Spoiler alert! It's an "I told ya so!" hit piece!
Our mayor has finally shown himself to be a politician. And I don't mean that in a good way. I mean it in the way where when you say the word "politician" you curl your lip, your eye twitches, and the word seeps out through clenched teeth.
Mayor McGinn is running trying as best he can to keep his nostrils above water - and someone had better throw this guy a lifeline fast.
According to a recent poll taken on February 2nd, McGinn has a popularity rating of 40%. A month in office and the guy is down for an eight-count. That doesn't mean he can't get back up, but my god he's way behind the curve.
He does have one thing behind him: his senior advisor, Chris Bushnell, resigned after admitting he had lied about having a Ph.D. But then there's the other things like his bank and check fraudof over $90,000... But aside from those two things - which would basically make anyone ask for the person's resignation - he had his education records sealed.
From PubliCola:
Bushnell has claimed that he graduated from the University of Washington with a B.A. in economics in 2004, and with a law degree in 1997. (Mayoral spokesman Mark Matassa says Bushnell got “within a couple of credits” of finishing his economics B.A., which is how he was able to attend law school without finishing his B.A. first.)
However, the truth about Bushnell’s degree(s) is impossible to verify, because he has requested that the university seal his records off from all outside inquiries. (A national database of student records was also sealed.) When I called the UW registrar’s office to ask when Bushnell had attended and whether he had graduated, I was told that I needed a written statement from Bushnell authorizing the release of his records. That’s a pretty unusual move—even public officials who graduated from UW, like Heidi Wills, Judy Nicastro, and, um, Mike McGinn have graduation records that are easily accessible online.
(While watching the video with King 5 News, pay close attention to McGinn's answer on whether he knew Bushnell was a convicted felon when he hired him. McGinn says, "No," and catches himself... It's your classic, 'Oh shit...' moment.)
Conlin has it right,
"It's a shakedown period." says Seattle City Council President Richard Conlin. "The mayor came into office with a lot of people who don't know what being in office is like. They're trying to figure out how to make it work."
It's true. Most of the civil servants I know have told me that the mayor actually does have some incredible people working for him. And then he has the people he brought with him. Unfortunately, I am told, he only listens to his own people - the ones who have never worked beyond small-fry politics where you have at most a committee president, a steering committee, and members. But now they are working with a billion dollar budget, several departments with several thousands of people, serving hundreds of thousands residents and a separate council that works as an autonomous entity to govern.
If he wants to at least only have the water up around his chin he's got to begin to listen from outside his small circle of friends.
(By the way, a couple of the city council members have already got his job in their crosshairs.)