It is one of those purposeless performances, an exercise in democracy where the people elected have no real power beyond the ability to inflate themselves into grand poo-bahs of uselessness. Most of the population, of course, wised up to the pointlessness some while ago but the political classes and their media pals will treat it as if what happens on the first Thursday in May is of any significance to the public. What once involved the choosing of men and women to make real decisions about their town or rural area is now little more than a national test of political virility. And not a very good one.