When Kamala Harris ran for District Attorney against Terence Hallinan in 2003, I watched from afar–Alameda. I was preparing to launch O’Shaughnessy’s, a journal covering the medical marijuana movement.
Kamala’s campaign manager, a woman named Rebecca Prozan, made a weird gaffe. On Nov. 30, trying to play spy, Prozan sent an e-mail signed “Jeff” to the Hallinan campaign website. She thought she was being slick, but her name appeared at the top.”Hello, I am a gay man who supports Terence because of his support of medical marijuana. Please tell me how I can help this week. Go Hallinan!!”
Hallinan’s campaign manager, Laurie Beijen, gleefully replied, “Thanks for your offer of help. We are having a campaign rally at Ocean Beach at Judah tonight at 10 PM- midnight. Please come and hold up a sign for Terence. Thanks!!”
On Dec. 1 the still unwitting Prozan e-mailed: “I just got your message and I was too late. Is there anything else I can do this week? I work, so I’m not available during the day or at 10pm on a Sunday. Thanks. Jeff.”
At this point Beijen notified a Chronicle reporter, who informed Prozan that she’d been exposed. “People make mistakes,” was her lame excuse. “I’m on a campaign. I’m just fighting fire with fire… When you’re in a war, you always want to know what the other side is doing.”
In a war the officer in charge has lieutenants, scouts, sources of intelligence. The general doesn’t put on a mask and try to sneak behind enemy lines. What kind of jive operation was Prozan running? And why would she impersonate a gay man? I’m not a Freudian, but…
The Chronicle described Beijen as “more amused than upset” by Prozan’s duplicity. They quoted her making ze little joke: “It’s too bad she found out. I was going to send her to the zoo tonight.”
Ms Beijen should have demanded an apology on Kayo’s behalf! The gratuitous invoking of sexual orientation and medical marijuana use is the worst sort of stereotyping. Kamala’s claim that she’d run a more efficient DA’s office was valid, for sure, but it was undercut by her choice of Rebecca Prozan to run her campaign. And Kayo’s campaign manager let up when she had her opponent on the ropes!
“Can’t anybody here play this game?” –Casey Stengel
