Opinion

After every election, writers interested in politics are strongly tempted to expound at great length on the deeper meaning of the results. I’m no exception to that pattern, but today I’d like to try to resist the temptation and instead touch on some of the shallower lessons which can be derived from national, state and local outcomes. (Bob Burnett, in these pages, has done a bang-up job of analyzing the national situation, by the way.) -more-

The Berkeley Police Department has sent out its periodic email with the subject line "Who are These Crooks?" Technically, they're not necessarily crooks, they're suspects until proven guilty. The page is entitled "Who are These Suspects" when you click on it, at least. Also, is it really necessary to repeatedly refer to the pictured suspects as "black" when their complexion color is clearly visible in the photos? In this context it's not a description, it's a racial term. Dog-whistling..

Shattuck Street in downtown Berkeley was shut down for several hours on Monday as an AC Transit bus burned (Berkeleyside).

Fired KPFA employees took over the Morning Show on Tuesday. (S..J. Mercury). -more-

His Views; Republican Claptrap; Pancreatic Cancer Awareness; Give New START floor time in the lame duck session -more-

What do Stewart Jones, Jesse Arreguin, and Kriss Worthington have in common? Their campaign signs were defaced by “NIMBY Robot”. Guess what else they have in common? They opposed Measure R! -more-

I am absolutely outraged to learn that you have decided to discontinue the Morning Show with Aimee Allison and Brian Edwards-Tiekert, two of the most knowledgeable and articulate news journalists on radio today. The Morning Show is a breath of fresh air, the likes of which very few communities in the U.S. have the good fortune to enjoy. -more-

Pacifica was founded on the need for alternative news, public affairs and culture and is even more needed today given the consolidation of the corporate/pentagon media. -more-

Editor's Note: The latest issue of the Pepper Spray Times is now available. -more-

I was swept up and arrested Friday night, in Oakland, California, at the "end" of the Justice for Oscar Grant march, on November 5th, 2010. As usual, most of the Bay Area TV stations gave a factually awful -- of course, very pro-police -- spin to what happened. It amazes me how edited and re-chronologized video can make viewers think they are seeing something that they aren't. Events are portrayed out of order, and most TV reporters falsely describe the context of the video clips they show. As in George Orwell's book Nineteen Eighty-Four, about a total propaganda media-controlled society: the lie becomes the truth, and the truth becomes the lie. -more-

Dear Becky (publisher of the best [online] local paper in the United States [in my opinion],

Sometimes I think you can be a little wrong-headed. While I concur with your negative take on measure R, it is not R as in Robert Reich. -more-

The Al-Iraq newspaper, in a blanket condemnation of America, declared: "America is on fire and behind this fire were a thousand, a million, or even a billion hands — for the savage, arrogant America, which is afflicted with megalomania, caused all peoples of the world to suffer from humiliation, starvation, and terrorism." -more-

'It's time for all of us to truly save KPFA' -more-