UPDATE: Thanks to everyone who bore with us through our tech issues today for the live stream. We finally got it done.
The video stream of the taping is after the jump:
Read the rest of this entry »
Scott Farrell of The Farrell Files on 10 Connects and Joe Bardi of Creative Loafing’s Film & TV section were on board again this morning to tape the weekly HoCast, in which we examined the week’s top political stories, made sense out of them and played funny-sounding audio clips.
Here was our tentative show rundown as written before taping; we added the Tampa health care reform “near riot” to the top of the issues list and had some audio from the unpleasantness:
1. BIll Clinton (and Al Gore??) set free the journo-hostages from North Korea. The price? An unsmiling photo-op with an equally unsmiling and flaccid Kim Jong-Il plus some “face” for the North Koreans. Worth it or not? What happens next time a nation takes poeple hostage and we don’t send Slick Willy or a different ex-president to rescue them? Can you imagine the hilarity that would have ensued if we’d sent former President George W. Bush?!? And how long will Hillary stand for Bill upstaging her?
2. Snakes in a State, starring Samuel L. Jackson Jr. Florida is overrun with Burmese pythons, and they’ve started eating our children and other endangered species. Time for a War on Snakes!
http://blogs.creativeloafing.com/politicalwhore/2009/08/06/its-war-florida-vs-burmese-python-snakes-with-a-possible-pet-ban/
Mrs. Former Fort Myers Beach Town Manager
This week’s HoCast marks a revamp of my format. While I will continue to do long-form interviews with political figures as podcasts, the PoHo brand will feature a fairly regular cast and a quick, funny format that looks at the top political and media issues, the Quotable soundbite and the Political Whore of the Week.
Joining me are Scott Farrell of The Farrell Files on 10 Connects and Creative Loafing Film & Television editor Joe Bardi.
Our topics this week:
1. The shameful Today Show coverage of the Obama health care newser
2. The firing of the town manager of Fort Myers Beach for marrying a porn actress (shown above)
3. The Barack Obama-as-Witch Doctor e-mail flap
4. ESPN’s multi-problems with censorship (the Ben Rothlisberger story)
5. Mary Mulhern uses tax dollars to go to Cuba
This week’s PoHo Award nominees are:
New York stripper Christy Yamanaka, who was involved in the Judge Thomas Stringer scandal. He pleaded guilty this week to one count of mortgage fraud in connection with a house the two bought in Hawaii.
And, via txt message from an anonymous politician, this nomination:
“The Jersey 44, that’s lookin’ like a real political gangbang! Even by Jersey’s standards.”
Listen to the HoCast after the jump to find out who won:
I’m retooling the Political Whore Podcast (or the HoCast, we we lovingly call it ’round these parts). I’ve added two regular guests, broadcaster/lawyer/former political candidate Scott Farrell of The Farrell Files on 10 Connects and Joe Bardi, our associate editor whose political views shaped our hilarious Short List online for years.
We want to hear from you as we look at the hottest topics, sexiest political scandals and goofiest politicians each week. We’ll also name a Political Whore of the Week, somebody in national, state or local politics or government who best exemplifies that they are only in it for the money — or the stupidity.
We’re taping our weekly installments on Fridays at 10 am, so you can get us your ideas, questions or Whore nominations via Twitter (@poho) before then, or live during the podcast taping from 10-10:30 am. We’ll do our best to get the best of the tweets on the HoCast.
My guest co-host for this week’s HoCast is Seth Nelson, a Tampa lawyer who is running for the Tampa City Council in 2011 (for Linda Saul-Sena’s citywide seat; she is term-limited).
He is a former law clerk on the 11th US Circuit Court of Appeals, so we look at how Sonia Sotomayor did in explaining her statement about policy being made at the appellate court level. Plus, we discuss Walter Cronkite’s death and how it shows what is wrong with today’s news media and ask ourselves whether Barack Obama’s health care reform effort is in trouble.
And between all those headlines, Seth talks about why he’s running for the Council and what his top priorities are.
I’m fascinated by John Warren, a longshot and last-minute candidate in the St. Petersburg mayoral race. He has a long history in the city as a preservationist, history advocate, real estate investor and — currently — the owner of Savannah’s Cafe on Central Avenue. Yes, he’s made rookie mistakes at a recent forum and in his campaign finances. But that’s not important. What is important is his message about learning from the past and looking at the city’s problems (especially those downtown) as all linked. He would restart the city’s visioning process to work on solutions in the aggregate.
Listening to Warren makes you think outside the box about the problems in St. Petersburg. Sure, as the Times has pointed out, he’s long on pointing out the problems and short on pat “solutions.” But his solution is the processes he advocates, the transparency and inclusion and comprehensiveness, and he bring an entrepreneurial bent and preservationist’s soul to the campaign, and that is refreshing.
I also asked him about the problem of aggressive panhandling. He had this to say:
Well, we do have an ordinance that serves a portion of downtown and it’s to discourage aggressive panhandling. But I think for a lot of the merchants who are down there right now, aggressive can be anybody who is sitting in front of their business. The presence of an unbathed individual sitting right at their front door is as aggressive and deters as much business as somebody that’s actually going up with a stick and asking you for a dollar.
CL: But that’s not something that’s drawing police action.
They are not. What really ought to be recognized is that downtown sidewalks and our whole street grid system is intended to allow for society to move, to flow, and your sidewalks downtown originally were owned by the property owners, and those rights were given up so that commerce could be conducted. Commerce is important for a strong tax base. Unless the community has a source of revenue, there is no way they can take care of the destitute. It’s important, No. 1, for us to recognize that the homeless, … is completely different from the career panhandler or the individual who has chosen not to live in a shelter or live in a home. And that distinction needs to be recognized. A lot of downtown business people are very charitable. They’d like to be able to help.
It makes business very difficult if you have the career panhandler who is competing and threatening the livelihood of those businesses whose sales and taxes are going to be providing for the other individual who genuinely has that need.
So, how do you balance that? One of the things that has been considered in other communities is extending to the merchant, or property owner, a bit more control. you’re not giving the land back to them, because you can’t, but assigning back to them some responsibilty for maintaining the property between the curb and their doors.
CL: So they would have the ability to say you’re trespassing on their area.
Exactly. It’s a delicate issue. There still are a lot of people who feel that any piece of property in front of business out to the curb belongs to the public, it’s a public right of way, without recognizing that public right of way was intended for infrastructure elements that are under the surface…
CL: And not as a living room…
It’s not somebody’s bedroom or bathroom.
Listen to the full interview with John Warren after the jump.
My column for next week’s print edition is about St. Pete City Council candidate Steve Kornell, who faces a tough run against Angela Rouson for the seat that Jamie Bennett is leaving. I caught up with him at an Ybor City fundraiser attended by Hillsborough progressives for this podcast chat.
Sonia Sotomayor with her kids nephews at a ballgame. She certainly will have to be alert for foul balls in the confirmation process. (photo courtesy of whitehouse.gov)
This week’s podcast breaks down the Sonia Sotomayor Supreme Court nomination with Tampa media lawyer David Snyder. We talk about her race-based rulings, her temperament, Rush Limbaugh and Tom Tancredo’s charges of reverse racism and whether judges really do/should make policy or not.
Download or stream the HoCast after the jump.
