Get ready to clear the deck. OC GOP chairman Scott Baugh seriously is considering a run for John Campbell’s possibly soon-to-be-vacant state Senate seat …
And the Insider hears that the socially moderate New Majority PAC is expected to endorse Campbell for SEC Chairman-nominee Chris Cox’s Congressional seat, a blow to the more moderate Marilyn Brewer. The NM has been mending fences with local conservatives, due largely to Baugh’s efforts …
Of course, “Hot Pockets” creator Paul Merage will receive a UCI Medal at this year’s Oct. 15 dinner. Other winners: med school dean Thomas and Mary Cesario, biology prof Walter Fitch and fund-raiser and donor Janice Smith. Lawyer Doug Freeman succeeds Ted (Mr. Janice) Smith as UCI Foundation chair …
Nothing comes easy for KOCE. Fresh from its first-ever million-dollar pledge drive, the Huntington Beach PBS affiliate had its foundation purchase invalidated (see pages 11, 55). Uncertainty reigns. Orange Coast Community College District trustees must decide whether to appeal the 3-0 decision; they ultimately may take the station back (and contract with the KOCE Foundation to run it) or sell to the high bidder, Dallas televangelist Daystar. Lawsuits are likely, whatever. Daystar seeks entree to the lucrative L.A. media market, currently the province of rival Paul and Jan Crouch’s Trinity Broadcasting Network in Costa Mesa (a strange bedfellow of KOCE in this battle). The finding of religious discrimination gives Daystar substantial leverage; the foundation’s key assets are possession of the transferred TV license and public support. Immediate winners: lawyers, both here and in Washington, D.C. Disclosure: EE RR produces and hosts KOCE’s weekly “Inside OC,” which launches its second season Aug. 3 fully funded …
Anaheim boosters who also like public television must be having mixed feelings about presiding state appeals court Justice David Sills. The Republican judge and former Irvine mayor wrote the opinion that turned KOCE upside down. Four days later, while joining in the decision that allows Arte Moreno to keep calling the Angels “Los Angeles,” Sills also provided Anaheim with fodder for the scheduled November trial. He opined that the clear contractual intent was for Anaheim’s name to be preeminent and “only the sophistry of lawyers allows” for the team’s current “oxymoronic” name …
George and Julia Argyros have donated $5 million to launch the Horatio Alger Military Scholarship fund for Afghanistan and Iraq war veterans. The couple said they were inspired by a visit with wounded troops at Rota Naval Air Station in Spain, while Argyros served there as U.S. ambassador. The Horatio Alger Association plans to raise a matching $5 million …
Quick wit: “Phantom” star Davis Gaines, commenting to the audience about the ambulance sirens interrupting his act at UCI Medical Center’s groundbreaking gala: “You like that,customers!”
