I have no love for Gavin Newsom, but he is getting my vote, anyway. Gonzalez' positions on the environment and transportation issues are great, but he just doesn't have realistic plans to solve what I see as more pressing and complicated problems facing SF. For me, these are the two big ones:

His position on the 'homeless' problem is naive in the extreme. Gonazlez' plan is just more of the same broken thinking that says that the solution is to simply put a roof over everyone's head. Never mind if they are an addict or desperately need mental health care - Gonzalez seems to think that we just need to give them a place to hang their hat and they'll be back on their feet in no time.

The 'homeless' problem is really about people who, for one reason or another, are unable to take care of themselves; the fact that they are homeless is a symptom, not a cause. Newsom's plans, however politically motivated they might be, at least attempt to articulate a more nuanced view of the problem.

Rent control as affordable housing. This part of his plan is laugably broken:
Tenants in these apartments pay about 25% less in rent than tenants in non rent-controlled apartments, making rent control the largest single “affordable housing” program in the City.

I'm not opposed to moderate rent controls, but to consider the rent control lottery to be part of a real affordable housing solution is beyond the pale. Moreover, he seems completely oblivious to the fact that the following idea

I will introduce legislation requiring that a “one for one” replacement, at rent controlled prices, occur when any rent controlled apartment is demolished or converted to non-rental status

is completely at odds with his stated desire for more affordable housing. TICs and condo conversions are the only practical way to produce even moderately affordable housing in SF, yet Gonzalez has consistently opposed them (e.g. HOPE). I simply can't abide this consistent willingness to sacrifice the aspirations of middle-class San Franciscans on the altar of failed ideology.

The following is a selection of responses to a poll on the seti@home website. The poll asks users why they donate their computing resources to the search for extra-terrestrial life.

• Because I'm a science fiction fan, and I believe in alien civilizations.


• Because my girlfriend thinks it's dumb.


• Crazy alien sex.


• Debunk the arrogance of the monkeyboys


• Distributive Computing as Alternative To Taxes


• ET IS HERE AND THE SHADOW GOVERNMENT NEEDS TO BE EXPOSED


• Enjoy Expensive Electric Bills


• Find ET and dissect it. Is it DNA-based? If it exists, it is likely to be fascinating inside.


• Find ET before they find us. Might give us a tactical advantage


• Find ET for personal gain. The knowledge that would be gained from the discovery would benefit me immensely (as it would everyone else, but that's incidental). "For the good of humanity" is an expression of the irrational morality of altruism.


• Find ET in case they are badass biker aliens


• Find ET so Leno will have new material for awhile


• Find a race that possesses the technology to travel great distances in space, so that I can finally get off this stinking hole.


• Get Girls


• Give the aliens a name and then kick in their butt.


• Hoping to find an alien like the one in "Species"


• I am an Alien. Just want to contact with my own species.


• I suspect the concept would be entertaining to college girls.


• I want to find my long-lost, evil-twin, anti-matter half-brother


• I want to impress my girlfriend


• I would like to see if an ET civilization would treat us as badly as we treat non-human animals


• I'm so lonely


• I've got lakefront property in FLA to sell, what better customer than "ET"!


• If I find E.T.do I get to meet Jodie Foster? Please?


• It's a techie tractor pull


• Let Star Trek please be true!


• My girlfriend saw it on a friends computer and found it annoying


• Possibility and fantasy


• SCIENCE KICKS ASS!!!


• So I can get lucky with an alien babe.


• The same reson firetrucks are red! well, if 1+2 is 3 and 3x4 is 12, hrmmm there 12 inches in a ruler, queen elizabeth was a ruler, queen elizabeth was also a ship, ships sail in the sea, fish live in the sea, fish have fins, the Fins fought the russians, russians wore red, firetrucks are russian, and thats why firetrucks are red, and thats why i do seti.


• To be able to add "Aided U.C. Berkeley in analyzing radio telescope data." to my resume.


• To bring Denmark up on rank number one where it belongs


• To find a cute alien to run away with and marry.


• To find a planet and sell the naming rights.


• To get Finland to pass Sweden on country-list

Yahoo News reports:

Describing the White House's concerns about access to the document, Bush said it is important "for the writers of the presidential daily brief to feel comfortable that the documents will never be politicized and/or unnecessarily exposed for public purview."

Of the many ways Mr. Bush has found to mangle the English language, his propensity to simply misuse words is probably the most irksome. Why use a word when you obviously don't know what it means? Why not just say 'review'? I just don't understand

Yahoo News reports:

Describing the White House's concerns about access to the document, Bush said it is important "for the writers of the presidential daily brief to feel comfortable that the documents will never be politicized and/or unnecessarily exposed for public purview."

Of the many ways Mr. Bush has found to mangle the English language, his propensity to simply misuse words is probably the most irksome. Why use a word when you obviously don't know what it means? Why not just say 'review'? I just don't understand

And today, Mr. Bush has a quote similar to Mr. Rumsfeld's yesterday:

"We are at war," Bush said in his first public comments about the downed helicopter. "There are people that hate us. ... The fallen soldiers were making America more secure."

Isn't his use of the word 'war' tantamount to acknowledgement that the reconstruction project in Iraq has been a failure? As a peacekeeping mission, things clearly aren't working out so well; however, if you just slap the word 'war' back on, we're still pretty much kicking ass.

Reuter's reports:

On NBC's "Meet the Press," Rumsfeld said: "We can win this war. We will win this war.... The work in Iraq is difficult. It is tough. It is going to take time. But progress is being made."

No one seemed to really take note, but I was struck by his use of the phrase 'win this war' here (in epistrophe, no less). I thought we already won the war, that major hostilities were over and the we've long since moved on to the relatively simple business of building a democracy in Iraq?

Given that the Bush administration exceeds even Clinton's in the way it manipulates language in order to frame debates, I can't help but wonder what Mr. Rumsfeld has signalled here.