Extra

In anticipation of yet another life-or-death city council session, a good many citizens--and more from beyond the limits--will be writing and sending reasoned, objectively-focused remarks on a related clutch of impending proposals at both city and state levels. They will address Berkeley's contribution to the hysterically-fashioned and to a large extent invented housing crisis.

Ironically, a city governance which continually nods to Berkeley's multi-part 'special' nature cannot accept subjective criteria (What makes Berkeley special?) in response to the draconian proposal, however sweetened, before you this evening. If passed by a deluded and possibly bought majority, Berkeley may indeed become special, in the worst way. 

The particle of subjectivity I wish to introduce now--as I don't think I have the stomach for tuning in later--concerns character, both individually and collectively. Who would have thought a community as 'reasonable' as Berkeley's would cough up a council majority bought by the real-estate and financial industries? Who would have thought the lesser of two evils we picked as mayor over four years ago would be as accursed as his then realtor opponent? I have a picture of him as a candidate being scolded by reps of the nascent YIMBY faction, in which he seems to listen patiently to the rant. We elected a fine fellow who works practically in his sleep to steward the city along, but on the issue of housing he apparently accommodated their Orwellian ideology; he's lost his bearings and perhaps a few vertebrae. 

We would expect this at the council level, whose YIMBY members share a generational bias toward their predecessors, who had it so much better. What better way to tell them that the better American Dream we sought was wrong, that we're rich racists, and that our cottages may be surrounded or replaced by big boxes?  

I doubt that anyone prepared to vote on either Item 1 or the several truly odious state bills has to worry about his or her own roof. And, it seems that here in town, both Bates and Trump are ultimate victors.