At Georgetown University's Foreign Service School, they taught us political analysis, of the sort that was once called "Kremlinology."
Looking at what the late Georgy Khoshroevich Shakhnazarov called "the correlation of forces in the world," the all-Republican Political Machine that has run St. Johns County is in disarray.
Four (4) Republican St. Johns County Commissioners yesterday brutally and publicly attacked the fifth Republican Commissioner, who often disagrees and asks questions. They also attacked the publisher of an online viewspaper, and a candidate for County Commission.
Republicans attacking Repubicans. How cool is that!
They've obviously violated President Ronald Wilson Reagan's Eleventh Commandment ("Don't speak ill of another Republican").
Why?
Perhaps the answer is in two words: Michelle O'Connell.
Due to the coverup of the September 2, 2010 shooting of a deputy's girlfriend, the corrupt St. Johns Cuonty political machine presided over by Sheriff DAVID BERNARD SHOAR and developers appears to be in disarray.
In fact, it appears that it is crumbling.
It's about time.
It's time for Glasnost and Perestroika here in St. Johns County.
Is this Democracy on the march? It happened here in St. Augustine three years ago, on April 26, 2010, when John Patrick Regan, P.E. was unanimously selected City Manager by St. Augustine City Commissioners.
After the 5-0 vote, I said to Mr. Regan, "I want you to be Gorbachev."
Indeed, Mr. Regan has outdone Mikhail Gorbachev in reforming a dysfunctional organization -- St. Augustine City Hall.
The former City Manager, WILLIAM BRUCE HARRISS, would not recognize the place.
That'sa good thing.
Let that same democratizing reform spirit now take over our County Administration Building (Taj Mahal) and our estimable Board of County Commissioners.
Due to the outrageous misconduct -- in the Michelle O'Connell shooting investigation -- of the St. Johns County political machine boss, Sheriff DAVID BERNARD SHOAR f/k/a "DAVID BERNARD HOAR," there will be accountability.
Justice for Michelle O'Connell.
NOW.
The late Boston Mayor and Congressman James Michael Curley was popular, despite being a criminal, and was even re-electe while serving time in prison. Curley's regime crumbed, however, when voters learned he spent $20 on trashcans, an outrageous sum in the 1950s.
Likewise, St. Johns County voters have now seen through the corruption of the SHOAR political machine with the O'Connell case, 2010-2014, and the $1.8 million no-bid helicopter Sheriff SHOAR got the Anastasia Mosquito Control Commission of St. Johns County to buy in 2006. SHOAR later wrote a letter threatening Mosquito Control with a county takeover after some remarks were quoted out of context in the newspaper, noting hundreds of hours had been spent in Sheriff's office staff time in assisting Mosquito Control with the abortive helicopter purchase.
We band of brothers (and sisters) -- diverse environmental and good government activists -- got the illegal contract canceled in 2007, winning full refund of the $81,000 deposit from Textron's Bell Helicopter subsidiary.
This is our town, and our time.
Hick hacks, poltroonish pachyderms and egotistical elephantine elected officials with edifice complexes, Beware!
Yes we can!
With CNN's Anderson Cooper, HLN's Nancy Grace and NBC Dateline's Dennis Murphy to soon join The New York Times and PBS Frontline in publishing the truth about the Michelle O'Connell case, our St. Johns County political machine's legendary corruption will be viewed widely.
No County Commissioner has said a word about the O'Connell case. The St. Augustine Record curiously has never asked Michelle O'Connell's family for any comment.
Wonder why?
Is it still in love with Sheriff SHOAR?
Is it incapable of writing balanced articles where the SHOAR-MORRIS political machine is involved?
With four (4) TV networks joining the world's greatest newspaper in investigating Sheriff SHOAR f/k/a HOAR, will the Record finally get the message?
Is the Record a newspaper, or a viewspaper?
Are its editors menschs, or mice?
Are its reporters inquisitive investigators or merely stenographers and amenuenses?
The Record's publisher and owners need spinal implants.
The Record can start by insisting that SHOAR answer questions that former Editor Peter Ellis was unable to get SHOAR to answer about the case of convicted bribe-taker THOMAS G. MANUEL, whom SHOAR got investigated in an undercover FBI investigation after MANUEL asked questions about SHOAR's budget. There has never been a detailed budget justification for the Sheriff in the past ten years, the County Attorney's office reports.
The whole world is watching.
Justice for Michelle O'Connell.
Democracy and openness in our county, in our time.
What do you reckon?
In secret, behind locked gates, our Nation's Oldest City dumped a landfill in a lake (Old City Reservoir), while emitting sewage in our rivers and salt marsh. Organized citizens exposed and defeated pollution, racism and cronyism. We elected a new Mayor. We're transforming our City -- advanced citizenship. Ask questions. Make disclosures. Demand answers. Be involved. Expect democracy. Report and expose corruption. Smile! Help enact a St. Augustine National Park and Seashore. We shall overcome!
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