Hanging Tough

I think you've got to respect the tenacity Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick is showing with his decision to hang on as mayor despite a 7-1 City Council vote asking him to resign. At issue is the fact that the mayor seems to have lied under oath to help cover up an affair with a subordinate. But the City Council lacks the authority to remove the mayor, and the governor who it seems does have the authority is disinclined to remove him from office. So now we wait to see if he's subjected to criminal charges by the Wayne County prosecutor's office, because a criminal conviction would get him booted.

Kilpatrick was previously best-known to me for such scandals as charging expensive meals to his city credit card including an $85 bottle of Moet & Chandon champagne in Atlanta and an impressive $456 bill at the Capital Grille here in DC.

Comments

An $85.00 bottle of champagne is expensive?

Posted by steve duncan | March 19, 2008 3:33 PM

There's nothing respectable about clinging to power long after you've shown yourself unfit to exercise it. Every day that Kilpatrick stays in office is a day that the city focuses on his own dishonesty and dying fortunes rather than its own multitude of problems. At least Spitzer took responsibility and knew when to quit.

Posted by Chris | March 19, 2008 3:35 PM

All of this effort on his part, and he's still mayor of DETROIT, for God's sake! He sounds like one of those asshat "Mayor for Life" types who love the perks of the job, but don't give a rat's behind about the condition of the cities they "lead".

Posted by Claudius | March 19, 2008 3:39 PM

Um, Chris I think MY is being sarcastic.

Posted by IP Guy | March 19, 2008 3:40 PM

At issue is the fact that the mayor seems to have lied under oath to help cover up an affair with a subordinate.

We've seen someone remain in a far higher office than mayor of Detroit after being pursued for this very infraction, and it didn't really bother me then, either.

Kilpatrick was previously best-known to me for such scandals as charging expensive meals to his city credit card including an $85 bottle of Moet & Chandon champagne in Atlanta and an impressive $456 bill at the Capital Grille here in DC.

Genuinely curious: how big are the travelling budgets for mayors of large cities, and how are they usually handled?

Personally, if I were a citizen of a large city, my frustrations might be more accurately measured in hundreds of millions rather than hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Posted by Brad L | March 19, 2008 3:47 PM

Teen1: Oh, here comes that cannonball guy. He's cool.
Teen2: Are you being sarcastic, dude?
Teen1: I don't even know anymore.

Posted by Zippy | March 19, 2008 3:48 PM

The issue is not that the mayor "seems to have lied under oath to help cover up an affair with a subordinate [his chief of staff]." The Detroit Free Press and Detroit News have both clearly documented, using, among other sources, text messages between Kilpatrick and his then chief of staff Christine Beatty, that he lied under oath in a civil suit brought by two Detroit police officers who had been fired by the mayor for investigating his, ahem, questionable behavior. The jury ruled against Kilpatrick, who then vowed to appeal. When his lawyer was shown the text messages proved Kilpatrick lied under oath, he quickly agreed to settle the case for nearly $9 million of city taxpayers' money. The question now is whether the Wayne Co. prosecutor, Kim Worthy, decides to bring perjury charges against the mayor. I do not respect his tenacity - sheer arrogance is more accurate - for hanging onto office; Detroit, needless to say, has a lot of problems, and Kwame Kilpatrick's putting his own ego before the needs of the people of this city is truly disgusting.

Posted by Paul | March 19, 2008 3:56 PM

The issue is not that the mayor "seems to have lied under oath to help cover up an affair with a subordinate [his chief of staff]." The Detroit Free Press and Detroit News have both clearly documented, using, among other sources, text messages between Kilpatrick and his then chief of staff Christine Beatty, that he lied under oath in a civil suit brought by two Detroit police officers who had been fired by the mayor for investigating his, ahem, questionable behavior. The jury ruled against Kilpatrick, who then vowed to appeal. When his lawyer was shown the text messages proved Kilpatrick lied under oath, he quickly agreed to settle the case for nearly $9 million of city taxpayers' money. The question now is whether the Wayne Co. prosecutor, Kim Worthy, decides to bring perjury charges against the mayor. I do not respect his tenacity - sheer arrogance is more accurate - for hanging onto office; Detroit, needless to say, has a lot of problems, and Kwame Kilpatrick's putting his own ego before the needs of the people of this city is truly disgusting.

Posted by Paul | March 19, 2008 3:57 PM

You've left out some important stuff here:

First, the mayor fired and ruined the lives of two Detroit Police Officers, including the head of Internal Affairs. He did this because IA was investigating on-the-job foolishness by the mayor's bodyguards (abuse of overtime, drinking, reckless driving), and this investigation my have led to exposure of the mayor's affair with his chief of staff (much of the bodyguards' time was spent following the mayor around to various tryst locations.)

Then, during the whistleblower lawsuit, the mayor and his chief of staff lied under oath to cover up the affair. Then the city was hit with an 8 million dollar verdict (even though the two cops would've settled for 10% of that). Then the mayor cut a secret settlement deal without the City Council's knowledge (in order to keep secret text messages that proved there was an affair.)

Posted by JB2 | March 19, 2008 4:02 PM

You forgot about secretly arranging for the city council to provide his wife with a leased Lincoln Navigator for free. It makes an $85 bottle of champagne seem quaint by comparison.

Posted by Tyro | March 19, 2008 4:02 PM

Kwame Kilpatrick is like a Gen-X version of Newark's Sharpe James. Aren't Detroit blacks embarrassed by him? I know there's a long tradition of electing corrupt hucksters in black cities, but Kilpatrick's not even good at it. Is there no black Rhodes Scholar in Michigan that Detroit can replace Kilpatrick with? No Corey Booker there?

Posted by Fred | March 19, 2008 4:04 PM

I think Zippy nails it. Is this post sarcastic? I don't know. And I'm not sure Matthew knows either...

Posted by Al | March 19, 2008 4:07 PM

I know there's a long tradition of electing corrupt hucksters in black cities

Yes, we all know that whites never elect untouchable corrupt hucksters in their cities or districts! Cripes, Fred, what's your problem?

Posted by Tyro | March 19, 2008 4:08 PM

Well, Fred, Kilpatrick's predecessor was Dennis Archer, who I believe did an ok job in Detroit. He was a judge, then was president of the ABA after his term and is now the chairman of a large law firm in Detroit.

Posted by Cain | March 19, 2008 4:11 PM

Sure, that's corrupt, but that ain't Marion Barry corrupt.

Posted by Spike | March 19, 2008 4:13 PM

I live in Toledo, OH so I get the Detroit news as well. And I have to agree with the other commenters that it isn't just the affair: it's firing respected cops, forcing the city to shell out $8 million to settle the lawsuit, the secret settlement deal, the loss of a mayor's conference that was going to fill the rooms of the new casinos, and most recently, dropping the N-word in the televised state of the city address. His shamelessness has been a complete embarrassment.

Posted by LeChuck | March 19, 2008 4:15 PM

And I have to agree with the other commenters that it isn't just the affair: it's firing respected cops, forcing the city to shell out $8 million to settle the lawsuit

Yeah, after peeking at some non-firewall news, this seems more like an abuse-of-power scandal than a basic sex scandal. The one thing I didn't find: what was the root misconduct that they were investigating?

Posted by Brad L | March 19, 2008 4:21 PM

Tyro,

"Yes, we all know that whites never elect untouchable corrupt hucksters in their cities or districts!"

Sure, but do you want to honestly deny that there has been a greater tolerance of this in black cities and districts?

Posted by Fred | March 19, 2008 4:23 PM

Fred,

I think if you tally up numbers of corrupt hucksters repeatedly re-elected as mayors throughout history the white side of the ledger will dwarf the black side by several orders of magnitude.

As usual your conservative ID just can't avoid going for the racist angle when most of us reasonable people recognize that corrupt hucksters have been successfully getting themselves elected and re-elected as mayors repeatedly throughout our history.

Posted by Eric k | March 19, 2008 4:26 PM

This is the best article on the orgins of the scandle:

http://www.metrotimes.com/editorial/story.asp?id=6269

Posted by JB2 | March 19, 2008 4:34 PM

Kwame Kilpatrick is a disgrace. He runs around acting like a thug in a rap video, while one of America's formerly great cities goes to hell. (My favourite point of reference: my old hometown, Windsor, across the river from Detroit, has a bigger snow removal budget than Detroit - a city 10x larger).

On top of the perjury, abuse of power, lying to council, there is now an investigation into any role the mayor's office had into the coverup of the murder of a hooker, who was shot execution-style, the same night that the mayor's wife came home to find the mayor's mansion overrun with hookers, of whom the deceased was one...in fact one the mayor's wife got into a physical confrontation with.

The Wire didn't have storylines this good.

Posted by McKingford | March 19, 2008 4:35 PM

I'd be embarrassed to have Kilpatrick as my mayor. But what should be embarrassing is that he won re-election despite numerous scandals prior to this, like the SUV scandal and the credit card fiasco, and the fact that he wastes taxpayer money on a security service like he is the president or something.

Posted by freddiemac | March 19, 2008 4:39 PM

freddiemac, I'm still not convinced he "won" that election. That was a crazy election full of shenanigans.

It's tough, in a city that's going bankrupt, to see your mayor pulling the crap he's pulling. Maybe that bottle of Moet doesn't sound like such a big deal, but when your city's flat broke, it IS a big deal. As others have said, though, that was the least of Kwame's transgressions. It's a lot more than a sex scandal.

My favorite thing to come of the scandal was a mock-up of the "Leave Britney Alone" schtick done by a local radio station. Somewhere in the middle of it, the guy doing the video says something to the effect of, "Leave Kwame alone! So what if he cheated on his wife with Christine Beatty -- even though she does look like Scottie Pippen!" Classic, that.

Posted by Amy | March 19, 2008 4:59 PM

Is there no black Rhodes Scholar in Michigan that Detroit can replace Kilpatrick with? No Corey Booker there?

Dennis Archer?

Posted by Peter H | March 19, 2008 5:50 PM

With the added context provided in comments--it does look more like a corruption and abuse of power case--I now want to know: Why doesn't the governor want to fire him, if the city council is on board and his city's fed up?

Posted by Deborah | March 19, 2008 6:02 PM

"I think if you tally up numbers of corrupt hucksters repeatedly re-elected as mayors throughout history the white side of the ledger will dwarf the black side by several orders of magnitude."

Really? Run the numbers and get back to us. Be sure to correct for blacks comprising only 12% of the U.S. population. Or you could just acknowledge that black voters don't always share the same sentiments as white voters do when it comes to electing and re-electing corrupt hucksters, e.g., James, Kilpatrick, Barry, etc.

Posted by Fred | March 19, 2008 6:14 PM

Is the title of this post a sly New Kids on the Block reference?

Posted by dry_fish | March 19, 2008 6:23 PM

Fred, there's a reason why so many cities have eliminated the mayor's office or made it a purely ceremonial position. It was because the mayors had become mired in so much corruption that the voters couldn't take it any more.

Posted by Tyro | March 19, 2008 6:25 PM

Fred,

You really are in "let me be an idiot and reenofrce all the stereotypes about racists Conservatives mode" today aren't you.

Sheesh, how many thousands of corrupt white mayors have their been all over America for hundreds of years? Between Tammany Hall style machines in the North and even more blatant corruption in the South, for a lot of our history the corrupt ones probably well outnumbered the uncorrupt.

As Tyro says it was so easy for corrupt mayors to control local politics that many cities stripped the mayor of actual power long ago.

Posted by Eric k | March 19, 2008 6:43 PM

Re: Well, Fred, Kilpatrick's predecessor was Dennis Archer, who I believe did an ok job in Detroit.

True, Archer did a good job given what he to work with, and too bad he didn't stay longer. He inherited a city that had been run to ruin by the profoundly corrupt and incompetent Coleman Young who single-handedly presided over Detroit's collapse and whose excuse for the mess consisted of anti-white, anti-suburban diatribes (laden with F-bombs usually) that would embarrass the Rev Wright.

Posted by JonF | March 19, 2008 6:45 PM

$85 for Moêt says one thing: the markup on restaurant champagne is atrocious.

In other news, Fred's still in the running with Sailer for Whitest Old Fart In Comments.

Posted by pseudonymous in nc | March 19, 2008 7:57 PM

Is Fred serious? I might just as well claim that all Italians are tolerant of corrupt hucksters off the example of Buddy Cianci in Providence.

Reels the mind, it does....

Posted by Daniel Shays | March 19, 2008 8:38 PM

"Why doesn't the governor want to fire him, if the city council is on board and his city's fed up?"

Basically because the residents of Detroit are notorious in this state for their "He may be a crook, but he's OUR crook!" attitude towards corruption, which was on display during the Young administration. They might get a bit irate about their city having a reputation for massive corruption and incompetence, but should anybody outside the city suggest doing anything about it, they become absolutely livid.

I suspect the Governor fears a repeat of the Detroit riots should the state government intervene to remove Detroit's mayor, no matter how corrupt everyone may know he is. Leading not only to death on a massive scale, but also the city becoming even more of a drain on the state's resources.

Posted by Brett Bellmore | March 19, 2008 8:42 PM

"Basically because the residents of Detroit are notorious in this state for their "He may be a crook, but he's OUR crook!" attitude towards corruption"

Same with the residents of Newark and D.C. up until recently. Be sure not to mention the common denominator there, Brett, or folks here we'll start feigning ignorance.

Posted by Fred | March 19, 2008 11:57 PM

Fred would lose just on the Tammany mayors. It's not even close.

Posted by tequila | March 20, 2008 12:09 PM

Just as a matter of sociological curiosity, I wonder what it is about venues like this that seem to attract a disproportionate numbers of racists....oh, I'm sorry, 'race realists'.

Posted by Hector | March 20, 2008 2:04 PM

Sure, but do you want to honestly deny that there has been a greater tolerance of this in black cities and districts?

Maybe you should ask Boss Tweed, or pretty much ANY 19th Century politician. Fuckwit.

Posted by Samuel Glover | March 20, 2008 2:43 PM

I don't know what the Governor is afraid of, but I expect that rather than riots, she is afraid of alienating (some) Detroit people from the Democratic Party.

Frankly, although he should certainly go, it would be much better if he went because the people of the city wouldn't tolerate him any more, rather than being removed by an outsider. Detroit needs to expect more of its leaders. The City Council isn't exactly a bastion of either intellect or virtue either.

Posted by matt wilbert | March 20, 2008 7:16 PM

Does Kilpatrick have sufficiently high favorables remaining in Detroit that Granholm feels the need to keep him in place?

Posted by Anthony Damiani | March 21, 2008 12:39 AM