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Got a nice little convergence of stories here for you today. I agree with Todd that the big story is how Rackauckas is, and will continue to, ignore the story of carpetbagging Fullerton Council candidate Paulette Marshall Chaffee’s bold-faced stealing of campaign signs, for the simple reason that her husband Doug Chaffee may very well be elected Supervisor soon, and have control over Rackauckas’ budget. Such has it always been in the twenty years since Rackauckas took office promising to turn a blind eye to political corruption and malfeasance.
An equally big deal to Fullerton District 5 voters is the weaselly way in which Ms. Chaffee quietly “suspended” her campaign two weeks ago, not mentioning this scandal but bemoaning the “meanness” she’s supposedly been subjected to, while keeping all her signs up (which would cost her $470 to have taken down), keeping her campaign website up, and sending out mailers as recently as last weekend while all the slate mailers come out with her name on them.
At this rate, Fullerton 5th district voters could very well end up electing this woman with her money and name recognition, knowing nothing about both her carpetbagging and sign thievery, and she could end up taking office while paying a modest fine at worst. Hopefully instead of that we’ll be electing a new DA who takes such political criminality seriously. Watch the press conference, at Tony Bushala’s place:
Was it two years ago or four years ago that Racky prosecuted some poor schmo in Irvine for stealing s sign belonging to Larry agran ir one of his claque?
I can argue the “prosecute” or “don’t prosecute” either way; what I can neither defend nor abide is the “prosecute my enemies, don’t prosecute my friends” mentality. I honestly don’t think that Spitzer will do that — and, even if at all, not nearly so much.
I do believe I’ve fallen into a play by Pirandello.
This was very effectively put together and well executed. My compliments to the chefs.
Only one thing doesn’t seem to make sense: Rackauckas is alleged not to want to prosecute Paulette Chaffee because he doesn’t want to risk losing Doug Chaffee’s vote for his chosen successor if he becomes Supervisor. But what if Tim Shaw becomes Supervisor? Isn’t Rackauckas worried about alienating Shaw?
And then I realized how this makes sense: Rackauckas knows that he wouldn’t get Shaw’s vote for his favored successor anyway!
(THERE’S your argument, Ryan.)
No. Rackauckas is careful not to ruffle the feathers of ANY politician who may at some time have ANY power. He does not choose sides. It’s probably not even conscious anymore, just institutional habit in the T-Rack “justice” department. He would not favor either Shaw or Chaffee over the other.
Buena Park catches a sign thief, they make an arrest and issue a statement.
Fullerton? Nope. Nothing to see here. Move along.
We can do better than this, right?
“We can do better than this, right?”
No.
Wildly depressing.
Mayor’s wife can commit an election related crime and no one cares.
Who needs Russian Facebook ads. Just lie, cheat, steal domestically.
“Mayor’s wife can commit an election related crime and no one cares.”
I wouldn’t say that. There seem to be a handful of folks who care very much. But don’t expect criticism from the party hacklings.
Not involved, Greg.
Push that cart all you like. No sale.
I don’t think that you understood what I was saying.
I don’t know how much we should bemoan the supposed ignorance of 5th District voters when it comes to Paulette’s apparent removal of signs. Any one of her opponents in the race could just send out a postcard or a robocall alerting voters to the issue.
At the cost of thousands of dollars.
Well, if there was ever a time for a negative mailer…
Please don’t conflate negative and honest.
I’ve been a resident of OC for many years. I’ve started to receive sponsored facebook ads from the OC District Attorney’s office asking for help on a pending case in the last few weeks. These ads started about the same time ballots were mailed. Great way to use taxpayer funds to promote DATony.
Can someone look into this? Seems like it’s not quite legal. And certainly not ethical.
By the way, I’m not a fan or supporter of Spitzer either.
On the presumption that no one is going to file for a restraining order against Racky over this, the only recourse would seem to be filing an FPPC complaint. I don’t know if you could do so while maintaining your anonymity. You could have an attorney do it for that, but the obvious candidates to do so — me, the Spitzer team — would also put your anonymity in doubt. (I wouldn’t blow your anonymity intentionally, but it would probably be better for both of us not to know and so remove all doubt.)
An FPPC complaint could be coming from anyone else reading this, so one could fairly not jump to the conclusion that if one were now filed it was coming from you. Whoever files one needs to have screenshots of as many of the ads on as many occasions they were offered as possible.
If I were you, I might also leave anonymous comments on the Voice of OC, OC Weekly, and OC Register websites, which might bring someone out of the woodwork to file. We don’t have their level of readership.