Oakland Mayor Jean Quan Drags Off Aggressive Husband at Art Murmur

Good job Mayor Quan! You do seem to know how to keep your husband under control when he starts to get out of control. Now if you would kindly do the same with the OPD.

Whoever made this video might not be a motherf**er, but he is way off on his critique (?) of gentrification. Of course it's always easier to see things in racial terms because race is pretty obvious. Yeah more black and brown people are being pushed out of Oakland and harassed and killed by police. But it sure isn't only white people who are cashing in on this. That's probably why Quan's husband got so pissed - he is an equal opportunity greeter-of-money and he doesn't want some white boy telling him he's a racist.

If we insist on framing gentrification as colonialism and reducing it to whites with money displacing everyone else we are not going to get anywhere. But the liberals love that critique because it leaves capitalism off the hook. We're not going to stop gentrification by guilt-tripping anyone, the landlords and employers could ramp up some affirmative action deal and sprinkle some color on the scene but that wouldn't change shit.

racializing these issues does not minimize them. of course it's capitalists displacing the people who live here–regardless of their ethnicity. but the economic/social infrastructure that we're forced to live under exists because of a colonial process, and not acknowledging that race was an essential factor of that process is what's really liberal.

capitalist displacement–or gentrification– got the model from colonialism. it absorbs all available resources, often by force, for the sake of a minorities financial gain and at the expense of the people who live there.

gentrification does not only benefits whites, but ignoring the fact that it does benefit a dominant class that consists mostly of whites is white-supremacist. even the so-called people of color cashing in on oakland's new small-business wave are upholding white-supremacy. guilt is the least of what they should be feeling.

I have no problem with former Maoist Dr. Huen getting some shit for his pandering to the ''1% ''and their allies, like him and the Mayor , who are probably in the Upper Petit Bourgeois 10% . But the heckler doesn't seem to realize that the the demographics of the Ruling class are changing .
The richest man in the world is a Mexican (and he considers himself to be a Mexican Nationalist)
While most Indians live in abject poverty there is a rapidly growing Indian Capitalist class that has strong aspirations for India to be a Imperialist power that can one day challenge US Imperialism .
In this country we have two Republican Governors who's parents are Indian Immigrants and even here in the Bay area the head of the SF GOP is a Sikh .
Also many , maybe most of the very upward bound Petit Bourgeois home owners in the Upscale Fremont Hills are Asians . They share the same class attitudes as their White counterparts. And it's too simplistic and mostly inaccurate to dismiss them as all a bunch of ''Uncle Toms ''. EVERY Culture and Nationality has it's own homegrown set of chauvanistic garbage . Ask any Indian or Chinese Nationalist if you doubt that ,
So the old sixties rhetoric that dismissed all workers of European descent as tacit (at best ) reactionaries and all Blacks, Latinos (with the embarrasing exception of Cuban exiles ! ) Asians and Native Americans as subjective revolutionaries should be discarded.

Maybe there a lot of police presence b/c of the murder that took place a art murmur recently. Maybe there's a lot of police presence because of the fact the10's of 1000's go to art murmur and we all know Oaklanders cannot behave within civilized bounds they need supervision.

There's nothing like a racist reporter who cant abide "white people." Gentrification or people who can afford to move to a neighborhood and choose Oakland. Do you want protectionism? Did you like Jim Crow laws? Why would you advocate them for white people? Oh you're a racist. I see. Gentrification is not a dirty word, retail thrives, schools improve, parks improve. Crime diminishes. All good things in my book.

A story that the KKKorporate stations will never carry even when society is breaking down into a Police state or an Indian Rez. Just to remind everybody the murder that happened at Art Murmur was actually an act of self defense where one kid pulled a weapon on another and that kid shot in self defense. Something we need to prepare for with this police state (Feds in town). So the powers at be are preparing for more kkkops (Hall monitors) to be and to shut down Art Murmur on non-issues like they did Occupy in the Commons (Oscar Grant Plaza) areas. City Council, You Tube and Indybay are tools to stick it to them but let it be known to all in Oakland that you live on an "Indian Rez" with the Introduction of the Feds in West Oakland. We welcome everybody (medicine wheel of the four directions) to the Rez and we know how to fight the beast as we have been doing it since 1492 and don't be afraid to ask us for directions (knowledge).

The people that shot this video make themselves look really bad when they start complaining that Jean Quan's husband shouldn't be driving drunk. It may be true that he had a few drinks, but by pointing out this fact, it is almost as if the producers of this video are seeking the assistance of the police to take action (or calling them out for their inaction?). Regardless, this video is poorly made and a cheap shot that reinforces the very presence it is trying to attack. Way to go COPWATCHERS, the COPS may finally be GOOD GUYS for once.

and that's overlooked for those in power. "have a nice day, sir"

however, had he been an African American unknown from East Oakland, he very well would have been hassled and arrested if police were aware of his inebriation, or even had the slightest suspicion, and there's a chance he could even be shot for it, possibly killed

the legal limit in California is .08 and that only takes about a beer and a half to reach for most people. Mr Quan was slurring and stumbling, and cursing and being aggressive when he didn't like what he heard from the person asking questions about gentrification. he looked to be well over the bare legal limit

but hey, he's a good guy, unlike the East Oakland resident mentioned above here who surely is up to no good, so what's it really matter if laws are enforced unequally? some people just deserve to be roughed up by police and hauled through the justice system and some don't, not matter what laws each follow

@drapetomaniac:

"the economic/social infrastructure that we're forced to live under exists because of a colonial process"

Really? So when "white" people stole the common lands that other "white" people were using and then exploited their labor - before European imperialism - that was a "colonial process" too?

"gentrification does not only benefits whites, but ignoring the fact that it does benefit a dominant class that consists mostly of whites is white-supremacist"

I think somebody else here commented on how the US ruling class is becoming more diverse. At what point in this diversification of the ruling class will your argument cease to make sense? Shouldn't we be preparing a more comprehensive critique? And so what if we acknowledge that this dominant class consists (for the time being) "mostly of whites"? What then? We shame the white newcomers for their "white privilege"? Let's face it, that kind of politics has gone exactly nowhere. Is everyone who rides the "google bus" our class enemy? Of course not, there are fools working in tech that barely make a living wage. But I think when they are white they are more likely to be seen as such. Their problem is not their job or their color, it's their consciousness. We can do something about that or we can alienate them permanently by race-baiting them or attempting to guilt-trip them. The latter are losing strategies and we should all know that by now.