Summary: KPSI radio bloviator Steve Kelly tried to carry water today for his friend, embattled Cathedral City Mayor Kathleen Joan DeRosa. In a column appearing in today’s Desert Sun headlined “proper role of elected officials”, Kelly criticized the council majority that voted to adopt Cathedral City’s pro-marriage equality resolution. Decrying what he perceives to be some kind of politically-motivated effort to “alienate the community” from a mayor to whom he is a willing sycophant, Kelly tries very hard to defend DeRosa’s cynical attempt to have it both ways on marriage equality, though DeRosa’s personal opposition to it is a matter of common public knowledge. Though Kelly claims to support marriage equality himself, his ill- considered column demonstrates that he is emphatically unworthy of being numbered among the straight allies of the queer nation.
By: Paul S. Marchand
In a “think piece” in this morning’s Desert Sun, headlined “proper role of elected officials” KPSI radio talking head Steve Kelly tried his level best to carry water for embattled Cathedral City Mayor Kathleen Joan DeRosa.
In his eight paragraph effort, Kelly takes a pro forma swipe at Riverside County Sheriff Stan Sniff, criticizing him for making comments about gun safety legislation to which Mr. Kelly took exception.
The remaining six paragraphs of Mr. Kelly’s finger wagging, tut-tutting piece constituted a dyspeptic, offensively arrogant attack upon the members of the Cathedral City city Council who had had the effrontery, in Kelly’s view, to “punch above their weight” by adopting a resolution in favor of marriage equality. Interestingly, Kelly claims to support marriage equality, but finds it terrible, just terrible that Cathedral City should have gone on record in support of marriage equality, over the blatantly equivocating objections of his good friend Kathleen Joan DeRosa.
Kelly, of course, has a well-deserved reputation for being a reliable water-carrier and a willing sycophant for DeRosa. His column this morning and did nothing to dispel that reputation, as he attacked the council majority of Greg Pettis, Chuck Vasquez, and Sam Toles for having impliedly conspired to “alienate” DeRosa from “the community.”
Really, who does Kelly think he is kidding?
“Alienate the community?” As if DeRosa were Evita Peron on the balcony of the Casa Rosada acknowledging the plaudits of her vast following of delirious supporters. Steve, get real; pay attention to the signs of the times around you; DeRosa has already well and truly alienated herself from a substantial portion of the community. This is Cathedral City in 2013, not Buenos Aires in 1949. The issue is marriage equality, not some tawdry column intended to bolster DeRosa’s risible efforts to fabricate some kind of cult of personality.
Of course, Cathedral City is not the only Coachella Valley city to have adopted a resolution supporting marriage equality. Palm Springs has already done so. And when it did so, what did we hear from Steve Kelly?
Crickets.
That’s right, as long as Kelly’s precious Mayor was not implicated, as long as she didn’t make a bloody fool of herself with almost unbelievably cynical equivocation and tergiversation, Steve Kelly apparently didn’t care; his pecksniffian objections only emerged when his good buddy DeRosa was implicated.
Of course, Kelly comes a little late to the rodeo. The better part of a month has passed since the resolution was adopted, and DeRosa came in for a well-deserved raft of criticism, not only in this blog, but in social media and in print in a “Thumbs Down” editorial in the Desert Sun. So, the mouth that roared has managed to do nothing but call down upon himself much the same kind of criticism that DeRosa earned with her own behavior.
My critique of the poor performance of both the mayor and her council protégé, former police chief Stanley Henry (who, rather than doing the job to which the constituency elected him chose to attend, as it were, the secret policeman’s ball in Palm Springs that evening) is well-known. Readers are free to go back to my earlier posts on this blog to refresh themselves of the outlines of my strong critique of Kathleen DeRosa. I don’t need to keep whipping that horse.
But when a man such as Kelly who is paid to bloviate in true Limbaughan fashion feels it necessary to impute crass political motives to Mr. Toles, and to lecture Mr. Toles and his colleagues in the unbelievably condescending tone he chose to employ, we may not only question his motives, but we may also reject his professions of support for marriage equality.
In his column, Kelly condescendingly advises the council majority to “look where [their] feet are.” Kelly should take his own advice and look where his feet are before he inserts one of them into his mouth, masticates the foot in question down to the bone and then shoots himself in it, as he did in this morning’s effort.
With friends like Steve Kelly, who the hell needs enemies?
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PAUL S. MARCHAND is an attorney who lives and practices in Cathedral City, California, where he served eight years on the city Council. He is familiar with Steve Kelley’s reputation as a vocal supporter of Cathedral City’s reigning Mayor. The views contained herein are not intended to be, and should not be construed as, legal advice.
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