First Lady Michelle Obama Refutes Any Notion That What Trump Has Said And Did Is Acceptable

Democrats Can’t Unite Unless Wasserman Schultz Goes

he Rep. Wasserman Schultz played games with the party’s voter database, restricted the number of Democratic candidate debates and scheduled them at days and times to minimize viewership all in favor to Hillary Clinton, who would be the presumptive Democratic nominee, but for Wasserman Schultz. At the height a disingenuousness, she told CNN’s Jake Tapper that super-delegates — almost all of whom are strongly supportive of the structural leadership establishment and overwhelmingly pro-Clinton — are more necessary than ever because the party must rely on currently elected and often high-ranking incumbent officials to ward off those pesky “grassroots activists.”

In Nevada, Wasserman Schultz jumped into a melee concerning what did or did not happen when Sanders supporters loudly and vehemently objected to the arcane and obscure rules at the Nevada State Democratic Convention.

To be fair, some Berniecrats behaved poorly at the convention, while some made aggressively negative and occasionally obscene threats to Nev. Dem state chair Roberta Lange via phone, email and social media. Such conduct cannot be excused and Sanders quickly and directly apologized for the behavior of the raucous and disruptive folks channeling their inner Trump.

However, one must ask why well-behaved Sanders supporters shouldn’t feel angry at the pervasive and clandestine political process by which Wasserman Schultz and the Clinton machine has manipulated the delegate-selection process to benefit of the former Secretary of State (which is an entire and lengthy topic in and of itself).

Wasserman Schultz has gone to great lengths to convince anyone who will listen that the rules over which she has presided and manipulated, are “eminently fair.” By attempting to quell unruly Sanders’s supporters so high-handily, her rhetoric has fallen flat.

A few days later and feelings still raw, the DNC Chair was said to not be, “helping her friend Hillary Clinton with her attacks on Sanders. … Wasserman Schultz’s defiant rebuke to the Sanders camp has made it worse.”

Another related matter at a time when money in politics is a top Democratic Party issue, Wasserman Schultz repealed the Obama-initiated ban on lobbyists and PACs giving money to the party.

In addition, it’s been revealed that a number of the members of the Philadelphia host committee “are actively working to undermine progressive policies achieved by President Barack Obama, including health care reform and net neutrality. Some... are hardly even Democratic Party stalwarts, given that many have donated and raised thousands of dollars for Republican presidential and congressional candidates this cycle.”

This is not just a slap in the face to progressives who have been calling for a halt to big money and allowing lobbyists to buy elected officials, it’s also contrary to what Hillary Clinton herself said about money and politics on the campaign trail.

Unless Rep. Wasserman Schultz steps down now or if Hillary Clinton has her removed, Philadelphia will be dominated by a person who represents everything that’s wrong with the Democratic Party and Washington. At the convention’s opening session, Debbie Wasserman Schultz will be bringing the gavel down squarely on progressive hopes of returning the party to its legacy as champion of working people and the dispossessed. 

It’s past time for her to go.

Bernie Sanders lost four state primaries this past Tuesday and even a good showing in California won’t provide him with the number of delegates he needs to compete for the Democratic presidential nomination. It’s a fact, not an opinion.

In addition, the Bernie supporters calling, emailing, etc. of super-delegates essentially stalking and harassing them is doing the opposite of what’s necessary to make an argument that he deserves certain concessions from HRC. All arguments against super-delegates and an unfair process are specious, as the rules were in in place when Sanders entered the race. He and his advisors knew exactly how things stood.

However, regardless of the protestation by Hillary a some of her campaign staff that it’s “not fair” to defer to Sanders flies in the face of the Democratic nominating process, not to mention that of the 8,967,401 voters who cast their ballots for him to date. Any argument based on the outcome and aftermath of the 2008 campaign are misleading. Besides, Mrs. Clinton will not get the votes she needs to win in the general election without the support of Sanders’ voters.

In 2008, Obama and Clinton agreed upon practically everything except Hillary's vote for the Iraq War, whether health care reform should include an individual mandate, and a few other issues. Both candidates were moderately progressive, which was best evidenced when Obama included Clinton's individual mandate in Obamacare and made her his Secretary of State.

This primary season is quite different. It has been marked by “yuuuge” and substantive disagreements on a wide range of issues from single payer health care for all, breaking up the big banks with whom HRC is closely aligned, paid leave, free state college tuition, additional funding for Social Security and a new national infrastructure program.

Sanders has advocated for an entirely different political ideology that seems to baffle and annoy the former Senator and her friends at the DNC. As foreign as it might seem to establishment Democrats, Bernie really means it when he calls for a political revolution.

Sander’s message fits the political moment. He is advocating ideas that have worked well against long odds, particularly among young people. And, his ability to raise millions from small donors is unprecedented.

To put this race in 1992 Bill Clinton terms, Bernie is about change, while Hillary is more of the same. Hillary Clinton is a status quo politician, content with holding the line against Republican advances and maybe fiddling around the policy margins here and there.

There's no reason for Sanders voters to believe that she is interested in their priorities.

While Obama’s 2008 coalition was primarily minorities and young people, the major demographic split this year is age. Clinton has African Americans by a substantial margin, but quite a bit less among Latinos and virtually shut out by young people. She needs Sanders’ young, passionate and somewhat idealistic voters to not only vote for her, but also vote for her in large numbers in order to deliver a mandate for change, flip at least the senate and make gains in the house.

The politically strategic and intelligent thing to do is for Clinton to make concessions to Sanders, despite the obvious acrimony that has grown between the two and their camps. It’s good politics for Clinton to make a few notable policy concessions to show Sanders and his supporters at least a modicum of good faith.

If Mrs. Clinton wants support from the left, she must first show that she’s not stridently opposed to the Senator’s ideas and concerns. She can do so by signing on to a few big Sanders ideas such as infrastructure, free college, or even a strong public option for Obamacare.

In turn, Sanders should take the wise and appropriate political path and confer his endorsement on HRC, especially since it’s highly unlikely that any of the policies for which Sanders has fought will even see a vote in the near future

Twenty one of litterally hundreds of new California laws as of 1/1/16

Literally hundreds of new laws will take effect on Friday, January 1, 2016. Here are twenty-one of which you may be interested.


Required vaccines: One of 2015’s fiercest fights was over SB 277, which was introduced in the wake of a measles outbreak at Disneyland and requires full vaccination for most children to enroll in school. Schools will begin vetting students to ensure they have their shots in July, before the 2016-2017 school year begins.


Bringing search warrants into the computer age: Arguing our privacy laws lag behind our technology, lawmakers passed SB 178 to require search warrants before law enforcement can obtain your emails, text messages, Internet search history and other digital data.


Ballot initiative fee increase: Thinking of filing a ballot initiative? You’ll need more cash. AB 1100 hikes the cost of submitting a proposal from $200 to $2,000, which supporters called a needed screen to discourage frivolous or potentially unconstitutional proposals.


Grocery store job notice: When grocery stores get new owners, AB 359 requires the stores to retain employees for at least 90 days and consider keeping them on after that period ends. While workers can still be dismissed in that window for performance-related reasons, the labor-backed bill seeks to protect workers from losing their jobs to buyouts or mergers.


Mandatory reproductive services advertising in so-called “crisis pregnancy centers”:  AB 775 requires any licensed facility offering pregnancy-related services to post a sign advertising the availability of public family planning programs, including abortions. It is aimed at so-called “crisis pregnancy centers,” which pro-abortion rights critics assail for pressuring women into carrying their pregnancies to term.


Cheerleaders are people (and employees) too: Cheerleaders who root on professional athletes will be treated as employees under California law, with the accompanying wage and hour protections, under AB 202. Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez, D-San Diego, who carried the bill, was a Stanford cheerleader. Thanks, Lorena!


No more testing for you (to graduate high school): High school seniors will no longer need to take a long-standing exit exam to graduate, thanks to SB 172. The bill lifts the requirement through the 2017-2018 school year and also applies retroactively to 2004, meaning students who have completed all the other graduation requirements since then can apply for diplomas.


Finally, banning guns on all school campuses: Concealed firearms are barred from college campuses and K-12 school grounds under SB 707, which the California College and University Police Chiefs Association sponsored as a public safety corrective. 

I feel more safe already ...


At last, women get equal pay for, well, “substantially similar” (and, presumably equal) work: SB 358 seeks to close the stubborn gap between men and women’s wages by saying they must be paid the same for “substantially similar work,” an upgrade over the current standard, and allowing women to talk about their own pay and inquire about the pay of others without facing discipline. While California already requires equal pay for equal work, women still consistently make less.


Mandatory sex ed in schools (which can be avoided if parents so choose): Student participation in sexual education courses is currently voluntary. AB 329 would make the courses mandatory unless parents specifically seek an opt-out and would update curricula to include, for example, more information about HIV and the spectrum of gender identity.


“Yes means yes” for consent to sexual acts only if there are mandatory health classes to graduate high school: As long as their school districts require health classes to graduate, SB 695 will ensure high school students learn about the “yes means yes” standard of consent to sexual acts. In other words, students will learn they should be getting explicit approval from partners.


More clearly making toy guns look like toys: Realistic-looking airsoft guns will need to have more features that distinguish them as toys, like a fluorescent trigger guards, thanks to SB 199. Advocates said it would help law enforcement avoid tragic mistakes when making split-second decisions, pointing to the 2013 case of a Santa Rosa boy fatally shot by Sonoma County deputies who mistook his toy gun for the real thing.

That’s not to mention the whole Cleveland police shooting and killing a 12-year-old boy with toy gun about two seconds after officers arrived, although dispatcher was told the gun was fake, yet failed to tell cops on the scene thing. See: http://cnn.it/1EqbHYk.

 
Gun restraining orders by relatives who believe person capable of violence: Passed last year in response to a troubled young man shooting and killing multiple people in Isla Vista, AB 1014 allows family members to obtain a restraining order temporarily barring gun ownership for a relative they believe to be at risk of committing an act of violence.


More quickly administered “rape kits”: AB 1517 prods law enforcement to more quickly process so-called “rape kits,” the forensic evidence collected from sexual assault crime scenes. While the bill doesn’t mandate anything, it encourages law enforcement agencies to send evidence to crime labs sooner and urges crime labs to analyze the data and upload it into a DNA database in a shorter time frame.


Peddle and tipple on big bikes with friends (or strangers): People rolling around downtown on beer bikes could get a little tipsier under SB 550. The measure allows alcohol to be consumed on board the multi-person vehicles, which currently travel between different bars but don’t allow imbibing in between, as long as the city authorizes it.

 
It’s not sports betting, it’s a “charity raffle”: Professional sports fans could bring home big prizes thanks to SB 549, which authorizes in-game charity raffles allowing the winner to take home 50 percent of ticket sales. That’s a change from the current system, which permits charity raffles only if 90 percent of the proceeds go to the cause.


No tolls to cross bridges on foot. Yes, seriously: AB 40 ensures pedestrians and cyclists won’t have to pay tolls on Bay Area bridges like the Golden Gate. While no such tolls yet exist, lawmakers were responding to a proposal to raise money with a Golden Gate Bridge fee.


Slap a lien on owner’s property if s/he withholds pay: If an employee doesn’t get paid what they are owed, SB 588 allows the California Labor Commissioner to slap a lien on the boss’s property to try and recoup the value of the unpaid wages. This was a slimmed-down version of a prior, unsuccessful bill that was pushed by organized labor but repudiated by business interests – the key difference being that the commissioner, not workers, files the liens.


Limit owner’s meddling in franchises’ agreements and sales/transfers: Another bill whose earlier labor-backed, business-opposed version was softened in the name of compromise, AB 525 modifies the relationships between individual franchise business owners and the larger parent company by changing the rules for when the parent company can terminate or refuse to renew a franchise agreement and how the franchise owner can sell or transfer the store.


More restrictions, uh, “government access to driver information” for Uber and Lyft: The steady drip of new regulations on companies like Uber and Lyft continued with AB 1422, which requires such businesses to give the California Department of Motor Vehicles access to driver records by participating in the agency’s pull notice program.


Expand clean air law, expand number of regulators: After a sweeping climate bill spurred objections from lawmakers about the clout of the unelected California Air Resources Board, AB 1288 offered a concession by creating two new spots on the regulator’s board, to be appointed by the Legislature.

Admittedly lifted almost verbatim from The Sacramento Bee.  

With A Little Help From My Friends

I have neglected to post items here for quite some time. I've been quite busy rearranging my life, living circumstances and work responsibilities.

The June 2016 Primary Election will be upon us before we know it. I'm hopeful that I'll be able to spend some time in the coming months writing my somewhat infamous "Crotty UnOfficial Voter Guide," which attempts to inform, educate and amuse, with an emphasis on amusement.

This election cycle, I'm attempting something new.

I'd like to receive input from those who have insight as relates to the plethora of candidates and issues that will before us for our (presumably informed) opinions regardless of position on the political and policy spectrum.

A few years ago, Pew Research put things this way:

"... [Political] party identification is, an attitude, not a demographic. To put it simply, party identification is one of the aspects of public opinion that our surveys are trying to measure, not something that we know ahead of time like the share of adults who are African American, female, or who live in the South. Particularly in an election cycle, the balance of party identification in surveys will ebb and flow with candidate fortunes, as it should, since the candidates themselves are the defining figureheads of those partisan labels. Thus there is no timely, independent measure of the partisan balance that polls could use for a baseline adjustment.

These shifts in party identification are essential to understanding the dynamics of American politics. In the months after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, polls registered a substantial increase in the share of Americans calling themselves Republican. We saw similar shifts in the balance of party identification as the War in Iraq went on, and in the build-up to the Republicans’ 2010 midterm election victory. In all of those instances, had we tried to standardize the balance of party identification in our surveys to some prior levels, our surveys would have fundamentally missed what were significant changes in public opinion.

The clearest evidence of this is the accuracy of the Pew Research Center’s final election estimates. In every presidential election since 1996, our final pre-election surveys have aligned with the actual vote outcome, because we measured rising Democratic or Republican fortunes in each year.

In short, because party identification is so tightly intertwined with candidate preferences, any effort to constrain or affix the partisan balance of a survey would certainly smooth out any peaks and valleys in our survey trends, but would also lead us to miss more fundamental changes in the electorate that may be occurring. In effect, standardizing, smoothing, or otherwise tinkering with the balance of party identification in a survey is tantamount to saying we know how well each candidate is doing before the survey is conducted."

So much for the pollster's views. I am simply asking for a little diversity of opinions and attitudes, hopefully with the same sense of whimsy with which I, and hopefully others of us who do this for a living, must adopt to remain sane. Of course, the preceding sentence is a topic for an entirely different type of discussion, which may or may not occur based on the level of interest.

In summary, I'm essentially putting out a call for entries into my almost bi-annual Voter Guide. 

Please send your thoughts, observations, rants and other hopefully salient views on any or all of the choices before us on the June 2016 ballot to crotty@crottyconsulting.com.

Thanks, and let's have some fun!

Bernie Sanders Interview: Attacks From The Establishment | MSNBC

The Unofficial Crotty Voter Guide

The Unofficial Crotty Voter Guide

For the June 3^rd Primary Election

It's alive, it's alive!

The Crotty voter guide is back following a hiatus going back to the 2012 general election.  A great deal has happened since then, including Bob Filner's election and subsequent self-immolation.  The Filner Foibles resulted in the Special Mayoral Election, which, in turn, saddled us with Kevin "Don't bother me with policy" Faulconer. 

However, don't blame Kevin too much.  He had plenty of help from the city's labor unions, which, while spending a couple of million, forgot Elections 101 and failed to move to the middle following the primary and practically handed the keys to the Mayor's office to "the Falcon."  Post election diatribe, uh … spin … was that the David Alvarez campaign for Mayor was not as much a campaign as it was a progressive movement.  Silly me.  I thought winning the Mayor's office and having a majority of Democrats on the City Council was the path to a more progressive San Diego.

However, let's not dwell on the past. We have citywide initiatives B & C that … well, essentially got their start when Kevin "I'll pander to anyone" Faulconer decided to make a mayoral race issue out of the years-long effort to update Barrio Logan's Community Plan.

Throwing the Barrio under the bus to score political points … San Diego's Republicans are back in form.

Seriously, though, let's get excited about this June's election.

Beyond Props B & C, we have Lori Zapf and Sara Boot slugging it out for District 2, Chris Cate and … whoever in District 6 and … and … Well, at least there's the County Board of Supervisors, where … uh, well …

Okay, I just re-read the ballot book.  Let's talk about … voter turnout.

Republican polling wiz John Nienstedt confirmed what I've been saying for almost six months.  We are headed for an election turnout of historic proportions … historically low proportions … despite the $20 million worth of political advertising statewide for races up and down the ballot.  Bill Horn and Lori Zapf are the only local candidates who contributed somewhat to that $20 million.  It seems everyone else got by without big bucks … I hope that's not a trend (a guy's gotta make a living).

Whether it's ballot fatigue, boredom or apathy, San Diego voters have yet to get it in gear and get to the polls. Two weeks from Election Day and only 6.2% of voters had returned their mail-in ballot.  One week out saw an uptick of almost 10%.  However, 16% turnout is well below traditional 40% or more among absentee voters.  Applying traditional turnout predictors, the pathetically low absentee voter turnout will still be greater than turnout at the polls.  This will result in an overall election turnout of approximately 26%, barely more than L.A.'s 2013 historically anemic 21% turnout.

San Diego's registered voters make up a little less than 50% of the city's total population, which means that a 26% turnout among registered voters will result in a citywide population turnout of 12.7%.  Who our next four City Council members will be and whether the Barrio Logan Community Plan remains in place or is repealed will be decided by fewer than 13% of the city's population.   That is not "representative democracy" and it's by choice.

Let's get to the ballot and discuss a few campaigns.

State Ballot Propositions

Proposition 41, the California Veterans Housing and Homeless Prevention Bond Act

If the initiative is approved by the state's voters, it will:

• Amend the Veterans’ Bond Act of 2008 to reduce the amount of authorized bonds from $900 million to $300 million.
• Enact the Veterans Housing and Homeless Prevention Bond Act of 2014 to authorize $600 million in bonds to provide multifamily housing, such as apartment complexes, to low-income veterans and supportive housing for homeless veterans.
• Authorize the legislature to amend the bond act by majority vote.
• Impose reporting requirements on the Department of Housing and Community Development and the Department of Veterans Affairs to evaluate any program established by the VHHPA.
• Authorize the Department of Housing and Community Development to provide specified assistance to veterans.

The measure would authorize the state to provide local governments, nonprofit organizations, and private developers with financial assistance, such as low-interest loans, so that they may construct, renovate and acquire affordable multifamily housing for low-income veterans and their families.

“Low-income” is here defined as “those who earn less than 80 percent of average family income, as adjusted by family size and county.” At least one-half of the funds would be used to build supportive housing for homeless veterans.

The allocation from the general tax revenues would average about $50 million annually for 15 years. The amount spent on these programs would be less than one-tenth of one percent of the state budget each year for 15 years.

But, remember, Toni Atkins said in a TV commercial that the $50 million a year for 15 years to be paid for by our tax dollars is not a tax, so don't worry about how it's paid for.

Since it's not a tax, vote "Yes." Heck, vote "Yes" anyway – it's the right thing to do.

California Proposition 42, the California Compliance of Local Agencies with Public Act (Senate Constitutional Amendment 3).

Remember May 2013, when Governor Jerry Brown and the state legislature said they would no longer reimburse local governments for the cost of obtaining public documents for the public? No? Then you must not be a member of the media or one of those government watchdog groups, because they went ballistic.

One newspaper wrote breathlessly that "In a resounding victory for open government advocates and the California media, Gov. Jerry Brown and the Legislature on Thursday backed away from plans to make the state's open-records law essentially optional for cities and other local agencies."

State lawmakers were hit with a torrent of criticism from newspapers around the state, as well as opposition from everyone from liberal open government advocates to Neanderthal conservatives, who feared the change approved by the Legislature would have severely limited the public's right to know what their government is up to.

After deciding to pull about $20 million from local agencies to respond to requests made under the California Public Records Act -- signed by Gov. Ronald Reagan in 1968 -- Brown and Senate leaders reversed course a day after the Assembly did the same.

The political firestorm proved too much to bear for state leaders, particularly in light of the relatively small amount of funding the state was looking to cut, which amounts to 0.02 percent of the state's general-fund budget at a time when the budget had a $1.1 billion surplus.

Well, it's time for local governments to pay their own costs of retrieving documents for the media and the public.

If Prop 42 is approved by the state's voters, it will require all local agencies to comply with the California Public Records Act (CPRA) and the Ralph M. Brown Act (Brown Act) and with any subsequent changes to the acts, thus guaranteeing a person's right to inspect public records and attend public meetings. Prop 42 will also make these laws core government responsibilities, thus ensuring taxpayers are not paying for items local governments have a duty to provide on their own.

The CPRA provides that public records are open to inspection at all times during the office hours of state or local agencies that retain those records and that every person has a right to inspect any public record. The act also requires agencies to establish written guidelines for public access to documents and to post these guidelines at their offices.

The Brown Act requires local legislative bodies to provide notice of the time and place for holding regular meetings and requires that all meetings of a legislative body be open and public. Under the act, all persons are permitted to attend any meeting of the local legislative body, unless a closed session is authorized.

The initiative would result in a fiscal savings for the state government, but would also result in comparable revenue reductions to local governments.

It seems reasonable (when was the last time you said that about anything done by the government?).

Each government agency pays the cost of finding and providing documents to the public. The state saves some money because it no longer is required to backfill local government costs associated with the CPRA or the Brown Act.  Local governments must find the money from somewhere (probably from the budget for filling potholes and replacing infrastructure) to pay for the public's right to know without having to pay to learn.

Vote "Yes!"

Governor

Jerry Brown isn't running a campaign because Tea Partier Tim Donnelly and former TARP ($418 billion federal government bank bailout due to the subprime mortgage crisis and subsequent economic free fall) Director Neel Kashkari have neither the money nor the wherewithal to mount a serious challenge to the Governor formerly known as Moonbeam.

Voters have an overall positive impression of this incarnation of the Governor and no one the Republicans could have run against him would have had a chance.

The bad news is all of the down ballot races. There isn't a single statewide office that is at risk of flipping from Democrat to Republican.  No, that's good news.  The bad news is that there's nothing statewide to generate any interest and create some enthusiasm for going to the polls, especially those offices far down the ballot (i.e., City Council).

Controller

Perhaps the only interesting race for a Constitutional office is Controller.  Former Speaker of the Assembly John Perez has the money, while Betty Yee has the qualifications.  Guess how that will turn out.

Board of Equalization, District 4

Former Chula Vista Mayor and Assembly member Shirley Horton is one of five Republicans along with some Democratic "Government Auditor" vying for the 4^th District Board of Equalization. The BOE was initially charged with responsibility for ensuring that county property tax assessment practices were equal and uniform throughout the state. Currently the tax programs administered by the BOE are concentrated in four general areas: sales and use taxes, property taxes, special taxes and the tax appellate program.  

I guess that means the "Government Auditor" ought to get our vote!

Congress

All of the Congressional seats will go to the incumbents, including the 52^nd District, where Carl DeMaio and the Republican National Congressional Committee are taking on first-termer Scott Peters, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and Scott's fat wallet (if necessary). 

I discuss this race as though it's November because both campaigns have been up on TV and trading General Election-like barbs for months already. I love that D'Carl implied that Scott's campaign was somehow linked to his office break-in. Paranoia will destroy ya … or, your credibility.

Usually, a challenger needs a reason other than wanting the seat to dislodge an incumbent.  However, Carl is Carl, and I'm certain he'll manufacture something between now and November.  You can never underestimate a man with his size ego and a burning desire to be back in the limelight.

Judges

Judicial elections are the least visible and possibly among the most important on the ballot.  Unfortunately, primarily because they are countywide races, you don't hear much about them.

I'm slightly biased against those with political endorsements, especially from the City Attorney, the Sheriff or the District Attorney. Neither do I look favorably upon attorneys who work for the DA or DOJ. They are prosecutors with the mindset that everyone is guilty until proven otherwise.  I like my judges open-minded.   

Superior Court Judge; County of San Diego; Office 9

Ronald S. Prager

Douglas Crawford

Crawford didn't bother paying the money to file a ballot statement. No wonder. The San Diego County Bar Association's Judicial Election Evaluation Committee rated Crawford as "Lacking Qualifications."

Prager by default.

Superior Court Judge; County of San Diego; Office 19

Michael J. Popkins is endorsed by both the Lincoln Club of San Diego and the San Diego County Democratic Party.

He must be doing something right. Vote for Popkins.

Superior Court Judge; County of San Diego; Office 20

Judge Lisa Schall received a private admonishment from the state Commission on Judicial Performance in 1995 related to her involvement in a juvenile dependency case. Then in 1999, she was admonished for “an abuse of the contempt power” after incorrectly ordering a woman into custody for five days. About a decade later, Schall was admonished again after she was arrested and found guilty of drunk driving.

Carla Keehn is not incumbent Lisa Schall.

Vote for Carla Keehn.

Superior Court Judge; County of San Diego; Office 25

Michele Hagan is a former Domestic Violence and Child Abuse Prosecutor, Assistant District Attorney and Judge Pro Tem. In 2012, she helped a San Diego domestic violence victim to pass a law to protect victims – no alimony to spouses convicted of violent sexual felonies (AB 1522).

Oh, she's also a Democrat. There are far too few Dems on the bench.

Vote for Michele Hagan

Superior Court Judge; County of San Diego; Office 44

Joseph Adelizzi is a civil litigator with a background outside of the “big government” norm for judges.  He has an unusually parent-friendly attitude toward family law matters – favoring alternative dispute resolution and cost effective litigation management.  He is keenly sensitive to how the litigation process is frequently harmful to litigants and their children, and understands how existing family court and industry practices exacerbate that harm.

The local Bar Association rated Judge Jacqueline Stern “qualified.”  Sitting judges are very rarely rated below “well-qualified.”

You do the math.

Vote for Joseph Adelizzi

County Assessor/Recorder/County Clerk

To refresh your memory, incumbent Ernie Dronenburg filed suit to to halt same-sex marriages from taking place. The legal work was paid for by Prop 8 attorney and lead counsel for the Freedom of Conscience Defense Fund, Charles LiMandri, according to an October 28 “Behested Payment Report” Dronenburg filed with the county. The form reveals LiMandri donated $11,240 in legal work to Dronenburg and the county to pay for “services required for the drafting and filing of a legal brief with the State Supreme Court.” Dronenburg described the legal work as “filing legal brief raising questions and asking for guidance.”

The Fair Political Practices Commission sent a letter to Dronenburg, admonishing him for failing to report the in-kind donation from LiMandri.

Aside from that, the current backlog in the assessor’s office is a serious problem for San Diego County taxpayers.

Susan Guinn has been a consumer attorney for over 20 years. She is a two time past president of Western Trial Lawyers and served on the board of the Consumer Attorneys of California. Her firm obtained a $3.3 billion settlement from Big Tobacco to benefit county government. She is well versed in property valuations and has the skills necessary to serve as Assessor/Recorder/County Clerk.

Plus, she's not Ernie Dronenburg.

Vote Susan Guinn

District Attorney

(With thanks to Doug Porter at the San Diego Free Press, from whom I plagerized shamelessly.)

High profile events attended by Bonnie Dumanis that seemingly weren’t disclosed in financial reports as required by law. Now, District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis is the subject of two state ethics complaints alleging she failed to report meals and travel she accepted from interest groups — complaints filed by a supporter of a political challenger on the June 3 ballot.

The allegations raise a particular issue for Dumanis, who has led a high-profile prosecution in the past three years of more than a dozen officials in South County for accepting meals and other considerations and not reporting them on state forms.

What we’re looking at here are fifty or so free meals with a total value of $4583, according to the story. The on-line version of the UT also has a handy-dandy photo gallery of Dumanis at some of these events, including:

§     February, 2012 ($100)- The Neighborhood Market Association

§     May, 2012 ($125)- Lawyer’s Club of San Diego 40th Anniversary

§    September, 2012 (Registration + Dinner) Chamber of Commerce DC Lobbying Trip

§     January, 2013 ($50) – San Diego Association of Realtors

§     February, 2013 ($200) Downtown San Diego Partnership Event

§     March, 2013 ($200) National Conflict Resolution Center

§     October, 2013 ($135) San Diego La Raza Lawyers Association

The UT says they provided the DA’s office with a list of the events in question, “but the office declined to say whether the DA attended for free and what her policies are on accepting and reporting such gifts.”

Ex-City Council woman Donna Fry appeared at a downtown press conference yesterday with Dumanis challenger Bob Brewer to call for release of recently discovered documents relating to a (mostly) failed investigation of Chula Vista politicians.

After telling KPBS back in February that records pertaining to a phone call ex-Chula Vista Mayor Steve Padilla said he got from Dumanis did not exist, the DA’s office is now obviously stalling for time before releasing the documents.

But when KPBS sent a Public Records Act request to Patrick O’Toole – the prosecutor who handled the Chula Vista investigations – he gathered the records in just hours and gave them to officials in the District Attorney’s Office.

Dumanis’ office said it never asked O’Toole if he had the documents because typically that information is kept in a case file that has long since been closed.

But the information sought by KPBS was not about case pleadings and motions. It was related to Padilla’s assertion that Dumanis had asked him to appoint her aide to a vacant City Council seat in that 2005 call. Within weeks of Padilla’s refusal, Dumanis initiated an investigation of the entire Chula Vista council.

The District Attorney’s Office told KPBS that it needed more time because the request was not restricted to records O’Toole handed over. KPBS promptly amended its request to ask for only what O’Toole has delivered. The office still has not released the records.

The real deal with Dumanis isn’t really about these allegations. They’re minor and she’ll probably skate free from any consequences. But they are indicative of a much larger problem.

Politics, not the law, is what rules the roost in the County District Attorneys office these days. The rank and file of local law enforcement agencies have come out solidly against the incumbent. The rank and file of the downtown set have come out in favor of Bonnie Dumanis. 

Here’s a comment posted recently by ex-prosecutor Dave Stutz:

Within 3 hours of making a call to Sycuan to ask about a $25,000 contribution to “Kolender for Sheriff”‘, which would be illegal, I was called into her office and told to stop the investigation. No one knew about my call expect Sycuan and myself. Either Kolender or Sycuan called her and she stopped an investigation without knowing what is was about nor did she ask. For the next year Dumanis was led by a leash by Kolender endorsing right wing candidates on a “law and order” ticket. She has been in their bag since day one.

Terri Wyatt, a 27-year DA's office veteran, began too late and doesn't have the resources to win this time around. If Dumanis ekes out 50% plus one in June, Wyatt is well positioned to run in four years.

Bob Brewer's time is now. He's matched Bonnie in fundraising, obtained major law enforcement organizations and has done well in framing Dumanis as too political to be an effective DA.  In addition, Brewer is benefitting from Dumanis' own missteps.  He's positioned himself as the anti-Dumanis and it's working.

It would be a major upset, but why not?  Let's jump on the Brewer Bandwagon!

 

Fifth District County Supervisor

See http://voiceofsandiego.org/2014/05/21/jim-wood-the-populist-candidate-with-some-people-problems, then you decide for yourself.

Second District San Diego City Council

When Kevin Faulconer won the special election for San Diego's mayor this year, he left behind an open seat in District 2.  Although Councilwoman Lorie Zapf represents District 6, redistricting moved her Bay Ho home to District 2.  She's now running for election in District 2.

Lorie received her Master's Degree in Marketing Communications from the University of Denver.  She and her husband started a business making an all-natural energy bar that was sold in grocery, health food and sporting goods stores across the United States and Canada.  The Zapf's later moved to San Diego.

Lorie successfully ran for City Council in 2010 on a fairly typical Republican platform of "running government like a business" and improving public safety.

Sarah Boot is a former federal prosecutor, an occupation rarely associated with Democrats. She led investigations to dismantle cross-border drug trafficking organizations and has prosecuted drug dealers, bank robbers and criminals who sell young children for sex on the streets of San Diego, according to her website.

Before her job with the U.S. Attorney's Office, Sarah worked in a private practice representing local technology companies, internet companies and non-profits, as well as litigation involving contract and employment disputes, intellectual property and land use.

Boot is running on issues familiar to those in the 2nd District, including neighborhood services, neglected infrastructure, height limits on development and crime.

Zapf is trashing Boot with several hundred thousand dollars from all of the usual Republican suspects. If there is a message between the hit pieces, it's extolling the virtues of increased budget revenues, alleged pension savings, managed competition and other DeMaio-like issues.

Kevin Faulconer could get away with talking about right-wing issues because, gee wiz, he seemed like a nice guy. Zapf doesn't have that luxury.

The outcome of this race will be interesting. Boot is focusing on neighborhood issues, which plays well.  Zapf is talking about what a great job she did on the Council.

It's Zapf's money and the thrashing Boot is taking in the mail that is worrisome for the Democrat, especially with a low voter turnout. Remember, Republican voters generally turn out in higher percentages than Democrats.

Given the circumstances, if Sarah has a good ground operation, she could make it. If not, Zapf and her money come out on top.

I don't see Jim Morrison or Mark Schwartz taking enough votes to force a runoff.

This race breaks along partisan political lines, so if you are a partisan, you know for whom you'll vote.  If you're not partisan, what are you doing voting in a June primary election?

Sixth District San Diego City Council

Republican Chris Cate, a longtime lobbyist with the San Diego County Taxpayers Association and the organization's Vice President, stands for whatever the local business establishment wants him to, including loosening environmental regulations and repealing the linkage fee on commercial development for affordable housing.

Cate has raised more than $100,000 in 2013 from developers, Cox Communications, lobbyists with California Strategies and, most importantly, San Diego's Republican Party.

He'll get as much money as he needs from the Lincoln Club.

Democrat Carol Kim lags behind Cate in fundraising, with a large chunk of cash coming from the county's Democratic Party.  

Former Republican School Board member Mitz Lee is running as an independent or No Party Preference (NPP) candidate.  There are two other candidates in the race, De Quang Le and Keith Wong.

This race comes down to whether Cate can outpoll Kim on Tuesday or whether Lee and others can pull enough votes from Cate to prevent him from winning the election outright, so Kim can take him on in the fall.

San Diego Elections Charter Amendment, Measure A

Brought to you from the Registrar of Voters Sample Ballot

Measure A would alter the city charter to make its election process more compatible with state law. It would also give the city elections office more time to mail out ballots, count ballots and certify election results.

Measure A would improve the elections process in the city in two important ways:

• It would protect the voting rights of military voters and other overseas voters by allowing more time for ballots to be mailed out and for the counting and certification of submitted ballots

• It would make the elections process compatible with the process mandated by state law.

There is no known opposition to Proposition A.

San Diego Measures B & C

The Barrio Logan Community Plan Update was approved by the San Diego City Council in 2013.  However, the maritime industry, business groups and then-Mayoral candidate Kevin Faulconer opposed the plan. They launched a petition drive, collected enough signatures and now voters will decide on June 3 if the plan moves forward or not.

The heart of the matter is a five-block-long commercial buffer zone that separates residential and industrial zones. The plan allows "community and neighborhood commercial uses'' in the buffer area, but no houses.

Supporters of Props B and C say the Barrio Logan plan is a change that's long overdue. They say the plan will ease health risks for Barrio Logan residents who live near shipbuilding facilities.

Opponents of the plan update say the council's actions would hurt the nearby shipbuilding industry. Ballot language backed by five retired Navy rear admirals calls the plan "a dangerous first step toward elimination of San Diego's shipyards."

All San Diego residents, whether they live in Barrio Logan or not, can cast votes on the issue. Mayor Kevin Faulconer (I will never get used to saying or writing those three words in that order) has since reversed his campaign position and is supporting the community plan.

If I were running the campaign for B & C, I would send mail to Del Mar Heights, Fairbanks Ranch Country Club, Kensington-Talmadge, La Jolla, Point Loma, Rancho Bernardo, Rancho Peñasquitos, Sabre Springs, Torrey Pines and other nice neighborhoods and ask whether they would like it if folks from the Barrio had input on their community plans.

In fact, I'll ask that the answer to the abovementioned question determine which way you vote.

Remember to vote Tuesday; it's one of the most important responsibilities of being a U.S. citizen. 


That's it for June. Email me with any questions or comment below.