Assemblyman Tim Donnelly on Tony Strickland’s “Race-Baiting” Mailer

Almost a year ago, the GOP Establishment declared war on the Tea Party, but what they really did is declare war on Republicans. Forget about the 11th Commandment. They simply use that to silence conservatives who tell the truth about Democrats who are running as Republicans. We saw it in Mississippi when major figures in the GOP establishment ran ads designed to strike fear in the hearts of Black Democrats. These ads were racist and really offensive to begin with, but for them to have come from the respected leaders in the Republican party, was incomprehensible.

Mississippi Senatorial Candidate Chris McDaniel summed it up well: “We saw despicable acts of race-baiting. We saw despicable allegations from those who are supposed to be leaders in our party. There is no place in the Republican Party for those that would race bait. There is no place in the Republican Party for racism of any kind,…”

Now, a failed politician named Tony Strickland, who is vying for a Congressional seat in a neck and neck battle with an accomplished State Senator, Steve Knight, has gone one step beyond.

In his desperation to get ahead in the race, Strickland is smearing Steve Knight by misleading readers about a vote he made against a ban on the sale of the Confederate Flag in state buildings.

Steve voted against the bill because he didn’t believe that legislation was the appropriate remedy, and he expressed his belief at the time, that this matter could have been better handled administratively by the Governor.

I voted against it because I swore an oath to defend the Constitution. You can accuse me of taking that oath too seriously, but it’s about defending the Constitution which guarantees the right to free speech, not the content of the speech.

Every voter–Republican and Democrat–should reject these race-bating tactics because it is an insult to those who have suffered true racism.

Strickland’s over-the-top race-baiting brings to mind the words of Gwyneth Paltrow, who recently hosted President Obama at her home:

“I think that when anybody criticizes anyone, it’s revealing more about where they are in time and space as opposed to where you are in time and space.”

This mailer says a lot more about how Tony Strickland views Democrats than it does about Steve Knight.  The “anti-immigrant” part that would be laughable—if weren’t so provably false. Steve Knight and I are both married to women of other races. Steve’s wife Lily is Hispanic. She immigrated here from Chile.  

My wife Rowena, was born here, but her family immigrated here from the Philippines. If any of these smears were true, it would be very uncomfortable every night around the dinner table.

Strickland views Democrats as “easily baited” with the phony race card that he pulls out of a loaded deck. On the issue of illegal immigration, many Democrats can probably identify with Steve’s actual position: While Steve has steadfastly voted to oppose using taxpayer-paid state resources for benefits such as free college tuition–which isn’t available to our returning veterans and active duty military personnel–to be used as incentives to attract more people to this country the most dangerous way possible, Steve does favors some sort of “comprehensive immigration reform” but stops short of outright amnesty.

Perhaps Strickland is threatened by the fact that Lily Knight is an immigrant, and naturally helps her husband with voters who immigrated here.

When politicians are losing, they get desperate and they go negative. Usually it’s to distract voters from their own flaws. Makes you wonder Strickland is trying to distract voters from:

Maybe it’s his outspoken support for more gun control—Strickland just endorsed (AB1014) the law that allows gov’t confiscation of guns without due process disguised as a restraining order.

Or maybe it’s the fact that Strickland became virulently anti-hunting and helped pass SB1229 (the ban on using hounds to hunt bears) just after the Humane Society dumped a truckload of cash into his campaign account.

One thing is clear, this ad says a lot more about the character of Tony Strickland than anyone else.

Whatever Stickland’s goal was, whether to scare Democrat voters into staying home, or scare them into not voting for Tim Donnelly–oh wait, I’m not even on the ballot, I believe it will backfire on him because California voters are a lot smarter than Tony thinks, and his myopic, sophomoric race-baiting that will be rejected, but not before it smears him, not Steve Knight.