Amen

K-Mack: "people who try too hard or politicians that desperately strive to make Houston "world class" are just plain tiresome."

The full story is here, under the headline, Houstonians can do without self-promotion .

We must give serious credit to Kristen Mack for breaking the Chronicle party line by intimating what so many of us have always thought: that Houston already is a world-class city, and that people with grand schemes to make it so are merely masturbating at the public trough.

Additional credit is due for citing Joel Kotkin, who uses concrete research to understand why people are drawn to great cities and what makes Houston great. We lately noticed a candidate for city council discussing on his website how Houston could be great. Memo to Zaf Tahir: Houston is great. Maybe you didn't notice while you were living in Fort Bend County, but this is a pretty big city with a pretty dynamic economy.

As long as Bill White doesn't run off business growth with ridiculous fees and snow-jobbing the crime problem, Houston will continue to be a great city. Enough with the cheap slogans and feel-good nonsense; let's recognize our strengths and focus on the fundamental qualities that drive development.

Besides which, we all know that chicks dig cities that are hard to get. Quit trying so hard, Houston.