The shootist

The Pulitzer Prize committee might as well pack up one of their awards and FedEx it to our old pal, Rachel Ritchie, the Urinal's primo photog, for her pix of the August 6 shooting at the Puerto Rican festival. The dramatic shot -- of David Fontanez holding a gun while moving through the crowd -- stopped your superior correspondents in our tracks when we saw the paper in a BeloJo sales box on Monday morning. Rachel displayed more courage and cool under fire, almost literally, than anyone could imagine, and her commitment means that one more pendejo with no brains and a gun will be off the streets.

No points at all, though, to the Providence police, who seized Rachel's film after the incident. This despite her telling an officer that she thought she caught the perp on film. If Major Martin Hames, the eedjit who fielded questions for Chief Barney Prignano, is the best the department has to offer as a PR man, we suggest that grunting and being generally incoherent is not a great way to say "Sorry" about the treatment doled out to Ms. Ritchie.

Bonus points to Joel Rawson, executive editor of the Urinal, who fielded questions for Rachel from every media outlet, from CNN to this distinguished rag, to keep the heat off her, and for refraining from calling the cops on their heavy-handed treatment of his employee. Phillipe and Jorge say this all the time to everyone's general surprise, given our ongoing criticism of La Prov's august organ, but thanks to folks like Rachel Ritchie, the BeloJo remains one of the top papers of its size in the country.

Now how about settling that union dispute, Mr. Management Types? While Rachel and other staffers shine, you're making yourselves look like assholes.

Any old Joe

A shocking choice by Al "Two-by-four" Gore in selecting Senator Joe Lieberman as his vice presidential candidate.

Phillipe and Jorge have thought for a long time -- and sorrowfully said as much in this space -- that given the nasty undercurrent of anti-Semitism in this country, it's more likely a black will be elected president or veep before a Jew. This makes Lieberman's anointment very fraught with peril for the Democratic ticket, despite the decency of the senator, and his courage in speaking his mind about moral and ethical issues, especially those involving the cuckold-in-chief, President Billary.

We hope we stand corrected come November, but as the recent race by African-American Harvey Gant for Jesse Helms's Senate seat in North Carolina showed, many people will conveniently lie to pollsters about their prejudices before revealing their bias when they go into the voting booth. And having a wife named Hadassah, which is Hebrew for Hillary, sure ain't gonna help. Good luck, Joe -- you're going to need it.

'Compassionate conservatism' in action

We can't help but take one last shot at the GOP Convention in Philadelphia. You may have seen news reports of the Texas delegation's doffing of their cowboy hats when Representative Jim Kolbe of Arizona got up to speak about free trade issues. Apparently, the delegation from Dubya's home state was exercised that Kolbe is openly gay. The Texas delegation was also reported to display a placard that read, "You can be cured," and to include some guy with a cane holding an upside down American flag (a signal of distress). P&J must say that we were distressed as well, a condition that might be cured if the guy with the cane and flag would just shove one of those poles up his wazoo, where it so rightly belongs.

The chair of the Texas delegation, Susan Weddington, was quoted as saying about Kolbe's brief, not-in-prime-time appearance, "It gives the opportunity for radical gay rights advocates to claim victory for their agenda." Say whuh? The man's a Republican talking about trade policy. What planet is Weddington on?

Charlie's a homie

In Sunday's BeloJo, film critic Michael Janusonis, writing about this week's Rhode Island International Film Festival, commented on all the films, directors and actors with Vo Dilun ties. Unfortunately, he gave short shrift to Charlie Rocket, a featured performer in a few of the films, claiming "sometimes . . . the connection to Rhody is more of a stretch, such as the string of films starring Charlie Rocket, who got his start as a local TV newscaster before going on to things like Saturday Night Live."

The fact is that Senor Rocket, nee Claverie, lived in Providence for more than 10 years, starting in 1967, when he first attended RISD as a photography major. Charlie was a well-known fixture in the local boho underground of the late '60s and early '70s, playing in bands like Snake & the Snatch, Pigtown and the Fabulous Motels. He was also on the radio (with cohort Dan Gosch) as Captain Packard & Lobo, ridiculous "ecology super heroes." Some folks may remember Charlie from his brief stint making sandwiches at Joe's (later rechristened Geoff's), or as one of the original bartenders at the legendary watering hole Leo's. Charlie's wife, Beth (another RISD grad), is a Barrington native, their son Zane did a year at RISD, and innumerable family and friends of Swiss Family Rocket still reside in the Biggest Little. We proudly count him as one of our own.

By the way, we highly recommend you check out Carlo's Wake at the festival. Charlie's in it, along with Martin Landau, Rita Moreno, Helen Slater, Theresa Saldana and a host of other well-known Hollywood performers. It's being shown Friday, August 11 at 9 p.m. at the RISD Auditorium. It was written and directed by another local-guy-made-good, RIC grad Mike Valerio. Also, don't miss URI alum Fred Joyal's production, Gentleman Bandit, to be shown Saturday, August 12 at 7 p.m. at the RISD Auditorium.

Dog spelled backward

A tip of the beret and sombrero to the folks at the Pentecostal Community Christian Church of God, which lies snuggled next to the road to the Kingston train station, off Route 138 in South County. Last week, Phillipe and Jorge took special notice of their sign board in front of the church, which contained the following message: "God is looking for spiritual fruit, not religious nuts." In the day of self-satisfied, soi-disant "born again Christians," like Dubya Bush and Al Whore, we find that message both inspiring and comforting.

Jurassic Spice

If the GOP convention made you sick, at least the Urinal's reporters in Philly had the good sense to keep the yucks coming by turning to Vo Dilun Republican delegate Eileen "Jurassic Spice" Slocum for her usual wisdom. M. Chuckie Bakst caught Jurassic Spice in fine form in his August 3 column, questioning her about Hillary Clinton.

"She's the type of fearful woman no one would want to marry," said our state's number one GOP supporter, invoking images in P&J's mind of Eileen herself in her nubile days. "She stands, really, against all the principles of good American women: home, motherhood, husband's career, in that order."

Whoo-eee, Ms. Slocum! You're right in sync with most women's feelings with those remarks -- provided this is 1919, instead of the year 2000. And the state's GOP wonders why it has trouble recruiting anyone, never mind any gal who isn't a candidate for The Stepford Wives, to their party. Keep Jurassic Spice out in front, gang -- the entire Democratic machine thanks you.

Brown-nosed

Your superior correspondents are madder than k.d. lang at a boys choir convention (as our friend Ed Anger might say) at the sanctions imposed on the Brown football team, which will keep them, due to questionable recruiting violations, from officially competing for the Ivy League championship that they were co-winners of last season. To suggest that Brown, the Rodney Dangerfield of Ivy football, is doing anything that Harvard and Yale haven't been brushing under the rug for years is too much to believe. Either that, or please explain how puppet head Stone Phillips of ABC, who may have been the model for William Hurt's character in the movie, Broadcast News, ever got a Yale degree inside 20 years while playing quarterback for the football team, and we'll buy the fact that the Elis are recruiting people with positive IQs for their athletic teams. Pul-eeze!

Local activist jailed

Phillipe & Jorge recently received an e-mail concerning a local activist Camilo Viveiros, a native of Fall River and Providence resident, who was arrested during the Philadelphia protests. The circumstances surrounding his arrest are unclear, but he has been detained in Philly since August 1. His lawyer was not allowed to meet with him until August 4, and bail has been set at $44,000. He's reportedly in need of medical attention and is being held separately from the other activists. A party to raise money for Camilo was held August 6 at Julian's. Those who would like to lend a hand can send donations to: Camilo Viveiros Jr., c/o Joseph Fletcher, 22 Nashua St., Providence, RI 02904. To read articles about what went down in Philly, use this Independent Media Center Web site: www.phillyimc.org/newswire.pl.

Jiggy JARheads

Was that our pal R.J. Heim on the air last Friday evening trumpeting the "exclusive" Channel 10 story about the state Economic Development Commission's forthcoming Quonset announcement, the same story that the Urinal hinted at a day or so earlier? Since the EDC put out a news release on Friday, August 4 at 11 a.m. announcing the news conference for Monday, August 7, we have to wonder exactly what an "exclusive" is over in JARland.

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