Bay Guardian: Election 2005

The Gavin Newsom who walked into the North Light Court at City Hall a couple of hours ago was impeccably groomed, his face almost a mask of political perfection. He didn't smile once. Gavin's been training for years to be a politician, and tonight, he seemed to have it nailed. He stuck precisely to his script, repeated the equivalent of a stump speech ("victory of good government over ideology," ick, yawn) over and over, ducked questions like a pro and acted utterly aloof, as if none of the folks in the press corps (many of whom he sees every day) were anything but maddening hordes of inquistiors, to be rebuffed and spun at every chance.
Even his one attempt at humor was alarming. When I asked him if he thought ranked-choice voting was a success, he said it still confused him. Then he added:
"But I went to public schools."
My mind was on the election, and I'm not as smart as I used to be, so I let it pass, but in retrospect, that was a terrible thing to say. Why is the mayor of San Francisco insulting the public schools, right when hundreds of parents are considering school choices for next year, a few days before what could be a devastating strike? Why is that funny?
I should have said: Mr. Mayor, my son goes to a public school in San Francisco, and he's learning more math in First Grade than I did in Third. I love the public schools. Don't make stupid jokes at the expense of the kids.
But it won't matter. Newsom is golden. He won it all tonight, and the progressives in this city need to figure out, fast, how to deal with him over the next few years.
I don't want to go too far with this -- it was a low-turnout off-year election, and those always favor more conservative causes. But a huge labor and progressive movement statewide shot down the governor -- and for once, the statewide results are better than the results in San Francisco. This isn't good news.
For starters, we have to get beyond this "ideology versus good government" line. Newsom the politician is happy to bash "politicians," and I think Gerardo Sandoval played right into that. In the waning days of the campaign, Sandoval acted not like a professional but like a politician, attacking his opponent with a hit mailer. That wasn't going to work; people are sick of that sort of negative politics, and it clearly did nothing for Sandoval. He was unable to present the case for electing him to a crucial city office, so he took the low road.
Meanwhile, Sup. Aaron Peskin has clearly decided that his political future depends on breaking away from his longtime pro-neighborhood, anti-chain-store stance. I'm not sure what the deal was, or exactly how he figures to gain from supporting Home Depot, but he's hardly offering an alternative to Newsom.
Perhaps the supervisors need a new board president in January, someone who can persuasively (and consistenly) challenge the mayor on the big issues -- and more important, present a competant, credible plan for making the city work better.
We're not going to win the mayor's race in 2007. If we're going to have a chance in 2011, we need to be thinking about it now.

http://dev.sfbg.com/election2005/archives/000227.html