28 October 2001

The Inept Stick Together

It is hardly a surprise that Houston's establishment paper has endorsed the favored pawn of the downtown establishment, incumbent Mayor Lee Brown. However, I'm more than a little amused at the Chron's tortured reasoning.

For example, the Chron contends that Mayor Brown's opponents do not bring much "managerial experience" to the race. But later in the endorsement, the Chron admits:

The mayor's watch has seen a number of problems surface. Continued inefficiency and scandal in the Public Works Department. The maddening snarl of traffic and construction, particularly in the downtown area. Disputes with firefighters. A churn of personnel into and out of administration positions. A strange inability to get fiscal projections right.

Yes, I suppose plenty of experience with mismanagement is an endearing quality of Mayor Brown, one not shared by either of his main opponents! Gotta love that Chron editorial board.

They also laud Mr. Brown's public safety record:

All of which brings up another point. No one in the race can match Brown's record on public safety, particularly his relationship with law enforcement in this community.

Conveniently, the Chron forgets to mention Mr. Brown's mismanagement of the police department in New York City (including his mishandling of the Crown Heights incident), something that took William Bratton YEARS to straighten out. The Chron also neglects to mention that the Houston firefighters union chose not to endorse the Chron's fearless champion of public safety, Mr. Brown, but his (managerially inexperienced, in the Chron's view) challenger Councilman Sanchez. But of course, the Chron didn't claim that Mayor Brown's record was good -- only that his opponents couldn't match it. I'm sure Councilman Bell and Councilman Sanchez would heartily agree!

Perhaps the best part of the editorial is this:

Is Brown a good mayor? It is debatable, of course.

He, by his own admission, has much room for improvement as a communicator for his administration and his particular vision for Houston. "His verbal gaffes and awkward demeanor dim the public perception of him," wrote one profiler of the mayor.

What a tepid endorsement! But even worse is that, after four years of "on the job" training, the Chron suggests that the inept incumbent really needs two more years to "grow" into the job -- contrasted with his "inexperienced" challengers.

As I noted, the Chron's endorsement of the downtown establishment's incumbent pawn is no surprise; indeed, it was about as sure a bet in Houston as betting on the Astros to lose in the first round of the playoffs. But given the ineptitude of the incumbent mayor, and the strength of his two primary challengers, I've been eagerly waiting to see if the Chron's "defense" of Mayor Brown would rise to the mayor's own lofty standards of ineptitude. I'm amused to see that it does. The inept have to stick together, after all!

[Posted @ 10:35 AM CST]