We all know that the Oakland Police Department is under attack. There are defunders, like Carroll Fife and Nikki Fortunato Bas, who seem to dominate the City Council. There are abolishers, who want to do away with OPD completely. There are extremists like Cat Brooks and her Anti Police-Terror Project that seeksto eradicate police terror […]

Review: Steven Kent 2018 The Lineage Cabernet Sauvignon (Livermore Valley): $125. Right off the bat, this 100% Cabernet tastes important. Flashy. Balanced, elegant. Pinpoint Cabernet character. Very rich, tannic and full-bodied, almost a food group in itself. Masses of blackberries and currants, new French oak, and an inviting olivaceous character....

The always-insightful James Carville gave a talk the other day, covering a variety of topics. Here are his main points, with my take on each. Why Democrats aren't as good as Republicans at messaging Republicans always revert to the ferality of human beings: their primal fears, the reptilian instincts for killing and survival that still […]...

Anand Subramanium is the managing director of a social justice organization, Policy Link. He was co-facilitator of Oaklands Reimagining Public Safety Task Force, the City Councils infamous study group that has been associated with slashing the Oakland Police Departments budget by up to 50%. Subramanium and Policy Link have come out with a webinar t...

I invite readers to visit the website of the group I co-founded, the Coalition for a Better Oakland, where I also post a daily blog. CBO is taking up more and more of my time. I consider myself fortunate to have found something so intellectually interesting, and so important. Although our focus is on the […]

Now that our Coalition for a Better Oakland is gaining traction in the media, the people who dont want us to succeed are coming out of the woodwork, spewing their special brand of hate. Its mainly the defund the police crowd. Since they cant attack us (or me) on the merits, they resort to the usual […]

It was 32 years ago, in 1989, that I decided to be a freelance writer specializing in wine. Id just parted company with my employer, California College of Arts & Crafts, where I ran the Career Planning and Placement Center. It was not a pleasant experience. Talk about campus balkanization! I mean the way all […]

I was walking downtown yesterdaya perfect Spring afternoon, 82 degrees with a gentle wind off the Bay. Passed a shop with a sign in the window that said We dont need cops and I had to laugh. I know the owner. Hes a white guy, very conservative, very law-and-order, probably voted for Trump. He doesnt […]

This mornings San Francisco Chronicle has yet another front-page story on the fire danger posed by homeless encampments in Oakland. The number of fires in RVs and tents is soaring, even as the Oakland Fire Department says it is extremely concerned by the fire risks for the unhousedthe surrounding area, and the firefighters. Indeed, with […]

These Republican efforts to crush minority voting are so obvious that I had to ask myself how they dare to do it in the glare of daylight. Usually when rogues do dastardly things, they wait for cover of nightlike cockroaches raiding the kitchen pantry. But these Republicans seem to have no fear or shame. Instead, […]

How much money does anyone need, anyhow? I used to work for a very wealthy family. They spent money like it was water. Their wealth was unfathomable, yet they still resented what few dollars they paid. During the 2016 Republican primary season they were inclined to support Ted Cruzyes, that Ted Cruz, the most disreputable […]

So self-absorbed and out-of-touch is Oaklands Reimagining Public Safety task force that they are able to publish blatant nonsense under the guise of fact and get away with it. Well, no more. They say the reason for Reimagining (which, lets be honest, is merely the new politically correct word for defunding) is because Many residents […]

I have known our Governor, Gavin Newsom, for 30 years, and am proud to call him my friend. For all that time, I have respected, admired and liked himnever more so than when, in the winter of 2004, as Mayor of San Francisco, he startled the world by marrying gay people in City Hall, one […]

The Coalition for a Better Oakland is the name of a political action group I have co-founded with a few colleagues. Our goals are twofold: to end the blight of homeless encampments that are polluting our parks, underpasses and sidewalks, and to support the Oakland Police Department, which is embattled on all sides, fighting a […]

The two pioneering forces of modern sensibility are Jewish moral seriousness and homosexual aestheticism and irony. –Susan Sontag, Notes on Camp, 1966 Sontag wrote these words a long time ago, when her New York City seemed the center of the universe, and other forces such as evangelicism and radical Islam were yet to make their […]

March, 19, 2025 Washington, D.C. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-KY, says he will introduce legislation to revoke the right of same-sex Americans to marry, a move that would echo the recent House of Representatives vote to take that right away from gay people. McConnell made his remarks at a meeting of American Christian […]

I was scrolling through online movies last night, looking for something to watch, when I came across The Normal Heart, director Ryan Murphys 2014 film based on Larry Kramers 1985 Tony award-winning Broadway play. Murphys film, executive-produced by Brad Pitt, had an all-star cast (Mark Ruffalo, Julia Roberts, Jim Parsons, Matt Bomer) and itself won...

I remember meeting Grandma and Grandpa Heimoff for the first time. I must have been three years old and was lying on the little sofa that faced our old Admiral television set in the room we called the foyer of our four-room apartment at 760 Grand Concourse in The Bronx. Of course, I must have […]

Like most of the world, I was so pleased when the jury found Derrick Chauvin guilty of all charges. I cant say I was surprised, though. The prosecution offered one of the most compelling cases weve ever seen. The evidence was overwhelming; Chauvin really had no defense, and his lawyer seemed to sleepwalk through the […]

The formal definition of reparations is the making of amends for a wrong one has done, by paying money to or otherwise helping those who have been wronged. Perhaps the most famous historical example of reparations were those levied upon defeated Germany after World War I. In todays U.S., the issue of reparations has arisen […]

(I wrote this analysis for two reasons: First, the bill is very important in that it would create a new statewide agency, with unprecedented new powers, to oversee all uniformed peace officers in the State, and secondly because several organizations I'm working with asked me to. All interpretations are my own, and I apologize if […]

For a long time, Ive had nothing but praise for the wines of Steven Kent, the Livermore Valley winemaker. A few years ago, I gave two of his Cabernet Sauvignons perfect scores of 100 points, a major rarity for this stingy reviewer. Ive always thought of Steven as a Cabernet Sauvignon specialist, and he is; […]

Well do I remember the morning of Sept. 11, 2001. I had just woken up when the phone rang. It was Marilyn. Are you watching T.V.?, she asked. I turned on the tube and for the next 24 hours was glued to it. And was furious. I was then keeping a daily diary of political […]

Like you, Ive been watching the demonstrations over the past year, following the death of George Floyd. But unlike you, perhaps, I experience a bit of post-traumatic stress syndrome, for I have my own, unpleasant experience. It was ten years ago, in October, 2011. Occupy Oakland was then at its height: a people-powered movement that […]

Lets face it, its over. That was the grim prognosis this morning from the T.V. weatherman. He was talking about the 2020-2021 rainy season in California. Its been dry as a dogs bone, and warm too. We hit 80 a couple times even here in cool, coastal Oakland. How dry is it? The normal rainfall […]

Former president Donald Trump endorsed his former press secretary, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, at his Mar-a-Lago resort last Friday. Sanders has announced that she is running for the Republican nomination for Governor in her home state of Arkansas. Sanders told steveheimoff.com how she managed to get her ex-bosss endorsement. It was simple, really. I s...

I first went to the far Sonoma Coast more than 20 years ago while I was researching my first book for University of California Press, A Wine Journey along the Russian River. The premise of my book was based on Conrads Heart of Darkness (or, if you like, the film Apocalypse Now): a journey along […]

A small group of us had a long meeting yesterday with an Oakland Police Department (OPD) senior cop. This was part of our imminent launch of a new political action group were organizing, the Coalition for a Better Oakland, to address some of the catastrophes in Oakland created by years of government mismanagement, political corruption […]

(This is a statement I wrote which will appear on the website of a new group I have co-founded, the Coalition for a Better Oakland. We'll have the website up in a week or two, and I'll share it here. CBO will focus on two related issues: encampments and policing. My manifesto concerns the first […]

Few politicians in America get me madder than Mitch McConnell. Ive never liked his shifty, chinless face, or his mirthless smirk, or his small, mean mouth, or his dead eyes, or his undertakers gloom. Ive never understood how people like him get elected and then re-elected. Somebody must be putting something into the water down […]

(Steveheimoff.com managed to get this transcript of the call. I cant reveal my sources. This explosive conversation took place last Wednesday.) Present: Donald J. Trump, Gov. Ron DeSantis (Florida), Gov. Brian Kemp (Georgia), Gov. Doug Ducey (Arizona), Stephen Miller Operator: Good morning, Governors. Please stand by for President Trump. (crackling...

Steveheimoff.com has obtained an exclusive interview with Karen, her first ever on a blog. Karen, who requested that I not publish her last name since shes afraid of reprisals from liberals, is a housewife in a small midwestern town. During our chat, her three young children were playing a rambunctious make-believe shooting game, while the […...

Biden is blowing my mind. His leftward turn was unpredictable, but it sure is welcome. Im not sure what I expected. Even though hed been around forever, he didnt stand for much, beyond a vague centrist-liberalism. His reputation as a nice guy was refreshing, but on the other hand, he lacked charisma. I voted for […]

A Texas boyfriend-and-girlfriend couple, Elizabeth Rose Williams and Bradley Stuart Bennett, have been charged with a variety of crimes, after video caught them storming the Capitol as part of the Jan. 6 Insurrection. Williams, according to her website, is a lifestyle coach who asks potential customers, HOW CAN I BE A BLESSING TO YOU? and […]

Its been a month since I got my second shot (Pfizer), and despite reports that lots of people are experiencing weird side effects, Im happy to say everything about me remains normal. Thats not to say there havent been any side effects. I began to notice a strong aversion to shaving, which coincided with an […]

Our seder was small, only the three of us. But sweet and sentimental. We remembered those who are no longer with us, including Gus, who was much beloved by Maxine and Keith. Maxine used to enjoy lying down on the sofa while we watched T.V. after dinner, and she would want Gus to snuggle with […]

People are really fed up with cancel culture. The evidence is everywhere. We were watching Bill Maher the other night. Maher is hardly a conservativehes been a screaming liberal his entire career. But he was royally pissed off about cancel culture, and so were his guests, and I thought, If Bill Maher is this upset, […]

Ive had a complicated relationship with my birth religion, Judaism. I was raised in what I suppose youd call a conservative Jewish home. We certainly werent orthodoxkeeping kosher and all that. My father attended synagogue, but I always thought it was more for the social aspects than the religious ones. For example, he ran the […]

Yesterday, for the first time in a year, I enjoyed a sit-down meal inside a local restaurant. It felt weird and wonderful. Now, today, Marilyn is coming for lunch in my place, also the first time in a year since she (or anyone else, for that matter, other than the workers who remodeled my place) […]

Ive always been fascinated by crazy thinkerspeople who believe in stuff thats plainly fake. Whether its evangelicals with their Rapture nonsense, anti-Clintonites who said Hillary murdered Vince Foster, Sept. 11 conspiratorialists or, nowadays, Republicans who claim the election was rigged, my reaction always has been: Who the fuck are these people...

I wrote yesterday about cancel culture and the way the far left reduces every conversation to a lecture about race or ethnicity. I meant what I said, but I dont want to be misunderstood: my criticism is not merely of the far left. Indeed, the far right practices cancel culture much more frequently and destructively […]

I write this as a warning to the Democratic Party, of which I am a proud member. White people, and not just white men but women too, are increasingly turned off by the cancel culture they see happening in America, which is being fostered by the extreme left. I admit I have no statistical evidence […]

The big news out here is that the Bay Area is emerging from the worst depths of the pandemic. The Governors color tier now has eight of the nine counties in the red tier, with oneSan Mateoentering the orange tier just yesterday. This is great news. Restaurants, bars, gyms, malls, movie theaters, bowling alleys are […]

Its amazing, isnt it, how blatant the Republican attempts are to prevent Black people from voting. They dont even care that their efforts are so obviously ham-handed. If anything, they seem proud of it. I guess these days, when it comes to racism, the philosophy is Let it all hang out. Everybody knows that if […]

My mother would have been 106 years old today. She died in 2005, just past her 90th birthday. Heres a photo I took of her at her birthday party. For the celebration, I created a three-day event. A lot of people flew in from around the country. We went through a boatload of lox, believe […]

Rules without relationships equals rebellion. John Mosley, Coach, mens basketball, East Los Angeles Community College (ELAC). This sports reality television show, Last Chance U: Basketball, airing on Netflix, is quite simply some of the most compelling television Ive ever seen. Now in its sixth year, the show focuses each season on a single commun...

I wasnt ready for how emotional getting my second vaccine shot made me feel. When I told Marilyn about it, over the phone, I wept. I took BART down to the Oakland Coliseum, where Alameda County has been giving the injections. For my first Pfizer shot, last month, I took the shuttle bus from the […]

THE BACKDROP California Governor Gavin Newsom gave his State of the State address last night. In advance, all the pundits called it the speech of his life. With his governorship on the line due to a recall that will likely make the ballot this Fall, they said, Newsom had to convince voters that he deserves […]

I watched the entire two hours of Oprahs sit down with Meghan and Harry, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I was hardly alone: it was the most-watched T.V. program since last years Oscars. Of course, the interviews fallout was immediate, as everyone knew it would be. Harry and Meghan dropped some bombshells, especially the part […]