Welcome to the monkey house: June 7 California Primary edition

Beginning with baboons, researchers have studied these great apes because they have more than just DNA in common with humans. They are masters of social interactions living and loving, working and warring in tightly knit clans.

Princeton University researchers have found is that the biggest problem for baboons are other baboons.

Which brings us to the 50th Congressional District and District 3 County Supervisor contests.

The biggest problem we have with filling those offices via the June 7 California Primary and November 8 General Election are the candidates. Two candidates to be precise: Duncan Dwayne Hunter Jr. and Sam Abed.

Starting with Hunter

Let’s swing through the political jungle with self-proclaimed party animal Duncan Dwayne Hunter Jr. starting with the wonderful world of his dad, Duncan Hunter Sr. an East County Republican congressman from 1980 to 2008,

Hunter Sr. was known not only as chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, but for his association with earmarks in general — he never met one he wouldn’t take — and Randy “Duke Cunningham” the Rancho Santa Fe congressman who went to prison for bribery, fraud and tax evasion.

Hunter, just like Cunningham, was up to his neck with the notorious Brent Wilkes Jr. who was convicted for bribing Cunningham, Hunter, along with Cunningham, helped direct almost $250 million in government contracts to defense contractors.

However, Hunter was never indicted. In that particular case, Cunningham took the Wilkes money and ran. In any event, he established a firm family tradition of being ridiculous by running for President in 2008, getting no votes and making it as fas as neighboring Nevada in the primary process

Hunter, the second, immediately distinguished himself in office by calling for using tactical nuclear weapons against Iran. He followed that up by endorsing Donald Trump. Esquire Magazine headlined that as “Of course, the vaping congressman just endorsed Trump.”

Lately, Hunter has made the nightly TV comedy show circuit. Late night hosts weren’t even going after Hunter’s campaign and congressional ethics violations or Hunter’s ridiculous vaping of an e-cigarette during a House Transportation committee meeting as he claimed that prohibiting passengers from vaping in airplanes somehow deprived them of their constitutional rights.

Trevor Noah of The Daily Show and Seth Meyers of Late Night absolutely devastated Hunter over his clown sponsorship of a defense spending bill amendment to require women to register for the draft.

“Because man, or woman, everybody should be able to rip out the enemy’s throat,” Meyers said. “Duncan Hunter introduced his Draft America’s Daughters Act as a joke, but if it becomes law I think we all know who is going to have the last laugh.”

Said Noah: “Recently a congressman named Duncan Hunter introduced a bill that would force women to register for the draft. Now the interesting thing is he didn’t actually want woman in the draft. He just heard people debating about it and he wanted to prove that no one would actually vote on a bill to make it happen, so he introduced that bill, which can we take a second to acknowledge is ludicrous.

“Do voters know that there representatives spend time on this frivolous SH**. There are politicians out there campaigning like I’m going to Washington to propose sarcastic legislation (audience laughter). Are people like are you being sarcastic now. ‘No, I’m going to actually help you, idiots.’

“Like there’s real people doing it. Now, here is the weirdest thing about it.This fake bill that Duncan Hunter proposed sarcastically, it actually passed.”

Abed gets fact checked

Abed, meanwhile, also has had the squeaky clean image he seeks to portray tarnished by several stumbles, according to Thomas Arnold, the veteran North County editor and writer. He built a parking lot on land he owns without getting a permit, which would have required him to install a pricey stormwater treatment system. He linked the city’s website to his official campaign website.

And he passes out a two-sided business card with “mayor” on one side and “Pacific West Consulting, Real Estate Development, Sam Abed, President,” on the other. The real estate development side also lists mayorsamabed.com as one of its websites.

The non-partisan Voice of San Diego recently ran a telling fact check of Abed’s most recent claims that somehow SANDAG was sandbagging North County in its proposed distribution of transportation dollars.

Abed’s statement: The new proposal from SANDAG … 14 percent goes to freeways and 40 percent goes to public transportation. … Public transportation is good for San Diego. It’s not good for a suburban environment in North County. North County is – what – a third of the county, 1.2 million, and we need to get our fair share of taxpayers’ money,” said Escondido Mayor Sam Abed, at a District 3 county supervisor debate on April 21 in Rancho Santa Fe.

This was labeled “A Stretch.” Voice of San Diego concluded: “But while it’s true that increased transit funding is more beneficial for dense San Diego than suburban Escondido, transit dollars are still useful for North County. That’s because Abed’s statement misses a broader point fundamental to regional transportation planning: North County residents don’t live in bubbles.”

Then, there’s the good old Escondido Country Club issue, the local outrage that just keeps on monkeying along. According to Thomas Arnold’s reporting, Abed’s campaign also received a total of $3,750 from partners and executives with New Urban West, which in March announced it is looking into buying and developing the site of the old Escondido Country Club.

Last October, Escondido ended a long legal battle with a prior developer who bought the club and golf course, closed it down and planned to replace it with 600 homes, Arnold said. A citizens initiative prompted the city, with Abed’s support, to change the zoning on the land to open space, only to lose in court, with a judge ruling that such a zoning change amounted to an unconstitutional “taking” of private property.

Homeowners were not happy with the settlement, with one, Mike Slater, president of the Escondido Country Club Homeowner’s Organization (ECCHO), telling the San Diego Union-Tribune, “Sam turned his back on the community and that will not bode well for him in his upcoming endeavors, particularly his campaign for the County Board of Supervisors.

Long story short, do us all a favor and don’t give these guys any more time at the public trough. Let Abed go back to monkey business and Hunter to who knows what he does. they;re in politics for themselves and not for us.

As for voting, we like the ticket Carmen Miranda-Griffith, an Escondido union School district employee, former teacher union president and local activist proposed recently on her Facebook page.

“U.S Senate Kamala Harris, U.S. Cong. 50 District Patrick Malloy, 75th state Assembly Andrew Masiel, Judges Paul Ware and Carla Keehn, county Board of Education Mark Anderson, county Supervisor Dave Roberts, Prop 50 YES. And don’t forget to vote for Jeff Griffith in November for Palomar Hospital Board.”

Take it to the ballot box at the nearest monkey house. specifically for our purposes on June 7, vote for Malloy for congress and Roberts for supervisor. We can’t afford a bunch of political monkeys any more.