Zahra Cares As Long As Somebody Else Does the Work for Him
I get quite a lot of pushback from people around town for picking on District 5 Council member Ahmad Zahra. Leaving out the partisan hacks, the biggest pushback I get is from people who, naively, genuinely believe that he puts in the work and cares about their interests. The single biggest issue of contention from these fine well meaning folk is Fullerton’s water. Constantly we hear about how much Zahra cares about the quality of our water. After all, his caring was the key reason people bemoaned his not being re-appointed to the Orange County Water District (OCWD).
The evidence of his caring most commonly referenced are usually the articles he wrote for the Fullerton Observer on water. Such as HERE and HERE and HERE.
But what if I told you that he only cares so long as somebody else is doing the heavy lifting and/or thinking for him?
The truth is that Ahmad Zahra, like many politicians, wants you to believe that he does the homework because he cares about you, while in reality he’s nothing more than a puppet.
Here are those three Fullerton Observer articles “by” Ahmad Zahra side-by-side with the original counterparts as written by a spokeshole for the OCWD:
Recently said spokeshole retired from OCWD which means you can expect the quality of Zahra’s “writing” to change as well.
Why do I care about this ghostwriting?
First of all it’s because he’s pretending that this is his work as evidenced by the “By Ahmad Zahra” byline over at Press Release Central, the Fullerton Observer.
Second, it’s because it shows who Zahra was really working for while over at OCWD. His job as Fullerton’s Representative at OCWD was to represent Fullerton’s interests – the interests of we residents – but somehow he decided that instead he would represent the interests of OCWD going so far as to pass off their PR as his own ideas and work.
Like most dishonest puppets in government he forgot the very role he promised the people he would do while chasing the gravy that was his $40k+/year stipend from OCWD.
I didn’t expect anything else from this peacocking faux-pontificator but many people around town took him seriously that he was serious and that’s why this matters.
The best defense for Zahra here is that he had somebody rewrite OCWD’s work just enough to not be straight up ghost-writing. Even he knew that he had to make the PR look a little less PR-ey to get passed the “eagle eyes” over at the Observer who only publish City Hall’s propaganda without question.
Perhaps one of the saddest things is people actually believe that Zahra isn’t your typical politician because he checked all the right boxes and said all the right things. He claims he is so different and he really cares, but at the end of the day, he’s just as much the same bought and paid for crony who needs a PR rep to write his own words for him.
So Zahra begs the government PR hack to put words in his mouth, then fraudulently passes them along to the public as his own thoughts?
This is shameful.
Yeah but don’t forget the Observer. Passing along secret government propaganda without missing a beat. They should be shut down.
Well hold on now, what will I line my worm bin with if they get shut down?
Dianne Pinnick can take over for Zahra after the recall. She’s obviously much smarter than him.
To regurgitate this crap using a by-line is just about the worst sort of fraud. PR people put words in politicians mouths all the time, but this little zit was actually pretending he wrote something requiring some sort of expertise.
And let’s not forget that the miserable Jan Flory actually had the balls to repeat the lie as she was trying to keep Zahra in his cushy gig – “He’s even writing articles about water for the Observer!”
No one actually thinks this idiot wrote anything. He didn’t write the shitty screenplay to his shittier documelodrama. Another example of his lies and fraud. Nice work FFFF.
What a shameless twat.
Great investigation, 4F! Thank you Mr. Ferguson for following the trail of slime. Ahmad Zahra is a complete disgrace. Arrested for vandalism, Grafiti, beating a woman, and now fraud. If he isn’t jailed for beating a woman he should be censured by the other councilmen who should feel like crap sitting next to a turd like Zahra!
I totally Agree.
Truth be told.
Zahra-self serving piece of
Not surprising from this phony weasel.
Excellent work Mr. Ferguson! Send it on over to the Observer for comment.
“I think I’ve got this” said in a nasty voice when a caring person told him there was a “learning curve” to being in water. There is no learning curve if you have everyone else do the work. Remember he is an actor so learning his lines is easy, well maybe. He was always much too defensive and angry toward his counterparts on the board. Me thinks that is a sign he didnt know Jack about water or the water board he sat on.
He didn’t “have this” he faked it.
Fake it till you make it Zahra
He opens his mouth and out comes a lie. His supporters are all Russian bots or full of crap and hot air. No one should be surprised he lifted the work of another person for his own personal gain. All he knows is personal gain. Another grifter like Jennifer Fitzgerald and Jan Flory. Fullerton sure knows how to pick em
minor league fraudster ahmad should go back to being a nobody. He’s good at being a big fat nothing
But he says it with a quite English English accent. I believe anything when someone has that way of talking.
” $40k+/year stipend”
WHAT?