The summer is kind of slow, eh? I guess when Pizza and the sweet syringe free beaches of the Jersey Shore beckon, it is understandable.

1) AJ Thomson had a column in the Daily News yesterday, pointing out that the Eagles, the beneficiary of millions upon millions of taxpayer dollars, continue to stiff the City out of 8 million dollars they owe. E-A-G-L-E-S, Eagles!

2) In the budget that was just agreed to in Harrisburg, City schools saw a significant increase in funding. (When all is said and done, about 85 million.) Of course, 85 million doesn't come close to the one billion dollars the State has already identified that Philly schools need. But, it also is theoretically just the start of a 6 year plan to continually increase education funding.

But, what are the chances we actually see those increases every year? Rendell has something like 2 budgets left. Even if he fights tooth and nail the next two years, we have no idea how powerful the next Governor will be, and whether he will even care about school funding. That is the obvious downfall of trying to change policy through the budget process: until there are lasting laws that say schools should be funded at levels to provide a quality education, this battle will be fought every single year.

3) Doron asks if there is a problem that Nutter hasn't told the public anything about his negotiations with the municipal unions (whose contracts expired yesterday), and expected them to do the same...

I don't have a problem with Nutter not negotiating in the press and behind closed doors, because in 2008 union negotiations are enough of an adversarial process that we don't have to worry about cozy backroom deals. That said, despite the candy canes and lemonade being passed out, the era of good feelings might be coming to an end:

Yesterday morning, Mayor Nutter was positive about the process.

"We're going to stay in our talks as long as it takes," Nutter said. "I expect everyone will be at work tomorrow because talks are ongoing."

But Kathy Scott, president of DC 47, struck a combative tone in a news release last night, saying that the city had not responded to many of the union's proposals.

"Not on a single issue, even the non-economic issues that don't cost the city any money, have we received a substantive response," she said in the statement. "It is our hope that the city will take the next two weeks to earnestly address the substantive issues we raised two months ago."

What are those issues? Well, we don't know, 'cause it is all behind closed doors.

Ah, summer.

1) Dan McQuade has a new weekly column in the Philly Weekly, focused on the idiocy of the drug war. There are few policies stupider than the drug war, so I think this could be a really valuable addition to the media discussion.

In his first week, he talks about how goofy it is that we have those shots of cops 'celebrating' their big drug busts, when we know that within a week or two, there will be just as many drugs out on the street:

In essence, if the Philadelphia police seize 748 pounds of cocaine, 748 more pounds will soon be on its way into Philadelphia. ”By the end of two weeks, there will be little evidence left at all that a record–sized drug bust ever occurred, other than the police records and the past media reports,” David Borden, founder and director of the Drug War Resource Network, writes.

One thing I hope he covers is the total cost of the drug war to the City- from police to incarceration, etc. There are very few things that could magically put the city in a better fiscal position than ending this bizarrely stupid policy.

2) In an article after my own heart, the School District has closed down two failing Germantown Charter schools. This is the first time the district has shut charter schools down due to underperformance, and likely is long overdue. One of the schools was run by Germantown Settlement, the amorphous Germantown CDC writ large, that sucks up Germantown development money, and is part and parcel of the Donna Miller machine. Given how poorly Germantown Settlement does so much, the school underperforming is not surprising. Now, what about the other charters in Philly that are basically little fiefdoms of politicians and political groups?

There are some charters that seem to be doing very well. But too many were given to people who don't really appear to have any experience actually, you know, running schools. If the School District is serious about closing down underperforming charters, I suspect many of the little fiefdom schools will be closed.

3) Inveterate racist, and Geno's Steaks owner, Joey Vento wants an apology from the City, and a meeting with Mike Nutter. Additionally, he is threatening to sue the City- using a right-wing think tank from Atlanta- to change our anti-discrimination laws.

Just a reminder to anyone in the City thinking about meeting with Vento, are his statements like these:

[Illegal Hispanics] are killing, like, 25 of us a day … molesting about eight children a day … All we’re getting is drug dealers and murderers.”

......

What else is going on?

I have been pretty busy over the last few weeks, and haven't been able to touch on as much as I wanted, so I thought I would give a quick round-up of some random things worth noting. Most of this is stuff I would like to (and still may) write more on, but have not had the time.

1) As Helen noted earlier, Arlen Specter has come out swinging for Philly, in the Carl Greene vs. HUD pissing match. That is good news. Specter passed a 'Sense of the Senate' (read:non-binding) resolution demanding that 50 million go back to HUD PHA. HUD can simply ignore it, and as the article notes, they are hinting they might do just that. At that point, Specter and Bob Casey Jr. can probably be more assertive. Kudos on this, Senator Specter.

We don't talk about Arlen very much. However, let me just say that I think he is a total joke. Is that wrong to say now? I know that occasionally Arlen burps out a decent vote (like SChip). But I cannot take his faux-moderation, which he uses to certify radical Supreme Court Jurists like Sam Alito, and to toothlessly go along with the war, with torture and with just about anything Dubya wants. He will once in a while roar, but like his conduct with the present and past Attorney Generals, there is not much behind the curtain.

But hey, he does use that same Judiciary platform to inquire into whether the Patriots cheated in the Super Bowl...

My random prediction is that Arlen loses to Pat Toomey in a Senate Primary in 2012, who then promptly loses himself, to someone like... Mike Nutter.

2) There was yet another attack on the ethics boards right to regulate campaign finance reform. This time, the lawsuit is by Cozen O’Connor, basically as an attempt to help Bob Brady pay legal bills out of Tom Knox’s challenge to him.

So, lets see here… We have Bob Brady almost getting kicked off of the ballot, because of a type of technical mistake that the party loves to go after. Does he come out and try and help end the practice, seeing the faults of his ways? (Remember this post? "Will Congressman Brady Now Help Us End Gotcha Ballot Challenges"). No, instead he gets Cozen to represent him, and then afterwards, instead of working to fix it... they go after campaign finance? Awesome.

I will have more soon, but, I suspect the case will be thrown out for lack of standing.

3) On a predatory lending/mortgage foreclosure note- it is bizarre to see big ol Bear Sterns fail, almost exclusively because of their involvement in subprime lending. Way back in 2001, I started doing a little research on foreclosures in Philadelphia. Even back then, you saw a lot of Bear Sterns as the foreclosing entity. And now, they have failed. I have no yay or nay for that fact that they were bailed out, but it sure would be nice if you government put that much care into… people.

Like Countrywide and New Century and so many other subprime lending failures before it- a ‘market correction’ that puts these lenders out of business it not a particularly new idea. See page 61 of Lost Values, for example. However, the same point remains there: a market correction and/or a bailout may ‘solve’ problems for Wall Street, but none of that stops an ongoing wave of foreclosures in our, and every other, City in the US.

4) I have seen the Obama campaign in three places around the City so far, registering people to vote. Very cool. As they note over there-->, you must register to vote by next Monday in order to be able to vote. If you know of anyone who needs to do this, git ‘er done.

5) Finally, thanks to Alex and Drupal: for those who have not noticed, there is now a small editing function when you write a blog entry that allows you

• to bullet;

1. make lists;

use bold, use italics, and embed links, all with just a click. (Make sure that you use "http" when you put those links in.

Oh, and it lets you do what all those on blogs love to do:

Easily Quote Yourself.

Hopefully that will be helpful.