Issues Surrounding the Baker Campaign

This letter is written in response to your June 26 article on (Irvine City Councilman and unsuccessful congressional candidate) C. David Baker. Baker demonstrates all the hallmarks of a morally and ethically bankrupt individual. He’s prone to choosing the easier wrong over the harder right. When finally exposed, he stated that he was “ruined.” How about all the others he affected and possibly ruined?

After his wrongdoings were fully exposed to his closest supporters, Baker continued to run for election. In choosing to do so, one of two things could have happened--both bad. He could have won. The 40th District then would have a congressman who is unable to make the hard decisions. Or (and as it turned out) he could have lost. In losing, he stole almost a third of the votes, votes that could have gone to either C. Christopher Cox or Nathan Rosenberg, possibly changing the election outcome. Certainly voters in the primary election were defrauded!

Unfortunately, our society is becoming overrun with morally bankrupt individuals parading around under flags of integrity. Recent examples of such individuals who consistently choose the easier wrong over the harder right are Jimmy Swaggart, Ollie North, Jimmy and Tammy Bakker, Gary Hart and our own Harriett Wieder.

What’s to become of Baker? The final paragraphs of your article are most unnerving. You state that he could lose his job and maybe the Bar would institute a routine examination of the situation and “possibly” recommend punishment. Baker should lose his job, and he should be disbarred.

Perhaps the most unsettling issue is the wavering of the district attorney. If the district attorney does not seek an indictment against Baker, then that office only endorses moral and ethical decay--the ultimate easier wrong over the harder right.

RONALD VON FREYMANN

Huntington Beach