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Hanging out on a street corner has taken on new meaning in San Francisco. Several dozen men and at least one woman took part in a naked protest Saturday in San Francisco's Castro District that has become known for its nude visitors. Some participants carried signs that read, "Nudity is Not a Crime" and "Get Your Hate Off My Body," . . .

With shouts demanding an end to fossil fuels, hundreds of people marched, biked and scooted down Market Street on Saturday as part of a global Moving Planet day. Some were dressed as polar bears and fish, while others carried signs calling for better public transit, more solar and wind energy, and cleaner air. Many participants took the opportunity to blast plans for a pipeline that would carry crude oil from the tar sands of western Canada into the United States. But everyone was there to express concern at the growing carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere. San Leandro teacher Maureen...

City Attorney Dennis Herrera may want to re-check his political contributors list. Herrera, a candidate for mayor, released a TV ad this week that links appointed Mayor Ed Lee to Republicans, showing three guys in suits with Republican lapel pins followed by the narrator saying: “Ed Lee’s getting it done for his friends and contributors, not for us.” . . . Herrera is “trying to brand Mayor Lee — a lifelong Democrat who started as an activist for tenant and immigrant rights — as a Republican because he has the support of Silicon Valley investor Ron Conway and other Republicans,”...

A few more points on today's column on the Supe Scott Wiener's proposed ordinance to regulate naked people dining and sitting in public places -- by requiring them to put something between their seats on those on which they sit. San Franciscans pride themselves in not particularly caring what happens between consenting adults. The problem: The City's nudists bare all without the consent of other adults -- many of whom are parents who want to enjoy the city with their children. I do not understand why restaurant owners do not refuse to serve naked patrons. It goes to show how...

I ran into a man I'd known for years at a supermarket the other day. He's an old San Francisco guy, so I was surprised at what he said. "I'm moving out of the city," he said. "San Francisco is not the city I grew up in anymore. I'm through with it. "Yep," he said, "I'm gonna sell my house and move to Novato. You know what? The sun shines there in the summer. I mean they have sun - that big yellow thing - sun in July and August. I'm tired of the fog - fog every night and...

A woman crossing a street along San Francisco's waterfront was struck and seriously injured today by a bicyclist who ran a red light, police said.

A circumcision ban measure on the November ballot contains clearly anti-Semitic campaign material and targets members of the Jewish faith, according to a press release Thursday from the San Francisco City Attorney’s Office. Jewish groups, along with some Muslim individuals, filed a lawsuit over the measure last week against The City’s director of elections and Lloyd Schofield, the San Francisco resident who gathered more than 12,000 signatures to get the proposed ban on the ballot. Groups that filed the suit argue that state law prevents local jurisdictions from restricting medical practice by “healing arts professionals” and that the ban would...

Our recent story about the increasing trend of families leaving the city once their kids hit school age garnered a lot of attention inside and outside City Hall. As we noted, despite years of policy initiatives by city and school officials, new census figures show 5,278 fewer kids living in the city in 2010 than in 2000. That means just 13.4 percent of San Francisco residents are kids - one of the lowest percentages of any city in the country. Is it just a given that not many kids will grow up in the city, or can more be done?

Amid an intensifying debate over a ballot measure to ban the circumcision of boys in San Francisco, state and federal laws are being proposed to ban such bans. Opponents of the measure have accused the effort of being anti-Semitic. A group of religious leaders and politicians are denouncing the effort as an infringement on religious freedoms. Rep. Brad Sherman, D-Sherman Oaks, said recently he would introduce the so-called Religious and Parental Rights Defense Act of 2011 to prevent San Francisco and other places to enact such circumcision bans. Assemblyman Mike Gatto, D-Los Angeles, reportedly is planning to introduce a similar...

An Internet comic featuring a blond Foreskin Man battling an evil Monster Mohel intent on circumcising a baby has angered local Jewish leaders who say it is anti-Semitic.Matthew Hess, the man behind both the comic and a ballot measure to ban circumcision in San Francisco, says he knows the loaded imagery behind his campaign has ruffled a few feathers.But that's kind of the point, he said."Any character who circumcises children is not going to be drawn favorably," he said. "I think what's being done to young boys right now is a serious crime. The fact that it has been done...

San Francisco would be the first city in California to require that crisis pregnancy centers prominently disclose whether they are antiabortion facilities that don't offer comprehensive health care, under legislation being developed by a city supervisor. Critics say that despite giving the impression that women facing unplanned pregnancies are offered a full range of medical services and counseling, many of these clinics try to talk patients out of terminating their pregnancies and do not provide any care or referrals beyond limited prenatal and postnatal services. "Legislation is a priority because there are clinics using misleading advertising tactics," said Supervisor Malia...

I've been wondering if the folks behind the circumcision ballot measure in San Francisco -- the subject of my most recent column -- are anti-Semites. Here's a clue. The mgmbill.org web site links to this site.

In 2010, San Francisco supervisors banned Happy Meals. They showed no regard for parental choice. So it should not come as a shock that activists have managed to put a measure on the November ballot that essentially would outlaw the circumcision of baby boys. If it passes, parents won't be able to choose to circumcise their infant sons. The penalty for the "genital cutting of male minors" will be a $1,000 fine and/or up to a year in jail. The ballot measure bills itself as a ban on "forced genital cutting" and "mutilation." Clearly, the authors want to confuse voters...

When Jack Hagerty closed on his new condo three weeks ago, he thought it had everything he wanted: a quiet, safe Glen Park location, easy access to BART and a backyard for his 10-year-old son. Turns out it came with an extra feature - a self-described "leather sex" enthusiast living downstairs. Not that there's anything wrong with that. "He's entitled to his life," Hagerty said. "I just wish he'd told me sooner." Hagerty said all was well until he announced that he intended to remove the carpet and padding in his unit to help with allergies. The downstairs condo owner...

It doesn't take much to whip up a protest in San Francisco - two people and a bad idea will do - but Gandhi? Really? A group billing itself as the Organization for Minorities of India plans to protest today to demand the removal of the bronze statue of Mohandas Gandhi that has sat in the plaza behind the Ferry Building since 1988.

Since Mayor Gavin Newsom took office, he and the city of San Francisco have spent more than $1 billion on the homeless. But is it helping? This year, the city spent $150 million on health care and social services for its estimated 13,500 homeless on the street or in city-funded housing. That comes to about $11,000 per person. The city has spent another $176 million, mostly in federal funds, on permanent housing for the homeless since 2004. Newsom said at a recent Chronicle editorial board meeting that since implementing his Care Not Cash program, the city has taken 12,000 people...

San Francisco is a colorful city. Sometimes it's a little too colorful. While living here, I've seen so many disturbing images that have now permanently burnt themselves into my retinas. . . . I surveyed some friends to find out what was the most disgusting thing they've seen while living in San Francisco. Something purely horrific whose image will always stick with them in the same manner as the fall of the Twin Towers or the opening sequence of Saving Private Ryan.

One of the biggest bulges in San Francisco's budget crisis is the $86 million a year that the city spends on premium pay - money that rewards employees and managers for everything from working nights to having toiled for the city for 10 years. For example, in addition to her $273,112-a-year salary, San Francisco Fire Chief Joanne Hayes-White earned enough in various pay premiums in 2009 to bring her total to $290,o27. The chief's extra pay comes in the form of a "fire education incentive premium," which goes to all firefighters who have an associate's or bachelor's degree or 10...

San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom's idea of holding a special election to name his successor if he's elected lieutenant governor appears to be DOA. Newsom doesn't have the six votes on the Board of Supervisors needed to place a charter amendment on the November ballot to require an election, and there doesn't appear to be much interest downtown for an expensive and rushed petition to get the 47,000 signatures needed to go around the supes.San Francisco Chamber of Commerce Vice President Jim Lazarus, who met with the mayor last week to talk about a charter change, said he doesn't see...

Hey Scott Brown. You may be the truck-driving new senator from Massachusetts, but Mayor Gavin Newsom says he can teach you a few things about job creation. Brown, you may recall, made the comment earlier this month at his first Senate news conference that President Obama's stimulus program "didn't create one new job." That's not what the Congressional Budget Office says, estimating the recovery program saved or created 600,000 to 1.6 million jobs in the third quarter of 2009. "You can not, in good faith, make the argument that his (stimulus program) has not created a job," Newsom said Wednesday...