The MacDonald Kennedy Show

To paraphrase Lloyd Bentsen, who was talking about a different Kennedy, "I know Mac Kennedy.  Mac Kennedy is a friend of mine."  He's also a very dedicated BP resident, and he's an excellent Commissioner.  Mac is very smart, supremely well-organized (well, no one is as well-organized as is Roxy Ross, but no one could be), focused and goal-oriented, and he's very hard-working.

Are there any imperfections about Mac Kennedy?  Yes.  Two, that I know about.  He talks a lot -- he dominates most conversations, including with me, and most certainly on the Commission -- and he makes too many irrelevant references.  The latter imperfection is most commonly exemplified by his reminding people that he's a Commissioner (yes, Mac, I know you're a Commissioner; I voted twice successfully to contribute to making you one), that he does his homework, and that he's dedicated (yes, Mac, those are among the reasons I voted for you, twice, and will again if you run for re-election), and that he has a husband (gay pride: good -- not relevant to the Commission or to improving the Village).  And I have to say that the same observation about referring to a spouse could be made of Chuck Ross, who rarely omitted to point out in his public statements that Roxy Ross is his wife.  Every word that came out of Chuck's mouth, or Roxy's, or Mac's, was pure gold.  The three of them are immense treasures to the Village.  It is completely unimportant to be reminded to whom they are domestically connected.

Another thing Mac and Chuck have in common is that they seem to know everyone, and everything about them.  They're interested, they probe, they're good listeners, and they have great memories.  This is a big advantage to us.  Presumably, we know that, because in the last election, we lavished on Mac more support than we ever before lavished on any Commission candidate.

It's fair to say that there's one other possible imperfection, in my opinion, about Mac Kennedy.  As Mac himself generally puts it, "'that's the way we've always done it' is not [in itself] a reason to keep doing it that way."  Mac is of course technically right, but he runs the risk of forgetting to form a clear understanding of why we've always done a particular thing a certain way before he cavalierly jettisons it in favor of what occurs to him to be a better way to do it.

The philosophical question, then, becomes would we, or I, like to lose what I consider to be Mac's imperfections.  The problem is that Mac, like everyone else in the world, is a package deal.  No one can lose part of Mac's style without losing other parts of Mac's style.  So, if we asked the question in another way, and imagined losing some of the best of Mac along with what I consider to be his imperfections, then the answer is a deafening NO!  I'll take Mac just the way he is.  As we all very resoundingly agreed to do last November, and as we all always should.