San Diego City Council candidate pleads no contest

Curiouser and curiouser. This is just too strange for me to keep my mouth shut any longer. What's up with John Hartley, the candidate for the San Diego City Council in District 4? Really now. I didn't say anything about his arrest last week for urinating in public and alledgedly masturbating in his car because it was so bizarre that I wanted to see what came out in the following days before making any judgement about his guilt or innocence.

For the first four days there was nothing. No spin. No denial. No admission. No statement.

Then today the urinating in public charge is dropped in a plea deal, and he pleads no contest to the charge of committing a lewd act in public.

Finally, he issues a statement this afternoon which reads in part:

I want to apologize to the voters of the 3rd District. I made a mistake. I accept full responsibility for my actions. And I promise not to let it happen again.

I also want to say that I harbor no hard feelings towards the police, who were doing their job, or towards the women who complained, who care about our neighborhoods, or towards the press, who have been working to inform the public.

Having said all of that, I do not intend to answer any questions about this today or in the future.

WTF?

Is it just me, or is that a bizarro response? Maybe I've just become conditioned to expect accused politicians to issue either a stunned and emphatic denial, or a tearful admission of guilt with the mandatory six weeks in rehab whether they need it or not. Most public figures wouldn't have the chutzpah to come right out and issue a statement saying they aren't going to talk about it. He says he made a "mistake" but that covers a lot of potential territory while still saying nothing. How very odd. His statement only makes me wonder all the more.

Maybe I don't really want to know.

It just doesn't seem politically smart to me to leave it to everyone's imagination. We have such dirty minds.