Ok, I just had to post (and comment) on a press conference held Friday by three of the four losers in San Jose City Council District 2. I wanted to link to the article, however the Mercury does not seem to have updated their "Internal Affairs" column, so here is the story, in full:

Defeat is hard, but worse if victor didn't even try

Losing hurts. But sometimes, you just have to move on and vow to do better next time. Otherwise, you run the risk of looking silly.

Three losing candidates for the San Jose City Council District 2 seat called a hastily prepared press conference last week (at 11:55 a.m.) in front of City Hall.

The team of would-be-power brokers - Ted Scarlett, Ram Singh and Bui Thang - wanted to speak out about what they called an "unfair" election. The word "conspiracy" was even tossed out a few times.

The gist? Scarlett, Singh and Thang, but mostly Scarlett, believe last week's election was "tainted" and that voters were "misled."

Scarlett claims that since Jacquelyn Adams' name stayed on the ballot, even though she had dropped out of the race, the election results should be tossed.

"I want the election declared void," he said, "for the fairness to the voters, in an attempt to try and restore faith in our election process."

Ash Kalra came in first, and Adams - who didn't drop out in time for her name to be removed from the ballot - came in second, barely ahead of Singh. Adams later put out a release saying she'd voted for Kalra and has no plans to get back into the race.

Scarlett, who placed fourth, plans to take his case to the city's elections commission and anyone else who will listen. "This is just another sad chapter in the history of the city of San Jose," he said.

Why don't we take a look at the vote total (as of Friday, June 6)

CITY OF SAN JOSE City Council, Dist 2

Completed Precincts 51 of 51
		Percent	Votes
ASH KALRA		42.25%	4,667
JACQUELYN ''JACKIE'' ADAMS		18.70%	2,066
RAM SINGH		18.59%	2,054
TED SCARLETT		7.93%	876
NICHOLAS J. RICE-SANCHEZ		6.94%	767
BUI THANG		5.59%	617

Kalra has 4,667 votes, Adams has 2,066, together giving them 6,733 votes. Given that both Kalra and Adams are Dems, and that it is a safe bet that most, if not all of those who voted for Adams would vote for Kalra, we can safely guess that had Adams NOT been on the ballot Kalra would have received the 50 plus 1 percent he needed to avoid a runoff. (Adams, as the article cites, voted for Kalra).

Singh, Scarlett, Rice-Sanchez and Thang TOGETHER pulled 4,314 votes, not even enough to beat Kalra's total. Singh, Scarlett and Rice-Sanchez are Reps who don't seem to understand how to win elections, nor do they have any support from District 2 residents. Kalra has the support of every community leader, neighborhood group and organization in D2. Singh boasts the support of one vocal person who shall remain nameless. Scarlett has no endorsements, and Rice-Sanchez has a few supporters who went to high school with him (he graduated four years ago).

If anything, Kalra was the one most hurt by Adams remaining on the ballot, as he would have most likely garnered the 50 plus one needed to avoid a runoff in November.

Once again our local Reps look like fools and have no clue about fiscal responsibility. If we were to throw out the election from last Tuesday and hold a "special" election without Adams' name on the ballot, the city would have to fork up over $100,000. The results would ultimately be the same, Kalra would come in first, with the Reps lagging far behind.

Advice to Scarlett: What is sad is how little support you drew in this election, and a do over isn't going to change the fact that you will still lose.

Now that our primary is over, I thought it might be fun to go over some of the local races and take a look at why our Democrats fare so well in elections. First of all we are very lucky as Democrats to have such great candidates, and as the results of the primary show, the voters know how wonderful our office seekers are as well.

In San Jose we had three contested city council races, districts 2, 8 and 10. In district two there were five active candidates and one person who was still on the ballot but had suspended her campaign. Out of the five active candidates, only one was a Democrat, Ash Kalra, and he placed first with 40 percent of the vote. Now comes the interesting part : )

Second place went to.......... Jackie Adams (though barely as of this post she is ahead by 12 votes), another good Democrat. What is interesting here is that Jackie suspended her campaign for personal reasons, and did nothing by way of campaigning, not one thing, yet she ended up in second place, ahead of every Rep who was running. One of the Reps, Ram Singh, actively campaigned, but in his case no amount of campaigning was going to change the fact that he was one of the worse candidates ever to run for office (the very worst being Hon Lien).

Ram Singh, while informed on water issues, had little to no knowledge of any other city issues, procedures or pressing problems. Rumor has it that when Singh was asked about a current land deal in which Lew Wolff would build a soccer stadium in exchange for San Jose rezoning industrial land in Edenvale to housing, Singh reportedly had no knowledge of this issue. Hint to Singh: Read the Mercury once in a while.

According to the San Jose City Attorney, if Jackie Adams remains in second place her name must be on the ballot in November, which means that Kalra will most likely be our D2 city council person! Good job Ash, you worked hard, the voters love you, the Mercury endorsed you and we are looking forward to your leadership on the San Jose City Council.

District 8 is a bit more complicated, however once again Dems rule the results. There were two strong Dems in this race, Craig Mann and Rose Herrera. Mann was our endorsed candidate and he came in third. Rose Herrera came in first, and Pat Waite, a Rep, came in second after spending $60,000 of his own money.

Given that the runoff will be in November, and given that the combined vote total for Mann and Herrera are well above Waite's numbers, I expect to see yet another good Dem elected to San Jose's City Council.

Who is Pat Waite? Well he has been involved in many local organizations, mostly religious, not one city commission, no other elected office, no experience in working with city government, basically someone with a whole lot of money and time looking for a way to inject their agenda in San Jose.

I realize that I didn't touch the Supervisor races, and will take a look at those in a future post, but the bottom line there is that we have runoffs that feature ALL Dems! Not one of the Reps running was able to muster enough votes to even get into the runoff.

Have a great weekend.