With no fanfare, Berkeley Mayor Tom Bates,73, slipped in under the radar on Monday and filed a form kicking off his campaign to become a candidate for a fourth term--the "Campaign Intention Statement" of the "Re-Elect Mayor Tom Bates Committee."

He's already served one two-year and two four-year terms, so if he wins another four-year term, he'll have been mayor of Berkeley for a total of fourteen years.

His wife Loni Hancock, now running for yet another term as State Senator from the district which includes Berkeley, preceded him in the Berkeley mayor's office. This time the Mayor's race will be decided by ranked choice voting, but as yet no other candidates have appeared to be willing to challenge the formidable power of the well-oiled Bates-Hancock apparatus, which last week knocked Oakland Assemblymember Sandre Swanson out of the race for the Senate seat. -more-

The City of Berkeley Police Department (BPD) has received word from the Alameda County Coroner’s Office that the 18 year old skateboarder passed away at 4:10 p.m. The young man, Tyler DeMartini was a Berkeley resident. Members of BPD extend their condolences to the DeMartini family. -more-

The Patch website is reporting that Tyler De Martini, the 18-year-old Berkeley skateboarder who was struck by a car while skateboarding down Marin in Berkeley Monday evening, died this afternoon. -more-

The Berkeley City Council, in a vote where several councilmembers chose to abstain, passed a resolution declaring a drastically expanded house at 2133 Parker a public nuisance. -more-

The City Council of the City of Berkeley today unanimously passed a resolution recognizing the immeasurable sacrifice of Tibetan monks and nuns who have self-immolated in protest of Chinese political suppression. The resolution calls on the Obama Administration to insist that China immediately end excessive security measures on Tibetan monasteries and lay communities in the region, and allow members of the media and international independent fact-finding delegations to visit the affected Tibetan-inhabited areas in Western China and the Tibetan Autonomous Region. -more-

The Berkeley City Council at its meeting tonight has agreed unanimously to request that the City Manager evaluate and report back to the City Council no later than May 1, 2012 regarding:

1. The fiscal and operational impacts of not renewing the city's with Wells Fargo Bank and contracting with an alternative bank, including but not limited to Community Banks, membership-based Credit Unions or Community Development Financial Institutions (CDFI) for city banking services. -more-

The City of Berkeley is offering a $15,000 reward, and Bay Area Crime Stoppers (BACS) is offering an additional $2,000 reward, for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the suspect or suspects responsible for the City of Berkeley’s first homicide of 2012.

On Thursday, January 26, 2012 at about 6:50 p.m., the City of Berkeley Police Department (BPD) got a flurry of calls from community members reporting gunshots in the area of Shattuck and Ashby Avenues, Shattuck and Emerson and around Essex Streets. Officers found Kenneth Allen Warren, 35, of Hercules who had sustained gunshots wounds and was on Emerson Street east of Shattuck Avenue. City of Berkeley Fire Department (BFD) Paramedics transported Warren to a local Hospital’s Trauma Center where he was pronounced dead by physicians there. -more-

Oakland police arrested an estimated 400 people Saturday during a day of protests that began with an attempt to take over a vacant building and ended with mass arrests and a break-in and vandalism at City Hall. -more-

An 18-year-old skateboarder is in "grave" condition today after being struck by a car in Berkeley on Monday evening, police said today. -more-

The Berkeley High School Info night for incoming 9th graders and their parents/guardians is being held February 1 at 7:00pm in the Community Theater (on the northside of the BHS campus on Allston Way). This is a must for any student entering BHS for the 2012-13 school year, both current and prospective BUSD students. Applications for Fall 2012 admission to BHS for students not currently attending a BUSD school are due the week of February 21-24. Much more information is available here. -more-

Taking early retirement from my job at U.C.'s Boalt Hall School of Law, where I was a lowly administrative assistant, clearly wasn't the smartest move I've ever made. Suddenly I had all this loose time on my hands, driving me absolutely bananas! Not to worry-- thanks to the good Lord above, a friend passed on her Elderhostel Road Adventure catalog, so now I can fill those empty hours with dozens of Road Scholar programs. Should you not be familiar with Elderhostel, this is a not-for-profit educational program dating back to 1975, with President James Moses responsible for its remarkable success. It offers more than 7,000 learning adventures in all 50 states and 150 countries around the world, as can be seen in the bulky catalogs sent regularly throughout the year. There's also an Adventures Afloat Catalog. To date I've taken more than 31 programs, some domestic , some international. To say which programs I enjoyed the most is almost impossible. I've attended three or four New York City programs. One focused on the Fifth Avenue Museum Mile at the Metropolitan Museum. I also had lunch at a restaurant in one of the Twin Towers, little dreaming of the horrific attack of 9/11. -more-

In early September, Evelyn Glaubman, who is a local artist, expressed her outrage to several of us about the unjustifiably low taxes paid by the rich and major corporations. She made a bunch of nicely designed posters and proposed that we publicize our concerns on Solano Avenue. None of us needed convincing. On September 12th, ten indignant protesters, mainly senior citizens, descended on Solano, by the closed Oak Theater on one side of the street and the Chase Bank on the other. We held up our signs, gave out leaflets, and engaged in conversations with people walking by. -more-

Yesterday, the Oakland Police deployed hundreds of officers in riot gear so as to prevent Occupy Oakland from putting a vacant building to better use. This is a building which has sat vacant for 6 years, and the city has no current plans for it. The Occupy Oakland GA passed a proposal calling for the space to be turned into a social center, convergence center and headquarters of the Occupy Oakland movement.

The police actions tonight cost the city of Oakland hundreds of thousands of dollars, and they repeatedly violated their own crowd control guidelines and protester’s civil rights.

With all the problems in our city, should preventing activists from putting a vacant building to better use be their highest priority? Was it worth the hundreds of thousands of dollars they spent? -more-

Police arrested around 200 Occupy Oakland protesters during a day of action Saturday that began with the protesters' attempt to take over a vacant building to establish a community center there. -more-

A downloadable audio file of the press conference has been posted at http://bit.ly/wuOsp8. -more-

Oakland, CA – At an 8:30 pm press briefing, Oakland officials provided updates on the Occupy activities in downtown Oakland. -more-

Oakland City Hall was broken into by multiple people tonight during Occupy Oakland protests, according to police. -more-

Occupy Oakland's building occupation, an act of constitutionally protected civil disobedience was disrupted by a brutal police response today. Protesters were met with baton strikes, shot with rubber bullets, and exposed to tear gas. Police immediately issued denials that tear gas was used, however, as many victims can attest, it was used freely and without regard to safety. -more-

At least 100 people have been detained and face possible arrest outside the YMCA at 2350 Broadway in Oakland after allegedly attempting to force entry into the building, according to Oakland police. -more-

Around 250 to 300 Occupy Oakland protestors have gathered at Frank Ogawa Plaza in Oakland to rest and reorganize following a failed attempt to take over a building this afternoon. -more-

Oakland--By 12 pm, a crowd of approximately 250 had gathered in Frank Ogawa Plaza for the Occupy rally. Just before 1:30 pm, the group started marching southbound on Broadway. As the group of approximately 450 marched, traffic disruptions occurred on downtown streets. At approximately 2:15 pm, some of the marchers entered the campus of Laney College. -more-

Police tear gassed Occupy Oakland protesters this afternoon near Lake Merritt and warned them to leave an area where they had gathered or they would be forcibly removed. -more-

Berkeley Police Lt. Dave Frankel has informed the Planet that the victim of the murder last night at the corner of Shattuck and Emerson has been identified as Kenneth Warren, who worked at Don's Headquarters, a popular neighborhood barber shop at the same location, as well as at the Port of Oakland. -more-

[Editor's Note: Reader Florian Charread sent the Planet this video which he made last night at the scene of the shooting which took place at the corner of Emerson and Shattuck in Berkeley.]

Shooting aftermath-Berkeley from manaovisual on Vimeo. -more-

A man was shot and killed on Emerson Street near Shattuck in Berkeley tonight. This account, author unknown, was forwarded to the Planet from the neighborhood watch group:

"My husband just finished talking to the police. We heard a group of shots (maybe 10?) and then a pause, then a few more shots (maybe 5?), then a pause, then another group of shots (maybe 10?). I went and called the police. My husband went to the window and saw a man with dark skin (maybe African American) get into a dark grey Honda (Accord?) and drive off heading east on Emerson without his headlights on. My husband walked outside and there was smoke in the air. We thought it was firecrackers and he was looking for a burn mark on the pavement or something to indicate firecrackers. He went back inside the house and got a flashlight and then saw bullet casings on the pavement but didn't see anyone injured. The police arrived and other neighbors came out. Other people came by and were screaming. Someone screamed, "Oh my god it was Donnie! Oh my god oh my god! No!" It was really terrifying as this was in the apartment building [near] our house. The paramedics came and did CPR on someone on the balcony of the apartment building. The victim was on the second floor. The paramedics took him away and we don't know if he was alive or dead. The police are now going door to door taking statements. I believe the officer used the word 'homicide.' "

Berkeley Police confirmed at midnight that the shooting did take place as reported, and that the victim has died. Comments on the Berkeleyside website indicate that the victim may have been the nephew of Don Warren, the owner of Don's HeadQuarters barber shop on Shattuck, a well-regarded fixture and a stabilizing influence in the neighborhood for decades, including the eight years when the Planet office was located next door. -more-

Police are responding to a fatal shooting in Berkeley tonight, police said.

Officers responded to the 3000 block of Shattuck Avenue and found a male victim suffering from multiple gunshot wounds near an apartment building at the corner of Shattuck Avenue and Emerson Street, according to police Sgt. Mary Kusmiss.

The victim was taken to a trauma center where he was pronounced dead.

"The evidence suggests that this was not a random shooting," Kusmiss said. -more-

When I recently went to Alta Bates hospital for surgery, I discovered that legal procedures take precedence over medical ones. I had to sign intimidating statements about financial counseling, indemnity, patient responsibilities, consent to treatment, use of electronic technologies, and the like.

One of these documents committed me to the following: “The hospital pathologist is hereby authorized to use his/her discretion in disposing of any member, organ, or other tissue removed from my person during the procedure.” Any member? Any organ?

The next day I returned for the actual operation. While playing Frank Sinatra recordings, the surgeon went to work cutting open several layers of my abdomen in order to secure my intestines with a permanent mesh implant. Afterward I spent two hours in the recovery room. “I feel like I’ve been in a knife fight,” I told one nurse. “It’s called surgery,” she explained.

Then, while still pumped up with anesthetics and medications, I was rolled out into the street. The street? Yes, some few hours after surgery they send you home. In countries that have socialized medicine (there I said it), a van might be waiting with trained personnel to help you to your abode.

Not so in free-market America. Your presurgery agreement specifies in boldface that you must have “a responsible adult acquaintance” (as opposed to an irresponsible teenage stranger) take you home in a private vehicle. I kept thinking, what happens to those unfortunates who have no one to bundle them away? Do they languish endlessly in the hospital driveway until the nasty weather finishes them off? -more-

A fire badly damaged a Chinese food restaurant on Kittredge near Oxford in downtown Berkeley on Wednesday night, Berkeley fire officials said. -more-

Yesterday the Alameda County Waste Management Authority (ACWMA) adopted two ordinances that will help the county achieve its long-term waste reduction goals. The first ordinance requires recycling of high market-value materials from larger businesses and multi-family properties. The second ordinance prohibits free distribution of single-use bags at check out in stores that sell packaged food. The initiatives are designed to reduce waste and litter, stimulate the local economy and create jobs. -more-

[Editor's Note: This is the first part of a two-part news analysis which explores some unexpected synergies between Tea Party protesters and progressive opponents of planning policies which are perceived as anti-democratic. Part 2 will appear on Friday.]

Most people regard meetings about regional planning, if they regard them at all, as soporific, PowerPointed affairs frequented by policy wonks. But on January 11, I attended a regional planning workshop in Dublin that was anything but dull. That’s because protesters from the East Bay Area Tea Party showed up along with some “fellow travelers” and nearly took the evening over. Their appearance was no surprise. -more-

Police arrested two teens suspected of injuring two people in a daytime shooting in Berkeley last month, police said. -more-

Wetland restoration is a billion-dollar-a-year industry in the United States that aims to create ecosystems similar to those that disappeared over the past century. But a new analysis of restoration projects shows that restored wetlands seldom reach the quality of a natural wetland. -more-

Ghosts of Berkeley's Blake's past happily haunt us on Telegraph Avenue.

Don't expect a chronology here, but ever since I can remember, Larry Blake's on upper Teley, has been closing and re-opening. Re-opened once more as Pappy's Bar and Grill, Saturday, it is more Blake's than ever, thanks to "smart" Alex Popov, who runs Smart Alec's next door. -more-

There’s bad news today in the Planet’s old neighborhood in south Berkeley. Kenny Warren, nephew of Don Warren who’s been running the very popular Don’s Headquarters barber shop on Shattuck for four decades, was gunned down last night as he stood on the balcony at a friend’s apartment on Emerson, around the corner from the shop.

The gunman is reported to have fired many many rounds of bullets, perhaps as many as 80, from a pair of automatic weapons, the super-lethal variety which make it possible for any fool, without need for target practice, to hit his mark with at least one bullet. Forty shell casings were recovered from the sidewalk alone.

We say “his” mark here because neighbor accounts suggest that the shooter, like his victim, was a young African-American man. This is sad but not surprising. -more-

Senator Loni Hancock (Berkeley) has announced in an email blast to her mailing list that she will not face any opposition in her quest for re-election to the California State Senate. -more-

Berkeley Police Information Officer Sgt. Mary Kusmiss today issued press releases denying two rumors which have been published elsewhere. She said that a recent Berkeley murder is NOT connected with a recent Vallejo murder in any way, and that there has NOT been a hold-up of any Wells Fargo bank in Berkeley. Neither rumor was published in the Planet. -more-

Don Warren, uncle of Kenneth Warren, who was gunned down on Thursday night next door to Don's HeadQuarters barbershop in Berkeley, said today that a fund for the victim's five children is being established. Don asked anyone who would like to contribute to send an email with contact information to warren.fund@berkeleydailyplanet.com and they will be contacted when the fund has been set up, probably early next week. -more-

Anyone interested in Israel or high tech funding might want to take a look at this piece, which touts an upcoming conference sponsored by U.C. Berkeley's Law School to promote investment in Israeli technology companies. -more-

The giant whoop-de-doo over Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory's decision to expand its bioscience research to U.C. Berkeley's Richmond Field Station is mind-boggling. Front page headline in the metro daily! Dog Bites Man--Read It Here!

What's mysterious is why such a fuss was made in the first place with purported consideration of other sites, given that the university already owned this obviously perfect site. The only explanation that makes sense is that it's The Planners' Full Employment Stimulus Program, given that hundreds of thousands of dollars were expended on fancy video-enhanced bids that, rightfully, should never have had a chance.

What if—just what if—the powers that be at the two UC-related players had simply announced that "we own a lovely site down by the bay, and we're putting our new labs there"? Period.

Who could cavil? Just sayin'. -more-

“The Bay Area Occupy Movement has got to stop using Oakland as their playground,” said Oakland Mayor Jean Quan, speaking at a press conference Saturday evening after a day of demonstrations called by Occupy Oakland that saw approximately 400 arrests, multiple injuries, and numerous confrontations with police. She ticked off the damage that had been done when a group of protesters broke into City Hall, overturning a scale model of the building, vandalizing a children's art exhibit, and burning an American flag. The next day in an interview with the San Francisco Chronicle, she returned to her talking point: "It's like a tantrum . . . They're treating us like a playground." -more-

As the Oakland City Council prepares to approve more layoffs and make even deeper cuts to already less-than minimal City services, Occupy Research released initial survey results that show the Occupy Movement provided food, healthcare, and other social services to Oakland residents in three months.

“Oakland is spending millions to prevent Occupy from providing vital services to Oakland residents when they need it most. These funds should be used to prevent further cuts to schools and social services, instead of being wasted on the violent repression of activists and community members who are trying to fill in the gaps where local government has failed.” said Sarah Thomason, member of Occupy Oakland Research Working Group and graduate student at University of California, Berkeley.

Over the past four years, Oakland has slashed $97 million from its General Purpose Fund, and $34.2 from other sources, cutting transitional kindergarten and adult education programs, reducing library services by one day each week, eliminating the senior shuttle and elderly nutrition programs, among other cuts, and laying off 277 City workers.

Initial survey results from Occupy Research show that: -more-

I found her article to be balanced. I am conservative and yes, one of "those" tea party nut jobs...

Recently, my "google alerts" went off and warned me about our County's plan to finalize a two-year process (of public input and comment) for our 25 year Comprehensive Plan.

I researched and was appalled at the draconian (I know, it's my opinion) nature of the sweeping changes headed our way. I read the Comprehensive Plan (CP) thoroughly at least 3 times and gathered my wits and performed deep-research.

I think you are on to something when you challenge your government's agencies to prove where the growth numbers are coming from. -more-

90% Smokefree is a Contradiction in Terms, by Carol Denney -more-

In her two articles about regional planning for smart growth, Zelda Bronstein repeatedly claims that the planning is undemocratic. She sympathizes with Tea Party members who have disrupted planning meetings and who gave the biggest round of applause one evening to a Berkeley extremist who is well known for disrupting city meetings. -more-

Here's rare good news, rare indeed these days, about a truly worthwhile piece of new legislation that's about to be born in the City of Berkeley. The City Council will give the final YES on women's human rights becoming law in Berkeley this Tuesday 31 January 2012, when it formally approves the passage into Berkeley law of the safeguards and protections of the UN Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW). CEDAW-related legislation is already in force in the city across the Bay; San Francisco was the first city in the US to establish new law based on CEDAW principles, making Berkeley the second city in the US to be taking this historic step. -more-

[Editor's Note: This is the second part of a two part series. Part One can be found here.]

Progressive observers treat the Tea Party’s forays into land use planning as the work of paranoid reactionaries. The March-April 2011 issue of Mother Jones ran an article by Stephanie Mencimer that portrayed Tea Partiers as “nutters” whose opposition to increased density and mass transit is rooted in “a hostility to what it sees as elites” and a pro-sprawl, suburban lifestyle. Last December, the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy’s Anthony Flint riffed off of Mencimer’s piece in a post on the Atlantic magazine’s “Urban Wonk” blog that decried Tea Party disruption of planning efforts from California to Maine to Florida.

The truth is more complicated. Pace Rosa Koire, to attack smart growth as part of an international plot guided by the U.N.’s Agenda 21 really is to espouse conspiracy theory. To denounce “human-caused global warming” as a myth, as does the East Bay Tea Party, is to indulge in perilous denial. But to claim that land use planning is often run by unresponsive elites is to tap reality. Flint himself intimated as much: “Some might wonder,” he wrote, “whether there’s some truth” to accusations that “planners have draped the public process with the trappings of citizen input, while in fact all the decisions to promote smart growth have been made.”

Some do more than wonder, and they’re not all members or even “fellow travelers” of the Tea Party—for example, longtime Berkeley community activist Doug Buckwald. Speaking at the Dublin open mike, Buckwald assailed Plan Bay Area for discriminating against dissenters from smart growth doctrine. He said that a friend had tried to register for a workshop online at 7:30 am the day that registration opened, only to be told that the meetings were filled, and that she would be placed on a waitlist. She never got a confirmation from MTC, but she did receive letters from Greenbelt Alliance urging her to sign up and hold the line against opponents to the process who were poised to flood into the meetings. -more-

An article by John Blake (a writer for CNN) attempts to create a controversy where there is none and to portray Martin Luther King Jr., as not being accepting of gay people. This is in line with CNN's tendency to be manipulative of public opinion and to do so through casting clouds of doubt in the absence of facts. -more-

Oakland, CA--Saturday, January 28, 2012, Sheila and I joined about 1,500 members of Occupy massed at 14^th and Broadway in downtown Oakland. Occupy Oakland’s announced intention was to march to and occupy a long vacant building “somewhere” in the city to re-create a living, working, and coordinating center for this young “politics on the fly” movement for the rights of the 99%. As you probably know, previous occupations of public space from coast to coast have been destroyed and precluded by Government ordered police actions, making community development, collaboration and participatory mass democracy yet more difficult. -more-

The Mayan prophecy that the world will end in 2012 has spawned hundreds of books, films, plays and satires. Although the public fascination with apocalyptic stories does not necessarily translate into real belief, I admit to secretly subscribing to an alternative vision of a 2012 apocalypse—one where the world is cleansed of tyranny, colonialism, and totalitarianism. -more-

Friends and family who know me well know how I would love to hibernate in winter. I am just not a winter person, and I would never contemplate stepping out of the house on a rainy day, especially these days when my falls have become unpredictable. Last Sunday seemed to be a nice sunny day, but by noon it turned to be a very rainy and wet day. The Jerusalem children’s orchestra of the Edward Said National Conservatory was scheduled to perform at the Cultural Palace in Ramallah, and the next day at the National Theatre in Ramallah. I already made up my mind to go the next day to Jerusalem and avoid the drive through Kalandia where the road ends up more like a river when the heavy rains fall. But alas the last minute the concert in Jerusalem was cancelled because the children from the West Bank were not granted permits. -more-

Is Kansas Secretary of State, Kris Kobach, he who roams the nation promoting vicious anti-immigration laws and ordinances a latter day Julius Streicher? -more-

The Curmudgeon Light was shining on the side of the Campanile the other night, my signal from Planet Editor Becky O’Malley that she wanted me to check in after she’d gotten copies of some emails I’d sent to councilmembers.

“Write something satirical, Curmudge,” Becky ordered, referring to the stultifying subject of voter redistricting, the process of redrawing election districts that follows every decennial census. But how can you be funny about something like redistricting? -more-

Thank you for Gar Smith’s excellent and detailed review of Addiction Incorporated (Addiction Incorporated: The Other Insider 1-17-2012 ) at the Shattuck Cinemas.

The tobacco industry’s manipulation of the public, cigarette additives, and the scientific community is still going on, and this movie does a great job of telling whistleblower Victor DeNoble’s insider story of doing research at Philip Morris like the great suspense thriller it is.

But the film leaves out a big part of the tobacco story – the dogged, dedicated citizens, parents, public health professionals, policymakers, teachers, casino workers, truck drivers, musicians and others who continue to fight ordinance by ordinance, city council by city council, for clean air despite the billions the tobacco industry spends to try to thwart common sense public health policy. -more-

For the last several years, Berkeley Budget SOS has attempted to focus our City government on the realities of Berkeley’s financial crisis; unfortunately, our pleas for fiscal reality and transparency have fallen on deaf ears. During 2011, most Berkeley City leaders appear to have remained deluded by the comments of Councilman Laurie Capitelli, who proclaimed “We are in better fiscal shape than virtually any other jurisdiction in the Bay Area and I would suggest even California”. The fallacy of that comment was repeatedly evident last year. The chickens have indeed come home to roost. -more-

From its birth more than 60 years ago, Israel has always presented itself as “an oasis of democracy in a sea of despotism,” an outpost of pluralism surrounded by tyranny. While that equality never fully applied to the country’s Arab citizens, Israel was, for the most part an open society. But today political rights are under siege by right-wing legislators, militant settlers, and a growing religious divide in the Israeli army, all of which threaten to silence internal opposition to the policies of the government of Benjamin Netanyahu. Since that may include a war with Iran—and the probable involvement of the U.S. in such a conflict—the move to stifle dissent should be a major concern for Americans. -more-

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January 30th marks the forty-fourth anniversary of the beginning of the Tet Offensive, a defining event in the Vietnam War. I was a U.S. Army Transportation officer stationed in Vietnam during the 1968 Tet Offensive. -more-

Food became a metaphor for life as M. F. K. Fisher learned and explained the arts of cooking and of eating. Her reputation as a writer about food and its importance in human life began in 1937 with publication of her first book, Serve It Forth. -more-

Why is the New York Times concealing the key role that the United States played in the 1965 coup in Indonesia that ended up killing somewhere between 500,000 and 1 million people? In a story Jan. 19—“Indonesia Chips Away At the Enforced Silence Around a Dark History”—the Times writes that the coup was “one of the darkest periods in modern Indonesian history, and the least discussed, until now.” -more-

Watching a predator eat an endangered species is always awkward. Should you intervene? Yell, wave your arms, throw things? I went through that train of thought a couple of years ago as a great blue heron and a great egret ate their way through the California red-legged frog population of a small stock pond at Point Reyes. -more-

“ . . . how much easier it is to let the mind, rather than the body, do the traveling. No tickets or schedules, no borders, no passports. Thought is the one thing that remains free no matter what changes outside the head.”
—Not Now Voyager (2009), Lynne Sharon Schwartz, (contemporary writer) -more-

The collaborations of director Luis Buñuel and screen writer Jean-Claude Carriere examine and satirize the dark underbelly of bourgeoisie society. Their films are dark, a bit twisted and sometimes discomfiting. But Buñuel and Carriere do not judge these characters. They are presented from a certain distance; we watch them, we gain a certain understanding of them, but we are not made to either identify with them nor be repulsed by them. Buñuel and Carriere merely present them as they are and allow the audience to come to their own conclusions. -more-

Virago Theatre Co—based in Alameda, and featuring a predominately East Bay cast—opens its production of Shelagh Delaney's 1959 hit comedy of asingle mother and her teenage daughter moving into a working class slum in Northern England, this weekend at the Thick House on Potrero Hill in San Francisco. -more-

A young early 19th century girl, learning about thermodynamics, asking her tutor the meaning of "carnal embrace" ... He replies it's about hugging a side of beef ... A garden in the new "scenic" style, sublime, with a hermitage—but where's the hermit? ... And almost 200 years later, speculation, conjecture—and a costume ball—on the former inhabitants and visitors of manor and garden, which may have included Lord Byron, and their thoughts, their secret loves—maybe a fatal duel over one of those loves ...

Tom Stoppard's 'Arcadia' is on the boards at Live Oak Theater, and looks very good there, the set, props and costuming a triumph for Actors Ensemble of Berkeley. -more-

The Friends of Jane Powell, a group organized to help the noted author of home renovation books and Planet contributing writer, is demanding her mortgage servicer GMAC negotiate and memorialize a reasonable modification of her home mortgage. In support of this effort the group will be holding a fund raising event at Jane’s historic home on February 12 at 2:00 pm. -more-

Berkeley Symphony, directed by Joana Carneiro, will perform another engaging program of modern orchestral music, featuring works of Debussy, Henry Dutilleux and Shostakovich, this Thursday at 8, preceded by a talk at 7:10, at Zellerbach Hall on the UC campus, near Bancroft and Telegraph. -more-

Tom Stoppard's 'Arcadia' at Actors Ensemble; John O'Keefe at Theatre of Yugen, free, on Sunday Only; Ragged Wing Ensemble performs 'A Fool's Errand' -more-

Hooray and Hallelujah! The New York Times recently rated Oakland as one of the world's top tourist destinations in 2012 because of its stellar restaurants and bars. We knew that. For a year Bay Area Photographers have been documenting First Friday's diverse and eclectic audiences in a show, "Portraits from Oakland." This show can be seen through Feb. 18 at PHOTO, 473 25th Street, Oakland. (510) 847-2416. -more-