It is the John Phillips Show at Johnny's on vacation. He'll be back on Monday. It's Randy Wang here and the phone number to join us is eight hundred two two two five two two two. You can email us at Johnny Don't Like show at gmail dot com. You could subscribe to the podcast by searching for the John Phillips Show wherever you get your podcasts, and while you're at it, subscribe for free to my substack so you can see my daily show prep.
I call it the California Report.
All the stories we talk about, all the links to all the YouTube pages are right there. You can watch them in your own time, share them with your friends, your family, your social groups. Randy Wang Radio dot substack dot com. We have a new poll out in the LA mayors race and it's looking like we're seeing an
increase in support for Spencer Pratt. According to the Tavern Research poll from May first to the fourth, they have Undecided in first place at twenty nine percent, Karen Bass in second place with twenty two percent, four points behind her Spencer Pratt, two points behind Spencer Pratt sixteen. Spencer Pratt being at eighteen percent might be why Karen Bass and Nythia Rahman decided to pull out of the debate
that was supposed to happen this week on Fox eleven. Now, Spencer Pratt already wasn't available for that debate, but it sure seems after the debate that aired on NBC four that Karen Bass and Nythia Rahmen have realized the less opportunities for them to be in a debate environment, whether Pratt is there or not, is not going to be a very good look for them because they did not
go very well. Meanwhile, Spencer Pratt did a whole lot of interviews over the weekend, including one with CBS News is Adam Yamaguchi, he's the guy that's been doing all of the hospice fraud stories. He sat down for a thirty minute interview on Spencer Pratt's burned out lot and apparently what was originally posted was a small package for
CBS Mornings that he didn't really care for. He thought they inserted way too many clips of the reality show and he considered it to be a hit piece, and he said, you know what, CBS release the full interview, And to CBS's credit, they released the full interview and I listened to it, But of the interviews that Spencer Pratt did over the weekend, I would argue the better interview was him sitting down with NBC Force Conan Nolan.
And now this is where I subscribe. You know, you get an extra benefit of subscribing to the YouTube channels of all of these news stations because Conan Nolan has a weekly local political news show. It's the longest running one in Los Angeles called news Conference. But it's only an hour and so even if you go eighteen to twenty minutes in an interview, only eight to ten minutes of that is going to make the air.
That's the beauty of YouTube.
They put the whole unedited thing on there ready for you to go because all of it is newsworthy. So without further ado, and by the way, this is one of those videos that you can listen to watch share by checking out my substack Randy Wangradio dot substack dot com. Let's hear what Spencer Pratt had to say over the weekend with NBC four's Conan Nolan.
Good morning, and welcome to the Tom brok On News Center here at Universal City. I'm Conan Nolan. Thanks for joining US with US. Spencer Pratt, candidate for mayor of the Great City of Los Angeles. You know him as a former reality show star but also a media entrepreneur. Mister Pratt, thank you very much for coming.
Do I have that right?
I mean, you're in you've been in media for pretty much your entire life.
Absolutely, but I once.
Oh boy, it's contagious.
Absolutely absolutely, But I once the city let my house burn down. I pivoted quickly into a community advocate, and I've received two Community Advocate awards. So when you vote for Spencer Proud in your ballot today or tonight, it'll say Spencer Brack community Advocate.
Hey, look at that a call to action. You can be voting right now. And that is true. Everyone in the state of California should have their ballots. If you live in the city of Los Angeles, well, then you are able to vote in this election. And apparently I haven't opened mind yet. I'm going to vote probably this week. But if you open your ballot, Spencer Pratt is the first name on there, and it says community advocate.
Community advocate, because that's how I identify now I'm no longer a reality star. And also It's funny I keep being called a reality star. I'm the only candidate living in reality too.
Okay, Right, and I saw that you gave an interview where he said, hey, another community activist was a guy named Barack Obama when he ran for the US Senate.
That is accurate. When Obama ran for Senate, he was a community organizer.
Yeah, people give say you don't have the experience. I said, I have two awards for my community. President Obama actually didn't even have awards when he was a community organizer. He was able to become a senator and then a president for a or so.
I feel like, look, when it comes to the job specifically of a mayor, being a good communicator is a big part of the job, and he's got that one figured out.
Him and I have the same experience.
Okay.
The other part is being trustworthy, and I think he has shown that he is way more trustworthy than Karen Bass and Nithia Rahman combined.
Him and I have the same experience.
Okay, we're going to get into some of the issues. But it's been several days since the debate. I think a fair assessment indicates you did well. What's been the reaction.
Well, according to your incredible NBC poll after the debate, I think I won by eighty seven percent.
I know it was like, I don't know if anyone could watch that thinking that Nithia won, maybe they can come on thinking Karen Bass didn't do too much damage to herself. But the takeaway from everybody, whether you're biased or not, is that you know, even if you didn't you know anything about Spencer Pratt, even if you didn't even know that he was on a show called The Hills twenty years ago, you'd know that he was on
his subject material. The guy had an answer for every single question and they were real answers.
I know it was like eighty two I posted that and then it went up to eighty seven, so I had to do two posts. But it was the most fun I've had, maybe you know, besides my two sons being born. It was that much fun because it finally felt like truth was forced onto power. And after the debate, this high school kid that was in the crowd, he came up and he shook my hand. He couldn't have been older than fourteen years old. He said, thank you, sir so much for being the only one up there
speaking the truth. You can tell when somebody's telling the truth. And I said, thank you God, because that was my only goal is to just be true and authentic. People are tired with politicians lying about what we see every day in LA and what we feel.
Right So before the fires, someone get to that, I know you have a degree in political science from usc That.
Is true, so he does know a little bit about this world.
What was your attitude towards Minisuba government or city government back then before the conflagration that was the Palisades place.
You know, I was a naive tax paying citizen. I always believe that you pay your taxes. The firefighters will show up, LAPD will show up, your.
Water comes out of the scene. I was I have blinders on.
I wanted to just be an entertainment business, provide for my family, make money.
You know, this is maybe one of the most real answers that you can give for a question like this.
This is the.
Average, especially an LA voter. Like first off, the majority of people don't vote, and the ones that do, some of them are fully engaged, but a lot of them aren't. They got their own stuff going on, They got their own lives going on. People that listen to shows like this, you are so much more tuned into what's going on than everybody else. But there are a whole lot of people that just they don't pay attention to any of it. They got their own stuff going on.
And I just didn't get that. I needed to be an advocate. I needed to be questioning everything. And now after you lose everything because of the failures as city leadership, you realize how important local government is.
What happened to Like talking about the mission statement of this show, you.
Realized how important local government is. What happened to America is we all got caught up with phones and national politics and the celebrity politics, when what really affects all of our day to day lives are our ladwp CEO, our chief of police, our chief of fire, our mayor, our city council members. All these things I truly was not paying attention to because I was just like, I'm paying lots of taxes, that everything's figured out.
So I really love that answer because it is it is. It is how we are today. People are so focused on what is going on nash and internationally, and yeah, there's a lot of crazy important stuff going on there. Yes, I'm a little nervous about all the war stuff going on in Iran, but you only have so much attention span, and it is just it is something that we all have to deal with. It is so important to pay attention to what is going on in our local offices.
If you are not paying attention and we have low voter turnout, that's when the special interest groups are the ones that are able to get their people in there, the ones that are supported by the union so they know they're voting, or the DSA block, that's how they get their people in there. But the average person, if they're not engaged and they're not paying attention, that's how
the fringes end up in there. And one thing that we always have tried to advocate here is it's so important to pay attention to what is going on locally. Having a competent mayor makes a big difference. Just look at the turned around in San Francisco in the last couple of years. London breed originally was a disaster. Now she pivoted and she realized about halfway through that she needed to change because San Francisco was getting out of control and.
Less tolerant of all the bulk that has destroyed our city.
But ultimately the voters decided that her pivot towards public safety was too little, too late, and Daniel Lurry got in there. Danie Lurry, by the way, somebody that had no political experience, He just had a lot of money. Well, a new poll has shown that Daniel Lurry is the most popular mayor in America, with a seventy four percent approval rating. He is getting support from Democrats, Republicans, and independents because of his efforts to revitalize downtown, his efforts
on public safety. Are there still a lot of problems, Yes, the Tenderloin is a disaster, so much has a lot of problems, has a lot of problems. But the other neighborhoods, it is crazy how beautiful and clean. Later on in the hour, I'm going to tell you about my trip to San Francisco. I stayed in Union Square and I was so pleasantly surprised of how safe and clean it was. And you know what Daniel Lurie did that that that
is how important these elections are. It can all change, just with the right management and the right ideas and somebody that cares about the most important local issues.
Never before until a lost everage. Well you lost your home.
Very sorry about that. Your parents lost their home. How are they doing? I should ask?
My mom cries all day long now for what is it eighteen months?
It feels like forever.
But she can't take herself out of this because everything she's ever known was gone. She didn't even get like they say, get your go bag. She didn't even get a goat, shed even get her passport. So my dad has more hope than my mom because my dad sees me becoming the mayor and making these changes.
And you know, he grew up in la He was the.
Picture at Inglewood High So he is like some positivity. But my mom, plus her heart, is just struggling.
Right. So, at what point did you say I'm going to run for this office?
Yeah?
What point was enough enough? I can't take this anymore. I'm getting in.
I mean, did people come up to you and say we need somebody You're in?
No?
So I just kept on whistleblowers from the LAFD. We're giving me the information of all the negligence by Mayor Bass and the city's failure. And I was posting this all this information.
You're getting You're getting information from the fire Department.
Yeah.
I mean so much of this was so organic, where most politicians everything they do is fake and doesn't seem authentic.
He has a real reason to be pissed off. His home burned down, his family's home burned down, his neighborhood burned down, And because he does have a social media platform, he was trying to get out the information about what was really going on because we had so much obfuscation from the La City Council, from the DWP, from leadership at the Fire Department, the after action report, all of that, And at that point he really became kind of this emblem of Okay, this is the guy on the scene
people inside the government that are afraid of getting retaliated against. We're giving him the real scoop on what was going on with the Lockman fire that then became the Palisades fire and so many other failures that the city does not want to admit.
You're getting information from the fire department, Yeah, about the level of failure across the board.
And I'm posting this. I go to Congress, I get a congressional investigation set up with Center Scott and I'm thinking, oh my gosh, Mayor Bass is going to jail. She caught, this is criminal negligence. Twelve of my neighbors burned alive.
And so if we could actually arrest politicians for criminal negligence, we'd need to build a whole lot more prisons.
And so I started having more positivity. There'll be hope. And La Times then reported that she hired this literal crisis pr firm with charity money to alter the after action report proving her negligence, like, oh, she's definitely going to jail, obstruction to justice, and nothing was happening. She announces she's rerunning when to me, I truly believe she would have resigned from Africa when she was on the flight from Ghana. I thought she would just send a letter like.
Just cancel a return ticket. I'm going to stay here.
That would have been what I would expect.
So I'm just complaining on social media, as the kids would say, I'm yapping. I'm just saying, how is this acceptable? And I see no one is running against her. So I call Rick Crusoe and I say, I'm going to run after Mayor Bass if you're not doing this, And.
Okay, this is the first I've heard of this. Before Spencer pred announced he was running, he checked with Caruso, who was constantly doing the will they won't they will? I won't they Maybe I'll run, Maybe I'll run for governor. Maybe I'll run for mayor. I don't know. And now Rick Caruso is like a full time social media influencer, but this is interesting against her.
So I call Rick Crusoe and I say, I'm going to run after Mayor Bass if you're not doing this, And he obviously made up his mind he said go after Bass.
So that when I hung up, I said, Okay, no one else is going to do this.
I have to do everything I can to try to fix LA and get it back on track. La should be the most beautiful, best place on planet Earth.
What has happened? So that's why, right, So.
I have to point out the mayor has denied the allegations in the La Times article.
And they stand by their report.
They do.
That's right.
Is Rick Kruso in your camp if you got elected mayor, would he have a role in your administration?
Rick Cruso cares about LA as much as all of these top business leaders that I'm talking to I'm meeting with everybody wants what I want. They want LA changed big time. My two opponents. You heard them for an hour. They just make up. They're talking about beds and blah blah. They don't even say how horror things are.
Things are horrible, well, because they can't then they'd have to own it. But yes, if you live in the city of Los Angeles, which for some unbelievably stupid reason I still do, this city is a disaster. Even when things looked like they were getting a little better when Best first took over, it's all back. You go onto Haskell at Van Owen to get on the four or five freeway, the street is once again covered in RVs.
And that's after they took away a metro parking ride lot that was supposed to be for all the RVs. We still have all the RVs. It's a nightmare.
Things are horrible.
And they try to say I'm the angry guy the LA times like always an angry white guy. No, everyone's angry, all genders, all races.
All.
Let's talk about that for a second, because one gets the impression, and you would know better than I that had started with a fire and then people started saying, wait, it's not just the fire, and there's a there's a grievance much of it. An argument can be made it's justified over over homelessness, over drug addiction, over the fact that the streets still have too many encampments, and that is what has fueled your campaign.
Well, it connects it.
Well, and it connects to the fire in a lot of ways, including that the LAFD is stretched so thin because the majority of the calls they have to go on are about the homeless.
Well, it connects to the fire because I learned firsthand how diabolical these NGOs were because with the.
Fire aids scam and governmental organizations.
Thank you, with the fire aid scam, one hundred million dollars was supposed to go to fire victims in Altadena, Pacific Poliicades.
Nobody got that money.
Yeah, if there was really all of these payouts to the fire victims, which we're not talking about that many people, Spencer Pratt didn't get a check.
It went to these non governmental organizations that have salaries of over a million dollars. They have all these employees making five hundred thousand dollars. This money went to random initiatives. People can again research this all even fired when they defended it with their law firm, they said, several of these organizations gave directly to fire victims.
Let's go along with that, Google several. It's under ten.
There was two hundred and fifty non government organizations that took the soul. When I learned that versand I was, oh, here's what they're doing with the homeless billions of dollars. Yep, there's billions of dollars coming into California, specifically Los Angeles to stop this horrible tragedy of people living on the street. What's happening with that money? It's being increased Mayor Bass I didn't want to interrupt her with because that's trying
to be very respectful. But her number about homelessness being down seventeen percent, let's talk about real quick.
First off, when Mayor Bass ran.
For office, she said she was going to remove fifteen thousand people from the street.
She did say that that has not happened since when she ran. Even the numbers with insight and say if it's like three forty percent of them went back to the streets.
When she opened office. Start office, homelessness has increased. She her made up numbers. She's talking about seventeen percent is year to year. That's not even true. The way they count homeless people or drug acts whatever. They just go around and they go one, two, three. They're not going in the sewers, They're not opening up the tents, they're not going in the camp Some of these encampments.
Are so dangerous.
I talk to LAPD, like when I was telling Cancel Raman, Yeah, go try that volunteer timent and you'll get stabbed in the neck. The LAPD will say they can't go down there because they will get shot at.
They're not counting homeless people.
He's damn right about this.
The RAND Corporation, and I.
Gotta tell you it is very refreshing. And this might be striking while the irons ho it. You have a couple of things going on at the same time. One, the city is a disaster, but you have a lot of attention being paid on this race because of the debate. But also those AI videos that are going around with Spencer Pratt. Those are getting a lot of attention. And if anybody who's a vote who has been paying that much attention to this race just decides. Okay, let me
hear what he has to say. It's really hard to dispute anything that he is saying, so we don't know what's gonna happen. There's still a lot of undecided, but at least right now it looks like at the very least, it's going to be a top two runoff Bass and Pratt, which means it's going to be quite a few more months of all this. It's Randy Wang here. Johnny's back on Monday. The phone number to join us is eight
hundred two two two five two two two. You can email us at Johnny Don't Like show at gmail dot com, search for the John Phillips Show wherever you get your podcasts, and subscribe to the California Report my substack where I post all the videos we talk about at Randywangradio dot substack dot com.
Let's do a couple of emails here.
Linda writes in one thing that we should highlight for Spencer Pratt is he's doing all of this without a campaign manager. He's running circles around the democratic machine single handedly. You know what, I think that's why the campaign is coming off so authentic. He has some friends that are putting together those crazy AI videos where he's Batman, but he does not have a consultant or a campaign manager eating up all of his money or giving him terrible advice.
Will writes in at Johnny don't like show at gmail dot com. Thank the Lord Caruso about out of another mayor run. He is more boring than the small world at Disney with the charisma paint and is fake and spineless as a Republican switching parties to help Bass point out what a fraud he is. If that Claude ran again, Karen Bass could have phoned in her reelection from Ghana. Let's go to the phones, Brian and West Hollywood.
Brian, Hello, Yes, good to speak to you.
I guess you have covered our area pretty well with the politics, and I'm always happy to listen to your viewpoints. I want to mention a point or two. I noticed that Nippia Ramon is campaigning, and she's campaigning at the very end. She decided on the final day on a Saturday, that she's a candidate, and it was very obvious to me that she was waiting to see if Lindsay Horbeth was going to be a candidate as well as Rick Caruso.
And once those two candidates or potential candidates said they're not entering this campaign, then on a last Saturday, she said, Okay, I'll give it a try. So she's basically a default on this campaign, and she's trying to be in what's called a viable candidate, but in mentally thinking, she knew she couldn't win if those two candidates entered the race.
So I'm questioning whether she's really campaigning on their decision or she's really campaigning on her own will and believes she's the right person to be the next mayor.
It's a really bizarre campaign because she even constantly is having a hard time I'm justifying why she's running or what she would do differently. I've listened to so many Nithia Rahman interviews, and every single answer to every question is, well, I would do the same thing as Karen Bess, but I'd be more focused.
Right, that's yes. I conclude that viewpoint. That's yes, And I think it's going to be interesting to see the voter's interpretation, and we'll only know by the numbers that come in, and then we'll say, well, with our thinking relative to what these voters decided upon.
Although, although there are.
Exceptions, once in a while somebody comes along and they are they turn out to be a candidate by surprise and win the election. But I don't think that this particular person is going to overtake the current mayor. I just don't think she's ready for the job right now, and I think she realizes it that she's running a little bit too soon as to the future. Who knows what's what beholds her her, you know, aspirations. She may have some great ideas in mind, but right now I
think she's running a little too soon. But we'll have to wait really to see what the voters think.
Well, I think a big takeaway from that debate that aired on NBC four is that Nithia Rahman was not ready for prime time and according to interviews, she said, if she doesn't win this race, she's leaving political office. So we'll see if that happens. Brian, thank you so much for the call. Appreciate it. Let's go back to Spencer Pratt sitting down with NBC four's Conan Nolan to discuss the mayor's race.
The RAND Corporation says the count. That wasa and Mayor Va says, they say that count is thirty percent low, and I don't even believe RAND can count it proper, right.
So Randy, I know that study.
Yeah, so the corporation of the Rand Corporation they did their own study and they looked at very specific areas like skid Row. Nobody on skid Row will say that Karen Vass has done a damn thing. And look, if you are running on ending homelessness, what she ran on and what Garcetti ran on, and what everyone wants to run on, why wouldn't you tackle the problem where it's most visible, where if you made any kind of a difference, you'd see it and immediately.
I know that study, and that was a I think downtown, skid Row, Venice, and Hollywood. They looked at those three specifics and they said yes. But there are plenty of people who say, so let's get back to homeless. How much of it, in your opinion, is it a law enforcement issue that you can actually arrest your way out of this by giving by doing sort of a European model from what I understand, which is you're going to jail or you're going to rehab picket, but you're not staying here LAPD.
And I've been to some major cities in Europe. You do not see this. You see a few people that are on the streets in Dublin, couple in Madrid, usually like beggars on the street. Uh, it was two damned cold in Amsterdam. I don't know if I think I even saw any But what's unique to Los Angeles even compared to San Francisco. I mean outside of the Tenderloin.
But the thing is with la it is everywhere. I flew back to Burbank Airport last night, just driving on Van Owen, going from Burbank to where I live in the valley tent ten tent, tent tent every single intersection, whether in North Hollywood, you're in Valley Glen, you're in Sherman Oaks, you're in Van Eyes. It doesn't matter that tents are everywhere.
LAPD have more arrest during COVID lockdowns than they do right now. We don't enforce any of the laws we need to enforce. Council Moraman is fighting that forty one to eighteen the law way have to remove dangerous encamments from schools, nurseries, parks from the libraries. And her argument is it doesn't work, it just moves. No, it was the law to make kids safer, you move it. Yes, I agree moving en campus doesn't work, but we should
take at least moving them away from the kids. So, yes, it's an law enforcement thing because again the DEA statistic ninety percent plus are drug addicts.
And if you look at what's going on in the streets, how does anyone disagree with that unless you're on the take.
People addicted to drugs do not want these services that mayor baths and inside safe and counselmen Ramen are offering. They want more drugs. When people are high, out of their minds, doing the fenanyl fold at the parks, next to kids blowing fentanyl, shooting up. These people do not want services optional.
We need as a functioning city to.
Take these people, put them into medical treatment, help them get sober, then go get them a bed, then help them get back into society and give them opportunities. Anyone in addiction knows anyone sober wants drugs, they want alcohol, they want so Again, it's an enforcement thing. These animals that are being abuse on the streets.
This is a known thing.
This is another thing that is very specific about his campaign. And later on this week, we're gonna talk with Joey Joey Tuccio, who is the guy who's covering all the animal abuse that's going on skid Row. Spencer Pratz the only one willing to talk about this. Karen Bass completely ignores the problem, says there isn't a problem with animal abuse on skid Row, even though it's being documented every
single day. Nitia Rahman, at the debate between her and Karen Bass for the Sherman Oaks Homeowners Association, was asked why all of a sudden, after six years at city Hall, she finally is putting out a plant about the animals, and she said, I have only been to an animal shelter in LA for the first time five days ago.
Unacceptable that are being abused on the streets. This is a known thing. They don't enforce the laws because this is real.
Stacey Danes from the Animal Services on zoom you can watch this video says we can't enforce the law because the mayor's office has told us it's culturally insensitive to give people without an address citations or tickets.
Sounds like Karen Bass.
Everybody that's in LA should be able to get citations and tickets and be arrested. This is a point council Woman Ramen will say, Oh, Spencer just wants to arrest.
All this homeless people.
If Councilwoman Ramen walks out of Arawan with her smoothie and silver Lake, pulls down her pants and goes number two in front of kids, she is going to jail. Yeah, people are going number two in front of kids on all streets across LA right now and nothing happens to them, and maybe not jail, but they're going into treatment. The courts once they get arrested, will decide if this is a violent criminal that's you know that maybe was just poop.
Well, here's one thing Spencer Pratd does need to learn. The courts are kind of a mess in LA and that's part of the problem. But you know what, he is saying things that you would never expect any candidate in this race to be saying. And I think for certain topics, especially the animals that will resonate.
Let's go to Chris and Westlake Village.
Chris, Hello, Hey, Randy, how's it going.
I got to say that fire aid to me, will be the absolute worst scam perpetuated across this land ever. But you know, you talk about last week, you spoke about the homeless shelter in Los Fielitz. You know, the drug addicts coming in, coming in and out and everything. You know, in the good old days, there's a cop car there and they're rousting, and if not, there's five or ten in the neighborhood and these drug acts don't go in there.
And then you talked about the MacArthur Park. Why did it take the Feds, you know, to come there and bust everybody out? You know, where's the police? And we know that Karen's of failure. You know, I know we have budget problems and everything with getting police, but we have like seventy four hundred We need fourteen thousand, you know, And.
You're totally right about that, Chris. We are so for the city that the size that we are we have about we're getting to a point we have half they've had a police that we should have and we need more manpower.
That is completely true. Thanks so much for the call.
And part of the reason the police budget is so bloated is because we're so understaffed that we have to spend so much money on overtime, which means everyone is stretched so thin. But we also need local elected leaders to have law enforcements back. Let's go to Bobby in San Jose. Bobby, Hello, Hello, this is Bobby.
Hey, Bobby, who is this. It's Randy.
Hey, Randy, how are you doing? Man? Are we on the air?
We are.
Okay. Well, here's my thing about this homeless stuff and all these people living on the streets. We need put a performance statement together. Hilton or the sheriff. Buy some cheap land way outside the cities where nobody is, Provide them with thousands of trailers from the RV manufacturers, build an RV park and case them in. Provide all the services psychiatric care, drug rehabilitation, but nobody gets out of
there until they earn their way out. Think these people cannot be allowed to come and just depicate in people's doorways and scrub and steal and everything else that's going on with this homeless crap. It's ridiculous. Or let these politicians steal the money like they did on the train situation here in California and everything else. It's a simple problem. It can be solved within ninety days if you build these places outside the cities with a cheap land.
I think you're totally right about that, Bobby, thank you so much for the call. If we centralize the problem and centralize the services and the solutions, can do that, but local electives will say it's not equitable.
So I spent.
The weekend a whirlwind trip in San Francisco and I had the best time. This all came about because we're trying to burn off our American Express hotel credit, so by June thirty, first we need to spend three hundred dollars at one of those hotels. San Francisco has a ton of those, and for some of them you could do a one night's day. So we got a five star hotel room at the TAJ Campton Place in Union Square.
It was three hundred and twenty nine dollars, so minus the room credit, it costs three hundred dollars and it came with an early check in, late checkout, food and beverage credit.
It was a great deal.
Flew up there on Southwest Bourbank to SFO, which is like an hour flight, and first, can I just tell you this as somebody that has to deal with Lax on a regular basis. SFO is a really pretty airport and it is really easy to get out of the terminal and into your ride share to get to your destination. You go right out there. It's clearly marked where the lift and ubers pick up. You call it. It picks you up immediately. Eventually you can do that with Waimo as well, but you have to go to the rental
car park. So we get to Union Square and let me just say, the first thing that you notice is the branded trash cans everywhere. The people that are cleaning up Union Square is back and it is in full force. There was a beautiful festival going on for Taiwan Ease people. There was great food, There was so much energy going on around that neighborhood, and it felt clean and it felt safe. The old Union Square of car break ins.
Didn't see any of that. Didn't really see any homeless people at all in Union Square proper.
You see a couple here there. But we had the best time.
So what we like to do when we go to San Francisco is drop the bags of the hotel immediately take away. I'm out of Golden Gate Park with the dogs and go hiking around because that is a gem that is such a gorgeous, incredible space. And so we wandered around for an hour till we ended out on the east side in Coal Valley. And this is where I really had a great idea. We're trying to figure out some brunch places and I don't know San Francisco that well, and I could do my own research, but
there's an influenza that I follow for cooking. Her name is Violet Witchell. She's the woman that does all of those the dense bean salads that are all over Instagram. I messaged her, I said, Hey, my wife and I are going to San Francisco. I know you're gluten free. I know you got dogs. What's a great gluten free brunch place that I could take my dogs to? So she told us about Zazzi in Cole Valley, and we had gluten free eggs benedict, and holy cow, is it fantastic.
They also have really really fancy mimosas. It was a great time. So we hung out there for a while, went back to the hotel. I wandered around Union Square, which was so much fun. I got to go to the Nintendo Store, which was a blast as a lifelong Nintendo fan, had brought some gifts for my family, very excited to go there. And then this next place I did find out on my own because you know, San Francisco is a big international city. I bet they have
some great Spanish bars. So we found a place to get top us and to get Spanish wine and more importantly Spanish vermoot And we found a place called was it l l Lopo?
Oh?
El Lopo was so much fun, such our vibe, and I think with San Francisco and dogs as they mostly kind of let you bring them inside if they're not bothering anybody, and our dogs are really good. So had a couple of great drinks there, like very authentic Spanish vermoots that you cannot get anywhere else. So that was a lot of fun. But then it was time for the main attraction. One of the reasons we love to go for a quick trip to San Francisco is we
are obsessed with Tony's Pizza Napolitana in North Beach. I know it gets really really crowded, but not only is it incredible pizza, but if you're gluten free, they have some of the best gluten free pizza. We're not talking your typical thin crust. They do gluten free Sicilian and
it is so wonderful. Got a great trip from I got a great tip from my boss Larry that, Hey, if you're going to North Beach and you're waiting for an hour plus at Tony's Pizza Napolitana, go grab a drink two doors down at Tony Knicks Cafe and Tony Knicks Cafe, that bar is fantastic.
And you know what's funny.
For as expensive as the city of San Francisco is, I don't think I had a cocktail that was more than sixteen dollars. The ones at Tony Knicks were fifteen dollars.
LA.
In the valley there are places with twenty dollars cocktails. So we had a great time the first night. The second day, we went back to Golden Gate Park, hiked for an hour. Got another tip from Violet Witchell about this breakfast burritop place Heist in knob Hill. Oh my goodness, is it fantastic. We enjoyed the crap out of those and then got ready to pack because this was just
a really quick trip. Found another place, super dog friendly, super chill in near the Pacific Heights cow Hollow neighborhood, Palmhouse. They have great pineapple margaritas enjoyed there By the way, we waymoded everywhere. We love the robot cars. It's such a fun experience. Now you can plug in your music account so you can play your music while you're going around the city. We just have a blast with it. It was such a fun little trip. We painted the town,
We had a blast, We took our dogs everywhere. We just it is really special and I was so pleasantly surprised, you know. On Sunday, I was wandering around Union Square and they had like a little outdoor gallery and a little place where kids could play games and read books and have little activities. And then there's just a guy out there playing the most beautiful guitar you've heard, playing the girl from Epanima. It was it's a vibe down there, and I felt completely safe and had a wonderful time.
And we already planned our next trip when we're going to do one of these quick little weekend trips to San Francisco.
It was a ton of fun.
Thank y'all so much for being a part of this show, I'm going to go get in the car, hit the freeway, and then I'll be back on the air on seven to ninety KABC at five o'clock for the News Blitz with Randy Wang. If you're in the Bay and you want to give it a listen, you can stream it at kabc dot com, or you can search for the KABC News Blitz wherever you get your podcasts. Regardless, I'll be back here tomorrow from noon to three for another edition of The John Phillips Show.