Our Choice: a good person who did a bad thing -or- a bully with a pattern of doing the wrong thing

Our Choice:    a good person who did a bad thing -or- a bully with a pattern of doing the wrong thing
 

Occasional Report No. 35

The following is a quote from an email I received, regarding a comment posted to the Patch in the late hours of last night:
“Giorgio C. also commented on Myrna De Vera Regrets ‘Poor Judgment’. 
'Myrna De Vera needs to resign immediately.'”  
(The full comment is quoted at the end of this article.)
 
Yes, Myrna has been exposed for doing something wrong, something which cannot be excused or explained.    For now, she is vulnerable, which makes Now a very attractive time for noisy opportunists like Giorgio Cosentino to kick her in the teeth.    For the moment, he won’t have to kick so high.    Dan Romero, The Truth, ol time, ol time pinoy…even THAT lot had too much class to do what Giorgio just did.
 
The council is split, and in five weeks, we will choose which path we will follow for Hercules.    Myrna de Vera is a genuinely good person, who did a genuinely bad thing.    Dan Romero is a genuine bully, who abuses his position to intimidate those who criticize him, has done so frequently in the past, and can be relied upon to do so frequently in the future.    Myrna is a caring individual who serves out of a sense of duty.   Dan Romero is a foul-tempered individual who is temperamentally unsuited to serve in public office.    Many of Dan’s past actions indicate that he serves out of a sense of ego, and to satisfy his own personal interests.   Nothing he has done indicates a sincere desire to listen to, to respond to, or to serve the community.
 
Myrna did NOT act against Kent von Aspern in order to protect ME.    She was reacting to Kent von Aspern’s backhanded slap, a slap to her personally, of June 15, 2012:
 

“On the article Your City Council Live: Council Moves Forward with Parcel C Sale Agreement

Kent Von Aspern

‘…Joanne [Ward] and Councilmember deVera have only one thing in common: they are both women. Joanne never ran a dirty campaign in her life, never spoke about anyone behind their backs, and never shared confidential personnel-related e-mails with the public. She also never took a dime from this City that she didn't earn as a Councilmember. Her only crime was in not being more aggressive in standing up to the goold ol' boys network….’”
 
I cannot imagine how Myrna ever could have imagined that she had a right, or ethical license, to react to this in ANY manner other than to publicly refute the charges.     She was wrong.    Wrong.
 
But that wrong, significant as it is, is not nearly significant enough to cancel out all of the good that Myrna has done in her service to the community, to democracy, to transparency, to informed and intelligent decision making by the council.    That wrong does NOTHING to enhance Dan Romero, who has consistently quashed public comment and public participation…The Village should say its piece and then shut up and let the council members run the city, as they were elected to do…; Dan Romero, who has followed an unintelligent and uninformed course of doing what the city manager tells him to do…a nonresident city manager who wants to bury the community’s long-sought vision under a new trailer park of a town with a population of transient, and nontaxable, renters; Dan Romero, who has so often sought to intimidate and silence his critics (Billy Vogele, John Loudermilk, Toni Leance, Phil Simmons, me).
 
What Myrna did to Kent von Aspern should make us pause when we consider reelecting her in November 2014.    It does not affect the choice with which we are faced in November 2012.   And, if we make the wrong choice in 2012, if we consign the fate of our badly-battered and weakened town to four years of RomeroWilkinsBoulanger…then it won’t matter what we do in 2014.
 
This is Giorgio Cosentino’s full comment:
 
“Giorgio C. also commented on Myrna De Vera Regrets ‘Poor Judgment’.  
‘Myrna De Vera needs to resign immediately. Until this incident, I did not know if the problem was her or Mayor Romero, but this time, our Mayor was nowhere near the crime scene. She recently had me believing that our Mayor is a bully, but I now realize this mayor has been dealing with a council member who is truly capable of sabotaging the efforts of our city government. Equally of concern is who she chose to defend. Many individuals and races have been attacked on the Patch, but she never defended them. Instead, she chose to defend someone who who referred to our Mayor as "Mayor Meatloaf" and who made another comment that likely contributed to the Patch editor's decision to close the thread. And this is the person Myrna chose to defend? And to candidate Bill Kelly who is worried that he will "lose the Filipino vote" by calling for an investigation into De Vera's behavior by the AG, why would any Filipino citizen want her in office when there are so many better Filipino individuals? Give the Filipino community some credit, Bill. John Delgado does not pull this nonsense. I voted for Mr. Dela Vega who I am sure would not have demonstrated such behavior. Many Filipinos I know are mature and disciplined, unlike Mrs. De Vera. I am sure many from the Filipino community echo my call for her resignation. Lastly, Myrna brought harm to at least one citizen, Mr. Von Aspern who now fears for his job. For this, she needs to resign. Immediately."
 
Yes, Giorgio Cosentino knows many Filipinos who are mature.    Ain't it great to be patronized by the likes of Giorgio Cosentino?