It’s been a tough year for U.S. Rep. Joe Baca (D-Rialto), who lost several skirmishes with fellow Democrats culminating in June primary election defeat for his two sons, Assemblyman Joe Baca Jr. in the 32nd Senate District primary and Jeremy Baca in the 62nd Assembly District.

It’s true that "Working Joe" has never been a favorite son of the Democrat party (he’s not considered liberal or effective enough, believe it or not).  It’s also not unusual for a legislator, especially a congressman, to be accused of losing touch with the local political base.  But Mr. Baca seems to take it a step further by demonstrating utter cluelessness about the goings on and operations of his own party.

For example, two days after Baca Junior’s Senate Primary defeat at the hands of Assemblywoman Gloria Negrete-McLeod, Baca Senior told the Press Enterprise that Republicans were secretly backing the liberal Negrete-McLeod because she would be easier for the GOP nominee to defeat in the November general election.  Problem there was no Republican was running for the seat.

Another victorious candidate in the June primary was County Supervisor Gary Ovitt, who easily won his non-partisan re-election, avoiding a runoff and keeping his Fourth District seat, representing Ontario, Montclair, Chino and Chino Hills.  Almost two months later, Ovitt, a member of the County Republican Central Committee, got a letter from Congressman Baca, congratulating him for winning the Democratic Primary (it didn’t say for what office), and urging that the two continue to work together to "resister (sic) Democrats…."

Sometimes little things say a lot about an organization.

This entry was posted on Monday, August 14th, 2006 at 12:00 am and is filed under Blog Posts.