Larry Baer, Ross Mirkarimi, and the furies

From the SF Chronicle this morning:

The decision by San Francisco’s anti-domestic-violence community to call for the suspension of Giants CEO Larry Baer after a public tussle with his wife followed weeks of waiting for Baer to take responsibility publicly for what he had done and seek help with anger management.

“It never came,” said Andrea Shorter, one of the 12 people who signed an open letter to Major League Baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred that was released Monday. What the group wanted was a public statement by Baer akin to the “it’s all true, and I’m getting help” statement that former Mayor Gavin Newsom made when he publicly admitted having had an affair with a staff member who was also the wife of a friend...

For Shorter and others, however, the issue wasn’t whether Baer’s actions rose to a criminal level. It was also about the bullying behavior, something that both the Giants and city leaders have long crusaded against.

“It was very disturbing and clearly very physically aggressive,” Shorter said. After the incident, Larry and Pam Baer issued a joint statement through the Giants saying it was “a heated argument in public over a family matter” and that they were both “deeply embarrassed by the situation” and had since “resolved the issue.”

As time wore on, so did the patience of the group, which also included Kathy Black and Sonia Melara of La Casa de las Madres, which works with domestic violence victims, and Beverly Upton, executive director of the San Francisco Domestic Violence Consortium...

Rob's comment:

These are the same zealots who tried to destroy Ross Mirkarimi and his family seven years ago after he and his wife had a spat that became public. As the video above shows, Baer and his wife were grappling with a cell phone, she was clearly knocked over inadvertently. Baer has no history of "bullying" his wife.

Like the Larry Baer incident, the Mirkarimi incident morphed into a much bigger deal than was warranted due in large part to the excessive zeal of people like Shorter and Las Casa de las Madres, a group that put up the billboard below before Mirkarimi accepted a plea deal from the District Attorney:

Ross Mirkarimi: Collateral damage

Like Mirkarimi seven years ago, Baer is supposed to publicly abase himself and eat a lot of shit to satisfy zealots like Shorter. 

Of course Mayor Breed piles on with a typically moronic statement:

Breed on Monday issued a statement calling on MLB to discipline Baer to “send a message that any and all acts of violence against women are unacceptable. “While Mr. Baer has apologized and expressed remorse for his behavior, it does not excuse his actions and it does not erase what transpired. Mr. Baer’s actions were serious and wrong,” Breed said in the statement.

No, his actions weren't particularly serious. (You can tell how serious Breed thought it was by the use of the semi-literate "transpired." It didn't, you understand, just "happen.") 

Apologizing and expressing remorse is not enough, Larry!

Like the goofy Mirkarimi hysteria back in 2012, the domestic violence mob is howling for Baer's scalp.

Shorter is a so-called moderate: Andrea Shorter against Olague.

See also Mirkarimi vote: Sore losers and dumb winners and Ross Mirkarimi: Better than those who tried to destroy him.