the pathology of elections
When a disaster strikes, everything is turned upside down. Elected officials and “experts” stand there with their pants around their ankles, not knowing anything, and unimportant people suddenly become the stars of the day, saving lives and holding together society. Suddenly, the mayor, the president, the governor, aren’t so big anymore- they are just people, just as human and fallible and helpless as the rest of us. Suddenly it is the kid down the street, or the guy who owns the corner grocery, or the artist who lived on St. Claude who gets vans from an auto dealership in Texas to run rescue operations who matter.
Maybe that’s what is so depressing about the upcoming mayoral election in New Orleans. Otherwise intelligent people are beginning to put their faith into leaders again, in the very Caribbean, cult-of personality political culture of this city. Suddenly everyone is looking for a personal Jesus, a savior for the city, whether it be an gullible devotion to a man who is now casting himself as the father-figure who led us through the storm (the billboards say: “Re-unite Our City, Re-elect Our Mayor”) or Mitch Landrieu with his hair implants, his polished, privileged demeanor, and his “plan”.
From the Bywater, it is easier to look askance at the foolishness and pomp of places like Uptown, where the serious candidates spend their time, but we are hardly immune. I’ve been ripping down Palmer signs for weeks now (Palmer is Jackie Clarkson’s hand-picked successor for City Council District C) and they just keep putting the monstrosities up everywhere I look. As much fun as it is to tear her two foot by four foot grinning image off a warehouse wall, nails and all, I am running out of places to put them. The one that I tore off of a wall on Dauphine street I tried to hide on top of a portable storage container, but it came down the next day. My back yard is filling up with yard signs, and I have no idea what I will do with them after this election is over.
Russell Henderson wants me to get excited about Virginia Boulet’s campaign. I’m having a hard time. Even a leader as intelligent as Boulet is no match for the sharks that really run this town. If she ever did get elected (she’s fourth or fifth place), she would immediately have to start playing ball with Joseph Cannizaro, or worse- the Uptown ladies (Women of the Storm?). No election is going to change the caste system that this city still labors under.
Don’t get me wrong- we need someone competent to get the money from Washington that they owe us. But ultimately, we are going to get fooled again like every other time.