I came across two awesome websites for us Buffalonians.

One is a great site for Buffalo sports called The Buffalo Sports Museum and another, for those of us that have moved from the Queen City, Buffalo Ex-Pat.

I love this quote from the text of the latter:

“Now in the same way that Dan Quayle is no Jack Kennedy, Buffalo is no Chicago—or any of the other places I‘ve lived or frequented since leaving Bills Country—Denver, Santa Fe, Miami, Southern California.

You could say Chicago is Buffalo in its heyday on steroids. There are more than a few similarities. Chicago hosted the World’s Fair within a few years of the Pan Am Expo. Some of the buildings that survive from the Fair resemble their counterparts in Buffalo. Obviously we’re both on a lake. And Chicago is a commercial center now, as Buffalo was when the lights first came on from the Falls. Lots of old money. Lots of new money. And lots of immigrants: Poles, Germans, Italians, just like old Buffalo. And industry too. Buffalo had Pierce Arrow. Chicago has Boeing. And so on, and Scooby Doo.

But Buffalo isn’t just a place, it’s a state of mind, a religion, a cultural overlay that works like ethnicity even though it isn’t exactly. It isn’t but it is.

Being Buffalonian is like being Jewish in a way. Even if you’re Buffalo Blueblood. Even if your grandparents actually owned one of the mansions on Delaware when they were still single family homes. Being Buffalonian in Buffalo is the great equalizer. Being Buffalonian outside of Buffalo, is like being Jewish in Tehran.

And therein lies the bulk of my experience. The ex-pat. The diaspora. If there is a Jewish bar in Tehran, I can imagine the comaradery there. Pretty much like what you’d find at the Nickel Bar in Tampa or the Buffalo bars in a hundred other cities that get less snow. It’s instant kinship. Run into someone with a Bills or Sabres baseball cap or t-shirt or jacket, in the airport, on the beach, in some other city’s stadium when the Buffalo teams are not even playing, and it’s always the same. It’s like meeting the twin you never knew you had. All you have to do is say, “Wide Right,” or “In the Crease” and you’ll keep buying each other drinks until you both need a designated driver.

You can imagine how excited we ex-pats get when the Bills are scheduled for Sunday night or Monday night. At least we get to watch the games at home on our own TV sets and we don’t need Sunday Ticket.

Now in the same way that Dan Quayle is no Jack Kennedy, Buffalo is no Chicago—or any of the other places I‘ve lived or frequented since leaving Bills Country—Denver, Santa Fe, Miami, Southern California.

You could say Chicago is Buffalo in its heyday on steroids. There are more than a few similarities. Chicago hosted the World’s Fair within a few years of the Pan Am Expo. Some of the buildings that survive from the Fair resemble their counterparts in Buffalo. Obviously we’re both on a lake. And Chicago is a commercial center now, as Buffalo was when the lights first came on from the Falls. Lots of old money. Lots of new money. And lots of immigrants: Poles, Germans, Italians, just like old Buffalo. And industry too. Buffalo had Pierce Arrow. Chicago has Boeing. And so on, and Scooby Doo.

But Buffalo isn’t just a place, it’s a state of mind, a religion, a cultural overlay that works like ethnicity even though it isn’t exactly. It isn’t but it is.

Being Buffalonian is like being Jewish in a way. Even if you’re Buffalo Blueblood. Even if your grandparents actually owned one of the mansions on Delaware when they were still single family homes. Being Buffalonian in Buffalo is the great equalizer. Being Buffalonian outside of Buffalo, is like being Jewish in Tehran.

And therein lies the bulk of my experience. The ex-pat. The diaspora. If there is a Jewish bar in Tehran, I can imagine the comaradery there. Pretty much like what you’d find at the Nickel Bar in Tampa or the Buffalo bars in a hundred other cities that get less snow. It’s instant kinship. Run into someone with a Bills or Sabres baseball cap or t-shirt or jacket, in the airport, on the beach, in some other city’s stadium when the Buffalo teams are not even playing, and it’s always the same. It’s like meeting the twin you never knew you had. All you have to do is say, “Wide Right,” or “In the Crease” and you’ll keep buying each other drinks until you both need a designated driver.

So in a way I feel guilty. I don’t have to live with the misery of Buffalo fandom full time. I can forget I’m from Buffalo when the Bulls are winning. And I have been lucky in ways no Buffalonian deserves to be lucky. I lived in Denver the first time the Broncos won it all. (When I went to Sears to buy a TV, the clerk asked me if I wanted it in Bronco Orange.) I lived in Chicago the first year the Bulls did it. And the second, and third and the next three after that. And I was here when the Sox won the series. (Poor Cubs!)

In a way I feel guilty, but in a way I don’t. Because the success of teams in my adopted home towns only deepens the pain of the failures of the teams where my heart is still firmly planted. It’s like, why the hell couldn’t I have brought this luck to the Bills or the Sabres? Do I need to move back? Would that do it? And why don’t I move back?

One word. Four letters. S-N-O-W! But you live in Chicago, you say. True, but do you know the difference between East and West relative to lake effect? Winter, in the middle of a lake effect squall, is the one time I feel no guilt for having abandoned my tribe. I watch footage of white-outs as the school closing list scrolls across the bottom of my TV screen, laughing because all of that is going on in Northwest Indiana– the other side of the Lake. Hammond or Gary might as well be Buffalo. Or Upper Michigan. I watch them get buried over and over again all winter long and feel pretty damn smug. I might have to shovel my driveway five times in an average winter. Hey, you idiots. I figured it out! I moved to the West side of the Lake. And then someone says, “If you’re so damn smart, why Lake Michigan and not Lake Havasu?” Touche. But I digress.

I’ve spent all this time talking sports, mainly, but it isn’t really about sports at all. Sports are the metaphor, the religious rite. It’s what makes the Buffalo sort-of-but-not-but-sort-of ethnicity so similar to being Jewish. We are bonded not only by our common roots but to the ritual. Watching the Bills or the Sabres, or to a lesser degree, the Bisons or even the freaking Braves (I mean Clippers) is like going to Temple for Yom Kippur. We have this common ritual of atonement.

Atonement for what? In a way, for being Buffalonians! We’re like Rodney. We don’t get no respect. Our homeland is often reviled as Cleveland’s ugly stepsister. Queen City? Not unless it’s Drag Queen. And we’ve done a lot of this to ourselves. Especially in the past. If you’re old enough, you remember Stan Roberts on KB Radio giving the weather report on Lake D-reeeear-y. Like the Jews, we’ve wandered in the wilderness for generations awaiting deliverance. We await the coming Messiah, having endured many false prophets. We thought it would be O.J., then Kelly and company, then Dominick Hasek. We thought the second coming of the Mighty Marv might finally lead us to the promised land. (And it still might, after the fact, but it hurts too much to hope.) So, like the Jews we wander. We hope. We have our hopes dashed. We hope again. And we go to Temple. The Ralph. The HSBC. We fast. We sacrifice. We sob. We celebrate.

We wait. We celebrate. We curse! But we do it together. As one. We are the chosen people. We still don’t know what exactly we’re chosen for, but we’re chosen.

But here’s the good part about leaving and coming back, albeit temporarily. You notice the changes for the better. In the time it takes me to drive across the entire Niagara Frontier (you don’t use that term any more, I don’t think, but it stays with me) I might get through two stop lights on the main drag outside my far suburban house. In the time it takes to drive from the Airport to the Peace Bridge I’d still be in line on the on-ramp to the Kennedy at rush hour. I come back and hear your bemoan the fact that 200,000 people have left Erie County and I see the wide open expressways and say, you don’t know how good you’ve got it.

And housing prices? What you spend a hundred grand on, even in this depressed market, would cost me easily three times that.

But here’s the best part. Your restaurants are as diverse and as rich with ambience and gourmet gravitas as anything in Chicago. Your arts and cultural life is vibrant, just as good, but much more accessible and much more affordable than in Chicago, or just about anywhere else I’ve spent any time.

Downtown’s making a comeback. The Niagara Thruway is no longer lined with belching factories. South Buffalo no longer reeks of sulfur. And what other city has the equal of Our Lady of Victory? Throw in the Falls, the scenic drive on the Canadian side—the Canadian suburbs in general—and Buffalo can hold its own against any city anywhere. I know, ‘cause I’ve been there.

Ok. It’s no Chicago. But it’s also no Dan Quayle. It’s a Buffalo simultaneously mature and reborn, retro and post-modern, Art Deco and just art. Whenever I come back (which for the past three years has been once or twice monthly, on business) I don’t want to leave. But in a way, I never do, and I never have.

God bless you, Tim. (Tim Russert always will be the quintessential Buffalo ExPat.)

Go Bills!“

Training camp starts in two weeks for the Buffalo Sabres, but restricted free agent Drew Stafford is still without a contract.

Two weeks from today, the Buffalo Sabres will be in their second day of training camp. In a rare quirk of scheduling, they will begin camp before the Bills have even played their first regular-season game.

So the best time of year in Buffalo sports is nearly upon us, stretching from late summer through the endless winter on into spring. For better or worse, this is when fans feel most alive, when both of our major pro teams are back at work, on the winding, elusive trail of a title.

It’s hard to feel optimistic about either. Yes, season ticket sales are booming. But it seems the more people click through the turnstiles, the greater the dysfunction in the two organizations becomes. Might there be a connection?

The best thing you can say about the Sabres is they’re closer to the playoffs than the Bills. That’s modest praise. But that’s the new standard, simply making the playoffs. Fans gobble up tickets, grateful to have two pro teams and hopeful that the Sabres or Bills might be among the 28 teams that qualify for the NHL and NFL playoffs.

At least the Bills went out and signed Terrell Owens, diverting attention from the team’s staggering finish and the continued employment of Dick Jauron, a career mediocrity, as head coach.

What have the Sabres done since missing the playoffs for a second straight year? They brought in Steve Montador and Mike Grier in an inexpensive reply to critics who said they lacked the toughness and will to compete for a Stanley Cup.

Darcy Regier and Larry Quinn conceded that their team needed more “compete,” without identifying the offending players or moving anyone of consequence off the roster. Max Afinogenov is gone, but it will be essentially the same soft cast of characters that shows up in camp Sept. 12.

Regier has all the excuses. They’re up against their salary ceiling. Free agents were pricy and unattractive. It’s hard to find trading partners in this economic climate. Lately, Darcy sounds more like an accountant than a GM, content to educate us on the nuances of NHL finance.

But in the end, your actions, or lack of them, speak loudly. The Sabres believe in their players. They are building from within, with young guys — and let’s never forget how young they are.

Lindy Ruff, sounding like a company man, said he likes his team. Why this cry for a shake- up? They were young last year, remember, a team in transition. They finished strong, beating a bunch of teams with nothing to play for. If Ryan Miller hadn’t been hurt, they might have finished seventh!

They like their guys, and they have a lot of them. It’s odd, how a team that misses the playoffs two years in a row can have a glut of players. How does a team of underachievers become too deep all of a sudden? Maybe because they want it both ways.

Smart GMs know you can’t rebuild and contend at the same time. The Sabres middled it, making a weak playoff run with an inferior team. They kept fading veterans like Afinogenov, Jochen Hecht and Henrik Tallinder, rather than move them while they had value.

Quinn dismissed the last two years as a mulligan, one of the most outrageous comments uttered in this town since Wade Phillips’ departure. So they’re going to try it over, again, and maybe this time they’ll get it right.

Sooner or later, the kids will blossom and the Sabres will make another run at the Cup. Apparently, they have some growing up to do. Last week, in a Sporting News interview, Miller said the Sabres had to “grow and mature in certain aspects” last season. He said they had to “address a few issues over the course of the offseason.”

It sounds as if some of the younger Sabres were told to start taking their profession more seriously. The Sabres have paid a lot of money on promise in recent years. Derek Roy, Tim Connolly, Jason Pominville and Thomas Vanek have all gotten huge contracts. What have they won?

Then there’s Drew Stafford, who remains unsigned as a restricted free agent. Stafford, 23, scored 20 goals last season. He’s big (6-foot-2, 202 pounds), skilled and plays with an edge. He is a big part of the team’s future. But two weeks before camp, he’s still looking for a contract.

Maybe Stafford’s agent is shooting for the moon, knowing the Sabres need to sign someone of consequence. But if they believe in Stafford, why play hardball? If their plan is to develop stars from within, they should sign Stafford and show the fans how much they believe in him.

Of course, you have to wonder if Stafford is truly worth the money. There is no lack of pro athletes in this town, on both the Sabres and Bills, who are being paid like stars but fall short of the designation.

That’s the quandary for Buffalo fans. It’s admirable to support teams that keep letting you down. But there’s a price. If you continue to accept mediocrity, it will be rewarded.

http://www.glennbeck.com/content/articles/article/198/26742/?ck=1

GLENN: I got a letter from a woman in Arizona. She writes an open letter to our nation’s leadership: I’m a home grown American citizen, 53, registered Democrat all my life. Before the last presidential election I registered as a Republican because I no longer felt the Democratic Party represents my views or works to pursue issues important to me. Now I no longer feel the Republican Party represents my views or works to pursue issues important to me. The fact is I no longer feel any political party or representative in Washington represents my views or works to pursue the issues important to me. There must be someone. Please tell me who you are. Please stand up and tell me that you are there and that you’re willing to fight for our Constitution as it was written. Please stand up now. You might ask yourself what my views and issues are that I would horribly feel so disenfranchised by both major political parties. What kind of nut job am I? Will you please tell me?

Well, these are briefly my views and issues for which I seek representation:

One, illegal immigration. I want you to stop coddling illegal immigrants and secure our borders. Close the underground tunnels. Stop the violence and the trafficking in drugs and people. No amnesty, not again. Been there, done that, no resolution. P.S., I’m not a racist. This isn’t to be confused with legal immigration.

Two, the TARP bill, I want it repealed and I want no further funding supplied to it. We told you no, but you did it anyway. I want the remaining unfunded 95% repealed. Freeze, repeal.

Three: Czars, I want the circumvention of our checks and balances stopped immediately. Fire the czars. No more czars. Government officials answer to the process, not to the president. Stop trampling on our Constitution and honor it.

Four, cap and trade. The debate on global warming is not over. There is more to say.

Five, universal healthcare. I will not be rushed into another expensive decision. Don’t you dare try to pass this in the middle of the night and then go on break. Slow down!

Six, growing government control. I want states rights and sovereignty fully restored. I want less government in my life, not more. Shrink it down. Mind your own business. You have enough to take care of with your real obligations. Why don’t you start there.

Seven, ACORN. I do not want ACORN and its affiliates in charge of our 2010 census. I want them investigated. I also do not want mandatory escrow fees contributed to them every time on every real estate deal that closes. Stop the funding to ACORN and its affiliates pending impartial audits and investigations. I do not trust them with taking the census over with our taxpayer money. I don’t trust them with our taxpayer money. Face up to the allegations against them and get it resolved before taxpayers get any more involved with them. If it walks like a duck and talks like a duck, hello. Stop protecting your political buddies. You work for us, the people. Investigate.

Eight, redistribution of wealth. No, no, no. I work for my money. It is mine. I have always worked for people with more money than I have because they gave me jobs. That is the only redistribution of wealth that I will support. I never got a job from a poor person. Why do you want me to hate my employers? Why ‑‑ what do you have against shareholders making a profit?

Nine, charitable contributions. Although I never got a job from a poor person, I have helped many in need. Charity belongs in our local communities, where we know our needs best and can use our local talent and our local resources. Butt out, please. We want to do it ourselves.

Ten, corporate bailouts. Knock it off. Sink or swim like the rest of us. If there are hard times ahead, we’ll be better off just getting into it and letting the strong survive. Quick and painful. Have you ever ripped off a Band‑Aid? We will pull together. Great things happen in America under great hardship. Give us the chance to innovate. We cannot disappoint you more than you have disappointed us.

Eleven, transparency and accountability. How about it? No, really, how about it? Let’s have it. Let’s say we give the buzzwords a rest and have some straight honest talk. Please try ‑‑ please stop manipulating and trying to appease me with clever wording. I am not the idiot you obviously take me for. Stop sneaking around and meeting in back rooms making deals with your friends. It will only be a prelude to your criminal investigation. Stop hiding things from me.

Twelve, unprecedented quick spending. Stop it now.

Take a breath. Listen to the people. Let’s just slow down and get some input from some nonpoliticians on the subject. Stop making everything an emergency. Stop speed reading our bills into law. I am not an activist. I am not a community organizer. Nor am I a terrorist, a militant or a violent person. I am a parent and a grandparent. I work. I’m busy. I’m busy. I am busy, and I am tired. I thought we elected competent people to take care of the business of government so that we could work, raise our families, pay our bills, have a little recreation, complain about taxes, endure our hardships, pursue our personal goals, cut our lawn, wash our cars on the weekends and be responsible contributing members of society and teach our children to be the same all while living in the home of the free and land of the brave.

I entrusted you with upholding the Constitution. I believed in the checks and balances to keep from getting far off course. What happened? You are very far off course. Do you really think I find humor in the hiring of a speed reader to unintelligently ramble all through a bill that you signed into law without knowing what it contained? I do not. It is a mockery of the responsibility I have entrusted to you. It is a slap in the face. I am not laughing at your arrogance. Why is it that I feel as if you would not trust me to make a single decision about my own life and how I would live it but you should expect that I should trust you with the debt that you have laid on all of us and our children. We did not want the TARP bill. We said no. We would repeal it if we could. I am sure that we still cannot. There is such urgency and recklessness in all of the recent spending.

From my perspective, it seems that all of you have gone insane. I also know that I am far from alone in these feelings. Do you honestly feel that your current pursuits have merit to patriotic Americans? We want it to stop. We want to put the brakes on everything that is being rushed by us and forced upon us. We want our voice back. You have forced us to put our lives on hold to straighten out the mess that you are making. We will have to give up our vacations, our time spent with our children, any relaxation time we may have had and money we cannot afford to spend on you to bring our concerns to Washington. Our president often knows all the right buzzword is unsustainable. Well, no kidding. How many tens of thousands of dollars did the focus group cost to come up with that word? We don’t want your overpriced words. Stop treating us like we’re morons.

We want all of you to stop focusing on your reelection and do the job we want done, not the job you want done or the job your party wants done. You work for us and at this rate I guarantee you not for long because we are coming. We will be heard and we will be represented. You think we’re so busy with our lives that we will never come for you? We are the formerly silent majority, all of us who quietly work , pay taxes, obey the law, vote, save money, keep our noses to the grindstone and we are now looking up at you. You have awakened us, the patriotic spirit so strong and so powerful that it had been sleeping too long. You have pushed us too far. Our numbers are great. They may surprise you. For every one of us who will be there, there will be hundreds more that could not come. Unlike you, we have their trust. We will represent them honestly, rest assured. They will be at the polls on voting day to usher you out of office. We have cancelled vacations. We will use our last few dollars saved. We will find the representation among us and a grassroots campaign will flourish. We didn’t ask for this fight. But the gloves are coming off. We do not come in violence, but we are angry. You will represent us or you will be replaced with someone who will. There are candidates among us when hewill rise like a Phoenix from the ashes that you have made of our constitution.

Democrat, Republican, independent, libertarian. Understand this. We don’t care. Political parties are meaningless to us. Patriotic Americans are willing to do right by us and our Constitution and that is all that matters to us now. We are going to fire all of you who abuse power and seek more. It is not your power. It is ours and we want it back. We entrusted you with it and you abused it. You are dishonorable. You are dishonest. As Americans we are ashamed of you. You have brought shame to us. If you are not representing the wants and needs of your constituency loudly and consistently, in spite of the objections of your party, you will be fired. Did you hear? We no longer care about your political parties. You need to be loyal to us, not to them. Because we will get you fired and they will not save you. If you do or can represent me, my issues, my views, please stand up. Make your identity known. You need to make some noise about it. Speak up. I need to know who you are. If you do not speak up, you will be herded out with the rest of the sheep and we will replace the whole damn congress if need be one by one. We are coming. Are we coming for you? Who do you represent? What do you represent? Listen. Because we are coming. We the people are coming.

http://www.buffalonews.com/home/story/767924.html

Woman details stay in Holding Center

Linda Arthur moves slowly on arthritic knees. She’s 60 years old, 5 feet 5 inches tall, and a breast-cancer survivor who reaches for her medicine at noon each day.

And she’s dangerous.

Or at least she was treated as a danger to society for a weekend in December when jailed in the Erie County Holding Center. She was denied her medicine and other basics of civilized life: toilet paper, a toothbrush, soap, water, a blanket, a bed.

It all stemmed from a neglected parking ticket.

Arthur recently read that the U.S. Justice Department accused Erie County’s Holding Center and Correctional Facility of trampling on inmates’ civil rights. So she wants to tell her story.

She is an ordinary Erie County resident. She carries a Bible, not a gun. She describes herself as a divorcee with credit issues who owns horses in Evans and wants to reopen her flower shop that failed.

Arthur probably wouldn’t admit it, but she seems easily flummoxed by bureaucracies. Still, she figures that if she can end up in the Holding Center, anyone can. And to her, no one deserves the treatment she got the weekend after Christmas.

Holding Center personnel, she said, seem to dismiss everyone as a criminal even when they’ve been convicted of nothing.

“They are passing judgment on people,” she said. “And that’s not their jobs.”

Sheriff Timothy B. Howard said Arthur had sent his office an e-mail on March 22 complaining of her treatment, but a jail manager who contacted her reported that Arthur was not interested in filing a formal personnel complaint with the professional standards unit.

“We would have to assume that since she never followed up with the complaint, that she was satisfied,” Howard said.

Arthur, however, said she thought she was filing a complaint when she described her treatment to Howard’s staff member. She said she was not, as Howard related, more angry about the Evans police who arrested her and her pending divorce.

“That’s what they are focusing on, to take the focus off of them,” she said.

Arthur’s ordeal began Dec. 27, when she entered the Evans police station to see if officers could help her collect support from her estranged husband. The officers ran her name and saw that Buffalo’s City Court had issued an arrest warrant for her.

Within minutes, she was under arrest and later shuttled by Buffalo police to the Holding Center over her protests. She said she was never told about the allegations in the warrant but suspected they stemmed from some city parking tickets she had paid months earlier.

While Arthur had paid the tickets to free her 8-year-old van from an impound lot — and can present the receipt to prove it — she and a court clerk had overlooked a lingering ticket, and that led to the suspension of her auto registration. Arthur insists she was never notified.

Evans police Capt. Charles Danzi said this week that his officers probably checked with Buffalo police to confirm that Arthur should be arrested. Aside from that, Danzi said, police have no authority to ignore a warrant.

Arthur said that, when booked into the Holding Center, she told one deputy and then another that she would need her medicine — Arimidex, which helps shrink tumors. Arthur had a mass removed from her breast in 2007 and had finished chemotherapy treatments in August 2008, she said.

“They don’t respond,” she said of the deputies. “They just ignore you.”

Several former Holding Center inmates have contacted The Buffalo News with the same complaint: Holding Center personnel appear indifferent to their medical issues, even though the State Commission of Correction, the agency that polices local jails, requires that prescription medicines begin without delay.

The commission is investigating the death of Marguerite Arrindell of Buffalo, who asked deputies for her blood-pressure medicine over several days before she suffered a stroke and died in 2008 at age 54, according to the lawsuit that blames Erie County for her death.

In a similar example, Craig S. Beatty went into a diabetic coma in 2005 after Holding Center personnel denied him regular doses of insulin. His lawsuit also is pending.

Arthur said another woman in her Holding Center room — the “bullpen” — had been bitten on her upper back in a fight before her arrest, and the wound was oozing blood. Her requests for medical attention were ignored, Arthur said.

Lack of drinking water

Arthur was never beaten or roughed up. But she described these conditions:

• While she and the other women were given meals — low-cost jail fare with milk or juice — hours passed with no water. On Sunday, Dec. 28, she watched a female deputy return with bottles of water. Then Arthur’s hopes sank as the woman gave the bottles to other deputies.

“All in a row, they opened their bottles, looked at us, and then drank their water all down,” she said.

Howard said jail deputies are not obligated to provide inmates bottled water. But he doubts Arthur’s claim that no water was available because the bullpen’s rooms have sinks.

“I don’t believe that we didn’t have water,” Howard said. “There are times when there could have been a water problem, but such a problem would not span two days.”

To that, Arthur said neither she nor any of the women held with her could get the sink to work. And when they asked for water between meals, she said, deputies responded that they had provided the women with milk.

• ‚Arthur said she remained in the clothes she wore when arrested, and they were too thin for a detention room with cold air from a ceiling vent.

“It was so cold I was violently shaking all over,” she said. At one point, a deputy threw in a sweat shirt and sweat pants for her but they were of little help, she said.

With no clocks, no windows and the lights always on, she lost track of time. At one point late Sunday, she was given a mat and allowed to sprawl out in a darkened room.

• ‚She was told she might go before a judge on Sunday morning but her paperwork was not ready or had been misplaced, which apparently is not uncommon, according to other inmates. A 2007 federal lawsuit implies that paperwork can go missing on purpose.

Louise K. Nolley of Buffalo described the instructions a female deputy shouted to a group of inmates.

“There are no sheets, blankets or supplies, so don’t ask,” the deputy said, according to Nolley’s court papers. And if there is toilet paper, the deputy continued, anyone using it for reasons other than than to wipe noses or bottoms would face this fate: “Your papers will be lost and you will not be taken over for arraignment in the morning.”

Nolley, who has been arrested several times, won a $150,000 verdict in 1992 in an AIDS-discrimination lawsuit against the Holding Center.

• Arthur said she asked to make a telephone call, to tell family members of her whereabouts. She got the chance around 2 a.m. Sunday — about 10 hours after her arrival — but got no answer. She didn’t see her family until Monday morning, when released. They had pieced together where she might be.

Guilty plea, $15 fine

A month after her release, Arthur pleaded guilty to violating Section 1201(a) of the Vehicle and Traffic Law — parking illegally.

It costs more than $100 a day to house an average county prisoner. The fine for her violation was $15.

If Arthur’s description of the conditions sounds familiar, it’s because state regulators, not just other inmates, have complained about them for years. The Commission of Correction has repeatedly faulted the Holding Center for failing to provide bedding and hygiene items to people awaiting arraignment in the bullpen.

Issues with the bullpen go back more than a decade. After a class-action lawsuit in 1995, a federal court judge found that Holding Center conditions constitute a wanton infliction of pain and unjust punishment, violating the U.S. Constitution.

Erie County added capacity to the Holding Center, but then in 2003 signed what has become a disastrous contract with Buffalo in the name of government consolidation.

Buffalo’s pretrial cellblock at Buffalo Police Headquarters was absorbed into the Holding Center, opening the door to a crush of new inmates and pinching county government because the service costs more than the city pays, according to an audit by Comptroller Mark C. Poloncarz.

While the state sets lower standards for prearraignment cells in police stations, the Holding Center is classified as a New York jail and must provide items of personal hygiene, an inmate handbook and showers, among other things.

Those higher standards would be less of a chore for jailers if inmates were promptly arraigned and either sent on their way or assigned a cell. But the Holding Center is the state’s second- largest pretrial detention facility. An inmate can linger in a bullpen with others for hours or days.

The holding rooms contain a bench but no beds, so people sprawl out on the floor. They share a toilet. They go without their medicines.

Under pressure from state and federal regulators, Erie County officials say they are making progress to improve the Holding Center. In February, the Commission of Correction told Howard that, if bullpen conditions did not improve, a lawsuit was likely. He made several improvements this year, and he often moves inmates before arraignment into cells where they get bedding and access to showers.

Howard, interviewed Tuesday, had two requests: That inmates complaining about conditions do so soon after they experience them, not months later when they are difficult to investigate. And that the Holding Center be judged based on this year’s state-sparked improvements, not on the past.

After a series of additional inspections this year, the commission’s staff reported that they had found sporadic upgrades but did not believe personnel could sustain them during the busy summer months. However, the commission has not filed suit.

The sheriff also has transferred his medical staff to the control of county Health Commissioner Anthony Billittier IV, on the theory that, as a medical professional, Billittier can better supervise inmate care.

Arthur is not suing Erie County over her treatment. And she says she’s not trying to harm the sheriff as Howard faces re-election this year.

State, research group battle for ownership of sunken schooner

A diver crosses the deck area of a sunken schooner found intact at the bottom of Lake Erie west of Dunkirk.

The shipwreck hunters who want to raise an old schooner from the bottom of Lake Erie and put it on display in the Buffalo harbor have been entangled in a five-year federal court battle with the state over rights to the vessel.

State historic preservation and museum officials believe federal law gives the state control of the ship, and they feel it is best preserved where it is, off the Dunkirk shoreline. They also allege the company behind the schooner-raising plan has damaged the ship and accuses its divers of improperly handling human remains found onboard.

Northeast Research LLC denies the accusations and says it has followed all the rules to obtain the legal rights to the sunken ship.

The company, headed by Richard Kullberg, whose previous business ventures include starting Cape Cod’s first whale-watching boat tour, laid claim to the shipwrecked vessel at the bottom of the lake in federal court in August 2004.

Last month, after years of research on the ship, Northeast Research met with Erie County Executive Chris Collins, the Erie Canal Harbor Development Corp. and other government and tourism officials to lay out its plans for the schooner.

Northeast Research wants to raise the two-masted ship from the lake and place it on display in a giant water tank. They see it as a potential centerpiece of the Buffalo waterfront and say thousands of tourists would flock to Western New York to see it.

They also want to make a series of documentaries about the shipwreck and its raising, which they say will bring international attention to Buffalo.

The group says it will put up as much as $5 million from investors to raise and store the ship while a museum is prepared. They said they’ll lease the shipwreck to waterfront officials for $1 over a 99-year period. And they say they will spend “over $1 million” on the first of four documentaries.

In exchange for all this, they want a third of ticket sales from the museum. To pay for the museum, Northeast has suggested using money that has been set aside for other projects in the Buffalo harbor redevelopment plan.

Northeast Research says its research shows the ship was a trading schooner, based on grains and hickory nuts found in its hull.

A disputed identity While no nameplate has been found on the ship, Northeast Research and its experts believe there’s a strong possibility the schooner at one time had been the warship Caledonia, which was commandeered by the British during the War of 1812, then taken over by the Americans and used against the British in the Battle of Lake Erie.

It then was refitted in 1816 to become a trade ship called the General Wayne, which may have been used to smuggle slaves to Canada.

The identity of the ship is key to Northeast Research’s claim to the sunken vessel. Federal law protects only abandoned shipwrecks, but not those whose owners have living descendants who want to lay claim to the ships or insurance companies with policies on them. In this case, Northeast Research has tracked down a direct descendant of one of the owners of the General Wayne who has given consent to the group to raise the ship.

But as Northeast Research has been developing and promoting its plan, it has been simultaneously fighting off efforts by the state to gain control of the shipwreck.

The state attorney general’s office, representing state historic preservation and museum officials, has been arguing for the rights to the shipwreck since almost immediately after Northeast Research went to federal court in 2004.

In court papers, an expert for the state argued there’s no evidence the ship is the Caledonia/General Wayne, which would mean the ship is abandoned. Under the federal Abandoned Shipwrecks Act of 1987, such a vessel would fall under the jurisdiction of the state where it was found.

Arthur B. Cohn, an underwater archaeologist with the Lake Champlain Maritime Museum, said none of the artifacts found on the ship points to its being the historic vessel. Cohn said the ship’s “flat-bottomed hull and parallel sides” are more consistent with ships built to fit in the Welland Canal, which was completed in 1829. The Caledonia is believed to have been built near the end of the 18th century.

In addition, the state has “serious concerns regarding the archaeological methods used by the plaintiff in their efforts on the shipwreck,” including what officials called the “desecration of human remains,” court papers read.

In June 2008, during the course of the lawsuit, the state had been forced by the courts to give Northeast Research an archaeological permit to work on the ship. The permit lays out specific guidelines on how to handle an archaeological site and includes specific guidelines on what to do with human remains that are encountered.

The state says bones believed to be human that were found on the ship were never reported to authorities. The state said that the bones were gathered up into a “bone bag” and that other pieces of bone were sucked up through a dredge hose and are being kept in cold storage in Dunkirk.

After the state received information about the discovery of bones, it rescinded the permit.

Northeast Research strongly denies the state’s assertions that it has been anything other than careful with the shipwreck.

“The last thing we’re going to do in a shipwreck of this historical magnitude is to destroy the integrity of the ship,” Pat Clyne, a part-owner and spokesman of Northeast Research, told The Buffalo News.

He said his firm has been working on the ship using expert technical divers and archaeology experts from Mercyhurst College in Erie, Pa.

Northeast Research contends any damage to the ship had been caused by trespassers.

Regarding the human remains, Clyne said the state’s accusations “are blatantly false and hearsay.”

Clyne said that divers sent down to explore and desilt the ship came across objects that they thought could be human bones and that they were set aside in a canvas bag inside the hull. A dredge hose also sucked up tiny, blackened fragments of bone, some of which were human and some from fish. A few pieces were sent to an Army
DNA lab, and the rest were frozen for conservation purposes, as was recommended to Northeast Research by archaeological consultants.

Experts have doubts

Northeast Research also contends that its experts have found strong evidence that the ship is the Caledonia/General Wayne. It disputes Cohn’s description of the ship, saying its design is consistent with the types of vessels built when the Caledonia was and also cites a line drawing by a Great Lakes historian that looks very close to the historic ship.

The drawing was based on historic accounts in 1997, (CQ) which the state says should not count as proof.

Northeast also says the lack of identification on the ship is consistent with the theory that it had become involved in helping escaped slaves.

Northeast alerted Collins about the “unresolved legal issues surrounding the wreck,” said Collins’ spokesman, Grant Loomis. “Erie County has done its own due diligence on this matter” he said.

Collins says he doesn’t believe the project can be funded by the county alone.

“Going forward, Northeast Research must now resolve its legal matters and convince the state and federal governments that this project is worth pursuing in Buffalo,” he said.

The legal fight and publicity over the schooner proposal have raised questions among some in the Great Lakes shipwreck community.

They wonder about the ethics and wisdom of disturbing archaeological sites to such an extent.

“In terms of picking it up and putting it in a tank, I don’t see how that’s a good idea in any way, shape or form,” said Carrie Sowden, archaeological director of the Great Lakes Historical Society in Vermilion, Ohio.

Sowden supports leaving ship wrecks in their final resting places. “The general rule of thumb within the Great Lakes is almost everything stays where it is,” she said.

“I really think they’re best preserved left where they are,” said Pat Labadie, historian for the Thunder Bay National Marine Sanctuary in Michigan. “Diving activity alone takes an awful toll on historic wrecks.”

Still, he said, it’s feasible that the shipwreck could be raised and that keeping it in a tank “could be a way of preserving the vessel. … It would certainly be impressive,” he said.

Many shipwreck researchers cited the cautionary tale of the Alvin Clark, a schooner not unlike the Dunkirk wreck, that was raised in 1969 off of Wisconsin.

Valerie Van Heest, who made a documentary about the ill-fated ship, explained how the Alvin Clark was raised “with good intentions.” The vessel was put on display outdoors on the waterfront in Green Bay. “But there was absolutely no financial backing beyond taking it out of the water,” she said. “It rotted. Storms took it apart … To make a long story short, they had to bulldoze it, and it went into a landfill.”

Northeast’s Clyne says he understands such concerns.

“It just wasn’t done correctly,” Clyne said of the Alvin Clark. “We have the technology now. We know what destroys shipwrecks. We know how to conserve them indefinitely. There is no reason in the world that shipwrecks can’t be put on display.”

Clyne said he believes that his company and the state are really on the same page and hopes they can figure out a way to work together.

“We as private, historical shipwreck salvors would like to bring this up and display it for the people of Buffalo,” Clyne said. “The state wants to keep it at the bottom of the lake. We both feel it belongs to the people of Buffalo.”

This morning I was awoken by my alarm clock powered by electricity generated by the public power monopoly regulated by the U.S. Department of Energy.

I then took a shower in the clean water provided by a municipal water utility.

After that, I turned on the TV to one of the FCC-regulated channels to see what the National Weather Service of the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration determined the weather was going to be like, using satellites designed, built, and launched by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.

I watched this while eating my breakfast of U.S. Department of Agriculture-inspected food and taking the drugs which have been determined as safe by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

At the appropriate time, as regulated by the U.S. Congress and kept accurate by the National Institute of Standards and Technology and the U.S. Naval Observatory, I get into my National Highway Traffic Safety Administration-approved automobile and set out to work on the roads build by the local, state, and federal Departments of Transportation, possibly stopping to purchase additional fuel of a quality level determined by the Environmental Protection Agency, using legal tender issued by the Federal Reserve Bank.

On the way out the door I deposit any mail I have to be sent out via the U.S. Postal Service and drop the kids off at the public school.

After spending another day not being maimed or killed at work thanks to the workplace regulations imposed by the Department of Labor and the Occupational Safety and Health administration, enjoying another two meals which again do not kill me because of the USDA, I drive my NHTSA car back home on the DOT roads, to my house which has not burned down in my absence because of the state and local building codes and Fire Marshal’s inspection, and which has not been plundered of all its valuables thanks to the local police department.

And then I log on to the internet — which was developed by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Administration — and post on Freerepublic.com and Fox News forums about how SOCIALISM in medicine is BAD because the government can’t do anything right.

(Read this in that deep, throaty, New York Private Eye raspiness…)

Rorschach’s Journal, October 12th.

Dog carcass in alley this morning. Tire tread on burst stomach. The city is afraid of me. I have seen it’s true face. The streets are extended gutters and the gutters are full of blood and when the drains finally scab over all the vermin will drown. The accumulated filth of all their sex and murder will foam up about their waists and And all the whores and politicians will look up and shout “save us!”…

And I’ll whisper “no.”

All those liberals, and intellectuals, and smooth-talkers; and all of a sudden no one can think of anything to say. Beneath me, this awful city, it screams like an abattoir full of retarded children. and the night reeks of fornication and bad consciences.

Tonight, a comedian died in New York. Somebody knows why… somebody knows.

October 13th 1985. 8:30pm.

Meeting with Dreiberg left bad taste in mouth; a flabby failure sits whimpering in his basement. Why are so few of us left active, healthy, and without personality disorders? The First Nite Owl runs an auto repair shop. The first Silk Spectre is a bloated, aging whore dying in a California rest resort. Dollar Bill got his cape stuck on a revolving door where he got gunned down. Silhouette… murdered, a victim of her own indecent lifestyle. Mothman is in an asylum in Maine. Even Adrian Veidt; possible homosexual, must investigate further. Only two names remain on my list. Both share private quarters at Rockefeller Military Research Center. I shall go to them. I shall go tell the indestructible man that someone plans to murder him.

October 25th 1985.

Edward Blake, The Comedian, born 1918, buried in the rain. Murdered. Is that what happens to us? No time for friends? Only our enemies leave roses. Violent lives ending violently. Blake understood. Humans are savage in nature. No matter how much you try to dress it up, to disguise it. Blake saw society’s true face. Chose to be a parody of it, a joke. I heard a joke once. Man goes to doctor, says he’s depressed. Life seems harsh and cruel. Says he feels all alone in a threatening world. Doctor says “Treatment is simple. The great clown, Pagliacci, is in town. Go see him. That should pick you up”. Man bursts into tears. “But doctor”, he says, “I am Pagliacci.” Good joke. Everybody laughs. Roll on snare drum. Curtains.

• Men get arrested. Dogs get put down.
• God didn’t kill that little girl. Fate didn’t butcher her, destiny didn’t feed her to those dogs. If God saw what went on that night, he didn’t seem to mind. From then on, I knew: God doesn’t make the world this way. We do.
• None of you seem to understand. I’m not locked in here with you… you’re locked in here with me!

• Ancient Pharaohs looked forward to the end of the world. Believed cadavers would rise to reclaim hearts from golden jars. Hurm. Must currently be holding breath in anticipation.
• Never compromise. Not even in the face of Armageddon.

But, I have to admit, I do have a favorite movie of all time. One that I think it would be hard for any other to unseat.
Before I say the name, I just want to give a little background.

This movie, released in 1984, featured two of Hollywood’s then, up and coming, promising actors in Mickey Rourke and Eric Roberts.
The cast is anchored by Darryl Hannah, who was already a leading lady.
Burt Page, of Rocky fame (Pauly) plays the villain, “Bedbug” Eddie.
Beautifully filmed with an incredible script, great directing, and an excellent story, which reminds me of home in every scene, and our attitudes back  in “the neighborhood”, plus a solid soundtrack, the movie is “The Pope of Greenwich Village.”
I’ve always been amazed the movie never garnered more acclaim or rose to blockbuster status.

I don’t believe that, although Mickey Rourke was excellent in “Diner” and “Barfly“, Rourke or Roberts have ever performed finer than they do in this film. Both should have taken Oscars. This is the movie that put Rourke on the map and opened up roles like 9 1/2 weeks, Angel Heart and Barfly and made him one of my favorite actors.

The first time I saw this movie was in the fall of ‘85, at a friend’s while we sat up all night partying (More like tripping on acid in Austin, TX), we both became engrossed by the film. And it’s been with me ever since, as moments throughout my life have always taken back to scenes in the film.

I watched it again, last night, for probably the 100th plus time, and every scene is like seeing it for the first time again.

It’s a shame that Rourke threw his leading man status away, and and it’s great that he’s back on the map, but I bet anytime The Pope Of Greenwich Village comes up, part of wonders, “What if?”

Anyone who watches this movie will be sure to gain a better understanding of how life in New York is, and how “the neighborhood”, attitudes, appearances and family are taken so seriously.
Particularly to us Italians!

(OK, I’m only half Italian, but still….)

Click here to view the embedded video.

Anyhow, the days the kids were gone were pretty good. Except at night when Bridget had her free pass to get obliterated and start nonsense fights.

Wednesday, they both came home… ….with colds.
My oldest had a bad bronchial cough and the youngest a runny, stuffy nose.

Thursday night, I felt fine when I got home, but by bed time, I was sick.
Friday, was worse, but I gave it a shot at work, until after lunch when I threw in the towel and came home and went to bed with 100 degree temperature.
During the night, I woke up and it was at 102, and I thought I was a goner.

Then Bridget started feeling sick!

Yesterday morning, I felt a lot better and continued to improve until later last night, when I came down with diarrhea and a urinary tract infection, which I had nothing here to treat it with.
Bridget was in agony all day and my oldest daughter who had been feeling better, started getting worse.

Today, I think I regressed a bit and feel completely run down, Bridget is still sick and my kids are definitely under the weather.

On top of that, I found out that the uncle’s girlfriend’s parents are so sick, both are on antibiotics!

This sucks!