In recent days, Medical Marijuana supporters and former Assemblyman Bruce Thompson have come out in support of term limits for the SD County Board of Supervisors. Although this may seemingly put the conservative Thompson in strange company, it’s pretty clear there appears to be no connection between the two … other than a shared dislike for incumbent Sups, or perhaps one incumbent Sup … in Thompson’s case.
Thompson’s campaign against Supervisor Bill Horn (pictured here with a mic, not a bong), rich with endorsements but apparently strapped for cash against the Horn war-chest, is simply tossing a needed issue into the public fray that Horn will either have to ignore or be hard pressed to ‘splain his position on. Here’s most of the Thompson release:
Fallbrook – 5th District Supervisor candidate Bruce Thompson formally announced today that as a County Supervisor he would immediately introduce a motion to adopt term limits for the Board of Supervisors.
San Diego County Supervisors are currently able to run for re-election indefinitely, which polls have indicated is unpopular with the county’s voters. The former California State Assemblyman, who is opposing incumbent Bill Horn in the upcoming June 2006 Primary Election, said he has long been a supporter of term limits, regardless of polling data.
“I have been in favor of term limits since the1980’s when career politicians gained a stranglehold on the state legislature. We face the same situation now at the county level. People get elected, gerrymander districts and re-write election laws to favor incumbents. It makes it very difficult to replace a failed Supervisor like Horn. Term limits need to be implemented to help ensure the public is protected from these would-be lifers,” said Thompson a resident of Fallbrook. Horn is opposed to term limits for Supervisor, as he stated recently at a republican club meeting in Valley Center.
Surveys taken in San Diego County have indicated support for term limits running as high as 87% among likely voters. Bruce Thompson faced term limits in 2000 while a member of the California State Assembly. He served three 2 year terms in the legislature and has since acted as the western regional director of the Small Business Administration. “People want term limits for County Supervisors. The time has come to enact this measure,” said Thompson.
"Regardless of polling data." Interesting phrase, usually meant to say you are taking a position despite the polls, because you have the courage to do what’s right … not because you are disregarding the 87% that agree with you.
Some believe the Thompson tactic is grasping at straws. What the Thompson camp may not have considered is Horn’s willingness, if pressed, to tie his opponent’s position to that of the Medical MJ supporters, who filed a notice of intention this week to circulate term limit petitions (see attachment below). In part, it reads:
Notice is hereby given by the persons whose names appear hereon of their intention to circulate the petition within the County of San Diego for the purpose of enacting term limits on the San Diego County Board of Supervisors. A statement of the reasons of the proposed action as contemplated in the petition is as follows:
We were initially prompted to pursue a term limits initiative because of San Diego County Supervisors’ contempt for voters’ opinions about medical marijuana. Since then, we have had an outpouring of support from other San Diego County residents who support limiting supervisors’ consecutive terms for a number of other valid reasons.
Preventing supervisors from serving successive terms will remove the overwhelming advantages they have as incumbents, forcing candidates to be elected in competitive elections that are based
on issues that matter to San Diego County voters.
A long-time GOP operative wanting to remain anonymous (can the Sup’s wrath be that serious?) said to me, "I have always supported term limits, so I have agreed to help this effort. I wish it had been filed by someone other than the medical mj people, but sometimes even a blind squirrel finds an acorn."
Classic … but with all due respect and sensitivity to blind squirrels, they possibly being the insulted ones.
Below is the Term Limit Intent to Circulate and the text of the Initiative.