Stop worrying about whether Paris Hilton got off easy. Stop worrying about whether Scooter Libby got what he deserved. You don’t have to leave Philadelphia for a better example of how there is one set of justice for the power brokers and another for the rest of us. Just look at Eli Karetny and Michael Asbell. The owner and operator of a nightclub got house arrest last week for the deaths of the three women who drowned after Pier 34 collapsed. You want more reason to be outraged? Prior to the sentencing, Mayor John Street wrote a letter on behalf of one of the defendants in a quest for a lighter sentence. The judge, Sheila Woods-Skipper, said sentencing Karetny and Asbell to prison wouldn’t bring the victims back. That’s true, but did the judge have to urinate on their graves? …
In South Carolina, where nine firefighters gave their lives, the Charleston mayor asked, "Why do they rush into intensely burning buildings? Why? To defeat their only enemies: fire." I think he should have asked a different question, "Why are firefighters forced to enter a vacant burning building?" There were no lives at stake, just a lot of combustible sofas and mattresses. Why do we tolerate the loss of life to save property? …
The wire services reported the Vietnamese president refused to yield to pressure from the White House to improve his country’s record on human rights. Exactly what credentials does Mr. Bush, who condones the use of waterboarding and the elimination of the right of habeas corpus, have when it comes to telling other countries to improve their human rights? …
According to talk-show host Michael Smerconish (who claims he has kept a transcript of all of the debates to date), only one question has asked the candidates about trying to capture Osama bin Laden in Pakistan — and it was by an audience member. This is not only an indictment of the shallowness of the media conducting these debates, it also is an indication of the Bush administration, which cut a deal to outsource the search for the man who was responsible for killing 3,000 Americans on 9/11. While we are sidetracked in Iraq, bin Laden gets to see the sun rise every morning on another day of freedom …
We have reached that time of year of the annual SEPTA budget crisis. It is stupefying we have to depend on the political goodwill of the yokels in the rest of the state to fund our transportation system. It is even more incredible that, at a time when government should be encouraging people to leave their cars home and use public transportation, there is no sense of urgency. If we can’t pull it off this year with a sympathetic governor and a more friendly legislature, it’s never going to happen in our lifetime. A truly world-class city needs more than a new playpen for its big-league teams, it needs a top-rate public-transit system …
We are obsessed with wanting our leaders to be regular people. Now that Michael Nutter has all but been elected the next mayor, some are concerned he might not project the image of a guy with whom you might want to have a beer. Ever been in a bar? Would you want the guy next to you to be responsible for your fate for the next four years? WIP’s Glenn Macnow apparently had Nutter on his show to discuss his favorite sports movie. Fine, but irrelevant. Who cares if Michael Nutter knows a baseball from a football? I like the fact he’s a policy wonk and seems to know municipal government inside and out. I don’t need to share a beer with him anymore than I needed to hoist one with Richardson Dilworth or Joe Clark or Ed Rendell …
It turns out Pappy Bush was right all along. His son Jeb would have probably been the better president than poor, overmatched Dubya. But I really don’t care. I don’t want another Bush or Clinton in the White House for at least the next 50 years (sorry Hillary and even sorrier, Chelsea). Enough already. If ever a country needed a new start without the old baggage, it is us. When Jimmy Carter (a lousy president himself) called Bush the worst president ever, he was right — Tricky Dick included …
Prediction: In September, Gen. Petraeus will tell Congress the surge is showing signs of success. What we need, he will say, is more patience and time (and with it more casualties). This is not a knock on the general’s integrity. He will believe what he says, because he is the architect of this strategy. It’s not as if the short-term results will not show some improvement in one of the metrics he chooses to emphasize. Critics of the war who bought into this September pronouncement will realize they have been had yet again.
