My Lunch With Mike. Mike Duvall, That Is

UPDATE: I HAVE POSTED A FOLLOW-UP STORY HERE, ABOUT THE SPECIAL OC ANGLE OF THE STORY.

It must be tough when just about everything anybody says about you is prefaced with the words “disgraced former assemblyman.” But that’s what Mike Duvall lives with every day.

On Wednesday I had lunch with Duvall.

Now, I’ve known Mike for a long time and thought that it would be interesting to hear his take on the events of last summer that led to his resignation and replacement as our State Assemblyman by Chris Norby. And he seemed eager to tell his side of the story.

Duvall has lost a lot of weight and looks pretty good. He attributes this to getting exercise and is benefiting from being away from the non-stop Sacramento smorgasbord provided courtesy of all those lobbyists. Well, I guess every cloud has it’s silver lining.

We met at Mike’s office and later moseyed on out for lunch. As our meeting progressed, Duvall shared his thoughts about what happened last summer.

Duvall said  that he had become well known in Sacramento for “rocking the boats” of other legislators, and that fact may have been at the root of the events that transpired. He was known, he said, for his unorthodox attitude to Sacramento, even upon one occasion, introducing some of his biker buddies into the Capitol.

Although he can not fully explain their motives, Duvall stated that he believe the likeliest scenario is that he was set up by a conspiracy involving Jeff Miller, the assemblyman from Corona, and his aide.  He believes the whole thing was either orchestrated or exploited by Republican operative Jon Fleischman, likely in retaliation for the forced resignation of Fleischman’s wife, a former employee in Duvall’s local office. He claimed that Fleischman had become extremely hostile to him personally.

According to Duvall the “hot mike” on the day his comments were recorded was Miller’s, not his; that in retrospect Miller seemed to coach the conversation into its lewd direction; and that Millers aide almost immediately went to retrieve a copy of the recording. Duvall stuck to his story that his comments were not a true revelation of anything that actually happened, and in fact he was just repeating stuff told to him about another legislator altogether.

When I asked him what Jeff Miller’s motive was to cooperate in the alleged set-up, Duvall speculated that it might have been done, at least in part to take heat off of him from the KFI John and Ken team who had been mercilessly attacking Miller, and who subsequently appeared to have stopped their attacks.

What still remains a mystery, except to the participants, and not explained by Duvall, are the events that transpired between July 2009, when the recording was made, and late August, 2009 when the story finally broke. Almost two months passed.

I have previously wondered about the on the role of Ackerman, Inc. in events of July-September 2009, since on September 10th Linda Ackerman received and responded to an almost immediate communication from the Register’s Martin Wisckol about her possible candidacy – while she was vacationing in Europe. It struck me as very odd that Linda Ackerman’s name would suddenly occur to Wisckol out of the blue without previous coaching. Duvall couldn’t shed any light on that.

But when I asked Duvall if he thought his support for the OC County Fair last summer might have played a role in the motive of someone trying to get rid of him, he acknowledged the possibility.

Is Duvall telling the whole story? Was he really set up, or was it simply the case that his unfortunate comments, true or not, were exploited by political enemies after the fact? The passage of the two month period and then the sudden revelation has all the earmarks of an orchestrated attempt to get rid of him.

The story about a conspiracy to set him up certainly sounds plausible. But without any real evidence to support his claims, Mike Duvall is going to have a hard time convincing a skeptics of his innocence.

37 Replies to “My Lunch With Mike. Mike Duvall, That Is”

  1. Really makes one proud of how slimy this bunch really is. We’re still wondering who the second woman was…she was never identified.

    And Norby as a replacement is no prize either…he should never be forgiven for voting for Maldonado as LG. At least we’re rid of him and his personal issues at the County level.

  2. This is a very helpful peice of “reporting” ( I only place that word in scare quotes because a web blog isn’t a traditional newspaper, but only serves as one since the old style newspapers have become Leftist propaganda rags).

    Unlike you, I don’t know Mr. Duval from
    Adam, but I’m quite interested in truth being reported.

    Not knowing any more than you have added to the “newspaper scandal” I remain struck by the question: “Why would Mr. Duval quit his Assembly office, if the “revelations” were untrue, no matter how hard it would be to unring the bell and get his side of the story to prevail?”

    As a “disgraced” (or not) Assemblyman, it seems he would have a better chance of marshalling evidence or support for his rendition of the facts.

    In any case, I appreciate your giving his side of the story some “airtime” and I wish him well.

  3. If you look at Duvalls voting record, he was real good on saving the tax payers money. More than I can say about his predecessor Lynn “the Bulldozer” Daucher.

  4. “According to Duvall the “hot mike” on the day his comments were recorded was Miller’s”
    Well, Jeff Miller must be a ventriloquist because when you watch the tape Miller is just sitting there grinning while Duvall’s nasty mouth is moving. And BTW Jeff Miller’s fat head is still “on a stick” on John and Ken’s page. Duvall is just the tip of the iceberg of the Sacramento Freak Show. http://thereluctantconspiracytheorist.blogspot.com/2009/09/lobby-ho.html

  5. I think the likeliest scenario is that the conversation was picked up accidentally. Then it found its way to Fleischman who had an axe to grind and grinded it hard.

  6. FFFF your website is almost famous. Driving home from work, listening to the John & Ken show, FFFF was mentioned numerous times for this blog regarding duvall’s scapegoating John & Ken.

    1. Seriously, kudos to you Admin, this was an awesome scoop. I’ve often wondered what the personal fallout of this was going to be to Duvall and I haven’t gotten to asking around, was there anything more about that mentioned?

      I’d say I felt sorry for him, but the corruption that he was participating in, and all his anti-gay votes make that go away pretty quickly.

  7. Oh I get it….it’s someone else’s fault that MD got fat on someone’s dime….and it’s someone else’s fault MD got caught saying disgusting things on a hot mike…and it’s someone else’s fault because they are all out to get MD. yeah that excuses MD’s behavior…I’m satisfied…let’s re-elect him 😉

  8. Another funny thing about the Summer of Love was the mysterious five grand that Eli Lilly dumped into that IE “California Alliance for Tomorrow” in July (!) and that ended up going to pay for an Ackerwoman mailer in her scampaign to replace Duvall.

    Of course Eli Lilly’s lobbyist was also on the board of Ackerwoman’s phony Pacific Policy Research Foundation at one time.

  9. I don’t know about you, but no one can “set me up” to say things I don’t want to say-especially if they arent true.
    Another nutty Sacramento representative who was in charge of my taxmoney- Maybe little green men zapped him with a special ray that made him say those things.
    Good gawd. Give me an effing break. Typical weasal, blame someone else.
    I dont believe this horsecrap and I bet alot of others dont either.

  10. Duvall as a button pusher, was spot on. He knew how to vote for the people who elected him, it’s a shame that he was so irresponsible with his personal life. Some part of me really does pity him, I hope he’s doing well.

  11. im not surprised that you two would be mingling together, probably picking out your guys next victim

  12. # 19. You are a moron with little verbal or social skills. Sixth grade drop out I am sure. Go away.

  13. Remember last summer when Duvall, Ackerman, Cunningham and Fleischman all got Harpooned? I miss the Harpoon. BRING BACK THE HARPOON!

  14. You know, being a politician is about personal sacrifice, to help those other than yourself.

    So when I hear the words “conspiracy” and “set-up” I can’t help but think Duvall is missing the point. Getting tarred and feathered is part of the job. Besides, it’s not like Duvall’s words were spoken by another person.

    His days as a politician are over, but he’s clinging to self-preservation. That kind of pride is just as bad as what he did. Look what the lies and denials did to John Edwards. Ruined his reputation, destroyed his family, and now he’s about to be indicted by a Federal grand jury.

    I’m not saying Duvall = Edwards. What I am saying is that he should start blaming himself for what happened, not other people.

  15. #24, for me the interesting part of this is no longer what Duvall said and what he meant, et. etc.

    I’m fascinated by who was in on the Dave Lopez ambush and especially why. Normally these sorts of things are handled quietly, if possible. I get the sense that the GOP powers that be decided to let Duvall be “tarred and feathered.” But why?

    I’m also getting the feeling that if this Fleishman guy was behind it he may have hedged his bets by letting Democrats do the leaking to Lopez and could then dodge his own bosses.

    1. P.S. I’m working on a nice post about your boss – Hide and Seek Sidhu that you may find equally amusing.

      1. Anxiously awaiting it Joe. All we hear about is Harry’s endorsements and momentum.

        Funny how he sends out the same press releases RE his endorsements every week. Just regurgitating the same jargon with nothing new to report…

        1. Yeah, that’s true. My wife is on his e-mail list. What’s a hoot is reading about these people. Who in the Hell is Shawn Steel and who cares?

          Hide and Seek’s supporters are either people who want to score off him or who have probably never even met him.

  16. Harry Sidhu sends his campaign spam to an email address at my work that he scraped off of the internet. Shady.

    1. Yeah, I never signed up for any of his mailings. Not even really sure how he got it.

      He has sent the Curt Pringle endorssment three times now, but he uses “Anaheim Mayor” in one and “Speaker of the Assembly (ret.)” in the another.

      Ha ha ha ha, smoke and mirrors.

  17. I’m not a fan of Duvall, but i’m even less a fan of Jom Fleischman- who is a huge scumbag. There are lots of people who hate him, so I’m pretty sure he’ll have a big career ending scandal soon enough!

  18. Sidhu can send me the news about his endorsements from the district from office holders above city council/mayor any time he wants. Of course, all those people endorsed Nelson so we are left with the parade of out of district nobodys. Nice job Sidhu. That kind of momentum wont get you a cup of coffee at Norms.

  19. Joe Sipowicz: Never underestimate the manipulation power of Dave Lopez. I’ll tell you a story that happened to a buddy of mine. He’s a business owner here in OC. Years ago Lopez shows up hounding him to do an interview. At the time my friend’s mother was dying of stage IV cancer. He wasn’t in the mood to talk that day.

    Lopez wouldn’t leave him alone, so my buddy tells him to visit one of his competitors instead, just to get Lopez the hell on out of there. He had no axe to grind with his competitor, and thought highly of him.

    After his mother’s funeral, my friend goes back to work and finds out Lopez did a story outing his competitor for being corrupt, unethical, etc. He couldn’t believe it. Not only did my friend have no knowledge of the accusations, to this day he has no idea where Lopez found the dirt on the guy.

    People do to Lopez what they do to cockroaches…whatever it takes to make him go away. In my friend’s case, he said nothing negative about his competitor, but the truth landed in Lopez’ lap anyway.

    Frankly, it’s no surprise Dave Lopez is so successful…he’s a major pain in the ass. People crumble under the pressure and tell him stuff they wouldn’t normally say. I mean, how do we know it wasn’t a non-politician, non-lobbyist, that leaked it by accident, at which point Lopez ran with the story?

  20. #35, Lopez is the only person who can answer the question you pose at the end. The original microphone thing may have been totally accidental, but once that recording fell into the wrong hands it was over.

    Now that i think about all the questions posed by admin, I have to believe that many pugs like Ackerman knew about the shit hammer that was coming down, but that they couldn’t do anything about it because by then the Dems had the tape.

    I also have to wonder, given Sacramento’s mentality if some sort of deal weren’t proposed to Duvall ahead of time – either for resignation or votes, etc. and he blew it off.

    Admin, how about another Duvall interview?

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