Pundits Turner, Ugly, Rawls-Ivy.
Even by American political standards, Bridgeport’s mayoral race is growing more bizarre by the day. Lennie Grimaldi thinks he found one explanation in the comment of a voter.
“I’d rather vote for an effective felon,” the voter told Grimaldi (pictured), “than an ineffective liar.”
The voter took part in Bridgeport’s Sept. 16 Demcorat mayoral primary, in which Joe Ganim — a former mayor who served five years in jail for taking a half-million dollars in kickbacks — beat an incumbent mayor, Bill Finch. Ganim somehow managed to look “cleaner” in the campaign than Finch, who, among other maneuvers, issued an ad calling his opponent a KKK sympathizer (for working at law firm where a different member represented an African-American client) and mislead pople about why he had a used-car salesman friend create a new third party.
That’s old history. More than a week old. The race has gotten weirder since then, as a bunch of candidates run, and don’t run, and sort of run, or force each other to run or not run, in the general election campaign. Along the way:
• FInch reemerged as a candidate of the newly created “Job Creation Party” …
• … then lost his ballot spot when he failed to submit paperwork on time …
• … then held a “convention” at a bingo hall and went to court to try to win his way back on the ballot …
• … while Ganim sent proxies to crash the fake party and nominate Ganim instead …
• … while Ganim simultaneously argues that the party doesn’t exist and shouldn’t appear on the ballot …
• … but should have his name, not Finch’s, if does appear on the ballot.
Whew! See what I mean? And that’s only half of it. Subplots abound (along with unforgettable moments like the one captured at the beginning of this CT Mirror story by Mark Pazniokas).
Grimaldi, a leading Connecticut jorunalist for decades, has documented all this daily on his must-read website Only in Bridgeport. He broke the story that caused Finch to lose the ballot position.
And he appeared on WNHH radio’s week-in-review “Dateline New Haven” Friday Pundits panel to reflect on all this.
Compared to Finch, Grimaldi observed, “Ganim right now looks like the Pope.”
The pundit panel — including Babz Rawls-Ivy, managing editor of the Inner City news and host of WNHH’s “LoveBabz” program; radio journalist Michelle Turner, host of WNHH’s “The Show; and Joe Ugly, host of the “Joe Ugly Show” on WNHH and uglyardio.net —chewed as well on the news coming out of the real pope’s visit to America, the search for a better loo in downtown New Haven, and the latest developments at Church Street South. Click on the sound file above to hear the show.