By Doug Porter
I’ve been predicting for some time now that San Diego’s Lincoln Club would play the race card in support of their candidate, Republican Kevin Faulconer, and today’s mailing proves my point.
Picture number two is a really crappy photoshop job trying to blame David Alvarez for former Mayor Jerry Sanders’ Proposition D back in 2010, which would have raised the local sales tax by one half cent. We’ve put Sanders face back in the place. (Thanks Brent) Alvarez was not on the City Council at that point, FYI.
This is just their opening salvo. If the racists (IMO) at the Lincoln Club are the type of people you’d like to see running San Diego, then Kevin Faulconer is your man.
Or the pie meme could be stood on its head…(thanks Brent!)
Anna Daniels says
This dose of BLECCH compels me to send another check to Alvarez. Good job, Lincoln Club.
Jay Powell says
I can’t quite make out the purported date of the Alvarez quote — is it Oct 7 last year and do we know context ? I suspect that Councilmember Alvarez was referring to Community Development Block Grants (CDBG) federal funds which are supposed to be restricted to benefit lower income communities as determined by census tract data. There has been a lot of fudging in the past on criteria to show benefit to lower income persons for projects in some not so disadvantaged communities. Maybe our friends at VOSD can do a “fact check” or Papa Doug Manchester can sic his “watchdogs” to sniff out the full story on this matter. Not so sure this is the race card play. Just a slam at folks who live in older, long neglected neighborhoods that don’t have the benefit of things like sidewalks. lights, parks or community plans that separate chrome plating shops from homes, and who might be living in a not so quality “affordable” apartment. Looks like with Mr. F. we will slice the pie up nice and even, regardless of your infrastructure deficits. Unless you live downtown. Then you get yours a la mode! Mmmm, love that apple pie.
Doug Porter says
This isn’t your grandfather’s kind of race baiting. It’s a (poll tested) accusation designed to play upon the innate fears of the “other” (who just “happens” to be Latino) guy getting a bigger piece of the pie.
It’s also important to place this in the context of campaigning from the right side of the aisle going back to the Nixon era. A Salon.com article on this very subject quotes the GOP’s Lee Atwater on the technique:
You start out in 1954 by saying, “N–ger, n–ger, n–ger.” By 1968 you can’t say “n–ger” — that hurts you, backfires. So you say stuff like, uh, forced busing, states’ rights, and all that stuff, and you’re getting so abstract. Now, you’re talking about cutting taxes, and all these things you’re talking about are totally economic things and a byproduct of them is, blacks get hurt worse than whites … “We want to cut this,” is much more abstract than even the busing thing, uh, and a hell of a lot more abstract than “N–ger, n–ger.”
La Playa Heritage says
The reason San Diego receives Federal HUD Community Development Block Grants (CDBG) is due to low income United States Census Tracks. The CDBG funds should, in theory, only be used in low income neighborhoods South of 8, and Mission Valley to fight poverty. The Federal guidelines were the funds should be concentrated are similar to the New Market Tax Credit (NMTC).
https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B_fHftxFXFhyNUxlWGVObmhQX2c/edit
In 2011, although District 8 accounted for 26% of the low income Census Tracks, District 8 received zero CDBG funds for projects in the neighborhoods.
http://www.sandiego.gov/citycouncil/cd8/pdf/110321memo.pdf
.
bob dorn says
I know how tempting it is to quote Rush Limbaugh, Sens. Vitter and Sessions and the nearly nameless and numberless Congressmen (they’re all men aren’t they?) who spew the offal and wait for the billionaire checks to roll in. Their angle shots are so well aimed to insult women, to degrade immigrants, to privatize water and air and deny a talented and moderate-centrist President his place in history that quoting them should undo them. It doesn’t seem to work. They keep coming back. Like bacteria, they seem to have grown resistant.
When I saw the Lincoln Club ads in my mailbox I took them out to the gutter and threw them there. Try it. You’ll like it. It’s one small step for mankind we can all take.
whale says
“Their angle shots are so well aimed to insult women, to degrade immigrants,”
An immigrant woman wrote it!
When I saw the Lincoln Club ads in my mailbox I took them out to the gutter and threw them there.
Illegal littering or dumping!
Jay Powell says
Bob: I think the throw it in the gutter is a violation of the Clean Water Act and will further pollute whatever waterway that is downstream from you. Similar issues with Clean Air Act if you burn it. I suggest recycling via your blue bin. In the meantime, maybe get more info out there on who funds the so-called Lincoln Club, how they made/make their money and what else they do with it.
Brent Beltran says
Stuck in the Rough provided much of the funding for these mailers. They own a golf course in north county that they’re losing buckets of money on. They’re trying to turn it into new developments to the chagrin of property owners that line the course. The course is not within SD city limits so I’m not sure why they are funneling so much cash through The Lincoln Club.
John P. Falchi says
What’ll they think of next. I bet by the 2/11/14 voting deadline they will have made David Alvarez to look like a curmudgeon, just as they made Donna Frye look like a witch when she ran against Jerry Sanders. Alvarez has to have a turtle shell on this, and the rebuttals from his campaign must deal with each instance of this as it comes up. I believe that people will get what they are up to, and vote, accordingly, for Alvarez! John P. Falchi
Maureen S. says
Jay Powell’s original answer, combined with the excellent explanation by La Playa Heritage of CDBG funds, really says it all. (Then Jay got a little to serious in responding to Bob’s tongue-in-cheek suggestion to “throw the mailers in the gutter.” Jay, you almost sound like a sarcastic right-winger making fun of enviro regs; I know you are not.)
All due respect, Doug, I don’t know you, but to cry out “race baiting” is in itself inflammatory and serves no real purpose – except to get people to read your stuff if they wanna find out why you said that. “race baiting,” “gay baiting;” let’s leave it to the readers to make up their own minds on that. If people find it that way, so be it, but I am tired of journos calling it out to create headlines and, thereby, create publicity for the “bad guy.” I see no fire in this smoke!
Brent E. Beltrán says
So you are saying that pitting more affluent, white communities against us poorer brown ones isn’t race baiting? If this isn’t race baiting them how come nobody here in Barrio Logan got that mailer?
Doug Porter says
I’m not here to “let people make up their own mind.”
See the slogan at the top of the page? “It says Progressive Views” That’s what you’re gonna get here from me. At least we’re not trying to hide behind some feigned premise of neutrality.
…and you probably think Republican obstructions have nothing to do with Barack Obama being black. 50 years of conservative political history makes me confident in declaring the intent of the mailer. As I said above, read this article:
Maureen S. says
Huh? Mr. Porter, I am a Progressive. Actually, I proudly wear the Big Double L”Liberal Lesbian. Once someone tried to compliment me by calling ma a “Moderate;.” I was offended. So, I don’t see where a masthead makes you somehow right.
Crying “race baiting” does not make you a Progressive nor a good journalist, no matter on what Salon article you rely. I am gonna guess that you are not of color, so I stand by my statement: let people who are the subject of what you label “race baiting” make up their own minds. They should b e the arbiter, not you.
By the way, your comment re Republicans and Obama being black makes no sense to me. I am gonna assume it is a misprint of what you actually meant. Or are you a believer that 1% black equals 100% black and therefor Obama is Black and not correctly:, “biracial? ” True Progressive, are you?
Judy Swink says
Doug isn’t arguing that he believes that 1% black equals 100% black. He’s pointing out that the 1% (or whatever percent) equals 100% black in the narrow minds of Republican Congressional obstructionists.
Furthermore, Doug Porter’s writings are “Opinion” so he’s free to interpret according to his personal perspective as a progressive.
Maureen S. says
Doug, sorry to be so harsh on you, but I found your response to be somewhat patronizing…guess I was offended by your dismissiveness. I find the “race baiting” accusation to be more harmful than helpful, but obviously we disagree on that.
Hope we can get on same page and pull together for causes we believe in. Peace be with you!
Anna Daniels says
Wow. Talk about discourse going off the rails.. Are we really arguing whether “race” or “poverty ” is the issues behind that dog whistle mailer? Does anyone seriously think that it is possible to untangle the two from each other?
I want the Faulconer campaign to make it clear to all of us which three neighborhoods are getting all the goodies. This mailer buries/flips the facts and looses a noxious cloud of victimhood that is very much about class and race. That is the point of the mailer. That is why there is push back here at SDFP.
Mary A says
Faulconer doesn’t even respond to calls from people in his own district. He’s famous for it. How can anyone believe he cares about neighborhoods?
Dana Levy says
I received a flyer that I am sure was meant for a Republican from Faulconer for Mayor 2014 stating that he worked with Jerry Sanders to save ONE BILLION DOLLARS (via the pension reform) that can now be used to fix our roads, restore services (?) in our city’s most neglected communities, and help homeless women, children, and veterans. What a crock and the lies just keep on coming. He must be trying to outdo Alvarez on the 47 million number. It will be a real contest and it will be decided by voter turnout and who can get out the vote. If only the “south of 8” population would vote en mass in their own best interests. And, not to beat a dead horse ,but race, money, party affiliation, and entitlement will remain at the forefront in this contest.