FOP recall vote a flat-liner

HAVING THOUGHT about it for at least 30 seconds, it seems to me that the FOP vote on the recall of Mayor Don Plusquellic proved nothing. Indeed Warner Mendenhall's efforts to bestir the mayor's angry opponents in the department fell hopelessly flat. Even though Mendenhall declared to the Beacon Journal in his post-vote "victory" speech that, "I couldn't be any happier," you should also consider that he has been deluding himself with happy thoughts about his campaign ever since it started. Happiness, after all, is in the eye of the beholder.

But the figures tell another story. THE FOP gave Mendenhall a two-vote edge - 168-166. That was an underwhelming percentage of the more than 800 eligible active and retired members of the FOP. The outcome was even less decisive when only a reported 64 pct. of the active members even bothered to vote. Ouch. Having worked as a reporter at police stations in other cities, I think it is fair to say that there is always some tension between City Hall and the Police Department. Both sides have tough jobs and grievances are normally expressed solely against the mayor.

That said, the FOP's recall vote was bad politics. There was nothing to be gained by it, and it came within a hair of undercutting Mendenhall's attempt to stampede the voters with more anti-Plusquellic propaganda. There isn't much mileage in the way it turned out.

(Meanwhile, Warner might take a cue from his favorite radio station, WNIR. with its daily lineup of fabulists, which (I'm told) is running commercials by an outfit called American Tax Relief. The ad promises to save you up to 85 pct. of your delinquent tax debt. Let's see....at $169, 000 in tax liens, that would come to...Oh, hell. That's Mendenhall's problem, not mine.)