UNDERCURRENTS OF THE EAST BAY AND BEYOND
2006
Columns Written For The Berkeley Daily Planet Newspaper, Berkeley, CA
Holler Back At Me
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Choosing
Who Can Be Using The "Nigger" Word
Response To The Response To Michael Richards' Anti-Black Tirade
Dcember 22, 2006
And Now,
The Oakland Fingerprint Foulup
In Which We Learn That While Oakland City Officials Were Telling Us We Needed
More Police, They Forgot To Inform Us That Oh, By The Way, We Needed Fingerprint
Processing Technicians As Well
Dcember 15, 2006
City Planning
The Veil Over Mayor Brown's Development Plans Begin To Unravel
December 8, 2006
Mr. Brown's
Victim-Blaming
Some Thoughts About The Outgoing Mayor's Policy Regarding Violence And The African-American
Community
Dcember 1, 2006
Oakland
Power Politics
Maneuvering Over Who Will Be The Next City Council President
November 24, 2006
A Time
Not To Be Wasted
What Progressives Must Do, Now That The National Elections Are Over
November 17, 2006
The Adults
Step In
Comparing The Once And Future Mayors Of Oakland
November 10, 2006
No Longer
Oakland's Problem
Mr. Brown Runs Against—And Runs Away From—The City Where He Has Sat As Mayor
November 3, 2006
Why Is
The OUSD Property Sale Proposal Still On The Table?
Continuing Questions About The Oakland School District Land Sale Proposal
October 27, 2006
The Artful
Mr. Brown Dodges Again
The Oakland Mayor, With The Help Of Republican And Media Ineptness, Avoids Answering
For His Oakland Actions
October 20, 2006
Making
Mistakes And Calling It Legal
Thoughts On The Release Of The New FCMAT Report On The Oakland Unified School
District (Part 2)
October 13, 2006
Between
A Bear And A Gorilla
Thoughts On The Release Of The New FCMAT Report On The Oakland Unified School
District (Part 1)
October 6, 2006
The School
Sale Glass Gets A Little Less Dark
Senator Don Perata's Thoughts Back In 2003 About The Oakland School Property Sale
September 29, 2006
Putting
It In Context
Comparing Mayor Jerry Brown, Former Mayor Elihu Harris, And President George W.
Bush
September 22, 2006
Oakland's
Dump And Tow
Did Oakland Police Ignore A Policy Directive, Leading Directly To An Oakland Shooting?
September 15, 2006
Welcoming
Their Presence, Honoring Their Spirit
Making A Place For Young People In Oakland
September 8, 2006
The First
Part Of The Play
Looking At The Root Causes Of Oakland's Violence
September 1, 2006
Get Hyphy
One Of Oakland's Best Young Videographers Is Back With A New Documentary On The
Sideshows
August 25, 2006
The Bad
Shepherd
To Concentrate On A Single Charter School While Watching An Entire School District
Go To The Wolves Is Not Good Policy For The Mayor Of The City Of Oakland
August 18, 2006
The One
Hundred Most Unwanted
Mayor Jerry Brown Unveils The Latest÷And Eleventh÷In His Series
Of Oakland Anti-Violence Initiatives
August 11, 2006
Rolling
Up Our Sleeves
Although [Some] Oakland Officials Keep Asking For Our Help To Curb Oakland's Violence,
They Keep Rejecting Community Initiatives
August 4, 2006
Priorities
While Oakland Obsesses Over Violence In Our Streets, Positive Programs Aimed At
Inner City Kids Sometimes Get Put On The Back Burner
July 28, 2006
Talking
About Violence
With Oakland Activists Pressing Him On The Oakland School Issue, Senator Perata
Suddenly Discovers That People Are Getting Killed In Oakland
July 21, 2006
The Golden
Rules
A Former State And Oakland School Superintendent Lectures Us On History And Why
We Need A State Dictatorship Over The Oakland Public Schools
July 14, 2006
The Long
Road Back To Local Control
A Brief And Incomplete History Of How The Oakland Public Schools Got Taken From
Oakland
July 7, 2006
The Media
And The New Mayor
A Critique Of The Criticisms Of Mr. Dellums By Mr. Johnson And Mr. Harper
June 30, 2006
What Comes
Next
Oakland's Future Tasks, Now That We Have Elected A New Mayor
June 23, 2006
Worse And
Worser
And Now Comes Brown Or Poochigian For California Attorney General
June 16, 2006
What Election
"Delay"?
The San Francisco Chronicle Reports On A Problem That Doesn't Exist, To
What Purpose?
June 9, 2006
And, So,
Another Set Of High-Speed Police Chase (Sideshow) Deaths
The Deaths Of Two Innocent Citizens Is A Tragic Reminder Of The U'Kendra Johnson
Accident
June 2, 2006
Some Thoughts
On The Stepchild Issue
How Transportation Gets Little Respect In East Bay Policies And Politics
May 26, 2006
One Of
Oakland's Greatest Public Scandals
Talking About The Seizure Of The Oakland Unified School District
May 19, 2006
Immigrants,
All
While My Latino Friends March In The Streets, Thoughts On My Own Origins
May 12, 2006
Miscovering
The Mayor's Race
The San Francisco Chronicle Gets It Wrong, Twice
May 5, 2006
Time For
Democracy
Mr. De La Fuente Complains That There's Not Enough
April 28, 2006
The Candidates
Take On Guns
The Causes Of Oakland's Violence
April 21, 2006
Merely
For The Show
Kitty Kelly Epstein's New Book Shows That The Oakland School Takeover Was A Long-Desired
Act
April 14, 2006
It Takes
A Village
Two Oakland VillagesöOne On The East Side, One On The WestöAre A Window
To The Roots Of Oakland's Violence
April 7, 2006
A Visionary
Without Work
Thoughts On Mayor Jerry Brown As A Slacker
March 31, 2006
Trusting
Us With A Little More Information
In An Emergency, BART Ought To Let Us Know What's Going On
March 24, 2006
Putting
The Heat On Who?
Bringing Some Light To The Negotiations Between The Oakland Police Chief And The
Police Union On Getting More Officers Out On The Street
March 17, 2006
Downtown
Entertainment
Mayor Jerry Brown's Missed Opportunities To Establish A Successful Downtown Entertainment
District In Oakland
March 10, 2006
Extremis
Malis
Oakland Officials Looking For A Solution To Police Understaffing Ought To Look
Closer To Home
March 3, 2006
The Port
Deal
Is There A "Whiff Of Racism" In The Reaction To The United Arab Emirates
Company"s Purchase Of Control Of Six American Ports? Of Course, There Is, And
It Started With The Bush Administration's War On Arabs (Uh, Terror)
February 24, 2006
Oakland's
Arts Renaissance Mayor
The Oakland Ballet Closes, And Mr. Brown Does Nothing
February 17, 2006
A Progressive
Defense
If They Ever Want To Be In Charge Of The Country, Progressives Need To Talk About
What They Would Do To Defend The Country Militarily
February 10, 2006
A Violence
Dialogue, Again
Is There A Latino Gang War And An African-American Based Drug War Going On In
Oakland, And Shouldn't The Mayoral Candidates Be Talking About It?
February 3, 2006
The Malls
Of The 21st Century
Why Oakland Mayoral Candidates Should Be Talking About Neighborhood Commercial
Development Instead Of Downtown Development
January 27, 2006
Punishing
Politicians For Doing The Right Thing
Mr. De La Fuente Should Be Criticized, But Not For His Recent Work On The Raider
Deal
January 20, 2006
A Violence
Dialogue
A Sudden Rise In Violence On Oakland's Streets, And A Conversation Needed About
What Is Going On
January 13, 2006
The Politics
Of Police Patrols
While My Friends In The Upper Scale Districts Complain About Losing Foot Patrols,
All We Get In East Oakland Is Rolling Squads Of Ticket-Givers And Auto-Towers
January 6, 2006