In the last use of non-paper trail electronic voting machines in Alameda County before new state standards kick in next year, voting reportedly went smoothly in last Tuesday’s special election, but the vote tallying trailed behind counting in other parts of the state. 

Alameda County returns did not finish coming in until 2 a.m., which Acting Registrar of Voters Elaine Ginnold said was normal for county elections. 

But most returns for the special election Tuesday night had been posted on the secretary of state’s website by midnight, with only Los Angeles and Alameda counties showing significant votes still uncounted. Alameda County had only 30 percent of its vote counted by midnight. 

When the Alameda votes did finally come in, they showed county voters in step with the trend in the rest of the state, rejecting all of the initiatives and constitutional amendments on the ballot. Alameda County voted no on Prop. 73 (parental notification on abortion) with 69 percent rejecting the measure, on Prop. 74 (public school teacher tenure) with 72 percent against, on Prop. 75 (union dues for political purposes) with 70 percent against, and on Prop. 76 (state spending and school funding limits) with 79 percent against. 

On Prop. 77 (redistricting), 74 percent of the county voters rejected the measure; on Prop. 78 (prescription drug discounts no. 1), 68 percent voted no; on Prop. 79 (prescription drugs discounts no. 2), 52 percent voted no; and on Prop. 80 (regulation of electric service providers), 61 percent voted no. 

Ginnold said that there was “no systemic failure” during Tuesday’s election, and blamed the delay on a number of factors, including the fact that Alameda County had a large number of election inspectors working the polls for the first time. 

“They had to ask a lot of questions,” she said. 

Several days before the election, the Alameda County administrator put out an emergency call for workers after election officials reported they were 90 poll workers short and did not have enough staff to open three separate polling places. Those positions were filled by election day. 

Ginnold said that another problem which slowed up Tuesday’s vote count was what she called an “additional step” in the counting procedure in which inspectors were required to count out the number of paper ballots cast at the precinct, add it to the total of electronic votes, and then balance it with the number of voters who had come to the poll. 

Next Monday, Alameda County citizens will get their first look at the electronic machines the county is considering to replace the Diebold machines. The County Registrar of Voters office is holding an all-day demonstration of the four electronic systems under consideration to provide state-mandated paper-trail machines. Ginnold said four companies will be represented at the demonstration: Diebold, Sequoia, Hart, and Election Systems & Software. The demonstration, from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., will be at the Alameda County Conference Center, 125 12th St., 4th floor, in Oakland. 

In other election news, voters in two East Bay communities went in opposite directions on tax increase measures on Tuesday’s ballot. 

In the Albany Unified School District, voters approved Measure A by a 67.8 percent margin, 3,301 to 1,564. Measure A was a seven-year, $250-per-residential-unit parcel tax proposal as well as authorization for a 5-cent-per-square-foot non-residential parcel tax. Money from the tax will be used to raise teacher salaries, reduce class size, hire student support workers such as librarians and mental health counselors, and support student extra-curricular activities. 

But in Richmond, voters just as decisively defeated Measure Q, a proposed 1/2 percent tax increase for retail sales within the city. Measure Q gained only 35 percent of the vote, losing 6,274 to 11,886.e

Two years after the North Oakland community successfully fought to regain their Oakland Police Department Crime Reduction Teams (CRT), the new chief of the Oakland Police Department has removed them again. 

In a message e-mailed this week to North Oakland residents, District 1 Councilmember Jane Brunner urged constituents to oppose the CRT removal. 

“In neighborhoods where the work of the CRTs has been demonstrated to be the difference between a dangerous neighborhood and a safe one, removing them is just irresponsible,” Brunner wrote. 

A spokesperson for the Oakland Police Department did not return telephone calls in connection with this story. 

And concern over the reduction in the CRTs was not helped by rumors that Chief Wayne Tucker was also considering either reducing or eliminating foot patrols in some of the city’s business districts. 

Oakland’s CRT units are roving patrols designed to concentrate on the city’s street level drug-dealing and felony crime trends. The city operates six such teams, assigned to specific areas of the city on a four-day-a-week basis. OPD Lieutenant Lawrence Green, North Oakland Area Commander, reported two years ago that the North Oakland CRT had been responsible for 1,000 arrests, including six homicide arrests, in the preceding 13 months. 

But in 2002, then-Chief Richard Word cut both North Oakland’s and West Oakland’s CRT patrols from four days to two, diverting the teams for the remaining days to “sideshow abatement” activities in East Oakland. Violent crime in North Oakland immediately skyrocketed, jumping 14 percent. North Oakland murders averaged 11 per year in the two years that the CRT was reduced, jumping 200 percent from the murder rate when the CRT was fully operational. 

The North Oakland CRT patrols were restored in late 2003 following intercession by BrunBrunner’s office and complaints from North Oakland residents and businesses. 

Speaking to a North Oakland community meeting hosted by Brunner in the fall of 2003, Chief Word admitted that his office had “made a mistake” in reducing the CRT patrols. Word promised that the CRTs would not be moved again under his administration. 

Now, according to Brunner, Word’s replacement, Chief Wayne Tucker, has again moved half of the North Oakland CRT patrols from North Oakland, effective Tuesday of this week, as well as from Montclair, the Lake Merritt area, and the San Antonio and Fruitvale districts. Brunner said that Tucker plans to divert the patrols to “focus on other areas of the city.” 

She said that Tucker had originally proposed eliminating the North Oakland CRT altogether, but after meeting with Brunner and hearing from North Oakland citizens, Brunner said the chief agreed to let half of the CRT patrols remain in force, with a promise to return to full service in seven weeks. She called Tucker’s compromise a “small victory.” 

“The chief told me that he is trying to lower the rate of violent crime in other parts of the city, and he doesn’t want to use overtime to do that,” Brunner said. “That’s why he’s using the CRT. But I clearly disagree with that tactic.” 

In her e-mail message, which she said received “tremendous response” from North Oakland residents, Brunner wrote that “many of [our] neighborhoods are right on the edge, and taking CRT’s out of the areas they’ve been working on threatens to throw away the progress that’s been made. I predict there will be an increase in crime in many North Oakland flatlands neighborhoods if we remove the CRT’s. We cannot let that happen.” 

On the issue of the foot patrols, Rockridge District Association secretary Louise Rothman-Reimer said that “it has been rumored for a long time” that Chief Tucker is considering their elimination or reduction. 

The rumors have become so persistent, Rothman-Reimer said, that the Oakland Merchants Leadership Forum, a citywide merchants group, has scheduled a meeting with the chief on the issue, to be held on Wednesday, Nov. 16, 8 a.m., in Hearing Room 4 at Oakland City Hall. 

“The citizens of Rockridge are very concerned about this possibility,” Rothman-Reimer said. “Their presence is needed on the street.” 

Discussion of both the proposed CRT reduction and the possible foot patrol reduction was circulating this week on a North Oakland police-community e-mail list sponsored by Lt. Green. 

Councilmember Brunner said that while she had heard the rumor of the possible foot patrol reduction, she could not confirm it.(

UC Berkeley’s nearly halfway to funding a major retrofit of Memorial Stadium, and plans unveiled Thursday have already sparked controversy. 

Designs unveiled at a press conference featuring a collection of academic and athletic luminaries include: 

• Improved restrooms and seating and enhanced access for the disability community. 

• A 132,500-square-foot strength, conditioning and sports medicine high performance center to be constructed along the western base of the stadium. 

• A seismic upgrade of the stadium’s western wall to insure the safety of athletes using the high performance center. 

A second phase, to be started when the first phase is complete in the Fall of 2008 could include: 

• Permanent night lighting, long a bone of contention with stadium neighbors. 

• The addition of three new levels atop the existing stadium to accommodate “premium amenities” (a term often used to describe so-called high-priced luxury skyboxes), television broadcasters and other members of the press. 

• A major new underground parking lot beneath Maxwell Field. 

The stars were Chancellor Robert Birgeneau, the deans of Boalt Hall and the Haas School of Business, Athletic Director Sandy Barbour, Cal Bears football Head Coach Jeff Tedford—who had demanded stadium improvements as a condition of his contract—and two student athletes. 

All funds will be privately raised, said Birgeneau “and we already have several gifts and a matching fund challenge that have taken us close to the halfway mark” for the $125 million needed for the stadium retrofit and the sports center. 

If all goes as planned, construction plans will allow for continued play at the stadium, with a completion date in time for the 2008 football season, said the chancellor. He added that the stadium would only be used for university events and would not be rented out for private use. 

University officials unveiled their plans two days earlier in a private meeting with Mayor Tom Bates and City Manager Phil Kamlarz. 

“At a cursory glance, the plans look very good, but the real questions are in the details, which will come out in the EIR [environmental impact report],” Bates said. “We need to look very closely at the traffic and parking issues and at the way the facilities are used.” 

Bates said the stadium retrofit was clearly needed. 

“When I played for Cal [in the 1958-60 football seasons] the stadium was already in disrepair. The sports training facility is absolutely necessary,” he said. “Would I build the stadium there if we were starting from scratch? Absolutely not. But it’s too expensive to relocate.” 

Bates said he wants to make sure the project is carried out in a way that does the least environmental damage and raises the least concern to the neighbors. 

“We’ll have to make sure it’s well done,” he said. 

The press conference left several important questions unanswered. 

Neither Robert DeLiso of URS Corporation, project manager for new development in the campus’s southeast quadrant, nor Birgeneau, was able to answer one key question, the level of earthquake which the retrofitted stadium will be designed to withstand. 

The issue is critical because the stadium sits directly on the Hayward Fault, the source of the catastrophic Loma Prieta earthquake. The soil under the stadium could liquefy during a major temblor. 

Also unveiled were sketches of a structure to be built during a later phase of development which would sit between the existing Haas and Boalt buildings and provide new office and academic space, as well as a glassed-in atrium that could house up to 700 for evening events, and outdoor seating capable of seating up to 1,500. 

“This will be the destination venue that provides a window on the world for Berkeley and a window for the rest of the world on the Berkeley campus,” said Boalt Law School Dean Christopher Edley Jr. 

Birgeneau said the cost of the second phase academic commons building with the glass atrium connecting the two halves for the law and business schools is currently estimated at between $140 million and $160 million, “and must be provided through private support.” 

The chancellor and the two deans waxed euphoric about the potential of the combined projects to, in Edley’s words, “marry the intellectual energies” of the two professional schools, and he said that the plan “marries academics and athletic aspirations.” 

Lyons and Athletic Director Barbour used similar language, calling the plans “really magical” and hailing the “overarching concept.” 

Barbour said the massive athletic high performance center “will move us to an elite position,” competitive not only with other PAC 10 teams but on a national scale. 

Community concerns 

Bates acknowledged that permanent night lighting will be a matter of serious concern for residential neighbors. 

It was partly in an effort to battle permanent nocturnal lights that residents of Panoramic Hill sought and won the designation of a National Historic District for their neighborhood. 

But Janice Thomas, one of the two authors of the successful application, said lighting was a trivial concern compared to the impact of major new construction directly atop the Hayward Fault. 

“I’m really worried that they’ll transform a natural disaster into a man-made disaster,” Thomas said. 

Leslie Emmington, a member of the city Landmarks Preservation Commission and the Berkeley Architectural Heritage Association, said the developments will have a major adverse impact on Piedmont Way, a streetscape designed by Frederick Law Olmsted, America’s preeminent landscape architect, in 1865. 

“No amount of mitigation can offset the effect of blighting this historic landscape that makes that area of the university graceful and campus-like,” she said. 

Former urban planner John English, who has authored many successful historic resource designation applications, has raised the ante for the university by filing an application with the State Office of Historical Preservation that would be the first step in listing Memorial Stadium, which was designed by world renowned architect John Galen Howard and built in 1923, on the National Register of Historic Places. 

“I incorporated a lot of material in the application from a historic structures report done for the university that came to the conclusion that nothing should be built above the existing site,” English said.

In a massive show of force on June 16, Berkeley police officers served a search warrant on Karim Cycle at 2800 Telegraph Ave., drawing the attention of neighbors and press whom they summoned to the scene. 

But no criminal charges were ever filed against the proprietor and all but one of the bikes have now been returned to the store. 

After blocking off the sidewalk with yellow crime-scene tape, 20 or so uniformed officers and evidence technicians hauled scores of bicycles out onto the sidewalk as they started marking down serial numbers and looking for bikes that lacked them. 

As pedestrians and neighbors gawked, police contacted the media, providing sound bites for the evening news and good photos and good copy for the next morning’s papers. 

By the time the day had ended, police had hauled 17 bikes off to their evidence lockers, one that police spokesperson Officer Joe Okies said had been confirmed stolen, and the other 16 with what he described as illegally removed, altered or obliterated serial numbers. 

Within hours, word and images of the raid had been posted in the bicycles-for-sale section of Craigslist. 

But as owner Adlai Karim explains, “I was never arrested; no charges were filed, and they returned all but one of my bicycles.” 

Berkeley police spokesperson Officer Joe Okies confirmed the return of the cycles and the decision of the district attorney’s office to reject the charges. 

John Adams, the prosecutor who rejected the case for prosecution, was not available for comment because he has since retired from the agency. 

Karim acknowledges that his shop—like any other dealing in used bicycles—may have purchased stolen bikes. But, he said, that’s because few owners record their bike’s serial numbers, and even fewer report them to the state—leaving no way for a shop-owner to know with certainty whether or not a machine was stolen. 

In addition, registration requirements vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. The city of Berkeley no longer issues bicycle licenses, and police recommend that owners go to UC Berkeley, which does. 

Further complicating the issue was the fact that different manufacturers stamp the numbers on different parts of the machines, unlike with cars, where stamps must be located in specific places. 

Police and Karim both advise bicycle buyers to write down the serial numbers of cycles they buy and keep the numbers and the receipt in a safe place so they can be reported in the event of a theft. 

Karim said he buys many of his bicycles from charities and garage sales, adding that he now reports to the state both the serial numbers and where he bought them. 

He said he still has a claim against the Berkeley Police Department for damage to his cycles during what he called “a very destructive search.” He said the city has made a partial settlement offer. 

Berkeley residents will get two chances next week to hear about relationships with the University of California, and the direction of the presentations could probably not be further apart. 

On Monday, a panel of outspoken critics of the present state of University/Berkeley relations will present their views at a free public forum on “Between Reality and Wishful Thinking: The University as a Neighbor” at the Multi-Purpose room of the Berkeley Alternative High School. The forum will be held from 7 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. 

On Tuesday, from 11:30 a.m. to 2 p.m., the Berkeley Chamber of Commerce is sponsoring a UC City Lunch ($60 for non-members, somewhat less for chamber members) featuring presentations by Mayor Tom Bates and UC Berkeley Chancellor Robert Birgeneau. 

The meetings come in the wake of a string of contentious reactions to UC Berkeley’s Long Range Development Plan, which will have significant effects on city residents in general and downtown development in particular. 

The City of Berkeley first sued the university over the plan, then reached an agreement with the university which led to the city’s dropping of the lawsuit. In turn, a group of Berkeley residents then sued city officials over the city-university agreement, saying that the city had given away too much of its development authority. 

Bates’ Chief of Staff Cisco DeVries said that representatives of the Berkeley Chamber of Commerce contacted both the mayor and the chancellor “some time ago,” asking them to appear jointly at the luncheon to “talk about the traditional issues of the town-gown relationship.” 

DeVries said both the mayor and the chancellor will make presentations on such topics as the Berkeley-UC partnership, economic development in Berkeley, and the downtown planning process. He said while he was not sure of the format, he expected that there would be time available for comments and questions from the floor. 

The day before, it will be the critics’ turn. 

“We’re trying to open up a community-based dialogue between the city and the university,” explained Berkeley activist and Daily Planet contributor Zelda Bronstein, one of the organizers of the Berkeley Alternative High forum. “And by the city, we don’t simply mean the government. We’re talking about the people who live and work in Berkeley as well.” 

Panelists at the Alternative High event include Wendy Alfsen, a university neighbor; Jesse Arreguin, UC student and affordable housing advocate; Andy Katz, chair of the city Zoning Adjustments Board and a planning graduate student at UC Berkeley; Dean Metzger, a member of ZAB; Anne Wagley, a plaintiff in the lawsuit against the UC-city agreement over the university’s Long Range Development Plan; Rob Wrenn, a member of city planning and transportation commissions; and Bronstein. Panelists will make five-minute presentations apiece, to be followed by a general discussion. 

Bronstein said that while there have been many public hearings, scoping sessions, and other formal presentations about city/university relations, “this is the first time in my memory that we have planned an open discussion on the subject.” 

She said that while she expected many of the speakers to talk about the events surrounding the university’s development plan, the forum was also intended to encompass “a larger, broader picture. Obviously, there’s not enough time in one evening to cover all of this issue. What we’re looking at is an invitation to begin a larger discussion.” 

Anne Wagley, who is an employee of the Daily Planet, said that the forum is designed to bring the issue of the impact of the university to a wider Berkeley audience. 

“People who live near the university are immediately impacted by any university development, and they are very aware of the implications,” Wagley said. “But the UC expansion which is projected in the new Long Range Development Plan is going to have implications for the entire city in ways that citizens haven’t seen before. We want to help people understand the full impact.”

As Berkeley lobbies neighboring cities to join in its greenhouse gas reduction efforts, constituents at UC Berkeley are trying to get their school to follow suit. 

A coalition of faculty, staff and student groups at the university are now lobbying school officials to join the city by adopting their own set of greenhouse gas reduction standards, which they hope will be consistent with the Kyoto Protocol. They are also calling on UC Berkeley Chancellor Robert Birgeneau to create a campus-wide plan for reducing and offsetting the school’s environmental footprint. 

“If a city adopts the protocol they are taking steps towards sustainability,” said Daniel Kammen, a professor in UC Berkeley’s Energy and Resources Group. “If a university does it they are making a strong statement about the environment.” 

Kammen and student representatives Brooke Owyang, Scott Zimmerman and Eli Yewdall sent a letter to Birgeneau last April urging him to formally endorse the protocol, an international treaty that requires countries to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions by 7 percent before 2010. 

A spokesperson from the university said that the chancellor has “made no decision on the matter,” but confirmed that he is scheduled to review the matter. Owyang said that she and four of the letter’s signatories are scheduled to meet with Birgeneau and university officials on Nov. 15. 

UC Berkeley’s main campus releases over 150,000 tons of greenhouse gas equivalents each year. That translates into roughly enough carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide to fill more than 11,500 Goodyear blimps, concluded a campus sustainability assessment released earlier this year. 

“The fact that they agreed to meet in the first place is the most telling part,” said Thomas Kelly, director of KyotoUSA, a grassroots non-profit organization that works with communities to promote adoption of the protocol. 

At the Alameda County Conference of Mayors on Wednesday, Bates, along with San Leandro Mayor Shelia Young and Hayward Mayor Roberta Cooper, introduced a proposal that would have all 14 cities within Alameda County work together to reduce their emissions. 

“I am exceptionally proud of the work Berkeley has done to reduce greenhouse gas emissions,” said Bates in a statement. “By setting up a regional greenhouse gas reduction effort, we can work together to make a far more significant dent in emissions and be an example of cooperation for other regions to follow.” 

In January, the Berkeley City Council formally endorsed the Kyoto Protocol, only to announce a few months later that it had reduced emissions from municipal operations by 14 percent since 2002—far exceeding the protocol’s requirements. 

Then in September, Berkeley became the fourth city to join the Chicago Climate Exchange. The nationwide association of over 100 public and private entities calls on its members to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions by one percent each year. Members who do not meet the reduction goal can buy emissions credits from others through a stock market-like trading scheme. 

“If we want to be a model, we have to find ways to partner up,” said Cisco DeVries, the mayor’s chief of staff. “We’ve got to reduce emissions community-wide. That obviously includes the university and all the people that drive to and from it.” 

The Mayor and Chancellor Birgeneau have discussed how they can work collaboratively on the greenhouse gas problem, said De Vries. 

Taking its cue from Berkeley’s use of biodiesel in many of its municipal vehicles, Owyang is spearheading an effort to convert campus recycling vehicles to the vegetable-based fuel.  

The citywide switch from diesel to biodiesel and other alternative fuels is credited with reducing Berkeley’s city vehicle emissions by 47 percent. 

De Vries also praised the UC system’s Green Building policy. Passed in 2004, the policy set a goal of procuring 20 percent of the electricity used throughout the UC system from renewable sources by 2017.  

But the university still has a long way to go. As the campus grows, its consumption of both electricity and steam heat, the two biggest contributors to campus greenhouse emissions, are projected to increase drastically, according to the sustainability assessment. 

“They have the expertise, they have the brain power” to adopt and implement the Kyoto Protocol at UC Berkeley, said Kelly. “Now they need the impetus.”  

›

Given their penultimate chance to raise issues for the environmental impact report on the new Berkeley Bowl store planned for the corner of Ninth Street and Heinz Avenue, most speakers focused on one issue: traffic. 

The Planning Commission was the venue of the scoping session, in which concerned members of the public were allowed to raise issues they thought should be included in the official report examining potential impacts of new development and possible ways to alleviate them. 

The largest share of the 55 or so people who filled the seats at Wednesday night’s Planning Commission were parents of students in the Ecole Bilingue—also called the French School—which is located at the northeast corner of the intersection cater-corner from the store site. 

Their biggest single concern was the threat that increased traffic generated by the new market might pose to their children as they were dropped off and picked up from school. 

Sally Drach, who spoke on behalf of the other parents, said they welcomed the addition of the market as “a positive project and welcome to the neighborhood,” but said their concerns were directly related to the safety of the students and parking. 

Traffic, she said, was the foremost issue, both for students parents were delivering to and picking up from the school and for pedestrians crossing an intersection that will see heavier traffic as a result of the development.  

Drach said she and the other parents were skeptical of findings in the project’s draft environmental impact report (EIR) that indicated the new store would cause no significant increase in traffic on Ninth Street north of the school or at the Ninth and Heinz intersection. 

“We want to discourage traffic on Ninth Street” either by means of fixed barriers or moveable barriers that would reduce traffic during drop-off and pickup times. 

“Additional measures can only serve to benefit the project and reassure the community so that it will allow us all to welcome the Berkeley Bowl into our community,” she said. 

Drach also said that she expected that, despite the surface and underground lots included in the plans for the project, surface streets around the store would see an increase in parking “because they are providing only slightly more spaces than are required by law.” 

The school has limited parking, and the reduction of on street parking—plans call for elimination of 35 spaces—and the inevitable use some of the remaining spaces by store customers will make it harder for parents and school staff to find parking spots. 

Other parents expressed concerns about the impact of construction on students, while parent Janice Kim, a pediatrician and a public health officer, said she was concerned about the impact of heavier traffic near the school and emissions that could pose health risks to students. 

Lise McAdams, a resident of the low-rental artists’ lofts building at 800 Heinz Ave., said she was concerned not only with the traffic and parking impacts of a new market, but of their cumulative impacts when weighed with other major development projects currently planned for the immediate area. 

McAdams also said that colleagues at her San Francisco workplace who commuted past Berkeley were telling her that they would swing by the new market on their way home, further increasing traffic on Ashby Avenue. 

A major new laboratory/manufacturing building now planned for 740 Heinz Ave. will add to the traffic burdens, she said, “and there are rumors of an expansion of car dealerships in the area.” 

Mayor Tom Bates is seeking rezoning along the Ashby, University and Gilman avenue corridors to attract more car dealerships into the city and to prevent existing dealers from leaving in an effort to raise the city’s sales tax revenues. 

Contrary to the study done for the draft EIR, McAdams said, “an independent traffic study already concluded that traffic was at capacity” along Ashby. “Seventh Street backs up two or three blocks just so drivers with be able to turn onto Ashby,” she said. 

Ecole Bilingue attorney Dave Bowie reiterated the parking and traffic concerns. 

“They need to be studied more fully, and I think the traffic” impacts are underestimated, he said. 

Mary Lou Van De Venter, a co-founder of Urban Ore, reiterated the concern that Ashby traffic was already at capacity, comparing it to a river about to overflow its banks. Widening Ashby wasn’t an option, she said, because it would involve extensive structural demolitions. 

Two speakers specifically commented on benefits the project could bring to the poor and those without cars in a West Berkeley that lacked an opportunity to buy a wide range of fresh organic produce. 

West Berkeley resident Christine Staples said the market was needed “as a matter of public health and economic justice.” 

Natalie Studer, a registered dietician who holds a master’s in public health, presented a 2003 study she and two other researchers had prepared on the Berkeley Bowl, subtitled “How Politics, Policy, and Community Affect Food Access.” 

The document reports how West and southwest Berkeley have the city’s highest rates of low-income and minority tenants, who have the least access to fresh produce and other healthy food. 

“This is an opportunity to improve the availability of food to people in need,” she said. “It will bring affordable healthy food to West Berkeley.” 

The final scoping session was held last night (Thursday) at the Zoning Adjustments Board meeting.›

Due to a copy editing error, Joe Eaton’s Nov. 8 column did not run in its entirety. The complete article is available on our website: www.berkeleydailyplanet.com.2

Campbell Coe, legendary resident of Berkeley and Seattle, Wash., died in his sleep at 4 p.m. on Oct. 2. Campbell’s six-year battle with prostate cancer ended in Honeydew Home, a hospice, in Renton, Wash. He was 81. 

Campbell was born Jan. 15, 1924 to Herbert E. Coe, the pioneer pediatric surgeon in the Northwest, and Lucy Coe of Seattle. 

Campbell worked in broadcast journalism during the 1940s, specializing in radio news. About 1951 he enrolled as an undergraduate student at UC Berkeley, graduating with the class is 1955. He then became a graduate student in biochemistry at UC Berkeley. 

An exceptionally skilled craftsman, he spent several years in the mid-1950s engineering and manufacturing custom-cast and -machined models of live-steam locomotives. He also began performing country and western music by playing guitar, singing, and learning the patois of masters of ceremonies. During this same time Campbell taught himself stringed musical instrument repair, and was in part-time business by May 1956. 

At this time the folk music revival in the mid-to-late 1950s began and old musical instruments were rediscovered. Prior to Campbell’s entry into the repair field and instrument sales, the sole East Bay craftsman was violin repair expert, John Aschow, of Oakland. Campbell’s repair skills filled an important niche for myriad banjo and guitar owners. He initially repaired fretted instruments out of his third floor apartment at 2419 Haste St.; he also became a supplier of fretted instrument accouterments (e.g., picks, strings, capos, cases) to locals and some regional music merchants. 

When Jon and Deirdre Lundberg came to Berkeley in 1960 to open a music store, Campbell helped them found Jon and Deirdre Lundberg Fretted Instruments. Lundbergs’ became the preeminent acoustic repair and sales store on the West Coast in the 1960s and 1970s, specializing in instruments constructed before World War II. 

Campbell’s business success soon outgrew his apartment, which prompted him in 1961 to open the Campus Music Shop at 2506 Haste St., near Telegraph Avenue. Business at the Campus Music Shop began to wane in the early 1970s. As the ‘70s wore on, transactions diminished incrementally until Campbell finally sold or packed his equipment prior to returning to Seattle. 

The legacy of his craftsmanship endures: for example, he inspired Hideo Kamimoto, three-year part-time apprentice (and sales representative), who in 1967 founded H. Kamimoto Stringed Instruments in Oakland, now in San Jose; Mike Stevens, of Alpine, Texas; Richard Johnston, of Gryphon Music, Palo Alto; and Larry Blom, Oregon, to enter luthiery. 

Campbell was a stellar guitarist, exceptionally versatile and extemporaneous, who played country music (e.g., country swing and Hank Snow lead guitar styles), blues, and Django Rinehardt jazz stylings, using both right-hand plectrum and finger methods. He was the bandleader of the Country Cousins. 

In his role as a musical mentor and supporter of developing musicians in the East Bay, he inspired such musicians as Sandy Rothman, Betty Montana (later a.k.a. Betty Mann), and Rick Shubb. Campbell also influenced select members of local bands, for example, the Redwood Canyon Ramblers, Country Joe & The Fish, the Cleanliness and Godliness Skiffle Band, Asleep at the Wheel, Commander Cody and the Lost Planet Airmen, and Don Burnham’s Lost Weekend. 

He was proprietor of Aeromarine Photography, specializing in photography of ships and related maritime subjects in San Francisco Bay. He also performed freelance photography of crime scenes and events of civil disobedience in Berkeley. An avid collector of disc recordings, especially 78 r.p.m. singles, he was also a recording engineer, for example, recording the private session at his apartment with Roland and Clarence White in 1964. 

Campbell was a consummate conversationalist—occasionally to a fault. Exceptionally articulate, his diction and eloquence, doubtless polished by his days in radio, were precise and his speech irresistibly engaging. He was widely known as a raconteur who could speak knowledgeably about a kaleidoscope of subjects, not merely limited to the acknowledged specialties above. Frequently his stories were so elaborate and far-fetched that they seemed at the moment of telling to be incredible, only later to be confirmed as accurate. 

Campbell enjoyed attention, and confidently excelled in communications within the context of small groups. Despite his self-confidence, he paradoxically did not seem especially comfortable in front of large groups. His conversational arts thrived among friends. The smaller the group, the closer the friend, the more focused his conversation became. It was here his command of rhetoric, verbal nuances, and paralinguistics came to the fore. It was difficult to resist Campbell’s blandishments. 

He was well known to many as an iconoclastic, eccentric character, enjoying an improvised life of intellectual individualism in a town well known as a haven for liberals and individualists. He personified the adventurous, ad hoc spirit of Berkeley and seldom took life seriously. At times his free-wheeling spirit became irreverent, critically cynical, even impish as he perfected puns and performed as a learned jester among his coterie of friends, occasionally testing his own limits—and those of others, as well. His gregariousness and enthusiasm generously embraced those who knew him well or those whom he thought needed his support. 

His many friends held Campbell in high regard and were spellbound by his mellifluous voice, loquaciousness, and bonhomie. We all learned a lot about life, music, performing arts, and musical instruments from him. We will remember his confidence, optimism, and irrepressible spirit. 

Campbell left Berkeley to return to Seattle on June 30, 1981 to be closer to his mother. In Seattle he completed the marine diesel engineering class at Seattle Community College. He became well versed in wooden boat restoration, culminating in wooden tug boat refitting. He also helped to refurbish Hidden Valley Ranch, the family spread outside Cle Elum, Wash., which became the premier dude ranch in the state by 2003. 

Campbell’s surviving kin include his brother and sister-in-law, Bob and Bobby Coe, Mercer Island, Washington; and nephews Bruce Coe, of Cle Elum, Washington; Matt Coe; and niece Virginia Coe Garland of San Francisco. 

Memorial contributions may be made to Children’s Hospital Foundation, Department of Surgery, Herbert E. Coe Surgical Fund at PO Box 50020-5200, Seattle, WA 98145. 

Photograph by Carl Fleishauer..

Women have had a bruising time in the public eye lately, ranging from Judith Miller’s deceptive reports in the New York Times to Harriet Miers’ embarrassing qualifications for the Supreme Court. So when a woman manages to outperform the most confident governor in America, it’s worth celebrating.  

On Tuesday, Nov. 8, every one of California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s pet initiatives failed, in large part because of Rose Ann DeMoro, the chief executive of the California Nurses Association (CNA). She and her 65,000-member union spent most of this year building a broad-based populist movement that the once-powerful governor tried to dismiss with glib one-liners.  

Certainly, one reason Schwarzenegger’s initiatives failed was widespread anger over his $70 million “special” election. Lengthening the probationary period before teachers can qualify for tenure (Prop. 74), weakening the unions (Prop. 75), bypassing elected lawmakers on fiscal matters (Prop. 76) and privatizing the redistricting process (Prop. 77) were not going to solve California’s financial problems.  

But voters may not have gotten this message if it weren’t for DeMoro and her indefatigable nurses. Early on they stressed that Schwarzenegger’s election was a corporate power grab at the expense of California workers. The nurses hammered home this message almost daily, even when they risked being ostracized. As Lou Paulson, head of the California Professional Firefighters, said: “Rose Ann and the nurses showed us that the emperor had no clothes.”  

Their activism started last November, after Schwarzenegger suspended key portions of the state’s nurse-to-patient ratio to help hospital chains. “That really angered us,” says DeMoro. But the nurses protested tentatively, almost timidly, until one pivotal day last December.  

While the governor addressed a state convention of 10,000 women, a few nurses unfurled a protest banner that read “Hands Off Patient Ratios.” Schwarzenegger grinned for the TV cameras, then said: “Pay no attention ... to the special interests. I am always kicking their butts.”  

DeMoro was outraged. “For the governor to denigrate nurses—a historically female profession—while speaking to an audience of women is an affront to women everywhere,” she told CNN. Because Schwarzenegger had shut them out of the health-care debate, the nurses decided to take their case to the streets.  

“We were told to not make waves, that the people of California would turn against us to support their popular governor,” DeMoro says. At the time, Schwarzenegger had a 65-percent approval rating, along with fawning cover stories in Fortune and Vanity Fair magazines.  

Even so, the nurses continued marching while the state’s firefighters, teachers, and law enforcement unions watched from the sidelines.  

DeMoro rented a plane to buzz wealthy guests at the governor’s gated Brentwood mansion during his Super Bowl Sunday party. The nurses flew it over Wall Street while the governor held a $10,000-a-plate fundraiser there. They dogged him in Chicago at a lavish fundraiser, flying a banner that read “Don’t Be Big Business’ Bully.”  

When the governor reneged on his oft-repeated promise to restore $2 billion to education cuts in February, students and teachers joined the nurses. They gathered with pickets one rainy day at a Sacramento theater where the governor was about to watch the premiere of Get Shorty 2.  

But when nurse Kelly Di Giacomo was whisked out of the movie line and into a back room, protesters grew worried. The governor’s security team grilled the petite nurse for over an hour until she finally asked why they considered her a threat. One of Schwarzenegger’s bodyguards pointed to her scrubs and explained. “You’re wearing a nurse’s uniform.”  

“Oh, sure,” she said, drolly. “The international terrorist uniform.”  

That intimidating experience emboldened the nurses, whose protests began attracting media attention. By spring, TV news cameras were moving their soft-lens focus from Schwarzenegger to the growing crowds of angry workers, most of them women.  

In March, Schwarzenegger’s popularity dropped to 55 percent, and a California court ruled that the governor had indeed broken the law by suspending the state’s nurse-ratio regulation. By then, however, the governor was trying to gut California firefighters’ and police officers’ pensions, mimicking a Bush administration proposal.  

That effort galvanized the conservative law enforcement community to join DeMoro’s ranks for the first time. That spring, firefighters joined a crowd of 4,000 nurses, parents, teachers, and state employees to object to the governor’s rash of cuts to middle- and lower-class programs.  

By April, even die-hard Republicans were growing wary of the governor’s company. When former Secretary of State George Shultz showed up for an Arnold fundraiser in San Francisco, he was visibly shaking as 5,000 booing protesters met him in front of the Ritz Carlton Hotel.  

Hotel workers later reported that 80 percent of the $100,000 seats went empty that day. “I’m convinced that the protesters scared them away,” said CNA organizer Shum Preston.  

By summer, the folly of holding a special election seemed obvious, but DeMoro didn’t let up. In August, CNA nurses flew to Boston to protest Schwarzenegger as he tried raising election funds by re-selling three dozen Rolling Stones tickets in his sky-box for $100,000 each.  

Picketing CNA nurse Stephen Ingersoll couldn’t afford a ticket to the Fenway Park concert, but he stood outside and calmly explained his, and CNA’s position to Boston reporters. A group of non-union nurses were so impressed with his aplomb, they asked Ingersoll: “How do you guys do this?”  

It’s simple, he told them: “When there’s an issue that needs to be debated, we just go to the streets.”  

By September, DeMoro and the nurses were inviting workers of all stripes to join them, which attracted some Hollywood guild members. Documentary film maker Robert Greenwald (Wal-Mart), Oscar-winning actor Sean Penn and movie actress Annette Bening attended the nurses’ convention in September, where Warren Beatty had asked to be the keynote speaker.  

“We’re fighting star power with star power,” said DeMoro. By the time Beatty lent his voice to CNA ads that ran up to election day, Schwarzenegger’s ratings had sunk to a low of 37 percent.  

“Instead of attacking the real problems of our schools, Schwarzenegger attacked school teachers,” Beatty said. “Instead of attacking the cost of healthcare, he attacked nurses. Instead of increasing our safety, he attacked police and firefighters.”  

That tactical mistake cost Schwarzenegger his special election initiatives and turned California’s nurses into grass-roots heroes in other parts of the country.  

Nurses in Illinois, Massachusetts, Arizona, and Mississippi have asked DeMoro for help in challenging the growing clout of corporate hospital chains and other states’ anti-worker initiatives. To be effective, the CNA has created a subsidiary called the National Nurses Organizing Committee, which allows it to organize nurses outside of the Golden State. This fall, the NNOC welcomed 2,000 Chicago nurses into their fold, and it anticipates more members by year’s end.  

As for Schwarzenegger, he’s lost more than his special election. He’s managed to squander his once-bright political future and to jeopardize the pro-business platforms of other Republican leaders in outlying blue states.  

And all because of a woman. 

Kathleen Sharp is a Santa Barbara-based writer who covers California politics. She is the co-producer of the documentary The Last Mogul, in theaters now.›

“The World Can’t Wait! Drive Out the Bush Regime! The World Can’t Wait! Drive Out the Bush Regime!” was the battle cry of some Bay Area residents last Wednesday. 

On Nov. 2, many Berkeley High students and adults, including teachers, walked out of school after second period to join the San Francisco protest against the Bush administration. 

“I tried to be as supportive as I could of the students’ efforts,” said Berkeley High Principal Jim Slemp. “My goal was to make sure that students were not going to be hassled if they wanted to leave. Also, I tried to make sure that absences were able to be excused. It would be illegal to have the whole school participate in the walkout, but I did the most I could to support the students.” 

While the principal may have approved of the walkout, there were school board members who did not. 

“I want our students in class,” said Berkeley School Board Director John Selawsky. “Being a student is essentially a job. Kids can’t just walk off the job without realizing the consequences.” 

The majority of Berkeley High students who walked out did attend the protest in order to show their disdain for the current administration, but some just skipped school to hang out. 

“I felt that it was important to show how many people cared and that high school students care too,” said sophomore Emma Bloom, 15. “There weren’t just old hippies ... there was a variation of support.” 

At the rally, people came from all walks of life. There were students, adults, homeless people, people of different sexual orientations, and people of all different races. 

However, some students questioned the aim of the rally, as well as teachers’ support of it. 

“My son and his friends showed up after lunch was over, because they said that their teachers had told them that there wasn’t going to be much happening during class,” said BHS parent Laura Menard. “They thought that the kids were being manipulated to get involved with the rally.” 

The protest was relatively peaceful. It began with a line of speakers, such as Cindy Sheehan and Supervisor Chris Daly, rallying up crowds at Civic Center Park in San Francisco. Following this, there was a march with a couple of thousand people. High school kids organized several sit-ins, but were eventually shooed away to avoid getting arrested. 

The only time when the protest got violent was when a person threw a Molotov cocktail at the San Francisco Chronicle office buildings. Immediately, about 50 police officers surrounded the area to see what had happened. 

Bloom said, “The Molotov cocktails diverted attention from the protest. The news was focused more on that than on the protest.” 

The organizers of the rally, The World Can’t Wait, hope to organize millions of people to “express their outrage, to speak the truth, to act with urgency and form an organized political resistance.” While many were excited with how the rally went, some offered advice for next time. 

“I think that it would have been much more effective for the organizers to coordinate with teachers to take their students to the event,” said Berkeley Councilmember Kriss Worthington. “That way the average daily attendance would not go down, and the schools would not lose their money.” 

Rio Bauce is a sophomore at Berkeley High School. He can be contacted by e-mail at baucer@gmail.com 

0

Bay of Pigs Redux?  

The U.S. State Department has apparently drawn up a plan to intervene in Cuba in the event Fidel Castro should die. According to the Financial Times (FT), Caleb McCarry heads the “day after” team, which will, according to McCarry, “manage the transition process between Fidel’s death and a democratic Cuba, because we know that at some point, that is going to happen.” 

State Department officials told the FT that the Untied States would never “accept” a handover of power in Cuba to someone like Castro’s brother, Raul. While McCarry says his office will be “respectful of the Cuban people and their wish to be free,” the only Cubans who will be consulted live in Miami. “They are the ones to define a democratic future for Cuba,” says McCarry. 

The National Intelligence Council recently added Cuba to its list of 25 countries where the United States has plans to intervene in the case of “instability.” The Cuba “day after” scheme comes out of the Office for Reconstruction and Stabilization headed by Cuban refugee Carlos Pascual.  

The plan calls for immediate intervention to insure “schools are kept open, and provided with new instructional material and staff,” and to impose a “market economy.” 

The congressionally funded U.S. Institute of Peace bowed out of the operation, because, “This was an exercise in destabilization, not stabilization,” one Peace Institute official told the FT. 

McCarry let slip what an intervention scenario might look like when he told the newspaper the “transition genie is out of the bottle”: Castro dies, Miami Cubans and a few small opposition groups inside the country call for intervention, and in go the Marines. And these people think Iraq is ugly?  

Other countries on the list are Nepal, Sudan, Haiti and the Congo, although you can scratch Haiti. We already pulled that one off.  

Iran 

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s recent demagogic remark that Israel “must be wiped off the face of the map” had less to do with any change in Iranian foreign policy than the ongoing war between political elites in Iran and an increasingly disillusioned populace. 

It was one of those remarks, as Mark Lawson of the Guardian pointed out last week, which should have been preceded by the old British Foreign Office phrase: “Speaking for domestic consumption.”  

Under Iran’s current political structure, Ahmadinejad may have access to the bully pulpit, but his office wields very little actual power. Mehdi Bazargan, the first president of the Islamic Republic, once described his job as being “A knife without a blade.” 

The real power lies with Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who supported Ahmadinejad in the last election. But no sooner were the ballots counted than Khamenei began shifting power to the Expediency Council, chaired by Ahmadinejad’s chief rival, Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani. The council’s powers have been expanded to oversee virtually every branch of government. 

Khamenei also appointed Muhammad Ghalibaf (another Ahmadinejad rival) mayor of Teheran, the current president’s old job. Ahmadinejad is apparently in such a snit over this that so far he has refused to invite Ghalibaf to a cabinet meeting. 

In a clear effort to tamp down the uproar over the Israel remark, the Foreign Ministry issued a statement that “Iran is committed to its obligations stated in the United Nations Charter and it never tried to use force or threat against a second country.” Even so, U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan canceled his trip to Tehran. 

On the surface this looks like a split between so-called “realists” trying to end Iran’s isolation and conservative “fundamentalists.” But things are not always what they appear in Teheran. Much of the “realist” wing is centered among those who have made fortunes by manipulating Iran’s internal policy and cornering sections of the economy. Rafsanjani may be a “realist,” but he is also a multi-millionaire who is cheek to jowl with the mullahs who have used the Islamic revolution to line their pockets and consolidate their power. 

Ahmadinejad’s anti-corruption campaign was aimed directly at these “Islamic profiteers.” He won, in large part, because the average Iranian is enraged at the corruption of these religious entrepreneurs and with the country’s growing gap between “haves,” and “have nots.”  

While Ahmadinejad was off giving a bombastic speech at the U.N., Rafsanjani went to Saudi Arabia to hand out assurances that the new president would not be setting foreign policy for Iran. Ahmadinejad struck back by declaring that he intends to replace most of the Iranian diplomatic corps, but, given that Parliament has been knocking down some of the new president’s appointees, whether he will succeed is not clear. 

One indication of how this fight is going will be if Iran moderates Ahmadinejad’s rhetoric in the upcoming negotiations with the International Atomic Energy Agency.  

Now that the election is over and the liberals largely sidelined, the real powers in Iran are apparently moving to put the anti-corruption genie back in the lamp. As for Ahmadinejad’s threat to Israel? As the Guardian’s Lawson puts it, “just wind.”  

Oh, Canada 

Question: Why did the Canadian chicken cross the road? 

Answer: To get to the middle. 

Which sums up the view that most Americans have of our northern neighbor. But there was Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice late last month rebuking Canadians for “speaking in apocalyptic language.”  

Canadians? 

You bet. That’s what happens when you pull a bait and switch on someone.  

It all started when we got the Canadians to sign the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and then turned around and slapped $5 billion in tariffs on Canadian lumber products because we said the latter were “subsidized.” Canadian products are no more subsidized than U.S. lumber (both get major deals when they cut trees on public land), but the tariff was a payoff to western lumber interests, which donated heavily to the Republican Party.  

The Canadians sued and won. But the U.S. turned around and appealed to the World Trade Organization, which has nothing to do with NAFTA, and is a wholly owned U.S. subsidiary. To no one’s great surprise, the WTO ruled in favor of the U.S. 

When Rice went to Ottawa last month, journalists asked her whether she thought the United States could be “trusted”? It was that question which set her off. 

The Canadians are so incensed over the tariff (and the fact that Rice visited 42 other countries before bothering to visit Ottawa) that they upgraded their relations with Beijing to “strategic partner” and announced they would start shifting oil sales to China. Canada supplies about 8 percent of U.S. consumption and may have the second-largest oil reserves in the world. 

Time to retire all the Canadian “nice guy” jokes. 

A Must Read 

Patrick Cockburn’s smart and erudite report on the Iraq War in Counter Punch is a reminder that being “embedded” once meant you were a reporter, not a stenographer handing out Pentagon press releases. 

“The need for the White House to produce a fantasy picture of Iraq is because it dare not admit that it has engineered one of the greatest disasters in American history,” Cockburn writes, “It is worse than Vietnam because the enemy is punier and the original ambitions greater.” 

You can access the piece at www.counterpunch.org, or subscribe: CounterPunch, P.O. Box 228, Petrolia, Ca. 95558. (Truth in advertising: They occasionally run pieces by me.) 

›

It’s hard for a politician to lose more decisively than California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger did on Tuesday night. And within moments after Mr. Schwarzenegger made his concession speech at a Beverly Hills hotel on Tuesday night, political observers were calling this a self-inflicted wound, accusing the governor and his advisors of hubris, overreaching in an attempt to stuff their mouths with political power. 

Respectfully, I’m going to have to disagree with the prevailing political wisdom. 

What did Mr. Schwarzenegger in was time. And in a truly Einsteinian twist, the governor was plagued both by too much of it, and too little, simultaneously. 

Regarding the issue of too much time 

Movie actors at the upper levels of box office stardom—as Mr. Schwarzenegger once was—operate on a public exposure schedule that roughly coincides with their movie releases. Except for teaser appearances here and there, such stars virtually disappear from public view for months while they are preparing for and filming their newest feature. Then, in the weeks immediately preceding that movie’s release, they are suddenly everywhere: on bus billboards and television commercials, on Oprah, on Larry King and Leno and everything in between, interviewing up to their eyeballs. You can’t get rid of them. The idea is to overwhelm the public, saturate us with their presence, make us believe that YOU HAVE JUST GOT TO GO SEE THAT MOVIE, OR YOU ARE GOING TO JUST DIE! These campaigns are all exquisitely timed to peak right at opening weekend. After that, except for the occasional carefully scripted promotional appearance or red carpet stroll, the stars disappear again until the next movie comes up, beginning the cycle anew. 

Mr. Schwarzenegger proved an absolute genius in this format and if his movies were not critical successes, they certainly performed magnificently at the box office. And because of the shortened time span of the 2003 California gubernatorial recall race, he was initially able to translate the winning formula to that arena as well, overwhelming the state’s voting public with a clever combination of star power and clever quips that translated into interesting sound bites. 

What those tactics masked was that over the long haul—when you listen to more than three minutes of one of his speeches or see him on the news more than a couple of nights in a row—Mr. Schwarzenegger tends to grate on your nerves. 

This is not ideological. Eventually, Ronald Reagan’s sunny personality and self-deprecating humor wore away much of the grumpiness of his Democratic and progressive opponents, even while they continued to blast away at his positions and policies. Mr. Schwarzenegger does just the opposite. The more you see of him, the more he gives you to fuel your anger against him, until you begin to forget what made you mad in the first place, and just know that you are mad. It’s like the worst of marriages. 

But it was the very boastful, World Wrestling Federation-type persona that made Mr. Schwarzenegger such a hit as first a body-building personality and then a movie star that got him into trouble as a politician. He began his body-building career baiting the shy and stuttering Lou Ferragamo and carried those activities into his action-figure movie roles. His fans loved it when his robot character blew away the bad guys in Terminator 2 with the deadpan line “Hasta la vista, baby,” or, in the midst of kicking Bill Duke’s ass in Commando, declaring “I eat Green Berets for breakfast. And right now I’m very hungry.” He was even able to get away with overt battery on a female, punching out movie wife Sharon Stone in Total Recall while telling her “consider this a divorce.” Audiences went for it because, like Jessica Rabbit, Stone’s character had been drawn to be so bad. 

In that cartoon-type movie world Mr. Schwarzenegger once ruled, those lines got the governor the greatest applause, both in the theaters and during promotional tours. But he got in trouble when he tried to repeat them in the real world during his political battles, once famously calling the Democratic members of the state Legislature “girlie men” or boasting that “the special interests don’t like me in Sacramento, because I am always kicking their butts.” These were all delivered with cigar-smoking winks, and the California voters were all supposed to know that this was part of a great joke, not to be taken seriously. But the mostly-women members of the “special interest” groups he was targeting at that particular time—teachers and nurses—were not amused, and neither were many of the state’s voters. 

Worse than that, the political demands of the governor’s office did not allow Mr. Schwarzenegger to manipulate his onscreen time as he was able to do when he was only in the movies. And the more California voters saw of him, the less they seemed to like of him. His problem here, then, was that there was too much time to get to know him. 

Regarding the issue of too little time 

The term of a state governor—or a United States president—is set at four years, but in actuality, that only gives two years of governing time for the first-termer. By the third year, with opposition candidates identifying themselves and making speeches and giving interviews, the incumbent’s actions start coming under the political microscope again. And the fourth year, of course, is taken up entirely by the campaign for re-election. 

But because he was elected following the recall of former Gov. Gray Davis after one year in office, Mr. Schwarzenegger had only three years to serve his term. That left him, in actuality, only one year to build up a political resumé, forcing him into some quick fixes with long-term consequences. He fulfilled his campaign promise to lower California’s unpopularly high automobile-registration fee. In so doing, however, he left himself with less available money to work on California’s severe budget crisis, a problem he had also promised to fix. That led him to the infamous education compact of 2004, the deal in which Mr. Schwarzenegger won the promise of state primary and college leaders to forego full educational funding for one year in return for the governor’s guarantee of a restoration of that funding in perpetuity beginning the following year. 

But Mr. Schwarzenegger could not keep his promise to those educators to put back their state funding if he was going to both return fiscal solvency to the state budget as well as avoid raising taxes, two of the platforms on which he won the governorship. Thus, he faced began 2005 with bleak prospects, looking at a year in which opposition to his policies would mount as his ability to both govern and maneuver politically would correspondingly dwindle. 

Thus was born the self-titled “Year of Reform” in which Mr. Schwarzenegger decided to stake the future of his governorship on one diceroll: a special election in which he would go over the heads of the unions and state educational establishment and the Democratic Party opposition and ask the state’s voters to grant him sweeping powers to deal with the state’s problems. His hope was in part that returning to the limited format of an election campaign, he could recapture the popularity that won him the governorship in the first place. 

It was a gamble, and Mr. Schwarzenegger lost that gamble, about as badly as you can. But given the political realities—both his own limitations as well as the limitations of time—it’s not clear he had much choice. Mr. Schwarzenegger limps, now, into the 2006 election as a wounded governor, the political hellhounds at his heels. But that’s probably the same scenario he would have faced anyway, without the special election. This wasn’t so much a case of hubris as it was a case of had-to-be inevitability.›

To view Justin DeFreitas’ latest editorial cartoon, please visit  

www.jfdefreitas.com To search for previous cartoons by date of publication, click on the Daily Planet Archive.

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WHIRLEY CRANE 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

The Nov. 8 article “Historic Crane Docks At Richmond Park” contained a glaring error. The Whirley crane was not used to build “the cruisers and battleships that sailed out into the Pacific and helped win the naval war for the United States,” since Kaiser’s Richmond shipyards built no cruisers nor battleships. Battleships and cruisers were built in a few Naval shipyards especially designed to accommodate their much larger size and weight.  

Precisely 519 of the 747 ships built in Richmond were Liberty ships, slow “ugly ducklings” manned by merchant mariners. An additional 142 ships, including the Berkeley Victory, were Victory class. These ships carried raw material to our factories, and troops and war supplies to the fighting fronts and to Navy ships at sea, assuring Allied victory in World War II. 

Henry Kaiser made his mark by adopting mass production methods to shipbuilding, lowering construction cost of a Liberty ship to less than $2 million dollars each. A Liberty ship comprised 250,000 parts weighing about 14 million pounds. As a publicity stunt, the Richmond yards built one in four days, 15 hours and 29 minutes, while the average was about 30 days.  

Readers can see photos of the record-setting Liberty ship SS Robert E. Peary at www.usmm.org/peary.html and can visit the SS Jeremiah O’Brien, one of two remaining Liberty ships of the 2,710 which were built, at San Francisco’s Pier 45 1/2. 

Toni Horodysky 

Webmistress, American Merchant Marine at War, www.usmm.org 

• 

OVERLOOKED 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Berkeley’s Latinos, and in particular Mexicanos, are often overlooked in political discussion of who are our strong “liberals” and “progressives.” It is said that the Latino community is in flux, or in other ways hard to evaluate. But state-wide results for the Nov. 8 election reveal one very large Latino (mostly Mexicano) community that showed itself outstandingly liberal and worthy of attention and support. 

Imperial county is 72 percent Hispanic, mostly Mexican. On Propositions 74, 76, 77, 79 and 80, Imperial beat out Los Angeles to stand as the most “liberal” county in Southern California. On Prop. 79 the Imperial vote was more liberal than Alameda, and second in the state to San Francisco. 

The people of Imperial county tend to be poor, and in our Latte Liberal world of Berkeley it is lamented that too little is known about what actual poor people want. The vote in Imperial county shows that what is wanted is medical care. It is wanted so bad that the Imperial folk will take anything they can get. The Imperials were not only second in the state for Prop. 79, their vote for Prop. 78 was the highest percentage in the state. 

Ted Vincent  

• 

OREGON STREET  

Editors, Daily Planet: 

After reading with interest the letters to the Daily Planet about the drug dealing from a house on Oregon Street, I am left with the impression that if is not your front yard that is being pissed on and not your property on which are tossed drug needles and used condoms, you can become concerned about the lack of compassion for a nice African American grandmother homeowner of this house and her 37 grandchildren who are then said to be victims of racism and poverty. 

Of course the letters that could be written might be about where these drugs come from and why there have not been more arrests for the drug dealing. 

Max Macks 

• 

THE FIRST CREDO 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

My heart goes out to those South Berkeley neighbors who have suffered the ravages of a crime-plagued neighborhood, been forced to look to a small claims court action when all other efforts failed, and now must endure the taunts of “racist” for merely seeking a peaceful neighborhood. 

The first credo of any Berkeley lefty is to always call your opponent a racist. But aren’t those screaming about racism in this instance, e.g., Andrea Pritchett and Leo Stegman, the real racists? They’re saying we should accept that black neighborhoods have a lot of crime. 

Of course, it is a little hard to feel sorry for Paul Rauber who works at the Sierra Club, an organization that likes to engage in race-baiting. A few years ago, the Sierra Club was overtaken by a wave of political correctness, withdrew its policy that called for reduced immigration along with reduced birthrates as part of a comprehensive plan to stabilize the population of the U.S. Prominent environmentalists such as E.O. Wilson, Lester Brown, Sen. Gaylord Nelson, and David Brower said that was wrong. The Sierra Club response was to smear its critics, especially candidates for the board of directors, as “racists” and “nazis.” 

Sometimes what goes around, comes around. 

Mark Johnson 

• 

SIDESTEPPING 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

The very public dispute between Lenora Moore’s family and her neighbors has a seductive “which side are you on” quality, tempting people to comment as to whether participants are showing too much compassion or not enough. But by suggesting to the afflicted neighborhood that a civil suit is the appropriate course, the City of Berkeley neatly sidestepped its own responsibility to keep streets safe, something we all know it can do when it wants to.  

There is no politician in Berkeley whose street, if similarly plagued with problematic behavior, would not be problem-free in minutes. The police, moreover, have had years of political backing for all manner of extra “tools” (anti-loitering, pepper spray, wooden and rubber bullets, etc.) without which they claimed to be helpless.  

Come help rebuild the People’s Park freebox. You’ll be suddenly and instantly surrounded by at least a dozen police officers equipped with video cameras who will videotape even a singing circle. You’ll suddenly realize that this town has all the police it needs and can accomplish anything it needs to once it straightens out its priorities. 

Carol Denney 

• 

FREEBOX 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

UC is trying to privatize the give-away box at People’s Park. The freebox which started out with a cardboard box had grown over the last 30-some years, to a wooden covered large box. So has the second-hand clothing industry, which is now one of the United States’ leading exports.  

Used clothing that was intended to go to the poor, in most cases, is now sold to corporations for profit. Then the used clothing is sent to Africa. There it has become 80 percent of the local textile sales. This has put millions of workers out of work in Africa. 

There is no charity when it comes to the trade in used clothing. This is a lucrative business.  

Last spring the People’s Park freebox was burned down. This is the third time this has happened but this time the gathering of the repressive forces‚ organizing around “blaming the victims for the way they must live,” has led to an attack by UC. The freebox was torched and UC will not let us build a replacement. 

Up until the late ‘60s, many African Americans and poor people could not venture east of MLK (formally Grove Street) in Berkeley. You know why: the police! But with the civil rights and anti-Vietnam war movements, People’s Park was the place to go. People who were not part of the college community had and still have a hangout. The park is UC’s only class-diversity program.  

Now People’s Park is the most used park in Berkeley. There are three services in the park, free food (Food not Bombs), free clothing, and a little free speech (12 concerts or rallies a year). UC has been attacking the Food not Bombs for years and park advocates and users had to go to court to get the concert times. Now it is time to end the freebox repression. 

Come to the park on Nov. 12 around noon and help us build a new steel box.  

Michael Delacour 

• 

TAKING THE CHALLENGE 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Loath as I am to reprise the battle of words about Israel in your letters column that inevitably winds up with someone likening the Daily Planet to Mein Kampf, I must award Robert Blau’s statement that “Jews are more reasonably paranoid about being in jeopardy than any other ethnic group in the history of civilization” with a prize for ethnic solipsism and meretricious victimhood. Blau follows his declaration with the challenge “Prove me wrong.”  

OK, Mr. Blau. You occupy land (California) previously inhabited by a people whose numbers by 1913 were reduced to less than 6 percent of what they had been in 1769 at the moment of white contact. That genocide is only a subset of the largely unknown Holocaust that overwhelmed Native Americans throughout the Western Hemisphere in the past 500 years as Gentiles and Jews forcibly took virtually everything they owned and often massacred them when disease and slavery proved insufficient to clear the land of their irksome presence. Yet I know of no museum commemorating their Holocaust in California, let alone of any serious effort to compensate their descendants for the horrors they suffered.  

Nor do I see in or on many of the Holocaust museums and monuments I have visited much, if any, mention of the persecution those of us who are gay, Roma, Slavic, African-American, or disabled have suffered throughout the centuries leading up to our own collective destruction in Nazi death camps.  

A friend asked her mother who had survived Auschwitz why most Holocaust museums concentrate on the agony of Jews to the exclusion of the rest of us, to which the lady candidly responded “Because we are white.” Is Mr. Blau prepared to state publicly that his team is worthier than the rest of us who have suffered as well?  

Gray Brechin  

• 

RESPONSE 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Gosh. Until I read Rhoda Levinson’s letter demanding to know my education, profession, and time, place, and length of stay in Israel/Palestine, I had no idea that a curriculum vitae was a prerequisite for passing on information about upcoming events. 

While I’m on the subject, let me remind readers that “Justice Matters: Artists Consider Palestine” continues at the Berkeley Art Center on Walnut Street through Dec. 17. There are a number of worthwhile special presentations in conjunction with this exhibit. For information about them go to www.berkeleyartcenter.org. 

Also, I cannot too highly recommend the amazing Ibdaa Dance Troupe from Dheisheh refugee camp. These energetic young people will be performing at King Middle School at 7 p.m. on Saturday, Nov. 26. Make support for kids who are struggling to maintain hope under soul-crushing circumstances part of your family’s Thanksgiving celebration this year. Tickets are available at local bookstores. 

You can catch Ziad Abbas, the co-director of the Ibdaa Cultural Center in Dheisheh, at 7 p.m. on Friday, Nov. 25 at the Berkeley Art Center. Bring your questions about life in the West Bank. 

And lastly, for holiday gifts, check out the Palestinian Handcrafts Sale at Berkeley Friends Meeting House on Walnut and Vine from 10 to 4 on Saturday, Dec. 3. Lots of moderately priced tchatchkes and the gratification of knowing your money goes to people who really need it. I suggest you get there early before the bottles of excellent olive oil sell out. (Rhoda, if I see you there, we can chat.) 

Joanna Graham 

• 

BERZERKELEY 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

As an aside to the Berzerkeley Veterans’ Day event reported in Daily Planet and elsewhere, my quirky imagination has me wondering if the casket carrying stunt planned for Santa Monica’s Veterans’ Day observance has any credibility. Did the terrorist sympathizers in People’s Republic of Santa Monica exploiting Bill Mitchell’s grief ever stage events where participants carried caskets to mark the deaths at Khobar Towers, Mogadishu, Marine Barracks Lebanon, USS Cole, World Trade Center (twice), the Pentagon, a Pennsylvania farm field, a Bali nightclub, U.S. embassies in Africa, and several airplane disasters? If you covered any such casket-carrying stories, I guess I missed them. There’s something “fishy” about “Country Joe” McDonald inviting Bill Mitchell to Berkeley. But then, maybe not, considering “Country Joe’s” history as a former associate of Hanoi Jane Fonda. Kudos to Berkeley DAV president Ed Harper for withdrawing from the event.  

Richard Rongstad 

USN, Phu Cat to Phu Quoc, Vietnam, ’69-’70, DAV life member 

Concord 

• 

OIL INDUSTRY 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Finally, the Senate is taking up the oil companies’ excessive profits. The oilmen tell us their all-time record high profits are “in line” with industry averages as a percentage of revenues. That’s not a satisfying statistic. While the world market for oil has shot up due to Bush’s war and Katrina’s response, the cost of oil production remains relatively constant. Add a fixed percentage profit margin onto higher prices and voila! higher profits. As oil companies pass the higher market prices onto us consumers, responsible companies would keep their profits at a fixed amount, not a fixed percentage. Congress should enact a Windfall Profits tax immediately, and should rescind the tax-breaks recently given to these gougers in the Energy Bill. Let them share our pain. 

Bruce Joffe 

Piedmont 

?

From time to time in our nation’s history, a cultural or social upheaval has resulted in a wave of new lawmakers entering Congress. Often the triggering event has been war. John F. Kennedy was one of many young men who returned from World War II to serve the nation as political leaders, and several members of the “greatest generation” continue to serve in Congress. There are numerous Korean War and Vietnam War veterans in Congress as well, the two most prominent Vietnam veterans being former presidential candidates John Kerry (D-MA) and John McCain (R-AZ). 

It is not always a shooting war that brings sweeping change to the nation’s leadership. The Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and 1960s, which sought to complete what post-Civil War Reconstruction had left unfinished, turned the House of Representatives from a white man’s club into a people’s house more representative of America’s diversity. In 1974, public outrage over the Watergate scandal swept a class of Democrats into office. 

In 1991, Anita Hill’s allegation of sexual harassment during Clarence Thomas’ confirmation hearing for the Supreme Court was one of the first engagements in the culture wars of the 1990s. It provoked a lively national debate over the place of women in our society and resulted in an unprecedented flood of women into Congress in 1992, which became known as “The Year of the Woman.” A second engagement in the culture wars was the 1993 debate over gays in the military, and although less dramatic, the increase in openly gay political leaders has been steady ever since. 

The congressional election of 2006 has the potential to be the next turning point in our nation’s political development. Sparked by a splendid little war gone bad and Democratic candidate Major Paul Hackett’s surprising near-victory in the heavily Republican Ohio 2nd congressional district, about 20 veterans have declared their candidacy for the House and Senate. What is odd is that it is not only Iraq War veterans who are seeking seats in Congress for the first time. In fact, a majority of the current wave are former officers and enlisted personnel with earlier military service. Why are these older soldiers turning to politics only now? 

The coming “Year of the Veteran” in 2006, while it shares some of the characteristics of previous waves of soldier-statesmen, also displays profound differences. This wave has arisen in reaction to the misguided militarism that instigated the Iraq war. This wave has also been shaped by the culture wars, by competing visions of what American values should be and how our country should conduct itself within the family of nations—“family values” in a much larger sense. 

To a large degree, the combatants in this American political insurgency have been spurred into action by their belief that the Iraq war was a mistake, and to continue a failed policy that pointlessly chews up lives and limbs is madness. They believe that the decision to send young Americans into harm’s way should not be made by “chicken hawks” who never spent a day on active duty, and in many cases never wore a uniform, yet are quick to commit the sons and daughters of others in battle. 

The horror and waste of war, and thus the gravity of the decision to go to war, can only be fully understood by those who have been there. This is not to say that military service should be a prerequisite for election to Congress or the presidency, although this might have rendered American history far less bloody. It is significant that America enjoyed its longest period without a foreign war while Civil War veterans controlled the Capitol and occupied the White House. 

People volunteer for military service not for love of war but for love of country. On Veterans’ Day and every day, let us say to all of them regardless of where or when they served, “Well done, and welcome home.” And between now and next Veterans’ Day, if a veteran asks for your vote, listen to what he or she has to say. 

Thomas Gangale is an aerospace engineer and a former Air Force officer. He is the executive director at OPS-Alaska, a think tank based in Petaluma, and an international relations scholar at San Francisco State. 

Ã

This Tuesday the City Council will consider neighbors’ appeal of a ZAB decision approving the conversion of a small, single-story, single-family house at 2901 Otis St. into a three-story “pop-up” apartment building. One controversial aspect of this proposed project is that the developers propose to provide the three required off-street parking spaces by converting the rear yard into a parking lot. 

Planning staff have argued since May 2003 that the Zoning Ordinance allows such conversions “by right.” That is, no use permit or public hearing is required, there is nothing neighbors can do to stop them, the public has no right of appeal. The city attorney rejected this interpretation in a July staff report to the Planning Commission, finding that parking in required rear yards is prohibited unless, as at 2901 Otis, the yard abuts a street, in which case it may (at the city’s discretion) be allowed by an administrative use permit. No such AUP was issued for this project. The Zoning Adjustments Board, apparently misled by planning staff into believing that the parking was allowed by right, never discussed the detriment to the neighbors, which is a necessary prerequisite to such a discretionary action. 

In residential districts, the Zoning Ordinance also limits vehicle-related paving to 50 percent of a required yard that abuts a street. As the city attorney interpreted “abuts a street” for the Planning Commission, that limit applies to the required rear yard of 2901 Otis, which per the plans approved by ZAB would be at least 80 percent paved parking spaces and driveway. 

As regards 2901 Otis, the City Council should remand it to the ZAB to reconsider parking in light of the city attorney’s findings. More generally, the City Council should discuss the underlying policy issues and provide appropriate guidance to planning staff, ZAB, and the Planning Commission (scheduled to consider revising the relevant sections of the Zoning Ordinance on Nov. 30). 

The diagram shows how allowing parking in required yards affects the maximum development possible on typical 5,000-square-foot corner lots in much of Berkeley, including R-2A, R-3, R-4, and C-SA districts. If parking is allowed only in the non-required portion of the yard, there’s room for only one space, and thus only one unit. If parking is also allowed in the required portion of the yard, there’s room for three spaces, giving developers a strong incentive to convert single-family homes with ample rear yards to three-story, three-unit apartment buildings with the legal minimum of open space. 

Apartments with parking lots instead of yards are unsuitable for families with children. Three-unit buildings are too small to fall under the Zoning Ordinance’s inclusionary housing requirements. Is that the sort of infill development city councilmembers want to promote? 

It seems to me that parking in required yards is fundamentally detrimental to the immediate neighbors, the neighborhood, and the city as a whole. Thus it should be allowed only when it allows some offsetting benefit to neighbors, such as preserving open space on another part of the lot, or to the city as a whole, allowing construction of affordable housing that would otherwise not be practical. Parking should not be allowed in required yards simply to let developers make more money than they would were it located inside the building or if the number of units were reduced. 

Robert Lauriston led neighborhood opposition to the similar “pop-up” project at 3045 Shattuck. 

It seems even in Berkeley McCarthy-like tactics are alive and well. Because Andrea Prichett has the temerity to note the many-layered nuances of the issues of drugs and crime and their relationship to poverty, racism and injustice, her job is threatened by one of the plaintiffs in the small claims court suit telephoning her place of employment. It is naïve and disingenuous to ignore the direct relationship that these issues play to the situation involving Mrs. Moore and her home, and we stand with Andre a and Daily Planet Executive Editor Becky O’Malley for courageously addressing them. 

South Berkeley has been a neighborhood of long-term, working-class residents who care for their community and for each other. It has also been a neighborhood characterized by poverty and its accompanying ills of unemployment, drugs and crime. All of this was there when newer, often white and more affluent residents moved in as gentrification has proceeded. It is incumbent upon those who move into such neighborhoods to become aware of what’s going on around them and to acknowledge the dynamics and strengths of the existing community. 

We live in an urban environment, and as such many of us have been victims of crime. No one deserves to be a victim or to live in fear. However there are other crimes as well that have taken their toll—crimes like poverty, racism and health disparities. The aftermath of Hurricane Katrina graphically revealed continuing inequities in our society which must be addressed. Failure to recogn ize the wider context in which neighborhood crime occurs leads to shallow and ineffective solutions. Putting a senior citizen who has lived in her home for over 60 years out on the street will not resolve the issues of drugs and crime. 

We can prove ourselves to be smarter, more inclusive and more compassionate than to pursue narrow, short-sighted solutions to these problems. We can then be truly called “enablers”—enablers of jobs, justice and progress. 

Unless there is a genuine attempt to involve all segments of the community in pursuing solutions to these very real problems, there will be no peace because justice is sought only for a few. 

Linda Olivenbaum speaks on behalf of Berkeley Citizens Action’s Steering Committee.˜›

Walk into another room past the barroom, and one encounters another bar. Some shows have a play-within-a-play; Woman’s Will has staged Bertolt Brecht/Kurt Weill’s musical play Happy End in a bar-within-a-bar—at Luka’s Taproom in downtown Oakland. 

Cabaret-style, anyway, for this piece from Berlin during the Weimar Republic of the ‘20s that, along with its more famous predecessor, Threepenny Opera, helped inspire Broadway’s ‘60s hit Cabaret. Set in a rathskellar, with only the crookedest of the shady encountering the cops and the Salvation Army in their chapel on Christmas Eve, Brecht’s wiseguys and Army of the Poor croon and belt out Kurt Weill tunes just as haunting and beautiful as the better-known “Mack The Knife”: “Alabama Song (Whiskey Bar),” with “That Old Bar In Bilbao” and the sublime ultimate love/hate song, “Surabaya Johnny.”  

Brecht’s famous style is stylized and, true to their name, Woman’s Will has cast Happy End with all female actors, gangsters and Salvation Army soldiers alike. It’s staged as an unblinking but wide-eyed noir, with Brecht’s famous inter-titles projected on the wall like a silent film. 

The mobsters are chafing at the bit; a rival gang just pulled off a heist “by boarding the train at Niagara Falls posing as a wedding party!” The crooked ensemble sings “Bilbao,” mixing the bittersweet with the piquant: “It was fantastic! Beyond belief! Now they cleaned it up and made it middle class.” Then a bell rings, a note sounds on a pitchpipe—and in troops the Salvation Army. 

After much sermonizing and cross-banter, Sister Lillian (Lisa Jenai Hernandez as a vivacious ingenue) is left alone to “preach a sermon to one man, Bill Cracker” (Jenny Debevec). But after a few drinks she confides, “We have songs that don’t have anything to do with Jesus,” and sings a slangy shipwreck number that she’ll later have to repeat in rather different fashion to her superior, Major Stone (Scarlet Hepworth)—Walter Benjamin’s setpiece in discussing Brecht’s “distancing” effect through repetition under different conditions. 

Brecht’s style is simple and not-so-simple, widely misunderstood by audience and performers alike, who stumble over the translated names of concepts like “Alienation” (or Strangeness or Distancing—the Soviet Constructivist literary notion of “Defamiliarization,” that shift in context to which Brecht owed so much, is maybe a better way to put it). 

A storytelling technique is performed onstage, taking full advantage of modern self-conscious theatricality to interrupt and digress, “play counter to the changes” (as Coleman Hawkins summed up “the modern style” in jazz) and offer up to the audience a considered performance for their own consideration and wonder: Just exactly how did things get to be this way? 

Much of Brecht is a process of discovery of the modern world through the mannerisms of his characters: “Of course the scientist couldn’t find God with his telescope,” exclaims Sister Lillian, “So I thought I’d bring in the miracle of radio!” 

As director (and Woman’s Will founder—and Brecht devotee) Erin Merritt points out, Happy End isn’t the most political of Brecht’s plays. It’s from fairly early on, and its sardonic folk humor (as reflected in Michael Feingold’s English version) and almost Confucian saviness can be enjoyed by anyone who’ll stroll into the bar, relax and take it all in. It’s well worth whatever you pay on the sliding scale. 

Woman’s Will presents Happy End at 7 p.m. Thrursdays and Saturdays and at 2 p.m. Sundays at Luka’s Taproom, 2221 Broadway, Oakland. The show also plays at 8 p.m. Fridays at Original Joe’s, 144 Taylor St., San Francisco.  

$15-25. For more information see www.womanswill.org or call 420-0813.

Because of incorrect information provided by the theater, the names and roles of the actors in The Dick ‘N Dubya Show were reversed in the text and accompanying caption in the Nov. 8 Daily Planet. 

Amos Glick portrays George W. Bush and Ed Holmes fills the role of Dick Cheney in the show which opened Thursday and runs through Nov. 20 at The Marsh Berkeley in the Gaia Building.

FRIDAY, NOV. 11 

THEATER 

Actors Ensemble of Berkeley ”Six Degrees of Separation” Fri. and Sat. at 8 p.m. at Live Oak Theater, 1301 Shattuck Ave. through Nov. 19. Tickets are $10. 649-5999. wwwaeofberkeley.org 

Aurora Theatre “Marius” Wed.-Sat. at 8 p.m., Sun. at 2 and 7 p.m. at 2081 Addison St., through Dec. 18. Tickets are $28-$45. 843-4822. www.auroratheatre.org 

Backstage Productions “All in the Timing” at 8 p.m., Sat. at 2 p.m. and Sun. at 7 p.m., through Nov. 20, at Choral Rehearsal Hall, Cesar Chavez Student Center, UC Campus. Tickets are $6-$8. 642-3880. 

Berkeley Rep “Brundibár” A musical fable staged by Tony Kushner and Maurice Sendak at the Roda Theater through Dec. 28. Ticekts are $15-$64. 647-2949. www.berkeleyrep.org 

Black Repertory Group “Dance with my Father Again” a musical biography of Luther Vandross. Gala at 7 p.m. Sat. at 8 p.m. through Dec. 4. Tickets are $7-$15. 652-2120. 

Central Works “Achilles & Patroklos” Thurs.-Sat. at 8 p.m., Sun. at 5 p.m. at The Berkeley City Club, 2315 Durant Ave., through Nov. 20. Tickets are $9-$25. 558-1381. centralworks.org 

Contra Costa Civic Theater “Noises Off” Fri. and Sat. at 8 p.m. at 951 Pomona Ave., El Cerrito, through Dec. 10. 524-9132. www.ccct.org 

Impact Theatre “Crumble (Lay Me Down, Justin Timberlake)” Thurs. through Sun. at 8 p.m. at La Val’s Subterranean Theater, 1834 Euclid Ave., through Dec. 10. Tickets are $10-$15. 464-4468. www.impacttheatre.com 

Masquers Playhouse “Dear World” Jerry Herman’s musical, Fri. and Sat. at 8 p.m. through Dec. 17 at 105 Park Place, Point Richmond. Tickets are $15. 232-4031. www.masquers.org 

Propeller, “The Winter’s Tale” Fri. at 8 p.m., Sat. at 2 and 8 p.m., Sun at 3 p.m. at Zellerbach Playhouse, UC Campus. Tickets are $65. 642-9988. www.calperfs.berkeley.edu 

UC Dept. of Theater, “Harvest” Fri. and Sat. at 8 p.m., Sun. at 2 p.m. at Durham Studio Theater, UC Campus. Tickets are $8-$14. 642-9925. 

Youth Musical Theater Company “Sweeney Todd” Thurs.-Sat. at 7:30 p.m. at Longefellow Middle School Auditorium, 1500 Derby St. Tickets are $12, $6 students. 595-5514. 

FILM 

The Battles of Sam Peckinpah “Major Dundee” at 7:30 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808.  

READINGS AND LECTURES 

George Packer reads from his book on the American occupation of Iraq “The Assassins’ Gate” at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852.  

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Country Joe McDonald in a Katrina Relief Benefit Concert with others at 7 p.m. at Unitarian Universalist Fellowship Hall, Cedar and Bonita. Tickets are $25 available from www.brownpapertickets.com/event/2530 

Mills College Repertory Dance Company “Primitive Mysteries” by Martha Graham at 8 p.m. at Lisser Hall, 5000 MacArthur Blvd. Tickets are $10-$15. 430-2175. 

Garrett McLean, violin, Gabriel Trop, ‘cello, Inning Chen, piano at 8 p.m. at Giorgi Gallery, 29112 Claremont Ave. Cost is $12. 848-1228. 

Hecho in Claifas Annual Festival with Casique y Congo at 8 p.m. at La Peña Cultural Center. Cost is $7-$10. 849-2568.  

Barbara Dane & Hot Five Jazz Band at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $7. 841-JAZZ.  

Dahveed Behroozi Trio at 8 p.m. at the Jazzschool. Cost is $12. 845-5373.  

Broun Fellinis at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

Youssou N’Dour at 9:30 p.m. at Shattuck Down Low. Cost is $5-$8. 548-1159.  

Baga Bae with drum circle, African dance and chants at 9:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $13. 525-5054.  

Acoustic Son at 8 p.m. at Caffe Trieste, 2500 San Pablo Ave., at Dwight. 548-5198.  

Duck Baker & Jamie Findlay at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $17.50-$18.50. 548-1761.  

DJ & Brook, jazz, at 7:30 p.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344.  

October Allied, The Botticellis at 9:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $6. 841-2082.  

Kalmex & The Riff Merchants at 8 p.m. at 924 Gilman St. Cost is $6. 525-9926. 

SATURDAY, NOV. 12 

CHILDREN 

Los Amiguitos de La Peña with Gerry Tenney at 10:30 a.m. at La Peña. Cost is $5. 849-2568. www.lapena.org 

THEATER 

Woman’s Will “Happy End” by Bertolt Brecht, Sat. at 7 p.m. and Sun. at 2 p.m. at Luka’s Lounge, 2221 Broadway at Grand Ave., Oakland. Tickets are $12-$25. 420-0813.  

EXHIBITIONS 

“Lost and Found: A Tribute to Animal Rescue” oil, watercolors and mixed media by Debbie Claussen. Reception at 7 p.m. at 4th Street Studio, 1717D 4th St. 527-0600. 

FILM 

Taisho Chic on Screen “Winter Camillia” at 5 p.m., “Public Manners: Sightseeing in Tokyo” at 7 p.m. “The Water Magician” at 8:50 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808.  

“Ballets Russes” film screening and discussion with filmmakers Dan Geller and Dayna Goldfine 6:45 and 9:25 p.m. at at Landmark’s Albany Twin Cinemas. Tickets are $9.50. 464-5980. 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

“Visible and Invisible Drawings” an evening of storytelling with Ira Glass and Chris Ware at 8 p.m. at Zellerbach Hall, UC Campus. Tickets are $20-$32. 642-9988.  

Marianne Villanueva reads from her short story collection, “Mayor of the Roses” at 4 p.m. at Eastwind Books of Berkeley, 2066 University Ave. 548-2350. 

Synergy Women’s Open Mic at 3 p.m. at Lakeview Branch, Oakland Public Library, 550 El Embarcadero. 632-7548. 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Alameda Civic Light Opera “Broadway’s Greatest Moments 2” at 8 p.m. at Kofman Auditorium, 2200 Central Ave., Alameda. Tickets are $25. 864-2256. www.avlo.com 

Baguette Quartette, Parisian café music, at 8 p.m. at St. Alban’s, 1501 Washington Ave., Albany. Tickets are $12-$15. 528-3723.  

Borodin Quartet, music of Russian masters at 8 p.m. at First Congregational Church of Berkeley, Dana at Durant. Tickets are $42. 642-9988.  

Rusalka Cycle “Songs Between the Worlds” at 8 p.m. at the Malonga Casquelord Center for the Arts, 1428 Alice St., Oakland. Tickets are $20-$26. 925-798-1300. www.kitka.org 

Young People’s Symphony Orchestra Opening Concert at 8 p.m. at Valley Center for the Performing Arts Holy Names University, Oakland. Tickets are $12-$15. 849-9776.  

Mills College Repertory Dance Company “Primitive Mysteries” by Martha Graham at 2 and 8 p.m. at Lisser Hall, 5000 MacArthur Blvd. Tickets are $10-$15. 430-2175. 

Keith Terry’s Hoterry Englecrest at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $7. 841-JAZZ.  

Quijerema at 9 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810.  

Fourtet with Julian Pollack, pianist and Berkeley High student at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

Dick Whittington with guest Andrew Speight at 8 p.m. at the Jazzschool. Cost is $12-$15. 845-5373.  

Hecho in Claifas Annual Festival with Las Manas, at 8 p.m. at La Peña Cultural Center. Cost is $7-$10. 849-2568.  

Co-Opted V with Why Are Boys Always Like This? John Howland, BublRap and N8 at 7:30 p.m. at Fish House Co-op, 1808 Bancroft Way. 914-0103. 

Richard Green and the Brothers Barton at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $19.50-$20.50. 548-1761.  

Brother Resistance with Junglz Apart at 9:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $15-$18. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Reverand Rabia and Dave Brownell at 7 p.m. at Spuds Pizza, 3290 Adeline St. Cost is $7. 558-0881. 

Stevie Harris and Splintered Tree at 7:30 p.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344. www.nomadcafe.net 

She Mob, Bleu Canadians at 9:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $6. 841-2082.  

BornDead, Regulations, Grey Skull at 8 p.m. at 924 Gilman St. Cost is $7. 525-9926. 

SUNDAY, NOV. 13 

THEATER 

Milbre Burch “Seasonal Stories from Around the World” at 4 p.m. at Julia Morgan Center for the Arts, 2640 College Ave. Tickets are $10 adults, $5 children. 925-798-1300. 

EXHIBITIONS 

“Mapping the Soul of the City” Landcapes in charcoal and silverpoint by Christopher Castle. Reception for the artist at 2 p.m. at Tilden Nature Center, Tilden Park. 525-2233. 

“Mestizo Exhibition: How Women are Presented in Our Society” Paintings by Eduardo Diaz and Carlos Granillo. Reception at 6 p.m. at La Peña, 3105 Shattuck Ave. 849-2568. 

“Taisho Chic: Japanese Modernity, Nostalgia and Deco” guided tour at 1 p.m. and panel discussion at 2 p.m. at the Berkeley Art Museum, 2625 Durant Ave. 642-0808. 

FILM 

Taisho Chic on Screen “The Lady and the Beard” at 7:15 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808.  

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Huston Smith in conversation with Native Americans on religious freedom at 4 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852.  

Poetry Flash with Jack and Adell Foley and Robert Sward at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. Donation $2. 845-7852.  

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Community Women’s Orchestra at 4 p.m. at Zion Lutheran Church, 5201 Park Blvd., Piedmont. Donation $5-$10, children free. 848-2268. 

Rusalka Cycle “Songs Between the Worlds” at 2 p.m. at the Malonga Casquelord Center for the Arts, 1428 Alice St., Oakland. Tickets are $20-$26. 925-798-1300. www.kitka.org 

Jonathan Lemalu, baritone, at 3 p.m. at Hertz Hall, UC Campus. Tickets are $42, available from 642-9988.  

Gordon Bok at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $19.50-$20.50. 548-1761.  

Falso Baiano Trio Brasil at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island. Cost is $7. 841-JAZZ.  

Rhonda Benin and Soulful Strut at 4:30 p.m. at the Jazz 

school. Cost is $15. 845-5373.  

Bandworks at 2 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $4. 525-5054.  

Jack Irving at 10 a.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344.  

Animosity, Time for Living at 5 p.m. at 924 Gilman St. Cost is $6. 525-9926. 

MONDAY, NOV. 14 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Peter Kwong describes “Chinese America: The Untold Story of America’s Oldest New Community” at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852. www.codysbooks.com 

Joseph Kerman discusses “The Art of the Fugue: Bach Fugues for Keyboard, 1715-1750” at 5:30 p.m. at University Press Books, 2430 Bancroft Way.  

Poetry Express with Manuel Garcia, Jr. at 7 p.m. at Priya Restaurant, 2072 San Pablo Ave. berkeleypoetryexpress@yahoo.com 

TUESDAY, NOV. 15 

CHILDREN 

Celebrate Children’s Book Week at the Kensington Library with illustrator Philippe Ames at 7 p.m. at 61 Arlington Ave. 524-3043. 

THEATER 

Shotgun Theater Lab, “Cry Don’t Cry” Tues.-Thurs. at 8 p.m. at The Ashby Stage, 1901 Ashby Ave., through Nov. 17. Tickets are $10. 841-6500. www.shotgunplayers.org 

EXHIBITIONS 

“Ship’s Sides” Abstract photography by Klaus opens at Lange Z Cafe, 2735 Broadway, Oakland. 663-2905. 

FILM 

Alternative Visions “La région centrale” at 7:30 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Daniel Wilson explains “How to Survive a Robot Uprising: Tips on Defending Against the Coming Rebellion” at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852. www.codysbooks.com 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Bandworks at 7:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $4. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Ellen Hoffman and Singers’ Open Mic at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $5. 841-JAZZ. www.AnnasJazzIsland.com 

Tuesday Night Jazz with Atmos Trio at 7 p.m. at Caffe Trieste, 2500 San Pablo Ave., at Dwight. 548-5198.  

Jazzschool Tuesdays, a weekly showcase of up-and-coming ensembles from Berkeley Jazzschool at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

Terry Rodriguez, solo piano, at 8 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810. 

WEDNESDAY, NOV. 16 

EXHIBITIONS 

“Aesthetics of Ecology: Occupying Space for Sustainable Living” Reception at 6 p.m. at the Tecoah Bruce Gallery, Oliver Art Center, California College of the Arts, 5212 Broadway. 415-703-9595. 

FILM 

Busy Signals: Telephonic Art in Motion “Rotary” at 7:30 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Café Poetry hosted by Paradise at 7:30 p.m. at La Peña. Donation $2. 849-2568. www.lapena.org 

Hyder Akbar talks about returing to his family’s country in “Come Back to Afghanistan” at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852. www.codysbooks.com  

Mary Felstiner reads from her new book “Out of Joint “ at 7:30 p.m. at Black Oak Books. 486-0698. www.blackoakbooks.com 

Berkeley Poetry Slam with host Charles Ellik and Three Blind Mice, at 8:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $5-$7. 841-2082 www.starryploughpub.com 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Whiskey Brothers, Old Time and Bluegrass at 9 p.m. at Albatross, 1822 San Pablo Ave. 843-2473. www.albatrosspub.com 

Calvin Keys Trio Invitational Jam at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $5. 841-JAZZ. www.AnnasJazzIsland.com 

Ned Boynton Trio at 8 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810.  

Red Archibald & The Internationals at 9 p.m. at Ashkenaz. West Coast Swing dance lesson at 8 p.m. Cost is $9. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Karl Perrazo, Edgardo Cambon, Carlos Carro at 9:30 p.m. at Shattuck Down Low, 2284 Shattuck Ave. Salsa lessons at 8 p.m. Cost is $5-$10. 548-1159.  

Matt Heulitt Trio at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

The McKassons & Laura Cortese at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $17.50-$18.50. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

THURSDAY, NOV. 17 

THEATER 

“Dick ‘N Dubya Show: A Republican Cabaret” Thurs., Sat and Sun. at The Marsh Berkeley, 2118 Allston Way, through Nov. 20. Tickets are $10-$22. 800-838-3006. www.themarsh.org 

EXHIBITIONS 

“Taisho Chic: Japanese Modernity, Nostalgia and Deco” guided tour at 12:15 and 5:30 p.m. at the Berkeley Art Museum, 2625 Durant Ave. 642-0808. 

FILM 

International Latino Film Festival “Promedio rojo” at 7 p.m. and “Tudo azul” at 9:10 at La Peña. 849-2568. www.lapena.org 

Selling Democracy: Films of the Marshall Plan, 1948-53 “Program Three: True Fiction” at 7:30 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

“Stained Glass Illuminations: Rennovations of the Jesuit Cathedral in Shanghai” at 7 p.m. at GTU Hewlett Library, 2400 Ridge Rd. Reservations recomended. 549-5051. 

Berkeley Treasures: An Evening with Marcia Donahue at 7:30 p.m. at Berkeley Art Center, 1275 Walnut St. in Live Oak Park.  

Nomad Spoken Word Night at 7 p.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344. www.nomadcafe.net 

Word Beat Reading Series with Sanford Dorbin and Bob Coats at 7 p.m. at Mediterraneum Caffe, 2475 Telegraph Ave. 526-5985. 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Mosaic Vocal Ensemble “Fire and Light” at 6 p.m. at ACCI Gallery, 1652 Shattuck Ave. 843-2527. 

Tania Libertad, Afro-Peruvian singer, at 8 p.m. at Zellerbach Hall, UC Campus. Tickets are $20-$32. 642-9988. www.calperfs.berkeley.edu 

Jeffrey Foucault at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $17.50-$18.50. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

Con Alma at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $5. 841-JAZZ. www.AnnasJazzIsland.com 

Sean Smith, Steve Mann with Janet Smith at 9:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $5. 841-2082 www.starryploughpub.com 

David Ross MacDonald, acoustic guitar, at 7 p.m. at Caffe Trieste, 2500 San Pablo Ave., at Dwight. 548-5198.  

Dhol Patrol at 9:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Bhangra dance lesson at 9 p.m. Cost is $8. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Interactive Crew at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

?

Vatey Seng is the bureaucrat you could have encountered in an Alameda County office, the mom you may have met at a high school open house, a neighbor you wave to from across the way. 

But few people know the horrors that plague the 44-year-old accountant originally from Cambodia. 

“I am forced to return to the hell that the Khmer Rouge put me through each night. The terror of my past always haunts me whenever I’m alone or asleep. ... The more I want to forget, the more I remember,” Seng writes in a recently self-published memoir: The Price We Paid: A Life Experience in the Khmer Rouge Regime, Cambodia, published by iUniverse, Inc. and available at www.iuniverse.com/bookstore. 

As the first rains of fall tapped the windows of the small Chinese restaurant where she was interviewed this week, Seng was reminded of the rainy season in Cambodia and of hard times there.  

But before the horrors overshadowing the rest of her life, there were happy childhood years in Phnom Penh. Seng’s mother was a housewife and her father was a military man. Growing up on military bases meant secure housing, healthcare and good schooling. Seng’s father had only a sixth-grade education and her mother had even less schooling; they vowed their children would be educated.  

Family life revolved around close ties with neighbors at the military base. But civil war in the first part of the 1970s culminated with the Khmer Rouge, Cambodia’s extremist communist party, bombing the base and killing most of Seng’s friends. The family escaped death by staying with relatives outside the base. 

In 1975 the Khmer Rouge came to power, enforcing a brand of communism that idealized uneducated, hard-working peasants and condemned the middle class, including teachers and government workers, as leeches of society. Peasants were the “old people,” who embodied society’s moral fabric. City people were “new people,” the root of all capitalist evil. 

Seng was 13 and in the eighth grade before the 11-member family—her parents, two brothers, four sisters, an adopted sister and a 96-year-old grandmother—were relocated to the countryside. They tried to go to their father’s birthplace, but the Khmer Rouge had other plans, moving them from village to village. 

Seng remembers living with a village family whose job was to spy on them. They wanted to know if her father had been a government worker. The house they lived in was built on stilts.  

“They just wanted to watch us, to see if we did anything wrong,” Seng said. “Every night, boys, 8-, 9-, or 10-years-old stayed beneath the hut and listened to our conversation.” 

To save themselves, the family fabricated their histories. The father became a former taxi driver and the children pretended they had never been to school. They buried family photos. During the day, Seng, her father, brothers and adopted sister worked. In one village, they helped construct a dam; in another, they worked in the rice fields. Seng remembers the 10-hour days and the cuts and bruises on her hands. 

One day, while transplanting rice seedlings, Seng, then 14, and the other “new people” in the village were called to a meeting. “It was the rainy season, raining like this,” Seng said. “That’s why I don’t like the rain.” 

The authorities called certain names. “They called my two brothers’ names, my name and told us they were going to transfer us to another village. It was too crowded here.” 

They were put on a truck to another village and a Khmer Rouge soldier told them that their parents would be taken to that village as well. They weren’t taken to a village, but to a military base where they found their parents. “My mom cried all the time,” Seng said. 

“I was so hungry and they gave us hot rice and dried fish,” which was unexpected. “I was eating and my mom whispered to me, ‘Do you know that they’re going to kill us?’”  

Seng struggled through her grief to continue: “We didn’t know what they were going to do with us. In that building, they took one family at a time—those people were government officials—they knew who they were, so they took those people before us.”  

The family waited. “I couldn’t cry,” Seng said. They focused on the well-known Khmer Rouge rule: “If they took people before midnight, it meant that they would kill those people. If it was after midnight, it meant that people would be O.K. We just watched the clock and it passed midnight, so we thought it was going to be O.K.” 

At 2 a.m., soldiers came pointing their guns at the families, ordering people onto buses. “The women and children were crying. We thought they were going to kill us.” 

Instead, they were taken to another village, about an hour from there. There were eight families, including a few friends of Seng’s father. One was a professor who was separated from the others and taken away….  

At this point in her story, Seng was overcome with grief and could not continue her story. “Every time I talk, I tell myself, ‘don’t cry, don’t cry, but I get emotional,’” she said. 

The family eventually was incarcerated in a “re-education camp,” where they stayed until the Vietnamese liberated that part of Cambodia in 1979. (Seng’s father was reported dead by the Khmer Rouge in 1976.) 

Liberation by the Vietnamese, however, did not put an end to the trauma. The Vietnamese interrogated family members about their history in a manner similar to the Khmer Rouge. “My mom was afraid it was going to happen again,” she said. 

The family escaped to a refugee camp on the Thai border and was granted political refugee status, based on the military career of Seng’s father. By that time, Seng had married and given birth to twin boys in the refugee camp. When the twins were two-weeks-old, the family was moved to a refugee camp in the Philippines, where they waited nine months for a U.S. citizen to sponsor their immigration. 

Life as a refugee in the United States was not easy. Seng, her husband and the twins lived in Revere, Mass. with a relative. Seng worked part-time sewing curtains for K-Mart at minimum wage, then found work as a housekeeper in a hotel, cleaning up to 16 rooms every day. Her husband washed dishes in the same hotel.  

They lived in an apartment building with other Cambodians, where the landlord would come every weekend and turn off the heat, knowing the tenants had no one to complain to over the weekend. Even worse was the brutal racism: On the way to the train station to go to work, white teenagers would beat the Cambodian men and pull Seng’s hair. “They’d tell us to go home back to where you came from.” 

The couple moved to Oakland, where Seng’s mother and siblings had a two-bedroom apartment. Nine people shared the home “but we didn’t feel crowded,” Seng said. “We were used to small spaces in our country.” 

Both Seng and her husband went to school and earned AA degrees from Laney College. Bigotry followed Seng to Oakland. New on her county job, she would answer the phone and sometimes did not understand what people said. And the caller would say something like: “If you can’t understand English, why don’t you quit your job!” Some cursed.  

“For the first month, I used to cry when I went home,” Seng said. But she underscores that racism is “just a small part of America. Most people are very nice.” 

She hopes to see some justice for the suffering and deaths of more than 1.5 million people in Cambodia under the Khmer Rouge. A tribunal is being planned under United Nations auspices in which some of the perpetrators are to be put on trial (though newspaper reports indicate financing difficulties may stall the project). 

“I read that those leaders don’t think they did anything wrong,” Seng said. “That really made me angry.” Those responsible “should be accountable for those people who were killed or died (of starvation and disease). I don’t want to see any of those leaders put in jail or executed. It won’t help. But I want them to realize they hurt people.” 

Vatey Seng will sign copies of her book at a dinner to benefit the nonprofit Friendship with Cambodia. The dinner, 5:30-7:30 p.m., on Sunday, Nov. 13, at the Berkeley Unitarian Universalist Fellowship Hall, 1926 Cedar St., will include Cambodian dancing and singing, a slide show and crafts. Tickets are $25-$50. For more information call (541) 343-3782 or e-mail cambodiaedu@hotmail.com. 

Vatey Seng will sign copies of her book at a dinner to benefit the nonprofit Friendship with Cambodia. The dinner, 5:30-7:30 p.m., on Sunday, Nov. 13, at the Berkeley Unitarian Universalist Fellowship Hall, 1926 Cedar St., will include Cambodian dancing and singing, a slide show and crafts. Tickets are $25-$50. For more information call (541) 343-3782 or email cambodiaedu@hotmail.com.?

FRIDAY, NOV. 11 

Reduced City Services Today Call ahead to ensure programs or services you desire will be available. 981-CITY. www.cityofberkeley.info 

Veterans Day Celebration at 11 a.m. at Civic Center Park on Martic Luther King Jr. Way. 

Veterans Day “Prayer for World Peace” at 11 a.m. at Berkeley Bethlehem Lutheran Church, 3100 Telegraph Ave., two blocks south of Ashby. 848-8821. 

Veterans Day Celebration with a tea dance and dinner at 5 p.m. on the Red Oak Victory Ship, Berth #6, Richmond Harbor. Cost is $20. 222-9200. 

Bruce Babbitt on “National Land Use Policy” at 1 p.m. at the Oakland Zoo, 9777 Golf Links Rd. 632-9525. www.oaklandzoo.org 

Katrina Relief Benefit Concert with Country Joe McDonald and others at 7 p.m. at Unitarian Universalist Fellowship Hall, Cedar and Bonita. Tickets are $25 available from www.brownpapertickets.com/event/2530 

“Food is Love Made Visible” Benefit Harvest Dance at 5 p.m. at Unitarian Universalist Church of Berkeley, 1 Lawson Rd, Kensington. Bring your weight in food or in dollars, at least $10. All proceeds benefit local food banks. www.uucb.org 

Womansong Circle Participatory singing for women at 6:45 p.m. at First Congregational Church of Berkeley, 2345 Channing Way, at Dana. Suggested donation $10-$20. 525-7082. 

Berkeley Critical Mass Bike Ride meets at the Berkeley BART the second Friday of every month at 5:30 p.m.  

Berkeley Chess Club meets Fridays at 8 p.m. at the East Bay Chess Club, 1940 Virginia St. Players at all levels are welcome. 845-1041. 

Women in Black Vigil noon to 1 p.m. at UC Berkeley, Bancroft at Telegraph. 548-6310. 

SATURDAY, NOV. 12 

Berkeley Historical Society Tour of the Ashby Arts District with Justin Katz of Epic Arts, Patrick Dooley of Shotgun Players and Kules Kilot of Lacis Museum of Lace from 10 a.m. to noon. Cost is $8-$10. 848-0181.  

Upper Rockridge Hill Walk with the Berkeley Path Wanderers Assn. Explore elegant staircases, panoramic views, and see traditional homes as well as eclectic, post-1991-firestorm new ones. Meet at 10 a.m. at the SE corner of Rockridge Boulevard and Broadway, by the white pillars. Free; wear comfortable walking shoes and bring water and snack for this hilly walk. 848-9358. www.berkeleypaths.org 

People’s Park Free Box Fashion Show and Concert from noon to 4:30 p.m. at People’s Park. Wear your Free Box finest! 

“Bats Ain’t Bad” Learn about bats and how important they are, from 3 to 4 p.m. at Tilden Nature Center, Tilden Park. For ages 8 to 12. Cost is $3, registration required. 636-1684. 

“Trees in the Garden and Landscape” A workshop from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the Ecology Center, 2530 San Pablo Ave. Bring photos or sketches related to tree or site questions, and a bag lunch. Cost is $10-$15. 548-2220, ext. 233. 

Vegetarian Thanksgiving Cooking Class, using local in-season, organic ingredients, from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. at First Unitarian Church of Oakland, 685 14th St. at Castro. Cost is $40, registration required. 531-26655.  

“Skywatchers of Ancient Mexico” with Dr. Anthony Aveni at 6 p.m. at Chabot Space & Science Center. Tickets are $8. 336-7373.  

Childbirth Preparation Intensive with Constance Williams, doula, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., also on Nov. 19 and Dec. 3, at Birthways, 570 14th St., Oakland. Cost is $160-$180 per couple. 869-2729.  

NorCal High School Mountain Bike League Benefit Dinner at 7 p.m. on Treasure Island. Guest speaker is Andy Hampsten. For details call 325-6502. www.norcalmtb.org/spon/dinner2005.htm  

“Patriarchies: A Global Perspective on Women’s Oppression” with the Suppressed Histories Archives at 7:30 p.m. at Change Makers, 6536 Telegraph Ave. Cost is $10-$20. 665-3689. www.suppressedhistories.net 

Boost Your Immune System Learn how to test the state of your adreanal glands and restore energy at 4 p.m. at Phamaca Integrative Pharmacy, 1744 Solano Ave. 527-8929. 

Softball Clinic for girls in grades 1-9, from 1 to 4 p.m. at Grove/Russell field, Martin Luther King Jr Way and Russell St. Free. Registration required. clinics@abgsl.org, www.abgsl.org 

Protest Rally at Berkeley Honda Shattuck and Parker every Thurs. at 4:30 to 6 p.m. and Sat. from 1 to 2 p.m. until the labor dispute is settled.  

Historical and Botanical Tour of Chapel of the Chimes, a Julia Morgan landmark, at 10 a.m. at 4499 Piedmont Ave. at Pleasant Valley. Reservations required 228-3207.  

SUNDAY, NOV. 13 

Fabulous Fall Discover leaves and other natural clues of the season from 9:30 to 11 a.m. at Tilden Nature Center, Tilden Park. Especially for ages 5 to 10. Dress for rain and mud. 525-2233. 

“Autumn in Asia” A tour of Asian plants with Elaine Sedlack at 10 a.m. at UC Botanical Garden, 200 Centennial Drive. Cost is $8-$12. Registration required. 643-2937. 

Celebration in Honor of Madeline Duckles, peace and social justice activist, at 2 p.m. at Redwood Gardens, 2951 Derby St. RSVP to 665-5459. 

“Is Wal-Mart Really That Bad?” with a screening of the new documentary by Robert Greenwald at 5 p.m., at the Niebyl-Proctor Library, 6501 Telegraph Ave., at Alcatraz. Sponsored by the Green Party of Alameda County. 

“A Most Unlikely Hero” film screening and discussion with director Steve Okino on the racial injustices faced by Bruce Yamashita while enrolled in the Marine Corp officer training school, at 2 p.m. at 22 Warren Hall, UC Campus. 520-7726. 

“Cloning and Stem Cell Research: Theological and Ethical Issues” with Dr. Ted Peters at 11:30 a.m. at First Congregational Chuch, 2345 Channing Way. 845-4145. 

Cambodian Dinner, slideshow and talk at 5:30 p.m. at 1924 Cedar St. to benefit humanitarian projects in Cambodia. Cost is $10-$25. 925-295-0791. www.friendshipwithcambodia.org 

Lake Merritt Neighbors Organized for Peace at 3 p.m. at the colonnade at the NE end of the lake. 763-8712. lmno4p.org 

“The Adventures of Milo and Otis” Family Film Sunday Series at 11 a.m. at Julia Morgan Center for the Arts, 2640 College Ave. Tickets are $5 at the door.  

“The New American Cooking” with author Joan Nathan at 7 p.m. at Congregation Netivot Shalom, 1316 University Ave. Cost is $15. 524-7867.  

“Merchant of Venice” at 2 p.m. at BRJCC, 1414 Walnut St. Cost is $5. 848-0237. 

MONDAY, NOV. 14 

“Between Reality and Wishful Thinking: The University as a Neighbor” A free public forum on UC’s impact on the city of Berkeley at 7 p.m. in the Multi-Purpose Room, Berkeley Alternative High School, corner of Derby and MLK, Jr. Way. 528-8345. 

Demonstration of Election Equipment from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. at the Alameda County Conference Center, 125 12th Street, 4th Floor, Oakland. The voting equipment shown at the demonstrations is equipment being considered for purchase by the County for use in elections held after January 1, 2006. Public input is requested. 

“The Constitution and War Powers” A panel discussion with Profs. Gordon Silverstein, Peter Irons and John Yoo at 7:30 p.m. at BRJCC, 1414 Walnut St. Sponsored by Black Oak Books.  

“Don’t Be Six Feet Under WIthout a Plan” Learn about creating a living will, powers of attorney and end of life services at 6 p.m. at Chapel of the Chimes, 4499 Piedmont Ave at Pleasant Valley Rd. 562-9431. 

“Seoul Train” A documentary on North Korean refugees at 8 p.m. in 145 Dwinelle, UC Campus. The director and producer will be available afterwards for a Q & A session. callink@gmail.com 

“The Search for Dark Energy in the Accelerating Universe” with Prof Saul Perlmutter at 5 p.m. at Berkeley Rep Theater, 2025 Addison St. 486-7292. 

Sing-A-Long from 10 to 11 a.m. at the Albany Senior Center, 846 Masonic Ave. 524-9122.  

Beginning Bridge Lessons at 11:10 a.m. at the Albany Senior Center, 846 Masonic Ave. Cost is $1. 524-9122.  

Berkeley School Volunteers Training workshop for volunteers interested in helping the public schools, from 4:30 to 6 p.m. at 1835 Allston Way. 644-8833. 

Berkeley CopWatch organizational meeting at 8 p.m. at 2022 Blake St. 548-0425. 

TUESDAY, NOV. 15 

Birdwalk on the MLK Shoreline from 3:30 to 5:30 p.m. to see the shorebirds here for the winter. Binoculars available for loan. 525-2233. 

Berkeley Garden Club “Careful Gardening Means Care for the Earth” with Christopher Shein, permaculture instructor at Merritt College, at 1 p.m. at Epworth Methodist Church, 1953 Hopkins St. 527-5641. 

“High School Dropout Rate Crisis” with Assemblymember Loni Hancock at 9:30 a.m. at Richmond High School Little Theater, 1250 23rd St., Richmond. 559-1406. 

Flu Shots for Berkeley Residents age 60 or over or “high-risk” from 1 to 4 p.m. at the Berkeley Public Health Clinic, 830 University Ave. 981-5300. 

University Press Books Book Party celebrating a new book by Roger Hahn at 5:30 p.m. at 2430 Bancroft Way. 548-0585. 

“Wal-Mart: The High Cost of a Low Price” a film by Robert Greenwald at 7:30 p.m. at La Peña, 3501 Shattuck Ave.. 849-2568. www.lapena.org 

“Darfur, Sudan: The Violence Continues; How Long Can We Ignore?” A panel discussion and slideshow lecture, at 8:30 p.m. at Booth Auditorium Boalt Hall, UC Campus. 220-8481. 

Choosing Infant Care A workshop at 7 p.m. at Bananas, 5232 Claremont Ave. Babies welcome. Registration required. 658-7353.  

American Red Cross Blood Services Volunteer Orientation at 6 p.m. at 6230 Claremont Ave., Oakland. 594-5165. 

“Weight-Loss Surgery: Is It For You?” at 6 p.m. at Alta Bates Summit Health Education Center, 400 Hawthorne Ave., Oakland. Free, registration required 869-8972. 

Berkeley Salon Discussion Group meets to discuss “Travel, Surveying the Empire” from 7 to 9 p.m. at BRJCC, 1414 Walnut St. 527-1022. 

“Ministry in the Eye of Disaster” at 7:30 p.m. in the Tuscan Common Room, Church Divinity School of the Pacific, 2451 Ridge Rd. Cost is $10-$15. to register call 204-0720. 

“Nutrition for Wellness and Harmony” Part of “Healing Therapies for Pain and Energy” at noon at Maffly Auditorium, Herrick Campus of Alta Bates, 2001 Dwight Way. 644-3273. 

Free Small Business Class on Opening a Restaurant at 5 p.m. at Berkeley Public Library, Community Room, 2090 Kittredge St. Registration required. 981-6148. www.sfscore.com 

Tuesday Tilden Walkers Join a few slowpoke seniors at 9:30 a.m. in the parking lot near the Little Farm for an hour or two walk. 215-7672, 524-9992. 

Berkeley Camera Club meets at 7:30 p.m., at the Northbrae Community Church, 941 The Alameda. 548-3991. www.berkeleycameraclub.org 

St. John’s Prime Timers meets at 9:30 a.m. at St. John’s Presbyterian Church, 2727 College Ave. 845-6830. 

WEDNESDAY, NOV. 16 

Tilden Tots Join a nature adventure program for 3 and 4 year olds, each accompanied by an adult (grandparents welcome)! We’ll hunt for spiders, or learn about the water cycle if it is cold out, from 10 to 11:30 a.m. at Tilden Nature Center, Tilden Park. Cost is $6-$8. Registration required. 636-1684. 

Mid-day Meanders to discover the newts. Meet at 2:30 p.m. across from the Tilden Botanical Garden, Tilden Park. 525-2233. 

“Time for an Oil Change” A lecture on dietary fats at 10:30 a.m. at Alta Bates Summit Merritt Pavilion, Cafeteria Annex B, 350 Hawthorne Ave., Oakland. Cost is $5. RSVP to 869-6737. 

“Llaguno Bridge: Keys to a Massacre” Venezuelan documentary at 7 p.m. at Humanist Hall, 390 27th St., Oakland. Donation $5. 393-5685. 

Berkeley Communicators Toastmasters welcomes curious guests and new members at 7:15 a.m. at Au Coquelet Cafe, 2000 University Ave. at Milvia. 435-5863.  

Entrepreneurs Networking at 8 a.m. at A’Cuppa Tea, 3202 College Ave. at Alcatraz. Cost is $5. For more information contact JB, 562-9431.  

Acupuncture and Integrative Medicine College Open House at 6 p.m. at 2550 Shattuck Ave. Tours of classrooms and clinics and information for prospective students. To RSVP call 666-8248, ext. 106.  

The Berkeley Lawn Bowling Club provides free instruction every Wednesday at 10:30 a.m. at 2270 Action St. 841-2174.  

Walk Berkeley for Seniors meets every Wednesday at 9:30 a.m. at the Sea Breeze Market, just west of the I-80 overpass. Everyone is welcome, wear comfortable shoes and a warm hat. 548-9840. 

Prose Writer’s Workshop An ongoing group made up of friendly writers who are serious about our craft. All levels welcome. At 7 p.m. at BRJCC, 1414 Walnut St. 848-0237.  

Sing your Way Home A free sing-a-long at 4:30 p.m. every Wed. at the Albany Library, 1247 Marin Ave. 526-3720. 

Fresh Produce Stand at San Pablo Park from 3 to 6:30 p.m. in the Frances Albrier Community Center. Sponsored by the Ecology Center’s Farm Fresh Choice. 848-1704. www.ecologycenter.org 

Stitch ‘n Bitch Bring your knitting, crocheting and other handcrafts from 6 to 9 p.m. at Caffe Trieste, 2500 San Pablo Ave. 548-5198. 

Berkeley Peace Walk and Vigil at the Berkeley BART Station, corner of Shattuck and Center. Sing for Peace at 6:30 p.m. followed by Peace Walk at 7 p.m. www.geocities.com/ 

vigil4peace/vigil 

THURSDAY, NOV. 17 

Public Hearing on Parking Fees and Time Limits Downtown at the Planning Commission meeting at 7 p.m. at North Berkeley Senior Center. 981-7010. 

Tilden Tots Join a nature adventure program for 3 and 4 year olds, each accompanied by an adult (grandparents welcome)! We’ll hunt for spiders, or learn about the water cycle if it is cold out, from 10 to 11:30 a.m. at Tilden Nature Center, Tilden Park. Cost is $6-$8. Registration required. 636-1684. 

“Albatross: On the Wings of Antarctic Ocean Wanderers” with naturalist Ted Cheeseman at 7:30 p.m. at Northbrae Community Church, 941 The Alameda. Sponsored by Golden Gate Audubon Society. www.goldengatesudubon.org 

“The Lodgepole Needle Miner in Yosemite Park” with forest entomologist Tom Koerber at 12:30 p.m. at Oakland Museum of California, Tenth and Oak Sts. 238-2200. www.museumca.org 

“Japanese Toys and the Global Imagination” with Anne Allison at 4:30 p.m. in the IEAS Conference Room, 2223 Fulton St., 6th flr. 642-2809. 

Flu Shots for Berkeley Residents age 60 or over or “high-risk” from 1 to 4 p.m. at the Berkeley Public Health Clinic, 830 University Ave. For information call 981-5300. 

“Update on What’s New in Parkinson’s Care” with Carol Evans, RNC, at 10 a.m. at North Berkeley Senior Center.  

LeConte Neighborhood Association meets at 7:30 p.m. in the LeConte School, Ellsworth and Russell. 843-2602. 

Food Drive and Tree Lighting Ceremony with children’s activities and holiday entertainment at 6 p.m. at Bay Street in Emeryville. Bring canned goods to donate to the Alameda County Community Food Bank. 

Spanish Book Club meets at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852. www.codysbooks.com  

World of Plants Tours Thurs., Sat. and Sun. at 1:30 p.m. at the UC Botanical Garden, 200 Centennial Drive. Cost is $5. 643-2755. http://botanicalgarden.berkeley.edu 

ONGOING 

Warm Coat Drive Donate a coat for distribution in the community, at Bay St., Emeryville. Sponsored by the Girl Scouts. www.onewarmcoat.org 

We Give Thanks Month Dine at a participating restaurant, and a portion of the proceeds will be donated to Berkeley Food and Housing. Restaurants include Bendean, Poulet, Rose Garden Inn, La Note, Skates on the Bay and Oliveto’s. www.bfhp.org 

Albany Berkeley Girls Softball League is looking for girls in grades 1-9 to play softball. Season runs March 4-June 3. To register, email registrar@abgsl.org or call 869-4277. Early Bird registration ends Dec. 31. Registration closes Feb. 1. Scholarships available. www.abgsl.org 

CITY MEETINGS 

City Council meets Tues., Nov. 15, at 7 p.m in City Council Chambers. 981-6900. www.ci. 

berkeley.ca.us/citycouncil 

Citizens Humane Commission meets Wed., Nov. 16, at 7 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Katherine O’Connor, 981-6601.  

Civic Arts Commission meets Wed., Nov. 16, at 6:30 p.m. at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Mary Ann Merker, 981-7533.  

Commission on Aging meets Wed. Nov. 16, at 1:30 p.m., at the South Berkeley Senior Center. William Rogers, 981-5344.  

Commission on Labor meets Wed., Nov. 16, at 6:45 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Delfina M. Geiken, 981-7550.  

Disaster Council meets Wed., Nov. 16, at 7 p.m., at the Emergency Operations Center, 997 Cedar St. William Greulich, 981-5502. www.ci.berkeley.ca. us/commissions/disaster 

Human Welfare and Community Action Commission meets Wed. Nov. 16, at 7 p.m., at the South Berkeley Senior Center. Kristen Lee, 981-5427. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/commissions/welfare 

Design Review Committee meets Thurs., Nov. 17, at 7:30 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Anne Burns, 981-7415. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/commissions/designreview  

Fair Campaign Practices Commission meets Thurs., Nov. 17, at 7:30 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Prasanna Rasaih, 981-6950. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/commissions/faircampaign 

Transportation Commission meets Thurs., Nov. 17, at 7 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Peter Hillier, 981-7000. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/commissions/transportation?

Prince Charles and his wife Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall, made it a priority to tour Berkeley’s student-run Edible Garden at Martin Luther King, Jr. Middle School Monday as part of a week-long tour of the United States, in part devoted to exploring environmental issues, such as organic farming. 

Led by Chez Panisse owner Alice Waters, whose foundation funds and helps guide the garden, the tour included a viewing of the one-acre project, which teaches students about nutrition, community and stewardship.  

The royal couple visited students demonstrating an outdoor wood-fire oven to prepare pizzas, using ingredients harvested from the garden. In the kitchen they met students preparing a harvest soup. As Camilla left, she carried bouquets of flowers also harvested from the garden.  

“I’m honored that he came,” Waters said. “His visit gives the garden real legitimacy.” 

Waters said she and the Prince of Wales have discussed the possibility of trying to implement a similar model in schools throughout his country. 

“That’s where this needs to go,” she said. 

In typical Berkeley fashion, the royal couple were met by several groups who lined the streets outside the school to protest various issues. About two dozen members of the Ethiopian community gathered with signs and chants protesting British Prime Minister Tony Blair’s support for Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, whom they accused of election fraud and human rights violations. Police paced the roofs of the school, keeping a watchful eye on the crowd. 

Among the people who gathered across the street was Dewi Zarni, 6, a first-grader at Berkwood Hedge Elementary, who sat on her mom’s shoulders and held a sign covered with little bugs that read “Make Gardens Not War.” When asked why all the bugs, she said, “Because war really bugs me.” 

Next to her, Tammy Borchert wore a bear suit to protest what her organization, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, says is the inhumane killing of Canadian black bears that are used to make the hats for the Royal Guard. 

Many others, however, were just out to see royalty. Neighbors sat on their porches and drank coffee and camera flashes started popping as soon as the couple got out of their car.  

On their way out of the garden Charles and Camilla passed by nervous students who lined up to shake hands. As the couple walked down the line, the middle school band serenaded them with jazz tunes. 

“It was pretty cool,” said Austin Perkins, a seventh-grade drummer in the band. “I’ll probably be the only one in my family to ever play for the Prince of England.”

The enormous photo of the distinguished young African-American man—dressed for success, as the saying goes—has disappeared from the front of the hangar at the entrance to the Oakland International Airport, along with the inferences that his success was linked to the type of gin he drank. 

Its replacement billboard—featuring a bottle and glass of cognac—is scheduled to be gone in a few weeks too, when its contracted run ends, to be replaced by automobile ads. 

For the time being, at least, the City of Oakland has won the battle to keep from being the home of one of the more conspicuous outdoor liquor advertisements in the country. But at least one city official says there is no guarantee that the victory will be anything but temporary, and alcohol industry watchdogs say that Oakland is still relatively powerless to do much more about the liquor and beer billboards still existing in the city. 

The problem began some two months ago when the original gin ad—as long as a football field— appeared on the airport hangar, visible above the flat marshes and runways to anyone driving to Oakland’s airport. It hit a nerve in a city where both violence and the image of violence is a continuing problem, particularly alcohol-induced violence among young African-American men. 

“I don’t want the biggest sign in the world for alcohol in Oakland,” said City Councilmember Jane Brunner. 

Joan Kiley, founder and director of the Berkeley-based Alcohol Policy Network of Alameda County, said that the problem with such high-profile billboards targeting young people in communities of color is the obvious. 

“It creates an environment where this targeted community feels like drinking is the ‘thing to do,’” she said. “That becomes a public health issue. When you see the kind of health disparities that are present between the larger community and the African-American community in particular and communities of color in general, you realize that these are communities which don’t need more encouragement to do something that is unhealthy.” 

It’s also an issue of crime and violence prevention, she added. 

“How many urban youth are currently locked up because of crimes committed under the influence?” she asked. “And there are plenty of studies on the direct connection between alcohol consumption and violence against women. It’s an astounding number. The alcohol companies should be sensitive on these issues. But they have a different set of priorities than we do. Ours is public health. Theirs is sales.” 

Kiley praised Oakland’s billboard-prevention efforts, saying that the city’s billboard regulation ordinance is a model across the country. 

“It came to being a decade ago because of the hard work of community advocates, but also because a lot of far-thinking businesses got on board after they realized it was in their overall best interest to have a better business climate in the city fostered by a better city image,” she said. 

Billboards at the airport are regulated by the Board of Port Commissioners, a seven-member body nominated by the mayor and approved by the City Council. In September, when the hangar ad issue first surfaced, Brunner got the council to pass a resolution to begin negotiations with the port to turn over billboard regulation to the city. If those negotiations fail, the resolution authorizes the city to begin drafting an amendment to the general plan to allow the billboard regulation takeover by statute. 

But Brunner concedes that even with the city in control over billboard regulation, the city is powerless to stop alcohol billboards on airport hangars. 

“Legally, we can’t ban them,” Brunner said. “Oakland has a statute that prevents alcohol billboards in proximity to churches and schools, but that’s all we can do. It’s a First Amendment issue. What we have is the power of persuasion. We can encourage the owners of these locations not to put up alcohol billboards. And we’ll be able to know in advance when and where these billboards are planned. One of the problems is that they’re just springing up, without the council’s knowledge until someone sees them on the road.” 

Meanwhile Oakland—which alcohol industry watchdogs say has one of the more stringent anti-liquor billboard ordinances in the country—can still do little more to reduce the number of liquor billboards around the city. 

A driving trip north from the airport towards downtown Oakland on I-880 shows beer billboards most conspicuously clustered near the High Street exit, an area of nagging violence and prostitution problems in the city. A little further north on the freeway, a driver can easily see a beer ad on a city street near the entrance of Laney Community College. 

Laurie Lieber, director of media advocacy for the Marin Institute, an industry watchdog, said getting rid of existing liquor and beer billboards is a challenge. 

“Even in situations where the city has the power to stop these billboards from coming in, the existing billboards are often grandfathered into the law, so you can’t put them out,” she said. “That’s why we counsel cities to be very careful about what types of advertising they allow on their streets. It’s difficult to go back, sometimes, and correct a problem even if cities believe they have made a mistake.” 

Lieber agreed with Brunner that billboard regulation has become a free speech issue. 

“But the First Amendment is not an absolute right,” she said. “And considering the public health aspects of the problem, you’d like to think that these alcohol ads would be the equivalent of yelling ‘Fire!’ in a crowded theater. It’s advocating something that is not in the best interest of the public health. But in recent years, the courts have broadened the concept of freedom of speech from purely political speech to become a protection for commercial speech.” 

?

Rising construction prices and economic realities have forced a redesign of the planned upgrade to Berkeley’s landmark Shattuck Hotel, developer Roy Nee said Monday. 

Nee’s plans to renovate the hotel and bring it under the Westin label have been hailed by city officials, who are eager to see a highly respected hotel brand in the city center. 

His initial renovation plans were embraced by the city’s Landmarks Preservation Commission, but the increase in construction costs and the dictates of Berkeley’s economy have forced him to find a new architect and a financial partner, Nee said. 

“We fundamentally redesigned different areas of the project,” said Nee. 

The changes were necessary because the plans by Elida Doldan Schujuman of Mill Valley proved uneconomical when Nee looked more closely at his potential clientele, he said. Nee abandoned her design and sought out JG Johnson Architects of Denver, Colo., one of the nation’s leading hotel design firms and the architects of recent major resort projects in Santa Barbara, Aspen, Colo., and San Diego. 

“The problem is that the Berkeley area has its pricing limits, which are lower than for areas that are tourism destinations,” he said. “The main demand driver is the University of California, which has set per diems, and they’re what control the economics.” 

The new firm is redesigning the mass of the structure along Allston Way west of Shattuck Avenue, transforming the proposed two-floor connector between the main hotel building and the U.S. Postal Annex into a five-story structure, while reducing the planned vertical extension of the postal annex from four floors to three—although a fourth floor remains an option, Nee said Monday. 

“This shifts the volume of the building and will make the project more economical,” he said, adding, “It will still be a Westin hotel.” 

The revised plans will have to be resubmitted to the Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC), which has purview over the designs because the building is a designed Berkeley landmark. 

“I hope that delays in the city approval process haven’t spoiled the chances to restore the downtown’s most prominent landmark,” said Leslie Emmington, an LPC member. 

City Planning Director Dan Marks said the hotel restoration “is a very high priority for the city. It’s a very exciting project and a potential revenue source for the city. It’s a wonderful old hotel we’d like to see done.” 

Marks confirmed that the new design will have to go back to the LPC, “but I don’t see any problems as long as they continue with their proposal to enhance and restore the hotel.” 

While a new design will add some time to the approval process, “we were finished with that in any case. It’s not like we’ll be starting over from scratch,” Marks said. 

The Shattuck Hotel opened on Dec. 15, 1910, as a square structure at the corner of Shattuck and Allston. It proved so successful that an annex was added, filling out the rest of the block along Shattuck to Kittredge Street, making it the longest structure in Northern California at the time. 

The solid, fireproof construction was designed with the 1906 earthquake in mind and proved a great attraction. The structure was declared a city landmark on May 16, 1983. 

Nee said the redesign process has been under way for about a month. 

The revised plans will maintain the hotel’s flavor and feel, he said, while giving the project a decent chance of economic success.ô

From the far end of the pier, the newest addition to Richmond’s Rosie the Riveter National Historical Park seemed, as it hung suspended from the crane of a tug barge, like an odd-shaped child’s toy dredged out of the bay waters being held up and examined by a curious beachcomber. 

It was only when you realized that the little figures scuttling on the dock below it are not sandcrabs but construction workers that you began to realize the enormous scale of the Whirley Crane, a revolving boxcar sitting on massive legs as tall as a 10-story building. 

The numbers in the handout given to press at the dock entrance—Weight: 229,000 pounds. Boom length: 110 feet. Lifting capacity: 166,000 pounds—didn’t fully convey the size of the machine towering above the onlookers. 

The Whirley Crane got its name not because of the speed of its movement—it probably moved carefully and deliberately because a single error could cost several lives—but because the crane could turn a full 360 degrees, thus allowing the boom to achieve a speed of operation as it went about several tasks. 

Sixty years ago, workers—many of them women—used to sit in the turret at the top of the Whirley Crane, operating the controls that caused the 110 foot boom to lift and assemble and put into place the massive sheets of iron that eventually became the cruisers and battleships that sailed out into the Pacific and helped win the naval war for the United States. 

Since then, the crane has sat rusting and isolated and all but forgotten on a pier on the Richmond docks. The crane was eventually donated to the City of Richmond by its owner, the Levin-Richmond Terminal Corporation, after a coalition of Rosie the Riveter National Park organizers came up with the idea that the crane would be a valuable addition to the park. 

On Friday of last week a handful of female former shipyard workers—now in their 80s and 90s—joined with Naval personnel, Richmond city officials and workers, National Park Service officers, construction workers, and various dignitaries to watch one of the last remaining Whirley Cranes take the short but logistically complicated barge ride down the harbor waters from Shipyard Number 1 and get placed in a site for permanent viewing at Richmond’s Shipyard No. 3 next to the docked SS Red Oak Victory, one of the last of those World War II era warships. 

While Friday’s ceremony was limited to a selected few for safety purposes related to the move and placement of the Whirley Crane, a public installation ceremony is being planned within a few months. 

Visitors can already tour the gray-painted Red Oak Victory, which is slowly being restored as a living memorial to the World War II war effort. A Naval officer involved with the restoration project said that while the Red Oak will never put out to sea again, it will eventually be shipshape enough to take limited sails up and down the bay. 

Now, in addition to seeing the warship, dockside visitors will also be able to walk past and examine a living example of one of the type of construction cranes that built it and, therefore, begin to get a small look back into an era that seems to dwarf all present human accomplishment. 

A National Park spokesperson said that the Whirley Crane “appears to be operational,” and that if it is, visitors may one day be able to see the turret revolve its full 360 degrees as it did during the shipbuilding years. 

Rosie the Riveter Trust president and Richmond City Councilmember Tom Butt, who was out of town Friday, said in a statement that the installation was “an unprecedented collaboration to save the Whirley Crane for posterity, to remind us of the single-minded and Herculean effort the home front generation made over 60 years ago.” 

›

Berkeley’s on-again off-again Veterans’ Day observance is back on, thanks to the withdrawal of a controversial participant. 

Berkeley’s “Country Joe” McDonald, the organizer of the event, had invited Bill Mitchell, a co-founder of Gold Star Families for Peace, to speak at Friday’s event. Mitchell's son, Army Sgt. Michael Mitchell, was killed in action in Baghdad’s Sadr City on April 4, 2004—the same day and place that the group’s more famous co-founder Cindy Sheehan lost her son, Army Spec. Casey A. Sheehan. 

Mitchell’s invitation rankled members of the Berkeley chapter of Disabled American Veterans (DAV), which responded by pulling out of the event. 

Mayor Tom Bates said he had talked to Mitchell, who informed him he had withdrawn from the Berkeley event to attend another event the same day in Santa Monica in which participants will carry caskets to mark the deaths of soldiers killed in Iraq. 

“Here the emphasis will be on honoring our veterans more than on protesting the war,” Bates said. “It’s a time to honor the dead and put politics on the back burner.” 

The program will still address issues involving the veterans’ community, he said. “We will speak to some of their issues, especially those facing homeless vets,” Bates said. 

Mitchell’s withdrawal was greeted with relief by Ed Harper, president of DAV Chapter 25 in Berkeley. 

“Now we’ll be able to honor our veterans the way we should,” Harper said. 

The Veterans’ Day commemoration will begin at 11 a.m. Friday at Civic Center Park, located off Martin Luther King Jr. Way between the old and new City Hall buildings. If rain intervenes, events will move indoors to the Veterans Memorial Building at 1931 Center St. 

Berkeley’s Planning Commission and the Zoning Adjustments Board (ZAB) will each hold hearings this week on the draft environmental impact report (EIR) on the proposed new Berkeley Bowl. 

The site, at the southwest corner of the intersection of Ninth Street and Heinz Avenue in West Berkeley, has generated opposition from those who fear problems from traffic and the expansion of commercial zoning in the area. 

Public comments will be considered by the staff for possible consideration and inclusion in a final EIR that must be prepared before the city can act on the project. 

The Planning Commission meeting starts at 7 p.m. Wednesday in the North Berkeley Senior Center, 1900 Hearst Ave. The ZAB meeting starts at 7 p.m. Thursday in City Council Chambers, 2134 Martin Luther King Jr. Way. 

The Planning Commission will also consider a report from city Housing Director Steve Barton on the Alameda County-wide Homeless and Special Needs Housing Plan. 

ZAB will also hear two wireless phone antennae proposals and two food service permit issues, one to establish a carry-out food service store at 2948 College Ave. and the other to extend the hours of an existing quick-service restaurant at 2548 Bancroft Way. 

—

Rejected in San Francisco, then spurned in Berkeley, Spaceship Earth is headed south. 

“It’s about time it found a landing place,” its creator, Finno-American sculptor Eino, said Monday. 

The sculpture, a 350,000-pound blue Brazilian quartzite sphere studded with bronze islands and continents, will be installed at Kennesaw State University in Georgia. 

In San Francisco, public arts officials rejected the orb as too big and unfitting for its honoree—renowned environmentalist David Brower. Berkeley then considered finding a home for it, while the sculpture itself, never assembled, languished in a warehouse at the Presidio. 

As a friend of both the Berkeley-born David Brower and Brian Maxwell, the late PowerBar founder who commissioned the work, Berkeley Mayor Tom Bates embraced the idea of placing the sculpture in Berkeley. He asked the Civic Arts Commission (CAC) to find it a home. 

The first hints of trouble came at the CAC, where then-Commissioner Bonnie Hughes made clear her bemusement with the rush to adopt what she considered an aesthetically dubious creation. 

Hughes, who opposed the controversial piece on aesthetic grounds, expressed her frustration in one sentence when describing the meeting last year when all but two of her fellow commissioners voted to accept the statue: “How would you like to have a 350,000-pound political football tossed in your lap?” 

Eino used virtually the same words Monday. “It’s a 356,000-pound football politicians are kicking around,” he said, “and its honoring a great man.” 

Some folks still didn’t seem to take to the thing, and while the CAC searched for possible sites, each selection in turn met with rejection. UC Berkeley didn’t want the thing, and neither did neighbors of city parks selected as possible sites. The East Bay Regional Parks District nixed any sites in Tilden Park as inappropriate. 

The Parks and Recreation Commission turned thumbs down on a proposal to locate the sculpture in Ohlone Park on July 25. Other rejected possibilities were Aquatic Park and the Berkeley Marina. 

Eino and Brower’s family objected to the Aquatic Park site because speeding traffic did not seem the most appropriate honor to the environmentalist. 

“One of (David Brower’s) requirements was that the sculpture not be placed next to traffic. I told the mayor, but I don’t think he heard me,” said Eino. “I was also concerned about placing it on landfill and in an area with no security.” 

CAC Vice Chair David Snippen agreed. “It seems rather inappropriate to install a sculpture dedicated to an environmentalist on top of a landfill,” he observed. 

By the time it was over, the CAC’s Public Arts Committee had considered more than 30 sites. 

With the final acceptable Berkeley site off the table, Eino remembered his visit two-and-a-half years ago to Kennesaw State University, located 20 miles north of Atlanta, Ga., where he said his works had been enthusiastically received. 

College officials there had no qualms about perching a statue of Brower atop the sculpture, an element that Berkeley had considered removing, thus restoring the work to the sculptor’s original intent—a design Brower himself had approved. 

Eino said the decision on a new location had been left up to him. “I went to the school two years ago to lecture, and they were really excited when I showed them slides” of the work in progress, he said. 

“They have a very good ecology program, and the students really want to honor David Brower properly,” Eino said. “They have a perfect location, with a forest behind and looking down over the campus. 

If all goes well, Spaceship Earth will be unveiled at its new and permanent home on Earth Day 2006.  

So Berkeley will just have to be content with a far larger monument, the five-story David Brower Center planned for construction at the corner of Oxford Street and Allston Way. 

Mayor Tom Bates said Monday that he was sad to see the sculpture go. 

“We just couldn’t find a place for it here in Berkeley,” he said. “It was a large globe, and hard to place. It’s too bad, but the Maxwell family felt it wasn’t welcome here. It’s unfortunate, but we have to move on.”

Rape attempt arrest 

Police have arrested a suspect in the attempted Oct. 28 rape of a 47-year-old woman in an alleyway in the 2000 block of Shattuck Avenue, said Berkeley police spokesperson Officer Joe Okies. 

The 45-year-old suspect was charged with assault with a deadly weapon and kidnapping for the purpose of a sex crime. 

Fracas busts 

A spat between a couple in the vicinity of Hearst Avenue and Sacramento Street early Thursday afternoon ended with both parties in custody. One was booked on suspicion of domestic partner abuse for landing a punch and the other was booked on suspicion of assault with a deadly weapon for escalating the fray with a broom handle. 

Rat pack attack 

Six youths aged between 14 and 16 robbed at 15-year-old of his cash near the corner of Regent and Oregon streets a few minutes before 5 p.m. Thursday, said Officer Okies. 

The gang remains at large. 

Kidnap and robbery 

Police are seeking the man who kidnapped a woman shortly before 8 a.m. Friday in an attempted robbery. 

Soon after the crime was reported, a Berkeley police officer stopped the car in question, and when the officer tried to question the driver, he sped off, striking the officer. 

The officer escaped with minor injuries, but the incident added yet another felony—assault with a deadly weapon—to the kidnapping charge facing the man. 

The victim was not in the car at the time of the stop, said Officer Okies, and she is currently in a safe location know to police, he said. 

“It doesn’t appear to be a random incident,” said the officer. “The parties were apparently known to each other.”›

To view Justin DeFreitas’ latest editorial cartoon, please visit  

www.jfdefreitas.com To search for previous cartoons by date of publication, click on the Daily Planet Archive.

›

OREGON STREET 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I applaud the efforts of Paul Rauber and 13 of his neighbors to rid their neighborhood once and for all of a drug house. 

With all due respect to Ms. Prichett, while it is certainly true that racism does still exist towards blacks in our society, and there are educationally and economically disadvantaged black youths in South Berkeley and a lot of other places, Paul Rauber and his neighbors have the right to live in a neighborhood free of all the elements a drug house brings on the scene. We have heard so much about the racism and the economic and educational disadvantage, but there is absolutely no reason for Mr. Rauber and his neighbors to have to wait for social solutions to their problem when they have obviously waited too long as it is! 

Frank Rivers 

Oakland 

• 

NIGHTMARE 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I am an active Berkeley Progressive, no more racist than the average white progressive, and one who has been generous in providing shelter to my homeless friends, black and white, throughout my tenure in Berkeley. I am flagrantly anti having to live near any house or liquor store where drug taking and drug sales can flourish. I have even become anti SSI government housing because of absentee landlords who let the rest of us deal with the addictive, drug-selling tenant and his multiple friends who come and go all night long. For those of you who have not lived near such a house as Mrs. Moore’s is reputed to be—and she is probably the best of women—you have not experienced one of the true nightmares of life in America. I recommend it and bring your fine progressive values, your hard work and your children—white, black, Latino, South East Asian—it won’t matter. You can participate with all of us in an ongoing hell, that feels too often like a war zone with the enemy close at hand instead of like a home in a time of peace. After seeing that we were serious about bringing a civil suit, our absentee landlord has reformed and no longer takes in SSI tenants. Which is a shame to be sure since most SSI tenants are also hard-working, good people such as ourselves. But what a difference a suit can make for the rest of us—no matter who owns the house. This is life in many parts of America—and minority peoples have to suffer this life far more than the average humanistically hearted well educated Berkeleyan. Does it sound as though I’m anti-white progressive? Oh, dear. 

Sara DeWitt 

• 

DEMOCRACY 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

We attempt to sell democracy to the world while we often ignore its values at home. Leo Stegman, Berkeley paralegal, who is attempting to aid Ms. Moore, points out that “the time, effort and energy put into this lawsuit would be better spent getting all the parties and relevant agencies together to find a common sense non-litigious solution.”  

He is correct in pointing out that forced litigation or even banishment is being used as a first step in this neighborhood dispute, rather than a last one, ignoring the available rational and moral democratic procedures of mediation. All parties in this encounter need to be heard. 

We teach our children non-violent solutions to conflict. Just as Rosa Parks taught the nation, conflict resolution can reach far beyond the “neighborhood,” and be the first step in reminding us again how democracy is supposed to work. 

Gerta Farber 

• 

PLEASE VOTE TODAY 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I hope that the Daily Planet will publish a front-page article today encouraging everyone to vote. Progressive areas such as Berkeley and Oakland need to have a high voter turnout in order to help defeat Gov. Schwarzenegger’s right-wing agenda. 

If you need to find your polling place, you can call the Alameda County Registrar of Voters at 272-6973, or you can enter your address and zip code on the League of Women Voter’s website at: www.smartvoter.org. 

If you want to read some online analysis, I recommend the Green Party’s or the Bay Guardian’s. (They both urge a no vote on Propositions 73 through 78, and a yes vote on Proposition 79. The Guardian recommends a “Yes” vote on Proposition 80 while the Green Party does not make an endorsement.) 

In any case please vote today—and help stop the Governator! 

Greg Jan 

Oakland 

• 

WHITE NOISE, WHITE PAPER 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

According to the Daily Planet, Berkeley Community Media (BCM) is attempting to dramatize a possible existential threat to its being by intermittently broadcasting a state of nothingness. It is difficult to decide if this action represents nascent insanity in certain ideological quarters or is simply an expression of typical infantile petulance whenever a supposed entitlement is threatened. Granted the notion that the “corporate” or for profit media has a fundamental moral obligation to subsidize and facilitate the dissemination of a viewpoint whose avowed goal is the destruction of those same corporate media conglomerates fits nicely into the old pseudo-Marxist concept that “the capitalists will sell (donate?) the rope that hangs them.” 

However, it is surprising that a comrade in arms such as the Berkeley Daily Planet has apparently not yet thought fit to express its profound solidarity with BMC in its shared struggle against the monolithic corporate media. 

Imagine what a powerful statement it would make if the Daily Planet were to publish at a loss a full-length completely blank issue to underscore the snow job foisted on a gullible public by a corporate media beholden to the neo-con Bush/Schwarzenegger regimes! Imagine the awesome public symbolism of the blank white pages of a free newspaper representing all of the innumerable white lies obscuring the disastrous consequences of a government of billionaires, by billionaires and for billionaires only! The longer the Planet’s “whiteout” were to continue, the more blank issues that hit the newsstand, the greater the sacrifice for truth and accuracy in media.  

Finally, to counter the objection that using up so much blank newsprint would be too wasteful and environmentally irresponsible even for such an important symbolic statement as this, the Planet could perhaps find a way to produce these blank issues in sturdy perforated toilet tissue so that those who pick up an issue won’t let it go to waste (so to speak). Who knows, it may even find its way into a litter box or two as well as the hallowed Free Box at People’s Park where it would doubtless find many creative applications. 

Edna Spector 

• 

DOWNTOWN PLAN 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I am a fairly new repeat resident of Berkeley and am trying to get a sense of this wonderfully diverse city after all these years of being away. 

One of the most interesting events to occur in the recent past was the on-again, off-again lawsuit filed by the city against the University of California’s new downtown development plan. Later we learned of the settlement of the lawsuit after secret negotiations and no public input. 

This seems to be a very big deal to me, and yet there is very little public discourse on the subject. So, interested Berkeleyans should know that a forum is planned this month to give a platform to some of those who oppose the settlement to present their positions. The public is welcome to attend the free meeting at the Alternative High School Multi-Purpose Room on MLK Jr. Way, Monday evening, Nov. 14 at 7 p.m. 

Corrine Goldstick 

• 

PUBLIC SCHOOLS 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Marilyn Boucher’s commentary should be read and reflected on deeply by the members of the Board of Education. Marilyn’s assessment is accurate and the message of caution critical before yet another reform is approved. Stay the course, follow the site plan, and assess the effectiveness of the stated goals first. 

Most importantly, create resource periods for those students below proficiency, especially reading instruction. And please require teachers to use progress-reporting software so we parents can be properly informed. We cannot do right by our kids without knowing what is happening in the classroom. Help us do our jobs so we can make sure our kids are engaged and succeed before you add another useless class period called advisory period. 

Laura Menard 

• 

CLEAN WATER ACT 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

The biggest threat facing this country today is President Bush’s rollback of the Clean Water Act, which preserves clean water around the country. The president’s action will result in producing dirty water in the bays, canals, rivers, lakes and oceans due to actions by the oil, gas, and chemical companies who got permission from the president to do their business without any regard to that law. 

This president poses to be a moral person which he isn’t. A true moral president wouldn’t let water be polluted in favor of greed. People who are concerned about preserving clean water should fight every attempt by this president to roll-back further laws protecting it. 

Billy Trice, Jr. 

• 

A SOLUTION 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I have what I believe to be a rather elegant solution to the continuing turmoil between the residents of Berkeley and its resident university. Under my proposal, all the residents (excluding those whom older residents deem “Berkeley babies” and “students”) of Berkeley assemble a committee, complete with a subsequent pro-protest, with the stated purpose to bring a special election to the city, a “Vote for Berkeley” if you will. Voting yes on such a ballot would authorize the city to completely raze its university’s campus, starting with that gaudy Barrows building and the dangerous Evans Hall. The law would further authorize the city to blow up any building the residents declare to be “of entertaining interest” and tickets sold to cover costs. Sather Tower could bring an absolute windfall to the cash-strapped city coffers. 

Of course, the city must then be renamed in order to fully erase the memory of its least grateful institution: I propose that a list be drawn together by concerned residents and the name be democratically elected by the same (Peaceland, Pottersville or Sequoia are all worthy contenders). Above all, this name must reflect the diverse opinions of this great city without offending anyone. “Castrated Neutrality and Inoffence” would therefore be our credo and written on civic structures of merit. Thus, citizens could simply point to our greatest monuments instead of speaking when confronted with an uncomfortable prejudiced statement. 

Once all the professors are sent packing and students ordered out of this newly minted land, the residents could then build at will upon the old campus grounds (fascist hamlet), perhaps a prodigious bust of a coffee cup, or an incessant “squeaky wheel” installation could accompany the “corporation-free tree.” 

Any attempt for outside revenue (i.e., tourists or right-wing fanatics as the city’s constitution would now refer to them) will be sharply curtailed. An Achillean picket wall, complete with slogans and bumper stickers would be built around the city to further discourage these fanatics from entering over the borders to see all the world-class stuff that our city has to offer, chiefly “odor.” 

With one single vote tally, we can live freely in unobtrusive peace, without supporting a tumerous [sic] center of education sapping away our valuable resources and destroying Berkeley’s way of life. 

Kyle Strom 

• 

ISRAEL 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I’d like very much to start one of those back-and-forth battle of letters a la The Nation magazine in which people passionately respond to responses of responses, etc. Let’s start off: I’m truly persuaded that Jews deserve a homeland because throughout history they’ve been successfully butchered. There seems to be this unexplained thing about being a Jew, which historically puts them in jeopardy. Okay, the U.S. backed Israel during the Cold War with lots of money. Blame the U.S., not Israel. Jews are more reasonably paranoid about being in jeopardy than any other ethnic group in the history of civilization. Prove me wrong. Israel is the best answer to the holocaust of the last 2,000 years of rabid, lethal anti-Semitism. Even left-wing Jews must feel at least a little trickle of sympathy for the State of Israel, i.e., for their right to exist. Here’s an analogy: African Americans know that when the chips are down, white folks are going to start talk about “niggers” and how they are the problem; and by the same token, so-called white folks, when the chips are down, are going to start talking about “kikes,” and how they are the problem. Remember, Adolph did it.  

Robert Blau 

• 

CHAMBER’S PICKS 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

As a member of the Government Affairs Committee of the Berkeley Chamber of Commerce and a co-owner of a small business here, I share Andy Ross’ displeasure with the positions adopted by the chamber’s board on the ballot initiatives on the upcoming ballot. The Government Affairs Committee is charged with reviewing the ballot and making recommendations to the full chamber board. A small handful of chamber members participated in the meetings, which resulted mostly in “no recommendation” since there weren’t enough members present and voting to achieve a yes or no position. For those of us who don’t believe that the governor and the state Chamber of Commerce know what’s best for Berkeley, this was a frustrating experience that needs to change. 

The Government Affairs Committee meetings are open to any member of the Berkeley Chamber of Commerce who will take the time to come and vote on recommendations to the full board. The board meetings are also open to all chamber members though only members of the board are eligible to vote on endorsements. So you don’t like the positions your Chamber of Commerce is taking? You can make a big stink without quitting the chamber. Come join me at a few meetings and make a big stink there. You’ll be in good company. 

Elisabeth Jewel 

AJE Partners 

• 

IRAQ 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Why another op-ed piece? And Why from a women’s group? After all everyone in the U.S. already knows: Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction. Saddam Hussein was not involved in 9/11. American dead now total nearly 2,000. To quote Donald Rumsfeld, “The lethality, however, is up.” Many of our soldiers lack adequate equipment. Bush has been closing veterans’ hospitals and cutting benefits. We have no exit strategy. And as to U.S. support of a democratic constitution in Iraq: A former C.I.A. Middle East specialist, Reuel Marc Gerecht, said on “Meet the Press,” “I mean, women’s social rights are not critical to the evolution of democracy.” 

Yes, everyone knows all this, but there are other facts not as well known.  

According to UNICEF, one in four Iraqi children under five years of age is chronically malnourished. One in eight children die before their fifth birthday.  

Saddam Hussein was a brutal dictator. No one disputes that. There was no political freedom. But it’s also true that in 1970, the Iraqi constitution, under Hussein, declared all women and men equal before the law. Women in Iraq became among the most educated and professional in the entire region, and working outside the home became the norm. 

After the 1991 Gulf War and economic embargoes were applied, living conditions for women in Iraq began to deteriorate. The declining economy caused many women to lose their jobs and abandon their education. Girls and women today are now facing a major learning gap, and there has been a sharp decline in adult female literacy. 

The country is in chaos. Violence is increasing. Let’s bring our troops home before more die. 

Nancy Ward 

Oakland/East Bay 

National Organization for Women 

• 

CORRUPTION 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

The news in today’s paper alone (Nov. 5) should be enough to show anyone that Bush’s administration is corrupt: politically, economically, and morally. 

Where millions of people rallied around us after 9/11, today, they are protesting against our president wherever he goes. 

Today, the U.N. International Advisory and Monitoring Board recommended that the U.S. (we taxpayers) should pay over $200 million to Iraq to compensate for price gouging and shoddy work performed by our vice president’s former employer, Halliburton, which received $7 billion of our tax money through no-bid contracts. 

Yesterday, it was revealed that the vice president initiated and encouraged the export of U.S. prisoners to torture chambers in other countries. Today, Cheney is working to exempt the CIA from anti-torture legislation. Americans who believe that we stand for high moral values are being denigrated by our own government. 

In today’s news, the president’s Supreme Court nominee is revealed to have opposed the special prosecutor who ultimately uncovered a previous administration’s wrongdoing: secretly selling weapons to Iran’s terrorist regime in order to support Contra terrorists in Central America. Also in today’s news, Bush’s nominee, Judge Alito, was discovered to have ruled in a mutual fund case in which he owned nearly $400,000 of the company’s funds. Can justice be any more corrupted? 

Finally, after ignoring the problem of global warming and cutting the funds for reinforcing New Orleans’ levees, the Bush administration wants the people of Louisiana, who suffered the loss of an entire city from Hurricane Katrina, to pay $3.7 billion to FEMA. 

Those conservatives who have honest integrity can no longer deny that Bush’s administration is rotten, and is rotting our country. 

Bruce Joffe 

Piedmont 

• 

LONG’S DRUGS 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Had you passed by early the other morning, you might have wondered why Sigmund Freud, Karl Marx, and Sherlock Holmes were standing in front of the new Long’s Drug Store in Downtown Berkeley, scratching their heads. 

Previously, as the interior installation of the store at Shattuck and Bancroft progressed, passers-by were struck by the noticeably awkward layout of the store. Neighbors had watched the landlord install expensive, heavy, glass display windows only to see the interior of the drug store designed to turn its posterior or “rear end” to the street. 

Why in the world was the new store purposely presenting such an unsightly view to the public? Some serious sleuthing was needed, so Sherlock was called in. Well, he soon found that Long’s had wanted to cover the windows but the city, insisting on the adaptive reuse integrity of the historical landmark, required that their windows match those of the other shops in the building. 

But, still, how to explain the unsightly display featuring the derrieres of the staff? Sherlock decided it was a case for Sigmund and Karl, who are always eager to pay a visit to Berkeley. 

After the one early-morning consultation, Freud and Marx agreed that the explanation was embarrassingly obvious. That is to say, to act out their resentment of authority and flaunt their arrogant sense of capitalist entitlement, Long’s chose to use the bodies of the workers to expose their corporate backside to the city and the people of Berkeley. 

Who knew you could moon while fully clothed? 

Bonnie Hughes?

“The EIR [environmental impact report] is to demonstrate to an apprehensive citizenry that the agency has, in fact, analyzed and considered the ecological implications of its action.”  

—California Environmental Quality  

Act Guidelines, Section 15003.  

When I heard last spring that the Berkeley Planning Department had chosen Fehr & Peers consultants to do the transportation analysis for the environmental impact report [EIR] on the West Berkeley Bowl, I was dumbfounded.  

Fehr & Peers prepared the preliminary traffic study on the Bowl for the city. They estimated that the proposed 90,000-square-foot new Bowl would generate 38,950 new vehicle trips a week, and that those 38,950 new trips would not adversely affect the environment in any significant way. Just stick a stoplight and a count-down pedestrian signal and crosswalk at San Pablo and Heinz (the Bowl is proposed to go in at 920 Heinz Ave.), they said, and everything will be hunk dory. Based on that conclusion, the city’s planning staff issued a Mitigated Negative Declaration. Translated from the planners, that means: “No Environmental Impact Report Required.”  

Only after Fear & Peers’ data and analysis were subsequently challenged by an independent civil and traffic engineer hired by the West Berkeley Traffic and Safety Coalition (TASC) did the city’s planning department call for an EIR.  

I cheered that move. (Disclosure: I’m a member of TASC.) But I was bewildered by the choice of Fehr & Peers as the traffic consultants for the EIR. They’d bungled the preliminary analysis. Didn’t that raise major doubts about their competence?  

I posed this question to two environmental lawyers. To my surprise and consternation, they both said no, at least not as far as California courts are concerned.  

One of my legal advisers was Trent Orr, Counsel to Earthjustice (formerly the Sierra Club Legal Defense Fund). Emphasizing that he was addressing CEQA [California Environmental Quality Act] standards in general and not the case of the Berkeley Bowl, Mr. Orr said: “It’s very unlikely that the court would find any significance in the city’s using the same expert. So long as the individuals who worked on the EIR study are qualified traffic experts and addressed whatever issues were raised about the negative declaration study, CEQA law indicates that the city is entitled to rely on their conclusions.”  

But what authorizes the experts hired by the city is not only their professional credentials and their having addressed the environmental issues at hand. Their authority also derives from the very fact that they have been hired by the local authority that’s responsible for determining whether EIR should be certified and the associated project approved.  

In the face of a legal challenge to the substance of a certified EIR, California courts, citing the constitutional separation of powers as well as their own lack of environmental expertise, habitually defer to the local agency that certified the report and approved the project associated with it. Ruling in the 1990 case Citizens of Goleta Valley v. Board of Supervisors, the California Supreme Court explained: “We may not substitute our judgment for that of the people and their local representatives.”  

Even if the challengers to a certified EIR put forward, say, a traffic study by a qualified expert that reaches the opposite conclusion to the study underlying the EIR; and even if the traffic study done by the challengers’ experts supports its contrary conclusion with lots of credible evidence; the courts will rule in favor of the agency that certified the EIR, assuming that the agency had employed a qualified traffic expert who addressed the issues at hand. “Lawsuits against EIRs,” said Trent Orr, “are generally only successful when the challenger can show that the agency failed to consider some significant impact altogether.”  

The California Supreme Court put it this way: “The court does not pass upon the correctness of an EIR’s environmental conclusions, but only determines if the EIR is sufficient as an informational document.” Sufficiency is evidenced by “adequacy, completeness, and a good-faith effort at full disclosure”—not correct conclusions.  

What, then, moved the city to reject the negative declaration on the Bowl and demand an EIR? The standards for challenging a negative declaration are much lower than those standards for challenging an EIR. If a negative declaration is challenged in court, and (again citing Mr. Orr) “the plaintiffs can show that there is any evidence that supports a fair argument that the project may have one or more significant environmental impacts,” the court will order “an EIR to be prepared before the project can be lawfully approved.”  

(I assume that the Berkeley planning staff looked at the critique of the Fehr & Peers analysis that was done by the independent traffic engineer hired by the West Berkeley Traffic and Safety Coalition, and realized that if the case went to trial, there was a good chance that the court would order the city to do an EIR on the Bowl.)  

But, Mr. Orr added, “Once the approval agency agrees, as they did with the Berkeley Bowl project, to prepare an EIR,” thereby “admit[ting] that the project does pose some potentially significant impacts[,] and examines those impacts, the standard of review is reversed to favor the agency that prepared the EIR.”  

So much for scientific objectivity and scrupulous expertise. According to the CEQA Deskbook, a standard reference on the subject, an EIR is “a Bridge between Science and Politics.” A better analogy, it seems, would be a bridge between Politics and Politics, especially when you consider that under CEQA, even when an EIR has concluded that a proposed development has the potential to wreak significant damage on the environment, that project can be approved by the lead agency on the basis of “overriding considerations”—for example, the need for more roads, more tax revenues or more housing.  

Though I believe that it’s always better to know what you’re up against, I hesitated to write this column, for fear that it would incline Berkeley citizens to give up on the EIR process. A cynical— or should I say, realistic—observer might conclude that Fehr & Peers didn’t bungle the preliminary traffic report after all. Instead, they arrived at the very conclusions that, they knew, the Bowl’s owners (who have paid for all the environmental studies on the project) and city staff expected.  

So why bother grappling with the mystifying and labyrinthine procedures mandated by the California Environmental Quality Act if it all comes down to political expediency?  

One reason EIRs are worth the effort is that they buy time—time for citizens to learn about the project, to educate others in the community, and if necessary to hire their own experts. Moreover, done with integrity, as they would be in a city with a conscientious planning and legal staff, EIRs can result in better, which is to say, more environmentally respectful development.  

The surest way to get a conscientious staff is to elect a mayor and council who demand integrity. “The EIR process,” says the State of California’s CEQA Guidelines, “will enable the public to determine the environmental and economic values of their elected and appointed officials[,] thus allowing for appropriate action come election day should a majority of the voters disagree.”  

Of course, by election time, it’s probably too late to improve or stop a particular project. But it’s not too late to take “appropriate action” at the ballot box. Berkeley’s next municipal election is in November 2006, a date we should all keep in mind when the Bowl and its EIR come before the city council early next year.  

“I brought my rap sheet,” he says. 

“What?” I ask. 

“I brought my rap sheet for you to see,” he answers. 

“I don’t want to see your rap sheet.” 

“But it’s important,” he says. “It is something you must know about me.” 

I watch him as he fumbles with the zippers on his scruffy backpack. He’s a very large man and his movements are clumsy. He breathes heavily as he bends forward, digging inside the bag. The chair he sits on appears too small to hold him. Hell, my entire dining room seems too small, as if the walls have suddenly collapsed in upon us. I feel hot, squeezed. 

“Here,” he says, looking up at me, leaning back in the too-small chair, smiling at his success at finding his papers. He opens a manila folder and offers its content to me. “Look carefully. You will see what I have done. It is important that you know.” 

I’ve never seen a rap sheet before. The papers he hands me are folded, stapled and paper clipped together, creased and wrinkled. I unfold them. It looks like a well-read manuscript printed on legal-size paper. As soon as my eyes hit the first page they begin to swim. 

“Too much information,” I say, handing the papers back to him. 

“I will show you,” he says kindly. He leans forward in the chair, takes the papers from me, and thumbs through them quickly. 

“Let me get my glasses,” he says. He reaches into the backpack again, and pulls out a pair of cheap, dime store bifocals. The frames are clunky and black. They magnify his eyes. 

“Look here,” he says, shuffling the papers again, pointing to the top of the second page with a soiled, thick finger. “Soliciting.” 

“Soliciting what?” I ask. 

“Drugs,” he says. 

“What kind of drugs?” 

“Cocaine, crack, weed. But it don’t matter. What matters is the date. See the date up here in the corner?” He taps the top left side of the page with his knuckle. 

I squint. 

“Nineteen-ninety-four,” he says. “Almost 10 years ago.” 

“Eleven,” I say. 

“Si,” he answers enthusiastically. “Eleven, exactly. A long time ago, don’t you think?” 

I shrug. “And the others?” 

“All a long time ago,” he says, flipping rapidly through the ragged sheets. 

“Two in 1995, one in 1996, three or four in 1997. Some for soliciting, some for public drunkenness, vagrancy, possession, pimping. And then.” 

He pauses. I wait. 

“And then no more,” he shouts triumphantly. “They finally put me in jail. I clean up. I go to rehab when I get out. Meetings every morning, every night, and sometimes in the afternoons. I get a job. I take care of sick people like your husband. I don’t do drugs no more. I’m clean.” 

He looks at me. I stare down at my hands, study the blue veins and brown spots. 

“I’m clean,” he repeats, staring straight ahead at some unknown space above my head. “And I’ve found Jesus, our lord and savior. He forgives me for all my mistakes. He say to me, come senor, make a new start. You can do this.” 

There is a momentary silence between us. 

“All right,” I say quietly. “Can you start tomorrow?” 

“Si,” he says. He smiles. “Tomorrow will be good.” 

I know that he knows I’m desperate for his help. 

“And don’t show me those rap sheets anymore,” I say, rising from my chair, trying to regain some control. “I don’t want to see or think about them ever again.” 

“Of course,” he says, shoving the papers back inside his bag. He follows me to the front door, past the hospital bed where my husband lies perfectly still, sleeping. Outside on the sidewalk we shake hands. 

“But I must tell you,” he says, swinging the backpack onto his left shoulder, “these papers I carry are of importance, you know? They are a record of where I’ve been, the bad things I done to myself, to other people, but also, they tell the story of what I’ve overcome. You see what I’m saying? There’s beauty in that, señorita.”n

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I am a female student at Berkeley High School. I am writing about my strong disapproval of Proposition 73. As I’m sure you know, Prop. 73 states that before an abortion can be given, a minor’s parents must be contacted and there must be a 48-hour lag period. In my opinion, this proposition is unfair, dangerous and very biased. No female wants her parents to know that she’s having sex, let along that she’s pregnant. 

Confidential abortions help many teenagers get out of an “unwanted” situation. I know three teens who have gotten abortions. When I confronted them about the idea of notifying their parents, they had this to say: “That’s crazy! My parents tell me all the time if I get pregnant I would be dead or kicked out.” 

Prop. 73 is dangerous because many teens will get illegal abortions or try to harm themselves to have a miscarriage. In addition, this is a biased proposition because parents are voting! And what parent do you know who’s gonna say they wouldn’t want to know if their child was getting an abortion. 

So basically Prop. 73 is very unfair to teens such as myself. I hope my letter will persuade your vote and many others. 

Tiara Swearington 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Proposition 73 is not subject to enough debate. By this I mean that there is not enough voter awareness of this controversial issue. Prop. 73 states that “a physician shall not perform an abortion upon a pregnant unemancipated minor until after the physician . . . has provided written notice to a parent or guardian . . . and a reflection period of at least 48 hours has elapsed.” 

This proposition raises many unanswered questions. For instance, what happens if a pregnant girl is too scared to have her parents find out that she’s having a baby and goes underground to get an abortion from unqualified people? Or maybe she is uncertain of her parents’ reaction and delays the abortion decision, making it more dangerous to have the operation as each day passes?  

These are just some of the questions raised by this proposition. The bottom line is, are we helping teenage girls with this proposition or are we merely putting them in more danger? The worst part about Prop. 73 is that not enough people know about it to think it through clearly; they are likely to vote yes just because it looks better on paper. 

As a student at Berkeley High School, I know that sometimes people make bad decisions. And when someone makes a wrong decision or is affected by someone else’s bad decision, should you help them, or make matters worse? 

Daron Lin 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I am a freshman at Berkeley High, and I am writing because I do not agree with Proposition 73. 

Proposition 73 states that in order for a girl under 18 to get an abortion, she must notify her parent/guardian 48 hours in advance. This proposition may sound like a good idea. Parents rightfully want to be involved in their teenager’s lives and to be included if there is a crisis, for example, an unplanned pregnancy. But you have to consider the girl’s safety. They may be afraid of being physically harmed or disowned. Girls who don’t tell their parents might even get back-alley abortions.  

This law isn’t helping anybody but the parents/guardians. Everybody under 18, who it actually affects, doesn’t have a say in it. All we can do is explain our thoughts on the situation and hope we sway enough voters in our favor. 

Ian Stewart 

›

My first admonition is given as a citizen looking for better governance—everyone should vote yes on 77, the redistricting initiative. Really, this is not a conservative/liberal issue. The Legislature is, as currently constituted, a total failure. It is unable to grapple with the problems of California. The main reason this is so is that competition for seats has been rendered moot by gerrymandering. This causes candidates of both parties to migrate to the extremes because the extreme groups of both parties’ bases choose the candidates. There is no penalty for stupid voting behavior by legislators. We need to change that. Both parties are guilty of this, and there is a lot of moaning and groaning from politicians about how this is bad for California. Bullshit. California desperately needs a better-functioning Legislature. Vote yes on this one even if you hate Arnold.  

Yes on Prop. 73: Waiting period for minors seeking abortion 

Abortion is not a pretty thing, though I am generally pro choice for adults. Minors are different. As a father I would like to be notified in such a case. It seems only common sense. I have to fill out umpteen forms at school to have Tylenol administered but she can get an abortion without telling me? Common sense—vote yes.  

Yes on Prop. 74: Teacher tenure  

I have thought about this for a good while. Millions of California’s poor school-age kids are caught in a cycle of poverty. A primary cause of that is poor schools. The quickest way to benefit millions of poor kids (listen up liberals—this is true) is to improve the schools—education is the key to success. The main block to this is not money. It is clear that throwing money at education does not really lead to much improvement in schools. Breaking the power of the teachers union to dictate working conditions, pay scales based on seniority, protecting bad teachers, work rules that prevent positive change etc., etc. The list goes on and on and is a small first step. Everyone else works in the marketplace, where if you screw up or you are lousy at your job there are consequences. Not if you are a teacher. It is more than reasonable that teachers wait an extended period to see if they are capable at their profession before earning tenure that other workers don’t get. Vote yes.  

Yes on Prop. 75: Paycheck protection  

This is the clearest conservative/liberal conflict on the ballot. Wise people can differ on this one. One thing is for sure: The public employee unions will eat California out of house and home. Government is an organized lobbying group for more government. Just look at the prison guards’ union—pathetic. How about the teachers, the nurses, etc., etc. The list is long and they all want more money from the state government. It is also true that many of these unions are ruled by liberal elites that are unresponsive not only to the public good but also to their own membership. Many members of these unions (like mine, I am a member of the Coalition of University Employees) are heavily leftist/liberal in orientation and don’t much care if a substantial portion of their membership doesn’t agree with this. I plan to vote yes, but I release all of you to vote as your conscience suggests.  

Yes on Prop. 76: State spending limits  

Look folks, California is broke. State government spends too much and can’t seem to control itself. Economic growth would be better stimulated by a state government that grew in size in a predictable way along with the growth of the state. There is no reason, in my view, that education should have first call on state funds. Education is important, very important, but so are other priorities. I think this vote should be obvious—vote yes.  

Yes on Prop. 77: Redistricting (see above) 

No on Props. 78 and 79: Discounts on drugs  

I am suspicious of both of these. Frankly, I find dueling propositions to be boring and suspicious and I tend to vote no on both. Prop. 79 seems the worse to me because it vests too much power in state bureaucrats. No matter how much people may believe that the government can do anything it wants, in fact the State of California can’t manipulate and go against markets for very long and be successful. If I were to vote yes on one it would be 78. However, California is broke and can’t afford to subsidize drugs or create a new state bureaucracy. Vote no on both.  

No on Prop. 80: Electric regulation  

More state regulation of the electric industry is not going to help California. The State of California is not going to create cheaper electricity by fiat or by burdensome regulation. We need more power plants, period. We need more gas power, we need more solar power and we may even need more nuclear power. Let’s start building some new plants. What we don’t need is state government trying to remove more and more of the influence of the marketplace from the electrical business. The State of California can’t do much right and I can just bet that it will not be able to “solve” the electrical problem by more regulation. Yes, the old regulation scheme was flawed; let’s fix it not over regulate it. Flogging the dead horse of Enron will not solve our problems. Californians want power up the ying yang, but they don’t want power plants. It don’t work that way. Vote no. 

Berkeley resident Alan Swain holds a master’s degree in international affairs from Columbia University.  

Ideology does count. What is the common thread running through our nation’s current war on terror (see Iraq) and the efforts of a neighborhood (see Oregon Street) to rid itself of undesirables? An ideology drummed into us from those that write the script and produce the show says that our problems stem from evil people (see others) that look and act different, that don’t follow the rules, and that act contrary to our standards. These evil doers should be controlled or eliminated by force or violence. This ideology is the basic tool, used by the directors of this show to contain and control popular discontent during periods of severe public service cutbacks while increasing spending for the military, the police, and the prison system. The current administration used the 9/11 tragedy to round up a posse and go take out a dictator they did not like and who stood on some prime real estate. We need to do something to protect our homeland we were told. Get the evil doers. It’s simple and direct, black and white, American as apple pie. Don’t be detracted by complexity and nuance. It just enables the evil doers. We went along because we were hysterical. Now we are more than a little embarrassed and confused by a very complex Iraqi intervention. It doesn’t work in Iraq and it won’t work in Berkeley. 

The same dynamic can be seen working right here at home. Our lives, our families, and our homes are under attack by people who look and act different and who don’t follow the rules. To get rid of this scourge we are told to form neighborhood groups (see posse) and to work closely with the police and the courts, two well-funded institutions these days. If this would curtail drug activity in our neighborhoods then, as Paul Rauber says, “I think we’d all be pretty damn happy.” Not all of us would be happy, Paul. For starters the many relatives and friends of Lenora Moore would have even fewer resources to work with. Are they all drug dealers? Or is it guilt by association? I suspect the ripple effect would be widespread. Possibly even more folks would be forced into illegal activities to avoid abject poverty. Many would go to poorer and less organized neighborhoods to ply their trade. I know a neighborhood in West Oakland where they could feel at home. If only the folks on Oregon Street could put up a gate to keep out the undesirables from filtering back in. How do we tell the good ones from the evil ones? This is a policy that works successfully in Blackhawk.  

It is shameful that otherwise good-hearted and energetic people are forced to organize against poor people with little or no resources to maintain a decent quality of life. We must come up with a better ideology or script. Let’s fantasize for a minute, shall we? We can imagine that we are all in the same cramped boat. The boat has a leak and is sinking slowly. What do we do? Do we turn on each other and throw the weakest out of the boat to raise the boat or do we work together to fix the leak? We are trapped by circumstances to treat each other as fellow human beings deserving of respect, courtesy, and compassion. We don’t throw people overboard for breaking the rules. We deal with the problems with compassion. We form a network of informal social connections with each other to monitor and modify personal behavior and to direct resources to problems. This is how compassionate people deal with each other. This is how a neighborhood could become a community, not just a collection of properties.  

We are all just a few paychecks and emergencies away from being flat broke. We could organize to get more resources into our neighborhoods (not just a police presence). We must organize and work together for more and better affordable education, health care, recreational opportunities and good-paying jobs that would provide the improved options denied to people who resort to illegal activities to survive. This would raise the boat for everyone. This fight would be very difficult because the folks who write the script and create the ideology of individualism, privatization, and militarism would and do fight us at every level. This would be the good fight. I think we’d all be pretty damned happy if that was successful. 

Bill Hamilton is a Berkeley resident. 

3

America’s favorite comic pairing, Dick ‘n Dubya, is returning to Berkeley, with the promise that they’ll take all questions from all comers. 

Their act will grace the stage of the city’s newest theater, The Marsh Berkeley, starting Thursday and running through Nov. 20 on Thursday, Saturday and Sunday evenings starting at 7 p.m. 

“It worked out perfectly. The show is wildly funny and we had had a window to bring them here,” said Marsh founder Stephanie Weisman. 

With two San Francisco Mime Troupe veterans starring as Berkeley’s least favorite dynamic duo, The Dick ‘N Dubya Show centers on a plot by the pair to infiltrate communities of a progressive bent until they’ve managed to convert every single American to the Grand Old Party. 

Ed Holmes, a 19-year veteran of the mime troupe, plays George Bush the Younger, while eight-year veteran Amos Glick plays Dick Cheney. 

The two have been offering their interpretations of president and vice president in San Francisco Mime Troupe shows, and in this show, they are directed by Bill Allard, a founding member of another noted Bay Area theatrical troupe, Duck’s Breath Mystery Theater. 

In an unusual twist, Dubya decides to write his own speeches, as Dick offers his guidance—and just a little bit more. 

While the real Dick ‘n Dubya have been somewhat reluctant to subject themselves to intense grillings by the press, this pair will be more open, the audience filling in for the Fourth Estate. 

What’s more, they’ll get the fumble-mouthed Texan and the wild man of Wyoming engaged in song and dance. 

Performances will be held the in The Marsh Berkeley in the Gaia Arts Center, in the Gaia Building, 2118 Allston Way. Thursday tickets are $10, and those for the Saturday and Sunday shows are on a sliding scale of $15 to $22. For tickets, call (800) 838-3006 or see www.themarsh.org. 

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TUESDAY, NOV. 8 

THEATER 

Shotgun Theater Lab, “Cry Don’t Cry” Tues.-Thurs. at 8 p.m. at The Ashby Stage, 1901 Ashby Ave., through Nov. 17. Tickets are $10. 841-6500.  

FILM 

Alternative Visions “The Pittsburgh Trilogy” at 7:30 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808.  

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Mark Crispin Miller discusses “Fooled Again: How the Right Stole the 2004 Election and Why They’ll Steal the Next One Too (Unless We Stoop Them)” at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852.  

Patrick Lane discusses his emergence from a lifetime of alcohol and drug addiction in “What the Stones Remember” at 7 p.m. at Cody’s Books on Fourth St. 559-9500. 

Whole Note Poetry with Julia Vinograd and Debra Khattab at 7 p.m. at The Beanery, 2925 College Ave. 549-9093. 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Alam Khan, classical music of North India, at 8 p.m. at Berkeley City Club, 2315 Durant Ave. Tickets are $20. 525-5211. 

Creole Belles with Andrew Carriere at 8:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Dance lesson at 8 p.m. Cost is $10. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

David Jeffrey Jazz Function at 8:30 p.m. at Albatross, 1822 San Pablo Ave. 843-2473. www.albatrosspub.com 

Steve Young at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $17.50-$18.50. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

Ellen Hoffman Trio and singer’s open mic at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $5. 841-JAZZ. www.AnnasJazzIsland.com 

WEDNESDAY, NOV. 9 

THEATER 

Propeller, “The Winter’s Tale” Wed.-Fri. at 8 p.m., Sat. at 2 and 8 p.m., Sun at 3 p.m. at Zellerbach Playhouse, UC Campus. Tickets are $65. 642-9988.  

FILM 

Cine Documental “Madrid” and “Robinson Carusoe Island” at 7 p.m. at the CLAS Conference Room, 2334 Bowditch St. 

The Unofficial Histories of Péter Forgács “Wittgenstein Tratacus and Meanwhile Somewhere” at 7:30 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808.  

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Restoration of the Palace of Fine Arts, Bernard Maybeck’s Pan Pacific International Exposition masterpiece with Hans Baldauf, Chairman of the Board of the Maybeck Foundation, at 8 p.m. at the The Hillside Club, 2286 Cedar St. Tickets are $12, $8 for members. 843-8982. 

Cultural Diversity Authors’ Night with readings by Deborah Santana, Gail Tsukiyama and Denise Sherer Jacobson at 6:30 p.m. at Nile Hall, Preservation Park, Oakland. Benefit for Center for Independent Living. Tickets are $100. 841-4776, ext. 153. 

Vikram Seth reads from his new memoir “Two Lives” at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852.  

Berkeley Poetry Slam with host Charles Ellik and Three Blind Mice, at 8:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $5-$7. 841-2082  

Café Poetry hosted by Kira Allen at 7:30 p.m. at La Peña. Donation $2. 849-2568.  

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Ned Boynton Trio at 8 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810.  

Ashkan Ghafouri, Aryan Rahmanian, Fares Hedayati, Persian classical music. Lecture and demonstration at 7 p.m., performance at 8 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $12. 525-5054.  

Calvin Keys Trio Invitational Jam at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. 841-JAZZ. www.AnnasJazzIsland.com 

Orquestra Sensual at 9:30 p.m. at Shattuck Down Low, 2284 Shattuck Ave. Salsa lessons at 8 p.m. Cost is $5-$10. 548-1159.  

Jazz Mafia Unit at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

Eric & Suzy Thompson, Jody Stecher & Kate Breslin and others in a fundariser for the Halleck Creek Riding Club for the Disabled at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $17.50-$18.50. 548-1761.  

THURSDAY, NOV. 10 

THEATER 

“Dick ‘N Dubya Show: A Republican Cabaret” Thurs., Sat and Sun. at The Narsh Berkeley, 2118 Allston Way, through Nov. 20. Tickets are $10-$22. 800-838-3006. www.themarsh.org 

EXHIBITIONS 

“Justice Matters: Artists Consider Palestine” An evening with Hilton Obenzinger at 7 p.m. at Berkeley Art Center, 1275 Walnut St. in Live Oak Park. 644-6893.  

Gallery Talk with Artists frm Day of the Dead Exhibition at 2 p.m. at Oakland Museum of California, Tenth and Oak Sts. 238-2200.  

“Looking for Hope” Photography by Matt O’Brien. Lecture by the artist at 7 p.m. at North Gate Hall, UC Campus. www.asucartstudio.org  

“Taisho Chic: Japanese Modernity, Nostalgia and Deco” guided tour at 12:15 and 5:30 p.m. at the Berkeley Art Museum, 2625 Durant Ave. 642-0808. 

FILM 

Selling Democracy: Films of the Marchall Plan, 1948-53 “Program Two: Help Is On the Way” at 7:30 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

"The Greater Circulation” by Antero Alli at 8 p.m. at 21 Grand, 416 25th St., at Broadway, Oakland. Cost is $8-$12. 444-7263. www.verticalpool.com 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Gallery Talk with Artists from Day of the Dead Exhibition at 2 p.m. at Oakland Museum of California, Tenth and Oak Sts. 238-2200. www.museumca.org 

Awareness Up! Spoken word and hip hop to celebrate National Adoption Awareness Month at 8 p.m. at La Peña Cultural Center. Cost is $5-$10. 849-2568. www.lapena.org  

Parthenon West Review Poetry Reading with Donna de la Perriere, Claudia MonPere, Joyce Jenkins, and Richard Silberg at 7:30 p.m. at Pegasus Books Downtown, 2349 Shattuck Ave. 649-1320. 

Jane Ganahl describes “Single Women of a Certain Age: Women Writers on the Unmarried Midlife” at 7 p.m. at Cody’s Books on Fourth St. 559-9500. 

“Further with Hip Hop” dicsussion with Adam Mansbach and Scottt Poulson-Bryant, author of “Hung” at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852.  

James Magnuson reads from his latest novel, “The Hounds of Winter” at 7 p.m. at Mrs. Dalloway’s, 2904 College Ave. 704-8222. 

Word Beat Reading Series with Selene Steese and Christina Hutchins at 7 p.m. at Mediterraneum Caffe, 2475 Telegraph Ave. 526-5985. 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Terry Hilliard Jazz Trio at 12:15 p.m. at the Berkeley Public Library, Kittredge at Shattuck. 981-6241.  

Kairos Youth Choir “There WIll Be Music” at 6 p.m. at Calvary Church, 1940 Virginia St. at Milvia. Donations benefit hurricane relief.  

Amy Rigby at 9 p.m. at Ivy Room, 858 San Pablo Ave., Albany. Cost is $8. 524-9220.  

Liz Carroll & John Doyle at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $18.50-$19.50. 548-1761.  

Debbie Poryes Trio at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is. $5. 841-JAZZ. www.AnnasJazzIsland.com 

8 x 8 x 8 at 9:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $8. 841-2082 www.starryploughpub.com 

Danny Caron Duo at 8 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810.  

Selector, lap-top funk, at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

FRIDAY, NOV. 11 

THEATER 

Actors Ensemble of Berkeley ”Six Degrees of Separation” Fri. and Sat. at 8 p.m. at Live Oak Theater, 1301 Shattuck Ave. through Nov. 19. Tickets are $10. 649-5999. wwwaeofberkeley.org 

Aurora Theatre “Marius” Wed.-Sat. at 8 p.m., Sun. at 2 and 7 p.m. at 2081 Addison St., through Dec. 18. Tickets are $28-$45. 843-4822. www.auroratheatre.org 

Backstage Productions “All in the Timing” at 8 p.m., Sat. at 2 p.m. and Sun. at 7 p.m., through Nov. 20, at Choral Rehearsal Hall, Cesar Chavez Student Center, UC Campus. Tickets are $6-$8. 642-3880. 

Berkeley Rep “Brundibár” A musical fable staged by Tony Kushner and Maurice Sendak at the Roda Theater through Dec. 28. Ticekts are $15-$64. 647-2949. www.berkeleyrep.org 

Black Repertory Group “Dance with my Father Again” a musical biography of Luther Vandross. Gala at 7 p.m. Sat. at 8 p.m. through Dec. 4. Tickets are $7-$15. 652-2120. 

Central Works “Achilles & Patroklos” Thurs.-Sat. at 8 p.m., Sun. at 5 p.m. at The Berkeley City Club, 2315 Durant Ave., through Nov. 20. Tickets are $9-$25. 558-1381. centralworks.org 

Contra Costa Civic Theater “Noises Off” Fri. and Sat. at 8 p.m. at 951 Pomona Ave., El Cerrito, through Dec. 10. 524-9132. www.ccct.org 

Impact Theatre “Crumble (Lay Me Down, Justin Timberlake)” Thurs. through Sun. at 8 p.m. at La Val’s Subterranean Theater, 1834 Euclid Ave., through Dec. 10. Tickets are $10-$15. 464-4468. www.impacttheatre.com 

Masquers Playhouse “Dear World” Jerry Herman’s musical, Fri. and Sat. at 8 p.m. through Dec. 17 at 105 Park Place, Point Richmond. Tickets are $15. 232-4031. www.masquers.org 

Propeller, “The Winter’s Tale” Fri. at 8 p.m., Sat. at 2 and 8 p.m., Sun at 3 p.m. at Zellerbach Playhouse, UC Campus. Tickets are $65. 642-9988. www.calperfs.berkeley.edu 

UC Dept. of Theater, “Harvest” Fri. and Sat. at 8 p.m., Sun. at 2 p.m. at Durham Studio Theater, UC Campus. Tickets are $8-$14. 642-9925. 

Youth Musical Theater Company “Sweeney Todd” Thurs.-Sat. at 7:30 p.m. at Longefellow Middle School Auditorium, 1500 Derby St. Tickets are $12, $6 students. 595-5514. 

FILM 

The Battles of Sam Peckinpah “Major Dundee” at 7:30 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808.  

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Robert Fisk introduces his new book, “The Great War for Civilization: The Conquest of the Middle East” at 7 p.m. at King Middle School Auditorium, 1781 Rose St. Tickets are $25, no one turned away. Benefits Middle East Children’s Alliance. 548-0542. www.mecaforpeace.org 

George Packer reads from his book on the American occupation of Iraq “The Assassins’ Gate” at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852.  

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Country Joe McDonald in a Katrina Relief Benefit Concert with others at 7 p.m. at Unitarian Universalist Fellowship Hall, Cedar and Bonita. Tickets are $25 available from www.brownpapertickets.com/event/2530 

Mills College Repertory Dance Company “Primitive Mysteries” by Martha Graham at 8 p.m. at Lisser Hall, 5000 MacArthur Blvd. Tickets are $10-$15. 430-2175. 

Garrett McLean, violin, Gabriel Trop, ‘cello, Inning Chen, piano at 8 p.m. at Giorgi Gallery, 29112 Claremont Ave. Cost is $12. 848-1228. 

Hecho in Claifas Annual Festival with Casique y Congo at 8 p.m. at La Peña Cultural Center. Cost is $7-$10. 849-2568.  

Barbara Dane & Hot Five Jazz Band at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $7. 841-JAZZ.  

Dahveed Behroozi Trio at 8 p.m. at the Jazzschool. Cost is $12. 845-5373.  

Broun Fellinis at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

Youssou N’Dour at 9:30 p.m. at Shattuck Down Low. Cost is $5-$8. 548-1159.  

Baga Bae with drum circle, African dance and chants at 9:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $13. 525-5054.  

Acoustic Son at 8 p.m. at Caffe Trieste, 2500 San Pablo Ave., at Dwight. 548-5198.  

Duck Baker & Jamie Findlay at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $17.50-$18.50. 548-1761.  

DJ & Brook, jazz, at 7:30 p.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344.  

October Allied, The Botticellis at 9:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $6. 841-2082.  

Kalmex & The Riff Merchants at 8 p.m. at 924 Gilman St. Cost is $6. 525-9926. 

SATURDAY, NOV. 12 

CHILDREN 

Los Amiguitos de La Peña with Gerry Tenney at 10:30 a.m. at La Peña. Cost is $5. 849-2568. www.lapena.org 

THEATER 

Woman’s Will “Happy End” by Bertolt Brecht, Sat. at 7 p.m. and Sun. at 2 p.m. at Luka’s Lounge, 2221 Broadway at Grand Ave., Oakland. Tickets are $12-$25. 420-0813.  

EXHIBITIONS 

“Lost and Found: A Tribute to Animal Rescue” oil, watercolors and mixed media by Debbie Claussen. Reception at 7 p.m. at 4th Street Studio, 1717D 4th St. 527-0600. 

FILM 

Taisho Chic on Screen “Winter Camillia” at 5 p.m., “Public Manners: Sightseeing in Tokyo” at 7 p.m. “The Water Magician” at 8:50 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808.  

“Ballets Russes” with filmmakers Dan Geller and Dayna Goldfine at Landmark’s Shattuck Cinemas, 2230 Shattuck Ave. Tickets are $9.50. 415-267-4893. 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

“Visible and Invisible Drawings” an evening of storytelling with Ira Glass and Chris Ware at 8 p.m. at Zellerbach Hall, UC Campus. Tickets are $20-$32. 642-9988.  

Marianne Villanueva reads from her short story collection, “Mayor of the Roses” at 4 p.m. at Eastwind Books of Berkeley, 2066 University Ave. 548-2350. 

Synergy Women’s Open Mic at 3 p.m. at Lakeview Branch, Oakland Public Library, 550 El Embarcadero. 632-7548. 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Alameda Civic Light Opera “Broadway’s Greatest Moments 2” at 8 p.m. at Kofman Auditorium, 2200 Central Ave., Alameda. Tickets are $25. 864-2256. www.avlo.com 

Baguette Quartette, Parisian café music, at 8 p.m. at St. Alban’s, 1501 Washington Ave., Albany. Tickets are $12-$15. 528-3723.  

Borodin Quartet, music of Russian masters at 8 p.m. at First Congregational Church of Berkeley, Dana at Durant. Tickets are $42. 642-9988.  

Rusalka Cycle “Songs Between the Worlds” at 8 p.m. at the Malonga Casquelord Center for the Arts, 1428 Alice St., Oakland. Tickets are $20-$26. 925-798-1300. www.kitka.org 

Young People’s Symphony Orchestra Opening Concert at 8 p.m. at Valley Center for the Performing Arts Holy Names University, Oakland. Tickets are $12-$15. 849-9776.  

Mills College Repertory Dance Company “Primitive Mysteries” by Martha Graham at 2 and 8 p.m. at Lisser Hall, 5000 MacArthur Blvd. Tickets are $10-$15. 430-2175. 

Keith Terry’s Hoterry Englecrest at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $7. 841-JAZZ.  

Quijerema at 9 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810.  

Fourtet with Julian Pollack, pianist and Berkeley High student at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

Dick Whittington with guest Andrew Speight at 8 p.m. at the Jazzschool. Cost is $12-$15. 845-5373.  

Hecho in Claifas Annual Festival with Las Manas, at 8 p.m. at La Peña Cultural Center. Cost is $7-$10. 849-2568.  

Co-Opted V with Why Are Boys Always Like This? John Howland, BublRap and N8 at 7:30 p.m. at Fish House Co-op, 1808 Bancroft Way. 914-0103. 

Richard Green and the Brothers Barton at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $19.50-$20.50. 548-1761.  

Brother Resistance with Junglz Apart at 9:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $15-$18. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Reverand Rabia and Dave Brownell at 7 p.m. at Spuds Pizza, 3290 Adeline St. Cost is $7. 558-0881. 

Stevie Harris and Splintered Tree at 7:30 p.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344. www.nomadcafe.net 

She Mob, Bleu Canadians at 9:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $6. 841-2082.  

BornDead, Regulations, Grey Skull at 8 p.m. at 924 Gilman St. Cost is $7. 525-9926. 

SUNDAY, NOV. 13 

THEATER 

Milbre Burch “Seasonal Stories from Around the World” at 4 p.m. at Julia Morgan Center for the Arts, 2640 College Ave. Tickets are $10 adults, $5 children. 925-798-1300. 

EXHIBITIONS 

“Mapping the Soul of the City” Landcapes in charcoal and silverpoint by Christopher Castle. Reception for the artist at 2 p.m. at Tilden Nature Center, Tilden Park. 525-2233. 

“Mestizo Exhibition: How Women are Presented in Our Society” Paintings by Eduardo Diaz and Carlos Granillo. Reception at 6 p.m. at La Peña, 3105 Shattuck Ave. 849-2568. 

“Taisho Chic: Japanese Modernity, Nostalgia and Deco” guided tour at 1 p.m. and panel discussion at 2 p.m. at the Berkeley Art Museum, 2625 Durant Ave. 642-0808. 

FILM 

Taisho Chic on Screen “The Lady and the Beard” at 7:15 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808.  

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Huston Smith in conversation with Native Americans on religious freedom at 4 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852.  

Poetry Flash with Jack and Adell Foley and Robert Sward at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. Donation $2. 845-7852.  

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Community Women’s Orchestra at 4 p.m. at Zion Lutheran Church, 5201 Park Blvd., Piedmont. Donation $5-$10, children free. 848-2268. 

Rusalka Cycle “Songs Between the Worlds” at 2 p.m. at the Malonga Casquelord Center for the Arts, 1428 Alice St., Oakland. Tickets are $20-$26. 925-798-1300. www.kitka.org 

Jonathan Lemalu, baritone, at 3 p.m. at Hertz Hall, UC Campus. Tickets are $42, available from 642-9988.  

Gordon Bok at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $19.50-$20.50. 548-1761.  

Falso Baiano Trio Brasil at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island. Cost is $7. 841-JAZZ.  

Rhonda Benin and Soulful Strut at 4:30 p.m. at the Jazz 

school. Cost is $15. 845-5373.  

Bandworks at 2 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $4. 525-5054.  

Jack Irving at 10 a.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344.  

Animosity, Time for Living at 5 p.m. at 924 Gilman St. Cost is $6. 525-9926. 

?

After following a trail of footnotes, I can tell you this much about the last victim of a grizzly bear attack in Berkeley: he was killed sometime in the 1860s in Strawberry Canyon, and a woman named Mrs. Parsons, the aunt of a Frank Armstrong who worked for the Schmidt family, made his shroud. 

I know a bit more about the first grizzly killed by a European in our area. As recorded by Father Juan Crespi in 1772, it was shot by Spanish soldiers on the banks of Strawberry Creek near the west side of what is now the UC campus to provide meat for an exploring party from Monterey. Monterey was where European and grizzly first met, in 1602; the chronicler of Vizcaino’s expedition saw the bears feeding on a beached whale. 

The coming of the Spanish disrupted a long equilibrium between grizzlies and humans. Native Californians regarded the great beasts with a mixture of respect and fear, attributing their powers to shape-shifting werebears and malign “bear doctors.” The Indians hunted grizzlies for their pelts and claws (for ceremonial use), and sometimes for food, although grizzly meat was taboo for the Yurok, Maidu, Pomo, and other groups. But they didn’t make much of a dent in the bears’ numbers. 

Despite the increase in human firepower, the Spanish and Mexican years were a good time to be a California grizzly. The abundance of livestock, especially the cattle whose carcasses were discarded after being stripped of hides and fat, fueled an ursine population explosion. By the time of the Gold Rush, grizzlies were turning up in all kinds of inconvenient places. There was no room for them in the new California, and they were shot, trapped, and poisoned to extinction. The last grizzly in Alameda County was killed in 1866; I haven’t been able to determine where. Some hung on into the twentieth century in the Santa Ana Mountains and the southern Sierra, with the last credible sightings in Sequoia National Park in 1924. 

What started me thinking about the fate of the California grizzly, and led me to read Tracy Storer and Lloyd Tevis’s 1955 book, was a recent manifesto by a group of biologists and environmentalists—big guns like Paul Martin, Michael Soule, Dave Foreman—published in Nature. It was a call for the re-wilding of the American West, the reintroduction of the megafauna we lost 13,000 years ago, or their next of kin—restoration ecology on the grand scale. Martin was the author of the Pleistocene Overkill theory, positing that the mammoths, ground sloths, and their contemporaries were killed off by Paleoindian hunters, and he feels our species has an ethical responsibility for redress. 

That could involve introducing African lions, Bactrian camels, and Asian wild asses, near relations of extinct North American species; maybe even cheetahs (although the North American cheetah was closer to the mountain lion than to the living African and Asian cheetah), and African and Asian elephants to replace the ecoystem services once provided by mammoths and mastodons.  

Martin and his co-authors had the Great Plains in mind for their Pleistocene Park. But California has its own lost megafauna, with one major player that was around a lot later than the Pleistocene. Why not bring back the grizzly? 

Apart from the obvious qualms about having another dangerous carnivore—omnivore would be more accurate, given grizzlies’ fondness for acorns and bulbs—next door, you might object that there’s no California grizzly gene pool left, and bears from Yellowstone wouldn’t be quite the same. Recent genetic studies, though, suggest that’s not the case. 

In Susan Snyder’s Bear in Mind, a splendid book from Heyday, along with the photographs of Seth Kinman’s grizzly-bear chair and the grizzly effigy made of prunes, there’s a map drawn by the early-20th-century biologist C. Hart Merriam. It shows the former ranges of what Merriam regarded as the state’s seven species of grizzly. The ones in the East Bay would have been Ursus colusus, which also inhabited the Sacramento Valley; then there was U. mendocinensis north of the Golden Gate and U. californicus south of it, and the four others. 

Taxonomists—biologists who name and classify organisms—come in two flavors: lumpers and splitters. Lumpers draw the boundaries of species and other units broadly, splitters narrowly. C. Hart Merriam was the king of the splitters. Based on variations in teeth, claws, and pelt, he recognized 84 species of grizzly and brown bears in North America. That’s full species, as in Homo sapiens. Later authors boiled this down considerably, uniting all the big brown bears in Europe and America into Ursus arctos and relegating the grizzlies to the subspecies U. arctos horribilis. 

More recently still, biologists at the University of Utah and the University of Alaska looked at the genetic structure of North American brown and grizzly bears by comparing mitochondrial DNA, the stuff we all inherit from our mothers: a favorite research tool because it doesn’t get reshuffled by sex like the rest of the genome, has a high mutation rate, and is invisible to natural selection. This group came up with four lineages of bears. The most distinctive was found only on the Admiralty Islands off the southern Alaskan coast; two others had wider ranges in mainland Alaska and northern Canada. The fourth lineage, or clade, included all the grizzlies from southern British Columbia down to Yellowstone. The oldest grizzly/brown bear fossils in the New World date to 50,000-70,000 years ago, but the four clades seem to have diverged between 245,000-700,000 years ago when the ancestral population still lived in Asia. Although only living bears were sampled, the extirpated California bears would have been part of Clade IV.  

So the California grizzly has gone from being a complex of seven species to a local population of a subspecies—maybe not even what would be considered an Evolutionary Significant Unit; no sturdier or more golden than other North American bears. Which means that Yellowstone or Glacier Park bears would make fine surrogates, if anyone is interested in bringing some in to, say, the Hamilton Range or the Carrizo Plain. Never mind the Great Plains: re-wilding begins at home. Probably not in Strawberry Canyon, though.

TUESDAY, NOV. 8 

Remember to Vote Today For information regarding Polling Place locations please call 663-VOTE (8683). www.smartvoter.org/ca/state/  

Birdwalk on the MLK Shoreline from 3:30 to 5:30 p.m. to see the shorebirds here for the winter. Binoculars available for loan. 525-2233. 

Flu Shots for Berkeley Residents age 60 or over or “high-risk” from 1 to 4 p.m. at the Berkeley Public Health Clinic, 830 University Ave. 981-5300. 

Introduction to Voting for Children from 9:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. at Habitot, 2065 Kittredge St. Cost is $6 for children, $5 for adult. 647-1111. 

“A Climbing Life Reexamined” with David Roberts at 7 p.m. at REI, 1338 San Pablo Ave. 527-4140. 

“Glaciers and the California Waterscape” with Prof. Kurt Cuffey at 5:30 p.m. at Goldman School of Public Policy, Room 150, 2607 Hearst. 642-2666. 

“Engineering Communism,” spies, Silicon Valley, and modern intelligence failures with author Steven Usdin at 7:30 p.m. at the Hillside Club, 2286 Cedar St. Cost is $5. 415-850-5431. 

Guitars in the Classroom Free guitar and music lessons for teachers at 7:30 p.m. at 2304 McKinley Ave. 848-9463. www.guitarsintheclassroom.com 

Michael Oren, fellow at the Shalem Center in Jerusalem, on current complexities of the Middle East at 7:30 p.m. at Berkeley Hillel Auditorium, 2736 Bancroft Way. www.berkeleyhillel.org 

Tuesday Tilden Walkers Join a few slowpoke seniors at 9:30 a.m. in the parking lot near the Little Farm for an hour or two walk. In case of questionable weather, call around 8 a.m. 215-7672, 524-9992. 

Introduction to Buddhist Meditation at 7 p.m. at the Dzalandhara Buddhist Center in Berkeley. Cost is $7-$10. Call for directions. 559-8183.  

Berkeley Camera Club meets at 7:30 p.m., at the Northbrae Community Church, 941 The Alameda. 548-3991. www.berkeleycameraclub.org 

St. John’s Prime Timers meets at 9:30 a.m. at St. John’s Presbyterian Church, 2727 College Ave. 845-6830. 

WEDNESDAY, NOV. 9 

The Hungry Owl Project Fundraiser with dinner and speaker Allen Fish, Director of the Golden Gate Raptor Observatory, at 6:30 p.m. at the Marin Art & Garden Center, 30 Sir Francis Drake Blvd., Ross. Tickets are $40, reservations recommended. 415-454-4587. www.hungryowl.org 

Save The Bay Native Planting Day from 1 to 3 p.m. at the Martin Luther King, Jr. Shoreline, Oakland. Gloves, tools and snacks provided. 452-9261, ext. 109.  

Choosing Infant Care A workshop on the options at 10 a.m. at Bananas, 5232 Claremont Ave. Babies welcome. Registration required. 658-7353.  

American Red Cross Blood Services Volunteer Orientation at 10 a.m. at 6230 Claremont Ave., Oakland. Advance sign-up needed 594-5165. 

“Higher Ground” An action documentary film on skiiing and snowboarding at 8 p.m. at Wheeler Auditorium, UC Campus. Tickets available at REI. 

“Chavez: Venezuela and the New Latin America” A documentary interview filmed in 2004, at 7 p.m. at Humanist Hall, 390 27th St., Oakland. Donation $5. 393-5685. 

Poetry Writing Workshop with Alison Seevak at 7 p.m. at Albany Library, 1247 Marin Ave. 526-3720, ext. 16. 

“Supporting Cast or Supporting Caste: Minor Characters in Biblical Narrative” with Prof. GIna Hens-Piazza at 7 p.m. in the Chapel, Pacific School of Religion, 1798 Scenic Ave. 649-2440. 

“In the Footsteps of Jewish Fusgeyers” with Jill Culiner, brown bag lunch at noon at BRJCC, 1414 Walnut St. Cost is $5. 848-0237. 

Walk Berkeley for Seniors meets at 9:30 a.m. at the Sea Breeze Market, just west of the I-80 overpass. Wear comfortable shoes. 548-9840. 

Berkeley Peace Walk and Vigil at 6:30 p.m. at the Berkeley BART Station. www.geocities.com/vigil4peace/vigil 

THURSDAY, NOV. 10 

Stephen Hawking “New Perspectives on the Origin of the Universe” at 8 p.m. at the Paramount Theater, Oakland. Tickets are $35-$125, available from 625-TIXS. www.ticketmaster.com 

Human Rights Watch Panel DIscussion with honorees Omid Memarian from Iran, Salih Mahmoud Osman from Sudan and Beatrice Were from Uganda at noon at the School of Journalism Library, North Gate Hall, UC Campus.  

“EcoNest: Creating Sustainable Sanctuaries of Clay, Straw, And Timber” at 7:30 p.m. at Builders Booksource, 1817 Fourth St., 845-6874. 

Grizzly Peak Flyfishers meets at 7 p.m. at the Kensington Community Center, 59 Arlington Ave. Stu Stewart will speak on fly fishing in the lakes and streams of the Mt. Lassen area. 547-8629. 

Herbs and Remedies to Counteract Overeating at 5 p.m. at Elephant Pharmacy, 1607 Shattuck Ave. 549-9200.  

“Ways to Lower Your Blood Pressure” with the Hypertension Work Group of the South and West Berkeley Health Forum at 6 p.m. at St. Paul A.M.E. Church, 2024 Ashby Ave. 981-4131. 

Flu Shots for Berkeley Residents age 60 or over or “high-risk” from 1 to 4 p.m. at the Berkeley Public Health Clinic, 830 University Ave. 981-5300. 

Headaches and Heartaches Learn about the relationship between physical and emotional pain at 5:30 p.m. at Phamaca Integrative Pharmacy, 1744 Solano Ave. 527-8929. 

Berkeley School Volunteers Training workshop for volunteers interested in helping the public schools, from 7 to 8:30 p.m. at 1835 Allston Way. 644-8833. 

Red Cross Mobile Blood Drive from noon to 6 p.m. at Elephant Pharmacy, 1706 Shattuck Ave. To make an appointment call 1-800-448-3543.  

“Detained at Angel Island: Stories, True Stories and Statistics” at 1:30 p.m. at Oakland Museum of California, Tenth and Oak Sts. 238-2200. www.museumca.org 

“Got a Book That Needs Publishing?” Panel discussion with book editors at 7 p.m. at the Journalism Library, corner of Hearst and Euclid, UC Campus. Sponsored by the American Society of Journalists and Authors. Cost is $5. RSVP to 530-6699. 

LGBT Family Night with Family Fun Zone and meetings with national leaders at 7 p.m. at Oakland Marriott City Center. 415-981-1960. 

Little Readers and Friends Night with storyteller Ayodele, at 5 p.m. at at Habitot, 2065 Kittredge St. Free 647-1111. 

East Bay Mac User Group meets to discuss mail clients for OS X at 6 p.m. at Free Expression College for Digital Arts, 6601 Shellmound, Emeryville. http://ebmug.org 

World Affairs/Politics Group for people 60 years and older meets at 3:30 p.m. at the Albany Senior Center, 846 Masonic Ave. Cost is $2.50. 524-9122. 

FRIDAY, NOV. 11 

Veterans Day Celebration at 11 a.m. at Civic Center Park on Martic Luther King Jr. Way. 

Veterans Day “Prayer for World Peace” at 11 a.m. at Berkeley Bethlehem Lutheran Church, 3100 Telegraph Ave., two blocks south of Ashby. 848-8821. 

Veterans Day Celebration with a tea dance and dinner at 5 p.m. on the Red Oak Victory Ship, Berth #6, Richmond Harbor. Cost is $20. 222-9200. 

Bruce Babbitt on “National Land Use Policy” at 1 p.m. at the Oakland Zoo, 9777 Golf Links Rd. 632-9525. www.oaklandzoo.org 

Katrina Relief Benefit Concert with Country Joe McDonald and others at 7 p.m. at Unitarian Universalist Fellowship Hall, Cedar and Bonita. Tickets are $25 available from www.brownpapertickets.com/event/2530 

“Food is Love Made Visible” Benefit Harvest Dance at 5 p.m. at Unitarian Universalist Church of Berkeley, 1 Lawson Rd, Kensington. Bring your weight in food or in dollars, at least $10. All proceeds benefit local food banks. www.uucb.org 

Womansong Circle Participatory singing for women at 6:45 p.m. at First Congregational Church of Berkeley, 2345 Channing Way, at Dana. Suggested donation $10-$20. 525-7082. 

Berkeley Critical Mass Bike Ride meets at the Berkeley BART the second Friday of every month at 5:30 p.m.  

Berkeley Chess Club meets Fridays at 8 p.m. at the East Bay Chess Club, 1940 Virginia St. Players at all levels are welcome. 845-1041. 

Women in Black Vigil noon to 1 p.m. at UC Berkeley, Bancroft at Telegraph. 548-6310. 

SATURDAY, NOV. 12 

Berkeley Historical Society Tour of the Ashby Arts District with Justin Katz of Epic Arts, Patrick Dooley of Shotgun Players and Kules Kilot of Lacis Museum of Lace from 10 a.m. to noon. Cost is $8-$10. 848-0181.  

Upper Rockridge Hill Walk with the Berkeley Path Wanderers Assn. Explore elegant staircases, panoramic views, and see traditional homes as well as eclectic, post-1991-firestorm new ones. Meet at 10 a.m. at the SE corner of Rockridge Boulevard and Broadway, by the white pillars. Free; wear comfortable walking shoes and bring water and snack for this hilly walk. 848-9358. www.berkeleypaths.org 

People’s Park Free Box Fashion Show and Concert from noon to 4:30 p.m. at People’s Park. Wear your Free Box finest! 

“Bats Ain’t Bad” Learn about bats and how important they are, from 3 to 4 p.m. at Tilden Nature Center, Tilden Park. For ages 8 to 12. Cost is $3, registration required. 636-1684. 

“Trees in the Garden and Landscape” A workshop from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the Ecology Center, 2530 San Pablo Ave. Bring photos or sketches related to tree or site questions, and a bag lunch. Cost is $10-$15. 548-2220, ext. 233. 

Vegetarian Thanksgiving Cooking Class, using local in-season, organic ingredients, from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. at First Unitarian Church of Oakland, 685 14th St. at Castro. Cost is $40, registration required. 531-26655.  

“Skywatchers of Ancient Mexico” with Dr. Anthony Aveni at 6 p.m. at Chabot Space & Science Center. Tickets are $8. 336-7373.  

Childbirth Preparation Intensive with Constance Williams, doula, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., also on Nov. 19 and Dec. 3, at Birthways, 570 14th St., Oakland. Cost is $160-$180 per couple. 869-2729.  

NorCal High School Mountain Bike League Benefit Dinner at 7 p.m. on Treasure Island. Guest speaker is Andy Hampsten. For details call 325-6502. www.norcalmtb.org/spon/dinner2005.htm  

“Patriarchies: A Global Perspective on Women’s Oppression” with the Suppressed Histories Archives at 7:30 p.m. at Change Makers, 6536 Telegraph Ave. Cost is $10-$20. 665-3689. www.suppressedhistories.net 

Boost Your Immune System Learn how to test the state of your adreanal glands and restore energy at 4 p.m. at Phamaca Integrative Pharmacy, 1744 Solano Ave. 527-8929. 

Softball Clinic for girls in grades 2-9, from 1 to 4 p.m. at Grove/Russell field, Martin Luther King Jr Way and Russell St. Free. Registration required. clinics@abgsl.org, www.abgsl.org 

Protest Rally at Berkeley Honda Shattuck and Parker every Thurs. at 4:30 to 6 p.m. and Sat. from 1 to 2 p.m. until the labor dispute is settled.  

Historical and Botanical Tour of Chapel of the Chimes, a Julia Morgan landmark, at 10 a.m. at 4499 Piedmont Ave. at Pleasant Valley. Reservations required 228-3207.  

SUNDAY, NOV. 13 

Fabulous Fall Discover leaves and other natural clues of the season from 9:30 to 11 a.m. at Tilden Nature Center, Tilden Park. Especially for ages 5 to 10. Dress for rain and mud. 525-2233. 

“Autumn in Asia” A tour of Asian plants with Elaine Sedlack at 10 a.m. at UC Botanical Garden, 200 Centennial Drive. Cost is $8-$12. Registration required. 643-2937. 

Celebration in Honor of Madeline Duckles, peace and social justice activist, at 2 p.m. at Redwood Gardens, 2951 Derby St. RSVP to 665-5459. 

“Is Wal-Mart Really That Bad?” with a screening of the new documentary by Robert Greenwald at 5 p.m., at the Niebyl-Proctor Library, 6501 Telegraph Ave., at Alcatraz. Sponsored by the Green Party of Alameda County. 

“A Most Unlikely Hero” film screening and discussion with director Steve Okino on the racial injustices faced by Bruce Yamashita while enrolled in the Marine Corp officer training school, at 2 p.m. at 22 Warren Hall, UC Campus. 520-7726. 

“Cloning and Stem Cell Research: Theological and Ethical Issues” with Dr. Ted Peters at 11:30 a.m. at First Congregational Chuch, 2345 Channing Way. 845-4145. 

Cambodian Dinner, slideshow and talk at 5:30 p.m. at 1924 Cedar St. to benefit humanitarian projects in Cambodia. Cost is $10-$25. 925-295-0791. www.friendshipwithcambodia.org 

Lake Merritt Neighbors Organized for Peace at 3 p.m. at the colonnade at the NE end of the lake. 763-8712. lmno4p.org 

“The Adventures of Milo and Otis” Family Film Sunday Series at 11 a.m. at Julia Morgan Center for the Arts, 2640 College Ave. Tickets are $5 at the door.  

“The New American Cooking” with author Joan Nathan at 7 p.m. at Congregation Netivot Shalom, 1316 University Ave. Cost is $15. 524-7867.  

“Merchant of Venice” at 2 p.m. at BRJCC, 1414 Walnut St. Cost is $5. 848-0237. 

MONDAY, NOV. 14 

“Between Reality and Wishful Thinking: The University as a Neighbor” A free public forum on UC’s impact on the city of Berkeley at 7 p.m. in the Multi-Purpose Room, Berkeley Alternative High School, corner of Derby and MLK, Jr. Way. 528-8345. 

“Don’t Be Six Feet Under WIthout a Plan” Learn about creating a living will, powers of attorney and end of life services at 6 p.m. at Chapel of the Chimes, 4499 Piedmont Ave at Pleasant Valley Rd. 562-9431. 

“The Search for Dark Energy in the Accelerating Universe” with Prof Saul Perlmutter at 5 p.m. at Berkeley Rep Theater, 2025 Addison St. 486-7292. 

Sing-A-Long from 10 to 11 a.m. at the Albany Senior Center, 846 Masonic Ave. 524-9122.  

Beginning Bridge Lessons at 11:10 a.m. at the Albany Senior Center, 846 Masonic Ave. Cost is $1. 524-9122.  

Berkeley School Volunteers Training workshop for volunteers interested in helping the public schools, from 4:30 to 6 p.m. at 1835 Allston Way. 644-8833. 

Berkeley CopWatch organizational meeting at 8 p.m. at 2022 Blake St. 548-0425. 

TUESDAY, NOV. 15 

Birdwalk on the MLK Shoreline from 3:30 to 5:30 p.m. to see the shorebirds here for the winter. Binoculars available for loan. 525-2233. 

Berkeley Garden Club “Careful Gardening Means Care for the Earth” with Christopher Shein, permaculture instructor at Merritt College, at 1 p.m. at Epworth Methodist Church, 1953 Hopkins St. 527-5641. 

“High School Dropout Rate Crisis” with Assemblymember Loni Hancock at 9:30 a.m. at Richmond High School Little Theater, 1250 23rd St., Richmond. 559-1406. 

Flu Shots for Berkeley Residents age 60 or over or “high-risk” from 1 to 4 p.m. at the Berkeley Public Health Clinic, 830 University Ave. 981-5300. 

University Press Books Book Party celebrating a new book by Roger Hahn at 5:30 p.m. at 2430 Bancroft Way. 548-0585. 

“Wal-Mart: The High Cost of a Low Price” a film by Robert Greenwald at 7:30 p.m. at La Peña, 3501 Shattuck Ave.. 849-2568. www.lapena.org 

“Darfur, Sudan: The Violence Continues; How Long Can We Ignore?” A panel discussion and slideshow lecture, at 8:30 p.m. at Booth Auditorium Boalt Hall, UC Campus. 220-8481. 

Choosing Infant Care A workshop at 7 p.m. at Bananas, 5232 Claremont Ave. Babies welcome. Registration required. 658-7353.  

American Red Cross Blood Services Volunteer Orientation at 6 p.m. at 6230 Claremont Ave., Oakland. 594-5165. 

“Weight-Loss Surgery: Is It For You?” at 6 p.m. at Alta Bates Summit Health Education Center, 400 Hawthorne Ave., Oakland. Free, registration required 869-8972. 

Berkeley Salon Discussion Group meets to discuss “Travel, Surveying the Empire” from 7 to 9 p.m. in a private home. Call for details 527-1022. 

“Ministry in the Eye of Disaster” at 7:30 p.m. in the Tuscan Common Room, Church Divinity School of the Pacific, 2451 Ridge Rd. Cost is $10-$15. to register call 204-0720. 

“Nutrition for Wellness and Harmony” Part of “Healing Therapies for Pain and Energy” at noon at Maffly Auditorium, Herrick Campus of Alta Bates, 2001 Dwight Way. 644-3273. 

Free Small Business Class on Opening a Restaurant at 5 p.m. at Berkeley Public Library, Community Room, 2090 Kittredge St. Registration required. 981-6148. www.sfscore.com 

Tuesday Tilden Walkers Join a few slowpoke seniors at 9:30 a.m. in the parking lot near the Little Farm for an hour or two walk. 215-7672, 524-9992. 

Berkeley Camera Club meets at 7:30 p.m., at the Northbrae Community Church, 941 The Alameda. 548-3991. www.berkeleycameraclub.org 

St. John’s Prime Timers meets at 9:30 a.m. at St. John’s Presbyterian Church, 2727 College Ave. 845-6830. 

CITY MEETINGS 

Commission on Disability meets Wed., Nov. 9, at 6:30 p.m. at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Don Brown, 981-6346. TDD: 981-6345.  

Homeless Commission meets Wed., Nov. 9, at 7 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Jane Micallef, 981-5426.  

Library Board of Trustees meets Wed. Nov. 9, at 7 p.m. at South Berkeley Senior Center., Jackie Y. Griffin, 981-6195.  

Planning Commission meets Wed., Nov. 9, at 7 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Janet Homrighausen, 981-7484.  

Police Review Commission meets Wed., Nov. 9, at the South Berkeley Senior Center. 981-4950.  

Waterfront Commission meets Wed., Nov. 9, at 7 p.m., at 201 University Ave. Cliff Marchetti, 981-6740.  

Community Health Commission meets Thurs., Nov. 10, at 6:45 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Kristin Tehrani, 981-5356.  

Housing Advisory Commission meets Thurs., Nov. 10, at 7:30 p.m., at the South Berkeley Senior Center. Oscar Sung, 981-5400.  

West Berkeley Project Area Commission meets Thurs., Nov. 10, at 7 p.m., at the West Berkeley Senior Center. Iris Starr, 981-7520.  

Zoning Adjustments Board meets Thurs., Nov. 10, at 7 p.m., in City Council Chambers. Mark Rhoades, 981-7410. ›

The now distinctly unstylish 19th-century Jesuit poet Gerard Manley Hopkins once wrote a poem based on the lamentations of the prophet Jeremiah which could have served as a mantra for disappointed progressives in the last six years or so: 

Why do sinners’ ways prosper? and why must / Disappointment all I endeavor end? 

It’s been a long dry spell for many of us; we can echo the poet’s plea in his last line, “send my roots rain.” But now, in November, just as California is experiencing our annual re-greening, albeit not that much rain and none too early, we’re beginning to see some signs of hope in the national and state political picture.  

First, of course, is the indictment of Irving Lewis “Scooter” Libby, Jr. It’s not just that he seems to be a perjurer, which puts him at odds with the whole basis of the Anglo-American legal system. As a lawyer himself, he certainly knows that giving false testimony to a grand jury is a very serious offense, really a moral lapse, independent of liberal or conservative political positions.  

But Lewis is also the scuzziest of the notoriously scuzzy neo-con crowd, a student and disciple of the disgusting Paul Wolfowitz, shown by Michael Moore in Fahrenheit 911 combing his hair with saliva. The Center for American Progress’s website says Scooter was the main architect and pusher of Colin Powell’s phony testimony at the United Nations in February of 2003. According to CAP staffer John Lyman, “It was Libby—along with Paul Wolfowitz, Doug Feith, and a handful of other top aides at the Pentagon and White House—who convinced the president that the U.S. should go to war in Iraq. It was Libby who pushed Cheney to publicly argue that Saddam Hussein had ties to al Qaeda and 9/11. It was also Libby who prodded former Secretary of State Colin Powell to include specious reports about an alleged meeting between 9/11 terrorist Mohammed Atta and an Iraqi intelligence official in Powell’s February 2003 speech.” 

Listening to Patrick Fitzgerald’s measured, precise press conference delineation of why he went after Libby was a deeply satisfying experience, after all the double-talk we’ve had to listen to in the recent past. Some women commentators, notably Arianna Huffington on KALW’s “Left, Right and Center,” went a bit overboard, casting him as the country’s latest sex symbol. One of her male fellow panelists wondered why that should be, since Fitzgerald’s pectorals didn’t seem to be much to boast about. But an honest, straightforward and smart man will be more admired by most women (and men) than a big-body guy like Arnold Schwarzenegger. Fitzgerald is a rugby player—there’s a bumper sticker that says “Rugby Players Have Leather Balls,” and in this case the metaphor describes his performance so far.  

And then there’s the news about Ugly Arnie himself. Again, deeply satisfying. He went out on a limb with his special election, and then he sawed it off. Has he learned that even big boys get in trouble when they talk back to nurses and school teachers? Probably not, because unlike Fitzgerald, Schwarzenegger’s not very smart. 

Finally, we can savor the results of the governor’s races in New Jersey and Virginia. Perhaps the depth beneath which negative campaigning cannot sink was reached in New Jersey, with Corzine’s ex-wife calling him a rotter in paid political ads: “Jon did let his family down, and he’ll probably let New Jersey down, too.” There are a lot of exes, both husbands and wives, among the voters these days, and they were all probably thinking “there but for the grace of God go I.” Then there’s Tim Kaine’s win in Virginia, despite his acknowledgment that he opposes capital punishment on religious grounds. Voters seem to have been paying attention for once—maybe it could become a trend. 

Californians do know that you can have a good shower or two in the fall and still end up with a drought year if the rains don’t keep up. Knocking off Libby doesn’t mean that Rove will go. The neo-con ideologues are running from Bush lately like rats deserting a sinking ship, but they might find another ship to jump on. Hapless and pathetic Harriet Miers seems to have been replaced by a more formidable candidate, but Senate Democrats might pull themselves together and stall his confirmation, at least for a while. It is even conceivable, though not guaranteed, that Democrats could take advantage of what appears to be the country’s new mood and come up with a viable candidate for president. We can always hope (or pray) that they’ve finally come alive again, after a long dead spell. 

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The second-highest ranking University of California official resigned suddenly Friday amid allegations of favoritism in hiring and possible conflicts of interest. 

Now, the university’s lawyers and auditors are investigating what role Provost M.R.C. “Marci” Greenwood, may have had in hiring her son for an internship at UC Merced. Investigators are also looking into Greenwood’s promotion of friend and veteran biology professor Lynda Goff to an executive position within the UC system, according to a statement released by UC Chancellor Robert Dynes late on Friday.  

Goff was vice provost at UC Santa Cruz when Greenwood tapped her for position at UC headquarters to design the new California Teach program, a UC initiative to increase the number of credentialed K-12 science and mathematics teachers. The two had worked alongside each other during Greenwood’s eight-year tenure as chancellor of UC Santa Cruz.  

The investigation, sparked by inquiries by the San Francisco Chronicle into the women’s financial relationship, revealed that Greenwood and Goff owned rental property together at the time of Goff’s promotion, said Dynes in his statement. 

“It appears that Provost Greenwood may have been involved in Dr. Goff’s hiring to a greater extent than was appropriate given that her business investment with Dr. Goff had not been properly and fully resolved in accordance with conflict of interest requirements,” said Dynes. 

Greenwood did not return calls for comment, and Goff’s office declined to comment further on the resignation. 

“It seems like there’s more than meets the eye here,” said Chris Krohn, the former mayor of Santa Cruz who met with Greenwood every two months while she was a chancellor. “She doesn’t resign over something like this.” 

Krohn said Greenwood was not considered a dishonest person within the tight-knit Santa Cruz community, and the resignation came as a shock, “to put it mildly,” he said.  

Greenwood’s absence at Friday’s installation ceremony for the new Santa Cruz chancellor, Denice Denton, was widely noted, said Krohn. 

A second high ranking administrator, Vice President for Student Affairs Vincent Doby, was placed on paid leave pending an investigation into whether he inappropriately helped Greenwood’s son, James Greenwood, secure an internship last August.  

UC spokesman Brad Hayward described the $45,000-a-year senior intern position as being for mid-career professionals interested in a career in student affairs.  

The close scrutiny of Greenwood’s hiring also comes after a Chronicle request for information filed on Oct. 25, according to published reports. UC did not respond to either of the inquiries until after Greenwood’s resignation was announced Friday, the Chronicle reported. 

Top UC officials moved quickly to minimize the damage, temporarily assigning executive vice provost Wyatt “Rory” Hume to step in for both Greenwood and Doby until a replacement can be found. Hume is a former executive vice chancellor at UCLA and president of the University of South Wales in Australia. 

Though Greenwood’s resignation was effective immediately, Hayward said that the investigation will move forward. A tenured biology professor, Greenwood may return to teaching within the UC system, Hayward said.  

Greenwood had resigned in order to return to her academic work, said Dynes in his statement. Hayward would not comment on whether Greenwood had tendered her resignation voluntarily. 

“The change in leadership shouldn’t be dragged out, especially when there are questions about the impropriety on behalf of the official,” said Patricia Sullivan, director of the Center on Education Policy. 

Public scandals within university administration, said Sullivan, can have a ripple effect on other areas of the school. It can color the community’s view of the institution and may also have an impact on student enrollment. 

The UC Board of Regents drew sharp criticism recently after they suggested using private donations to augment top administrators’ salaries. A study conducted by the board found that UC administrators’ salaries are lower than at comparable private institutions.  

“Any parent that is going to write that huge check wants to make sure that the university can run itself,” Sullivan said. 

Dynes, however, was careful not to cast the specter of controversy over others within the statewide UC system, especially Goff who now heads up the multi-million dollar science and math teacher-training program which she designed. 

Goff was named director of California Teach in late August, after an executive search committee unanimously recommended her for the position, according to an earlier UC statement. 

As director, Goff earns $192,100 a year. 

“This in no way reflects on Dr. Goff, her credentials, or the terms and conditions of her appointment,” Dynes said. “This involves only the appropriateness of Provost Greenwood’s role in her hiring.” 

Dynes stressed that there was “no presumption of wrongdoing” on the part of either Doby or James Greenwood, adding that Greenwood is “reportedly making a valuable contribution.” 

Doby, who had worked at UCLA for 30 years before being promoted to UC headquarters, is well known for his efforts to increase educational opportunities for students of diverse backgrounds. In 1986, he co-founded the Young Black Scholars program, a college prep program for black high school students.