Posted on 01/04/2007 7:54:44 AM PST by SmithL
Attorney General-elect Jerry Brown said Wednesday that he will appoint his wife, Anne Gust, as his unpaid special counsel, giving her a "broad mandate" in a new post that will be part of a significant reorganization of the state attorney general's office.
"It will be a very important and high-level role very close to the policy and administrative processes," said Brown, who was in Washington, D.C., to attend House Speaker-elect Nancy Pelosi's inauguration. "It is a broad title and she certainly will have a broad mandate because her experience is very broad."
This will not be the first time Brown and Gust have worked together. After their wedding in June 2005, Gust quit her post as chief administrative officer of Gap Inc. to become Brown's campaign manager. Gust was also unpaid in that role.
Brown, 68, a former two-term governor and mayor of Oakland, said Gust is more than qualified for the job.
"She had a very big role as a lawyer and chief administrative officer for Gap, and she did an extraordinary job in the campaign," Brown said.
Exactly how Gust, a lawyer who is 20 years Brown's junior, will fit into the state's law enforcement bureaucracy remains unclear.
"I haven't determined the organization chart, who reports to whom," Brown said.
Speculation about Gust's potential position in Brown's administration was sparked by a December e-mail from Brown to officials at the Justice Department that read: "Some of you may have noticed my wife, Anne, accompanying me as I have made the rounds of the various offices. I find her advice pretty invaluable and very practical."
On Wednesday, Brown made Gust's post public in a telephone interview with The Bee, saying he had cleared any potential conflicts with the "appropriate authorities" and had been given the go-ahead...
(Excerpt) Read more at sacbee.com ...
Her salary will be paid in part by Michael Savage's campaign contribution.
We get your point, Jerry.
Dear Jerry
Just make sure that she pays for her own car service.
Good luck!
Alan Hevesi
I was wondering when he got married.
Yes, it would appear that Jerry's Freudian slip is showing.
How about a nice desk for her in Jerry's office ? They can give each other broad mandates.
I couldn't resist the opportunity for the double entendre. Quite frankly, I didn't know he was heterosexual.
That is worth repeating, with corrections...
Her salary will be paid in part by Michael Weiner's campaign contribution.
I think I also read somewhere that Eliot Spitzer's wife will have an office down the hall from his. I'm assuming it will be in Albany, N.Y. since that is where the Governor's Mansion is located, and again I'm assuming that he will be living there.
Sunday, June 19, 2005
Oakland Mayor Jerry Brown and Anne Gust, a lawyer who's been his sweetie since friends introduced them 15 years ago, got married in Oakland yesterday, and it was romantic, traditional, pink-and-white and surprising to at least a few of their friends.
"No!'' said former San Francisco Supervisor Angela Alioto when asked whether she'd expected her old pal Brown, one of California's most famous bachelors, to marry. "He's 67 years old ... . It was about time.''
On March 15, the day lawyer and then-Gap Chief Administrative Officer Anne Baldwin Gust turned 47, the mayor of Oakland and would-be state attorney general proposed marriage. "First of all, she wanted a ring,'' he laughed yesterday, in response to a question about why he'd decided to make a marital move.
In fact, friends described Brown as becoming mesmerized by the gem-selection process, even using a loupe to inspect for flaws. When a solitaire stone was chosen and Gust said she'd like two more to surround it, the bride-to-be stood her ground against the groom-to-be's contention that less would be more.
"Not in this case,'' she said, and a three-diamond ring it was. "She's strong and supportive,'' said old friend Jo Schuman Silver, "Beach Blanket Babylon'' impresario. "She has showed him how not to take himself so seriously, loosened him up. He laughs a lot with her.''
"I think his personality has always been great,'' says Silicon Valley gastroenterologist Bart Lally, who has known Brown since grade school 60 years ago, but his "fun-loving side'' has sometimes been "dormant.'' With Gust, "he has blossomed.''
Gust, who grew up in Bloomfield Hills, Mich., graduated from Stanford and the University of Michigan Law School; she quit her Gap job a few months ago. She will manage Brown's campaign for attorney general; the election is next June.
Willie Brown, who's known Jerry Brown for 40 years, says that Gust "is probably the only person that could be his campaign manager. I don't think he has that much respect for most persons in the world of politics, but I think he does have that much respect for her. ...
When I have had meals with the two of them, she is a full participant, and has an opinion. And most of the time, it isn't his.'' Gust has said that she's been a registered Republican, an Independent and a Democrat.
Gust said the issue of whether she'll become Mrs. Brown is still "under discussion. When you're my age, you get used to your name.''
The wedding was attended by almost 600 guests, including former Gov. Gray Davis, and three past and present San Francisco mayors, Willie Brown, Gavin Newsom and Sen. Dianne Feinstein, who conducted the precisely planned ceremony (the second marriage she's conducted).
The readings from the Old and New Testaments, Gregorian chants by Exaudi nos and Cum jubilo, brass fanfare by the Whole Noyse and selections of medieval music sung by Melanie Spiller and Jennifer Lane were planned by Brown.
The groom's earliest plan for the event was for a pre-Tridentine wedding, harking back to the era before the Council of Trent made weddings church business. But "I told him it wouldn't feel real if he didn't get married in church,'' said his friend Alioto.
So after the Rotunda Building ceremony and reception, the couple came to San Francisco, where they were married at 5 p.m. in a much smaller religious ceremony at St. Agnes, where Brown's parents had married and where he was baptized.
Alioto interpreted Brown's decision to marry as a coming to grips with life's trajectory: "Jerry has big issues of mortality and immortality, so it makes sense." Alioto said she bought a burial plot "next to his, and I kept saying to him, 'What about eternity, Jerry?' ''
Philosopher and innovator Stewart Brand, who, like his friend Brown, is a man who takes a long view, said, "He's a good Catholic boy who's read the Confessions of St. Augustine. He knows that you get to play for a long time, and then you bear down. He did play for longer than most.''
Willie Brown viewed the timing as a practical matter: "Diane hasn't endorsed him yet.''
UC journalism Dean Orville Schell, who wrote "Brown'' in 1978, said the groom's rarest trait is that he "does not spin himself,'' which probably bodes well for marriage. "She must appreciate the fact that he isn't all smoke and mirrors,'' said Schell. "Jerry Brown is an uncensored person. He says what he is thinking.''
He has an "amazing capability to say things that other people dare not say.'' Schell spoke admiringly, but it's clear such plain talk can get a politician into public difficulty. "Anne's a pretty level-headed person, and in many ways a good complement to Jerry's Roman candle effect,'' said Schell.
Some details: The wedding planner was Sarah Berger, the flowers were by Ron Morgan, and the food was by Barbara Llewellyn Catering. Veggie-burgers were served along with mini-burgers, the carrot cake (not a formal wedding cake) featured nuts but no raisins, and the groom specially ordered cookies, ginger snap and peanut butter.
As a surprise for Brown from Rotunda developer Phil Tagami, custom-made wine labels were ornamented with the words "Celebratio Nuptiarum Rubrum'' and a Gaelic-looking cross, a Brown family symbol that was also on the front of lengthy programs.
The bride's ivory taffeta dress (3/4 sleeves, wraparound shirtwaist, box-pleated, lace-trimmed, street-length) was by the groom's old friend Diane von Furstenberg, and Gust carried a bouquet of white roses and lily-of-the-valley. The bride's lace pumps and groom's black oxfords had been purchased two days before the wedding at Wilkes Bashford, and the groom seemed impishly proud to say that.
An Oakland School for the Arts choir sang during the reception, but there was no dance music. It was too early in the day to dance, Brown said, but according to an insider involved in the planning, "He doesn't dance in public.''
About 20 out-of-town family members, from as far away as Florida, bunked at Brown's old We the People commune on Harrison Street, and the couple was supposed to return there Saturday night for a small gathering after the St. Agnes ceremony. Then it would be off to the Russian River for a few days, and Rome in August for a real honeymoon.
Later on, when the bride and groom were surrounded by TV cameras and reporters, the subject turned again to rings, and the newlyweds held out their hands to show them off. The bride, unable to resist the urge, picked up her husband's hand and gave it a quick smooch. And that's why people get married.
Leah Garchik, Chronicle Columnist
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2005/06/19/JERRYBROWN.TMP
*ping*
Nothing to see here, just move along...
Ugh. He may not be hetero after all.
I have to admit that I always kind of liked Brown. I guess I have a thing for eccentrics. Not that I'd ever vote for him, mind you, but at least he's interesting and tells you what he thinks, rather than just talking political mush.
He's not
Thats because you never had to live under his rule. Charles Manson and his followers are still alive because of him. The "onion field killers" Powell and Smith are alive because of him as well as a few hundred other MURDERERS. He appointed a very liberal (didn't think ANY cop killer should be executed) or any other killer should be executed to the Supreme court of California.
Moon beam also didn't want any more freeways built in Ca, and delayed for about 20 years the Century Fwy that goes to L.A. International airport.
Well I'll be darned. I never knew he was married. Since Jerry is a well-known homo, the wife must be a guy in drag.
And the 118 across The Valley and out to Simi, for over 15 years.
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