Whether by intent or simply failing to think things through, the Tulsa City Council in its war of words with Tulsa Mayor Dewey Bartlett has managed to paint itself into a corner.

First, the City Council spends $6,000 to fund an investigation into allegations that the Mayor and his Chief of Staff Terry Simonson lied to the Council.

Next, the Council receives the report from its paid investigator and announces that it will turn the report over to the City Attorney’s office to determine if misdemeanor charges are justified against Bartlett, Simonson or both.

In spite of announcing it intended to turn its report over to the City Attorney’s office for possible prosecution, the Council decides instead to ask the City Attorney to recuse the office from deciding on whether charges are justified against the Mayor and his Chief of Staff.

It turns out that the office of the City Attorney and therefore the city prosecutor is under the control of the office of the Mayor and evidently the Councilors did not place a lot of faith in such a scenario.

Last week, eight of Tulsa’s nine councilors urged City Attorney Deirdre Dexter to withdraw her office from reviewing the case and sure enough she granted their request.

With Dexter’s bowing out of the case, the Tulsa City Council is left with no one to decide if charges are justified, let alone to prosecute any charges if such were deemed justifiable.

Now, Tulsa’s City Council is going to hold a special meeting at which it will try to determine whether it has the legal authority to appoint an outside prosecutor, a scenario not addressed in the city’s charter.

Oh well, there are a couple of lessons to be learned from this fiasco.

Be careful of what you ask for and don’t paint yourself into a corner.

Read the latest on the fiasco at Council eyes outside prosecutor…