Jersey City, Councilman Steven Fulop in a very clever act of political theater, used the National Night Out Against Crime, to bring attention to the corruption scandal amongst Jersey City and other politicians. Basically, the first Tuesday of August this take back the night initiative, now in its 26th year, fights crime by the presence of citizens and police in the parks. The councilman took the opportunity, because, as he was quoted as saying, "The crime inside City Hall must be dealt with the same way as crime on the streets.”
Probably a little over 200 people gathered—the faithful, the politically committed and the curious. I counted four television news crews, and at least five other reporter types. A guy with a megaphone provided the rally portion, trying to get folks excited with sort of odd chants—only a dope accepts an envelopes (how about, only a whiner takes bribes in a diner?), and that old Queen standby—nanana nanana hey hey, good bye or something, you know the song. Even the megaphone guy had an ironic take, saying something like, isn’t this just like a baseball game.
Everyone is against corruption, and it was a positive sign to see folks active in this way, which I guess is a side effect of more people voting, but I couldn’t quite get a handle on exactly what they want—just the deputy mayor to resign because of the FBI sting, or the entire “Team Healy” to go. Do they want the Mayor to resign? What laws exactly do they want passed? I share the outrage, but the bluster obscured any policy coherence. I'm not sure what the precise remedy was that the rally meant to propose.
I was only able to stay a half hour or so. I missed Fulop’s address to the crowd. I wonder how specific he got, about what he wants, how to eliminate the decades old culture of corruption that is New Jersey Government. I don’t mean this in a bad way, we need our politicians, but I am not sure whether this was more an outrage lets take action against corruption event or more of another step towards Fulop’s ascent in New Jersey Politics. Certainly it was both, but I wasn’t sure about the ratio. Any outrage exhibited by the crowd was of the crocodile tears variety. Blasé, not exactly, but I don’t think residents of Jersey City, Hudson County, or New Jersey were shocked by arrests of politicians accepting bribes (it was not a first), and there seemed to be a healthy amount of skepticism among the crowd that anyone was going to do something effective about it, but hey, we all love a rally.
Still, we the people try. I liked the “don’t lie… don’t cheat… don’t steal…” balloons and the signs with a cover of the Jersey Journal with the picturing the councilman and the headline: City Not For Sale.
“Sweep” them out of office came up. Actual brooms where handed out. Clever political theatrics worthy of appreciation. Didn’t seem to be any mention of what action should be taken in November. Do we still vote Corzine?
The megaphone guy, who was white, was sort of screaming himself hoarse, in a good way, warming up the crowd for Fulop, who was being interviewed by the TV crews. So, I guess to take a break, the fellow gave the megaphone to another guy, who was African American. He took a different tact. He railed against the Developers “who are trying to push us out of our city… we’re not going to take it anymore.” Some of the crowd cheered, but the majority seemed perplexed—wasn’t the rally about politicians, not my condo?
I wouldn’t say the megaphone was wrestled out of his hands, but he seemed to be made to hand it back before he was through. Attacking the developers may have been off-message to the rally, but I thought he was getting at the heart of the corruption. How come the FBI isn’t doing a sting operation for the people who offer bribes, which are developers, construction firms and financial companies who invest in projects? I wasn’t able to stay for the whole rally. Maybe everyone’s heart is in the right place. Maybe Fulop’s speech to the crowd transcended the chants and talked about the bigger issues and workable solutions. There’s only so much you can fit on a sign, or a balloon. For the record, I hate corruption and I like apple pie.
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