We have been disparaging the Linda Ackerman carpetbagging campaign for the 72nd State Assembly seat as nothing more than an Irvine political socialite prowling for a job in North Orange County. Well it isn’t!
The images above were harvested from her campaign website showing the versatile Mrs. Ackerman in numerous wardrobes in obviously staged poses with the usual subjects of political campaign photography: business people, cops, doctors, a geezer, firefighters, et al.; even a gaggle of eager little girls, perhaps learning how to plan a Maui vacation on somebody else’s dime!
And what a wardrobe she has!
Notice the time stamps on the images. Six different get ups for six different locations documented by photos taken with a few hours. What a quick change artist! Hard to believe she actually found time to chat with those actors they called in from Central Casting. What a gal!
Art Pedroza over at the Orange Juice blog has written a piece about the candidates in the Special Election Primary to fill the vacancy left by Repuglican darling and now disgraced Mike Duvall. Read about it here.
Art notes that in the absence of a Libertarian candidate Norby should be picking up some votes from that quarter. Well that’ll be about 8 votes.
Pretty soon we’re going to be getting a flood of election mail and it ain’t gonna be pretty, soon.
A while back Congressman and purveyor of lousy RINO city council candidates, Ed Royce, was overheard bragging about the 800 pound gorilla he was going to be unleashing on Fullerton political scene. Who was this electoral juggernaut? None other than now former Police Chief Pat McKinley.
He's big. He's bad. He's baaaaack!
With McKinley’s endorsement of Mrs. Ackerman to replace her disgraced pal Mike Duvall, the pieces all seem to fit. It looks like McKinley has indeed decided to run for City Council next year and has worked out an endorsement swap with the Repuglican elite.
The choice of McKinley on the part of the Repugs would in no way be surprising. As an ex-cop he could be counted on to secure the law ‘n order vote as well as charm the bluehairs. He’s getting up there age-wise, and in poses zero political threat to the Repug machine. Who cares if he is an ex-city government employee and likely to go along with every staff proposal and boondoggle? He would be following in the proud footsteps of Don Bankhead, Dick Jones, Leland Wilson, Mike Clesceri, Julie Sa, Peter Godfrey, Buck Catlin, and even Dick Ackerman himself. Who knows? Maybe even the Yellowing Observers might go along for the ride. After all they went with Dick Jones, right?
Best of all, he’s not a female Democrat, the hideous monster that inhabits Ed Royce’s closet at night.
The first thing that came to my mind when I first saw these street signs was: am I the only one that thinks these things look like something I might find at Knotts Berry Farm or the dopey French Quarter at Disneyland?
There is something odd about the idea that a street sign needs to be treated as an “aesthetic” object – meaning that it is subject to the whims of visual preference among some class of people self-appointed to pass judgement on such things. A street sign is a street sign. The first necessity is functionality. Can it be read easily, and read at night? Is is affordable? After all, the taxpayer is footing the bill, rarely the individual who makes the “design” choice.
But there is something more subtle and just as pernicious as mistaking a utilitarian object for an artistic one. And that is the application of boneheaded and embarrassing aesthetic choices. We have already illustrated the confused thinking behind the aesthetic viewpoint that prefers the curved to the straight line, the complicated over the simple. Remember this post on Fullerton’s goofy redevelopment sidewalks?
And in our numerous posts that have railed against fake old we have also criticized the bureaucratic bad taste that adores the hideous old-timey themes so prevalent in insecure places like Fullerton. Who knows why there is a hump on the top of these signs? Is it something someone saw somewhere? Something picked at random out of a street sign catalogue by a traffic engineer? Are we supposed to discern an echo of the Mission Revival espadana in the hump – like those disgusting Taco Bell outlets of the 80s? Who cares?
This is just another example of confusion: confusion that a street sign needs to be gussied up; confusion that a hump on top is better than a simple rectangle; and confusion that the inclusion of the almost illegibly dinky word “Fullerton” somehow adds something to the ensemble.
Say, whatever happened to that Country Bear Jamboree?
We have been making fun of Mrs. Ackerman’s carpetbagging run for the 72nd Assembly seat – up for grabs in November after the Ackerman’s pal Mike Duvall got caught with his pants down and his microphone open.
We're really not as close to the Duvalls as we used to be...
We have recounted Mrs. Ackerman’s bogus Hawaiian vacation “non-profit” corporation, noted the out-of-town fundraising attempt with Sacto lobbyists; and of course we have had some fun with the phony residency – in which they want people to believe they are moving in with another Fullerton family.
What all this really adds up to is a breathtaking arrogance, a sense of self-entitlement that the rest of us have trouble grasping. Just how these OC Repuglican stalwarts grab hold of and hang on to government power to promote and enrich themselves is something that most regular people just can’t quite fathom. Who in the 72nd Assembly District asked Mrs. Ackerman (who has lived in Irvine for ten years) to represent them? Nobody, that’s who! It was the Ackermans’ idea.
And so, ever helpful, we have decided to put the inherent selfishness of these people into a local perspective, personified by our old pal, Fullerton Councilman Dick Jones. Over the years Jones has remained on the City Council with the staunch support of the Ackermans, who endorse this loud-mouthed, ignorant blowhard term after repugnant term. Why? It can’t be because they care about good government in Fullerton. No, it is because Jones fills their bill just perfectly.
But Dick told me I gotta run again...
First, Jones is getting on in years and has no political ambition; second, he mostly does what he is told by the people who put him in office – when they deign to care about something in Fullerton at all, that is. At this point his assignment is principally to stay in office – to avoid a Godless Democrat from getting in, a Democrat whose voting record would be essentially the same as Jones, but who might pose a threat to the Repuglican elite. So what if Jones is really just a RINO? So what if he shoots his mouth off with incoherent tirades? So what if he knows nothing about what he’s blathering about? His job is to keep the seat warm until the next cipher with more ambition than brains can be unearthed, and to avoid soiling himself in public.
What? That guy's nuts!
And so you see, the Ackermans get the prize they like to gloat over – political control – and we get – well you’ve seen the video clips. You know what we get.
Friends, we just received this entertaining e-mail from a devoted reader:
So there I am in my kitchen, washing dishes on a quiet Sunday night when my phone rings. Who is is? The last person on Earth I would ever expect. Fullerton’s former Chief of Police, Pat McKinley. The guy who wasted untold hours “designing” a dumb police “vest” that, upon retirement he could sell back to the people of Fullerton. The zombie who let all his pals in downtown Fullerton create havoc and stick US with the bill. Oh yeah, that wonderful public servant.
How'd you like to buy my vest? Again.
Well, actually, it’s a robocall, and this slacker starts peddling Linda Ackerman for Assembly! Well I guess they all have it wired the same way.
If I needed any more encouragement to oppose the carpetbagging woman from Irvine, this was it: a guy who milked his job in Fullerton for over 15 years as the City went to the dogs as he worked on his lame-ass vest that the City bought with their Obama stimulus dollars!
Thanks for the e-mail, Friend. This is really sad news for Fullerton. What it means is that McKinley has cut a deal to peddle his backside with Ackerman and Royce to run for our City Council himself next year – with the support of the Usual Suspects. Well, that cat’s out of the bag!
Just what we need. Another ex-public employee negotiating with the public employees! Some Republican!
Remember 1969, free love, and all that? Many of us are too young perhaps, but others maybe not be. In any case, we evoke 40-year anniversary recollections of a film that was both epilogue to the 60s and harbinger of the 70s. Paul Mazursky’s Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice. Refresh your memories here.
But who can forget this image of Eliot Gould, Natalie Wood, Robert Culp and Dyan Canon? Not us.
“Linda and Dick are renting and occupying a part of our house.”
The high-rolling Ackermans (who are getting thousands in campaign contributions from lobbyists for the Mrs.’ carpetbagging run for the 72nd State Assembly seat) are renting a part of a house in Fullerton’s Raymond Hills. Good thing their amigos have a big house! But seriously, does anyone actually believe they’re going to be living there, despite their “landlord” emphasizing the word “occupying”?
Would there even be room in the driveway?
Actually the whole thing is a bit creepy, if you ask us, and the less we think about it, the better off we may be, although we can’t help wondering whether the Ackermans have taken out renter’s insurance.
But, really: how dumb do they think we are? The answer must be: “very.”
Hey who is in charge over there at City Hall? Doesn’t anybody have a clue?
At their September 15, 2009 meeting, the Fullerton City Council deliberated over whether or not the Fullerton School District could get a two-year pass making annual payments on a $1,320,000 loan the District had received from the Redevelopment Agency for the renovation of Maple School nine years ago.
Without debating the merits of the proposal, we note that the suspension of payments was approved 5-0 by the City Council.
But wait! Both Sharon Quirk-Silva and Pam Keller are employees of the School District, and have no business voting on issues, especially financial issues, in which their employer is involved. If ever there were a case for recusal, this was it. At the meeting Mitch Hovey the Superintendent of the Fullerton School District was in the audience. Imagine that! You’re voting to defer over $50K in loan payments to the operation you work for and your boss is sitting in the front row! Hmmm. No bueno!
We can’t imagine why it didn’t occur to either Keller or Quirk-Silva that there was an evident conflict of interest involved. Perhaps it never occurred to them because they see the District as some sort of charity, and doing favors for charities can’t possibly undermine the fiduciary responsibility that they have to the City of Fullerton. It’s all about the children, after all. But we merely speculate. Who really knows why they voted?
And even more baffling is why Richard Jones, the City Attorney failed to bring up this problem. Attorney Jones is paid, and paid a lot, to keep these meetings on the up and up, and keep his charges out of trouble, in loco parentis, as it were. Hmmm.
And finally we reserve a separate post for the performance by Mayor Don Bankhead, who really outdid himself on this item
The other day we did a post that dealt with the Republican “leaders” of Orange County treating government like it was their own private plantation to be worked, and worked hard for all it was worth.
Unfortunately, the Ackerman team seem to fit this profile almost perfectly, what with the Missus deciding to run to “represent’ us peons in a district in which she doesn’t even live, and getting Sacramento lobbyists to grease her skids.
Things are lookin' pretty sweet from the verandah!
And so we can’t help but recall that great Bob Dylan song Maggie’s Farm, from the Bringing it All Back Home album. Enjoy the clip. And just remember who you’re working for!
