Mark Ridley-Thomas' Disappearing Endorsement

We Stand Corrected.

I had a nice conversation this evening with Bernard Parks, Jr., Chief of Staff for Councilman Bernard Parks, Sr.

We discussed the story which ran on our blog and others which may have led some to believe that the Councilman - who is running for the LA County Board of Supervisors against former Councilman and current State Senator Mark Ridley-Thomas - was tied to the Reverend Eric Lee who what some feel made anti-semitic remarks at a recent benefit saluting Israeli-American philanthropist Daphna Ziman.

We had reported that Parks was present at the event where Lee made his controversial speech and that Parks had plans to discuss with the Reverend his remarks.

It turns out our initial information was incorrect. According to Parks, Jr. the Councilman had left the event well before Lee made the comments and had not made any plans to meet with Lee. Parks Jr. confirmed his father did meet with Ziman later.

Since Ridley-Thomas once held a high position with the Southern Christian Leadership Conference as Lee does know, I wanted to find out if Lee had endorsed Ridley-Thomas. My first stop was Ridley-Thomas' (Christ, couldn't they have settled on one name? Well it's not bad as Villar-a-you know what) website. In his list of religious leader endorsements; no Reverend Eric Lee. But you can always turn to the blogger's friend; Google Cache. Bingo! An older version of Ridley-Thomas' site has Lee's endorsement.

So the question is when did Ridley-Thomas remove the endorsement and why did he do it?

Sunday Hotsheet First Edition

Mayor Villaraigosa has to be having buyer's remorse about appointing Jane Ellison Usher to the Planning Commission. Her pro-NIMBY memo screed will be exhibit A in Sandy Hubbard's lawsuit against SB 1818 - which is bad policy for another reason that I've discussed before. (By the way on a slightly unrelated note, here is an interesting article from almost 20 years ago about Usher's husband, Harry, a longtime LA power player. The story goes back to the days before Mayor Villaraigosa, even Mayor Riordan, Mayor Sam and the internet. Thought provoking to see what Usher thought LA's issues were in 1990.)

We posted it Saturday, even LA Observed covered it but crickets from the fishwraps of record, digital or otherwise, on the alleged anti-Semitic comments of Reverend Eric Lee, President of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference of Greater Los Angeles. Lee reportedly made the remarks during an event marking the 40th anniversary of the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King at which Israeli-American philanthropist Daphna Ziman was honored for her years of activism on behalf of the poor. Blogger Ed Morrisey wondered "where the press was for this event. With the Mayor attending an event honoring King, one has to believe that the LA Times would have had at least a beat reporter there."

When a Westchester based blogger and Neighborhood Council member challenged DWP General Manager H. David Nahai as to why the utility transfered millions of dollars of revenues to the City of Los Angeles general fund instead of investing it in the Department's infrastructure, Nahai referred to the blogger as an "angry person." Glad to see Nahai gets it!

Captain Greg Nelson makes a good point about how developers can work with the community on their projects in order to blunt some NIMBY/BANANA/CAVE hysteria around their projects. I've mentioned this before, using the example of developer J.H. Snyder and his consultant Ira Handelman who did a beautiful job of engaging the North Hollywood community on several large projects that achieved significant and widespread community support.

The San Fernando Valley Democrats have another picnic-softball game next week. Tip to City Council Staffers: Don't drive your City owned vehicle to the picnic. Snoops will be watching.

Following Luke Ford's post that the Westside White Guy claimed credit for Pulitzer Prizes Ford believes he has no right to, David Markland had a brief interview with the blogger that Sherry (Shirley?) Bebitch Jeffee says is the only one she knows from Adam. Though he was discussing Ford's allegation, I guess the WWG decided it was an opportune time to lie about our blog and say "I don’t trust the accuracy or the ethics of anything at Mayor Sam, and I don’t know anyone in L.A. politics who does." Yea - sure Kev. That's why they all read it and that's why lots of send us tips, news and other items. What a waste of time to try to get stuff on a blog that no one reads or trusts.

Bad News for Bitter Bernie

** UPDATE: Click here for our correction on this story. **

City Councilman Bernard Parks - who is running against State Senator Mark Ridley-Thomas to replace retiring County Supervisor Yvonne Burke - is apparently trying to distance himself from yet another minister alleged to have made anti-Jewish comments.

Parks was at an event to honor Jewish philanthropist Daphna Ziman at which the Reverend Eric Lee, President and CEO of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference of Greater Los Angeles, allegedly made a series of anti-Semitic remarks.

According to local blogs, On Wednesday Lee denied and then a da y later apologized for his words. Thursday, the Councilman's son and Chief of Staff, Bernard, Jr., told the questionable Pulitzer Prize winner of record that Bitter Bernie left the event prior to Lee's speech and that the 8th District Councilman was to "meet" with Lee later that day.

In other bad news for Bitter Bernie, the California Majority Report says that Ridley-Thomas received the endorsement of the Los Angeles County Democratic Party Thursday.