Don Saylor’s Parlor Game

If you have been reading the Davis Enterprise you might have caught the following article:

http://www.davisenterprise.com/articles/2006/07/30/news/156new2.txt

You’d have to be living under a rock in Davis to not realize that Samantha McCarthy is dead-set against pesticides and it should come as no surprise at all that she opposes the use of pesticides to attempt to knock down the mosquito population as a means to curtail the spread of the West Nile virus. You however have missed that she and her family were hiking in Canada when her husband, Don Mooney fell ill and had to have a quadruple bypass surgery. He has since suffered from a number of setbacks that has left him in the hospital and Samantha fighting mad in Canada.

My impression of Don Saylor is a very negative one, I’ve been around politics for a long time. I’ve never met a more cold, calculating, and seemingly remorseless individual as Don Saylor. Yet it took me awhile to understand Samantha’s outrage on this one.

She sent off an angry letter via email to a number of public officials. It was not a kind letter. It was an angry letter. Unless you know Samantha, you might be taken aback by the venom in this letter. “A medical exemption is not a neighborhood vote. It is an exemption to save the health of certain [members] of your constituents.” The gist of it is neatly summed up: “Thak you for placing my husband’s immediate life at risk and for impacting my daughter’s puberty. You are unfit to watch over others.”

Don Saylor responded:

“Samantha

I am sorry to hear of Don’s health setback. I wish him a speedy recovery and the best to you and Morgan at this challenging time.

Don Saylor”

You might say, hey he’s actually being nice and compassionate.

Then we get to the PS. This gives us a stronger hint at the true agenda:

“P.S. Your message was sent to a public e-mail address. Some people who may benefit from your thoughts were not included in your list of addressees. I am forwarding your message to those who come to mind. I note that for some reason you chose to send this message to only one of the five Yolo County Supervisors and so I have included the remaining four in this transmission.”

So Saylor never responds to her concerns about a medical exemption. Instead, he makes what appeared at first to be a kind remark of condolence about Don’s health. However, then he takes it upon himself to send it to the public officials that Samantha did not send the initial letter to. Moreover, as I found out later, he also sent the entire letter to the Davis Enterprise and Bob Dunning.

This all seems not only inappropriate but wholly unnecessary. I do not understand the reasoning behind Don Saylor’s decision to send this to the press. It certainly seems like some sort of game that Saylor is playing. Samantha is not one who is shy with words. She was absolutely livid at what she perceives as Don Saylor’s cynical manipulation of her husband’s health issues for his own political gain.

“Don Saylor this shows you to be a true political ass, egotist and definitely unfit for service . You take my husband Don’s condition as a political game, smugly smile and forward my email to the newspapers. You truly are lower then scum. I think this shows you in your true light not me. I fight for my husband’s health and you play games. I in turn am forwarding your little political trickery and low moves to the folks working on recalling all of you who so thoroughly prove yourselves unfit for public service.”

It will be interesting to watch this unfold as Samantha fires back from Canada.

—Reporting Doug Paul Davis