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Joe Mathews

Joe Mathews

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‘Civil War’ envisions bloody breakup of U.S. That’s not how it would really happen

Director Alex Garland's “Civil War” is a series of horrifying set pieces — torture by gas station attendants, summary execution of journalists,...

sunday 2

San Francisco Chronicle

Joe Mathews

How the A’s new home, West Sacramento, transformed into a major league city

The Oakland A’s will play their home games from 2025 through at least 2027 at Sutter Health Park in West Sacramento. The Oakland A’s are...

14.04.2024 7

San Francisco Chronicle

Joe Mathews

Think your vote doesn’t matter? A new tool from Stanford might help convince you otherwise

Campaign donations from special interests determine which measures get on the ballot and they have grown increasingly long and complex, defying...

07.04.2024 7

San Francisco Chronicle

Joe Mathews

Which is the best state in America? Not so fast, California

Former Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia is part of the collection of Supreme Court Bobbleheads at the Yale Law School. Scalia once said California...

29.03.2024 3

San Francisco Chronicle

Joe Mathews

American judges are mostly clueless about politics and elections. How that needs to change

The Brazilian Electoral Court upheld 2022 election results after President Jair Bolsonaro made unfounded allegations of fraud and sought to overturn...

24.03.2024 30

San Francisco Chronicle

Joe Mathews

How Indonesia’s bullet train is a lot like California’s and that’s disappointing

A full-scale mock-up of a high-speed train at the Capitol in Sacramento. Cost overruns and delays have hindered the project.  The good news:...

19.03.2024 50

San Francisco Chronicle

Joe Mathews

Please stop trying to ‘save democracy’

People use “democracy” to refer to our post-World War II liberal order, supposedly superior to all other systems, even though that order often...

10.03.2024 10

San Francisco Chronicle

Joe Mathews

Reading between the lines of Newsom’s ‘deferred’ budget: Screw the kids

Gov. Gavin Newsom’s proposed 2024 state budget resembles Shohei Ohtani’s $700 million deferred contract with the L.A. Dodgers. Shohei Ohtani is...

18.02.2024 8

San Francisco Chronicle

Joe Mathews

Here’s why nobody can accurately predict the weather in California

Waves crash into the windows of the Marine Room restaurant on Jan. 23 in the La Jolla area of San Diego. Forecasters need to expand their knowledge of...

11.02.2024 7

San Francisco Chronicle

Joe Mathews

Inaccurate ‘primary’ label suppresses spring voter turnout

Spring elections in California — like the one scheduled for March 5 — are called primaries but they really aren’t that at all. My fellow...

04.02.2024 2

San Francisco Chronicle

Joe Mathews

Why California’s Death Valley is a portal to our planetary future

A warning greets visitors to Death Valley National Park in July. Climate change is making the world a place of extremes. Death Valley is already...

28.01.2024 10

San Francisco Chronicle

Joe Mathews

Steve Garvey’s dodgy campaign for Senate could land him on the November ballot

Senate candidate Steve Garvey tours the Skid Row area of Los Angeles on Jan. 11. The former Dodgers star is the only Republican with a recognizable...

21.01.2024 3

San Francisco Chronicle

Joe Mathews

Come to California, if you want to live longer than most Americans

From left to right, Carson, Rippin Rosie and Charlie Surfs Up share a board during the World Dog Surfing Championships on Aug. 5, 2023, off Pacifica....

12.01.2024 3

San Francisco Chronicle

Joe Mathews

Tell us you'll be back, Arnold, this time to run for president

Arnold Schwarzenegger in “FUBAR.” Dear Arnold, In the new Netflix action series, “FUBAR,” you’re terrific as a retiring CIA agent pulled...

07.01.2024 7

San Francisco Chronicle

Joe Mathews

Run, Arnold, run: Schwarzenegger for president?

Dear Arnold, In Netflix’s new action series, “FUBAR,” you’re compelling as a retiring CIA agent pulled back into intelligence madness because...

06.01.2024 4

USA TODAY

Joe Mathews

More than half of humanity lives in countries with elections in 2024. Can democracy survive it all?

Workers prepare ballot papers at the general elections logistics warehouse on Dec. 22 in Surabaya, Indonesia. Indonesia’s General Election...

31.12.2023 10

San Francisco Chronicle

Joe Mathews

Why California is fully justified in keeping Trump off the 2024 ballot

Former President Donald Trump speaks at the California Republican Party convention on Sept. 29 in Anaheim. There are legal efforts in 28 states to...

18.12.2023 5

San Francisco Chronicle

Joe Mathews

Why some Californians get to vote for a new nation in January

Surrey, British Columbia, Sikh community leader and Khalistan referendum organizer Hardeep Singh Nijjar was gunned down in his vehicle in June....

10.12.2023 6

San Francisco Chronicle

Joe Mathews

Come home, Kamala, and become California’s governor

U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris speaks during the APEC Business Advisory Council meeting in San Francisco on Nov. 16. She could be a formidable...

03.12.2023 10

San Francisco Chronicle

Joe Mathews

Why not let students run California’s school boards?

Largo High School English teacher Jennifer Wilson protests book banning at a Pinellas County School Board meeting on Feb. 14 in Largo, Fla. ...

12.11.2023 6

San Francisco Chronicle

Joe Mathews

How government by lottery could save our democracy

Not far from the Acropolis in Athens on a hill called the Pnyx, 92 people from 15 countries gathered to brainstorm about a new form of government, a...

29.10.2023 6

San Francisco Chronicle

Joe Mathews

What the divided cities of Belfast and L.A. can teach the world

Tourists walk past the Peace Wall in west Belfast in January. The 1998 Good Friday Agreement halted much of the violence of Northern Ireland’s...

15.10.2023 6

San Francisco Chronicle

Joe Mathews

Dianne Feinstein was California’s ambassador to the U.S. government

Senate Judiciary Chairman Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., greets Sen. Dianne Feinstein before a hearing in 2020.  The death of Dianne Feinstein isn’t just...

04.10.2023 5

San Francisco Chronicle

Joe Mathews

California has the worst owner in baseball. But is it Anaheim’s Moreno or Oakland’s Fisher?

Oakland Athletics owner John Fisher raised ticket prices, let the Coliseum fall apart and got rid of all players who would give the team any real...

01.10.2023 5

San Francisco Chronicle

Joe Mathews

Enough with the censuring, California

24.09.2023 6

San Francisco Chronicle

Joe Mathews

Mathews: California needs to censure the whole idea of censure

Let’s censure the whole idea of censure. Because it’s consuming the precious time and money of California’s local governments. Censure is the...

23.09.2023 5

The Mercury News

Joe Mathews

How virtual reality can help us feel and understand forgotten horrors

This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate A virtual reality version of the Auschwitz Nazi death camp in Poland helped prosecute...

17.09.2023 6

San Francisco Chronicle

Joe Mathews

Mathews: VR took me to the world’s past — and to its future

I was more than a little startled when Konrad Adenauer approached me in the Old Market. Sure, I was visiting Cologne, Germany, Adenauer’s hometown....

16.09.2023 5

The Mercury News

Joe Mathews

Want to see the future of California's people? Leave the state

William Smith moved to Bend, Ore., in 1998 for an improved quality of life. The city’s population has more than doubled to 100,000 since 2000....

10.09.2023 5

San Francisco Chronicle

Joe Mathews

Mathews: If you want to see the future of California, look to Oregon

In this era of exodus, if you want to see the future of California, you have to leave the state. I got an unexpected glimpse of that future recently...

09.09.2023 20

The Mercury News

Joe Mathews

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