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Ingredients: 1 busted budget, 2 karaoke songs, 2 testicles

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Published: Sep 24, 2008

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Kenny Gamble getting into bed with the Bush Administration's HUD director. For some reason, Gamble thought he could use HUD to strong-arm Philly's Housing Authority to hand over land valued at $2 million to his development company. Kenny, the song's title was "Love Train," not "I Do Whatever the Fuck I Want Train." —Tom Namako

No city can have too many men like Sgt. Stephen Liczbinski of the Philadelphia Police. The officer's last acts would have been impossibly brave in any context, but coming as they did at a time when police officers seemed to be getting shot every few weeks in this city — well, it's unfortunately the nature of such people that you sometimes don't know you have them until they're gone. Rest in peace. —Doron Taussig

It's bad enough when your old man sings in front of your friends; when it's your mayor, and doing it on TV — oh man is that embarrassing. From his rendition of "Rappers Delight" at his inaugural ball to a recent recitation of "House of the Rising Sun," His Honor Michael Nutter has really been pushing it. Next time New York or D.C. wants to play, we're going over to their house. —Isaiah Thompson

Bill Green. Before the former mayor's son even had his office furniture picked out, he was already trying to prevent his decades-long-entrenched counterparts from fattening their pockets in the city's deferred pension program, and was tossing out ideas about those riverfront (now Chinatown-front?) casinos, much to the ire of the elder statespeople on the council floor. Oh, and he uses both sides of the paper when he prints. It's Bill Green, get it? —Tom Namako

In Season 5 of the Best Show in the History of Television, a fictional Baltimore Sun publishes an investigative series about the problem of homelessness. Now, former real-Sun editor Bill Marimow, on whom fake-Sun editor Thomas Klebanow is based, is editor in chief at The Philadelphia Inquirer. So one had to wonder when, as the season premièred on HBO, the Inquirer unleashed a big investigative series on homelessness. Was it a "screw-you" from Marimow back to Wire creator David Simon? An unbelievable irony? To the Inky's credit, the real homelessness series was solid, and featured none of the fiction that The Wire's version did. But it was clear evidence that Simon's Baltimore and our Philly are not so different. —Doron Taussig

Tommy Carcetti never steps up and tells his city how bad things are, money-wise (at least, not on-screen). But after this month's public pronouncement by Michael Nutter that Philly is screwed-screwed-screwed, it's not so hard to imagine Mayor Mike behind closed doors, saying things like, "I just promised to cut our dropout rate in half. I can't cut summer school!" And then Commissioner Ramsey is all like, "Well I can't keep the homeless out of Rittenhouse Square at night without overtime. Not if you want the prostitutes off Frankford Avenue." —Doron Taussig

If you haven't seen Season 5, STOP READING! SPOILER! But between the defendant's former reputation for invincibility, the government's preponderance of evidence and the general poorly informed certainty with which everyone has been assuming he's done, don't you feel like this Fumo thing could end up like that Clay Davis thing? Also, can't you imagine Fumo calling everyone "pardner"? —Doron Taussig

Impressed by Man on a Wire? Take a ride up to North Philly sometime, and look closely at those abandoned factories right off Broad and Erie. Near the roof of one, starting roughly 15 stories up, then climbing vertically down the exterior of its north wall — rendered in what must be 7- or 8-foot-high letters — reads the phrase "Boner 4 Ever." I don't know if pulleys or harnesses were involved, or if it was a free-climb deal, but let's just pause and appreciate the acrobatic skill required just for some dude to brag about his libido. —John Vettese

No matter how hard they work, no matter what risks they face, no matter how much good they do, sometimes, the police really piss off the communities they serve. This year, seeking to let out some bad blood, Police Commissioner Ramsey called a series of town hall meetings, one for each police district, for residents to vent, ask questions, and get to know their commissioner and local captains. The meetings were good for everyone: Residents showed up in strong numbers, and Ramsey answered their questions patiently and respectfully throughout. The trick now is to make the streets look like the town hall. —Isaiah Thompson

Vince Fumo's "Doc is Dead!" chant at the victory party for Larry Farnese, his newest minion, after Farnese's triumph over John Dougherty in the April primary. Oh, that's classy. An already-indicted state senator who had to retire because his federal trial was approaching decides to throw his support to a man his constituents had largely never heard of before; once this "darkhorse" beat a union leader whose office has also been investigated by the Feds, he implies in a childlike chant that he's WON?! No. There are no winners here. —Tom Namako

Perhaps you've heard that Philadelphia's having a budget problem. Perhaps you thought, meh, Philadelphia's always having a budget problem. But listen: This is a little different. Philadelphia has, for some time now, been a poor city; now it's a poor city that's not hitting its revenue projections. That means either taxes have to be raised (feel like having your taxes raised?) or things will have to be cut back; those things could include the little "extras" that make this city a better place to live (arts and parks) or even some basic services (trash pickup). All in all, the budget situation threatens that sense you had that Philly was up-and-coming, a city that was going to get better, not worse, in the next few years. —Doron Taussig

There's a faded, decades-old street sign off 71st and City Line directing drivers and pedestrians to a so-called "Historic Tree." But I don't see a tree there. Nowhere in the immediate vicinity is there a tree remotely large or visually arresting enough to be believably "historic." I've even spent up to a half-hour wandering the adjacent neighborhood, trying to seek it out, but it's just sidewalks and front yards and oaks and maples, all uniform in size. Hey, Overbrook — what gives? Where'd your tree go? —John Vettese

If City Hall is looking a bit more lavender these days, it could be because Philly's first openly gay judge, Daniel Anders, was elected to Common Pleas Court. As the first out gay man to wear the judicial robes in city history, Anders' swearing in signaled a big step for LGBTQ supporters. And if that wasn't enough, fun-loving audiences got to gander at Australia's favorite drag queens in Priscilla Queen of the Desert during City Hall's first summer film series. If this keeps up, don't be surprised if William Penn starts wearing a boa. —Natalie Hope McDonald

Unless it's your job to bust, prosecute or defend an individual suspected of buying or selling drugs, you probably missed this one. Last December, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled in favor of Nathan Dunlap, a Philadelphia man whom police officers found in possession of crack-cocaine shortly after making a hand-to-hand transaction on the street. The ruling set the precedent that the arresting officer's experience and background in narcotics does not equate to probable cause, and "Dunlap defenses" have found their way into the Philadelphia criminal court. "It's an obstacle," admits assistant District Attorney Charles Ehrlich, chief of the Municipal Court, "but not an insurmountable one." —Isaiah Thompson

It's Our Money (philly.com/philly/blogs/our-money), one of those good-government budget-watchdog collaborative-effort-type-things that seem to be all the rage these days, brought to you by the Daily News and WHYY. These people preach it in plainspeak, and are able to explain why your taxes might go up without using anti-literacy phrases like "flex cash payments" and "sinking fund payments." —Tom Namako

Radicals. Rooftop bunkers. A police raid of dubious origin. Sound familiar? The police seemed to think so when they raided the house of Francisville resident Daniel Moffat in June. Alleging that there was anti-police graffiti and propaganda inside, Ninth District Capt. Dennis Wilson called the residents "a hate group." Police spokesman Lt. Frank Vanore later referred to a rooftop "bunker," making the comparison to MOVE himself (it turned out to be a greenhouse). This time, rather than drop a firebomb on the place, police merely detained Moffat and three other residents without charges, as the house was sealed by L&I. Moffat has since been able to return — charges were never filed against him, and the incident was never fully explained. —Isaiah Thompson

DUTY CALLS: This election can't even be close, people. (CLICK IMAGE FOR LARGER VERSION)

Just when it seemed doomed forever, Mayor Nutter announced in June that the ambitious, but failed, Wireless Philadelphia project had been miraculously raised from the dead. And there it was, the next day, appearing under the AirPort bar on our laptops like a little beacon of hope. But something happened to it during that journey to the wireless underworld, and it came back ... different. It works, sometimes; often, it does not. Its future still uncertain, Wireless Philadelphia roams the ether like an undead soul — waiting, hungry. —Isaiah Thompson

It's not just making sure that Obama carries Philly by enough that he wins Pennsylvania — that will probably happen. If local Obamanians really want to help out, they need to make sure the state looks good and blue in the weeks leading up to Election Day, so the Obama campaign can focus resources elsewhere. Write letters to the editor of the Morning Call, talk to your relatives in Pennsyltucky, whatever; let's not allow this thing to be close. —Doron Taussig

Most Ridiculous Use of Lumber

We get it. The good people of Rittenhouse Square don't like homeless men and women to sleep on park benches reserved for Paris Hilton look-alikes (and their dogs) and buttoned-up guests from the five-star Rittenhouse Hotel. How do we know this? Ugly wooden dividers are being installed on benches throughout the park. And while it may very well keep our city's most impoverished citizens from getting a little horizontal shut-eye, it also means three-person benches have foolishly been reduced to two-person love seats. Now about that rat problem ... —Natalie Hope McDonald

We could talk all day about Segway patrols, stop-and-frisk, quality-of-life laws, community policing — but in the end, police work in Philly comes down to one thing: The Number. Last year, The Number was very, very high: 2007 ended with 391 murders. But so far this year, things are looking up a bit: The Number is down by about 20 percent, or 60 murders, and the number of cases getting solved is up 10 percent. It's hard to call that good news — especially for the hundreds of families who lost someone — but it's better than nothing. —Isaiah Thompson

Philadelphia's an old union town, but it's becoming a new union town, as well. In the past year, several movements have surfaced in which workers unable to form traditional unions have formed quasi-unions instead. With the help of Jobs with Justice, security guards at the Philadelphia Museum of Art have been demanding wage hikes and better benefits. And the United Taxi Workers Alliance of Pennsylvania, which calls itself a union even though technically it isn't, took off this year, claiming more than 1,000 members. —Isaiah Thompson

The Inquirer's summer series on the homeless sleeping in swank-tastic Rittenhouse Square, and the Police Department's rapid deployment of personnel to keep the tuna tartare crowd happy and the homeless moving. Really? There was no other issue in the city going on that deserved more ink/police hours? —Tom Namako

After years of fighting tooth-and-nail for tax reform, the advocacy group Philadelphia Forward declared victory over legislation to eliminate the Gross Receipts Portion of the Business Privilege Tax by 2017, and enact the first-ever cuts to the BPT's Tax Net Income Portion ... then, promptly, Mayor Nutter announced that tax revenues were not where they should be, and that the reversal of tax cuts was "on the table." Right back to work, Brett Mandel? —Doron Taussig

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