Los Angeles Big Shots for Hillary

Last week I blogged about Obama and Oprah -- As Far As You Can Get From South Central Los Angeles.

Today, I posted a link to an article in the most prominent African-American weekly newspaper in Los Angeles about Hillary Clinton's big show hosted by Magic Johnson.

Daily Kos: Los Angeles Big Shots Backing Hillary

Hillary's cheerleaders included LA Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, newly-elected Congresswomen Laura Richardson, Texas Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee, and State Assemblyman Mervyn Dymally, the dean of Black California politicians.

It says something about contemporary politics that this is the very same Laura Richardson who ruthlessly played the "race card" in her primary battle with Latina State Sen. Jenny Orapeza.

It says something about the character of the political wheeler-dealers the way they duck 'n hide and flip-flop on the issues and choose to play or disdain the "race card" when it serves their purposes.

CA-37 - 37% of 11% = Safe Seat in Congress

You call this a democracy?

[UPDATE: MORE ON CASINO ISSUES]

Everybody says Laura Richardson is on her way to Congress. In the special election to succeed the late Congresswoman Juanita Millender-McDonald. Richardson received a “whooping” 37.57% of the ballots cast. That is 11,956 out of 31,825 votes out of 265,102 registered voters.

In other words, Laura Richardson is presumed to be going to the Congress based on 4.51% of the registered voters.

On this Fourth of July no doubt the good folks in Lebanon, Palestine, Israel, Iraq, and Iran are really, really impressed by the manifest superiority of democracy in America.

Follow the Votes

(Source: County of Los Angeles Department of Register-Recorder/County Clerk)

                                                        
                                                     
NAME:                  PARTY:      VOTE:     PERCENT:       
                                                     
LAURA RICHARDSON       DEM         11,956    37.57
JENNY OROPEZA          DEM          9,960    31.30
VALERIE MC DONALD      DEM          3,027     9.51
JOHN M KANALEY         REP          2,425     7.62
PETER MATHEWS          DEM          1,125     3.53
TERI RAMIREZ           REP            612     1.92
DANIEL A BREZENOFF     GREEN          391     1.23
JEFFREY LEAVITT        REP            386     1.21
ED WILSON              DEM            362     1.14
L J "LJ" GUILLORY      REP            361     1.13
HERB PETERS            LIB            342     1.07
GEORGE A PARMER JR     DEM            242     0.76
LEE DAVIS              DEM            202     0.63
JEFFREY S PRICE        DEM            142     0.45
BILL F GRISOLIA        DEM            141     0.44
FELICIA FORD           DEM            122     0.38
MERVIN EVANS           DEM             29     0.09
                                                     
REGISTERED VOTERS:                265,102   100.00
RICHARDSON VOTE:                   11,956     4.51

What Does it Mean?

A clueless AP reporter actually gushed that "an energized black electorate proved the difference." Ha! If that is "energized" then next year the Republican won't have to campaign.

Follow the Money

Laura Richardson raised $105,000 for her campaign.

In addition, according to the Long Beach Press Telegram, the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor poured $275,000 into the Richardson campaign. They put 1,140 union members on the street and on the phone contacting 37,000 union voters, making 45,000 phone calls.

                                                                                                                                     
MONEY RAISED:          $105,000
MONEY FROM LABOR:      $275,000
TOTAL MONEY:           $380,000

RICHARDSON VOTE:         11,956

DOLLARS PER VOTE:           $31.78

Follow the Tribes

That’s not all. A huge proportion of the Richardson vote was a direct, unapologetic appeal for “racial” solidarity from the African-American community. Black residents make up 22.7 percent of the district's population, down from 33.6 percent a decade ago, while Latinos make up 47.6 percent. Among registered voters, however, African-Americans still have the edge.

Throughout the campaign Richardson repeatedly said creepy stuff like "no one can take our seat from us... " and persisted in this "party line" about "our community" and "our seat" even after being criticized. Los Angeles’ major African-American weeklies, The Los Angeles Sentinel and the Los Angeles WAVE quit pretending to be newspapers and became the Pravda and Izvestia for the Richardson campaign. At her victory party, gleefully reported by Pravda, there were high-fives all around over sending a "bad sister" to Washington.

Incidently, California casino gambling interests (which the MSM always refers to as "Indian Tribes" instead of as the profit-seeking capitalist businessmen that they are), spent $450,000 for Latina Jenny Oropoeza on account of Oropeza's vote on a controversial question about expanding casino slots. And so, Marc Cooper of the LA Weekly and The Nation, warns about "what might become a full-blown political war between labor and the tribes."

The Incredible Flip-Flopping Fabian Nuñez

Why did the unions come out so strongly for Richardson even though Oropeza had a strong labor record? Presumably, it was their anger over this casino business.

Check this out!

Do a search on Google News and this is exactly the way two items appear:

Richardson wins primary for congressional seat

Los Angeles Times, CA - Jun 27, 2007
By John L. Mitchell, Times Staff Writer Assemblywoman Laura Richardson finished ahead of her closest Democratic rival, state Sen. Jenny Oropeza, and a field ...

Impasse over tribal gaming accords ends

Los Angeles Times, CA - Jun 28, 2007
Assembly Speaker Fabian Nuñez (D-Los Angeles) agreed to move ahead with the compacts, which the state Senate already had approved. But union issues were not ...

It was like: "The election is over now and Laura is in... Screw the unions!"

Here's what flip-flopping Fabian told the Los Angeles Times about his endorsement of Richardson:

Nuñez, a former labor organizer, said he had heard some of the complaints about his decision.

"There were some voices out there who think that because you are Latino, you should only be supporting Latinos, but we were able to lower the decibels a bit," he said. "The good thing about the job I have is that it carries a little bit of weight with it."

More important, Nuñez said, was the principle of supporting a strong African American candidate.

"I wanted to send a message loud and clear to the African American community of Los Angeles that we have got to work together to advance the Democratic agenda," he said. "The cause of African Americans is not a flag that African Americans have to carry on their own."

What a world-class Clintonesque double-talking hustler!

August Run-Off

Since Richardson received way below 50% of the vote, there will be a runoff election between the top vote-getters for each party in August. So, Green Party candidate Daniel Abraham Brezenoff gamely carries on as the last progressive left standing and the only candidate actually talking about issues like the war, healthcare, and the environment.

Big league politics in America is a big bucks dirty business. Nevertheless, this nonsense bodes ill for the future of the Democratic Party at least in a hugely diverse state like California. As a matter of practical politics Democrats will never be able to raised enough cash to "buy" more votes than rich Republicans in competitive districts. And Republicans are s-o-o-o-o much better at playing the divide-and-conquer game. I can see 'em now -- cackling over a "war" between the Black, Brown, and Red "Tribes."

So, as a member of the Black "tribe" I'm supposed to be "proud" of this?

I feel a little ashamed and frightened for my country when at this critical moment in the history of the world anybody can schlep into the United States House of Representatives in this way.

Our Sunni, Shiite, and Kurdish friends in Iraq must be really impressed. Pray each night Laura Richardson is not another Harold Ford. Work like hell each day for Daniel.

CA-37 - "Bipartisan" Meltdown in Compton

It is tragic the candidates presumed to be front-runners for U.S. Congress in the 37th congressional district were arguing on stage Thursday night and almost came to blows over race-baiting personal attacks. Thank God the Green Party candidate Daniel Abraham Brezenoff was on stage to state clear, unambiguous grown-up statements on the war, health care, and the failed "war on drugs."

The presumed front-runners are Democrat Laura Richardson, an African-American member of the state assembly and Democrat Jenny Oropeza, a Latina state senator in a very diverse district.

The confrontation started when Laura Richardson said "No one can take our seat from us without fighting every bit of the way for it." On Friday, Richardson's campaign consultant, John Shallman, told the Long Beach Press Telegram that Richardson had used the term "our community" and not "us.

Well, I attended the event and heard Richardson say "No one can take our seat from us "and Richardson did say "our seat" not once, but twice. But you don't have to take my word for it (memo to John Shallman: this is the 21st century Remember George Allen's "Macacca Moment" last year). An audio recording of the closing arguments has been posted on the web at:

http://www.lbreport.com/news/jun07/37compt.htm.

I have also posted a two-minute mp3 audio file of the offending remarks at:

http://alexcathy.com/richardson-guillory.mp3.

Here is a partial transcrpt of Richardson's closing remarks:

Posted on LBReport.com, June 8, 2007

Congressional Candidates Face-Off in Compton

...This is about someone who says that no one can take our seat from us without us fighting every bit of the way for it. [applause] This is our community. This is our seat. And let me tell you something: why is it that with redistricting, Compton was removed out of the 55th [Carson-LB Assembly district]? We need people who want Compton, who will represent Compton and who will do everything humanly possible to make sure all of the people in our community are represented and taken care of."

Let's cut the bull. I am an African-American and when Black pols, pundits, and cranks slowly and deliberately say "our community" taking an hour to say "our" with emphasis, it's code for "race."

That's not all. After Richardson made her closing remarks it got really weird.

Republican L.J. "Bishop" Guillory, also African-American, seated next to Richardson on the dais, jumped into the fray. Guillory asked Richardson to "Stand up! Stand up!" When she stood Guillory put his hand on her shoulder and said "I am the Republican candidate. I don't care what Democrat Party endorsed who... this is our choice... if we lose this seat you will have no more connection..." whereupon the moderator ruled that Guillory had violated the rules.

Here is the Press Telegram's account of what happened next:

Published in the Long Beach Press Telegram, Saturday, June 8, 2007

Who's Going to Washington?
by Gene Maddeus

Oropeza rushed over to confront Guillory and denied his accusation. Compton Councilman Isadore Hall, a Richardson supporter, then inserted himself between the two and told Oropeza, "Not in my city, Senator, not in my city."

Why would a labor-endorsed Democratic assembly member accept the endorsement of a rich Republican wingnut like "Bishop" Guillory? Is this what Gov. Schwarzenegger means by "post-partisanship?"

This is one African-American who is sick and tired of Democratic and Republican politicians acting like a bunch of rowdy high school kids about "race" issues in America.

Redistricting: Democrat-Republican Gerrymander

What about Ms. Richardson's rhetorical question "why is it that with redistricting, Compton was removed out of the 55th?"

I do not know about Assembly District 55, but we do know that the City of Long Beach was chopped into three congressional districts as part of the general Democrat-Republican "bipartisan" gerrymander to guarantee "safe seats" for incumbents.

An article was posted on this subject:

Posted on The District Weekly, June 7, 2007
In The Not Seat
by Dave Wielenga

Long Beach hasn’t had a congressional district to call its own since 2001, when state legislators chopped up the city and parceled it out to districts based in Huntington Beach, Carson and Lakewood. The electoral surgery was self-serving, a bipartisan deal cut so incumbents would be re-elected. They were.

Orange County right wingnut Republican Dana Rohrabacher is serving his 10th term, his third since the 46th district was contorted through a Long Beach coastal corridor that includes about 20 percent of the city—significantly, the parts that pass through Long Beach State, the Los Cerritos Wetlands, Belmont Shore and the Port of Long Beach. Almost everywhere else was lumped in the 37th district of the late Juanita Millender-McDonald, a liberal Democrat from south-central Los Angeles who never faced serious opposition after taking office in a 1996 special election when predecessor Walter Tucker of Compton went to prison for corruption.

Nowadays, with all the loose talk about "Our Seat" everyone conveniently forgets that just a dozen years ago "Our Seat" was held by "Our Crook" Walter Tucker. And thanks to Democrat-Republican "bipartisanship" part of the extremely diverse city of Long Beach, California, with it's uniquely sensitive environment, is represented by rightwing openly racist Republican Dana Rohrabacher who has said that global warming could have been caused by "dinosaur flatulence" and that prisoners can do the work of immigrant farmworkers.

Daniel Brazenoff's Unforgettable Line:

The most unforgettable line the night of the Compton Meltdown was from Green Party Candidate Daniel Abraham Brazenoff:

I'm going to go rock the boat. OK? I'm going to raise the roof too. I'm tireless, I'm fearless and I know the issues. Look. I have the best preparation you could want for going to the United States Congress: I work in a psychiatric hospital.

Amen, brother.

Daniel Brezenoff for Congress

Excerpt from Daniel's Press Conference

May 27, 2007

For More Info: http://www.danielforcongress.com/

California's 37th CD - Democratic Party "Crash"

Los Angeles Democratic Party hacks continue "Crashing" into each other in the special election for the seat left vacant by the untimely death of Democratic Representative Juanita Millender-McDonald. Ms. Millender-McDonald was a distinguished senior member of the Congressional Black Caucus and had just begun serving as chair of the Committee on House Administration.

The two front-running Democratic candidates are: Laura Richardson, an African-American state assembly member and Jenny Oropeza, a Latina state senator. The overwhelmingly Democratic district is extremely diverse with an African-American plurality. If no candidate gets more than 50% of the vote in the special election in June, a runoff between the top candidates in each party will be held Aug. 21.

A Win for Oropeza

Ms. Oropeza won the endorsement of the Democratic Party caucus, winning 119 of the 168 ballots cast by party delegates. (see, "Democrats Back Oropeza in the 37th District",
The Los Angeles Daily Breeze, May 20, 2007 ).

A Win for Richardson

Ms. Richardson won the coveted endorsement of the County Federation of Labor, the region's most influential labor organization (see "Oropeza loses key group's support in bid for Congress", The Los Angeles Daily Breeze, May 22, 2007, ).

Another Win for Oropeza

The California League of Conservation Voters have endorsed Oropeza (see "California League of Conservation Voters Endorses Senator Oropeza in 37th Congressional District Race", The California Majority Report, ).

Dan Walters of the Sacramento Bee says there is not "an ideological crack wide enough for a human hair among the congressional candidates" and that it's about the competitive personal ambitions of politicians running in districts deliberately setup by Democrats and Republicans and one-party "safe" districts:

Democrats stage two juicy duels by Dan Walters The Sacramento Bee Friday, May 25, 2007

When the Legislature and then-Gov. Gray Davis reconfigured the state's 173 legislative and congressional districts in 2001 with the intent _ and the effect _ of eliminating two-party competition for seats, they created a vacuum that begged to be filled.

If the two parties could not contest for seats, competitive instincts would be shifted into factional rivalries within the parties themselves _ a syndrome heightened by legislative term limits, which produce crops of term-limited, but ambitiously office-seeking politicians.

Continuing Controversy Over the "Black Seat"

Meanwhile, certain intellectuals among my fellow African-Americans continue putting emotional over-the-top rants about the need to retain the 37th Congressional District as a "Black seat" in Congress, insisting that the election of Ms. Oropeza would be a grave threat to some vaguely defined "Black agenda."

In point of fact either Richardson or Oropeza would go to Washington as back-benchers in a feckless Democratic Congressional Majority that has already demonstrated it is incapable of stopping or even slowing George Bush's agenda.

California's 37th C.D. - A "Black Seat?"

The special election for California's 37th Congressional District is already intense and ugly. On Saturday, May 19, 2007 at 10:00 am at the Lucy Florence Coffeehouse at 3351 W. 43rd Street near Leimert Park, longtime journalist Earl Ofari Hutchinson will host a public Urban Policy Roundtable Discussion on the topic:

The Fight For Congresswoman Juanita Millender- McDonald's Seat
Should it Be a Black Seat? A Latino Seat? Or the Best Candidate's Seat?

Nineteen candidates have filed nomination papers to be on the ballot in a special election in the 37th Congressional District in Southern California. If no candidate gets more than 50% of the vote in the special election in June, a runoff between the top candidates in each party will be held Aug. 21. (See Los Angeles Times "19 file for Millender-McDonald seat", May 15).

It is highly unlikely any candidate will get more than 50% which means that the Green Party candidate, Daniel Abraham Brezenoff, will be in the August runoff.

The seat was left vacant last month by the tragic and untimely death of Democratic Representative Juanita Millender-McDonald. Ms. Millender-McDonald was a distinguished senior member of the Congressional Black Caucus and had just begun serving as chair of the Committee on House Administration. Among other things this committee oversees federal elections. In her role as Ranking Member of the Committee during the GOP-controlled Congress, Millender-McDonald investigated widespread voting irregularities and voter disenfranchisement and called for a hearing in Ohio, the first election reform field hearing in Congressional history.

Millender-McDonald was active on women's issues. As Democratic Chair of the Congressional Caucus for Women's Issues she met with U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan to talk about the plight of women globally, and another with the chairman of the New York Stock Exchange to develop strategies for increasing women's investments and net worth.

She convened the first meeting between women members of Congress and Supreme Court Justices Sandra Day O'Connor and Ruth Bader Ginsberg. In 1997 she brought CIA Director John Deutch to Watts to address allegations of covert involvement in drugs trafficking.

Here is where things get dicey. Ms. Oropeza is Latina. Ms. Richardson is African-American. A recent poll indicated that in a two-candidate race, Richardson would win, but in a three-candidate race among Democrats, Orpeza would win. Already, members of the Los Angeles African-American intelligentsia are hysterical about losing "a Black seat." See below an excerpt from an article posted on The Black Comentator Web Site and also printed in the Los Angeles Sentinel, the most prominent African-American weekly in Los Angeles

Face-Off For The Millender-McDonald Seat:
More At Stake Than Just Politics As Usual
By Dr. Anthony Asadullah Samad, PhD
The Black Commentator, May 17, 2008.

"... It is about what the Black community is prepared to do to keep an all important Congressional seat...

What significance? It's the 800-pound gorilla in the room called the ever-expanding Latino politic. Tied to a population growth that will make them a statistical majority in the state by 2010, the fear of encroachment on historically Black seats is becoming a reality. This is the biggest power flex since former L.A. City Councilman, Nick Pacheco, a few years ago, tried to clip downtown out of Councilwoman Jan Perry's district in a redistricting power play. Some think the Black and Latino communities are on a head-on collision course for political and economic control of shared geographies. It doesn't have to be that way, but the over-zealous and over-ambitious have a way of dictating this relationship. So now we wait to see just how Orpeza's stepping into this race plays out in the long term. Is this an isolated incidence, or the crack in the political dam that will cause a flood of non-Black candidates to come rushing through the Black community at a later date? All of this has to be considered... "

Earl Ofari Hutchinson, to his credit in my opinion, posted an article on The Hutchinson Report rejecting this nonsense.

The Wrong Way To Get
Congresswoman Millender-McDonald's
(or any) Political Seat
by Earl Ofari Hutchinson

The tragic and untimely death of Congresswoman Juanita Millender-McDonald ignited a raw outburst of political jockeying by local politicians to fill her seat that hasn't been seen in years. It was a near textbook case of unchecked ambitions, egos, opportunism, and pure naked publicity seeking run rampant. The spectacle was appalling, disgraceful and totally disrespectful to the beloved congresswoman's family members and legions friends who barely had time to mourn her passing before being stampeded by the pack of hungry wanna be office seekers and climbers. Their frantic stampede brought another ugly truth about politics, especially black politics to the surface. And that's the infuriating tendency by some black elected officials to assign to themselves the arrogant and imperious right to self-select who will, no who can run, for an office...

The cover for this orchestrated brand of political bossism is to insure that another black fills the seat held by a black elected official. The rationale is that blacks are so under-represented politically that a seat held by a black bestows a proprietary right in perpetuity for them to hold that seat, and also that a black officeholder best understands the needs and problems of black constituents. The real, but unstated, reason is the great fear that a Latino will get the seat and will tilt toward Latino interests. That's blatantly evident in the anointing of the hoped for black heir apparent to Millender-McDonald. But these are faulty assumptions. Millender-McDonalds's district is a multi-ethnic district, and non-back elected officials have represented Los Angeles, state and congressional districts with a significant number of black constituents for decades; and in many cases quite effectively. If black elected officials are in any peril of losing offices, the blame for that lay with them. Many black politicians make little or no effort to inform and involve their constituents on vital legislation and political actions that directly impact on black communities. Their all-consuming obsession is to elect more black Democrats to office and in making sure that those in office stay there. The fill-the-Millender-McDonald-seat committee assigned candidate is the maddening example of that.

. . .

Black politicians in California hold their fate in their hands. They must find a way to reconnect with the black poor, and craft an agenda that can motivate, inspire and renew their belief that black politicians can deliver the goods. That agenda must emphasize jobs, increased income, drug and crime prevention programs, better neighborhood schools and services, and the battle against police abuse. Black elected officials must also broaden their agenda to build coalitions and alliances with Latinos and Asians. The cruel truth is that black elected officials are at a crossroads in California politics. Those that can adapt to the rapidly changing class and ethnic realities in the state will survive and be effective players in politics. Those that can't will continue to vanish from the political map.
. . .

I was personally delighted to read Hutchinson's article because he is a commentator with considerable stature in the community and so his commentary provides a clue to the "boundaries" of what can and cannot be said in criticism of the feckless African-American Democratic Party leadership in L.A.

In my opinion Mr. Hutchinson, of course, does not go far enough. Hutchinson challenges the conventional wisdom on these matters but doesn't dare take it on directly. In the past Earl Ofari Hutchinson has even said nice things about Black Republicans, but in the minds of a lot of folks Black Greens are beyond the pale. It's instructive that in 857 words, Mr. Samad never gets around to mentioning a single issue. The main thing and the only thing he cares about is that his congress person is the same color as he is. Hutchinson, to his credit, rejects this ideology. Hutchinson writes that we should "build coalitions and alliances with Latinos and Asians" (in opposition to the presumed incurable and irredeemable racism of Whites).

I go much further. This nonsense has nothing whatsoever to do with civil rights or even black power. It is all about good old-fashioned 19th Century Tammany Hall machine politics. This is precisely the sort of political gangsterism that has ruled and misruled the great City of Chicago almost continuously for seventy years.

I do not want to be part of a political party whose central organizing principle is that people like me should get together with members of my "tribe" to be instructed on how to vote and what to think by "my leaders" in a "coalition" of my tribe with other tribes organized the same way to negotiate a second-caste deal for "minorities" with The Empire's corporate interests and militarists. Mr. Hutchinson is quite right when he writes: "If black elected officials are in any peril of losing offices, the blame for that lay with them." I concur 100%. These guys occupied the high ground in Los Angeles for decades when Latinos were being treated like, well, being treated like Blacks in Chicago in the 1950s. I find it shocking and even offensive that these hacks are reacting to our Chicano sisters and brothers exactly the way old Richard J. Daley of Chicago and Sam Yorty of Los Angeles reacted to us.

Of course, I don't say all that stuff at public meetings. I know I'm out of the mainstream, but I really just don't care to necessarily be "popular" with this crowd anymore. Whatever sentimental emotional attachments I may have had to the Black wing of the Democratic Party when I was young and naiive have long since been blown away. When I go to public meetings, I do identify myself as a Green and make it clear I want to be part of a political party of informed, open-minded citizens with shared values and principles.

I intend to show up on Saturday wearing my bright green Green Party t-shirt. It would be nice if I were not the only Green person-of-color in the room.

Los Angeles Urban Policy Roundtable Presents:
Saturday May 19 10:00AM
Community Discussion:

The Fight For Congresswoman Juanita Millender-McDonald's Seat
Should it Be a Black Seat? A Latino Seat? Or the Best Candidate's Seat?

Lucy Florence Coffeehouse
Saturday, May 19, 2007, 10:00 AM
3351 W. 43rd St
Los Angeles
Leimert Park