Ana Bailao needs either a new lawyer or an image consultant. At the very least, she could do with a trusted ally who’d speak truth to imprudence.

That would automatically rule out the gaggle of Toronto City Council colleagues who, deplorably, buttressed the shaken rookie pol at her non mea culpa news conference Wednesday.

She spoke but said nothing of significance or reassurance about getting busted on a drunk driving charge in the wee hours of Tuesday morning.

Wouldn’t say how much alcohol she’d imbibed in the previous hours.

MORE:MADD Canada condemns councillors’ public support for Ana Bailao

Wouldn’t say where she’d been after leaving the Mayor’s Ball for the Arts earlier Monday evening.

Wouldn’t say what she was thinking, getting behind the wheel of a car, allegedly guzzled and blowing over the limit after consenting to a breathalyzer.

Did not, as far as I can tell — and contrary to what Councillor Doug Ford claimed in comments to reporters afterwards — “apologize’’ for the incident during her brief remarks.

Rather, Bailao ducked behind the barricade of due judicial process, maintaining that she was following her lawyer’s advice in not shedding any further light on a matter that’s now before the courts. “There is a process to be followed and out of respect for that process, my lawyer has advised me not to comment.’’

This is a common cop-out when individuals are charged, whatever the purported offence, and has no basis in legal reality. There is nothing to prevent an accused from speaking about an incident. It’s a transparent gimmick to quash scandal.

Instead, Bailao made matters worse with her patronizing statement about co-operating fully with the police investigation, as if she should get bonus points for it. “I intend to plead not guilty. I assure you that I am taking these charges very seriously and I will continue to co-operate with the legal process.’’

She’s pleading not guilty but didn’t explicitly deny a thing.

That might fly, in the abeyance, for most folks. Bailao, however, is an elected official, a position of trust. And that appeared to be uppermost on her mind, putting the emphasis not on what she’s accused of doing but how she will rise above it all to soldier valiantly on.

“I want to be absolutely clear, these charges will in no way affect my ability to do the job I was elected to do.’’

Really? At the moment, Bailao’s judgment has been seriously impugned.

“A bad night,’’ Councillor Ford characterized whatever preceded Bailao drifting into the crosshairs of a cop just before 2 a.m., when pulled over at Harbord and Bathurst Sts. A “mistake’’ chimed in various council buddies, from left and right, who aligned themselves in a phalanx of support.

I understand standing by a friend in trouble. But this show of solidarity was ill-advised and so clearly a stage-managed exercise.

In pre-emptively rationalizing Bailao’s behavior — offering all the nicely-nicely assertions of good character, which is of utterly no consequence — they’ve tacitly excused the alleged conduct. Cut the lady some slack, was the refrain.

Little wonder MADD is furious. The organization has spent years trying to change attitudes toward impaired driving, stressing it’s not merely a mistake with too-often ghastly consequences — drunk driving the leading criminal cause of death in Canada — but a conscious choice made that could so easily be averted, the wreckage to lives avoided.

If soused, Bailao could have killed somebody, maybe your kid or spouse. She could have killed herself. Imagine the tears then, as opposed to the emotional tremblies at her news conference.

I’ve no way of knowing if Bailao has a drinking problem. This may have been a one-off occurrence, resulting from an over-refreshed social evening, politicians frequently attending events where the booze flows freely. As such, it should be a cautionary tale.

Unless Bailao truly believes she can beat this charge — acquittal is always a far different thing from innocence — she should have taken the morally admirable road.

Former B.C. premier Gordon Campbell has shown how that’s done. After he was charged with impaired driving during a 2003 vacation in Hawaii, Campbell stood before the cameras and sucked it up, professing regret and shame. He pleaded no-contest and observed: “The most important thing for everyone is simply not to drink and drive. I think that’s the major lesson in this for everyone.’’

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The public is remarkably forgiving. Mayor Rob Ford himself pleaded no-contest to drunk driving in Florida in 1999. The fallout didn’t hurt him any.

When that story broke, I don’t recall council colleagues rushing to give Ford a consoling arm-around.

Rosie DiManno usually appears Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday.

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