It’s time to record genuine history rather than historical debasement books like “Season of the Witch.” San Francisco’s first experiment with district election of supervisors was voter-enacted in November 1976, resulting in election of Harvey Milk in the so-called Castro Street area (he had run unsuccessfully citywide) and Dan White in the Portola in 1977.
Once upon a time, presidential campaigns were relatively short. Not now in the era of Trump, especially for Democrats, like an unknown congressman from Texas who was vanquished two months ago for U.S. Senate or another similar type unknown except in Alameda County and the SF Chronicle, and rookie U.S. senate members, including one from San Francisco.
As observed by a judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit on Constitution Day this year, Thomas Jefferson in 1789 wrote: “Wherever the people are well-informed, they can be trusted with their own government.”
As a lawyer and retired judge, I was keenly attentive to last month’s confirmation proceedings respecting U.S. Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh. Neither his opponents nor Kavanaugh demonstrated good judgment and appropriate conduct.
Last month, I mentioned the self-congratulatory dedication of the Transbay Terminal, another San Francisco project years behind schedule and tens of millions of dollars more expensive than represented to taxpayers for more than a decade.
San Francisco Supervisor Aaron Peskin correctly notes that without high speed rail and Caltrain, the Transbay Terminal “will go down as the most expensive bus terminal in the history of humankind.”
Wordsmithing government employees with “public service” conveys the notion of lower pay and lower benefits. That’s untrue, but the cliche is so engrained in news coverage that elimination of such a misplaced notion is impossible.
Supervisors are limited to two four-year terms. The policy theory was that such a system would encourage everyday citizens, not aspiring politicians, to lead San Francisco legislatively. That’s a fallacy.
Election choices; bad fees by Quentin Kopp Was it Diogenes who declared: “If a man carries his own lantern, he need not fear darkness”? Reiteration appears inevitable in the face of the June 5 California […]
A savant once observed: “It’s useless to try to hold some people to anything they say while they’re madly in love, drunk or running for office,” and, don’t forget: “Everybody makes mistakes. That’s why we keep having political elections.”
As always, the truth about aliens is malleable, and politicians are trimmers; they love illegal aliens as part of their politics. As the son of a legal immigrant and husband of another legal immigrant, I scratch my head in dismay.
Friends of Ethics, a volunteer city organization receiving no taxpayer money, discovered
as of Feb. 13, that $798,566,250 has been paid to non-profit entities for the fiscal year
2017-18, that $191,790,256 remains to be paid by June 30, 2018, for a total
of almost $1 billion from taxpayers.
Quentin Kopp offers his view of California’s high speed rail project.
Steinle’s alleged killer wouldn’t have been in San Francisco but for San Francisco’s
“sanctuary” law and its implementation by former Sheriff Ross Mirkarimi.
Commentary by Quentin Kopp.
