Thursday, March 12, 2009

It's Rabbit Season !!!!


If it walks like a ‘duck” and quacks like a “duck’ it’s probably a “duck”…. Or in this case maybe a DOK?

Well it is official. The Huddler has survived “endorsement week”. With the coming of St. Patrick’s day – Pittsburgh politics will be turned up a notch. It's officially rabbit season. As in those rascally rabbits - aka politicians that are chasing the vote of all of those democratic faithful that participate in the election process known as the democratic primary election.

The HUDDLER is not surprised to hear that the local democrats can’t even do an endorsement process without a scandal. The HUDDLER will say, that this can and probably does happen on a semi-regular basis. The odds are low, and it is certainly not the norm but it is still WRONG. The HUDDLER is referring to the committee person that took his aunt to the polls to vote in place of his mother. The HUDDLER would love to know more details on this one, but thinks that he will learn the answer to the decade old question of how many licks it does take to get to the center of a tootsie pop first….

The Huddler would like to know IF this Aunt showed the poll worker a photo ID?
The Huddler witnessed an event similar to this one, while waiting to vote, an elderly women was being assisted by her younger son in the poll. The HUDDLER heard the women say, “no I want to vote for the democrat” when the son said something to the effect that she did, before touching the screen and dragging her out by her arm. It takes a real piece of work to rob your elderly parent of their right to vote.

The Huddler hasn’t picked on the Hoagie in some time, so perhaps this was inevitable. (besides it tends to attract viewers to the blog, just kidding.) Apparently the HOAGIE has started accepting blog posts directly from the candidates. While the HUDDLER was tickled that someone apparently had an entire day to do research on the man now known as “DOK”, the huddler is highly suspicious that this info did not come from Ravenstahl’s campaign. And apparently the Coghill camp had the time to call the Hoagie and report the results of an independent witch hunt, where Coghill who just happened to know the address of this old lady, (because he put her roof on? Wonder if she got a discount if she supported his last run at office). You do not conduct your own investigation and got out banging on doors, to make accusations. There is a system in place to report discrepancies. Unless the candidates can show this happened on more than one occasion, the HUDDLER sees this vote standing. (Due to the margin) The HUDDLER is not the official white knight of the Wagner family. But for people to say they put this old lady and her son up to this is flat out wrong. Unless someone has proof that this occurred.

Moving on to the Mayoral ticket….
Let the HUDDLER be crystal clear, the HUDDLER is not impressed by “DOK”. DOK has several issues to resolve before his candidacy can be taken seriously. First DOK is not a Burgher. The HUDDLER is sure that if DOK had an odometer which accounted for the time DOK actually spent in the “city limits’ the hours would be extremely low. Unless you count throwing yourself birthday parties, clubbing, and being an “eternal” student at Pittsburgh institutions of higher learning. DOK reeks of the “spoiled” rich kid mentality. How is the average Pittsburgher going to identify with Franco Jr.? Has DOK ever faced the same issues of the average Pittsburgher? Cutbacks of City services? Bad neighbors? Absentee landlords? How to pay the taxes? How to pay the rent? Do I pay the light bill or get the kids new school shoes? The HUDDLER especially wasn’t won over by DOK walking the Mexican War streets with dad…. (as seen on you tube). The War Streets are great, but the HUDDLER would hardly consider them as the epicenter of life in the BURGH.

Getting back to the Hoagie, it seems like every anon poster out in the burghosphere has shit to talk on the Wagner Clan. The HUDDLER takes great pride in being able to predict winners in local races. However this district 4 race is truly testing the HUDDLER’s abilities. Perhaps the HUDDLER lacks the internal – behind the scenes access to poll every committee person out there. But the HUDDLER was shocked to see that Rudiak only pulled down 5 votes from the democratic committee. This is the same committee that she has served on for a considerable amount of time. The other two candidates nearly split the vote, with Patrick Reilly coming out on top by a few votes.


The HUDDLER must ask…. IF Rudiak only pulled down 5 committee votes, does she have what it takes to win this race? In addition, the HUDDLER did not think that Coghill would retain the influence and votes he carried the last time he ran for public office. This race will get more and more interesting in weeks to come.

The Huddler must give the Angry Drunk Bureaucrat a big old atta boy for keeping track of the notorious Pat Ford. While most of Pittsburgh is trying to forget this character, Bram kept his eye of the ball to report on Ford’s new gig. Just when the HUDDLER thought he had seen some of the most inept politicians, apparently someone actually hired Mr. Ford. Are these folks nuts in Maryland? Who would hire this train wreck?

The HUDDLER is once again apologizing to the burghosphere for a lack of posts. It has been six days since the Huddler pushed this drabble of comments, thoughts, and run on sentences, onto the viewers in the burghosphere. The HUDDLER just hasn’t been feeling the urge to write. Therefore the HUDDLER will be accepting applications for a co-blogger. SO anyone interested in writing here at the HUDDLER, can send an email to thehuddler@gmail.com.

The HUDDLER likes to think that any decent blog has more than one contributor. And the Huddler’s only purpose in life is to improve the burghosphere, and save the working class. Right now the former sounds a lot easier. So if you are interested in blogging at the HUDDLER….. Send the HUDDLER your best shot at writing down your thoughts, with a touch of sarcasm, attitude, and your personal twist on things as you see them.

15 comments:

Lady Elaine said...

Actually, Angry reported on Ford. Not that I'm being picky.

THE HUDDLER said...

Its all a BLURR... Hudd stands corrected.

Anonymous said...

wagners are thugs!

Schultz said...

Excellent post Hudd. I have to say that a lot of people have the same first impressions that you have of one F. Dok Harris. You shouldn't fault him because his father happened to be Franco Harris, or because he was able to not only attend but excel at some elite of the universities. I don't know him that well, but I will say that from the little I know him and what his good friends have told me that Dok is an honest person who is not only extremely bright but who has a strong desire to make a difference here in the burgh. I would also not do the typical Pittsburgher thing and say that he's not a true "burgher" just because he spent a few years outside of the region. He chose to come back here for grad school and to work here because he loves his this city. I guess we will wait and see what types of ideas and proposals he has for the city but I go out on a limb right now and say that his priorities will not be declaring war on snow or potholes.

Crystal Eastman said...

dear the huddler,
with regard to dist. 4 (more later hopefully on dok and other topics)

here is a short list of elected officials in allegheny county who have won democratic primaries without winning the democratic commiette endorsement. (be sure, i'm not hating on the committee, i and members of my family have served on it. but to be honest, it doesn't have the best track record for picking winners.)

- Dan Onorato (when he ran against Baldy Regan)
- Jim Motznik (two times)
- Brenda Frazier
- Joan Cleary
- Dick Caliguiri

i'm sure other readers can add names.

To me, and i'd assume to the Huddler, the Allegheny Labor Council endorsement is more meaningful-- there're actually issues that get raised and principles that are adherred to. In that endorsement nobody won for Dist. 4.-- and that's because none of them could get 2/3 of the vote. I think that's probably a better indicator than the party vote of the kind of tight race this is going to be.

Lady Elaine said...

I'd add to crystal's list:

patrick dowd
bruce kraus

Anonymous said...

"his priorities will not be declaring war on snow or potholes."

But that's what the voters want.

Anonymous said...

do you think hoagie gets his dist 4 info via batphone/hoagiephone? or do you think that he is just attached at cog's hip?

his unabashed, uninformed, libelous, coverage of the dist 4 election isn't flattering.

as for dok...he should drop out now before his campaign tarnishes joe williams

Anonymous said...

"The HUDDLER is not the official white knight of the Wagner family. But for people to say they put this old lady and her son up to this is flat out wrong. Unless someone has proof that this occurred."

Just wait and see... This WILL be proven when these people are subpoenaed and questioned.

Anonymous said...

The HUDDLER should pay more attention to ground game and who is actually putting the work in to win votes. Rudiak may have only gotten 5 votes at the endorsement, but she turned in almost 1,100 signatures to get on the ballot. That is three times as many as Reilly, and more than twice as many as Coghill.

Rudiak's running a campaign to win, the other two are jokers.

Anonymous said...

"but she turned in almost 1,100 signatures to get on the ballot."

That doesn't mean anything. I am not a fan of trying to get the most signatures to get on a ballot. It wears out your voklunteers in a fruitless activity too early in the campaign and in the end it really doesn't matter.

There are more effective ways to engage your volunteers.

Anonymous said...

^^ that's the funniest thing i've read all weekend.

Anonymous said...

why?

those signatures don't mean anything in the end. As long as you meet your number your OK.

Anonymous said...

no, i'm more interested in hearing about non-fruitless ways of engaging volunteers, since you apparently feel so strongly about it. what are they?

Bram Reichbaum said...

Hell hath no fury. All I'm sayin'.

Matt, gathering signatures is a great way to engage voters. I'll bet 60% of those sigs translate to votes without any other impressions.