Judge: O'Brien Not Guilty

Us: Still Not a Good Mayor, Either...

The mayor of Ottawa remains in office, this morning found not guilty of influence peddling.

I admit that I would not have looked a gift verdict in the mouth, if the guy had happened to go down on this. But the trial has always been little more than a sideshow in the three-ring circus that is Larry O'Brien's mayoralty.

His Nibs seems to view leading a city of a million-plus as an ideal entry-level training position. You know, the kind most businesses give to summer students.

I probably do a disservice to students working their first summer jobs when I say this, but the mayor has, for the past three years or so, been remarkably similar to the overconfident, underprepared greenies who overestimate their clout, intelligence and value to the organization because they lack smarts to see how truly dreadful they are. Except that he, unlike most of them, does not seem to be learning from experience. Although, fueled by near-pathological hubris, he persists in thinking he has.

He's always made the mistake of thinking that private-sector thinking will solve the city's problems. News Flash: the public sector is here to do the important things that the private sector cannot or will not touch. The common good is often unprofitable as hell. There's a reason why the public and private sectors are separated. They're different.

What concerns me most now is that the man will mistake the verdict as complete vindication of his worth as mayor, and carry out his threat to run again in 2010. If the election turns out the same clueless types that gullibly swallowed his uninformed campaign promises the last time around, we're in trouble.

Ottawa would have its very own long-running Lastmanesque burlesque. The mind reels.