Sam Spade's San Francisco

Today is the first full day of service between San Francisco and Los Angeles for Frontier Airlines. In coming months Denver-based Frontier Airlines is likely to hire at least 40 people to work at SFO. Frontier anticipates as many as 158,000 passengers a year between SFO and LAX.

A visit to the Frontier Airlines web site produced a schedule of five daily flights between SFO and LAX at a standard ticket price of $129.30. Frontier operates a fleet of 53 Airbus A319 and A318 aircraft.

Frontier Airlines may be reached online at www.frontierairlines.com or by phone at .

You can learn more about Airbus aircraft by visiting their web site at www.airbus.com

To learn more about working for Frontier Airlines at SFO click here.

VIA Magazine, the publication of the California State Automobile Association (CSAA) , has published an article describing the five most significant literary landmarks in Northern California. The City Lights Bookstore in San Francisco is among them.

Lawrence Ferlinghetti's City Lights Bookstore on Columbus near Broadway became internationally famous during the beat generation. City Lights is more than a bookstore. It is also a publishing house. One of the first titles published by Ferlinghetti was a book by his friend, a gay beat poet from San Francisco by the name of Allen Ginsberg. The book was Ginsberg's acclaimed poem, Howl.

Today City Lights has more than 200 titles in print and the bookstore offers three floors of space and countless opportunities to bump into researchers, authors, poets, teachers, famous literary figures and bibliophiles from around the world.

City Lights Bookstore will be found at 261 Columbus and it's open 10 AM to midnight every day.

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VIA, The CSAA magazine

City Lights Bookstore

Lawrence Ferlinghetti

Allen Ginsberg

San Francisco's Beat Generation

San Francisco's Beat Museum

I was present for the famous riot at Gene Compton's in 1966. Compton's was a late-night hang-out for transgenders, hookers, hustlers, young queers, and the regular denizens of the Tenderloin. Compton's was on the corner of Turk and Taylor.

In 1962 SFPD Sergeant Elliot Blackstone was appointed the City's first police liaison to the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community. I joined Harry Hay's Mattachine Society in the 60's and Sergeant Blackstone was well-known to Mattachine members as well as members of the Daughters of Bilitis, the Sexual Freedom League and even the Hooker's Union. He was the queer community's first friend and supporter among the San Francisco Police Department. Those of us who have been in San Francisco since the beginning of the queer civil rights movement know very well that we owe a substantial debt of gratitude to Sergeant Elliot Blackstone.

Sergeant Blackstone is now 81 and has been retired for years. Last week he put his uniform back on and was honored by Chief Heather Fong and the San Francisco Police Commission for the remarkable way in which he served his City and the queer community. Tomorrow Sergeant Blackstone will ride in the San Francisco Pride Parade as our Grand Marshal.

The Pride Parade is much larger than it was decades ago, but it has also lost a lot. It used to be called the Freedom Parade when I first marched in it. In those days it was a local event for local queers. We marched in defiance of a homophobic world. San Francisco was a lot different then than it is now. Remember, in those days psychologists still classified homosexuality as a mental illness. (The Pentagon still seems to think so, but that's another story.)

Today the parade is very commercial. It has been invaded by corporate public relations departments and advertising agencies that produce slick professional floats and entries. These days, instead of watching pioneers of the queer community march in solidarity, we watch an endless parade of corporate commercials rolling on wheels. It is a very different parade today. In one sense it is more and in another sense it is less.

It was a different world in those early days. It was in that different world that Sergeant Blackstone stood up and took a position in defense and in support of the San Francisco queer community. If you watch the parade tomorrow try to take the opportunity to meet Sergeant Blackstone and shake his hand. He is a true and bonafide hero to the queer community and an outstanding San Francisco Police Officer.

I remember Sergeant Blackstone well. We appreciated him and we trusted him. Many times, Elliot Blackstone was the only friend we had. This year we honor him publicly and in grand style.

Congratulations, Sergeant Blackstone, and thank you for listening to the heart beating beneath your silver star.

Why would the management of a major San Francisco hotel, the Argent, deliberately deceive its guests and block police efforts to solve crimes committed at the Argent? It has San Francisco civic leaders puzzled, but that's exactly what happened at the Argent Hotel this past month.

Shawn Bailey, a 23-year-old local man, was arrested by San Francisco Police on charges of burglarizing rooms at the Argent and other downtown hotels. The biggest surprise for the SFPD, however, was not the criminal they caught, but the unbelievably unethical behavior of the Argent Hotel's Operations Director, James Giffin, who deliberately set out on a plan to deceive Argent Hotel guests.

As amazing as the story sounds, when hotel security employees tried to stop Bailey, he dropped a backpack containing items stolen from guest rooms and ran. Giffin, the Argent's manager, sneaked the stolen items back into the guest's room, made it look like nothing was ever wrong, and failed to inform the guest that his room had been burglarized. That's the kind of behavior one might expect from a cheap Tenderloin flop house, but not from a major San Francisco tourist hotel.

Inspector Rich Leon of the San Francisco Police Department told the Chronicle, "They have him (Bailey) on the video surveillance, and they can see him actually enter nine rooms. None of the nine people have been notified that their rooms had been entered illegally."

As if this isn't disgraceful enough, Giffin and the Argent Hotel refused to provide police officers with any information about any of the burglaries and refused to file a police report. Police had to get a warrant and force the Argent to provide essential information. It appears clear that James Giffin and the Argent Hotel are more concerned with the hotel's advertising image than they are concerned about their guests' safety and welfare.

Brian Loss, a guest from Baltimore staying at the Argent Hotel, had his backpack and laptop stolen from his locked Argent Hotel room by Bailey. When San Francisco Police later contacted him and told him that Argent management had returned his backpack and laptop without telling him his room had been burglarized and his property stolen, he responded with, "I was kind of shocked. You would think a place like that, they would tell you about the burglary. They didn't."

San Francisco is in the tourism business. It is the activity that pays our civic bills. We have little control over streetcorner panhandlers, but at least we can get rid of incompetent people like James Giffin, who has just done greater damage to our hospitality reputation than all the panhandlers combined.

The job opportunities page on the Argent Hotel web site does not list an opening for Operations Director, but based on Giffin's embarrassing performance, one can assume the posting will appear shortly.

The Commonwealth Club of California will present a special LGBT member-led forum featuring Craig Newmark, founder of www.craigslist.org, and Betty Sullivan, founder of www.Bettyslist.com

The forum will begin Wednesday evening, June 21st with a reception at the club's office, 595 Market Street, second floor. The forum, lead by John Lazar, LGBT Forum Chair for the Commonwealth Club, will begin at 6 PM.

The event is free for Commonwealth Club members and $15 for non-members. Seating is limited. For reservations, call or visit www.commonwealthclub.org.

The Commonwealth Club of California is the nation's oldest and largest public affairs forum, bringing together its 16,000 members for over 400 annual events on topics ranging across politics, culture, society and the economy.

The ACLU has accused the San Francisco Department of Public Health's City Clinic of misleading patients about the privacy of their HIV test results. This past April Senate Bill 699, which was signed into law by Governor Schwarzenegger, requires the City to report the names of persons who test positive to the Department of Public Health. The law took effect upon being signed by the Governor - three months ago - and City Clinic continues to deceive and mislead patients, according to the ACLU complaint.

The ACLU addressed the letter to Dr. Jeffrey Kalusner, Director of STD Prevention and Disease Control for the San Francisco DPH and Dr. Susan Philip, Medical Director of City Clinic. The letter accuses City Clinic staff of informing people seeking HIV testing that their names will not be reported to the DPH. City Clinic staff is also accused of failing to inform people of the availability of anonymous testing still available at other sites.

According to the ACLU the City Clinic web site includes erroneous and deceptive information.

The ACLU letter continues by reprimanding City Clinic. "By providing patently erroneous information about the consequences of testing positive for HIV, the City Clinic has tested individuals without obtaining their informed consent in violation of California Health and safety Code Sec. 120990."

The letter was signed by ACLU staff attorney Rose Saxe and counter signed by Tamara Lange, Senior Staff Attorney at the ACLU San Francisco office.

While this may be nothing more than poor administrative management, the harm that can be caused to the objectives of public health by a reputation of outright deceit is extremely damaging and counter-productive to the goal of encouraging persons newly diagnosed with HIV to seek follow-up treatment.

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The full ACLU letter may be read here.

City Clinic

SF DPH

ACLU Press Release

ACLU San Francisco

Kimpton is among the most gay-friendly hotel groups in America, with 40 stylish hotels in the most progressive cities in the U.S.

Kimpton operates 10 hotels in San Francisco.

Kimpton's San Francisco Pride Party Invitation

Kimpton Hotels offers InTouch, a customer loyalty program that offers invitations to parties and events sponsored by the hotel chain. The latest offering is a pre-Pride party at Harry Denton's Starlight Room on the top floor of the Sir Francis Drake Hotel on Powell street near Union Square.

InTouch members and a guest are invited to join Kimpton Hotels as they kick-off San Francisco Pride Week with ther First Annual Pride Party to benefit the Richmond Ermet AIDS Foundation.

Delicious!
Cocktails and complementary Hors d'oeuvres, music and a special cabaret performance.

Delightful!
Tuesday Evening, June 20, 2006
6:00pm - 8:00pm

DeLovely!
Between the Stars and the Cable Cars at Harry Denton's Starlight Room
Atop the Sir Francis Drake Hotel
450 Powell Street, San Francisco

Deluxe!
Meet and mingle with Kimpton's gay and lesbian InTouch members, employees and vendors--as they and The City celebrate Pride Week!

Drink It In!
Specially created $5.00 Pride-a-tinis available all evening long with proceeds benefiting the Richmond Ermet AIDS Foundation.

Silent Auction
Fabulous silent auction with all proceeds going to our charity.

Don't Miss It!
RSVP required to with your name and the name of your guest. If you are not an InTouch member yet, please join here before RSVP

Kimpton Hotels in San Francisco include the Hotel Monaco, Monticello Inn, Hotel Palomar, The Prescott, The Serrano, The Sir Francis Drake, Villa Florence, the Argonaut, Tuscan Inn and the Harbor Court Hotel.

For the full 2,000 years of it's history the Christian Church has sought to brutally repress the free thoughts of people who choose not to accept religious control over their lives. This "control freak" mentality exists in just about every form of organized religion and it is nothing new. The first great colossal struggle against the power of religion occurred during the 18th Dynasty of Ancient Egypt.

Pharaoh Akhenaten exercised his enormous power and authority in a monumental struggle to remove religious control over his government. He went so far as to move the capitol from Thebes to an entirely new city he created. He outlawed the established religion and created his own. More than 3,300 years ago Akhenaten was the first ruler in history to embrace the concept of monotheism.

Unfortunately his victory over organized religion was short-lived. His successor, Smenkhare, restored the traditional Egyptian institution of organized religion. Akhenaten is credited with conceiving monotheism, but Smenkhare created the first Inquisition thousands of years before the Pope's friars did so in Spain.

That experiment in the 18th Dynasty was the first time a people attempted to oust the power of organized religion in the political affairs of a sovereign people. It didn't work then and it hasn't worked since.

Fast forward in time through the birth and growth of the Roman Catholic Church and the Church of England. When the Religious Control phenomenon reached the New World, a Pandora's Box was opened. Out of it slithered the Pilgrims of Salem, Massachusetts, who were fond of burning non-Christians at the stake. Later dozens of individual Protestant denominations sprang up like weeds. In 2006 the Religious Control freaks are still attacking us with righteous fervor and we are still fighting the same witch-burning mentality that has remained unchanged since the reign of Smenkhare.

Enter George W. Bush, America's Colonial Pilgrim Clone. For the first time in American history the President of the United States is advocating and promoting an amendment to the Constitution of our nation that will enshrine discrimination. He wants to deny queer Americans the right to marriage and he wants to carve discrimination into a document which was created to defend liberty: The Constitution of the United States.

To sane and sensible gay San Franciscans this is an Act of War. It is incumbent upon all of us to take up arms ... not arms of destruction, but electoral arms that will empower us to win at the ballot box.

Finding a unified voice in the San Francisco queer community is not difficult. I think the general consensus of the queer community is most accurately found in the political endorsements provided by Equality California.

Equality California's Political Action Committee endorses those candidates who most clearly voice their support for marriage equality, which is arguably the pivotal issue driving the Queer civil rights movement today.

During the Spring and Summer months in San Francisco the days are often sunny, but by the afternoon or early evening the fog rolls in over the City and chills things down considerably. Here are a few suggestions for some Internet browsing on those chilly and foggy afternoons and evenings. Enjoy!

The San Francisco Historical Photograph Collection consists of approximately 250,000 photographs. It is an amazing collection of photographs dating back to the time of the Gold Rush and bringing the viewer up to date through the centuries, decades and years. Visit the collection here.

The Daniel E. Koshland San Francisco History Center contains a research collection of books, newspapers and magazines, photographs, maps, posters, archives and manuscript collections, and ephemera, documenting all aspects of San Francisco life and history. The Center is also the official archives for the City and County of San Francisco. Visit the History Center site here.

The Museum of the City of San Francisco provides a virtual online museum that is full of fascinating stories, accounts and photographs. You will find the virtual museum here.