July 2009 Archives

Did you read where that guy in New Jersey who stole $1,200 worth of lobster tails from a casino kitchen in Atlantic City pleaded guilty and made a deal with the prosecutor. He was sentenced to four years in prison. Meanwhile in Pennsylvania, Vince Fumo is sentenced to 55 months (with good behavior, less that four years) in prison after being convicted unanimously in a jury trial of every stinking charge in the 137 count indictment against him in a trial that seemed to go on for 55 months.

What could possibly bind these two men in crime? A taste for lobster, perhaps.

Years from now we will all look back in fond favor upon this sentence by Federal Court Judge Ronald Buckwalter as one that allowed Vince Fumo, who will be 70 upon his release, to live out his final decade or more in the spirit and service of Benjamin Franklin, another great Philadelphian who once used his tremendous influence and energy to found libraries and universities and hospitals and philosophical societies and volunteer fire companies without once shaking down a major corporation for $17 million by threatening to politically oppose its financial interests.

Whatever you think of Vince Fumo's hard work and good intentions to improve his community, the biggest crime he committed is the one he wasn't charged with. He demanded a well-laundered bribe of millions and millions of dollars to change his vote on a crucial legislative issue involving major corporations controlling energy and communications in the state of Pennsylvania.

They call it hardball. He pretended to say no, no , no until $17 million made it yes. To me that was either posturing or outright bribery. Either Fumo knew he was going to vote yes all along, in spite of his previous stated positions, or he was waiting for the right dollar figure to change his mind. You just know that Vince's first words after the $17 million deal was sealed were, "I'll bet I could have taken him for twenty."

All politics is this way. That's probably why the feds didn't charge Fumo outright. Start charging politicians about how they vote opens a can of worms with a hornets nest in the middle. Nail him on the vaccuum cleaners rather than the blatent "for sale" sign on anything Vince Fumo had for sale. Which turned out to be everything.

I don't hate Vince Fumo. I hate his type. And to see one of his type humbled gives me faith and hope. I don't know what he was before, how he saw himself, but after all these months of merciless revelations about his public and private business Vince Fumo is a shipwreck. Once he was under a white sail on the high seas, the west wind forming white capped waves against blue swells. Once he was at the helm of the ship of state, no matter what the governor thought.

He wasn't an outright pirate, but Vince Fumo was the ultimate privateer. We only call them pirates when they aren't doing good things for us. Fumo robbed the rich to give to South Philly. And then he'd wet his beak. But Vince was a gadget substance abuser: One Oreck was too many, 19 were not enough. The feds nailed him with unauthorized use of paper clips when his more obvious crimes went unprosecuted. Like Capone getting sent away for income tax evasion rather than for being the boss of the mob that ran Pennsylvania from South Philadelphia.

Not that that's a bad thing.

This is a cautionary tale. That means this same thing could happen to you if you have ever parked your car in the city of Philadelphia. The odds of something like this happening to you are greatly increased if you are as, a). stupid, b). unlucky, c). cursed or d). all of the above, as me. This is the beginning of week four of Clark's Car Held Hostage by a Law Nobody Heard of Before. But first a brief recap: Some people flirt with illegal parking tickets; I have had unprotected sex with illegal parking tickets. Over the decades my cars have been booted and towed, drawn and quartered by the Philadelphia Parking Authority so often that I am the only person to ever have a reserved parking space INSIDE the Parking Authority's Impound Lot.

I kid. . . the city's most effective and efficient governmental agency. If my trash was collected as vigilantly as I'm guaranteed of getting a parking ticket within minutes of the meter expiring, I might consider it a wash. But this time I've been hosed big time. After years of irresponsible parking habits (by that I mean failure to pay parking tickets in a prompt and timely manner) and after paying astonishing sums to retrieve my vehicles, I finally learned my lesson about five years ago when I actually had to walk away from a car the PPA had seized because I didn't have the money. I rediscovered SEPTA (slogan: "We're getting there.") because of the PPA (slogan: "We Gottcha!")

In 2004 I bought a previously owned 1991 Cadillac from Hy Lit, my childhood radio idol and good friend before his death, and I avoided tickets by parking legally or paying promptly when I got one. Despite my vigilance I accumulated four unpaid tickets and on June 19 my car was booted while legally parked in front of my house. When I went down to the PPA office on Filbert Street to get a hearing I was told fuhgeddaboudit. I couldn't get a hearing or pay for my current tickets until I paid $3,779.25 from unpaid tickets dating back to 1989 on four different vehicles registered to me. I was told that a change in the law within the last year and a half allows the Parking Authority to hold vehicles until all unpaid fines for any other vehicles in my name are paid, and paid in full, to the collection agency (a Center City law firm) that now owns my debts. And that law firm wants all $3,779.25 right now. I've pulled every string I know, political and legal, and nobody can help. Do you see why this is a cautionary tale? While we weren't looking, the PPA became as powerful as the IRS.

Colored men walking, boss. This is how I see this crossing of men black and white in the city of Philadelphia in 1863, right about now in July after the battle of Gettysburg. This was an honor guard of Union Soldiers who accompanied the Presidnt of the United States, Abraham Lincoln.in ceremonies over the Fourth of July weekend in Philadelphia on July 4, 2009. Black and white wouldn't have been marching together back then.

And you know what?

That's their loss.