Clout: Mariano plugged in for a job when he gets out of prison
A PHILLYCLOUT favorite, former City Councilman Rick Mariano could be doing electrical work at a job site near you any day now.
A PHILLYCLOUT favorite, former City Councilman
Rick Mariano
could be doing electrical work at a job site near you any day now.
Mariano, who was sentenced to six years for corruption, is set to leave the minimum-security federal prison in Lewisburg, Pa., Monday and move to a halfway house in Juniata Park, according to an e-mail he sent to friends and family on Sunday titled "8 Days to Go."
In the note, Mariano said he hoped to soon move from the halfway house to home confinement.
Wherever Mariano is residing, he should be able to get to work soon. The former electrician is still a dues-paying member of Local 98, the electricians union that backed him in his political rise.
"Rick Mariano is an active member of IBEW Local 98 and will have the right to work the day after he completes all of the official requirements of his release," Local 98 spokesman Frank Keel told us yesterday.
PhillyClout guesses this is one ex-offender who won't need re-entry services to land a job.
One year down, three to go
Former state Sen. Vince Fumo has grown a beard, put on a little weight and seems fairly upbeat, attorney Stephen Cozen told us yesterday. Cozen visited Fumo last weekend at the minimum-security federal prison in Ashland, Ky., where he is serving a four-year sentence for corruption.
"He's still Vince," said Cozen, who went to see Fumo as both his friend and attorney, so he couldn't tell us much about their conversation. "He's acclimated himself to what he has to do. Clearly he's not happy. He believes with all the things he did for the city and for so many people that he doesn't deserve to be where he is."
Fumo gets out on Aug. 26, 2013.
Playing the role of vindicated
Kathy Wickline, a Philadelphia casting agent at the center of a political dispute in the race for the U.S. Senate in West Virginia, is out from under the bus.
Wickline worked with Jamestown Associates, a political-consulting firm with strong Republican ties, to cast characters for a campaign ad critical of the Democrat running for the Senate in West Virginia.
The ad was filmed at the Oregon Diner in South Philly.
This line from the casting call started the trouble, once it leaked to Politico.com - "We're going for a 'hicky' blue-collar look."
Democrats pounced and the National Republican Senatorial Committee, which hired Jamestown Associates to produce the ad, put the blame for that wording on Wickline.
But e-mails released by her attorney, Charles Graber, show that a Jamestown Associates production manager wrote the line in an e-mail that was copied to the firm's CEO and vice president.
The NRSC fired Jamestown Associates yesterday, saying the firm wrongly accused Wickline of penning the controversial line.
Jamestown Associates issued this statement yesterday:
"We apologize for any embarrassment this may have caused to any of the parties and have resigned from the account."
This all sounds as if it's heading toward a lawsuit to us.
"We are certainly considering how she wishes to proceed," Graber said of Wickline. "Today is the first day of her attempt to get her name back."
Curveballs at the Obama rally
Imagine if the most "dramatic day" of your life, one filled with a mixture of "daring, courage and lunacy," was upstaged by some naked guy seeking $1 million.
Sajid Ali Khan, who described Sunday that way, seems to take it all in stride. Khan was detained by Secret Service agents for more than an hour Sunday, after he tossed a book he wrote onto the stage at a Germantown political rally with President Obama and Vice President Joe Biden.
Khan, who runs an antiques store in Manhattan, said he wasn't trying to hit Obama or Biden with the book, "How to Become Wise." He just couldn't get close enough to the stage to hand it to them.
That's where Khan's experience playing the game of cricket came into play. He said the book toss was a "googly" cricket pitch, similar to a curveball in baseball.
Khan said Biden flashed him a thumbs-up after the toss. "He loved it," he added. "If he approved it, how can it be a crime?"
Khan's toss was overshadowed by the antics of a Staten Island man who streaked at the event, prompted by an offer of $1 million from an English website owner.
Juan Rodriguez learned yesterday that he will get some but not all of the money since the website owner decided he did not get close enough to the president.
Political junkie DVR alert
State Attorney General Tom Corbett, the Republican nominee for governor, and Allegheny County Executive Dan Onorato, his Democratic opponent, will debate in Pittsburgh tomorrow night. The debate will be broadcast in Philadelphia on Sunday on the CW Philly 57 from 11 a.m. to noon and on CBS 3 from 1 to 2 p.m.
Corbett and Onorato will also debate Monday night live from WPVI (Channel 6) from 7 to 8 p.m.
Channel 6 will also air a debate on Wednesday with Republican former U.S. Rep. Pat Toomey and Democrat U.S. Rep. Joe Sestak in the U.S. Senate race live from the National Constitution Center from 7 to 8 p.m.
Quotable:
"I'm all shale all the time. KYW uses that, don't they, Tony?" -
Gov. Rendell to KYW NewsRadio reporter Tony Romeo this week about trying to get an extraction tax for Marcellus Shale natural-gas deposits approved by the General Assembly before the legislative session ends.
Staff writers Catherine Lucey and John Baer contributed to this report.
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