Clout: Guv Ed on 'frenemy' Fumo: Kinda Shakespearean, kinda not
WHAT IS IT about former state Sen. Vince Fumo that inspires such a need for logical flexibility among fellow politicians?
WHAT IS IT about former state Sen.
Vince Fumo
that inspires such a need for logical flexibility among fellow politicians?
Consider Gov. Rendell. Talk about your "frenemies." The case against Fumo revealed that he used a private investigator paid with Senate cash to spy on Ed.
Rendell, who testified just before Fumo wrapped up his trial in March, praised his sometime adversary for working long hours. But nobody gets to break the law, Rendell added, not even Fumo.
In a letter to U.S. District Judge Ronald Buckwalter before this week's sentencing, Rendell again plays King Solomon and slices that baby down the middle. Fumo did "tremendous good," Rendell wrote in a plea for mercy, as a "ruthless politician."
We now know that Buckwalter favors the acts over the tactics. He cut Fumo a big break, sentencing him to just 55 months in prison as the feds asked for 15-plus years.
Rendell kept up the dichotomy this week, saying that just one year in jail would be a deterrent for potentially corrupt politicians, but, as a former prosecutor, he would appeal the judge's sentence.
Rendell was just trying to tell the judge that Fumo is "multifaceted," said the governor's spokesman, Chuck Ardo.
"He was less poetic than Shakespeare's 'The evil that men do lives after them; The good is oft interred with their bones,' but he was making the same point," Ardo added.
Beach-blanket Brady
Surf's up for U.S. Rep. Bob Brady and friends.
Signs are posted outside Democratic City Committee's Center City office advertising party chairman Brady's annual beach party. The "Brady Bunch Beach Party" will be held at Keenan's in North Wildwood on July 25. For just $35, you can drink $2 Miller Lites with all your favorite local political personalities.
Full disclosure: We at PhillyClout cannot confirm who among the attendees may be fans of the Speedo. Dark sunglasses are advised as a precaution.
Religious hubbub in Harrisburg
State House Speaker Keith McCall has been getting national hate mail after an incident last month when one of his aides asked a visiting pastor to drop a reference to Jesus Christ at the end of a prayer to open a House session.
Paul Parsells, chief of staff to the Democrat from Lansford, Pa., said that the matter's been blown out of proportion. For decades, he said, individual House members have invited guest clergy to offer opening prayers.
Their words were expected to be "nondenominational." Although there were no written guidelines for what that meant, and no enforcement mechanism, it was generally understood that references to God were OK, but references to Jesus Christ, Allah, Zeus and other denominational icons were discouraged.
Things changed about six weeks ago, Parsells said, when a visiting pastor whom he would not identify made negative remarks so offensive about welfare programs, abortion and other topics that some House members walked out in protest.
For a couple of weeks afterward, the speaker's office asked clerics to submit advance copies of their prayers. In an instance of unnecessary caution, one of the visiting ministers was asked to remove the phrase "in Jesus' name," before "Amen."
The pastor was offended and decided not to appear. The Hanover Evening Sun reported the incident and it was picked up by talk radio and the Internet, leading to the current controversy.
Parsells says that McCall, a devout Catholic, had no intention of offending anyone and that his office is no longer editing prayers.
Rendell spending wisely?
Is Gov. Rendell operating on the edge? He's spending $15,000 in campaign money for newspaper Web site space across the state, including philly.com, to tout his version of the state budget. But the state election code says that campaign money can be used only "for the purpose of influencing the outcome of an election."
PhillyClout asked Chuck Ardo, Rendell's spokesman, if the Guv is planning to run for another public office since term limits keep him from running again.
"He is not," Ardo said, "but he may be influencing future elections by making an important political/philosophical point."
Uh-huh. That and the fact that state election officials (Ed is their boss) and the courts traditionally define "influencing the outcome of an election" very liberally, according to legal experts.
This is probably good for Rendell - and for philly.com.
Quotable
"He gets 12 days per felony. No expression of remorse, no admission of guilt, nothing. It's unbelievable."
- Former city housing director Tommy Massaro, in a Daily News quote later used as an Associated Press headline.
Staff writers Bob Warner and John M. Baer contributed to this report.
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