Thursday, December 25, 2008

FONG GETS THE GONG

At first I thought we were getting a Christmas present.  The sfgate headline said:

S.F. police chief announces retirement

But after opening the article we find only an IOU. Chief Fong promises to retire (phew!) but not until April (gdmf!).

Fong has been a long despised lackey of the mayor and his Pacific Heights puppeteers.

fong

Above we see Chief Fong last Christmas stooging for the Zoo guy (in bg) who let a tiger escape and kill a zoo patron. They both blamed the victim.

In reviewing her tenure as chief, the story recalls:

Late in 2005, Fong and the mayor revealed that about 20 police officers would be suspended because of their alleged involvement in the creation of what they described as racist and sexist videos.

The video, to this gay person's eye was maybe slightly edgy but was completely understandable foxhole humor.  But boy-mayor Newsom and Chief Fong pounced, PC claws extended.

Gavin_Newsom_p1170550

Now the cops are suing the City and will probably win.

So I stumble across the website of cop-tape videographer Andrew Cohen, his blog is called  Inside the SFPD.

Still on the force, Andrew Cohen speaks his mind. And how!

About departing Chief Fong:

She and Gavy are simply the most callous, fearful and slimy politicians this City has ever seen.

or about Police Officers' Association President Gary Delagnes [I went to SI with a Delagnes--a year ahead of me] in a recent post about Fong's possible successor:

The other rumor floating about is worth mentioning, but only for its laugh factor: Someone told me that Gary Delagnes was tossing his hat in the ring for the top spot. Oh yah, now that is exactly what we need. If there was any chance that we could go from bad to worse, this might be the answer.

And I was thinking that sfwillie might be getting a bit rantious!

So Officer Cohen disses the Mayor, the Chief, and the POA president. Way to go, Andrew.

Sweet Melissa (is she rantious enough?) provides a youtube of Newsom/Fong imagery over the soundtrack from Newsom's radio show in which he and Chief Fong announce her promise to retire.

Rather than rant about Fong and Newsom, she lets us listen to them ourselves.  Caution, wait four hours after eating. The article is here.

Even Her Sweetness is sour on Fong:

Our androgynous, antisocial and enigmatic chief had been hounded for at least a year to leave her post.

So, it's almost like a Christmas present.

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1 comment:

Anonymous said...

sfwille - thank you so much for the shout! And while my essay may not have been "rantious enough" (you are probably right on that point - the SFPD is not really my area of expertise) my friend Benjamin over at SFWeekly wrote a stinging piece about the handling of the retirement announcement. Enjoy!

http://blogs.sfweekly.com/thesnitch/2008/12/fong_retires_with_dignity_nope.php