Chris Norby Archives - Page 8 of 11 - Friends For Fullerton's Future

October 29, 2009December 28, 200972nd Election

The Ackerman Anti-tax Pledge. What a Hurl

UPDATE: This post was previously published on October 18th. Our Friend Joe S. asked that we repost as a reminder that the Ackerman campaign is really built on nothing but hot air and bad intentions.

We received an e-mail from our long-time Friend, Joe Sipowicz, yesterday and decided to share it with you. It has Joe’s trademark frankness so please don’t get mad at us. We just pass it along as Joe sent it, with a couple of spelling corrections:

Sure, I'll sign anything. — Sure, I'll sign anything Dick tells me to. We're a team.

I came home from work the other day and brought in the mail. Among the rest of the junk was a Linda Ackerman campaign mailer. One side included some bullshit about how Norby voted to raise his Sanitation District stipend, something I had already read about: he didn’t actually cast a vote so we don’t even know if he was in the room. But the Ackermans just decided to say he voted for it. Throw it up, see if it sticks.

The other side showed the Ackerman woman in her staged “experienced businesswoman” pose and costume – a blatant fraud already well debunked as a con by Grover Cleveland’s excellent posts.

But the best (worst) part of this flier was the little corner dedicated to a facsimile of some asinine “no tax pledge” signed by this woman. No new taxes. And a signature.

Then it hit me. What kind of a goddamned idiot would be impressed with this horse crap, and what kind of cynic would think they would be? Well, clearly this flier was meant to appeal to some brain-dead jackass who actually thinks a politician’s pledge is all that meaningful. And of course I understand that the Ackerman woman has no record on anything, and needs to make up stuff. So she signed some stupid piece of paper to see how many of the rubes would go for it.

Given that fact that the Ackerman “campaign” has been nothing but a load of lies from the beginning – residency, experience, etc. it’s hard to believe why anybody would take this lame-ass pledge seriously.

And another thought: people like the Ackermans with their political money machines and their lobbyist enabled free trips to Hawaii know how to game anything in government – even signed “no tax” pledges. There are all kinds of ways to raise government revenue in Sacramento, the most obvious being the notorious “fee” increase, often nothing more than user taxes applied to government services or facilities that have already been paid for by the taxpayer. And raising these fees is just another way of raising general fund revenues through the back door – without actually “raising taxes.”

Well, the back door seems to be the place of preferred entry for the Ackermans: from Sacramento to Lindendale, in Fullerton; through which they must be sneaking in at night since nobody has seem them going through the front door of their rented address.

October 14, 2009December 28, 200972nd Election

Why Chris Norby Will Be Good For Us, And Good For California

by Grover Cleveland26 Comments

norby1

We’ve taken a bunch of legitimate shots at Chris Norby’s opponent in the 72nd Assembly District Special Election, Linda Ackerman. You know: she’s doesn’t live in the district; has a fake “residence” with another family on Lindendale; has applied the completely phony “businesswoman” label to herself; has been paid by her husband’s political campaign; and has even cooked up a scheme to get free Hawaiian vacations – compliments of lobbyists. The list of negatives just goes on and on. In fact, there’s hardly anything in her campaign that isn’t fraudulent.

We haven’t taken much time to say why Chris Norby would be good for us, and for California. So now we will.

First, Norby is not part of the slimy and incestuous Sacramento culture of corruption that the Ackermans have immersed themselves in for 15 years, and that’s a pretty big deal. Norby actually has informed opinions about State-wide issues like budget reform, education and Redevelopment; and, unlike Ackerman, Chris doesn’t just shovel out hollow platitudes about being a conservative.

Furthermore, Chris has a real legislative record – standing up for the people of Orange County against the perpetual demands of the public employee unions. He has opposed retroactive pension spikes put in place by some of the same dubious cast of characters that have endorsed Linda Ackerman. Over the years Chris has stuck up for the property rights of small businesses and homeowners against the depredations of government. Linda Ackerman chooses this very record on Redevelopment to draw a distinction between Norby and herself. And of course compared to Norby’s long conservative track record, Mrs. Ackerman has no record at all. Zero. Zilch. Just election slogans put in her mouth by her campaign manager.

We like the idea of Chris in the Legislature; with real ability to work on issues, especially the long-overdue reform of Redevelopment. The lobbyists won’t like the idea of Norby coming up to Sacramento, and that makes the idea really appealing to us.

At local campaign events the contrast between Norby and Linda Ackerman has been stark. Chris has been engaged, knowledgeable, and has spoken authoritatively about real conservatives issues. His opponent hasn’t done any of these things.

Although the Ackermans have tried (and will continue to try) to attack Norby’s morality by innuendo and gossip, it is the Ackermans who gave the disgraced Mike Duvall their support. Voters ought to reflect on that when they consider who is qualified to speak about morality with any authority.

Finally, Chris lives, and has always lived in Fullerton, unlikeLinda Ackerman who moved out ten years ago when greener pastures opened up in Irvine. He has never lived in a “secret, gated community” for “the privileged few.” He didn’t have to fake a residency with another family to evade the requirements of the law.

And so we say: Chris Norby for the 72nd Assembly!

October 12, 2009December 28, 200972nd Election

“Loophole Linda” Ackerman Knows How to Game the System

by Grover Cleveland2 Comments

Rules are made to bent. As far as possible. Unenforceable laws aren't really laws at all. — Rules are made to bend. As far as possible. Unenforceable laws aren't really laws at all.

We’ll say one thing for Mrs. Ackerman. In her years as her husband’s Sacramento helpmeet, Linda has learned well how to game the system to make money by skirting the intent of campaign financing laws.

We have already recounted the Pacific Policy Research Foundation scam – a phony non-profit whose only purpose to to get legislators to Hawaii – and into the clutches of waiting lobbyists posing as “expert” seminar speakers. Because the fraud is made to look like an educational endeavor, the politicians get to use their excess campaign funds to make trip – funds that would be otherwise off limits for personal use. Sweet.

stackocash

Now, according to a Chris Norby mailer, it emerges that Mrs. Ackerman was on her own husband’s campaign payroll as a “consultant,” and raked in $76,000 for her efforts – whatever they were. Another brazen evasion of laws that are meant to keep politicians from pocketing campaign funds. It seems rules are simply there to be evaded. Art Pedroza at the Orange Juice blog has a post on the mailer here. Mrs. Ackerman is dubbed, appropriately enough, “Loophole Linda.”

Well, Mrs. Ackerman has pretty obviously gotten used to finding the angles and exploiting them for her and hubby Dick’s personal gain. That’s the way things are done in Sacramento; and that, Friends, is really her true experience – gaming government. The rest is just smoke and mirrors – like her phony residency and her fake “self-applied “businesswoman” label.

October 8, 2009December 28, 200972nd Election

Mickadeit Recounts Ackerman Trash

by The Fullerton Harpoon6 Comments

If there's a bottom, I haven't found it yet.

UPDATE @ 2:17 PM 10/08/09

I MISSED THIS LITTLE GEM WHEN I READ MICKADEIT’S PIECE EARLIER:

Ackerman says the two had a friendly beer at Elmer’s after Norby won. “I said, ‘Hey, things are going to be good. We’ve got five conservatives.’ But the votes kept coming out 4-1,” with Norby dissenting.

PROOF THAT ACKERMAN IS A LIAR – OR HAS A REAL, REAL BAD MEMORY. MOLLY McCLANAHAN WAS ON THE CITY COUNCIL THEN. THERE WERE NEVER 5 CONSERVATIVES. C’MON DICK. YOU REMEMBER MOLLY DON’T YOU? YOU KEPT HER FROM BEING MAYOR FOR 6 YEARS. YOU OUGHT TO. MAYBE LINDA LEQUIRE CAN HELP. HER MEMORY IS AT LEAST AS GOOD AS YOURS.

In a piece today the Register’s Frank Mickadeit recounts the history of the Norby-Ackerman feud – talking to both. Ackerman, it seems, has suddenly recovered memories of errant Norby behavior from the 1980s that went by the boards back in the 1995 Assembly campaign when Ackerman dove to the bottom of the campaign swamp and wallowed around there. But really.To mention completely undocumented events relating to sexual harassment, and to cite as an authority a dead man, is low even for Ackerman – and that’s saying a lot.

What makes the whole thing ring completely untrue is Ackerman’s assertion that Norby changed his voting positions on the dais from previously stated positions (actually it sounds like Ackerman is admitting to violating the Brown Act, but we’ll let that pass). He also purports that Norby called him up and threatened him. Pure unadulterated bullshit. But that’s Ackerman for you. Throw up garbage nobody can disprove and see what happens. Right out of the Richard M. Nixon playbook.

The real reason Norby got under Ackerman’s skin (and stayed there for 25 years – how’s that for weird) is that he had the audacity to vote no. Ackerman admits his annoyance with 4-1 votes. No teamwork there – and Ackerman was team captain. See the problem? Also Norby had the good sense to oppose egregious Redevelopment nonsense and Ackerman went for it. See the problem?

The crowning moment of the Mickadeit article is when he uncovered Linda Lequire, Fullerton’s former Queen of Spleen, from under her desert rock. Of course she backed up Ackerman’s story – in eerily identical detail. Since Lequire moved out of Fullerton some years ago we assume Mickadeit got her number from the Ackermans themselves – but only after Lequire had time to be coached on the nuances of the Ackerman strategy.

For those interested in a pyschological take on the Ackerman Obsession we refer readers to a previous post.

September 27, 2009December 28, 200972nd Election

A Tsunami of Slime Is Coming

by The Fullerton Harpoon8 Comments

Lest anyone believes the special election to replace scummer Mike Duvall in the 72nd Assembly seat will be a model of decorum, we will disabuse them of that misconception right now.

Chris Norby can run on his political record – because at least he has one. His principal opponent in the GOP primary, Linda Ackerman, has no record other than being married to the once-powerful, and still venomous Dick Ackerman, and she doesn’t even live in our district. But the Ackermans have an ally.

Roski

That ally is named Ed Roski. Never heard of him? Roski is a hyper-wealthy LA real estate guy (Majestic Realty) and virtually controls the City of Industry as his personal fiefdom. The City of Industry is the single biggest Redevelopment scam in the history of California, and Roski’s latest big idea is to steal a professional football team – the San Diego Chargers were a likely target for a move northward – to a new stadium at the confluence of the 57 an 60 freeways. Since Norby has openly attacked the phony City of Industry and the NFL theft, he has incurred the wrath of Roski, so the story goes, who is supposedly as vindictive as he is rich. In other words a perfect playmate for Dick Ackerman.

According to local political theorists, the plan is laid. The Ackermans keep their South County hands clean vis-a-vis Norby, and continue to show up at Central Committee meetings with smirks and innocent shrugs; and Roski does the dirty work on Norby. Nice folks, huh?

Well, get ready, Friends. Absentee ballots are mailed out in a couple weeks. A tidal wave of slime is on its way.

September 25, 2009December 28, 200972nd Election

Moby Dick Writ Anew?

by The Fullerton Harpoon4 Comments

I wonder what Chris Norby is doing right now...

We have been wondering of late just what kind of personality engages in the sort of obsessive, seemingly pathological hatred one politico demonstrates to another. Specifically we have in mind the abysmal, enduring, and apparently limitless abhorrence that former State Senator and Irvine resident Dick Ackerman holds for County Supervisor (and Fullerton resident) Chris Norby.

This bottomless well of antipathy even seems to extend so deep as the promotion of Dick’s wife, Linda to run against Norby for the 72nd State Assembly seat, an assembly district that the Ackermans don’t even live in, having fled nine years ago for the greener fields of a “secret gated community” in Irvine.

We’re sort of baffled by this bitter bile and animus Ackerman holds for Norby, and so we called upon the expert opinion of Dr. Reinhold Ott of the Schwabian Institut fur Psychologie in Tubingen, Germany, and FFFF on-call staff analyst.

Dr. Ott — The penetrating gaze of Dr. Reinhold Ott

The case study that you have suggested is most interesting to me as both a psychiatrist and a student of American literature. Of course I may only speak in generalities based upon the facts that you have presented, not having met the principals in the case.

It seems clear to me that there is an obvious case of obsessive compulsive hatred involved on the part of Mr. Ackerman. The source of this animosity may be related to a variety of causes including early rejection and power fixation; there is certainly an element of uncontrolled paranoid megalomania involved and, perhaps a love-hate relationship between himself and the object of his apparent hatred. Dr. Freud identified this “Cain and Abel” syndrome early on in certain cases; and clinical studies in the United States involving Rhesus monkeys and Bonoabo chimps have demonstrated similar tendencies.

I would draw your attention to the great pyschological novel by Herman Melville, Moby Dick, to demonstrate a classical example of this obsessive lust for hatred, revenge, and of course, eventual disaster.

Well, call me Ishmael!

September 22, 2009December 28, 200972nd Election

Mrs. Ackerman Goes Negative @ GOP Central Committee

by admin5 Comments

Oh yeah. It's gonna get ugly. Real ugly.

Our Friend Allan Bartlett who happens to be an OC GOP Central Committee member reports that an anonymous flier was passed out at last night’s meeting attacking Chris Norby – for the bogus sexual harassment suit (filed by a County employee fired for misfeasance), and for allegedly saying bad things about Mexicans.

Bartlett says Mrs. Dick Ackerman (who is going to run against Norby for the 72nd Assy seat) denied any knowledge of the flier, but he’s not buying that, and neither are we. She already let the cat out of the bag that others will be doing her dirty work for her- most likely her old man who has a natural flair for it. So be it.

As we have said the harassment thing was conjured up out of malice. As far as discriminatory comments about Mexicans is concerned, two thoughts come to mind: first, Norby may have his faults, but he is one of the least prejudiced people on the planet Earth; second that such a charge would be brought up at the forum of the OC GOP Central Committee meeting is just hilarious. How could anybody think that was going to hurt Norby at that venue!

When word of that flier gets out it might actually help Norby win the Raymond Hills GOP Bluehair vote!

Some of my best friends are Mexicans. Like my gardener and my house cleaner.

September 20, 2009December 28, 200972nd Election

Linda Ackerman Announces Candidacy for 72nd Assy District; Federated Republican Bluehairs Run Wild in Streets of Raymond Hills

by Grover Cleveland13 Comments

UPDATE: A WISE GUY COMMENTER MADE A SNIDE REMARK ABOUT THE SIZE OF THE IMAGE ABOVE. BUT RATHER THAN BE OVERLY SENSITIVE, WE HAVE UNCOVERED ANOTHER IMAGE THAT WE THOUGHTFULLY SHARE BELOW.

Well, it’s official. Linda Ackerman the wife of our former State Senator and Assemblyman, Dick, has decided to run in a special election to replace the Ackermans’ old pal, disgraced perv Mike Duvall, for the 72nd Assembly seat now vacated by the latter.

Mrs. Ackerman has a few things going for her, including a lot of contacts with big money and a husband who knows a lot of people; and she made it pretty clear to Martin Wisckol at the Register that she intends an amicable relationship with all those Redevelopment interests. She also has zero political record so that it would be pretty hard for an opponent to go negative on her record – she hasn’t got any. And as a woman – possibly the only woman on the Republican ballot – she could get a gender boost.

But she’s got some practical problems, too. First off, she doesn’t live in the 72nd District and although she doesn’t seem to think living in Irvine for the past decade is an encumbrance, we’re not too sure that many north countians won’t resent a carpetbagger. So she’s gotta move – presumably to Fullerton – and set up a temporary residence, at least through a primary. Second, her strength of no political record is also a liability: no experience either. Third, any ties with Duvall’s sordid 72nd career are bound to come out. Fourth, her opponent is none other than Chris Norby, a sitting County Supervisor who already has a lot of money in the bank and has pretty high name recognition in the district – in which he actually lives.

Behind all the ifs and buts is one solid truth. Mrs. Ackerman’s spouse detests Norby with a weird passion, and obviously sees his wife’s candidacy as an opportunity to do his enemy a bad turn. Ackerman went out of his way to endorse an unknown ribbon clerk for the County Clerk job when Norby had his eyes set on that dubious prize. And now Ackerman’s plan is perfectly transparent: suck up all of Norby’s money advantage in a special election primary for the 72nd, beat him, and then watch with satisfaction as a tapped out Norby is bested by a politcal novice for the Clerk job. Sayonara Norby, Sacramento here we come. Again.

September 13, 2009December 28, 2009Chris Norby

A Sign of Things to Come

by admin9 Comments

We keep hearing that County Clerk Tom Daly wants to be our next county supervisor, replacing Chris Norby, the current job holder, who is termed out next year.

We have never cared much for the idea – not because Tom isn’t a likable sort of fellow, but instead because he has held a series of government jobs in and around the County since the 1980s and we don’t relish the thought of being represented by a typical insider, career politician-type.

What really worries us is the fact that the Democrat Daly is being energetically promoted by one-time conservative Republican John Lewis, the campaign consultant/lobbyist whose modus operandi is to get ’em into office and then begin to lobby ’em.

But back to the Daly campaign. Apart from Daly’s announcement away back in March – six months ago – we’ve heard virtually nothing about the his campaign, except that Lewis paid a loud visit to Chris Norby a few months ago trying to secure the latter’s endorsement for his man Daly. He didn’t get it.

So we’ve decided to help the Daly campaign. To that end we’ve designed a nifty campaign sign, several thousand of which we plan to decorate the Fourth Supervisorial District if in fact, Daly does decide to run after all. Hope you like it!

Daly-4-Sale-&-Career-Politician-22x30-[Converted]

September 9, 2009September 9, 2009Chris Norby

Norby Throws Hat In Ring

by admin10 Comments

The word of Mike Duval’s resignation has spread like a wildfire. I just got off the phone with soon to be termed out Orange County Supervisor Chris Norby and according to Chris even though he’s only had 30 minutes to think about this he told me, “I believe this is an opportunity I have to take”! “Opportunity”? Hell, this is the Red Sea parting.

Everyone who knows Chris’ avowed principles knows that he would better serve the public by being in Sacramento and advocating for Redevelopment reform than by hanging around Civic Center Drive and Broadway recording “vital” records. There’s no better place to advocate for Redevelopment reform than in Sacramento.

Goooo Norby, we’re behind you 100%.