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The November election will in all probability flip California a fair deeper shade of blue than it already is. And that’s not essentially a great factor.
Democrats now maintain 29 seats within the state Senate to Republicans’ 11 seats. With a blue wave heading our approach, because of the prospect to vote President Trump out of workplace, the spillover impact might elevate the Democratic complete to 35 Senate seats to simply 5 for the GOP.
California goes to be virtually actually a one-party state. Democrats might effectively rejoice. They shouldn’t.
For many years, California was ruled by a unfastened mixture of reasonable Democrats and reasonable Republicans. Their mutual want for one another’s votes created a center floor that stored every social gathering’s extra militant wings in examine.
That’s already gone, with Democrats holding two-thirds supermajorities in each the Senate and Meeting even earlier than the election. The battles are largely between progressive Democrats and reasonable Democrats, with progressives difficult the moderates at each flip. That can solely intensify with the accelerated disappearance of Republicans.
In different phrases, the Legislature might flip into an expanded model of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors. Who’s up for that?
Then and now: The nationwide polls on the presidential race persistently have Joe Biden with a six- to 10-point lead over President Trump — however bear in mind, in 2016, Hillary Clinton had an identical lead at this level within the race.
The distinction is that now it’s Trump on the recent seat, with the robust activity of getting to persuade the handful of undecided voters on the market that he didn’t make the coronavirus pandemic worse or trigger them to lose their jobs.
And this time, there’s no James Comey using to the rescue.
Confirmed controversy: The Senate hearings for Supreme Court docket nominee Decide Amy Coney Barrett taught America fairly a bit about constitutional regulation, the destiny of the Inexpensive Care Act and a lady’s proper to an abortion, however very little about how Barrett may interpret the regulation if she is confirmed.
It’s clear the Joe Biden marketing campaign, whose success underlies Democratic hopes of ever getting something performed, was thinking about having the social gathering look defiant however dignified within the hearings. So there have been no wild-hare procedural strikes, no mass boycott of the hearings — no purple meat for progressives, but in addition no motive for moderates and independents to look side-eyes on the social gathering.
In that regard, California Sens. Kamala Harris and Dianne Feinstein did effectively for California. They each received A’s in constitutional regulation, and neither harm the Biden ticket.
And in typical Democratic vogue, the left wing of the social gathering promptly called for Feinstein’s removal from the committee.
If there may be one factor Democrats do effectively, it’s eat their very own.
Title sport: I see that Willie L. Brown Center faculty survived the purge of the San Francisco faculty board’s renaming committee.
The committee has chosen 44 faculties for doable renaming, on the grounds that their present namesakes, like Abraham Lincoln, Thomas Jefferson and even Dianne Feinstein, are responsible of every little thing from proudly owning slaves (Jefferson) to mistreating Native People (Lincoln) to displaying the Accomplice flag as a part of a historic flag assortment exterior Metropolis Corridor (a flag Feinstein later eliminated).
I’ve little question, nonetheless, that if the pattern continues, I too will finally be discovered responsible of one thing and be part of the ranks of the eliminated.
Maybe the perfect factor for town to do is to take a web page from New York and assign every faculty a quantity and be performed with it.
Tilt up: The mega-million-dollar settlement to repair San Francisco’s tilting Millennium Tower got here with a pleasant monetary repair for the constructing’s householders.
Underneath the settlement among the many developer, the builder and town, householders are being reimbursed for his or her loss in property values that resulted from the massive sink.
I didn’t get a penny. I purchased my unit after the lean was found.
The house owner checks, which I hear vary from $350,000 to as much as $1 million, started arriving final week.
Fortunately for the Millennium homeowners, the misplaced worth was primarily based on pre-coronavirus-shutdown actual property costs.
Sidewalk speeders: Outdoors eating will be numerous enjoyable, nevertheless it additionally comes with some dangers.
Simply the opposite day, a woman was killed in San Jose when a sport utility car plowed into outside diners.
Nothing that tragic has occurred in San Francisco. However alongside the Embarcadero between Mission and Howard, the place Boulevard, Angler, Saison Smokehouse, Perry’s and Ozuma have all arrange tables on the broad sidewalk, it may be a bit hair-raising.
The views of the Bay Bridge can’t be beat, nevertheless it’s worrisome when the bicyclists, skate boarders and the electrical scooters come whizzing down the walkway at breakneck speeds.
We spent a small fortune placing in bike lanes to guard our non-motorist pals, however many nonetheless favor the sidewalks, which I consider is towards the regulation.
If it continues, any person goes to get harm, or on the very least get coated with smokehouse barbecue sauce, burgers or sushi.
Fly flip: A diner at Boulevard identified to me that the main focus at this 12 months’s vice presidential debate was the fly that landed on Mike Pence’s hair — whereas within the 2016 debate cycle, the fly everybody was speaking about was the one on Donald Trump’s pants.
Wish to pontificate? E mail: wbrown@sfchronicle.com
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