Free Republic

L is for Lobster, that's good enough for me. It's also good enough for Cookie Monster, who is in San Francisco this week. Everyone's favorite fuzzy blue monster (sorry, Grover) stopped by Lobsta Truck at Off The Grid yesterday, where he ordered lobster and crab rolls. (C is for crab roll, too!) He also visited The Chairman food truck, where he got one of everything (but no cookies), and Frozen Kuhsterd, where he got his namesake dessert, "The Cookie Monster." Earlier this week, Cookie Monster also attended a Giants game, revealing in an interview with MLB.com that he too plays...

A political battle that is shaping up in San Francisco has implications for other communities across the country. The issue that will be on the June ballot is whether voter approval shall be required to change the height restrictions on buildings along the San Francisco waterfront. Like so many other political issues, this one is being debated in runaway rhetoric bearing no resemblance to reality. Former San Francisco City Attorney Louise Renne, for example, says that "the people" own the waterfront and therefore should be "consulted." Really? Can one of "the people," who supposedly own the waterfront, decide that he...

Although Malia Cohen has the power of incumbency, and Tony Kelly beat Cohen in the first round of ranked choice voting in the 2010 election, a number of other candidates are vying for the District 10 supervisorial seat on this November’s ballot. In addition to the two Potrero Hill residents, four Bayview and one Visitacion Valley inhabitants have indicated that they’re running: Shawn Richard, DeBray Carpenter, Diane Wesley Smith, Marlene Tran, and Ed Donaldson. Tran’s entry into the race late last month creates a new dynamic in the City’s only seriously contested supervisorial race this year. Tran, the sole Asian-American...

Reboot in San Francisco this summer with young Republicans.Startup employees Aaron Ginn, 26 -- a former Mitt Romney campaign worker -- and Garrett Johnson, 29, are looking to do what Democrats have done for almost a decade: connect conservative and libertarian "technologists" with old-school political campaigns with like minds. There just isn't enough opportunity in Silicon Valley. For a dyed-in-the-wool, true-red conservative. So, a pair of Silicon Valley denizens with right-wing politics are planning their answer to Netroots Nation, according to the Huffington Post. Startup employees Aaron Ginn, 26 -- a former Mitt Romney campaign worker -- and Garrett Johnson,...

When it comes to the San Francisco Fed, it is best known throughout the financial community as the group of crack economists who spend millions of taxpayer funds to investigate such probing, for kindergarteners at least, topics as: is water wet, do trees make a sound when they fall in the forest, is it still worth going to college, and are hedge funds important in a crisis. Little did we know that, at least some of them, are homicidal psychopaths with suicidal tendencies. Because this is precisely what was revealed moments ago when Bloomberg reported that the chief operating officer...

A group of wealthy liberal donors who helped bankroll the Center for American Progress and other major advocacy groups on the left is developing a new big-money strategy that could boost state-level Democratic candidates and mobilize core party voters. The plan, being crafted in private by a group of about 100 donors that includes billionaire hedge fund manager George Soros and San Francisco venture capitalist Rob McKay, seeks to give Democrats a stronger hand in the redrawing of district lines for state legislatures and the U.S. House.

Two longtime members of The City's little-known Patrol Special Police resigned in recent weeks after administrative charges were filed against them with the Police Commission, but then apparently rescinded their resignations, opting instead for a leave of absence. The resignations or leaves of absence of brothers Todd and Scott Hart brings the already dwindling number of Patrol Specials down even further. Once numbering in the hundreds, they now stand at fewer than 10. "They were brought up on administrative charges, not criminal charges," said Alan Byard, president of the Patrol Special Police Offcers Association. "They have resigned so everything is...

In a historic day for the nation's 10th-largest city, San Jose on Wednesday officially topped 1 million residents -- likely for good this time. The state of California estimated in its annual population report that San Jose had 1,000,536 residents at the start of 2014 -- up 1.7 percent from last year as tech-fueled Santa Clara County continued its run as the fastest-growing region in the state. The seven-figure milestone is a significant one for a city that has long struggled with its identity, especially as hecklers in more urban areas dismiss San Jose as a run-of-the-mill giant suburb that...

<p>The Hook-Up Truck, a commercial box truck retrofitted for sex on the street, departs on its maiden voyage this weekend around the Bay Area.</p> <p>The truck, described on the project’s website as “either participatory performance art, a safe and convenient place to get down while out on the town, or the end of civilization as we know it” will be cruising around Oakland Friday night before heading over to San Francisco’s Mission neighborhood at 10 p.m.</p>

Israel-bashing figures prominently in 'teach-ins' where San Franciscans seek a flavor of the Vietnam era Let's admit it - San Francisco is gorgeous, and deserves its name as the capital of resistance to what the US is trying to do in the Middle East. After all, while other places from coast to coast had rallies and marches before and during Operation Iraqi Freedom, only there were thousands "hauled off by the pigs" for blocking the financial district, and only there was there a rally and march almost every Saturday for weeks and weeks until Saturday, April 19. But were all...

Maggots found in Whole Foods meat case, health officials say they’re not moving fast enough to fix the problem Whole Foods claims to be “America’s Healthiest Grocery Store,” and that they, “maintain the strictest quality standards in the industry.” Such claims might start to be questioned, however, after a disgusting discovery at one of their San Francisco locations on Monday, April 21. Last week, KRON 4 News exclusively reported that maggots were found in a meat case. Now, KRON 4 News is reporting that the San Francisco Department of Public Health (SFDPH) claims Whole Foods hasn’t worked quickly enough to...

Let’s not get crazy. Let’s not take the NBA’s rather surprising and (cautiously) encouraging smackdown of racist billionaire team owner Donald Sterling – a member, mind you, of the most inbred, powerfully entrenched clubs in history, humans who’ve quite literally gotten away with murder since the dawn of American capitalism (hi, Koch Brothers) as anything other than what it likely is – as rare as an abortion clinic in Texas, as precious as a good book in Idaho.

<p>Arriving now in the mailboxes of more than 10.6 million California voter households: Sen. Leland Yee’s pledge to fight corruption.</p> <p>Yee, indicted earlier this month on corruption and conspiracy charges, paid $6,250 for a statement touting his secretary of state candidacy in the voter information guides that began going out Thursday for the June 3 primary.</p>

Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) is firing back at Mark Zuckerberg and his pro-immigration reform group, calling the Facebook CEO a "liberal billionaire" who should "go back to San Francisco." Earlier this month the Zuckerberg-backed super PAC FWD.us released ads in Iowa and online attacking King for his controversial remarks on immigration, such as when the congressman compared granting veterans citizenship to handing out "M&M's or Tootsie Rolls" at a parade.

The final football game ever in San Francisco's Candlestick Park will be played this summer by a team of 49ers greats, led by four-time Super Bowl winner Joe Montana. Montana, who played quarterback on the 49ers from 1979 to 1992, will suit up once again on July 12 to take on an all-star team led by famed Miami Dolphins quarterback Dan Marino, organizers said at a news conference in the waterfront restaurant Epic Roasthouse this morning. The 49ers played their last game at Candlestick in December and will debut at the under construction Levi's Stadium in Santa Clara for the...

Gov. Jerry Brown took the stage at a downtown San Francisco luncheon Saturday to tout his legislative record, plug some upcoming projects and note the changing demographics of California.

n 1999, my wife and I saw a For Sale sign on a small house on Nob Hill, two blocks away from the apartment where we’d been living for years. We went to look at it. Large sections of Nob Hill are basically extensions of Chinatown, and this house and the connected three-unit apartment building behind it were essentially run-down tenements. About a dozen people were living in the front house, squeezed into rooms that had been crudely subdivided by sheets and plywood partitions—doors sealed off, the staircase drywalled over, an illegal kitchen installed upstairs. The rear apartments were in...

And, as one reader noted: he's not on his cellphone! This is a pretty good example of how pedestrians should be on the roadways in San Francisco -- even if the example is a coyote. Jennifer Anwaya snapped this image which we spotted on Richmondsfblog.com this morning. Apparently, the prairie wolf was seen casually making his way across Geary Boulevard at 37th Avenue earlier this week. No word on where he was headed that evening. Perhaps it was just an urban stroll.

A high-dollar Obama donor who was caught on video brutally beating his girlfriend got off with 25 hours of community service last week after he pled guilty to domestic battery charges. CCTV footage caught Gurbaksh Chahal, the CEO of San Francisco tech startup RadiumOne, kicking his girlfriend 117 times, including blows to the head, and trying to smother her with a pillow during a vicious 30-minute assault. He faced 45 felony charges until the footage was deemed inadmissible. As a result, Chahal has managed to avoid jail time, the Daily Mail reported on Thursday.

The Democratic National Committee says it has returned $20,000 donated by a wealthy San Francisco Internet entrepreneur recently convicted of domestic violence. DNC spokeswoman Rebecca Chalif said Friday the organization has returned Gurbaksh Chahal’s 2014 contribution after discovering he pleaded guilty last week to misdemeanor domestic violence battery and battery charges. Chahal was sentenced to three years’ probation and faces no jail time. …