Posts Tagged ‘Politics’

Story by MARTIN RICARD Video by CHRISTINA SALERNO Oct. 21—Twelve dedicated staff. Four extra-long tables. Floodlights. A decked-out AC Transit bus playing “God Bless America” and other patriotic songs. And a whole lot of coffee, hot chocolate and cookies. That’s what it took for the Alameda County Registrar of Voters’ office to pull off its…

by MELANIE MASON Voting is the basic building block of our democracy, but Election Day presents its own confusions.  Here are commonly asked questions in anticipation of November 4.  If you have other questions, please submit them as a comment and we’ll try to get them answered for you.

By LINNEA EDMEIER In this photo and audio essay from her hometown in northern California’s Amador County, where life-size John McCain and Sarah Palin cutouts decorate shop entrances, Oakland North reporter and former fire captain Linnea Edmeier listens to friends and neighbors who live a long, long way from the Democratic strongholds of the Bay…

Business is actually brisk in one corner of American retail: Obama gear. McCain gear? In North Oakland, not so much. Click here for the story.

By MARTIN RICARD Oct. 17 — On most days, you can usually find 19-year-old Lajon Collins at the Bushrod Recreation Center, playing basketball, lifting weights or just hanging out with friends. But come Nov. 4, there is one place you probably won’t find him: at the polls. Collins isn’t registered to vote. And he doesn’t…

by CLARE MAJOR The cards would look much like any other ID card—driver’s license, student or employee ID—that people use in Oakland every day. The new cards would display a photo, name, and address; a magnetic strip would run across the back. And these cards, issued by the City of Oakland, would be available to…

By MAGGIE FAZELI FARD, CLARE MAJOR and CHRISTINA SALERNO OCT. 7—The experts agree: the second presidential debate was a snoozer—and irrelevant. Three political experts analyzed the candidates’ performance after a debate-watching party sponsored by the Institute of Governmental Studies department at UC Berkeley, where a rather sedate crowd of about 140 students and professors gathered to watch the event.

By OAKLAND NORTH STAFF Sept. 27—They cheered, they jeered and they rolled their eyes. Some even slurped “Obama-Mama” cocktails—a special concoction of coconut rum and pineapple juice—at one of the dozens of debate-watching parties held throughout Oakland and Berkeley on Friday night. Ardent supporters of Barack Obama or John McCain gathered to watch the season’s…

By MARTIN RICARD SEPT. 23 — Over the summer, some North Oakland residents were furious with the city when they unexpectedly got tickets for parking their cars in front of their homes after they had already paid to renew their residential parking permits.

by MELANIE MASON “The first thing you do in municipal government is take care of public safety.” That was a quote from Oakland resident Charles Pine, who runs the community group Oakland Residents for Peaceful Neighborhoods. But it was also, almost verbatim, a quote from City Council President Ignacio De La Fuente. And a quote…

By BAGASSI KOURA Sept. 22 — As the California Democratic Party works on playing a larger role in the battleground states for the presidential election, Bay Area Democrats opened Sunday a new Oakland campaign office that will focus on local races. “We want the Obama supporters to get involved for the different propositions that we support,…