Let’s stop pretending, shall we?

Ever since a federal judge released a ruling last month that said Metro Atlanta will have to stop withdrawing water from Lake Lanier, Gov. Sonny Perdue has gotten an incredibly easy ride in the media. Reporters solemnly transcribe Perdue’s comments about his intentions to “fight on” in a court appeal while at the same time “meeting” with Georgia’s congressmen to plan “strategy” and drawing up a list of dates on which he will be more than delighted to sit down with Govs. Bob Riley and Charlie Crist to work out a gentleman’s agreement on this water situation.

It’s time that somebody said it: the emperor has no clothes.

To be even more blunt: Georgia got its ass handed to it in Judge Paul Magnuson’s Lake Lanier ruling. Perdue has little or no leverage to use in negotiating anything with Riley and Crist. Perdue is the guy who’s holding a pair of deuces and trying to bluff two people who are holding royal flushes — when the other two players are fully aware that Perdue only has a pair of deuces.

And why does anyone think Congress is going to be able to work this out? We’ve got a congressional delegation dominated by the minority party in a legislative body that hasn’t been able to pass healthcare reform legislation for the past 15 years. They’re going to fix this in less than three years?

Let’s all stop pretending that Perdue is some kind of omnipotent politician who really wants to work out a magical solution to all of this in his remaining 16 months in office. He doesn’t. His public comments and actions instead suggest that he’s more interested in kicking this can down the road and leaving the mess to whoever succeeds him as governor.

The one media outlet that seems to understand this is the Anniston Star in our neighboring state to the west. Here’s how the Star editorialized Monday about Perdue’s positioning in the water wars:

The fly in the ointment is Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue, but who can blame him? After enjoying years of economic growth as good, if not better, than its neighbors, the Peach State is mired in a recession as bad, if not worse, than the states around it. Public school teachers are being furloughed, public workers are being laid off, colleges and universities are facing deep cuts and now Perdue seems to be losing the water war.

Not that everyone in Georgia is upset. Downriver, the Columbus Ledger-Enquirer reminded the governor that south Georgia also was concerned “over how much water chronically overdeveloped metro Atlanta should be entitled to take from the Chattahoochee before the rest of that water gets to anybody else.”

But “chronically overdeveloped metro Atlanta” is where power resides, and if Perdue fails those folks, that will be his legacy. He does not want that to happen. So the betting is that the governors will meet, Perdue will play hardball, no agreement will be reached and this mess will be passed on to his successor to clean up.

Candidates seeking to replace Perdue are not particularly happy about this, but what can they do?

It has long been noted that the water war will not end until all sides have an incentive to end it. Right now, Gov. Sonny Perdue has none.

That’s the most accurate assessment I’ve seen anywhere.