Four short years ago – 2006 – Bill Hunt challenged Sheriff Mike Carona’s re-election. Carona was well funded and had the backing of the entire OC political establishment – including me. That was my mistake. Our mistake. We already knew there were serious leadership issues in the Sheriff’s Department, serious enough to at least stay neutral. But we didn’t.
Three challengers received 49% of the votes, just a shy of forcing a November run-off. Of those three, Lieutenant Bill Hunt received by far the most votes. Give him credit for standing up and running, for taking an underfunded campaign without endorsements and nearly making it a 2-man run-off in November.
When Carona was forced to resign, I supported another candidate (Santa Ana Police Chief Walters) who had also nearly been elected – in 1998. I give my consideration and respect to those who want a job enough to actually place their name before the voters. Of the three current Sheriff’s candidates, only Hunt has actually received any votes in an election. The three votes our current Sheriff received came from the Supervisors who appointed her. Based on her subsequent performance, it is doubtful those three votes would still be there today.
A sheriff should protect people’s liberties – not restrict them. The current appointed Sheriff has arbitrarily revoked legally issued CCW permits of law-abiding citizens who did nothing to deserve such treatment.
A sheriff must face economic facts and work with the Board of Supervisors to adjust to revenue realities – not play a game of fiscal “chicken” and budget brinksmanship.
A sheriff must instill in staff a respect for elected decision-makers – not use security cameras to spy on them. They should respect citizens’ rights to voice their opinions – not use government-issued blackberries to belittle them in public meetings.
Bill Hunt understands this. He was there for us in 2006. He’s there now, again.
Craig Hunter is trying to pass himself off as a 2nd Amendment warrior, claiming to support gun-rights legislation to open up concealed weapons permits (CCW’s) to all citizens.
But the 2nd amendment hasn’t always been that simple for Hunter. A year and half ago, he approached the Board of Supervisors and expressed “comfort” with the current system that allows the Sheriff to arbitrarily restrict permits (and thus the Constitutional right to bear arms) to any law-abiding citizen.
So what changed Hunter’s position on constitutional gun rights?
The reality is that Hunter probably doesn’t really give a rat’s about anybody’s right to bear arms. Rather, his new fondness for the 2nd amendment was born at the behest of his political puppeteer Michael Schroeder and the Carona beneficiary Greg Block when they decided to run Hunter for sheriff late last year.
Passionate gun-rights supporters, while a minority, are high-value political target. They have money, grassroots energy and they’ve been kicked around by Sandra Hutchens so badly that they suffer from “Anybody But Hutchens Syndrome”. While that sounds nice on a bumper sticker, the danger of an “anybody but…” mindset is that we could end up with… well… anybody. Including another Mike Carona.
One of the fun things about public records searches is that you can also see who is doing searches. Now that’s good, clean fun!
We found out that Matthew J. Cunningham of the formerly Red County blog did a public records search on County Clerk candidate and Republican Hugh Nguyen. He asked for Nguyen’s e-mails since the invention of the computer. Well, over two year’s worth, anyway.
Oops! That was going to be pretty expensive since the County would have to hire a contractor to collect the data and then it would have to be reviewed prior to release. The upshot was the County declined to satisfy the request. They did provide Nguyen’s 700 forms (statement of economic interest).
On the other hand a record search of available records turned up a brief and harmless discussion about Daly protegee Renee Ramirez’ very brief County Clerk campaign sent to Nguyen. Wow. Go to work and turn that into an issue, Matthew!
Now first, let’s dispense with the “why” part for the uninitiated. Cunningham claims to be a conservative Republican – he’s been chattering away just like one for years now. And yet his mentor and string puller from way back is John Lewis, a campaign consultant and lobbyist who has been working for Democrat County Clerk Tom Daly behind the scenes since 2002. Daly recently quit the 4th District Supervisors race after a series of embarrassing revelations of waste and mismanagement in his office and has scuttled back to the County Clerk’s race so he can keep wasting money left and right as he protects our vital records.
Snooping on a fellow Republican, and one backed by a good share of the County Republican establishment in order to help a Democrat with an awful fiscal record? Bad boy. Bad, bad, boy!
When I'm done with my sports hall of fame project we'll get right to work on fixing 433 Civic Center West
Cunningham has already made it a point to parrot “untrustworthy” drivel about Nguyen he picked up at the local liberal blog and comically expanded upon; and hasn’t said a peep about any of Daly’s fiscal squanderings. How’s that for conservatism and accountability?
Matt and I are of like mind...
Now for the “how” of the great e-mail hunt. Presumably Cunningham could actually pony up the dough to do opp research on a Republican. Would he?That’s a lot of cash. If he does, it will look extremely suspicious and a reasonable person would have to question the source of the cash.
To wrap up, it’s pretty obvious that the Daly/Lewis/Cunningham team are worried about Nguyen. Daly has challenged Nguyen’s ballot title and a surrogate has actually challenged Nguyen’s use of his first name. Still it’s a County-wide race and Daly has plenty of name ID over the relatively unknown Nguyen.
But maybe they’re right to be worried. Are there more Daly skeletons that are about to tumble out of the closet?
Down in Anaheim Cynthia Ward (aka Colony Rabble) has been trying to raise the profile of the California High Speed Rail (CHSR) project that will inevitably cut a swath out of neighborhoods as it makes its way to Curt Pringle’s Platinum Triangle Ghost Town.
In Fullerton (except for us) I’ve heard nary a word.
It’s pretty evident that this massive boondoggle was promoted to bamboozle the State’s electorate into floating another 10 billion dollars of indebtedness and to divert it into the pockets of huge engineering and public works contractors. Conservatives used to call this income redistribution. Now some of them call it jobs, jobs, jobs.
My good friend popular Mayor Curt Pringle has taught me this much...
It is telling that Repuglicans Curt Pringle and Harry Sidhu both back this massive waste, plus the unconscionable OCTA uber-subsidy for their ARTIC choo-choo stop, as does Anaheim’s own Precious Princess Lorri Galloway, a union puppet who can be expected to do anything necessary to promote expanded union membership.
But I digress, yet again. Damn. Sorry.
How come there has been almost no discussion about this monster project and its potential right-of-way through Fullerton? Buena Park has recently learned to its dismay that the HSR will either take out part of their station or dozens of newly built houses built as part of a TOD scheme. Does our City Council know something they’re not telling us?
No. We don't anticipate any big environemental issues.
So what is happening in Fullerton? There is only one available route from BP to Anaheim, of course, and it will have to follow the BNSF/old UP rights-of-way. What will this mean to property owners and businesses in the way? What sort of traffic disruptions will this cause over the major north-south streets over the years? Aren’t we entitled to know?
At the January NUFF forum Shawn Nelson came out against the HSR; but what of the other councilmembers? Isn’t it time for a public hearing on this topic if, indeed anybody in City Hall is serious about transparency?
Shawn? Sharon? Pam? Dick? Don? Is there something you’d like to share with us? Why not agendize this issue. Now. Let’s have at it out in the open.
And maybe this should be a campaign issue for the fall. And maybe we need somebody on the OCTA like Nelson who is not going to just go along with Pringle.
P.S. For some fun watch this CNN video that is really little more than an infomercial for HSR: what a sweet deal for the tiny percentage of California’s 40 million people who just have to get between LA and SF in a hurry (they won’t, of course).
Try not to giggle at Pringle’s performance, if you can.
The rough surface belied the literary genius lurking beneath...
How else can I explain the weird post put up on the Mauve County blog by a guy called Thomas Anthony Gordon accusing me of “voter intimidation?”
You see I busted Gordo last week for being the guy who was circulating last minute petitions for Harry Sidhu’s carpetbagging effort to get himself elected to the GOP Central Committee for yet another district (69th AD) that he doesn’t live in. Sean Mill over at the OJ Blog has also done a post on the comical doings of Gordo.
Gordon responded by claiming that my publishing the petition forms was a species of intimidation. Imagine that! Sharing a public document – with the public! The horror! Does Gordon really think these worthy folks might be ashamed at promoting the circus carnie campaigns of Hide and Seek Sidhu?
My loyal troops will follow me almost anywhere if the price is right...
And could it really be that the charming Gordon is really just ashamed at being found out to be the lackey of the perjurer Sidhu? Well, that would presuppose a sense of shame, as Joe Sipowicz would say.
Still he didn’t really believe anybody was going to swallow that load, did he?
If somebody were teaching a class of young bureaucrats and politicians on the art of how to really screw something up and get a way with it, he might very well use the County of Orange’s acquisition of the building at 433 Civic Center West as textbook material.
Maybe we can...aw, Hell, tear it down.
As we have detailed here, the building was purchased at the beginning of 2008 for $2.1 million by the Board of Supervisors, at the behest of County Clerk, Tom Daly. The ostensible purpose was to accommodate the overflow of paper in the County’s archives, of which Daly is chief custodian.
The job requires no qualifications except getting the most votes.
Somehow, almost inexplicably, the County staff in the then RDMD building and real estate sections claimed to have checked out the building and found it acceptable; the County CEO Tom Mauk recommended to the Supervisors an “as-is” purchase, another inexplicable decision. As later events revealed, the County staff’s involvement in this acquisition was utterly disastrous and placed the Board in what has become an acutely embarrassing situation.
So why did the so-called professionals make the determinations they did? There aren’t a lot of choices. They were either lobbied by Daly; or they simply did what they thought Daly wanted them to do; or they are completely incompetent and should be immediately terminated for gross negligence.
Who did what, now?What? Why? How?Good thing the Ackermans never found out.
I also note that the Board of Supervisors are endowed with ample budgets to employ able and competent staff. So what happened to these all these gifted people? Chris Norby, John Moorlach, and Janet Nguyen each voted for this. Where were their personal staff members? Was there not one competent person among all these well-paid supervisorial aides who could have raised a red-flag? How come not one of the Supervisor’s aides walked a couple hundred yards to examine a decrepit building that staff was recommending purchase, as-is? And why didn’t an “as-is” purchase raise a serious red flag to the Supervisors themselves, all three of whom purport themselves to be fiscal conservatives? Would any three of these folks buy property with their own money “as-is?”
And how come none of these same Supervisors argued for an examination of alternatives to acquiring real estate to house the paper overflow?
Or was “rubber stamping” simply the modus vivendi of these Superviors and their direct employees? I think we have to assume that the same narrow possibilities that apply to the bureaucrats above, also apply to the Supervisors and their personal staffs.
Sometime in 2009 the County hired Kishimoto Architects to do a space and physical assessment of 433 Civic Center West. We can only speculate at this point what caused this to occur, but since a competent assessment of a property normally occurs before and not after a property is purchased, I really have to wonder. But the building was acquired “as-is.”
Kishimoto’s assessment was grim. The building failed to meet the County Clerk’s space needs; and it was deficient or obsolete in every conceivable way and can’t be used by the public. It will cost additional millions to make it work; but the original investment appears to be a dead loss, given the scope and cost to fix the building.
Off we go, into the Wild Blue Yonder...
And here’s the rub, accountability-wise. So many people have their fingerprints all over this disaster that it becomes virtually impossible to pin effective culpability on anybody, and hence, accountability. Tom Daly is the prime architect of this fiasco, to be sure; but as his adherents are quick to point out, staff recommended this and the Board approved it.
I didn't do it...
So Daly can shrug and point to the incompetent staff. Staff is always protected as the poor, under-compensated civil servants that they are; and after all they were just following direction, they’ll say. Plus, the lax overseer of the RDMD has slinked off to retirement with a massive, inflation-linked pension.
Bryan Speegle. The door didn't hit him on the way out.
The Supervisors’ aides can shrug it off, too. Daly wanted it, not us; plus, our crack County staff said everything was hunky dory. And besides we were out at the Chamber of Commerce breakfast schmoozing with the locals.
It was Norby's fault. That's why I'm putting all these new people in his office.
And what of the Supervisors themselves, who are responsible to nobody but the voters, and who have so signally failed them? Norby has already moved on, and Moorlach faces no opposition for re-election this fall. Janet Nguyen is the only one who is going to have to answer to the electorate on this issue. She’d better.
Every now and then word filters back to us about some zany corn pone antics by our own beloved municipal treasure, Dick Jones, at the County Vector Control District meetings. See, Jones is supposed to be representing us in this agency whose mission to do battle with the evil forces of rats, ants, and mosquitoes.
Our sources inform us that at the last meeting’s closed session that was addressing the future of the arrogant General Manger, Gerard Goedhart, Jones just lost it, stood up, declared that he was quitting, and left the room. Fellow boardmembers were nonplussed, to say the least.
Good grief. Just last year this same nincompoop popped his cork at a meeting.
Now, apparently, he just quit. He’s still got 21 months to go in his “term” on the Board.
Maybe it’s all for the best. And maybe Jones is actually onto something. If he can’t handle the annoyance without petulant outbursts, he should go. And he really ought to think about resigning from the City Council while he’s at it.
I knew it wouldn’t be long before Matthew J. Cunningham started glossing over the fact that his boy Harry Sidhu committed perjury twice when he falsified voter registration documents. After all, his boss John Lewis is now one of the piglets sucking the mama sow dry.
The one on the left...
It didn’t take very long.
He’s up to his old tricks again: diversion, obfuscation, and trying to change the subject. First he says Tony Bushala is Shawn Nelson’s neighbor. Irrelevant to anything, and of course not even true. But let’s not let facts get in the way of defending the indefensible. His point, perfectly predictable coming from this self-appointed paragon of morality, is that the whole thing is only political, as if Sidhu’s signature on an official document means, you know, nothing.
The registration was so brief that it doesn't count. Sidhu gets a re-do.
Apparently, the concept of perjury is a really flexible concept for Cunningham who seems willing to concede that his boy never lived at the beautiful Calabria Apartments. It was only a “brief registration,” you see. Brief registration? Damn, it was only 30 days! But what’s that got to do with anything? The registration was never aligned with any residency. It was a fraud. An outright lie. But are we to accept that the concept of the truth only kicks in when it’s convenient for Sidhu?
Well, good luck selling that bullshit to anybody smarter than Brett Barbre.
My word is my bond. Trust me.
A second post addresses the breathtaking revelation that Bushala’s investigation into the Sidhu scam was conducted by Sheriff candidate Bill Hunt. Wow, now there’s a great discovery, Columbus. Bushala put the guy’s letterhead in his post! Another example of Cunningham dodge ball, having zero to do with the fact that his boy Sidhu falsified public documents. Of course Cunningham proceeds to insinuate that something fishy is going on because one of our bloggers at FFFF has been posting positive stuff for Hunt’s Sheriff campaign.
Um, Chip, I think I have something I need to tell you...
Say what? Influence peddling, and profiting from same, is Cunningham’s line of work, not ours. Nothing to disclose here. I’m not even voting for Hunt.
Pathetic. Sorrowful. Deceitful. Hypocritical. Did I say shameful. No. That would imply a sense of shame.
It looks as if Mr. Cunningham has really decided to plumb the depths of irrelevance and hypocrisy. Let’s wait and count the hours until Cunningham spits out one of his patented “the guy’s not to be trusted” posts against someone who is running against a John Lewis candidate.
Well its a free country. And pretty soon for him, it’s going to be a really lonely one.
Fans of Bill Hunt for Sheriff are invited to participate in Operation Overpass on Friday afternoon from 3:30 to 6:00 pm. Freeway overpasses all across Orange County will swarm with supporters holding up signs for Bill Hunt during rush hour. The Friends at FFFF have chosen the overpass of the 57 freeway at Yorba Linda Blvd to show our support.
Park in the Target parking lot on Yorba Linda Boulevard and head up the sidewalk to the overpass. We will have signs ready to go.
And while we’re talking about Bill Hunt, here is a new video that describes Hunt’s challenge to the Sheriff-turned-convicted-felon Michael Carona in 2006.
2nd District County Supervisor and former County Treasure, John Moorlach, has endorsed Shawn Nelson’s campaign for 4th District Supervisor. Here’s the press release:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: Dave Gilliard
March 18, 2010
(916) 626-6804
Orange County Supervisor John Moorlach
Endorses Shawn Nelson for Supervisor
FULERTON, CA — The Shawn Nelson for Supervisor campaign announced today that Orange County Supervisor John Moorlach has endorsed Shawn Nelson in the 4th district.
“Shawn Nelson is a proven watchdog for taxpayers in Fullerton. I am confident he will be a tremendous asset to the Board of Supervisors as we continue to lead the state in our fiscal pursuits, including downsizing, balanced budgets and public employee pension reform. Shawn will bring the financial acumen needed to deal with the annually increasing pension costs that Orange County is facing,” said Supervisor Moorlach.
Nelson now enjoys the support of two prominent Supervisors, Pat Bates and John Moorlach, as well as former Supervisor and current Assemblyman Chris Norby. In addition, Nelson is endorsed by U.S. Representative Ed Royce and the Lincoln Club of Orange County.
Shawn Nelson is a Fullerton City Councilman and the leading candidate for Supervisor in the 4th district, which is currently open due to the election of Chris Norby to the Assembly.
# # #
Nelson for Supervisor 2010 • FPPC ID# 1316599
