For Mayor In The Primary Election: Michael Nutter (D)

There is a lot we don’t like about Michael Nutter: On principle, both the Smoking Ban You Can Smoke Along To and Stop N Frisk — both of them, awkward Nutter love-children — are equally infuriating if you care about things like personal freedom and other selfish values that all of a sudden don’t matter as much when the young and poor are dropping like flies. But Philadelphia is sick, it is bleeding, the old models are not working, and look at this gang of morons who are running for Mayor: To say Nutter is the smartest guy in the room is like saying City Hall smells like popcorn and piss. No shit, Sherlock. And time and again, Nutter has proven he’s got the smarts and the guts to wade through the stench to make sure that as long as it’s on his watch, civilization will prevail. He’s got the confidence that comes with being in a room full of ancient yellow trolls for years at a time, knowing that if you spin your shit just the right way so that their fiefdoms are protected and involved, he can make these fools do whatever the hell he wants. So in the end, he really does have our best interests at heart. And he who smelt it hath not always dealt it.

And if it seems like this endorsement is less a high-five than a buyer-beware, you are catching on quick, son. Stop N Frisk, for instance, is definitely gonna clog up the courts with lots of easily-dismissable cases and make the Philly court system even more of a clusterfuck than it already is. On the other hand, however, you can’t argue with the logic of taking that gun away from that guy on that night. One by one is how Nutter plans to knock thugs out. And the fact that he’s willing to throw himself on a grenade of Uncle Tom cries to do it shows that the guy’s got balls. Which is good. He’s gonna need ‘em.

Like we have said before, this election is about New Philadelphia versus Old Philadelphia. You’re either voting for one, or you’re voting for the other, and it’s as clear as day to us that this election is a referendum on the way our civic forefathers from Rizzo to Fumo have sold us out and taken us for unquestioning, short-sighted proles. One Philebrity reader estimated that whoever gets 75,000 votes wins this. That’s roughly the attendance of two Phillies games. That’s all you need to be mayor. But in a field so crowded, every vote counts. No, seriously, it does.

So break it down this way: Brady and Fattah are so Old Philadelphia they smell like your grandma’s couch. Evans is new Philadelphia, too — and for the record, has run a dignified, forward-thinking campaign in a town where that is hard as hell to do — but we caution you all against allowing him to become the Ralph Nader of this election. A vote for Evans at this point is a vote out of Nutter’s column and in, God help you, you poor sucker, Knox’s column. And at this point, we feel we must remind you: Tom Knox is not a politician. And no matter what your level of disaffection for the political animal may be, the fact remains that to be Mayor of Philadelphia, you need to be one. Sorry, we don’t make the rules. We were just born here. On Tuesday, open up the windows and let some fresh air into this sarcophagus of the petty and banal that we call Home. Vote for Michael Nutter.

On Monday: City Council Endorsements. And for more election info, visit The Committee of Seventy.

This entry was posted on Sunday, May 13th, 2007 at 3:20 pm.