I was driving in my car last night and an advertisement came on the radio supporting Michael Mulcahy’s campaign for mayor. It wasn’t his platform that struck me but his opening statement that he is “not a politician.” Has politics gone so wrong that someone who is running for public office would state such a claim? Isn’t it a little like interviewing doctors to help with what ails you and one doctor saying, “And best of all, I am not even a doctor!”
How has it become a positive campaign strategy for a candidate wanting to hold the highest political office in town to claim not to be a politician? Would we be better off with someone who has no knowledge of the inner workings of City Hall, how things get done, and the process by which boards and subcommittees meet and resolutions are achieved? Does anyone need to know all that to be an effective mayor? Or does the mayor get to rely on people who know about the minutia of politics while worrying about the vision and not getting bogged down with details?
Maybe someone new to politics might not be as vulnerable to lobbyists, payoffs, and under-the-table deals because they don’t know how politics works—not yet at least. But, as has been proven in the past, there is always time to learn how to be a crooked politician.
I am still not sold on the fact that just anyone can step right into the job of mayor from the private sector. But maybe you just need to be smart and driven and everything else can take care of itself.
I agree you Single Gal in many ways. A polititian is an elected policy maker. Only a ruling body can make policy. Politics as a profession has taken on a less than savory reputation. A good polititian is a good policy maker. Usually someone with good leadership skills. When money and favors get involved then the bad reputation of “politics” gets earned. Someone who can effectively be the council chairman and represent the city well is desireable as Mayor. A good, effective Mayor will have a vision about the city and goals and ambitions to improve the city.
I can think of several Mayors who I would judge good and effective. They have been so well thought of that we have parks, and an airport and convention center named after them.
Gal, I think this is a case of everybody knowing it but Mike.
If you’re running for office, you’re a politician, plain & simple.
He may not be a political insider, but since he’s declared his candidacy he’s also declared that he’s a politician. Let’s hope he turns out to be a lousy one. That will work in his favor.
I don’t think he’s a bad guy for saying he’s not a politician. We all know what he means by that. I can’t blame him for wanting to distance himself from vote whores like Cindy as well as the rest of the pathetic lot on the 18th floor.
First of all “A lot”, you are a pot calling the kettle black. Don’t bitch about anonymous postings and then do one yourself.
And to answer the original question, many people equate politician=corrupt which is understandable given our current mayor [and a county board of supes about to stick us with another .50 on the sales tax]. Therefore it is understandable for an outsider candidate to market himself in this way. Think about it-would you rather have Cindy Gonzales as your next mayor?
How is Michael Mulcalhy
“Methinks the man doth protest too much,”
By the way, for those self-rightious folks who hold truth is such high regard, this is a lie by Mr. Mulcalhy.
Time to call for an investigation. If he is willing to lie about this—he must be willing to lie about everything!
How can we ever trust him again?
etc. etc. etc. with tongue firmly implanted in cheek.
If he’s not a politician now if elected he will, by definition, become one.
I hope Mulcahy has better issues on which to base his candidacy.
To single girl,
You so dim-witted it’s pathetic! Don’t you understand what he’s trying to say!
Just because I mow my lawn on the weekends. Does that make me a Gardner?
Now please try to understand my point, I have the confidence to do it and the wisdom not to call myself a Gardner! Do you understand that? Certain people have the fortitude to do whatever they choose in this life and not to be labeled to that certain thing they are performing.
There are probably 12 candidates that are running for Mayor of San Jose, but the newspapers only want you to believe that there are 6. Hasn’t anybody figured this out yet?
If you don’t already understand how this works please don’t blog on here anymore with your stupid columns. Madison came from the private sector now she’s doing public sector work for us, I don’t consider her a politician, but a citizen with a big heart that wants to change what’s bad in city hall and help out the community where she lives.
Anybody with commonsense can do whatever they want to, once they put their Heart, Mind and Soul into it.
Sorry, if I called you dim-witted, but it just bugs me that people judge people for what they do for a living, and not for who they are as well as what they can do!
Ever heard of a ordinary guy walking down the street sees a house burning then goes inside of it! And then saves somebody’s life, it’s time to let someone else be the hero (an ordinary guy) he’s the one that will save this city! Not stand by and watch it burn down!
I pray that we as a city do not put in an incumbent as Mayor, WE ARE 76 MILLION DOLLARS IN THE HOLE AND ITS GETTING BIGGER, AND THIS LAWSUIT OF 40 MILLION DOLLARS BY THE COUNTY AGAINST THE CITY WILL PUT US OVER THE 100 MILLION DOLLARS MARK!
I rather vote for a person that fill’s holes for a living, then to vote for a person that makes them! Do you get my point? I’m not voting for Michael Mulcalhy.
I’m voting for the underdog of the group, (the pothole filler).
Thanks
GM
Where’s the Beefy” reforms that all the reform Mayor candidates have promised us but NO ONE has delivered ?
Where are the candidates on other important issues like
– massive downtown, infill and new Coyote Valley / Evergreen development
– charging developers at least Santa Clara County average development and impact fees NOT San Jose’s lower fees
– having adequate city services like code enforcement and not shutting community centers and parks
– following city charter and have strong independent City Manager without politician interference
96 days and counting to the election to convince us that your reforms are worth voting for YOU –
So Far politics as usual NOT reform
Single Gal;
A long Blog ago you pleaded with the readers and bloggers of San Jose Inside to find San Jose a Gavin Nuesome of our very own. Well you best think before you ask. Micheal Mulcahy is it! He and his well connected family of San Jose have been behind positive and exciting projects for San Jose for a long time. His involvement alone with the San Jose Childrens Musical Theatre deserves great respect. Some one who has had incredible advantages in life and chose to do something good with it for others, not like so many of our local young up and coming leaders who come from generations of San Jose past leaders who only think for themselves and how San Jose could benefit them…Micheal Mulcahy and his family are well respected in this community and he deserves a chance to change the disaster and embarassment all San Joseans face. Raised in this community for 33 years I do recall this same family you try to put down also was the same family who supported a certain past Mayor. Funny! spoken like a true politician YOU FORGET THE PAST TOO QUICKLY BEFORE DOING ANY RESEARCHING BEFORE OPENING YOUR MOUTH, SINGLE GAL……….
San Jose City Government Song Book
San Jose Voter
Hey GM,
You are a Garndner. You may be an amatuer gardner, a part-time gardner, an infrequent garnder, a bad gardner, an inexperienced gardner, an uninformed gardner,—you may even be a dim-witted gardner—but you are still a gardner.
Being neither a gardener nor a politician, by definition, makes you a dim-wit. You have to earn it.
Rich
GM – I have to give you credit for passion. Love the personal attacks too. Why don’t you just state your opinion on the topic? I think that is what Single Gal was asking. (BTW, give Madison some more time in office before you use her as an example. I hope she does great.)
Single Gal – I think you got more comments on your Los Gatos outings than discussing the role of one’s political background. The irony.
I am looking foward to learning more about the candidates. The idea that our next mayor wouldn’t make back door deals is attractive (but realistic?).
My concern is efficiency and effectiveness. If a mayor is going to play by the rules, they must have the ability to maneuver through the bureaucracy. It’s not easy. Does a candidate who has experience in politics have an advantage? SG, are you hinting at the “Pandori Factor”?
Rich (#12) – Well put!
CH – You refer to Mr. Mulcahy’s family 4 times in #10. In his initial announcement Mulcahy also made point of mentioning his prominent family. I would hope that as a candidate he, and his supporters, could offer more than familial connections.
A platform of: “I’m related to the DiNapolis, but I’m not a politician” probably won’t carry him too far. Voters are looking for a bit more substance this time around.
SG – Congratulations on an interesting and provocative piece this week.
Personally, I can’t fault a candidate for making the claim of not being a politician. The context in which the claim is made is everything, and our local political context more than justifies Mr. Mulcahy’s decision to emphasize his outsider status. Right now, anyone holding office has the challenge of removing the stink of the Gonzales administration from his/her political wardrobe—a stink not found on newcomers like Mulcahy (or political veterans who’ve had their wardrobe in storage, like David Pandori). That said, Mr. Mulcahy’s claim should be viewed not as a qualification for the position, but as the absence of what potentially might be a disqualification. For instance, of the mayoral candidates currently holding office, I have already ruled out one, and am holding my nose while assessing two others. However, I hold no such prejudice towards those candidates not now in office. When examining them I assume good intentions and pristine freshness, and if other voters feel the same way, then that’s a real advantage—one each of those wannabe mayors would be wise to exploit.
One thing is certain though, the outsider status of Mr. Mulcahy and the others will be cease to be important should one of them be found to be devoid of real qualifications…
or have a stink of his very own.
CH—We have our own Gavin Newsom? That’s a good one. You seem to have left out a major difference between Newsom and Mahoney, Mulrooney, whatever. Newson had government experience as an elected official.
You make your choice—I’ll make mine and it won’t be for the inexperienced guy whose major campaign issue so far is who his family is.
Single Gal,
I am not saying that you have no right to speak your mind on local politics—you certainly do.
However, your comments would likely be a lot more credible if you signed your name to your postings.
As it stands, you have as much credibility as the anonymous posters, like me, who frequent this blog.
So Mulcahy is a politician and a lobbyist.
How delightful for his opponents. Without having to address any substance they can simply use these descriptive words to describe his unfitness for public office.
Who would ever want a knowledgeable advocate to be their Mayor?
#10 Ouch! I didn’t think that single gal was attacking mulcahy & warranted that response but now that you are on the subject…you say that he was “involved” with the children’s theater – what exactly did he do there? And I don’t mean what was his title.
I am all for an “outsider” to go in and clean up city hall but you need someone who knows the system a bit. Our “outsider” needs to be someone not influenced by labor interests.
Excerpt from Michael Mulcahy at Dec. 13, 2005 City Council meeting, item 6.2 – on restricting trucks over 6 tons on small residential streets in Spartan Keys residential neighborhood:
“My family’s been a jobs creator and property developer in central San Jose since the 30s. We own over 2 million square feet of real estate – Senter Rd., Monterey, Alma and Tully to the north and south. We’ve toed the line with the Council’s desire to maintain the industrial zoned land in District 7, and this council has studied and moved to secure the future of industrial land in central San Jose, however, you continue to chip away at it’s ability to compete and survive, and tonight’s proposal is no exception.
…we do concede this will pass this evening, but we did not want to let this opportunity to go by without telling you a few of the challenges that we have in our ability to do business in District 7 in that particular area.
Yes this has been an open process. We have been involved since the beginning, working with current businesses and stakeholders. But we’re concerned mostly about the future. It’s difficult enough to market in this particular area, we have a 200,000 square foot building that’s coming online as available land, one of three of it’s type of buildings in the Santa Clara County, and we are competing with areas outside of this area. When businesses leave this area, they leave San Jose, and that’s an economic issue for the City as a whole….
So I urge you – unfortunately I just saw Vice Mayor Chavez memo just a few minutes ago, and there are some good measures in there to look at from a 30,000 foot view, but if you do intend to preserve that industrial base, we urge you to do more.”
Sounds like business as usual to me…
I don’t see how the following can be considered legitimate reasons not to vote for Mulcahy:
No prior political experience
Coming from a successful family
Involvment in development
Political experience: would you not want John Chambers or Peter Ueberroth to be SJ’s mayor, if they were so inclined. Politician’s want to be politicians, climbing to higher office and making as much money as possible. Mulchay wants to step in and apply his abilities to help the city he loves.
Family: Mulcahy being from the DiNapoli family is a plus. This is a family with history in SJ, love for SJ, and with a huge stake in SJ. They’re going to make money regardless of who is mayor. They aren’t trying to slip Mulcahy into office so they can get some projects approved; they’ve done just fine working with the city to this point. They do know the city inside and out, and they have the influence and motivation to make positive things happen. There’s no comparison of Mulcahy to the other candidates in conncetion/influence. For expample (not that pro baseball is our most imporatant issue), who do you think has A’s owner Lou Wolfe’s ear?
He’s a developer: So what? Development is no easy profession. You have to take and manage risk while running a multi-facted operation. If you think Mulcahy is trying to become mayor to help his or his family’s development efforts, you are mistaken. If anything, he’ll be forced to go overboard not to give any appearance of impropriety. I’ll take a successful businessperson over a career politician anyday.
And last, please don’t question Mulcahy’s experience with the CMT. He ran that organization for quite a while, increasing fundraising, managing expenses, growing participation and providing a great service to the community. The CMT is no little playhouse, it’s a good sized operation that puts on impressive performances. Talk to any kids or parents that were involved while he was running the show. They’ll tell you about his abilities and his passion to serve.
Obviously it’s just an opinion, but Mulchay is exactly what San Jose needs right now. He is an outsider with the ability to run the city and make positive changes. If the inside candidates could do that, they would have shown us that while in their current positions.