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The Gettysburg Address,
Nov. 19, 1863
Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth, upon this continent, a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that “all men are created equal.”
Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived, and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of it, as a final resting place for those who died here, that the nation might live. This we may, in all propriety do. But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate — we can not consecrate — we can not hallow, this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have hallowed it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here; while it can never forget what they did here.
It is rather for us, the living, we here be dedicated to the great task remaining before us — that, from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they here, gave the last full measure of devotion — that we here highly resolve these dead shall not have died in vain; that the nation, shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people by the people for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
It may be little noted nor long remembered, in Culver City and elsewhere on the Westside, that President Lincoln traveled 90 miles to Gettysburg, Pa., a crucial battlefield in the Civil War, to appear as a secondary speaker 145 years ago this afternoon at the dedication of the Soldiers National Cemetery.
Hopefully all five members of the City Council — one, in particular — will absorb not only the hallowed meaning of these golden words but the sheer brevity of one of the great speeches in the history of the world.
In this latter day when even elected officers in small towns carefully pack up their fragile egos and hand-carry them into Monday night City Council meetings, Mr. Lincoln tucked his ego into a suitcase and left it there.
The greatest President in American history was assigned to the undercard.
Edward Everett, the Barack Obama of his day on a speakers’ rostrum — although a much more accomplished academician and politician than the President-elect — was invited to deliver the main address. Daring the crowd to move, I suppose, Mr. Everett spoke for a whopping 2 1/2 hours.
Mr. Lincoln’s ghost should nightly haunt the windiest of bags on the City Council.
He magnificently engraved his singular thoughts on the beating heart of history by speaking merely 244 words.
He needed just 2 1/2 minutes. Go ahead. Read his speech and time yourself.
At last Monday’s City Council meeting, Vice Mayor Gary Silbiger, just in his opening monologue, commanded the floor for 30 minutes, and I guarantee you not one schoolboy in the next 145 years will be called upon to recite his pointedly unmemorable address.
Mr. Silbiger is, by far, the grossest offender of the rule of brevity on this City Council. No one ever has referred to him either as “Barack,” “Hussein” or “Obama.” Not even as “Edward Everett,” whom schoolboys are taught was the greatest orator of his generation, the 1840s, 1850s and 1860s.
The Silbiger File
Since last April, we have been noting that the long-shunned Vice Mayor has felt suddenly emboldened, revived, reborn, because two fairly reliable allies were just elected to the Council, Chris Armenta and Mehaul O’Leary.
Now he can have his way, for the first time, whenever he wants, and no one, least of all the Mayor, can stop him. The cow may not have jumped over the moon. But guess who is going to try.
Because of quirky professional conduct that borders on the outrageous his performances nearly every Monday night require strong criticism.
Mr. Silbiger’s underappreciated ego is out of control as he drives this Council like a team of underworked, overfed horses.
Mr. Silbiger appears to seek to replace democracy in Council Chambers with thugocracy, and guess who is riding the lead steed?
Until recently, Mr. Silbiger was the, shall we say, unusual uncle, different from everyone else in the family, no matter how unique you think your relatives are.
Odd, said some, but probably pure of motivation in his fulsome heart.
A harmless departure from the norm, a description that also characterizes a certain former Mrs. Noonan, who, thank both heaven and Murgatroyd, never was elected to public office.
However, the last two Monday nights, Mr. Silbiger has turned up the heat in his relentless campaign to crudely widen his influence. He has played cheerleading drum major to two well organized mobs of partisans, whom I would hold reasonably blameless for the Vice Mayor’s two disgusting performances.
Guilty or Innocent?
If rabid believers in a project find an influential politician who will carry their mail, pile on, guys, and away we shall fly. (Put aside, for now, the staccato outbreaks of loutish behavior from the mobs in each instance.)
Mr. Silbiger’s oxymoronic behavior has dominated the last two Council meetings the same way an elephant monopolizes a telephone booth.
If you do not look carefully, he appears to be the quintessential politician, oozing passion and rock-solid commitment to your cause. You presume that if you peeked into his non-Council lifestyle, you would find him tirelessly doubled over erudite volumes of law and policy, deep into the night, heroically researching subjects vital to him and to select interests in this community.
If he even faintly cracks the thick file Council members receive the week before the meeting, I would be shocked.
He must have mistaken gravitas for a gravel pit.
Every Monday’s performance bespeaks a stunning lack of preparation, a lack of general awareness, a lack of even pedestrian insight and a resounding lack of concern for anyone else in Chambers, except for the claque following him.
