Weekend Observations

It’s the Saturday before election day.  Have you turned your ballot it?  Please, please, please, get out and vote and vote blue.  And to that end, some thoughts heading into primary day.

• We aren’t going to be posting up to the minute election results and analysis on election night; www.ocvote.com is the place to go and, in the close races, we might not know the winner until much later in the week.  The RSA cybersecurity conference is this week in San Francisco and I can’t tell how much this industry respected the work of former OC ROV Neal Kelley for the precautions he’s put in place for secure elections.  Neal set the standard for many to follow.
• OCDA Todd Spitzer continues to slide down the path of political sewage.  The LA Times reports that a judge has found that Spitzer violated the racial justice act in a double murder case.   What’s the Racial Justice Act?  Passed in 2020, it prohibits prosecutors from seeking or getting a criminal conviction, or imposing a sentence, based on race, ethnicity or national origin. However, the judge isn’t imposing any sort of punishment on Spitzer, so perhaps voters will.
• Spitzer’s Twitter feed is using images of dead kids from the horrific mass shooting in Texas to promote the use of calling 9-1-1 if you see a crime in progress, using the old 9/11-inspired slogan, “if you see something, say something.” Because calling 9-1-1 sure helped those kids in Texas didn’t it?  Spitzer left out the fact his face is on Pro-2nd amendment/Gun rights mailers during this primary season and that he’s one of the few “local” candidates from office who got $ from the NRA.
• Embattled OCPA CEO Brian Probolsky ought to do the right thing and resign as it appears at least half of his organization’s Board of Directors has lost faith in him. But instead, he’s pulled  a Joe Dunn move and filed a Whistleblower complaint against some of his board members.  I shake my head in disbelief when the person running an organization, as Dunn did the California State Bar, then claims to be a Whistleblower about disfunctional organizational issues with the team you’re in charge of.
• The Voice of OC has done a fab job of reporting on the disfunction at OCPA:  The original story referenced a public letter by Irvine City Council candidate Dr. Kathleen Treseder.  But the letter is nowhere to be found and VOC has edited the story to reflect the letter is “widely circulated.”  To whom?  So I texted Treseder last night to ask for a copy.  She texted back that the letter wasn’t public.  I referenced the VOC article which said it was.  She said the publication was mistaken and reiterated the letter isn’t public.  I asked if she was correcting the record and asked if they had a copy of her letter.  Her response: “Ok, that’s enough.”  So if anyone out there has a copy of this not-public but widely circulated letter, please send it my way. If she’s going to fall apart after four simple questions, does she have the backbone for public office?  Because its pretty thin skin here.
• Treseder insists former political consultant Melahat Rafiei told her that “she (Melahat) controls OCPA.”  Rafiei denies ever saying that and maintains she has had almost no contact with Treseder since turning down an opportunity to manage the UCI professor’s city council campaign.  Now, allegedly, sources say the FBI is investigating the “Irvine Cabal” and there’s a grand jury investigation into the OCPA. VOC calls Treseder “one of the leading activists who helped start the agency (OCPA)” and members of the DPOC central committee have told me Treseder made a modest financial contribution to Republican Irvine Councilmember Mike Carroll who chairs the OCPA board (I’m looking this up later, so I’ll give her the benefit of a doubt now).  As a longtime Irvine Democrat, I have never heard of a Democrat with aspirations for city council make a contribution to a Republican candidate during an election cycle.
• Irvine Mayor Farrah Khan sent us a note on the alleged “Irvine Cabal” that she shared with some of her supporters.  “I’m not part of any Irvine cabal. The investigation with Irvine council members begin in 2018 prior to my election in regards to cannabis.  We have done no work on cannabis. There are no stores in Irvine. I am not a part of any investigation.  I was asked by Ada (Briceno, DPOC chair) to run for the Coastal Commission. This appointment is made by State Senate leader Toni Atkins.  I don’t need a Republican’s assistance (meaning Probolsky) to an appointment made by a Democrat at the state level.  This (argument) makes no sense, said Khan.
• GOP candidate for Congress Greg Raths and current Rep. Young Kim got the Bill Maher treatment on RealTime last night.