The Shenanigans

Where to begin? In no particular order, here are several reasons why the public quickly fell out of love with John Farmer de la Torre. This is just the highlight reel, to illustrate the hostility and dysfunction of the campaign.

We can warm up with the time a member of his staff mocked a woman's weight, with no rebuke or apology from John. A woman who was on chemotherapy but still took the abuse with civility.

Then we can proceed to the time he went off on someone for supposedly bragging about their education. That's a little hypocritical, all things considered. It's almost like he was posturing for The Young Turks, who endorsed his opponent.

Maybe you'll enjoy his belittling of my education. By the way, if you talk to John be sure to ask him to show you his journalism bylines. Maybe he knows how to find them, because I sure can't. Apparently his fancy degree can't get him published much of anywhere. As for what he means about voting for someone else, I have no idea. I wasn't running for office.

Or might you be enlightened by John talking about a video he made (he made several, each more desperate than the last) where he claims his fibs about his degree were on purpose. Conveniently forgetting his current campaign site also claimed he had earned his degree.

How about the time he didn't get an endorsement, so he pouted on Twitter? He calls himself a truth teller, despite being fully questioned by the public at this time. I was by no means the only one asking for the truth at this point.

Wait! It gets even better. He lost endorsements because of his behavior. By this point, John Farmer de la Torre's behavior had become not just a problem for his campaign, but for the party as a whole. Stories of his embarrassing conspiracy theories, insults and deleting comments from citizens who questioned him had spread far and was witnessed by many.

His campaign lost a lot of credibility when staff mocked a woman for being suicidal, and brought her family matters into public. There is no telling how twisted the accusations are, because the attacks were rarely based in any kind of truth. They made sure to bring her sexuality into it, to further try to damage her reputation in a very conservative anti-LGBT region. While staff was speaking under John's name, there was never an apology or rebuke of this behavior.

Then there was the time he exceeded the limit a candidate can accept from an individual ($2,700 according to the FEC), but it was a loan he didn't pay back. He said he didn't owe the money. Then he tried to repay it with an $800 check. In the usual classy John Farmer de la Torre way, he handwrites that "acceptance of check = forgiveness of all debts" to get out of the full balance. The person did not accept those terms. Their affidavit is below for your review.

And in the end, he and his staff could not handle questions, criticism or input. He deleted comments and entire threads, and lectured others about intellectual integrity and journalism principles.