Harry Sidhu is running for O.C. Supervisor — in the wrong district

My sources tell me that Anaheim City Councilman Harry Sidhu is running for Orange County Supervisor in the Fourth District — even though he lives in the Third District. He is scouting a new residence in the Third.

Beginning a week ago, on Feb. 6, I made several calls to Sidhu to confirm his position, but he has not returned the calls. So I’m going with this story anyway.

His candidacy means Sidhu is moving out of the Third District, the location of his current residence, into the Fourth District.

It’s called carpetbagging, and Americans frown on it. A politician is supposed to come from among the people he represents.

We have residency requirements that are supposed to prevent rich people from other areas effectively buying a seat, something common in England, where there is no residency requirement for parliament. The most famous modern American carpetbagger is Hillary Clinton, who switched from Arkansas to New York to run for the Senate in 2000, but now is President Obama’s secretary of state.

The Fourth District currently is held by the excellent Chris Norby, who is term-limited out of office. The best candidate to replace him is Shawn Nelson, currently a Fullerton councilman and previously the city’s mayor.  Nelson has made a name for himself fighting a pension-spiking scheme for the city’s government workers.

At times like these — of economic Depression and insane tax increases pending at the state level — Orange County needs a real fighter like Nelson. As times get tougher, you just know Orange County’s government-shirker unions are going to imitate their state brethren and push tax increases instead of cuts in government waste.

Sidhu should stay put in Anaheim, complete his current term as councilman and, if he still thinks Orange County needs him as a supervisor, run in his home Third District when it is vacated in 2010 by term-limited incumbent Bill Campbell.

After all, the Third District is the Indigestion District. Campbell once owned a number of Taco Bells, and Sidhu owns a number of Burger Kings.

Burger King’s most famous slogan is, “Have it your way.” In Orange county, “our way” is electing locals.

About John Seiler

I was an editorial writer at The Orange County Register for 19 years, until I took a buyout in 2006.