In a message dated 5/10/2007 1:01:56 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time,
[EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
Just to be clear..I don’t see the police as my enemy
And, you will be judged by the company you keep.
Another example of how Team Fattah is not for reform or transparency leading
to good government. It is also total selfishness on Street's part. If Fattah
doesn't win opening up a congressional seat for Street, Street will have to
look for a real job instead of continuing to suck public tax dollars from the
nipple of working productive people.
Backroom politics continue only because civilians rarely do the hard work
necessary to follow the game, when the political entities will not furnish you
with their team rosters, including their shadowy taxi squad members paid with
WAM and street money.
This is an absolutely despicable engagement on the part of a moribund and
disintegrating Street Dynasty.
Ciao,
Craig
Anti-Nutter group has ties to the mayor
By Marcia Gelbart and Craig R. McCoy
Mayor Street tried to raise money for the group that's behind an ad
attacking Michael Nutter, the front-runner in Tuesday's mayoral primary.
Nutter and Street are longtime political foes.
Shawn Fordham, a paid consultant to the "527" group and a top adviser to
Street, said yesterday that the mayor had made at least three telephone calls
"a
few days ago," soliciting money for the group, known as One Step Closer.
Street's spokesman, Joe Grace, confirmed that Street had made the
fund-raising calls - though Fordham said no one Street had contacted agreed to
donate.
"The mayor understood this committee was intending to raise issues and
inform voters of issues of concern in this election," Grace said last night.
"The
mayor was made aware of the committee by Shawn Fordham, who asked him to make
some calls, and he made some calls."
Efforts to interview Street for this story were unsuccessful. A reporter who
went to his home last night to seek comment had the door slammed in her
face.
One Step Closer is the third 527 group to surface in the mayor's race, a
development that critics call an end-run around the city's new limits on
campaign giving and spending.
This week, One Step Closer made public on YouTube a TV ad that began with
1960s footage of civil-rights marchers and baton-wielding police, and then
attacked Nutter's proposal to have police "stop and frisk" people suspected of
carrying illegal guns. The narrator asked: "Haven't we had enough of
politicians like Nutter, who step on our rights in the name of security?"
The ad ran last night on CBS3 with a slightly revised narration, deleting a
statement that Nutter would "suspend constitutional rights" in some areas.
So-called 527 groups - their name is from the section of the federal tax
code governing them - can keep donors secret until after the election, and
aren't bound by the city's limits on individual and political committee
contributions.
"I wish he [Street] hadn't gotten involved in this way," said Zack Stalberg,
president of the Committee of Seventy, a campaign watchdog group that has
condemned the use of 527 groups.
Melanie Johnson, a spokeswoman for Nutter, said he would not comment on the
ad and Street's role in the group.
Under federal rules, 527s can't coordinate their efforts with a candidate.
Fordham said One Step Closer had raised about $100,000 to broadcast the
anti-Nutter ad.
Fordham declined to say whom the mayor had called to ask for money for One
Step Closer.
Fordham and the people involved in One Step Closer have insisted that their
group is independent, and supports no one in the mayor's race. Street has not
endorsed anyone to succeed him.
According to Fordham, Street made the calls at his request after Fordham
told him that the group would mount a "public awareness" campaign, possibly
including TV spots.
He said he had told Street that the campaign would focus on "a number of
issues, but the number-one issue was 'stop and frisk.' "
"He didn't want to get into too many of the details," Fordham said of
Street. "He just said, 'You've been around a long time; you know what's
appropriate.' "
Nutter's stop-and-frisk stance has become a hot-button issue in the
campaign, drawing criticism from all four of his rivals. Chaka Fattah and
Dwight
Evans have said it would trample civil rights.
Nutter has said police would be trained to conduct stop-and-frisk operations
in accordance with the law, which says police may search people based on a
"reasonable suspicion" - such as behavior - that they are carrying a concealed
weapon.
Street and Nutter, allies in the early 1990s, have been political foes for
years and over numerous issues. Street opposes using stop-and-frisk tactics;
Nutter's mayoral campaign has slammed Street's record in a TV ad.
Fordham insisted yesterday that One Step Closer was not a creature of the
mayor's. "There's nobody behind the curtain here," he said.
Some of One Step Closer's previous funding, $75,000, came in 2005 from a
separate group with ties to Fattah. That group is run by Greg Naylor, Fattah's
chief mayoral campaign strategist. Fattah has said he knows nothing about One
Step Closer.
Nutter's campaign lawyer, Susan Burke, said the campaign contacted TV
stations yesterday to question use of the One Step Closer ad, which she called
"defamatory."
Fordham said the ad was revised after talks involving a Nutter lawyer and
CBS3. He said One Step Closer is still seeking to show its ad on other
stations.
Burke said last night: "The real issue is, who the heck is this One Step
Closer? It's not what it purports to be. We're going to dig in and look and
see
what it is."
____________________________________
To view the anti-Nutter commercial that the One Step Closer group produced
and aired on TV last night, go to _http://go.philly.com/closerad_
(http://go.philly.com/closerad)
____________________________________
Contact staff writer Marcia Gelbart at 215-854-2338 or
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
(http://www.philly.com/philly/news/homepage/mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]) .
Find this article at:
http://www.philly.com/philly/news/homepage/20070510_Anti-Nutter_group_has_ties
_to_the_mayor.html
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