The enemy of the moment always represents “absolute evil.”--George Orwell

Let’s do this first. The teeny-weeny McG sign behind the adobe disappeared today and I had nothing to do with it. There is no need to send some ex-con posing as an investigator to videotape the place. I’ve got better things to do than personally assaulting one of the 30 or so McG lawn signs scattered throughout the city.

So, the pre-cast concrete people hired by our Architect-in-Chief have finally decided to demand payment from the city. A snippet from the Voice story:

A central Pennsylvania concrete company filed a $3 million arbitration case against the redevelopment authority for violating a signed contract on the stalled downtown movie theater.

The mayor’s response from the same Voice story?

"Anybody can file anything they want," the mayor offered. "The fact is Wilkes-Barre City Council obstructed the project."

Whoa! Wow! Hold the presses! Holy purple throbber Batman! That is a bald-faced lie. This isn’t some opinion oozing forth here. Can anyone tell me what the proper etiquette for vomiting is? We are obviously entering a new and increasingly pathetic phase here as the mayor races toward unemployment. Revisionist history is now quite the rage at McG’s campaign headquarters, otherwise known as city hall. Talk about stretching the truth. We are facing an election where the facts, the truth, doesn’t even enter into the equation anymore. Council did it, council did it and council did it is hilarious coming from a man that micro-managed everything single aspect of city business right down to how and when the girls at city hall could decorate their offices for Christmas, while launching nonstop F-bombs at them.

I’m not an agnostic. I’m not an atheist. I’m not sure what the heck I am, but, I would like to believe that if there really is only one omnificent force available to us, it would rescue us from what is rapidly approaching unadulterated evil in this city.

The truth no longer matters, only votes do. The facts are no longer important, only one man’s continued employment is. Wilkes-Barre’s future is a complete afterthought as the worst administration in the history of this city attempts to further plunder what little is left of the city they inherited from the previous administration. This has really gone way beyond pathetic at this point. Facts are facts, but in Wilkes-Barre, there are no facts anymore. In rapidly failing Wilkes-Barre, facts are now known as political attacks. Facts are know known as the useless rants of politically motivated residents. Facts are going by the wayside faster than our tax dollars are going down the proverbial drain.

City council obstructed the Holeplex project? That is a bald-faced lie, a whopper, offered up for public consumption by a man who really believes that the general public are as a group, stupid and ignorant enough to accept his insults to their intelligence as facts. The worst mayor in Pennsylvania has spoken.

If the residents of this city are collectively smarter than he gives them credit for being, his goose is cooked and the city can finally head toward better times. If not, he can preside over the abject failure of a city that he will eventually be proven to have single-handedly destroyed.

Lies! Lies! All you’re telling me is lies.

Let’s go music fans. Name that 60’s garage band.

The Wilkes-Barre Fire Department (Hose Dudes) will be staging an “informational picket” at City Hall and on Public Square tomorrow from 11 am ‘til 1 pm. The “Hose Dudes” are owed a massive amount of back pay, which has been withheld from them by the city’s administration, which will not bargain with their union in “good faith.” Some of our younger firefighters have earned educational benefits after proudly serving in this countries armed forces, yet our mayor will not provide his signature to the necessary documents that would allow them to collect what they were promised by the federal government. He calls himself a veteran, yet he will not allow Wilkes-Barre’s brave veterans to collect what they earned by selflessly serving to protect this country from hostile forces abroad.

If you happen to be out and about tomorrow, hoot, holler and honk in support of our “Hose Dudes.” They are not getting rich while serving the residents of this city. They are not a problem in the troubled Wilkes-Barre scheme of things. They are the people that will rescue your stranded cat from the tallest tree, stop the bleeding when your kid gets broad-sided while traversing a city intersection and drag a toddler from a burning building when called upon. These are the people that come to the rescue when things go bad, while the mayor goes on and on about increased city services, namely curbside pick-ups.

Support your “Hose Dudes,” you’ll never know when you might need their tireless efforts.

And then there’s this. A group of residents are going to assemble on the square at 11:00 am and then head to the Holeplex and stage a vocal demonstration against the total folly that our current administration has become. Their simple message is, meet us at the “Hole-In-The-Ground” and help to right the wrongs that have been perpetrated upon this city.

Honk, hoot and holler for them too. They have as much to lose as anyone involved with this troubled place that once seemed to be such a great place to live in. This is grass roots stuff here folks. The Hoi Polloi are pissed and they are not willing to accept endless foibles and upsetting failure in a city that on the surface, seems to have so much to offer.

The nonsense has to be done away with. We will know whether we have re-claimed our city, or lost it to corruption forever on May 20th. In this city, the upcoming primary is a D-Day of sorts. We will either defeat totalitarianism, or we will be totally consumed by it.

Private Sector Dude weighed-in yesterday, but I was too distracted to post his comments. Here they are:

******"Joey Bagadonuts here folks. It's a star-studded evening. Limos have been arriving for the past hour. The red carpet has been rolled out, only to be graced by some of the biggest names in the business. We've seen Gucci, Yves St. Laurent, Calvin Klein, and even Dockers. Wow, what a night. Let's now go inside where the announcement we have been waiting for all evening is about to take place. Wendy!"

"Thanks, Joey. Wendy O. "Eat me" Williams here. The academy certainly had their work cut out for them this year. There were just so many good candidates to chose from. Here with the announcement is none other than Marion "I promise you a police car for every sidewalk" Barry!"

clap, clap, clap, yeah, yeah, clap, clap

"Thank-you, thank-you. Tonight is a special night. When I won this award a few years ago, I thought that my deeds could not be surpassed, but like so many times before-I was wrong. This year's winner needs no introduction and his list of misconduct, broken promises and failures is too long to fit into a three hour show. His tirades are infamous, but we can't repeat them here as this is a family show. This years winner of the United State's Worst Mayor-Tom McGroarty."

huzzah, huzzah, clap, clap, clap, burp, good one, heyna, clap, clap, cheer, cheer

"Thank-you, thank-you. Chief George, please get down off the table. I would have been here sooner, but I was out paving a street. I work 7/24 or 24/7 or whatever-it's all council's fault. I would like to thank my wife, isn't she gorgeous? I would also like to thank all the citizens and city workers of Wilkes-Barre that I screwed, especially one punctuationally challenged individual with a way-out website. I rule, cops drool."

There you have it folks, hizonner wins worst mayor of the US. Well, it could happen.

I am so excited about the level of passion and commitment coming from downtown-perhaps it's time to drop the "r", maybe I'm a bit premature or just overly optimistic. God help us if hizonner wins again. Rock the vote folks, send a message that we will no longer stand for back-door, locked room, good ol' boy, dictatorial, finger pointing politics!!

Have to say that WILK is showing some ugly colors. Yesterday, WILK let Chris (I believe this was his name) spout on about how bad America is and how we are killing "thousands" of civilians in Iraq, while never bothering to mention the fact that Saddam has put many of these folks in harms way himself. Nor was he concerned about the hundreds of thousands of Iraqi people that died at the hand of this madman, not to mention countless thousands of others killed in Iran, Kuwait, and elsewhere. He says he is concerned, but somewhere in his twisted mind the US killing civilians by accident or as a result of the war is far worse that Saddam doing it intentionally? This is almost as warped as the skinheads saying the Holocaust never happened.

I work with a marine that was in Gulf War I. Ask him about Saddam's work. Ask him about the nightmares he still has about cutting the gutted bodies of men, women, and CHILDREN down from every pole the Republican Guard could find while on their way back to Baghdad. Ask him about the innocent folks that were shot while in their hospital beds so Iraq could loot the medical equipment.

This idiot claimed that we could have removed Saddam with talk, just like in Yugoslavia. He went as far as to say that it wasn't the bombing or presence of our troops that caused Milosevic to be overthrown. Really? So all the talking and diplomacy and pressure were able to remove him? Sorry. No amount of pressure from ANY country and the entire UN changed anything at all in Milosevic's warped mind. Remember how the UN troops (American's included) had to stand by while people were slaughtered in front of them. And they could do nothing because they were "peace keepers." They were giving diplomacy a chance. Diplomacy has never ended anything, not in any country-name one. France, England, Germany, Spain, Africa, South America, Central America. Go back in history as far as you like. Revolutionary War, nope. Civil War, nope. WWI, nope. WWII, nope. Vietnam, nope. Korea, nope. Gulf War I, nope. Alamo, nope. 100 Years War, nope. Romans, nope. Greeks, nope. Huns, nope. Mongols, nope. Middle East, nope. Waterloo, nope. And while we are at it, what got the UN inspectors back into Iraq in the first place? It was the threat of force from our President and Tony Blair. And on the heels of 9/11 and Afghanistan, Saddam knew we meant business.

The point he is failing to see (and he isn't failing to see it, he just won't admit it because then his whole argument fails) is that while it is true that Milosevic was removed from power somewhat peacefully, this chance never would have came without the presence of our troops and the bombing. Never. No amount of talk would have stopped him. It was tried for two years! Saddam had twelve! In both cases, what good did any of the sanctions and diplomacy do! Name one thing. He will not go back to the "root cause", only back as far as the support he needs for his twisted argument. And if he is intentionally doing this, and I believe he is, then he has no credibility whatsoever and should summarily be dismissed. He tries to pass himself off as enlightened because he has been there, he has experience, and he does. But to ignore the root cause of the problem and to ignore the root cause of the solution is a disgrace.

For WILK to allow him this forum, when so many folks here have loved ones overseas, with the 109th right downtown, was at best shortsighted, even if it was just to use him as set-up (kind of like their logic for allowing Kurt on the radio-he generates many calls.)

Keep the faith. 21 days, tick, tick, tick...

Wendy O.-hmmm, Mark, got any Plasmatics laying around?

Private Sector Dude.*******

I hears ya’. The last couple of days have been a blur for this resident. The skirmish that we would normally call democracy is about to be reduced to a bloodcurdling free-for-all by the man that whines about everything being “politics.”

Me gotta go nite nite.

TLFM

TLFM

TLFM