1st SD Mailbox: A Hit Piece on Carlos

A quiet day at Stately Leyes Manor, with only one piece of mail arriving in the mailbox. Although faithful readers may have to go Cold Turkey withdrawal after today, my mailman, for one, will be grateful.

The mailer arriving today is a 8.5x11 card from the "Orange County Healthcare, Education and Neighborhood Leaders' PAC" (BTW, points for correct punctuation). It makes an accusation that First District Supervisorial Candidate Carlos Bustamante "gave $6 Million" to "a Wealthy Car Dealer." It goes on to say that Carlos is "Bad for California," adding "And He's Bad for Orange County" seemingly as an afterthought.

Maybe they cut-and-pasted from another hit-piece in another race, but the "Bad for California" line is completly non-sequitor. My suspicion is that this is a last-minute effort from Janet Nguyen supporters as a means of pulling some final votes away from Carlos (though not necessarily to her). This is the same PAC that earlier (re)produced an anti-Carlos mailer to Republicans.

Although not nearly as unfocused and unclear as the earlier "hit," this mailer suffers from what many attack pieces share - an attempt to use a complicated issue against someone by first explaining the circumstances, then explaining why the vote was bad. Although this is not as bad as some, the piece presents a muddled issue that has been completely absent from the debate so far (except in comments by Art Pedroza on this Blog).

The mailer tries to frame an issue of a $6 million "Subsidy" while the city "was experiencing a $23 million deficit," labeling it as the dreaded "Corporate Welfare" that "COULD HAVE BEEN USED" for more cops. Whew! The important thing is that it uses a BLACK-AND-WHITE photo of Carlos Bustamante, so he MUST be suspicious. And no one likes " Wealthy Car Dealers", right?

So, the vigorous and rancorous mail campaign for the vacant First District Board of Supervisors seat ends, not with a bang, but a whimper...

Comments

[Thin Blue Line]

What is that cop doing? He looks like a meter maid!

[Great]

This is a great hit piece. Mark glosses over that because it hurts his candidate of choice.

[Green Machine]

I agree...it is a good hit piece. Everybody feels like they've been hustled by a car dealer at one time or another. Associating Bustamante with a car dealer is tantamount to calling him slick/sleazy.

[You saps]

And can someone explain to me how a city can use redevelopment funds to pay cops?

Like it or not, the redevelo0pment $$ for the Santa Ana Auto Mall can't be used for any other purpose.

So this mailer is a lie. Great hit, huh?

Any idiot can make stuff up and call it a hit piece. I must have missed Green Machine gushing over the IE hits on Umberg...oh yeah, that's because they mussed up the phony he's backing. Any liar will do, as long as they tow the union line!

[The Truth Hurts!]

This is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to ethical problems for Bustamonte. After he loses tomorrow, watch how fast the GOP rich white guys drop this "Rising Star".

[Totem]

Great negative piece. The part about:

"He's bad for California"
"He's bad for Orange County"

Is this mailer trying to remind people of Cruz Bustamante?

[informant]

ADAM PROBOLSKY TO SCOTT BAUGH DROP DEAD

this is the second of 2 mailers produced by adam p. from a phoney group. this after chairman baugh's request that republican candidates refrain from attacking each other. aside from the insult to scott's leadership these 2 mailers have significant legal and ethical proplems.

1 no 24 hr. notice was provided to campaigns as required by law.
2 adam as janet n's pollster in integrally involved with both her campaign and these mailers clearly violating the law with regard to illegal coordination.
3 this pac has the same id # of a pac that adam ran which was in its prior life an ie committee funded by the lincoln club to defeat larry agran. according to financial reports there was several thousand dollars left in that acct. when adam had the committee's name changed and a different treasurer hired. how happy will the donors be to see that money they supplied helped fund an attack against a candidate they support?

This issue will linger for a long long long time.

[Re Informant]

Informant with that information so Trung Nguyen, Brian Parks and Chad Morgan should get in trouble for the same reasons.

For Not Listening to Baugh
Illegal Coordinating Viet Pac with Campaign
No 24 hour notice of the Phone hits from Leyes and Oc Tax Payers Association.

[Boo Hoo!]

This must have been an effective mailer or informant and company would not be crying about it. I'm sure Adam is soooooooooooooo afraid of Scot and the other "leadership"!

[GGMan]

All of Us did see the IE hit Carlos Bustamante from Nick LeCong and Tony Lam, who are Janet's advisers and big donors.

Janet make a huge mistake, you burn all friends and party.

[its okay for Trung]

Okay for Trungs people to do the same thing