The Valley of Lying Sacks

According to the new Morning Call/ Muhlenberg College poll,  Donald Trump is 9 points behind Ms. Clinton.  Over the years,  I have developed no faith in Muhlenberg's polls.  In Allentown's 2005 mayoral election they were 20 points off.  Once, they and the paper collaborated on measuring how the debates were effecting undecided voters.  By chance,  I knew most of the supposed undecided independents,  and they were anything but that.  At best, I can conclude that their polls are useless;  At worst,  I can suspect that they are actually trying to influence voters.

Am I cynical,  or do we live in the Valley of Lying Sacks?  Over the years I have seen Allentown City Council approve numerous mistruths.  I have seen the County Commissioners ignore history and fund political correctness.  Whose going to farm all those preserved acres?  Never mind, it will yield Jaindl cheap farmland to rent, and grow feed corn.  Even the South Whitehall Commissioners have joined the disingenuous, by greatly inflating the cost to maintain Wehr's Dam, and justify a referendum.

I'm not sure who will win Pennsylvania,  but it will not be a 9 point spread.  It will be very close.  Perhaps our local college professors should attend Molovinsky University.

Whose Afraid of Booze and Drugs

Regular readers of this blog know that I'm lite on the personal stuff. For today, I make an exception.  When I ran an as independent for mayor in 2005, somebody commented that I didn't even graduate from William Allen.  They had searched the yearbooks for several years,  and couldn't find my name or picture.  Truth be known,  William Allen and I separated several times.  This weekend I attended the 70th Birthday Party for what I consider my "class", or the fellow delinquents that I spend the most years with.   It is 52 years since graduation, and most of us turned 70 in 2016.

Graduated or not, I started College in NYC after high school.  This weekend we learn that Edward Albee passed away.  It is known that he fashioned Whose Afraid of Virginia Woolf after the relationship between underground film makers Marie Menken and Willard Maas.  I'm afraid that my discipline hadn't improved much by college, because I recall a crazed evening in their Brooklyn penthouse.

I suppose that if there is a moral to this post it is to keep your babies away from booze and drugs, or risk them reduced to writing a non-monetized blog in their sunset.

X-Raying Trump and Clinton

Nothing exemplifies the difference in media treatment more than the controversy about the candidates's health.  While Clinton literally collapses,  the liberal media is concentrating on the disclosure that Trump doesn't exercise.  To me, it doesn't appear that Hillary works out too much either.  Putting aside political bias,  it takes no doctor to see that Trump is in better shape.  Although that certainly doesn't qualify him as a better candidate,  it does disqualify any media pretense for objectivity.  Both of the candidates are pushing 70.  Many of us that age don't have the energy to attend a rally, much less give one every night.

As someone who is basically non-partisan, it has become more difficult to discern attempted truth in the news.  Truth seekers must mix numerous sources,  then go through an elaborate filtration process to distill small drops of it.  We have come to rely on those sources which lie the least.

illustration credit: Ben Garrison@grrrgraphics

The Dimness of Allentown's Future

This blog concerns itself with the intersection between local politics and history. By those parameters, the future of Allentown does indeed looks bleak. There is nobody on the political horizon who appears pragmatic enough for the current reality. We are aptly described as a small town with big town problems. The potential crop of candidates even believe that positive thought in itself is a strategy. Now, positive thought certainly has its place, I enjoy sermons by Joel Osteen; However, it's not enough of a plan with which to manage a city. They have confused J.B. Reilly's real estate portfolio with revitalization. The candidates on the horizon, at best, suffer from political correctness, at worst, to outright acceptance of the status quo.

I believe that it is possible that Ed Pawlowski will not be prosecuted, or will be exonerated if indicted. More on that in a future post. I personally think that a fourth Pawlowski term would be better than some of the alternative candidates.

As for history, and the importance of its gift for future generations, there is nobody serving on any level of local government who has a clue.

The Lehigh Valley's Lost Morality

One of the headlines in today's paper is that the Allentown Planning Board approved J.B. Reilly's new apartments on the former parking lot next to Symphony Hall. Never mind that Symphony Hall expressed its displeasure at losing the convenience of an adjoining surface lot.  The Parking Authority, serving what is masquerading as progress in Allentown, cooperated with the sale.  Never mind that the Community Music School, primary tenant of Symphony Hall, said that it would relocate without that lot.  Allentown's commissions and authorities are mere bobbleheads.

Not only has the Parking Authority played ball with private developers using progress as an excuse, the Park Department compromised itself to cover Pawlowski's purchase of unnecessary land, at a greatly inflated price.  Isn't it wonderful to add a park or two when the department cannot afford to maintain what they already have.  While the collapsed portion of the wall was repaired so that Lehigh Parkway could reopen,  the rest of the wall was never repointed,  and the double stairwell is falling apart.

It's not just Allentown officials compromising themselves, it has become standard procedure in the valley.  The South Whitehall Commissioners inflated the price to repair Wehr's Dam by 1000%, to justify a referendum to accommodate the Wildlands Conservancy.   Call these things progress,  but it's really just excuses for corrupt agendas.

Pawlowski and The Little People

Lately, I noticed on facebook, that Ed Pawlowski has started attending littler events, such as a small hispanic church picnic. Understand that if Mayor Ed had his choice, he still would be a candidate for the United States Senate, and not the object of an FBI investigation. He still might had,  under the prior scenario, attended a mega congregation picnic, but previously he didn't have interest in the small fry stuff. Why now is Ed showing up at the munchkin events? Does he want to say he got religion as part of his future defense? Naw, he always had big church religion. Beyond the obvious, that his personal cache has depreciated, he might be trying to cultivate a Marion Barry constituency. When the Washington mayor got popped for cocaine, his followers still elected him. I think that the taint from the Raid On City Hall has made bigger office, or big appointments, on the state or federal level, a goal no longer attainable. Perhaps Ed sees being Mayor For Life now as his best shot, supported by the little people, more tolerant of legal scrapes. 

ADDENDUM: The above is a reprinted post from September 7, 2015. Ed has continued courting the little people. Before the scandal, aka FBI investigation, he certainly keep company with more uptown constituents. However, in all fairness to him, he has always been inclusive with city residents. There is now, however, a noticeable difference in photo ops. Previously, they were Morning Call moments, often appearing on the weekend society page; Now, they are cell phone selfies. If Ed is still available to run for a 4th term,  it is the little people who will elect him.  They are less sensitive to the scandal,  and more flattered by his attention.  I believe that there has been too much damage done to the city's self esteem for the more established Democrats to again support him.

The Spandex Yuppie Dilemma

The spandex yuppies, who have been championing for decades for Rails to Trails, have created a dilemma for themselves. This is the same constituency who would like to see rail service reestablished between Lehigh Valley and NYC. Norfolk Southern, the current rail freight operator, has informed those yuppies that there is essentially only one track left, and that they need it exclusively for the freight service.

molovinsky on allentown is a teacher and student of our past rail history. I have documented all the major rail and spur routes that intersected Allentown. Recently, I protested against the riverfront NIZ removing the last remnant of the Lehigh Valley Rail Road Old Main Line from along the Lehigh River.

$Millions have been wasted on both removing tracks for the spandex crowd, and planning to restore rail service on tracks that no longer exist.   Even as I write this, the Allentown Economic Development Corporation has a plan to restore a freight track back to its building on S. 10th Street, although a tenant who could possibly utilize such service hasn't existed for 50 years.  Spare us the expense of bureaucrats who want to fund solutions to problems that they helped create.

Shown above, a Lehigh Valley RailRoad freight train heads north on it's Old Main Track.  That track has recently been removed to make more Rail to Trail.