Representatives of UC Berkeley’s student government, landlords of the Daily Californian, an independent paper aimed at UC Berkeley students, have declared war on the paper’s editors, threatening to evict the paper unless editors sign off on editorial stipulations in a draft lease renewal agreement. -more-

FRIDAY, SEPT. 12 -more-

BORN AGAIN -more-

FRIDAY, SEPT. 12 -more-

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The following letter was addressed to City Clerk Sherry Kelly. -more-

The Berkeley Unified School District has killed plans to reschedule today’s beleaguered Berkeley High-Oakland Tech football game amid continuing questions as to why the game was put off in the first place. -more-

On Sept. 9, at City Council, Tom Bates acted in a way that will damage his political career as mayor of Berkeley. Before this date, few will remember that Bates, with former Mayor Hancock, U.S. Senator Cranston, and then-Legislative honcho Willie Brown—all key Democrats—worked hard to defeat a Palestinian West Bank sister city resolution in Berkeley in 1988. Backed by big money, some of it from the Rightist American-Israeli lobby which unquestioningly supports all Israeli policy no matter how egregious, the Democratic Party machine interfered in Berkeley politics to trash the Jabaliyah resolution put on the ballot by 19,000 citizens. “We have a better way” to peace, they wrote in their glossy mailers. But the rest of us—whether Jews, Palestinians or other Americans of goodwill—are still waiting for the party’s “better way.” That fraud reminds one of Bush’s Iraq policies. As we wait, presidential front-runner Howard Dean has said his views are closer to the Rightist Israeli lobby—which has given over $120 million to the Democrats in a decade—than to the broad Israeli peace movement which seeks a just two-state solution. -more-

After an hour-long closed door session Thursday evening, the Berkeley City Council emerged to announce they had picked Deputy City Manager Phil Kamlarz as the interim replacement for retiring City Manager Weldon Rucker. -more-

The school board has bristled at receiving a “report card.” However, report cards are important tools to help us assess how well students and the school district are doing. Unfortunately for the students and community, the California’s Fiscal Crisis Management Assistance Team, (FCMAT) gave the school board and district administration failing marks in major areas of responsibility, including maintenance. -more-

The Berkeley firefighters got to test out what could be new and important fire safety equipment Thursday: high-tech gadgetry developed by a UC professor and a handful of students to prevent recurrences of events that led to the deaths of so many at the World Trade Center two years ago. -more-

When searching a mainstream news Web site don’t be surprised if you find Muslims described as “ragheads” and “Islamofascists.” Just don’t expect Israelis to be subjected to the same sort of ethnic slurs—articles that contain derogatory terms about Israelis are forbidden. -more-