Scooped

Well, it is a good thing someone at the Urinal is reading the Wall Street Journal on a regular basis so we can get some news about what's going on here in the Biggest Little. P&J are referring to the fact that the WSJ scooped Vo Dilun's paper of record on not one, but two, news stories in its August 18 edition.

First off, we had the revelation that a seven-screen Angelika Cinema, described by developer David Wasserman as "urban" and "hip" (two words which the BeloJo editors made sure were lifted into their headline when the story appeared in their day late and dollar short report August 19) was coming to the proposed Providence Marketplace development, a stone's throw from the Providence Place Mall that has been so relentlessly reported on by the Urinal.This trendy cineplex will have to compete not only with the artsy Avon and Cable Car cinemas, but also the traditional garbage . . . er, excuse us, fare that will be screening on Providence Place's 16 screens. At least the Urinal report did credit the WSJ when it quoted Wasserman, a good thing, because by that time he had done his PR spiel and wasn't returning any calls to Fountain Street.

In that same edition, the WSJ also scooped the BeloJo on the story about the rapidly vanishing interest of Stevedore Services of America in doing business with the Bankruptcy Boys of Quonset Point Partners. No big achievement since P&J knew about that development on August 17 when we went to press with our two-day lead time, but it might be nice if the paper that's carried countless articles on this massive and hideously flawed proposal got the news before a New York based-rag. Oh well, there's always that scoop about the Titanic being found that we can look forward to this weekend.

"The Craw" strikes again

While Phillipe and Jorge could only love the story in the Urinal about the gentleman who attacked his brother-in-law with what Johnston police described as "a prosthetic claw that he has in place of a right hand," we were a bit baffled by what spurred his assault. The Other Paper's Celeste Katz reported that the man was "infuriated at not being able to use his mother's car." Fair enough, we get testy when Mom takes the keys away, too. But when Katz further adds, "He then fled in a red Jaguar with his girlfriend," we're a bit baffled. What's Mom driving, a custom Maserati?

The postman always rings twice

The Other Paper's editorial page editor, Robert Whitcomb, called P&J to inform us that the missive to his attention on Fountain Street from Kenny McKeven, which we referred to last week, never made it to Whit's desk.While it may have been buried under the hundreds of letters the Urinal gets on a daily basis, Whitcomb tells us he would happily run it (despite our previous prediction to the contrary) if he received a copy. But hey, the highlights have already been printed in this space, so let's save room for more cogent correspondence about Rhode Island-sized measuring units.

The mystery of the Red Fiero

If you have had occasion to stroll down Congdon Street on Providence's East Side recently, you may have noticed a red Pontiac Fiero parked on Congdon near the corner of Halsey. A resident of the area, who lives around the corner on Prospect Street, called Casa Diablo over the weekend to discuss the strange case of this automobile.

Seems that car has been sitting there for at least three weeks with cobblestones placed behind the back tires and no license plates. Oddly enough, the Providence Police have deemed this automobile off-limits to any sort of legal repercussions. We say this because one morning, the Prospect Street neighbor noticed that one car parked on Halsey and another on Congdon both received tickets for illegal overnight parking. Examining the tickets more closely, it was determined that they were issued at 2 and 2:05 a.m., respectively, and by the same officer. The red Fiero, parked between the two cars, was left untouched.

Monday afternoon, your superior correspondents took a little jaunt up to Congdon Street to check out the car for ourselves. We noticed that it was cleverly parked about two feet off the curb on the side of a tenement house where students dwell, about 15 feet from a single-family home. The car also had an inspection sticker (Y-043652) that is good until January 2000.

We spoke to the woman in the single-family home who told us that the car had indeed been there for about three weeks and that she was considering calling the police. She also mentioned that, "This has happened before . . . about a year ago there was another car parked there for about a month."

Here's what P&J are wondering: Why have the Providence Police, who have obviously been aware of this car's existence, done nothing? Isn't it illegal to have an automobile with no license plates sitting on the street for almost a month? Couldn't they have traced ownership through a VIN number or through the inspection sticker number? It smells like selective enforcement of the law, and we'd just like to know who the lucky person is who owns this vehicle and what hold does he/she have over the Providence Police?

The Ahh-lene factor

Now that radio talk host and former Attorney General Arlene Violet has established an exploratory committee to look into running for the US Senate, opposition forces find themselves in somewhat of a bind. A couple of weeks ago, state Senate Majority Leader Paul "Slappy" Kelly was on Channel 36's Deadly Experiment declaring that support from Violet's "29 listeners" did not exactly constitute a tidal wave of encouragement. Angry members of talk radio nation (are there any other kind?) took umbrage at Kelly's statement, and the next day he was heard on WHJJ's John DePetro show swearing that he said "callers, not listeners." Nice try, Slappy, but a tape of the show proves that you said "listeners," not that such parsing matters all that much.

That's because the main problem faced by the anti-Ahh-lene forces is that attempting to marginalize or ridicule her candidacy will only backfire. There are plenty of ways to skewer Violet (her record as attorney general certainly contains many opportunities), but not taking her seriously is a big mistake. She has plenty of charisma, a quality noticeably lacking in announced candidates "Dorian" Weygand, "Little Richit" Licht, "Linked-to-drugs" Chafee and Rolland ("Cheers Reverso" because nobody knows his name) Grant. While most of the pros don't think that Ahh-lene has a chance, we must remind you that, in Vo Dilun, weirder things have happened. Just ask Eddie Beard.

We also think that there is little to gain from complaining about the fact that Violet can continue to stay on the radio for three hours a day, five days a week. Nobody cares, and all that's accomplished by publicly grousing about the situation is the drawing of more attention to Ahh-lene. Of course, the former AG's contention that this has no more of an advantage than that of an incumbent is sheer baloney. She doesn't have to discuss her candidacy; she's got three hours a day to promote herself in more stealthy ways. Check with the Bud-I on how effective that can be. Almost all of the massive amounts of money raised for major political campaigns goes directly into broadcast advertising, a division of Hollow Posturing Inc.

At the very least, Ahh-lene's threatened candidacy makes P&J's job much easier.

Kudos and congrats . . .

. . . to golfer and local hero Brad Faxon, along with fellow pro Billy Andrade, for raising millions of dollars for New England charities through top-class links events, including the recent CVS Charity Classic, which brought the likes of legend Jack Nicklaus to Little Rhody for the first time ever. When current American PGA stars Tiger Woods and David Duval publicly bitched and moaned about not being paid enough to play in the prestigious international Ryder Cup versus the best of Europe, and were lambasted by team captain Ben Crenshaw, Woods quickly conjured up an explanation that they wanted the money to give to charity. Faxon kicked that bogus excuse in the teeth, telling the media, "He has enough money to give to charity. He wants it in his pocket." And yes, this is the same Tiger Woods who once refused to sign a golf ball to be auctioned off at a Faxon/Andrade tourney to raise money for needy children. Hola, Sergio Garcia.

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