Update: Lindsay Lohan claims innocence on the drug possession

Looks like someone put too much sugar into my morning coffee this morning... word from the entertainment program: Access Hollywood reports that recently rehabilitated from alcohol abuse, Ms. Lindsay Lohan claims innocence to the drug possession charges.

What an interesting story, good old drunk-o Lindsay Lohan, a woman who was carrying cocaine on her possession when checked for any contraband, gets caught by the cops. Haven't you ever heard of the term, "you have the right to remain silent?" How the hell are you going to deny the possession charge if you have the damn illegal narcotic in your pocket?

What is interesting to read is that she did not deny the DUI in the recent Access Hollywood interview for alcohol on her most recent arrest. So she must have been drunk when the cops were giving her the sobriety test.

Either way, she's screwed. Time for her to visit a nice jail or prison cell! I'm sure the ladies at the big house will give her the "special treatment" (with the shiv!).

Lindsay Lohan - Needs some jail time for DUI and Drugs

Just posted on the news this morning, Lindsay Lohan is arrested for driving under the influence of alcohol (misdemeanor DUI), driving with a suspended license, and possession of cocaine (felony) and transport of a narcotic (felony).

Plus, just to add insult to our morning coffee and cereal, she was just released recently from a rehab center after being in a six week detox program. She had to wear a tamper-proof ankle bracelet that constantly monitors her blood alcohol levels for alcohol, but it seems that device that is supposed to keep her sober, made her get buzzed and possibly "high" again. Now she's arrested with a blood alcohol level of .12 to .13 percent (legal limit is .08 percent).

Does it seem that Lindsay Lohan is becoming the next "Paris Hilton" to be sent to a jail for some real life treatment? But wait, there's more! If she gets convicted of a felony for the drugs, she would not go to a county jail (where she'd get the "special" treatment), she'd go to the overcrowded, awful, and orange jumpsuit world of the state prison system! You know, the place where Governor Arnold doesn't give an honest crap about you and you just have to eat stale hot dog buns with some mystery meat product on the side.

My suggestion, lets get her into a "scared straight" program where we send Lindsay to an infamous female or even a male prison. There, a trustee of the prison will give the ultimate tour of the facility, including giving a scary lecture about life behind bars, a tour of prison cells (which I don't think they are "model" rooms) and a good lecture about why you should not drop the soap in the damn shower.

Or how about we shove her into the Maury Povich show (not to do the paternity test) and bring in some ex-military sarges to bust her butt with good old-fashioned push-ups and scream at her until she cries; waaah waah wah!

Here's my point of view about this, how in the hell did this goody goody girl turn into a piece of turd? Did she get "the talk" by her parents and by her teachers about people who abuse alcohol and drugs? Remember the classic South Park "drugs are bad" episode when Mr. Mackey said "drugs are bad... m'kay?" I wonder what her private school taught this little stupid lady?

Lastly, whenever she does get her driving privileges back, I hope that the judge orders that all her vehicles has to be installed with a breathalyser to start the engine.

Let's summarize my rants:
Drugs are bad.
Alcohol is bad (especially for her!).
Driving with a suspended license? Can we create a lifetime ban?
Let her wear a sandwich board that says "this is my second DUI and I had drugs in possession, and I was and still am stupid" and she should stand at a very busy intersection from 9AM to 5PM for an entire week, including weekends.
Have a nice time in prison! Watch out for the shivs!

Hail to Dolly Paez - Taking Action on Waste Management

NEW: Extended "raw" news video of Dolly Paez's taking a stand on Waste Management (click here).

Waste Management, the contractor hired by Alameda County to handle all trash pickup has locked out its workers for three straight weeks, but Alameda County resident Dolly Paez who lives on Octavia street in Oakland took the problem in her own hands on Wednesday, July 18, 2007 when it came to the three weeks worth of trash, recyclables, and compost that is piling up on her residential block.

Dolly was being covered by KTVU and KRON's morning news programs when they were interviewing her about the large amount of trash piling up on her street and that the Waste Management "replacement workers" were always driving down her block and just passing by, and not picking up the trash.

Luckily, the TV cameras were there to record her going apes (video 1) (video 2) on a Waste Management truck that was to pass by her neighborhood again. She dragged the trash cans from her home directly into the pathway of the oncoming Waste Management collection truck, and the truck was forced to stop in the middle of the road. Dolly then proceeded to grab as many trash cans from her neighbors and block the road, demanding that the trash must be picked-up immediately. Her neighbors noticed what she was doing and joined in the action, including one neighbor that pulled her car out to surround the Waste Management truck so that it could not escape. Eventually the replacement worker was forced to pick-up the trash and all the cans were finally emptied.

Here's what Dolly Paez said on camera on KTVU's 10 O'Clock News:

• Dolly Paez: "What do you expect us to do!?!?"
• Garbageman: "(Talking on a cell phone) alright."
  
• Dolly Paez: "Is this what it takes to get the garbage to get picked up!?!?!"
• Reporter Renee Kemp: "This woman, Dolly Paez took matters into her own hands today when it looked like garbage trucks were about to pass-up her street for the third week in a row."
• Dolly Paez: "It is extremely aggravating to see a truck come-up and only pick-up only truck one trash bin and leave; I just could not let the truck go by again."

Here's a transcript of what Dolly Paez said on KRON:

• Dolly Paez: "I am just so upset. This truck has been comin' for the last two weeks, every Wednesday. He drives down here, sees all this debris, and will never pick it up! I can't take it no more. We need garbage picked-up we've been since June 28, with no service, and I think it's time they picked-up this trash, bottom line."
• Darya Folsom of KRON: "It was truly amazing to see. The neighbors started joining in; another woman got her car and blocked-in that trash truck right there, and really the replacement workers had no choice, but to deviate and take everybody's trash as they handed the bags over to the workers..."

As a resident of San Francisco and being a caring activist for when I feel my neighborhood problems are never being resolved:
I personally salute Dolly Paez for taking direct and swift action to get her garbage picked-up. When something is wrong and nobody is taking care of it, it is necessary to take action by doing it yourself in a non-violent manner.

If you live in Alameda County, your trash has not been picked-up, and nobody cares to pick-up your trash: do it like Dolly, organize your neighbors and throw your cans in the middle of your street. If possible, get it recorded on video and post it on YouTube.


For video information:
KRON (yeah, I still don't like the news station, but at least they covered Dolly Paez) - click here for an extended (not full raw footage) video of her tossing cans into the street and taking the "law into her own hands."

KTVU 10 O'Clock News - To view the video of Dolly going apes on Waste Management (2 minutes, 13 seconds in the video), here's a clip that will automatically open-up in Windows Media Player. Click here for the clip. The file is not downloadable, but it is a streaming video link off the KTVU website.

Let's summarize my rants:
Kudos to Dolly Paez for taking action when Waste Management replacement workers ignored pleas to get her block's trash picked-up.
Waste Management, get your union workers back on the job.
Waste Management, you better pray that when your contract renewal is up with the local cities and Alameda County, that they do allow you to renew. But I hope NOT ANYMORE!

Great America Wave Pool - Discussing the Issues & Problems

Great America (formerly known as Great America (owned by Marriott) and Paramount's Great America (owned by Paramount studios)) recently was the scene of a death of a four year old male that drowned in the wave pool at the "Boomerang Bay" section of the theme park.

Yet, while this tragic event is horrible to hear, and will attract negative attention to the theme park for a long time, the theme park has its share of accidents with deadly results. One in particular was in 1998 on the popular "Top Gun" inverted roller coaster attraction where a man intentionally went over a fence to retrieve an item he dropped. The man was killed instantly when the incoming train with dangling feet (due to the inverted trains), was kicked in the head at a high rate of speed and impact.

With the pool accident, it is unfortunate that someone that young had to die, yet there is heavy criticism from the general public, as well as me (Mr. Complaint Department) that the responsibility lies within the parent. Let's take a look at what happened.

The child is about 4 ft. tall, and about six lifeguards were on duty at the pool. The mother was concerned that she couldn't find the son and asked the daughter to look for the child. The child was found unconscious in the shallow end of the wave pool and the girl screamed for help from the lifeguards. The lifeguards responded, provided CPR, got the EMTs, and transported the child to the hospital. The medics were unsuccessful to resuscitate the child and were declared dead at the hospital.

What the big outcry in this incident is not the park's policy on lifeguards on-duty, but that the parent was irresponsible by not directly supervising the child in the pool. The San Francisco Chronicle quotes: "Carlos was found unconscious in the wave pool shortly before 2:30 p.m. on Thursday. His mother, Yolanda Flores, and sister were nearby but not with him."

(This author intentionally put the topic in question in italics and put in bold the key word)

In this blogger's opinion, "NEARBY" does not mean direct supervision by being next to the child. An interesting thing to think about is, will the parent have a decent legal claim to this accident, and that the parent already admitted the fact that she was not directly supervising the child (parental neglect)?

Yes, it is tragic that someone had to die at a wave pool, but lets use an analogy and think of different locations where no direct parental supervision will cause high risk of injury or death to a child:

1. Parent and young child at a BART station, and parent is not directly supervising child at station. Potential harm to child: Hit by train, falls on train tracks, touches high voltage electric third rail.
2. Same scenario as above, but at a Caltrain station. Potential harm: Hit by high speed Baby Bullet train, and plays on tracks.
3. Child chasing a soccer ball that fell out of his/her hands and ran loose on a busy street. Parent not paying attention to child, therefore is not "directly" supervising child. Potential harm: Hit by speeding vehicle.

By not being in direct supervision ("nearby" or not even paying attention) is a much bigger risk than being in direct supervision. In many cases, being "nearby" will more than likely result in no major incident happening, but the "what if" comes into question. The "what if" factor would then have a parent or appropriate adult supervising a child is much better than just being "nearby" and only paying-half attention.

A big question to ask is, should parents directly supervise young children at the pool? I believe that it is necessary for young children, child non-swimmers, and child weak swimmers should be supervised by their parents and wear life vests. For young adults and adults that are below a certain height, have limited swimming abilities, or no swimming skills, these people should be required to wear life vests, and participate in the "buddy" program.

I think the best way to fix the problem is that in order to be allowed to participate in the water park is to test them by providing a small length and shallow pool to test people at their swimming skills. Only people that wear a special wristband can be allowed to use the water park facilities and each wristband has a certain color that allows access to certain attractions. If a person is "disqualified" to use a certain attraction, then admission to the attraction requires use of a life vest and direct supervision by a qualified wristbanded adult. In order to make it speedy, people that have passed a qualified swimming program that is typically supported by someone like the Red Cross with a card that proves their skills would automatically receive the proper wristband to their age and skills. Not participating in a test will automatically give the person the lowest grade on the wristband system. By wearing no wristband will automatically get the person in trouble and could be potentially ejected from the park. If theme parks and airports can do metal detector screenings for contraband with a short wait, I think a simple swim test with a similar wait time period can assure that there will be less of a liability to operate water themed attractions at a theme park.

Here's an easy color scheme to ID skills of swimmers:

For children:
RED - Child, no swimming skills, requires life vest and requires direct supervision at all times.
RED & YELLOW striped - Child, some swimming skills, requires direct supervision at all times, and disqualified from certain attractions unless if wearing life vest.
RED & GREEN striped - Child, has swimming skills, no life vest required (but may be recommended by parent's request), but requires direct supervision at all times.

Note: The color RED identifies at the person is a child, and always requires supervision (no exceptions).

For teenagers, young adults, and adults:
BLACK - Adult or young adult, no swimming skills, life vest required. Also includes adults of a very short stature and requires a life vest at all times. Having a skilled swimmer buddy is highly recommended.
YELLOW - Adult or young adult, some swimming skills, but disqualified from certain attractions unless if vest is worn. Having a skilled swimmer buddy is suggested.
GREEN - Adult or young adult, qualified swimming skills, no life vest necessary.

Note: The color RED is never used for teens, young adults, and adults to distinguish them as the proper age to be in this group. That is why the color BLACK is used as the lowest ranking instead of RED.

Currently, Great America's management is requiring vests for children, and I think it is a great idea to start-off with. But, I also think that my color wristband idea may also help in sorting out the young vs. old swimmers, and the weak vs. strong swimmers. For the wave pool, restricting certain areas of the pool to certain color wristbands may help in saving lives.

Alameda County's Garbage Strike Woes

Alameda County (the East Bay) has been hit hard by a garbage worker lockout by trash mega giant Waste Management. News reports show that some Oakland residents have not had their trash picked-up for over a week and there is worry of infestation of animals, rodents, and flies spreading diseases around.

What makes me concerned is that the workers were locked-out, and were not planning to strike. Their contract was up and the workers were to go negotiate out a deal with management, but instead, WM's management decides to lock them out and get "scab" workers to pick-up the trash.

First of all, the scab workers aint really doing their job right, especially if they cannot pick-up the trash like 10 days LATE.

Second, why in the world would management lock the employees out when it could have been dealt with easily without a lockout?

Waste Management's solution for now is that citizens can transport their trash to their local dump collection site. But the irony of dropping off your trash at one Waste Management site is that they are only open on WEEKENDS and you have to dump your trash in 35 gallon trash bags. Well damn, you piss people off with those two rules and you scab workers don't pick-up the trash? What a shame. And how about the people that don't have a vehicle to get their garbage there? I don't think any AC Transit operator will allow a citizen to transport stinky trash on the bus!

Let's summarize my rants:
Stop the lockout, and get the workers on NOW.
If you can't stop the lockout, get the scabs to work overtime and even do it at night.
Every citizen should refuse to pay their garbage bill in protest of shitty service.
Waste Management in Alameda County is history.

Annoying People in San Francisco City Politics

In the world of politics everywhere, there is always business to take care of, shaking hands, making speeches, and of course, using the system to your advantage.

On the past few days, I've been on a comment rampage on news sites and blogs about annoying citizens in San Francisco politics that enjoy abusing their citizens' rights.

First up: Kimo Crossman. He's been labeled in the Chronicle for wasting time with the Sunshine Ordinance, similar to the Federal Government's "Freedom of Information Act" where he puts useless requests for information that plugs up the system for REAL citizens who need information without much delay. Would you like a backlog of useless requests for government "public" information when you are last in line to get real information for a problem you might be facing? To learn more about the a-hole, read this article.

Second up: Two people I don't have names for, but if you go to any legislative meeting or hearing in City Hall, you always see an old lady and some guy that speaks English with an accent. What makes it annoying is that the lady and guy has nothing better to do and just decides to attend every FRICKIN' MEETING they can get their hands on. Also, they attend every meeting so that they can get in front of a microphone during the "public comment" session(s) of the meeting to give WORTHLESS COMMENTS to topics that don't involve them at all. Here's a message for you, there are REAL SAN FRANCISCO CITIZENS who want to leave comments to something that is way more important to them than what you people say.

I even remember going to a hearing about an event that affected my neighborhood drastically and the Supervisor invited residents to attend and tell their side of the story. When it was time for public comment, the old lady came up and spoke her mind, gave worthless shitty comments to an event that did not even involve where she lived, and wasted my time. I finally gave my comments, but sometimes you just feel like telling the lady, get a fucking job or a damn life.

Or how about this annoying person? Abusing their "public comment" time to sing a song about the troubled SF Supervisor Ed Jew?


Let's summarize my rants:
Kimo Crossman should scratch his head instead of his butt. Stop bothering our government for useless shit.
Stop wasting the time of our city hearings and meetings with pointless comments.
Can the deputies at the meetings kick out annoying ass people that give worthless comments?

Amazing Time at the 2007 All-Star Sunday Event at AT&T Park

I was one of the fortunate people that was able to attend the 2007 All-Star Sunday Major League Prospects, plus the Legends and Celebrity Softball game at AT&T Park (a.k.a. Pac Bell and SBC Park) on Sunday, July 8, 2007.

My ticket was in the "Dugout Club" section located in the area behind home plate (section 115) and I was sitting in the second row, and I know that I was on national television on ESPN several times. If you don't believe me, take a look at this video clip:


Now sure, my tickets cost me a whopping $125, but the nice padded (yes, I said it, PADDED) seats were totally worth the price. I was able to get three photo sessions with various mascots like Lou Seal, and plenty of photographs of celebrities at their best (and sometimes doing odd things).
Comedian Dane CookMayor Gavin Newsom


I must say, the price I paid for the seat was totally worth it. I did not pay anything extra to some Stubhub or scalper guy, I paid directly through the Giants ticketing website the day before the event and scored!

The celebrity all-star softball game is tonight (Monday) at 8PM west coast time on ESPN, after the live Home Run Derby.

To view more photos, visit this site: http://flickr.com/photos/agentakit/