Andy Lang
12-06-2001, 02:17 PM
I have many heroes.
They come from all walks of life, and from many different eras, and countries.
There are two current ones in today's Philly Inquirer, as different as can be, but with some similarities and both great nonetheless.
1. John Timoney, http://inq.philly.com/content/inquirer/2001/12/06/front_page/PTIMONEY06.htm and
2. Chistopher Hitchens http://inq.philly.com/content/inquirer/2001/12/06/magazine/HITCH06.htm.
Timoney, who just resigned, was the Philadelphia Police commissioner since February 1998, when he was brought from NY City and appointed by Mayor Rendel (another hero who rescued Philadelphia from fiscal bankrupcy and is now running for Governor of PA) to help clean up the Philly police Departement widely viewed as among the most corrupt and incompetent in the nation, was a tough Irish cop, with charm and two advance degrees, who did a fantastic job, seemed to everywhere at once, whether it be on his bike patrolling the streets, in front of the TV camera or attending a black-tie event--the kind of guy who didnt put up with any crap from the bad guys--and Philly has many of them--but who could charm the socks off a leprechan when it was necessary, or admit mistakes when that was necessary too--as it was on occasion, like when his cops bought into Richard Mellon Scaiffe's man's phony tip to squelch dissent and raid the 'puppet warehouse' and wrongfully arrest and jain innocnet people during the GOP Convention.
But you had the feeling that he could and would solve any problem that came his way in time--but alas, as he said once, the shelf life of a Police Commisioner was no more than a few years at best.
He intends to commute from here to Ny City. There is something about Philly and this area that gets to you if you give it a chance. It must be the ghosts of the Founding Fathers and al lthat history and maybe Rocky too.
Chris Hitchens is a writer-intellectual, from Britain, living in Washington DC, who in many ways is similar to Timoney, in his toughness, admission to being wrong on occasion, but correcting it(He was a Marxist at one time), but always willing to think things through again, tenacious about finding out who the bad guys really are--the right-wing Republicans, natch), but unafraid of also criticizing the left-wing democrats to get off their duffs and do the right thing to push the progressive agenda, and never afraid to tell the truth, no matter who might be offended.
Read his two massive articles in Harper's on the Nixon-Kissinger cabal that got Nixon elected and extended the Vietnam war years, killiong some 30,000 additional Americans and perhapos millions of Vietnamese, and other Southeast Asians, calling Kissinger a War Criminal for that and for his giving the go-ahead to the CIA for Pinochet's thugs to assasinate President Allende, and which led to thousands of deaths and tortures--the latter BTW, for which Kissinger has now been served with U.S. legal papers not too long ago.
Hitchens also likes George Orwell a lot, as I do. Orwell wrote some of the finest work of any writer of the 20th century, taking on the Communists in his famed '1984' and 'Animal Farm' but who also wrote a marvelous essay--some think the finest ever written--on the terrible effects of British colonialism, using India as an example.
If Orwell was alive today he would be attacking every day the Right-wing Republicans, The Christian Right, fundamentalism, Big Business--they would be Big Brother--and the Bush Administration--not on the war on terrorism, which Bush has done an excellent job on--but on almost everything else.
Maybe Chistopher Hitchens is George Orwell reincarnated?
The again, maybe I am.
They come from all walks of life, and from many different eras, and countries.
There are two current ones in today's Philly Inquirer, as different as can be, but with some similarities and both great nonetheless.
1. John Timoney, http://inq.philly.com/content/inquirer/2001/12/06/front_page/PTIMONEY06.htm and
2. Chistopher Hitchens http://inq.philly.com/content/inquirer/2001/12/06/magazine/HITCH06.htm.
Timoney, who just resigned, was the Philadelphia Police commissioner since February 1998, when he was brought from NY City and appointed by Mayor Rendel (another hero who rescued Philadelphia from fiscal bankrupcy and is now running for Governor of PA) to help clean up the Philly police Departement widely viewed as among the most corrupt and incompetent in the nation, was a tough Irish cop, with charm and two advance degrees, who did a fantastic job, seemed to everywhere at once, whether it be on his bike patrolling the streets, in front of the TV camera or attending a black-tie event--the kind of guy who didnt put up with any crap from the bad guys--and Philly has many of them--but who could charm the socks off a leprechan when it was necessary, or admit mistakes when that was necessary too--as it was on occasion, like when his cops bought into Richard Mellon Scaiffe's man's phony tip to squelch dissent and raid the 'puppet warehouse' and wrongfully arrest and jain innocnet people during the GOP Convention.
But you had the feeling that he could and would solve any problem that came his way in time--but alas, as he said once, the shelf life of a Police Commisioner was no more than a few years at best.
He intends to commute from here to Ny City. There is something about Philly and this area that gets to you if you give it a chance. It must be the ghosts of the Founding Fathers and al lthat history and maybe Rocky too.
Chris Hitchens is a writer-intellectual, from Britain, living in Washington DC, who in many ways is similar to Timoney, in his toughness, admission to being wrong on occasion, but correcting it(He was a Marxist at one time), but always willing to think things through again, tenacious about finding out who the bad guys really are--the right-wing Republicans, natch), but unafraid of also criticizing the left-wing democrats to get off their duffs and do the right thing to push the progressive agenda, and never afraid to tell the truth, no matter who might be offended.
Read his two massive articles in Harper's on the Nixon-Kissinger cabal that got Nixon elected and extended the Vietnam war years, killiong some 30,000 additional Americans and perhapos millions of Vietnamese, and other Southeast Asians, calling Kissinger a War Criminal for that and for his giving the go-ahead to the CIA for Pinochet's thugs to assasinate President Allende, and which led to thousands of deaths and tortures--the latter BTW, for which Kissinger has now been served with U.S. legal papers not too long ago.
Hitchens also likes George Orwell a lot, as I do. Orwell wrote some of the finest work of any writer of the 20th century, taking on the Communists in his famed '1984' and 'Animal Farm' but who also wrote a marvelous essay--some think the finest ever written--on the terrible effects of British colonialism, using India as an example.
If Orwell was alive today he would be attacking every day the Right-wing Republicans, The Christian Right, fundamentalism, Big Business--they would be Big Brother--and the Bush Administration--not on the war on terrorism, which Bush has done an excellent job on--but on almost everything else.
Maybe Chistopher Hitchens is George Orwell reincarnated?
The again, maybe I am.