May Day in Berkeley 2010 was a disappointment. Yes, there was the requisite amount of Arizona immigration bashing and leaflet handing out and random activist literature tables but this is the Worker's Day. Where were the socialists? Where were the downtrodden? The unions? The huddled masses were drinking mocha lattes.
The most prominent early morning promotion was for the "family friendly" May Day picnic and that was over in Dolores Park in San Francisco. This is not your parent's Berkeley. There is more concern these days about reversing the decades of traffic calming measures (that's blocked off neighborhood streets for those who have not experienced the radical traffic patterns of Berkeley). And lest we forget, we need to be ever watchful of asbestos ceilings and old lead paint.
Perhaps I was just having an olde leftie day and expected more from the former nexus of all things radical. Or maybe I was looking for the other meaning of May Day.
