Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California dies at age 90, sources tell the AP

cawacko said:
Less than zero chance of that happening. He already promised to appoint a black woman. His career would be over if he appointed Schiff.

Newsom was really hoping Feinstein would make it to the end of her term. He does not want to be in this situation. While still early I believe Schiff is currently leading in the polls over Porter and Lee. But if he does appoint Lee that will be a game changer.
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So whites need not apply. That is racist. Newsom should say he will appoint the best person regardless of race or sex. Would it be OK if Newsom had said he would only appoint a White Male? Nope.

Under the laws enforced by EEOC, it is illegal to discriminate against someone (applicant or employee) because of that person's race, color, religion, sex (including gender identity, sexual orientation, and pregnancy), national origin, age (40 or older), disability or genetic information. It is also illegal to retaliate against a person because he or she complained about discrimination, filed a charge of discrimination, or participated in an employment discrimination investigation or lawsuit.
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Geeko Sportivo said:
Mosely Braun already broke that glass ceiling way back in 1992!

Moseley Braun was the first African-American woman elected to the U.S. Senate, the first African-American U.S. Senator from the Democratic Party, the first woman to defeat an incumbent U.S. Senator in the primaries for the nomination by a major party, and the first female U.S. Senator from Illinois.
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And Kamala Harris broke the ceiling in California but that's besides the point. He promised to appoint a black woman if Feinstein left office. He said it was to be as a placeholder and now Barbara Lee has come out and said that's disrespectful, that black women are more than just placeholders. So the bar has been upped to basically appoint Barbara Lee.

One not from California may not follow this, which would be understandable. Nonetheless, it's reality. If Newsom doesn't appoint a black woman his political career will be over.
 
ExpressLane said:
So whites need not apply. That is racist. Newsom should say he will appoint the best person regardless of race or sex. Would it be OK if Newsom had said he would only appoint a White Male? Nope.
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Not just whites, any other race. If you think about it, Hispanics outnumber whites in California. So based off that Hispanics should arguably be the most upset. But Newsom appt Alex Padilla, an Hispanic male, to replace Kamala Harris when she stepped down to be VP.

Newsom made this promise when he was being recalled as black voters, and specifically black women, are the most loyal Democratic voters and he needed their support. He boxed himself into this corner.
 
Newsom probably has it all figured out. Her death was somewhat predictable. She was looking terrible. Incumbency is powerful. Whoever he puts in will get a boost in the next election.
 
I disagreed with her vehemently at times. But it is a sad time for family most of the time when one passes, no matter one's beliefs/religion or whatever. I always hate to hear about the end of one's life but such is our lot.
 
cawacko said:
To me, everyone is just wired differently. Some people count the days (for years) until their retirement. For others the thought of not working is equivalent to not living. Then you have the reality that a Senator is one of the more powerful people in the country. I can imagine its not easy giving up that type of power.

I'm certainly open to the term limits argument. The counter argument is we (voters) can vote anyone out of office if we feel they have overstayed their welcome so it doesn't need to be mandated.
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Grassley is still sharp as a tack.
 
signalmankenneth said:
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California, a centrist Democrat who was elected to the Senate in 1992 in the “Year of the Woman” and broke gender barriers throughout her long career in local and national politics, has died. She was 90.
Three people familiar with the situation confirmed her death to The Associated Press on Friday.

Feinstein, the oldest sitting U.S. senator, was a passionate advocate for liberal priorities important to her state -- including environmental protection, reproductive rights and gun control -- but was also known as a pragmatic lawmaker who reached out to Republicans and sought middle ground.

She was elected to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in 1969 and became its first female president in 1978, the same year Mayor George Moscone was gunned down alongside Supervisor Harvey Milk at City Hall by Dan White, a disgruntled former supervisor. Feinstein found Milk’s body.

After Moscone’s death, Feinstein became San Francisco's first female mayor. In the Senate, she was one of California’s first two female senators, the first woman to head the Senate Intelligence Committee and the first woman to serve as the Judiciary committee’s top Democrat.

Although Feinstein was not always embraced by the feminist movement, her experiences colored her outlook through her five decades in politics.

"I recognize that women have had to fight for everything they have gotten, every right," she told The Associated Press in 2005, as the Judiciary Committee prepared to hold hearings on President George W. Bush's nomination of John Roberts to replace Sandra Day O'Connor on the Supreme Court.

"So I must tell you, I try to look out for women's rights. I also try to solve problems as I perceive them, with legislation, and reaching out where I can, and working across the aisle," she said.

Her tendency for bipartisanship helped her notch legislative wins throughout her career. But it also proved to be a liability in her later years in Congress, as her state became more liberal and as the Senate and the electorate became increasingly polarized.

A fierce debater who did not suffer fools, the California senator was long known for her verbal zingers and sharp comebacks when challenged on the issues about which she was most fervent. But she lost that edge in her later years in the Senate, as her health visibly declined and she often became confused when answering questions or speaking publicly. In February 2023, she said she would not run for a sixth term the next year. And within weeks of that announcement, she was absent for the Senate for more than two months as she recovered from a bout of shingles.

Amid the concerns about her health, Feinstein stepped down as the top Democrat on the Judiciary panel after the 2020 elections, just as her party was about to take the majority. In 2023, she said she would not serve as the Senate president pro tempore, or the most senior member of the majority party, even though she was in line to do so. The president pro tempore opens the Senate every day and holds other ceremonial duties.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/democratic-sen-dianne-feinstein-california-125554050.html
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China Mourns.

Feinstein was the CCP eyes, ears, and voice in the United States Senate.
 
cawacko said:
And Kamala Harris broke the ceiling in California but that's besides the point. He promised to appoint a black woman if Feinstein left office. He said it was to be as a placeholder and now Barbara Lee has come out and said that's disrespectful, that black women are more than just placeholders. So the bar has been upped to basically appoint Barbara Lee.

One not from California may not follow this, which would be understandable. Nonetheless, it's reality. If Newsom doesn't appoint a black woman his political career will be over.
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I think Gavin's political career, once he is no longer governor, will take off, as he will probably be the YOUNG presidential candidate the Democrats are looking for in 2028.

As long as he keeps his nose clean! I mean, he does have a nice hair do and all! That's kind of a "Must Have" essential now after Donnie! :palm:
 
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Here's some fun Di Fi history: (This is about the GOAT team beating the Cowboys in '81)




How Dianne Feinstein helped the 49ers make ‘The Catch’ happen


Dianne Feinstein’s legacy as a San Francisco titan was, to some extent, bolstered by the San Francisco 49ers’ 1980s dynasty.

But what many people may not know about that era’s most famous game is that Feinstein, who died late Thursday at age 90, had a hand in making sure that “The Catch” happened at all.

In an interview published January 2022 with Jackson Michael’s “The Game Before the Money” podcast, which looks back at the history of football, NFL groundskeeper George Toma said that Feinstein, then mayor of San Francisco, had a direct hand in making sure that Candlestick Park’s football field was ready for the 1981 NFC title game against the hated Dallas Cowboys.

“She was down there, with mud up to her boots and everything,” Toma said. “It rained every day, she’d be down on that field with her raincoat, her rain hat and boots, trying to help us.”

In the week entering that season’s NFC title game, San Francisco had its worst rainstorm in 50 years. The numbers, according to the San Francisco Chronicle, were staggering: more than 6 inches of rain in most regions, 29 deaths, “nearly $300 million in property damage” and just the third-ever shutdown of the Golden Gate Bridge. (The Chronicle and SFGATE are both owned by Hearst but have separate newsrooms.)

The 49ers fled the area during the storm, heading to Anaheim to practice.

Candlestick Park’s football field already had the derogatory nickname of “The Quaqmire” because of how poorly it was maintained over the years. After the week of rain, the field was in no condition to host the massive showdown with Dallas.

The 49ers requested that Toma — who has been the NFL’s groundskeeper for every Super Bowl — come in and try and help the Candlestick grounds crew in the middle of the season. Issues arose even before the rain, which the Washington Post reported could be at least partially attributed to Candlestick’s shared tenancy between the 49ers and the San Francisco Giants and also because Candlestick hosted two Rolling Stones concerts on Oct. 17 and 18 in the middle of the NFL season.

Toma called Candlestick a “mud hole” in his conversation with Michael and admitted he and the San Francisco Recreation and Parks department couldn’t do much because the roots of the grass were too short, allowing the field to get easily and thoroughly waterlogged. But he said one person was coming by every day, trying to help fix things: Feinstein.

“By the end of the 1981 regular season the field was a mess,” Feinstein said in a statement her office emailed to Michael for the podcast. “I told the Parks Department the grounds crew had to get it right for this biggest of playoff games.”

The solution that Toma and SF Rec and Parks came up with: ripping up the sod from Kezar Stadium, the 49ers’ original home in Golden Gate Park, and moving it southeast to Candlestick.

It was certainly unconventional, and the fix is noticeable if you look back at game footage. The next time you pull up a highlight of “The Catch,” don’t just watch Joe Montana roll to his right, searching for Dwight Clark. Take a look at the grass underneath his feet.

By the time Montana pump-fakes and makes the throw over Ed “Too Tall” Jones, he’s on a visibly lighter and likely smoother cut of grass. His throw off of his back foot happens cleanly, without slipping on what could have been a horrendous sod.

The San Francisco political titan helped make that happen — in Toma’s eyes, at least.

“Mayor Dianne Feinstein and Barney Barron, the head of the San Francisco Parks and Recreation department, thinking and getting together to take the old sod out, and we did that and put it in and everything went great,” Toma said on Michael’s podcast. “Don’t give me the credit, give the credit to the people that made it happen.”


https://www.sfgate.com/49ers/articl...ezar-18397132.php?IPID=SFGate-HP-CP-Spotlight
 
cawacko said:
R.I.P. Di Fi. She has a long history in SF including being the City's first female Mayor. (They named an elementary school after her but I think they decided she was a bigot and it's on the list of school names they want to change). I never met her but I did meet her (since deceased) husband Dick Blum and got to visit his office. They were SF institutions/royalty.

Gavin Newsom is about to have a lot of fun. During the recall he felt desperate enough to go the Joe Biden route and declare if Feinstein ever stepped down he'd replace her with a black woman. What he had in mind was a place holder candidate until the next election. There are currently three main candidates declared to run for the seat - Adam Schiff (a white male), who Pelosi endorsed; Katie Porter (a progressive white woman) and Barbara Lee (a progressive black woman).

Newsom wanted a placeholder because he didn't want to give anyone the advantage of incumbency in the race. Well now he is under big time pressure to do exactly that and appoint Lee. Black women are the most loyal Democratic voters and they want representation in the Senate so a lot of talk in the state that a black woman as a placeholder isn't going to cut it.

Gavin clearly has aspirations for higher office. Hard to go against your most loyal constituency.
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I think he hoped she would hold out until 2024 so he could drop himself in if they won't do Operation Newsom Drop so he can be Prez.
 
If we still had a functioning nation as conceptualized by the founders and the Enlightenment she would have been shoved out a lot of years ago.

But we dont.
 
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