Erica C. Barnett wrote:

After four years crafting Nickels’ agenda, [Casey Corr] needs to distance himself from the mayor if he wants voters to take him seriously.

Why? You’re much more in tune to council races and the council-mayor dynamic than I am, and I’d love to get your take on why Corr has to run away from the mayor to have a shot at winning a council seat. A relationship to Nickelseither because you worked for the guy or share a lot of his viewsseems largely irrelevant to me.

Mayor Nickels is pretty damn popular at the moment, and his agenda, for the most part, is admirable. (24/7 city? Cool. Mass transit? Check. Density downtown? Right on.) Moreover, no one has the balls to run against himthat’s surely a sign that Nickels is onto something, right? It seems a hell of a lot smarter to align yourself with him, than flip-flop and flounder to manufacture distance from the executive.

Sure, the council is ideally supposed to function as a check on the mayor, so it’d be nice if the members had their own brains. But that doesn’t seem to be the ultimate message Corr’s striving for. He’s just coming across looking like an idiot.

Enlighten me, please.