Tim Keller's vile attempt to deceive us

What would you tell your kid if he came home from school with all Ds on his report card and when you questioned him about it, his response was, “You should be happy with me because my classmate, Jimmy, got all Fs.” Would you be happy? Well, you aren’t little Jimmy’s parent so you could care less about the grades Jimmy received and so you yell at your kid and tell him he needs to get his butt in gear, study and work harder and get better grades, or else.

That's the way the real, normal and responsible world works. If you fail you acknowledge it and work harder to fix the problem and to get better. You don't try to hide and explain away your miserable performance by saying someone is worse at it than you. Because saying that someone is worse than you at something is really low and sick, and it shows defeatism, a willingness to accept failure and a totally reprehensible attempt to deceive oneself and everyone else. In short, it's ugly debasement.

Well, guess what, Albuquerque. Your mayor, Tim Keller, is that sick little kid who is getting Ds when it comes to fighting crime and who is trying to deceive you, his bosses, by saying that his failure is OK because other cities are doing worse than Albuquerque. Yes, welcome to the crime-fighting world of little Timmy Keller, who is failing miserably at his job. This is exactly what Failing Timmy did this week to cloak the fact that Albuquerque is just as crime-ridden under his leadership as it was under R.J. Berry.

Albuquerque has already had our fourth homicide since the start of 2021! At this rate we will eclipse the record high homicide rates of the last three years of Mayor Tim Keller’s administration.

So how does smiling Tim Keller respond to the tsunami that is the Albuquerque crime wave?

In 2019 Keller told Albuquerque residents that crime was going down, and he produced stats to support his statement. The crime stats were subsequently found to be a lie—fake, false and simply not true. Keller later apologized for the “mistake,” and soon enough real crime stats confirmed what everyone living in Albuquerque knew: crime here is really bad.

In 2020 Keller praised APD Chief Mike Geier for doing a great job (state of the city address) only to get rid of Geier months later. In what could only be described as cowardly behavior, Keller didn’t act like a strong mayor by calling Geier into his office and telling him he was done. Instead, Keller had Geier meet him, incognito, at a park on the Labor Day Holiday weekend. As Geier described it Keller was in disguise when he sat down with Geier on a park bench and asked him to resign. Weird. And cowardly.

How did this Forrest Gump, err Tim Keller park bench meeting turnout? Scandalous and embarrassing for all of Albuquerque. It’s worse than a soap opera, with Geier accusing Keller and Interim Chief Medina of plotting against him. In response Keller and Medina now say Geier was the worse chief ever (weird how Keller praised Geier just months earlier). While Keller was diverted into this stupid tit-for-tat with Geier, Albuquerque crime continued to grow unabated.

The year 2020 got worse for Keller and his police department as Attorney General Hector Balderas and State Auditor Brian Colón announced investigations and audits into APD overtime and spending. Balderas got involved when Colón requested that his office investigate potential criminal activity related to APD overtime. Once again, Albuquerque's crime wave took a back seat to a profoundly serious issue within APD.

Again, I ask where was Tim Keller? APD overtime issues were well reported by ABQReport and other media outlets for years, so why didn’t Keller address them when the Albuquerque Police Oversight Board investigated and recommended termination for one of the officers involved? (A recommendation ignored by Keller and Geier.) Just where is Tim Keller when it comes to doing something about crime in our city?

As Albuquerque is reporting its fourth murder since the start of 2021, Keller and APD come to the citizens with one of the worse PR spins I have ever seen. Instead of focusing on Albuquerque and fixing our crime epidemic, Keller holds a press conference where he tells Albuquerque citizens that it’s worse in other cities. You heard me right. Keller is so lost when it comes to fighting crime in Albuquerque that he wants us to divert our attention to other crime-ridden cities.

Keller is telling us that the next time you get robbed at gunpoint, know that in Baltimore you could have gotten shot. Oh boy, that certainly will make everyone feel better. I can see it now, Keller and Medina will begin ordering APD officers to tell every crime victim that they should stop complaining because they could live in Detroit where crime is so much worse.

APD dispatcher: “911 what’s your emergency?”

Caller: “Help! I have been robbed!”

APD dispatcher: “Sir, do you know how lucky you are to live in Tim Keller's Albuquerque? In Memphis you would probably have gotten shot. Thank God for Tim Keller.”

Caller: “You are right, it would be worse if I lived in Memphis. Thank God I live in Albuquerque where I am warmed and comforted by Tim Keller’s smile. I am sorry to take your time. Disregard”

Note to Mayor Keller: You are the mayor of Albuquerque and it’s pretty clear you have no idea what you are doing when it comes to stopping the crime crisis and managing APD. Stop feeding us citizens with PR bullcrap about how it’s worse in other places or that you have a 20th crime initiative that looks like the 1st failed crime initiative. Victims of crime in Albuquerque don’t care about other cities and their problems; we only care about Albuquerque. I wish Keller would care more about Albuquerque than he cares about re-election and his PR spin.

Tim Keller you need to know you are the mayor of Albuquerque, and citizens here don’t give two-shits about Baltimore or any other city. We care about the job you're doing, and right now your failing. Timmy, you're coming home with Fs on your report card. And when you try to explain away your failures by saying that other cities are more dangerous we see it for what it really is: a pathetic attempt to hide your incompetence and an attempt to debase this entire community.

So Timmy, stop the PR crap and just do your job of making us safe. If you can’t do this, then we'll have to find a mayor who can do the job better than you.

And Timmy, stop your pathetic and sickening game of trying to hide your incompetence and to deceive us. It's vile.