 passes. Yes, Darrius Heyward-Bey didn't have a catch. But the passes got out of the quarterback&#

Image via Wikipedia For some reason, these events go together: today's the 71st Anniversary of The Wizard of OZ and on Sunday, August 15th, at 7:30 PM PDT at The Herbst Theater in San Francisco, REAF, The Richmond Ermet AIDS Foundation holds its 16th annual presentation of "Help Is On The Way" called Help Is On The Way XVI. Melissa Manchester It's hard to believe The Wizard of OZ is a full 71 years young.  In fact, it seems timeless.  Music and songs from The Wizard of OZ are etched into my brain, in part because one of my favorite songs to sing at The Alley in Oakland, is If I Only Had A Brain .  But it is 71 years yound, so it's important to stop and consider the impact this awesome musical movie has had on American Culture. It has been translated in 40 languages, and been the basis for scores of reinterpretations, including the popular musical, The Wiz . Which reminds this blogger why the link with Help Is On The Way XVI was made in my pea brain!

Image via Wikipedia Downtown Oakland, CA  Apparently, the City of Oakland's going to great lengths, almost neurotic, to alter the street culture of Downtown Oakland, but this bit of news is really disturbing. It rests in a Facebook message I just received, and part of which is posted here: have you heard about some of the ambitious plans of the Downtown and Lake Merritt Business Improvements District boards? Take a look, they want to pipe in shitty soft country musak 24 hours a day at all the corners of 13th and Broadway to drive away "undesireables" So a visit to this link reveals a Wikepedia page which reads: In July 2008, landlords in the district voted a parcel tax upon themselves to fund the "Downtown Oakland and Lake Merritt/Uptown Community Benefit Districts" to provide "special security services, cleaning of sidewalks, beautification, marketing and improvement of district identity and organizational services for businesses in the d

If you follow this space, you recall the long process of working to get a final design for the new San Francisco Transbay Terminal. The old terminal, slated for demolition, was the hub of trains into San Francisco from the East Bay and using the San Francisco / Oakland Bay Bridge. Then, after trains gave way to cars and buses, it was the terminus of AC Transit Bus Service and San Mateo Transit Service for the East Bay and the North Bay. But with all of that, it had still fallen into a state of deterioration such that it became a blight in the South of Market area of downtown San Francisco. After the establishment of the Redevelopment Plan in 2005 and a competition, a design created by Pelli Clarke Pelli emerged as the unanimous winner. Here's this blogger's video from the competition and the presentation in San Francisco City Hall in 2007 : Ground breaking marks new beginning The plan is to take shape over the next seven years and be complete in 2017. I'm ce

California Attorney General Jerry Brown should look into this. According to The Associated Press via The Huffington Post , Wells Fargo was ordered to pay $205 million to its customers as part of a successful class-action lawsuit. What Wells Fargo was doing was allowing debit purchases to go through when a customer's account was overdrawn. But Bank of America has the same practice, and this blogger experienced it after a client bounced a check. What Bank of America does is pile on one payment when you're overdrawn, thus triggering another overdraft charge and making more money from it. Then, when the non-paid vendor tries to collect again, the Bank of America issues a second overdraft charge ! My sources in and out of Bank of America have confirmed this problem. In other words, Bank of America has practiced the same process Wells Fargo was accused of and is now ordered to pay its customers back to settle. U.S. District Judge William Alsup accused Wells Fargo of pro

The Oakland Mayor's Race is not without its share of groups who think they can influence the race by excluding certain candidates. The Oakland SEIU 1021 Union Organization is just one of them. As this is written, the Oakland SEIU 1021 is about to hold its interviews of candidates for the Oakland Mayor's Race. From many conversations held Tuesday, it appears the SEIU finally got its act together and contacted all of the candidates, instead of just three: Former State Senator Don Perata, and Oakland Councilmembers Jean Quan and Rebecca Kaplan (District Four and At-Large, respectively.) Now, from the information communicated to this blogger, the SEIU's talking to more than just the three, although as of this writing the Joe Tuman for Mayor campaign was left out of the SEIU process. UPDATE: a text from the Joe Tuman Campaign explains that after "several phone calls" they were invited for later tonight. In all, it was an awful state of affairs punctuated b