When thinking about Larry Farnese these days, I keep thinking about the old Moody Blues song 'Every Good Boy Deserves Favour.' In this case, however, it's 'Every Good Boy Does NOT Deserve Favour.'

Farnese may be a decent guy with decent progressive views, but there are a lot of arenas where he could bring those positives into use. I don't think elected politics is one of those arenas. Not every progressive has what it takes to be an elected official.

The seeds of my doubts about him were planted last Fall, and ever since, his actions have only served to reinforce my doubts.

Last fall, after attending a 'meet and greet' with Farnese at St Maron's Church at 10th and Ellsworth, I was leaning towards supporting him in his race against Babette Josephs. I even sent a long email to him describing my reactions to his presentation, and my thoughts on his relative merits vis-a-vis Josephs. I subsequently received emails and phone calls from both Farnese and from his campaign manager Renee Gilinger, inviting me to get involved with their organization.

But I held back, partly because I felt uneasy about how the Farnese campaign was joined at the hip to the DiCicco/Fumo crowd, partly because I was not certain that Babette Josephs should be replaced, and partly...well, back then I couldn't quite put my finger on it.

But the way his campaign has been run subsequently has made it all much clearer for me. Farnese is just utterly passive. He's not a fighter, he's not creative, and he doesn't really seem in control of his own campaign.

There was one particular moment at the 'meet and greet' last fall that most made me uneasy. Late in the Q & A session, the topic turned to the large influx of Mexicans into this South Philly neighborhood over the past several years. People were venting an awful lot of angry comments about how 'they' were dirty, loud, hurting the neighborhood. I was rather shocked at the vehemence of the opinions expressed.

Farnese looked like a deer caught in the headlights. He desperately looked to his handlers to help him figure out what to say and do, even went over to them for a short whispered exchange. In the end, all he managed to say was that it was important to beef up L & I inspections to ensure that the immigrant businesses were up to standard.

It most definitely was not a profile in courage. He let the audience vent their prejudices, but made no attempt to talk about the positive things that the influx of immigrants had brought. He simply pandered to their prejudices.

Hell, at the Great Expectations debate between Dicicco and Anastasio, I submitted a question asking for their views on the changing character of the neighborhood. I give Dicicco credit for answering with a spirited and positive viewpoint about how much money, energy and revitization the new immigrants had brought in, comparing it to the earlier wave of Italian immigrants.

Farnese couldn't do it.

Since then, I've seen the patently transparent jump to the Senate race. Does anyone really believe this was not done with the full encouragement and support of Fumo, Dicicco, etc?

I've seen the total abdication of Farnese to the political hacks running his campaign in the collection of signatures to get on the ballot. Not to beat this dead horse, but still...Farnese is a lawyer, a professed independent progressive, and someone who had been running for office for several years. There is no excuse for letting so many pages of fraudulent petitions be submitted and then forced to be withdrawn. He wasn't in control of the campaign, methinks...he just let the party guys cobble together the petitions in their habitual corrupt manner.

I've seen his campaign, which, for all it's money, has been very lackluster and uncreative. It's a real by-the-numbers job, again giving the impression that the driving force behind it is not the candidate, but rather the political hacks sticking to their tired old tactics. Sheesh, if I have to hear one more time about how Larry fought the insurance companies to help his father....Hell, anyone would do the same. It doesn't necessarily translate into political activism. Sorry...his campaign is just cliche after cliche, boring mailings, dull emails. It does not inspire in me any sense that Farnese is a leader or even has much input into his campaign.

I've seen the whole stupid bit about his not changing his registration from Republican to Democrat for so many years. Farnese says he was registered Republican when he lived in Delaware County, since that was what most people were registered as, but always voted Democratic, and just never bothered to change his registration until well after moving into the city.

Fine. I have no reason to doubt that. But you know, I also grew up in Delaware County, was registered a Republican. But after moving into the city and having my views turn progressive, I made sure I changed my registration to the party that better reflected my views and the party where the action was in Philadelphia. The fact that Farnese took so long to do that just reinforces for me the sense that he is too passive.

And I've seen the lingering criticism that he has come late to a lot of the progressive views he espouses in this campaign. Well, maybe that's true, but if they are now his views, that's fine. Nevertheless, the fact that he only comes to them in the context of a political campaign...well, once again, that says to me passivity, and someone not fully in control of his campaign.

In the end, that is the impression I'm left with when it comes to Farnese. He doesn't seem to be able to break free of the control of his old-style political handlers. He doesn't seem to show much creativity or fight.

It's not that he's a bad person or a bad progressive. It's just that I feel his talents would be better utilized elsewhere. The 1st senate District needs a fighter and someone with vision.

Anne Dicker, on the other hand, despite all the drama, still strikes me as gutsy, creative, strong, wily and fully transparent in the development of her progressive views and in her dedication to fighting for them. I'm sticking with Dicker.

I'm voting grassroots top to bottom in this primary. It feels good!