Joe Rooney vs. 1% Allyson

Posted on November 5, 2012 by Mike Shortall

Joe Rooney – PA 13th Congressional District

It’s almost over, really it is! And it’s taking everything I have to write just one more Election 2012 post. Not sure I can make to the end, but the importance of this election mandates not only a change in The White House. This election calls for wholesale changes at the Congressional and Senate levels as well!

I have given you my reasonings for both Mitt Romney and Tom Smith for the Pennsylvania Senate race against Bob “Senator Zero” Casey. Now let’s take a look at the race in the Pennsylvania 13th Congressional District.

I met Joe Rooney in February of this year as he made the rounds of the GOP establishment trying to drum up support for his primary candidacy. I was immediately impressed by Joe’s honest, straight-at-you demeanor and his grasp of the important issues facing us. My reaction to his visit and remarks were that he was head-and-shoulders over the entire field that vied for the same primary endorsement in 2010. There were 5 …. or 6 candidates back then; and none of them seemed strong enough to shine their lights through a brown bag, let alone in competition with Allyson Schwartz. (Joe Rooney for Congress website)

But all that changed once Joe began laying out his background, experiences (including service to this Country as a Marine pilot flying F-4 Phantoms and F/A-18 Hornets, the mainstay of the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps air fleets), and goals for Congressional service and the interests of PA 13th constituencies. Like many well-rounded military officers, Joe Rooney had his political game wound tightly and focused. He has confidence in his understanding of what the Country needs to be successful domestically, internationally, and Economically.

Joe Rooney is an American Optimist.

“The American economy can be the engine that drives the rest of the world out of the economic hole that currently exists.” – Joe Rooney

His message resonates with Everyone, whether you are hard-working mother or father trying to get your take-home pay to at least wave at your Budget, if not actually try to meet it! It resonates with retirees on fixed incomes, with students who will be out looking for Jobs in the years to come. Joe’s message will especially resonate with those who have been victimized by an Economy mired in 8% Unemployment, 12.3 million people out of Jobs, mounting debt both National (up from $10 trillion to $16 trillion during the Obama/Schwartz years) and personal.

One thing about Joe Rooney really impressed me. He was ready to take on all comers to earn the right to face Allyson Schwartz in this crucial election.

Allyson Schwartz swings a big stick when it comes to Democratic competition

Allyson Schwartz of the 1% had an entirely different approach to entertaining an opposing voice in the Democrat primaries. She very coldly forced one Occupy Wall Street candidate, Nate Kleinman out of the primary race through dirty tricks (making a staff-less Kleinman sit with a team of Schwartz operatives to verify each individual nominating petition) and through financial intimidation (filing lawsuits intended to make Kleinman responsible for the legal costs incurred by the Schwartz campaign).

Not exactly the kind of free and open Democracy we are used to, eh? Why, it was downright Nixonian! Yes, Richard Millhouse would be very, very proud!

But that’s what happens when The Queen rules the roost.

Schwartz has benefitted mightily from a wide array of political benefactors in the form of large dollar corporate donors and Political Action Committees.

Schwartz’s funding for the 2011-12 election cycle came primarily from large individual contributors (57%) and Political Action Committees (38%), only 3% came from small individual contributors. Her biggest corporate and association sponsors include Comcast Corp, Teva Pharmaceuticals, and the American Association of Orthopaedic Surgeons. Her top industry support comes from lawyers, health professionals, pharmaceutical and insurance companies.

Not exactly residents of the 99% …

Now no one really knows how the headline political confrontation will end up Tuesday – or whenever the last Electoral College votes get cast; but certainly it’s easy to see which candidate in the PA’s 13th Congressional District is more like you and me!

It’s Joe Rooney for Congress!

Lady Allyson of the 1%

Posted on March 9, 2012 by Mike Shortall

Democracy can be a tough nut to crack. But it gets so much harder in this day and age if you have neither the power nor the money that your opponent can muster and use to keep you at bay.

Nate Kleinman

This was the lesson Nate Kleinman learned this week in his bid to challenge Representative Allyson Schwartz for the Democratic nomination in the Pennsylvania 13th Congressional District.

Kleinman is a human rights activist and political organizer within the Democratic Party. He has worked for President Obama and Joe Sestak in his failed U.S. Senate bid. He is also considered the first Occupy Wall Street political candidate. But he really had no chance against the very well-financed, very well-connected Schwartz.

REP Allyson Schwartz (D-PA 13)

Allyson Schwartz, currently serving her fourth term, has always been a savvy fund-raiser, and is reported to have in excess of $2.3 million in her war chest. Her only Republican challenger is Joe Rooney, a former U.S. Marine fighter pilot and current resident of Ardsley.

Schwartz’s funding for the 2011-12 election cycle came primarily from large individual contributors (57%) and Political Action Committees (38%), only 3% came from small individual contributors. Her biggest corporate and association sponsors include Comcast Corp, Teva Pharmaceuticals, and the American Association of Orthopaedic Surgeons. Her top industry support comes from lawyers, health professionals, pharmaceuticals and insurance companies.

Not exactly residents of the 99% …

You would think that with all that fire power behind her, the last thing Allyson Schwartz needed was the appearance that she was insensitive to the interests of the Occupy Wall Street movement.

Yet when it came to Nate Kleinman, Allyson Schwartz went for the throat. She could out spend, out fund-raise, out network, and out wait just about any in-party challenge with one hand tied behind her back. Not to mention the difficulty such an insurgent Democrat faces in getting any form of support from within The Establishment of the DNC when running against such a successful incumbent.

Challenging the validity of nomination petition signatures (required to qualify to appear on Election Day ballots) has become a regular tool for suppressing political opposition. It’s the quick and dirty way to score a knockout; yet it rarely works to the satisfaction of the petition challenger.

The petition challenge has become one of the accepted political practices with which I have a problem. When did it became acceptable to silence opposition in the public square? It smacks of fear for open debate. It makes a candidate look petty, aloof, and overbearing. But as bad as that looks, it gets even worse when the conqueror decides to machine-gun the life rafts.

And this is the part of the Kleinman episode that makes Allyson Schwartz look ruthless and more than a little afraid.

Last week, Kleinman decided to withdraw his name from the ballot as a formal challenger to Schwartz’s Congressional seat. Instead he decided to continue his candidacy by seeking to win the April 24 primary via write-in ballots.

As if Democracy wasn’t already hard enough.

The reason Kleinman decided to throw his lot with the Hail Mary of write-in ballots is the tortured hell that Schwartz’s campaign intended to put Kleinman through just to keep his candidacy hidden from the Democratic voters of the PA 13th. In a move reminiscent of Richard Nixon-esque dirty tricks, the Allyson Schwartz campaign pushed the nominating petition issue to the extent that Kleinman, who has no real political organization, would have had to spend weeks of his own time sitting down with Schwartz’s rather ample campaign staff to go over each and every individual petition signature to prove their validity or to rehabilitate questionable entries.

In other words, keep Mr. Kleinman penned up in a conference room, off the street, out of the public’s view, and away from any potential media attention.

And just when Nate Kleinman was standing there like a deer in the headlights, the Schwartz campaign pulled out the napalm by filing a claim that would have required Kleinman to pay the legal costs incurred by the Schwartz campaign! “It’s a legal option for the campaign to request that Nate Kleinman pay legal fees,” says Rachel Magnuson, Rep. Allyson Schwartz’s Chief of Staff.

Nice …

And since Kleinman’s “campaign war chest” totals just $10-15,000., as compared to Schwartz’s $2.3 million, it’s not hard to see what that move was all about. It was an attempt to threaten Nate Kleinman with personal financial retribution for having dared to challenge Lady Allyson of the 1%!

A case of priest sexual abuse too close to home

Posted on February 11, 2011 by Mike Shortall

I am sickened and disgusted … again.

News broke last night and was prominently reported in today’s Philadelphia Inquirer on a new sexual abuse case linked to children attending an Archdiocese of Philadelphia school. In this case several individuals, including two priests and a sixth-grade lay teacher were indicted by a grand jury for the abuse of two male students – ages 10 and 14 at the time of the assaults – at St. Jerome Church and School in Northeast Philadelphia.

This is the same parish both my wife and I attended as a children during the late ’60s and early ’70s. I graduated in 1970 … Carol in 1972, along with my brother and several other friends. Almost everyone I grew up with was associated with St. Jerome. And many of us have friends and family still living there. Carol and I were married in the church. And both my parents and Carol’s mother were buried after funeral Masses at St. Jerome.

I think having so many personal connections to that parish – its neighborhoods and its people – makes this more personal.

I left St. Jerome in 1985, when Carol and I were married. We then attended St. Martha’s, also in NE Philly. Currently, we live in Horsham, PA and I have been an on-again, off-again member of St. Catherine of Siena. More off-again – than on – for several years, mostly due to my failed faith.

But not my failed faith in God, or in the belief that His Son, Jesus Christ came to us as Savior. No, it’s much more my failed faith in what the Church has become in its quest to minimize liability in cases of sexual abuse of children by members of its clergy.

The Church’s reactions to these assaults is simply incomprehensible, unless it is placed in the context of a very wealthy plaintiff desperately scrambling to protect financial assets from victims’ need for closure and their righteous desire for justice. In any other context offered by The Church, it makes absolutely no sense.

I have failed long ago in trying to comprehend the need of some adults to prey on the trust, innocence, and vulnerability of children. If this was the extent of the problem, I could live with my sense of disgust and the compelling urge to clamor for state-sponsored castration in these cases.

Unfortunately, it goes way, way beyond my tolerance level to witness the continuing actions of The Church when confronted with priests (and now a teacher) who prey on kids. How is that The Church can claim that its people ARE The Church when they consistently refuse to protect their flock from the wolves that abuse?!? How many times can you transfer an individual, against whom credible accusations of abuse exist, from church to church, from and to positions of authority and trust, without performing the only decent actions required … turning the accusations over to law enforcement for investigation and getting the abusers out of The Church and away from children?!?

The grand jury report, resulting from the Philadelphia D.A.’s investigation, states that one of the accused, serving as Secretary for Clergy, “… was acutely interested in shielding abusive clergy from criminal detection … and … the Archdiocese from financial liability.”

This is the crux of the problem, a church more interested in protecting assets than in protecting the true Church – the people who worship there.

I have made two attempts since turning 40 to return to The Church. In one attempt I even went beyond my usual apathetic attitude towards spiritual involvement in a way that made me feel good about myself and what The Lord meant – and could mean – in my life. But in each attempt, renewed allegations of clergy abuse of children and the more infuriating revelations of inaction or outright cover-up by the Roman Catholic Church in the U.S. has smothered whatever flickering flames my attempts rekindled.

It is no longer worth the effort.

Memories of My Northeast Philly, circa 1966-1974

Posted on January 25, 2011 by Mike Shortall

Center of this Universe: Ashton & Willits Roads
Frankie Masters, Joseph’s Delicatessen, wiffle ball, Holme Circle, Winchester Swim Club, St. Jerome Church & School, Father Dougherty, 25-minute Masses, “Winchester, Colfax & Narvon lines …”, EJ Korvettes, Crown Cork & Seal, friendly football games, Angus Road, nasty football rivalry, Grant & Ashton, Grant & Academy, John Byrnes GC, the fence along Torresdale CC, Pollock School & playground, softball, FlatIron, chain-link basketball nets, the “Big A”, turtle jungle gym, huge angled sheet-metal slide, Route 20 & 88 bus, Philadelphia Electric Co substation (Ashton), North(east) Philadelphia Airport, Ryerson Road, Ryerson Circle, the 5 & 10 cent store (Willits), Shop ‘n Bag(s), “Free Soviet Jews” (B’Nai B’Rith??), 15-cent burgers at McDonalds (Frankford Ave.), Linden Avenue projects, I-95, Roosevelt Boulevard, Roosevelt Mall, Thomas Holme School, Cannstatters, Father Judge HS, dances in the gym, Cottage Green, the original intersection of Ashton & Willits, Lincoln HS, the football bowl, Thanksgiving football games, concrete roads, Bluegrass Shopping Center, grass median strips, Nazareth Hospital, Pennypack Circle, jungle-themed miniature golf, concrete underpasses (before and after), Shriner’s Hospital, Pennypack Park, beer parties, cops, running, beer-dumping parties, street hockey, Flyers Stanley Cup street celebrations, Holy Family College, Nazareth Academy, girls at Archbishop Ryan/St. Huberts, robin-egg blue police cars (post-’74?), PTC, Crispin Gardens, pee wee football, little league, The Evening Bulletin, newspaper shack on Ashton near Winchester SC …

(Disclaimer: Dysfunctional memory may result in not-completely-correct recollections. Please feel free to correct any inconsistencies via Leave a Comment/Post a Reply below.)

Sister Mary Elephant

Posted on January 21, 2011 by Mike Shortall

Sister teaching a class 1960's Certainly my experiences in the parochial schools of Philadelphia were no different from anyone else in the late 60’s/early ’70’s. We had nuns we loved and respected. And then there were those we resisted with every fiber of our being, in many cases for no other reason than they expected way more from us than we were willing to give them, with no appreciation for their efforts to prepare us for the outside world. The clarity of hindsight forces us to recognize that those Sisters – despite our rebellions and organized disobedience – always had our best interests at heart.

But that’s beside the point.

Whenever opportunity provides for a group of Catholic grade school products to gather, their stories and laughter inevitably address those unforgettable experiences at the hands of the more colorful creatures in dark-colored habits. They tend not to dwell on those less-than-memorable nuns who were simply great teachers. No, the best stories involve those blessed religious figures with the unique personalities, quirky mannerisms, and – in some cases – borderline psychoses that rendered them unforgettable.

Of these I had a few …

“None” looked like this though …

My fondest memory by far was of saintly Sister Ann David in the first grade at Immaculate Conception (1962-66) in the Germantown section of Philadelphia. (The school was located on E.Chelten Ave, but was lost years ago to a fire.) She had me hook, line, and sinker as a wide-eyed, overwhelmed fledgling. She was kind and gentle … an excellent choice for the task of quelling my grade school terrors. Another sterling example of what Sisters could offer in terms of positive childhood experience was Sister Bartholomew, who taught at my second parochial school, St. Jerome (1966-70) in the Holme Circle section of Northeast Philly. She was the perfect mix of grandmotherly love, combined with a stern refusal to put up with the antics of a herd of prepubescent teens.

The characters-in-habit that I remember most – however – were those in my later grades at St. Jerome. There was Sister Cecelia in the fifth grade, whose seemingly non-stop lotion-rubbing hands were always held almost prayerfully at chin level, as if preaching her lessons to her flock. There was also the bent-over Sister Mary Magdalene, always short-tempered with a face reddened by boiling blood pressure. She once beat a fellow student so crazily she actually peed herself … or so the legend goes.

… more like this.

Needless to say, said fellow student probably got what he deserved; and it’s hard to look back on those days, when kids our age enjoyed expressing our independence and testing the limits of religious patience, without a good bit of guilt. Exasperating the tender inclinations of the good Sisters (Okay … To be perfectly honest, not all of them had tender inclinations.) as they tried to instill in us the favorable qualities of the Palmer Method, the Baltimore Catechism, and long division were not our most Catholic of moments.

But I digress …

By far our most “Sister Mary Elephant experience” came in the classroom of Sister Margaret Leonore, a droopy-faced, ruddy-complexioned saint. She was so clearly over-matched by the rebellious miscreants who swept through her classroom every day. Her venue was the vehicle for my only foray into the realm of class clown, which may have been the height of my grade school rebelliousness. For I was not brave enough to try it with any of the other nuns. But Sister L always seemed like such a push-over, almost incapable of discipline. And that was a recipe for classroom disaster!

So the patients ran the asylum. Every possible disruption, class delaying tactic, and sophomoric stunt was trotted out to howling laughter and a slowly building pot of boiling frustration in the good Sister. But it could only go on until the limits of Sister Leonore’s patience were breached and explosively overwhelmed. If you listened closely, you could hear the tension rising in her voice; her aggravation level bubbling over. You knew it was just a matter of time.

“Children …. Be Quiet. OK … That’s enough. Sit down, please. OK, class, Let’s get back to work. Class … Class … Please be quiet! Class … Class …

“SHUT UP!!!”

Ah … the memories …