Be careful what you wish for

The Vinny "Family Man" Mesolella Environmental Dubious Achievement award has been won hands-down by Michael Kent for his wonderful display of artistic clear-cutting on his Plum Point property in Saunderstown .

Kent's handiwork, displayed recently by the Other Paper, is literally stopping traffic on Route 1A, just south of Route 138. In response to his desire to build on his substandard lot, neighbors fought Kent's plans (which were either: a) incredibly ambitious or b) equally insane) to try to maintain the neighborhood's wooded character. This proved to be much to Kent's annoyance. So, with a figurative shout of, "They want open space, I'll give them open space!" Mad Mike cut down all the trees on his property, and painted the waist-high stumps in day-glo and fluorescent colors like yellow and purple, and adorned them with cryptic symbols. If Peter Max had been a lumberjack, this could have been his high point. The result really must be seen to be believed.

P&J usually favor clear-cutting as much as we enjoyed Family Man's draining of Pascoag Reservoir, part of a court case now being heard over the reservoir's ownership. Still, we couldn't resist chuckling at Kent's defiant payback and what the neighbors who made such a stink about his plans now think. Like they say, be careful what you wish for -- you might get it.

Blowing hard

As if the Bankruptcy Boys of Quonset Point Partners weren't full of enough hot air to get a fleet of Virgin Airways balloons aloft: Flack Dave Preston once more got his lapdog, former Governor Bruce Sundlun, aka Captain Blowhard, to do his bidding in supporting the B-Boys' embarrassingly inept and incomplete port proposal.

Sundlun showed up the special "public meeting" held July 22 by the Economic Development Corporation (Governor Bigfoot, proprietor) and, according to witnesses, gave a rambling and virtually incoherent defense of QPP's quickly self-destructing vision of the future. It's bad enough that the captain, who P&J are actually inclined to like, needs to use industrial-strength Poli-Grip any time he speaks in public any more, but at least he should know what he's talking about and not play ventriloquist's dummy for Preston, his former campaign manager. The Bankruptcy Boys' proposal is leaking like a sieve. As a former big hitter in the biz world, Captain Blowhard would shred on sight QPP's third-rate proposal if something that weak ever came before him while he was the Outlet Co.'s head ramrod.

(And while we're correcting folks, we would remind Urinal scribe Bob Jagolinzer that it was a "Trojan port," not "horse" that the Jamestown folks called the B-Boys' now-fully discredited proposal.)

Symbol-mongering

P&J have always been fascinated by reactionary and moronic legislation created to uphold unsupportable views. The humorously titled "Defense of Marriage Act" is a classic example of this. Fearing that the state of Hawaii, seemingly on the verge of allowing superior behaviorists to marry -- and therefore be catapulted to the rank of first-class citizens, with all the rights and protections of everyone else -- the Republican-controlled Congress took swift action. They came up with a bill to quash this affront to antediluvian heterosexist privilege by assuring that, when an enlightened state finally passes legislation (as surely one will) to legally recognize the right of gay couples to marry , the rest of the states can ignore it. Of course, it doesn't "defend" marriage in the least; it merely supports the right of states to continue to discriminate. It was, of course, promptly signed by our national finger-in-the-breeze, President Clinton.

On Monday, the BeloJo reported on a similar bit of reactionary legislation that was passed in the final days of the recent General Assembly session. Rep. John "Simian" Simonian, D-Cranston, fearing that Vo Dilun may be losing some of its edge as the last holdout for vengeance-in-patriotic-clothing, introduced a bill to prohibit any government entity from referring, in paid advertising, to the second Monday in August by any other name but "Victory Day." This because of that devious little thing called Bay Day, a backdoor attempt to subvert the VD holiday into a celebration of our lovely Narragansett Bay (the date for Bay Day was already changed this year under pressure from veterans groups). There is also the fact that, in recent years, attempts have been made to change the name from the martial "Victory Day" to the more appropriate peace day.

We say more appropriate because honoring peace and sisterhood seems far less messy. Folks of Asian descent have been attacked and verbally abused in recent years by troglodytes jacked up on Victory Day hormonal imbalances. Sadly, though, there is still political clout among those who would still use the term "Jap." And, no matter how others try to present it or coat it with patriotic platitudes, that's how P&J see it.

We also feel this is not unlike the battle now going on in South Carolina, where the Confederate battle flag proudly waves over the State House. Various black and civil rights organizations have been discussing a boycott of the state, while the defenders of the flag go on and on about tradition and honor. The thing to remember is, the few Southern states that insist on flying the flag didn't come to this momentous decision until the early '60s. Coincidentally, this was also the same time that those states were being forced by the federal government to abandon their racial segregation laws. Supporters of the battle flag argue that there's no connection between flying the colors and the South's history of legalized racial oppression. P&J wonder how it would be received if we insisted that the swastika be reclaimed as the Greek cross, the symbol of good luck it represented before being subverted by the Third Reich.

Bigfoot's latest circus trick

What could be more entertaining than watching a giant bear-like creature flip-flopping around, while verbally fumbling in bogs of ambiguity? Governor Bigfoot put on just such a display for the BeloJo's intrepid Katherine "Faster Pussycat, Kill, Kill" Gregg, who duly reported it all in Sunday's Other Paper. The case in question: the state Department of Administration's ridiculous stance to not release information on the pay records of state union representatives who collect their taxpayer-provided salaries while doing union business. Separating the private parts of the information from the pertinent details on pay is quite simple, but avoiding embarrassment is not. In spite of that, Bigfoot continues to stonewall.

John Rooke, Almond's deputy communications director at the time, let the cat out of the bag last March with this hilarious take on public records: "If a record (is) not prohibited from being released, then we can produce such voluntarily -- which also means we can choose not to, based on our best interests at the time." The Almond brain trust quickly realized that this Marie Antoinette-like pronouncement wasn't working, and soon announced that he'd release the information. We're still waiting.

The best part of Gregg's article was at the end. After being informed by Gregg that the Missing Linc was basing his argument to conceal the records on a previous case concerning the bank records of private citizens, lawyer Jay Glasson (who litigated the case) "laughed out loud."

Mall's well that ends well?

Last Sunday's Arts & Leisure section of the New York Times featured two pieces on Providence, one on the popular television show whose cloying sentiments are quickly turning Out Little Towne into the insulin shock capital of the nation, and the other on the downcity Renaissance. While architectural observer Jane Holtz Kay was highly laudatory about Waterplace Park and its attendant glories, there was also this: "another new project detracts from the area's urbanity. It is the $435 million 1.3-million-square-foot Providence Place soon to open between the canal and the capitol . . . a mall-like intruder on the cityscape . . . this looming structure, along with three new downtown hotels and a convention center, could drain customers from the city's core and threaten the vitality hard won by Waterplace. Indeed, the overscaled Providence Place raises questions as to whether the city can build more lively, intimate projects like Waterplace Park as developers push for more conventional projects." And that critique, friends, is right on the money.

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