Last week Michael Phelps taught me about championship perseverance, Rudy Giuliani schooled me down on never letting terrorists win, Colin Powell explained how American might can defeat all, and Steve Forbes showed me that despite what all the losers say, “there is nothing wrong with the fundamentals of our economy.”

Billed as the “Super Bowl of Success,” the day-long seminar held at the HP Pavilion in San Jose was named simply “Get Motivated,” and drew more than 10,000 people. Sitting in the penthouse suite my friends and I snuck into, I couldn’t help but feel that in spite of the pyrotechnics, the famous people, and the massive energy, which (I assume) can only be matched by a mega-church revival, this was a funeral for an old American way of thinking. It was a celebration of the rock-solid institutions of an American identity that once was—unbridled capitalism, Jesus, and winning—in the face of a new, changing, and confusing America. Phelps, Giuliani, Powell, Forbes and the rest of us came together for once last hoorah.

On Friday, March 20, I participated in a fun event called San Jose Bike Party. The “bike party” is organized by people who promote bicycling in San Jose. They pass out flyers at bike shops and use the internet to get the message out. There have been 18 “Bike Parties” so far and the 19th is coming up on April 17 at 8:45pm at the old Zorba the Greek Restaurant parking lot located at South Bascom Avenue and Stokes Avenue in District 6. The bike parties are themed events, around themes like mustaches, mardi gras, robots etc… The event has some of the flair of the Burning Man scene, plus some rockabilly style, but it also includes just regular bicycle enthusiasts.

It’s San Jose Inside’s open forum. All opinions on any topic of local interest are welcome.

The Mercury News devoted the majority of its front page today to an in-depth look at the hormonal changes that occur in adolescents. Under the large, all caps headline “PUBERTY,” Silicon Valley’s only daily newspaper, winner of several Pulitzer prizes under its previous ownership, breathlessly revealed that humans between the ages of 10 and 16 begin paying attention to members of the opposite sex — and leave clothes on the floors of their rooms.

The legendary Herb Caen invented what was once called three-dot, or dot-dot-dot, journalism; that is, using the ellipsis to separate sections of his commentary. In my case, I’ll call it splat-splat-splat journalism, which suits this week’s musings—in honor of some local heroes.

Should San Jose City service levels be cut, and fees for services raised, so that city employees can enjoy more pay?

The Mercury News recently reported that automatic “step increases” will cost the city $10 million in FY 09-10 (almost $8 million to be paid from the city’s general fund). “It’s going to come from layoffs or reducing services…” Councilman Oliverio said…“Or, we can recognize the severity of the situation, bargaining units come together…and come up with a way to save jobs and save the city money.” (Mercury News 3/22).

President Barack and First Lady Michelle Obama have had an enormous amount of face time on television since the Inaugural on Jan. 20.  Just in the last few days we have seen the president ESPN, Jay Leno, and 60 Minutes and Michelle in the White House garden.

Let me softly suggest that the First Couple use their popularity to squelch the insidious and growing problem with schoolyard bullying

Apparently San Jose State University is quite the party school. Except it’s not the students who are having all the fun. On March 5, around noon, police were called to room 229 of Clark Hall, where Food Culture was being taught. According to Detective Mike Santos, the officers on the scene found the instructor Eileen Trans, whom they say was a tad bit intoxicated. “She walked in and she had fallen and hit her head on the whiteboard and then she just started acting really weird,” said Dan Lu, a student in the class. Though she was not arrested or cited, the officers had someone come pick her up, and told the class it was canceled for the day. The following week a new teacher was filling in for Trans.

When Mayor Chuck Reed and his City Council allies created the Public Intoxication Task Force back in October, they put its members on a tight leash. The Task Force, created in response to community members outraged over the large number of Latinos arrested for being drunk in public, predictably demanded full access to arrest reports, as well as a greater scope and extended timeline so they could get down to the bottom of this issue. Members of the group soon began to feel stonewalled by city leaders—and let them know it.

Last Friday night I went to something that seems almost counterintuitive these days given the decline of their industry—a celebration for journalists. The Northern California Ethnic Media Awards, held in San Francisco, honored the various faces and forms of ethnic media outlets—the Sing Toa Daily’s investigation on SRO’s, Allianza’s photo essay on Oaxacan migrants, the Nichi Bei Times full issue on the concept of “mixed race.”

Last week I responded to many of your questions with a term, “Meet-and-Confer.” This terminology is used in reference to discussions that city management has with unions about almost anything.

Once a labor contract is agreed upon, any thought of a change requires a meet-and-confer meeting. It could be a compensation freeze, sick time, vacation time, grievance, health care, retirement, education reimbursement, uniform allowance, time off with pay to conduct union activities, examining the possibility of using a non- union person to provide a city service, or even discussions about future employees who have not been hired yet, etc… So with the current budget deficit, if we want to have a discussion about city staff taking one day off without pay ($2.88M) to avoid layoffs, then there needs to be a closed-door meeting.

San Jose news, San Jose politics, City Hall, “the 18th Floor,” Santa Clara County, SIlicon Valley, newsmakers, issues, thoughts, opinions; here at San Jose Inside, the keywords are: rants and raves.

The San Jose Earthquakes kick off the 2009 campaign this Saturday against the four–time MLS Cup finalists, the New England Revolution. In building this year’s squad, coach Frank Yallop added several new pieces to the puzzle, the most notable of which is U.S. National Team midfielder Bobby Convey.

The night she was arrested, Maria Castillo fit the description. A petite, 49-year-old grandmother and home healthcare worker, Castillo is Latina in San Jose – and that ethnicity, in that city, makes her the most likely person statistically to be charged with resisting arrest.

When the Hearst Corp threatened, on Feb. 24, to shutter the San Francisco Chronicle, the San Jose Mercury News reported the announcement with hook-line-and-sinker-swallowing gullibility in a story headlined: “S.F. Chronicle may cease operations.” Now, it seems, the Merc‘s owner is prepared to come to the rescue.

Last week saw the Silicon Valley return of ETech, the O’Reilly Emerging Technology Conference, where programmers and philosophers pool resources with fringe technologists, CEOs, hackers, artists, marketers, urban planners, statisticians, garage software engineers and geeks from every part of the spectrum—all with the future in mind. It took place at the Fairmont Hotel in San Jose, and here are just a few of the things this tech nomad experienced during his traversal of the landscape.