Month: May 2015

My series on the Just Us Brothers has concluded. I have left out the third brother in this triad, but today we will spend some time with him too.

Today’s long and sordid tale includes fraud, deception, treachery, jealousy and the stuff that you would expect from the novels of Agatha Christy or Allison Brennan. Some of this information was presented in previous blogs, but without context. Today, dear reader, you will get the context.  Once you do, you will be mad as hell. So without further explanation, here we go.

The seeds of their plan have been germinating for some time now in the fertile recesses of George and Aaron’s minds. The original plan was revealed last year when Aaron proposed eliminating the office of Executive Vice President. Aaron pulled the proposed bylaws amendment, but was still moving forward. The goal was the same, but the path was modified due to changes in the battlefield.

The revised plan was to elect Aaron as Executive Vice President and then promote George to President of CRA. The Park brothers would control CRA. They could promote their friends and dismember their enemies. Like Barbara Alby and her friends, they could be major players in the State Party and the GOP.

The plan was moving forward until they hit some unexpected resistance on two fronts. In their own backyard were Barry Pruitt and the Nevada County Republican Assembly. The other obstacle was those nagging, pesky committees for Chartering and Credentials.

January 24, 2015
Despite their best efforts, the Park boys could only get to fifty percent on a two-thirds vote to suspend the charter of the Nevada County RA. They blamed Tim Thiesen and the Charter Review Committee for screwing up what should have been a slam-dunk vote. The opposition to the Parks at the January 2015 board meeting was led by Tom Hudson, the Executive Vice President.

When Charter Review refused to recommend a second suspension vote, the alliance the Parks thought they had with the members of Charter Review was broken. George shutdown access to the membership files and battened down the hatches to ride-out the storm until the Convention. Placer County RA was the host of the 2015 Convention and George was the Convention Director.  Going into the Convention, George and Aaron did not ask for help from the neighboring CRA units. Instead, they chose to run the entire convention themselves.

Annual Convention March 13 – 15, 2015
At the Convention, the Park boys controlled everything, including the Senate District elections. They were trying to shape CRA into one even more favorable to them. They purposely tried to keep paper copies of everything limited and in short supply. This was partly due to a lack of preparation and also a way to get items approved by the Board and Convention without too much scrutiny.

In the proposed 2015-2016 budget, George gave himself $4,000 for expenses. The CRA President was given $2,500 for travel expenses. This was their walking around money to build goodwill with local units and build a base for George’s ascension to the Presidency. Who decided to abort the traditional Board meeting after the convention I’m not sure, but it certainly was.

John Briscoe would often negotiate business items with others on the Board and then get overridden by George and Aaron. The abbreviated Board meeting after the convention was one example and the other was the call for a May 30th board meeting. Briscoe agreed to it and then balked.

April 15, 2015
John believed that was the end of the meeting idea and had moved on; but eight state officers, seven district directors and seven deputy district directors thought it was necessary. Since Briscoe failed to act, they utilized a seldom used provision in the CRA Bylaws to call a board meeting for May 30, 2015 in Santa Barbara as was originally agreed to by John and eight Vice-Presidents.

At first, the Parks tried to disqualify enough board members to invalidate the call to meeting. They had leverage because they possessed the caucus ballots for the Senate District elections. No one has seen the ballots since Aaron and George took possession of them at the Convention. However, they could not theoretically disqualify enough Board members to invalidate the call, so they had John put up what they falsely called an alternative which was a July 25th board meeting. This was put to an online vote. Voting took place from April 15 to 20.

As results began to come in on the online vote, Aaron and George were dumbfounded. They had never been rebuked like this in CRA. This was their organization, how dare others oppose them.

Aaron decides to post his famous five blogs on April 17th. Then a curious thing happened, these folks didn’t back down. They were pressing for more. It was clear that CRA was not the friendly playground that the Parks thought it was, so Aaron and George implemented plan B.

April 18, 2015
Before the voting period was even closed for the proposed July 25th meeting, the three Park brothers—Aaron, George and John—implemented their version of Operation Chaos.

Not only had they implemented a scorched earth approach on their blog, but they had done so behind the scenes as well. You know about the deletion of our records on Hightail and Mailchimp, but that was only part of the plan.

The other part of the plan required subterfuge and stealth. Also on April 18, 2015, Aaron Park registered the domain name for the website that he, George and John Briscoe planned to create. Impact Republicans

www.whois.com/whois/impactrepublicans.com

April 20, 2015
As a stall tactic, John Briscoe rolled-out the proposal for an Investigative Committee even before voting was completed on the July 25th meeting. This was their version of three card Monty. John was to keep the Board occupied while Aaron and George went to work.

Before forming their own group, the Park boys made an attempt to find a new home in another existing organization. Aaron and George began hunting for sanctuary within competing groups such as the Conservative Republicans of California. Can you imagine the stones these guys have to run Karen England from CRA, ban her for life, and then talk to her group and offer to join? Oh, and as an added bonus, they promised to bring at least one third of the statewide CRA membership with them.

Well, surprise, no one wanted them. So they did the next best thing, they started their own Republican club to compete directly with CRA. Their group is called CIR on their internal emails. To this end, Aaron and George repurposed the CRA membership lists.

It costs lots of money to start your own group. It was reported that Aaron was looking for at least five thousand dollars to start the new organization. It was also reported that he was having trouble finding anyone willing to write him a check.

April 21, 2015
Treasurer closes Legal Defense Fund account and transfers money to general account.

April 22, 2015
John Briscoe resigns.

April 26, 2015
Tom Hudson announces the results of the vote on the Investigative Committee, which was approved.
CRA website just happens to get hacked on this date.

April 30, 2015
George Park deletes the Hightail account and presumably the Mailchimp data also.

gparkjr Apr 30 02:20 pm

I have removed or already retrieved copies of all the files I need from this account. I have cancelled the subscription plan as well. Please delete the free account effective immediately and delete all data that my be left in the account immediately.

Senate District Director Carl Brickey emails the six additional complaints to the Parks and CRA Board seven and a half hours after George had deleted everything.
Here is date stamp from the email
Date: Thu, 30 Apr 2015 23:54:04 -0700

May 3, 2015
Aaron begins to blog about getting banned for life. Please note that the majority on the board did not call for this punishment. At this stage, most just wanted Aaron and George off the board and exiled to Placer County…although that opinion was beginning to change.

May 18, 2015
Convention Financial Summary given to CRA Treasurer with no supporting documents (receipts).

Today
We are six weeks into the Park Brother’s version of Operation Chaos. Those of you that stayed loyal to them have been played for fools. They decided to leave before the first online vote was concluded on April 20th and twelve days before the ten charges were sent to them and the CRA Board.

Lastly, and we did save the best for last, is the proverbial smoking gun. You may read from their own email about their plans. The Sith Lord said you guys were idiots when it comes to technology. Here’s the proof.

RE: Delays in producing CIR Documents??? We need to be ready to go on 5/30
—Forwarded Message Attachment—
Date: Thu, 21 May 2015 21:10:04 -0700
Subject: Re: Delays in producing CIR Documents??? We need to be ready to go on 5/30
From: benitagagne@gmail,com
To: aaronfpark71@yahoo,com; gparkjr@yahoo,com; tjblair62@yahoo,com; pres@cragop,org

The only changes to this section VI is the deletion of VP Charter Support and substitution of VP Endorsement and Legislation with job duties.

Todd, Marketing VP has outreach communications as part of the job description.

What job duties does the Engagement VP have in your view?
One suggestion: I suggest the order of the officers in Article V get carried over to Article VI.

Benita

Article VI – Officers Duties

Section 6.01.    President. The President shall preside at all board meetings and conventions of the CIR. The President is also the Chief Executive Officer of the CIR.  In order to serve as President of the CIR, the candidate for this office must have been a member of the CIR for a minimum of 3 years.

Section 6.02. Executive Vice President.  When or if the President is absent or unable to perform his/her duties, the Executive Vice President shall Preside and act as President. The Executive Vice President must be a member of CIR 3 years prior to being a candidate for this office. Upon the written resignation of the President, the Executive Vice President automatically assumes the office of CIR President.

Section 6.03. Regional Vice Presidents. Regional Vice Presidents shall organize and preside over regional endorsing conventions and be responsible for developing and starting new CIR Chapters. There shall be one northern Vice President and one Southern Vice President. A Regional Vice President must have been a member of the CIR for 2 years before becoming a candidate for this office.

Section 6.04. Administrative Vice President. The Administrative Vice President shall record the meeting minutes for all CIR Board meetings and shall be the custodian of CIR records not related to membership. The Administrative Vice President shall also responsible for internal communications within the CIR. The Administrative Vice President must have been a member of the CIR for 2 years before becoming a candidate for this office.

Section 6.05. Marketing Vice President. The Marketing Vice President is responsible for all outreach communications, social media, electronic presence, and media relations for CIR. The Marketing Vice President must have been a member of CIR for 2 years before becoming a candidate for this office.

Section 6.06. Membership Vice President. The Membership Vice President is responsible for all membership records, and verifying the integrity of membership data for CIR. The Membership Vice President must have been a member of CIR for 2 years before becoming a candidate for this office.

Section 6.07. Endorsement and Legislation Vice President is responsible for formulating and administrating a procedure for endorsing both candidates and legislation at the state level and assisting chapters, counties and regions to understand and properly engage in the endorsement process. The Endorsement and Legislation Vice President must have been a member of CIR for 2 years before for becoming a candidate for this office.

Section 6.08. Chief Financial Officer. Chief Financial Officer is responsible for the financial management of the CIR.  The Chief Financial Officer must have been a member of CIR for 2 years before becoming a candidate for this office.

Section 6.09. County Commissioners and Senate District Directors. County Commissioners and Senate District Directors shall execute duties assigned to them by the CIR Board of Directors. County Commissioners and Senate Directors must have been a member of CIR for 1 year before becoming a candidate for this office.

On Thu, May 21, 2015 at 6:19 AM, Aaron Park <aaronfpark71@yahoo.com> wrote:</aaronfpark71@yahoo.com>

That ROCKS!

Sent from my iPhone

On May 21, 2015, at 6:14 AM, Benita Gagne <benitagagne@gmail.com> wrote:</benitagagne@gmail.com>

Let me recap the status of the documents as I am aware.

May 19th: George sent out all documents via Dropbox. The Chapter Bylaws and CIR state bylaws have recent changes. The other three may not have had recent changes, however I don’t know if Todd and John have commented/cleared them in the past.

We were considering adding an Issues VP – vacant – suggested name – Endorsements and Legislation VP; I think the VP Engagement was for Outreach.I suggest dumping the VP Chapter Support for now as it was created for me and I am not taking it. It can stay a Committee Function under the VP Admin direction, in my opinion.

My suggested workflow as of today, May 21:

I work up the VP job descriptions for my above suggestions and send them around. If that is agreeable I can have that done by tomorrow.

Receive Todd and John’s changes (Track Changes option) on any and all documents. By Sunday morning if possible.

My status: Doing a final review. Estimated time/date for this review: Monday, May 25th if not before.

Aaron/George – please let me know if you are ok with this suggested workflow.

Benita

On Wed, May 20, 2015 at 3:51 PM, Aaron Park aaronfpark71@yahoo,com wrote:

Hi Guys – we are almost out of time.

We do not have two months. We need to be able to call people the first week of June and give them somewhere to go.

A lot of people are unable to visualize or grasp “something that might be”. I have at least three units that need me to have something in front of them the first week of June.

you may not realize it – but once we get expelled, it is going to set off a mass exodus. If we do not have the unit transfer kit and the organization by-laws ready to go, we will miss the opportunity with several of them.

Please help.

Aaron F Park

http://www.rightondaily.com Blog
Cell 916-316-9570 Fax 916-244-0167
follow me on twitter @aaronfpark

Lastly, why C.I.R.?
Everyone knows Karen England’s group is C.R.I. (Capital Resource Institute).
At least you could get original letters in your acronym.

George, Aaron, Benita, John, and Todd; don’t bother showing-up of Saturday. We’ve wasted enough time on you guys. Just go away and take your three chapters with you. If you are fool hardy enough to attend the board meeting, be prepared to answer some though questions.

 

 

Since Celeste Grieg was shown the exit in 2013, many peculiar financial arrangements have come to light. For a full accounting of these and others, you may need to attend the CRA Board meeting on May 30th. Perhaps you will leave with more questions than I am about to raise but here is a preview of likely topics.

• The Antelope Valley Republican Assembly credit with CRA

• Why were twelve ATM cards running about the state for CRA bank accounts? Who had them?

• Why did CRA have four different accounts? Why was this not in the Treasurer reports?

• Where is the accounting of expenses for 2014? The Treasurer has zero receipts for the entire year.

• Why were some chapters allowed to pay their convention registration by personal check but members of other clubs were required to pay cash?

• Why did the Membership Secretary get paid for mileage and expenses this year and last? When was that authorized? Where are receipts? Who signed the checks? Was this on CRA ATM card?

• Why was the Membership Secretary given $2,000 for travel and $2,000 for expenses in the proposed 2015-2016 budget?

• What happened to the CRA Business Round Table?

• Where is the accounting of the CRA conventions this year and last that were sponsored by the Placer County Republican Assembly? No deposit records for money received or receipts for expenses were ever presented to the Board.

• Why did the account for legal defense have $6,000 in it? All legal bills were paid before Celeste left office. Why was the account even open? Bonus question: why did John Briscoe promptly resign after this account was closed?

Oh, once again I remind you that Aaron claims that he and George are experts in the financial services sector. They have superior training or so he has asserted. Based on what I’m about to present, I wouldn’t trust them with the neighborhood lemonade stand.

Below is the final report of the March 2015 CRA Annual Convention.

That’s it. This is the whole report.

Breakdown of Convention Registration Fees: NONE
Breakdown of Convention sponsors: NONE
Number of receipts for Convention Expenses: NONE
Receipt for Michael Reagan honorarium: NONE
Receipts for Convention advertising: NONE

What about the $800 from the raffle at the last Convention?

Again, this is from the self-proclaimed experts in financial matters.

Over the last week or so I have presented what the news is, tomorrow you’re going to learn the rest of the story.

 

Following the purge of consultants from CRA in 2011, the Parks began to explore the new environment that they had created. Celeste Grieg had survived the coup attempt by Karen England but she had proven vulnerable. Over the next two years, Aaron and George found and recruited John Briscoe to challenge Celeste for statewide President. When Celeste stood for election in 2013, the Park brothers threw all their weight into the Briscoe campaign. For the first time in memory, a sitting CRA President lost re-election. This was April of 2013.

After Briscoe was elected, the Park brothers began participation in a series of special projects that were kept from the Board. That is not to say that nobody knew about them just that nobody was talking. The Board as a whole was left out. There were a whole series of “side deals” and “off the books” financial activities that were conducted. It is clear that John Briscoe knew about them but never brought them before the Board.  If the Treasurer knew, he never put them in his reports.

The first of these concerns the Antelope Valley Republican Assembly.

The Parks characterized the fight with Karen England as a battle to remove consultants and politicians that were using CRA as a “pay to play” organization in order to buy CRA endorsements. Money for political access was reportedly prohibited with the Parks overseeing the Membership and Chartering process of CRA. They claimed then—as they do now—to be the bulwarks of fraud prevention in the group. As you continue to read, please keep this in mind.

I heard rumblings about this transaction several weeks ago. Thru a series of emails with the principals involved, I was able to verify the following.

On December 10, 2013 a resolution passed by the Antelope Valley Republican Assembly is published on Aaron’s blog. Here is the Link
(Please note that this resolution was also passed by the Santa Clarita RA. This is quite possibly the last time Aaron ever praised the SCVRA on his blog.)

This resolution was issued in support of California Senator Steve Knight and encouraged him to run for Congress. The first two Whereas clauses are omitted.

  WHEREAS; conservative state Senator Steve Knight has been a longtime member of the Antelope Valley Republican Assembly; and

WHEREAS; if elected, Steve Knight will be the only person from the Antelope Valley ever to serve in Congress; and

WHEREAS; Steve Knight earned a 100% voting record from the Howard Jarvis Taxpayer’s Association; and

WHEREAS; Steve Knight has consistently fought for second amendment rights and the sanctity of life; and

WHEREAS; Steve Knight continues to stand for the same conservative values as he promised us he would in his first campaign as he does today;

THEREFORE; be it resolved that the Antelope Valley Republican Assembly opposes Tony Strickland running for the 25th congressional district and will support state Senator Steve Knight with our delegates to the California Republican Assembly endorsing convention if Congressman Howard P. “Buck” McKeon decides to retire in 2014.

The next day, December 11, 2013, the Steve Knight for Senate 2016 campaign committee issues a check to CRA for “CAMPAIGN PARAPHERNALIA/MISCELLANEOUS”

There is no record of CRA giving any material goods to Senator Knight in return for this check other than good will. While the check was written to CRA, it arrived with the understanding that this $4,000 was to be used as a club credit for the Antelope Valley Republican Assembly. Using this credit meant AVRA did not have to submit any dues payments until the credit was used-up.

I contacted AVRA about this matter and confirmed the money came from Steve Knight and surprise of surprises, the CRA contact was George Park.

We “have submitted numbers/accounting accordingly with our annual membership documents as required for all CRA units to the CRA Membership Chair.”

Email from AVRA member

The only question that I could not ascertain was how much of the $4K balance is remaining.

This transaction has been kept off the books of CRA. It should have been carried on all Treasurer Reports since George deposited the check. The Board was kept in the dark. John Briscoe had to OK this arrangement.

Per accounting rules, such an obligation should be shown on the CRA books as a long term debt (over one year). I don’t fault AVRA because of this; however, the few leaders that hid this from the rest of the Board should answer for this.

In my mind this raises a whole host of questions:
Why is a politician allowed to prepay chapter memberships years in advance?
Why did the CRA leadership—including the Membership Secretary—OK this arrangement?
Why was this kept from the Board if it was such a great idea?
Why not let other politicians do this?
Would George let Ted Gaines or Tom McClintock do this in Placer County?
Were campaign laws followed when CRA deposited this check?
What is the current balance that CRA owes AVRA?
Why didn’t Knight just donate to AVRA? He gave them $1,000 directly in 2014.

Were it up to me, I would cut AVRA a check today and be done with this. Make them submit their dues just like any other chapter. Why do they get a pass on following the rules the rest of us have to abide by?

Stay tuned, more on the next thrilling episode of the Just Us Brothers.

The Parks political “consulting” goes back to at least the 2010 election cycle per the public record. From the period of 2010 to 2013, they gradually moved from a regional force to have a statewide influence.

Below I will walk thru some info from the Secretary of State concerning brother George.

Note: Additional activity of the Parks can be found from the Secretary of State’s Office if you look up Headquarters Partnership. Most activity is under consultants. Reported activity pre-dates June, 2010. Any campaigns with less than $50,000 don’t have to file electronically so you need to resort to paper copies for more details. Also, Placer County GOP was paying rent to Headquarters Partnership (HQP) for many years. Aaron was nice enough to post this press release about HQP.

NorCal Tea Party Patriots Concerned about Ethics in Placer County Republican Central Committee

For Immediate Release March 7, 2011

AUBURN, CA – The Executive Board of NorCal Tea Party Patriots is concerned about ethical questions surrounding the Placer County Republican Central Committee. Specifically its relationship with a private company called Headquarters Partnership.

Red flags were raised when it came to light that members of the PCRCC executive board were also principals in HQP. On its face this appears to be a conflict of interest. The situation is further complicated by the fact that PCRCC members have been thwarted in their efforts to look into HQP’s operation. HQP was ostensibly set up as a leasing agent to handle payments on the PCRCC headquarters. It has since been turned into something more.

Rumors have flown about HQP’s involvement in political campaigns and other activities that have nothing to do with its original mandate. In the current atmosphere it’s possible for these activities to continue without oversight since the majority of the PCRCC votes down such requests. This has left the PCRCC much less effective in Placer County and can have a negative impact on elections in 2012.

Blog Post

George’s Political Consulting
George Park’s first client per the SOS website was Sam Aanestad in 2010. Dr. Sam, as he was often called, was a State Senator that was term limited out, so he decided to run for Lieutenant Governor. As you can see from the screen print below, George did well for a six month, part-time job.

George and Aaron began their political consultant work for “Dr. Sam” by delivering an endorsement from Placer County Republican Central Committee in January 2010. Blog Post

Then in February, they got Tom Hudson to send a letter on behalf of CRA to try to block Abel Maldonado from becoming the next Lt Governor. If Maldonado became LT. Governor, it would undercut Aanestad’s chances for winning the Republican Primary because Abel would go into the race as the incumbent. Blog Post

Maldonado did win in June despite the heroic work of George and Aaron on behalf of their client.

Rumor has it that the good Senator fell short of their monetary arrangement and that is the explanation for the late payment in May 2011. Reportedly the Park brothers are still waiting for the balance of their fees from this campaign. I can’t confirm this but such things often happen in political campaigns.

Aaron and George were able to provide a one stop shop for candidates. In addition to the regular stuff provided by consultants, they could provide a headquarters, endorsements from the County Party and Placer RA, and access volunteers from both organizations. Plus Aaron was developing his skills in other areas.

In 2012, George Park had two other clients. Assembly Candidate Andy Pugno and Les Baugh for Senate. The checks were made to George but in reality you got both brothers.

Linda Park was recruited to run against Assemblywoman Beth Gaines and Les Baugh was recruited to run against Senator Ted Gaines.

On June 3, 2012, Aaron wrote:

Les Baugh – the client of mine … is a pastor of a Church in Anderson, CA and believes that there are only two pledges he should ever make in his life – to God and his wife.
Blog Post

There is no record that Aaron was retained by Mr. Baugh. The only payments went to George. I know Aaron worked for Andy Pugno during the 2012 election cycle but again there is no record of payments to Aaron. In fact, whichever name was on the check, you got both brothers.

 

2014 electronic records don’t seem to show any activity for the Park Brothers.

Park Brothers Transition to Statewide Operation
Beginning about 2010, the Park’s hold on Placer County began to be challenged by both the Tea Party and other political players such as Karen England. This period was both a challenge for the Parks and an opportunity. The challenge was to defeat Karen and the opportunity was that George and Aaron had the chance to sweep most of their competition—consultants, many aligned with Karen—out of the CRA. To do this, the Parks had to move from a regional power (Placer County) to a statewide operation.

By mid-2011, not only was Karen England ejected from CRA, but almost every political consultant in the state that was involved in CRA was purged also. At the July 2011 Board meeting, they wiped the CRA map of all England’s paper clubs and simultaneously began trying creative ways of making new CRA units that would be under their sway. In effect, the Parks cleared the decks of the competition and then had CRA mostly to themselves. Only Steve Frank survived and by 2013, he and Celeste were gone too. The projection of their newly acquired power was an evolving process that they experimented with over the next two years.

The Park brother’s first attempt at flexing their new political muscle post Karen England was establishing the Republican Assembly of the Greater Santa Clarita Valley. This chapter was created after the July 2011 Board meeting was ended. This “chartering” was added into the minutes as if it occurred as part of the meeting. After all, rules should not get in the way of progress.

…a New CRA Unit was Chartered, the Greater Santa Clarita Valley Republican Assembly.

As of the writing of this email – plans are in the works for several new CRA units – please look out for updates on the movement to re-build the CRA with new activist-driven units. Blog Post

• Oh, the new Santa Clarita club (RAGSCV) they chartered in the hallway became the “great Satan” by 2013 and needed to be de-chartered. If you can’t control it, kill it.

During that discussion Sgt. At Arms Aaron Park (who was in favor of the de-chartering of the newer RAGSCV unit) stood up and told the entire board that he had lied to the board about the newer unit that was being considered for de-chartering.  That after the April 2011 CRA convention, that he and two other Board members (who are no longer on the CRA board) decided to promote and create the new unit on top of the older unit as punishment for the SCVRA’s support of another candidate for CRA President during the 2011 convention.  Vice President Steve Macias posted this on his blog post:

After over an hour of lively debate before the board, Sergeant-at-Arms Aaron Park stepped forward to lend clarity to his role in the chartering of the RAGSCV. Aaron explained that the charter was intentionally pushed through against the bylaws for “political revenge.” Aaron elaborated that the new group was part of a plot to retaliate against the SCVRA’s refusal to support President Celeste Greig. “Bob Hauter, Steve Frank, and I lied,” confessed Park. “We perpetrated a lie, we lied to the board of directors. We knew what we were doing.”



(http://www.stevemacias.com/end-of-cra-drama/)  (This URL is no longer correct)
From the CRA Vice-President Craig Alexander, email to CRA Board, Sunday, June 30, 2013 12:58 AM

• Antelope Valley was slated to be dismantled in April of 2013 but as you will read in the next installment, they became the special friend of our Membership Secretary by December of that same year.

• Nevada RA must go now because they chose to support Tom McClintock. Barry Pruit used to be supported by the Park brothers as was Tom McClintock.

• Re-constituting Ventura RA was their greatest success of 2013 and by 2015 Ventura needed to be put down as a fraudulent unit. If you recall, Aaron and George handpicked most of the core members. Re-chartering this club in 2013 was a way to hurt Celeste Grieg and Steve Frank while delivering votes for John Briscoe. However, when the club voted against the Parks in the 2014 local endorsing convention, then they were an obstacle.

If you wondered why their relationships with various chapters ran so hot and cold, I think you can begin to see why. Look at the Santa Clarita units, Ventura, Antelope Valley, Pasadena, Nevada, and a host of others. When you were on their side everything was great. If you stood in the way of their money making ventures then they would turn on you on a dime. Always to oppose them was fraud. This is their playbook. When they confronted other consultants, this worked; and very effectively.

Often, the Parks were just as guilty as the other consultants that they attacked but since they were not known as consultants within CRA, they would frame the issue as grassroots volunteers versus the professional political class. They managed to remain concealed as the men behind the curtain and masqueraded as something that they were not. They often framed their confrontations as David versus Goliath. They were common men just like us or so we were expected to believe.

Most of the people they attack now were once their friends and fellow travelers on the Conservative trail. Tom McClintock, Ted Gaines, Steve Frank, Barry Pruett, Bill Cardoza, Tim Thiesen, Alice Khosravy, Celeste Grieg, Carl Brickey, etc. Once you get in their way then they throw you under the bus.

Just remember, Aaron said “perception is more important than truth.” The only political consultants in CRA that won’t admit what they are, happen to be named Aaron and George. They hide behind the label, “activist” but clearly there is more than meets the eye.

I think my last few installments are enough to prove that the brothers are up to their necks in consulting and special projects, and they are not just grassroots activists as they pretend to be. The Parks may start from a conservative bent but they eventually are all about power and money, their principles are negotiable.

Tomorrow we begin to examine financial dealings involving the Parks and CRA.

After writing my original post on Aaron getting paid to blog, I was tipped to another incident earlier this year.

Clearly those that don’t learn from the past are doomed to repeat it. Or as Solomon once said, “As a dog returneth to his vomit, so a fool returneth to his folly.” Proverbs 26 :11

 

February 12, 2015
Aaron Park will gladly go against CRA endorsed candidates yet he proudly proclaims that he is THE CRA Vice-President.

Park needs to come clean about why he is attacking Moorlach.  It is a damn embarrassment.  The CRA overwhelmingly endorsed Moorlach and yet there is Park, continuing to attack Moorlach for what amounts to a really stupid reason.

OC Politics Blog

From March 17, 2015

This was not an easy decision for me to make but now that John Moorlach has prevailed in the Special Election for the 37th State Senate District I am doing something I should have done a while ago.  I am saying good bye to Aaron Park.

Park is a player in Northern California GOP politics and the CRA.  I invited him to blog here because I thought he would be of like mind.  But he has repeatedly backed the wrong O.C. Republicans and even worse has used my blog to conduct vicious, person attacks on some of my friends, including Greg Raths, Anna Bryson and Moorlach.

I am a Libertarian but I have a soft spot for Republicans who actually stand for something.  I utterly dislike the RINO Republicans and the plethora of Orange County GOP lobbyists, including the abominable Curt Pringle.  Park knew full well that Moorlach’s main opponent, Don Wagner, was a Pringle hack but he backed him any way.  Well now Park can do that elsewhere.

I apologize to Raths, Bryson and Moorlach for allowing Park to savage them.  I hope that my decision to delete all of Park’s posts on this blog will salve their wounds.

OC Politics Blog

The comments added to this story were interesting also.

Davey says:
March 18, 2015 at 1:03 am
Good job Art, you should have booted him long ago. His outright lies, slander and mean spirited banter was not a benefit to this blog. I predicted early on that quotes from Park’s nonsense would make its way on to mail pieces, which it did and ironically ones funded by unions. He is a pay for play blogger and his objectivity is nonexistent.

David Zenger says:
March 18, 2015 at 11:47 am
It takes a pretty low character to abuse somebody with half-truths, mischaracterizations, and outright lies – even in politics – for a few bucks or a few favors, and appear to be relishing it all the while.

At first I tried to communicate with this individual as an adult – which turns out to been a waste of time.

John Stammreich says:
March 20, 2015 at 12:44 am
The Parks, along with Rick Marshall and Todd Blair, literally stole the CRA from the true conservatives, including Mike Spence and Celeste Greig. Celeste was naive and trusted them, even as I and others warned her. …

Totally self-serving and definitely not standing for what the CRA founders did. At some point, a coalition will need to be started to wrestle back the CRA from the hands of these RINO-servers.

steve frank says:
March 20, 2015 at 4:21 pm
Someone should ask about his relationship with Charles Munger (the bowtied money man) and Harmeet Dhillion, who appointed Aaron to the CRP as a delegate–is all of this their work and he did it for them? He only smears when he is told and gets paid.

In case you were wondering what Aaron gets paid for his blogging, I was told it’s a sliding scale based on the size of the office. My source says the high three figures for local office, mid-four figures for Assembly or Senate and he tops out at about 10K for congressional races.

2014 Congressional Candidate Igor Birman reportedly paid Aaron about $8K. In case you didn’t know, Igor is Tom McClintock’s Chief of Staff. So Aaron was simultaneously schilling for Birman while preventing his boss McClintock from getting the CRA endorsement.

05-22-2015 Updated John Stammreich quote to remove reference to Turn Right PAC

On December 9, 2009, Aaron was fired from Red Countyas a blogger.

I have it in writing that the Poizner camp has been secretly paying one of our writers, “Sgt. York,” for favorable coverage all year long.

Now, to be fair, the Poizner camp wasn’t paying him directly. Instead, they were paying a “consultant,” and that person was paying our now-former writer. But it is a fact that the person was paying York explicitly for pro-Poizner, anti-Whitman commentaries, articles specifically to be written on RedCounty.com.

URL Archived

But who is St. York? Aaron often brags about his black bag operations and was kind enough to link the following news story on his blog.

You may remember last week’s flap involving gubernatorial candidate and Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner, whose campaign indirectly paid a blogger to write nice things on RedCounty.com about the candidate. RedCounty.com owner Chip Hanlon fired Aaron Park, who posted as “Sgt. York,” for failing to disclose the renumerative impetus behind his Poizner e-gushes.

Hanlon did the right thing. Paid praise is a poor substitute for unsolicited admiration.

Contra Costa Times

OK so who was the evil political consultant?

Now, to be fair, the Poizner camp wasn’t paying him directly. Instead, they were paying a “consultant,” and that person was paying our now-former writer…Shame on Steve Poizner, Steve Frank and Aaron Park.

Delicious Post

Yeah, ole Steve Frank was the money man.

Now – when I went to Steve Frank about what transpired in the conversation on 12/24/2008 to let him know that there was an offer on the table… that is what ultimately led to my arrangement with Steve Frank. Note that I worked for Steve Frank, not Steve Poizner.

Blog Post

This pattern of using political consultants as the go-between to move money from candidates to the Park brothers is a business model that they still use to this day. Occasionally, the Parks will actually sign their work.

Aaron went from being a paid blogger at Red County on December 9, 2009 to his first blog post on RightOnDaily a week later, December 16, 2009. The post is even tagged with St. York.

By searching the St. York tag on Aaron’s blog I found another gem. This time Aaron was bragging about his services and offering them to a US Senate candidate. Again, his link to Red County is a fun read.

To all you Republican politicos out there in California: ever wonder why Mr. Conservative himself, Aaron Park (AKA Sgt. York), has been trashing Chuck DeVore relentlessly? Well, probably not (judging by his new blog’s anemic Alexa ranking it must get about a dozen visitors a day), but let’s just say he has been finding ever more bizarre and picayune ways to criticize the most conservative Senate GOP candidate in the race recently.

Seems odd given you’d assume the two of them should be pretty darn close to one another, philosophically, right?

Perhaps I can shed some light.

The email below was provided to me by the DeVore campaign, one I have known about for months—since the days after our rather public split with Mr. Park (it helped confirm I had made the right decision on that one). Because it has since become an increasingly open secret that Park made this advance and was declined, DeVore’s campaign gave me the go-ahead last week to share it with all of you:

From: Aaron Park <aaron…@yahoo.com></aaron…@yahoo.com>

Date: November 8, 2009 9:28:56 PM PST

To: Chuck DeVore <chuckd…@….com></chuckd…@….com>

Cc: Josh Trevino <josh…@trevinostrategies.com></josh…@trevinostrategies.com>

Subject: Re: Campaign Opportunities

Hi Josh and Chuck –

Chuck – thanks for the hour long conversation on the phone. If you want to know more about me, Dan Logue, Roger Niello or Ted Gaines might be good people to speak with in the Assembly.

I am going to help you find a chair for Placer County. In fact, I have one in mind… Angelo Andriotti – check out www,conservativerule,com, his site. He is new on the scene in Placer and would be a great fit as he could really benefit from the exposure.

My problem is that I have a number of paid gigs so to speak and my time to volunteer is quite limited. I think Chuck and I were clear on the phone about that.

However, as someone that loves to stick it to the establishment, I am committed to helping.

To that end – I can be retained at a quite reasonable rate or for “projects”. I assume you’re both familiar with my work (ask Doug Ose or Meg Whitman how effective it is)…

Again – it is awesome to make the connection. Stand by as I will put Angelo in contact with Josh asap.

Regards,

Ahhhhh, right… since she’s only leading in the gubernatorial primary by 40 points, Meg must tremble every time Park unloads on her with the full force of his mighty pen!

But seriously, folks… the message in the email is as clear as day, no?

Is his trashing of DeVore lately a result of having been told “no?” You be the judge, but “no” was the DeVore response.

Oddly, I’ve heard some say that Park blames DeVore for having outed him and his Poizner payment scheme which got him booted from Red County. That would be particularly bizarre since I have since shown that Park outed himself directly to me.

Regardless, many out there suspect that Park only writes about candidates he’s being paid to shill for; I have no idea if that’s true, care little and simply share this so readers can draw their own conclusions, but given the email above it’s not hard to see why folks have that impression.

Two of the banner advertisers on Park’s new blog—which I will not do him the service of linking to—are from McClintock and Poizner, guys who we know have paid Yorkie to shill for them. One should be forgiven for wondering whether similar deals are in place for the other advertisers on his 3.5 Million Alexa-ranked blog.

At the very least, now it’s perhaps easier to take a guess at what’s fueling the surprising anti-DeVore rhetoric that has been spewing forth of late from one Aaron Park.

URL Archived

So what we know from multiple sources is that Aaron is happy to take your money in exchange for praising you and trashing the opposition. While this does include his blog, it also includes a host of other “projects” and endorsements. He is a gun for hire. However, as mentioned in my other article, sometimes Aaron forgets to point his guns away from his client.

Aaron frequently admits to things that make most folks shudder.

Maybe what we are doing here at www,rightondaily,com will be ground-breaking. If you advertise here – it means an endorsement.

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Update 05-21-2015 correct Red State to Red County