What Can I Say? I'm So Flattered.

Some people call them Steviegrams, and some call them nastigrams.  They're the e-mails Steve Bernard sends to his flock.  He sends them to the people he discourages from coming to meetings, but encourages to rely on him and his wisdom and insight instead.  These are the kinds of people whom he can massage into thinking of running for Commission, even though they have no concept of Village government and functioning, telling them things like "it's really a lot easier than you might think to become a candidate."  The people of whom "so many...have let [him] know of [their] frustration with local government these past few years."  (What?  How could they be "frustrated with local government these past few years?"  Steve himself hand picked the majority of the Commission.  Steve and his flock should be like pigs in...a pig pen.  The last thing on earth they should be is frustrated.)  Steve relies on these people to listen to him, believe absolutely anything he says, and read what he writes to them.  In fact, he tells them, "If you've been reading my e-mails over the years, you'll know I've tried to foster the kind of government many of us would like to see."  Yup, that's what they'll know, if they just read his e-mails and keep away from Commission meetings.  If they do stay away, he can tell them how he cherishes respect, civility, and a professional demeanor, and they'll never know who the arch enemy of respect, civility, and a professional demeanor is.

Steve knows his flock.  He knows them very well.  He can tell them what kind of Commissioner he wants to represent him, and he "believe[s] that's what [they] want, also."  "Believes" that's what they want?  He knows it for a fact.  He knows what they want better than they do.  If they ever want to know what they want, they are welcome to ask him.  And in case he's stimulated any of them to consider running, or placed them in a trance, he is "available to discuss all this week."   Don Bernard will grant audiences to the humble and deferential.

I'm quoting, of course, from today's Steviegram.  But setting aside all the mind-numbing, patronizing, infantilizing pablum, Steve made a special effort to draw attention to me and this blog.  It was a deeply moving experience.  He mentioned my candidacy for Commission (aw, shucks, Steve), and he seems to suggest I am a miserable, ill-tempered, undermining wretch.  He even quoted me, although the best he could do was to quote a post from two years ago.  He quoted my "best guess" that there was no chance on earth that he and Cooper and Jacobs and Watts would not collude outside the "Sunshine."  That speculation of mine seems to have meant something important to Steve.  I don't know if he's protesting too much, but he's certainly protesting a lot.  If he thinks anything in the past two years has shown me how unlikely it is that I was right, I must have missed it.  Then, Steve directs his readers to this blog, so they can see for themselves what I have to say, "how [I say] it," and what I "stand for."  He seems to have run out of illustrative quotes, though, but oddly, he accuses me of failing to cite by quoting.  I do hope he'll look again, and maybe pick up some of those quotes he seems to have overlooked.  But he did direct his flock to this blog, and I'm very grateful to him for it.

So I'm sorry for Steve and whatever "personal circumstances" will reportedly prevent him from lavishing on us his caring, dedicated, and honest representation.  I hope things improve for him, or his family, or whencever the problem is coming.  I'm guessing that the reason he's on me, and trying to get someone to run, is that Cooper has decided not to run again.  I certainly hope that's the reason.  Although I wouldn't want Steve to think I was ungrateful for all Cooper, and Jacobs, and Watts, and Steve himself have done for the Village.  We wouldn't be the same without them.  We'd be very, very different.