I want to tell the public something about the Coalition for a Better Oakland. We seem to have experienced a schism, similar to that which bifurcated the Catholic Church during the Protestant Reformation. This schism is reflected in the existence of two different social media presences: the Coalition now has a Facebook page as well as this blog, which I alone write.
I have dissociated myself from the Facebook Coalition. It has gone over to the extreme right wing, or MAGA cult: the worship of Donald Trump is (to me) appalling, as is the hateful denigration of the Democratic Party and its leaders, from Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama to Gavin Newsom. The people who manage the Facebook page also have allowed it to become a megaphone for the unstable rabble-rouser Seneca Scott, who is identified on the page as a “top contributor.” He’s running for Mayor, although he doesn’t have a chance. For the Facebook Coalition managers to allow the demagogue, Scott, to spew his vitriolic nonsense is an embarrassment and, frankly, an admission of their failure.
From the very first moment when we created the Coalition for a Better Oakland (2020) and I was elected President by the Board, I made it clear I would not tolerate the group becoming a captive of the right wing. As President I had a certain influence; as an individual I can be vocal and persuasive. It was clear to me, even back then, that the existence of a pro-police, anti-crime citizens’ group in Oakland could potentially be perceived by disturbed individuals as a cozy place to infiltrate and turn into a Tea Party or militia-style platform. Indeed, in the very beginning I had to ban a few people from joining after learning that they were members of militant neo-fascist groups intent on fomenting an insurrection against our government—exactly what happened on Jan. 6, 2021, when thousands of crazed MAGAs attacked the Capitol and tried to overturn the election.
For some years I was able to fend off these people. But then things happened that were beyond my control. For starters, Todd Soderberg, whom I had asked to be our treasurer, neglected to pay our taxes, a fact unknown to the rest of us. This resulted in us losing our coveted nonprofit status. I remain pissed at Todd for this egregious oversight. When our legal status disappeared, so did all semblance of being a unified group. The Facebook page quickly devolved into a rightwing echo chamber of insults to Democrats, celebration of Trump, and benign neglect of his crimes and scandals—precisely what I had fought so hard to prevent.
To be sure, I agree with the Facebook page on the fundamentals: support for the police, intolerance of crime, and an end to homeless encampments in Oakland. Those were always the pillars upon which the Coalition was founded, and you’ll find no daylight between me and the Facebook folks on that. But, as most of you know, I’ve always been an ardent foe of the far-right poison that infects the modern Republican Party. In my opinion it constitutes a clear threat to our American liberties and freedoms, especially for LGBTQ people, women’s rights, the safety and security of people of color, particularly immigrants, and non-Christians, not to mention the health of the American people under the worm-brained RFK Jr. There can be no place in American society for haters and irrationalists, but that, sadly, is what the Facebook Coalition has become: a MAGA bastion of creepiness.
I’m not asking the Facebook people to become Democrats. They’re entitled to be Republicans, if that’s what they like. But I am asking them to be fair. They bash Newsom and Democrats as being the scum of the earth, while giving Trump and his white nationalist Christian insurrectionists a pass. I’ve regularly criticized Democrats on my blog when they deserve it for their stupid wokeness. Where are similar voices of reason on the right? There are so many reasons to oppose Donald Trump, but you’ll never hear any of them on the Coalition Facebook page.
And so, here we are. The Coalition for a Better Oakland is no more. As Trump and MAGA sink lower and lower in the estimation of the American people, I hope my friends at the Facebook page realize the error of their ways, and revert back to true nonpartisanship, which is the only way out of our current morass.
Steve Heimoff