Hmm … not bad. Now for a few questions.

The general idea was to reconfigure New Albany's city council, and so it has been done. Where the reconfiguration goes from here is anyone’s guess, although at this moment I’m optimistic.

Moreover, the relatively simple notion here at NAC was that it might be helpful for there to be a bloc of five, six or maybe even seven council persons capable of rational deliberation and critical thought, and while there isn’t any such thing as perfection in any aspect of life on Earth, the goal of civic progress just might be better served overall by eliminating the insanely dysfunctional paradigm whereby “4 + 4 + poor unfortunate Donnie Blevins = irrational gridlock.”

Could be; we’ll see. I haven't been this encouraged in a while, but as Groucho Marx once observed, “it’s early yet.”

My morning’s (thankfully, not “mourning’s”) post-election scorecard shows Caesar, McLaughlin, Gahan, Messer, Gonder, Zurschmiede at least capable of supporting progress at any given time, while the shrunken heads over at the cinder block and tar paper headquarters of the Coffey/Price duodumbvirate remains consistently in favor of anti-intellectual societal regress. This countdown leaves one council person as an unknown quantity: Newcomer Diane McCartin-Benedetti, who defeated Dick Bliss in the 5th.

Among the questions to be asked:

Is the walking, breathing political contagion known as Dan Coffey now sufficiently quarantined?

Where will the incoming 5th district representative come down on the persistent issue of progress vs. regress?

How much damage can the bile-infused current council do in its remaining 2007 meetings?

Meanwhile, two alleged political swan songs turned out to be horribly discordant, though perfectly in keeping with the ineffectual careers that preceded them. Lame duck councilman Bill Schmidt (D, bizarrely) actively campaigned for eventual election winner Bob Caesar’s Republican opponent. Outgoing council president Larry Kochert (D, seldom) played precisely the same disloyal hand on behalf of the Republican challenger in his own 4th district, and for good measure, the 6th district’s Republican candidate, too. Tellingly, both of the GOP candidates were handily defeated (by Democrats Pat McLaughlin and Jeff Gahan, respectively).

That’s a sad preponderance of chicanery on the part of two Gang of Four stalwarts, both mercifully departing the council, but given that their tactics were entirely unsuccessful, it’s also an obvious and massive repudiation. The question being asked today is:

Was it enough of a repudiation to drive the political equivalent of a wooden stake through their reactionary hearts?

While we’re on the topic of pre-election chicanery, there was plenty more of it surging through the veins of the Main Street corridor’s forever Machiavellian opinion shifters, who navigate ever-shifting labyrinths murky enough to make Afghanistan’s feuding warlords appear as cribbage-playing tea sippers by comparison.

We’ll probably never understand the weekend’s fervent behind-the-scenes activities, with newspaper and blog attacks being launched, rebutted, refashioned and hurled again; with strange meetings between even stranger bedfellows; and amid a generally incomprehensible series of couplings, decouplings and recouplings. Given the dimensions of the scrum, the question that comes to my mind is this:

How is it possible that a 3rd district business owner -- mind you, not just one, but any business owner – support an incumbent (Steve Price) who has voted again and again against the sort of progress that enhances the value of one’s business investment?

Furthermore, as an observer whose Main Street lineup card currently carries enough white-out to coat the exterior of the City-County Building, another question to be asked is this:

Will there ever come a time when these people can row in the same direction for the good of the entire city?

And, while we’re at it …

How exactly can mayor-elect Doug England please the senior editor and Price at the same time?

My conclusion: New Albany’s political landscape has indeed shifted, but it’s too early to predict the extent.

Join us next time for another episode of “Connor’s Place Putsch.”