Vote for Your Beliefs
by Councilman John Paul Ledesma

Several people have asked me about the 71st Assembly District and the 33rd Senate District races. Regarding the 71st Assembly District, there is a stark difference between the two candidates. Jeff Miller is superior to his competitor on every single key policy issue – and I mean every. Jeff Miller is a person who is ideologically grounded and actually has a history of actions that back up his claims.

Jeff Miller is a lifelong Republican and, like most active republicans in Riverside County, he has Orange County roots. Jeff started the Riverside County Young Republicans; he became chairman by building up grassroots clubs and taking control of the Central Committee; he turned the Riverside County GOP into a functioning organization; he raised money for key partisan races and local volunteer clubs; he was co-chair of Jessica’s Law initiative and he raised money for Proposition 90. In other words, he actually had productive accomplishments before becoming a candidate.  

Neil Blais’ actions include endorsing some of our past council members (Susan Withrow, Sherri Butterfield and Roger Faubel) after some of their infamous decisions (Faubel was not involved in all of these). To go back in history, Neil made these endorsements after the old regime made Mission Viejo a leading city in the area of homosexual domestic partner benefits and opposed putting Internet filters on computers used by children in the Mission Viejo library; they were found guilty of violating open meeting laws … you get the idea. Then in a candidate forum this past October, Neil said he would never endorse someone who is Pro-Choice unless he did not know their position. So he cares so deeply about the issue that he claims to not bother to ask a person about the issue he feigns sincerity on. That is one reason I think that he is spewing bunk.

As for those of you that want to vote for the “Orange County guy,” you may not realize that Jeff Miller has actually lived in Orange County longer than Neil Blais. Jeff Miller is the candidate who has lived and worked in Mission Viejo. His parents had a business here in Mission Viejo, and they lived in Casta Del Sol for several years before they passed away.

I agree I want converts to the Republican Party too, but when the person’s claimed conversion is coincidental with probable political expediency, I am skeptical, especially when the Blais’ lack of actions (lack because no record exists of him doing ANYTHING before he ran for Assembly), and the few actions he has taken in the past have been on the wrong side. For example, remember Proposition 22 (definition of marriage being one man and one woman) which was struck down by the State Supreme court recently? Neil has no record of ever taking a position on it, yet Jeff Miller was active in getting the initiative passed. It is yet another issue where Neil is saying the words but has no track record of actions to back up what he says. That is the reason the widow of the sponsor of Proposition 22 has endorsed Jeff Miller.

Regarding one person’s Christian picks site supporting Neil, by its logic, geography must mean more than ideology. According to that site, being able to reinvent oneself for a Republican Primary must mean more than any stance the candidate has taken or failed to take in the past. With this kind of thinking, a candidate can legitimately call himself a conservative, even if he is a moderate socialist, because conservative means conserving what one has; therefore, a conservative socialist is still a conservative.

It appears from its flawed logic that one can believe that what a candidate has actually done and believes mean nothing if he tells people he is a Christian. When candidates get away with hiding behind professions of faith, they have no reason to get into a conversation about ideology because, as in this case, the candidate simply tells people about being a bad pro-abort Catholic before converting – no need to ask if many Catholics are Pro-Life.

Neil says he is a “real” Christian because he is very involved in a small church, so his pastor knows him; but he professes that someone who goes to “Saddleback Church” can’t really be a “committed Christian” because “they can hide,” as Neil says, in the masses. After all, at Saddleback Church they don’t read Scripture. [Note: Sarcasm aside, I heard Neil say this to a group of people, and I confirmed this with another member of Saddleback Church who was listening.] By the above-mentioned Website’s logic, a candidate is Pro-Life if he says he is Pro-Life, and his status has nothing to do with endorsing Pro-Abort candidates.  The message being sent is, if the candidate cares so much about the issue that he purposely does not even ask another candidate’s stance on the issue, then it is OK.  The candidate doesn’t forget to mention he is a Christian if someone questions his Pro-Life-Don’t-Ask-Just-Endorse stance.

Values are what matter, so why would anyone support a candidate like Neil who has a track record of supporting candidates who oppose holiday displays on public property, support domestic partner benefits, support well known Pro-Aborts and support tax increases?  After all, this would mean supporting the guy (Neil) who never took a position on Proposition 22, not the guy (Jeff) who actually worked to get Proposition 22 passed. I think it has something to do with those “Pro-Family” values we believe in.

By that flawed logic, when it comes to living out values and promoting public policy, what a candidate actually does is not significant as long as he is telling people that he is a Christian, “a really real” Christian.  After all, if someone is a really real Christian, then there is no way he can have his actions questioned or be incorrect on a policy issue or fail to stand for our values, right?  In fact, words and catch phrases must mean more than actions and movement in a direction that is indicative of the values we espouse.   

As for the 33rd Senate District, I have endorsed Harry Sidhu. He is a good conservative who is self-made, a legal immigrant who is passionate about people coming here legally and being required to learn English.