...And You Will See the Truth: Rollan Burris Part 2

Back on January 6th,I wrote that Rollan Burris was appointed by a corrupt and soon-to-be-impeached Governor to the US Senate. The outcry from some was that Burris shouldn't be tied to the action of the governor, and some extreme people went out to hint, if not cry out, racism by baring the only non-white Senator, despite his appointment being... well, sketchy.

In particular, I want to point out Keith Olbermann for his hypocrisy on the matter. No, I like Keith, I still watch his show, but I'm calling him out on this because if's irritating watching him flip-flop on this. Back in Januarary before getting appointed, Olbermann hinted at a "only black Senator" move and that he should be judged on his merit.

It just came out that Burris purgered himself by saying during his hearings that he never had contact with the Governor or anyone close to him... despite talking to his brother.

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This is the story from, of all places, Keith Olbermann. No longer trying to paint him as a good man, instead he's admitted that he is now on the way out and may have the shortest term of a Senator ever.

In turn, I want to simply say he should never have been appointed in the first place.

There's Money To Be Made in This Obama Thing!

This Obamania is getting out of hand.

The Gaza Ceasefire lost out in coverage over Obama riding a train. Let me repeat that: The Israel-Gaza ceasefire, a war that's gone on for nearly a month, happened and instead, 2 of the 3 24/7 news networks covered Obama riding a train.

I think I'm going to be sick.

A lot of things are going into this entire Inauguration: The end of the last 8 years of Bush tyranny and incompetence, the election of a non-Republican, the first black president... you have all three of these converging at a time when the country is experiencing fiscal unrest and an uncertain future in the world stage... and the presidential campaign slogan has become the theme of the same news networks who job it is to criticize and be objective of our leaders.

At the same time, anyone and everyone is trying to cash in on this Obamania fad as much as possible. T-shirts, posters, bobble heads, dolls, commematrive plates, collector coins, mugs, stickers, buttons, wristbands... LIPBALM!

Here's a list of the 35 Weirdest things... including a wine bottle.

I was standing around about 2 weeks ago in a subway station in Philly and some middle-aged woman was selling Obama posters, buttons, and other merch. I felt a need to say something:

"How great a time we live in when we can profit of the election of the first black president! Yes, in a time when our economic future looks bleak and we're not sure of what tomorrow will bring, thank god we live in a capitalistic society where we can make money of our president! And god bless it!"

The Story of Roland Burris: Or How To Make People Hate You

When Illinois Governor Rob Blagojevich was accused (and, basically, found out) to be selling Obama's Senate Seat, one thing was basically agreed: If he appointed anyone, they would be rejected. When I heard about it, I decided to put myself in the position of someone being asked to do it. "Larry, would you please replace President-Elect Obama as Illinois Senator?" "Sir, thank you very much for the offer, but I'm going to have to decline. I'm going to prepare a statement and release it stating that I am thankful for the seat, it's an honor, but I don't feel it's appropriate at this time to accept it."

So Roland Burris, what's your excuse?

Instead of doing the right and honorable thing, he has, instead, pushed himself into a media circus where he has become... well, I don't know. I guess an idiot. But who can entirely blame him? If you were offered a job as a US Senator, would you simply turn it down, especially if you knew it was yours, 100% legally, free-and-clear? The only catch... is that your appointed by a corrupt politican and may never get to serve because of it, especially if you don't try to distance yourself from it.

Here's a fact you may not know; if he doesn't get the job, there will be no black senators this time around. And, in turn... some people have dragged race into this. Great. Pointless racism. Just what we need with our first black President.

Long story short: He should have publicly turned it down. Said it was an honor to be asked, but he can't do it. Now? Now it's too late. And that's sad.

Councilman Wilson Goode, Keep Your Money!

This is relatively new and I just heard about it:

Philadelphia city coffers are $836 richer thanks to a check from Councilman W. Wilson Goode Jr.

The personal check, hand delivered Friday to City Controller Alan Butkovitz, comes ten days after Goode promised to reimburse the city for what he calls "mistakes" his controversial aide, Latrice Bryant, made on her timesheets this summer.

Source: Fox 29 News

Councilman Goode, do us a favor: Keep your money.

Your money means nothing to the hundreds of thousands of citizens who have witnessed the devastating toll you've taken upon our city government. You and your aid have made a mockery, dear sir, of what our city government is about. It is nothing short of terrible that you have not done the one deed, the one single action that would redeem you. The one thing that anyone looking at this situation, anyone who has the facts they have concerning you, your employee, and your relationship with said employee, that would redeem you and her actions.

Fire Latrice Bryant.

The fine you paid, this fine of $836, was supposed to be paid by YOUR STAFFER. Because she didn't, you did. The City Controller said, "This is a clear signal to all government workers that bad behavior won't be tolerated."It is, dear sir, anything BUT! Instead, you've given an example of what happens if you don't follow the rules and the laws. You've shown that if you don't follow the rules and do as your supposed to, your boss will pay to bail you out, especially if your sleeping with them.

You've shown the citizens of Philadelphia that the laws do not apply to the members of City Council or it's staff. You've shown that lying about when you work is fine unless your caught, you've shown that racism and slander and liable is fine and should not be fought against, you've shown that sleeping with your boss and having relations with them, even when your supposedly working, is fine. Wilson Goode, Jr, you've just shown that you believe City Council and it's staff is, in fact, ABOVE the law.

Keep your filthy, dirty, stinking, no-good money!

If you want to do some idiotic P.R. stunt to save yourself, if you want to try and make some idiotic and EMPTY gesture as to why the citizens of this city shouldn't storm your office and demand you leave... well, don't bother. The sooner you fire Latrice Bryant, the better. The sooner you simply admit that she was wrong for having those racist signs, the sooner you simply admit that, yes, THIS IS AN ISSUE.... the sooner you finally dismiss her, the better off the City of Philadelphia will be.

City Council and Mayor Nutter: SAY SOMETHING, YOU BASTARDS!

Mayor Nutter, you should be ashamed of yourself! For not saying ANYTHING, for not speaking out against this... this OBVIOUS corruption, you have instead simply resided yourself to letting this happen! By not doing anything you've become as much of a problem with this as if you had witnessed this yourself! Yes, I understand the need of keeping peace with the Council Members. Yes, I understand that speaking out of this may, in the future, make working with the City Council harder. And, yes, I understand that the current City Budget are a slightly bigger deal.

At the same time, Mayor Nutter, this scandal is just going to get worst by the day without you squashing this in the bud! The longer this goes on, the worst it looks upon yourself and your promise, dear sir, your PROMISE to end corruption in City Hall.

Councilman Goode, keep your god-damn money. We sure as hell don't want it.

How Philadelphia Can Save $90,000 a Year

With Philadelphia facing budget cuts that even Mayor Nutter says will be "tough", Philadelphians are wondering where, just where are we going to find the money? 

Stop looking, Philadelphia, I found a solution: Fire Latrice Bryant.

Do... do I need to explain this? On Septemeber 19th, Philadelphia found out that Councilman Goode's aide, Latrice Bryant, was accusing Fox 29 of racism. Then, on Septemeber 24th, we found out that Latrice Bryant and Councilman Goode had little sex-romps on Tax Payer time. 

On October 1st, Fox News revealed photos of Councilman Goode and Latrice Bryant is Jamica. 

Today, the City Controller agreed with Fox 29 and stated that she owed the city $836.35 for 19.45 hours of missed work. In the eyes of myself and, most likely most Philadelphians... that's not enough!

She needs to FIRED AND ARRESTED AND FORCED TO REPAY HER SALARY FOR 2008!

On what grounds? Easy:

1. Recieving raises based on a sexual relationship with her boss.

2. Breaking the Philadelphia City Charter for having signs promoting racial intimidation.

3. Failure to appropriately log in hours.

On those three alone anyone would be fired. Fucking our boss? Lying about when you work? Using racial intimidation? I doubt anyone would get to keep their job if corporate found out about any of them.

If your mad as hell about this, WRITE CITY COUNCIL:

1st FRANK DiCICCO Dicicco-1st-District@phila.gov
2nd ANNA C. VERNA verna-2nd-district@phila.gov
3rd JANNIE L. BLACKWELL blackwell-3rd-District@phila.gov
4th CAROL ANN CAMPBELL cambell-4th-district@phila.gov
5th DARRELL L. CLARKE Clarke-5th-district@phila.gov
6th JOAN L. KRAJEWSKI krajewski-6th-district@phila.gov
7th DANIEL J. SAVAGE savage-7th-district@phila.gov
8th DONNA REED MILLER miller-8th-district@phila.gov
9th MARIAN B. TASCO tasco-9th-district@phila.gov
10th BRIAN J. O'NEILL oneil-10th-district@phila.gov

Councilmembers-At-Large 
W. WILSON GOODE, JR. goode-at-large@phila.gov
WILLIAM K. GREENLEE greenlee-at-large@phila.gov
JACK KELLY Kelly-at-large@phila.gov
JAMES F. KENNEY Kenney-At-Large@phila.gov
JUAN RAMOS Ramos-at-large@phila.gov
BLONDELL REYNOLDS BROWN brown-at-large@phila.gov
FRANK RIZZO rizzo-at-large@phila.gov 

With Councilman Goode, Let's Tackle the REAL Issue Here!

Has anyone out there realize that the problem with Corrupt Councilman Goode ISN'T racism?

It's irritating seeing everyone who paid a little attention to this focus on the race factor. It's great that the entire "reverse racism" argument is being thrown out the window, awesome even, but it's only a SMALL part of the larger problem.

As was reported days ago, the guy fucked a staffer while having beer with her on City Time! COME ON! HE FUCKED HIS STAFFER! Isn't that more interesting than the stupid hand-scrawled signs? Isn't that the BIGGER issue? Or the fact that he's basically used $13,000 in raises for Latrice Bryant to keep his, ahem, "policies in line"? The guy is drinking on tax payer time, has a corrupt office, and instead of cries to fire him, what do we get?

"Well, he shouldn't use the race card and should fire her."

No. Not quite. Fire HIM at the same time. He needs to go! 

Councilman Goode, Lock Your Doors! The Citizens are PISSED!

Beer.

I've seen a lot of crap come from City Council members, I've seen them do a lot of shady crap. But this... wow, this takes the case.

As shown by Fox29 Investigators, Councilman Goode, on tax payer time, went home with his legislative aide, took her out to lunch and... brought back beer. It's obvious that Latrice Bryant, the aide in question, got more raises than one now last year. In fact, she got $13,000 in raises this year. Apparently... well, you get the idea.

I'm calling for Goode to be Impeached. Quickly. He needs to be tried and hung out to dry for this! This isn't lying about a blowjob, this isn't licking cream off the breast of a wife... this is freaking flat-out illegal! You have proof that Latrice Bryant only recieved raises, or at least in part, because of a relation she had with her boss. In 99% of America, that's illegal!

Goode, lock your doors. The citizens of Philly aren't fucking happy!

VIDEO OF THE REPORT

Sex, Race, and Politics: How Councilman Goode Just Woke Up Philadelphia

"Don't you ever disrespect a black woman that way!"

With those 8 words, Philadelphia City Councilman Wilson Goode, Jr, woke up the citizens of Philadelphia to everything that's wrong with their local government, myself included. With those 8 words, Councilman Goode alerted the public that City Council was back in session after taking their summer vacation. With those 8 words, Goode did something that needed to be done; He woke up the media.

Why did I pick those 8 words to start the story? Because they were given a much more harsh light because of what the aide held in her hands at the City Council meeting and, in turn, ignited the firestorm to begin with.

On a piece of paper, she scrawled the words "Jeff Cole: KKK".

There was so much intriguie as to why this happened that the reporter, Jeff Cole, became part of the story and a discussion, not about race, but about corruption in the halls of our government. In fact, the only people in this entire debate who have the aide and the Councilman himself.

For the past few weeks, Jeff Cole of Fox 29 has been following an aide of Philadelphia Councilman Wilson Goode. According to sources, the reporter found out that the aide, Latrice Bryant, was going to the gym on taxpayer time. The story would have been a standard story was it not for where it goes... She was found buying bear and going to the Councilman's house... and spending the night there. It's worth noting that we were, as you may have guessed, foot the bill for this as it was all done on taxpayer time.

When Councilman Goode was confronted with this information, he refused to answer his question. The local media, in a show of either unity or, even better, force against a corrupt
Councilman, than began to ask the same questions Cole had tried and he answered them. You can watch the video here and, frankly, it tells the story better than I can.

This entire mess stems from one thing: Time sheets.

According to the records attained by Jeff Cole, time sheets show that Latrice Bryant was clocked in for hours before she was spotted going to the office. It is worth noting, because it ties into the overall story, that Latrice Bryant dresses in rather, ahem, REVEALING clothing on a daily basis. A visit to her MySpace, which she made private after a local blog found it and posted images and photos from it, show's racy photos and reveals that her dream was to become a state represenative. Because of her actions, it is very likely those dreams will never come true. And, admittedly, these photos will come back to haunt her.

But this woman aside, Councilman Goode also highlighted his horrible new bit of legislation: By having one-party rule.

Councilman Wilson Goode Jr. wants to eliminate one at-large Council seat for the minority party, amending his original proposal that would have reduced Council from 17 members to 15 members with two less at-large seats. Philadelphia Metro

In part of this story breaking, he's alerted us of this. He's reminded us that, despite a mayor who is trying harder than any I've seen before to clean up this government and make sure Philadelphia shines again, that out our City Council still have members hellbent on destroying it and making Philadelphia the same culture of corruption it was before.

It also showed that the local media, as a whole, have been far to warm to City Council and, in part because Nutter has done so much good on a whole, has become latheargic and lazy about covering the events of the city and, in turn, have not done their job. Which is why I think the citizens of this city should be so thankful for Jeff Cole.

I would like to thank the following people for all the research:

Fox 29 Philadelphia for reporting on this. Philebrity.com for posting the MySpace Page.
And, most importantly, thank you, Daniel McQuade of Philadelphia Weekly! He alerted me first to the story and inspired me to write this. Dan, thanks a million and please, keep up the awesome work!

IT'S MILLER TIME!

As in, Donna Reed Miller is still a horrible City Council Person.

It's the holidays, and if you've thought, "WOW! That Larry has been really kinda mellow lately!"... your right, I have been. In terms of politics, it's getting insanely quiet and anything making the news is just... well, it's not aggravating for once. Nutter did something good and scored a good $3 million for the City's Schools. He still hasn't even begun to explain his idiotic Crime Emergency Plan, though.

But let's go back to Miller. Instead of posting a long diatribe about how she shouldn't have been re-elected or just what is wrong, I'll just post the damn article:

A Philadelphia woman was charged Monday with extorting more than $5,000 in cash and a cell phone while working for the city of Philadelphia and City Councilwoman Donna Reed Miller.

Theresa Pinkett, 53, of Philadelphia is alleged to have extorted the cash and cell phone in exchange for providing assistance on real estate issues for properties located in the city, which was part of her duties, according to the charges.

Pinkett is alleged to have accepted about $5,000 in cash and a cell phone from 2001 to 2003 -- while serving as a constituent services representative for Reed -- and $1,200 in cash from September to December of last year while serving as a community specialist in the Community Affairs Division for the City Controller's Office. No wrongdoing is alleged by others in Reed's office or the Controller's Office.

Councilwoman Joan Krajewski to Retire for 1 Day to Collect $300,000!

There's a lot of news going on right now in this city, namely the new murder rankings are in. I'll have to get to that later, because right now, I'm incredibly angry about this!

This is Joan L. Krajewski. She was recently re-elected to an eighth-term as Councilperson for the 6th District. For all her time in office, at age 73, she has decided to retire.

For one day.

At a cost of $297,466.

Yes, that's right; After all her time in office, she has decided to retire simply to cash in before she starts her 8th term in City Council! This is because of a Deferred Retirement Option Plan (DROP), which freezes their eventual retirement benefits — meaning they will receive less of an annual pension at retirement. One can only assume that she is doing that in order to save you, the tax payer, money.

Why I do I say that? Because, thus far, no reason at all has been given for this move. The only explanation given has been this:

Krajewski pointed out that she could easily leave office now with her $297,466 payment and begin drawing her $74,366 annual pension — which she can’t get until she leaves office for good — and the taxpayers would have to pay that plus a new councilperson’s salary.

Which we will have to do once she finally retires, anyway, so that's a rather moot point to make.

Let's consider this; According to a 2003 report, the DROP program costs the City of Philadelphia $7 million a year, although some say the program does pay for itself. At the same time, this still comes out of the pocket of you, the taxpayer.

The City of Philadelphia must enter into negotiations with City workers to discuss this very pension plan. Right now, the union wants more money for their pension funds. The question now is if not only should the city do this, but how can a raise now not be justified after this?

We have a Councilperson who has just shown just how blatant some crooks are in this city. Publicly announcing she is ready to rob the City Treasury for a day, telling us just how much loot she's going to get away with? And telling us we should be HAPPY about it?

When I said I didn't want criminals in City Hall, I wasn't kidding! We need to make sure this robbery never happens!

Feel free to contact her office by writing to her personally:

http://www.hallwatch.org/profiles/council/krajewski/faxbank/writeletter