Kaboom!

It takes a special kind of stupid. . . .

* To, if you're the incoming mayor, not conduct background checks on people you're appointing to key jobs in your administration. Like chief of staff.

* To tell the local newspaper that background checks represent a "suspicious, punitive system, and that's not something I build on. . . . What goes on in private lives is private business. I don't sit down with anybody and say, 'Tell me about your past.'"

* To refuse to ask police for documents detailing accusations that your designated "community chief of staff" began a homosexual relationship with a 14-year-old boy and kept it up for two years. (A law-enforcement source told the Omaha World-Herald the teen, who killed himself after going to the police, "was credible and the investigation of the first-degree sexual assault allegations he made when he was 19 would have been pursued if he hadn't died.")

* To dismiss the allegations about the aide, Matthew Samp, out of hand as "character assassination" and tell a reporter something as dumb as "You have to set (rumors) aside and just look at whom is trying to embarrass whom. I've seen this, and this happens."

UNFORTUNATELY for Omaha, alas, it looks like Jim Suttle is going to be a "special" kind of mayor. God help us all.

Imagine for a moment that we're not talking about the chief executive of a city of 435,000. Imagine instead that we're talking about a Catholic bishop who has just named a new chancellor for his diocese.

And say there were credible allegations that the priest picked as chancellor had initiated a sexual relationship with a 14-year-old boy, who five years later reported the underage relationship to police, who found the teen "credible" and initiated an investigation, but then this tormented youth killed himself.

Furthermore, let's say the new bishop was taking a leisurely swim down the River of Denial and publicly refused to even consider looking into the matter himself. And let's just imagine His Excellency then proclaimed that he didn't believe in conducting background checks, calling them a "suspicious, punitive system, and that's not something I build on."

How do you think that would go over?

ME, I THINK an enraged public would be burning the chancery down by now -- and not totally without justification, given the recent history of these kinds of things. In fact, a Catholic priest facing "credible" allegations of the sort now dogging Samp would be immediately removed from active ministry pending a complete investigation.

What, is it somehow more dangerous (or unseemly, or unjust, or whatever) when sexual-abuse scandals occur in the Catholic Church than when they hit city hall?

But that's a rhetorical question. Here's something more concrete: Your average forklift driver probably undergoes more pre-employment scrutiny than Jim Suttle's average chief of staff.

According to this morning's World-Herald, we are not amused:

Some angry and appalled leaders and residents want Omaha Mayor-elect Jim Suttle to look further into allegations that a top aide had a sexual relationship with a teenager in the late 1990s.

The World-Herald reported Sunday that a 19-year-old Omahan told police in 2001 that he had a sexual relationship, starting when he was 14, with Matthew Samp. Samp, now Suttle's co-chief of staff, was about 23 at the time.

It is illegal for an adult to have sex with someone under 16.

Suttle said Saturday, while out of town on vacation, that he did not plan to ask police for more information and did not do background checks on employees.

Suttle, who could not be reached Sunday, plans a statement today at a 1:30 p.m. press conference, spokesman Ron Gerard said. Suttle, a Democrat, takes office June 8.

Nebraska Attorney General Jon Bruning wants Suttle to rescind his offer to hire Samp.

"We can't have someone like that working in government," he said of Samp.

(snip)

A 2001 police investigation into the report about Samp stalled when the youth, Brad Fuglei, killed himself a week after filing a police report. Fuglei was 19.

Patlan said Samp, expected to handle communication with external groups such as neighborhood associations, will have no credibility unless he is cleared.

"If the kid was still alive," Patlan said, "the question remains: Where would Samp be now? Would he be in prison? There's too many questions."

Omaha resident Amy Adams, who attended high school with Fuglei, was incensed to hear that Suttle wasn't investigating further.

"That disgusts me," she said. "If allegations come up and you don't look into it, that seems ridiculous."

THAT SEEMS ridiculous because it is ridiculous. I guess Jim Suttle is just a ridiculous kind of guy.

Who is going to be our next mayor.

I think we're about to learn the hard way that not being Hal Daub is no good reason to elect somebody mayor.

Speaking of f***. . . .

The "community chief of staff" for Omaha's mayor-elect apparently has a rather low opinion of the city's daily newspaper, the World-Herald.

Matthew Samp, on his Twitter account, had some choice words for the newspaper -- which endorsed former mayor Hal Daub -- after the returns were all in and Samp's guy, Jim Suttle, had been elected Omaha's next mayor.

"Love me some Jim Suttle. F*** the World-Herald," the Democratic political operative tweeted after the May 12 election.

WELL, as it turns out, the World-Herald is reporting Samp may know a little something about f***:

A top appointee to Mayor-elect Jim Suttle's administration faced an investigation in 2001 into whether he had sex with a 14-year-old boy.

The teenager, who championed gay rights in high school, killed himself a week after telling police about his sex with two men, including Matthew Samp, who has been named Suttle's co-chief of staff.

SOMETHING TELLS ME this morning's Sunday World-Herald will be burning a hole in our driveway. Which is nothing compared to the impact it will have at the Suttle residence.

"F*** the World-Herald"?

Matt Samp just may have learned his last lesson in politics: That which f***s last f***s well, indeed.

UPDATE: The teen-ager involved in the story, says the World-Herald, was Brad Matthew Fuglei. Here's an excerpt from a 1998 feature in the newspaper on the then-North High School student.

Note who figures prominently in the piece:

Brad Matthew, the son of Nancy Fuglei of Omaha and Bruce Fuglei of Montana, is a member of North's Student Council and show choir. He volunteers for the Nebraska AIDS Project and recruited friends to help out with Teens Educated to Combat AIDS.

When he is not working at the men's department at Younkers, hanging out with friends or doing homework, Brad likes to play the piano and write music. His lyrics often reflect his thought about God, he said.

"He's a total free spirit. He doesn't care what others think," said Matthew Samp, an older friend who is like an older brother to Brad Matthew. "He's every parent's dream child -- strong, intelligent and dependable. He's completely against smoking, drinking and drug use. He doesn't need a baby sitter."

The murder of Shepard hit Brad Matthew hard. The idea for a vigil came to him around 2 o'clock one morning while he was talking online and doing homework. The next day he called Samp, who had been an events coordinator in Minneapolis, for help. Samp outlined a plan for Brad Matthew, who went right to work.

Between classes, he called gay and lesbian support groups seeking speakers and spreading the word. He selected Memorial Park because it was built, he said, in honor of those who have died in battle. It seemed appropriate.

Brad Matthew wrote press releases, selected the music and outlined the program. He asked Brink to speak because he knew members of her youth group.

"I think he showed a lot of initiative," said Bruce Fuglei. "I was amazed he did it. But then I'm often amazed by him. He's always been a unique kid. He thinks of others before himself."

Samp said Brad Matthew's natural charm and charisma make people enjoy being around him. He knows who he is and what he wants out of life.

OF COURSE, we won't know a lot until the World-Herald story actually hits the street in a bit. But I think it might be safe to say that the sound you just heard was a nuclear bomb going off in the middle of Omaha politics.

The next police union mailer?

Given the Omaha police union's "dedication" to truth, justice and the American Way, I think this might be the only place left for it to go in the quest to pare down its enemies list through political assassination.

And if Hal Daub happens to get elected amid the fallout . . . hey, it's a wonderful life, right?

YEAH, a wonderful life. In a city where the police union bullies politicians, then unleashes all demagogic hell upon them if the pols don't toe the security forces' political line.

From the Omaha World-Herald's story on the latest Omaha Police Officers' Association smear job:

The union mailed another political flier this week that shows a creepy sex offender on its cover and takes Vokal and Brown to task for voting against an amendment that would have allowed officers to monitor sex offenders.

Vokal and Brown have both criticized the mailers as "dirty politics," saying they are misleading and that they are political payback for other police issues before the Omaha City Council.

Vokal and Brown have said the mailers are political retribution for his attempt to to limit police pensions during contract negotiations last year.

The mailers are expected to land in mailboxes today.

The dispute centers on a 2006 proposal to allow police to do compliance checks on sex offenders, making sure they were properly registered under state law. It was part of a debate on an ordinance to prohibit high-risk sex offenders from living within 500 feet of schools.

The amendment failed on a 5-2 vote, with Vokal and Brown joining the majority. The ordinance passed on a 7-0 vote.

Police union's politics of fear

If Jim Vokal becomes mayor of Omaha, he ought to appoint 50 independent police auditors and make them all Ernie Chambers.

Come to think of it, half a hundred of the Omaha Police Department's worst political nightmare may not be enough for the job. Just think what Omaha cops are capable of doing to folks in the 'hood when -- given a ballot and the cloak of anonymity -- they elect union reps who will stoop to any level of depravity to trash a sitting city councilman.

One with the nerve, and the poll numbers, to pick off their fair-haired political enabler, former mayor (and mayoral wannabe) Hal Daub.

WHY SHOULD ANY OMAHAN have any faith or trust in the city's police when officers pick as their union bosses an ethics- and truth-challenged band of political sleazemeisters capable of wallowing so deeply in the mud they'd need a ladder to scratch a serpent's belly? This is what we're to expect from our public servants?

Think of it this way: These people -- these "law-enforcement" personnel -- are the folks we entrust with maintaining public order. Yet the leadership of the Omaha Police Officers' Association, when it suits its political purposes (or those of its political patron) does not hesitate to use fear . . . to employ the language and imagery of the lynch mob to take down a sitting councilman.

In the world of politics, Omaha's police-union bosses are perfectly willing to stretch the boundaries of truth, civility and propriety to the breaking point for their own benefit. In the world of the streets, they expect civilians to stay within those same boundaries . . . or else.

Speak to an Omaha cop the way Omaha cops' leadership speaks of their political enemies, you're probably going to get arrested. That speaks to me of a profound credibility problem.

Credibility is the cops' problem -- not the people's. And that will come back to bite them exactly 100 percent of the time.

SlimeDaub Mayornaire and his rent-a-cops

The Omaha police union strikes again. If only Jimmy Hoffa had had a badge to hide behind when he was throwing the Teamsters' weight around back in the day.

Obviously, this Midwestern metropolis' answer to "On the Waterfront" has picked its man in the May mayoral primary. It ain't Jim Vokal.

Something tells me it likewise ain't the Democrat in the race, Jim Suttle. Let's see . . . who's left among the major candidates?

Could it beeeeeeeeeeee . . . Satan Hal Daub?

IT'S NOT really surprising the police union is stooping to really slimy tactics -- not to mention trumpeting "facts" that happen to be absolutely irrelevant -- in a bid to kneecap the leading challenger to the former mayor. After all, the "tough on crime" Daub let Omaha cops pretty much get away with murder for six years.

Perhaps literally, some would argue.

What is surprising is that Hal Daub needs a "bad cop." Maybe he's trying the "bad cop/bad cop" technique to break the voters this time around.

Here's what the Bad Cop's bad cops are trying to get the good people of Omaha to swallow -- that Vokal "failed to protect our neighborhoods" by being one of a majority of council members nixing a proposal to assign Omaha cops to help the Douglas County Sheriff's Office in checking up on sex offenders. The rejected item was an amendment to a unanimously passed ordinance restricting where sex offenders can live in the city.

Sounds like Vokal is against sex offenders to me.

And unless Vokal is a superhero with the superpower to single-handedly prevent sexual assaults and eradicate sex offenders, you have view the "facts" of his district being the location of a disproportionate number of sex offenders and sexual assaults as laughably irrelevant.

Strike that. It's not laughable.

THE FOLKS making such disingenuous and asinine assertions are police officers. That people so dishonest, stupid and dismissive of your intelligence are on the streets -- with guns -- enforcing the law isn't funny at all.

And it's even less funny that such political and moral cretins are serving as a de facto goon squad for Daub, a politician petty enough to allow the credibility and legitimacy of law enforcement to be so diminished in service of his addiction to political power and blind ambition.

Oh . . . since we're talking about sex offenders, you really have to give the Omaha police union Brownie points for sheer nerve, the criminal record of one former cop being what it is. If Jim Vokal is going to be made to own a single vote, and the crime stats of his district, how much, then, ought the police union be made to own Scott Antoniak.

Just asking.

Old times there are not forgotten. . . .

In all the sordid racial history of the American South, one taboo was always powerful enough to kill.

The act of it was strictly illegal. In 1955, in the Mississippi Delta, the mere thought that a 14-year-old black boy might have had it on his mind put Emmitt Till in his grave. What was left of him.

MISCEGENATION.

If all the racial bugaboos of the segregated South had a corresponding curse word, miscegenation would be the F-word, the C-word, the MF-word and the S-word all rolled into one. Especially if we're talking a black man marrying, having sex with, dating or just looking wrong at a white woman.

(White men having their way with black women -- so long as no wedding vows were exchanged -- garnered de jure disapproval but a de facto wink and a grin.)

Miscegenation.

The feds said states' rights didn't include forbidding interracial matrimony. But the toxic enculturation of a Jim Crow society remains lodged in many a Southern mind, not unlike a malignant and inoperable tumor.

The fear of miscegenation is the kind of carefully taught evil that wormed its way into the subconscious of Southerners -- of Americans -- of a certain age and older. It gets beneath one's beliefs and convictions; it adheres itself to Pavlovian recesses of the subconscious, the ones governing what you feel in that split second before moral rectitude kicks in.

IT'S AN UGLY TABOO that feeds on the ugliest parts of our human fallenness.

Which, of course, makes exploiting voters' ingrained race-mixing revulsion a no-brainer for the savvy-but-unethical political operative.

And, in case you haven't noticed, there are just a few of those in the Gret Stet of Louisiana. It looks like a few more have just crawled out from under a rock in Baton Rouge to take racially charged shots at the city's African-American mayor, as reported by The Advocate:

Mayor-President Kip Holden on Friday said he is calling for a criminal investigation into a political mailer that alleges he had an affair with a married woman and was beaten up by her husband.

The mailer was in the form of a letter signed by the Rev. Charles Matthews, who Holden said does not exist.

The mailer includes a photo of Holden with a “black eye and busted lip” that he said is actually a doctored version of the picture on the mayor’s Web site.

Holden acknowledged he did suffer a black eye last year when he tripped over a piece of carpet, but noted he did not get a busted lip from the accident.

The mailer claims the woman’s husband punched Holden in the mouth and eye, and police have refused to serve as his bodyguard “on moral grounds and a strong belief that someone is going to get injured or worse, die.”

THE NEWSPAPER, truth be told, sanitized the story quite a bit. It didn't even touch the miscegenation angle, which the political mailer most certainly did -- including a photo of the black mayor and the white woman in question. Here's some purple prose directly from the "reverend's" word processor:

Pulling his pants up with one hand, grabbing his expensive alligator shoes with the other, Mayor Melvin "Kip" Holden ran from the residence, but not before a 5' 10" Caucasian man punched him in the eye and mouth (see picture). A reliable source reported seeing the Mayor's mouth bleeding as he hurried to a black Lincoln with a public license plate.

Standing in the door of his residence the man watched the Lincoln speed away driven by the mayor's bodyguard, an on duty Baton Rouge police officer. With tears in his eyes, he turned and stared at his nude spouse.

EXPENSIVE alligator shoes.

Caucasian man, tears in eyes.

Nude spouse.

You didn't see any of that ugliness in The Advocate's "mainstream" reportage. Nor did the paper point out the staggering irony of it all -- the political opponent Holden suspects is responsible for the flier is . . . black.

Holden said the allegations are ridiculous, and are obviously the handiwork of one of his opponents in the mayor’s race and their operatives.

“I have had the same four police officers with me since I took office. The only one that is no longer working with me is Eugene Smith, who said he needed additional time with his family after his father was killed in an accident,” Holden said.

Holden said criminal charges may be filed as a result of the smear tactic. He said he’s contacted the state Attorney General’s Office and the FBI.

Because the mailer was sent via U.S. mail and contained false information, federal mail fraud charges could be pending against the perpetrators, Holden said.

Holden also suggested that Metro Councilman Byron Sharper may be involved because he called the mayor’s office earlier this week and warned that “we’re going to drop a bomb on you.”

Sharper could not be reached for comment Friday afternoon.

In a statement issued Friday afternoon, Holden said Metro Councilman Sharper’s brother, Kurt, has distributed the fliers in public buildings.

“We have provided his identity to law enforcement as a source of information and involvement,” Holden said in the statement.

PERHAPS SOMEBODY'S trying to get both white men and black women mad at the mayor. I mean . . . y'think?

Then, to throw in a red flag for all the fire-breathers among the Religious Right, the smear piece declares, ostensibly unironically:

The FAMILY RESEARCH COUNCIL, THE LOUISIANA FAMILY FORUM, Local Ministers, and the Metro Council recently defeated Mayor Holden's attempt to pass a blanket declaration as to Baton Rouge being a sanctuary for homosexuals through his One Baton Rouge resolution. Please join with us in demanding legal and moral conduct from our public officials.

YOU BET, podna. Pleas for legal and moral rectitude in a sleazy, racist flier allegedly produced by black pols stooping to Kluxer tactics against a black mayor. Only in Louisiana. . . .

Only in Louisiana, dammit. Isn't anyone down there the least bit ashamed yet of what they tolerate and who they vote into office?

Anyone? Anyone?

It sucks to be second fiddle . . . and falling fast

In the capital city of Louisiana, the mayor is howling at the moon and -- perhaps -- praying for another hurricane.

The Census Bureau's 2007 population estimates are in, and Baton Rouge didn't do so well. The city -- whose population swelled in 2005 with the near loss of New Orleans -- has not been able to hold on to its demographic largesse and now has assumed its historical position. That would be second banana to the Crescent City, which continues to slowly rebuild from its swamping during Katrina and now has a good 12,000 people on Baton Rouge.

NOT ONLY THAT, Baton Rouge's population drop, in sheer numbers, was the third biggest in the nation -- notching another bad-list triumph for Louisiana. In terms of percentage of population lost, the capital city was a solid No. 2, behind front-runner Columbus, Ga.

At least if you believe the federal government's numbers.

According to The (Baton Rouge) Advocate, Mayor-President Kip Holden doesn't:

New Orleans was the nation’s fastest-growing city during the same period, regaining the title of Louisiana’s most populous city from Baton Rouge for the first time since Hurricane Katrina displaced tens of thousands of people in August 2005.
The estimated 2007 population for New Orleans was 239,124, an increase of 28,926 but still just more than half of the city’s pre-Katrina population of 453,726.

Baton Rouge’s estimated population was 227,071.

Mayor-President Kip Holden said Wednesday that the Census report is a flawed estimate that dramatically underreported the city’s population.

“They take a mathematical extrapolation — that they come up with themselves — and come up with erroneous numbers,” Holden said. “Until we have a full census, they would do us all a favor if they would just go away for a couple of years until we can know the exact population.”

Holden said the report contradicts what he said is clear evidence of Baton Rouge’s ongoing growth: steady school enrollment, climbing sales tax revenue and booming business development.

“You can go virtually all over Baton Rouge and buildings are coming up everywhere,” Holden said. “So if that number was correct, would banks be out here loaning all these people money to build condos and apartments and office buildings and restaurants?”

I'M SURE THE CENSUS PEOPLE would be happy to take Holden's contention under advisement, but first they'll have to carve out a parameter in their database for "buildings are coming up everywhere."

They'll get right on that . . . just as soon as they get their giggles under control.

At least one Louisiana demographer is surprised that anyone is surprised by the Census Bureau's estimate.

Shreveport demographer and political analyst Elliott Stonecipher said the simultaneous population drop in Baton Rouge and growth in New Orleans was “anything but a surprise” given the ongoing resettling of Katrina victims.

“To me, it’s just very logical; it was very expected,” Stonecipher said.

Greg Rigamer, a New Orleans urban planner with GCR and Associates, said the shifts in both cities are related and most likely the result of major improvements in services in New Orleans during the summer and fall of 2006.

“When you look at when most people came back to New Orleans, it was really in that period,” he said. “Many of the people from New Orleans were clearly in Baton Rouge.”

The Census report is the second this year to estimate a population drop for the Baton Rouge area.

The bureau released population estimates for parishes and counties in March. That report estimated a population drop parishwide and was also criticized by city-parish officials.

East Baton Rouge Parish had an estimated population of 431,278 in July 2006, but that dropped to 430,317 by July 2007, or a loss of 961 residents, that report showed.

Holden said the estimates are “crippling” for Baton Rouge because federal and state funding is often tied to population. He said Congress should come up with a new method for calculating population between censuses.

WHAT MIGHT BE more useful than trying to convince the world -- and convince it on the sketchiest of anecdotal evidence -- that Baton Rouge can hold its population better than a New Orleans levee holds water would be, instead, figuring out why all those folks (presumably New Orleanians) fled after three years in paradise.

Of course, the pull of home is a strong one . . . particularly for natives of as insular a city as New Orleans. Still, we find that people are leaving Baton Rouge to return to a city that has one of the world's worst mayors at the helm.

They're leaving Red Stick for a city with the highest murder rate in the nation. And that race isn't even close.

They're leaving to return to a city where the school system is still a shambles. And where graft is bigger than Rex on Mardi Gras day.

They're leaving to return to a city that's just a direct hit by a Category 2 or 3 hurricane from oblivion. Again. Likely for good next time.

They're leaving for a city that's still largely in ruins, is a municipal-infrastructure nightmare, suffers under sky-high electric rates and needs patrols by National Guardsmen to stave off utter chaos. As opposed to its normal, everyday pre-Katrina chaos.

I KNOW WHAT IT IS to miss home. To miss one's culture . . . familiar foods . . . familiar music . . . familiar sights and sounds. For reasons transcending all good sense, there aren't that many days that I don't miss Baton Rouge.

But that's not enough to make me go back. And I live 1,100 miles distant from there. Have for 20 years now.

Baton Rouge's former exiles from the Big Easy had found refuge less than 90 minutes away from home. They found themselves relocated somewhere with a somewhat similar culture, closely related cuisine and an identical climate. And any onset of Crescent City delirium tremens would be easily "fixed" by a short road trip.

Did I mention the "one direct hit from oblivion . . . again" thing?

THAT'S WHAT Baton Rouge's mayor needs to be worrying about: Why in the name of Buckskin Bill and Tabby Thomas would people want to leave America's Next Great City(TM) for the corrupt, dysfunctional, beaten-down, dangerous basket case that is New Orleans?

Why would people do that if Baton Rouge is sitting there on the first high land on the Mississippi, just ready to launch itself into greatness?

Could it be that Baton Rouge ain't as wonderful as the mayor thinks?

Could it be that the crime isn't that much lower, the murders not that staggeringly fewer, the landscape not that less dilapidated and the public schools not that much better as to be meaningful to a homesick exile?

Could it be that Louisiana's once-again Second City barely outperforms a crippled New Orleans in the essentials that make a city livable while lacking the kind of vibrant, indigenous culture that makes the Crescent City -- in a very real sense -- the spiritual heartbeat of America?

WHEN MY WIFE AND I LEFT Baton Rouge in 1988, it was pretty much the same size it is now . . . perhaps 10,000 or so smaller in population. That kind of anemic population growth doesn't point to a vibrant, fundamentally sound municipality.

When we arrived in Omaha 20 years ago, Nebraska's largest city was about 100,000 people smaller than it is today. And even then, it still was 100,000 people larger than Baton Rouge is now.

What's the difference?

I think it comes down to this: Leaders of "next great cities" don't waste their time (and the taxpayers' money) trying to mau-mau the federal gummint when census figures don't fall their way. Leaders of great cities (those of "next" or "present" greatness) want to find out why the numbers turned against them.

They want to find out why people left -- or why more people aren't moving in. They want to find out where their city falls short.

And once they've done that, leaders of "great" cities -- or even "pretty good" cities -- move heaven and earth to fix what's wrong and improve what's right. That's not what it looks like Baton Rouge's Kip Holden is doing here.

Nobody likes a whiner, Kip. Not even exiled New Orleanians whose only alternative is "Crazy" Ray Nagin.