For those unaware, of Conyers rap sheet, click here for AB's CliffNotes. I don't have time to rehash all that nonsense, but the long and short of it is, she's out of a job for ethics violations, but couldn't resist mucking up some more on her way out the door. Witness the latest in a long, distinguished history of f*ckery.
Former Councilwoman Monica Conyers was back in the news last week when Council President Kenneth Cockrel Jr. claimed $21,000 worth of equipment is missing from her office. He has since called the cops and they are investigating, although her lawyer denies Conyers pocketed anything.Boy, oh, boy. What can be said about Detroit Councilwoman Monica Conyers that hasn't already been said about Afghanistan?[1]
Records obtained by the City Hall Insider shine more light on Conyers' final spending before she resigned July 6.
Two laptops were ordered about three weeks before she resigned. The first was an Apple MacBook with a 13 inch LED screen for $1,443 and Microsoft Office 2008 for Mac "Special Media Edition" for $494. The bill was paid using a petty cash fund. The second laptop was an HP 6530 Intel with HP Microsoft Office and carrying case for $1,245.
Here are other spending highlights:
* $888.20 for airfare to Washington D.C. April 24 for a "meeting with First Lady Obama". It's not clear if that meeting ever happened.
* $408.20 for airfare to Washington D. C. March 2 for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee 2009 national conference. In January, Conyers traveled to the Middle East on the group's dime for a seven-day educational trip to learn about the country and its conflicts. But in March, the city would foot the bill for the conference.
* $200 to attend the Employment Law Conference in Dearborn thrown by the law firm, Clark Hill. According to the registration form, Conyers planned to attend several sessions, including "What to do when an employee 'blows the whistle' on you or complains to you" and "How to handle your problem employees." Conyers has been sued by two former employees. One said she was fired after being forced to perform personal errands for Conyers, like delivering dry cleaning. The other said she quit after Conyers threatened to boot her, in part, for signing Conyers' signature to a resolution in a "sloppy" manner. Conyers has denied the accusations.
* $1,150 to print 10,000 directory cards with a variety of City Hall numbers featuring a photo of Conyers behind an American flag and the title "President of Detroit City Council."
* $424 in law books. The City Hall Insider first told you in February that Conyers was creating her own law library at City Hall, spending $959 last summer on a dozen law books through Thompson West. In March she bought more, including the "Michigan Criminal Law and Procedure Deskbook Full Set".
* $440 in spaghetti and wing dings from Cutter's Bar & Grill for outreach meetings at local senior facilities and nursing homes in February and March.
The more I watch Negroes like this run elected positions into the ground, the more I wonder just how much this sorta incompetence casts an aspersion over those trying to run for statewide office. Artur Davis (Alabama Governor), Kamala Harris (California Atty General) and Kendrick Meeks (Florida US Senate) face uphill battles in 2012 to ride the Obama coattails to the promised land. Is it at all possible that local clowns like Conyers, Sharpe James, "Dollar" Bill Jefferson, Marion Barry, Bill Campbell, etc. made the job that much harder for these guys? You tell me.
Either way, keep ya' head up, Monica. And don't drop the Lever 2000.
Shirley Chisholm is crying inside.
Question: When black politricians like Conyers screw up, it is generally considered a local, personal, isolated eff' up, or do these smaller incidents essentially ruin it for blacks who (presumably) walk the straight and narrow on their way to bigger things?
From MacBook to wing dings, Conyers' final days of spending [DetroitNews]
[1] Obligatory random Chappelle's Show reference? Check.
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A former colleague of mine always says 'God has a wicked sense of humor,' and this may be God's maniacal way of culling the chaff from the wheat. I pray this makes it harder for the b.s.'ers to run for office, yet the honest public servants will be more apparent to the voting public.
Let's pray for this; pray hard for this.
You know I really think it's just us, Black people, who are really paying attention when Black politicians screw up around the country. Sure Whites and others pay attention if the Black politician is local but otherwise probably not so much. So I doubt that Conyers will have any effect on any other Black politicians elsewhere.
I think it hurts all black politicians. The comments of the local newspaper boards here in SE Michigan are extremely racist and dismissive of all black elected officials. Very ugly stuff.
It doesn't help, obviously that the Detroit School Board has been taken over by the State again and there are indictments coming down for financial malfeasance and outright theft.
I'm a Detroiter who celebrated when Conyers finally left office and got behind bars. People in SE Michigan disagree on a lot, but this was one point every seemed to find a consensus on ...
That said, as a previous commenter pointed out, the Conyers case seemed to open the door on a lot of ugly, disgusting racism and sexism, most especially displayed on the news comment boards (HOW can those boards not be moderated?!).
While Conyers doesn't necessarily make the whole nation draw generalizations about black politicians, local folks with latent racism/sexism follow her case and draw horrible generalizations about national leaders (like Obama, Hillary Clinton even).
Thanks to the new political town square - the black blogosphere - people ultimately hurt themselves.
That said, anyone who wants to serve as a foil to President "No Drama" Obama's personal example is free to knock themselves out.
speaking of Detroit, how do you not have a single major food store chain in the city?? WTF??
http://money.cnn.com/2009/08/06/news/economy/detroit_food/index.htm?postversion=2009080610
@Denise
And remember the Detroit Public School system is about to file for bankruptcy.
Seriously?!?!? WTF?!?! You have a city of 900,000 and the city almost doesn't work. I mean, let the record show, as much as I don't like Daley, fact of the matter is that Chicago is a city that works. You can have all the graft and corruption you want, but most people aren't going to say anything if the city still works--when Detroit happens, then God bless you.
@AB
Don't forget Sheila Dixon and the "gift card" scandal. She just got indicted again last week.
I think we tend to focus more when its a black politician. I don't recall any blacks involved in the Abramoff scandal. I also believe the result is more disastrous. Black politicians tend to serve black communities; they are screwing their own people. In addition, certain people believe we are all criminals in some way, these folks just reinforce that stereotype which magnifies the issue. Now all future black politicians have to fight off the Clay Davis stereotype.
Sheeeeit!
Agreed. Let's not forget that Madoff primarily screwed over his own people (Jewish). A criminal will always work those closest to him or her. The recent arrests in NY show that corruption is across the board.
Denise
As far as the city of Detroit not having a supermarket that is something that's bothered me for a while as a native Detroiter. It didn't used to be like that. Almost any explanation seems like blaming the victim but there are some ugly facts that are behind much of this.
1) Detroit has lost massive amounts of people. Supermarkets need lots of foot traffic as well as folks driving in. They generally don't get that in Detroit. Detroit is no longer a place with high population density.
2) Supermarkets work on pretty low margins. Those that would locate in Detroit have to accept higher insurance costs, higher transportation costs, higher security costs and the risk (probably certainty) of higher costs from theft, burgulary and other crimes. If you can make a 5% profit in Grosse Pointe (a local suburb) and a 1% profit in Detroit, where does it make sense to locate.
3) The local grocery store ("party store") market in Detroit is already locked up pretty tight by the Iraqi, Yemeni, Lebanese and Chaldean communities. Obviously they won't look favorably on additional competition and indeed there may not be enough potential profit to lure a large chain market into the city.
4) Detroit is pretty impoverished. There is a high ratio of single parent families, families living beneath the poverty line, families on assistance. Fewer people paying with cash means additional trouble getting paid in a timely manner so again a possible store manager/owner would have to take those things into consideration. I don't know how common it is but the Farmer Jack in my neighborhood had actually built a fence around the outside of the store to prevent people from stealing carts.
5) Higher costs for training and retention. Again, I'm not in the business so I don't know how true this is but supposedly businesses hiring in the city have complained about having to spend additional funds training employeees in basic things. (ties into a failing school system)
6) Also the area is very divided racially so a store located in Detroit would almost certainly attract few or no white customers. Few stores would want to do that-not necessarily for racist reasons-just for money reasons.
All that being said though there have been recent attempts to get a major grocery store in the City proper and I think they will be successful. There is (or was?) a Farmer Jacks in Hamtramck, a "suburb" of Detroit that is almost completely surrounded by Detroit and plenty of Detroiters shop there.
Thanks for the background perspective, Shady Grady.
I didn't mean to go off-topic, AB. But, frankly, this grocery store issue - and the looming threat of food shortages - in predominately black Detroit is symptomatic of an underlying political leadership issue.
Unbelievable!
FWIW, the scandals don't make me any more or less likely to vote for or think poorly about a black politician.
supermarket deserts.
its more than a few neighborhoods in Chicago that don't have supermarket chains.
it totally sucks.
And even in Atlanta, there's the el cheapo supermarket Save-A-Lot, a la Aldi's and what not, that's over on the West End, but you'd still have to go aways down Ralph Abernathy to run into the Krogers. Not walking distance, accessible by bus, but in Englewood, not a one. Not unless they've dropped one near the old Halsted Street Mall, they'd effectively closed all major ones, even the supermarkets that looked to be doing well in business.
I think it's all on purpose.
I pull out my conspiracy theories with stuff such as this. Like honestly, even in these cities, they could at least put ONE supermarket.
In general, many minority communities, not just in Detroit, are underserved by supermarkets.
But I think if some of these grocery chains can "think outside the box" and use some imagination, there are opportunities precisely because these communities are underserved. Those in the NYC area can correct me if I'm wrong - but I think Pathmark or someother chain had the smarts to put up a store in Harlem, and it's doing pretty well.
^^ Silverkris:
We have similar problems getting chain supermarkets to do business in sections of my own city. And, thanks to efforts by the mayor and city council, in recent years large grocery chains stores have opened in communities where none existed.
I just couldn't believe this was a problem for the entire city of Detroit. That seriously boggles my mind.
Meanwhile, our First Lady gets hated on for starting a veggie garden - with the help of local elementary school kids - and raising awareness about healthy eating...
@ Denise:
She got hate for the veggie garden?
Ugh. Why am I even surprised?...
Seriously. What, I say what POSSIBLE complaints did their fevered little minds manage to cook up about THAT?
^^ @ Marbles:
I read there were initial complaints that the garden was nothing but a big photo op for Mrs. O's image. Then, after the garden got underway, I heard/read mild rumblings about "the image of a black woman toiling in the dirt."
Eventually, the fertilizer and pesticide industry groups got involved because of the focus on "organic" vs. conventional gardening methods and the use of "crop protection products" (chemicals).
Now, claims are that use of a sludge fertilizer on the soil during the Clinton Administration challenges the whole "organic" concept...
>:/
Anybody got an aspirin? My head hurts. Sheeeeeesh!
@silverkris-
Yup, the Pathmark on E. 125th was a big deal when it opened about 12 years ago I think? It's still there and looks to be busy.
Hearing about Detroit's lack of supermarkets is really sad. My former suburban town had five supermarkets and a Costco in maybe a 5 square mile area. Two expensive/ semi-gourmet ones on the border of the rich town next door, and three cheap to mid-priced ones for everyone else. Plus a bunch of smaller markets serving the Latino immigrant comunity.
I remember when I was living in Newark, NJ for like a year back in the mid-90s (under the reign of Sharpe James of course- can't stand him on gp), and there was this one really nasty grocery store on Clinton Ave. a few blocks from my aunts house. You'd see packs of bacon that would have little holes in the corner where mice had nibbled them.
Fortunately a big Pathmark opened, but it was driving distance away from us and lots of people didn't have cars. Of course they can call a cab, but then that's another expense.
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