THE BELL CURVE:

Bits and pieces, and ragged remnants of clips to clean out the idea folder and start a new year fresh:

In talking to Pilot reporter Joseph Serna about proposed cuts in the Costa Mesa Police Department to meet budget demands, Mayor Allan Mansoor said: “We’re facing some difficult times, and some difficult decisions have to be made…We need to be responsible and accountable.”

Indeed they do. And in that process, they have consistently overlooked an easy decision that could have saved both time and money — and the only price to be paid would have been a bruised ego for the mayor.

That would be the ridiculous pursuit of a criminal case against Benito Acosta for raising a fuss at a City Council meeting when the mayor refused to allow him his full speaking time.

The criminal charge was rejected by county prosecutors before the city took it on and had its knuckles rapped by a county court, then in county and state appellate courts.

Running this out against steadily increasing odds was not only irresponsible by the city and the law firm representing it but may very likely have caused irreparable damage to the city’s position in the counter lawsuit filed by Acosta charging that the city had denied his right to free speech.

If this should end in a judgment against the city, we can look back on a long string of irresponsibility that started with the manner in which the meeting was conducted and was fueled by the city’s determination to keep flogging a horse that was long since dead. It could prove to be an expensive effort to justify an ego.

Chuck Cassity has offered Pilot readers another model of determination.

His mission is to show up those of us guilty of “cacophonous caterwauling” in suggesting that the United States should get off its butt and join the majority of our scientists and the rest of the world in efforts to check global warming while we still can.

Since Cassity and I arguing the reality of global warming is rather like two Little Leaguers debating how to pitch to Manny Ramirez, I would like to skip that debate here and nominate him, instead, as a role model in a form of argument refined and made famous for the past eight years by the administration of George W. Bush. This system is called Selective Facts, and it goes like this:

First, you pick a position you devoutly hold and would like to convince others to hold as well. Like the futility of global warming. Or invading Iraq. Or the “cacophonous caterwauling” of Al Gore (a place I share with honor). Then you look for facts to support that position. They aren’t hard to find once you know what you‘re looking for. You could probably find some in the Bible. So could I.

Since your destination is not to weigh divergent opinions and their sources, you don’t have to bother with the other side. That’s where Cassity and Gore’s styles part company. Gore and I would freely admit there are legitimate arguments to be made by the other side. So we acknowledge the arguments of both sides and weigh the number and quality of the scientists holding them. Cassity saves a lot of time and effort by brushing off anything he doesn’t agree with as cacophonous and caterwauling, which makes considering them irrelevant. After all, he has the facts. The real facts, just like weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

To go from the ridiculous to the outrageous, I would like to make one last 2008 caterwauling protest against the price of popcorn in local Regal theaters.

At a time when the whole nation is moving into crisis mode, gasoline prices are on the skids, retailers are going into two-for-the-price-of-one, the price of popcorn is going steadily up.

For us old-timers, a “small” bag of popcorn will soon be as expensive as what we used to pay for a ticket to the movie. Admittedly, in some cases the quality of the popcorn is greater than the movie, but the principle is all out of whack.

So is labeling “small” a bushel of popcorn that would stultify a dinosaur. I believe that a legitimate business opportunity exists for the entrepreneur who would set up shop outside Regal theaters and offer a modest bag of popcorn at a fair price.

I would find it a satisfying tribute and a life well lived to be known as the man who brought back the small bag of popcorn. If that movement fails, I would urge you to pop it to size at home and bring it to the theater.

If there is any one New Year’s resolution that all of us in Newport-Mesa could agree on, it would be to keep front and center our determination to fight any expansion of John Wayne Airport that would increase the air traffic and noise level generated from there. We are told that the current construction at JWA is not an expansion but an effort to better accommodate growth to an agreed-on passenger cap.

If the addition of six new commercial passenger gates makes us dubious, we can hardly be blamed for keeping a close watch in the year ahead.

JOSEPH N. BELL lives in Newport Beach. His column runs Thursdays.