Democrat Holley ousted as Mayor

Portsmouth has kicked out Mayor James Holley again. Yes, this guy who favored a black hotel because they have a white hotel is gone. The guy who thinks city employees should handle his Playboy subscription and do his vanity shopping is finished.

I wonder if he knows it.

Voters tossed him with a 2-1 vote for recall. They fired him before in 1987, but hired him again nearly a decade later. Why these cities feed the egos of these lifetime Mayors I’ll never know. We shouldn’t be so surprised when they believe they actually are as indispensable as people tell them they are.

Tuesday showed they aren’t.

Like a broken clock that eventually shows the correct time, the Virginian-Pilot editorial board has long favored the resignation or ouster of their endorsed Mayor, James Holley. The Pilot is wrong in saying today that “there’s no cause for celebration this morning in Portsmouth.”

Are you kidding? Everytime these lifelong mayors in Hampton Roads gets shown the door is a time to cheer, shout and sing songs from Kool and the Gang and Steam. Cities locked in yesteryear with their engines permanently set on idle always need a reboot.

City Council will choose a new Mayor until an election can be held.

One thing is certain. Portsmouth will be no better off if they continue to let pettiness drive their politics. Issues are absent in their campaigns. I thought Norfolk had problems, but they are just more glaring. Portsmouth’s quadrennial races to the bottom are no less self-destructive.

Someone should run in November on a campaign of real reform to clean out the generations-old reputation of Portsmouth. There is no reason Portsmouth can be a safe, job-creating economic juggernaut.

Holley was just a more visible symbol of political decay. There’s some more change needed for Portsmouth to have any hope at all.

Let’s hope!

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About the author

Brian Kirwin

The right wants to jeer him. The left wants to censor him. Moderates usually want both. Brian Kirwin is a political consultant and public relations strategist in Virginia Beach with a lightning-rod flair. Brian also serves on the VB Arts & Humanities Commission and frequently appears on Hampton Roads theatrical stages, if only to prove that all actors aren’t liberals. Kirwin’s columns stir up debate and hit the political scene with no punches pulled.