One-term curse strikes down another mayor
Scientists are practically piddling themselves over the discovery of a new Earthlike planet that is about the same distance away from its star as we are from the Sun.
Which got me thinking … Could it be that there is a Spokane-size town on this new world?
And could this interstellar Spokane also be populated with easily annoyed voters who are continually throwing their mayors OUT ON THEIR KEISTERS!?!
My Lord. It looks like we’ve done it again. Barring a miracle on a par with the raising of Lazarus, it appears that another newbie Spokane mayor has been thrust into the electoral wood chipper.
Down goes Mayor Hession.
Welcome to City Hall, Mayor Verner.
I’m a skeptical guy. I don’t believe in voodoo. I sneer at hoodoo. Heck, I don’t even buy into the notion of bad juju. But I’m actually starting to believe that Spokane really is operating under a Curse of the One-Term Mayor.
David H. Rodgers was our last multiple-term mayor. He left office in 1978, after a near 10-year run.
Since then we’ve been treated to a parade of one-term wonders. Some didn’t run for re-election. The others were voted into extinction.
Ron Bair, James Chase, Vicki McNeill …
Early on election night, Dennis Hession was still clinging to a whisper-thin strand of hope.
Sheri Barnard, Jack Geraghty, John Talbott …
“We expect to be strong toward the end of the count,” he said. “We expect that advantage will shift to us and we anticipate that we’ll have returns that are more favorable to us.”
John Powers, Jim West …
I didn’t hear Hession utter the above words, by the way. I stole them off the front page Wednesday morning.
See, on election night I couldn’t decide where to go.
Do I go hang with the Verner camp at the Red Lion River Inn? Do I crash the Hession gathering at his campaign headquarters at the Steam Plant?
Aw, screw it. I drove out to Northern Quest Casino and watched tough dudes pound each other in 10 cage fight matches.
Yeah, it was violent and bloody but still way more wholesome than being around unsavory politicians and their fanny-sniffing lackeys.
Cage fighters have standards. Unlike politicians, they aren’t allowed to engage in backbiting or character assassination.
Poor Dennis. The guy hasn’t even served a full term. He got in via appointment, after creepy West was booted out by way of the first recall in city history.
What’s Hession supposed to do if he loses? He’s a lawyer. It’s not like he’s got honest work to fall back on.
Somebody should install a swinging door on the mayor’s fifth-floor office.
Oh, well. It’s always nice to break in a fresh mayoral face.
(I don’t know if many of you realize this, but I tend to wear out my welcome with mayors rather quickly.)
The honeymoon won’t last, of course. Within a month or so my relationship with any new mayor goes from “Hi, Doug, feel free to call me anytime” to “The number you have reached has been disconnected.”
Either way, Spokane could be in a lot worse shape.
When I wandered into work Tuesday, one of my co-workers told me that her father didn’t think that Hession or Verner had the right stuff to lead the Lilac City.
What’d he do?
She laughed hysterically. “He wrote in your name,” she said.