Abridged Daily News Columnists

Ronnie Polaneczky: “The healthy heart of a community - the bricks-and-mortar embodiment of its best, most hopeful and egalitarian self. Close a library and you still a neighborhood’s beating heart.” What? Are you going to tell me the beating heart of Logan Circle is the Central Library and not the giant heart in the Franklin Institute?

Christine Flowers: Here’s my favorite part of Flowers today:

Some judges think we should not elevate their deaths above “the rest of us,” those without the bulletproof vests and the shields. Some citizens think that color excuses criminality, or that poverty is an explanation for antisocial behavior, or that grief is misplaced for those who willingly enter a dangerous profession.

These sentiments are heard in the streets, seen in the courtrooms, read on the letters page.

But they are wrong. Decent people understand it. The rest are irrelevant.

When using a strawman argument, you’re allowed to tear it down a little better than, “Well that’s wrong BECAUSE I SAID SO!”

Abridged Daily News Columnists

John Baer: Bill DeWeese — in charge when House Democrats made decisions that led to a probe (ouch!) and some charges (double ouch!) — is of course going to get a promotion to Speaker of the House. Dennis M. O’Brien, we hardly knew ye.

Ronnie Polaneczky: Think of the message it would send if the Obamas intentionally lowered the quality of their childrens’ education to send a message! Uh, wow, that would be quite the message. “Wow, Michelle and Barack Obama are a bunch of loons who hate their kids!”

I wonder how Michelle and Barry would do it. “Hey, kids, you know how we kind of permanently changed your lives forever by having Daddy run for president and actually win, and while it’s cool and all, it’s totally going to make things awkward for you and everyone who interacts with you? Yeah, well now you’re going to a shittier school. Sorry, some people on the Internet signed a petition; as you can see, we have no choice.”

Elmer Smith: Ooh, Obama is sending “hopeful signals” to big cities. Hopeful! Signals!

Abridged Daily News Columnists

Michael Smerconish: “At the end of the day, I was on info overload. So I downloaded the new John Legend CD from iTunes and plugged in my iPod.” This is the both the worst and greatest sentence Michael Smerconish has ever written.

John Baer: Oh, it’s that time of the year again, when Pennsylvania bigwigs gather for a party in Manhattan. You should read Baer today, really.

Ronnie Polaneczky: This, friends, is drama:

Jim asked if I would arrange the meeting, then write about it.

Hmmm, would I?

Well, yes, I bet you did, since you’ve already written a column about it.

Stu Bykofsky: The city might bill the Mummers this year for parade cleanup! Oh, this could end poorly.

Abridged Daily News Columnists

Elmer Smith: Boy, Barack Obama and Michael Nutter sure are politicians during this time of financial crisis.

Ronnie Polaneczky: She begins this column with the a “bitch” Vince Fumo wanted to shut up, and the, ha ha, guess what, the bitch was actually a dog Fumo allegedly put a hit out on.

Christine Flowers: Flowers really thought the world was going to end because Obama won. Wait, what?!

Abridged Daily News Columnists

Elmer Smith: This is the most mindboggling thing in the newspaper in a while.

In the dry cleaners yesterday, a guy asked me what I thought of Chase Utley’s profane exultation at the end of the Phillies victory parade.

I don’t remember my answer. But I’m certain that I did not shed any new light on the subject.

By now, you’ve heard the full spectrum of reactions, ranging from shock to shrug.

What was more interesting was what the guy in the cleaners said to me.

“I was really surprised,” he said. “He’s the last guy I would have expected that from.”

What? Did noted expert “the guy in the cleaners” forget what happened at the All-Star Game? Come on, that was just a few months ago.

Ronnie Polaneczky: Oh my God someone’s dog is registered, what ever will we do. Hey, wait, it’s not like this dude’s dog was going to vote! So I guess it doesn’t matter. Anyway this lone comment (for now) on the story is awesome:

Michael Smerconish supports blowing up the Army-Navy Game! Oh, no.

Abridged Daily News Columnists

Jill Porter: This is a Phillies celebratory column probably written before the game was played. Whatever, that’s fine. Let me just quote a little bit of it.

Dingy? Crumbling? In ruin?

This, the next great city in America, glimmering with new skyscrapers?

This, the so-called 6th borough of New York because of the folks who relocate and commute there?

This, a town internationally renowned for its history, its restaurants, its hospitals and universities?

This, one of the few American cities with a thriving, growing Center City?

Ha, ha, all it took was three years for “sixth borough” to be viewed as a compliment.

Ronnie Polaneczky: Convicted felons can vote in Pennsylvania, who knew?

John Baer: Oh, yeah, Obama was on the teevee last night, too. Oh no buying up all the TV ad time for a giant infomercial is apparently Big Brother-ish!

Michael Smerconish: This is the first paragraph of Smerconish’s column:

IT TOOK me only a few seconds of my hairy-eyeball test to conclude that McCain-Palin volunteer Ashley Todd, who said she had been assaulted and branded with a politically tinged scarlet letter, was full of it. It was the same internal alarm that sounded when I first heard of the alleged Duke-lacrosse rape. No way, I thought.

Man, why do we even have courts when we can just get Michael Smerconish to use his “hairy-eyeball test” to decide everything! Also, um, it’s Christine Flowers who needlessly mentions the Duke rape case, Michael, don’t steal her shtick.

Abridged Daily News Columnists

Ronnie Polaneczky: Boy, politicians sure are greedy!

Elmer Smith: Oh, yeah, there are a couple of wars the next president will inherit, I wonder if either of them has a plan for what to do in them.

Fatimah Ali: It’s Fatimah! She says that John McCain forgot a name mid-sentence, and so he shouldn’t be president of the United States. Eh, whatever.

Abridged Daily News Columnists

John Baer: A couple days ago, John Baer wrote the best column in the Daily News in a long time. And guess what? Idiots got pissed off at it!

Apparently, many wrote, calling a white person “cracker” is just as offensive as calling a black person a “nigger,” thinking that is way more racist than not voting for Obama because he’s black. I’ll give Baer the mulligan for the “column about reader mail” column just this once, because the first one was solid. But no break on writing “the Daily News has never been a slave to political correctness.” Um, dude? Once I overhead a conversation in the media room at the Palestra where Daily News editors cut a joke about Anna Nicole Smith. If you can’t make fun of her, you guys might as well be in charge of political correctness.

Ronnie Polaneczky: There have been about a million stories about the Phillies in the past week. Pretty much everything has been written about the Phils. Lo and behold, then, when Ronnie Polaneczky ends up writing something different! Apparently, her father (a Franklin Institute scientist) was the one who cost the 1964 Phillies the pennant. Neat. And thanks a lot.

Stu Bykofsky: Everyone wore red on Friday because Stu Bykofsky asked them to.

Michael Smerconish: The research for Smerconish’s column this week involved driving around a couple neighborhoods and counting Obama signs vs. McCain signs. Really I like the fourth comment on his piece better: “White folks never cease to amaze me. You come up with cute little phrases (i.e., The Bradley Effect) to mask the real issue: The inherent racist nature of the European.”

Abridged Daily News Columnists

Ronnie Polaneczky: “The last time we heard of a road-rage incident this bad was in July 2007.” Man, that SEPTA cop who killed that dude in the suburbs sure got off easy even in the sphere of public opinion, eh?

John Baer: Oh, yeah, there was a debate last night. And, hey, guess what: It was pointless, just like all third presidential debates nowadays!

Um, okay, there are two Stu Bykofsky columns today. It’s like Abridged Daily News Columnists Christmas!

Stu Bykofsky: This is about animals and PACCA. Whatever the other one is about Latrice Bryant so I’m just going to read that one.

Stu Bykofsky: Here’s the best line: “Having failed to get any city entity to condemn Bryant’s public display of a hate symbol (KKK) and possible ethnic intimidation of Fox 29 reporter Jeff Cole, who broke the story about Bryant’s off-campus capers, I move from ethnics to ethics.” I still can’t believe that anybody is actually surprised that there are cushy jobs in city government and that City Councilpeople use their positions to benefit themselves. Welcome to politics!

Also, ha ha, yes, there are more racist comments.

Abridged Daily News Columnists

Ronnie Polaneczky: “A NEW GALLUP poll shows that 91 percent of Americans are dissatisfied with where the country is going. That means 9 percent think we’re doing fine.” But what about undecideds?!

Elmer Smith: “As a Navy combat pilot, [John McCain] was probably shocked and saddened by damage reports that revealed the unintended consequences of some of his missions.” This was the first positive thing I read about John McCain in weeks, until I realized it said “probably” and as such was essentially made up.

John Baer: Oh, apparently Obama won the election already.

Fatimah Ali: “I CRIED buckets when I realized that a prior commitment would prevent me from going to the rally for Barack Obama in Vernon Park in Germantown on Saturday.” These are your Daily News columnists, people.