Bulldog 2007-Article 111

(7-19-07)

If there was ever a good example of how tied the Newsom Team is to the photo as opposed to the reality, we got it this morning at the gates to Chinatown.

In an obvious attempt to spin the Ed Jew story (Gavin’s numbers amongst Chinese voters is at an all-time low according to a just-released Bulldog Survey (heretofore to be known as the ‘BS’ poll.

I figured Gavin was talking on the steps below the gate to Chinatown with his highest ranking Chinese appointment (Florence Fong) standing beside him cause his handlers had read my piece last week about the Jew thing hurting him with that vote (the blacks hate it too … I’m constantly talking to people on the street and in liquor stores).

So, Gavin’s coming and I toss in a few questions at Heather Fong as she passes:

Bulldog: “Chief, will you be giving us single-officer foot patrols?�

Fong: “No. They’ll be teams.�

Bulldog: “Why? Your fathers and grandfathers walked single-officer patrols and every officer I talked to here said they’d be proud of walking a single-officer foot patrol.�

Fong: “Foot patrols will be assigned.�

Bulldog: “We should hire 400 ‘Patrol Specials’. They actually walk a beat.�

Fong: “They’re not City employees. They are private contractors.�

Bulldog: “Yeah, and your POA destroyed them. They are lots older than the POA. They were created because the police department stopped doing their work and they are older than you.�

Fong: “I know that.�

Bulldog: “There were 440 of them and the POA has them down to 50 or so. I say we use the next 400 slots at the Police Academy for Patrol Specials.�

Fong: (Just looks at me to register recognition – I’d done a zero buss on my head the day before and look different, I guess)

Bulldog: “Why don’t you do old-fashioned, single-officer foot patrols?�

Fong: “We have to consider safety issues with the officers.�

Bulldog: “What about us!? I walk the Tenderloin every day without a gun or a badge. You have more officers than at anytime in your history. You are better paid. You are better trained. You are better equipped. Yet, murders are up and arrests are down. You have 250 officers doing civilian jobs instead of walking beats. You maintain 200 vacancies to keep your overtime up so your people can pay their mortgages in Petaluma and Walnut Creek. You’re doing a terrible job.�

Fong: Walks away.

Bulldog: (to her retreating figure) “For a different answer, ask a different chief! Get ready for your next assignment, Chief. A single-officer beat in the Bay View.�

I’m not proud of the last part but I did say it and all the rest is true too. The cops bristle at the suggestion they’re afraid to walk the same beat their predecessors did. Hell, they might not even be afraid to fly a helicopter. The brass is the problem. Brass of the POA that is.

They are a complete failure. It is the responsibility of Gavin Newsom that they are a failure. He will not challenge or reform them because his handlers want the support of not just the POA, but later of the Prison Guard’s Union (they lobby for stiffer penalties, so’s they’ll have someone to guard) on down the road.

This (failure of police force to accomplish mission) has happened before. As I said, that’s where the Patrol Specials came from. Nowadays, the Mayor’s office has turned to another form of neighborhood ‘vigilante’ groups.

They’re called either BID’s or CBD’s. That’s, as in, ‘Business Improvement Districts’ or, ‘Community Business Districts’. What they are is kind of like when the town council couldn’t count on the law for anything, so they went out and hired their own gunslingers.

Oh yeah, kid you not. Sure, they sweep sidewalks and the like but if you want to see what they’re really about, watch em deal with a homeless person who enters Union Square or Yerba Buena. Private security. Cause the SFPD won’t get out of their cars. Cause it’s too dangerous. They should try Bagdhad.

Slime-bag, Patrick Murphy was there. Drunk on his ass, which I thought might have improved him. Naw. Our exchange:

Bulldog: (Always start friendly and work your way down) “Hey Murphy, you’re a thief and you can’t write!�

Murphy: “How’s your cancer?�

Bulldog: “When are you gonna give Thomas his money back?�

Unidentified photographer from Chron: “I’m outta here.�

Murphy: “I’ll pay him when I start using his stuff again.�

Murphy has written columns about groping male mayoral staffers and getting away with it. He talks about the time he was able to press his own body against that of Gavin and how it felt.

And, he still covers the Mayor from one foot. It’s a disgrace. The cops give this prick a press pass and have been turning down all requests for passes from online Progressive publications?

Barbara Taylor was standing next to Cecilia Vega. Talk about a contrast. Vega, the tightly-wound and talented young ideologue with all the promise in the world. Taylor, who still busts her ass to look sexy (and succeeds) but has forgotten why. I wondered how many years before Vega became Taylor.

There were some guy reporters there too, but I’m a heterosexual and so I practiced my usual orientation bias and ignored them.

The Mayor was there for political spin on his Ed Jew ‘my bad’. He brought nothing new to the table on foot patrols. The Police Chief confirmed that there would be no change. District Captains will still decide if there will be any foot patrols at all on any shift.

Crime is up because the cops have disengaged with the public over the past 20 years. They’ve done this because it is dangerous to walk a single-officer foot patrol. The only possible way to reform the force is to elect a different mayor who will appoint a different chief. And, on down the line.

Woman nearly K.O.’s Mayor!!

So, we’re at the gates to Chinatown which is a very narrow Grant Street and it’s just so they’ll have the backdrop for the Mayor’s shots but it leaves photographers and reporters out in the street cause the sidewalk is only about 4’ wide and nobody told the tourists they couldn’t keep coming.

All these cops are trying to herd the reporters and camera people while the drivers literally push through the people, but then there was this one young Chinese woman who was dropping off either her mother or grandmother. And, it was clear that she was used to driving her car through people and she let her ride off and looked back at her fondly as she edged ever further. And, came very close to running over the Mayor.

It was hilarious. There was this big command cop banging on her hood and yelling at her to stop and back up (she was nearly on the sidewalk and only a yard or so from Newsom – if she’d have panicked and hit her gas we’d be looking at a different Mayor and Police Chief tomorrow).

Then, as the Mayor gets into the guts of his bullshit about how the City is going to be blanketed with these foot patrols, a huge garbage truck slows down and drags an appropriate stench within 3’ of the stage. And, it took a long, long time to pass and I hope John Hahn got pictures of it (he was covering it for Luke and Ben Wilson was shooting for Murphy).

Ahhh, Murphy on all fours. Lobs at the net from the Mayor and his staff and the cops. Another decent workout. 4 bottles of $2 Buck Chuck left and a healthy sprinkling of green bud. You work. I’m gonna turn on SFGTV and listen to it in my sleep as I take my afternoon siesta. You get a siesta, right?

h@ludd.net