I HATE TO SAY WE TOLD YOU SO


but we told you so.

Yesterday afternoon on the Kevin Miller show, Pittsburgh City Councilman Ricky Burgess noted that if we don't do something about the city's failing finances, we'll go bankrupt in two or three years. Mr. Miller told the Rev. Burgess, you sound like Mark DeSantis. The Rev. Burgess replied that he hoped he sounded like Rick Burgess. Which, of course, he did. But that didn't stop him from sounding like Mark DeSantis.

And the thing is, a whole lot of people are sounding like Mark DeSantis these days. Even The Boy Who Would Be Mayor, who last year hemmed and hawed and cried Garbage collection in Wilkinsburg! like some foul little Tourette's Syndrome sufferer every time Mark argued for City/County consolidation, but who now, thanks to a near-death-bed conversion in the wake of the Nordenberg report, supports it. And especially the Rev. Burgess' colleagues on City Council, some new, some old, all of whom have suddenly grown balls and backbone enough to stand up to The Boy King, but who lacked both when we needed them most -- last fall, when they all were too concerned with their own asses and their own vote totals to do what this city really needed them to do: break ranks not with their party but with the most base and crass and incompetent local official of it. They're fighting a good fight now -- and they have, along with generous contributions from the Burghosphere, set in motion a series of events that rid us of the worst mayoral spokesperson for the history of time, may also rid us of her cigar-smoking, glad-handing, knuckle-dragging husband, and could even help Pittsburghers beyond the East End and the Mexican War Street see what a corrupt little sty we have for an administration -- but they could be doing a lot more good now, and wasting a lot less time since, if they'd stood on principle then.

Reducing costs. Eliminating perks. Doing more with less. Re-evaluating the URA. Pursuing Act 47 savings recommendations. Getting serious about private interests feeding at the public trough. Holding the mayor's office accountable for insider access and old-boy politics. Restoring a sense of competence and a commitment to public service on Grant Street.

Hmm.

Remember, in his concession speech, when Mark DeSantis said, Our efforts in this campaign have made -- and will continue to make -- our city stronger?

If the past few weeks, and especially the past few days, are any indication, it looks like he was -- like we were -- right about that too.

Posted: Thu - April 10, 2008 at 02:16 PM          

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