Politics

SO DEMOCRATIC Rep. Joe Hoeffel thinks it's "hypocritical and inflammatory" that his GOP challenger, Melissa Brown, has raised the issue of Section 8 housing in her bid to unseat him in the 13th Congressional District. He's also accused her of "playing to racial fears" by distributing a mailing on the issue that shows Hoeffel with Mayor Street. Hoeffel tried to duck the substance of Brown's criticism that there is widespread dissatisfaction with the program by disclaiming any responsibility for it, either for himself or the mayor.

RE THE RECENT letter "Sad case of Casey vs. Romanelli": It's a sad farce when supporters of Sen. Rick Santorum give money to a third-party candidate only to drain votes from Bob Casey. It's even more disturbing when they write letters to explain why Mr. Casey is the bad guy. It seems apparent that letter-writer Edward Smith has no faith is his candidate's ability to win, and will do everything possible to diminish Mr. Casey's lead. Mr. Casey has every right to challenge the petition signatures.

MAYOR STREET now blames City Council's failure to pass a much-needed smoking ban on the death of David Cohen, which has made it more difficult to get nine yes votes. What we should really be asking is why the mayor himself has wavered on this issue and refused to get fully behind the ban? He surely knows that a few calls to his close allies on Council would probably ensure the bill's passage. But he also knows that a smoking ban would be another victory for his political rival who sponsored it. Apparently, the mayor cares more about a petty political feud than he does about the health of Philadelphians.

At the center of Children of the Revolution, an irreverent satire of leftist politics in Australia and points north, is Joan Fraser, uproariously played by the divine Judy Davis, that snarl of emotions, lips and hair. The more serious Joan gets about her mission as the driving force of Australian Communism, the more hilarious this breakneck comedy, the feature debut of writer/director Peter Duncan. Duncan's naughty implication is that Joan's ideological fervor makes her both a Red and a red-hot mama, catnip to all men, no matter their politics.

In full post-convention, on-with-the-campaign spirit, the Ritz Five has launched a political-film minifest. It begins today with a double bill of Bob Roberts and True Colors and continues through Thursday with American President and Election. In between are All the President's Men and Dick, and, on Sunday, Bulworth, Warren Beatty's blazing satire about class, race and political hypocrisy. In Bulworth, Beatty stars as a California senator running for reelection who is suddenly compelled to be brutally honest to one and all. The role probably went to the actor's head: In the wake of its 1998 release, Beatty flirted with the notion of a run on the White House.

The Delaware County Intermediate Unit school board has dismissed the law firm that represented the board for 30 years - a move that some members claim was politically motivated, but others maintain that it was "simply time for a change. " Democrat William P. Lincke, who has sat on the board for three years as a representative for the Media law firm of Beatty Young Clouse & Lincke, was present at Thursday's meeting when his replacement, Michael F.X. Coll, was named by a 5-3 vote.

Trample Not on the Oppressed. Drink and Die. These statements are so skillfully sewn into the century-old quilts that they're easy to miss. But Elaine Hedges makes a point of ferreting them out, as evidence that although women were shut out of political pursuits, they nevertheless promoted their causes with quilting needles. Hedges, professor of English and coordinator of Women's Studies at Towson State University, spoke last week at West Chester University as part of the Women's History Month celebration.

"What is this - a Tupperware party?" asked Barbara Irvine's neighbor. "Not quite," answered Irvine as she and a group of women emerged from her Cinnaminson home one afternoon last spring. This, she explained, was the first meeting of a group whose agenda was politics, not plastic, and whose purpose - rather than making it easier for women run a household - was to make it easier for them to run for local office. Although the question both irritated and amused members of the newly formed group, More Women in Politics, it served as a welcome source of inspiration, they said.

Isadore A. Schrager, 91, a longtime West Philadelphia ward leader and lawyer for the Democratic City Committee, died Sunday at Saunders House in Wynnewood. Over the decades, Mr. Schrager held a lot of titles: 60th ward leader, Fairmount Park commissioner, director of the Board of City Trusts, solicitor for the Register of Wills, and delegate to several Democratic National Conventions, to name a few. Mayor Street said yesterday that "if politics is an art, Isadore Schrager was a master painter.

John F. McCullen, 83, a friendly foot soldier of the Irish community who made Center City politics a mainstay of his life for more than 20 years, died Monday at his home in Palm Bay, Fla., where he had lived for the last four years. Short and stocky, with a broad face and an easy grin, Mr. McCullen tended to the Seventh Ward's 15th Division and delivered its vote at a time when Republicans dominated city politics. Mr. McCullen considered it his job to keep it that way. Walking through the 15th Division - bounded by 22d, Pine, 24th and South Streets - he greeted all he encountered and let them know he was available.