Crosscurrents

This song sounds Irish – and it is. But the Black Brothers, who perform it, live in the Bay Area. Brother Michael is a lecturer at San Francisco State University, and brother Shay has a weekly Irish show in Berkeley.

This Saturday the Black Brothers will be at the Larkspur Theater, in Larkspur, for St. Patrick’s Day!  Their performance begins at 8pm, following a documentary about Irish Step Dancing. 

Senate Leader Pro Tem Darrel Steinberg says he's happy about the tax initiative compromise reached yesterday by Governor Jerry Brown and the California Federation of Teachers. Steinberg estimated that the new plan would generate about two billion extra dollars for the state through June 2013...

A clinic goes mobile to cover underserved youth; an investigation exposes human trafficking in the Bay Area; an alternate perspective on egg donation; and local singer Even Taylor.

Slavery doesn’t often make the headlines, but the practice is alive and well in the 21st century. According to an investigation in the San Francisco Public Press, there are more people enslaved today than at any other time in history. The U.S. State Department says that estimates of those enslaved through human trafficking ranges from 4 million to 27 million people.

If you missed the premiere of Bravo’s “Shahs of Sunset” on Monday, you’re not alone. I did, as did another colleague who was planning to watch. Perhaps ethnic reality TV has become less of a must-see. Not that most of these shows have been must-sees in the first place, though some have tried harder than others.