San Francisco Diary--Journey Of An Exile

The picture is the Bay Bridge at sunset, taken from a hill on Yerba Buena Island,looking west towards The City. The island is an integral part of the bridge--two bridges, actually. The western span, built very much along the lines of the Golden Gate, has remained basically pristine since it was built. The eastern spans, which you can't see here, are the ones which have had all the problems. The tunnel through Yerba Buena Island is the third component of the famous bridge, connecting the two bridges.

NOTE: And now CalTrans (the California Department of Transportation), tells us that it has found a permanent fix for the crack in the eastern span bridge superstructure which has caused multiple bridge closings at some rather inconvenient and embarrassing times over the past few months. They also said that the check is in the mail, and they're from the government, and they're here to help us.

Now how's this for a brilliant solution which took months and dozens of highly-paid government engineers to solve? Close the lanes of the bridge closest to the brace/eyebar (that caused so much trouble and destruction) nightly for about three or four weeks. Then put a new eyebar over the one that keeps cracking and breaking. Why this will take multiple lane-closing over a period of several weeks is unclear. But it sounds to me like we will now have two potential eyebar failures instead of just one during the next high winds.

And now for the piece de resistance. This isn't the end of it. You see, this permanent fix is only temporary (are you following me?). Sometime in the unknown future (probably after the next failure), CalTrans says they'll have to do a major closure of the bridge to assess how well the permanent/temporary fix worked. By the fiteenth or sixteenth repair (with no deaths or serious injuries, we hope), the all new spans will be finished, and this troublesome portion of the bridge will be gone forever. The new "cable-stayed" bridge looks beautiful in the plans, and is supposed to be far more earthquake-resistant and esthetically pleasing than the former one. But since it's being built by the same people doing the current repairs to the old bridge, I think I'll keep taking the BART tube under the Bay for my trips to Berkeley.

Note: Some things are too much even for the San Francisco Chronicle, home of slanted news, incomprehensible editorials, non-existent investigative reporters, and Mark Morford. Responding to thousands of complaints about the degenerate public sex taking place at the Folsom Street Fair, "responsible S&M advocates" have proposed a compromise. Are you ready? Public sex tents! Now on Earth, that would be simply laughed off as a preposterous idea. But this ain't Earth. This is San Francisco. The proposal is being "taken under advisement" by Supervisor Bevan Dufty (I repeat, I did not make that name up). Says the Chronicle: "Public sex tents? Now there's an idea that should have been shot down the second it was announced from the mouth of a member of the 'leather community' in response to complaints about public sex at Folsom Street Fair and its smaller sibling fair, Up Your Alley."

And then, in an astounding moment of unequivocal clarity, the old Chron says: "Since our local leaders are having trouble speaking the obvious, we will: Public sex is not appropriate at Folsom Street Fair or anywhere else. Even in San Francisco. Public sex isn't just lewd, it's illegal under state law. Enough. This is a quality-of-life issue that should have been tackled years ago. Local leaders need to stop clowning around and insist that everyone obey the law." I'm still in shock with disbelief. The Chronicle has finally found a perversion that it doesn't think should be made a part of San Francisco's reputation for being cutting-edge.

NOTE: The Obama administration has asked the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals sitting in San Francisco to dismiss a lawsuit accusing former Bush administration attorney John Yoo of violating the legal rights of a terrorist detainee. In case you don't remember that name, heres' a link to my July 18 article: Yoo. Yoo Who?.

Oddly, the banana republic vendetta of Obama and Eric Holder's Justice Department seems to have taken an unexpected detour on this one. Yoo was accused of authorizing the torture of a terrorism suspect. Yoo had merely written a legal opinion requested by President Bush. Yoo had no power of his own to authorize torture. He advised that under the circumstances, and given the foreign nature of the capture or its clear terrorist connections, the president was entitled to exercise his inherent war powers provided that he abide by proper legal, constitutional and treaty restraints. But to the persecutors in the Obama administration out to get their political enemies, it was a criminal act.

The motion before the court states that federal law does not allow damage claims against lawyers who advise the president on national security issues. "Such lawsuits ask courts to second-guess presidential decisions and pose 'the risk of deterring full and frank advice regarding the military's detention and treatment of those determined to be enemies during an armed conflict.'" The Obama/Holder lawyers didn't have to work too hard on that wording, since it is almost exactly the same wording used by Yoo in his draft of his own defense.

The suit was filed by Jose Padilla. The memo didn't actually even apply to his case, since Padilla is a US citizen who was arrested in Chicago (appropriately enough) in 2002 and accused of plotting with al Qaeda to detonate a radioactive "dirty bomb." But he was held in a Navy brig and intensively interrogated under new more stringent federal laws regarding terrorism. The suit tried to draw a very tenuous connection between Yoo's memo and Padilla's enhanced interrogation.

U.S. District Judge Jeffrey White, a Bush II appointee, made a sharp turn at the RINO fork in the road, and made a series of decisions to allow suits on very shaky legal grounds. Often the cases were rejected by other judges in the Circuit before they got to him. So when the defense moved for dismissal on the pleadings (a way of saying there is no law to support this type of suit), White said Padilla had the right to sue the "alleged architect of the government policy" on enemy combatants." A lawsuit built on tissue paper.

It is now up to the judge to decide whether he should grant the dismissal after the Justice Department has requested a dismissal on the original grounds which White denied earlier. The Justice Department, however, has added some strong words to the original defense motion. It said in its new brief that Padilla is asking the courts to determine the legality of Yoo's advice, Bush's decision to detain Padilla, the conditions of his confinement and the methods of his interrogation, all "matters of war and national security that are beyond judicial authority."

I don't know what produced this dramatic turnaround, but my best guess is now that Obama has decided to pursue a surge in Afghanistan, he may need his troops and the CIA to add a little extra nudge to the questioning of detained terrorists, and he doesn't want a future administration coming after him for "war crimes." He's been in office too long for me to believe Obama or his pet lawyer Holder would do this because it's the right thing to do.

Note: All right, Mark Morford Fans. Nothing particularly political or of pure San Francisco interest this week. But I know we have loyalists who need a weekly fix, so I'm sending you to his current post anyway: Confused Naked Teens Click Here. Now that got your attention, didn't it? Do you suppose that Morford has any connection to Obama's new Kiddie Porn Czar?