Mike Ericson might the dumbest candidate in the nation. I know that is a sweeping statement but here is a guy who lies about paying for an abortion, lies about his endorsements and now is lying about a trip to Cuba. If he wasn’t rich he would be long gone but who can get excited about the dumbest politician in the nation.

With an election in less than 3 months we are pretty busy over here, so we are not posting as often as we would like. So I am putting into place a new program. I will be referring you to other blogs or thoughts I come across that I think have merit. Steve Novick does a very interesting blog post on the power of branding in politics that is worth taking the time to read.

You might have heard that this year voters in San Francisco, will be asked to decide if the Oceanside Water Pollution Control Plant should be named after George W. Bush. While this is funny and as the founder of the Committee to Find the Lost Ballots I am not generally opposed to this type of satire I am not going to support this measure.

The Oceanside Water Pollution Control Plant won the 2004 EPA Plant of the Year Award and offers “extraordinary environmental benefits.” This plant is a vital part of San Francisco’s effort to be one of the greenest cities in the world. George Bush is perhaps the worse presidents ever for the environment. The plant is useful and efficient, I don’t think those terms could even come close to describing this president.

So for those reasons I am opposing this measure.

Despite spending millions of dollars on one off the most negative campaigns in the country, Gordon Smith’s campaign is in a tale spin and Jeff Merkley is building momentum. A Rasmussen Reports Poll puts the race at 41% for Senator Smith and 43% for Speaker Merkley. Over the last five weeks, Merkley gained 5% and Smith slipped 5%. For mid-July Jeff Merkley is well positioned to win this seat.

My firm helped start-up www.stopgordonsmith.com more than a year ago. We knew then that Senator Gordon Smith was vulnerable. If you want to help out Jeff Merkley a truly great guy and someone who would be an outstanding Senator, please visit his website.

So I just learned that former Clinton Administration Labor Secretary has a blog. It is worth checking out for his strong, mainstream, Democratic economic policy ideas. I think his post on infra-structure as an economic stimulus is spot-on. George Bush sent out a bunch of checks that people blew on Japanese electronics or paying off the debt they built buying junk at Wal-Mart. When we could have used that money to create hundreds of thousands of jobs and improve our infrastructure and long term economic prospects.

Now we are in a consumer driven recession that has every sign of getting worse… I guess George Bush does not want the title of worse president ever to be in doubt.

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

Harry J. Aleo passed away on Saturday. While his obituary focused on his horse racing and service in World War Two, he might be best known for his store window. Harry owned Twin Peaks Properties, where he posted his conservative views and Republican political memorabilia. His office stood out like a sore thumb along ultra-liberal 24th Street.

The thing is I knew Harry and I could never tell if he posted this stuff because he believed it or because he found the outrage funny. Probable a bit of both but then Harry was not someone who took himself too seriously. I did not agree with him on a thing but he helped out a young kid new to the City, that is just who Harry was, he could give good counsel even when if it went against his political beliefs.

This marks the end of an era in San Francisco, with Harry’s passing and the likely closure of Twin Peaks Property, Noe Valley has moved from the working class neighborhood it once was, to a bastion of rich, liberal yuppies.

With the election, start up of new campaigns and other activities we have not been keeping up with our blog. Expect more frequent and hopefully interesting posts over the next few weeks. In the meantime I thought you might find George Skelton’s story on redistricting of interest.

From today’s San Francisco Chronicle

The Mirant power plant near San Francisco’s Potrero Hill neighborhood is a disgrace to a city that brands itself as a “green” city for the future. The old turbines that operate at the plant - three run on diesel, one on natural gas - have been spewing an unacceptable amount of filthy pollution for decades. Nearly everyone in the city agrees that the plant has been a major contributor to the disproportionate health woes of residents in San Francisco’s eastern neighborhoods. The sooner it is shut down, the better.

But it makes no sense to shut down the old plants only to replace them with three new ones that will burn fossil fuels that contribute to global warming and create continued health hazards for the same neighborhood’s long-suffering residents - for 30 long years. Regrettably, that’s the only option before the Board of Supervisors on Tuesday. Supervisors must reject it.

The plan before the board would close the four plants at Mirant and install three smaller “peaker” plants a few blocks away. The plan would cost an estimated $250 million. According to the plan’s supporters, the three new plants would run at least 38 percent cleaner than the current ones and would be ready to go by 2010.

A 38 percent reduction is not acceptable. San Francisco must insist on a cleaner alternative - and pour as much political will and technical guile as needed to make it happen.

And the main benefit to approving this plan? “We know that the energy will be reliable, and we know that the plan is ready to go,” Board President Aaron Peskin said.

Well, yes. But if San Francisco expects to live up to its reputation as a green city, it needs to start walking the walk. There’s already so much needed work to bring the city up to speed - “In the 10-county Bay Area, San Francisco ranks last in terms of our solar power,” said David Hochschild, a San Francisco Public Utilities commissioner. “And we have seriously underinvested in energy efficiency” - that it makes no sense to add to our carbon footprint by adding new plants.

We understand the frustration that has led Supervisor Sophie Maxwell and City Attorney Dennis Herrera, each of whom lives within sight of the plumes, to decide that the trade-off of the peakers’ pollution is worth getting rid of the Mirant plant once and for all. “I don’t want the perfect to be the enemy of the good,” Herrera said.

Still, alternatives to building these new plants do exist, if the supervisors and the mayor are seriously interested in pursuing them. And the final argument that many of the current plan’s supporters have presented - that new plants are the only solution acceptable to state regulators - is dubious.

The California Independent System Operator “hasn’t been presented with another plan outside of this one,” said Supervisor Michela Alioto-Pier. “San Francisco has never said to them, there are new models for grids and peakers, and we have another way to make this work.”

Finding another way to make this work, of course, is going to take leadership - and here’s where it’s time for Mayor Gavin Newsom to start living up to his second-term promise to be “audacious,” especially if he wants to earn his claim as a green mayor.
Newsom has been sitting on the fence on this critical issue.

A new transbay cable should help meet the city’s energy demands in 2010. What else can be done to bring the city into compliance with regulators without building new, expensive, polluting plants? How much can we improve our energy efficiency? What about new strategies like reconductoring?

With leadership, tenacity and imagination, San Francisco can pursue alternatives that don’t involve a $250 million, 30-year investment in a 20th century technology and the compromised health of a new generation of San Francisco residents. The residents of southeast
San Francisco have held their breath long enough.

IJ recommends Joe Nation for state Senate seat

TWO QUALIFIED and experienced Democrats are fighting it out in a race that started more than a year ago. Sound familiar?

This campaign now involves three Democrats - and none of them are named Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton.

The race is for the Democratic nomination for the 3rd state Senate District, which includes Marin, southern Sonoma and parts of San Francisco. The candidates are incumbent Sen. Carole Migden, San Francisco Assemblyman Mark Leno and former Marin Assemblyman Joe Nation. Because Democrats dominate the district, the winner on June 3 likely will prevail in November.

The IJ recommends Nation.

All three candidates have impressive resumes.

- Migden, the first-term incumbent from San Francisco, is facing two challengers in large part because her personal behavior, including a bizarre freeway crash, and scores of campaign law violations resulting in a record state fine have made her vulnerable. If this race was just about her ability to deliver for her district, it would be no contest. She has been an effective legislator, and has been a constant presence in Marin since Leno entered the race, but she has betrayed the trust of voters. Her ethical violations and lapses of judgment cannot be rewarded.

- Leno, who is being termed out of his Assembly seat, announced more than a year ago that he was running against Migden. He also has spent much time in Marin and Sonoma of late. He is the chairman of the Assembly Appropriations Committee and also has been an effective state legislator.
- Nation, a climate change expert who represented the North Bay in the Assembly for six years before being termed out, entered the race a few months ago. He would not be running if Leno wasn’t in the race. Conventional wisdom says that Leno and Migden will divide the San Francisco vote, improving Nation’s chances because of his North Bay history.

Leno told the IJ editorial board that this race “is not about geography - it’s about effectiveness.” He says he is a better legislator than Nation.

Of course, this election is partially about geography. The 3rd Senate District is an odd creature that stretches from Hunters Point-Bayview along eastern San Francisco to Marin and southern Sonoma. A North Bay resident has not held this seat for more than 30 years.

Marin and Sonoma would benefit from a state senator who truly knows and understands local issues.

That would be Nation. The former San Rafael resident who also served on the Marin Municipal Water District board now lives in southern Sonoma.
This race is also about ideas and the state’s future. Nation, who was frustrated when he left the Assembly four years ago, is an economist and an expert on climate change - he teaches the subject at Stanford - who will play a leadership role in this increasingly important issue.

When asked about how to fix the state’s broken budget process, his rivals essentially blamed Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger for repealing the state vehicle license fee and Republicans for their vow not to raise taxes. Nation outlined a new “green” version of the license fee, one that would be based half on a vehicle’s value and half on its fuel efficiency. The fee would raise $6.1 billion a year. He would use half to provide incentives for people to buy more fuel efficient cars - rebates worth $1,500 to $2,000.

Nation also advocates slightly lowering the sales tax and broadening it to include services to increase state revenue and avoid the boom-and-bust cycles California has experienced of late.

He would continue to push climate change issues because he says we are running out of time. Nation says we have five to 10 years to get our act together before too much harm has been done. He helped shape climate reform efforts when serving in the Assembly and his expertise in this area is needed in the Senate.

Leno criticized Nation for saying he would never cut education, even with the state facing huge deficits and education accounting for half the state budget. Leno says such positions and votes would make Nation “irrelevant” as state senator and deny him any leadership positions.

There is some truth in that. Such absolute stances should be avoided when tough decisions are required. Marin’s senator needs to have a seat at the table when key decisions are being made - not be on the outside looking in.

But that senator also needs to bring fresh thinking and ideas to Sacramento.
All three are capable of doing the job. The IJ endorses Joe Nation because he would do the best job for Marin, for the district and for the state.