Readers take note: Sex, lies, and
videotape is a 3-part commentary. If you’re short on time, consider
reading PART I today and PART II and III tomorrow.
PART I
Lies and Videotape
Does anyone out there remember the
doomsday cult called Heaven’s Gate -- UFO-believers led by Marshall Applewhite
and Bonnie Nettles, aka “The Two,” aka “Te and Do,” aka “Bo and Peep”?
Heaven's Gate cult members were ascetic “vehicles” on a journey to the “next
level.” Their shared delusions and willing submission to authoritarian
leaders came to a shocking end in a tragic group suicide. This happened
in 1996. Only videotapes remain, documenting their stay in and departure
from San Diego.
Yes, truth can be stranger than
fiction. But if you think it can’t get even stranger, consider this:
we’ve got another Hale Bopp scenario on our hands. This time it
involves billionaire corporate investors with an anointed “vehicle” who happens
to be running for mayor of San Diego. This could be the plot for a 3rd rate horror film but I'm afraid it's real.
Here's what's going on:
A group of of
multi-million/billionaires -- well-known for their anti-tax, anti-government,
anti-labor, anti-regulation, anti-pension, anti-public, anti-environmental,
pro-privatization proclivities -- have targeted the city of San Diego for
political takeover. Their goal is not greater efficiency or raising
the standard of living. Their goal is to transfer the control, ownership,
and wealth embedded in the city's valuable public assets straight into private
corporate hands. Their goal is a new world order. Their goal is to
use San Diego as a launching pad.
This radical group includes familiar
names in the national news -- Grover Norquist, the Koch brothers, Newt
Gringrich, Virginia Thomas (wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas),
Karl Rove, Dick Armey, the Heritage Foundation, Reason Foundation, CATO
Institute, and Americans for Prosperity. Bringing up the rear is our very
own Doug Manchester.
Their shared philosophy is part
anarchist, part Machiavellian, part domino-theory, and weirdly-Maoist: conquer
the countryside (San Diego) and watch cities across the nations tumble.
To echo Carl DeMaio, “If we can show ‘reform’ in San Diego, it becomes a
model nationwide."
That, in a nutshell, is what’s at stake
in the Carl DeMaio / Bob Filner race for mayor.
Sex and Videotape
San Diego leaders are a conservative but
non-radical group of entrepreneurs (I’m referring to the tightly-held inbred
consortium of bankers, real-estate developers, hoteliers, law firms, lobbyists,
and other political intimates who have historically ruled the city’s
roost). They’re sophisticated when it comes to running home town
politics, but when it comes to the tantalizing, reckless, greed-fulfilling bag
of tricks offered by big-time billionaire investors, they’re
goners.
Even the bunch of up-and-coming San
Diegans who swear they’ve seen the light and moved to the middle (the
next level?) swoon when they get a glimpse of billionaire fantasy
videos with titles like: Private control over public property. New ways to
screw city employees. Corporate dominance. Voter submission.
Retooled performance standards. Hands in the public pocket. Pay to
play…
Lies
About ten years ago Carl DeMaio was sent
to San Diego to implement a right-wing takeover. A stand-in for Bo, he
was programmed early in his career to believe that government is the enemy and
should be shrunk small enough to “drown it in a bathtub.” Under the guise
of cleaning up city government he went to work dismantling San Diego employees’
labor unions and privatizing city government services. He called his plan
Roadmap to Recovery.
Carl DeMaio is relentless and talented at
capturing public attention. His ambitions and abilities must have looked
like promising qualities to his Washington D.C. and radical right-wing
mentors. Even his personality quirks (robotic demeanor, evasive
responses, dexterity at conflating truth and fiction, bullying threats to people
who cross him, volatile temper) may once have been considered ammunition to
speed along his takeover assignment. Financial backing from superPAC
funders, on top of his considerable personal wealth (by the age of thirty
DeMaio could boast, "Don't people know I'm a man of means now? I drive a
BMW!") have been greasing the skids in his run for mayor of the nation’s 8th biggest city.
But the fickle finger of fate, aka
mischievous cupid, pointed its arrow in the direction of Carl DeMaio. And
here’s where the story takes a sharp downward turn. Here’s where the sex,
lies, and videotape get personal.
PART II
Sex, Lies, and Videotape
For the past few years the man who would
be San Diego’s highest elected official has been leading a bifurcated
life.
In public, Carl DeMaio remains a populist
avatar of fiscal rectitude and righteous tea-party values. In private,
DeMaio is now the live-in mate of the publisher of San Diego Gay and Lesbian
News and SD Pix magazine. This partner is a controversial and successful
videographer and photo cataloguer of social and party events in the gay
community, a go-to man.
This is not a casual relationship.
Carl DeMaio and his partner have shared ‘promise rings.’ They share
DeMaio’s home in Rancho Bernardo.
It’s fair to ask whether the domestic
details, background, and activities of a candidate and his/her live-in mate
should be revealed to voters. If they are public figures the answer is
clearly Yes. History tells us that domestic partners of politicians often
have significant influence over their mates’ decisions and careers.
Consider Arnold Schwarzenegger and Maria Shriver. Mindy and Nathan
Fletcher. George W and Laura Bush. The Clintons. Ike and
Mamie Eisenhower. Nancy Reagan and Ronald. Standards apply to gay
and straight couples alike, in national, state, or local office.
In a Facebook photo, DeMaio’s partner is
shown lounging in a city council office while the council member is upstairs at
a council meeting. The LGBT Weekly asks an important question: “In addition
to what role Johnathan Hale would play as San Diego’s first “first gentleman”
to a gay mayor, is the question of how sound are Councilman DeMaio’s powers of
judgment?" The article points out that the "photo...depicts
Hale seated at a table in the councilman’s conference room. On the table is a
folder labeled ‘confidential.’ It’s impossible to know what the envelope
contains. But it is possible to ask how appropriate it is for
a husband, wife, boyfriend or girlfriend of an elected official to have easy access
to sensitive information in the official’s office.”
A May 24th article in the LGBT Weekly discloses other equivocal information
about the checkered past of DeMaio’s live-in partner: “As LGBT Weekly
has confirmed, it is a story that includes alleged violence, admitted theft,
burglary, as well as multiple name changes and restraining orders against Hale
(filed against him by former “roommates” for domestic violence).”
If his troubled past were cleanly behind
him, that might be the end of it. But current public accounts tell a
different story of DeMaio’s partner, who has been called out by Nicole
Murray-Ramirez, a well-known leader in the gay community, as a “pit bull of
negativity, ugliness and pettiness…a snake.”
PART III
6 Lessons of Heaven’s Gate
- Becoming a follower of Carl DeMaio is akin to political suicide. It is not an acceptable option. Billionaire puppeteers on the national scene groomed DeMaio to be their "vehicle," their instrument for a right-wing takeover of San Diego. The Koch brothers are alter egos of Te and Do...Bo and Peep...The Two.... As they say in my birthplace, fuggedaboudit.
- There are big-business/ downtown San Diego interests who believe they can keep Carl DeMaio in check... reined in... serving their interests... doing their bidding. It’s a delusional fantasy. He’s got richer, more powerful masters to please.
- There are sincere and good people in San Diego who cry out for meaningful pension reform and mistakenly believe that Carl DeMaio can take them to the “next level.” His message is untrue. His true agenda is not reforming but dismantling public institutions of government. It's a new-age form of anarchy.
- There are voters throughout our city who understand that city government is in deep financial trouble but have no wish to dismantle San Diego by outsourcing city services and privatizing city resources. They don’t share the dog-eat-dog mentality promoted by DeMaio and his mentors.
- Judging from unprecedented boos and shouts of “liar” hurled at him at a mayoral debate in Hillcrest earlier this year, as well as from mounting opposition among people who have known and worked alongside Carl DeMaio in the gay community, it’s apparent that DeMaio’s reputation and standing have diminished considerably among people who know him best. How much excess baggage are we willing to tolerate in City Hall?
- I'll say it again. Political suicide is not an acceptable option. This is no ordinary election. What happens in San Diego in this mayoral election will be either a deathblow to our city or the start of a difficult but exciting era of rebuilding. Whichever way it goes, it will be the handwriting on the wall for other major cities around the nation.
Forget Heaven’s Gate. Never mind
Hale Bopp. Real history is in the making with this year’s mayoral
election in the city of San Diego.
