The Other McCain

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CA-36: Anti-Hahn Video Draws More Than 75,000 Viewers in First 18 Hours

Posted on | June 15, 2011 | 54 Comments

Janice Hahn, Los Angeles City Council member and
Democrat candidate in CA-36 special election

An online attack ad highlighting a Democratic congressional candidate’s support for a controversial “gang intervention” program has generated more than 75,000 views at YouTube.com since its release Tuesday afternoon. 

“It will probably hit 100,000 [views] by the end of today,” video director Ladd Ehlinger Jr. said in a brief interview Wednesday morning. Ehlinger noted that the video now requires an 18-and-older age verification after it was repeatedly flagged as offensive by liberal blog readers. “I don’t see them going and flagging any other rap videos,” the director said.

Funded by a conservative political action committee, the rap-themed video focuses on the record of Los Angeles city council member Janice Hahn, a Democrat who faces Republican Craig Huey in a July 12 special election for California’s 36th District congressional seat, vacated by the retirement of Democrat Jane Harman.

The video has drawn almost universal condemnation, not only from Democrats, but also from California GOP officials and the Huey campaign. Ehlinger has refused to apologize for the online ad, which one leading liberal blog called “Willie Horton on steroids.”

As David Weigel of Slate reports, Ehlinger’s objective was to “create something so shocking that it would get people talking about a spot on the Hahn record that no one had paid attention to.”

Justin Elliott of Salon claimed that the ad relies on a “debunked” 2008 TV news report. However, the Torrance (Calif.) Daily Breeze article cited by Elliott did not address other evidence that the controversial “gang intervention” program aided criminals. 

Criticizing media he accused of being “too lazy to do research,” Ehlinger posted three further items about the scandal:

The indictment of Sanchez was also reported by the New York Times. In May 2008, Hahn urged a tax increase to expand funding for L.A.’s gang intervention program to $40 million. Here is the 2009 report by KTTV in Los Angeles about Crips gangster Steve Myrick, a career criminal who received a certificate of appreciation from Janice Hahn, and other gangsters who collected checks from the program:

And here is Ehlinger’s ad for the conservative Turn Right USA PAC:

As of 11 a.m. ET Wednesday, both the PAC’s main Web site and its “Hahn’s Homeboyz” site were non-operational due to unusually heavy Internet traffic.

Category: California, Congress, Crime, Democrats, Election

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