WHO WE ARE-Maybe he thought it was like a Bar Mitzvah or having sex for the first time but you could see from that smug little boy ear-to-ear grin on his face that Eric Garcetti felt he had achieved a rite of passage into manhood, finally.
You can believe with absolute certainty that there was much discussion in his inner sanctum about whether he should drop the F-bomb at the LA Kings championship celebration, that there were numerous rehearsals under the tutelage of his acting coach and adoring wife to make sure he didn’t flub his big moment or have his voice squeak at the moment of truth like a pubescent lad.
"There are two rules in politics. They say never, ever be pictured with a drink in your hand and never swear. But this is a big fucking day. Way to go guys.”
Just a slight cerebral fellow, a full-time politician and part-time actor, who was now just one of the guys hanging with toothless, scarred monsters of the ice who had triumphed over all to claim their second NHL Stanley Cup in two years – one more cross-checked box on his way to the presidency like joining the Navy Reserve as an officer and a gentle man.
The crowd roared its approval. Kings executive Luc Robataille followed quickly with a disclaimer, “We told our players not to cuss,” he told the crowd, turning to the mayor to add, “thanks.”
And the mayor offered a smirking disclaimer of sorts that night on Jimmy Kimmel’s show: “Kids out there, do not say what your mayor said today.”
We’ve come a long way baby. I’m inspired, liberated. Thank you, Eric.
If you can bring down the house by using the word that the LA Times says it “doesn’t print … not family friendly,” then surely the rest of us can use it at public gatherings, like before the City Council or at other city meetings where our rights are being trampled upon, our neighborhoods ruined and our jobs chased out of town.
I’m not sure I can master that Cheshire grin of yours and I’m way too old to find my manhood but I think the mayor is on to something. I’ve already started working on my delivery of his now famous line with the same sang-froid that he showed, except I couldn’t resist editing it slightly should I find the need to appear at public comment before an official agency of the city government of LA.
“This would be a big fucking day if …”
You can fill in the blank with whatever beef you got with the city: DWP outrages and outages, broken streets and sidewalks, bloated payroll, destructive planning processes without coherent policies and on and on.
So my advice is get over it – KCBS has two-thirds of you disapproving. Give credit where credit is due.
Eric’s F-bomb has opened the door to all of us getting real and honest with our public officials. An F-bomb here or there just might help Herb Wesson and the men and lady on the Council understand we’re sick and tired of their self-service and service to special interests and contributors.
We want our money to go to making our lives better – not to enriching themselves and their friends.
No more of the mayor’s “darn” this and “darn” that stuff and how he is “darn determined” to get federal funds for the city’s poorest neighborhoods and not just his old turf around Hollywood.
“My basic philosophy is you deserve whatever you want or a darn good explanation as to why you can't have it and nothing in between," he said last August.
That’s the idea we all need to embrace and to let them all know if they don’t deliver, we have two words they would all understand: F--k You!
(Ron Kaye is a lifetime journalist, writer and political observer. He is the former editor of the Daily News and the founder of the Saving LA Project. He writes occasionally for CityWatch and can be reached at [email protected])
-cw
CityWatch
Vol 12 Issue 50
Pub: June 20, 2014