Nancy Pelosi is not only from San Francisco...it turns out she's also the runaway bride.

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You're correct Will; Pelosi, Boxer and Feinstein are way too close to the right for most San Franciscanos.
If anything, they'll be under far more scrutiny from the residents of the city than from Homer and Hannah Holyroller in the fly-over states.
The men, women and gender-reassignment voters of this city have lived under siege for too long, watching the nation's civil right get tossed on those rightwing bonfires.
We live shoulder to shoulder on this tiny, hilly, quake-prone peninsula; sharing religions, social customs, foods, and languages.
Live and let live isn't as painful and dangerous as the quickly-falling-from-grace crooked fundamentalists preachers would like their afraid-to-think-for-themselves flock to think.
The republicans and their fundamentalist backers have taken the USA to the brink of fascism.
Pelosi will simply be the finger in the dyke......er, dike!, but it's a start.

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The Right has developed a vernacular to appeal to homophobia without really appearing to. "San Francisco Values" in Right Wing code = "Gay," as does any mention of redefining marriage.

San Fran is different than it used to be. It is no longer a giant magnate for gays as it's simply too expensive for many...and thankfully things have gotten somewhat better for gays in this nation, so gay/lesbians can stay close to where they were born rather than having to move to gay ghettos in SF or W. Villiage NYC as was the case in the past. SF is a high-tech, rich yuppie city with a lot of gays, but otherwise it's straight.

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It's long past due that we should take the term liberal back from the spin-meisters, hacks and political commentators. A national 'coming out' day for people proud to admit to what we stand for. Most of what everybody takes for granted today that has changed our nation and world for the better has come from people considered liberal/progressive in their time. Radical ideas like-

1- Abolition of child labor.
2- Universal suffrage.
3- The right to a free public education.
4- Preservation of natural areas in National Parks, National Forests, Game Preserves, Wilderness Areas, etc.
5- Laws and agencies designed to protect consumers from unsafe foods and medicines.
6- Legal abolition of discrimination based upon race, ethnicity, or sex.
7- The GI Bill that sent tens of millions to higher ed for the first time, made home loans widely available for the first time. Simply the birth of the middle class in America.
8- Land Grant Universities.
9- The Clean Air Act, The Clean Water Act & the EPA.
10- Pell Grants and Federal School Loans.
11- Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.
12- Rural Electrification Co-ops that brought electricity to every corner of our nation.
13- Public Broadcasting, the most trusted media voice in our nation in poll after poll.
14- Fair Housing Laws that outlawed redlining and in-your -ace discrimination.
15- The Interstate Highway System.

If conservative thinking people had always run this country we would have a far harsher, more stratified, less fair, less open, more polluted and less upwardly mobile nation than we have now. Since when has it been a bad thing to be tolerant of others and concerned for the welfare of all of our neighbors?

Liberals know that if one person in a community is held back, we are all the lesser because of it. We also know that investment in people is better by far for the community as a whole. We defend the commonwealth- our land, air, water and wildlife both for ourselves and as a trust future generations. We assist those unable or least able to help themselves get ahead, so that they may live in dignity. We seek peace and understanding with all people, in deed- not just in principle.

Conservatives, at their very core value property rights (read money) above all else. Liberals put people first because they think it to be morally right. I'm on the people's side.

If supporting and standing for values like that makes one a liberal, then by all means call me a liberal. It's a tag I will wear proudly until my very last breath.

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Nancy is the best liberal SF has ever created. If she were cooking for the Bushies she would debone the chicken before serving it. She says there will be no impeachment but she is much smarter than to just say no. If the full truth about the Bushies is revealed then she would have no choice but to just say yes. When decent people replace criminals there is no place to go but up toward the most decent US government ever. The way toward enlightenment is in nice hands.

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We do go out of our way not to place restrictions on people or their actions or religions or appearances.

I get it: you are all about freedoms. What happened to one's freedom to negotiate a deal? Yes, like paying a worker what you think his or her labor is worth (unthinkable!), rather than the government-enforced minimum wage. Or does all this going "out of our way not to place restrictions on people or their actions" apply only to cross-dressing and saving the wales?

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Pelosi, Kleiner Perkins Push for Overhaul of Sarbanes-Oxley Law

By Ari Levy and Jesse Westbrook

Nov. 13 (Bloomberg) -- For Silicon Valley venture capitalists eager to weaken the Sarbanes-Oxley corporate- governance law, it may pay to have friends in high places. The speaker's rostrum of the U.S. House of Representatives, for instance.

Nancy Pelosi, the leader of newly empowered House Democrats, received more campaign money this year from partners at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, the venture capital firm that helped launch Google Inc. and Amazon.com Inc., than she got from Democrats' traditional friend, the AFL-CIO labor federation. She in turn has already identified revising the 2002 Sarbanes-Oxley law as a top priority when she becomes House speaker in January. . .

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Sorry, couldn't resist. ;)

The whole idea that liberals don't have 'values' is ridiculous. Peace and social justice are values, just not ones associated with the Republican party. But, whatever. Like I said, this country is conservative and doesn't like gay people. Things are getting better but not fast enough to avoid wingers ragging on San Fran. You can just imagine if she'd been from New York.

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When Nancy said, impeachment is off the table, she lost my support. She will be a toothless grandma. How can any member of our Senate or House not question signing statements? It is willingly giving legislative power to the executive.

I'm for an Equality party, where each individual vote is equal in influence. Take the power of money out of democracy. I've had enough of spineless and principless democrats. R's do have guts. They know D's don't.

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No one should forget, that San Francisco also is home to over 20! of some of the worst billionaires and their lovely companies. A gold diggers town in origin, our seven hills are graced with unspeakable wealth, while many of our valleys are filled with families living in parks and streets. Though some of us actually run around semi enlightend, in search of real solutions to the mess human kind tends to drown itself in, others are quite busy accumilating more wealth. It's still America, you all...by the way, aubergine is of a dark purple color, the result of blue and red, I am sorry to say. My 2 cents.

Still shocked here, of all the pro Bush stickers I saw in my 'oh so liberal San Francisco' not that long ago.

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Everybody – even the mainstream media – seems to have picked up on the idea that the replacement of Rummy by Gates is an attempt by the paleocons surrounding Father Bush to finally take back some power from the neocons, and try to salvage what they can from the Iraq debacle. There is a real fear in the Establishment – you know, the guys Noam claims, in the ultimate insane conspiracy theory, to have been running things all along, an odd idea if such drastic steps have to be taken to rescue the United States from Lobby treason – that the results of Iraq will be a permanent destruction of American military power coupled with the real potential for a grass-roots revolution across the entire Middle East, leading to the loss of literally trillions of dollars of Establishment wealth. Thus the traditional Establishment, which has allowed the neocons and their Israel Lobby bosses to get away with murder for the past six years, have finally decided to take back the American government from the pro-Israeli traitors.

While Gates is certainly a paleocon figure from Father Bush’s circle, and the fabulous James Baker boys are working out a more conciliatory approach to the Middle East which may even involve a little diplomacy, it would be a mistake to count the neocons out completely. We have just witnessed a rather sweet Israeli maneuver whereby the pro-Israeli Republican Congress was replaced by an even more pro-Israeli Democrat Congress, under the control of Israeli agents including Rahm Emanuel. The rather incompetent campaign run by the Republicans, the delay in firing Rummy thus wasting the political advantage of removing him at a time when it could have done the Republicans some political good (to the fury of the party), and the failure to fully use the ‘Diebold advantage’ when the races were won on razor-thin margins, all point to an upper-level conspiracy to allow the Democrats to win. One advantage is that the crooked voting machines will live to see another election. Another is that Israeli policies will continue to dominate American politics.

Gates is an interesting figure. A clear paleocon with a CIA/Cold Warrior background, he is also one of the main criminal figures in Iran-Contra (as well as being involved in the 1980’s program to arm Saddam; the first ‘October surprise’; and the extending of the Cold War through lying CIA estimates of Soviet power). Iran-Contra was the first neocon attack on the United States. It follows the model of cloaking Israeli partisan interests behind a façade of American Establishment interests. Somehow the neocons, essentially the same group that now runs the Bush Administration, managed to convince otherwise sane and supposedly intelligent paleocons that it would be a good idea to break laws involving sale of arms to Iran in order to provide funding to break laws involving the providing of arms to the Contras. The only beneficiaries of this wild scheme were Israel and some Israeli arms dealers.

You’ll remember that the end game for Wurmser’s Zionist Plan for the Middle East involves the break-up of Iraq, leading to the creation of a moderate Shi’ite state in Iraq, which will in turn influence Iran to become moderate. Just as the paleocons were led by the nose by the neocons in Iran-Contra, the same thing appears to be happening in paleocon planning for Iraq. The plan will involve some kind of partition of Iraq, exactly what Wurmser and his Israeli bosses want to see.

This is not a new paleocon idea. Gelb has been writing about it for years.The neocons want American troops to stay in Iraq long enough so there will be no possibility of any kind of federal Iraqi state surviving.The Zionists still control Bush/Cheney, all the American media, and the entire Congress. They can thus continue to throw roadblocks in the way of any sane paleocon plan. It is still too early to say the neocon nightmare is over.

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A quick note. If you are trying to promote your city to the 'flyover country' and middle-class folks and are also trying to do away with stereotypes of San Francisco 'tinkerbell' is not the appropriate fictional person to use as typifing your city. Classic!

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Pelosi will do a good job representing that psuedo left that drive their Lexuses on Christmas or Thanksgiving day down to the soup kitchen in downtown SF to "help the poor." The same group that has sufficiently "invested" in SF real estate to make it the most expensive in the country. Well, you know who will be taken care of now, that's for sure. We will be saving the whales and redwoods while under our noses poor peole can't afford housing or enough to eat. Just keep them along with all those stinky smells away from Marin County. The banks, real-estate and insurance companies have invested millions in Pelosi and Hillary, just why do you think that is?

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Pelosi will do a good job representing that psuedo left that drive their Lexuses on Christmas or Thanksgiving day down to the soup kitchen in downtown SF to "help the poor." The same group that has sufficiently "invested" in SF real estate to make it the most expensive in the country. Well, you know who will be taken care of now, that's for sure. We will be saving the whales and redwoods while under our noses poor peole can't afford housing or enough to eat. Just keep them along with all those stinky smells away from Marin County. The banks, real-estate and insurance companies have invested millions in Pelosi and Hillary, just why do you think that is?

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The “San Francisco Values” of which commentators of the right like the Bill O’Reillys’
ad-server-d10.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,227846,00.html critique so critically is just another ploy of their party to discredit the liberal left. There is a reason men like O’Reilly don’t live in San Francisco, don’t visit San Francisco, don’t want to be associated with San Francisco. Maybe they are afraid of change, of more civilian liberties, or that he may be treated like a person rather then a “radio superstar.”
San Francisco Values parallel the values of the United States of justice, equality, and freedom. It is one of the most open places in the entire world.
Nancy Pelosi brings these same values with her as House Speaker. Her values are built on expanding freedoms, not taking them away. She strongly believes in the same equality and justice written into the constitution. The City of San Francisco lives those out everyday. The current heads of office have diminished equality with the use of amendments to limit freedom and civil liberties rather then to expand them.
I know Pelosi will bring to the country, what she has already accomplished in San Francisco. She has been a huge part in maintaining the high quality of life San Franciscan’s pride themselves on living. Check out this recent San Francisco Chroncile article,
www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/ 2006/11/11/MNGE4MATQD1.DTL which shows many of the good things she as accomplished for San Francisco. It is a great time for San Francisco, and will for sure be in the spotlight, as the article also suggests.
Pelosi being from San Francisco will help the international view of the country. It promotes a positive change in our government and for cities across the country. If it works in San Francisco, why wouldn’t it work in other cities? Pelosi should give the United States some needed renovations as she did for The City.
San Francisco is a jewel of a city, world renowned for its beauty, character, tranquility, and freedoms. The city is by far no Utopia, but is closer to it then most cities in the United States. As an individual that has lived his entire life in San Francisco, I may be a little bias with my love for the city, but there is a reason I have lived there my entire life with little thought of leaving. It is a bubble. It is not like other cities. It has so many influences, which makes it so unique. So many cultures living together for the most part in peace. I agree with Will Durst that we do not judge the individual, and have to add that we have good perceptions of an individual’s character.
Pelosi is also a consensus builder, and does not take sides, but rather brings people together in finding a middle ground. She is a warm genuine person principled person, but is also tough. She will not stand down to President Bush. She is an ideal person to fill the role of the Speaker of the House. She gets it that she represents the country, not the left of left, not San Francisco, but the country as whole and to do what’s best for her people.

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SF is a port city and a mining city. The freedom here goes way beyond just being OK with the gays. Why do you think they came here? Because this City lives and breathes freedom. Need to drive your car down the sidewalk? OK, just so long as you don't park on the sidewalk! Looking for a seatbealt on the cablecar? Ha, ha. What are you looking to do, sailor? You got it. San Francisco, spelled F-R-E-E-D-O-O-M.

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The progressives don't have to take credit for the Interstate Highway System since it was started by Eisenhower. It was initially titled the National System of Interstate and Defense Highways. He got the idea from Hitler who initiated the German Autobahn.

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Those who know Ms. Pelosi is not the same 30 years ago, and I could care less if she is from the Bay Area. Californians should rejoice that we finally have a politician who is intelligent and has a philosophical bent in her ideas. I think the country should embrace this tough fighter.
It's time we elect a female for president. It remains to be seen if anything should happen to Cheney, but we'll see. She could be our Angela Merkel without the conservative slant.
For the moment, Washington and her haters must deal with it. She's earned the right to be Speaker. She's going to do a great job in the nation's capitol.

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All this "what if" talk about somebody getting fired, somebody else choking on his cufflings, somebody getting abducted by aliens and somebody else going crazy and signing his whole kingdom to the Democrats is very amusing. And Ms. Pelosi may (or may not) be the right person to benefit from this highly unlikely coincidence. But there is one question that keeps on bothering me for a few years already:

What was wrong with Elizabeth Dole? Why didn't people support her?

Seriously, other than the fact that her party is hated on this Web site - what was wrong with her as a Presidential candidate?

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"""""Hope you were hanging on to something solid Tuesday night because this country lurched so hard to the left, half of Washington woke up with a wicked case of whiplash on Wednesday...."""""

Seen from Europe the Dems are mega-right and the GOP giga-right!

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Sounds good to me. Pelosi '07.

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