Election Night 2012

Last night was an outstanding night for me.

First, I’m breathing a big sigh of relief that Mitt Romney is not the President of the United States. I didn’t vote for President Obama; I voted for Roseanne Barr on the Peace & Freedom Party ticket for a lot of reasons, both positive for Roseanne and negative for Obama. That said, Mitt Romney has proven himself to be so incompetent that he’d probably get us into a war through sheer stupidity.

Payback is a Bitch

Second, Brad Sherman appears to have beaten the hell out of Howard Berman in the 30th Congressional District. Note that I really don’t like to use the “B” word as above, but it is an old saying with meaning that’s apropos to the situation. As of 2:00 a.m. these are the results so far in the 30th:

My family lived in Sicily (according to my DNA) from the year 70 until they were expelled by the Spanish Inquisition (Sicily was then part of Spain) in 1492. The Sicilian proverb about revenge is of course, “Revenge is a dish best served cold,” as found in Mario Puzo’s The Godfather. My maternal grandmother was from Gorodieshe in the Ukraine, where the proverb is, “Revenge gives you a warm feeling inside.” So I was happy to have a part in dishing it up cold to Howard Berman and it gave me a warm feeling inside.

As I wrote in this blog on October 18:

It’s no secret that the policy wonk for years behind Democratic Party gerrymandering schemes in California has been Howard Berman’s brother Michael and at this point, let me make the same conflict of interest disclosure publicly that I made for the Same Page/Misma Pagina interview committee. In 1978 my candidate (Peace & Freedom Party) for State Assembly in the Northeast San Fernando Valley got 4% of the vote and the Democrat lost by 2%. In 1980, I ran against ranking California Congressman James Corman who that year alone had voted for the MX Missile, the Neutron Bomb, and Draft Registration (all of which his Republican opponent opposed, as did I). Additionally, the only candidate in the race supporting the NAACP-ACLU “Together for Integrated Education” program was me. I polled almost three times as many votes as Corman needed to win, and the Berman brothers were majorly pissed because it completely upset the apple cart for their reapportionment (read gerrymandering) plan for the State of California. As far as I know, this was the only time in California history that a third party had achieved “balance of power” status in two back to back elections in the same geographical area with the ability to knock off incumbents.

Michael Berman came up with plan A and plan B for reapportionment. Normally, political parties get thrown off the ballot in America for not getting enough votes. In authoritarian countries, like the old Soviet Union, Burma, and Nazi Germany, parties get thrown off the ballot because they actually have support. Michael Berman’s plan A was throw the Peace & Freedom Party off the ballot with what Democratic Party hacks publicly called “the Jan Tucker bill” so that they could cut district lines with 1,500 vote Democratic Party margins, or else they had to use plan B in which they failed to kick PFP off the ballot and instead had to cut districts with 3,000 vote Democratic Party margins.

Howard Berman and his “gang of four” in the Assembly shoved the bill through that house with threats and coercion. There were several hold out Democrats defying the “caucus vote,” including Larry Kapiloff, Ken Meade, Sam Farr, Tom Hannigan, Mike Roos and even former Assembly Speaker Leo McCarthy. When you vote against an official “caucus” position, you can be stripped of all of your committee assignments, so it’s not something one does lightly and then only out of absolute conscience. Berman was one vote short for the bill, so he went over to Tom Hannigan and threatened him with loss of his committee assignments and twisted his arm into becoming the 41st vote for the bill.

There are many reasons and many states where we depend on the Voting Rights Act, like the San Fernando Valley where it’s supposed to protect us from the Berman Brothers.

We killed the bill in the State Senate where it never came up for a vote. We pointed out that in the entire 20th Century up till that point, no African American, Asian American, Mexican American, or Native American had wound up on the general election ballot in the four (4) California counties that have prior Voting Rights Act convictions-unless they were running on the Peace & Freedom Party ticket. If the bill passed and we won a Voting Rights Act conviction, that fifth conviction would have put California under the “pre-approval” process like the old thirteen (13) former Confederate States.

If I ever felt any guilt for knocking off Jim Corman in 1980 it was only because I opened up his seat for Howard Berman. Now by helping to take him out of Congress (I’ve been getting furious emails and calls from his campaign and supporters since Saturday when an endorsement letter under my signature went out to many of the district voters in support of Brad Sherman) this little bit of history has come full circle.

Seeing Old Friends & Comrades

Next, I was delighted to see several members of of San Fernando Valley/Northeast Los Angeles NOW at Brad Sherman’s victory party, including Dan McCrory, Patricia Nazario, and Heather Martin. Also ran into Sherman aides Aubrey Farkas, John Alford and Scott Abrams.

But completely unexpected and long overdue was running into former Assembly Member (and hopefully soon to be Los Angeles City Council Member) Cindy Montanez.

In the 2002-3 legislative term, I drafted and Cindy introduced AB 1617 in an attempt to put teeth into the laws against workplace harassment and discrimination by amending the Fair Employment & Housing Act. Although business groups kept it from passing, its principles went on to be adopted nationally by civil rights organizations as a model. It’s one of my proudest achievements.

Signed, Sealed, Delivered!

Finally, I rounded out the night at the California Legislative Black Caucus victory party in Culver City which had been thrown by Isadore Hall, re-elected tonight in the 64th Assembly District with 100% of the vote. Isadore is a great friend, an effective representative of his community (based in Compton), and a proven leader. But the evening missed out being absolutely perfect.

Just as I sit down and change my Blackberry battery, who sits down at the table right next to mine? Stevie Wonder! Here I’m in the middle of re-booting the phone so I can’t get a photo of him! Damn! But his performance of Signed, Sealed, Delivered: I’m Yours made up for it. Isadore had called Stevie’s people and told them to get his a…over to the Culver City Studios for the official Obama Victory Party and sure enough, Stevie was signed, sealed and delivered to the studio to highlight the night’s entertainment.

At the end I was reminded of election night 2008 which I also spent at Isadore’s first election victory party for the State Assembly and Barack Obama’s election as our first black president. Compton was the place to be that night as Virginia and North Carolina in the old South went for Obama, and then to see the crowd’s ecstasy when he was declared elected. Like 2008, this crowd was jubilant as Obama’s re-election was Signed, Sealed and Delivered.