FOLLOW me on my popular Twitter feed. Just click this photo! @hbbtruth - David - Common sense on #Politics #PublicPolicy #Sports #PopCulture in USA, Great Britain, Sweden and France, via my life in #Texas #Memphis #Miami #IU #Chicago #DC #FL đ«đđșđœ️đ. Photo is of Elvis and Joan Blackman in 'Blue Hawaii'
Beautiful Stockholm at night, looking west towards Gamla Stan
One year later, their power and brilliance remains undiminished: Old songs we loved are made new and great again, via the genius of TV4's "SĂ„ Mycket BĂ€ttre" re Ace of Base, Jenny Berggren, Lisa Nilsson, Kleerup.@aceofbase@jennyberggren @kwidewitt@kleerup
Kleerup & Lisa Nilsson - Longing For Lullabies (Live on TV4's "SĂ„ Mycket BĂ€ttre") https://youtu.be/EROHkyGeshU I can't even begin to tell you how OFTEN I've found myself singing or humming this amazing song the past year, esp. the last few months in and around South Florida. More recent segments and music videos from TV4's "SĂ„ Mycket BĂ€ttre" at its YouTube Channelthat I subscribe to: https://www.youtube.com/user/samycketbattretv4 In my opinion, the past two season have been the best of the past ten years, offering so much more insight that U.S. TV programs into music artists' thinking, their feelings about their craft and the industry and how they have been treated in it. Sometimes, you are even convinced that you have really seen a glimpse of their private side that few people see besides their family, friends and industry colleagues. And that definitely lingers with you, too @SaMycketBattrehttps://twitter.com/SaMycketBattre
What America and the world lost when we lost John Glenn: A genuinely heroic man of unquestioned bravery, character and integrity -who thought his wife, Annie, was the real hero. One of the highlights of my 15 years living and working in the Washington, D.C. area from 1988-2003 were those handful of opportunities, usually outside on Capitol Hill between the Supreme Court and the Senate Office buildings to the north, to speak one-on-one for a few minutes with one of the bravest and most-famous Americans then-alive, Senator John Glenn of Ohio.
@AmyKinLA John Glenn: Genuinely heroic man of unquestioned character/integrity -who thought his wife was real hero! https://t.co/em7p0bBcw3
“We tend to think of heroes as being those who are well known,” he wrote, “but America is made up of a whole nation of heroes who face problems that are very difficult, and their courage remains largely unsung. Millions of individuals are heroes in their own right.”
But anyone who lives to be 95 years old doesn't do so without some mis-steps along the way, and certainly John Glenn wasn't immune to this fact, since he was not without his ideological blind spots.
As best-selling historian Victor Davis Hanson noted in a 2005 column on the then-current parlor game in Washington and other urban areas of the U.S. among many prominent members of the Democratic Party and its friends in the news media of comparing President George W. Bush to Hitler because of his administration's policy of keeping Guantanamo open -instead of closing it and moving the prisoners to the U.S., which would have been against the POV of the majority of the American people- Glenn claimed "It's the old Hitler business"
Then again, even at age 89, he still had the power to speak for many Americans upset at a diminished space exploration program when he openly criticized President George W. Bush's policy of ending the U.S. shuttle program, and instead, paying Russia to launch American astronauts to the International Space Station.
"Operating Atlantis, Discovery and Endeavour until successors are ready might end up being cheaper than buying seats on Russian Soyuz spacecraft, the retired senator said. Flying the shuttles beyond their planned retirement may also be the best way to maximize return on taxpayer investment."
This is but the tip of the iceberg in a fact-filled defense of keeping faith with the origins of the U.S. space program.
Statement of Senator John Glenn (ret.) Regarding NASA Manned Space Flight
Surprise! Peter Deutsch and his Ben Gamla Hebrew Charter School in Hollywood STILL think they can do whatever they want to do, regardless of what the city and its citizens think Per this unsettling but-hardly-surprising news being reported today by William Gjebre in the Florida Bulldog, above, in case any of you forgot or were unaware of my negative feelings about former Congressman Peter Deutsch and his constant litany of bullying insults and threats directed over several years at Hallandale Beach and Hollywood residents, officials and even neighborhoods, in his desire to build or expand his Ben Gamla Hebrew Charter School empire in both cities, I remind you that his words were almost always delivered in public with grating contempt for others in the community, and with what I and many others perceived to be a VERY LARGE (misplaced) sense of entitlement on his part. Yet despite Peter Deutsch's ease of access to powerful people and resources throughout Florida, he constantly tried to paint a narrative for himself and his development efforts as being one akin to a victim -the proverbial "little guy." But those roles were more accurately being played at the time by the neighborhoods and the concerned citizens of our area who believed that a powerful man like Deutsch used to getting his way all the time, should NOT be able to change their neighborhood and city in what they perceived to be negative ways just because he thinks it's a good idea that can make him and his partners more money. I also remind you that both before and after I returned to South Florida in 2003 after living and working in the Washington, D.C. area for 15 years, I've been a very strong and reliable supporter of Charter Schools and the variety of choices they afford students and parents. But that support of mine doesn't mean that I think charter schools are the answer for every student or parent, or even necessarily think that most charter schools in South Florida are well-managed. Clearly they aren't, since the record shows that many are started by people and groups with more good intentions than common sense, good management or enough capital in the bank to do things the right way the first time for kids. That said, Peter Deutsch's ability to successfully and continually "game" the system at so many different levels of govt. and official oversight, using a variety of legislatively-approved legal advantages that residents and neighborhood groups opposed to him didn't enjoy -or even knew existed- might NOT have stood for as long as it has if even a few more honest reporters and columnists among South Florida's press corps had ever done the right thing at the time and fully disclosed the exact nature of those curious advantages -and how they were obtained! But as we know now, at the time, my own blog, Hallandale Beach Blog, and the Florida Bulldog, were unique in South Florida in consistently trying to ferret-out useful, important information for the public to know about what had been taking place below-the-radar with Ben Gamla. Unique in being places where honest people could come to learn and understand how the public policy playing field got so one-sided in the first place that local governments often didn't know until public meetings had started that their usual procedures and tactics regarding planning and approving land use were precluded, and that Deutsch would get the benefit of any doubt. Just as happened in Hallandale Beach, when he and Ben Gamla got the last laugh on the city's bumbling, out-foxed staff. That's why this is the 23rd time I've written about Peter Deutsch and Ben Gamla on the blog.
My last blog post about Ben Gamla Hebrew Charter School was on October 3, 2013, titled, What will Peter Deutsch do Thursday night to try to win over angry Hollywood neighbors/residents who want no part of any Doral Ben Gamla Preparatory Academy in their neighborhood -or the arrogant Ben Gamla parents and their galling sense of entitlement and antipathy towards others? My educated guess is that Deutsch doubles down and is as arrogant as ever
The city of Hollywood violated municipal law when it approved a request by the controversial Ben Gamla middle-high school to stop maintaining a rooftop vegetation area that was a key consideration for a zoning exception allowing the school in a residential neighborhood.
This and other allegations made in a lawsuit filed by the Citizens For Responsible Development Inc. ask the Broward Circuit Court to rescind a Hollywood Planning and Development Board-approved variance for the school to operate without the rooftop green space at the facility headed by former U.S. Rep. Peter Deutsch (D-FL).
The school, which has drawn neighborhood opposition since it was proposed and opened during the past three years, was able to build a larger complex on its property at 2648 Van Buren St. by pledging to provide green area on the school’s roof rather than creating an open space recreational area elsewhere on its property, according to the complaint.
Secret audio implicates Hallandale Beach city attorney in alleged improper conduct Commissioner Bill Julian can't seem to hang up his phone By Bob Norman - Investigative Reporter Posted: 11:58 PM, November 01, 2016
Firing City of Hallandale Beach City Attorney Whitfield was a good start, but the fact remains that there are several city employees and Dept. heads who need to go ASAP in order to have the city move forward.
There's no point in pretending that's not the case.
On Monday I told many off you via a fact-filled email that was sent to concerned citizens
throughout Hallandale Beach, Broward County and South Florida -and members of the news media-and then later, posted here at Hallandale Beach Blog, that on Tuesday, the first big step towards creating a new, positive and more-inclusive future for Hallandale Beach and its long-suffering residents and Small Business owners at Hallandale Beach City Hall would begin. And so it has....
Well, one down, but there are several more heads at Hallandale Beach City Hall that need to roll, including temperamentally-challenged City Manager Daniel Rosemond.
To be sure, it was a nice way to start, getting rid of City Attorney V. Lynn Whitfield, a
woman who for years has acted one way publicly, but acted quite another way behind-the-scenes, as I know from first-hand experience.
Besides the dozens and dozens of times I saw Whitfield in action at public meetings over the years, where she often looked the other way at ethical situations involving elected officials and city employees that cried out for her to say or do something publicly, I got a chance to know the reality of her personality.
But before I mention that, consider this 2013 video I recorded with my friend and fellow Hallandale Beach and Broward County civic activist Csaba "Chuck" Kulin, who is a recent member of the city's Planning and Zoning Advisory Board, who has been a watchdog on finances, ethics and the appearance of impropriety in this area of Broward for many years.
The video speaks for itself regarding what seems to have been Whitfield's inexplicable willingness to look the other way on ethics and conflicts of interest in Hallandale Beach when it's right in front of her.
Csaba Kulin re Hallandale Beach City Attorney Whitfield's comments re her role on ethics. Uploaded May 2, 2013 https://youtu.be/dtpFnVOFA-I
That came when I repeatedly tried to tell her about the City of Hallandale Beach having illegally stolen a Hallandale Beach citizen's property, and then used it later without this person's permision or consent, in what was a profit-making enterprise, for which the citizen whose property was used received NOTHING.
I know the facts better than anyone because I was that citizen whose property was stolen by the city and the city-funded Hallandale Beach Chamber of Commerce.
The facts and context involved being what they were, and which would clearly point to it being an embarrassing episode for the city if made public, I thought it would be best tp go thru the system and for the City Attorney to know all the facts, so she could urge the City Commission to do the right thing.
But City Attorney V. Lynn Whitfield could hardly have cared less about knowning the facts involved when the city she represented had broken the law.
In fact, her own staff was witness to her yelling at me while I was outside of her office in January of 2014, when I stopped by the City Attorney's office one day while doing some errands in an attempt to schedule a meeting with me, a Hallandale Beach citizen, so that she would know what had taken place, since it had happened before she was hired by the city.
City Attorney Whitfield couldn't possibly have known all the germane facts, so, foolishly, I thought a calm and relaxed conversation of maybe 10-15 minutes with her in the near future, with supporting documents that would make clear the city's self-evident liability, would be a positive thing.
Instead, Whitfield kept insisting that I tell her then and show her my proof on her computer. Right then and there!
Well, as stated before, I was running errands that day and had only stopped by HB City Hall because my phone calls were not being returned.
I am one among many other Hallandale Beach citizens who over the years have had bad and troubling experiences with city employees and elected officials lying about what they would do to address problems.
Given that fact, I was not about to fall for the trap.and do something stupid and allow her to buffalo me into having a meeting before it was appropriate.
More importantly, before I had time to make sure that I had someone with me who could witness anything that was done, said or agreed to.
Experience is the best predictor of behavior, no?
Someone on Whitfield's staff even told me that she had a history of refusing to meet with anyone from Hallandale Beach who had hired a lawyer, which is interesting in that she so often met and spoke with lawyers for people with interests before the city who were not even Hallandale Beach residents -like I was then.
So again, firing City Attorney Whitfield was a good start, but the fact remains that there are several City of Hallandale Beach employees and Dept. heads who have a long and well-established history of showing a pronounced antagonism towards sharing facts and public documents with elected officials and citizens when they are supposed to.
There are lots of HB city employees who are clearly opposed to engaging in transparency and treating citizens with respect or civility, to say nothing of ones guilty of goofing around that is legendary in this small oceanside city, where it often seems like every other city employee has a city car of their own to drive around in, with taxpayers paying the tab.
It's long been known that there are certain locations in HB where for several hours a day, you can be sure of seeing a completely different city vehicle drive past nearly ever few minutes.
Question: Where are they all going if the problems in this city never actually get fixed, as is abundantly clear?
No, for years under imperious Hallandale Beach Mayor Joy Cooper'sRubber Stamp Crew of Julian, Sanders and Lewy, Hallandale Beach citizens and Small Business owners all had to glumly accept as "normal" conduct and behavior that was not only completely unsatisfactory, but often proof of the insidious culture of corruption, cronyism and incompetency that has long held sway here.
After all, and this may surprise some of you newcomers to the blog, Hallandale Beach is a city that, under Joy Cooper, once signed a secret deal with somone in the community to act as a paid spy and lobbyist at city meetings and community forums, both to voice enthusiasm for the city's position in public and to monitor who spoke out publicly against the city's position. Really.
I know because I'm the person in South Florida who first broke the news about it happening in 2010, a story that combined creepy elements of cronyism, corruption and breaking ethics and lobbying rules in one fell swoop.
I'm the person who made sure that the sordid story about elected officials betraying the pubic trust got reported publicly in the first place.
APRIL 5, 2010
Joe Kessel is the spy/mole for Hallandale Beach City Hall's Ruinous Mike Good & Joy Cooper Regime
That April 9, 2010 post of mine has this nugget that still shines today and gives anyone reading this blog now and in the future a real taste of how bad things have been done at Hallandale Beach City Hall in the past -and continue to be:
Neverseem inclined to find out how an entrenched culture of corruption could develop here where HB city employees would think it's normal orappropriate to try to physically preventcitizens like me from attendinga publicly-noticed meeting at City Hall for 15 minutes, until theycanceled it right before yours truly finally got there -thanks to the assistance of Comm. London- as happened to me just last month?
Did Assistant City Manager Mark Antonio, he of the $150k-plus salary,and a member of the Evaluation Committee that was meeting that daytry to explain to me when he saw me there, why the meeting wassuddenly canceled once they knew I was trying to get to the meeting? More to the point, did he even attempt to explain why I, the only citizentrying to attend the meeting, was physically preventedby city employees from getting to the meeting? No, he did not.
Instead, Antonio just scurried back to his office like a petulant child,actually yelling atComm. London, as he hurried to his bunker of anoffice, safe from the reasonable questions of a citizen taxpayer. That my friends, is the low moral and professional caliber of people currently working at Hallandale Beach City Hall -and he's one of the persons in charge.Now multiply that unprofessional attitude dozens of times.It explains an awful lot here, doesn't it?
On Tuesday afternoon, the ship that is the new leadership at HB City Hall finally
started changing directions.
Obviously, it won't all be smooth sailing in the future, and there will clearly be difficult times when some hard and unpopular decisions will have to be made or even agonized over. Good thing, then, that there's so much "deadwood" at Hallandale Beach City Hall to be tossed overboard in the coming weeks and months to help lighten the load and help the ship pick up some much-needed speed to be where it ought to be.
Attention: SPECIAL Meeting of Hallandale Beach City Commission on Tuesday at 4:30 PM to discuss contracts of City Manager and City Attorney.
On Tuesday the first big step towards a new, positive and more-inclusive future for Hallandale Beach and its long-suffering residents and Small Business owners at Hallandale Beach City Hall begins...
I earnestly hope that as many of you as possible will make plans to attend and not only meet your new resident-friendly elected leaders, but also let them know just what you think about what we have all had to glumly accept as "normal" conduct and behavior for so many years, and what you want instead in the city's top two bureaucrats.
The only two city employees the HB City Commission directly hires and is
responsible for providing oversight over.
On Tuesday afternoon, the ship that is HB City Hall finally starts changing directions.
