Pinko Magazine Hedonism + Activism

Editor’s Note: The following is the first in a series of profiles on Barack Obama’s potential running mates. First up is Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell, as profiled by our newest contributor J Wilder Konschak.

Ed Rendell. Since I understand he’s a potential running mate for Obama, I’ve done some pretty extensive polling on him amongst my friends and family. I’ve been unable to find any patterns amongst my friends from elsewhere — that is, places like Hawaii, Massachusetts, or Texas. And actually, amongst my friends from Pennsylvania, the results are pretty mixed, too. But one thing is clear: my friends from South Jersey don’t like Ed Rendell. And for some reason, neither do I.

I’m originally from South Jersey. If you check a map, you’ll find New Jersey smooshed between Pennsylvania and the ocean, and if you look real close, you’ll notice that South Jersey is deep inside Philadelphia’s media market. Especially if you look at a media market map. As a result, folks from South Jersey claim the Flyers, the Phillies, and the Eagles as our hometown teams. (If you’re like me, and you don’t know from sports, those are Philadelphia teams).

And yet, we don’t embrace our neighbor’s celebrity politician. Everyone I know from South Jersey recoils at the mention of his name. Why? I think it’s because we came to know him on the nightly news. News about another city. News we barely paid attention to. There he was, standing in front of some dirty government building, like a scene from Batman, announcing that, “This crime will not go unpunished!” It seemed like, if he was on the news, a cop beat someone up. This is fascinating to me because this must be how the general public thinks about politics. Something they see on television. Something they barely pay attention to. But something generally distasteful. And all that’s left are vague associations. Like the memory of a Saturday morning cartoon you saw a few times when you were six.

For all I know, Rendell may have saved Philadelphia from space aliens with his own fists. He may have taken Pennsylvanians from eating their own feces to… whatever it is that Pennsylvanians do now. But when I see his face, I think “they must have busted up another crack house.”

Take from that what you will.

About The Author - Wilder is a founding member of Misplaced Planet Productions, a business partnership and a collective of filmmakers, artists, performers, writers, and bums working out of New York City, Chicago, Los Angeles, New Jersey, and east, west, south, and north somewhat. It is always seeking new members for its online community and new projects for its idle hands. - Visit J. Wilder's site.