November 8, 2012

Irony out of Oakland

A reader writes:
TV cameraman attacked outside tough high school... 
http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Oakland-robbers-assault-rob-TV-cameraman-4020757.php 
...while filming a piece about how thanks to Prop 30, the schools stand on the edge of a new golden age: 
http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/video/7932012-teachers-celebrate-passage-of-california-prop-30/

From the newspaper article:
11-08) 11:36 PST OAKLAND -- A KPIX news cameraman was punched and robbed Wednesday during a live broadcast outside an Oakland high school, the latest in a spate of holdups targeting the media, police said.

You can see the camera swing wildly in the last one or two seconds of both clips.
Reporter Anne Makovec and cameraman Gregg Welk were on the air shortly after noon outside Oakland Technical High School near the corner of 42nd Street and Broadway. They were at the school to do a story on the passage of Proposition 30, the tax measure preventing deep budget cuts to education. 
As Makovec was finishing her report, police said, five men rushed up and grabbed a $6,000 camera from the tripod. Viewers saw the live picture being jarred and turned sideways for about two seconds. 
One of the assailants punched Welk in the mouth before the group fled in a Mercedes-Benz, which apparently was accompanied by a Lexus, police said. ... 
Monifa said the station would continue to report in Oakland but declined to specify whether any changes would be made to protect its crews. 
Sources, however, said all KPIX crews covering stories in Oakland would be accompanied by security guards, day or night, effective immediately. 
The incident comes amid a series of robberies in which the news media have been victims throughout Oakland, often in broad daylight. 
Veteran Oakland Tribune photographer Laura Oda has twice been robbed of cameras since July. 
Late one night in June, a KTVU news crew was robbed of a computer, camera and tripod by several men who pushed their way into their van parked on Redwood Road in the Oakland hills. 
In May, a man stole a camera and tripod from a KNTV crew at 20th Street and San Pablo Avenue.

With Jerry Brown on top of the world again and talking about running for a fourth term as governor of California, I recall when I met him a decade ago. When Brown was mayor of Oakland, I attended a Milken Institue speech he gave in which he explained what he had learned as mayor. I was quite astonished, because the gist of his speech, as far as I could tell, was that being mayor of Oakland had been a most eye-opening experience for an old liberal like him, that he had concluded that the main hope for Oakland was persuading poor people to move out and for the the poor people who insisted upon staying, trying to get their kids to go to a public military school he started to get some discipline pounded into their dysfunctional heads.

Unfortunately, Brown is a remarkably incomprehensible public speaker for somebody who has won Presidential primaries in three separate decades. I don't think many other people in the room could follow his convoluted and halting sentences. I finally obtained a tape of the speech to see if it could be turned into an article, but my editor and I eventually agreed that even that Jerry's quotes had too high of a Gibberish Quotient for readers to follow.

I give Obama a hard time for being a moody introvert of a politician, but compared to Jerry Brown, he's practically Arnold Schwarzenegger. And yet Brown will be governor of California off and on over at least a 40 year span, and perhaps 44 years, plus he won multiple Democratic Presidential primaries in other states in 1976, 1984, and 1992. What a long strange trip it's been.

Now, that I think about it, why not Jerry Brown for President in 2016? Who is his competition? Hillary? Biden? That would be quite a field. The Democrats could really use some of that Senior Citizen Mojo that's been working for Republican nominees so well since 1992.

According to this Wiki page from the future, Jerry does run, but the 77-year-old drops out after a poor performance in the 2016 Iowa primaries. So, now we know...

40 comments:

Engineer Dad said...

I think most Californians now know due to Democrats winning a super majority in both the Assembly and Senate, if you're not a CEO or a public employee union member, you're little people.

Anonymous said...

Steve, don't you get it, it's all about adding more money. See, blacks from families with six-figure incomes are outscored by whites from families earning less than 10k/yr on the SAT (http://www.jbhe.com/features/49_college_admissions-test.html)... oh wait, I guess money doesn't fix the problem after all.

Steve, don't you get it, it's all about finding innovative teachers from Ivy League schools who will find out how to reach these kids, and boosting self-esteem so that low achievers stop hating themselves too much to actually learn...

Anonymous said...

"... the group fled in a Mercedes-Benz, which apparently was accompanied by a Lexus..."

Ah, the disadvantaged youth...

Anonymous said...

Sweet! The newborn eating their own in California. Sure to be a sign of more things to come.

Not to be morbid but in cases such as this, it is best to get out the popcorn and enjoy the show.

I'll borrow a page from south park:

http://youtu.be/3ACqLVx4kG0?t=20s

stari_momak said...

OT -- but this caught my eye on the same page
=======
Injured Giants Series reveler dies

(11-08) 11:47 PST SAN FRANCISCO -- A 37-year-old man seriously injured during the Giants' World Series win celebration last week has died of head trauma, police said Thursday.
Sean Moffitt died at San Francisco General Hospital on Oct. 30 after hurting his head during the celebration two days earlier in the Haight-Ashbury, said Officer Gordon Shyy, a police spokesman.
Before losing consciousness, Moffitt told his roommate he had been assaulted by four men with a metal pipe, according to the roommate. But police said Thursday it was more likely Moffitt was hurt accidentally during the revelry.
"The victim may been involved in celebratory events," Shyy said. "He may have been injured, not necessarily assaulted."
Investigators said they were never able to interview Moffitt, and no one reported an assault to police. Moffitt's death is considered suspicious, Shyy said.


Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Injured-Giants-Series-reveler-dies-4020863.php#ixzz2BhN5ZrG2
====

Notice that the nature of the injury -- an alleged beating -- isn't mentioned until graph 3. Notice the the dude's roomate says he was assaulted by pipe-wielding men, but nah, cops don't believe it. He injured himself.

I used to believe that there was no way cops could 'disappear' murders. But on the margins, maybe they can. Not saying that this guy didn't injure himself, just saying that cops can use ambiguous circumstances to get rid of a few stats.

stari_momak said...

Remember, crime is at a 100 year low!

DaveinHackensack said...

A question for Northern Californians: there are plenty of wealthy hipsters and techies in San Francisco with fat wallets, fancy watches, iPhones, etc. Is the SFPD enough of a deterrent to keep Oakland robbers from taking BART or the Bay Bridge over and fishing in more lucrative waters? Or is there some other reason why they don't venture across the bay?

CJ said...

"One of the assailants punched Welk in the mouth before the group fled in a Mercedes-Benz, which apparently was accompanied by a Lexus, police said."

And then they drove off to record some East Bay Hyphy!

Anonymous said...

when liberal whites are beaten by nams they hide the fact
it is racist to name the race of perps

see yglesias after he was beaten down

Enoch Powell said...

Jerry Brown is sort of like a kinder, gentler Biden. They both know what they should say in order to be politically-correct liars and thieves, but they keep getting confused by their childish delight in making accurate observations about life around them. This leads to a competition in their own heads that they aren't all that concerned about sorting out. No one will blame them. They are Leftists. I'm sure the Soviet Union had babbling idiots too in the politboro and the Supreme Soviet. Even commissars have to have a giggle now and again.

beowulf said...

Brown is an interesting guy and an atypical politician. I imagine he would ended up a pretty cool Catholic high school history teacher if his dad Pat had a job other than, you know, Governor of California.


Anonymous said...

Is the SFPD enough of a deterrent to keep Oakland robbers from taking BART or the Bay Bridge over and fishing in more lucrative waters? Or is there some other reason why they don't venture across the bay?

Doing that requires planning. You know, an element of future time orientation. Not the strongest point of those responsible for your typical "youth" mayhem.

NickinSanFrancisco said...

DaveinHackensack said...
A question for Northern Californians: there are plenty of wealthy hipsters and techies in San Francisco with fat wallets, fancy watches, iPhones, etc. Is the SFPD enough of a deterrent to keep Oakland robbers from taking BART or the Bay Bridge over and fishing in more lucrative waters? Or is there some other reason why they don't venture across the bay?

Oh, but they do, they do.

On a side note, here is a list of notable Oakland Technical High School alumni, including Clint Eastwood:

http://oaklandtech.com/staff/alumni/notable-alumni

Steve Sailer said...

"I imagine he would ended up a pretty cool Catholic high school history teacher"

Yup. His father was a bulldozer, a governor who built the California Water Project, a half dozen UC campuses, and a bunch of freeways, a no longer imaginable list of projects.

By the way, Jerry wore the same suit to all three days of the conference in Beverly Hills in 2002: this slightly mauve three piece number that would have been very stylish at a disco in 1979.

Anonymous said...

I have a hard time believing the prop passes. I know no one who voted for it.

Fraud.

Anonymous said...

From retreats to time with Tibetan monks to back to politics.

After all that, still just another pol.

eah said...

Oakland Technical High School

It must be called that because 'technically' it's a high school. Other than that...well, you know, they need more money.

stari_momak said...

" this slightly mauve three piece number that would have been very stylish at a disco in 1979."

Where's Linda

Jason Sylvester said...

Oakland, while somewhat larger population-wise (one thing you have a lot more of in California is people) and quite more geographically compact (one thing we, conversely, have a lot of here in the Southern plains is land), isn't really much different than the Northeast side of Oklahoma City in many ways: the demographics are quite similar to Oakland's in that quadrant of Okie City, minus the Whites & Asians.

Curiously, the crime rate in Oklahoma City is also consistently, year after puzzling year, highest on...the Northeast side of Oklahoma City. Let's put that aside for the moment, lest I lapse into some unfortunate Steve Sailer-inspired spasm of Noticing Patterns.

On Nov. 1, "Open Carry" of a firearm became legal in Oklahoma for all those who have "concealed carry" licenses issued by the state, which amounts to pretty much anywhere but schools, bars, and government buildings; the same law authorized business owners to openly carry firearms on their premises whether they had a license to carry or not.

The recent American immigrant shown here, trying to make a living among the vibrancy that is the aforementioned Northern side of OKC, loves the new law:

OKC Store Owner Says Open Carry Keeps Business Safer

Check out his accounts of being told he's "not from the neighborhood" and the numerous crime reports he's had to file with the Oklahoma City police department in encounters stemming from encounters with the locals assaulting both his person and criminally interfering with his business - I'm sure the Civil Rights division of the Justice Department is right on top of these ongoing implicit threats to an recent immigrant business-owners person and livelihood by the locals. Or not.

In any event, that gun openly carried on his hip, legally, seems to have provided much more deterrent from the curious - again, puzzlingly curious! - hostile and frequently violent expressions of xenophobia from the "community" he is trying to do business in than about anything else he's apparently tried to date.

Perhaps the quickest, most sure path of immigrant "assimilation" to the realities of the American Way in 2012 America is a mandatory business apprenticeship in our more "vibrant" communities for a period of time; it may not make new arrivals more conservative or more apt to vote for the laughable clowns that lead the GOP, but at least it will make them more enthusiastically in favor of the Second Amendment to the Constitution of the their newly-adopted country, and that's something.

Steve Sailer said...

"Where's Linda?"

I could well believe that that suit was picked out for Jerry by Linda Ronstadt in the 1970s and he dusts it off for visits to L.A. for sentimental reasons.

stari_momak said...

"a half dozen UC campuses"

Pat Brown was a giant, but that would be three UCs, Santa Cruz, San Diego and UCI.

Of course, when the taxpayers can be pretty sure their kids, or at least kids their kids know, can get in, they'll fork out. When there is a good chance the places in a new university are going to be taken up by people whose parents are now in Taipei or Seoul, the appeal of funding a new campus is somewhat tarnished.

Reg Cæsar said...

You're never going to comprehend social phenomena in the Bay Area or anywhere else until you're conversant with geology.

Alcalde Jaime Miguel Curleo said...

Jer has moments of what I would term "pothead insight." Today Calif governor ain't what it used to be (Brown Sr., ibid.) Last year I was sitting next to him on a plane and didn't even recognize him until landing. He seemed to be studying(?) four-color pie charts the whole flight.

Alcalde Jaime Miguel Curleo said...

^^ That multihued paleogeography link is probably the type of thing Gov would esteem "far out"

DaveinHackensack said...

Back when Jerry Brown was running for president in '92 (on a flat tax proposal, of all things, if memory serves), sleeping in supporters' homes around the country, he had an enigmatic advisor -- some French film director, I think. Whatever happened to that guy? Still in Brown's orbit?

Anonymous said...

As Makovec was finishing her report, police said, five men rushed up and grabbed a $6,000 camera from the tripod. Viewers saw the live picture being jarred and turned sideways for about two seconds.

One of the assailants punched Welk in the mouth before the group fled in a Mercedes-Benz, which apparently was accompanied by a Lexus, police said...

The incident comes amid a series of robberies in which the news media have been victims throughout Oakland, often in broad daylight.

Veteran Oakland Tribune photographer Laura Oda has twice been robbed of cameras since July.

Late one night in June, a KTVU news crew was robbed of a computer, camera and tripod by several men who pushed their way into their van parked on Redwood Road in the Oakland hills.

In May, a man stole a camera and tripod from a KNTV crew at 20th Street and San Pablo Avenue.


For the crooks, some of this stuff might have some resale value [pawnshops, Craigslist, eBay, etc], but the specialized stuff is going to be almost impossible to fence [simply because it's so rare and so easy to trace].

Instead, I'm thinking that they want this stuff so as to be able to shoot [-er- "film"] their own porno videos.

Condor said...

Events like the robbery are far more valuable information to the public than whatever leftwing spin du jour the news team was putting out. The only good thing about the country going down the toilet is that the media has a harder and harder time trying to make a silk purse out of a sow's ear in regards to the narrative.

Anonymous said...

The same thing happened in Australia. The Australian Sascha Baron Cohen was filming a documentary called 'dumb drunk and racist' out in the middle of Australia, when he was attacked by two aboriginal women.

Here it is:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Im8UqmXxIQg

Chicago said...

The race of the criminals seems to have been glossed over. Just some raceless youths in luxury cars, most likely. Expect greater boldness and over-the-top violence in the coming years, all from the sons of Obama.

DPG said...

Here's my idea for a GOP policy: expand Teach for America to the military.

It's great politics: it's pro-veteran, pro-jobs, pro-education, pro-urban youth.

Most importantly, it's in line with the reality of HBD. A lot of urban youth don't need a 22 year old Sociology major from the 'burbs; they need a strong role model who can teach them some discipline. Put a former soldier with half a brain in the classroom. He doesn't even have to teach much, just inculcate some values.

Anonymous said...

"I think most Californians now know due to Democrats winning a super majority in both the Assembly and Senate, if you're not a CEO or a public employee union member, you're little people."

No, you're a tax cow to be milked annually. That is, if you can get a job. If you're unemployed, like 12% of working age Californians, you might strive for the American Dream by throwing newspapers onto people's lawns while cruising in your 1971 Country Squire station wagon with the smoking tailpipe.

Anonymoose said...

"Here's my idea for a GOP policy: expand Teach for America to the military.

It's great politics: it's pro-veteran, pro-jobs, pro-education, pro-urban youth."

I agree. They already have this in some states. It's called "troops to teachers" in mine. However they don't go to urban schools as would be ideal, though. A lot of them monopolize the good jobs in suburban school districts, despite being less qualified.

Faceright said...

A scarry/surprising/eye-opening thing about this is that 42nd and Broadway is a very heavily-trafficed location in what would be considered a pretty nice part of Oakland. (Just a block or two away, a prosperous yuppie might pay $400,000-$600,000 for a nicely done-up little California bungalow, for example.)

Ah, the joys of urban life!

Pat Boyle said...

I know that High School. I drive past it often. But I'm not stupid enough to stop. She stood outside Oakland Tech unarmed? She might as well have gone into the lion's den at the zoo. There was also a 'save the zoo' measure on the ballot. If she had been mauled by the lions I would have had about the same level of sympathy for her as I had when she tempted the local black hoodlums.

I take personal responsibility for all this. I didn't vote. I had had an automobile accident earlier that morning. I would have voted against 30 and for 32 and the hell with the zoo.

I actually voted for Jerry Brown for mayor. You have to understand two things. First most Oakland politicians are black and most black politicians are crooks. Jerry Brown was and is a loon but he's an honest loon. No one who is interested in only his personal wealth cleans latrines for Mother Teresa.

It's interesting to get your testimony on Brown's live speaking ability. The most incomprehensible politician I ever heard was Dwight Eisenhower. But in his defense that was right after his second stroke. He got better later. The next most incomprehensible politician I ever heard live was George Moscone. In his case I think it was simple stupidity. And as someone once said - "You can't fix stupid".

The real political issue in Oakland is like so many other places - police pensions. It got to the point where a cop could retire at fifty for 90% of his highest year's salary. The city had to cut the number of cops and then cut back on the number of neighborhoods they patrolled.

Mayor Quan - apparently tiring of seeing Oakland crime on TV - concentrated all the police in just a few neighborhoods downtown. She had a theory.

Maybe voting for crooks is a better idea.

Albertosaurus

Anonymous said...

DaveinHackensack
"Is the SFPD enough of a deterrent to keep Oakland robbers from taking BART or the Bay Bridge over and fishing in more lucrative waters? Or is there some other reason why they don't venture across the bay?"


In Marin county -- lily-white home of wealthy Obama supporters -- East Bay Persons Of Vibrancy do make little forays over another bridge now and then, but I suspect that a bridge represents too much of a choke point for some criminals. Besides, Marin is so lily-white that any EBPOV would stick out like a sore thumb.

My guess: the organized ones have realized they can make more money selling drugs in Marin than they could by stealing. They also have a forward operating base near Sausalito.

One especially wealthy (and uncharacteristically Republican) Marin town on a peninsula recently installed automated license plate readers on the only road that permits entry/egress, to deter (or at least catch) criminals. From time to time someone suggests that readers be installed on the bridge, as well.

Anonymous said...

"See, blacks from families with six-figure incomes are outscored by whites from families earning less than 10k/yr on the SAT"

You start to wonder how much blacks contribute to the economy, even when they make six figure salaries. For example, the black HR executive in the Fortune 500 firm where my wife works had to redo the paperwork for her job reclassification three times.

Reg Cæsar said...

If you're unemployed, like 12% of working age Californians, you might strive for the American Dream by throwing newspapers onto people's lawns while cruising in your 1971 Country Squire station wagon with the smoking tailpipe. --anon.

Those are all in the barrio. The tailpipe is not smoking, but throwing sparks, because the rear end has been lowered in the local fashion.

And whatever they're throwing, it almost certainly isn't newspapers, with which they have no experience.

ATBOTL said...

It doesn't say what year the cars were. Here on the East Coast, ghetto streets are lined with 90's vintage luxury cars.

anony-mouse said...

1/ The Benz and the Lexus were obviously stolen cars.

2/ As to not knowing anyone who voted for that prop-Pauline you're alive!

3/ CA is such a terrible place-and such small portions, too.

Alcalde Jaime Miguel Curleo said...

I haven't been over to that side since "Full House" was on the air--does Marin County have any statues or tunnels or bridges now dedicated to Tupac Shakur? I think it was there, that he got started, in the Novato hyphy scene right