Crap Talk host Bill Rowe took exception on Thursday to this initiative by St. John's council at-large candidate Simon Lono.
In the interests of full disclosure, Lono is an old buddy of mine and I am working with him on the campaign.
That said, Rowe seemed to find Lono's release today of a basic code of ethical conduct for city councillors to be something that was irksome, troublesome or maybe even obnoxious.
If the whole thing is a statement of the obvious, as Rowe suggested, then Rowe shouldn't have any trouble with it and councillors should be willing to sign on.
Rowe argued at one point that politics is about differences of opinion and conflict. There's a penetrating insight into the obvious, Bill, bye. The question for St. John's residents for as long as I can remember has been how to have the sort of disputes and differences of opinion that are bound to happen without them degenerating into a name calling contest.
In any other place, people would be mortified at having the mayor and a councillor labeling each other as "morons" in a public council meeting and then taking each other to court. That battle was at public expense, if I recall correctly. Even if the two paid out of their own pockets, just the notion that these guys wound up doing everything but sticking out their tongues at each other defies understanding.
Maybe Bill recalls his time when he was a member of the provincial legislature. Back in those days, members sometimes took to fistfights in the precincts of the legislature to settle personal scraps.
Truthfully, I find it really hard to figure out Rowe's line of reasoning.
The sarcastic s.o.b in me wonders if maybe Rowe is afraid that his show will become a place to discuss public issues based on facts.
Maybe Rowe perturbed by the prospect Lono's proposal will resonate so strongly with voters that they'll want to call about ethics rather than clog up the lines moaning about the fortunes of some guy from the province competing in a national televised star search.
Maybe Rowe's annoyed because discussion of Lono's proposal won't let him refer to Newfoundland and Labrador as "a pimple on the arse" of some other place, to use Rowe's phrase.
Maybe things will become a bit clearer later on Friday when Lono calls Rowe's show.
In the meantime, flip over to Lono's site and see what he has been talking about.
