'Damage control'

Dan Laidman, the Copley News reporter at L.A. City Hall, throws another entry on Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa's pile of undesirable press clippings in today's San Diego Union-Tribune:

When Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa donned a yellow vest and pushed around an asphalt patching machine in front of a bank of cameras last week, he was aiming to repair more than a damaged street.

Suddenly beleaguered after nearly two years of glowing treatment from the public and the press, Villaraigosa angled his “Operation Pothole” news conference as a vehicle to hoist his administration out of a political pit of policy setbacks and a salacious personal scandal....

At the midpoint of Villaraigosa's four-year term in office, some political observers are increasingly skeptical about the mayor's focus. They question whether Villaraigosa spread himself too thin with a slew of ambitious promises, and suggest his relentless pursuit of publicity has masked a lack of progress.

In the story, longtime Democratic strategist Darry Sragow predicts this too will blow over for Villaraigosa. "He's a tremendously capable, endlessly energetic person," Sragow said. "One thing I'm quite confident of is that he'll persevere."