I voted over the weekend, which means the campaigns that are using money smartly will soon not see me as a target for mailings and phone calls. Which should mean the big pile of glossy dead trees will stop growing.

Let’s take a look at a few of this week’s offerings. I live in North Park, so what I get in the mail won’t match what somebody living in another part of the county will see.

First off, the Democratic Party is spending big bucks to counter the three-way smear-fest aimed at Nathan Fletcher. They’re mailing, they’re emailing, and they’re Facebooking.   [Read more…]

It’s dirty tricks time folks, and it should surprise nobody that San Diego’s Lincoln Club is funding it. These are the rich guys downtown who’d be really happy if America’s Finest City turned into a little Trumpian fiefdom. All that voting, tree hugging, and social justice stuff simply get in the way of their personal greed.

Today’s ratf*cking comes at the expense of District 4 Supervisor candidate Nathan Fletcher, who is (mis)characterized in a mailer as a pro-NRA kind of guy. This KPBS article explains why the accusation doesn’t hold water.

This just happens to be the same message Mickey Kasparian’s rump labor PAC is sending to voters. And it’s the same messaging Supervisorial candidate Lori Saldaña was pushing in social media.   [Read more…]

San Diego Congressman Duncan Duane Hunter is, once again, the subject of a feature news story in Politico. He’s facing legal problems, a spate of scandalous sounding stories in the local press, and spending more money on lawyers than getting re-elected. Now Papa Hunter is tamping down and inter-party competition.

The last time Hunter made the national news we learned about all the local Republicans circling round his not-yet-politically-dead corpse. The time before we learned about his “freewheeling Washington lifestyle,” with hints of an extramarital affair and hefty bar tabs in all the right places around town.

The Republican Congressman faces allegations of misusing campaign funds as a locally empaneled grand jury heard testimony from Hunter’s parents, former aides, and a female lobbyist. Although he has the repaid campaign more than $60,000, federal prosecutors are interested in tens of thousands of additional charges.   [Read more…]

Tis the season for misleading and attack political advertising. I’ll be doing an irregular showcase featuring the campaigns and “Independent” committees willing to sling mud, spin tall tales, make unkeepable promises, or engage in fear-mongering.

Today we’ll start with ads from the Working Families Council in support of Lori Saldaña for supervisor, simply because those were the first to land in my mailbox. Feel free to send me ads you think are hinky via the email address at the bottom of the page.

This will be a non-partisan endeavor, mostly because I can’t stand being talked down to, regardless of political party. “They all do it” is a tired excuse from people who fundamentally don’t believe in Democracy but are not honest enough to say so.   [Read more…]

Here’s a quick and easy way to vote in the June 5, 2018, primary election.

Many San Diego County races, including District Attorney, Sheriff, and Assessor will be decided in this election since any candidate getting better than 50% gets a pass on the November election.

City and State races, on the other hand, allow the top two finishers to go on to November. We’re told there will be a ballot measure in November to bring the county into sync with the rest of California.

Not every candidate listed here will appear on your ballot. If you don’t live in a district, you don’t get to vote on their candidates.   [Read more…]