It hit me today that the O.C. Democrats just love backing white attorneys instead of minority candidates. They have backed Umberg over Claudia Alvarez and Lou Correa. They backed some random white guy over Loretta Sanchez when she first won a primary – and went on to take out B-1 Bob. They did not back Lou Correa when he first took on Jim Morrissey – and he barely lost that race. And then it struck me. We have seen this before…with Gray Davis.
That’s right – the Democrats statewide have pulled this same stunt before. The Statewide Dems stubbornly hung on to Davis way past his expiration date. And he was just as much a union sycophant as Umberg. Boy did the Dems love him. But when Schwarzenegger ran against Davis in the recall election, guess what happened? Arnold outpaced Davis – in Santa Ana! Hmmm… Could it be that Latinos rejected Davis because they just could not stomach the guy? Will they do so to Umberg this time?
Somebody picked up on this David/Umberg synergy. Check out the picture below, of an I.E. hit on Umberg, courtesy of Red County/OC Blog. Too funny.
Why is the Democrat Party able to back one white guy after another and still they get to brag about being the party of diversity? Look at them now. Kerry just dropped out of the presidential elections – to clear the path for Hillary. So much for Obama. And white lawyer John Edwards is still lurking…
The O.C. Dems did not even try to find a minority candidate for the 1st Supervisorial District. The Reeps at least came up with a multitude of minority candidates. Poor Benny Diaz isn’t even getting the time of day from his fellow Dems. They are too busy fawning over the white guy Umberg.
The unspoken truth is that the O.C. Dems still have a lot of old racists in their midst. Look at what happened in Westminster, where the teacher’s union turned on the first Vietnamese Superintendent in their school district’s history. And she was a Democrat.
So the Dems in the 1st District are stuck with Umberg. But perhaps he will end up with the same fate as Davis. I wonder if the Dems will learn from this mistake? Somehow I doubt it.
UPDATE:
According to Red County/OC Blog, only 10% of the votes cast so far in the race to replace Correa have come from Latino voters. Sure sounds like Umberg and Bustamante are utterly failing to attract Latino support. Called it! Even worse for Umberg, only 33% of the votes have come from Democrat voters. And even worse for Bustamante, only 31% of the votes are from Santa Ana voters. Janet Nguyen may win this race after all…
Art,
What I have noticed as of late is not that the Democratic party does not choose Latino candidates but rather they take the Latino Votes for granted. Many democratic leaders believe Latinos are a sure vote for their democratic candidates without taking into consideration the needs of the lation electorate. As statistics shows us, more and more citizens are switching parties. Decline to State voters are becoming more and more popular. Latinos are following the same path.
It would be wise, for any candidate, Republican or Democrat to begin targeting the Latino Voters to swing them over to their party. Unfortunately, the Republican Party is failing badly due many of their policies.
Luis,
I totally agree. I have written extensively about the fact that Carlos Bustmante is no friend to Latino voters. The fact that he is Latino is of no import given his awful record on the Santa Ana City Council.
The sad truth is that for most Latinos DTS may be the only way to go…
date count
1/16/2007 0
1/19/2007 161
1/22/2007 6,930
1/23/2007 4,155
1/24/2007 2,003
1/25/2007 2,443
Total: 15,692
Official information from the ROV web site. All the other percentages of who, where and what party are guesses
Weight the numbers and the messenger, 50% gop
The numbers aren’t guesses.
If you buy the data (as all political data vendors do), you know exactly *who* has turned in their absentee ballot.
From there, party breakdown and ethnicity are relatively easy to determine.
Big brother is watching.
Art,
The Democratic Party of OC DID support Lou when he first ran for the 69th in 1994. ’94 was a bad year for Democrats and I think that without the Gingrinch revolution, Lou would have won. It was 1996 that Loretta Sanchez breached the castle walls and Lou was with her. With more shoe leather, phones and money, we might have elected and African American woman in the 68th over Pringle. She has since moved to Florida and sits on the state legislature there.
As for diversity, the OCDP continues to become more diverse. Something that did not happen on the OCGOP. I also believe the OCDP on the whole has done a better job recruiting non white males and women for the Central Committee, and over the long haul, for various offices.
As for Dr. Kim Oanh Nguyen Lam the party has always supported her. The vote divided between two Latinos (Dem & Rep) and 3 white people (1 Dem 1 Rep & 1 DTS). Also, Since when must teachers union members be Democrats. If that were the case Art, you would have been denied membership.