Well, here we go ...

A number of city progressives are rallying behind the mayor. Their mistake is thinking the issue is about sex. It isn't (unless the teenager was underage -- and if the mayor lied about one thing, why not about another?). It's about lying, telling your partner to lie in your behalf, telling your colleagues a lie and the public a lie, all because you are going to run for mayor. And then owning up only when a newspaper is about to break a story with the truth. This was the guy scheduled to keynote to students on "Ethics and Social Responsibility" this Friday! I mean, I'm a progressive, too, but you can't let ideology blind you to what happened, especially in an Obama-age when a new more responsible politics is trying to be born. The bottom line is, Sam Adams no longer can be trusted about anything. It's really great he has progressive ideas. It's really cool Portland can elect an openly gay mayor. It's too bad he betrayed the public trust. It's a tragedy of sorts, in fact. But his sex life has nothing to do with it -- unless, of course, it turns out he is a predator. It's about how you use power and the public trust.

And his being gay has nothing to do with it, except that unfortunately he's now become a poster boy for the right wing. If a heterosexual mayor in his 40s seduced a teenage girl in government, I think the outrage would be considerable. So here.

But if the progressive ideologues have their way, this will stretch out, and then it may really get ugly if it energizes the other side, etc etc etc ... it will polarize the city. If Sam Adams has an ounce of sense left, he'll resign -- and soon. But I'm not taking any bets.

Dispatch from "the city that works."