SFCityBear said:

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south bender said:

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OBear073akaSMFan said:

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Big C said:

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Trying to show everybody how "classy" he is.

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Classy? Sorry he loss me long ago when he announced the purchase of the warriors in SF & not Oakland. It was no doubt his intent was to move to SF from the get go.

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Is it a sin to move his investment to a more profitable location?

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Probably less of a sin than it was for original San Francisco Warriors' owner Franklin Mieuli to change the name of the team to Golden State Warriors in 1971, and then move the team to Oakland in 1972, a more profitable location. Even though Mieuli is gone, and the name of the team is still Golden State Warriors, this is something of a payback for San Francisco Warrior fans.

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I used to see Mieuli play foosball in the alley way at Big Art's on Durant when I was a student. I also saw Eddie Money, Delta Wires and Arm n Hammer play there. Tom Bates' goons threatened to beat me up there when I refused to be quiet when he was giving a stump speech for his State Assembly run.

bearister said:

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SFCityBear said:

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south bender said:

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OBear073akaSMFan said:

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Big C said:

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Trying to show everybody how "classy" he is.

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Classy? Sorry he loss me long ago when he announced the purchase of the warriors in SF & not Oakland. It was no doubt his intent was to move to SF from the get go.

---

Is it a sin to move his investment to a more profitable location?

---

Probably less of a sin than it was for original San Francisco Warriors' owner Franklin Mieuli to change the name of the team to Golden State Warriors in 1971, and then move the team to Oakland in 1972, a more profitable location. Even though Mieuli is gone, and the name of the team is still Golden State Warriors, this is something of a payback for San Francisco Warrior fans.

---

I used to see Mieuli play foosball in the alley way at Big Art's on Durant when I was a student. I also saw Eddie Money, Delta Wires and Arm n Hammer play there. Tom Bates' goons threatened to beat me up there when I refused to be quiet when he was giving a stump speech for his State Assembly run.

---

All very cool. I had not heard of Big Art's. There was nothing of note on Durant back in my day, other than the hotel and the new dorms up near College Ave. I may have asked you before, but did Big Art's have any connection with a band called, "Big Art and the Trashmasters"? They wore jeans and white tee shirts, and played great '50s Rock and Roll in the early '70s, in a club down on San Pablo. They were a warmup for country bands like "Asleep at the Wheel."

Tom Bates as I remember was football player at Cal, and when he ran for mayor or something, the Daily Cal either wrote something critical of him or endorsed his opponent, so in the early morning, Bates went to campus and began stealing all the Daily Cal newspapers from the news racks. He got caught by cops, and I don't remember if he was tried or given a fine or what. I do seem to remember, the guy won the election anyway. Only in Berkeley.

Or in the US of A...

I loved the way Big Art's would serve me beer when I was an 18-yr-old freshman! Of course, I didn't LOOK 18... I looked 17.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/theathletic.com/1075898/2019/07/14/summer-league-chatter-the-consensus-on-dangelo-russell-chris-paul-and-all-those-huge-moves/%3famp

Really good article by cal's own Ethan Strauss that perfectly summarizes where the modern nba is going

For those that don't subscribe to the athletic, I'll try to summarize

- accumulating assets is more important than worrying about fit (see dubs and dlo)

- centers have little value (unless the center is elite)

- mid to late first round picks don't have the value they used to (mainly because even if you hit on a superstar - chances are high that star will leave after the initial contract)

- rise of the supermax contract is good for the 1% but killing the middle/lower class players as teams are trying to get as many superstars as possible and surrounding them with cheaper assets The huge contracts are simply drying up the salary cap.

- tampering is rampant

It's going to be super interesting to see if this current model is sustainable. I'd love to see if some mid market team can exploit a market inefficiency and put together a team that goes against all the current trends

Marquee players leaving their teams and its max money on the table is still pretty rare. Thus it is also rare for mid market players to leave for big markets. This year some big names changed homes, so it appears as if this is the norm. It's not. And Durant and Irving left 'premium' markets for another premium markets. If Kawhi didn't grow up in L.A., he's in Toronto. Toronto is a huge market, it's just not 'glamorous' like NY/L.A./Bay Area/Miami. PG passed up L.A. to re-sign with OKC, a mid market.

Cleveland, a mid market team went to 4 straight finals. Before that it was the Spurs, Mavs, Magic etc.

The key to build success, for any market, is to acquire a foundation of nice pieces through drafting and talent evaluation. Having a core primed for success for the next few years is the best way to attract a marquee FA.

All I will say is that there is regular talk, in every sport, about "where the game is going," with people always making proclamations that this is it, the end game, nothing we can do, get used to it. Then in a few years something changes and the league is different.

This too shall pass.

Where is Alec Burk. Good chance that he will be a starter at SF.

GBear4Life said:

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Marquee players leaving their teams and its max money on the table is still pretty rare. Thus it is also rare for mid market players to leave for big markets. This year some big names changed homes, so it appears as if this is the norm. It's not. And Durant and Irving left 'premium' markets for another premium markets. If Kawhi didn't grow up in L.A., he's in Toronto. Toronto is a huge market, it's just not 'glamorous' like NY/L.A./Bay Area/Miami. PG passed up L.A. to re-sign with OKC, a mid market.

Cleveland, a mid market team went to 4 straight finals. Before that it was the Spurs, Mavs, Magic etc.

The key to build success, for any market, is to acquire a foundation of nice pieces through drafting and talent evaluation. Having a core primed for success for the next few years is the best way to attract a marquee FA.

---

I think the huge discrepancy in salary between the top players and the mid players is unsustainable and will probably change over time.

However, the trend of the top free agents going to the coasts is something that I don't see stopping any time soon.

Let's look at this year's top free agents

- kd New York
- Kawhi LA
- Kyrie New York
- Kemba Boston
- butler Miami
- klay Bay Area

Those are literally the top 6 free agents. All to teams on the coast.

For now, let's ignore the fact that (for the majority of young minorities with money) living on the coasts is way better than living in middle America.

If we look at this purely from a financial standpoint, sure you lose out on the super max by leaving your original team. But how much can you make up by moving to a bigger market? Or moving to Hollywood? Or moving closer to Asia (anyone know what kiay's shoe contract looks like?)

The days of superstars staying with one team their entire careers (like Duncan or dirk) are over. And when players have freedom of choice, you better believe that many are going to choose major market teams on the coasts.

Agreed on the discrepancy of salaries. Been seeing that coming to a head for a while.

This summer was a bit of an outlier for sure, as my post resonates much more in June than it did July 7th.

But Kemba stays in Charlotte if MJ offers him the max.
Kawhi stays in TOR if he's not from L.A.
Davis doesn't request a trade to L.A. if LeBron isn't there.
KD left a premier market and org

Look at all the resignings over the last 10 years.

Guys want to play with their friends, and they don't want to play with a losing franchise. That's the trend.

Players have more control than ever before, which is a good thing since they generate the income.

It's up to teams to make their franchises as attractive as possible, and of course some teams have advantages others don't. No amount of CBA adjustment or magic wand waving will change the reality that players like to win, like to live in nice places and like to plan for their future.

And there are reasons, after all, that most of us here live in Northern California ...

Any place is a nice place to live on an NBA salary, so to speak...

NBA players have to spend ultimately only about 3 months in their team's home city. The rest is road games and off season.

For the stars that can earn max everywhere, yeah they have the luxury to give more weight to lifestyle, winning, and friends.

The problem I see, due to player's having so much leverage, is signing max deals knowing they can demand a trade at any point if it suits them. Franchises basically have to give in and play nice because the alternative is getting a reputation of being adversarial to stars.

Make max deals 3 years.

GBear4Life said:

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Any place is a nice place to live on an NBA salary, so to speak...

NBA players have to spend ultimately only about 3 months in their team's home city. The rest is road games and off season.

For the stars that can earn max everywhere, yeah they have the luxury to give more weight to lifestyle, winning, and friends.

The problem I see, due to player's having so much leverage, is signing max deals knowing they can demand a trade at any point if it suits them. Franchises basically have to give in and play nice because the alternative is getting a reputation of being adversarial to stars.

Make max deals 3 years.

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I completely agree with affording a comfortable lifestyle - even at the NBA minimum. I'd be curious what it would be like if we didn't have MAX deals. Harden and the G-league all stars?

Anyway, It's a game. It is played by players. They should have the most leverage, IMHO. The fans should have leverage, as well - and they do - since they are the ultimate source of the revenue. However - as everyone who is a Cal fan can admit, fans are not very good at leveraging their wallets. The owners can come in last place in the leverage race. They all seem to be doing just fine.

BeachedBear said:

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Anyway, It's a game. It is played by players. They should have the most leverage, IMHO.

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The other thing is that though players make a lot of money, their careers are short. Even the best players aren't going to make an NBA salary for more than 15 years or so. That's a lot of lifetime spent without making that kind of money, unless you can branch out into some other kind of business (not everyone is going to be good at that).

So I'm not really bothered by players trying to max out their earnings and/or happiness while they can still play.

BeachedBear said:

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I completely agree with affording a comfortable lifestyle - even at the NBA minimum. I'd be curious what it would be like if we didn't have MAX deals. Harden and the G-league all stars?

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If there were no max deals AND no salary cap, the other guys on the roster would not just be making the minimum. Every team with enough money would pay what it takes to surround the stars with enough talent to contend for the title, like the wealthiest European soccer teams do.

On the other hand... with both max deals and a salary cap, there is already grumbling from a lot of players that too much of the cap space is taken up by superstars with not enough left over for the rest of the roster. The grumbling is that the CBA suits the superstars' agents, who collect a sweet percentage from max contracts and don't care so much about the rank-and-file players.

The average NBA player will make $24.7 million in his career. That is based on an average salary of $5.2 million and an average career length of 4.8 years and is $18.6 million more than the career earnings for the average NFL player ($6.1 million).Oct 10, 2013; Business Insider

NFL players definitely get way more screwed than NBA players.

bearister said:

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The average NBA player will make $24.7 million in his career. That is based on an average salary of $5.2 million and an average career length of 4.8 years and is $18.6 million more than the career earnings for the average NFL player ($6.1 million).Oct 10, 2013; Business Insider

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I wonder what the median (as opposed to mean) numbers would be.

bearister said:

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The average NBA player will make $24.7 million in his career. That is based on an average salary of $5.2 million and an average career length of 4.8 years and is $18.6 million more than the career earnings for the average NFL player ($6.1 million).Oct 10, 2013; Business Insider

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Is this a great country, or what? I wonder what the average NBA fan will make in his or her career? And how much does the average working stiff make in his or her career? Can they afford NBA tickets? If not, we need a government program to provide them with free tickets.

"The median salary of an NBA player is $2.5 million, compared to $31,000 for the average American." Northwestern Business Review

"At last look, an estimated 60 percent of former NBA players go broke within five years of departing the league. And by no means are these financial problems confined to the NBA. A reported 78 percent of former NFL players have gone bankrupt or under financial stress just two years after retirement." CNBC

south bender said:

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Or in the US of A...

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I did a little searching on newspaper thefts, and found that the Bates case appears to be unique.

There was a case in a town in Maryland where a newspaper was going to publish an article critical of the Sheriff and DA prior to an election, and they conspired to spend $500 each to buy as many papers as they could, and the Sheriff order deputies to buy or confiscate the newspapers. They bought and confiscated 1600 of 6000 printed. Both men won their elections, the newspaper owner sued, and won a $435K judgment.

There was a case back in the days of Rodney King and the LA riots, where there was an article being published in San Francisco in a free gay community newspaper, Coming Up, criticizing the way SF Police Chief Hongisto treated demonstrators in San Francisco. wanted to supress the article and ordered his inspectors to confiscate the papers, and they confiscated between 2,000 and 4,000. Hongisto was fired for exceeding his authority.

There was a case in Singapore where a jobless woman stole delivered newspapers from door steps and sold them, and another case in England where thieves stole a van full of free newspapers about to be delivered to subway station newsracks. They sold the newspapers to recyclers for an amount of money per ton.

There have been other cases on different campuses of free student newspapers being stolen, but never by a government official or politician. So as far as I could find out, the only case of a politician PERSONALLY stealing free newspapers to keep them from being distributed, and violating the right to free speech for a newspaper, was Tom Bates in Berkeley, on the eve of an election in which he was a candidate. He was caught, made to pay a $500 fine, and won the election and was re-elected a few times, apparently a very popular mayor. I wrote what I wrote because the Bates case is unique, and bizarre, both for him doing this personally, stealing free newspapers, getting fined very little, and apparently his crime had no effect on the electorate's opinion of him. So far it hasn't happened anywhere else I know of.

SFCityBear said:

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bearister said:

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SFCityBear said:

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south bender said:

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OBear073akaSMFan said:

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Big C said:

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Trying to show everybody how "classy" he is.

---

Classy? Sorry he loss me long ago when he announced the purchase of the warriors in SF & not Oakland. It was no doubt his intent was to move to SF from the get go.

---

Is it a sin to move his investment to a more profitable location?

---

Probably less of a sin than it was for original San Francisco Warriors' owner Franklin Mieuli to change the name of the team to Golden State Warriors in 1971, and then move the team to Oakland in 1972, a more profitable location. Even though Mieuli is gone, and the name of the team is still Golden State Warriors, this is something of a payback for San Francisco Warrior fans.

---

I used to see Mieuli play foosball in the alley way at Big Art's on Durant when I was a student. I also saw Eddie Money, Delta Wires and Arm n Hammer play there. Tom Bates' goons threatened to beat me up there when I refused to be quiet when he was giving a stump speech for his State Assembly run.

---

All very cool. I had not heard of Big Art's. There was nothing of note on Durant back in my day, other than the hotel and the new dorms up near College Ave. I may have asked you before, but did Big Art's have any connection with a band called, "Big Art and the Trashmasters"? They wore jeans and white tee shirts, and played great '50s Rock and Roll in the early '70s, in a club down on San Pablo. They were a warmup for country bands like "Asleep at the Wheel."

Tom Bates as I remember was football player at Cal, and when he ran for mayor or something, the Daily Cal either wrote something critical of him or endorsed his opponent, so in the early morning, Bates went to campus and began stealing all the Daily Cal newspapers from the news racks. He got caught by cops, and I don't remember if he was tried or given a fine or what. I do seem to remember, the guy won the election anyway. Only in Berkeley.

---

I remember the TBates episode. Yes, he was caught, and it looked very bad. After dithering and whining he finally issued a public apology. That's why he's referred to as "Turkey Tom".

SFCityBear said:

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There was a case back in the days of Rodney King and the LA riots, where there was an article being published in San Francisco in a free gay community newspaper, Coming Up, criticizing the way SF Police Chief Hongisto treated demonstrators in San Francisco. wanted to supress the article and ordered his inspectors to confiscate the papers, and they confiscated between 2,000 and 4,000. Hongisto was fired for exceeding his authority.

---

I remember this incident.

Note the last sentence in the article below -- one of the perpetrators is still a bigwig in the SFPD, or rather was until earlier this year.

From Wikipedia:

After declining to endorse Agnos for re-election as mayor, in a race won by police chief Frank Jordan, Hongisto was appointed in 1992 by Jordan to be San Francisco's police chief.

Hongisto's tenure as police chief lasted only six weeks, and was punctuated by controversy over his handling of demonstrations and riots which occurred in the wake of the Rodney King police brutality trial in Los Angeles. Hongisto cordoned off an entire neighborhood in the Mission district on a Saturday afternoon, establishing a net that saw the arrests of all people on the street, demonstrators and ordinary citizens alike. Hongisto had rented city buses to transport the arrested citizens, and they were processed at a warehouse on San Francisco's wharfs. Instead of merely citing and releasing those arrested, Hongisto ordered that they be arrested and processed at the Santa Rita jail in Dublin (Alameda County), rather than in San Francisco County, thus ensuring that they would not be able to avail themselves of their civil rights and return to San Francisco. This enraged progressive activists and civil libertarians as well as the San Francisco Board of Supervisors, which ordered Hongisto to release the citizens he had arrested. On the following Saturday, Hongisto ordered police to disrupt another demonstration and arrested demonstrators with no order to disperse. Both incidences were later the targets of class action suits against the city of San Francisco, although the former, undertaken by the Lawyer's Guild, would not be resolved for nearly a decade.

Soon thereafter, a gay and lesbian community newspaper, the San Francisco Bay Times, published a cover graphic of Hongisto's head pasted on the body of a lesbian activist. The activist, dressed in a police uniform, held a giant baton with one end protruding from the groin area as if it were an erect *****. The headline screamed, "Dick's Cool New Tool: Martial Law", in reference to the police actions. What happened afterwards is subject to dispute. Hongisto claimed that he had asked members of the police union to gather copies of the paper to show members of the rank and file what he was enduring in the activist press, in reaction to their criticism of his supposedly failing to properly defend their conduct of the arrests during the King riots. Around 2,000 copies of the free papers were taken from news racks by three officers and later found stored at the Mission District police station. Hongisto was publicly accused of ordering the confiscation of the papers in attempt at censorship, a charge he continued to deny up to his death. After a hearing, which many considered to be highly politicized, the San Francisco Police Commission found him culpable, and Mayor Jordan dismissed him. One of those three officers, Gary Delagnes, is now president of the San Francisco Police Officers Association.

BearSD said:

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SFCityBear said:

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There was a case back in the days of Rodney King and the LA riots, where there was an article being published in San Francisco in a free gay community newspaper, Coming Up, criticizing the way SF Police Chief Hongisto treated demonstrators in San Francisco. wanted to supress the article and ordered his inspectors to confiscate the papers, and they confiscated between 2,000 and 4,000. Hongisto was fired for exceeding his authority.

---

I remember this incident.

Note the last sentence in the article below -- one of the perpetrators is still a bigwig in the SFPD, or rather was until earlier this year.

From Wikipedia:

After declining to endorse Agnos for re-election as mayor, in a race won by police chief Frank Jordan, Hongisto was appointed in 1992 by Jordan to be San Francisco's police chief.

Hongisto's tenure as police chief lasted only six weeks, and was punctuated by controversy over his handling of demonstrations and riots which occurred in the wake of the Rodney King police brutality trial in Los Angeles. Hongisto cordoned off an entire neighborhood in the Mission district on a Saturday afternoon, establishing a net that saw the arrests of all people on the street, demonstrators and ordinary citizens alike. Hongisto had rented city buses to transport the arrested citizens, and they were processed at a warehouse on San Francisco's wharfs. Instead of merely citing and releasing those arrested, Hongisto ordered that they be arrested and processed at the Santa Rita jail in Dublin (Alameda County), rather than in San Francisco County, thus ensuring that they would not be able to avail themselves of their civil rights and return to San Francisco. This enraged progressive activists and civil libertarians as well as the San Francisco Board of Supervisors, which ordered Hongisto to release the citizens he had arrested. On the following Saturday, Hongisto ordered police to disrupt another demonstration and arrested demonstrators with no order to disperse. Both incidences were later the targets of class action suits against the city of San Francisco, although the former, undertaken by the Lawyer's Guild, would not be resolved for nearly a decade.

Soon thereafter, a gay and lesbian community newspaper, the San Francisco Bay Times, published a cover graphic of Hongisto's head pasted on the body of a lesbian activist. The activist, dressed in a police uniform, held a giant baton with one end protruding from the groin area as if it were an erect *****. The headline screamed, "Dick's Cool New Tool: Martial Law", in reference to the police actions. What happened afterwards is subject to dispute. Hongisto claimed that he had asked members of the police union to gather copies of the paper to show members of the rank and file what he was enduring in the activist press, in reaction to their criticism of his supposedly failing to properly defend their conduct of the arrests during the King riots. Around 2,000 copies of the free papers were taken from news racks by three officers and later found stored at the Mission District police station. Hongisto was publicly accused of ordering the confiscation of the papers in attempt at censorship, a charge he continued to deny up to his death. After a hearing, which many considered to be highly politicized, the San Francisco Police Commission found him culpable, and Mayor Jordan dismissed him. One of those three officers, Gary Delagnes, is now president of the San Francisco Police Officers Association.

---

Thanks for all this information. I still live in SF, and I often wonder why. We are one of the most corrupt cities in the country. I'd tell some stories, but I'd be getting too far off topic, even more OT than usual.

SF CITY, I will listen anytime. I lived in The City from 1977-1990, in the Sunset,before I moved down south. Still fondly remember what it was back then., but I can't turn back time.

ducky23 said:

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I think the huge discrepancy in salary between the top players and the mid players is unsustainable and will probably change over time.

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I don't. A player like Steph Curry costs a lot, but he also generates a ton of revenue. Wille Cauley-Stein, for a counter-example, generates essentially no more revenue than any other guy doing his job. He is fungible.

I think the middle class will continue to disappear and there will be fewer and fewer Iguodala type salaries out there and IMO, it's a good thing. There are stars and then there are guys who do a job that about 50 other players can probably do about as well.

BearNakedLadies said:

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ducky23 said:

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I think the huge discrepancy in salary between the top players and the mid players is unsustainable and will probably change over time.

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I don't. A player like Steph Curry costs a lot, but he also generates a ton of revenue. Wille Cauley-Stein, for a counter-example, generates essentially no more revenue than any other guy doing his job. He is fungible.

I think the middle class will continue to disappear and there will be fewer and fewer Iguodala type salaries out there and IMO, it's a good thing. There are stars and then there are guys who do a job that about 50 other players can probably do about as well.

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Given that there are 30 teams, those 50 do not even amount to two apiece per team.

A team with two top players to succeed (challenge for the title) needs minimally 5 or 6 more exceptional, if not NBA all star caliber, players. This elite middle class will command salaries of several millions, say, no less than 10 or 15. I would call that thriving, not disappearing.

....and speaking of Richard Hongisto, I went to this concert at Winterland:

SFCityBear said:

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BearSD said:

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SFCityBear said:

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There was a case back in the days of Rodney King and the LA riots, where there was an article being published in San Francisco in a free gay community newspaper, Coming Up, criticizing the way SF Police Chief Hongisto treated demonstrators in San Francisco. wanted to supress the article and ordered his inspectors to confiscate the papers, and they confiscated between 2,000 and 4,000. Hongisto was fired for exceeding his authority.

---

I remember this incident.

Note the last sentence in the article below -- one of the perpetrators is still a bigwig in the SFPD, or rather was until earlier this year.

From Wikipedia:

After declining to endorse Agnos for re-election as mayor, in a race won by police chief Frank Jordan, Hongisto was appointed in 1992 by Jordan to be San Francisco's police chief.

Hongisto's tenure as police chief lasted only six weeks, and was punctuated by controversy over his handling of demonstrations and riots which occurred in the wake of the Rodney King police brutality trial in Los Angeles. Hongisto cordoned off an entire neighborhood in the Mission district on a Saturday afternoon, establishing a net that saw the arrests of all people on the street, demonstrators and ordinary citizens alike. Hongisto had rented city buses to transport the arrested citizens, and they were processed at a warehouse on San Francisco's wharfs. Instead of merely citing and releasing those arrested, Hongisto ordered that they be arrested and processed at the Santa Rita jail in Dublin (Alameda County), rather than in San Francisco County, thus ensuring that they would not be able to avail themselves of their civil rights and return to San Francisco. This enraged progressive activists and civil libertarians as well as the San Francisco Board of Supervisors, which ordered Hongisto to release the citizens he had arrested. On the following Saturday, Hongisto ordered police to disrupt another demonstration and arrested demonstrators with no order to disperse. Both incidences were later the targets of class action suits against the city of San Francisco, although the former, undertaken by the Lawyer's Guild, would not be resolved for nearly a decade.

Soon thereafter, a gay and lesbian community newspaper, the San Francisco Bay Times, published a cover graphic of Hongisto's head pasted on the body of a lesbian activist. The activist, dressed in a police uniform, held a giant baton with one end protruding from the groin area as if it were an erect *****. The headline screamed, "Dick's Cool New Tool: Martial Law", in reference to the police actions. What happened afterwards is subject to dispute. Hongisto claimed that he had asked members of the police union to gather copies of the paper to show members of the rank and file what he was enduring in the activist press, in reaction to their criticism of his supposedly failing to properly defend their conduct of the arrests during the King riots. Around 2,000 copies of the free papers were taken from news racks by three officers and later found stored at the Mission District police station. Hongisto was publicly accused of ordering the confiscation of the papers in attempt at censorship, a charge he continued to deny up to his death. After a hearing, which many considered to be highly politicized, the San Francisco Police Commission found him culpable, and Mayor Jordan dismissed him. One of those three officers, Gary Delagnes, is now president of the San Francisco Police Officers Association.

---

Thanks for all this information. I still live in SF, and I often wonder why. We are one of the most corrupt cities in the country. I'd tell some stories, but I'd be getting too far off topic, even more OT than usual.

---

Don't think SF is an outlier there. Here in San Diego, 3 of the 5 mayors immediately preceding the current mayor were forced out of office in disgrace. One accepted illegal campaign contributions, one was a serial sexual harasser, one presided over so much mismanagement and corruption in the city's pension fund that the media called San Diego "Enron By The Sea".

BearSD said:

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SFCityBear said:

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BearSD said:

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SFCityBear said:

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There was a case back in the days of Rodney King and the LA riots, where there was an article being published in San Francisco in a free gay community newspaper, Coming Up, criticizing the way SF Police Chief Hongisto treated demonstrators in San Francisco. wanted to supress the article and ordered his inspectors to confiscate the papers, and they confiscated between 2,000 and 4,000. Hongisto was fired for exceeding his authority.

---

I remember this incident.

Note the last sentence in the article below -- one of the perpetrators is still a bigwig in the SFPD, or rather was until earlier this year.

From Wikipedia:

After declining to endorse Agnos for re-election as mayor, in a race won by police chief Frank Jordan, Hongisto was appointed in 1992 by Jordan to be San Francisco's police chief.

Hongisto's tenure as police chief lasted only six weeks, and was punctuated by controversy over his handling of demonstrations and riots which occurred in the wake of the Rodney King police brutality trial in Los Angeles. Hongisto cordoned off an entire neighborhood in the Mission district on a Saturday afternoon, establishing a net that saw the arrests of all people on the street, demonstrators and ordinary citizens alike. Hongisto had rented city buses to transport the arrested citizens, and they were processed at a warehouse on San Francisco's wharfs. Instead of merely citing and releasing those arrested, Hongisto ordered that they be arrested and processed at the Santa Rita jail in Dublin (Alameda County), rather than in San Francisco County, thus ensuring that they would not be able to avail themselves of their civil rights and return to San Francisco. This enraged progressive activists and civil libertarians as well as the San Francisco Board of Supervisors, which ordered Hongisto to release the citizens he had arrested. On the following Saturday, Hongisto ordered police to disrupt another demonstration and arrested demonstrators with no order to disperse. Both incidences were later the targets of class action suits against the city of San Francisco, although the former, undertaken by the Lawyer's Guild, would not be resolved for nearly a decade.

Soon thereafter, a gay and lesbian community newspaper, the San Francisco Bay Times, published a cover graphic of Hongisto's head pasted on the body of a lesbian activist. The activist, dressed in a police uniform, held a giant baton with one end protruding from the groin area as if it were an erect *****. The headline screamed, "Dick's Cool New Tool: Martial Law", in reference to the police actions. What happened afterwards is subject to dispute. Hongisto claimed that he had asked members of the police union to gather copies of the paper to show members of the rank and file what he was enduring in the activist press, in reaction to their criticism of his supposedly failing to properly defend their conduct of the arrests during the King riots. Around 2,000 copies of the free papers were taken from news racks by three officers and later found stored at the Mission District police station. Hongisto was publicly accused of ordering the confiscation of the papers in attempt at censorship, a charge he continued to deny up to his death. After a hearing, which many considered to be highly politicized, the San Francisco Police Commission found him culpable, and Mayor Jordan dismissed him. One of those three officers, Gary Delagnes, is now president of the San Francisco Police Officers Association.

---

Thanks for all this information. I still live in SF, and I often wonder why. We are one of the most corrupt cities in the country. I'd tell some stories, but I'd be getting too far off topic, even more OT than usual.

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Don't think SF is an outlier there. Here in San Diego, 3 of the 5 mayors immediately preceding the current mayor were forced out of office in disgrace. One accepted illegal campaign contributions, one was a serial sexual harasser, one presided over so much mismanagement and corruption in the city's pension fund that the media called San Diego "Enron By The Sea".

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At least you have weather that you can enjoy. I lived in San Diego (La Jolla) for the better part of a year. It rained a tenth of an inch while I was there. The day it rained there were accidents all along the road on the way to work that day, maybe because the natives were not used to rain. Sometime the fog would roll in about 10PM but would be gone before sunrise. Here the fog rolls in by 5PM, and if we are lucky, it will disappear by 2PM the next day, and we will have a window of sunshine. We have a good 10-15 days a year comparable to the average San Diego day near your beaches. I'm trying to talk myself into moving back.

SFCityBear said:

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bearister said:

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The average NBA player will make $24.7 million in his career. That is based on an average salary of $5.2 million and an average career length of 4.8 years and is $18.6 million more than the career earnings for the average NFL player ($6.1 million).Oct 10, 2013; Business Insider

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Is this a great country, or what? I wonder what the average NBA fan will make in his or her career? And how much does the average working stiff make in his or her career? Can they afford NBA tickets? If not, we need a government program to provide them with free tickets.

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I would think Bernie would be all over that.