Nativo Lopez revisited

Anyone who still wonders why Santa Ana voters overwhelmingly dumped political activist Nativo Lopez from the school board in 2003 ought to pay attention to the Register’s Wednesday article explaining how a “consultant who got [a] no-bid contract from [the] Santa Ana school board gave $105,509 to [a] group linked to board member” Lopez.

As the Register reported, the contractor, Del Terra, was defended by Mr. Lopez and his allies when school officials complained about the contractor’s inaction with regard to the school construction program.

Del Terra’s contributions to Citizens in Action, the community group Lopez founded, kept the organization afloat. The group also rented space to other Lopez-affliliated organizations – at a large financial loss over a five-year period.

Mr. Lopez was controversial not only for his agenda, which promoted bilingual education and left-wing ethnic politics, but for the questionable financial dealings of his immigrant-rights group, Hermandad Mexicana Nacional. The federal government dropped a lawsuit against Hermandad, but Citizens in Action “paid $639,000 to settle claims that it hid Hermandad assets from federal seizure,” the Register reported.

Mr. Lopez has commented little since his electoral come-uppance two years ago.

We hope this recent article remains fresh in the public’s mind should he ever try to bring his divisive racial politics back for an encore.
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LOPEZ IS PRESIDENT of the Mexican American Political Association and a leading force behind Hermandad Mexicana Nacional (Mexican National Brotherhood), a tax-exempt non-profit formed to aid undocumented workers which nevertheless dabbles in partisan affairs–so much so that it’s been the subject of an election-fraud investigation.Until last year, “Nativo” (his real first name is Larry) was a Democrat. Then he switched to the Green party to join the Nader-Camejo presidential juggernaut. Lopez’s own brush with elected office was even more calamitous. Elected a decade ago to a seat on the Santa Ana school board of trustees, Lopez was recalled by residents of Orange County (just months before Gray Davis met the same fate) for his refusal to comply with California’s Proposition 227, which ended bilingual education in public schools. The recall vote wasn’t close: Lopez lost by a 40-point margin. He said he wanted to make Spanish California’s primary language; he was rejected in every precinct of the most Spanish-speaking city in America.
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Chris. Is it your position that anyone who questions partisan favoritism is an idiot? If so have at me. Did you speak out, at any time, in opposition to Nativo? If not, why not? Be consistent if you wish to have any credibility.
Thanks to all those who defended the poor choice of words to characterize me. And thank you Chris for making the changes. Larry G

I like your suggested revisions and I have incorporated the changes into my post.

Moron is a pretty offensive term. And unnecessary. Larry’s posts–while often long and hard starbord, are pretty civil personally. Publius may be right about the Measure M campaign–I thought Larry was going to morph into Col. Kurtz during that campaign–but generally he’s pretty nice.

An intelligent person can utter stupid remarks. We all do. A suggestion: revise and extend your remarks by deleting any reference to larry as a moron and characterize his analysis as moronic or stupid or whatever you deem best.

I read the definition of moron as an idiot, or idiotic. I find trying to compare the matter of a call for a recall of Chris Street to Gray Davis, Nativo Lopez, and even Robert Citron to be idiotic. There is no relationship at all between them. Further, tht allegations against Citron, as I recall, was that he was making risky investments, not that he was leveraging the entire investment fund to make risky investments. The problem for Citron was the leveraging, not what he invested in.

So based upon my understanging of the definition of moron, in the matter of Larry’s post; he’s a moron.

I will yield that he may not always be a moron.

And I’m glad that I could contribute something towards bringing Matt and Art together again.:)

Hopefully this signifies a new era of BFF…

For once I agree with Matt. Larry is no moron. He is passionate about the issues he cares about, but that does not make him a moron.

And if he can’t tolerate other views, then blogging at the Orange Juice must be driving him nuts! LOL

Obviously you view government through a philosophical lens than Larry Gilbert. But he is anything but a moron, and calling him such is completely uncalled for. Larry would certainly never do such to you. He is an intelligent conservative whose posts are remarkably void of personal rancor.