Antonio Exposed: “The all-about-me-mayor: Antonio Villaraigosa’s frenetic self-promotion“
Stop reading this now and go to the L.A. Weekly and read Patrick Range McDonald’s devastating takeout on how the mayor spends his time working for himself — not the people.
But if you’re too busy to read a long article right this minute, here’s the short take on how he spent the 900 “work” hours in his daily calendar from May 21 to Aug. 1: “804 hours, or 89 percent of his work schedule, on
ceremonial/PR, travel, blacked-out activities, gap time, fund-raising,
personal issues and undisclosed “security” issues. On direct city
business — such as signing legislation and meeting with city-department
heads — his schedule shows the mayor spent 11 percent of his time.”
Got it? He’s not doing the job. 
At a time when the city is teetering on the brink, when communities across L.A. are seething with resentment over City Hall’s neglect, disrespect and failure to address the problems, the mayor is running around the world inflating his ego — and his campaign treasury — and doesn’t have the time to manage the city’s business or the inclination to listen to the people.
Critics like Jack Humphreville, Greg Nelson, Bill Ring and myself have a lot to say in the article but the one that matters most is Eli Broad:
“I think he’ll realize his
political success in the future relies on the job he does with the
city…Let’s put it this way, Would I be more comfortable with
a mayor like Richard Daley or Mike Bloomberg? The answer is yes.”
McDonald describes Villaraigosa as being “so focused on the glitzy trappings of the job, and so distant from the sometimes dreary work inside City Hall,” he’s unlike any other mayor in recent years.
The result is this: “Los Angeles’ mayor has not yet produced any results in improving
schools, addressing greatly worsening traffic, keeping kids from
joining gangs, cleaning the city’s infamously filthy sidewalks, halting
patently illegal clutter like 10-story building ads and thousands of
illicitly constructed billboards, or controlling his spending in a time
of family belt-tightening.”
So ask yourself why not a siingle politician or potential candidate with the money to take Villaraigosa down has challenged him. And if they don’t have the courage to do it now, should you really consider them for office in two years or four years when the city will be that much worse off?
Who needs a mayor when there’s a hard-working City Council tackling the big issues:
* Council votes 15-0 to ban smoking in farmer’s markets.
* Council votes 14-0 to require fast food chains to post calorie information.
* Council votes 12-1 to increase visual blight with massive electronic signs on Convention Center (more on that later).
“So ask yourself why not a siingle politician or potential candidate with the money to take Villaraigosa down has challenged him.”
Walter Moore’s “what about me” whine in 3…2…1…
Isn’t Villar silly? He has convinced himself that we are lucky to have HIM as the Mayor.
Boy, is he ever due for a fall. Hard and fast.
Like next spring.
Oops! I am not Walter W. Moore — should I wait to post til later?
Forget that.
I believe that the reason the City Council votes on all of these dumb nanny state things is to show that they “are doing SOMETHING.” Note I did not say something of substance. Half of them are running for office in March — and they do not want to DO anything that will reflect badly on them. The other half are spotting State and County posts or “Mayor” or “Controller” or “City Attorney” or “Dog Catcher” they want to graduate into. Who is to blame? Plain and simple, folks,we are. Look at LaBonge and his attempts to take Griffith Park away from us with his cullinary institutes, exclusive spas and the like. And Weiss and Huizar who only show up to Council meetings when they have something on the Agenda — which maybe a good thing because they do not often show. Council meetings are only 2 days and week and 2 hours each day. I know that you are thinking — no, it’s 3 days a week. But, truthfully, folks, do you really count ceremonial parading Fridays as a serious meeting.
But I digress — let’s throw the bums out with our recycled trash (the cost is cheaper than a hitman!) and get some good stuff going on in this City. I love L.A. ! (a little Randy Newman for your morning)
The L.A. Weekly article is great.
I, too, served a public records request for Villaraigosa’s calendar. And even though I expected to see he wastes a bunch of time, I was stunned at how little time he actually spends working.
Instead, his calendar comprises an endless series of ridiculous photo-ops, e.g., 15 minutes to pose for pictures at the snack bar on the second floor of City Hall.
That’s why Plank 1 of my platform is that I will work FULL-TIME. The L.A. Weekly estimates that Villaraigosa spends only 11% of his time in L.A., working on actual City business. We deserve better.
Walter Moore
Candidate for Mayor of Los Angeles
http://WalterMooreForMayor.com
The council is very accurately observed as doing nothing but unfortunately it is not the masses that are observing this, but only a small number of residents who are noticing the new “Emperor’s Clothes” version that includes his disciples.
The do-nothing (and really that should be “do-nothing good”) council is busy to keep their jobs by doing the “distractors” to make people look away from what they really want to accomplish- analogy here is to a pickpocket doing a bump and lift, or having a partner make body contact while the purse or wallet is lifted by the second person. That would be the m.o. of the city.
We see them practice acute verbosity and redundancy to implant ideas in the minds of the ininformed that they are really smart guys/women, and the rest of us see that they are not, just the one-pants-leg-at-a-time person behind the curtain.
They are not gifted but connected, and that is why they are in office, and at the same time, that is why they do so much damage to the society and the people here.
On this anniversary of the outrageous attacks on this country and its people, the council has no regular meeting and we are spared their insincerities and mutual back-patting. While they may think they have praise coming on their hit-and-miss security “accomplishments” to make the citzenry safe, they continue to completely exempt border security and its collateral impact in all its forms from being tended to so that we can be secure. This goes for the Mayor and on down the line.
As a Latino, it seems the allegiance of these fellow Latinos is more solidly placed with a place that would not allow most of what they criticize about this country than it is to respect our own culture as Americans.
Were the American culture not light years better than many detractors portray it, would so many people from all over the world want to come and live here or to be like us? Isn’t it that those people want a better life and it found here, and not in their country. Yet people want to dismantle what we have and replace it with even more things that would continue to dissolve the precise American culture that draws persons here.
Making this country third-world is a far cry from heading it to world-class, and continued unmanaged importation of poverty, especially to this region, is taking us there.
There is no accomplishment that the city council and the mayor can look to as any preservation of the security of the city or country and our culture and I am glad we are spared from hearing any of that today in the Council Chambers.
SMITH BLOCKS PROGESS MADE BY NCS
For the first time since they were instituted, it seems like the NC system is making real progress that would allow them to participate in the democratic process. If these recommendations pass city council, I think there will be a renewed interest in NC participation. How many Angelinos knew that the average citizen, or even a NC up until now, does not have the right to be heard before city council unless and until a council member has opened a file on that issue. NCs have absolutely no power when their council member ignores their recommendation.
Greig Smith should not make the mistake of opposing this progress on empty allegations and phantom claims. He claims that he has seen “special interests” infiltrate some NC boards in his district. Let him be Specific about who those individuals are, which NCs are involved, and what special interests they stand for. (I bet he and Mitch will say that is confidential.) One bad apple should not spoil the whole basket. If there was ever a real violation, let us learn from that and move forward. How many times do council members violate the rules and simply get a slap on the hand. There is no need for volunteers who have absolutely no power to do anything , to open up their finances to the city.
Let’s not forget what we are talking about here. There is no assurance the a file opened by a NC will ever get through each and every hoop and roadblock already put in place by the city. If something a NC introduces passes the committee then full council, and it looks like one firm stands to earn huge sums of money from it, then the city ethics commission could investigate. However one firm profiting from a no bid contract has not been a problem in this city–look at the sweet contract that Anschutz Entertainment Group was just awarded, Greig Smith voted for that.
Day in and day out real special interests (those standing to make big money and not neighborhood groups who want to protect their neighborhoods) infiltrate every level of city government. When City Planning decides to update the Knollwood/GH community plan, developers and architects who do not live, work or own property in the area, are considered “stakeholders” and are allowed to give input to the proposed plan. There is no check on what influence these special interest have on the process or finalized plan, although their interest is usually adverse to those who live and work in the area.
A devastating portrait of an elected official who appears to be way out of his depth, and a sad commentary on the quality of leadership in Los Angeles today.
I’ve needled Walter Moore a few times on this site, but I’ll give him this much — the only solution is to find and elect quality leaders who are committed to public service rather than self-service.
When we elect empty suits into office, we get what we deserve.
Two other comments:
1) The story also exposes the lack of political culture in this town. Not one politician has the guts to question the mayor in any way. The city’s entire political life is a carefully orchestated Kabuki of low-impact consensus. Never a bare knuckle nor a raised voice within 500 miles of this place.
In New York, Chicago and a hundred other cities across the country, politicians engage in, well, politics — staking out positions, defending them with vigor and speaking without fear or favor in a real public debate on substantive issues.
In LA, politicians recoil from any issue that would spark heated debate, and instead engage in an orgy of masturbatory consensus on non-controversial issues.
What I wouldn’t give for a leader willing to take a public stand on an important issue without worrying about losing some ephemeral privilege in the club feeding at the public trough.
I love you, Ron, and I think your comments in the Villaraigosa profile were spot-on. But it’s kind sad that you’re one of the main voices in the story.
Where are the quotes from Laura Chick? Eric Garcetti? Wendy Greuel? Jack Weiss? Tom LaBonge? Tony Cardenas? Richard Alarcon? Jan Perry? The rest of the hapless City Council? What about former City Council members like Ruth Galanter, Jackie Goldberg, Cindy Miscikowski? What about other current and former electeds? Zev Yaroslavksy, Jim Hahn, Dick Riordan, etc etc etc.?
I’ll bet dollars to donuts that every single one of them will duck and run rather than comment on the issues raised in / conclusions drawn from the Weekly story. They’re political cowards. Lapdogs to the system, afraid of losing their key to the elected-officials washroom.
That might be a good follow-up to the Weekly story: Ask every single elected official to comment on it. Force them to either defend the mayor and his performance to date, or not. Again betting dollars to donuts: Not a one will respond. Every single one will duck and cover, dodge and weave, refuse to take a stand. Political pussies.
2) Second point: The story also is an eye opener regarding local media. Kudos to the Weekly and Patrick Range MacDonald for the story. But why didn’t I see it in the Times? Who’s on the mayoral beat there, and when are they gonna get in the game?
Yes!!! What a great expose of the shyster, con-man extraordinaire..by Patrick McDonald!!! I read every word of it, and I hope the rest of the city does the same!
As I have said ad nauseum, Villar is only where he is because of a measly 289,000 votes from a citizenry of FOUR MILLION!!! He slithered into office because of voter apathy. And who knows how many of those 289,000 votes were from illegal aliens???
Nevertheless, we can’t put the toothpaste back into the tube; we have to ACT!!! We ALL agree that Villar has to go, but I haven’t seen anyone, except Walter Moore, throwing their hat in the ring! Where are the leaders? Where are the challengers?
We only have a few more months left to get every single LEGAL citizen registered to vote! You know that this time the voter fraud will be RAMPANT because of the illegal aliens and the fraudulent push by the Mexican mafia to register them! There are at least 1M of them in LA!
We need to have the County Registrar’s office check every single voter registration before the election next year. There is NO time to waste! And we need to have election monitors at every polling location to check ID’s. But, most importantly, all of the ABSENTEE ballots need to be checked and re-checked! This is where we will find the most voter fraud!
We are dealing with the most corrupt Mayor in the history of LA, and the most corrupt City Council in the history of LA. If we don’t throw them out of office NOW, it will be too late! Four more years will destroy LA!
No more Mexicans!!! The mayor and his gang of 15 are working for Mexico…what more proof do we need???
No more Mexicans!!! The mayor and his gang of 15 are working for Mexico…what more proof do we need???
It took 9 comments, but I suppose it was inevitable that the racist contingent would rear its head. Too bad, in that it’s a distraction from a real discussion of the man’s performance on its merit.
Merit? What merit. The guy does NOTHING – he’s the biggest waste of $$ in the entire City govt. It’s no wonder the City Council gets away with what they do… the one person who can stop them is never going to. What a cozy arrangement for the Council.
Tony Villar – The Absentee Mayor.
Let’s make his absence permanent.
Mr. McDonald is picking up where David Z. left off…BRAVO, Patrick!
Villar is such a DISMAL FAILURE, I am befuddled as to why he has not already been recalled and removed! The city is on life-support as far as the citizenry is concered. Villar has robbed, pillaged and plundered our treasury…leaving us with the highest taxes in the nation, the worst schools, the biggest sub-prime fiasco, the highest property prices and rents, and a city teeming with millions of illegal aliens who have DRAINED ALL of our resources!
If you haven’t noticed by now, Villar is an agent of Mexico and should be recalled and removed for aiding and abetting the flow of illegal aliens from Mexica and Central America, aiding and abetting gangs, and declaring LA a sanctuary city!
RICO charges apply to VIllar because, in the process of aiding and abetting the flow of illegals from Mexico to our city, he is aiding and abetting them to benefit FINANCIALLY from the act of coming here ILLEGALLY! The rubber hits the road when the illegals benefit “FINANCIALLY”, i.e. receiving benefits only meant for legal residents. Taking jobs from LEGAL residents is a form of THEFT!
Stealing ID’s from LEGAL residents is FRAUD…punishable by a $250K fine and 5 years in prison!
VILLAR is GUILTY of aiding and abetting! He has openly condemned SO 40 and E-Verify!!! He is defying our FEderal laws!!!
Maybe Walter Moore, a lawyer, can embellish on the RICO laws. We need to start a class action against Villar…I’m sure there is plenty of ammo…dereliction of duty, gross malfeasance, and abuse of power! Not to mention being an absentee mayor!
How about it, folks! Walter, what say you???
When I heard AV wanted to run for governor I thought to myself, “That’s not going to happen,” Now I know why.
However, I am not at all impressed with this Walter Moore guy. If I’m not mistaken he doesn’t even have children, right? I couldn’t access the “bio” link on his site to check.
If someone doesn’t have kids and hasn’t raised them in the area then how can he really know anything about “quality of life” issues?
Dion Cahn