Mayor Daley Refuses To Apologize
Is was too good to be true.
Even though the text of the Mayor Daley’s speech was highly publicized hours before gave it, and did seem to contain some form of apology, when it was his turn at the microphone, he just couldn’t go through with it.
According to his speech Daley was supposed to say, “I’ll be the first to admit that we screwed up.”
But the closest he came to a real apology was saying he takes responsibility for the problems with the transition.
The truth is, leaking the speech to the media ahead of time, was a ploy, a slight of hand, to make it look like Mayor Daley was actually sorry for the meter privatization deal.
Rumors have been circulating that the administration had been doing polling and focus groups on this subject, with the results coming back to City Hall overwhelmingly negative and perhaps injurious to Daley’s re-election.
What a surprise!
Now, with the next Mayoral election in the admittedly far distance, the Mayor has to look like he’s truly sorry. Because many believe the meters could be Daley’s snowstorm.
But he isn’t sorry.
Daley is like the petulant two year old forced to apologize to a sibling for hitting them, when they’re obviously not contrite.
Daley is obviously not sincere because inside he’s seething with anger, you can see it in his scowl, you can hear it in his tone. Because he can’t understand why so many people don’t see it his way.
He thinks he saved the day by doing this $1.15 billion dollar deal. We needed the money he explains. It was a windfall for the city he tries to rationalize.
The question he won’t answer is how did you and your administration mismange the city’s finances so spectacularly, that there’s been a half a billion dollar deficit two years in a row?
Because if it weren’t for these huge budget deficits, the city wouldn’t have been forced into what 32nd Ward Alderman Scott Waguespack calls, “…One of the worst deals in the history of the nation…”
In order to apologize successfully, it’s common practice to speak the words, “I’m sorry,” or the lesser used, but equally popular “I apologize.”
But don’t expect to hear any of these words or phrases from Mayor Daley any time soon.
In fact, don’t expect them ever.
Photo courtesy and copyright of Joe M500′s Flickr page.
I apologize for having voted for Daley in the past and I am sorry that he is the mayor of Chicago.
yes, yes, and yes.
but, the people of chicago get what they deserve. we’ve voted shortshanks into office how many times now? will the people learn this time around? unfortunately, i’m not hopeful.
Doesn’t he realise that what he did last night will probably hurt him even more?
Or is he just so arrogant that he assumes he will stay in the office till he decides he is done?
No one ever thought a woman would be Mayor of Chicago…
No one ever thought a Black man would be Mayor of Chicago…
No one thinks a Daley would lose an election…
Greg…
You are sooooooo right. I thought that exact same thing. The arrogance of that guy.
Man, people are usually forgiving, but you have to be sincerely contrite.
Last night though…what the hell?
My only fear is that the election is still a long way off. Will the outrage last?
Someone of stature (with plenty of money since Daley will vacuum up all of the donations) will have to run in order to compete – question is who?
He did apologize during the budget hearing last night. Not for the deal, but for the transition.
Daley’s apology for the transition process is like the manager of Ford’s theatre apologizing to Mrs Lincoln that the play was interrupted and offering her a rain check.
Daley needs to be removed before the election……with handcuffs!
Daley could learn from Bezos’ apology last month:
“This is an apology for the way we previously handled illegally sold copies of 1984 and other novels on Kindle. Our “solution” to the problem was stupid, thoughtless, and painfully out of line with our principles. It is wholly self-inflicted, and we deserve the criticism we’ve received. We will use the scar tissue from this painful mistake to help make better decisions going forward, ones that match our mission.
With deep apology to our customers,
Jeff Bezos
Founder & CEO
Amazon.com “