When you give something for free to a living creature, the creature can come to expect more of the same. This is why park rangers urge people in, say, the Tahoe area or Yosemite not to feed bears. If the animals become dependent on humans to give them food, they may lose the ability to hunt, and make human-bear interactions worse than ever.

There are many angles from which to tell this story, which is as multi-faceted as any Constitutional, cultural, and financial issue in America can be. What my interpretation lacks in depth, it perhaps makes up for in simplicity and accuracy.

Carroll Fife is a progressive politician who has promised to create “permanently affordable housing” in Oakland.

Well, not into a bar, but their lives intersect on Broadway in Oakland on a sunny, mid-Autumn day. On my way walking home from Kaiser on Tuesday, I stopped by Sprouts for a bite to eat. It was a nice day, on the cool side but sunny. I figured I’d get one of their $5.99 sandwiches, which are really the best deal in town. Normally, I would also have got a cappuccino or cold brew to wash it down with, but the Starbucks next door recently closed, a big loss for the area, but not unexpected due to the crime and filth that plague most of our commercial corridors.

One of the most perplexing political questions of our time is “Why do people vote against their own interests?”