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I’ve noticed that we didn’t get around to posting an Open Thread last weekend and I suspect that we’re going to need one, and this is it. Its topic is prompted by a seriously weird website that I discovered (while searching for something else) has been constructed by Tony Rackauckas, who seems to give “cluelessness” a new meaning. Here’s what it looks like:
Text in the box entered by your author….
SERIOUSLY? Harassment of people (other than yelling at subordinates, which Todd shouldn’t do) is not something I’m aware of Todd Spitzer being accused of. Arresting people committing criminal assault (which is what I presume the Wahoo thing was technically about)? Yeah, at least that once. Going after the DA’s mistress when she was involved in corruption inf the Public Guardian’s office? Well, that may have seemed like bullying to her boyfriend (now-husband) the DA, but it’s actually not: it’s appropriately fighting corruption — which might explain why Racky isn’t familiar with it. But bullying campaign contributions out of people? That always struck me as more like Rackacukas’s thing than Spitzer’s. Racky, after all, can call on most of the other Supervisors, most of the Republican establishment, and most of the judges in the county, to have his back. Who’s in a better position to twist arms here? (And my understanding from tips is that yes, it DOES happen.
In case it’s not visible enough, I sent a tip to the Rackauckas campaign reporting that Todd Spitzer turned me into a newt. (All together now: “I got better.”) Hopefully it will help steer their message. Here’s what you get after you submit your tip, highlighted because it’s very hard to read otherwise:
Now I’m not saying that anyone should abuse this golden opportunity, but … it IS anonymous and confidential!
Anyway, through the magic of Photoshop, I’m able to offer you the chance to send your “TONY TIPS” directly to me! Have a look!
In fact, it’s not paid for nor authorized by ANY candidate or committee, and because it’s editorial content (website parody) and not a regulated ad, we don’t even have to say that!
This is your 2½ Weeks Left Before Pre-election Weekend Open Thread. Use it responsibly along the usual standards until a new one comes along.
Just came across this on a forlorn browser lab– and it is quite interesting! It’s by David L. Bahnsen, a Christian-oriented “Wealth Management” fund manager who is clearly highly integrated with The National Review and is or was on the Board of Directors of the Lincoln Club — and the article is entitled “Disneyland’s Republicans: Anaheim GOP Must Abandon Crony Capitalism“! My guess is that this one Republican who is not endorsing Harry Sidhu!
Speaking of which — the fever dream that Matt Cunningham is paid to both endure and convey that Harry Sidhu can beat Ashleigh Aitken and Cynthia Ward can’t is — well, fervidly unreal. I don’t know that either will — or that either could — but with Lorri Galloway circling the drain leaving only a resident of signs like mainsails behind her, it’s pretty clear that the pro-Disney vote will be split between Sidhu and Aitken and the anti-Disney vote will be split between Ward and Aitken. (No one is quite sure how Aitken would break as Mayor, which is both a political disadvantage and an advantage.)
Tait Republicans are going to go overwhelmingly for Cynthia — and they are the biggest bloc of likely voters. Democrats will go overwhelmingly for Ashleigh — but those who won’t are far more likely to go for Cynthia than Sidhu. Seriously, if you’re a Democrat and you want to support Disney you’re going to support Ashley and prepare to lobby him, not Sidhu and hope that there will even be a city left to do anything. Disney Republicans may vote for Sidhu, but they’re just not a huge portion of the electorate anymore — as this article indicates — and as Sidhu seems to be slipping they may be willing to support Aitken.
Yea, she’s a Democrat, but party lines are not Red-Blue in Anaheim, but Tait-Disney. Ashleigh is a Democrat who has endorsed Brandman — as to be fair, the party did, but that doesn’t constrain her own endorsement — had equivocated on the bitter Moreno/Caldwell race (and I’m not even positive who she supports even now), and who I believe supports the Disney-leaning Democrat in Anaheim Hills. Ward is either overtly supporting Tait’s candidate Patty Gaby or, at a minimum, is quite comfortable with her.
I have hope for Ashleigh, if she’s elected, that she’ll stand in the Dr. Moreno “Tait Democrat” tradition — but she’s positioned herself to bite into Sidhu’s portion of the electorate more so than Cynthia’s. I don’t know what that means for the two of them, but it does mean that a vote for Sidhu is probably wasted. If I were a Republican who wanted Cynthia to lose — and I hope that Cynthia will forgive my saying so — I’d be putting my money on Ashleigh rather than Harry.
Cynthia — has had literally nothing to do (I did ask her) with the mailers bashing Sidhu and “endorsing her,” paid for with union independent expenditures — but those mailers have been as devastating as any mailers I’ve seen this year. Labor (with the exception of the public safety unions and the trades) has much more to worry from Sidhu than they do from Ward — Ward is no unionist, but she has negotiated with unions before and shown that she will listen to reason — so I guess that their boosting Ward at Sidhu’s expense makes sense even if it puts her into competition with Aitken. But the notion that Sidhu is assured to finish ahead of Ward no matter what is still pretty strained.
I wonder who Matt Cunningham would support between Ashleigh and Cynthia, if they turned out to be the front-runners. Ashleigh, right? Again: there is no Party competition in Anaheim.
Vern, this comment ran long enough to be a story, so if you think that it should be one that’s up to you.
Criminal assault is preaching our Lord and Savior?
No, that was a frothed-up, self-created crisis by an overheated megalomaniac just waiting all those years for his chance to play superhero.
Oddly, no one in Wahoos was the least bit worried about Bible Boy. Except Wonder Dog, of course: https://voiceofoc.org/2015/10/santana-oc-supervisors-get-ethics/
I’d love to continue fighting with your dorky self, but the cronies have launched their coordinated October surprise — Angels terminate their lease agreement; clearly forewarned Ament, Sidhu, and Murray immediately weigh in in three-part harmony — and we will have to get along well enough to focus on that. (Though — which DA candidate do you think will bend over further for the cronies?)
(And yes, if your preaching puts people in reasonable fear of offensive touching by you, it is criminal assault. There’s no “Gospel exception.” You think that there should be?)
I can remember when the hacks were just in teenlove with the “LoGal.” And now that the unspeakably obnoxious LoSan (Woo Woo Woo) has endorsed Mitch Caldwell I wonder how complete the memory erasure will be of their former inamorata.
Matt Cunningham let’s Vern post, but my posts don’t appear! Why is Matt Cunningham so afraid of me?
Just ran across this from our archives.
Preznit Joffrey just praised a candidate in Montana who literally body-slammed a reporter for asking him about health care. But Dana Rohrabacher was well into this “adopt Mafia violence tactics for political intimidation” thing first.