Prop. D. Leader Gets Mad at Publisher, and Gets Even Too

This is a little story of politics and money in San Diego.

It starts with Chris Crotty, chairman of the committee that was trying to convince voters to allow the City Council to continue exceeding the Gann spending limit.

Crotty, a former aide to Mayor Maureen O’Connor, state Sen. Lucy Killea and City Councilwoman Linda Bernhardt, decided that the Yes-on-Proposition D campaign should sign on to a “slate mailer.”

Slate mailers are the latest gimmick.

Several candidates and campaigns buy space on a hand-size mailer that can be carried to the voting booth and has an impressive title like “Democratic Choice ’90.”

Enter Larry Remer, 40, San Diego political consultant, weekly newspaper publisher and print shop owner.

Remer’s clients/contacts include Bernhardt, councilmen John Hartley and Bob Filner, Rep. Jim Bates and Supervisor Susan Golding. He’s also working for Southern California Edison on the SDG&E; merger.

His reputation is that of a fierce partisan with a take-no-prisoners attitude.

Crotty says Remer approached him and offered to include Yes-on-D on a slate mailer he was sending to 150,000 voters. Asking price was $6,000.

Crotty got other bids. A San Francisco political consultant asked $2,000 to include D on a mailer.

As Crotty tells it, Remer then dropped to $1,500.

“Then he told me, ‘If you don’t do business with me, we may be in the position of going ‘No on D,’ ” Crotty said. “I thought he was joking. I didn’t think it was a serious threat.”

Crotty stuck with the San Francisco bidder. But, he said, he realized Remer was not joking after he saw Remer’s slate mailer.

The mailer urged a no vote on D. So did Remer’s newspaper, Newsline, a flip-flop of its usual position.

Remer, normally quite talky, is mum: “I don’t have any comment at all about this stuff.”

Crotty figures he had the last laugh when D passed easily Tuesday. Still, he resents what he says was Remer’s tactic of buy-me-off-or-suffer-the-consequences:

“If that’s the way he does business, he’s lost any future business I might do with him.”

There Ought to Be a Law

Of men and mice.

* Just when you thought it couldn’t get worse.

Vince Jimno got to bed at 3 a.m. Wednesday, exhausted and depressed about his weak showing (17.6%) in the sheriff’s race.

A few hours later he struggled out of bed and drove to his campaign office in Escondido to check the final results.

When he left, he found even more bad news: a hit-and-run driver had clobbered his new Cadillac parked outside.

* Overheard from a Vista attorney: “Yeah, the guy drank until he thought she was 21. . . .”

* Last week, the county Grand Jury said working conditions at the downtown courthouse are crummy. This week, a dead mouse appeared on the floor of the felony arraignment court.

Clerks put chalk marks around the corpse and cordoned off the scene with police tape.

It wasn’t the first courtroom to find an expired rodent.

Presiding Municipal Judge E. Mac Amos says he’s trapped 26 mice in his court in recent months.

Justice Is Blind

Notes from watching Richard T. Silberman testify.

* An elderly woman in the front row of the spectators’ section wore a sweat shirt from the play “Les Miserables,” the classic tale of a virtuous man hounded by heartless law enforcement.

She told me she was not trying to send a subtle message to jurors. Nice touch, though.

* During the prosecution’s cross-examination, three jurors had intermittent bouts of heavy eyelids.

* If any jurors are “Twin Peaks” fans, the prosecutors may have trouble proving that’s a real FBI agent talking on those wiretaps.

No discussion of apple pie, doughnuts, dreams, or dictating notes to Diane. Not even coffee or budget motels.

* What’s an undercover FBI agent’s favorite way to end a conversation.

According to the tapes: “Take care. Bye-bye.”

Take care. Bye-bye.