Antonio Villaraigosa- Moving On

"I said no questions, lady"

Yesterday, LA Mayor, Antonio Villaraigosa appeared at the Port of Los Angeles in San Pedro as part of his great pothole tour, this time to announce that the Target chain was implementing the use of 100 new cargo trucks using cleaner burning natural gas. (Really! I'm not making this up, folks.) Unfortunately, as usual, the assembled reporters had no interest in this topic and again peppered His Honor with questions about his paramour, Telemundo reporter, Mirthala Salinas. The timing was exquisite since Telemundo had just announced a 2-month suspension of Salinas, coupled with the transfers and suspensions of three of Salinas' supervisors (who had known about the affair).

As is his wont, Villaraigosa evaded any questions about Salinas, trying to bring the subject back to the clean air trucks that interested nobody. During his tap dance, Villraigosa repeatedly reminded the press that "it was time to move on", a favorite line of the Democrats during the Clinton-Lewinsky affair.

Finally, as Villaraigosa retreated to his car, covered by a phalanx of Port Authority Police, reporters tried to follow the mayor to continue their questions. As police blocked their route, one reporter, Alicia Unger of Azteca America, tried to slip between a couple of cargo containers to avoid the security and get closer to the mayor. At this point, she was slammed into a cargo container by a burly plain-clothes Port Authority sergeant in sun glasses named Kevin
Mc Closkey. (Talk about a name right out of central casting. Say, wasn't he the same New York PD cop who roughed up Al Pacino in Godfather I?) Anyway, as they say in Spinland, Villaraigosa succeeded in "moving on" right back to the temporary safety of City Hall.

Meanwhile, what will eventually happen to Salinas' career is anyone's guess now that Telemundo has concluded that serious professional guidelines were violated by her and her bosses. Much like Clinton, however, Villaraigosa skates merrily along, from pothole to clean-air trucks, while those he comes in contact with go down life's toilet.