Today’s news, that Neuman Development is pulling out of the Geneseo Gateway project, was a surprise to many people, but not to me. Bill Lofquist and I have been saying for years that the whole concept of the PDD law was a poor fit for this project. I’m glad that Neuman finally realized that we were right, but I do wonder why it took them so long.
After all, as anybody who has been paying attention around here could have told them, I am almost never wrong about things like this! I know that sounds conceited, but as Dizzy Dean said, “It ain’t bragging if you can do it!”
Typical people (as Barack would say) might think it would be a great boon to be right about everything, but I can tell you from bitter personal experience that it is really a great disadvantage. People generally don’t appreciate you for being right, instead they resent you and are always looking for ways to trip you up and prove you wrong. This can be a big pain, (and not very helpful in politics) as eventually people come to doubt almost everything you say.
Not that I’m expecting any sympathy for my plight. I know that’s not in the cards. Over the years, I’ve come to accept that being consistently right is just my cross to bear.
If I could figure out a way to be wrong more often, I would, but I’ve tried it, and somehow I always end up being right despite myself. For example back in the old Blarion days I used to write the most outlandish stories that I thought could not possibly come true. Guess what?
In this way I predicted that the Red Wings would consider coming to Avon for their Field of Dreams about six months before it actually happened and I predicted the collapse of the old Retsof Salt Mine. O.K. Maybe I was off a little on the location and the reason for the collapse, but the fact is I predicted it about a year before it happened. You could look it up!
It got so bad that I actually became afraid to make predictions because they had such an uncanny way of coming true. It seems that, in my case at least, fact follows fiction. In the present case, however, I have no qualms about this year’s Blarion coming true. In fact, I hope it does, and the sooner the better!
The end result is going to be the same anyway. Either Newman can pull out now and save themselves a lot of time and trouble, or they can wait for a court to confirm that their project and their procedures are all goofed up. Either way their project is dead in the water. And about that, I know I’m right, although I don’t expect anybody to believe me! Happy April Fools!
The Clarion Call 