The Daily Dirt: Sandoval and Dufty

How low can they go?
Over the last few days, I have been astounded at the sleazy tactics people have been employing. Last week I commented on how repulsive I found it that some political consultants are going after Supervisor Sandoval's home. After a bruising battle where he faced some pretty egregious mailers that tried to depict him as anti-Semitic by utilizing a swastika, Supervisor Sandoval, in the heat of the election battle, filed a lawsuit against the political consultants who were creating the mailers that were funded by an anonymous source. Sandoval lost the lawsuit and now the consultants who sent out this disgusting, vile so-called political mail are suing him for their legal fees.

Yesterday there was a rally of his supporters and even people who were not his supporters to demand that the consultants back off stealing his home.

Today the SF Bay Guardian wrote:

In the end, what's going on here is a billionaire power broker and a greedy consultant trying to destroy a politician who defied them. After the election, Sandoval was ready to let the matter lie; he even waived the right to ask for any damages from his suit. But Sutton, Fisher, and Baughman whose obnoxious, giddy remarks to the Chronicle demonstrate how pleased he is to be squeezing Sandoval won't let go.

This is now a political issue, not a legal one. Mayor Gavin Newsom, who hired Sutton to advise his campaign and who is friendly with Fisher, needs to let these attack dogs know that their conduct is not acceptable and that, if they continue to poison the atmosphere of local politics, they will have no future in this town.

Right on! Leftinsf agrees. Moreover, we hear through the grapevine that there will be a resolution passed at the SF Labor Council saying that any candidate using Baughman or Sutton for their campaign will not be elible for endorsement by the SF Labor Council. It has been done before and was successful in reigning in consultants.

And then Dufty

On another sleazy note, The SF Weekly picked up a repulsive story that Les Natali and his PR people have been spreading to try minimize the impact of a resolution by the SF Board of Supervisors.

Last month, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors passed a unanimous resolution condemning discrimination at the Badlands bar in the Castro, per the SF Human Rights Commission's April Finding, and urging City and State agencies to impose penalties on discriminatory bar owner Les Natali to the fullest extent of the law.

Right afterwards, Natali's PR person tried to suggest that the Supervisors voted for it because they were afraid of being called racists. Now they are suggesting that it is all a plot by a competing bar owner that is a friend of Sup Dufty.

These tactics smack of desperation and leave me wondering, how low can they go? This is truly the underbelly of politics. Distasteful is an understatement. Repulsive is more like it.