Hello again Gentle Readers.

I have spent this “hiatus” contemplating the future of this blog. Having been unapologetically plagiarized twice—once by a local columnist—I began to wonder why I was giving away my content for free.

Of course, the reason for this is the Red Pill.

Those familiar with the movie The Matrix will remember when Morpheus handed Neo the Red Pill, Neo was abruptly yanked out of the Matrix, the “normal world” disappeared and Neo’s unfortunate reality as a slave literally providing power for his masters, was irrevocably revealed. Cypher, a character in the movie played by Joe Pantoliano, betrayed Morpheus’ crew for a chance to be put back into the Matrix—the chance to “unsee” what he had seen. He didn’t want to remember nothin’.

Well, unfortunately for me, there is no way I can be put back in the Matrix (believe me, I’ve asked) and I cannot unsee what I have seen. So all I can do is try to “Red Pill” as many Gentle Readers as I can out of providing power for their masters.

Regular readers will recall your humble blogress’s utter contempt for the group “UpperProvidence First Worst.”

This is the group that formed for the sole purpose of expanding the Upper Providence Board of Supervisors from three members to five members, so that their organizers could be elected to the newly expanded Board positions. This worked out well for one founding member, Democrat John Pearson, but the unfortunate Republicans who supported this venture did not count on the anti-Trump sentiment bleeding down to the local level in 2017, or 2019. Our newest supervisor, former Democrat municipal leader Bill Starling, was a big supporter of the expansion of the Board and he was most recently rewarded with a spot on it.

The core group of Upper Providence First Worst did not dissolve, but continued to try to influence local government. This influence waned significantly when the incompetent John Pearson was sidelined out of his position of Chairman of the Board. All that is left of the group is the faux community facebook page that is administered by our elected tax collector, Julie Mullin and Republican Party gadfly, Jim White.

Now, I’m not sure how many people actually follow Upper Providence First or read what is posted on it—it has basically devolved into a fangirl’s page for State Rep Joe Ciresi, who, in case you have forgotten, received the most Johnny Doc money of all suburban candidates in 2018 and does NOT represent Upper Providence.

When not fawing over Ciresi, the page also presumes to arrogantly offer anonymous “endorsements” for elected office twice a year. Presumably, these are from White, who consistently overestimates his own political savvy.  I’m not sure why anyone would trust an endorsement from an anonymous source, but the ridiculousness of endorsements is a subject that is screaming for its own blog post. Most community facebook pages do not do this.

To keep up the façade of being a community page, Upper Providence First Worst does often repost posts from the Upper Providence Police Department. As one of the most recent posts from UPPD was regarding an incident that happened on my property, I was curious to see if that post had been reposted on Upper Providence First Worst, so I checked out the page for the first time in literally months.

Well, that post was not reposted, but I did scroll down to see what they had been up to. The last post from UPPD that they had reposted was the UPPD’s call for applications for two open positions back on January 15, 2020. Note, there are TWO comments on this screenshot:

Here are the comments that were on this post.

Obviously, poor grammar notwithstanding, the first comment is from one of the page administrators; the other is my response to the page administrator.

First of all, Gentle Readers, I happen to know that the UPPD had a complement of about 28 officers when I left office. Shouldn’t a “community facebook page,” even a faux one, know how many cops we have BEFORE they start complaining that we have too many? Isn’t the purpose of a “community facebook page” to educate and inform its followers? Shouldn’t they take the most basic step of checking their facts before making a comment like this?

I do, in fact, know that the two positions being advertised here are to replace two officers who have left the department. So there is no expansion to the police force being proposed here. It’s to bring the force back up to regular strength.

But isn’t it ironic that the group that formed for the sole purpose of adding people to our governing body is advocating—rather belligerently—against more bodies devoted to our safety?

Unfortunately, Montgomery County isn’t unfamiliar with anti-police sentiment coming from its elected officials. Abington School Board recently made the news for one of its oh-so-woke newly elected Board members commenting about how cops “regularly shoot” people, especially people of color.

This kind of irresponsible and unchallenged sentiment coming from elected officials in their official capacity makes it more difficult for police to do their jobs.

Which brings us back to Upper Providence First Worst.

That comment remained on that faux community page for two whole weeks. It was removed—by one of the administrators—only when I commented on it yesterday. Because members of this group have a documented history of scrubbing their facebook profiles and blocking me on facebook, I took the liberty of screenshotting this immediately. And sure enough, it was gone within minutes.

Julie Mullin is our elected tax collector. She is also an administrator on the Upper Providence First facebook page, though she keeps that information mostly anonymous.

I put it to you, Gentle Readers: Should elected officials–or candidates– have anonymous facebook pages where political opinions are shared? Where endorsements are offered? Where other elected officials are promoted?

Where anti-police sentiments are shared anonymously by a site administrator?

I have long opined that our elected tax collector is far too political for the office she presumes to occupy. Expressing anti-police sentiment—or allowing that sentiment to remain on the site for two weeks—can only be interpreted as the view of the administrator(s) of said site. As was demonstrated yesterday, Julie Mullin, as an administrator of the Upper Providence First site, had the power to remove the anti-UPPD comment at any time. She chose to leave it up there until I commented. Therefore I think we can conclude that it is the opinion of Upper Providence First that we have too many police.

For the record, the UPPD did a great job resolving my issue in short time. I am grateful for the service they provide to our Township.

I only wish the administrator(s) of this faux community page felt the same.

For those of you that think Upper Providence First is still a harmless little community information page, this is your Red Pill.