It’s been this week’s triumphalist Democrat talking point – trumpeted all over TV and even in a press release slapped up on Dan’s blog (because that’s what Dan does, thoughtlessly slap up press releases) – Kamala Harris raised TWICE AS MUCH MONEY as Donald Trump in the month of July.
Sounds great & promising. But, am I missing something? Isn’t it really A LOT BETTER THAN THAT? As it’s pretty impossible to forget, there WAS no Harris campaign until July 21 when Biden finally handed the keys over to her. So she hasn’t been fundraising until the FINAL TEN DAYS of July, right?
And that means, Kamala Harris raised 5 or 6 times more than the Ochre Abomination, since she’s been the candidate. Why undersell that? I don’t get it. Or why people from MSNBC all the way down to Dan C are such mindless parrots.
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But that’s not enough for an open thread (in which you-all can discuss anything you like.) I went to the Democrats of North OC meeting Thursday night, which I was able to do because my Anaheim Democratic Club finally changed our meeting night so we wouldn’t conflict with them. (I had offered to do rock, paper, scissors with their President to see who’d have to change to SECOND Thursdays, but then I realized – THOSE GUYS HAVE BEEN MEETING AT THE SIZZLER SINCE THE 70’s – they’re even mentioned in Agents’ Orange as, along with Laguna Beach, the two OG OC Dem Clubs.)
But anyway the speaker was Lee Fink, superstar OC Democrat litigator (and hopefully Tustin Councilman soon), and he spent a lot of time talking about the Airshow Giveaway in HB. I had been planning to write about that – Greg wanted me to – my title was “Airshow Follies: The Birth of an HB Kleptocracy” – but I wasn’t sure I had too much new to add. I was going to compare the HB MAGA Council’s $20MM+ subsidy to a campaign contributor to the way Anaheim coddles Disney, but in one way it’s actually worse – Disney really is an essential employer and contributor to Anaheim’s economy, whereas HB has been unable to show any benefit the Airshow brings to Surf City beyond a brief transitory revenue bump each year.
The other way this-all reminded me of Anaheim was the way that HB’s MAGA 4 ran in ’22 with a main message being “Only WE can save the Airshow, and keep it in HB.” On a stage literally provided by the Airshow’s CEO. This was EXACTLY the way Lucille Kring and Harry Sidhu ran for Mayor in ’14 and ’18 – “Only *I* can keep the Angels in Anaheim.” While plotting to hand over the store to them.
When HB voters elected Gates and his “Fab Four” Majority, they KNEW they were electing MAGA fascists who planned to make voting harder, they knew they were electing hateful book-burners and pride-flag banners, they even knew they were electing quixotic “cost is no concern” litigators, which is all bad enough. But did they know they were electing Anaheim-style kleptocrats who planned to give away $20MM+ to a campaign supporter, and then lie about it? I guess even that wouldn’t have mattered to a majority of HB voters, sad to say.
Anaheim’s Council Races Shape Up
The above looks like what Anaheim’ll be looking at this fall, unless someone pops up all of a sudden this coming week. The cabal has (or had – read on) their three anointed candidates. And us good-government reformists don’t have any of our (expected) standard-bearers. But each district is looking interesting in its own way…
DISTRICT 1 (West Anaheim) The anointed one is rightwing Republican Ryan Balius, endorsed by incumbent Jose Diaz, and the guy we have to thank for Diaz barely beating Denise Barnes in 2020. Klepto-Scribe Cunningham wrote in expected fulsome praise of Ryan here.
So far the only person running against him is a Muslim activist we don’t know, an Ojaala Ahmad, whom Cunningham quickly made into an anti-Israel monster based on deep research into her Facebook posts. (Uncharacteristically, Matt got comments on this story of his: “Speechless – be curious to see who is supporting her.” “I was thinking the SAME thing.”) Matt is right though that NOBODY knows what this former CAIR worker’s positions are on Anaheim issues, or indeed on any issues beyond the Middle East. I should probably invite her and Ryan to our next Club meeting, but there are already so many candidates scheduled…
District 4 (south-central Anaheim including Disneyland & the Resort) is the only place where an incumbent is running, and that incumbent is Norma Kurtz, who was appointed to take Avelino’s place, and came from Daly/Avelino’s office as well as the SOAR (Disney) Board of Directors. We watched her, talked with her, met with her, tried to give her a chance. She seems very nice and always listens. But her votes are exactly as what you’d expect from a SOAR board member, and the same as all her colleagues as well. Like them, she won’t support rent control or an affordable housing ordinance, campaign finance reform or a gate tax; and like them, she gave Disney everything they wanted with Disneyland Forward, ignoring all residents’ concerns.
This Disneyland Forward vote upset local Navy veteran Francisco Rosas so much that he had to run against Norma. Both of them are registered Democrats, and both are members of our Anaheim Democrats Club. But Francisco is running on rent control, an affordable housing ordinance, and a gate tax on our entertainment giants. Unsurprisingly, the DPOC (County Democrats Party) endorsed Norma – she will have ten times more funding than Francisco and is an incumbent, and that’s the important thing to them – just making sure as many people with a D next to their names keep their seats, as possible. Check that seat off!
This makes things difficult for the Club, as Francisco stands for all the things we stand for and Norma doesn’t, but we could lose our charter for supporting him. (DPOC is ALWAYS on the verge of yanking our charter.) What to do, what to do?
District 5 (eastern flatlands & Platinum Triangle) – Francisco and possibly Norma will be at our meeting Thursday because they’re both members; meanwhile at least two of the three district 5 candidates will be speaking – Kristen Maahs and Cristal Ruiz!
The establishment had their candidate all ready to go, they thought – the lovable Kristen Maahs had the endorsement of the Building Trades and Steve Faessel, the termed-out Councilman whose place she’d be taking. A glowing Cunningham profile came out in May. The obligatory Brewery X Fundraiser was held. Cynthia Ward of all people thinks the world of Kristen. Donna and I met with her, and she is very nice of course, but didn’t have any strong policy ideas or positions which is typical of a politician awaiting their instructions after victory. But still we figured she had the inside track on winning and we want to keep a friendly relationship with our next Councilperson.
But Kristen was worried about her opponent Andrew Sarega, she worried that the police union might endorse him instead of her “because he used to be a cop” (in Newport.) “HA!” I responded. “That guy is SILLY. Unions want to get behind whoever’s likely to win.” But of course the bulk of District 5 voters never read and may never hear about all of Sarega’s (and his family’s) behavior as Councilman in La Mirada, and how, JUST THIS PAST MAY, right after being named La Mirada Mayor, he resigned and carpetbagged over to Anaheim to run here.
AND. One little thing Kristen didn’t mention – she has had two DUI’s one of ’em recent. [UPDATE – I was told wrong – the most recent one was 2010. Sorry Kristen!] I got a tip about that a few days ago but didn’t really feel like writing about it, but now people who are probably Sarega’s friends are spreading it far and wide so the cat is out of the bag. Will Kristen’s backers dump her? Will she stay in the race? I hope she does.
Two flawed frontrunners really shakes up the race, and maybe creates an opening for CRISTAL RUIZ! We met with her too, and she is a work in progress, but she seems to be seriously considering some of our ideas which are very similar to what Francisco is running on. And I’ll probably vote for Cristal.
Anyway you can meet most of these candidates this Thursday night, August 8, at the Anaheim Democrats Club meeting. First half of the meeting will be about dedicating our Club to getting RENT CONTROL IN ANAHEIM, and our special guests will be the folks who managed to do that in Santa Ana, TUSA (Tenants United Santa Ana.)
But damn, look at me going on. I’d forgotten this is an Open Thread. GO FOR IT!
Hang on — if Balius is a Republican, can he be invited to the Anaheim Dem meeting?
On the other hand, if he shows up, he can be asked a lot of questions like DoneOld Trump was at the Black Correspondents Dinner, so maybe it’s a good thing.
Glowing Wordsmithery is dictated from On High. Always an immediate telegraph.
[previous portion deleted; following is verbatim] Nee Mexico.
https://www.santafenewmexican.com/news/local_news/judges-written-order-in-alec-baldwin-case-highlights-prosecution-missteps/article_1010194e-50dc-11ef-a624-6bea534af490.html
Ibrahim baytieh was a former prosecutor too. That also didn’t pan out so well In retrospect. Just saying. Don’t overvalue the former prosecutor moniker. It’s overplayed and tired.
It’s WALZ!!!! Kamala’s pick for VP. Great, that was my favorite, I love that guy. This will be a really fun race now.
And he was considered the “progressive choice.”
Now I got it – Walz reminds me of my old friend Gus Ayer, who wrote here as “Mayor Quimby” until his untimely death in 2013.
And idiots on TV are saying that progressive Kamala was smart to balance herself off with a moderate like Tim. It’s the opposite, if “progressive” means anything. If progressive means anything besides a black woman from California and if moderate means anything besides an old-looking white man from the Midwest.
Donna wishes Tim was at the top of the ticket.
Walz is not odd looking! He just looks like someone grafted the top of Patrick Leahy’s skull onto Steve Martin. And the Coach pulls it off!
I’m over the moon on this. I thought she would go with Shapiro and thus lose the election. Maybe Shapiro will be President someday, as he’s a young ‘un, but hopefully that will be after Netanyahu, Itamar, and their gang are imprisoned and Israeli money is used to rebuild Gaza and the most or all of the West Bank for Palestinian families as part of their reparations.
I said old-looking. (I didn’t say “old” because both these fuckers are younger than you and me.)
Yeah, on Shapiro. There was the concern he’d be biased in the wrong way on the Middle East, but I found what Fetterman said about him to be more concerning. Simpletons simplified what Fetterman said as “Shapiro is too ambitious,” and laughed that “of course politicians are ambitious.” What Fetterman actually said was that, while working with him on some important but unpopular issue (having to do with prisoners or wrongly accused people) Shapiro let his political ambition get in the way of doing what they both knew was the right thing. And I agree that is troubling.
“Shapiro let his political ambition get in the way of doing what they both knew was the right thing.”
They all do it.
Yeah, miss those Grover Cleveland Social Club meetings, myself. I’ll see if Greenhut’s coming down this way anytime soon. If he is you maybe hearing from us. Also wanna invite Greg Diamond. I like his sense of humor, as well as his thoughts on Israel and Gaza. Hopefully you do, as well.
By the way, our staple was sausages, not hamburgers!
OK, but no recordings of the initiation ceremony!
Democratic leadership loves old white guys!! Hollywood not so much. Hollywood v progressives. Progressives 1 Hollywood 0.
Will Hollywood punish Hoochiemamala for not picking their darling Shapiro?
Never noticed Shapiro being Hollywood’s favorite.
Or you just saying that because, you know, Jews & stuff?
I’m going to delete one of Eric’s comments (ones that you’ve not yet decisively rebutted, as here) every time he says anything even in the ballpark of “Hoochiemama,” Maybe more than one.
Notably, Kamala also raised another $36 million over the 24 hours after the Walz announcement. That means that we’re having fun.
The amount she’ll get over the course of the convention may be mind-boggling.
Are you running for Council? I heard from a parent at 1st day of school.
To whom is this addressed?
We threw Howard Dean under a bus after he was the front runner during the 2005 primaries and now we need to rally behind a candidate who never made it to the primary vote the only time she fans because Biden anointed her and we have to save democracy. Pffft.
If Jimmy Carter stays alive to vote for her, I just may do so. Otherwise, all bets are off.
Correction on this story: I’d been told by a usually reliable tipster that Kristen Maahs’ most recent DUI was “recent.” Turns out it was 2010, which is NOT recent. Apologies to Kristen.
Ahmad came to Anaheim Dems last night, didn’t she?
Is she a Dem? If so did she seek a DPOC endorsement? If so, did she get one? Or was she perhaps “anti-endorsed”? I didn’t make the connection or I would have said hi, even though I am currently at odds with Iyad over Kamala.
She did briefly, and her first name is not pronounced “Ojala” in Spanish which means “hopefully” (and I suspect is coincidentally taken by the Spaniards from Arabic “in’shallah.”) The j is a hard English j and the second syllable is emphasized. Oh-JAHla. But I still don’t know how to contact her. I don’t know that she has anything to do with Iyad. She is a Democrat, says Rebecca. No idea if she’s approached the DPOC, but her only opponent is a rightwing Republican.
Our troll thinks she’s hot. Among a lot of other stupid things, in another comment I trashed.
We’ll probably have her speak at the historic Sept 12 meeting.
Looks like the Harris campaign just got swiftboated a la John Kerry. US military is a larger fraternity than the black sorority system. Dumb dumb Dems do it again!! Chose Kerry over Dean for a goose egg. Now, what? TBD with the anointed one.
https://www.npr.org/2024/08/09/nx-s1-5069480/swift-boat-john-kerry-tim-walz-jd-vance
It’s like it’s 2004 all over again. So many flashbacks it’s getting hard to keep up. 68 to 72 to 04. Hunter S Thompson called he said Perot was right “we need a third party”
Trump was hacked. Iran wants Harris?
https://www.politico.com/news/2024/08/10/trump-campaign-hack-00173503
Iran may indeed prefer Harris against the man who might be more likely to incinerate them. That says nothing bad about Harris or her policies. This leak does suggest that Trump is still not good at hiring.