Scoop’s Views

What was the debate about? Something incredibly stupid: If a poll watcher, with a certified certificate from the City of Philadelphia, allowed the gentleman to be in the actual voting area or if he had to “step back 100-to-150 feet. Because the debate was getting more interesting the longer I listened, I pulled up a chair, pulled out my cell phone, and snapped a few photos. At the right, you see the poll watcher — the man with the gray, long hair — being tag-team debated and challenged about his “appropriateness” of being in the polling area.

My primary concern and reason for my actions were to ensure my vote — as well as the votes of all other citizens in my area — really do count, are counted, and all things at the polling place are handled legally and ethically. For those reasons, I did call the Philadelphia District Attorney Voting Complaints Hotline. The District Attorney’s office, obviously, has legal jurisdiction over all polling place, including committee person’s with too big of an ego and too little background on dealing with poll watchers (not to mention voters).

Tags: 2008 Presidential election, Barack Hussein Obama, Barack Obama, citizens, city of Philadelphia, Committee of Seventy, committee persons, courts, election day, election issues, ethical, get out and vote, get out the vote, Jack's Deli, John McCain, judges, just vote, Legal, legal action, Northeast Philadelphia, Philadelphia, Philadelphia Board of Elections, Philadelphia City Council, Philadelphia District Attorney, political parties, poll watchers, polling area, Rock the Vote, voter complaints, Voter Hotline, voters, voting complaints, voting complaints hotline, voting oversight

Hurricane Gustav is going to hit the United States unless there’s an act of divine intervention. Short of a miracle from Heaven, all computer predictions are showing Hurricane Gustav will hit somewhere along the Gulf Coast, anywhere from Pensacola, Florida on the Eastern side to Houston, Texas on the West.

Unless Hurricane Gustav’s path is suddenly diverted, or unless Hurricane Gustav falls apart and becomes little more than a tropical storm or depression, it’s more than likely at least one of the many oil platforms in the Gulf of Mexico will receive some damage, but likely all of the platforms will be closed down in advance of the storm.

Tags: computer predictions, crude oil, divine intervention, Florida, gas prices, gasoline, gasoline prices, Gulf Coast, Gulf of Mexico, Houston, Hurricane Gustav, Louisiana, New Orleans, Northeast Philadelphia, oil, oil barrels, oil companies, oil platforms, oil prices, Pensacola, Philadelphia, price per gallon, shale, Texas, Tropical Storm Hannah

A string of thunder storms, some producing hail two inches in width, blew through the Delaware Valley today, starting around noon or so, at least in the Far Northeast Philadelphia section of town. It was a storm in the evening that made me stand in awe.

Like many people, I am a sucker for rainbows. Maybe it has something to do with some stories I heard many years ago from an elder Cherokee who has since passed. Maybe it’s because a rainbow is simply beautiful and awesome in its own right. No matter what, they are something fascinating.

Tags: Bustleton, Cherokee, Delaware Valley, double rainbows, dual rainbows, elder, evening rain, evening storms, Far Northeast Philadelphia, flooding, hail, lightning, Northeast Philadelphia, Philly, pots of gold, rainbow, second rainbow, storms, thunder, thunderstorms, Weather

If you look at the new home construction going on around the 9:24 mark in the video, that’s some of the construction that led to many of the cookie-cutter style homes in Mayfair at the time. From the mid-1940s through the early 1960s, a lot of new home construction converted much of Northeast Philadelphia from open fields to the Northeast Philadelphia of today. In 2004, Northeast Philadelphia provided around 70 percent of all city revenue from taxes.

Tags: 1929, baby boom, candy makers, chocolatiers, depression, Frankford Avenue, Lincoln High School, Mayfair, Mayfair Elementary School, Mayfair Men's Association, Mayfair movie Theater, Northeast Philadelphia, Philadelphia, Philadelphia Transportation Corporation, Pott's Ice Cream, PTC, Route 3, Route 66, SEPTA, Torresdale Avenue, World War II