The Return of Ron the Red

Ron Dellums, for years the ultra—left wing Congressman from Berkeley (Michael Medved once was one of his aides, 180 degrees ago), is back and running for mayor of Oakland, to succeed former governor Jerry Brown. He is selling the voters left wing snake oil, all posture, PC, and no specific plans.

Chip Johnson, the excellent columnist at the San Francisco Chronicle, deftly paints a sharp picture of Dellums while being scrupulously fair.

His vision of Oakland as a model city —— a national mecca for multicultural arts, a leader in the shift toward renewable energy and a thriving city where everyone has health care —— addresses issues near and dear to liberal voters....

...the retired congressman and undisputed dean of progressive politics has said exactly what people want to hear.

But so far his campaign has been long on rhetoric and short on details. And as Brown has learned during two terms at City Hall, the devil is in the details when it comes to governing a large American city. [....]

And it's not as if Oakland residents haven't heard such grand plans before, and so might be skeptical.

Brown himself painted a picture during his first campaign of Oakland as a utopian "ecopolis," a city of solar power and eco—farmers where artists would thrive. The idea was to model Oakland after a charming Italian village.

We know how that turned out.

Dellums was far left anti—military activist, who served on the House Armed Services Committee and was the ranking Democrat on it when he retired. He was very friendly with the Marxists on Grenada at the time the Cubans were building an airstrip and other items there. Before the USA invaded and threw them out. They still celebrate the anniversary in Grenada.

I don't know of anything sizable Dellums has run, much less a disputatious and difficult city, full of potential that nobody has been able to realize.

The sad thing is, he might win.

Thomas Lifson  4 23 06

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