Why Eric Garcetti Will (Probably) Never Be President
[guest post by JVW]
For those of you who could use a break from all the impeachment talk.
Los Angeles’s forty-second and current mayor, Eric GarbageCity — er, make that Garcetti — had a piece published in the Daily Breeze over the weekend which serves as a strong reminder why so many of us find him to be pompous and tiresome. While recounting the passage of California’s Proposition 187 a quarter-century ago, which according to the progressive catechism drove Latinos away from the GOP into the arms of Democrats forever and ever, the mayor treats us to this howler:
I had taken time away from my graduate studies abroad to work for six months on Kathleen Brown’s campaign for governor and to campaign against Prop. 187. I returned to Oxford University disappointed but energized, sad but hungry for change.
A few weeks later, I was literally hungry — adopting the tactic of community organizers through the years: I led a three-day fast and teach-in, in solidarity with immigrants in California and around the world. [. . .]
How relatable, right? I mean don’t most of us have the luxury of interrupting our lives to spend six months on the doomed campaign of a lesser member of a powerful lunatic political family, only to then return to the warm cocoon of Oxford on our Rhodes Scholarship for spring afternoons reading Hobsbawm in Radcliffe Camera then nipping off to The Bear Inn for a glass of French wine? It’s what our studies at the prestigious Harvard-Westlake School and Columbia University prepared us for, wasn’t it? My advice to the mayor should he wish to ultimately reside at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue would be not to talk about sabbaticals to fool around in political campaigns and sojourns at Oxford in the same grating insouciance that, for example, John Kerry might use to describe skiing in Zermatt before popping down to Corfu to sail the Ionian Sea.
Mayor GarbageCity — dang it! Garcetti — wants badly to be President and clearly thinks he is deserving of the honor, but for now his path to the White House is difficult to foresee. He leaves office on New Year’s Day 2022 with pretty much no place to go. Gavin Newsom will almost certainly be running for reelection in 2022, Dianne Feinstein’s term doesn’t end until January 2025, and Kamala Harris, who ain’t gonna be President, is almost certain to seek reelection in 2022. Short of Gov. Newsom or Sen. Harris ascending to the Vice-Presidency, it would seem that the Los Angeles Mayor faces a significant roadblock in his political aspirations.
Finally, as Eric Garcetti celebrates his party’s Pyrrhic Defeat in the Prop. 187 vote twenty-five years ago, he might pause to reflect on the fact that California Latinos, who now vote devotedly for his party, continue to struggle to realize the middle class California dream, especially in the City of Angels, despite all of the pandering and empty gestures that they receive from the progressive elite. If and when he finally runs for President, he is going to be asked the simple question of what he accomplished as mayor, and right now I don’t see him having much of a satisfactory answer.
– JVW
Twenty-five years ago I was watching Eric Garcetti’s father lay the groundwork for botching the O.J. Simpson murder trial.
JVW (54fd0b) — 11/20/2019 @ 1:40 pmMayor Yoga Pants?
The real questions are how is LA to survive 2 consecutive dud mayors and why do democrats keep putting up idiot pretty boys as mayoral candidates?
steveg (354706) — 11/20/2019 @ 2:07 pmOh and the Jeopardy question of stupidest person ever to be declared a Rhodes scholar.
Wasn’t Rhodes a white nationalist?
steveg (354706) — 11/20/2019 @ 2:11 pmWasn’t Rhodes a white nationalist?
Yeah, they’re removing his statues from the very universities his scholars attend. The bitterness of social justice irony.
JVW (54fd0b) — 11/20/2019 @ 2:15 pmI was certain Warren was a shoe-in but apparently the more they get to know her they more they want to get away.
Plus Buttigieg seemed to be making serious headway towards getting potential VP cred.
Now they both look to be going Thelma/Louise.
Gonna be a crazy 2020.
harkin (337580) — 11/20/2019 @ 3:11 pmBiden bed-crap #987,654,321:
http://theweek.com/speedreads/879793/biden-just-sent-postdebate-email-hours-before-debate-starts
urbanleftbehind (56af07) — 11/20/2019 @ 3:48 pmGarcetti could be tapped for AG in a Warren administration, where he could restore much needed respect and nonpartisanship to that department not seen since the Holder/Lynch/Yates era.
Munroe (dd6b64) — 11/20/2019 @ 4:47 pmGarcetti could be tapped for AG in a Warren administration. . .
It would be perfectly fitting: Garcetti doesn’t have a law degree, is not a member of the bar, and has naturally never tried a case, but, hey, he would be the first Latino A.G. we’ve had (Alberto Gonzales doesn’t count, because he was a Republican) and our first Jewish A.G. as well (Edward Levi and Michael Mukasey don’t count, same reason).
JVW (54fd0b) — 11/20/2019 @ 5:10 pmI think he’d have to run for Congress and then later maybe President. There isn’t any other path, at least not right now.
Nic (896fdf) — 11/20/2019 @ 5:26 pmI think he’d have to run for Congress and then later maybe President.
Yeah, but after being the Big Cheese in a city of four million people and an annual budget of $36 billion dollars, sitting in DC as a piddly little junior congressman in Nancy Pelosi’s stable would be a huge comedown.
JVW (54fd0b) — 11/20/2019 @ 5:53 pmSure, but if he wants it bad enough he should be able to spend a few years putting in some dues.
Nic (896fdf) — 11/20/2019 @ 6:03 pmMaybe he can join that USC “think tank” with former mayor Villaraigosa, and think about stuff.
steveg (354706) — 11/20/2019 @ 6:06 pmHe’s clean and well spoken. Last time we had a President like that we got an uncouth germophobe for the sequel
steveg (354706) — 11/20/2019 @ 6:08 pmHe probably wants to be the Chief of Staff or some cabinet position in a Democrat administration.
JVW (54fd0b) — 11/20/2019 @ 6:37 pmMaybe he can join that USC “think tank” with former mayor Villaraigosa, and think about stuff.
Doesn’t ol’ Arnie Schwarzenegger muck around in that particular sty too?
JVW (54fd0b) — 11/20/2019 @ 6:39 pmYes
Steveg (889bad) — 11/21/2019 @ 5:11 pmArnold and Villaraigosa.
Thinking
I’d dare anyone to read the notes on those thoughts aloud and not laugh
Add Fabian Nunes and you got the west coast version of the Butabi Brothers.
urbanleftbehind (a5a437) — 11/21/2019 @ 6:26 pmA poll in LA said that about 90% of residents thought that homelessness, traffic and housing prices were critical issues. Guess which of the 3 the mayor is failing at.
Kevin M (19357e) — 11/21/2019 @ 8:25 pm“Guess which of the 3 the mayor is failing at.”
All of them, and twice on Thursdays.
C. S. P. Schofield (757b7b) — 11/21/2019 @ 9:29 pm