Now is the time when special interests have their day

I'M READING "A Prayer for the City," Buzz Bissinger's classic book about Ed Rendell and his fight for the soul of Philadelphia, and this passage quoting the former mayor jumped out at me: "Everything that goes on is a power struggle between black politicians and white politicians, and it isn't because of what's good for the citizens. It's about who controls what project. I'm so fed up with the blackmail stuff that goes on I could just scream. I could just take a machine gun and shoot 'em all."

Clearly, this book was written a long time ago, when someone could make a hyperbolic comment about a machine gun and no one would bat an eye. It also reflects a 20th-century dynamic, in which the only true political divide was defined by race. Philadelphia is the city of Cecil B. Moore and Frank Rizzo, of Mumia Abu Jamal and Daniel Faulkner, of MOVE and James Ramp. At least it was. Growing up in the 1960s and '70s, I knew there essentially were two teams on the playing field, and I belonged to the one that was losing the public relations battle.

Yes, race was always the great divider, and there are generations of public figures such as Bill Gray and Charlie Bowser and Carl Singley and Chaka Fattah and John and Milton Street and Lucien Blackwell who made being African-American a central characteristic of their agendas and their accomplishments. It was the beginning of identity politics.

But those were simpler times, and Rendell's comment reflects the fairly manageable duality of that society in which there was a white perspective and a black perspective and nothing much else. Sure, there were Jewish groups, Catholic groups, Italian groups, Irish groups and a very, very few feminist groups, but all of these could have been lumped into the greater conflict between African-Americans and ethnic Caucasians.

Reading this book at a time when Jim Kenney is settling in at City Hall as mayor of this great city is an eye-opening experience, mostly because it serves to remind me that identity politics used to mean only one thing: what color you were. Now, in a city where we have a new diversity czar, there is no limit to the characteristics, preferences and posturing that form the basis for our various "identities" and apparently no limits to our new mayor's willingness to pander to them. And I find that to be extremely unfortunate, because it simply adds to the number of people we have to apologize to when we say things that aren't polite, politic or pleasing.

For example, I can't imagine Rendell getting all hot under the collar because the Comics division of the Mummers (not exactly Emily Post acolytes) made some off-color jokes about Caitlyn Jenner. Just because a group of rowdy and institutionally drunken fellows decided to voice a politically incorrect opinion of The Woman Formerly Known As Bruce does not mean that the mayor of this city should vilify them and promise, in his own endearing way, to make them as accepting of gays, lesbians, trans, bi, and questioning folk as the beaten-down Boy Scouts. He can't shut them up, according to the First Amendment. He cannot, in any way, coerce or induce them to play nice with the LGBT community with threats of municipal punishment. He can just ask them to make their members behave, and hope for the best.

Rendell would not have had to deal with this new special-interest group. He would not have to appease what I like to call the storm troopers of tolerance, because the only people on his radar who were using identity as a bargaining chip were African-Americans. Whites didn't even think of doing so, because they were used to having a monopoly on things from the beginning.

But I'm fairly certain that Rendell wouldn't have caved to the demands of the LGBT community back in those "I'm saving the city" days, because he didn't have time for stroking egos, which essentially is what Kenney is doing. It's a shame if the trans community doesn't have the same sense of humor that I, a Catholic woman had when I saw the Comics dressed up as priests chasing little boys. Ha Ha, I said, through gritted teeth. How (blanking) adorable. And I didn't even think to protest.

And even if I had, someone like Kenney wouldn't have listened. Because white Catholics (not even white Catholics who happen to be members of another aggrieved identity group - women) are not important enough to snag the attention of the enlightened and progressive imam from South Philly.

Which brings me to another special-interest group that has endeared itself to the new mayor: the Islamic community. Hours after a police officer was shot by a man who declared his allegiance to ISIS, Kenney made sure to lecture us on the peaceful nature of Islam. This, to me, was completely irrelevant, and inappropriate, when one of his men in blue was fighting for his life in a hospital.

Back in Rendell's day, that wouldn't have happened. There were, of course, Muslim communities in the city. They coexisted peacefully alongside of Protestants, Catholics and Jews. This was years before jihadists used the word "Islam" as a cover for terrorism.

But now, we have to be very careful about insulting Muslims, just as we have to be careful of insulting members of the LGBT community, just as we have to be careful of insulting the criminally insane, just as we have to be careful of insulting women, just as we have to be careful of insulting fat people, just as we have to be careful of insulting people who don't have children, just as we have to be careful of insulting people with overbites, and on, and on, and on.

Kenney has started to turn Philadelphia into a haven for special interests and, unlike the days when Blackwell and Franny Rafferty literally represented the real combatants for the soul of Philadelphia by beating each other up on the floor of City Council, there are now many different groups ready to engage in identity politics.

And we have a new mayor who seems ready, willing and able to cheer them on.

I think we'll need more than a "Prayer for the City." This might take a Novena.

Christine Flowers is a lawyer. You can reach her at cflowers1961@gmail.com

On Twitter: @flowerlady61