Anybody but Breed for mayor
The video above shows that London Breed doesn't really understand the homeless issue: "The city's economy is thriving but not for everyone," over a shot of a homeless man out cold on the sidewalk.
The implication: the city's homeless are simply poor city residents, not people with crippling drug and psychological problems, probably like that guy and most of the city's homeless.
Breed also tells us that she has "achieved the improbable dream of becoming supervisor and acting mayor." Neither she nor any other city kid has ever "dreamed" about becoming a district supervisor or acting mayor.
From the above video: "San Francisco needs a strong leader, someone who won't back down and won't let politics get in the way."
As supervisor Breed was quickly co-opted by City Hall and city departments, since she was a blank slate on policy from the beginning.
She rarely has any significant political stands to back down from. But her recent waffling on Scott Wiener's SB187 housing bill---and being endorsed by Wiener!---is not likely to help her in SF, where even the Planning Department opposes Wiener's heavy-handed approach.
"Politics" is the business she's in and the process by which we choose our leaders. The implication of Breed's derogatory comment is that it's somehow an obstacle to good government, instead of democracy itself, not a sordid process that Breed is supposedly above.
As a District 5 blogger, I've followed London Breed's undistinguished career as supervisor from the beginning, when she emerged from well-deserved obscurity and was elected District 5 Supervisor in 2012 due to our misguided Ranked Choice Voting system, as I pointed out at the time:
...Breed was the most acceptable default candidate. In an issue-free campaign, the least objectionable candidate---not a racist, not a homophobe, a woman of color, photogenic, etc.---can win. Without RCV there would have been a runoff where there might have been a real political discussion of her record and specific issues.
As supervisor Breed quickly made a remarkable record as a dim bulb on the issues.
Labels: City Government, District 5, Highrise Development, History, Homelessness, Japantown, London Breed, Ranked Choice Voting, Ron Conway, Scott Wiener, Smart Growth
posted by Rob Anderson @ 2:47 PM
3 comments
3 Comments:
"Thounds of new homes". So why not get off your implementation of plan Bay Area. Get off your developing treasure island crap and prove you worry about the homeless by building housing for them on a piece of city property that you have decided to sell to a private developer. London breed are your ideas just as good as your Masonic ave idea?
"London Breed doesn't really understand the homeless issue"
So which candidate does ??
IMO NONE of them!!
Agreed. Both Alioto and Leno have promised the impossible: a quick solution to an issue that has been with us for more than 15 years. Just got an email from Kim with her homeless proposals. It would be good to hear a single major candidate tell the public what it doesn't want to hear: there is no quick fix to the problem, since it's a national issue that will be with us for the foreseeable future.
The best thing we can do is keep implementing humane, effective programs to cope with what's obviously a chronic problem.
My favorite program: Homeward Bound that has bused more than 8,000 homeless people out of the city in the last ten years.
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