- Tonight, something may happen that has not occurred since 1954 and never in San Francisco: The Giants may win the World Series. Last night, Madison Bumgarner, the precociously cool 21-year old with the Dickensian name, threw eight shutout innings, leading the Giants to a 4-0 victory over the Rangers. Game 5 is today at 4:57 p.m. PT, in Arlington. The game will be shown on a big-screen Jumbotron in San Francisco's Civic Center.
- The California Air Resources Board has proposed rules to implement AB 32, the state's landmark law that aims to cut greenhouse gas emissions to 1990 levels by 2020. From the San Jose Mercury News:
Roughly 600 of California's major polluters -- from oil refineries to power plants and factories -- will face mandatory limits on the amount of greenhouse gases they emit, starting on Jan. 1, 2012, under new rules released today by state air regulators.
The facilities will be able to trade pollution credits under a new "cap and trade" market, and will be allowed to use projects that offset global warming, such as tree planting, to cover up to 8 percent of their emissions limits...
If (the Board approves the rules), as expected, California will become the first state in the nation with mandatory limits on emissions from a wide variety of industries that most climate scientists say are contributing to global warming through the burning of fossil fuels like natural gas, coal and oil.
The eleven-member air body is scheduled to vote on the rules Dec. 16. Of course, if Proposition 23 passes in Tuesday's election, all bets are off. Proposition 23 would suspend the global warming reduction law until California's unemployment rate is significantly reduced.
Read Craig Miller's Climate Watch blog post for an analysis of how the cap-and-trade aspect of the new rules would work.
- On Halloween, a 16-year old boy was shot to death in East Oakland, a three-year-old girl was seriously injured in a Potrero Hill shooting in San Francisco, and nine people were shot just after midnight at a Halloween party at Sweet's Ballroom, in downtown Oakland.
- Carolyn Lochhead of the Chronicle reports that RealClear Politics, after switching the Boxer-Fiorina Senate race last week to "leans Democratic," has now moved it back into the tossup category after a new poll from the Public Policy Institute puts Boxer up by only four points. As of Sunday, however, FiveThirtyEight polling guru Nate Silver gave Boxer a 95% chance of winning.
- Google has taken a big bite out of the Apple, in terms of growth, at least. The research group Canalys said that Google's Android shipped 9.1 million units in the third quarter compared to 5.5 million for the iPhone. Still, Apple managed to take the lead in smart-phone market share in the U.S.