The Morning Report
Get the news and information you need to take on the day.
In the latest edition of Blood Work, our series about a biotech entrepreneur’s bid for fame and fortune, we look at why the company is called Biological Dynamics and not BioDyn: “I didn’t want it to sound like Cyberdyne from The Terminator,” an officer of the company said.
How do new companies choose their names? Some sound like constellations or cars (in one case, it turns out, too much like a car), and are sleek, catchy, somewhat science-y, but still cool. One chose the name of a god of the Aegean Sea who fathered 50 sea nymphs.
In Other News:
• The pro-Prop. D campaign brought together a broad and somewhat surprising coalition: Democrats, labor, the Republican mayor and even some business groups. It wasn’t enough by a long shot. Will these newfound friends stick together? City Hall reporter Liam Dillon ponders whether this relationship will last.
• Thanks to a citywide vote, residents of a development in the Carmel Valley neighborhood in the north part of the city may be moving closer to getting parks, a library and a shopping center. As we’ve reported, an unusual restriction stuck the development (and its residents) in limbo regarding construction of so-called amenities.
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• It may not sound like a very big position, but the president of the City Council actually has some important powers. We check the tea leaves (do they come in decaf?) and think we have a good idea who will get the position next.
• The San Diego school district’s parcel tax got clobbered at the ballot box, and the unsuccessful campaign was costly. We hear from proponents about whether they should have bothered in the first place.
• Stephen Whitburn, whose campaign against incumbent County Supervisor Ron Roberts went down in flames on Election Day, says voters don’t comprehend what the county government does.
• Check out our fantastic collection of photos from Election Day.
• Our editorial cartoonist makes a quack — er, crack — about the local election.
• On the arts beat: San Diego’s top baseball historian (profiled in our pages last year) is pushing for a statue of our hometown hero Ted “The Splendid Splinter” Williams at the waterfront near the former site of Lane Field. Williams, who grew up in North Park, played there for a couple years with the minor-league San Diego Padres. For more about Williams, check my KPBS blog post about how authors have explored his roots in our city.
Elsewhere:
• Just about all incumbents got reelected in the county, with some notable exceptions in North County.
One loser was the councilman who was serving in his rotation as mayor in Encinitas. As the NCT reports, he got in hot water “over both a discount kitchen appliance deal he made last year and a $100,000 loan he received in 2007.” Also, Escondido’s longtime mayor seems to have lost her bid to be a councilwoman; the council appears to be poised to have the same three-person majority that fought illegal immigration from 2004-2008.
• Go ahead and crown County Supervisor Bill Horn as the ultimate political survivor: voters returned him to office in spite of (or maybe because of) an avalanche of bad press that robbed him of a newspaper endorsement or two. (NCT)
• Our media partner NBC 7/39 features the top-10 winners and losers in the California elections. Number one loser: political consultants, who didn’t succeed in helping Meg Whitman win the governorship. Number one winner: “old farts,” who elected their own, stopped the legalization of marijuana, and, according to a television competitor, fight crime.
• As my colleague Grant Barrett told you yesterday, the Internet is abuzz over an embarrassing (and amusing) clip of what one blog calls the “The Worst Start To A Newscast Ever” from San Diego’s very own KGTV/Channel 10. The clip is actually from 2007, not last September as people keep saying.
• Rufus Hannah, who starred in the Bumfight videos — in which he executed horrific, drunken violence — is a different man now, and author of the book A Bum Deal (La Jolla Light), which chronicles his road back. The U-T has an interview, too.
Please contact Randy Dotinga directly at randydotinga@gmail.com and follow him on Twitter: twitter.com/rdotinga.