Oakland Focus News | Oakland News Online Blog

Jack Clark of Cal Rugby On Tuesday, as this blogger was traveling away from the San Francisco Bay Area and Cal Berkeley, UC Berkeley was in the process of nuking it's prized Rugby Program, and destroying Cal Athletics as we know it. Rugby Coach Jack Clark was fired - his position ends June 2011 -  and the program dumped to varsity sports status. The reason given was Title IX requirements to financially equalize male and female sports, but given that Coach Clark had a plan to fund and to elevate Women's Rugby to intercollegiate status that was jettisoned by the Cal Administration, using Title IX as an excuse is pure horseshit. The overall issue has been Cal's need to cut the overall budget of the athletic department, but the one revenue-generating program, Men's Rugby, and its coach who has a plan to elevated women's rugby, was a major target. For someone not familiar with this issue at all, Cal Men's Rugby has achieved legendary status in the sport

Dr. Candell - I didn't endorse him Note: no endorsement for any mayoral candidate from this space, yet. When this blogger attended the second Oakland Mayor's Race Forum at The Lakeshore Baptist Church, a sheet of paper was being passed around the audience. It was a petition to have the name of Dr. Terrance Candell on the ballot for the election for Mayor of Oakland. I asked what I was signing before I put my name to the paper; such a signature is not an endorsement of any candidate. For some reason, my name is listed in the voter guide as endorsing Dr. Candell for Mayor. It's not true. The news of this problem came from Oakland businessman and once-challenger of Councilmember Ignacio De La Fuente (District Five - Fruitvale, Central East Oakland) Mario Juarez, who via Facebook asked if I'd lost my mind. Of sound mind, certainly. A call to the City of Oakland City Clerk Office did confirm Mr. Juarez's report. The person on the phone then said they

From Pamela Drake- Oaklanders who want fair elections and who believe that candidates for election to Oakland offices should not violate the laws that they have promised to uphold, should show up at the City Council Rules Committee tomorrow, Oct 1st, at 10:45 AM. We're asking the Council to close the loophole that lets Don Perata's buddies violate the law on behalf of him and then announce that all bets are off on violating the spirit and intent of our campaign reforms.In what world does this sound remotely ethical; but it may just barely be legal unless we close that loophole now! Please read: Open Letter to the Mayor, Oakland City Council, City Attorney, and the Public Ethics Commission: The Oakland Campaign Reform Act of 2008 was devised to promote good government and to protect Oakland’s electorate from the undue influence of money in the choice of our elected leaders. Former Senator Don Perata has shown by his actions that he will not abide by those laws, even while he is

Jean Quan and her supporters put together a video about her work with youth, neighbors, and merchants on how to take Oakland back and lower crime and violence block by block. About Pamela Drake- I'm one of Jean's supporters. We urge you to call her campaign office at 444-Quan or go to jeanquanforoakland.org. Jean will be the hardest working mayor Oakland has ever had!

Anyone that opposes the West Oakland Eminent Domain Project is invited to sign the online petition. City Council meeting for public comment is October 5th, 6:30 PM City Hall

Oakland Mayor's Race Forum first take. (Which means, there's going to be more of these posts on last night, because a lot was happening.) This just in: The Oakland Tribune's out of touch with Oakland. A number of attendees of the 450 estimated said they learned of the Oakland League Of Women Voters via "the newspaper." All of the people who made that statement were over 50 years old. Still, the forum, which attracted every candidate except Dr. Terrance Candell, was a success. The auditorium at 300 Lakeside Drive seats 380 people, so if you do the math, it was about 70 over capacity. The crowd was a happy mix of supporters of candidates and long-time observers of the Oakland political scene. The one complaint they had was there wasn't enough time to hear what the candidates were about. That wasn't because there were too many candidates, but due to the format. Either Oakland Tribune Editor Martin Reynolds or the League of Women Voter

Oakland Mayor Candidate Terrance Candell The Oakland Mayor's Race gets crazier. In 90 minutes something is about to happen that's never went down in Oakland's history. At 6:30 PM, three Oakland Mayoral Forums will take place at the same time. One, the "first planned" one, is the infamous Oakland League Of Women Voters Forum that was going to have just two candidates, then opened it to all of them. The other, the "counter-forum" as this blogger calls it, is being produced by Terrance Candell.  The third is the "other candidates" forum at Calvin Simmons Theater at 10 Tenth St. The Oakland LWV Forum is being held at The Kaiser Center Auditorium at 300 Lakeside Drive; Terrance's one-man Q&A is being held at the Laney College Tower Forum. And the "other candidates" forum is at The Calvin Simmons Theater across from Laney College. All three start, as mentioned, at the same time. Dr. Candell's forum started in re

( First on Zennie62.com ) Meg Whitman , the California gubernatorial candidate and former eBay CEO, already loathed in this space for her passive-agressive Oakland campaign headquarters, is under fire now for a statement she made about Fresno, California, saying "It's awful..it looks like Detroit." The comment was ill-considered in several ways: First, she made it before the Editorial Board of The San Jose Mercury News. Second, she insulted a not one but two cities: Fresno and Detroit. Third, it's the second time she's dissed a California city in some way. The first time was in Oakland, when Whitman's staffers set up an office on Lakeshore that looks like a fortress and at one point had signs that reported 24-hour surveillance, but with the word misspelled! Here's the video : Jerry Brown Fails To Capitalize Meg Whitman's many shortcomings and history of issues have not been drilled into the collective conscious of Californians. The on

( Post originally at Zennie62.com ) Obama Terror Attack Quote: the definition of "absorb" - keep that in mind. The Internet's ablaze with news, blog, and soon video and audio chatter about President Barack Obama's quote in Bob Woodward's new book Obama's Wars . The Right Wing of the blogsphere's especially excited over the so-called statement by the President that America "could absorb" a Terrorist attack. The right, looking for whatever edge it can get politically, is prone to great leaps in misjudgement. Want an example? Look no further than Senator John McCain's selection of Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as his vice presidential running mate. Not to digress, the problem of Couch Potato Conservatives rests in their lack of desire to think. Thus, failing to ask one simple question: what's the definition of "absorb." Here are all of the possible definitions: 1. To take (something) in through or as through pores or

Are NFL Head Coaches Benching Black QBs Faster Than White QBs? It's a pattern that's starting to emerge, though not in a neat way. On Sunday, Tennessee Titans QB Vince Young (black) is benched after a 3 interception one fumble performance against the Pittsburgh Steelers for Kerry Collins (white). Oakland Raiders QB Jason Campbell (black) is sent to the sidelines after lackluster first-half play against the St. Louis Rams, and replaced by Bruce Gradkowski (white). The Philadelphia Eagles trade Donovan McNabb (black) to make room for Kevin Kolb (white), who doesn't play because of a concussion last week, and gives way by need to Michael Vick (black). Vick, even though he's playing lights-out football, is forced to be humble and say "This is Kevin Kolb's team" because Andy Reid says so, even as Vick's proved in two straight games (and in preseason) that he's a better quarterback. The point is that many NFL head coaches seem quick to pull t

The 3D Entertainment Summit is a great place to be in on the ground-level conversation about an industry in its infancy. The overall concern, paced by DreamWorks Animation CEO Jeffrey Katzenberg, is one of quality. No one of the movie players in this room at the Hilton Universal City wants to be known as the one who makes the next Clash Of The Titans . Clash Of The Titans is the now infamous 2010 remake of the 1981 movie about a conflict between a god and a man-god, Originally created in a 2D format, Warner Bros execs rushed to do it in 3D after seeing the box-office revenue from Avatar . Scott Hedrick moderates panel  on 2d to 3d monetization The result was a 3D version that was so bad it spawned complaints from, of all people, Avatar producer and director James Cameron. It was Cameron who specifically called out the movie as an example of bad 3D. That episode in the short history of 3D has driven the conversation here at the 3D Summit. The issue, even right now, is

Oakland City Hall Gwillym Martin's an Oakland Resident and taxpayer who first found this blogger on Facebook and sent via email a copy of a complaint filed against the City of Oakland. Now people file lawsuits all the time, and at times for silly reasons; not in this case. But any media person who seeks to pick up on this story should make sure they understand it first. Read on. Martin filed a lawsuit in Alameda County Superior Court that specifically names City Administrator Dan Lindheim, CEDA (Community and Economic Development Agency) Director Walter Cohen, Building Services Director Ray Derania, and City Controller Osborne Solitei, and because "revenues generated from permit and code enforcement activities have been misappropriated for purposes other than those permitted by law and seeks an injunction to prevent further misuse of funds," as the email reads. Looking beyond the email and at the documents, Gwillym Martin's simple and controverial point is

Oakland's bar scene has really improved over the last five years. Where there were one or two good bars downtown ten years ago, now there's arguably six of them. You know the environment's good when there's a bartender competition. The problem is such events have been all-male or mostly male. Not anymore. On October 5th, 2010, Pican Restaurant will play host to the first Oakland Female Bartender Competition sponsored by Grand Manier and Zennie62.com . A Great Idea. How the idea started goes back to a video I created of another Oakland bartender competition held at Sidebar on Lake Merritt. This one: Where at the end of the video, I said Oakland needs an all female bartender competition. Well, Josh Perry and the good folks at Pican Restaurant at 2295 Broadway at 23rd, in Oakland CA, figured it should be done and at Pican! One thing: the first person to say they saw this at Zennie62.com, of which this blog is part of the network, gets a bottle of Grand M