Political Uses of the Fait Accompli

"Fait accompli" means a act already done.  

Parents, some of them, know the value of the fait accompli.   Removing a band-aide is accomplished with the least fuss and anticipation of pain if the parent just grabs one end and pulls it off fast, maybe while talking about something else.

Tooth pulling is the same.  grab a loose tooth telling the child that the parent wants to see how loose it is, then a sudden yank, and the deed is done with a minimum of tears and worry. 

Or getting into a fight.   Some people have to work themselves up to a fight, make faces, yell, pound the chest preparatory to the actual fisticuffs itself.   While with others you find yourself lying on the ground, blood pouring from nose and mouth, and then you realize you had just been in a fight and lost before you knew it had begun. 

For some years now, there has been a mastermind in city government who understands voter resistance and the fait accompli.   I say "a mastermind."  It may be a cadre, the last two city managers,  some higher-up in city administration, and/or Mayor Martin.

If we can't precisely identify who the mastermind is, we can see their handy work.    Normally, things do not move at light-speed at the city.  But sometimes they do, and those are the instances I'm talking about.

If the city moves slowly when they do something that offends a block of voters, voter resistance can build, grow and organize.   The city doesn't have that problem with a fait accompli:  what's done is done, and once a thing is crushed into ravel and sand there is no puttng it back and less weeping and gnashing of teeth. 

Some instances I've identified;  the footprints of the mastermind--

Item:   The razing of the little park at 9th & K. 

Item:   The demolition of South Beach on Crickets Ave..

Item:   Destruction of the civic center fountain and park.

Item:   Demolition and filling in of the old Lubbock swimming center at Mackenzie Park.

Item:   Undermining of resistance to the abandonment of the city health department via the bootstrapping I wrote about in my previous blog.