7-15-2004

Yet another anonymous nitwit

Ads featuring Ms. Goldberg will no longer be on the air.--Slim-Fast General Manager Terry Olson

Whoopee! John Kerry's "Heart & Soul of America" would be more accurately described as the asshole of America after she entered the political debate much like a drunken sailor would after the MPs went and chased all of the prostitutes and she-males away.

Spin it any way you want lefties, but she was way out of line.

Fellow bloggers...

...Please, do not continue to mistakenly assume that Larry is the only member of our fire department that I speak to. I don't get just "one side of the story" as things pertain to our hose dudes. Also, I do not drop by any firehouse to pump anyone for information. I drop by headquarters now and again to hang out with and gab with Larry among others. Why? Because I like him as a person. He's a good guy. He's not my source, he's my friend.

And I did not mention any of his history with the fire department after any recent conversations with him. I didn't pay much attention to what went on in this city before, say, 1999 or so, and I just love listening to folks talk about the politics and such that preceeded the horrible McGroarty era. Like anyone in the knowing of a lot of recent history, Larry talks about the past trials and tribulations and I listen intently. And I happen to posess a rather scary memory. So don't get your polka-dotted boxer shorts twisted into an exotic looking knot or anything.

If any of the...

...old gang who played baseball with me day in and day out at Guthrie Field ever return to Wilkes-Barre, I'm sure they'll attest to the fact that the following paragraphs are an accurate assessment of my batting skills.

Once I stopped leeching off of Ethel's In-A-Gada-Da-Vida generation, with my very first paycheck, I bought a "Ralph Garr" Louisville Slugger. A 32 ounce thing of beauty as far as I was concerned at the time. It was the very first brand spanking new baseball bat I ever owned. It's sitting in the basement at this very moment.

Anyway, I was a line drive hitter with some serious wheels to boot. What may have been a double for every other Nord End kid easily turned into a triple or more once I exploded out of the batter's box. During the early stages of the Summer of '73, I fell from the top of the fence at Guthrie and the very tops of the unbent chain links impaled the top of my left arm. After a few dozen stitches, most internal, and a month with my arm taped to my chest, the doctor decided that the only way that arm would ever return to normal would be through weight-lifting. I spend the remainder of that Summer and the entire Winter pumping iron.

When Spring finally rolled around, I not only was a power hitter for the first time, I would rarely even swing and miss a single pitch. How weights can turn one into a contact hitter I'm not entirely sure about, but it worked for me. No matter where it was thrown, or what the pitcher was trying to make it do, the baseball was mine. And that stayed with me throughout the years.

So...if you're gonna post direct challenges to me on the forum page, you had better not throw them under-handed anymore.

Welfare Ding-a-lings -- J.F.Kerry, 06:49:44 07/15/04 Thu [1]

Typical republican remark. We have the power to make a change, but we're too worried about the voting choice of the poor to do anything about it. Does anyone remember what Pres. Clinton (D) did to the welfare benefit

What in the f**k was that? It wasn't a softball. It wasn't under-hand. It wasn't a knuckler. I know. It was a knuckle-headed pitch. Allow me to take a swing at that:

Gee whiz. What did Clinton, a Democrat no less, do to the welfare benefit?

Let's see here. Newt Gingrich and the Republican-controlled Congress wrote the Welfare Reform Act as part of their "Contract with America." Does anyone remember that? They sent it to Clinton's desk and he vetoed it. They retooled it just a tad and sent it back to his desk. He vetoed it a second time.

Then, during 1996 and the run-up to the November election, Newt and the boys hammered the issue non-stop and when sent to Clinton's desk a third time late in the Summer of '96, Clinton signed the bill into law which was almost exactly the same as the original draft he vetoed.

Does that help? Did I remember enough for ya? Clinton? You're f**king funny. Stick to A ball, slugger. We play hard up here.

Just in case you don't understand how it all worked, the law ended open-ended matching grants to the states for the purposes of welfare payments. Being that the federal funding for welfare was no longer finite, the states had their first real incentive to implement welfare-to-work programs in their states. It was ingenious. It was the work of a few motivated Republicans and a most reluctant Democrat president who feared for his re-election chances amidst scandals of his own making.

He swings...long fly ball...deep left...way back...

Whatever you do, don't ever climb that friggin' fence. Walk all the way around and retrieve that ball.

The lowly bat boy!

For obvious reasons...

..we tend to bitch about the utility companies that so often hold our wallets hostage.

Well, the streetlight directly across the street from the adobe went kablooey recently. That may not seem like a big deal, but I gotta tell ya, it's freakin' darker than dark out there without that light blazing away at night. What to do.

I called PP&L at 4:45 PM yesterday and reported the light as being out of service. The girl on the phone asked me if it was an emergency. 10-10, was my reply.

So, I was sitting here bangin' away on this wireless keyboard last night when I heard something rather large rumbling forth. I wandered outside and a PP&L dude was already climbing into his cherry picker basket. It was barely 10:45. After a few minutes, the light was blazing again and complete darkness was no more on Thompson Street.

Whatever. No big thang, I guess. I just thought I'd mention it. Apparently, not all of our utility companies suck.

But don't get me started about PAWC.

I see that..

...Walter Griffith, King of the self-serving publicity whores, managed to get his name in the paper again. I'll bet he's thrilled. Expect to see copious amounts of his election yard signs in a couple of years.

It seems that he still needs signatures on his petitions seeking to put a few referendum questions on the ballot. How many separate petitions is he up to these days? 6? 12? 80? Who cares?

Look, we've already got this redistricting thing bouncing around the courts and hanging over our heads. And the home rule crazies are still hard at work tying to impose their brand of unproven insanity on all of us. Do we need to throw even more gas on the fire at this point?

We, as a city have got more than enough on the three-legged table without embracing even more "learned" uncertainty coming from the folks with no practical experience, but all of the right answers.

Please...if Walt flashes his massive file of petitions at you, flash something back at him and walk away in a big hurry.

If nothing else, Mayor Tom Leighton and City Council have provided us with a sense of normalcy this year as they continue to work on even bigger and better things yet to come. Compared to what Wilkes-Barre was one short year ago, normal feels pretty good right about now. I could deal with normal for the time being.

And what does Walter propose? What is Walt's vision for Wilkes-Barre? From where I'm sitting, it's anything but normal. It sounds like a reckless return to unchecked rancor bordering on chaos.

Do what you gotta do.

So much for...

...the Laker dynasty, huh?

I just don't get it. Try this. You wake up tomorrow in someone else's body. At first, you're horrified, but you quickly learn that the life of a general manager of the newest NBA expansion team is fairly glitzy and mucho exciting. So, you go with the flow and the numerous groupies.

Your first order of business. For the very first time, the NBA has decided that you can choose any player you want from any existing teams roster, but only that one player. The rest have to come via the draft. You poll your long-frustrated fan base and find them evenly divided between picking Shaq, and Kobe. Time to earn your money, big shot.

Who would you pick? Shaq? Or Kobe?

I will not share my opinion with you on this one. You tell me.

Besides, you're the freakin' GM, not me.

I'm a Republican from a broken home that absolutely worships the ultra-liberal Frank Zappa and abhors all of those Uber-Patriots in the country music biz. I'm a Christian, I hate church, but I can't stand it when people bash the church. I believe that we should all be free to persue our dreams, but I just can't see myself hanging out with Frank & Bill, the newlyweds down the street. I'm a mish-mash of opposing influences that don't even make sense under close scrutiny. So I leave it to you.

Shaq? Or Kobe?

Or fractional divisions thereof?

Bye