L.A. council candidate Paul Krekorian assails 2 mailers by Christine Essel

from the LA Times
by Maeve Reston

Prominent supporters of Los Angeles City Council candidate and Assemblyman Paul Krekorian denounced two mailers sent last week by the campaign of his opponent, former Paramount Pictures Corp. executive Christine Essel, that accuse Krekorian of sexism and anti-Semitism, based in part on comments on a blog.

Tuesday's runoff race for former City Councilwoman Wendy Greuel's seat in the San Fernando Valley has grown increasingly caustic in the final weeks, but Krekorian condemned one of Essel's new mailers as "the most disgusting and grotesque political communication" he had ever seen.

In the first mailing, Essel's campaign said a previous Krekorian campaign mail piece had portrayed her "hog-tied with arms and hands held back by heavy rope." Krekorian's spokesman said the mailer, which depicted a smiling Essel with ropes lifting an ankle and her wrists as she stood on a DWP bill, was intended to portray the candidate as a puppet controlled by the union that represents Department of Water and Power employees. That union has independently spent more than $244,000 to boost her campaign bid.

Essel's campaign consultant, John Shallman, said Krekorian should apologize for the portrayal.

The mail from Essel's campaign also charged that Krekorian and his supporters "have unleashed a shocking barrage of nasty, sexist and anti-Semitic personal attacks" on a website. Shallman provided a list of comments that the campaign had collected from readers of Mayor Sam's Sister City blog as examples.

Krekorian's campaign stressed that it has no relationship to the independent blog, created in 2004 by Valley resident Michael Higby. In a telephone interview, Higby said he supports Krekorian but has no official role in the campaign. He and two other writers on the blog have authority to approve reader comments, he said.

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