Discounted Democracy

"It's just more gamesmanship," Cronk snorted, "and Arnel definitely knows how to play the game to win. We're dealing with big, rich professionals here—and they didn't get that way by throwing in the towel every time they were asked to respect the will of the people."

Would Arnel actually do such a thing?

"We don't have any comment," executive vice president Rudy Baldoni said tersely. "We don't want to talk at all about what we're doing. We're not going to tell you what we're going to do."

Well, how about this for a prediction:

Crest View wins the March 7 election in a landslide. Arnel refiles its suit. A judge overturns the vote on the basis of Crest View's apparent technical violation in signature gathering. Arnel settles out of court with the city, leaving Cronk and Crest View as the lone defendants in the suit. The bulldozers start their engines.

When Bauer was presented with this scenario, you could almost hear him wringing his hands. Almost. Perhaps he was washing them.

"They [Arnel] have got to do what they've got to do," he said. "This job is not always a lot of fun."