Fishing At DeWitt Pond

Alderman Fred Wessels wants the city health department to do something about the piece of real estate north of the ballpark that was supposed to be filled with office space, shops and condos by now.

Wessels is right on.  The spring and early summer has been so rainy that the depressed part of the theoretical Ballpark Village has become a permanent pond.  In fact, “DeWitt Pond,” as it is referred to colloquially, has become a fishing hole.  Unfortunately, it’s probably also mosquito breeding heaven.

Short Arm of the Law

Why do parking enforcement cars in St. Louis City have police-style revolving lights on their roofs?  Parking enforcement officers are supposed to write tickets and put them on cars that aren’t moving.  Does someone at City Hall think that a parked car getting a parking ticket is all of a sudden make like KITT and speed away, such that the parking enforcement officer will have to turn the roof lights on and give chase?  After all, the parking enforcement cars are all four-door Chevy Cobalts (maybe Aveos) — like the Chevy Citation of the 1980s, it is physically impossible to get a speeding citation if you drive the civilian version.

Answer

Right-Wing Neighbor of Mine:  The black radicals booed him.  Why did he even go there to speak, the dumbass panderer?”

Blogmeister:  You just answered your own question.

I Hope He Wasn’t Recruiting

Mayor Slay gave University of Missouri head football coach Gary Pinkel the key to the city today, in honor of the school’s best season in more than a generation.  Pinkel’s first use of the key was to head on over to the St. Louis City juvenile lockup and give a motivational speech to the “residents.”

If he thinks the next Chase Daniel is somewhere in St. Louis’s junior graybar hotel, he’s fooling himself.

Si Slay Puede

Mayor Slay’s for amnesty, and in that spirit, he wants to know your thoughts on the matter.

Does Vince Schoemehl Want To Be Mayor Again?

We found out about a month ago that former St. Louis Mayor Vince Schoemehl has essentially endorsed Obama for President, while the current occupant of Room 200, a very similar figure in the person of Francis Slay, is for HRC.

Now guess who, in spite of his history, is siding with the Lizz Brown wing of city politics in support of former Fire Chief Sherman George and against Slay?  Yep.

Methinks old S sees enough of an opening that he thinks he can ride the disgruntled blacks of this city and beat new S in March 2009.

SCAMs

Mayor Slay:

STDs

According to the national Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the City ranks high among US cities in the rate of infection for such sexually transmitted diseases as HIV, Chlamydia, and Gonorrhea.

Who has them? The City’s Health Department recently sent over some sobering statistics: approximately 31 percent of all STD cases are among teenagers, 12 to 18 years old. And 90 percent of STD cases (in which race is known) are African Americans.

That data is important because there are no cures or vaccines for HIV or AIDS, and because many STDS cause irreversible health problems. Knowing who is most likely to be infected and when, helps City health officials focus their efforts in the right places to save lives and improve health outcomes on prevention programs.

Really?  When a group of more than 60 “residents” at the city’s juvenile lockup, who fit into those “sobering statistics” of those most at risk, allowed themselves to be tested, not one of them was positive for HIV/AIDS.  The article didn’t say if any (or how many) tested positive for other STDs, but if it was high, I imagine the article would have said how many.

How does that work?  And how much money does the St. Louis City Health Department get because we all so think that STD infection rates are as high as they want us to think?

Leave Elliot Davis Alone. Everyone Else (Including Yourself) Is Fair Game.

Larry Salci (above), the CEO of Metro St. Louis (formerly Bi-State), the agency that runs the public transportation system in the St. Louis area, was recorded by KTVI-2’s cameras and microphones as telling “You Paid for It” Reporter Elliot Davis that he was a clown, and that he fits right into St. Louis.

Reportedly, that “fitting right in” line was a subtle barb at Mayor Francis Slay.  And quite honestly, he might as well have included himself — after all, he was heading Metro during the Metro Link expansion debacle, where the most recent leg of the light rail system was zillions over budget and eons late, because of idiot know-nothing affirmative action contractors.

I Have Many Bones to Pick With This Mayor, But…

…Recalling him, or countenancing the idea of recalling him, would be stupid, and only play into the hands of the Lizz Brown wing of St. Louis politics, and their anger over Sherman George.  It’s not as if the choice is Francis Slay vs George Wallace.  When it comes to St. Louis Mayoral politics, you’re either going to get a pandering white, or a Bosleyite black.  (Clarence Harmon was an accident of history, IMO).  Remember, if Slay is recalled, the President of the Board of Aldermen becomes Mayor, and that is currently Lewis Reed.

Keep that in mind as any pro-recall PR tries to use white themes to appeal to white city voters.  They’re trying to trick you.

This Tune Sounds Familiar

P-D:

The Police Department got a $260,000 boost from a crowd that turned out Tuesday to hear shop talk from sportscasters Joe Buck and Dan Dierdorf at the St. Louis Police Foundation’s inaugural luncheon.

The foundation was established to raise money to supplement the department’s regular budget with private contributions. The fundraiser was at the America’s Center downtown.

Proceeds are earmarked for roof repairs at the mounted patrol stables in Forest Park, improving canine unit facilities, buying equipment for the hostage response team, and an upgrade in body armor.

“The luncheon was very exciting, and was truly an historic moment,” said Police Board President Chris Goodson, a key player in setting up the foundation.

Like the parents of soldiers in Iraq that have to hustle money together to buy the body armor that the Pentagon won’t, as those no-bid contracts for political friends are the top priority in spending money on a war or occupation, the cops in this town have to pass the hat around and hope that the civic boosters put in enough money for the local gendarmes to have body armor, and for their horses not to have a leaky roof on top of their stables.

Since St. Louis City Hall isn’t fighting any wars, I wonder where all the money is going that it has to be raised from private sources?

Lipstick on a Pig

Francis Slay named by Esquire as America’s best-dressed mayor.

New to the Blogroll

Lewis Reed.  The President of the St. Louis City Board of Aldermen starts a blog/vlog.

“Gas and Go” to Stop in City

If Alderman Bill Waterhouse has his way.

Though I don’t know if he will have his way, because pumping and running is a way that many of our diverse citizens get gas, and the city’s black aldermen will probably whine about “disparate impact” and “racism” in relation to this proposal.

The Missouri Petroleum Marketers and Convenience Store Association has come down with the Home Depot Syndrome. From the P-D:

But the Missouri Petroleum Marketers and Convenience Store Association opposes the pre-pay rule. Kansas City and a few other western Missouri communities recently adopted similar requirements, said association President Ronald J. Leone.

“This is a bad idea that appears to be gaining ground,” Leone said from the association’s office in Jefferson City. “Our members have ways to deal with gas theft, and we should leave it up to the individual retailer. We’re against this sort of government intervention in the free market.”

It doesn’t appear that your members are “dealing” with gas theft well enough, except that they will pay higher insurance premiums, and charge consumers more in areas that have more driver-offers. Other than forcing prepayment at the pump, the only way to “deal with gas theft” is to have agents of governments, (i.e. police, prosecutors, jail and prison supervisors, probation and parole officers), spend time and money to pursue, apprehend, prosecute, jail or imprison, and/or probationally supervise gas thieves, assuming they are successful in each stage of the process.  In St. Louis, government agents in that stead have many bigger and more worrisome fish to fry.  But all that involves the same kind of “government intervention” that they complain that this bill does.

As for this business about “government intervention in the free market,” a fundamental tenet of economics is that a transaction takes place when two people have something, and each person wants what the other has more than what he already possesses. This implies that each person gives up that which he doesn’t want as much to get that which he wants more. It doesn’t imply that one person gets something from the other and gets to keep what the other person wanted from him. Waterhouse’s bill therefore preserves the essence, instead of spiting, of free market economics.

Guns vs Hoses

The St. Louis City Police Department has opened an investigation of the St. Louis City Fire Department. There are allegations that a Fire Commander took recruits at the Fire Academy away from training in groups of four at a time, for a total of twenty recruits affected, and made them clear junk and debris from an apartment building the Commander owned. The news of the Police investigation of the Fire Department broke yesterday.

Today, Fire Department officials are fighting back, claiming that it’s all political, based on the fact that City Hall has been trying to force the Fire Department (against its will) to promote a bunch of white firemen. A recent promotion test, based on skill and qualifications, showed that nearly all of those that should be promoted are white, and the affirmative action junkies that run the Fire Department took it to Federal court, and lost, i.e. the courts said the test was not discriminatory. Since that point, City Hall has been lobbying to the Fire Department to make the promotions formally, but they’re dragging their heels.

It’s a goofy theory, and here’s why.

In the first place, City Hall has almost no control over the Police Department, as black anti-police activist keep reminding us. Four of the five members of the Police Board are chosen by Missouri’s Governor, while the Mayor gets the fifth seat. So even if City Hall wanted to use the Police Department to do this or anything, it couldn’t make them.

Second, the Police Department is run by the same mentality of affirmative action goober that runs the Fire Department. I don’t think that the PD would engage in a politically-motivated vendetta on the FD based on the fact that the FD wants to use affirmative action. The PD wouldn’t do that sort of thing either at the behest of others, or on its own.

That’s why I think this investigation is legit.

Here’s (the Illusion of) Help

P-D reports on the spike in the crime rates of major American cities, including St. Louis.

Mayor Slay tries to beat the bad news to the pass by telling us that the city is already doing something about it. Among the deja le meme chose line items are: (1) The Police Department has created a special anti-crime unit to target the small coterie of people that commit a majority of the violent crimes. (Ignoring the fact that they’ll all be sprung out of the clink and let back out onto the streets when Federal or state courts declare that the overworked Public Defenders office couldn’t provide them adequate counsel.) (2) The Circuit Attorney’s office is reciprocating the cops’ efforts and creating a special “career criminals unit” of prosecutors in her office. (Forgetting the fact that such “career criminals” have the luxury of having at least a few black jurors, meaning nullification.) (3) Recreation centers and programs are on the way. (Crimes at recreation centers are such a frequent occurrence that I have created a category for news of them on this blog.)

It’s Just a Street

Which way? Or boulevard, or highway, or freeway?

P-D Political Fix:

A tad pressed today, but I wanted to give you some updates from this morning’s Board of Aldermen meeting:

The push to name part of Fourth Street in honor of Dred Scott was nearly sidetracked when Freeman Bosley Sr. inquired what would it take to name the area “Dred Scott Boulevard” instead of Dred Scott Way.

It could be done, the Boz was told, but not without printing a new sign.

It’s a street, and Boz Sr. wants to call it a boulevard. Why not go all the way and call it “Dred Scott Freeway?”

Some Voter Fraud Is More Equal Than Others

KSDK-NBC-5:

Three people who were part of a petition drive to oust St. Louis alderman Jeffrey Boyd are now accused of election fraud.

On Thursday, prosecutors filed felony election violations against Linda Rogers, Sebekhu Smith and Charles Keller.

The St. Louis Circuit Attorney’s office said many of the signatures collected in 2005 by the 22nd Ward Democratic Organization were not valid and obtained illegally.

Assistant Circuit Attorney Scott Ingram said Rogers, Smith and Keller were responsible for collecting and witnessing signatures under oath.

According to a probable cause statement, hundreds of signatures were collected while the three were not present and many of the signatures appear fraudulent.

Each person faces a maximum of five years in prison and a $10,000 fine.

The recall effort against Boyd failed because of a lack of valid signatures.

More black voter fraud in St. Louis City; I’m so shocked.

Actually, the thing to note here is the double standard in the St. Louis City Circuit Attorney’s office.  We didn’t hear boo from them, nor the Federal prosecutors, when the black political machine in north St. Louis was stealing elections from white candidates in the years between 1987 and 1993.  It’s only when another black politician is the intended victim does the C.A.’s office spring into action.  I wonder if Alderman Boyd pulled some strings.

Sorry, Mayor. This Isn’t Good News.

Mayor Slay:

One of the City’s highest (and long-running) legislative priorities in Washington, DC, took an important step forward this week. H.R. 1700, the House version of S. 368, was approved by the House Judiciary Committee.

The bill, The COPS Improvement Act of 2007, would help cities like St. Louis pay for more police officers and prosecutors, and better crime-fighting technology.

There’s plenty of legislative reconciling and maneuvering standing between this bill and final passage, but the progress is heartening.

I don’t think it’s heartening. It will only further place the Federal government in control of the St. Louis City Police Department.

Say What?

Mayor Francis Slay, doing his best President Bush “ambiguous malapropism” imitation, in his State of the City address delivered today at City Hall:

“I want to increase the number of chronically unemployed citizens who are prepared for the workplace.“

One could take this to mean that he wants more unemployed people in St. Louis.

No Obamagasm For Slay

Endorses HRC.

The article says that Slay supported Kerry in 2004.  He did more than that, he was the National Campaign Co-Chairman for Finance.

But He Likes Their Business

From the blog of our two-faced mayor:

During the next several days, more than fifty-five thousand visitors will step up to the main registration desk at America’s Center. After they pick up their convention credentials and schedules, they will likely head out to the City’s restaurants and stores, entertainment venues, parks, and cultural institutions. They’ll probably take in a Cardinals game at Busch Stadium — and they might walk up to Ellen Curlee’s nifty art gallery on Washington Avenue, stop at Bob Ray’s Washington Avenue Post barbecue stand for a burger, or visit Bob Cassilly’s City Museum to gawk. Adventuresome people will end up at the Shangri-La diner on Cherokee Street, at The Royale on S. Kingshighway, at Crown Candy in Old North St. Louis, or the Atomic Cowboy in the Grove.

Assuming good weather, these visitors will leave behind more than $10 million when they go back home. That, of course, is why we have a convention center – and a full-time team to market St. Louis as a friendly destination.

Mayor Slay is referring to this weekend’s National Rifle Association in St. Louis.

This is the same Francis Slay who did nothing but moan and whine and bitch and caterwaul about conceal-carry, the Missouri NRA’s top statewide legislative priority for about 15 years until it was universally adopted by all counties in the state.

He doesn’t like their legislative agenda, but he sure likes their business.

Note to NRA members: If you’re coming to the Convention, and you take Mayor Slay seriously, and go to Cherokee Street or to Crown Candy Kitchen, and you have current CCW privileges, make sure you’re carrying. Missouri recognizes valid CCW permits from all states.

UDPATE 5:20 PM: The runup to the NRA convention here has seen no controversy, even though there are plenty of gnats around here and their willing accomplices in the media who could cause it. However, all three TV newscasts today at 5 PM trumpeted “controversy” or “major controversy” about the convention.

As it turns out, all it is is B.T. Rice, the local analogue to Al Sharpton, complaining about how there will be guns for sale at the convention, so near high-crime neighborhoods, and how some billboards promoting the convention are in those high-crime areas.

Rice may be shocked by what I’m about to say, and this might befuddle his relatively feeble mind, but guns possess no evil demon totemistic spirits nor powers on their own to join gangs or commit crimes.

UPDATE 4/13:  From KSDK-NBC-5:

Despite the high attendance, the NRA has its critics including St. Louis pastor B.T. Rice.

Rice isn’t happy the convention has come to St. Louis because he said it will encourage people to buy guns.

“Why are we promoting more guns when guns have caused such a devastating effect in communities like St. Louis (City) and St. Louis County?” said Rice.

Rice is especially unhappy with convention billboards that he said promote “acres of guns.”

No guns are being sold at this weekend’s event, however they can be ordered.

The fact that guns aren’t sold at NRA conventions has legal reasons behind it.

First, if you buy any gun (handgun or long gun) from a dealer (i.e. a federally-licensed firearms dealer, as opposed to a sale between non-prohibited individuals), then you have to buy it from an FLFD that resides in, and has his business in, the same state in which you reside, and the transaction actually has to happen in that state.  Many of the vendors and conventioneers will be from out of state, and even if the dealer and conventioneer happen to be from the same state that is not Missouri, they can’t legally make a sale here.

Second, even if the vendor and purchaser are from Missouri, and the objects of consideration are handguns, Missouri laws about transferring concealable firearms mandates paperwork and about a week’s waiting period.  If it were a sale of long guns, and the dealer was a MO-based FLFD, a MO resident and the purchaser was from MO, then the sale can be made then and there, pending the instant background check.

The third reason has nothing to do with the law, but I’m sure the NRA would rather avoid PR headaches that they might get from figures with far more gravitas than the local cracker jack box black preacher mentioned above.  Because of the size of NRA conventions, they can’t hold them in anything but bigger cities that have more convention space and hotel accommodations, and surrounding attractions to draw crowds.  And when you’re dealing with big cities, you’re dealing with anti-gun politicians and police chiefs.  There are expedient concessions necessary here.

In past years, the NRA has had some star-crossed timing when it comes to their conventions.  For instance, their 1999 convention was scheduled for Denver for a weekend that turned out to be shortly after the Columbine massacre.

Blame the Building

A black man in his 40s is being sought by the St. Louis City Police Department, as he is suspected in abducting and raping a 14-year old young black man in north St. Louis city on Monday. The same suspect tried to but failed to abduct the same victim in January.

Sam Moore, the Alderman-Elect for the ward which the crime took place, is complaining that City Hall isn’t doing enough to tear down abandoned buildings, which are havens for these kind of crimes.

I think it’s a copout to blame buildings rather than perpetrators for crimes like these. There is nothing about an abandoned, run-down building that has ever tempted me to commit a felony.

ACC Whiffs On Reed Victory Analysis

The first DT&I version of the Arch City Chronicle since the upset victory of Lewis Reed over incumbent Jim Shrewsbury for Aldermanic President has hit the streets.  Dave Drebes, E&P for the ACC, has the feature article on the Reed victory.

Drebes bites the CW, claiming that contested aldermanic seats on the northside, and a rare contested Republican one on the southside (meaning Shrewsbury’s constituency would be blocked from voting for him in the 12th), combined to give Reed the victory.

However, the ACC’s own data dump demonstrates that CW is wrong here.  Turnout was higher on the southside, and especially in Shrewsbury’s back yard.  Furthermore, the Heitert/Browning R-race in the 12th didn’t draw that many votes.

I think the real story behind Reed’s victory is that enough white people stood down on Shrewsbury, (like myself), or actually voted for Reed.  One can rationalize the ACC not understanding this line of reasoning, because the logical inference, and the message that ACC-reading city politicians would take from it, is that white politicians have to pander to white voters and sensitivities to win.  Forbid that should ever happen…

What Say You, Mayor Slay?

San Francisco Chronicle:

Antwanisha Morgan was making the right choices, having learned from her family’s struggles as she grew up in San Francisco’s troubled Bayview.

The 17-year-old was set to graduate from South San Francisco High School in June. She had spent four years preparing for college. She was about to go on a bus tour to check out universities in the South.

But her promising life was cut short when she was gunned down outside a Bayview community youth center where she and her brother had been Friday night, an innocent victim of apparent gang violence, police say.

(Emphasis added for Mayoral eyes)

Mayor Slay Tells the Truth (For Once)

Ibid.:

A handful of students from the St. Louis Public Schools are camped out at City Hall. They hope to make their voices heard in the debate over the district’s future. I respect these young people. They are, in fact, why I am fighting to improve public education in the City.

The students came to City Hall, in part, because some adults told them that if the district loses state accreditation, its good students won’t be able to go to college. I reassured the worried students that would not be the case. And a well-researched story in today’s newspaper agrees.

I have met with these students – and have agreed to meet with them again. But, I also think they ought to be back in school now. Unfortunately, the adults who are “advising” them, including current members of the school board and senior district administrators, have convinced the students to remain out of school.

He might add a certain morning talk radio hostess to that list, though he is accusing “senior district administrators” of being provocateurs, and this does not surprise me.  The reason is that “senior district administrators” are opposed to the state takeover, because they fear the interim board would do a lot of cutting of needless fat from the school system’s bureaucracy, namely themselves.

The Mayor also points out that the Post-Dispatch exposed the supposed students’ main supposed fear, not earning scholarships based on their graduation from an unaccredited district, as a red herring.

I’m glad to see that Mayor Slay and the Post-Dispatch recognize political fraudulence for what it is.

The Sitter-Inners Manifesto

Here are the ten demands of those engaging in the City Hall Sit-In.

1. Do not take away our accreditation before the end of the school year

Just pretend that the city schools are good schools only until Memorial Day.

2. Contact Missouri Colleges and Universities and provide statement/proof from them that the lack of accreditation will not have any negative impact on our scholarships or admissions to college

No worry; the effect will be just the opposite. They will take pity on you.

3. Make no final decision before the April election

Newsflash: The April general elections in St. Louis City don’t matter, save that for school board, because St. Louis City is a one-party city. March is where all the action resides.

4. “Play By They Rules” - Give us provisional accreditation until 2008

But learn some grammar first.

5. Show us your educational plan that would be put into place if you take away our accreditation

And what good will any such plan do?

6. Explain in writing why you are treating our district differently then other districts

Last time I looked, Mayor Slay wasn’t the Mayor of Chesterfield

7. Provide proof that you have talked to the students of the SLPS before you decided to support a State take over

8. Provide a forum for a student-based discussion on a State take over

Provide proof that you as a 16- or 17-year old paid city real estate property taxes or rent on a city apartment.

9. Provide proof that you will keep your promises

You all can’t be THAT naive, can you?

10. No retaliation against us for our actions

What “retaliation” do you think that the Mayor could or would try on high school students? Do you actually believe Lizz Brown’s agitprop that you’re liable now to have Slay talk to Mokwa and have him send that secret white-hooded outfit of the SLPD to your house where they’ll swing a knife through your gut while you’re studying for the SATs?

Obviously, nobody is going to retaliate against you, because everybody with a brain knows that you didn’t invoke this. These are all doings of Lizz Brown, Eric Vickers and school board member Donna Jones, and probably other older adults.

It’s Worse Than That

KSDK:

St. Louis police and firefighters won a multimillion-dollar victory against the City of St. Louis this week, but thousands of local officers, firefighters, widows, and retirees may not realize just how much their pensions are owed.

They don’t make a lot of money, and they don’t collect Social Security. So when they retire, officers and firefighters rely heavily on their pensions — something the City of St. Louis has shortened by an estimated $90 million.

James Owen, a St. Louis Police retirement system attorney, said that for 50 years the City of St. Louis fully funded officer’s pensions. But in 2003, he said the city arbitrarily decided to contribute only six percent of payroll.

Back in the days when that local radio station whose mascot is a wildebeest was worth listening to, they had a host named Gary Wiegert, who was at one time the President of the St. Louis Police Officers Association (SLPOA), the dominant union of city cops.

He informed his listeners that not only did the city quit paying all the monies they should have to the cops’ pension fund (he did not say anything about firefighters), the cops’ pension fund was so well managed that they didn’t need all the city’s lawfully required contribution, that their fund would be self-sustaining for years, although it only allowed for at most 75% of payscale-at-retirement pension levels, and that the city’s non-contribution was the reason why it couldn’t be 100%.

But it’s worse than that, Wiegert made the contention that the city was trying to borrow money from the cops’ pension to finance public housing projects, essentially meaning that those “loans” would be grants. So the city didn’t put in the money it should have, and tried to sneak money out of the fund.

Lizz Brown Provokes SLPS Students to Engage in City Hall Sit-In

KTVI-Fox-2:

St. Louis public school students stage a sit in at city hall. They arrived at Mayor Francis Slay’s office around 3:30pm hoping to present a list of demands concerning the mayor’s position on a state take over of the schools. The group told reporters they don’t like the idea that the district might lose accreditation. The Missouri Board of Education will make its decision next week.

About 10 protestors sat in the Mayor’s outer office. By six o’clock parents brought in pizza, though the building officially closed at 5pm. The students say they are tired of adults bickering over their education. And they don’t like the fact that Mayor Slay supports sate involvement in public schools. The seniors worry that a loss of accreditation will affect their chances to get into select universities. Sarah Smith is a senior at Gateway Tech High school. “Nobody has asked the students how we feel and that’s why we’re here, and we want people to know what we think because we’re the issue here”

KTVI’s reporting on the matter at 9 PM broadcasted the same implication, that these student sit-ins were spontaneous and self-organized.

Bullintegrity. Young people don’t do anything in the realm of this kind of political activism that isn’t provoked by older adults.

And KTVI’s own footage at 9 PM, unlike that which is linked to in this story, from 6 PM, provides the answer.

Lizz Brown. She was shown standing right in the thick of the sit-in.

As for Miss Smith’s contention, we’ll start taking you seriously when you produce a receipt for city property taxes that you paid, or rent receipts for city property. Otherwise, nobody cares how you feel.

Mr. Jackson, in the screenshot above, is worried that a disaccredited SLPS would mean the difference between him earning admission to a prestigious university and this not being so. Somehow, I think you know the answer to that charge already; I actually think that SLPS disaccreditation would work marginally in the favor of people like himself, especially like himself in one obvious characteristic.

UPDATE 9:50 PM: Eric Vickers was also there. He’s in the news lately because he’s about to get his law license back in spite of being massively in arrears in taxes. There’s a ringing endorsement. Also they get to stay all night in City Hall because Mayor Slay, who was in Jefferson City ironically lobbying for more charter schools, gave the squatters permission. Keep that in mind during the coming days while you listen to local MSM, talking heads, and morning revolutionaries blabber on about how bravely these “young men and women” engaged in “civil disobedience.” Sure, Lizz, and if any of them would get arrested for committing a crime, you would be calling them “babies.”

UPDATE 10:10 PM: KTVI has finally posted its video from the 9 PM story on this subject. Here are some screenshots:

There she is, Miss Africa, in the thick of it.

Oh to be a victim of repression and injustice, and to text message my peepz about it…

…and to endure a hunger strike…

…and with nothing but a MacBook using City Hall’s bandwidth to keep me company through my trials and tribulations.

Just about all of the students were wearing these professionally made and highly politicized T-shirts, (trespassing in Slay’s office, no less), and these shirts just smack of the total and unfettered spontaneity of youth protest (???).

UPDATE 3/15 @ 10:00 AM: Antonio French:

Using tactics out of the FBI stand-off handbook, city officials ordered the air conditioning to be turned off yesterday as St. Louis Public School students, some as young as 8 years-old, waited to speak to Mayor Francis Slay about the coming takeover of the school district.

Spare me.  The only reason they got to stay is because Slay gave them permission, through whatever calculation of pandering, posturing or patronizing went through his head.  Or maybe it would have looked too bad on TV to have city police and marshals toss teenagers out using physical force.

However, I won’t blame the authorities for using supposedly “FBI stand-off handbook” tactics, (even as the cops allowed their parents to bring pizza last night, and didn’t confiscate the students’ cell phones or laptops, and allowed them to use city hall’s bandwidth; some stand-off there), nor the young people themselves.  The blame goes to Lizz Brown, Eric Vickers et al. who provoked these young people into doing this.

The only “playbook” that’s being followed here is from the 1960s Civil Rights Movement, when older adults provoked young blacks into engaging in the riskiest street theater and demonstrations, that were too risky for the older adults themselves, and would have cost them the jobs we were all made to think they didn’t have in the evil white seggy south.

Reed vs Shrewsbury Data Dump

From a downloadable spreadsheet at Arch City Chronicle Blog.

Shrewsbury’s best ward got him 79.14% of their vote, and his worst ward was 13.07%.

Reed’s best ward was 86.93% of the vote, and his worst ward was 20.86% of the vote.

So Reed’s best got him more than Shrewsbury’s best, and Reed’s worst got him more than Shrewsbury’s worst.

Three of the top four wards in terms of total number of voters were heavily (70%+) Shrewsbury.  Overall, turnout was heavier in the south half of the city than the north.

So I think this is indicative of black voters in south city, moreso than white frustration with Shrewsbury.

Tales of a Prospering City

P-D:

A proposal by Rep. William Lacy Clay Jr., D-St. Louis, for Soldiers Memorial in downtown St. Louis to become a national monument — and relieve the city of the financial burden of its upkeep — was approved Monday by the House of Representatives.

“At a time when so many of our brave soldiers are sacrificing everything in Iraq and Afghanistan, landmarks that honor their service and the bravery of veterans from previous generations are extremely important to the American people,” Clay said.

Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., said she soon would introduce a companion bill in the Senate.

If the bill is approved in the Senate and signed into law by President George W. Bush, upkeep of the memorial would be transferred to the National Park Service.

Veterans and other groups have complained in recent years that the city has failed to keep up the Soldiers Memorial building and the museum inside.

Yet, people like Mayor Slay will continue to broadcast a voulez-vous les bon temps roulez attitude in public. Fancy that, a city supposedly as prosperous and revitalized as St. Louis can’t afford to maintain its own soldiers’ memorial.

Another thing the city can’t afford is to maintain its major urban boulevards. If you drive around in St. Louis city, especially on major avenues, you will notice that a lot of state route shields and state letter shields have gone up on some of those boulevards’ street light poles. That is because the state gave the city a gift a few years back, in that the state would designate some city boulevards as state routes, and thus assume financial responsibility for paving those roads and (in some cases) maintaining or rebuilding bridges and viaducts.