Add a Dose of Sex to Politics and San Diegans Are Hooked

All that stuff about San Diegans being laid back and not giving a fig about politics? Forget it.

San Diegans were as bug-eyed and obsessed with the Clarence Thomas affair as any group of Americans who love a little smutty talk with their politics.

There’s even a rumor that Thomas will be invited to throw out the first ball (and leer the first leer) at next year’s Over-the-Line Tournament at Fiesta Island.

San Diegans were drawn to the Thomas hearings like cops to fresh doughnuts, staying affixed to their televisions and radios.

Even during the weekend KidzArtz Festival in Balboa Park. Parents of all colors herded their kids to various exhibits, all the while listening on their headsets to white politicians question black people about sex. Is that multicultural diversity or what?

On Tuesday, phone calls threatened to swamp the San Diego office of Sen. John Seymour (R-Calif). By the 3 p.m. vote, 700 calls had been logged, anti-Thomas by more than 2 to 1.

In 11 years running the San Diego office for a succession of senators (Hayakawa, Wilson, now Seymour), Kathy Holladay said she’s never seen San Diegans exhibit such passion.

The office got more calls on Clarence Thomas vs. Anita Hill than it did last year when the issue was a vote on whether the United States should go to war with Saddam Hussein. Analysis: Third World dictators come and go, but the battle between the sexes is forever.

The Senate’s vote did little to stop the calls: 200 more calls were recorded between 3 p.m. and 5 p.m. Some threatening Seymour (who voted for Thomas) with retribution at the polls.

Still, it remains unclear whether long-term shifts in San Diego culture will result. Local X-rated bookstores do report numerous inquiries about the body of work of one Long Dong Silver.

One guy said his interest was “strictly politically.” No luck. Mr. Silver made two (gay) films more than a decade ago, but they’re no longer sold locally.

“I have a hunch they’ll be reissued soon,” said a clerk at the downtown F Street Bookstore.

As for any uptick in paperback sales of “The Exorcist,” there has been none recorded yet. I’ll keep you posted.

Candidate Puts On Gloves

You hear such things, you see such things.

* Former Del Mar Mayor Ronnie Delaney, now running for the Assembly, is planning an invitation-only, $125 per-person fund-raiser Nov. 8 at a hotel in Del Mar.

The lure: a large-screen viewing of the Mike Tyson-Evander Holyfield heavyweight title fight.

But feminists are grumbling that no woman candidate should be associated, in any way, with Tyson because of the rape charges pending against him in Indianapolis.

Delaney says Tyson is innocent until proven guilty. Besides, “I figure most women will be rooting for Holyfield.”

* Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Coronado) notes that the average building project in regulation-happy San Diego County takes four years to be approved and constructed.

His clincher: That’s longer than it took the United States to mobilize and win World War II.

* Bumper sticker in car-phone-laden North County: “Hang Up and Drive.”

* A San Diego computer software firm, StudyWare Corp., is just out with BABY NAMER!, a software package to help parents select from more than 14,000 names.

Not just a list: Summaries of studies about the psychological impact of certain names, nicknames, and initials (i.e., Frances Ann Thompson is FAT).

Three years in the making by a Chicago journalist. That’s four times as long as the average baby.

Pack Up Those Troubles, Jimmy

When last we left San Diego’s Capt. Sticky (nee Richard Pesta) he was organizing the Real Man’s Mid-Life Crisis Tour of Thailand.

For $3,500, you get 15 days of drinking, fishing and wenching “where women still know how to treat a man.”

Now, Sticky says, his first tour departs in three weeks (once the monsoon abates). He’s also devising the Real Woman’s Mid-Life Crisis Tour of Thailand, to include shopping and (optional) cosmetic surgery.

And he’s offering a free spot on the men’s tour to the Rev. Jimmy Swaggart, once again linked with back-alley prostitutes.

“If anyone needs a mid-life crisis tour, it’s Jimmy,” Sticky says. “I think we can help him.”