Ranked-choice Voting: Epic Fail in Oakland.

Mayor Quan releases dove at religious conference.
The dove was reportedly killed shortly thereafter, struck by a wayward bullet
while flying over the Occupy Oakland encampment.

One year ago, Jean Quan was elected mayor of Oakland. She never led in any poll at any time during the campaign. She always trailed front-runner Don Perata in every minute of the campaign from beginning to end.

On election day, 36% percent of Oakland voters said they wanted Don Perata as their mayor. Only 24% of Oakland voters said Jean Quan was their first choice to be mayor. In prior years, a runoff election would have followed and voters would have chosen between Perata and Quan in a head to head runoff election. Not this year. This was Oakland's first Ranked-choice Voting election for Mayor. The other candidates on the ballot were eliminated and the second and third choice votes on their ballots were added to Quan and Perata's totals. Jean Quan became mayor. Oakland saved the cost of conducting a runoff election.

After only 10 months in office Mayor Jean Quan unifies Oakland

Ten months in office, and Oakland Mayor Jean Quan has done what most people would consider impossible. She has united the citizens of Oakland. A recent CBS 5 poll reports that 85% of the Oakland do not think she is doing a good job as mayor. Occupiers, Anarchists, Business Owners, Protesters, The Chamber of Commerce, Conservatives, Liberals, Centrists and Anarchists all standing shoulder to shoulder with this this single shared conviction and unity of purpose. Amazingly, an even higher percentage are united in the belief that she is doing a terrible job handling the protests.

STRIKE! STRIKE! STRIKE!

With the call from Occupy Oakland for a General Strike, the epicenter of the Occupy Wall Street/D.C. /San Francisco/Oakland/Sesame Street movement moved to the left coast today:

"OAKLAND, Calif. — A week after police in riot gear rousted and then tear-gassed Occupy Oakland protesters, supporters of the movement have rebuilt their encampment in front of City Hall and are calling for a general strike on Wednesday that will include an attempt to shut down the nation’s fifth-busiest shipping port. “We call for a general strike around the country, and around the world, because we know that the wealth of the 1 percent is produced by the work of the 99 percent,” said Louise Michel, one of the protest organizers, at a news conference."

What better day to end my 60 day strike against my own blog and re-occupy this space in solidarity with the "movement". In no particular order, some thoughts on the unfolding events that are currently occupying my mind:

Strike Status
Upon awakening this morning, the first thing I did was check out the traffic cam for the Bay Bridge connecting Oakland and San Francisco. I expected to seen this primary commuter route to be deserted as the oppressed 99% flexed their collective muscle and answered the call for a general strike against the oppressing 1%. As you can see in the screen shot at the top of the page, the bridge superficially appears to be jammed with commuter traffic at 6:45 AM, pretty much as it is every day at this time. I can only assume that this is attributable to the 99% streaming across the bridge to Occupy San Francisco. Or something. I may have to walk down the hill and see how my Occupy San Francisco brethren are doing in Justin Hermann square. Or not