Monday, April 26, 2010

Please wake me up before I start screaming…

I voted for Mitch Landrieu. My belief was that he would be a fairly straight shooter, perhaps a little clerkish, but a guy we could trust. His record of bringing entertainment dollars and tourism to Louisiana spoke to the artist & musician in me, I admit. I had high hopes, Mitch. High hopes, indeed. Above all, I really wanted to believe that he would take serious steps towards cleaning up our mired NOPD. The T-P reports today that Ronal Serpas is one of the finalists for Police Superintendent of the City of New Orleans. Please, somebody, pinch me and wake me up, before I start screaming uncontrollably. Not only does Serpas’ family have alleged ties to the Landrieus (both families are New Orleanian for generations, so it stands to reason), but Ronal Serpas is Ex-NOPD. He also has been seriously accused of maintaining the ‘blue line’ in his tenure as Chief of Police in Nashville, going so far as claims that he hid or altered evidence and coached officers to perjure themselves, in a case where white officers are accused of mistreating minority children at a 2007 Fraternal Order of Police Youth Camp for Less Fortunate Children. Maybe the Landrieu & Serpas families only met at a Bar-B-Q once or twice. Maybe Mitch isn’t just reaching out to the Good Ole Boy Network of People He Knows Will Do As They’re Told. Maybe the accusations are entirely false and an entire family spent everything they had on nonsense, just to make Ronal Serpas look bad. As the First Big Thing that Mitch does, and possibly The Most Important Thing that happens as he takes office, the mere cloud of such obvious impropriety is enough to make me gag. Even Ray Nagin didn’t make such obvious gaffs in public trust for the first few months. So I haven’t woken up yet. And I feel a scream coming on. And even if this guy isn’t our next police chief, I’m done. I voted for you once, Mitch. You won’t get another chance from me. You’ve already lost my confidence, and it’s too dear to trust to this kind of bullshit anymore. The ride is broken, and no matter how far your hands are inside the roller coaster car, it’s going the wrong way already. I want my money back. And the Federal Government taking over our crooked fucking NOPD.

7 comments:

giuliana said...

We just got fooled again. I'm starting to feel better about living in Jefferson Parish. Almost.

Unknown said...

It's hard to tell who the good guys are anymore, why do you think the feds will do a better job? Just another set up for another disappointment, this world is flawed, we ALL fall short of the glory!

When the politicians have deceived you
when the churches have lead you astray
when you baby has broken your heart...

REMEMBER Rock 'N Roll has NEVER lied to you
Rock 'N Roll has NEVER lied to you!!!

You wandered in and the writing was on the wall
it said for a good time call...
SISTA OTIS @ 1 800 YEAH U RITE

OXOX your sista

Lord David said...

I can't believe ex-NOPD will fix the NOPD.

Lord David said...

This discussion can be followed further at:
http://humidcity.com/?p=3156

Lord David said...

Dear Sista;

I think the Feds would do a better job because they HAVE done a better job here:

Bill Jefferson
Mose Jefferson
Oliver Thomas
The Danziger 7
among others....

...and the list keeps growing.

juli said...

but the even bigger question is - do you really believe that the federal govt. can fix the NOPD? If it had a better record of doing anything right, i would be all for it, but all we have to do is drive down to the levee or the industrial canal to see all the good that the federal govt has done for new orleans :-/
SSDD - jules

Lord David said...

I believe I addressed this in the above comment.

Jim Letton has had more success prosecuting corruption here then we have, by a country mile.

Besides, a Fed 'takeover' of the NOPD doesn't mean they fire everybody and bring in G-Men by the score, all looking for Edward G. Robinson.

It means they place monitors in various precincts or levels of Law Enforcement and watch, making sure guidelines are met and rules followed.

They did this here, with some success, under Pennington. It only ended when Pennington decided to give up police work & run for Mayor.

In retrospect, we might have been a lot better of with him than the winner, C. Ray Nagin.