Ask me what I like most about Jewish culture and I’ll give you an honest answer. My partner. Head and shoulders above everything else, and it isn’t close.
Before that, my answer was Einstein. Full stop. If the Jewish people had never done another thing in the history of the world, and of course they’ve done plenty, handing us Einstein buys a permanent pass. Then throw in bagels and matzo ball soup and we’re not even keeping score anymore.
So that’s one side of the ledger, and it’s a hell of a side. Now let me show you the other one, because I live in Deerfield Beach, and Century Village keeps mailing us elected officials.
I want to be clear about who I’m talking about. I’m not talking about the fifteen thousand people who live in there, most of whom are decent, funny, and a lot sharper than the folks who claim to speak for them. I’m talking about the politics that come out of the place, which have been factory seconds of factory seconds for as long as I’ve been paying attention.
Start with Trinci. Amadeo Trinchitella ran that village like a small European duchy, and every politician who came out of it afterward learned the same lesson he taught. The votes live behind the gate, so the people behind the gate get what they want, and the rest of the city gets the invoice.
Then came the parade. There was the one whose name I’ve mercifully forgotten, oh yeah, Bernie, and so has everyone else, who wanted me to spend a hundred dollars of my own money to file his complaint against Carol Berner. That’s the caliber. He had the grievance, and he wanted me to have the receipt.
And now we have Dan Shanetzky.
Shitsky took the ride down to the courthouse with April Boondoggle along for company, and he did it after the city attorney told him not to. Told him plainly, too, in the way lawyers do when they’re trying to keep a client from stepping on his own dick tie.
He went anyway.
Now look, the man has every right to do whatever he wants. That’s America, and I’m the last person on earth who’s going to lecture somebody about ignoring official advice. But there’s a difference between defying the system on purpose and wandering into it because nobody explained where the walls are.
This is the same commissioner who covers himself in Post-it notes like he’s the answer man, and who voted for the thing and then against the thing, or maybe against it and then for it, until keeping track of him turned into a part-time job.
Which brings me to the actual problem, and it isn’t Shanetzky. It’s the math.
If you’re on that dais and your neighbor wants to extend his dock two feet, it takes three votes out of five. If you’re on that dais and somebody wants to spend seventy-five million dollars, it also takes three votes out of five. The dock and the seventy-five million cost the same at the register.
Remember when we tried to roll in the supermajority out of the city manager rules? Blew a spleen over that one.
Long timers will remember the original screaming harpy, Lynn Deetjen.
Because to fix it, you’d need this commission to vote against its own comfort. You’d need Shitsky, and you’d need the gentleman who has been in office for roughly four thousand years, Ben Preston.
Let me give Ben his due, because he has earned exactly this much. He put a flower bed outside Deerfield Beach High School, and he has named damn near every street in this city after somebody, which I suppose counts as a skill in certain company.
Beyond that, I’m not sure what the man has done in all those years. He is, and I say this with real affection for the office and none at all for the officeholder, about as effective as a fart in a spacesuit.
Now, on to happier business. There’s a constitutional convention thing coming up over at Dr. Philgoods, and I’m calling it Cocktails with the Coddingtons. Er, Coddington, as one Coddington is in the Cooler.
I plan to show up.
Long timers might remember Ron Conington’s campaign final supper, over at the Casa Maya in the Cove, he spent real money ($80 no less!) on security because he was certain some badness was headed his way.
No, Ron. That was projection. You figured that if you lost, and somebody nearby was celebrating, you’d wander over and make trouble. So you assumed I would too. That was never about me. That was a confession with a price tag on it.
Let me put something on the record, since we’re talking about who’s dangerous around here.
In thirty years of this work, nobody has ever once accused me of physical harm. Not once. Have the thoughts crossed my mind? Sure they have. My therapist explained it to me years ago, and I’ve never forgotten it. You’re supposed to think those thoughts. You’re just not supposed to act on them.
I never acted on them.
Jeff Sayles insinuated I was the victim of childhood sexual abuse … Pointing the finger at a family member. I look forward to taking a big stinking dookie on his grave.
My dog was poisoned, there were bullet holes in my car, and there was a sheriff’s cruiser parked outside my house. I did nothing. Not a thing, and I had every reason in the world to be something other than calm.
I have a pretty good idea who was responsible. That’s between them and whoever they answer to on the last day.
I’ll see you at Dr. Philgoods.
Caryl, the first box of wine is on me. The second box will likely poured down the front of your Will **** For a Bartles and James t-shirt.
