Fear & Loathing At Wendy’s

Aww, remember just a few weeks ago when Dwight Evans and Tom Knox were thebest of pals? They’d sit on the swings together, drink lemonade and occasionally challenge Bob Brady’s nominating petitions. (Brady’s officially on the ballot now, by the way.)

Well, all of that is over. Yesterday, Dwight Evans held an anti-Knox press conference, attacking Knox on his lack of public safety credentials. The theme for the day was “Where’s the beef?” For those of you who don’t remember the 1980s — and, really, there’s not much there to remember except for that last Police album and The Legend of Zelda — “Where’s the beef?” was a Wendy’s ad campaign which was popular enough to get its own Wikipedia page and its own novelty single. The phrase was later used by Walter Mondale in the 1984 democratic primary to attack Gary Hart.

At this point, you’re probably wondering exactly what year the candidates think this is. Chaka Fattah was walking around with Shaft on Monday and yesterday Evans held his “Where’s the beef” presser. I fully expect tomorrow to see Michael Nutter wearing MC Hammer pants and Bob Brady wearing flannel, listening to his cassette of Nevermind. (Tom Knox doesn’t know who those two people are. Hammer and Kurt Cobain, I mean.)

Anyway, I attended the press conference today based on one simple reason: It was a half-block away from the PW offices. To really drive home his point, Evans held the event across the street from the Wendy’s at 15th and Chestnut. If you’re not familiar with the location of the PW offices, I’ll draw (read: steal from Google Earth) you a map.

I will make this known to all the mayoral candidates now. If you hold an event within a block or so of the PW office, I will show up. (You could also hold one on the route I walk home from work.) But, man, if you’re at, say, 22nd and Chestnut, yeah, no.

But back to Evans. In addition to slogans, another way to make your event memorable is to hold it almost directly on top of a steam grate, as you can kinda sorta see from that linked photo There really isn’t much room to hold a campaign event near the Wendy’s, so apparently the steam grate was the only place.

A candidate can also make his or her event memorable by handing out hamburgers.

But these weren’t any ordinary burgers. They didn’t have any beef in them, see! Because Tom Knox hasn’t done shit for public safety! Ha ha! Get it!

The event took a tragic turn when Dwight Evans apparently got angry and rushed at me, killing me and breaking my camera. I don’t really remember it, though.

Update, 12:45 p.m.: The Evans campaign has video from the event, which is funnier than I remembered, apparently. This also shows the steam vent pretty well.

Evans airs his beef with Knox [Daily News]
State’s top court says Brady will remain on ballot [Inquirer]
Monday: Blaxploitation Film Star Wants You To Vote Chaka