L.A.'s part-time mayor tells Congress to get its act together - or else!

They must be quaking in the Republican cloakroom. Eric Cantor must be running short on Prilosec. From Villaraigosa's speech at today's Mobility 21 conference:

The President has delivered on his promise to end the war in Iraq. I urge him to make a new pledge. To take the money that was used to build democracy in Iraq and now use it to build the bridges, the schools, the rail lines we need here at home. The Congress has dithered enough over deficits and debts. Now it's time to secure the country's future. It's time to start building again.

[CUT]

We cannot make true progress unless we think - and act - big. I hear it every day. My fellow mayors across the country are hearing it. We cannot keep living on the investments our parents and grandparents made. If we want to get people working again... If we want to secure a better future for the next generation... We must reject the politics of cut and cap. And embrace the politics of CREATE and COLLABORATE.

You'd think that after six-some-odd years of a mostly failed mayoralty, the guy would be too embarrassed to spout off like this. But inflated egos know no bounds, I suppose. He does manage to highlight, quite inadvertently, one of his major faults as mayor: thinking too big. Villaraigosa has consistently insisted on going after the big score (subway, schools, pro football), rather than focus on incremental change that will be cheaper, more manageable, and, in most cases, actually realized in less than 20 years. But hey, that would only make L.A. a more livable place - not nearly sexy enough for the empty-suited mayor.