A Journal of Humor and Verbal Anarchy

 

talking magpies

Next to Antiques Road Show, Ezra's favorite television program is Channel 78's broadcast of Ithaca City Council meetings Wednesday nights.*

A regular parliament of fowls. Puffed up roosters in sweaters. Swaggering crows in sneakers. Chaucer didn't have a tv, did he? Maybe he snuck into the House of Commons one day to hear a debate on the War of the Roses? Ezra is about a thousand years away from his good old golden school days so he can't tell you why Chaucer came up with the idea for his classic parody. We do know, however, that he predated C-SPan and Pegasys so it goes to figure that politics hasn't changed much in all these centuries.

The suction produced by all the verbiage emitted into the atmosphere at a typical Common Council meeting could run TCAT for a week. If the City switched over to wind-powered buses.

Ezra has his favorite City Council personalities. Mayor Cohen, of course, tops the list. Ithaca's own Tony Blair look-a-like. Ok, he vaguely looks like Tony Blair. But don't overlook the similarities between Al and Tony's political skills even if you dismiss the physical resemblance. Alan Cohen is one smooth operator! Like a fine salad oil, his personal charm spreads out to form a slick whenever he's in the room. And when he's not in the room, there's no stopping Carolyn Peterson from filling the vacuum left by hiz honor.

Do you think Carolyn wants to be Mrs. Mayor? Ezra thinks that she'd be a perfect mayor for Ithaca. On a self-importance meter, she rates about an 11. Then, she's blonde, articulate, deeply concerned with the issues, a real policy wonk if there ever was one. The way she flips through her sheath of papers, you know she's organized. And she's been around forever. Back in the '80s, Carolyn had already done a stint on City Council. She was one of Ithaca's young Turks with a finger in every jam jar around town.

Ms. Peterson represents the Social Worker/Human Services vote on Common Council. Down to her toenails, Carolyn personifies the Human Services profession in Ithaca. Soft spoken, prunish, formidably self-righteous, disinclined for a moment to consider that she could be wrong, she looks at the camera from behind those trendy wide rimmed glasses like she knows that she has ALL the answers. Give her a chance and Carolyn will guide all of our destinies.

Next on Ezra's list of IIP(Ithaca's Important People) is David Whitmore. He represents the college student vote. Well, he looks like he's in college! Maybe he's getting a little old around the carefully manicured beard.

The college vote is important in Ithaca. It's only been recently that this bloc has had a presence on Council. Was it the need to bring on new blood or new money that convinced Ithaca to reach out to college students? Everybody else in town had done at least 5 stints on Council! Those kids pour a lot of money into this community. Three quarters of the restaurants would go out of business if they left town forever. And Alan Cohen knows about importance of restaurants! He made his political fortune on soup de jour.

The major thing to watch in David Whitmore is the fact that he's so self-referential. He constantly refers back to something he's already said or done. That means he has an established identity, a beach head on the Ithaca coast, as it were. He doesn't have to prove himself continually. Even if he doesn't appear to have a clue, he has at least an identity! We know him from the Ithaca Times cameos, his important work on the Patriot Act resolution, his untiring efforts for peace.

It's a good thing (as Martha Stewart says) that Common Council meetings are televised. In a lot of municipalities and counties around the US, the business of governance goes on behind closed doors. In noisy, smoke filled rooms. Now, in Ithaca, you can't smoke within 20 feet of City Hall. The politicians eat granola bars and health food snacks from GreenStar during Council meetings.

So, gazing blankly at the tv screen, trying not to fall asleep and keep up with the monotonic spell of Carolyn Peterson's voice, we can really say - this is what democracy looks like. The reason American troops swarmed all over Iraq, The reason over 100 Americans and countless Iraqis lost their lives. The reason why Cuba may be next on the hit list for the fabulous Bushs. (Jeb needs all those expatriate votes to get re-elected so he can help his brother fix the next presidential election.)

The truth is that few of the Americans who died in the desert during Operation Iraqi Freedom would ever had held elected office. Even if they lived in Ithaca, they might never have won a seat on Common Council. Most of them would have been working two jobs to feed the wife and kids. They never would have made it out of the trailer parks, the projects, the ghettos where the governed have to live in order to bask in the political limelight.

Most Americans can't afford to ante up for a run for office. They certainly don't have the time to gather names on petitions, stand out in parking lots, shaking hands and slobbering over prospective voters. Instead of sitting around a meeting room, jabbering endlessly about a Liveable Wage policy, our unsung heroes of the desert would have been sitting drugged in front of a television set at this time of night. And they wouldn't be watching a broadcast of Common Council subcommittee meeting either. They'd be too tired, that is, if they could still counted among the living, from trying to earn a liveable wage to follow all the gibberish.

Ezra has heard a rumor that, when Carolyn gets elected mayor, she plans to hire Martha Stewart to redecorate chambers.

*Be sure to follow Ezra's continuing coverage of political events in Ithaca, the nation and the world on Politics as Usual, a regular feature of Ithacasucks. Ezra's new website -www.ithacsucks.com - is within 5 years of construction. He's hoping to get a grant from A Plus and Short Stop. For the time being, type in 'ithacasucks' to your MSN browser and you'll come up with the one and only ithacasucks.blogspot . Google hasn't figured out yet we're the best place to go on the world wide web to get the dirt on Ithaca, New York.
Comments invited at: ezrakidder@gmail.com - Peace, Ezra at 4:28 AM