The recall of San Francisco's District Attorney

Michael I usually don't care about politics, except maybe when there's something to laugh about. However, the fun of observing San Franciso politics has evaporated completely in recent years, having to watch helpless feel-good politicians turning the city into a lawless hellscape. When you can't buy a bicycle anymore because it will be stolen immediately, or you can't park a car on the street anymore because unchallenged thieves cut off the catalytic converter in broad daylight, the fun stops eventually (USARundbrief reported).

Many others were in the same situation as us when we had to watch the San Francisco District Attorney, Chesa Boudin, who was elected by the people for four years, refuse to prosecute criminals arrested by the police. This kept happening even for repeat offenders, the man obviously following a very absurd and radical political ideology. But eventually even the most tolerant citizens of San Francisco were so fed up, that they demanded the dismissal of the inactive prosecutor through a petition, only two years into his four-year term. This "recall" procedure exists in the state of California for all kinds of political offices, and even some of our governors have had to face a vote of no confidence forced by the people. The signatures of angry citizens were certified in November, and the actual recall vote was held on June 7, 2022.

When such referendums pile up, as is unfortunately the case in California, many citizens simply don't bother to vote out of fatigue. Boudin was elected in 2019 with only a few votes ahead with a voter turnout of only 41%. However, in the June 2022 recall, large parts of the city's population were so angry about the prosecutor's missteps that 46% of them managed to cast their votes. 90% of them voted by mail, 10% dragged themselves to one of the many polling stations scattered across the city.

As is now common across politics, unfortunately no party today runs fact-based election campaigns or can even accept a democratically targeted election result when they're not the winner. Every week I found new leaflets in our mailbox, mainly from Boudin's fanatical followers, in which it was dramatically explained to me that anyone who voted for the recall must be a Republican! The whole recall process was allegedly financed by billionaires, some of whom were even connected to Republicans in Congress, the flyers said! Interestingly, San Francisco is one of the most left-leaning cities in the USA, with about 5% Republicans and 63% Democrats, so "Republican" is an insult that hardly anyone will tolerate.

Furthermore, it must be mentioned that practically every election campaign here in the USA is sponsored by wealthy citizens, who finance television and internet ads and donate money for spectacular stage appearances with lots of balloons. Even Boudin's anti-recall campaign was funded by wealthy citizens who supported his politics. But on election day, of course, it was the citizens who went to the polls, each with only one vote, regardless of whether they were rich or poor.

With excitement, we followed the vote count after the polling boths had closed in the evening hours of the day the votes were cast, and it quickly became clear that Boudin had been ousted from office with a bang. A glance at the election map (Figure 6) made it clear that purple-colored wealthy old hippie neighborhoods (Bernal Heights, Haight-Ashbury, Noe Valley) and the Latin American Mission District wanted to keep the district attorney. The residents of the green-colored neighborhoods, who wanted to fire him, were composed of wealthy snobs (Pacific Heights, Marina, Seacliff) and Asian working class (Sunset, Richmond, Excelsior), which gave the edge due to the higher population count.

In his resignation speech, Boudin blamed wealthy Republicans who had funded the recall with three times as much money as his own supporters. That he was simply a bad fit for the job of District Attorney never occurred to him. You see, when you lose an election nowadays, you don't look for the blame within yourself. After all, you own the truth and everyone else is a fraud or simply crazy. It's quite remarkable that democratic principles are no longer in demand with the "Me! Me! Me!" generation, no matter if left or right.

The recall received surprisingly wide press coverage, and even though it was only a city election, national news outlets such as CNN and the major daily newspaper New York Times reported extensively on it. They all wanted to recognize a political trend in the result. The magazine "The Atlantic" even published a ten-page article titled "How San Francisco Became a Failed City", written by an author who grew up in San Francisco, documenting the decline of the city she once loved. Worth reading!

The US Supreme Court and "Roe vs. Wade"

Angelika The German journalists have already written their fingers to the bone about the latest decisions of the American Supreme Court. So you should already be well informed. But not everything that was written explained the situation correctly and based on facts. But we all agree that the decisions will have or already have groundbreaking consequences. It is on everyone's lips that the abortion law that has been in force throughout the USA for almost 50 years has fallen. Back in the day, the case "Roe versus Wade" had been decided in favor of the plaintiff Norma McCorvey (called "Jane Roe" in the proceedings) by the Supreme Court in 1973.

The highest judges at the time determined that the right to privacy afforded to all women in the USA included the decision to continue or terminate a pregnancy, and that this could not result in any state prosecution. This right to privacy is outlined in the 14th Amendment of the American Constitution. More specifically, it is derived from the so-called "Due Process Clause" which states that the state cannot arbitrarily deprive its citizens of life, liberty, and property.

In June of this year, the Supreme Court finally decided in a 6-3 decision that the right to privacy does not lead to a uniformly applicable right to abortion in all states, but that the individual states must decide for themselves whether and how they want to grant this right. It is therefore possible to completely prohibit abortions without exceptions, but on the other hand also to allow them, or to extend the existing right, depending on what the state decides.

In California, for example, where the court ruling has not changed anything regarding the right to abortion, our governor Gavin Newsom is currently working to include the right to abortion in the California Constitution as an additional article. In November, the California voters will decide whether they want to change their constitution in this regard. In Alabama, however, abortions are now prohibited without exceptions, even in cases of rape and incest.

Since "Roe v. Wade" was decided in 1973, anti-abortion opponents have vehemently and often violently opposed the right to abortion in the USA. I remember well the various attacks on clinics that performed abortions. Legal experts feared from the beginning that the derivation of the right to abortion, based on the constitutionally granted right to privacy, had been on shaky feet, even those experts who generally welcomed the decision. However, the Supreme Court had been very reluctant to reverse the established rights. If you have followed the recent hearings in the Senate, whenever a new seat on the Supreme Court was to be filled, it was also about checking the candidates to see if they accepted cases like "Roe v. Wade" as a precedent. Incidentally, surveys have repeatedly confirmed that a majority of Americans (about 60%) wanted "Roe v. Wade" to remain untouched. I already wrote in the last newsletter that I increasingly feel that we are all regressing. There are really enough problems to be solved and we are getting into a culture war that seemed to be solved a long time ago.

Incidentally, there have been long-standing efforts to make some fundamental changes regarding the highest American court in order to counter the increasing politicization of the court. Many would like to implement that judges are no longer appointed for life. The Founding Fathers actually wanted to prevent politics from taking too much of a forefront in the Supreme Court. Therefore, it is stipulated that Supreme Court judges are not elected, but appointed, and there is no time limit as to when they have to vacate their posts. It was intended to make the court less susceptible to political currents.

Unfortunately, increasing life expectancies have had the opposite effect, as the women and men on the Supreme Court now keep their robes on average for almost 30 years, thus shaping not only the highest court but also life in the USA through their decisions for decades. For comparison: until the early 70s, the average term of office for the judges was 15 years. Constitutional judge John Paul Stevens, on the other hand, still sat on the bench at 90 years of age and was active at the Supreme Court for a total of 34 years. Of course, the judges are free to retire or leave for other reasons, but many cling to the office until their last hour. Few retire voluntarily.

The illustrious exceptions are Stephen Breyer, who recently retired at 83 years old, and Anthony Kennedy, who stopped at 82. Now, that's not exactly a typical retirement age, but Stephen Breyer, who was one of the more liberal justices on the Supreme Court, wanted to make sure that President Biden nominated his replacement, so that the position would go to someone with a more moderate or liberal background, which is what happened. Ketanji Brown Jackson was sworn in on June 30, 2022, after the Senate, which currently has a narrow Democratic majority, confirmed her, following the required hearings.

It's been a common occurrance lately that Supreme Court judges just pass away while in office. Antonin Scalia suddenly passed away at 79 years old, and Ruth Bader Ginsberg at 87 years. Both were active at the Supreme Court until their death. Many who followed the court's rightward shift with concern repeatedly appealed to Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who belonged to the more liberal wing of the court, to retire, so that then-President Obama could appoint her successor. Ginsburg was seriously ill with cancer and had relapses. But she couldn't be persuaded to quit and fate took its course. Ginsburg died in 2020 when Trump was president, who then nominated the conservative judge Amy Coney Barrett, who was confirmed by the Senate. The composition of the court would look very different if Ginsburg had not made this blatant miscalculation.

Limiting the term of office for Supreme Court judges is actually a quite popular opinion amongst American voters, even across party lines. Many legal experts also support this. The most common proposal is to set the term of office of the judges to 18 years, which would mean that an incumbent president could appoint two judges per term on average. However, the experts are divided on whether this would require an amendment to the Constitution. The American Constitution does not directly mention a limitation of the term of office and the formulation of how long judges should remain in office is very vague and open to interpretation: "The judges, both of the supreme and inferior courts, shall hold their offices during good behaviour". Now, an amendment to the Constitution would be a very lengthy process. It would require a 2/3 majority in both houses, i.e. in the Senate and the House of Representatives, and then three-quarters of the states would have to agree to the amendment.

Incidentally, there is no term limit or retirement age for senators or representatives in the House of Representatives. More and more people over 80 hold very important positions in these institutions. Nancy Pelosi, the Speaker of the House of Representatives, for example, is 82 years old and is running again in November to defend her position. Republican Mitch McConnell, who is 80, has been in the Senate since 1985 and is currently the minority leader. Or Diane Feinstein, who has been a California senator since 1992 and is now 89 years old, but still isn't thinking of retiring. Reports are increasing on Feinstein, that she is suffering from dementia and is no longer up to the task.

Surely there may be a few very fit people over 80 years old, but perhaps it's time to let the next generation take the helm. President Biden had promised that he would only serve one term as president, but now it is rumored that he wants to run again in 2024, which also puts him over the age of 80. In my opinion, this would be a blatant mistake. Hopefully someone will talk him out of this idea. I can't understand how anyone could be so eager as to continue in such a demanding job at high age. At least, American presidents are limited to a maximum of eight years in office by the constitution.

Now back to the Supreme Court: Another idea is to appoint more judges to the highest court in order to achieve better balance. This proposal is somewhat jokingly referred to as "packing the court." The American Constitution does not specify the number of judges on the Supreme Court either. The number has historically fluctuated between five to ten judges. Since 1869, however, it has been set at 9. The US Congress can set the number, so a change in this regard would be easier to implement if the corresponding majorities in the Senate and House of Representatives can be found. Many, however, doubt that this will accomplish much, and fear that it will turn into an eternal back and forth, depending on which party has the majority, and the whole thing will turn into a political puppet theater.

Addendum from Michael: For readers who would like to be well-informed on the topic "Roe vs. Wade" in German, I hightly recommend the article by Thomas Fischer in the German magazine Der Spiegel. He's one of the few writers in Germany and especially in the online issue of Spiegel, who still report in a well-founded manner, and not just produce click-bait while featuring colorful hair and sensational glosses to attract attention at any cost.

Fourth of July

Angelika On July 4th, the United States are celebrating their national holiday. It is the day that the United States declared its independence from England in 1776, stopped paying taxes to England, and began to govern itself. Most American holidays fall on a Monday. However, Independence Day is always tied to the date of July 4th. This year, the fourth happened to fall on a Monday, giving everyone a long weekend. Independence Day is also the holiday when there are parades and fireworks in even the smallest towns. Traditionally, people also set off fireworks privately and shoot rockets into the sky, just like in Germany on New Year's Eve. However, this year, due to the severe drought in the American West, many communities officially banned private fireworks to reduce the risk of fire. San Francisco had an official fireworks display, which, as always, disappeared in the fog. That, too, is a tradition on July 4th.

But aside from that, the city strictly prohibited private fireworks beforehand. Or course, that didn't stop many people from firing rockets anyway. It was like the Wild West and it lasted almost all night. I never liked fireworks. I was always glad when it was over on New Year's Eve and nobody had lost a finger. Michael, on the other hand, was known as a fireworks master in his youth.

If you, like us, had experienced multiple raging forest fires in California, you'd be trembling all over and be hoping that nothing will catch fire. This year alone, there were several fires, all caused by illegal rockets or fireworks in the city. One was right around the corner from us on Twin Peaks Hill, and we could see the smoke from our balcony. Thank God the fire department arrived quickly and was able to put it out, but I don't even want to imagine what could have happened.

Wordle

Angelika Here in the US, the Wordle fever has been spreading for quite some time now. Everyone is playing the game, and a common question at work is: "Have you figured out today's "Wordle" yet?" What's going on? Behind "Wordle" hides an online letter game. The task in each round of the game is to guess a secret five-letter word in a maximum of six attempts. You start with any word that consists of five letters. The software then indicates whether the word to be guessed has same letters as your guess.

If a letter of the secret word is present in your guess and in the correct position, it will be displayed in green. The letter will be highlighted in yellow in your guess if it is in the secret word, but in the wrong position. If a letter in your guess turns gray, it means that it isn't present in the word to be guessed at all. Josh Wardle, a Brit living in New York, made the game popular on the internet. By the end of 2021 it had spread like wildfire. Then, the newpaper The New YorkTimesI purchased the game in January 2022, and the boom began.

There is only one word to guess per day. Even German versions have been on the market for quite some time. At my school, we play the English "Wordle" with my fourth graders every day. It's a great trick to practice spelling and expand vocabulary. I'm always amazed at the words my students know. I can also highly recommend "Wordle" to learn English. Michael, of course, went ahead and wrote a program that automatically cracks the word in "Wordle". That leaves you speechless.

Soda maker with Welder's CO2 Tank

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As reported (Rundbrief 05/2020), we've stopped buying bubbly water at the supermarket during Corona times and switched to a soda maker. Now, however, the scoundrels of the SodaStream company are demanding twenty dollars for their tiny CO2 cartridges, which only work for a month a and then go silent. I had already mentioned in a previous newsletter that ingenious tinkerers on Youtube have demonstrated how to convert the soda maker to use larger gas bottles, which can be bought in stores for welding supplies.

Due to the shortage in CO2 production during the coronavirus pandemic, welding supply stores had stopped selling their gas tanks to private customers. Fast forward two years, and production is now flowing again. So recently, I bought a five-pound CO2 gas cylinder from the welding store "Airgas" in San Francisco and quickly connected it to the adapter cable I had bought from Amazon in preparation. And it's flowing like crazy! According to my calculations, this gas cylinder will pump enough for our relatively low demand until the universe turns into a glowing fireball, so I'll never have to buy cartridges again.

You could also assemble the Amazon adapter yourself cheaper, from parts available at the hardware store, but I didn't care about a few bucks, and with pneumatic systems I prefer to play it safe. Incidentally, I also bought the gas cylinder at the Airgas store when I bought the gas, but only afterwards I realized that it is much cheaper on Amazon! Beginner's mistake! Anyway, as long as it keeps bubbling, that's fine.

If you want to refill an empty gas cylinder with new CO2 at some point, the welding shop won't do it like a propane gas station where you bring your own tank to be refilled. As everyone knows in the propane business, only fools buy those overpriced pre-filled Blue Rhino propane tanks! With CO2, however, you don't have a choice, the welding shop only sells already filled, and thus used, gas cylinders! This means that you bring in your own, shiny, newly bought but empty cyclinder, and receive a filled one, possibly used on plumber master Rührich on construction sites, pushed around for years featuring a thousand dents! But as I said, probably not in this life. If so, the newsletter will of course report live from the refill run.

Sunken WWII Cannon Platform on the Beach

Michael One of our favorite hiking trails runs along the Pacific beach below the former artillery position of Fort Funston. There, military fortifications made of concrete from World War II protrude from the sand. The whole thing gives the area an apocalyptic look, and always reminds me of the first movie in the "Planet of the Apes" series, in which Charlton Heston is one of the few survivors of an atomic war and stumbles upon such a relic protruding from the sand. He realizes that the relic is the Statue of Liberty, and that humanity has actually managed to blow up the planet, and he screams his famous line: "You maniacs! You blew it up! Damn you!" What a movie! Nowadays only technically bloated nonsense junk comes out of Hollywood.

If you know me, you're aware that for a few cheap laughs, I'll do just about anything, so I reenacted the scene from the movie where Charlton Heston laughs maniacally. Just as I remembered it, of course, and camerawoman Angelika helped shoot the scene near San Francisco's Ocean Beach. My brain is notoriously porous like a sieve, and so something completely different came out naturally, but as always, it's at least entertaining!

Michael is copying Charlton Heston in 'Planet of the Apes'.

But back to the bunker ruins now found on this beach: The concrete half-circle protruding from the sand in Figure 16 is a segment of a so-called Panama Mount.

It consists of a platform made from concrete in the shape of a circle, on which soldiers can roll around a giant cannon to point it in different directions. In this case, the gunners were firing towards attacking ships at sea, and the position covers a full 180 degrees along the coastline. The weapon enthusiasts among you can find detailed pictures on the Military Museum Website. Look at the black and white pictures of yesteryear to get a feel for how it looked like when the whole thing was still under construction or then in operation.

The fortification, complete with cannon, was undoubtedly once anchored at the top of the dune, and over the years it has tumbled down onto the beach. The Pacific tides change twice a day here, washing huge amounts of sand around, so that the platform sometimes is covered completely and sometimes stands out far from the sand.

At the top of the dune, there is still an old concrete bunker (Figure #2) from the Second World War, and it's hanging there so loosely, that I always wonder when it will fall down next (update: it fell down in July of 2023). The authorities responsible for beaches in California are usually scaredy cats who immediately block off any dangerous areas, but the bunker is still freely accessible and often times you an see overconfident people up there who are playing around on it. Pride comes before the fall!

The Little Produce Store Around the Corner

Angelika Most Germans know the concept of American corner stores from various Hollywood movies, where customers can quickly buy a few things at any time of day or night that they have just run out. There is usually an interesting range of things to be purchased there from beer to snacks, milk and sweets, but also flour and toilet paper.

In our neighborhood on Church Street, there is a wonderful little store of this kind, but it is quite special, because at "Church Produce", you can find not only a wide variety of fresh vegetables and fruits, great bread, but also dairy products, pasta and coffee from small roasters. We are always amazed at how well the store is stocked. Because here we also find our beloved Italian Mortadella, which is not easy to find in the USA. The fruit and vegetables are always of excellent quality and yet affordable.

The employees are always super friendly and give their customers the feeling that they have known them for a long time. Since the store is located in our neighborhood but is still 15 minutes away on foot from our apartment, we often combine a shopping trip there with our daily walk. We hope that "Church Produce" will stay, because running a small store in San Francisco is often a big challenge. But the people in the neighborhood love the store, and it is always well visited.

Greetings from San Francisco!

Angelika and Michael