The San Francisco Police Officers Association (POA) never learns.

There’s an old saying, “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, and expecting the same result.” That must be the motto for the POA.

Current POA President Tony Montoya is responsible for the slanderous attacks on the late Jeff Adachi and District Attorney elect Chesa Boudin. He ran for office as someone who would be more in synch with the culture of San Francisco. We know how that turned out.

Now the POA rank and file may elect a new leader who is more hard core and bombastic than the incumbent Tony Montoya. Stay tuned.

San Francisco Examiner 11.18.2019

Less than two years after saying he would abandon the “bombastic style” of his predecessors, the president of San Francisco’s police union could be ousted over his new approach to leading the embattled association.

San Francisco Police Officers Association President Tony Montoya (pictured below) and three members of his leadership team will have challengers when they run for re-election in January, the San Francisco Examiner has learned.

The POA union joined other law enforcement groups in spending more than $650,000 to oppose now District Attorney elect Chesa Boudin in the Nov. 5 election.

“I don’t know how anyone can look at the extreme hit job and the mailers and the ads they ran in the DA’s race and think that is kinder and gentler,” said retired ACLU attorney John Crew. “There seems to be broad consensus that that was extreme and over the top and ultimately backfired.”

Crew, who has been a frequent critic of the SFPOA, said the union has “completely squandered” its political clout in recent years.

“The question for the next generation of San Francisco police officers is, do they want a relationship with the people of San Francisco that is new and productive and collaborative, even if there are disagreements?” Crew said. “Or do they want to follow the example of the old guard which has not served them well?”

When he became president in May 2018, Montoya said he would be more thoughtful and work more closely with City Hall than former SFPOA presidents Gary Delagnes and Martin Halloran, who earned reputations for being brash and opposing police reforms.

But one of his predecessors said the collaborative approach has not been successful.

“When we left, Tony made it really clear that it was going to be a kinder, gentler POA,” Delagnes said. “He tried the new way here and it’s culminated in members of the Board of Supervisors yelling ‘F— the POA,’ so I am a little dubious that this new style is working.”

Delagnes was referring to the anti-police union chant led by Supervisor Sandra Fewer on election night after the SFPOA spent hundreds of thousands of dollars opposing District Attorney-elect Chesa Boudin in the contest.

“In San Francisco you have to fight for everything you get,” Delagnes said. “The POA is being used as a punching bag, and it’s a little old. I just don’t think that the current leadership is aggressive enough.”

Delagnes said he has endorsed a slate of candidates including newly promoted Sgt. Rich Cibotti to run against Montoya and his team. The other candidates are said to be officers Kevin Lyons for vice president, Kevin Worrell for secretary and Louis Wong for treasurer.

Montoya fired back at Delagnes in an email to the Examiner.

Montoya said Delagnes is bitter about the SFPOA executive board voting to fire him from his role as a consultant in March after he publicly accused the late Public Defender Jeff Adachi of being “a serial adulterer” on Facebook.

“Gary should remember that projecting leadership and strength must include a dose of humility and a continuous re-evaluation of what’s in the best interests of our members,” Montoya said. “I am proud of what our board has accomplished and what our membership does every day to try and keep our city safe.”

Montoya said the current leadership team has “put the membership first and has delivered results” including working with City Hall to obtain “longevity pay raises for our members.”

“Gary appears more interested in settling years old personal vendettas, seeing his name appear in the media and looking for validation in his retirement,” Montoya said. “The POA will stay focused on delivering results for our membership and will not be sidetracked by anyone groveling for relevancy.”

While Montoya may be working to repair the union’s relationships with City Hall, critics question whether the SFPOA has actually changed its ways under his leadership.

In May, Montoya called on Police Chief Bill Scott to resign after he blamed investigators for widely condemned raids on a journalist.

On the other hand, Supervisor Hillary Ronen acknowledged earlier this month that she had sat down with Montoya, marking the first time she had a meeting with the SFPOA.

“I thought we were going to be able to move forward as professionals,” Ronen said at a press conference condemning the anti-Boudin ads. “[To] be able to disagree and speak about those disagreements in thoughtful ways. But this unprecedented spending on lie after lie after lie sets us backwards.”

Cibotti confirmed he is running against Montoya but declined to comment further until the election is decided.

“This is a union matter and I believe it should stay amongst the members,” Cibotti said.

In addition to being an officer, Cibotti is an attorney and has represented officers accused of discipline on behalf of the SFPOA.

He regularly writes articles for the SFPOA Journal, including one in which he criticized the police watchdog Department of Police Accountability for going “after cops for any and all possible violations.”

In another, Cibotti took jabs at the Board of Supervisors for passing new guidelines for referring to convicted felons as “justice-involved persons.”

https://www.sfexaminer.com/news/battle-brews-at-sf-police-union-over-leadership-style/

#BreakingNews Sources for Heavy.com from Walter Reed said the President was being checked out for chest discomfort. No other information is available at this time,” Andrew Vernon wrote on Twitter on the evening of November 16, 2019. Vernon’s Twitter page profile says that he is “President & CEO. Opinion Contributor @thehill. @ColumbiaMSPH Alum & @UMaine Alum. @USArmy Veteran. #GoHabsGo.”

According to an article on him by the University of Maine, Vernon used to work at the VA in the position of “coordinator and cardio-pulmonary rehabilitation therapist with the Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation Service.”

https://heavy.com/news/2019/11/trump-chest-pain/

….Could be the heartburn from watching the Impeachment hearings while consuming Big Macs.

The Guardian 11.16.2019

White House says president is ‘healthy and energetic’ and tests were part of his routine annual physical

Donald Trump spent more than two hours at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center on Saturday for what the White House said were medical tests as part of his annual physical.

The appointment wasn’t on Trump’s weekend public schedule, and his last physical was in February.

His press secretary, Stephanie Grisham, said the 73-year-old president was “anticipating a very busy 2020” and wanted to take advantage of “a free weekend” in Washington to begin portions of his routine checkup.

She did not specify which tests he’d received or explain why the visit had not been disclosed in advance. Trump’s 2018 and 2019 physicals were both announced ahead of time and appeared on his public schedule.

“The president remains healthy and energetic without complaints, as demonstrated by his repeated vigorous rally performances in front of thousands of Americans several times a week,” she said.

Trump also spent time at the hospital meeting with the family of a special forces soldier injured in Afghanistan. And he visited with medical staff “to share his thanks for all the outstanding care they provide to our wounded warriors, and wish them an early happy Thanksgiving,” Grisham said.

It was the president’s ninth visit to the hospital since taking office.

Trump’s last checkup, in February 2019, showed he had gained weight in office. At 110kg (243lb) and 190cm (6 feet 3 inches), he passed the official threshold for being considered obese, with a body mass index (BMI) of 30.4.

That checkup, which was supervised by Trump’s physician, Dr Sean Conley, took more than four hours and involved a panel of 11 specialists.

Saturday’s test came as House investigators on Capitol Hill were interviewing a White House budget official as part of the impeachment inquiry. Trump has insisted he did nothing wrong.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/nov/17/donald-trump-visits-hospital-for-unscheduled-two-hour-medical-checkup

The perspective from The Nation is always worthwhile.  Watching the hearings I have not heard a similiar analysis from the Mainstream Media nor did I hear these thoughts on such Progressive media as Democracy Now.

In my distillation of the testimony by the three Diplomats my takeway is less about America’s relationship with Russia. It has been more about the genuine dismay the three Diplomats with a cumulative 111 years experience expressed about Trump’s use of the Foreign Service to further his crass political aims and destroy his adversaries.

Still, the observations from The Nation are important and should be read and treated seriously.

Jeet Heer – The Nation 11.15.2019

Trump should be impeached for using his office for corrupt purposes—not for challenging the national security consensus.

At a rally in Louisiana on Thursday, Donald Trump mocked two members of the government, senior State Department official George Kent and the top US diplomat in Ukraine, William Taylor, both of whom testified in the impeachment hearing the previous day. “How about when they asked to these two Never-Trumpers, what exactly do you think you impeach him for?” Trump asked the crowd. “They stood there like, what?” The president drawled out the “what” to make it sound like the stunned speech of a confused person: “whaaa?”

Trump’s words were typically false and malicious. Neither Kent nor Taylor are Never-Trumpers. Both are civil servants who have worked for both Democratic and Republican administrations. This is why they refused to answer the question from Republican members of Congress as to what was impeachable in Trump’s actions. As government employees, both refrained from taking a stance on impeachment, saying the decision belonged to Congress.

It was precisely their status as members of the national security establishment that made Kent and Taylor ideal witnesses from the point of view of the Democrats. As Peter Baker of The New York Times observed, Taylor provided “the image, at least, of a wise, fatherly figure with hard-to-undercut credibility expressing restrained but unmistakable disapproval of what he found when he turned over the rock.” Quinta Jurecic, managing editor of the Lawfare blog, echoed these comments, saying, “Something to be said here about the desire for an older, white father figure with establishment credentials to Set Things Right.” He added that, “There’s a profoundly small-c conservative impulse there.”

This small-c conservativism was evident in the way Kent, and to a lesser extent Taylor, framed the impeachment issue as an outgrowth of Trump’s sabotaging efforts to build a strong alliance between Ukraine and the United States. “For the past five years, we have focused our united efforts across the Atlantic to support Ukraine in its fight for the cause of freedom, and the rebirth of a country free from Russian dominion and the warped legacy of Soviet institutions and post-Soviet behavior,” Kent argued, adding. “The United States has clear national interests at stake in Ukraine.”

Taylor presented a more nuanced view. He agreed with Kent that a Ukraine alliance made sense because it “is clearly in our national interest to deter further Russian aggression.” But Taylor’s focus was on the confusion caused when Trump cronies like Rudy Giuliani carried out a separate foreign policy that was often at odds with the consensus agreed upon by the national security establishment. As Taylor observed, “There appeared to be two channels of US policy-making and implementation, one regular and one highly irregular.”

The Democrats chose to elevate Kent and Taylor precisely because they were nonpartisan professionals, hence could speak in terms that might win independents and Republicans to impeachment. But nonpartisan is not the same as nonpolitical. As their testimony made clear, Kent and Taylor very much have a political agenda: They are advocates for a hawkish foreign policy that wants to use Ukraine as a bulwark against Russia. The diplomats used the limelight impeachment gave them to sell this policy to the American public as if it were the only approach a patriot could take.

As Republicans like Devin Nunes and Brad Wenstrup were quick to point out, Barack Obama resisted a push to send military aid to Ukraine after the Russian invasion of Crimea. Nunes and Wenstrup brought this up with the intent to prove that Trump was more in accord with the foreign policy establishment on Ukraine than Obama was. But the proper way to frame this is to note that presidents have a perfect right to reject the counsel of foreign policy hawks and act in measured ways if they see fit.

The whole question of proper Ukraine policy is a distraction, created by the Democrats’ desire to hold impeachment hearings on an issue where they could align themselves with the national security establishment and win over independents and conservatives.

Trump should not be impeached because he upset the national security establishment. Presidents have not just the right to disregard that establishment but, in fact, would usually be wise to do so. Nor should Trump be impeached because he undermined a Ukraine policy that has bipartisan support. After all, outside the consensus in Washington, there are many others who disagree with that policy. Even the fact that Trump runs a messy White House where goons like Giuliani are elbowing career diplomats isn’t really a good reason to impeach him. Giuliani is repugnant, but there’s ample precedent for a White House with private back channels. During the Kennedy administration, the president’s brother Robert Kennedy used a back channel with the USSR to help de-escalate during the Cuban missile crisis.

Regarding Ukraine, the most valid ground to impeach Trump is that he used his office for a corrupt purpose, to get a foreign government to slime a rival politician. That’s the offense that merits a constitutional rebuke and removal. Unfortunately, Democrats have watered down their own argument by giving center stage to Kent and Taylor, who prefer to grandstand for a hawkish foreign policy. Going forward, it’ll be crucial for Democrats to keep the focus on corruption rather than travel down the irrelevant byways of Ukraine policy.

https://www.thenation.com/article/kent-taylor-impeachment-ukraine/

Marvelous Marin, one of the wealthiest counties in America,  is receiving the kind of headlines its generally well heeled, entitled residents are not accustomed to reading about. 

Marin City, home of Marin’s predominantly black population, is a place most residents only seeing driving by on Highway 101 or passing through on public transit.

Marin Independent Journal 11.14.2019

Shooting killed five, injured several others

ORINDA, CALIFORNIA — Following a series of raids in Vallejo, Antioch, San Mateo and Marin City, authorities announced the arrest of five suspects Thursday in the Halloween shooting here that left five dead and several more injured.

Two of the suspects are Marin City residents.

Announcing the arrests, the Contra Costa County sheriff also suggested that two of the five victims might have had a hand in the shooting. He did not say which ones.

The charges range from murder and conspiracy to accessory. Authorities have still not discussed details of the crime, nor exactly what role each person is alleged to have played.

The shooting occurred around 10:50 p.m. Oct. 31 at 114 Lucille Way in Orinda. The house had been rented out on Airbnb, and was the site of a large party with more than 100 guests, authorities said.

Law enforcement officials said early on that the investigation included probes into gangs in San Francisco’s Fillmore District and other parts of the Bay Area, including Marin City.

The victims have been identified as Tiyon Farley, 22, of Antioch; Omar Taylor, 24, of Pittsburg; Raymon Hill Jr., 23, of San Francisco/Oakland; Javlin County, 29, of Sausalito/Richmond; and Oshiana Tompkins, 19, of Vallejo/Hercules.

County was identified by friends as a Marin City resident.

https://www.marinij.com/2019/11/14/marin-city-police-conduct-early-morning-raids-related-to-orinda-halloween-shooting-that-killed-five/

It only took a few days for the Wall Street Journal to weigh in on the election of Chesa Boudin as District Attorney

Here are the exacts words from the mouthpiece of American capitalism and the Corporate State.  This is just one salvo from the basions of corporate America.  

Readers should expect  demagoguery from the right wing, corporate, law enforcement leaning media during Chesa Boudin’s tenure as District Attorney.

Wall Street Journal 11.13.2019

The new district attorney will ignore quality-of-life offenses.

The deterioration of the City by the Bay has been tragic to watch. From the Tenderloin to Mid-Market to the Mission, open use of narcotics is commonplace, homeless encampments dominate public spaces, and human feces dot the sidewalks. The middle class has fled punishing housing costs, and neighborhoods are increasingly plagued with burglaries and property crimes.

Why not?  HIllary got totally, pardon the expression, “Screwed” in 2016.  In case anyone fhas forgotten Hillary received THREE MILLION more votes than the failed game show host currently in residence at the While House.

Only in the absurd American system can someone receive THREE million more votes and lose an election.  We can thank the slave owning founding fathers who wanted to protect their plantation mentality for creation of the “Electoral College.”

Guess what? We have an incumbent today who most definitely has the “Plantation Mentality.”  The Founding Fathers got their wish, 230 years after this country received its “Independence.” Given the way things have matriculated we might have been better off as a subject of the British Crown.

Washington Post 11.12.2019

This is an excellent analytical piece by Randy Shaw, publisher of Beyond Chron.  It cuts through all the superficial blather in the Media since Chesa’s victory as District Attorney. Randy’s insightful observations provide the first realistic perspective on what DA Boudin will be confronting when he takes office.

Beyond Chron -Randy Shaw 11.12.2019

A True Progressive Protects Low-Income Neighborhoods

After eight years of George Gascon refusing to vigorously prosecute Tenderloin drug dealers, many in the neighborhood were looking forward to Suzy Loftus permanently replacing him as San Francisco District Attorney. Loftus backed community demands around police redistricting in 2015 and was expected to stop the revolving door of drug dealer arrests that has long hurt the Tenderloin.

But Loftus lost and Chesa Boudin is the new District Attorney. He is unknown to many in the Tenderloin.  Some fear that his concern with mass incarceration—which most San Franciscans share—will lead him to refuse to prosecute a Tenderloin drug dealer demographic which is over 90% African American or Latino.

Some Tenderloin people felt Boudin’s election would be the worst thing that could happen to the neighborhood. But these critics are wrong. Here’s why.

Boudin a National Progressive

George  Gascon was not part of any criminal justice social movement. With his San Francisco political career launched by Gavin Newsom, he was never seen locally as “progressive.”

Gascon got burned soon after he became Police Chief in 2009 by arresting so many Tenderloin drug dealers that the Sherriff and Public Defender complained. As District Attorney he made sure not to repeat that “mistake.” Gascon also never built a political base which is why he would have lost re-election had he stayed in San Francisco.

Chesa Boudin has very different roots and priorities. He will be a District Attorney whose approach to low-income communities of color will become a national story. Unlike Gascon or any San Francisco District Attorney since Terrence Hallinan, he is a true progressive who does not feel low-income communities should be containment zones for drug dealers. When Boudin met with a member of my staff during the campaign he expressed surprise that there was not more police visibility in the Tenderloin.

Hallinan’s shortcoming was he won election as District Attorney without knowing how to run the office. In contrast,  Boudin’s tenure as deputy public defender educated him about how the District Attorney’s office operates. He knows how to end the revolving door that Tenderloin drug dealers arrested time and again have used to avoid prosecution.After all, the public defender’s office represents these criminal defendants.

Boudin ran an avowedly political campaign. This makes it a lot easier for the Tenderloin to hold him politically accountable for not serving the neighborhood. My sense is that he welcomes that accountability. He believes his office can help reduce drug dealing in the Tenderloin and elsewhere.

Mass Police Resignations?

There have been rumors of mass police resignations if Boudin were elected. This obviously concerns Tenderloin people as the neighborhood suffers from a lack of officers (which is why Tenderloin “beat patrols” are rarely seen). The Tenderloin has lacked officers since former Chief Suhr instituted a redistricting plan in 2015 that vastly expanded the district and left it understaffed. Residents, owners and nonprofit workers urged the Chief not to create a new Tenderloin Station and all of our predictions of increased drug activity and fewer officers have proved true.

I don’t know if these police resignations will occur. But I feel a disconnect from the officers I talk with in the Tenderloin and the angry, combative negativity expressed by the Police Officers Association (the POA). If an officer wants to leave because Boudin has a more progressive approach to criminal justice, the city may be better off without them.

If the POA feels it can make Boudin look bad by either leaving the SFPD understaffed or by not making arrests, they are making another political mistake. Boudin overcame a $600,000 independent expenditure campaign by the POA, and the voter backlash to that campaign likely helped elected him.The POA’s causing understaffing or not making arrests would just give Boudin an excuse for not succeeding.

Police officers certainly should leave if they do not want to work with Boudin as District Attorney. But no District Attorney could be more lenient on drug dealing and other crimes than George Gascon.

Give Boudin a Chance

I encourage Tenderloin folks upset with Boudin’s victory to give him a chance. D6 Supervisor Matt Haney actively campaigned for Boudin and has his own responsibility for reducing district drug dealing; Haney also needs a District Attorney who is aggressive in prosecuting D6 drug dealers, as voters will also blame the supervisor if the same dealers repeatedly return to the street.

The national movement for criminal justice reform does not want stories coming out of San Francisco about low-income communities of color suffering under an ideological driven “social justice” mayor. I don’t think Boudin fits that stereotype. I think he is a true progressive. That means he cares about the quality of life for the low-income and working-class residents of non-gentrified urban neighborhoods like San Francisco’s Tenderloin.

The San Francisco District Attorney’s office needs major change. And while Loftus supporters will still regret her defeat, the Tenderloin must now work with Chesa Boudin to  end public drug dealing in the neighborhood.

http://beyondchron.org/will-chesa-boudin-prosecute-tenderloin-drug-dealers/

While law enforcement has been attacking the newly elected District Attorney, what have the San Francisco cops been doing for years to stop the senseless crime which is happening on their watch?  

The Police Officers Association can criticize the District Attorney.  That’s easy.

Law enforcement needs to take a hard look at itself. If the cops aren’t apprehending the suspects so that they can be prosecuted then the POA has no business calling out the DA.

San Francisco Chronicle 11.11.2019

The violent beating of three older men captured on video in San Francisco’s Chinatown over the weekend has sparked fear and outrage among some residents in the city’s Chinese-American community, who said they feel increasingly targeted following several high-profile attacks on the neighborhood’s most vulnerable residents.

No one has been arrested and no suspects have been identified in the attack. Supervisor Aaron Peskin, whose district includes Chinatown, visited the scene on Monday and said police believe the same vehicle in the attack was involved in another robbery the day before.

“We do not tolerate this violence in San Francisco,” he said. “We’re going to apprehend these criminals.”

“In almost 20 years on and off the board of supervisors, I’ve never seen violence like this in District Three, particularly in the senior-filled community of Chinatown,” Peskin said. “I am more than concerned about it.”

The police department has “saturated” the area with officers as investigators work to track down the group, Peskin said.

A citizen captured the disturbing video of the attack from an overhead perch, showing four assailants ambushing a group at Clay Street and Walter U. Lum Place on the southwest corner of Portsmouth Square just after 9 p.m. Saturday.

Officials said the violence erupted after one of the attackers ripped the cell phone from a man’s hand and others tried to intervene only to be pummeled.

One assailant cold-cocked a man with a sweeping roundhouse punch, leaving him unconscious on his back as others struggled in the street feet away. The marauders then jumped into a waiting sport utility vehicle and sped off.

Three victims, all men ages 63, 67 and 68, were left with varying injuries, police said. Two were treated at San Francisco General Hospital and later released. A third was checked out by paramedics and released at the scene.

Every Picture Tells a Story – Ongoing Series

Election Night San Francisco 11.5.2019

DA elect Chesa Boudin overcame a vicious campaign of character assassination by the Police Officers Association (POA) to be elected to office.

On election night Chesa, the usual picture of diplomacy and decorum, showed his devoted followers what he thinks of the attempt to smear and destroy him.

Into the trashcan of history the  POA literature is tossed to join other noxious political literature.

Photo- San Francisco Chronicle