Scouting report

Your superior correspondents were startled last week to discover that the two local Boy Scout councils, the Narragansett Council and the Moby Dick Council, will be merging into one larger organization. With all the problems the Boys Scouts have had because of their totally boneheaded ban on gay Scouts and Scout leaders, reorganization isn't exactly what we were thinking about. Of course, this new realignment could be the first step in a declaration of independence from the national organization, run as it is by clueless troglodytes.

What is truly surprising, however, is that this new entity would retain the name "Narragansett" and dispense with the far more colorful "Moby Dick," which is laden with literary, historical, and cultural significance. Phillipe & Jorge, of course, would have much preferred retaining the Melville-inspired moniker, while tacking on the empowering credo, "Our johnsons are whales."

Chutzpah boy

For those wondering when the "compassionate" part of "compassionate conservatism" will finally make its appearance, the answer is, it already has. In case you hadn't noticed, the formula is compassion for the rhetoric, rigid conservatism for the policy.

Giving the commencement address last week at Notre Dame University, Dubya went out of his way to ally himself rhetorically with the forces of compassion and progressive thought, praising two presidents, Lyndon B. Johnson and Bill Clinton, who he couldn't be farther from in terms of ideology.

Most audacious of all, however, (as Hendrick Hertzberg points out in this week's New Yorker), was Bush quoting Dorothy Day, founder of the Catholic Worker movement, legendary left-wing agitator, and true American Saint of the Streets. For those unfamiliar with Day, we suggest you scurry down to the closest library and read up on one of the most extraordinary figures of the 20th century, an advocate of pacifism, voluntary impoverishment, and true service to the poor and suffering.

Bush's "tax cut" is just about the polar opposite of Dorothy Day's perspective on economic justice. It represents an upward realignment of wealth that will give the richest one percent thousands a month in savings, while offering the poorest a break of about $5.50 a month. Gee, thanks.

While the wealthy continue to receive tangible rewards, all the talk of spiritual renewal and anti-materialism is aimed at the poor. Never before has the phrase, "don't listen to what they say, watch what they do," meant more than it does with the Bush/Cheney right-wing ideologues in charge.

Rolling heads at EDC

Your superior correspondents were quite surprised to learn that Tom Schumpert, director of Little Rhody's Economic Development Corporation, summarily cashiered Ron Patalano, one of his top execs last week. This is especially shocking after Schumpert -- Governor Bigfoot's water carrier for the Quonset Point megaport debacle -- recently told his Quonset Point/Davisville advisory board that any QPD decisions are made at a level above his. In other words, "Hi folks, I'm Linc Almond's hand puppet."

P&J are led to believe that Patalano's ouster was directly linked to his calling into question Schumpert's back-channels decision to close the steam plant at QPD. It seems Tom was upset that Patalano supposedly pointed out in a memo that the land on which the steam plant is situated would be of little value to QPD, as previously argued, due to its proximity to the air strip on the old base. It could only really be used for parking, or perhaps storing shipping containers. (That loud sound you heard was the other shoe dropping.)

Schumpert -- who was steamed up himself at a recent QPD advisory board hearing about his finagling -- and his EDC staff have been far from forthcoming with the QPD board, focusing instead on making the full EDC board dance to whichever tune is called by the Missing Linc. Perhaps this is why QPD advisory board members aren't sure if Patalano's replacement will be one of those EDC officials known, before being caught, for some very creative use of credit cards. Arf!

Living wage

A proposal in front of the Providence City Council to provide a "living wage" (estimated at about $12.30 an hour) for "employees of the city, of substantial city contractors, subcontractors, and beneficiaries of tax, loan, grant and other subsidy assistance" has met with unprecedented scorn from the likes of the BeloJo and Providence Business (as Usual) News editorial pages. The proposal also mandates either family health insurance for covering employees and their dependents or an additional wage of $4.02 to cover health costs.

The "living wage" initiative is part of a national movement that would address the growing inequities in the American system. That the gap between rich and poor has grown at an astonishing rate throughout the recent US boom years isn't even debatable. And while your superior correspondents can see that there are numerous problems with this particular proposal, we'd still hope that those in economic and political power might see this more as a challenge than as an insult.

What do the Other Paper, the PBN, the Greater Providence Chamber of Commerce, and more-breaks-for-the-rich politicians, like Senate Majority Leader Bill "Napoleon" Irons, suggest as a counter proposal? Or is everything so rosy for the middle-income and poor that the only alternative is more of the usual trickle-down snake oil?

People are struggling. Whenever a concrete attempted solution is proposed, it receives nothing but derision from the six- and seven-figures-a-year set. The prevailing "rising tide lifts all yachts" philosophy is apparently just fine with the economic elite, who have yet to proffer any ideas for expanding real opportunities for lower-level wage earners. Just for once we'd really like to see some thought given to that.

Poppy's boy

There was a very telling sidebar in the New York Times about Senator Jim Jeffords's decision last week, to nationwide huzzahs, to leave the GOP. Jeffords obviously had all he could take from little Georgie and manipulators like Big Time Cheney and Rummy Rumsfeld (but isn't it nice seeing Trent Lott have to bend over and grab his ankles?).

At any rate, the Times chased down Jeffords' mentor, Robert Stafford, the former Vermont governor and US senator, at his home in Shrewsbury after Jeffords announced he would become an independent. It turned out that Stafford was on the phone with none other than Poppy Bush when the reporter knocked on the door. Poppy, who, like Dubya, was born on third base and thought he hit a triple, was trying to help out little Sonny Boy by persuading fellow Republican Stafford to help Jeffords change his mind. As usual, it was Daddy trying to ride to the rescue of one of his spoiled rotten little tykes, and using the family pull to attain what Dubya is incapable of doing on his own. This is much in the way that his parents have set him up all his life, even as the Dubster somehow persists in thinking he's a self-made man.

And where, we might ask, was the baying by the ink-stained wretches of the Fourth Estate this Memorial Day, when Dubya made his addresses to veterans at Arlington National Cemetery, the Tomb of the Unknowns, and the Women's Memorial in Washington? Georgie was just as devious in dodging the draft as his predecessor, President Billary, who was hammered by the media and right-wingers every Memorial Day for his supposed lack of fitness for anything involving the military. But wasn't it Dubya who had it hushed up when he failed to report for duty with the Alabama National Guard during the Vietnam War? Now, what's worse, dodging or going AWOL? Perhaps the American Legion will tell us in due time.

Our own horn

The redoubtable Jorge, aka Rudy Cheeks, aka Bruce McCrae, will be presented with an Alumni Excellence Award at the University of Rhode Island this Saturday, June 2. The '72 graduate will be recognized for his work as a musician, comedian, columnist, radio talk show host, and for performing at fund-raisers for dozens of community agencies and benefits for injured, ill, or deceased musicians without insurance. Cheeks has been writing a weekly newspaper column for more than 20 years, first with the Providence Eagle and then with the Providence Phoenix. He's also news and features director at WFNX (103.7 FM). Congratulations, Rudy! -- Ed.

Great minds . . .

There was a recent scandal when a North London hospital was found to have employed a cleaner who had tuberculosis - not exactly the kind of fellow you'd want wandering the wards. In an effort to further expose the lax hiring habits at the hospital, the satiric magazine Private Eye pointed out that Paul McMullan, a News of the World reporter, applied for a job as a porter without receiving any health checks or hygiene training. "Great scoop!" the Eye exulted.

They also pointed out it was an overnight sensation. It turned out that when McMullan showed up for his first day at work, the person who taught him the ropes had only been there a week himself. The kicker was that the "teacher" was a reporter-cum-spy from a rival paper, the Sunday Mirror who, like McMullan, had gone undercover to air the hospital's dirty laundry.

Send scuttlebutt, tonic, and Pulitzer-grade tips to p&j[a]phx.com.

---

The P & J archives

---