Hardball


My huevos rancheros were accompanied by gales of laughter from the next table.  Earlier I had dropped off the grandkids at school and headed to Cafe Verde for breakfast.  Although normally a quiet spot on a weekday morning, I had unknowingly taken a seat next to Gil Cedillo's political brain trust.  It was six weeks until May 16, when Cedillo would try to be re-elected to his seat on the Los Angeles City Council and the three men seated next to me were there that morning to meet with a fellow whose help they needed for the campaign.

While they waited for the fellow to arrive they entertained each other by discussing the challenges of backing Cedillo.  I assume since they were in Pasadena and not Boyle Heights or Highland Park, they felt it was safe to speak and laugh aloud reminding each other of incidents where Cedillo had displayed his social ineptness and disregard for constituents.  They found each tale hilarious while at the same time underscoring the difficulty they faced in the coming runoff.  A grass roots activist named Joe Bray-Ali had come out of nowhere and, although getting less votes in the primary than Cedillo, had collected numerous endorsements including the Los Angeles Times.

Introductions took place when the person they were there to meet joined them.  He listed off his experience working for various campaigns, the last of which had just concluded allowing him to return to Los Angeles where he lived in Lincoln Heights. He stated that his expertise was with social media and though he hadn't met any of Cedillo's team previously he was familiar with recent events.  The spokesperson for the team was the finance guy and he explained that they wanted him to come aboard to work on the campaign for the final five or six weeks.  With that the finance guy asked him for his assessment of Cedillo's chances. He responded by telling them that he thought the runoff would be tightly contested and that knocking on doors and shaking hands could be the difference.

He was told, "That's not going to work with Gil.  He's terrible with people, the further away from voters and the less time spent with them the better.  He can relate to developers or other politicos but that's because it's a situation where they both have skin in the game." 

The team of three reminded the newcomer of a few things that had created such deep dislike for their candidate, "During the recession, Prop. 25 passed which lowered lawmaker's salaries 18% to $96,000.  Gil later submitted a claim for back pay insisting this was illegal. Can you imagine how that went over with people that live in Glassell Park?" Another of the team chipped in with, "Since he reversed himself on crosswalks and bicycle lanes for Figueroa, pedestrian deaths are up including a child run over by a city truck."

The social media expert thought for a moment and then said, "We will have to see what we can come up with.  You'll need something, look at what just happened to Hillary.  Not even her enormous war chest and organization could make up for being truly despicable."

One of the three said the only negative they were considering at this point was that the opponent was once registered as a republican.  They discussed a flyer with Joe Bray-Ali wearing a photo-shopped Trump t-shirt.

A month following the breakfast at Cafe Verde, I find that the Los Angeles Times and others have retracted their endorsements of Joe Bray-Ali.  It seems someone provided the press with an assortment of politically incorrect comments made by Joe on social media sites.