Noted legal scholar Tony Francois is a Senior Attorney at the Pacific Legal Foundation and longtime Californian. In this exclusive interview with Opportunity Now, he examined the juridical issues around vandalizing the mayor's house, not enforcing curfew citations, and managing escalating violence.
Read MoreMedia and police experts, along with SJPD chief, provided perspective on how local media failed to provide context on the protests and riots that disrupted downtown SJ. Mark Lisheron reported.
Read MoreSJ City Council, earlier this year, approved big cuts--$45 million--to the city's upcoming budgets, due to the coronavirus health crisis and concurrent business shutdowns. Pierluigi Oliverio of the Silicon Valley Taxpayers Association parsed the cuts, and explored why the city spends so much money on programs outside its charter.
Read MoreThe San Jose City Council was forging ahead with a November ballot proposition to “align authority with accountability” as Mayor Liccardo wrote in his memorandum proposing changing the City Charter to provide the Mayor more power, reduce the power of special interests and move the mayoral election to coincide with the presidential election cycle. “What’s the rush?” asked Pat Waite, President of Citizens for Fiscal Responsibility, helping to derail the ballot proposition idea.
Read MoreMedia expert and journalist Mark Lisheron took a close look at the Merc's coverage of San Jose's demonstrations--and responses to them--and found that a lot of important questions went unasked.
Read MoreWhat to learn from the SVO's collapse under charges of racist campaign advertising? Opp Now co-founder and ex-SVO PAC member Christopher Escher took a look at how bad business practices may have contributed to the debacle.
Read MorePete Constant, former San Jose Police Officer, former San Jose City Councilmember, and professional visual artist, discussed why he was deeply troubled by the city-funded art show ("Holding the Moment") that arguably promoted violence against the police. He provides thoughtful insight into the problematic nature of government-funded art.
Read MoreThought experiment: if you found out that there were up to a million unused apartments in California, wouldn't you think we should use them to solve the housing crisis instead of spending upwards of $400k/unit for new ones? Tom Elias looks at the role office building vacancies might have in the Napa Valley Register.
Read MoreThe most recent CalChamber poll speaks clearly: many Californians think it's too expensive, too dangerous, and too polluted to live in the state. Loren Kate, President of the California Foundation for Commerce and Education, explains in Fox & Hounds.
Read MoreFor decades, local voters seemed eager to approve almost any tax or bond measure put in front of them. But 2020 showed that perhaps the limit has been reached: voters are shouting down new, onerous taxes, as Dan Walters explains in CalMatters.
Read MoreSJ's Department of Cultural Affairs recently drew flak about its "Holding The Moment" art show at Mineta Airport, which the department funded and curated. Some residents were outraged that one painting in particular, Americana, may have promoted violence against police officers. Even though the show was ostensibly about artists' reactions to COVID 19, a quick scan of the "Artist Narravtives," in which the artists explain their work, suggests that politics, not pandemics, may have been at the core of many of their creative expressions. Here's a sampling.
Read MorePete Constant is a former San Jose Police Officer, former San Jose City Councilmember, and a professional visual artist. He provides analysis of the contentious SJ Dept of Cultural Affairs art show at Mineta Airport from a variety of perspectives.
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