Denham ads by both sides lack substance

Forget dropping gloves. In the recall effort against state Sen. Jeff Denham, the tenor has moved to the level of biting and eyepokes.

Only days after the recall was pegged to California's June 3 primary, both sides began firing with nasty ads. Their content? So far, harsh charges that are somewhat light on anything to do with policy, governance or issues.

Taking a look at the pro-recall side first, there are television and radio commercials that attack Denham for taking a trip on campaign funds to Las Vegas, and later to a luxurious day spa in Arizona, while the Senate was in session.

The same commercials say Denham, R-Atwater, was "sleepwalking" as a result of his excursions when he voted against last year's state budget.

Said vote, the ads claim, hurt schools. The ads also state that Denham quietly accepted pay raises after earlier saying he wouldn't.

While true on their face, the charges lack some context. Denham's trip to Vegas and Sedona were part of a Republican Party fund-raiser, said Kevin Spillane, a spokesman for the recall opposition.

Making trips to raise funds while the Legislature is in session isn't just the province of Denham, or Republicans, for that matter. Democratic leaders in the Assembly and the Senate have faced criticism for similar expenditures.

Though they stink from a good-government perspective, such trips aren't illegal as long as the details of how they were paid for are spelled out.

Denham rejected the 2007-08 budget because he said it wouldn't balance the state's financial books.

His no-go helped stall the budget's approval by about a month and, while some education funding was held up, it was backfilled by the budget that ultimately passed in late August with no cuts to school spending.

Spillane also said that while Denham has accepted raises, he hasn't accepted every one approved for state senators, and his salary is less than what other senators receive as a result.

The claim about sleepwalking is more difficult to research, but absent any reports of Denham wandering the Capitol halls with eyes closed and a blanket over one shoulder, one can assume it was made figuratively.

On the anti-recall side are commercials that stress two points. The first is that Denham was targeted by state Senate Pro Tem Don Perata, D-Alameda, because of Denham's vote against last year's budget. The second is that newspapers in Denham's 12th District are uniformly against the recall.

A political fund controlled by Perata did contribute heavily to the early part of the recall process, though Perata himself has not played a public role in the effort.

As strategies to beat the recall go, Denham could do worse than make a bogeyman out of Perata, said Allan Hoffenblum, a Los Angeles-based political consultant who writes an annual book on state political races.

"The whole thing is, a political boss basically wants to overturn the last election," said Hoffenblum of Perata, noting that Denham easily won re-election in 2006.

"To most voters, it's a legitimate issue," he said.

Spillane said his side would very much like to cast the effort as the Perata recall, rather than Denham's. Still, it's Denham's name on the ballot, and Spillane believes the senator can't be tied to the kind of malfeasance that would compel his being booted from office.

"It sets a terrible precedent," Spillane said. "You'll have recalls launched at whatever politician the Democrats or Republicans want to get rid of."

The anti-recall ad's point about media opposition is true, and could be expanded to include newspapers from Sacramento to San Diego that have slammed the effort.

Even Simon Salinas, who would take Denham's job if he's recalled, will concede that the recall process isn't perfect.

"Maybe it needs to be changed," said Salinas, a Monterey County supervisor and former assemblyman. "But the reality is that this recall is happening, and the 60,000 people who signed the petition for it want to have their say."

Salinas, who beat Denham in an Assembly election in 2000, said he thinks he can represent the Northern San Joaquin Valley's part of the district because it's similar to the Salinas Valley in having a heavy Latino population and an agricultural base.

He also said he plans to visit this side of Pacheco Pass before the election, if just to put a face to his name.

The moves on both sides, strident as they may be, don't give much indication of how the race will turn out.

Hoffenblum said he hasn't seen any polling released about the recall since it became official, which suggests that if any polls were taken, they didn't prove much.

Which probably means more harsh ads, questionable claims and flung clods of mud to come.

On the Net: Watch the pro-recall television commercial at www.youtube.com/watch?v=byAc00jKnYA.

The anti-recall commercial can be seen at www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mr-VkcJZG4k.

On the Net, Part II: Next week, state Senate Republican Leader Dave Cogdill, R-Modesto, will answer reader-submitted questions about the state budget. To submit your question, go to http://thehive.modbee.com/talkingtothetop and look for the entry titled, "Blog with Sen. Cogdill."

Bee staff writer Ben van der Meer can be reached at bvandermeer@modbee.com or 578-2331.

This story was originally published April 21, 2008 at 3:02 AM with the headline "Denham ads by both sides lack substance."