CITYWATCH TODAY—There are at least a couple of ways to pay off a politician. One could invite the politician out to dinner and hand him real dollars in an envelope under the dinner table. Or, one could donate a reasonable sum to his election campaign or to one of his ‘charity’ funds. In the second case it is called ‘soft corruption.’ In the first case, I suppose, ‘hard corruption’ would be an appropriate description. But, not unlike ‘soft porn’ and ‘hard porn’, in either case the subjects are still naked.
So-called soft corruption has our attention in Los Angeles these days because of the Sea Breeze scandal where a developer channeled a bunch of money to LA’s Mayor Garcetti and various LA City Council members in return for a favorable vote.
The Sea Breeze scandal is not the only report of soft corruption activity in our fair city. CityWatch believes that corruption in politics and government is wrong no matter the type … soft or hard. We think that voters should refrain from returning corrupt politicians to their dirty perches in the City Hall cage. We’re going to continue to inform you and shock you on this subject until you do the right thing and take a stand against corruption in our government.
If we argue that it is our … the people’s … government, then we cannot ignore our responsibility in this democracy to speak up. At the ballot box. To our friends. In our communities.
Mitchell Schwartz is a candidate for Los Angeles mayor. He’s calling for the feds to step in and conduct an investigation into political corruption in Los Angeles. Richard Lee Abrams … CityWatch Corruption Watch writer … updates us on this story in Today’s CityWatch. Check it out. Stay informed. Take a stand.
Ken Draper-Editor, CityWatch
