Written on Friday, July 10th, 2009 at 8:30am by Christopher Smith | 15 Comments

Mickey Kearns Can’t Win

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He can’t win and he’s wasting his time.

There, I said it.

I’m not the only one who is saying it as several local Democratic operatives, journalists, legislative staff members and politicos have shared the same feeling with me.  Kearns hasn’t been able to drum up support from much of anyone in the elected ranks.  The other politicians who overlap his district (Schroeder, Higgins, Stachowski, etc.) have all pledged support to Byron Brown.  Kearns was able to wrangle a tepid endorsement from Assemblyman Sam Hoyt earlier this week, but Hoyt and the Mayor have been locked in mortal combat for years.  It’s not like Hoyt had any other options.

We’re just going through the motions with a primary challenge to Mayor Brown that will precede an inevitable 70%-30% general election trouncing of whatever Republican decides to take a bullet for the team.  Which is a shame, because we have a petty, small minded autocrat running this city without a vision for success.

In every single interview I have seen or heard with Kearns, he comes across as completely unserious.  He lacks the soberness, gravitas or political will to run a city as troubled as our fair Queen City.  His “platform“, such as it is, is woefully lacking any bright shiny initiative that differentiates himself from the incumbent.  Mickey’s “issues” page is  filled with schlock about neighborhood quality of life centers, improving failed processes and “streamlining” red tape.  It’s the agenda for a councilman, not a serious candidate for Mayor of the second largest city in New York State.

Take, for example, his interview with Elena Buscarino at Buffalo Rising, it’s total and utter crap…no offense.

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He’s sitting face-to-face with a person who isn’t going to ask him a tough question and he comes across as a kid running for Student Council Vice President promising Coke Machines in the lunchroom.  She lobbed more softballs than the drunk guy from accounting at the corporate picnic and the best he could come up with was some vague process improvements and a promise to do something the Mayor has already pledged to work on (Smart Code).

There is a hard truth in this campaign.  For many citizens of Buffalo, Mayor Brown is a pretty solid guy.  His administration has reduced crime in some of the city’s most distressed neighborhoods and he always appears to be “doing something“.  In Buffalo, that goes a long way.

Those of us who pay attention to the inside baseball stuff, the corruption, the half-assed machiavellian tendencies, the political machinations, overpaid staff,  and the general lack of a vision…we all know Brown is as useless as tits on a bull.  For those schooled in public policy, Citistat is bullshit.  It’s a garbage in-garbage out data collection system which simply allows for the Mayor to look very serious dozens of hours each week on public access television.  For those of us who care about ethics, this administration is an embarassment.

From Pete Cutler allegedly drunkenly hiding under a car after allegedly hitting a motorcyclist, to Brown’s son joyriding around the east side and destroying property, allegedly confiscating Syaed Ali’s underpants and deodorant, to the epic FAIL of One Sunset, to slamming crappy hotels for cronies into plum waterfront development sites, to the staffers pulling multiple salaries from multiple departments and all the other bullshit…this administration makes the Masiello crew look like choir girls.

Sadly, most people in the third poorest city in the nation don’t give a rat’s ass about any of that.  They know they have cameras on their corners, lower crime rates, the taxes have gone down a couple of bucks and shitty houses on their blocks are being demolished.  And everywhere they turn, Mayor Brown’s smiling visage is seen on billboards and the TV screen.  He’s everywhere, the king of press conferences and studies to plan studies that will assemble committees to fix problems.

byron_brown_billboard

What does Mickey have to counter that?  Not much.  He needs a message, an idea, a vision.  In the Buffalo Rising article I referenced above, Mickey claims to be a “big picture” kind of guy.  Sadly, everything he says makes him look like he hasn’t the slightest idea of what he’s gotten himself into.

And we’re all going to be the worse for it…guaranteed another four years of incompetent and misguided leadership from the Brown Administration.

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15 Comments

  1. Colin says:
    July 10, 2009 at 9:13 am

    As an objective analysis of Mickey’s chances, I think you’re right. The problem is that that analysis becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy. I’ve seen lots of people and organizations decide to support or endorse Brown based on nothing more than the fact that “he’s gonna win.” Yet in the last 10 weeks, he’s been at the center of enough scandal to choke a horse, with more to come. Things change, and the mayor is weaker now than he was a few months ago, but no one had the vision to anticipate that change.

    http://eagercolin.wordpress.com/2009/07/09/byron-brown-and-the-inevitable-thing/

  2. ethan says:
    July 10, 2009 at 9:28 am

    Maybe he comes off as unserious because he knows he won’t win, too. The fix is in!

  3. Buffalo Blood Donor says:
    July 10, 2009 at 11:36 am

    Wait: Crime is down, taxes have gone down a few bucks and shitty houses are being demolished. Aren’t these things exactly what a large portion of Buffalo’s population wants?

    As corrupt and unethical as Brown’s administration appears, the average citizen will put up with a lot of it so long as basic needs are met. I’m not trying to too judgmental here, but unless the corruptness and unethicalness is *measurably* wasting a ton of money relative to what’s being spent to reduce crime and improve neighborhoods, then no one stands a chance against Brown because he’s actually accomplishing something that’s perceived as beneficial. And he’s balancing the budget to boot.

    I’m not so sure this is as bad a thing as your post makes it out to be.

    BBD

  4. Chris Smith says:
    July 10, 2009 at 11:47 am

    @Colin I’d agree that setting someone up as inevitable is usually a bad idea and discourages people from getting into races and dismisses good ideas from the debate.

    However, what I was trying to say in this post is that Kearns does not have an effective message, which is why he can’t win. Brown can be beaten, for sure, but not with this type of platform.

    Hillary was pronounced as “inevitable” in the 2008 Presidential Primary, until Obama came along with a compelling platform and some big ideas. Vision, mission, compelling message…without those things, Kearns is dead in the water.

  5. Chris Smith says:
    July 10, 2009 at 11:54 am

    @BBD Yes, many people will take the tradeoff. I’m also in the camp that a little bit of corruption is a good thing if it amounts to progress for many, i.e. Daley, Richard (Chicago)

    What’s lacking from Brown is a grand plan. Take for example, this post: http://wnymedia.net/wnymedia/smith/2009/02/buffalo-youre-doing-it-wrong/

    There is no vision for economic development, most of the development success Brown takes credit for were started under Masiello and he lacks substantive interest in developing a strategy for the city and region. He’s a legislator making incremental process improvements. Which is exactly what Kearns is pledging to do.

  6. Mark says:
    July 10, 2009 at 12:37 pm

    while interning at city hall i liked him and saw potential in him as a mayor but when he’s on tv or on radio he sounds like he’s completely in over his head…i guess some shades of masiello in him (”he’s such a nice man, loves buffalo too ya know!?”) but there is absolutely no vison in his campaign.

  7. KevinP says:
    July 10, 2009 at 11:25 pm

    Imagine the parking tickets and general harassment you would have received if you still lived in the city after you wrote this one!

  8. AnswerLady says:
    July 11, 2009 at 5:16 pm

    Given the state of the republican party in Buffalo (and NY), the only game in town is the democratic primary. Who ever wins that will become the next Mayor of Buffalo. Last time about 16,000 people from a City of over 260,000 voted in the primary. Democratic insiders are going to decide who will be the next Mayor and many of these people hate Mayor Brown and what he has done to our neighborhoods and the City in general. If nothing else, its going to be interesting …

  9. Downtownjunkie says:
    July 12, 2009 at 9:51 pm

    You would think seeing as how he has a 99.9% chance of losing he would take some risks and really outline a future vision however taboo the ideas may seem…Matt Ricchiazzi has more going on with his campaign than both of these clowns

  10. J says:
    July 14, 2009 at 10:16 am

    Taxes may be down, but assessments are up. So, in reality, taxes are up.

    Is crime down? Violent crime is up 6.5% http://blogs.buffalonews.com/outrages_insights/2009/06/violent-crime-in-buffalo-jumped-65-percent-last-year.html

    Shitty houses are being demolished. But nothing is being done with shitty neighborhoods. Pull one shitty house down on a block with 12 and you still have a shitty neighborhood.

    The mayor has no plan for the city. Mickey Kearns has a plan for… something. But neither of them is the mayor that this city needs.

  11. Chuck says:
    July 15, 2009 at 7:22 am

    Mickey sure can’t win with only $17k in the bank.

  12. June says:
    July 15, 2009 at 9:27 pm

    It is going to be tough, needs some momentum, by the way he has a lot more than 17K.

  13. Warren says:
    July 23, 2009 at 4:08 pm

    Mickey Kearns Must Win.

    It’s true that there’s no slick message coming from the Kearns campaign. This seems to be a lament that he is not packaging himself properly. Meanwhile, Brown is rolling out his ribbon-cutting-a-day strategy, to give the appearance of momentum and improvement. Brown is projecting the image of a coherent plan to develop the City. Brown is creating the illusion of accountability. Brown is controlling the message. And other members of the Democrat establishment are reenforcing that image.

    But it is a false image. Crime is not down in the City of Buffalo. If you take the crime rate and adjust it for the loss of population over the same time period, it is actually up. Brown points to last years homicide body count as an indication of improvement of public safety. However, if you compare the homicide rate over the first three years of the Brown Administration to the rate during the last three years of the Masiello Administration, the number of homicides actually increased.

    What’s distressing about your post is that it is defeatist. Not from the perspective of a political partisan of Kearns, or a staunch opponent of Brown, but as another version of the lament that all politicians are the same, that nothing will ever change, that people are too stupid to vote properly, that corrupt candidates would be thrown out but the opponents are always lacking, etc.

    Kearns has no money (and therefore no obligations to anyone). Kearns has no “message” (which means he hasn’t willfully lied to us). Kearns is not smooth (he is not presenting a false front). Kearns lacks gravitas (he does not demonstrate the sense of ruthlessness so ably demonstrated by the Brown administration). This means that if he is elected, he will come to the office with no obligations, no false promises that he will have to pretend to realize, no flashy programs that will waste more money and effort with no return, and no predisposition to corruption and graft.

    This is why Kearns must be elected. Plenty of people are lining up to get their piece of the action by supporting Brown, thinking his election is inevitable. That’s fine. The corruption of the Brown administration, and the baseline corruption it exposes, is coming to light. If you’re okay with that, then repeat the mantra being fed to you by the politcos, and pronounce Brown inevitable.

    While you’re at it, pronounce Buffalo dead.

  14. westsider says:
    July 28, 2009 at 10:24 am

    Here’s a second for Matthew Richazzi! He’s got a great vision: http://www.changebuffalo.org/

    I don’t care if he accomplishes a fraction fo what he lays out here, nearly all of it would be good for the city, particularly reclaiming the waterfront from the 190!

 

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