I drive down from Oregon to the Bay Area to visit my parents every 6 weeks or so. My dad is 90, my mom is 88 so I want to be seeing them as much as possible.. My Dad lives in San Rafael, My mom lives in Berkeley on Benvenue street just down fom Parker.
Ive always consdeired the East Bay to be my home, I'v lived all over, not least in Oakland
Ive lived in Oakland, rented, owned, worked here in several places, met my first wife here. I went to both Laney and Merritt.. I have a lot of affection for the old place so I wanted to come down and see what effect the latest unrest has brought to it. Join me below
I'm sittin in Tulllys, right across the Frank Ogawa Plaza from the City Hall. The City hall is an impressive old building with a big tower and cupola.
I'm here to judge the impact of Occupy Oakland on the city and , after spending an hour so far looking for it, haven't seen any at all.
I'm beginnning to think OO may be assuming the Legend In Their Mind Status. There's nothing happening here at all.
Ive been going around trying to engage people in conversation for an hour or so. Like any big city, lots of people are indiffferent. But all wh hae answered are in agreement---OO is just a big pain in the -----
Just got through talking to the barrista here. I am not one to jump to conclusions but he sure looked obviously a different sexual orientation than mine and looked by the bright orange/chartreuse hair mix like he would support any good liberal cause. He said it was worse last October, they had to close down for 19 days. he wasn't at all happy with them and had a lot to say like brought a whole lot of bad people in here they didn't like.Well, I'm sure ski masks can be frightening. So much for 99%, better go with 98% from now on
Just an anecdote while I'm sitting here
Oh good!! There's a police presence! Finally some action!!! But its only one cop on a bicycle talking to someone. He is the only policeman in sight and i have a view for blocks. WOW! An Oakland cop talking to someone and he's not clubbing him---who'da thought?
Darn, now he's gone and he didn't club anyone.
Hafta say looks like the Oakland Occupy is a no show during the business days. I have a feeling now that this whole thing is just a big internet buzz morphed into some action every rare now and then.
There's an intersting column in the SF Chronicle/Gate from Chip Johnson and anyone who would call him a conservative or 1%erwould be talking out their hat. This pretty much gives the view of a lot of people. They want the City Council to stand up to OO. I haven't found one other person outside of OO who is in favor of it.
The council failed to pass a resolution calling on police to enforce all available laws to prevent another shutdown of the Port of Oakland or another violent demonstration. The seaport terminal has been shut down twice by Occupy Oakland protests since November.
Council members Ignacio de la Fuente, Libby Schaaf, Jane Brunner and Desley Brooks voted in favor of the resolution, which also would have required Occupy protesters to obtain permits for their marches and rallies.
But it did not get the required five-vote majority needed to pass. Nancy Nadel and Rebecca Kaplan voted against the measure - no big surprise there. Kaplan spouted some nonsense about gun violence while Nadel wandered off into an infomercial for restorative justice.
So I'm going to hang out here in downtown Oakland for a while.
If somethin big happens you'll be the first to know.
I'll come back and update after a while but first I'm going to go down and chow down on some excellent Argentinian empanadas (aj!) I saw down at the 9th street open fair
Ciao