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Three cardboard cutouts of black people were reportedly found hanged in effigy from nooses on the UC Berkeley campus on Saturday morning. The incident follows a week of protests on the streets of Berkeley, California, to denounce the grand jury decisions not to indict white police officers in the deaths of two unarmed black men in St. Louis and New York. Local pastor Michael McBride was the first to share the image on Twitter. One of the hanged figures, which appears to be a cardboard cutout of a lynched woman identified as Laura Nelson from 1911. The cutout includes the...

On Wednesday evening, in the very hall where the University of California at Berkeley had just celebrated the 50th anniversary of the Free Speech Movement, demonstrators shut down a speech by billionaire tech guru--and noted libertarian--Peter Thiel. The activists who broke into Wheeler Hall were protesting the non-indictment of police officers in the deaths of black suspects Michael Brown and Eric Garner in Ferguson, MO and Staten Island, NY for the fifth straight evening.

BERKELEY (CBS SF) – A lecturer at the University of California, Berkeley who posted a tweet offering extra time on an assignment to students injured during anti-police brutality protests has received numerous threats, prompting her to delete her Twitter account. Kaya Oakes, an author who teaches writing at the university, tweeted Sunday, “If any of my #Berkeley students were teargassed, batoned or shot w/rubber bullets last night, you can have an extension on your essay.” Since then, Oakes and her colleagues at the university have received complaints and threats.

Update, 4 p.m. Tuesday: The latest fallout from a series of Berkeley protests against police violence: The Berkeley City Council has canceled its Tuesday night meeting. The decision was made as activists from Occupy Oakland called for a shutdown of the meeting. A statement from Mayor Tom Bates suggested the meeting was scratched because of capacity issues:

The widespread demonstrations led to the arrest of about 160 individuals, some of whom pelted police with rocks as they attempted to reopen Interstate 80. In the end, it appears the protesters experienced the inconvenience they had inflicted on others, resulting in what many are calling an ironic twist. Twitchy reported a number of those who took part in the demonstration were heard complaining that they were forced to walk back to their homes due to the shutdowns their actions caused.

BERKELEY, Calif. -- Hundreds of people marched through Berkeley for a third night a row, blocking a major highway and stopping a train as activists in this ultra-liberal bastion protested grand jury decisions not to indict white police officers in the deaths of two unarmed black men. Demonstrators blocked traffic on both sides of Interstate 80 in Berkeley, while another group stood on and sat on train tracks, forcing an Amtrak train to stop Monday night. At one point, a woman in a vehicle stuck in the traffic jam caused by the I-80 blockage went into labor, and the local...

Hundreds of protesters marched through Berkeley for hours Monday night, confronting police outside their headquarters before heading west and intermittently shutting down Interstate 80 in both directions near University Avenue. The rally, the third in as many nights, began on Telegraph Avenue near UC Berkeley around 5 p.m. as hundreds gathered to denounce police killings of unarmed black men in Missouri and New York. Now-familiar chants of “Hands up! Don’t shoot!” and “Out of the houses! Into the streets!” rang out as the march moved up Durant Avenue and protesters called for students to leave their dormitories and join the...

Protests over police killings in Missouri and New York turned violent in Berkeley, Calif., for the second night in a row as demonstrators vandalized businesses and blocked traffic on a freeway. "I did a few things that, you know, I'm not too proud of but, you know, I felt like it was all for a good cause at the time," protester Gary Leroy told KRON TV. Protesters threw rocks and bottles at police who responded with tear gas. The protests came in the wake of a grand jury's decision last week not to indict a New York police officer involved...

Demonstrators have gathered in Berkeley and Oakland, California for another night of protests against the non-indictment of police officers in the deaths of black suspects in Ferguson, Missouri and Staten Island, New York.

Hundreds of protesters returned to East Bay streets on Sunday for a second night of raucous demonstrations against police killings of unarmed black men in Missouri and New York. Sunday’s protest started out largely peaceful in Berkeley, but by 9 p.m. crowds had climbed past lines of California Highway Patrol officers onto Highway 24 in Oakland, where they blocked multiple lanes of eastbound traffic. Even as the crowd chanted “peaceful protest,” a group of people jumped on top of two law enforcement vehicles and kicked at the sirens, and several set small fires nearby. Police eventually moved protesters away from...

Hating Jews at Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley’s graduate student labor union (UAW 2865) is voting on whether the State of Israel should continue to exist. No one is waiting with bated breath for the tally of a vote whose implementation would violate both California and United States law. It is one of those exercises in academic hubris laced with ignorance for which Berkeley is famous. After all, students know slightly less American history after four years at the prestigious institution than before they crossed through Sather Gate. One of the leaders of the anti-Israel movement is Lara Kiswani,...

The city of Berkeley is considering whether to require local retailers to give out radiation-related safety sheets to cell phone customers who make a purchase. Customers could be advised not to hold or carry the phone near the body while using the device, and directed to consult the manual to learn the “recommended separation distance” between the phone and one’s body.

The San Francisco Bay Area city of Berkeley will decide whether to slap stickers on gas pumps warning that burning fuel contributes to global warming in a plan that’s a first of its kind in the country. […] A spokeswoman for the Western States Petroleum Association, an oil-industry lobbying group, has said the labels reflect the state’s and Berkeley’s opinions and would force “unwanted speech in violation of the First Amendment.” …

VIDEO Raw footage from DxE East Bay in Berkeley last week: "Next to us is the body of a mother, who bellowed in grief as she was dragged to the kill floor."

Voters in Berkeley, Calif., have passed the nation’s first soda tax with a resounding 75 percent of the vote. The measure aims to reduce the effects of sugar consumption on health, especially increased rates of obesity and diabetes. It will levy a penny-per-ounce tax on most sugar-sweetened beverages and is estimated to raise more than $1 million per year. Proceeds will go to the general fund; Measure D calls for the creation of a health panel to advise Berkeley’s City Council on appropriate health programs to receive funding. Campaign Co-Chair Jack Daniels called Berkeley’s win a tipping point. “I think...

Berkeley, California, one of the most liberal cities in the nation, have overwhelmingly approved the nation's first 'sugar tax,' which will raise the cost of sodas and energy drinks by one penny per ounce. A similar tax in neighboring San Francisco, which would have levied two cents per ounce, failed to pass - gaining 55percent of the vote, short of the two-thirds majority needed. The Berkeley tax would raise the cost of a can of Pepsi from $1 to $1.12, but bigger fountain drinks would get hit harder. A large Coke from McDonald's would go from $2.29 to $2.61. A...

...But he stumbled onto the truth a few months ago, arguing that, indeed, Islamic extremism is a problem that needs to be confronted. The cheering from the Left has stopped. Now, to punish Maher for pointing out the truth, students at UC Berkeley are looking to ban him from the campus and to prevent him from making a speech there. They have started a petition, which now has over 1,500 signatures. The petition, called, "Stop Bill Maher from speaking at UC Berkeley's December graduation," makes a number of accusations about Maher, specifically slamming him for his statements against radical Islam....

A student petition at University of California, Berkeley, aims to prevent Bill Maher from speaking on campus following his recent comments on Islam. The petition, which now has more than 2,200 signatures and is circulated on change.org, demands that the university revoke its invitation for the liberal comedian to speak at a December commencement ceremony. “Bill Maher is a blatant bigot and racist who has no respect for the values UC Berkeley students and administration stand for,” the petition reads. “Bill Maher’s public statements on various religions and cultures are offensive and his dangerous rhetoric has found its way into...

On both coasts, grandparents are learning to apply a modern-day rule of thumb with surprising accuracy: If it looks inane, it’s probably Common Core. “The Berkeley school district's curriculum for sixth-grade math was an exact copy of the Common Core State Standards for the grade,” Marina Ratner wrote in The Wall Street Journal on August 5, 2014. “The teacher in my grandson's class went through special Common Core training courses.” “As his assigned homework and tests indicate, when teaching fractions, the teacher required that students draw pictures of everything: of 6 divided by 8, of 4 divided by 2/7, of...

The progressive War on Soda may have failed in New York, despite the best efforts of the Deplorable Nanny State Mayor, but this is a multi-front battle which will clearly rage on for some time. As any good battle commander will tell you, when fighting an opponent with numerical superiority, it’s best to drag them into a skirmish on your home turf. In the effort to save people from their own ignorant, evil selves, the fight to make soda more expensive – and thereby modify public behavior through tax policy – has moved to Berkeley.