No on Propositions B and C

If you vote in San Francisco, and happen to be doing it old-school on Tuesday's actual Election Day, please let me urge you to vote No on Propositions B and C. You can vote no on everything else too, including the four candidates who are running unopposed a la the Russian Comintern, but it's B and C that are temporarily important. Millions of dollars have been spent by the aptly named real estate developer, Simon Snellgrove, a moniker amusingly reminiscent of Simon Legree. Snellgrove has been bankrolling a multi-million dollar political campaign highlighted by a comically untruthful television ad featuring Gavin Newsom, former San Francisco Mayor and current Marin resident who occasionally drags himself to Sacramento to play Lieutenant Governor.



Newsom is joined in the ad by the famously mendacious current mayor of San Francisco, Ed Lee, who points at a fence and a parking lot and asks, "What's better? A parking lot or a park?" as if that was the actual choice. Of course everyone would prefer a park, but the real choice is between a parking lot/outdoor tennis courts/swimming pool and a 12-story luxury condominium complex near the waterfront. Built on public land for a small fraction of the global rich who want a pied-à-terre in San Francisco, this is possibly not the best use for what should be public commons.