Before the facts are in w/update

The Humboldt Democratic Central Committee is a political animal in more ways than one. And this week, in their partisan zeal, they decided to send a letter to the Attorney General demanding he look into "the push."

HCDCC Subcommittee on Education and Communications Chairperson Greg Conners said the group’s hope is that the attorney general will investigate “and the appropriate action will be taken based upon facts that can be confirmed.”

"based upon facts that can be confirmed" - Fascinating statement. Because nothing has been "confirmed" yet. First Glass filed a report, then he decided to press charges. Then EPD appointed a senior homicide detective to look into the matter, and presumably an investigation is underway.

Before the results of that investigation are known, the HCDCC pounces. Seizes this golden opportunity to bring down the man that brought down Tom Daschle. And, depending on Jerry Brown's own integrity, he may seize this opportunity to punish a politcal foe of the democrats.

And, When reached by phone on Thursday, Gallegos said Arkley has contributed to his campaign and he considers him a “friend.”

“To avoid an appearance of an impropriety, I think it’s best the AG’s Office as opposed to me” pursue the matter, he said.

Meanwhile - the Attorney General's Office has tacitly refused to get involved here with Paul Gallegos, deeming all criticism of him to be strictly "political." But the stack of complaints will add up sooner or later, and the decimation will reach a point where the Attorney General has no choice but to intervene, maybe even have to send in a team to run the office until it can be stabilized.

Yet the HCDCC cares naught. CAST, the Victim Witness Unit, an unbelievable list of plea bargains, a Grand Jury report that left no doubt as to what was happening, yet the HCDCC chose to endorse the man. Even though, in that case, the facts were in.

It's very telling.
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UPDATE:
I'd have to say things are going to get even more interesting. The Journal's Town Dandy reports: We had a good time meeting last week with Steven Glazer, the public relations man retained by Eureka kazillionaire Rob Arkley to put forth his case in the now-infamous Avalon incident (see "Town Dandy," Sept. 13). We'd heard from KSLG's John Matthews -- the first local to score an interview with Glazer, we believe -- that the fellow actually serves as mayor of the East Bay town of Orinda when not flacking. That intrigued us. Then, when Glazer showed up and we embarked on the customary getting-to-know-you chat, we were even more astonished to learn that in the turbulent ’70s he had served as press secretary to then-Gov. Jerry Brown and embattled California Supreme Court Justice Rose Bird.

But Glazer was in town to talk Arkley, and we worked our way quickly to the point. Eureka City Councilmember Larry Glass, the alleged recipient of Arkley's shoves and "I will destroy you" threats, had gotten all the good press so far, Glazer said -- he realized that. Now the Arkley family wished to tell its side of the story, so they retained his services. He had already worked with them in some unspecified capacity on the Marina Center, the big box-anchored development proposal that will be making its way before the City Council sometime soon.

Basically, Glazer wished to make the case that Glass was an asshole from way back, especially to Arkley's daughters. Though he could not discuss what happened that night at Avalon, he could say that this alleged rudeness to the Arkley daughters was what so exercised the father that night, when he met Glass face-to-face for the first time. He provided a statement from one of the daughters, to the effect that in their meeting with Glass, back when he was giving away "anti-Arkleyville" stickers in his shop, Glass had called the daughters "collateral damage" in his war with Arkley. (Glass told the Times-Standard that he didn't remember the conversation that way at all.)

Fine and good, we said, but it doesn't really cut to the heart of the matter, does it? The accusation on the table is that Glazer's client physically assaulted and verbally threatened an elected official. What of that?

Glazer said that Arkley had apologized for the incident, contra Glass' assertions. He then read a section of an e-mail that Arkley sent to Glass the morning after. Strangely, though, he would not give me a copy of that apology. He said that I should get it from Glass -- that it was Glass' place to give it to me. It was then I realized that I was in the spell of some kind of master PR mojo that I didn't really understand. To me, it was like -- Dude, you have information? Great. But I don't really feel a burning desire to play Blue's Clues with you.

But then the City of Eureka released the e-mail in question in response to a Public Records Act request from the Times-Standard. We were able to horn in on their work. You probably read the full e-mail in Wednesday's T-S. Suffice it to say that it did, in fact, say "[M]y apologies for last night." The e-mail also reiterated that from Arkley's point of view, it was all about the hurt to his family: "It is hard for me to express the pain and outrage that I feel when my wife and daughters are needlessly brought in, as you did."

For Glass, it wasn't enough. "'I'm sorry I pushed you, I'm sorry I dissed you, I'm sorry I called you a liar a million times,'" he said Tuesday. "None of those elements were there."