Philadelphia, PA

KYW 1060 has reported that too many people have registered to vote, and as a result, there will be ridiculously long lines.

The Committee of 70 says 16 divisions in the city are way beyond the state limit for number of registered voters.

The group’s policy director, Sarah Stevenson, says those divisions are in center city, near Penn and Drexel in West Philly, and in the northeast: “The threshold in the state election code is 1200 voters per division. Some divisions here are just over 1,200, but some have three times as many voters.

The city says it can’t split the divisions this late in the game.

This is going to be a pain in the ass.

Here we go, let the “Hockey Mom” jokes begin. Sarah Palin will be dropping the puck at the Flyers opener.

Comcast Spectacor’s press release says otherwise; they must just be pulling our chain. An excerpt:

Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, the nation’s most popular hockey mom, will join the winner of the Philadelphia Flyers regional search for the “Ultimate Hockey Mom” contest and drop the puck at the ceremonial opening face-off as the home team Flyers host the New York Rangers at the Wachovia Center on Saturday, October 11 at 7 p.m.

“Because of the tremendous amount of publicity she has brought to our sport, we invited the most popular hockey mom in North America to our home opener to help us get our season started,” said Comcast-Spectacor Chairman Ed Snider who founded the Flyers in 1967. “We are very excited she has accepted our offer and we are very proud of the publicity she is generating for hockey moms and the sport of hockey.”

See, they’re bringing out a regular hockey mom along with Palin so you can’t boo her. Also, why only a regional search for the Ultimate Hockey Mom? Pretty soon John McCain’s going to suspend his campaign to say we should only vote in Alaska.

Hell, I can’t afford to go to Alaska to vote.

(Inquirer - Meet the Flyers new hockey mom: Sarah! As in Palin!)

Just a few days after Wachovia had been bought by Citigroup , with help from the federal government, Wells Fargo jumped in to buy the company with no help from the federal government.

Wells Fargo Chairman Dick Kovacevich said the deal “provides superior value” to the Citigroup deal and that it will allow Wachovia shareholders to “have a meaningful opportunity to participate in the growth and success of a combined Wachovia-Wells Fargo that will be one of the world’s great financial services companies.”

Update: Hmm, it looks like this may not be true.

So, yesterday Sarah Palin came to good ole’ Philadelphia to watch the debate. Where in Philly did she watch the debate? An Irish pub. Perfect place to watch right?

There were people outside the pub protesting her. Must of been a great night.

That’s all the time I’m going to waste on this idiotic woman.

Now, did you see the debate? McCain looked very pissed off, especially in the beginning. From my personal opinion, I think Obama kicked his ass.

If you missed the debate than you can watch it here, right now.

Uhh, St. Lucie County officials are investigating whether a firefighter took a man’s severed foot from the scene of a traffic accident. On September 19th, 2008, a crash on I-95 caused a man’s foot to be sheared off; the man survived and is undergoing treatment at a local hospital.

It’s the Fire District’s policy to take a severed body part with the patient to the hospital if there is any chance of reattachment, or the body part goes to the medical examiner’s office. But authorities said the foot was taken to the hospital days later, on September 24th.

Officials would not release the name of the firefighter under investigation, but said the firefighter trains cadaver dogs, which are used to locate and follow the scent of decomposing human flesh.

What the hell was this guy doing with a severed foot…

Fox News reported 33 minutes ago that there may be a possible bomb outside of the Citizen’s Bank Park in Philadelphia. More details will come…

::Update::

The discovery of several hot dogs in packages outside Citizens Bank Park brought the bomb squad out and forced the temporary evacuation of the stadium Wednesday evening.

According to police, Pattison Street between Darien and 11th Streets were shutdown as officials investigated the discovery of several suspicious packages near a ticket office.

Fans inside the stadium were evacuated, but players remained on the field following the incident.

Bomb squad members further investigated the packages and determined they were simply several hot dogs in foil wrappers. Sadly, the wieners were detonated as a precaution.

The stadium was reopened at about 5:20 p.m.

The Phillies take on the Atlanta Braves at 7:05 p.m. on Wednesday evening.

Via CBS3.com.

I was browsing my partners website, CBS 3, and came across an hilarious cover story.

That’s right.

This may just be the biggest story of the day.

Ok, if your done laughing at the huge rat and you really care about this story - here’s the low down, this is a free speech case in front of the New Jersey Supreme Court, stemming from an incident where a union was fined $133 for protesting with said inflatable rat in front of a Gold’s Gym.

[CBS 3 - Legitimacy of Giant, Inflatable Rat Questioned]

Yes! I can feel it! Halloween’s right around the corner. Here’s the Mistress of the Dark discussing her Halloween plans in Philly.

Hah, people in Gloucester County are suffering from a wild boar invasion.

As many as 100 feral swine are ripping up golf courses, rooting through flower farms and generally making a mess of things in the swamps, forests and fields of Gloucester County. Thought to be descendants of domestic hogs freed from pens at least a decade ago, the belligerent boars have mentally and physically regressed and are no longer the familiar pink porkers slopping it up on lazy little farms. [...] “They eat anything, endangering rare plants and degrading the habitat. They compete with native wildlife, eating the eggs of ground nesting birds like quail and turkeys,” said Lawrence Herrighty of the state Division of Fish and Wildlife.
Feral pigs have been declared one of the most destructive invasive species on the planet, and the federal government estimates about 6 million of the animals are digging up crops and making mud wallows of sensitive vernal pools, where rare reptiles and amphibians reproduce. They also are reservoirs for a host of diseases that impact domestic livestock, wildlife and even humans.

“They are a threat to wildlife, agriculture and landowners,” Herrighty said. “They have to be eradicated.”

Under a contract finalized in April with environmental officials and the state Department of Agriculture, federal biologists began trapping, testing and killing the hogs in June but so far have bagged only three.

I wanna’ go check this out. Who wants to come with?

Holy shit. Take a look at Larry Mendte’s statement. This story finally got interesting again.

Let me explain. This whole episode started five years ago when Alycia Lane came to Philadelphia. Almost immediately, Dawn heard rumors that Alycia and I were a little too close and she should watch out.
The rumors were true. Alycia and I had a flirtatious, unprofessional, and improper relationship.

Dawn found proof of that relationship when she waited in my office on New Years Day 2005 and read emails that I had left out on my desk, emails between Alycia and me that confirmed her suspicions.

Dawn confronted me with the emails. I told her the truth. I told her I loved her, and I apologized. I then immediately stopped having long dinners with Alycia, staying out late with Alycia, and I stopped allowing her to come into my office to do her makeup everyday.

The relationship that was once close quickly turned into a personal feud.

Alycia Lane then became friends with others in the building, including the new General Manager. Suddenly, I had shows and responsibilities pulled away from me without explanation. The GM angrily confronted me one day and said that I was bad mouthing him. I was not. But, clearly, I was not on the list you want to be on with the new GM.

I found proof that it was Alycia who was undermining me when I saw an email she sent to management that she left up on the computer she uses on the set.

Then he goes on and on about how keylogger programs are available “too easily” on the Internet, and how he’s going to become a lecturer on how scary the Internet is.

Absolutely nothing.

That’s the legal price Larry Mendte is expected to pay for his very successful effort to destroy his TV news co-anchor, Alycia Lane.

Mendte was scheduled to plead guilty in federal court today for spying on Lane’s e-mail in a diabolical scheme to destroy her.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office, under the terms of the plea agreement, will seek no jail time, and no restitution.

Unless the judge objects, which seems unlikely, Mendte will be given probation.

Lucky Larry…

Catherine Lucey sends the joyous news that Jack Kelly’s chief of staff has been indicted, along with three other developers. The local developers were not able to appear in funny photo’s though. I know, big let down.

One or the worst story of the year: Philadelphia’s child welfare agency, a horrible grand jury report yesterday found that a fourteen year girl rotted in her bed because of the system’s brutal indifference.

Prosecutors charged nine people, including the girl’s parents and four social workers, who stood by while Danieal Kelly, who ahd cerebral palsy, starved to death.

Kelly’s corpse was found in a boiling hot West Philadelphia rowhouse on August 4th, 2006, weighing only 42 pounds, which is the weight of a typical five year old.

The grand jury charged Kelly’s mother, Andrea Kelly, thirty nine years old, with murder, and her father, Daniel Kelly, thirty seven years old, with child endangerment. But it devoted most of its 258 pages to chronicling how those outside the family failed their mission to rescue Danieal Kelly.

The jury also criminally charged two DHS social workers, Dana Poindexter, fifty one years old, and Laura Sommerer, thirty three years old, with felony counts of child endangerment and misdemeanor counts of reckless endangerment. It said that Poindexter tossed Daanieal Kelly’s file into a trash filled file box and that Sommerer, in a visit to the home shortly before the death, failed to realize that the girl was in horrible shape.

In addition, the grand jury also charged three friends of the victim’s mother with perjury. It accused them of trying to protect her by lying to the grand jury about Danieal’s deteriorating condition.

As of yesterday, by early evening, six of the nine people charged were in custody.

This completely sickens me.

On July 19th Alycia Lane sued KYW-TV, claiming that the station exploited her, tore her down, and defamed her on her way out the door. Ouch.

Lane is seeking unspecified damagers, the former anchor alleges in a complaint filed in Common Pleas Court that management “turned a blind eye” toward leaks of personal information after she repeatedly voiced concerns about “security breaches” in her private email. She also alleges that management engaged in “deep seated gender discriminatory animus” toward her and other female employees. Wow.

Lane uses the lawsuit to spell out for the first time her side of her downfall at CBS3. She claims that the breaches of her email began in early 2006, when the New York Post reported that she was cozying up to Prince Albert of Monaco.

The lawsuit also tells Lane’s side of the May 2007 scandal after the Post wrote that she was chastised by the wife of the sportcaster Rich Eisen for sending him photos of herself in a bikini.

Besides the station, station manager Michael Colleran and two defendants called John Doe and Jane Doe are named in the filing by her attorney, Paul Rosen of Spector Gadon & Rosen.

Lane’s co-anchor, Larry Mendte, is not a defendant. The complaint alleges that Mendte was “obsessively jealous” of her “growing popularity and success” and resented her higher salary. Her compensation is thought to have been $100,000 above his $700,000 a year, according to station sources.

A KYW-TV spokeswoman said the station had not seen the complaint and had no further immediate comment.

Lane’s suit claims that a statement from Colleran that Mendte read on-air on Jan. 7 killed her career.

It read in part: “After assessing the overall impact of a series of incidents resulting from judgments she has made, we have concluded that it would be impossible for Alycia to continue to report the news as she, herself, has become the focus of so many news stories.” It added, “We understand that Alycia expects to be fully vindicated in that proceeding” in New York.

The suit says the “clear meaning” was that Lane was “now unable to report the news for any news station anywhere in the world.”

The Philadelphia Inquirer reports that there were three skinny, sheepish teenagers, pushing the limits of adolescence but not yet men. Ok, for one thing, if I was described as “sheepish” I may be offended. I don’t know if that’s just me.

A thirty eight year old Bucks County mother was ordered held for trial on a variety of sexual assault charges.

Angela Honeycutt of Lower Makefield Township is accused of engaging in sexual acts with two of the boys (the sheepish boys), ages fourteen and fifteen years old. The “crimes” allegedly occurred during a teen sleepover last April at the home of a female friend of Ms. Honeycutt’s, who lived in the neighborhood.

The “sheepish” boys testified that Ms. Honeycutt had danced provocatively, discussed sex with them, and kissed two or three of them before “disrobing” and heading for the shower.

She had asked the boys if any of them wanted to join her in the shower. The fifteen year old boy said that he wasn’t planning on having sex when he entered the bathroom with her. The boy said that “other stuff happened” and he changed his mind.

Blah, blah blah, the same old stuff.

One of the boys ended up engaging in two sexual acts in the shower with Ms. Honeycutt, but did not have intercourse, but than one of the boys did have intercourse with her (?).

(more…)