Oakland's New Mayor Hits The Ground Running

On Monday, Libby Schaaf was sworn in as Oakland's 50^th mayor at the historic Paramount Theater, where she used to dance in the hallways as a little girl while her mom served on the board of directors. And she left no doubt in anyone's mind: There's a new sheriff in town.

"I have lived here all my life, and all my life I've been one of Oakland's biggest boosters," she said. "But I've also spent my life frustrated by Oakland's lack of safety and the gross inequities in our public schools. I've been miffed when investment has passed us by and I've been furious when people have disrespected our beautiful city with dumping, graffiti, and most recently with smashed windows."

Translation: Look for a crackdown on violence.

This will not come as welcome news to the so-called "anarchists" – I call them nihilists – who just want to fight. (Trashing the Christmas tree at Jack London Square? Really?)

But it's music to the ears of the people who actually live and work in the part of Oakland that's been affected by the violence.

They are young people, minorities, single moms, restaurateurs, tattoo artists, sculptors, painters, hipsters and entrepreneurs, including one guy I talked to who runs a medical marijuana dispensary.

They are appalled by Michael Brown, Eric Garner, and all the other killings that demonstrate a nationwide pattern of blue-on-black violence too obvious to miss. But it's their garbage cans that are being set on fire and their neighborhood stores that are being looted. And they can't understand how that does anything to stop police brutality.

Not everyone thinks the violence has been a bad thing. I heard a student at Berkeley High being interviewed on KCBS last weekend, and she said, "Nobody paid any attention to what was happening in Ferguson until they burned the QuickTrip down."

But she couldn't be more wrong. The only thing burning down the QuickTrip accomplished was to give the other side an excuse to divert the conversation from Officer Wilson's behavior to the protestors' behavior.

What really generated public interest in the case was the sight of hundreds of people peacefully chanting, "Hands up! Don't shoot!"

As Martin Luther King, whose birthday we'll celebrate next week, would have told us, that the only way to win when the other side owns all the guns, printing presses and TV stations is to force the American people to watch what is being done in their names.

Dr. King called it "bearing witness," and it worked for him. It also worked for Gandhi. "People Power" brought down Marcos in the Philippines, Mubarak in Egypt, and the whole Soviet Union. In each case, the only shots fired were fired by the losing side.

There must be some way the police and the protestors could get together and figure out how to isolate these nihilists. It's in their common interest. The protestors could protect their demonstrations from being hijacked, and the police could get a decent night's sleep for once.

Back in my day, during the Vietnam War demonstrations, we'd deal with the problem by surrounding the troublemakers with hundreds of people. That might not work today, so today's protestors will have to figure out their own tactics.

But if they can't do it in Oakland, where can they?

The Grinch Strikes Again

The Grinch was up to his old tricks this Christmas. On December 21 somebody decapitated the large angel and damaged two other figures in El Cerrito's annual Sundar Shadi Christmas Display, and the residents are hopping mad.

I'm going to be charitable and assume the vandals don't understand what they have done, so let me clue them in.

Mr. Shadi came to El Cerrito from India in 1921. Because of prejudice against immigrants, the only job he could get was pumping gas.

But he worked hard, saved his money, made some good investments, and retired a moderately wealthy man at age 50 in 1949.

That's when he began his true calling. That Christmas, his neighbors awoke to find a large star made out of papier-mache in his yard.

He added a fe more sculptures the next year, and the next, and the next, and before long the hillside was covered with the entire town of Bethlehem - wise men, angels, doves, sheep, lambs, shepherds, cows, horses, donkeys, and camels - all lovingly created by Mr. Shadi himself. He kept it up until failing eyesight forced him to call it quits in 1997.

The community quickly took the Christmas display to heart. Little kids grew up and brought their own kids, and then their grandkids, to see it.

Charter busses full of tourists came from as far away as San Jose and Sacramento - more than 70,000 every year.

For many people, Mr. Shadi WAS Christmas. He was a real-life Santa Claus who gave us something more precious than toys: the true spirit of the holiday.

Paradoxically, he wasn't a Christian himself. He was a Sikh. He chose a Christmas display because that was the way he could say, "I love you" in a language we all could understand.

Mr. Shadi died in 2002 at age 101. And then something wonderful happened. The people of El Cerrito refused to let his legacy die.

Under the leadership of former Mayor Jane Bartke, they restored the Shadi sculptures, which had deteriorated badly. That December the Christmas Display made a triumphant return at the corner of Moeser and Seaview. It's been there every Holiday season since, and there's never been a bit of trouble – until now.

So here's a message for the vandals: You may have broken our sculptures, but you have not broken our hearts.

John F. Kennedy famously said, "Don't get mad; get even," and the best way we can get even is to make next year's Christmas Display better than ever.

That's going to cost money, of course. The damage sculptures have to be repaired, and security will have to be beefed up.

 But the people of El Cerrito have never failed to come through before, and I see no reason to expect they won't come through this time, either.

 You can "adopt" the figure of your choice. A Wise Man (camel included) goes for $500, a shepherd for $350, and sheep are a real steal at only $25. Send a tax-deductible check to the El Cerrito Community Foundation, Inc., P. O. Box 324, El Cerrito CA 94530.

But even more than money, what they really want is you. Whatever skills you have to offer, call Bartke at (510) 235-1315, and she'll find a way to put them to use.

Appeasing The Supreme Leader

When Sony Pictures caved in last week to North Korea's extortionate demands to yank "The Interview" from distribution, my thoughts turned to Salman Rushdie.

Twenty-five years ago Rushdie, a British author of Indian Muslim extraction, was condemned to death by Iran's Ayatollah Khomeini for writing things that the Ayatollah deemed insulting to Islam in his new, critically acclaimed novel, "The Satanic Verses."

Khomeini issued a fatwa ordering any Muslim who encountered Rushdie to kill him on sight, forcing Rushdie to go into hiding for his life.

How did the publishing industry react? As you might expect, the major book chains, including Amazon and Barnes & Noble, chickened out like Sony and immediately stopped selling "The Satanic Verses."

But Cody's Books, an independent bookstore on Telegraph Avenue in Berkeley, in the heart of the student quarter, decided to stand up for freedom of speech and stocked the book.

In the early morning hours of May 4, 1989, Cody's owner, Andy Ross, was wakened by a phone call from the Berkeley Police. Somebody had thrown a firebomb through the store's front window.

After the firefighters put out the fire, Ross and his staff started cleaning up. He looked down and spotted a second device – an unexploded pipe bomb rolling on the floor next to the poetry section.

It was too dangerous to move, so he and his staff watched from across the street while the bomb squad blew it up. Though they packed it with sandbags first, it still made the whole building shake.

After it was all over they filed back inside, and Ross told his staff that it was up to them whether to continue stocking the book.

They took a vote. It was unanimous. The book stayed.

"That was Cody's finest moment," Ross said proudly.

A few months later, Rushdie briefly came out of hiding to make a surprise visit to Cody's. Ross showed him the hole in the ceiling from the second bomb. Next to it someone had written, "Salmon Rushdie Memorial Hole."

"Some authors get statues," Rushdie quipped. "Others get holes."

Other independents followed Cody's example, and the writers' community – led by Susan Sontag, Kurt Vonnegut and Norman Mailer  - rallied around Rushdie with petitions, press conferences and full-page ads in the papers.

Compare that to the shameful behavior of the Hollywood community last week when George Clooney circulated a petition urging Sony to call the North Koreans' bluff. He couldn't get a single signature.

Some people are questioning whether it's worth taking even a remote risk for the sake of a dumb comedy like "The Interview."

But, as Clooney pointed out, "With the First Amendment, you’re never protecting Jefferson. It’s usually protecting some guy who’s burning a flag or doing something stupid." We need to defend Seth Rogen's freedom of speech not for his sake, but for ours.

Epilogue: That one firebombing aside, the Ayatollah's threat turned out to be more bark than bite. He died in 1989, but Rushdie is still alive and well. So are Amazon and Barnes & Noble.

I wish I could say the same about Cody's Books. After years of struggling against the huge Internet giants, Ross reluctantly closed Cody's doors in 2006.

The space it used to occupy on Telegraph Avenue is still vacant.

Dick Cheney's Tortured Logic

(Above: Lt. Commander John McCain recuperating from his torture-induced injuries)

On September 14, 2001, four days after the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, a memorial service was held in Wheeler Auditorium on the Cal campus for Mark Bingham, one of the heroes of United Flight 93 who led the passengers' attack on the hijackers and caused the plane to crash in a field outside Shanksville, Pennsylvania, instead of the White House or the Capitol,

I arrived at Wheeler Hall about a little early, so I decided to use the men's room in the basement.

I was the only one in the room until the door opened and a short man in a dark suite, red shirt and white shirt walked in and stood at the urinal next to me.

I looked at him and then I looked again, hardly believing my eyes. It was John McCain!

After a few awkward moments he stuck out his hand and said, "Hi, I'm John Mc Cain."

He told me he had flown out from Washington for the service in the back of a military cargo plane – remember, all civilian flights were grounded - because he was moved when he heard that Mark had a McCain poster in his office, and he figured the least he could do was say thanks to the man who probably saved his life. (He had been inside the Capitol that day.)

Then we went upstairs. He sat on the stage with the other speakers, and I sat in the audience.

After the speeches the lights were dimmed, and there was a slide show. Everyone was watching the screen except me. I was watching McCain.

While the others on stage turned around and watched, he waited until he thought nobody was looking, then he quietly stepped down the stairs and watched from the audience.

I was puzzled for a while, and then it finally hit me: He couldn't turn his head because of the torture he suffered for five and a half years in the Hanoi Hilton.

Now, I don't agree with McCain about a lot of things, but you can't deny that when he talks about torture, he knows what he's talking about.

So here's what he said last week on the Senate floor about the Intelligence Committee's report on torture during the Bush years:

"I know from personal experience that the abuse of prisoners will produce more bad than good intelligence. I know that victims of torture will offer intentionally misleading information if they think their captors will believe it. I know they will say whatever they think their torturers want them to say if they believe it will stop their suffering."

Then, almost shouting, he added, "The use of torture compromises that which most distinguishes us from our enemies, our belief that all people, even captured enemies, possess basic human rights."

In response, Dick Cheney, one of the main architects of the torture program, said, "What are we supposed to do? Kiss them on both cheeks and say, 'Tell us everything you know?'" – as if those were the only two choices.

I don't know about you, but on this matter I'd rather trust a war hero than a draft-dodging chicken hawk.

Muse on that next Thursday, when the world celebrates the 2014^th birthday of a man who was tortured to death.

Dear Santa

"Dear Santa, My name is Eddie, and I live in Oakland, California. My mom says that oversleeping can get me on the bad list, so I want to say I'm sorry for that. It's just that my bed is really, really comfy!"

"Dear Santa, I am 6 years old. I've been helping my mom every day to clean my room and brush my teeth. I don't like it a lot, but I want to be on your nice list. Love, Alexandra."

"Dear Santa Claus, The jacket was too big. Would you please send me another? The tie was too long. I did not get any doggy treats for Ivory. The buttons on the vest were too big and too tight. I did not get a hat! Or any shoes or socks. Thank you for all my other gifts. Love, (Name excised at writer's discretion)"

Once upon a time, letters like these ended up in the U.S. Postal Service's dead letter office. But for the past 28 years, they have gone instead to the consumer affairs department at the main Oakland Post Office on 7^th Street, where the public is invited to read and, if you like, answer them.

"You don't have to send a gift," says MaryGrace Cruz, USPS Consumer & Industry Contact Manager. "The children appreciate just knowing that somebody out there cares."

But, of course, if you're moved to send a present, too, nobody's going to stop you. To get in on the fun, call the Santa's Mailbag hotline at 510-874-8737 and leave a message, and one of Santa's elves will call you back.

In the meantime, here's what our kids want this holiday season:

"Dear Santa, My big brother is writing this because I'm still in my mom's tummy, but I will be out before you know it. I will be born around the first of January, It would be helpful if you could get me some baby clothes and baby shoes and toys if you can. Sinsirely, Cristobal."

"Dear Santa, My name is Emmie. I am 6 years old. Ive been really good this year. I will like to have a dress from the movie Frozen. It’s the blue dress Ella has. I love Frozen things. And if you want to bring my little brother something, you can, but he's not really good."

"Dear Santa, My name is Brianna. I'm 8 years old, but my birthday is December 25, so I'm happy that it's almost my birthday. I'm really happy because I have a new baby brother! He's just 3 months old and I want you to bring him a toy because he does not know how to talk or write. I have really good grades in school, and I am always good at my house. Love, Brianna. P.S. Don't forget about my little brother!"

"Dear Santa, My name is Luis. I am 9 years old. I am visualizing you reading this letter. I hope that this Christmas you can bring me something. I ask my mother, but she cannot buy me anything. Her money won't stretch or is not enough. I would like a tablet to do my homework. Also Santa, you know I love to sing. I would very much like a karaoke machine to sing along with. I also send this letter for my mom. She cannot afford to buy for my big brothers either. So if you could buy something for them it would be very nice. They are in school right now so I can't ask them what they want. Well that is all Santa. God bless you Santa. Love, Luis."

"Dear Santa, I have a question. I saw you last Friday. Was that you or do you send out helpers? (Unsigned)

"Dear Santa, I was wondering if you could do me a BIG, BIG favor. You probably can't, but I was wondering if you could help me. You see, whenever I get something, I lose it. Like my camera. I was hoping you could bring it back this year in its case. I also lost the pocket knife you gave me last year. Can you help me find it? If you do, put it on the bench by my window. Love, Scott."

"Dear Santa, I think I was good this year because I haven't got into trouble that much. An oops slip is a slip of paper that means you didn't do your homework and I haven't got an oops slip this year. I think I deserve presents because I am playing a sport and if I am playing a sport it means I am doing well in school. I am a good brother because I help him when he is stuck with something and help him when he needs help. I am a good son because I help my mom when my dad is not home and I help my dad when my mom is not home. I am a good uncle because I take care of Maddox. I hope you agree I am on the nice list this year." (Unsigned)

"Dear Santa, How are you doing today? I hope everything is great and that you're reading my letter. J I really hope you're reading this and I also hope to hear back from you! Sorry to be bothering you. I know you are busy, but it would be so great if I get a gift this Christmas because my mom isn't working at the moment so it's hard for her to get me something which is fine because I understand her situation. I hope to hear back from you and have a wonderful Christmas! Love, Lupita."

"Dear Mr. Clause, Since you've been watching me I think you already know what I want. But just in case, I'm enclosing a list of what I want. A star next to it means I want it a lot." (No signature)

"Dear Santa, I only want a few things this year. I would like to have the Kaya American Doll, even more stuffed animals, and a book of activities. I wish I could get you a gift in return, but I don't know what you want. Maybe you could send me a note that says what you want on it. Have a good Christmas! Love, Vivian."

"Dear Santa, I'm going into surgery for a tumor on my spine before Christmas. For my present, I would like to be here for Christmas. I know it is an unusual gift, but it would mean the world to me and my family. Love, Maika."

Topological Toyz

Another distinction for Oakland: It's home to the man who makes the nerdiest Christmas gift in America.

Says who? The uber-nerd himself, Nate Silver, the guy who crunches the numbers and makes those uncannily accurate sports and election predictions.

On Black Friday Silver released his FiveThirtyEight 2014 Holiday Gift Guide. And right at the top, with a perfect "Nerd Factor" of 10 out of 10, is a Klein Bottle made by Cliff Stoll, owner and sole proprietor of the Acme Klein Bottle Company, which he runs from the kitchen of his home in North Oakland.

So what's a Klein Bottle? Well, remember your geometry class in high school, when you took a strip of paper, gave it a half-twist, and taped the ends together?

The result was a loop with only one side, one edge, and other properties that math geeks love. It's called a Möbius Loop after August Möbius, the 19th-Century mathematician who invented it.

In 1882 another mathematician named Felix Klein imagined what would happen if you glued two Möbius Loops together: You'd have a bottle with only one side. Its inside would be its outside, and vice versa.

The only problem with a Klein Bottle is that to properly see it you need to live in four dimensions, and we only live in three.

"But you can represent it in three dimensions," says Stoll, "just as a photograph is a two-dimensional representation of something that exists in three dimensions."

Acme Klein Bottles come in all sizes and prices, from the 3 1/2-inch "Baby" bottle, which sells for $35, up to a 3 1/2-foot behemoth that’ll set you back six grand.

You can also buy Klein swag, including a Klein hat and matching Möbius scarf. To get a Klein Bottle for that special geek in your life, visit kleinbottle.com.

                                   * * *

Finally, do you know a senior – say, 55 or older – who is going to be home alone on Christmas?

Senior Center Without Walls is in between its regular sessions right now, but they're bridging the gap by offering special telephone group chats over the holiday season and beyond to keep everyone's spirits merry and bright. All you have to do is call up and join in. Among the offerings:

December 19: Laughing Through The Holidays.

December 21: Holiday Caroling.

December 25: Winter Holiday Celebration.

January 2: Building Friendships.

January 9: Talent Show

January 16: Eating Healthy on A Budget

January 19: A celebration of Martin Luther King Jr. Day with Dr. King's lifelong friend, Dr. Jewell Taylor Gibbs.

SCWW will also offer weekly conversations about Bible study, Improvisation, birdwatching and trivia, as well as online chats about art appreciation and the great American songbook.

Then, on January 26, the regular Winter/Spring session, offering dozens of conversations each week on subjects ranging from the silly to the sublime, will start up. I'll let you know more details when the time draws closer.

In the meantime, you can sign up for any of the holiday break telephone conversations by calling 510-444-5974 or toll-free at 1-877-797-7299.

This time of year can be lonely for isolated older people. If you know someone who might be in this situation, please let them know about this wonderful service. And please remind them that it's 100 percent free.

Winston Is Back

Winston Churchill, who would have celebrated his 140^th birthday today, was a man who was wrong about almost everything in his life.

He was wrong about India, jeering at Gandhi as "a half-naked Indian fakir" and, when the Mahatma was on one of his hunger strikes, firing off an indignant telegram to the Viceroy demanding to know why Gandhi hadn't died yet.

He was wrong about Ireland, where is name is still a dirty word because of his role in organizing the infamous Black and Tan paramilitary death squads to terrorize the Irish population.

He was wrong about women's suffrage when, as Home Secretary, he subjected hundreds of suffragists to forced feeding (which was like waterboarding, only grosser) in prison.

He was wrong during the abdication crisis of 1936 when he backed Edward VIII's plans to marry his paramour, Wallis Simpson, who was simultaneously sleeping with Hitler's foreign minister, Joachim Von Ribbentrop.

He was wrong about the cockamamie Gallipoli invasion in World War I, when, as First Lord of the Admiralty, he sent thousands of ANZAC soldiers to their deaths in a hopeless military adventure.

He was wrong when, as Chancellor of the Exchequer in 1924, he put Britain back on the gold standard, triggering a deep recession that mushroomed into a general strike two years later.

And he was wrong about what he called "the soft underbelly of Europe," forcing Eisenhower to postpone the D-Day invasion for a whole year and embark on a bloody campaign up the Italian peninsula instead.

Have you ever looked at a map of Italy? It's crisscrossed by hundreds of mountain ranges and rivers, all horizontal, which provided better natural defenses for the Germans than man could ever build. Some soft underbelly!

In fact, he was right about only one thing in his life: the absolute necessity of standing up to Hitler. But that one thing was so important, it dwarfs all his failures and permanently establishes him as the greatest statesman in British history, and one of the greatest in all of world history.

In the 1930s he was a lonely voice warning about Nazis intentions, but nobody listened. He cautioned Chamberlain not to give in to Hitler at Munich, and when Chamberlain did it anyway, he retorted, "You were given a choice between war and dishonor. You chose dishonor, and now you shall have war."

When war came and the bankruptcy of Chamberlain's appeasement was exposed, Churchill was named Prime Minister. But everyone in British ruling circles, including his own foreign secretary, Lord Halifax, wanted to sue for peace on whatever terms Hitler offered.

But despite the enormous pressure, Churchill refused to give in. Instead, he marshaled the English language and sent it into battle with some of the most stirring speeches since Shakespeare:

"We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills, we shall NEVER surrender!"

And this:

"Let us therefore brace ourselves to our duties, and so bear ourselves, that if the British Empire and its Commonwealth last for a thousand years, men will still say, 'This was their finest hour.'"

It was not only Britain's finest hour; it was his, too. And the world was saved.