Venezia: Let’s have fun dissecting campaign mailers

The June primary is about three weeks away, and mailboxes are brimming with candidate mailers.

I’m oddly fascinated with them.

Interestingly, these mailers are double-edged swords.

Bombard voters with too many and you run the risk of turning them off. Don’t send enough, and you’re viewed as not a serious contender.

In any case, I thought I’d have some fun reading between the lines of mailers.

So far three candidates have jammed my mailbox: Michelle Steel, who is running for the 2nd District seat on the Orange County Board of Supervisors, and legislative aide Emanuel Patrascu and Newport Beach City Councilman Keith Curry, both of whom are running for the 74th Assembly District.

I’ve received the most mail by far from Steel. I even made mention of it at the April 28 Feet to the Fire forum, where she debated her opponents.

She must be spending a bloody fortune on this stuff, but I am enjoying everything she sends.

One piece of mail recently pictured U.S. Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Costa Mesa) smiling ear to ear with a quote reading, “I only trust one candidate for Supervisor and that’s Michelle Steel.”

I guess that works if you trust Rohrabacher, but if you’re not a fan of his, I’m not sure this so good for Steel.

And if I’m to believe her mailers, she’s a Wonder Woman in the tax arena.

I especially liked the one with check marks next to bullet points implying she saved 2.8 million businesses and 38 million Californians from a new Internet tax, 55,000 businesses received tax refunds, and 22,000 businesses were helped with regulatory and tax problems.

Wow!

She did all this singlehandedly?

What about the rest of the State Board of Equalization, of which she’s a member?

And don’t businesses receive tax refunds if they qualify for them, with or without anyone’s help?

Isn’t the Board of Equalization supposed to help businesses? I see a whole section devoted to tax appeals on the website, https://www.boe.ca.gov.

Patrascu’s mailers are equally interesting.

One has former President Ronald Reagan’s quote, “Tear down this wall,” with a Communist symbol behind it. The text states Patrascu and his family fled Romania two years after the wall came down.

I’m not sure what that has to do with running for Assembly, but my guess is he’ll keep communists out of Sacramento.

The funny thing is that of all the fliers I’ve received from Patrascu, not one has mentioned that he’s district director for Assemblyman Travis Allen (R-Huntington Beach), which is a good thing because it shows he knows his way around Sacramento.

Instead he touts himself as a small-business owner, though he doesn’t say what kind of business he has or that he started it this year. And by all accounts it’s not his main source of income.

Reagan seems to be a favorite mailer theme.

Curry says he’s proud to have worked for the late president from 1982 to 1987 but doesn’t say in what capacity.

He’s into the whole Reagan mystique. That same flier depicts the Reagan statue he was instrumental in erecting in Newport Beach’s Bonita Canyon Sports Park.

If you’re a Reagan fan, this might make Curry your guy. Then again, maybe dead presidents aren’t your thing.

But I have to hand it to Patrascu. Until this week, I hadn’t received any negative or attack mailers. He’s the first to come out swinging.

His most recent depicts a cartoon of a sleek train with Curry sitting on top of it, conductor’s cap and all, hands in the air. The bold lettering says Curry called the high-speed rail “tremendous” and “He’s the one who created tax increases to pay for it!”

OK, so it’s not the most obnoxious hit piece I’ve ever seen, but it certainly is funny.

I called Curry to see what he had to say about it.

He told me that 15 years ago, he was a paid consultant for the state assessing funding for the high-speed rail idea.

At the time the estimated cost was $30 million. Now it’s over $60 million, he said.

Curry said that as the state’s consultant, he believed that a dedicated funding source was needed for the project, and the only idea that made sense was to increase taxes.

“They didn’t like my advice and got another financial consultant,” he said.

Curry said consultants are like lawyers in that they are paid to do a job. What you think personally doesn’t come into play.

Personally he didn’t think the project was viable then and he doesn’t think it is now — and has gone on record saying so, he told me.

Reading between the lines of these mailers makes them all the more interesting and entertaining. And somewhere in all of them is a message, though maybe not the one intended.

BARBARA VENEZIA, whose column appears Fridays, lives in Newport Beach. She can be reached at bvontv1@gmail.com.