Mayor Luke explains himself and I (try to) explain his explanations

While David may be fine with letting Luke Ravenstahl explain himself, I have a few comments.

LUKE: No, in fact, I called myself and spoke with an individual from Oakmont, from the USGA early that morning and he said he would check into it and get back to me. And I never had the opportunity to speak with him, but we were never told, at all, that we were not welcome on the grounds.

So let me get this straight: the USGA tells Lil Luke that they'll get back to him and then he goes ahead and shows up anyway? He just assumes that they'll say yes? Unless they had screamed "NO, NO, NO" to him, he takes that as a yes?? (Note to self: Remember to personally tell Luke that he's not invited to any party I throw because if I don't, he'll feel perfectly OK with showing up.)

LUKE: And in fact when we got here, I was invited in and sat down, had lunch and was given a shirt was given a badge. And really, you know, welcomed by the people at Oakmont.

Here's a clue: Oakmont did not want to make a scene by throwing your ass out. Generally if someone is rude and pushy enough to crash a party, the host doesn't call the cops if the crasher is reasonably presentable.

LUKE: I was told that Tiger would not sign autographs. And [not to] approach him and I didn't, in fact. I was introduced to him by Mike Tirico who is an ESPN Anchor, who was on the course that day. And he suggested that I meet Tiger. Reluctantly at first, I said I didn't want to cause any trouble because he was golfing. And he insisted that Tiger would be OK with it, so he approached Tiger on my behalf to introduce me.

But you did approach him, Luke. First of all we doubt that you took great measures to explain to Tirico that the USGA/Oakmont had specifically told you not to approach Tiger. By your own admission, you only told Tirico that you didn't want to cause any problems because he was golfing -- not that you were told not to approach Tiger. So you got Tirico to bother Tiger on your behalf and then YOU APPROACHED HIM (Tiger).

FRED: I guess the question is, why didn't you tell this to Jon when Jon asked for a comment?

LUKE: He didn't. In fact he was – I mean to think that this was April 23rd, what's the date today? June 10th, 11th or 12th . I'm losing track of my dates but we're looking at almost two months. And was never asked a question about it, was never approached on it. He called yesterday afternoon. I was unavailable. He didn't-

FRED: We know. We know you were unavailable (ha-ha!).

LUKE: Yea, exactly right and I apologize for that. But he didn't identify – apparently he was going to do a story on the billboards and how we're promoting the city etc for the US Open and never - until almost four-thirty yesterday called and asked my spokesperson about the Tiger Woods day. And obviously you know an hour and a half before the story aired.

So you now admit that Jon Delano did contact your office on this story. So why did you claim that he didn't this morning on WDVE? Do you not communicate with your communications people or did you, as is your pattern, lie?

FRED: I mean the interesting thing was your office issued a statement yesterday saying, look it's always been your life long dream, you being the Mayor, to meet Tiger Woods and people ought to be satisfied that you had the persistence to do it.

LUKE: Well again, I think my staff was just responding to the question that was asked and quite honestly they were caught off guard by the question.

Might they have been caught of guard because you fired your top communications/PR guy without having someone ready to take his place? Ya think that might have been part of the problem?

LUKE: And you know Fred, I think you know me pretty well. I'm not a pushy guy.

Oh, right. God knows that you don't have any history of crashing private parties.

LUKE: I mean I was certainly told that it was an American Express party and it was for their patrons and not to approach Tiger and not to ask him for an autograph and not to impose myself on the party and I didn't do that. So that was all. That was all that was suggested.

Yes, Luke. You knew it was a private party and you were told at the very least to wait until they called you back, but you didn't and went anyway and you DID approach Tiger. You didn't tell Tirico "No" because you didn't want to admit that you were specifically ordered not to "approach" Tiger. Here's the dictionary definition of "approach" since you seem not to understand the word:

To come near or nearer, as in space or time: Spring approaches.
Sports.
To make an approach, as in golf.v.tr.
To come or go near or nearer to: approached the tunnel.
To come close to, as in appearance, quality, or condition; approximate: The performance approaches perfection.
To make a proposal or overtures to with a specific end in view.

By your own admission, you first "approached" Tirico and then you "approached" Tiger after Tirico offered to introduce you to him.

LUKE: That's how it all transpired and you know again I wish I had the opportunity to tell the story before Jon told his version of it.

Oh for f*ck's sake, Luke. Again, by your own admission (finally) Delano contacted your office prior to airing the report. This is the exact same excuse you used with the NYC incident. It wasn't your fault that the reporters didn't ask you the right questions -- you said then what a shame it was that they didn't give you the opportunity to explain yourself.

It's the same damn pattern every time:

Lil Luke does something wrong/stupid. Then he lies about it/tries to cover it up. Then he blames the media, or the blogs or calls it "political."

LUKE: But hey, that's the nature of what we do in politics and [unintelligible]

If you ask me, the entire damn interview was unintelligible.

NOTE: I started this post hours ago and AOL freezed up on me and I lost it. In the meantime, I see that The Burgher has had some of the same thoughts here as well as links to non Pittsburgh blogs who have picked up the story on our Frat Boy of a Mayor.