Free California

FROM MARTHA (from inside)

TODAY WE RECIEVED A NICE LETTER FROM OUR OLD FRIEND MARTHA STEWART WE JUST HAD TO SHARE WITH YOU. AND MARTHA, WE'LL SEE YA REAL SOON HONEY, HANG IN THERE.

October 20, 2004

Dear Free California:

After two weeks in prison, I have been pining for those tranquil days with you back in ’99. Santa Barbara seems like so long ago, I just had to write.

FC, strange as this may sound, the “hard-knock-life” has been great for me. Camp Cupcake? Right, more like Camp Canyon Ranch, I feel great! I have not been in this good of shape since I lived in Jersey. And, I’ve learned so much.

Obviously, prison is hard but really it’s not all that much different than Westport. It is, in a word, “clubby.” During the first 48 hours, I had to defend myself in 2 fights (which I lost, badly); an attempted rape by a guard (Ever heard of Keihl’s, Billybob?) and I my last carton of smokes got snatched. It's rough, but not so different from a night drinking with the ladies at the Colony Club, and there’s less smoking.

After that, I realized I had no choice to but to join a gang. I’d hoped to become prison mediator al a Ice Tea or Jim Brown but in the hole you’ve got to pick sides so I did. Just like home, the old Mayflower gangs are not what they used to be. So, it’s ethnic all the way for Mad Martha. How could I soil myself with Aryan Nations tattooing; what would my appeal lawyers think?

Anyhoo, I got invites to join all the best gangs: Latin Kings, Neta, Black Guerrilla Family, Mexican Mafia, La Nuestra Familia, and the Texas Syndicate. You name it; they all wanted little old me ;-). I may be in jail but I have not lost my touch! Oh, I feel like a debutante, again.

So, I weighed my options, creating a pro ‘n cons list as I always do, and eventually joined up with La Nuestra Familia. By coincidence, my old housekeeper Lupita has a niece on the inside and she pulled some strings so I could avoid the whole ritual initiation-thing. I don’t think I would have survived the “soap-in-a-sock” beating the other girls went through, bonus. Heck, I never even thought Lupita liked me but I guess the famous X-Mass gift basket I give the staff every year paid off after all.

My gang is the best. We get the best table at lunch and, now that I’m on board, its “good things” all the way, the best uniforms, we dominant medal shop (wait until you see the new NY License plates, there fabulous) and our parties have become the envy of the cellblock.

That's it for now, I really miss you FC. I think about our time together a lot and cannot wait until you visit me. As an added bonus I’ve attached a photo of my new self. I have been hitting the weights hard with my La Familia sisters and my 50 Cent prison-bod's rounding out nicely. Look at me! With my trey-chic henna tattoo, I’m like, J-Lo eat-your-heart-out! Worth your trip, I’d say.

XOXOXO.

Martha “Da Ghostface Baker” Stewart
Cell 5b
Federal Women’s Correctional Camp
Alderson, W.Va.
P.S. Can you send me 6 six cartons of America Spirits? I am desperately trying to barter for Chantal’s flowered drapes. Again, Kisses4ever.

Helping those in need: "100 Jobs in 100 Days"

California has the reputation of being merciless when it comes to helping the disadvantaged survive in our ultra-competitive state. The declining state of public job programs and our endless supply of low wage, often illegal, immigrant labor, has created an environment in California were those on the edge (the homeless, the disabled, the under-educated), who might otherwise be functioning members of the workforce, find it almost impossible to do so.

But today there is at least one reason to be hopeful. Increasingly, the private sector has gotten more involved to help enfranchise the downtrodden through private/public partnerships. One example of this type of program kicks off tomorrow. Mayor Gavin Newsom (who is gaining a real reputation as an innovator when it comes to private/public governance) and The Arc, a job center that trains adults with developmental disabilities, is spearheading “100 Jobs in 100 Days”, an effort to partner trained disabled people with companies that can benefit from these type of workers. The program kicks-off today at The Arc San Francisco located at 1500 Howard Street (at 11th Street) at 5:45 p.m.

This kick-off includes a cocktail party and an awards ceremony honoring employers who have gone the extra mile to get those with disabilities on the job.

Way to go Gavin and way to go The Arc.

Peterson to LA (Part 2)

Yet again Mark Geragos is pushing to get the Peterson trial moved south. And yet again his motives must be questioned and firmly rejected by the judge. He can claim tainted jury pools until he is blue in the face but it will not wash, not up here, sorry. We all know his crying is just a facade to get the trial returned to the cozy confines in LA where wacko juries are the norm, and he can keep a closer eye on the Jackson case.

He should have known better than to mess around with this brand of legal council 20 minutes from Stanford University. You must learn, brother, the sensible folks of Northern California are far different than the celebrity obsessed clowns that rule LA.

Your problems with hostile jurors are only the beginning. You are losing the only advantage you have. Geragos, and his ilk, are masters of manipulating the media to influence the outcome of trials. But those tactics are gone now. Once, the Peterson case looked like it was going to be just the kind of circus Geragos thrives on. But now in Redwood City he’s got Wendy Tacuda in place of Greta Van Susteren. And with each passing day it looks more and more like this is just going to be a run of mill case, fertilizer salesman kills his wife, bring out the chair boys. No Mary Carey topless, no live feed to Regis, no AC in the White Ford Bronco, just a cold hard justice by a jury of his peers and judges who carry themselves with honor. Geragos must think he's landed in a different country.

Dominick Dunne put it best as quoted in SFGate.com, as to why Geragos really wants this show moved down to Hollywood. "You must understand, it's just not hot news, Who knows? I would never say never. But I don't feel compelled toward covering that trial.'' Well put you disgusting sycophant.

Tomorrow's Storm(troppers)

If all goes as planned, tomorrow will make for interesting times in San Francisco.

Under aegis numerous anti-war groups, mass actions are planned throughout the city. San Francisco's protests form part of a larger nationwide "day of protest" commemorating the anniversary of the invasion of Iraq.

As anyone who attended last years protests will tell you, this will be a scattershot affair organized by groups like "Queers for Palestine", Earth Flag, A.N.S.W.E.R., SF, among others that come together for the day. The war protest is a template from which they grind a very personal ax. Watch out for those out of place shouts for gay marriage, the environment. anti-globalization, Indian issues or whatever.

Given this mix bag approach it is actually quiet surprising (and a stark rebuke to Bush's ill fated policy) that the core message from last year has proven to be 100% correct: no weapons of mass destruction, no embrace by the Iraqis, more civilians then soldiers have died and, as the bombings in Madrid prove, we are no safer.

Though, in contrast to Europe, being right has done little to change the general perceptions of the War or President Bush. More the point, the protests failed and tomorrow's will too. If change is to come the protesters need to face reality. George W. Bush has one cause, and a unified audience behind him, fearful, right-center, middle and upper class America and rock hard backbone of evangelicals. Until the protesters make in roads with them nothing will change.

In fact, guerilla protests with swarms of black-clad wannabe Che Guevara's stirring up trouble is doing more harm than good. If they really want change, protesters (and the left in general) need to start chipping away at Bush's base. Not as impossible as the press and the religious right would have us believe.

Instead of whining about things normal folks see as nitpicky (the conflicts of interest associated with the war; the fact that the President and his praetorian guard of neo-cons lied to us, etc.) the movement needs to focus on the thing important to the general unwashed mass: money and God. That's it, in their eyes nothing else matters when you have a job, tuition to pay and a personal Jesus to answer too.

All is not lost. It is still possible to get them thinking anti-war and anti-Bush. There are facts on-the-ground right now the movement can capitalize on to turn the tied. Whether or not the far left will openly talk about the fact that we are spending billions to bail out a hoard of ungrateful Iraqis is open to question but they should at least scream from the rooftops that our soldiers are coming back in body bags to serve grand dreams in the Middle East and that massive numbers of innocent human souls are dying needlessly. Those facts hit the Christian Right and Bush knows it. That's why you no longer see dead Iraqis on Fox News.

If the protesters put aside frindge issues and created a real dialogue about these issues only even the most ardent evangelical will start to pay attention. It's body bags, billions and babies. That's it, over and over again.

But here is the big problem. Today, traditional voices have been disenfranchised of any voice within the anti-war movement. Like it or not, this movement is controlled by people most Christians and "normal folks", are morally opposed to being associated with. In a perfect world all those whack jobs with their bad b.o. and conspiracy rants would stay home, they won't and its crying shame.

Happy revolting, children. To bad it does more harm than good.

My Picks for the Ballot Initiatives

My Friend Isaac Clements asked my opinion of the ballot initiatives for the March 2nd elections so here goes. Now get out and vote.

San Francisco:
A - Deferred Taxation Plan (File No. 031547)
Board of Supervisors
Yes. This will allow city employees to defer vacation pay to a tax-free fund. This helps poorly paid employees and its good for the city.

B - Retirement Benefits for Public Defenders, District Attorneys, and Investigators
Yes. Basically, this saves us $250,000 over the next 5 years.

C - Civilian Jobs in the Police Department
No. This will allow the Police to hire non-policemen to do police work and it’s a one-way ticket to having private Brown & Root-style investigators working on crime. Bad idea. Basically this is a hit at the Police Union.

D - Equal Treatment of Domestic Partners
No. This is going to pass but vote No anyway. This will allow city employees to provide benefits to “partners” who live outside the city. What’s a partner? This bill allows any city employee to give his benefits to a partner even if they live in New York? Lets make the weddings legal and then give them the benefits not the other way around.

E - Requests for City Records Containing Private Information
Yes. Yes. Yes. This bill will make any federal government requests to the city for information on San Franciscans a matter of public record. So, if check out a book from the SF Library and the Feds what to know which one you are reading a member of city council will be informed and will make it a matter public record. San Francisco is fighting the Bush/Ashcroft hunta at every turn. Hurrah SF!

F – Labor Negotiations with Deputy Sheriffs
Yes. This provides that Sheriffs have the same bargaining rights as SF cops. It’s only fair

G - Supplemental Pay for City Employees on Military Duty
Yes. This will continue the pay and benefits for city employees currently serving on active duty.

H - Public Education Fund
No. This sets aside more cash for schools. This is cash we do not have and the School Board needs to get its act together and spend the money they currently have more wisely.

I - Replacement of Diesel Buses
Yes. Those buses stink and have to go.

J - Incentives to Build Below-Market-Rate Housing
No. This is a blatant move by developers to put high-rises around the south side of the ballpark and make it seem like its going to help middle-income folks. Its total hogwash, these apartments will be for Lawyers and Bankers not Cops and School Teachers.

California:
55 Kindergarten-University Public Education Facilities Bond Act of 2004.
No. This bill is just pork. We need to stop spending cash needlessly.

THE FOLLOWING BILLS REGARD THE BAILOUT OF THE STATE BUDGET AND YOU SHOULD VOTE YES ON ALL OF THEM. THESE BILLS MAKE THE BEST OF A BAD VERY SITUATION.

56 State Budget, Related Taxes, and Reserve. Voting Requirements. Penalties. Initiative Constitutional Amendment and Statute.
57 The Economic Recovery Bond Act.
58 The California Balanced Budget Act.

DEMOCRATIC PRIMARY:
John Edwards – Kerry is dead against Bush because he is waffler and Edwards is best of a bad lot in my opinion.

Marc Loves Hillary

Strolling down San Francisco’s ever fashionable Maiden Lane this past weekend, I stopped by Marc Jacob’s signature store and was greeted by quite a sight. A swath of multi-colored t-shirts embossed with the not so comely visage of New York’s Junior Senator, Hillary Rodham Clinton. Mr. Jacob’s, it seems, is a real, big fan and the proceeds of the sale will be going to “support Senator Clinton in her on-going fight to protect New York’s workers.”

This is yet another example that there is a highly influential segment of New Yorker's who seem to live in a fantasy realm apart from the rest of us. Does Mr. Jacobs really believe we are so bored out here in the boonies that we follow Hillary’s every move? Does he not know we have more important things to think about, like what we are going to wear to our 20th gay wedding this week?

If this campaign was anything more than phony hype, Mr. Jacobs would put his money where his mouth is and really do something for New York’s workers. For example, he could hire a few in the Bronx or Queens to produce some cloths because right not one article of Marc Jacobs New York is produced in the city that bares its name.

Twit, fashions designers making politcal statements is a very slippery slop. If he really and truly loved Hillary he would produce at least one dress she could shoe-horn that rear end into. Alas, Marc Jacobs New York does not carry her size.

History is hope

Tip O'Neill was right all along "all politics is local."

Amazing, even with all the mind numbing luxuries to deaden our fears and anxieties, all the physiological bombardments: the prozac, the ritalin, the booze, the doomsday proclamations of God's wrath, we still rise; on the spot, to free ourselves. Centralized authority is powerless against a unified community, we the people.

This is a great idea, freedom. America's revolution against the crown was an unstoppable force which the mightiest army in the world could not deter. Thankfully, the spirit still lives.

Yesterday, against the will of the government, San Francisco started marrying gay couples and though you may not think its right - I don't - San Franciscans overwhelmingly do. And, in far off Iraq, local elected councils are being formed in contradiction to the hand-picked councils the Bush Administration is trying to install. Slowly, at a grassroots level, Iraqis are beginning to take care of themselves. Of course, as everyone knows, if the direct vote happens we'd leave Iraq in the hands of a militant Islamic government along the lines of Iran. That would be our legacy, failed democracy by force, failure.

In effect, what is happening in both cases is the most natural thing in the world. It is an effect so apparent in history only an idiot would try to go against it. The real will of the people, overtime, will become reality no matter how powerful or arrogant that outside force may be. We the people dictate how we are going to live, whether "the we" is a bunch of go-go boys in the Castro or a gang of expectant mothers in Kirkuk.

Given that fact, all these old commie-fighters in the White House must have alztiemers, centralized authority from on-high is destined to collapse. Rummy, Chaney, et al ought to go back and read some of their speeches from the 80's. At this moment in history they are the Politburo party bosses, they are destined to end up in the 'dustbin of history'.

The Peterson Case To LA (part 2)?

Yet again Mark Geragos is pushing to get the trial moved south. And again Geragos' motives must be questioned. Tainted jury pools are just a facide for Geragos to return the cozy confines of LA where wacko juries are the norm and he can keep a close eye on the Jackson case. But there might be a bigger reason. Once the Peterson looked to be one of those big trials with glammed out reporters covering it OJ style. But with each passing day it looks more and more like this is just going to be a run of mill case, a fertilizer salesman offing his offing his wife. Dominck Dunne put it best as to why Geragos really wants this whole show moved down to Hollywood. The fact is Mark's loosing his audience to Kobe, Michael, Barretta and all the rest:

"You must understand, it's just not hot news, Who knows? I would never say never. But I don't feel compelled toward covering that trial.''

Today, the defense team in the Scott Peterson case began pushing to get the trial moved out of San Mateo county claiming that Scott would not get a fair trial there either. If the trial is moved this will be the second time such a move has occurred from Modesto, to Redwood to where?

Low and behold the Peterson defense team what's to move to LA. Huh? I wonder why? Could it be that this is being driven by the self-interest of lead Peterson attorney, Mark Geragos. Geragos, of course, is also one of Michael Jackson's attorney's and he would like nothing more than to have the trial moved closer to LA so he can squire over both high profile cases and sleep in his own bed.

The judge needs to keep the trial up north. Does anyone need reminding that SoCal trials are a complete joke! Remember OJ? Remember and never forget. OJ OJ OJ OJ OJ. Lacy does not deserve to be Nor Cal's Nicole Brown.

The Newsome Way: Talk New School; Act Old School

Folks, palm greasing and Tammany Hall-style party politics are alive and well in San Francisco.

When Gavin Newsome (aka Mr. Kimberly Guilfoyle) was elected Mayor he proclaimed himself to be "an agent of change in the politics of San Francisco". And after years of Willie Brown back door action this was like a ray of light to the huddled masses of 'Bagdad by the Bay'.

But alas, as things are wont to do in the sordid world of SF politics, it was all just phony rhetoric. Once he started work the real Gavin Newsome suddenly appeared. The Gavin Newsome, who's been bankrolled by Getty cash, who's father was the actual bag man who flew to Italy with a cool $2 million to free J. Paul Getty III from his kidnappers in 1973 and later served as a San Francisco judge, yes that Gavin Newsome remember him, the one personally anointed by Slick Willie Brown to a seat on the Broad of Supervisors back in '96.

Here's how it’s going down. First, he appointed Joanne Hayes-White as head of the fire department. Looks good right, a women as a fire chief, wow how progressive! But on closer inspection the cracks come through. Ms. Hayes-White, you see, is from a very well connected Irish family from the Westside. A favor here, a favor there, hey we’re all Jesuits, right? Howza-bout a few cement contracts Your Honor?

Then, for the other public safety post, Hizzhonor picked Heather Fong as chief of police. Chief Fong you may remember from her days as Interim Chief during the "Burrito-gate" scandal that cost the career of one-time chief Alex Fagan, Sr and was the crowning stain on Willie's legacy. For all intents and purposes, Fong looks a lot like a deer caught in the headlights but she’s Asian which goes a long way to reassuring the most important political base in the city. I give her 4 months, tops.

And then came the real whopper. Last week, he appointed Michela Alioto-Pier (granddaughter of former Mayor Joseph Alioto, and the niece of one-time mayoral candidate, Angela Alioto) to fill his spot on the board of supervisors. Remember also that Angela Alioto endorsed Newsome just days before his tight race with Green Party candidate Matt Gonzalez? A political payoff for Angela's endorsement? We are only left to wonder, and God forbid we question the ethics of a women in a wheelchair, but we do have the right to ask ourselves what real value Ms. Alito-Peir brings? After all this is a person who for all intensive purposes has gone from one political appointment (based on her last name) to the next: from the Clinton White House to the Newsome regime. And I seriously doubt she is going to stop there. She is the last dying amber of a political dynasty going back to the 40's.

The sad part about all of these appointments is that they were such cold calculated politic bargains. How can we expect to be treated with reverence by the rest of the country if we constantly play the same stupid political match games as the people in Texas, Cleveland, Boston, etc. etc.

The more things change, well, the more they never really do, do they. Gonzalez 2008!