Kwame Kilpatrick, the stench Detroit can’t seem to wash out

So just as Detroit is gearing up to wash off the stench of the past and vote in a better (hopefully) future tomorrow on Election Day, Tuesday, Nov. 3, who is it comes to town?

Kwame. Naturally.

Here we are doing our level best to forget one of the worst mistakes we ever made as an an electorate (but then how could we have ever known the man would turn out to be that crooked?), looking forward to Election Day as a chance to finally vote in a City Council where the sane members might actually outnumber the fruit loops for the first time since I moved to this city 17 years ago, and who comes to town?

Why, Kwame. Naturally.

But then maybe this is a good thing. Why? Because maybe it will serve as both a reminder and inspiration to all fence-sitting Detroit voters – those who comprise the vast majority of this city’s voting age population – that this is no time to be sitting on anybody’s fence. This is a chance – the first chance we’ve had in a long time – to actually have ourselves represented by a majority of elected leaders who are qualified for the job and aren’t likely to rip us off or embarrass us (too bad). Because in case any of you Detroiters out there forgot what that was like, just take a read of this right here and I’m quite certain it will all come rushing back to you why disgraced ex-mayor Kwame Kilpatrick had to leave town.

Or in case you don’t feel like clicking on the link right now and haven’t read the papers in awhile or listened to the news, here’s what’s up: turns out Kilpatrick received a loan of more than a quarter-million dollars from four of the region’s most prominent businessmen (Compuware’s Peter Karmanos Jr., Quicken Loans’  CEO and Rock Financial Founder Dan Gilbert, automobile mogul Roger Penske, and PVS Chemicals President and CEO Jim Nichols), plus Ambassador Bridge owner Matty Maroun who took ‘pity’ on the poor, downtrodden Kilpatrick clan and gave Carlita Kilpatrick a check for $50,000.

And I am tellin' you, I'm not goin'...

So why did they give him the money? To make sure he left town once he got out of jail.

No. Seriously. That was the reason. They didn’t want him to drag Detroit through the muck and mire of a trial, so they told Kilpatrick that if he would just settle the deal, they would pay him off. Otherwise, apparently, Kilpatrick was prepared to stick it up Detroit’s backside even deeper. In other words, pay up or I’ll keep on raping you until you scream. This from a man who swore to all of us how much he loved Detroit. Like I’ve said before, I sincerely believe the man doesn’t know the difference between love and a good hard fuck. Which is why we’re all paying for his screw-ups right now and will be for awhile.

But here’s the thing I don’t get about the ‘loan’; did they really believe this was necessary to get the man out of here? And were they really that worried about his welfare? And who is the sucker who feels so bad for Kwame that he/she is shelling out more than $3,000 per month for the million dollar mansion he and his family are living in? Because if it’s Kwame making that payment then, like, WTF?  I mean, I’m not saying the man has to live in the projects, but does he need to live next door to JR Ewing? And yet even with his six-figure salary from his new job (also compliments of Peter Karmanos), Kilpatrick is still bitching that he’s in pain because his required restitution of $6,000 per month toward the $1 million he owes us is just too heavy a cross to bear.

Well, yeah, I guess so. When you feel you must live in a million dollar mansion located in one of the  most exclusive gated communities in the nation, and that you must drive a $60,000 Cadillac Escalade plus a $35,000 Chrysler Aspen because simply no other vehicles will do then, well, yeah. I feel your pain. The strain of carrying around all that newly acquired debt while trying to repay $1 million to the City of Detroit has got to be just a bitch, dawg. Seriously.

So you’re gonna vote tomorrow, right?

SHAMELESS PLUG: Read my wife’s blog @ The “D” Spot Redeux

~ by Keith A. Owens on November 2, 2009.