Free Republic

The Bay Bridge reopened just after 9 a.m. today, six days after a repair job on a cracked structural beam on the eastern span fell apart and plunged onto the upper deck. Tests conducted overnight and this morning on an altered version of that repair job showed that the fix was holding, Caltrans spokesman Bart Ney said. At 9:01 a.m., a fleet of five California Highway Patrol cars escorted the first private vehicles allowed onto the westbound upper deck since the span was shut down Tuesday evening. About 10 minutes later, the lower deck reopened for traffic heading to the...

Authorities said they are shutting down the Bay Bridge in both directions after pieces of the cantilever section fell during the late-afternoon commute, striking three vehicles on the upper deck, the California Highway Patrol said. Caltrans officials said the parts that fell were two high-strength rods and a saddle that were part of the emergency repair that delayed the opening of the bridge on Labor Day weekend.

Two big questions hang over President Obama's radical "Green Jobs Czar" Van Jones. Is he still a communist? Is he a security threat? Many have assumed that Van Jones' committment to communism ended when the organization he helped to lead STORM (Standing Together to Organize a Revolutionary Movement) dissolved in 2002. Yet a 2004 treatise Reclaiming Revolution: History, Summation, and Lessons from the Work of Standing Together to Organize a Revolutionary Movement written and endorsed by a majority of former STORM members makes it clear that most ex STORMers are still committed to the revolutionary movement; From page 49. When...

<p>Two of three hikers being detained in Iran are Bay Area residents and freelance journalists.</p> <p>Shane Bauer and Sarah Shourd, both UC Berkeley graduates, worked as freelance journalists affiliated with New American Media in downtown San Francisco, according to Sandy Close, executive director.</p>

As the economy struggles, and most of us with it, a few more join the seven-figure clubThe number of millionaire families in the Bay Area jumped 10.2 percent, from 123,621 to 136,120, according to a report from Merrill Lynch and Claritas. Similar gains were won by the wealthy in Los Angeles and San Diego, according to The World Wealth Report. What, no word on Fresno? Scott Anderson, a senior economist with Wells Fargo, takes issue with the report. "As a reading of the health of California's wealthy, I'm not sure that's the best indication to go by," Anderson told the...

A 30-year-old Northern California woman has pleaded not guilty to charges that she had sex with three teenage boys. Deborah Towe faces 11 felony counts, including unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor, oral copulation of a person under the age of 16, committing lewd acts upon a child and arranging a meeting with a minor for a lewd purpose. The boys were 15 and 16 years old. Police in Anderson, about 150 miles north of Sacramento, began investigating in April after two girls from a local middle school reported that a friend's mother was having sex with boys. In a...

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich debuts in tomorrow’s edition of The Examiner as a weekly political commentator, writing a broadly focused column on national and international politics, personalities and issues.

Swine flu outbreak skips Bay Area for now Rachel Gordon,Julian Guthrie, Chronicle Staff Writers Saturday, April 25, 2009 California health officials said Saturday that there was one more confirmed case of human swine flu in the state, but none have been reported in the Bay Area as local hospitals stepped up surveillance for a possible outbreak. In all, seven cases of the potentially deadly flu strain have been reported in California, the latest case involving a 35-year-old woman in Imperial County, who was hospitalized but recovered. None of the California cases resulted in death. "The cases in California have all...

A few weeks ago several Villagers reported a stranger knocking on their door in the evening asking for money and/or the use of a phone. The excuse was generally that she needed a locksmith. She didn't ask for much, always less than $30 but she did go to many Village home and was given an undisclosed amount of money by kind and trusting Villagers. It seems she either startled or ended across the creek as at least one San Leandro resident reported the same experience. It is very unlikely that this was legitimate given the fact that she was given...

"I don't like it. That's a lot of money we're giving to try and fix things that happened too long ago, like the mortgage crisis. The government should spread it around to more people" Eric Jones, San Leandro (snip) "We don't know yet if this plan will work. I hope it turns out for the best, that the money is spent where it is needed most. Right now, we need to support Barack. He inherited Bush's problems. He just needs time to fix them." Ulander Russel, San Leandro

A San Rafael woman has filed a product liability lawsuit against the Victoria's Secret lingerie chain, claiming the Chinese-made bras and underwear she bought at the Terra Linda store caused her a rash and blisters. Deborah Keck is seeking unspecified compensatory and punitive damages for emotional distress, pain and suffering, hospital and medical expenses, permanent scarring and chronic discomfort, according to the lawsuit in Marin Superior Court. Keck also is claiming wage losses because she needed to visit the doctor about 15 times, keeping her from her job as a flight attendant. According to the lawsuit, Keck has shopped at...

The San Francisco 49ers on Friday acknowledged that the battered economy likely will slow down their plans to build a new stadium in Santa Clara and now has them willing to discuss a once unthinkable option — sharing a new home with their cross-bay rival, the Raiders. Combining resources with the Oakland Raiders — as the New York Jets and Giants have done on a new $1.6 billion stadium — may be the only way for the 49ers to overcome frozen financial markets to fund a new stadium, NFL insiders and sports economists say. Team officials said Friday that they...

A young man allegedly involved in a possible scuffle aboard a BART train was shot to death by a BART police officer on the platform of the Fruitvale Station early today.

ANTIOCH, Calif. (AP) - As more and more black renters began moving into this mostly white San Francisco Bay Area suburb a few years ago, neighbors started complaining about loud parties, mean pit bulls, blaring car radios, prostitution, drug dealing and muggings of schoolchildren. In 2006, as the influx reached its peak, the police department formed a special crime-fighting unit to deal with the complaints, and authorities began cracking down on tenants in federally subsidized housing. Now that police unit is the focus of lawsuits by black families who allege the city of 100,000 is orchestrating a campaign to drive...

Color the brake lights red as the column of cars backs up from the Caldecott Tunnel, the often bottled-up gateway between Contra Costa and Alameda counties. Color drivers' moods red as the congestion worsens over a span of 45 years. Many drivers are looking forward to relief from a long-planned $420 million fourth bore of the Caldecott Tunnel, but a lawsuit by Alameda County neighborhood groups and a bicycling advocacy organization could delay the project scheduled to begin in the summer and finish in 2014. A ruling on the lawsuit is expected soon from Alameda County Superior Court judge Frank...

The impacts of climate change are a hot topic among scientists and environmental activists. Now the Bay Conservation and Development Commission wants to hear from another perspective: the design community. The state agency is preparing to launch a $125,000 competition that will invite architects, planners and engineers to bring innovative proposals "to climate-proof the Bay Area," in the words of the competition outline. The aim isn't to stop climate change from happening, say officials, or to build impregnable levees. The goal is to get designers thinking creatively about how to prepare for a world where the sea level might climb...

t was a bizarre and abrupt way to die for a man who, by all accounts, went at life full-bore and was fit and agile from riding his bicycle everywhere he went ... Doctor killed in mysterious elevator shaft fall It was a bizarre and abrupt way to die for a man who, by all accounts, went at life full-bore and was fit and agile from riding his bicycle everywhere he went. But as San Francisco police combed over the evidence Tuesday, investigators said this is what appears to have happened: Dr. Daniel J. Kliman, an Alameda physician and one...

Alameda, San Francisco, Santa Clara, Contra Costa and Marin Counties are expecting long lines again today for people wanting to vote early for the November 4 election. A record number of people are voting early this year. San Francisco Department of Elections reports that over 21% of registered voters for the November 4 election have already casts their ballots. This weekend lines have wrapped around county election offices with waits up to an hour to be able to vote. Offices will be open again today to handle the crowds of early voters.

It’s not unusual for guys to buddy-up and join the army together, but how about a mother-and-daughter duo instead? That’s what one Fremont family is doing. Lisa Altoon, 39, and her daughter Megan, 17, have both enlisted in the army together. “It’s an opportunity for me to go back to school,” says Altoon. “I didn’t finish getting my degree… I started going back to school kind of late in life after a divorce so I can [now] finish my education.” KCBS’ Mike Colgan reports Altoon says it all started as a joke when her daughter decided to enlist in the...

SAN FRANCISCO -- Federal immigration authorities raided more than a dozen locations in San Francisco, Richmond and South San Francisco today, arresting several alleged members of the notorious MS-13 street gang, authorities said. Authorities said the investigation targeted a San Francisco-based faction of the violent group, also known as Mara Salvatrucha, which started in Southern California with roots in El Salvador. "This is a major take-down," said Northern California U.S. Attorney Joe Russoniello, adding that the investigation dealt with alleged drug trafficking, gun running, terrorism and extortion activities of the group. He declined to provide further details about the raids....

Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin was slated to attend a political fundraiser in Burlingame Sunday morning with more than 1,00 people paying as much as $2,500 each to sit down with her for brunch. Palin supporters and anti-war protestors were both expected to rally outside during the brunch at the Hyatt Regency San Francisco Aiport. Palin has spent the weekend accusing Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama of "palling around with terrorists" for his association with a former 1960s radical. Palin was referring to Bill Ayers, one of the founders of the Weather Underground. The group took credit for bombings,...

I got an email from a friend from my Bay Area college days the other day. He emailed me, as well as 30 of his closest friends. He had a link to an anti-Palin article, TO WHICH, one of his female friends took offense at the "sexist" nature of the article. I want to send an email response to this group situated in the very heart of liberalism/communism. But what should I do that *might* sway people? 1) pictures of Obama dressed as a Muslim 2) link to the video of Obama talking about "my muslim faith" 3) link to...

Muslim beliefs are barely understood in the United States, if not intentionally distorted. It can also be hard for outsiders to know who speaks for Muslims, a diverse and complex group still finding its footing in America. **snip** Leaders hope that someday they will create a statewide body, a coalition for what may be the largest Muslim population in the nation.

It used to be that marijuana came to the Bay Area from the legendary back country of Humboldt County or the desert fields beyond Tijuana. Now the fields are in the Bay Area, and everywhere else in the state. Marijuana is one of the top cash crops in California, NBC Bay Area's Mike Luery reported. Many of the fields are located next to popular trails and in the middle of state parks. A fierce battle is being waged in our own back yard to remove the pot groves. They are hidden in brush so thick that specially trained officers must...

UNION CITY — Lower corporate and capital-gains taxes and more immigration visas for skilled workers are the keys to keeping Silicon Valley and America's economy humming into the future, business leaders told Republican presidential candidate John McCain on Thursday. Flanked by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and former eBay President and CEO Meg Whitman, the Arizona senator listened to and shot questions back at high-tech executives in a global-competitiveness round-table talk on the production floor at Finelite, a maker of lighting systems for offices and schools. "I'm here to listen and learn, a lot more than I am to be talking to...

Okay gang this is a call to action, we all know that the leftist are coming to town to reenact the lies of the Winter Soldiers, who smeared our heroes who fought and died in Vietnam and won every engagement with the enemy. Now the aging hippie crowd is employing willing youth as "useful idiots," to smear another generation of heroes yet again, but their lies are known and unlike last time there are those of us who will fight to preserve the honor of our heroes and make sure those who have fallen are never forgotten. We know that...

In addition to everything else to worry about, now comes the Burmese python. The giant snakes are slithering from Florida toward the Bay Area, very slowly to be sure, but inexorably. And they can strangle and eat an entire alligator...

<p>A major new study of the "mystery disease" known as Morgellons will be launched in Northern California, federal health officials said today.</p> <p>The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Kaiser Permanente Northern California are teaming up to investigate the straight-out-of-science-fiction syndrome whose symptoms include itching, biting and crawling sensations and filaments or fibers reported to emerge from the skin.</p>

NEWARK — The fourth annual American Muslim Voice peace convention brought many speakers of various backgrounds to provide a blueprint for protecting civil rights in the post-Sept. 11, 2001, era. Visitors at the Chandni Restaurant in Newark on Sunday evening cheered and listened to guest speakers, such as anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan, Muslim convert Brandon Mayfield and Ron Takaki, an ethnic studies professor at University of California,Berkeley. The conventions theme was building a beloved community, which included topics such as Fighting for the American Constitution and America, One Nation under God? These topics were discussed by a group of panelists...

I was in Sausalito recently. While walking and window shopping I saw this. Damn nice to see. And in a rich liberal area like that.

FAIRFAX, Calif., Oct. 1, 2007 (KGO) - For all the big debates about the environment and global warming, there are small ones, as well. Consider the town of Fairfax in Marin County. Residents are looking hard at a proposal some say violates a basic right -- to wash your car in your front yard. It is the kind of environmental debate you're likely to find only in a mostly affluent community. One resident asks, "do you save the fish or wash your car?" It's the debate du jour in Marin County's Fairfax. There's a town council proposal to ban residents...

It's a story that virtually begs for the "only-in-Santa-Cruz" eye-roll treatment - another item in a wave of wackiness over the years that has painted the beach town, fairly or not, as nuttier than a bowl of granola. Only this time, it might actually be true - the "only-in-Santa-Cruz" part, at least. That's because two cherished progressive ideals - smoking bans and medicinal marijuana - have collided in a cloud of, well, smoke. The city last year banned smoking in two city parks, citing the threat to public health. The city also is on record in support of the local...

Marriott still employs security firm with Black Muslim Bakery ties. Over the past decade, more than a hundred thousand visitors have strolled into the Oakland Marriott Hotel and convention center, where among the first faces they encountered were those of well-dressed young men sporting bow ties. These men are the hotel's private security officers, who also happen to be members of the Black Muslim clan believed responsible for the assassination of Oakland Post editor Chauncey Bailey.

WHY WON'T FOLKSY "Law & Order" actor Fred Thompson just admit he's running for president of these here United States? It all boils down to that pesky NBC show, and using that exposure to your best advantage. Thompson, a Republican, has dabbled in acting, lobbying and lawyering over the years, serving as Tennessee's representative in the United States Senate from 1994 to 2003. In his twilight days of serving the country, he joined the cast of "Law & Order" in 2002 as good'ol backwoods boy and New York City District Attorney Arthur Branch. Strong character, basically a good guy who...

The driver who crashed a tanker loaded with gasoline and brought down a heavily trafficked highway overpass was given a commercial trucker's license despite a history of criminal convictions, including drug and burglary arrests. James Mosqueda, 51, of Woodland also got a special hazardous materials endorsement last year from the federal Transportation Security Administration. To get it, he had to undergo an FBI criminal history check and an intelligence background check. "It's reprehensible," said Assemblyman Pedro Nava, D-Santa Barbara, who chairs both the Assembly Transportation Committee and the Joint Committee on Emergency Services and Homeland Security. "Someone with that record...

Any other Freepers in the Bay Area just feel the small earthquake. According to early reports, it was a 3.4 on the Richter Scale. I'm in Berkerkely and felt a quick jolt but nothing too bad (considering I'm from LA).

Highways, houses, industrial developments and entire neighborhoods along the San Francisco Bay will be under water if global warming causes tides to rise as much as 3 feet in the coming decades, according to new maps developed by the Bay Conservation and Development Commission. The maps, prepared for The San Francisco Chronicle, depict entirely submerged parts of residential cities such as Corte Madera, Mill Valley, Sausalito, San Rafael, Hayward and Newark. In San Francisco, the Caltrain mass transit system and an ambitious Candlestick Point redevelopment project would be vulnerable to flooding. Much of the Silicon Valley shoreline would be under...

SAN FRANCISCO Foreclosure activity in California jumped sharply last quarter, but analysts say the spike is not significant enough in the Bay Area to become a market factor. DataQuick, a real estate information service, reported that mortgage default notices filed against California homeowners are now at the highest level in more than eight years. Lending institutions sent 37,273 default notices to homeowners across the state during the October-to-December 1996 period. That’s up by 36.9 percent from the previous quarter, and up more than 145 percent from the previous year, DataQuick reported. DataQuick analysts attribute the rise to unusually low numbers...

THIS New Year's Eve, both the San Jose Convention Center and the Santa Clara Convention Center will host Bollywood and Bhangra-themed parties. If all goes well for the promoters of just those two events, it means that thousands of people will spend the last day of 2006 in South Asian splendor. And that's not including the four other public Indian-themed NYE parties we included in our guide to New Year's Eve events in the valley, plus any number of private parties we didn't. So we talked to DJs and promoters, and they all say the same thing: the demand for...

BE HERE, OR BE NOWHERE!

Measure Meant to Raise Awareness About Bush's 'High Crimes'; Some Call It a Wasted Effort In the last six years, President George W. Bush has never set foot in Berkeley—his anemic 7 percent of the vote in Berkeley in 2004 places the city among the least Republican in the country. But come November, Berkeley voters may drive the final nail in the coffin of their relationship with the administration by supporting a ballot measure calling for the impeachment of Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney. The vote is purely advisory—only the U.S. House of Representatives has the power to impeach—but...

Silicon Valley Young Republicans Federation Weekly Alert September 9, 2006 Presidents Message Well the summer is over and the fall campaign begins. Before we get into the political season, lets reflect on the events of 9-11 and what would have happened if a Democrat was in the White House and not President Bush. Even in a place like the Bay Area where the name George W. Bush is the same as plague to many he is respected for the way he handled things during that difficult period. That is why I am resolved to help the Republican Party in November...

Bedbugs, the flat, brown, blood-sucking subjects of the beloved nursery rhyme, are back with a vengeance after almost being eradicated from this country for the past 60 years. They're turning up in the residences of local travelers, having hitched rides in suitcases from parts of Europe, the former Soviet Union and other international hot spots. They've popped up in a San Jose State University dormitory, where one room underwent extensive fumigation and cleaning Thursday morning. One world, one icky, icky bug. Case in point: the San Jose State infestation, which was found in a third-floor room of International House, one...

There were picket signs, picket lines and protesters imploring motorists to honk for their cause. But all similarities between Friday afternoon's rally in front of City Hall and other political gatherings in San Francisco ended there. About 50 exotic dancers and other adult club employees gathered to protest outside as the Entertainment Commission heard public testimony on a proposed ban on private rooms and booths at the clubs. The Commission on the Status of Women proposed the legislation on the ban based on interviews with dancers who said sexual assaults have occurred inside the private rooms. The rally more closely...

The Silicon Valley Young Republicans Federated would like for you to attend this event this August.This is a funraiser to help raise funds for many Pro Troop causes. SVYRF Club Socials SVYRFC Annual BBQ Location: Sanborn Skyline County Park, Saratoga When: August 12, 2006 Registration: starts at 3pm Food: 4pm Program/Speakers: 5pm Clean-up: 8pm Confirmed Speakers: Claude Parrish, BOE member and Republican candidate for State Treasurer Mike Wasserman, Los Gatos town councilman, former Los Gatos mayor Elsie Gufler, Republican candidate for CA Assembly District 19 Larry Hileman, Republican candidate for CA Assembly District 24 Rob Smith, Republican candidate for CA...

Two Oakland police officers working undercover at an anti-war protest in May 2003 got themselves elected to leadership positions in an effort to influence the demonstration, documents released Thursday show. The department assigned the officers to join activists protesting the U.S. war in Iraq and the tactics that police had used at a demonstration a month earlier, a police official said last year in a sworn deposition. At the first demonstration, police fired nonlethal bullets and bean bags at demonstrators who blocked the Port of Oakland's entrance in a protest against two shipping companies they said were helping the war...

June 10, 2006 was the date for the World Naked Bike Ride, which -- as its name suggests -- is an international political event at which protesters take off all their clothes and ride bicycles through various cities around the globe. The focus of the protest is theoretically to encourage people to give up their "dependence on fossil fuel" -- but in practice the messages (which the organizers tell participants to paint directly on their bodies) are more scattered, ranging from "free speech" to presidential politics. I attended the San Francisco version of the event, which started at noon in...

Andrew Martinez, the South Bay man who gained national notoriety as the ``Naked Guy'' when he insisted on walking around nude in Berkeley in the early 1990s, has died, the apparent victim of suicide. Martinez, 33, died early Thursday after he was discovered unconscious in his cell at the Santa Clara County main jail. He was found lying under the covers on his cell bunk, with a plastic bag tied around his head, said jail spokesman Mark Cursi. He was pronounced dead about an hour later at Valley Medical Center. Martinez, who had been in custody since Jan. 10, was...

The former University of California, Berkeley student known as the "Naked Guy," who gained notoriety for attending class in the buff in the early 1990s, died of an apparent suicide while in jail, authorities said. Andrew Martinez, 33, whose stripped-down campus strolls got him expelled from UC Berkeley and prompted the famously liberal city to adopt a strict anti-nudity ordinance, was found dead Thursday in the Santa Clara County Main Jail, said jail spokesman Mark Cursi. Martinez was found under his bed covers with a plastic bag cinched around his head, Cursi said. Officials are investigating the death as an...

Hayward -- Hayward firefighters extricated a naked man early Saturday who was stuck in the chimney of his stepmother's residence in Hayward. After the man was freed and treated at a local hospital, he was arrested on suspicion of being under the influence of drugs, according to police. Officers initially responded to a report by a Hayward resident on Gainesville Avenue who said she had heard muffled calls for help outside of her home over the course of several hours. "We started walking around the neighborhood, and then we heard the cries for help," said Hayward police Lt. Gary Branson....