Category: Life in the Big City

Stop and frisk in Philly

~ susie ~ 1 Comment

They do this because they can get away with it. So who’s letting them get away with it? All of us:

NO ONE GOT PUNCHED in the face – this time – but YouTube has given the Philadelphia Police Department another black eye, proving once again that smartphones are a bully cop’s worst nightmare.

Let’s just hope that Officer Philip Nace doesn’t land in the city’s tourism department when the dust settles.

“Don’t come to f—ing Philadelphia. Stay in Jersey.”

That’s one of Nace’s rage-induced zingers that were recorded in a disturbing 16-minute YouTube video of a recent stop and frisk.

The video, dated Sept. 27, shows Nace, 46, and another police officer from North Philly’s 25th District stopping two unidentified men, apparently after they said hello to a third man on the street.

“You don’t say ‘Hi’ to strangers,” Nace said as he confronts the two pedestrians. “Not in this neighborhood,” his partner added.
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What’s happening in Philly schools is sad and disgusting

~ susie ~ 1 Comment

This isn’t a matter of “not enough money.” This is the governor and the statehouse Republicans playing games with the funding to break the teachers union:

Robbing Peter to pay Paul: ‘Leveling’ Philly schools in the time of budget crisis Historic Philadelphia mansion leaves imprint on Elizabeth Gilbert’s ‘Signature of All Things’ (via NewsWorks)

It’s gone from bad to worse. Packed classrooms. Lack of a full-time guidance counselor. No education in arts or music. Those were the complaints of parents at South Philadelphia’s A.S. Jenks elementary school through the first month of school. And now…

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Killadelphia

~ susie ~ 4 Comments

Only this time, it’s a 12-year-old with asthma who died because her school no longer has a school nurse.

After the initial cuts, one protesting nurse specifically warned that other staff were not competent to deal with asthmatic students in her absence. This year, Parents United for Public Education and the Public Interest Law Center of Philadelphia have compiled a list of complaints filed with the state Secretary of Education, including those having to do with health and safety — some of which were made by parents worried for their asthmatic children.

But she was just a union thug, trying to rationalize the phat paycheck she didn’t deserve. Because freedom!

massey
Laporshia Massey, 12, a student at Bryant Elementary School, became ill at school and died later that day.

This is on your head, Tom Corbett.

Flashback

~ susie

I was in the local WaWa convenience store buying milk, and an NRBQ song was playing on the in-store music. But the really weird thing is, it was a cover version of “Riding In My Car.” Like, they couldn’t afford the real thing?

Powerless

~ susie

I’m sitting in a cafe, antsy as hell because I can’t go home. The power’s out in my immediate neighborhood and I can’t work at home. This makes me cranky.

Another mass shooting

~ susie ~ 5 Comments

http://youtu.be/8v5gmlCaBkk

But the kind that usually gets ignored because it’s really not news anymore and it’s only black people, so they died to protect our 2nd Amendment rights! Or something:

Thirteen people, including a 3-year-old boy who suffered a gunshot wound to the head, were shot at a Chicago park in the Back of the Yards neighborhood Thursday night, authorities said.

Ten adults and the 3-year-old were transported by Fire Department ambulances after the attack in the 1800 block of West 51st Street in the Back of the Yards neighborhood, said Fire Department Deputy District Chief James Mungovan at the scene. A 12th victim was believed to have driven himself to Little Company of Mary Hospital in Evergreen Park, a source said, citing preliminary information.

Police said later a total of 13 people were shot, the boy, two teens, and 10 adults, with the boy the most seriously wounded. The boy suffered a gunshot wound to the head at an ear that exited through his mouth, and was in critical condition at Mount Sinai Hospital, police said.

The attack took place about 10:15 p.m. and fire officials called an Emergency Medical Services Plan II, sending at least 10 ambulances to the scene.

Chicago police were making no information about what happened public, except to say that the shooting appeared to be gang-related. The shootings took place on a basketball court on the 51st Street side of Cornell Square Park near Wood Street.

A witness at the scene said three police officers carried the child to an ambulance.

“I didn’t hear no sounds,” from the child, he said.