Dirty DeMaio

San Diego needs real leadership - not more mismanagement and dirty politics. We need leaders who look beyond their own personal gain and work for all San Diegans.

What we don’t need is more dirty politicians – but that’s exactly what we would get with Carl DeMaio.

When DeMaio showed up at City Hall in 2002, nobody knew what was behind his buzzword-driven proposals for “cleaning up City Hall.” It turns out that it’s DeMaio’s own record that needs cleaning up. The truth is, Carl DeMaio is just one more dirty politician. And his record proves it:

DeMaio claims to be a fiscal watchdog. In fact, he can't even balance his own books and has regularly violated tax laws.

DeMaio says he’s running to represent fellow San Diegans. In fact, he recently said in a sworn affidavit that he is a resident of Arlington, Virginia.

DeMaio has criticized City Hall corruption and special interests. In fact, he is a lobbyist and consultant who represents corporations and special interests.

See for yourself. Get the facts on DeMaio's dirty record and help clean it up. Go to DirtyDeMaio.com.

This message was paid for by the thousands of firefighters, nurses, teachers and other workers of the San Diego Labor Council.

Wednesday - Quick Hits

Pot selling pastor given pardon by president. UT

Art Madrid saga in La Mesa continues. City manager hires investigated to look into police action on the night of the incident. UT

County moves closer to new libraries in Fallbrook, Ramona, and Alpine. UT

County looking at creating a fire warden position. UT

Riverside county board of supervisors approve affordable housing plan. UT

County home prices in practical free-fall. NCTimes VOSD

Tuesday - Quick Hits

Street Scene set to return to the downtown streets that give it its birth back in 1983. UT

Not a good sign, Agurrie falls short on fundraising. Has only raised $7400 between Jan 1 and Mar 17. UT

Council approves mini-dorm ordinance. UT

Scripps Research Institute plans first new medical school in U.S. in 40 years. UT

City council committee pushes forward with recommendation to hire 17 more auditors. UT

Marti Emerald raises more money than April Boling in D7, Steve Whitburn barely out raises Todd Gloria in D3. UT

Steve Francis is outspending Jerry Sanders 4 to 1 in mayoral race. UT

President of Vista Unified School Board to run for Oceanside city council. UT

Monday - Quick Hits

UCSD is planning on building another biomedical research building on campus. UT

Housing crisis continues. County homes sales drop 17.9% compared to same time last year. UT

Wow, the D.A. discovers that juries tend to be overwhelmingly white. UT

Another example of failure of modern conservatism as a governing philosophy. Report states city needs an audit staff five times its size to adequately do its job. UT VOSD

I'm shocked! Bill Horn is doing the right thing? Supervisor Horn taking on role to preserve Rancho Guejito from development. NCTimes

Challenger to Susan Davis?

As the CDP’s Pre-Primary Endorsement Process winds its way to conclusion in San Jose, it appears that a democratic challenger has emerged to take on Susan Davis. Mike Copass garnered enough delegate votes to pull Davis from the consent calendar.

This is the first time I have ever heard of a sitting Congressperson being pulled from consideration locally. It’s not a secret that Davis isn’t exactly loved in San Diego. But the fact that someone from out of nowhere was able to get enough support to do this is worthy of note.

Hope Jim Cramer Has a Defined Benefit Plan

A video of Jim Cramer from CNBC's Mad Money has been making the rounds on the Internet following the historic collapse of Bear Stearns.

A lot of people are now vilifying Cramer for his bad (understatement) advice, but it isn't really fair to pick out one mistake and project it to everything the man has done. Especially in light of claims now being investigated by the SEC.

Today, the LA Times reported that the SEC is looking into claims that traders who benefited from the collapse intentionally spread rumors to cause market panic.

I know this isn't a blog for financial advice, but I think this is a perfect reason why all Americans should strive for a defined benefit plan for retirement.

The bigger issue is that people like Cramer are on television every day making the financial world look easy. People who promote defined contribution retirement plans point out that over time the stock market comes out ahead.

Of course someone in their late 50s who was heavily invested in the fifth-largest securities firm in the country would probably disagree with those claims after the Bear Stearns fiasco.

It is easy to tell everyone who lost large chunks of their retirement that they should have been smarter. But, how can you expect people to make informed decisions when even so-called experts such as Cramer struggle?

It is insane that more and more employees are being pushed toward a retirement system that punishes those who make the wrong decision based on the best information they have available to them.

"It's a paradigm shifting election." An interview with Nick Leibham

I shared breakfast with Nick Leibham last week and discussed where he stands on a number of issues. I mostly just lobbed topics and let him talk; this is the relevant transcript edited to be a remotely reasonable length and minus fun stuff like us chatting with the waitress and our occasional divergence into non-relevant shop talk. Some parts I liked, some parts less so. But here it is. Note this is a contested primary.

Iraq

Each and every day we remain in Iraq we're compromising our national security further. It's a blood feud that goes back 1400 years between the Sunnis and Shiites. American military forces are not going to be able to sort this out for them and at the end of the day they've got to want peace; they've got to want their own stable form of government; they've got to want democracy more than the American Marine Corps wants it for them

The longer that we're there, the more strain it puts on our own men and women in uniform. They're going out on third, fourth, fifth tours of duty, and you read about it all the time of course because we're just miles away from Camp Pendleton

We need to come out and we need to set a date certain for when we are going to redeploy out of Iraq.

Military and Security

There’s one...threshold question that needs to be answered whenever even the thought of American military use is involved, and that is 'Is it in the interests of the United States of America; Is it in the national security interest?' Obviously the United States military has a role to play in ferreting out al Qaeda, in ferreting out terrorist organizations, in...making sure that our own interests abroad are taken care of.

But the United States military has no business in trying to create whole cloth [or] molding different societies. It's kind of antithetical- democracy can't be imposed at gunpoint.

They’ve got to figure it out for themselves. It can't be the United States government doing it for them.

Immigration

The most fundamental job of a nation is to protect its sovereignty, and when you can't secure your borders and ports you can't protect your sovereignty...As a nation we need to recognize that we are going to have to put a significant amount of money, time and effort into suring up our southern border.

As a former prosecutor...if you really want to dry up illegal immigration, you hold employers accountable, and I’ll be the only one up on stage that has ever prosecuted an employer for hiring illegal immigrants. After that's done, you get to other questions.

Health Care and SCHIP

We should be providing health care to kids and Brian Bilbray has staked out a position of essentially rabid ideology at the expense of some 10 million American kids...I think that it's a disgrace that he decided to stand on ideology and stand with the President as opposed to providing these kids with proper medical care. I think it's just very mean-spirited and worse, it's bad public policy.

My endpoint [on health care] is that every family should be able to see a family doctor of their choosing. The way in which we get there I think is going to be a battle royale come January 2009. And what is being pitched today out on the campaign trail- there isn't going to be even a shade of resemblance once this thing actually gets done.

There is a little bit of overlap between Democrats and Republicans on a few issues. One, I think all parties agree that you're going to have to see rapid and massive adoption of information technology and digital patient files. That will cut down on everything from medical errors to back office expense. And the estimates on what that would shave off- I've seen 10-12% of the total healthcare dollars. Secondly, another overlapping area is preventative care. There are certain areas of medicine where this makes a lot of sense. This makes a lot of sense in the area of inoculations...it makes a lot of sense as it concerns preventative screening for certain diseases. From a cost benefit analysis and a quality of years lived analysis.

You've got to have a very serious debate on how else you get there. we're the only westernized country in the world that tells the pres drug companies that they can charge anything they want and it doesn't matter...I think that's something that needs to be addressed.

What that final product is going to look like, I’m not exactly sure. But I know that...we need to look at that end goal...and say let's try to get there.

FISA

we spoke briefly about the general nature of modern privacy before FISA

What's much MUCH more disconcerting to me is the entire FISA bill...As somebody who has been a prosecutor and dealt with the 4th Amendment, I can tell you that this happened to have been the one amendment in the Bill of Rights that all the Founding Fathers could agree upon; that in order for the government intrusion there had to be probable cause signed off on by an independent magistrate that says you may have committed a crime. I find the entire FISA process to be constitutionally dubious. That doesn't mean that it couldn't be made constitutionally valid but I think that anytime you have wiretaps involved...that deals with an American citizen, you've gotta have a court sign off on it. The only question in my mind is whether or not that has to be done prior to there warrant being executed or whether or not there is some grace period. There is no doubt in my mind that the executive branch itself cannot act as both overseer and executioner (of warrants or wiretaps). That, I think, is constitutionally impermissible; I think it's a violation of the judiciary's proper role of interpreting laws.

As a former prosecutor [and] law clerk in the US Attorney's office in the Major Frauds and Economic Crimes section...I've never heard of anybody being given immunity when you don't know what they've done. It's not how the immunity process works. You don't say to somebody 'Whatever you've done, don't worry about it.'...It's unthinkable to me as a lawyer and as somebody who will have...sworn to uphold the Constitution that I could ever support that.

California Emissions and the Environment

I’m not a scientist, but from what I have read...the EPA seems to have made their decision to deny California its waiver based on faith based science. That’s not good enough. If it's warranted by the facts and the evidence, it should be granted. During the next administration, if it's a Democrat, I think we'll get a fair hearing. And if we don't, that's ripe for congressional action to clarify the rule. Because it's the congress that makes the laws, the executive branch simply carries out those laws.

The debate on the science (of global warming) is over. There is no doubt in any serious scientist's mind that global warming is happening. There is virtually no doubt that mankind is directly causing global warming. The only question at this point is 'What is the causal relationship and what are the consequences going forward?'

The role of government as it concerns energy and the environment I think is going to be crucial in the next 5, 10, 20 years. One of the things I very much hope to work on as a member of Congress...is pursuing and advocating for alternative energy in the areas of wind, solar, some biomass, hydrogen. And the role of the government here is to set high standards, it's to help foster innovation- especially in the very early stages of research and development- and then I think it's to turn it over to the market who does a great job of packaging this up...and if people can make a...fortune doing it, great. It makes good public policy, it's good politics, I think it's a good way to return some manufacturing to...the Americas.

It's also an issue of national security. We send hundreds of billions of dollars each year to...Middle Eastern regimes many of them hostile to our interests. We know...that some of that money ends up with Hezbollah; that it ends up with Hamas; some of it filters down and ends up with al Qaeda. We're funding both sides of the war in this particular time.

Then there is the great moral calling of our time which is addressing the global warming problem itself...There is no doubt that our kids will bear the full brunt of this, and we need to figure out now a way to mitigate it because to do anything other than that is nothing short of...long-term child abuse.

Economy

Two prime reasons (for the current economic situation). One, it has been fiscal insanity on the part of the Bush administration...We see that in everything from the weakness of the dollar which hits you...at the pump and in the grocery aisle, to being able to sure up many of those social programs which we know have a pending disaster: Medicare, Social Security, our infrastructure, etc. Secondly, the war. You cannot talk about anything else in this campaign until you address the war.

We are spending- the estimates are- $10-12 billion a month. We have direct outlays to Iraq...upwards and including $500 billion. For one single solitary day of war making in Iraq, we could have sent 160,000 low-income students to college for a year. For 3 1/2 months of war in Iraq we could have provided healthcare coverage to those 10 million...American kids for 5 years under SCHIP. Until we end that, again, we are committing long term fiscal child abuse. Because we're not paying for it...we're borrowing money from...foreign creditors to finance this thing. It's completely and totally irresponsible and it must end.

There’s some middle class tax cuts that...we should retain. We should retain the 15% capital gains rate as opposed to seeing it revert back to 20%. More than 50 million Americans at this point have 401Ks; hat benefits them greatly. We need to once and for all end the AMT. These last couple years it has snagged a whole cross section of our population that it was never meant to hit, and the doubling of the child tax credit is a positive thing. It's a positive thing for San Diego families and San Diego parents. Of course, the recklessness as it concerns the Bush giveaways in terms of the top 1%- no. That's fiscal insanity and I will be a voice to end it.

Most interesting for me was an interlude about halfway through the interview where we lapsed into discussing this year's election in an historical context:

We win this fight because their platform is old and it's worn out...The Reagan Revolution...which started really in 1964 with Goldwater's defeat...it culminated in 1980 and 1994 and the end of the Bush years are a bookend. It's tired, it's played out, and it no longer offers up a positive agenda for America. This isn't just a change election in the sense of Democrats or Republicans. This is a paradigm shifting election and Democrats can capture that...they've got a lot of work to do but we can capture it and I think the pendulum is swinging our way.

Cross posted from Calitics

Monday - Quick Hits

Sanders names two to stadium advisory board. UT


Mexican officials belive they have arrested a top member of the Arellano drug cartel. UT


Seven local students honored as some of the state's top scholars by the governor. UT


After first week, Sprinter rail service getting positive reviews. UT

School District Budget Slashing A Harbinger For Future Of Public Services

Since the Office of the Governor began spouting off bleak projections of California's state budget shortfall, currently estimated at $16 billion, trustees who preside over regional school boards in San Diego County have scrambled to deal with their consequential district deficits.

The analysis and subsequent action that each school board has chosen to take have been unique and telling of their commitment to the lives of workers and the students they serve. Members and staff of SEIU Local 221 have aggressively lobbied the trustees of each school board within our jurisdiction, including Fallbrook Union High School District (FUHSD), Grossmont Union High School District (GUHSD), Poway Unified School District (PUSD), and the San Diego Community College District (SDCCD).

While the school boards governing FUHSD, SDCCD, and PUSD have employed a collaborative and transparent process in approaching their budget shortfalls, others have been less demonstrative of their commitment to equalize these imminent budget cuts. For example, the FUHSD voted unanimously to forego their stipend and health benefit expenses during the next few lean years in an effort to soften the brunt of cuts to classified and certificated employees. The SDCCD and PUSD have consistently engaged in good-faith discourse with our members, choosing to address their financial woes humanely and responsibly.

As examples of rational, non-political, and compassionate school boards continue to make headlines with their creative proposals about how to humanely address the largest cut to public education in California's history, it is our hope that our Board of Supervisors will emulate the exemplary governing bodies above when dealing with the County's budget shortfall.

Gore Vidal to Attend Peace Rally and March

Legendary essayist and author Gore Vidal will be in San Diego tomorrow to attend Peace rally marking the 5th anniversary of the disaster was in Iraq. Theme of the rally "Costs of The War" which has now surpassed a half a trillion dollars and nearly 4000 American servicemembers deaths.

The event is being sponsored by the San Diego Coalition for Peace and Justice. The first rally is scheduled for noon at Fairmount and University avenues in City Heights. [Map] At 1 p.m., protesters will march to Teralta Park, 40th Street at Orange Avenue [Map], where the second rally will go from 2 to 3:30 p.m.

Friday - Quick Hits

Crime and wildfires top concerns for city voters. UT

Registrar of Voters overcharged some cities and districts by almost $500,000 during the 2006 election cycle. UT

Housing crisis continues, San Diego County home prices are off by 20% from peak in 2005. UT

Oceanside still desperately trying to shake its image as a military town, is planning $1 billion worth of downtown projects. UT NCTimes

Tribal leaders discuss impact of planned casino hotel in Valley Center. UT

Thursday - Quick Hits

State Senator Ducheny has gone off the rials by proposing a bill that would strip the Coastal Commission of its ability to self-initiate appeals. NCTimes

City finances are getting a hard look by candidate. But is it a serious look. UT

Community of Potero trying to move past the Blackwater saga. UT

Another candidate jumps into the Acle held school board seat race. UT

D.A. will not investigate Art Madrid incident. UT

Residents taking the initiative to have their older neighborhoods designated historical districts to prevent misguided infill development. UT

Increase in home foreclosures are having a serious impact on housing market. UT

Healthcare Workers Respond

In a previous post regarding Sal Roselli as a hypocrite here is a response from healthcare workers to that post :

The response from SEIU-UHW, posted on their website [Link] shows there is a real debate.[Link]

In particular, long term care members of UHW's Executive Board responded that Tyrone Freeman of 6434 has "repeatedly refused to participate in developing a coordinated bargaining plan for the dozens of facilities operated by national and regional chains where both UHW and your local represent nursing home workers." [Link]

UHW's Convalescent Division Director John Vellardita's response to Freeman claims ongoing efforts and calls to coordinate bargaining with 6434. [Link]

These are real healthcare workers in a real debate.

There will be future posts regrading this debate as it continues.

Democrats Have Their Say Last Night

Last night's Democratic Party Central Committee turned out to be the contentious meeting that many were expecting. The big item on the agenda of course was the endorsement for city attorney. As reported elsewhere, incumbent City Attorney Mike Aguirre failed to receive the endorsement from the party last night. Besides Mike Aguirre, both Scott Peters and Amy Lepine were in attendance to seek the party's endorsement too. The process quickly boiled down to the Aguirre v. Peters match that everyone had expected it to be.

During the candidate discussion period Aguirre continued to play the role of martyr. That he was the victim of backroom deals being orchestrated between corrupt politicians, labor bosses and the downtown establishment. For many of the central committee members, Aguirre's manichean view of city politics played to their sympathies. Agurrie also took several jabs at Peters, arguing that he was responsible for the financial mess in the city.

Scott Peters, on the other hand touted his Democratic bona fides that fell on a deaf ear for many of members in the audience. Peters additionally argued that unlike Aguirre, he has demonstrated an ability to work with others council in his role as president of the city council. It was painfully obvious that the central committee was divided Aguirre and Peters with Aguirre having more supporters there that Peters. After two votes Aguirre fell 1% short of the 60% required for the party endorsement.

Aguirre has now twice failed in the last 6 months to capture the party endorsement. It appears that he wasn't able to enlarge his majority on the central committee enough for him to break the 60% threshold. If he ends up making the runoff for the November election, he can once again go before the central committee in July to try to get the "hat trick" in no endorsement from the party.

Correction: In a post the other day I made mention that the Democratic Party in 2004 had endorsed Kathryn Burton over Scott Peters in 2004. The information I received was wrong from a central committee member was incorrect. Scott Peters and Kathryn Burton were co-endorsed by the party.

Wednesday - Quick Hits

Just as long as it is not a Wal-Mart. Developer proposes a 5-story vertical big box development on the edge of downtown. UT

Metropolitan Water District voted to raise water rates by 14.3 percent. UT

County had no voice in the regional meeting during the wildfires to allocation of resources. UT

City attorney candidates lock horns at debate. UT VOSD

Valley Center planning group has say on proposed casino hotel, now public will have their say. UT

City of Vista rolls over and approves expansion of Wal-Mart into a Supercenter. UT NCTimes

Union workers rally in Riverside County administration complex for temp workers to be allowed to organize. UT

Tuesday - Quick Hits

City Council approves updated blueprint for future growth, but tells poor people there is no place for you here in San Diego. UT

City to appoint "relocation experts" in order to properly compensate De Anza Cove residents. UT

Poll says that Aguirre would lead all candidates in June primary, but would lose in general elections. UT

Cal State San Marcos students and staff unite to fight budget cuts. UT

Growth management initiative petition turned in San Marcos for June ballot. UT NCTimes

Preview: Aguirre vs. Peters

Tuesday evening the Democratic Central Committee will be meeting to discuss endorsements for the upcoming races in June. The big item on the agenda will be the endorsement in the San Diego City Attorney's race. Last November incumbent City Attorney Mike Aguirre came up two votes short of the 60% threshold in order to receive the early incumbent endorsement. Since then council president Scott Peters has joined the race for city attorney and will also be seeking the party endorsement. It should also be noted that when Scott Peters ran for re-election back in 2004, he didn't win the early incumbent then, instead is went to Kathryn Burton. If the November central committee meeting was any indication, Tuesday night's meeting stands to be quite contentious.

DeMaio Musings

I spend a lot of time in District 5, and recently discussed the topic of Carl DeMaio with friends and family in the Carmel Mountain Ranch/Rancho Bernardo area.

The discussion is often pretty short, with friends being able to tell me he’s going to fix San Diego’s finances followed by silence. No one can answer how DeMaio, as just one of eight votes on the City Council, is going to be able to do this. No one can tell me his plan for solving all our problems. Just that DeMaio can fix everything, as if he were magic.

The fact is that to this point DeMaio has been somewhat of a one-trick pony insisting that the solution to solving all of San Diego’s fiscal problems is by selling-off city services one-by-one. Good luck telling parents in D5 that their children can’t visit their branch library because it closed early or their child’s Little League games at Community Park or Highland Ranch Park are canceled due to poor conditions, all because the contractor has profits as higher priority than service.

Having grown up in the heart of District 5, living there until I was 25, I know there will be questions about what are DeMaio’s plans after he “fixes” city finances. This is where I think he will struggle due to the area’s ultra-conservative values.

I remember debates in my high school civics class where the majority of the class would argue, passionately, that the widow of a fallen soldier should not receive any government assistance since she was “foolish” to marry and have children if she couldn’t have been able to afford life without her husband. My senior year a fellow progressive-minded student and I searched for a teacher who would brave the stigma from ultra-conservative parents and sponsor a campus Future Democrats Club (we found a closeted gay teacher, but with just two members in a school with 2,800 students we couldn’t sustain a full club).

So I can’t help but think that, as sad as it may be in this day and age, DeMaio’s sexual orientation will be a factor in this election.

This is still an area of the city where there was more outrage that a student was asked to remove a t-shirt referring to a Bible verse than that said t-shirt was hateful towards fellow classmates.

This is the same area where a local country club recently settled an anti-discrimination lawsuit with a lesbian couple.

This is the same area where the fear of high school girls wearing the wrong type of underwear resulted in a disgraceful school dance.

It’s unfortunate, but I have to think at some point DeMaio is going to run into problems from those spouting traditional family values.

Monday - Quick Hits

Maybe his heart just isn't in it. School Board trustee Luis Acle fails to qualify for the ballot. UT

For the next four weeks San Diego and Tijuana will be an hour apart. UT

Future of Balboa Park was the subject of forum held on Saturday. UT

After years of planning, and a half a billion dollars, North County finally has its rail service. UT NCTimes

They should try recycling the water. Escondido has a disposal program for its much waste water. UT

Thoughts on the 3rd SD City Council Race

It’s a solid Dem district with three good Democrats running. Here’s where I see things:

Todd Gloria
This guy may only be 29 but he’s running a campaign like a pro. From the signs blanketing University just after the Pride parade last year to racking up endorsements from the P.O.A., the League of Conservation Voters, and Francine Busby, this guy’s got it going on. From the beginning, I was impressed with his campaign and the tightness of his team. This shows an executive ability to put together a staff and manage operations.

But I don’t think he can clear this in June because of…

John Hartley
Say what you will about him, his shoe-leather campaign will pay dividends. San Diegans dig a bit of old school in their politics and John has the time and energy to walk the district. This bodes well for him making the run-off. Hell, he can win without Remer even though, like a lamprey, Larry is present.

Gloria has a more professional operation but Hartley has name recognition and recognizes that, for all its bluster, this is not a “gay” seat. Just look at the numbers. Any strategy based only on the community may get you in the run-off but won’t deliver the election, at least the first time.

Which brings me to….

Stephen Whitburn
An upstanding young man with the San Diego Democratic Club and some of their more active members behind him. Were the community unified, either he or Gloria could have a shot at taking this in the first round. As is, he’s got a lot of ground to cover having been out-hustled by Gloria early on. With Hartley pounding the pavement, Whitburn is caught between toe skilled operators plying their skill which leaves him, IMHO, the third man in this race.

I know labor is split, as is the gay community, on this race. I don’t know who will win, but, so far, things haven’t gotten bloody and this bodes well. Any of these three would be necessary for progress on the City Council. I just hope things don’t get too ugly before it is all over.