Free Republic

Folsom Street Fair 2009.

OAKLAND, Calif. -- A spokesman for BART's second-largest union announced Thursday that its members would begin a strike Sunday at midnight. BART's board of directors voted unanimously Thursday to unilaterally implement terms and conditions of employment for members of Amalgamated Transit Union Local 1555. BART management held a special meeting today and in a 9-0 vote approved imposing the terms after the union rejected BART's final contract offer in negotiations Wednesday night. Jesse Hunt, president of ATU Local 1555, which represents about 900 train operators, station agents and power workers, said earlier Thursday that if the board took such a...

Maybe Nancy Pelosi is just sick and tired of John Murtha getting all of the "bennies" from the defense budget. Not anymore, the defense policy bill has a provision that Pelosi has been pushing for a long time. It would speed up the transfer of military bases to private developers. The reason Pelosi wants the provision is Treasure Island, a Navy base that closed in 1993 and sits atop a man-made island in the San Francisco Bay. The city wants the Island and wants it cheap. For years the Navy and the City have been haggling over the sales price,...

This report suggests that noise can actually kill you. Unbelievable!!!

Barack Obama's chief campaign strategist David Axelrod, once worked for a man who was an identified member of the Communist Party USA, a registered agent of the Soviet Union and a paid disseminator of Soviet black propaganda. This man went on to become a key Chicago political fixer who helped elect communist linked politicians including the late Chicago mayor Harold Washington and former US Senator Carol Moseley Braun. This man knew Barack Obama and was a key member of an organisation which endorsed Barack Obama in his 2004 US Senate race. Barack and Michelle Obama were active members of this...

- A network administrator has locked up a multimillion dollar computer system for San Francisco that handles sensitive data and is refusing to give police the password, the San Francisco Chronicle reported Monday. The employee, 43-year-old Terry Childs, was arrested Sunday. He gave some passwords to police, which did not work, and refused to reveal the real code, the paper reported. The new FiberWAN (Wide Area Network) handles city payroll files, jail bookings, law enforcement documents and official e-mail for San Francisco. The network is functioning but administrators have little or no access.

SAN FRANCISCO — The San Francisco Medical Examiner says a teenager who was killed by an escaped zoo tiger six months ago had marijuana and alcohol in his system. The toxicology report was released Monday. It is included with an autopsy that concluded 17-year-old Carlos Sousa Jr. was killed by "blunt force injuries of the head and neck." -snip-

After San Francisco Supervisor Gerardo Sandoval introduced a resolution condemning the "defamatory language used by radio personality Michael Savage against immigrants,” Savage lashed back at the newly elected supervisor. "Illiberalism is not only a mental disorder it is fascist at its core,” the mega-popular talk show host told NewsMax.com. "This schmuck says my comments are 'symbolic of hatred and racism.' And they want the City to sue me for 'symbolism.' "There is no basis in American Law for such a suit but the larger point is the astonishing hate speech he is engaging in. To stop opinion by threatening legal...

SAN FRANCISCO - Even on a weekday in winter, the Castro district vibrates with energy, most of it male. Men holding hands, walking dogs and lounging at cafes have long been the main attraction in a neighborhood known as a gay mecca the world over. Yet where visitors see a living monument to gay pride, longtime community leader Brian Basinger sees a cultural enclave at risk of becoming a faded museum piece - or worse, a place where gay men may one day feel like they don't belong. "When I see a stroller now, I see it as someone who...

Mayor Gavin Newsom said he has had other stalkers since coming into political office, but said he filed a restraining order against a 42-year-old Hayward man because he “crossed the line” by working his way into Newsom’s apartment building in the late evening hours last month. On Wednesday, a San Francisco Superior Court judge issued a three-year restraining order against Han Sup Shin, which prohibits him from coming within 100 yards of the mayor’s person, place of business, home and vehicles. Shin is also ordered not to call Newsom’s staff members. When Shin showed up outside Newsom’s home on Valentine’s...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d8EIpdj-S30

Raising an Ebenezer at the church of her (March 2005) In Forum Letter’s December issue, we included Pr. Marshall Hahn’s report on a pair of Episcopal clergy in Pennsylvania who achieved notoriety when it became known they were also priests of the ancient pagan religion of Druidry (“Christians 2—Druids 0”). Of course, as Mom used to say, when you point a finger at someone else, three are pointing back to you. Fittingly, we recently came upon the website of an Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) congregation. Frankly, it makes Druidry look rather traditional. A new form of church The...

<p>SAN FRANCISCO, California (AP) -- Former television talk show host Rosie O'Donnell said she planned to marry her longtime girlfriend Thursday in San Francisco, where more than 3,300 other same-sex couples have tied the knot since February 12.</p> <p>Appearing on ABC's "Good Morning America," O'Donnell announced she would wed Kelli Carpenter -- two days after President Bush called for a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage.</p>

<p>SAN FRANCISCO - Gavin Newsom may have narrowly prevailed after one of this city's most tumultuous mayoral elections late last year, but in the month since he took office, he has appeared unafraid to shake up the town a bit more.</p>

A Christian law firm is calling for the arrest of the mayor of San Francisco in the wake of his decision last week that has resulted in hundreds of same-sex marriage licenses being issued. Despite the threat of that lawsuit, the City by the Bay continued throughout the weekend to grant licenses to homosexual couples who waited in long lines. Steve Crampton, a spokesman for the American Family Association Center for Law & Policy (CLP), calls Mayor Gavin Newsom's move "an arrogant stunt [that] proves the radical homosexual movement will trample the rights of all who stand in their way."...

<p>If you've seen the recently released DVD of the Grateful Dead's New Year's Eve concert at the old Winterland in 1978, you likely have an incomplete idea of just how big a role drugs played in the group's appeal to its fans. If you caught the feature on the return of the Dead that aired on CBS' "Sixty Minutes II" in November, you were also likely disappointed that the show barely broached the band's wide influence on the drug culture. Yes, one of the world's greatest news organizations covered one of the world's most vocal and successful organizations in promoting drug use. Pretty simple assignment, one would agree.</p>

<p>SAN FRANCISCO — A woman convicted of involuntary manslaughter along with her husband in the dog mauling death of a neighbor was released from prison after serving more than half of a four-year sentence.</p> <p>Marjorie Knoller, 48, was released Thursday from Central California Women's Facility in Chowchilla, according to Yolanda Campo, an assistant in the warden's office.</p>

<p>SAN FRANCISCO -- In the latest twist in the drama over alleged police misconduct, the district attorney on Tuesday dropped obstruction of justice charges against the police chief and his second-in-command after determining he couldn't get convictions.</p> <p>District Attorney Terence Hallinan, at a court hearing to discuss motions in a case that has consumed much of the San Francisco Police Department and city government the past two weeks, said that "in the interest of justice," he was shelving the indictments of Police Chief Earl Sanders and Assistant Chief Alex Fagan Sr.</p>

<p>SAN FRANCISCO -- To many of this city's African Americans, Police Chief Earl Sanders is a symbol of progress and leadership whose recent indictment on obstruction of justice charges is the handiwork of malicious, even racist, foes.</p> <p>But another segment of African Americans who have long criticized police misconduct are finding a measure of satisfaction in the serious predicament in which Sanders finds himself.</p>

In my social problems class my professor seems at times to be a communist, sometimes a socialist, and other just liberal. He never gives a conservative point of view, and the more he does this the further conservative I become, in the sense I feel obliged to argue the other side. In class recently the discussion was on Family and myths in America. One of many examples (some of which were accurate) came the brief discussion on welafre. Basically it was in his opinion (of course not fact) that welfare doesn't lead to damn near anything bad. The conventional wisdom...