It's Official - Eric Bever Is An Idiot!

HERE'S THE DEFINITION
According to Dictionary.com - Idiot: an utterly foolish and senseless person. Now, I ask you - doesn't that describe Eric Bever to a "T"? And, his performance at the Special City Council meeting on Monday demonstrates this fact perfectly.

DON'T BELIEVE ME? WATCH THE TAPE
But don't take my word for it. Take a look at the short - 15 minute - video clip from the beginning of yesterday's Special City Council meeting, HERE. Under normal circumstances this would simply be going through the motions - taking roll, reading the closed session items into the record and soliciting questions on those items only. They would then typically adjourn to the closed session for deliberations.

RIECKHOF REQUESTS TRANSPARENCY
However, it began with an aberration - police union president Allen Rieckhof stood and again requested a fair and transparent investigation into the Jim Righeimer/DUI checkpoint issue. Although his comments were inappropriate for this particular meeting, Mayor Allan Mansoor permitted him to speak.

REGISTER ARTICLE ANGST
From that point on Bever used his time to comment first on his concern about the recent Orange County Register article by Watchdog Teri Sforza regarding city finances that placed Costa Mesa at the bottom of that particular list for Orange County cities. You can read Sforza's article, HERE. If you DO go to that link, be sure to read the clarification at the bottom, published after all the hub-bub about Costa Mesa occurred. It was the original, un-modified, article that gave Bever an emotional wedgie.

SIMPLETON DEMANDS SIMPLE REPORT
During his little speech on that subject he attempted to get City Manager Allan Roeder to present, from memory, budget details - not Roeder's style, for sure. Bever was asking him questions that would have been impossible to answer because the current budget, although approved, is still a work in progress and fully dependent upon how the negotiations go with the employee bargaining units. He demanded a "simple" report from Roeder at a future date. I'm sure that's the only kind Bever could understand.

BEVER BOYCOTTING, DESCRIBES HIMSELF
Which led Bever to his real purpose - to announce to the world that he's going to boycott any further contract negotiations with the city's employee unions because a "majority on the council have conflicts". I'll let you watch the tape for yourselves, but he actually did get off one perfect phrase. When referring to continuing the negotiations he said to do so was "outstandingly stupid". Let me tell you, he couldn't have described himself any better if he tried!

WON'T LET FACTS CONFUSE HIM
Despite attempts by Wendy Leece and Katrina Foley - Gary Monahan was absent and never did show up at the closed session - to help Bever understand just what was at stake with his position, he apparently held firm and later bugged out of the closed session when the subject of the negotiations began. Come to think of it, "idiot" is a generous description of Eric Bever. In the words of General Honore in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina when describing some of the things that had happened in New Orleans, some people are just "stuck on stupid". That's Eric Bever.