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The Maybe Mayor
By Dan P. Lee
He offered another non-answer: "I'm gonna sit down with" — that's wit', of course — "my family and some people over the holiday, and if I feel that I can better serve the people of Philadelphia" — blah blah blah.
His waffling seemed difficult to believe, given the events of late: his reported forcing out (read: screwing over) of his best friend, Jon Saidel, from the Democratic mayoral primary race this May, presumably to clear the way for his sizable self; a highly publicized fund-raiser the night before that raked in over half a mil; a staff clearly coalescing.
A minute later, though, an attractive young Hispanic woman with two children in tow suddenly approached our table.
"Congressman? Bob?" she called out politely. "Congressman Bob? How are you?"
Brady's eyes lit up, and he began not so much standing as pulling his body up from the vinyl seat he was sticking to. "Hey honey, how you doin'? Hey, how you been, babe?"
He put his huge arms around her, kissing her on the cheek. "I hope the rumors are true," said the woman (who Brady later told me is a missionary from the neighborhood, and whose check he naturally picked up). "We need you," she said, "we need you."
Brady merely laughed. The woman persisted. "Are they true? Are they true?"
Brady lowered his voice, apparently thinking — wrongly — that he was far enough from my ears and my tape recorder. "Yeah," he said, "we're gonna do this."
And so there I had it, the first semi-public moment of Bob Brady's Yes I'm In!, though as I continued interviewing him, he maintained the charade of To Run Or Not To Run. The problem was — and he seemed unaware of this — playing Hamlet for so long hadn't just exposed his doubts and how he, at the least, had seriously complicated Saidel's mayoral bid. It has ramped up more important questions: Just what kind of mayor would Bob Brady be? He has the gift of down-home appeal, of connections here, in Harrisburg, in Washington. But can such a reluctant candidate be a good mayor? And with all this indecision, does he have a plan?
His waffling seemed difficult to believe, given the events of late: his reported forcing out (read: screwing over) of his best friend, Jon Saidel, from the Democratic mayoral primary race this May, presumably to clear the way for his sizable self; a highly publicized fund-raiser the night before that raked in over half a mil; a staff clearly coalescing.
A minute later, though, an attractive young Hispanic woman with two children in tow suddenly approached our table.
"Congressman? Bob?" she called out politely. "Congressman Bob? How are you?"
Brady's eyes lit up, and he began not so much standing as pulling his body up from the vinyl seat he was sticking to. "Hey honey, how you doin'? Hey, how you been, babe?"
He put his huge arms around her, kissing her on the cheek. "I hope the rumors are true," said the woman (who Brady later told me is a missionary from the neighborhood, and whose check he naturally picked up). "We need you," she said, "we need you."
Brady merely laughed. The woman persisted. "Are they true? Are they true?"
Brady lowered his voice, apparently thinking — wrongly — that he was far enough from my ears and my tape recorder. "Yeah," he said, "we're gonna do this."
And so there I had it, the first semi-public moment of Bob Brady's Yes I'm In!, though as I continued interviewing him, he maintained the charade of To Run Or Not To Run. The problem was — and he seemed unaware of this — playing Hamlet for so long hadn't just exposed his doubts and how he, at the least, had seriously complicated Saidel's mayoral bid. It has ramped up more important questions: Just what kind of mayor would Bob Brady be? He has the gift of down-home appeal, of connections here, in Harrisburg, in Washington. But can such a reluctant candidate be a good mayor? And with all this indecision, does he have a plan?
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