Downtown's dirty tricksBy Steven T. Jones
So everyone knew that downtown financial interests (such as the Committee on Jobs, Chamber of Commerce, Police Officers Association, the Association of Realtors, BOMA, PG&E, etc., not the mention their enablers at the Chronicle and Examiner) would be spending big money this election to try to buy the Board of Supervisors. And we knew they’d fight dirty, particularly in the swing districts of 1, 3, and 11.
But a couple of revelations from the past 24 hours show that the attacks that are filling mailboxes and the airwaves aren’t simply dirty – they’re dishonest, unethical, and perhaps even illegal. The Fog City Journal stumbled onto a great story that appears to show illegal political collusion between Dist. 11 supervisorial candidate Ahsha Safai (the real estate developer candidate of Mayor Gavin Newsom who refused our request for an endorsement interview and won’t return our phone calls) and the POA.
And the Chronicle reports on the complaint that Dist. 3 candidate David Chiu filed with the Ethics Commission after a television ad falsely claimed that he supports legalizing prostitution, despite his consistent opposition to Prop. K, the ballot measure that would do so. The commercial and several mailers also falsely claim that Dist. 11 candidate John Avalos still works for Sup. Chris Daly, who downtown is trying to make the poster child for all that’s wrong with San Francisco.
Of course, PG&E and downtown’s bagman, attorney Jim Sutton, have already been the subject of the biggest fines that the Ethics Commission has ever levied for illegal campaign behavior. So perhaps they’re content to just keep lying now and worry later about paying fines with their seemingly bottomless reservoirs of cash.
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Comments (5)
Update: The Chiu campaign has just announced that Comcast has decided to pull the inaccurate commercial, writing in a letter to Chiu, "As of this morning, the ad has been suspended and off the air. S.F. Realtors Association must now provide substantiation to back up their claims or provide a new ad."
And Chiu comments:
"Special interests are trying to mislead, manipulate, and in this case blatantly lie to voters to turn City Hall into a rubber stamp for their agenda," said candidate David Chiu. "I ask our San Francisco voters to stand with me to reject a tired, McCain/Palin-style of politics based on lies and false smears, and to elect Supervisors who will stand up to special interests."
Posted by Steven T. Jones | October 15, 2008 03:21 PM
David Chui is smart and well educated man, who will do what ever he feels will enhance his career. These adverts are clearly wrong, but it does not change my opinion that David Chui will not be good for North Beach/China Town, the District or the city. His most public vote recently for the DCCC president indicates that he will do what is best for David Chui as opposed to what is right.
Posted by Chris P | October 16, 2008 06:41 AM
The expenditure limit in D11 needs to be lifted due to these expensive independent expenditures of tv commercials and POA attacks so that John Avalos can fight back.
-marc
Posted by marc | October 16, 2008 09:54 AM
Marc, of course the rules should be changed when a "progressive" candidate is hurting.
How long ago did you carpet bag back into town again?
Posted by Bob | October 22, 2008 11:36 PM
So just so I am clear Marc Salomon:
We should change the rules when a progressive candidate is being challenged?
Posted by Thill | October 23, 2008 09:48 AM