Away We Go
If what Source X said was true, though … well, that’s a whole other level of sleaze. Sleaze on the part of Person Z, certainly, and possibly on the part of the candidate: The laundering of campaign donations is a pretty serious violation of the letter and spirit of California’s Political Reform Act. But also an overwhelming amount of sleaze on the part of Source X’s posse — which, by implication, would seem to possess a fairly significant black ops opposition team aimed not only at the candidate but at the candidate’s donors and allies. How did someone get Person Z’s bank statements, then? Dumpster diving? Electronic surveillance? Friend at the bank? If you can think of an innocent explanation, let us know.
Either way, we took the conversation as a sign that Humboldt County’s political apparatus — which, even in the best of times, operates just outside the boundaries of the law and way outside the realm of the honorable — is gearing up for a big 2010. We’re going to go out on a limb and predict that this year will equal or even best 2004, year of the Gallegos recall, for sheer dirty pool. The shady telephone polls, which will never appear on any candidate’s financial disclosure forms, have already begun. Next we’ll get the threats, the false front groups, the scare ads, the word-of-blog innuendo, the campaign finance gymnastics and all the rest of it. There will be cynical campaign managers whose aim, as we wrote last week, will be to secure your vote by frightening you and making you more stupid.
There are two contests on the June 2010 ballot that will generate scum by the boatload, guaranteed: the races for District Attorney and Fourth District Supervisor. The Fifth District Supervisor race could get promoted into that territory. Who knows — maybe the politicos will throw the competitive races for Sheriff and Assessor into the mix, too.
The Journal, a newspaper, can’t help but be of two minds about this. On the one hand, it’s absolutely fantastic to get to air out a vile campaign move and to shame those involved. Someone has to attempt to play watchdog, and come May there will likely be enough material for five or six full-time reporters and twice our current number of pages. Then again, there’s the nagging reminders in the back of one’s head that elections really are important. They should be about something.
And so we lift our hands and make a pledge to you — in the coming months, we will deliver full, comprehensive, no-bullshit coverage of the issues behind these races, and we will do it better than anyone else. We’ll expose the scandals too, if we can, but tipsters take note — you can’t just tell us about your stolen documents. You gotta show us your stolen documents. And you better be prepared to answer questions about how you stole them.
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on the cover
Railroad!
Proposed lines ‘set rich blood a-tingling’ in early 1900s
Some Other Proposed North Coast Railroads
Choo-choo Fantasies
Exposing this east-west rail nonsense
seven-o-heaven
Undeterred Will
Will chides Andrew for lack of attention to detail and makes plans for his inevitable victory.
Recent the town dandy
Jan. 13, 2011
The Golden Boy
Dec. 23, 2010
Wish Lists
Dec. 16, 2010
The Train Geeks Return
Today
44th Annual Kinetic Grand Championship Race
STAFF PICK / events, art, outdoors, sports, for kids, free / 9 a.m.-6 p.m. A 3-day, 42-mile kinetic sculpture race over land, sand, mud and water! LeMans start at the Noon Whistle on the Arcata Plaza. Follow the race through Manila, Eureka and into Ferndale on Memorial Day for the Glorious Finish. kineticgrandchampionship.com. 889-3024.
Flow 2012 Fashion Show
STAFF PICK / events / 8 p.m. Arcata Theatre Lounge, 1036 G St. Student designed and produced clothing. Fundraiser for Arcata Arts Institute. $35/$25 students. artsinstitute.net. 822-1220.
Woodside Preschool's Rummage/Bake Sale
events / 8 a.m.-noon. Woodside Preschool, 900 Hodgson St, Eureka. www.woodsidepreschool.com. 445-9132.
Lanphere Dunes Restoration
STAFF PICK / outdoors / 9:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m. Meet at Pacific Union School. Help remove non-native invasives at the Lanphere Dunes Unit of the Humboldt Bay National Wildlife Refuge. Tools and gloves provided, wear work clothes and bring water. Carpool to the protected site. 444-1397.
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12 Comments
Comment / By Curious / Feb. 18, 7:21 a.m.
One names comes to mind on Virginia Bass’s list of contributers
Truman Renner
Comment / By Anon.r.mous / Feb. 18, 10:28 a.m.
Come on Hank, we all know the Journal goes for the soft and easy stories now. Hell, you haven’t even covered how you had a vile blogger on your staff for years!
Comment / By pics or it didn’t happen / Feb. 18, 5:15 p.m.
so, true or not, you know of a crime being committed, right? unless your defense is fingers in your ears singing “la la lalalalala”. maybe hank would care to update us on the shield law, libel, and ethics.
Comment / By Hank Sims / Feb. 18, 5:55 p.m.
Eh?
I know of an accusation of a crime being committed.
As for the rest of it, you’re going to have to be a little more specific.
Comment / By Tom Fredriksen / Feb. 18, 7:12 p.m.
Scheech…..show a strong journalistic ethic and your “base” starts jumping on you Hank. I would compliment what you wrote…but I don’t want to make it worse for you.
Comment / By pics or it didn’t happen / Feb. 18, 11:55 p.m.
isn’t a false accusation a crime?
either someone told you a true story and you have knowledge of a crime, or, someone made a false accusation to you (that you then printed) and thereby committed a lesser crime themselves, both ways you know the culprit.
for the record, i was just going for irony and not “jumping on you”, i think you’re Dandy.
Comment / By unanonymous / Feb. 19, 8:44 a.m.
hopefully, no-bullshit coverage includes not sending the wife of a staff writer into a political rally to make inflammatory remarks, reported under her maiden name to conceal the relationship from the reader and to fabricate a storyline that supports the NCJ political bias.
objectivity would be nice even with names. let the slanderous whisper campaign begin.
Comment / By Rose / Feb. 19, 3:42 p.m.
I’m staying tuned - there’s a number of possibilities here.
Comment / By Dave / Feb. 20, 10:29 a.m.
Hank,
I’ve been in the position you are now in many times over the years. My experience was 99% of those hot leads were bullshit. I can only recall one tip in nearly 20 years of being an editor, that actually proved out.
I was the managing editor of a group of newspapers in Palm Springs (The Post Newspapers)back in 1991 when I got some real dirt on a local politician (are you ready for this?)it was Sonny Bono who was the mayor of Palm Springs at the time. Needless to say, I jumped all over it when I had my facts in line.
I wish you well in the coming months of mud slinging…
Comment / By Ernie’s Place / Feb. 23, 9:28 p.m.
Hank Interesting, but somewhere a crime has been committed. You might have already been sucked in over your head by printing this, unless you don’t know who deepthroat is. The question is; Are you ready to go to jail to protect your alphabet?
Comment / By Hank Sims / Feb. 23, 10:03 p.m.
Dave: I’ll be a little more generous and say that it runs at about 80 percent bullshit, in my experience.
Ernie: I can only wish that they’d haul me off for a nice couple of weeks in the pen. I need a cheap vacation.
Comment / By ncj “reader” / Feb. 25, 1:51 p.m.
I wipe my ass on this rag.