Gaslamp Nightspot Stretches It a Bit With Presidential Preference Poll

Here’s political news you can’t get on C-SPAN or CNN (probably for good reasons).

* This just in: the results of the presidential poll whose motto is “Better Latex Than Never.”

The condom poll by Dick’s Last Resort, the chicken and ribs place in the Gaslamp Quarter, asked people buying condoms in the restrooms to state their preferences.

Based on 105 purchases (43 by women, 63 by men), the results: Perot 44%, Clinton 30%, Bush 26%.

Of the five Dick’s places across the country, only San Diego went for Perot.

The nationwide winner was Clinton, although the Dallas results may be skewed because 20% of the condom buyers there wanted Texas Gov. Ann Richards.

* Queer Nation/San Diego, the radical gay group, is “outraged” at Ross Perot for saying that the phony photo of his daughter would have been humiliating because it would have shown her in a lesbian embrace.

* David Marmon, 52, of Dulzura, a write-in candidate in the 52nd Congressional District, is in the final throes of a four-week protest fast: one week for each $1 trillion the country is in debt.

So far he’s lost 15 pounds from his normal 160, but the debt keeps getting fatter. He’s undaunted: “I’m physically weak but my spirits are good.”

* KCEO radio (AM 1000) in North County will offer political commentary on Election Night by a local character known as Zimfa the Psarcastic Psychic.

Normally (or abnormally) Zimfa does an astrology chart for the Rancho Santa Fe Review. He’s predicting a Bush victory with a civil war to follow:

“I’m predicting Bush because of my Tarot cards. The last card to come up was Justice Reversed.”

* Hillcrest’s Contemporary Comics (“Unauthorized and Proud of It”) is out with a scathing new comic book, “Ross Perot: Dressing the Emperor.”

Says Contemporary Managing Editor Jay Allen Sanford: “The man has already served his purpose, and he can now safely and quietly go the way of the Edsel, full-service gas stations and the milkman.”

Contemporary earlier did a book on Dan Quayle, part of its “Great Morons in History” series.

* La Jolla bumper sticker: “Bye, George.”

A Legend in His Own Mind?

Before Scott Tracy Barnes disappears into the footnotes of political history, let’s take another look at this curious character who warned Ross Perot of wedding-gate.

Barnes wrote a book titled “BOHICA.” BOHICA is said to stand for Bend Over, Here It Comes Again.

In the book, Barnes says he was recruited clandestinely by San Diego County Dist. Atty. Edwin L. Miller to work as a counteragent within the El Cajon Police Department.

Barnes writes that Miller summoned him to his office and whispered, “There’s a lot of shady things going on in the department, so we’re going to quietly make you part of the BET,” the biker-gang enforcement team.

Steven J. Casey, a spokesman for Miller, says the account is “pure fantasy” and that Barnes was never an “overt or covert” member of the biker team:

“The district attorney and Mr. Barnes may have been in the same town at the same time, but that’s the closest they ever got.”

The Wonderful World of Politics

More of the same.

* There’s nothing like a campaign to make a politician turn to religion.

Peter Navarro, who lists his religion as Protestant and lives in the Del Mar Heights area, has been attending services at Bayview Baptist Church in Encanto.

* Susan Golding won’t get an endorsement from the firefighters’ labor union.

The union’s executive board had recommended Golding, but the membership this week turned the idea down, preferring to stay neutral.

* The San Diego Daily Transcript, whose previous polls have won praise for accuracy from both camps, reports today that the mayor’s race is a dead heat: Golding 42.4%, Navarro 42.4%, undecided 15%.

The poll was done by the San Diego firm Competitive Edge; 401 voters polled Tuesday and Wednesday.

* Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer are scheduled for a Saturday rally here, along with actresses Sarah Jessica Parker (“sex, lies & videotape”) and Ali McGraw.

Bruce Herschensohn will also have a San Diego rally, maybe with state Atty. Gen. Dan Lungren.