By Ralph Cipriano
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| Image: Jamie Bond/flickr.com |
For BigTrial.net
So Philadelphia voters just decided to reelect D.A. Larry Krasner, and give him four more years to wreak more havoc on the city.
Really, it's perfect timing. Summer is almost here. With the heat on, there will be fresh rounds of shootings all over town as the city goes blithely on its way to setting an all-time murder record.
Will it be 700 murders this year? 800? Should we "shoot" for 1,000?
And so in the aftermath of the Krasner "win," which in reality, is a loss for everyone else in town, let's hand out the "Uncle Larry" awards to the people most responsible for reelecting Krasner.
1. --- The Philadelphia Inquirer.
Take a bow all you diehard progressives at the Inky, editors and reporters alike. By relentlessly censoring the news for the past two years, you boosted your man to victory.
It wasn't easy. Time after time, you had to censor or not print stories that involved Krasner repeatedly letting armed and dangerous criminals out of jail who went out to maim and kill more people.
Such as Byseem Smith, the 19-year-old who, during his brief but savage criminal career, allegedly racked up 10 felonies, including shooting a man in the groin, shooting a woman in the stomach, and committing aggravated assault against two cops.
But time after time, all of you were able to stoop to the task.
You never talked about the blood on Krasner's hands. When you published interviews with Krasner, you let him make one excuse after another for the carnage on the streets. You never once challenged him, or held him accountable.
You never once got up off your collective knees.
When two of Krasner's prosecutors got nailed in court for lying to judges, you covered for the D.A. 's office. When Krasner's ADAs were accused of breaking the law, by, say, stealing porn from a stripper, or went on Twitter and wrote things like "F---K THE COPS," or how much they hated white people, you looked the other way.
When Krasner's gun violence counselor shot and killed a male prostitute that he had arranged a tryst with during office hours, it took a public shaming by then U.S. Attorney William McSwain to force you to publish a short story on that distasteful subject, a story that predictably disappeared from your website within 24 hours.
Always covering for Uncle Larry.
When Krasner, the city's top law enforcement officer, didn't pay his taxes this year, and owed the city $53,966, you gave that deadbeat a pass.
When Krasner and his favorite Real Justice PAC brazenly violated the city's campaign finance laws, you pretended it wasn't happening.
You did the same thing when Krasner failed to disclose personal conflicts of interest in his crusade against former chief inspector Carl Holmes.
For most of this year, you ignored Krasner's opponent, Carlos Vega, and colluded with Krasner's campaign to falsely portray Vega as the tool of the FOP, the late Frank Rizzo, and Donald Trump.
Then, you finished the job by endorsing Krasner for reelection.
Congratulations, Inquirer editors and reporters. By breaking every rule of journalism, you have enabled an incompetent, reckless and irresponsible D.A. to stay in office. There will be more bloodshed, more innocents caught in the crossfire.
And it will be on your hands. All because you didn't fulfill the first duty of journalism, to hold public officials accountable.
Instead, you served as Larry Krasner's enablers, and blindly carried his water for him, because you agreed with his politics.
A bunch of whores have more integrity. As somebody who once worked there for more than a decade, I can only conclude by saying you're a disgrace to journalism.
2. The Real Justice PAC of San Francisco.
For the second straight election cycle, this band of carpetbaggers parachuted into town, brazenly broke all of the city's campaign finance laws, and got away with it.
Since 2017, the Real Justice PAC and its leaders have donated more than $230,000 to Krasner, including $109,000 in cash. The PAC also paid $106,813 to Brandon Evans, the national political director at Real Justice who has served as Krasner’s campaign manager since 2017.
While the city had a limit on annual donations from a PAC, $12,600, the Real Justice PAC last year successfully poured more than $100,000 in cash, in-kind payments to Krasner's campaign staffers, and even rent money at the D.A.'s tax delinquent office building at 1221 Locust Street.
This year, in addition to brazenly breaking campaign finance laws, Real Justice added libel to its tool bag as Real Justice co-founder, rabble rouser and chief fundraiser Shaun "Talcum X" King ran a vicious online smear campaign against Vega.
3. J. Shane Creamer Jr., executive director of the city's Board of Ethics.
For the second straight D.A.'s election, while Real Justice and Krasner, both repeat offenders, made a mockery of the city's campaign finance laws, you sat and watched and did nothing as you let the carpetbaggers from San Francisco decide who would be Philadelphia's D.A.
When you finally get around to fining them, Mr. Creamer, it will be too late, as the damage will have already been done.
4. John McNesby & The FOP.
Congratulations, Mr. McNesby. In a year when cops were vilified coast to coast, you brilliantly went out of your way to make sure the public knew exactly which candidate was the cops' favorite choice for D.A.
Like parking that Mr. Softee truck outside the D.A.'s office on Fridays and handing out free ice cream.
Larry Krasner sincerely thanks you. He based his entire re-election campaign around you, Trump and Frank Rizzo, who's been dead for 30 years.
A central rule of politics is don't give your opponent any gifts. But that's exactly what McNesby and the FOP did for Krasner.
5. Carlos Vega
It's hard for anybody who's never been a politician to try and become one overnight. To his credit, Vega attacked the job with considerable energy, and boundless enthusiasm, and was even able to raise money, as in more than $800,000.
But he got bad advice from his handlers, and played it way too safe on the campaign trail. In the early debates, Vega was way too polite.
When Krasner relentlessly attacked Vega, and repeatedly called him a liar, Vega never got riled, or showed any passion. Instead, he continued to play by the debate rules and obey the debate hosts who were gonging him, and gagging him, and selling him down the river.
For an upstart to win, Vega had to indict and convict Krasner as a corrupt and incompetent D.A. with blood on his hands. Certainly the evidence was available to do that job. And Vega had the credentials, as a homicide prosecutor who had successfully prosecuted more than 450 murderers, losing only a handful of cases.
What was needed was a fiery closing argument.
Instead, Vega gave us a dignified debate. He actually campaigned like he was an incumbent, and worse, Krasner treated him as one. The D.A., with the help of the Inquirer and the rest of the media, was able to make Vega's record the central issue of the campaign, rather than Krasner's own horrible record, which should have been the only issue.
It was an amazing feat of magic to pull off, but when you have the media in your back pocket, like Krasner did, you can pull it off.
When Vega finally found his voice, at the WURD debate, where he took on three biased hosts while repeatedly blasting Krasner as a rich white elitist, it was way too late.
Had people seen that fiery candidate earlier in the campaign, it might have been a closer race.
Instead, we're stuck with four more years of deadly progressivism from Larry Krasner.