It seems that the first six months of 2009 have not been kind to New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin.

First, he goes on a “goodwill” trip to China and is quarantined in his hotel room due to fear from Chinese officials that he had contracted the swine flu from a fellow passenger on the flight to Shanghai. They kept him confined to his hotel for a few days before they discovered that the only thing about this passenger that was even remorely related to swine flu was the fact that he was an Arkansas Razorbacks fan.

Back home, hizzhoner got some flack from constituents who complained about the trip being financed by the taxpayers. Nagin tried to address these comments in a guest apparance at a meeting of the city’s Gravity Drainage Board. (Since water does not drain by gravity in New Orleans, the meeting had a pretty light agenda, so they decided to give the mayor some time to speak.) In his comments, he maintained that the trip was totally financed by private interests. The bill the city received for an expensive dinner at a Shanghai restaurant he attributed to “identity theft”. Nagin was very thankful to the board for letting him appear, and he promised in return to push a bill through the city council requiring that all water in within the city limits flow uphill.

More recent antics involving the mayor may suggest that he had indeed contractred the swine flu during his boondoggle- that is, if amnesia is one of the symptoms.

It seems like Mayor Nagin can’t seem to remember what he did with all of his e-mail from the time he took office in 2002 through the first half of last year. Initially, he tried to claim that it all was washed away during Hurricane Katrina, but, alas, that would only explain the files up through 2005. So now he just says that he misplaced it. The city then hired a top notch firm that specializes in locating missing electronic data. The consultants looked high and low, but to no avail. Even a search of William Jefferson’s freezer came up empty. Nagin prompthy fired the consultants for incompetence.

Many now accuse Nagin of deliberitely deleting the e-mails to cover up possible evidence of malfeasence. Others are ticked off imagining the thousands of great jokes that made it to his inbox that are now, sadly, lost for eternity. Say what you will about this guy, he’s got to have a great sense of humor.