I know I’ve said this before but it bears repeating.

Politicians lie.  It’s what they do.

They lie to get in office.  They lie to stay in office.  They lie to protect their special interests.  They lie whenever it suits their agenda.

One of the many reasons that I vowed to never run for office is that I am a terrible liar.  I have found it’s so much easier to remember the truth than to keep track of a string of lies.

We already know that North Miami Beach career politicians Phyllis Smith and Frantz Pierre are flat out, in-your-face, unabashed liars.

We also already know that the results of their last campaigns for re-election were horribly tainted by“alleged”  (cough, cough) absentee ballot fraud.

While Frantzie’s opponent didn’t have the resources to contest his “win,” candidate Michael Joseph (who “lost” to Phyllis by a handful of votes), decided to proactively and aggressively fight the plague of voter fraud in North Miami Beach that’s been rampant ever since Frantz first got into office.

No, there is no coincidence there.

Despite their questionable “victories” at the ballot box, Frantz and Phyllis shamelessly sit on that dais, and continue to blatantly lie with absolute impunity.

Despite all the criticisms I’ve made about North Miami politics, and especially the corrupt clerk and chief of police, I take comfort in the fact that at least the North Miami Mayor and Council were all legitimately elected.

This is not the case in North Miami Beach.  As long as the “alleged”  (cough, cough) absentee ballot fraudsters Frantz Pierre and Phyllis Smith are permitted to occupy council seats on the dais, the integrity of the Mayor and Council as a body will remain compromised.

And as long as the five legitimate council members on the dais keep pretending that it’s business as usual, no one could possibly take North Miami Beach seriously.

As such, I rarely pay attention to their council meetings anymore.  I only tuned in to Tuesday night’s council conference because I heard that my name came up once or twice.

Oh, and also because I heard it was the Phyllis and Frantz Comedy Hour.  I was not disappointed.

Councilwoman Beth Spiegel brought up an issue she’s had with City Attorney Jose Smith because he responded to a public records request I had made by providing me with a copy of an email a day before the Mayor and Council had received it.  The email in question was from Joe Centorino, the Executive Director of the Miami-Dade Commission on Ethics and Public Trust, regarding Phyllis’ latest recusal from a council vote.  I also posted a blog about the email on November 4, 2015, before Ms. Spiegel even knew about it, which understandably did not sit well with her.

Although the specific content of the email had nothing to do with Councilwoman Spiegel’s disagreement with Jose Smith, Phyllis just HAD to put her two cents in and, as usual, hijacked the rest of the meeting.

In one of her infamous rambles, Phyllis wasted nearly fifteen minutes of air time, babbling on and on about why she recused herself from voting on a resolution on November 3, 2015.  She claimed that she did so because the liar lawyer defending her in the absentee ballot fraud lawsuit, Joe Geller, was also representing a hotel that was petitioning the Mayor and Council for a variance.

Phyllis also declared that “many” attorneys told her she did the right thing by recusing herself.

Which means she spoke to absolutely no one.

She then exclaimed, “And, no, I’m not gonna give you names.  I did that once on this dais and it was the wrong thing to do.”

Yes, Phyllis.  It’s always wrong to lie.

The longer she spoke, the more demented she sounded.

As only Phyllis can, she went off on one of her disjointed tangents about Jose Smith’s wife, how she’s a wonderful woman, and that “she’s in real estate.”  She then muttered something completely incoherent about being told, “not threatened,” that the city attorney “would never defend me if somebody sued me because I recused myself because I wouldn’t listen to his advise.”

WTF?

Then she had the freaking audacity to say “I have to live with myself to this day if somebody is representing me and I’m paying him financially.  Very big money.  I haven’t gone to court.  And he is standing in front of us asking for a vote and it’s a “quanti-dijudishal” which we have, we already had that issue with this very Braha Dixie project.”

After more than ten minutes of squawking, Phyllis announced she had “only one  statement to make.”

Seriously?  When was the last time Phyllis had only one  statement to make?  Ever?

She breathlessly announced, “I have not seen the blogs for a long time.  I don’t look at them.  But I will tell you a lot of the information in that blog in reference to myself, I’m not gonna speak about anything else, it’s so inaccurate.  It’s so not true.”

Alrighty then.

Phyllis NEVER reads “the blogs.”

But she absolutely KNOWS that NONE of it is true!

Phyllis continued meandering, “And, you have the right freedom of speech, you have the right to say what you like to say many people call me up and say you must say something on the dais I’m not I’m just saying that I’m fortunately not only is it inaccurate in my case it’s said with such distaste of name calling and vulgar things, uh, you know what?  Good for them.”

But she NEVER reads “the blogs!”

“They have the right to free speech, I can once again reassure the constituents, the business people, and the employees that live in North Miami Beach I will continue to do the best I can.”

If you actually thought Phyllis was finished making her “only one  statement,” you’d be wrong.

She continued her rant.

“On this particular issue I never went back to Mr. Smith, I thought he went to the state about me, I never heard from the state, I didn’t get a letter that I was under investigation, which I’m happy to do and I’m happy to testify the exact same way.  Um, we have a responsibility, um, you come to where you are from where you’ve been, all of us, and I have been involved with that Braha Dixie, I have sat in enough seminars to know that they can start from day one don’t say anything or do anything that could jeopardize the day one of the process to maybe eight months later to jeopardize it to back to day one.”

CLASSIC PHYLLIS!

And then there’s her famous mystifying line, “You come to where you are from where you’ve been?”

Really, Phyllis?  Is that  how it works?  Dang!  So profound!

Yeah, I hurt myself laughing, too.

And, finally, Phyllis made her final “only one  statement.”

“So with that, Mr. Mayor, I thank you.  I don’t know what kind of direction, I don’t know what the law says about somebody speaking or not speaking.  I, I, I, didn’t hear from any media about it, so, I, I, nobody called me to say they saw it in the paper, whatever other people do that  speaks very highly about them not I feel how I feel about myself.  And so, with that, I just want to set the record straight about my recusals, uh, to think that I am recusing personally on any grounds other than to protect this city to me is absolutely way out in left field.  And thank you again for the time.”

Ever the statesman, Mayor Vallejo tried to smooth things over in an attempt to move things forward.  He asked that everyone respect each other and work together.  He offered his services as peacemaker.

HAH!  NMB’s terminally disgruntled agitator, L’il Frantzie P, wasn’t about to let anyone make peace under his watch!

Summoning his trademark unintelligible histrionics, Frantzie began, “I unnastand wif blank mind because dis is a topic somebody like me could have been should have been bias about it.  But I try to be as balanced as I can to unnerstand de issue at hand.  I AGREE  with most of the things that you say, Mr. Mayor.  But there is one thing that make me speak when you say we have done SO  much together so many great things we not gonna let – I’m paraphrasing – eh, small stuff get in our way.  From my understanding Mr. Mayor, dis is not small stuff.  We talking trust.”

Wait, WHAT?  Did Weasel say TRUST?

THE  most untrustworthy career politician in all of South Florida is bitching about a matter of TRUST?

And now I seriously hurt myself laughing again!

“If deys no relationship between our charter [sic] represent us something is wrong.  And, it’s not okay we can put a band-aid on it and it’s over.  You know it’s not over.  We know it’s not over.  Don’t fool ourselves.  If deys a way to co-dict [sic] maybe [unintelligible] to sit together to walk out everything I don’t know.  But say okay we gonna solve it no it’s not gonna solve it like dat.”

Now get ready for Frantzie’s #1 Lie of the Day…

“BEING A VICTIM MYSELF I know it hurts when out of nowhere and you learn stuff that you didn’t know about or didn’t do and to portray you what you’re not inside.”

WHAT?  This is a person who has committed perjury, engineered elections through absentee ballot fraud, scammed taxpayer money for his fake “non-profits,” racked up code violations, intimidated and threatened city employees, ripped off campaign workers, and stolen money from anyone stupid enough to trust him.

Yet, somehow, Frantzie actually believes he’s a VICTIM!

But, here’s the zaniest part of all.  Putting on his “Jesus” hat, Frantzie vainly attempted to preach a parable.

Or something.

“Having said that, with … [unintelligible], let me finish a story that I read many, many, many years ago.  Once upon a time, in the alphabet world, there was a big bad wolf, who came, he came and he ate A.  B didn’t care.  I’m only B.  Then he ate B.  C didn’t care.  Then he ate C.  And S was waaaaay down the line and he said I’m only S.  I don’t have to care about A, B, and C.  Guess what?  The big bad wolf ate all of them and when he get through to Z.  Z cried for her there was no letters around.  Thank you.”

I don’t know what drugs Frantzie is on, but seriously.  WHOA!  They can’t be legal!

Right on cue, Phyllis just HAD to pipe in.

Again.

“I just wanna address one thing because, um …”  Blah, blah, blah.

Phyllis said a whole bunch of nothing for the next three minutes because (a) she just can’t stand not talking, and (b) she always has to have the last word.

But, of course, she has absolutely no clue that she’s the joke of NMB because she NEVER reads the blogs.

The five legitimate members of the North Miami Beach Mayor and Council continue to sit quietly while these two posers rant, rave, lie and make complete jackasses of themselves.

(Note to Mayor Smith Joseph:  Rest assured, North Miami is NOT the laughing stock of the county.)

If I were sitting up on that dais, I could not in good conscience perpetuate that lie.  There is no way I could pretend that it’s business as usual.  I’d have to say something … anything … each time either one of them opened their mouths to spout the garbage that inevitably comes out.

I’d also be compelled to question the integrity of each and every resolution and ordinance passed by this council from the day the two grifters were allowed to re-occupy seats on the dais until the absentee ballot fraud lawsuit is finally concluded.

But, that’s just me.

This is exactly why I could never be a politician.

Politicians lie.  It’s what they do.

Stephanie Kienzle
“Spreading the Wealth”