Moffitt slips up, tells truth

by John Boyle, Asheville Citizen-Times, August 17, 2013.

Why can’t politicians just own their gaffes?

In the latest round of “too absurd to believe” Tim Moffitt shenanigans, the state representative from Buncombe County claims he just badly delivered a “joke” about punishing Asheville with legislation.

The exchange with Asheville City Councilman Chris Pelly took place Aug. 5 at a gathering of local Realtors, including Pelly. The councilman asked a question about whether Asheville could join the Culture and Recreation Authority, which was set up allegedly to save Buncombe and Asheville money, some $2.5 million for Asheville in the first year alone.

“No, we took that away from you,” Moffitt said flatly. “First of all, you filed your lawsuit. ... We’re not going to let you file the lawsuit on this side and sue the state and charge your taxpayers money but at the same time be the benefactor of this because it’s going to cost people outside the city some of their hard-earned money. So until the lawsuit is settled, we took the authority away from the city.”

OK, that seems clear enough. Thank you for telling the truth, sir.

Right?

Oh no. Moffitt told us this week he was just joking, that Pelly knew the answer to the question beforehand so he responded with hijinks.

“In a deadpan manner I basically told him what he wanted to hear,” Moffitt said, adding that he won’t give up his career to be a comedian.

The matter is important because Moffitt, as well as fellow Republican state Rep. Nathan Ramsey, have vehemently denied bullying or punishing Asheville, which has sued the state after the Moffitt-engineered transfer of its water system to the Metropolitan Sewerage District. The city, naturally, is very upset with that arrangement, which offered no compensation to Asheville.

In fact, Moffitt chastised me in a phone call pretty vehemently for taking the city’s side on the issue in a column. I had suggested the parks authority maneuver, as well as talk of district elections for Asheville Council, clearly were designed as intimidation to dissuade Asheville from suing.

In the video, taken by local water activist Barry Summers, Moffitt is clearly not joking. He straightforwardly answered the question, and no one laughed, because, well, it clearly was not intended as a joke.

He continued in a serious tone about how the authority will work, then spoke about the Mountain Moral Monday gathering, suggesting it was union-organized and union-based.

It was a serious exchange, through and through. He delivered his “joke” with all the animation of Eeyore on Quaaludes. Moffitt’s Def Comedy Jam it was not.

Taking it to streets

I went out Friday and tried to deliver his statement as a joke, and as you can guess, it flopped worse than that lawyer’s knock-knock joke at the George Zimmerman trial. I even sought the assistance of a professional humor writer, Michele Scheve, but we couldn’t get anywhere with this material.

In short, we bombed.

Because it’s not a joke. Moffitt’s delivery was serious because it’s a serious issue and he gave a matter of fact reply.

And that’s great. That’s refreshing. That’s honest.

I like it when a politician just tells the truth, straight up, and treats constituents like grownups.

That’s what this looks like to me. Now that Moffitt realizes it looks bad, because maybe legislators shouldn’t bully, threaten and intentionally penalize cities financially, he’s backtracking.

What he should do is own the statement.

Why not just say, Hey, you’re going to sue the state and spend taxpayer money on legal fees, you’re going to be punished. That’s the way the world works.

I could respect that. But this twaddle about “I was joking?”

Come on, Tim. Man up and own the truth you spoke.