MetaFilter posts tagged with mayor

Justin M. Nickels, Mayor-Elect

hermitosis — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 06:35:16 -0800

Meet Justin Nickels , the 22-year-old grocery store cashier and college student who was just elected Mayor of Manitowoc, WI by a margin of 15 votes.

Soy Milk: I'm Sam Adams, and I'm here to seduce you.

strangeleftydoublethink — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 14:27:23 -0800

Sam Adams, the recently elected openly gay mayor of Portland, Oregon, has come under fire for lying about a relationship he had with a teenage legislative intern in 2005 named Beau Breedlove. When first asked about the relationship in 2007 during the election campaign, Sam (then 42) claimed he was being a mentor to the young man. Sam recently cut short a trip to DC to return to Portland to publicly apologize and control damage over a new article in which he admits to having a sexual relationship with Beau. It's got the town divided over whether he should resign of if the whole thing is being blown out of proportion.

And he won by thirteen points.

tractorfeed — Fri, 07 Nov 2008 21:24:10 -0800

The recent election season in the US was marked by many firsts. One you might not know about: Silverton, Oregon has elected Stu Rasmussen as their mayor. Stu is believed to be the first ever openly transgender mayor in the United States.

Police raid mayor's house, shoot dogs, recommend land war in Asia.

Optimus Chyme — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 18:11:03 -0800

A SWAT team in Maryland raids a city's mayor's house and kills his dogs. Oh, and the warrant was wrong.

U.S. Conference of Mayors

lunit — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 10:11:59 -0800

The United States Conference of Mayors will take place from June 20th-24th in Miami, FL. The agenda (pdf) includes rising energy costs, housing, water, transportation, street crime, public schools, gangs, health care quality and costs, secure airports and ports, illegal guns, drugs, and immigration with a special focus on climate protection initiatives. Not to mention speakers Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and Bill Clinton. Not sufficiently addressed in the proposed resolutions (pdf)? Gentrification, according to some.

Boris is GEIL

MrMustard — Fri, 02 May 2008 16:20:57 -0800

It's Boris. London has elected Boris Johnson as its new mayor.

WE DID IT THROUGH TEAMWHURK!

Mayor Curley — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 13:15:40 -0800

Boston Mayor Tom Menino is running for president. Here's why he'd be a better president than Mitt Romney. And he's done vocals for a techno track.

"Then, on Election Day, 1975, I disappeared."

amyms — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 20:51:01 -0800

Mayor Ken Williams of Centerton, Arkansas, recently resigned over allegations of identity theft and other weirdness. He claims that a truth serum injection helped him to recognize that he was formerly The Rev. Don LaRose. He runs a website telling the "amazing story" (in 11 chapters) of his abduction by satan-worshippers three decades ago.

The Worst Mayor In America

stupidsexyFlanders — Tue, 23 Oct 2007 11:57:04 -0800

He once stopped a school bus on a busy interstate because he “needed a hug” from the kids inside. He’s been known to strap weapons to his chest and leg that he has no authority to carry or conceal, then wear them in public. He once bulldozed an elderly woman’s house, promising to build her a better one. He then forgot to build it. He recruited a team of kids to torch a row of dilapidated shotgun houses, without clearance or first turning off the utilities. Meet The Worst Mayor In America.

Bojo fo' Lo' M'o'

nthdegx — Mon, 16 Jul 2007 13:46:58 -0800

"Even the greatest cities have further greatness in them. I will stand for a greater London and for putting the smile back on London's face." Boris Johnson announces his candidacy for Mayor of London, though he is yet to be endorsed by the Conservative Party. Though decidedly right wing in his views (this clip, perhaps more than any other summarises his view on Europe, for example) his very English brand of buffoonery lends him unique appeal (though not universally).

Martial law on-demand in Baltimore

dead_ — Thu, 17 May 2007 12:37:54 -0800

Public gatherings restricted? Check. Shutdown of independent businesses? Check. Lockdown on traffic and transportation in the area? You bet. Lawmakers in Baltimore trying to curb the city's homicide rate (already 108 this year) have come up with some "desperate measures" of questionable constitutional legality, including heightening police presence in order to lockdown streets in "emergency areas." It has been called, "partial martial law" by some, and one has to wonder if the city of Baltimore may not do better to take a page from The Wire's Hamsterdam for a solution to their inextricably linked drug and homicide issues.

Brotherly Love.

rzklkng — Wed, 16 May 2007 09:14:08 -0800

Unconventional Wisdom: Vote Local, Impact National? The City of Philadelphia often serves as a test-market for the introduction of goods and services, due to demographics that are sometimes representative of the country as a whole. Many of the usual tenets of political conventional wisdom have not held true in this election. A city still geographically divided by the artifacts of redlining did not have a campaign reflective of the population's breakdown by race (although the results map [PDF] implies a racial deliniation, with a largely-white Northeast Philadelphia preferring candidate Knox). The candidate with the largest war chest and most TV advertising did not win. Incumbents with various amounts of local name recognition (and even the support of a BIG NAME) could not garner a simple majority of the vote. Tremendous Get-Out-The-Vote (GOTV) efforts by local labor and the party-machine proved fruitless. And save for some swiftboating and alleged dirty-tricks at the end, the campaign was fought cleanly. Given that, the recently completed Primary Election and Great Expectations for the Next Mayor of the City of Philadelphia may serve as an example of newly-evolving voter behavior, where a brainy policy-wonk is the people's choice versus the usual suspects.

Rest in Peace, Mayor Iccho Ito

stagewhisper — Wed, 18 Apr 2007 19:45:57 -0800

An assassin with alleged links to the underworld shot and killed the mayor of Nagasaki yesterday. Nagasaki Mayor Iccho Ito was a tireless anti-nuclear proliferation activist who travelled the world to spread his pacifist message and help serve witness to the horrors of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. His comments during bombing anniversaries have criticized the United States as well as North Korea and Iran for contributing to proliferation.

As supreme monarch, I've had to make the tough decisions.

CunningLinguist — Tue, 14 Mar 2006 09:48:03 -0800

King Mike for Monarch NYC Mayor Mike Bloomberg stars in a political ad parody. From the Inner Circle, via YouTube.

London mayor suspended

atticus — Fri, 24 Feb 2006 06:34:26 -0800

London's mayor suspended for four weeks for comparing a Jewish journalist to a concentration camp guard.

Tucson Rodeo Craziness

Guerilla — Fri, 24 Feb 2006 06:23:47 -0800

Only in Tucson can the Mayor and his wife get rear-ended by a stagecoach. It all happened during the annual Rodeo parade in downtown Tucson. There is a fantastic made for TV video of it attached this story.

DaVinci's Successor

docgonzo — Fri, 18 Nov 2005 20:49:13 -0800

On one side: Jim Green, the Alabama-born, opera-loving Vietnam draft-dodger, a hard-nosed community activist and the choice of the local tabloid and the outgoing mayor (himself the inspiration for not one but two Canadian television series) who together fought to bring harm-reduction (i.e. sanity) to Vancouver's drug-plagued downtown eastside; on the other: Sam Sullivan, the surprising underdog, a paraplegic -- and former lead singer in the "Spinal Chords" -- who, he's proud to say, was flat on his back and on welfare 20 years ago, then taught himself Cantonese and is the longest-serving member of city council. Who will be the next mayor of Vancouver? (It'll be close.)

Not the new Fox reality show!

fenriq — Fri, 11 Nov 2005 13:45:46 -0800

Teen Mayor!
Eighteen year old Michael Sessions can't buy or drink alcohol but he has been elected the mayor of his hometown of Hillsdale, Michigan. He won the office by two votes, which he's credited to his parents for putting him over the top.
His reason for running? Eight races in his town were being run unopposed and he didn't think that was right so he tried to run but was underage at the time. So he ran as a write-in. And won, pending a recount.
It will certainly be an interesting senior year of high school for him.

Ray Nagin lays it down: you must hear this

taz — Fri, 02 Sep 2005 05:29:31 -0800

They are feeding the public a line of bull, and they are spinning, and people are dying down here: A post with a link to MP3 of an explosive WWL radio interview in which New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin has a message for politicians: "I don't want to see anybody do any more goddamned press conferences... put a moratorium on press conferences, don't do another press conference until the resources are in this city, and then come down to this city and stand with us... Don't tell me 40,000 people are coming here - they're not here; it's too doggoned late. Now get off your asses and let's do something..."

Republican Mayor accused of gay sexual misconduct

Ignition — Sat, 07 May 2005 20:59:46 -0800

KXLY News 4 Mayor Jim West of Spokane Washington has been accused of sexual abuse of a male child. Mayor West announced in the local Spokesman Review newpaper that he plans on staying on as Mayor.

Good and gooder...

badstone — Thu, 04 Dec 2003 10:01:16 -0800

Lesser of two goods? (SanFranciscoFilter) SFWeekly's John Mecklin sums up the wild ride in San Francisco's mayoral race, from Matt Gonzalez's late entry, to the baffling Guardian endorsement, to the obvious Chronicle Gavin Newsom endorsement, to the downright surreal Alioto endorsement debacle. Oh, and then there's the Chron's not so coincidental "Shame " series on homelessness, Newsom's defining issue, in the final days of the election. In all, Mecklin concludes we're pretty damn lucky to have the fortune in this day and age to choose between two candidates that both have the capacity to do a decent job. Is this relevant to non-San Franciscans? Well, if Matt wins (and the odds are even), that puts a Green at the helm of a fairly important US city and may help counter the effect of Arnie.

Let me tell you about my mother.

xmutex — Fri, 05 Sep 2003 09:08:57 -0800

San Francisco mayorial candidates take the Voight-Kampff test. You know, from Blade Runner. For the children.

watch your a**, or where you put it.

cadence — Tue, 20 May 2003 07:48:23 -0800

New York man gets ticket for sitting on a milk crate. Not, of course, that i take the NY Daily News all that seriously, but still... This is beyond ridiculous (much like a lot of things taking place in New York these days). Makes me ill that I have to wait until 2006 to vote this ridiculous mayor out of office.

SF Police Indictments, Civic Duty and Justice

ed — Sat, 01 Mar 2003 10:19:32 -0800

"I'm the commander in chief of this goddam place, and there is no way the command staff of my Police Department is going to step down at this time. It's a matter of public safety."

So responded San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown to the indictments of ten SFPD members, which included Police Chief Earl Sanders. The convictions were passed after police officers assaulted two men who wouldn't hand over a bag of steak fajitas. Top brass deliberately delayed handing over records to the DA. Has Brown committed political suicide standing by an old friend? Are his words a realistic portrayal of municipal operations? And what does an indicted command staff still on the job say about justice being served?

PrinceValium — Fri, 06 Sep 2002 17:17:53 -0800

Buddy, we hardly knew ye. Vincent A. Cianci, Jr., mayor of Providence, R.I., heads off to jail on conspiracy charges, thus ending one of the most colorful relationships between a mayor and his city since Daley's Chicago. Whether revered for his astounding reconstruction of an embattled downtown, chastised for a career of shady dealings with shady people (and one unfortunate incident involving a fireplace, a lit cigarette, and his wife's lover), or turned into a cult figure by artsy college students, one thing is certain: Providence is a more interesting place because Buddy was a part of it.