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Sunday, July 06, 2008

194 Comments, ON A SATURDAY?

Saturday is the slowest day of the week for all Bloggers but as we saw record numbers on this Blog yesterday, the comments were unreal as well.

As a matter of fact, we saw completely unexpected numbers for the entire week, being summer and all. That being said, Pocomoke Tattler has taken over the #1 Political Blogger spot this week while Salisbury News is #2. Congratulations Billy Burke, (Boss Hog) as you certainly rocked this past week!

The Eastern Shore has certainly proven to be the hot spot for news and information verses the rest of the state of Maryland.

3 comments:

BossHogg said...

Thanks Joe.

Once again the Pocomoke Tattler has received the honor of being rated as the #1 “most influential” political blog in the State of Maryland. The *BIG* stories this week were questioning “old news” of the cities refusal to enforce the junk or untagged vehicle laws against X-Councilman Honiss Cane and asking for a formal written response.

We finally asked for a formal written statement from both the Chief of Police and the Mayor of Pocomoke City as to why they have refused to enforce the Municipal Code in this matter. A little birdie reported that the phones were ringing and Boss Hogg told X-Councilman Cane he was an embarrassment to the community and drawing “heat” on their activities over a few junk cars and it was time to move them. It was reported that the car was removed from his former residence on Fourth Street and on Friday we took pictures of his “business” and only found one untagged boat stored there.

Other stories this week included questioning is the City was going to replace Chief J.D. Ervin when his illegal and immoral employment contract expired last Monday June 30th. The Mayor reported that Chief Ervin has been retained in his current position “at the pleasure of the City Manager” who reports to no one. (Our Mayor being the same person who called him incompetent and incapable of properly performing his duties prior to his election) This action demonstrates to the citizens that Boss Hogg still retains a firm grip on ALL activities related to the City Government.

The most controversial posting / article of the week was my personal challenge to Pocomoke City Councilman Rob Clarke (District 5) asking if he would stand up in outrage and make a motion to remove the City Manager from office. Mr. Clarke declined to make an official comment but the communication(s) we received indicated he was afraid that the city would stop offering services to residents of district 5 in retaliation. There was a bit of confusion created from the way I asked the questions where some people thought I was “insulting” Councilman Clarke thereby alienating the only person sitting on the City Council who has any integrity.

Mr. Clarke please accept my personal apology for making it appear like we/I were slamming you or putting you into the same category as the other Councilmen. It’s purely frustrating that the open lies, deceit and corruption have gone on for decades and nothing has been done to stop it.

The people thought they had elected a “hero” with Mike McDermott but he made the fatal mistake of not firing City Manager “Boss Hogg” Russ Blake for self-dealing (and more) after he wrote employment contracts for himself and the Chief of Police that were approved by the previous Mayor and Council on the eve of the April 2005 Municipal election.

It’s really time to take a stand to run Boss Hogg and his cronies out of City Hall and we are pleading with Rob Clarke to take a stand. When I ran for City Council in the 90’s my only campaign promise was “To begin each city council meeting with a resolution to remove the city manager from office“.

During that campaign there was not one single person who had anything good to say for or about the City Manager and people came out of the woodwork to tell me stories about his corruption (like never paying water bills for his Pocomoke rental properties) and how he had negatively touched each and every citizen of Pocomoke City. Mayor Mike McDermotts defense of King “Boss Hogg” Russ Blake here on the Pocomoke Tattler were the first words I personally have ever heard uttered in his defense, ever.

Other news reported was that Chief J.D. Ervin had been elected as President of the Maryland Municipal League, Maryland Municipal Chiefs of Police Executive Association. Everyone at City Hall puts on a good face for the “MML Trade Association” of government executives. City government members have all of their association dues, education costs, travel to and from MML events, meals and lodging paid for as a “perk” of office costing Pocomoke taxpayers thousands (to tens of thousands) of dollars every year.

Good news reported this week:

The Pocomoke City Volunteer Fire Dept is having its annual Fourth of July weekend Chicken BBQ on the Router 13 North in front of Nocks Tires / Jiffy Lube. All of the food from the BBQ chicken to the sweet corn on the cob has been excellent as usual. Please show the PCVFD your support and stop by today (the last day) and getcha some great chicken BBQ.

We still have not figured out how or why the Pocomoke Tattler is the “Number 1” rated political blog in the State of Maryland but we would like to thank all of our readers and contributors.

Sincerely,

Billy Burke, Publisher

It’s Pocomoke…

Anonymous said...

nice to see the tattler kickin ass down south a bit, you all keep this up and all the sleezy local politicians will be runnin for the hills. that would be a nice change for the eastern shore, im a shore-billy, born and bread.

Anonymous said...

Joe, You know how to keep it real.