According to the Springfield News-Leader, on Tuesday, Judge John Holstein found that Councilwoman Kristi Fulnecky had not violated the law when she recorded a supposedly closed city council session back in November. The closed session was set up by five members of council to meet with their lawyer, Kevin O’Keefe, to discuss what actions, if any, could be taken against her for allegedly being ineligible to run for city council because of failure to pay business license fees.

Exonerated of any wrong-doing (as I suspected she would be) Fulnecky took to social media with her signature dish of graceless bravado seasoned with a dash of false-victimhood, writing that she is “[v]ery pleased with Judge Holstein’s ruling.” She continued:

“This all has been a gigantic waste of taxpayer dollars. The mayor and the Gang of Five will stop at nothing to destroy those that disagree with them. Their high-priced St Louis attorney still disagrees with Judge Holstein and the Attorney General’s opinions. The city’s attorney has been paid, we think, over $60,000 and the number is still rising. Time to get back to the city’s business and be done with this witch hunt. As an aside, five council members are up for reelection next year. The tradition of council not supporting the police and public safety ends with the election of April 2017.”

There are several points that need to be made here, and I will make them as succinctly as possible.

Fulnecky does not care about wasting taxpayer dollars. She only feigns interest when it suits her purposes. Back in September, when the city passed its more strident indecent exposure ordinance against the advice of City Attorney Dan Wichmer, Fulnecky dared Free the Nipple to sue them, saying, “the city gets sued all the time.” The lawsuit turned into a massive embarrassment for Springfield when the United States District Court for the Western District of Missouri issued an injunction against the ordinance. The ordinance has proved to be a giant waste of the city’s time, since they were bound to lose any lawsuit from the start, and has undoubtedly cost the city thousands of dollars.

More recently, Fulnecky was the only member of city council that voted against Springfield’s unconstitutional panhandling ordinance. The ACLU filed suit against the city back in December, citing first amendment violations. Fulnecky told the News-Leader that she wanted the city to continue fighting for the existence of its panhandling ordinance, saying, “The Supreme Court didn’t issue an opinion on this. I think you’d have a strong case going through the circuit and going to the Supreme Court, asking them to hear your case.”

That’s right, Kristi Fulnecky wants to take a dispute over a local panhandling ordinance all the way to the Supreme Court of the United States. How much taxpayer money would such an absurd and unnecessary pursuit cost the people of Springfield? And all in the name of winning. So I reiterate: Kristi Fulnecky does not care about wasting taxpayer dollars. She cares about winning, no matter the cost, regardless of right or wrong.

 

Fulnecky’s behavior shows a complete lack of self-awareness. Though she is undoubtedly pleased with Holstein’s ruling, Fulnecky is completely ignoring the fact that the Judge said her behavior was “disrespectful.” However, Fulnecky doesn’t care about disrespecting anyone, so long as the outcome favors her. More to the point, she never actually learns from her mistakes or the critiques of others. She is a self-absorbed narcissist who isn’t even aware that her posturing looks ridiculous. She is like a side-show version of Benito Mussolini, completely absorbed by her Machiavellian pursuit of power.

 

Part of Fulnecky’s 2017 campaign strategy is to play the victim. This may or may not be deliberate (it is), but it is certainly true. When it comes to the hearings against her, Fulnecky accuses the council of a witch hunt that is being pursued for no good reason at all. She even invents a catchy name for her tormentors: “the Gang of Five”, chosen, one assumes, because Axis of Evil was already taken.

When she announced that she would be running for mayor, Fulnecky tried to play the victim card to drum up sympathy. In that speech, now on her website, she said, “I might not be a part of the establishment—I’m conservative, not politically correct, female, an Indian minority, and a mom.” Actually, Fulnecky is exactly the establishment: a wealthy, white (she is one quarter Comanche), conservative business owner. But none of that matters if she can trot out as many “victim” tropes as possible. It doesn’t matter if it’s true, so long as it gets votes.

 

Kristi Fulnecky does not care about the police and fire departments. You might be asking yourself, “what does supporting the police and fire departments have to do with Fulnecky’s exoneration?” Good question. If you are rational person, the answer is clearly, “nothing.” But if you are an irrational, cheap sloganeer like Kristi Fulnecky, it means everything.

“Support our Police” is the local equivalent of “Support our Troops” and like “Support our Troops” it means absolutely nothing. It’s a vapid political statement designed to elicit applause from an unthinking audience. To my knowledge, Fulnecky has never put forward an actual plan to support the police, though perhaps she will build and pension fund and make Mexico pay for it.

So why bring it up?

Bringing up the police and fire departments is, much like everything else in Fulnecky’s public life, a thinly veiled political tactic. She only wants to smear the names of her colleagues while making herself out to be like Jesus – both savior and victim. She does not care about the police or fire departments beyond their usefulness to her own aspirations, which is why she uses them to take cheap shots at her rivals at every conceivable opportunity in order to score a few political points. Fulnecky is using the police and fire departments to win an election, ethical and moral considerations be damned.

And on that note, I believe we have come full circle.

 

Image: Fulnecky for Springfield / Facebook