Kevin, let's hope Culliver slips past the Public Safety Committee. (I've been reading quite a few history books lately and every time a revolution turns nasty, there always seems to be a "Safety" Committee, which usually means a few people's heads are going to get lopped off.)

I think I know what you mean about SF's reactionary streak. Purely anecdotally, based on only a couple of visits to the Bay, but mainly when I think about a former brother-in-law, a Brooklynite who moved to SF in the early 1970s. Basically everything he thinks politically, everything he eats, drinks, smokes or wears, and most of the music he listens to and the jokes he likes to tell, were cemented in place by 1973 and have never shifted in the last 40 years. I happen to agree with most of what he believes, but I like to think there has been a small element of evolution in my own ideas and opinions; I've always had a healthy awareness - or rather fear - of my own stupidity, and hence have always had the feelers out for positions or thoughts that might be better than those already clattering around in my brainpan. Oh well; as you know, even a hive as big as New York is often driven by the tyranny of its own provincial thinking. One interesting sign of recently changing priorities here, though, is that the City is apparently giving up its campaign to outlaw honking by drivers.