Thoughts on a big day

Well, it's the first day of school for Metro Nashville students. the first day of Standard School Attire and the first day as a District in NCLB trouble.

None of the larger issues matter to my kids. They are just excited to be getting back to see their teachers and friends. I would be remiss if I did not take a moment to thank all of the teachers and administrators who make the school experience so wonderful for so many in our city.

I spent yesterday at the Mayor's First Day celebration. I saw Karl Dean, but somehow I missed Bob Clement. I am sure he was there. Can anyone verify that? My gut impression on the scene was that Clement had more supporters with signs, but I was pretty secluded from my post at the Parent's Advisory Council table.

The District's Strategic Plan and virtually all of the articles on NCLB stress the importance of parental involvement. I think that parental support and involvement is indeed one of the most significant variables in determining the success of a school. Words in a newspaper or on a blog site pale in comparison to the daily involvement of thousands of parents and teachers in the daily work that our schools do. We all need to find ways to pitch in and support our students and our schools if they are going to be successful in their mission.

The Tennesseean's coverage today is pretty good. The opinion page covers NCLB questions pretty well, and Marc Hill's editorial on the continuing improvement of the schools delivers the kind of balanced optimism that we need in our community.

The Tennessean has also taken the time to detail the people behind the Mayoral candidates, giving an interesting and broader glimpse into the kinds of administrations each man may lead.

Finally, the GJCC is sponsoring what Avi Poster calls a, "Chicago-style" candidate debate tonight. That should be interesting, and if I understand the format correctly, audience participation will be encouraged.

I can't wait to see how that goes.

What is a blog?

As I was under attack by two of the city's mainstream news editors last week, I took some blows in the interest of our common futures that I really should not have abided. I was accused of taking words out of context, which I did not do. I responded only to the claim that I was a nattering nabob, and defended the only claim I made which was that horse race journalism does not improve our political situation (never answered by Mr. Brewer), and suggested that my voice (unfortunately calling myself a blogger, rather than the citizen of Nashville that I am) was relevant in helping the mainstream press to ask good questions on our behalf. Everything else I was accused of by Mr. Brewer was hyperbole and distortion, and I will leave it to those who read my posts to confirm that. Because I believe so strongly in the power of reasoned discourse, I resisted the urge to engage in a shouting match when I was falsely accused of misrepresenting a post by Clint Brewer, and I let that accusation go for awhile, rather than to deny it outright.

As I have reflected on the experience and the exchange, I have increasingly felt that my responsibility to the people and the future of this city and my responsibility to my own family demands that I lay out my concerns clearly. With two recent and intervening days of posts about mayoral candidates who are in no political or rhetorical position to debate the real needs of this city that have received virtually no response, it occurred to me that I had let the citizens of Nashville down. While I originally entered the discussion with Mr. Brewer in the hope that we were basically seeking the same accountability from our politicians, his response convinced me that little could be further from the truth.

I speak now to point out that blog, blogosphere, and blogger are terms that are being used to silence citizens with opinions. Much like Reagan used liberal to silence any reasoned disagreement with his policies, many now use the label blogger to imply that the author of a blog is a wacko, siting around writing in his underwear. That impression is offensive and wrong, and while I have come to expect that kind of heavy-handed silencing rhetoric from politicians who don't want to address the specifics of their education plans, I was surprised to hear it from the editors of our papers. I understood journalism to be a noble craft and journalists to assume the weighty responsibility of making our officials answer to the concerns of real citizens. Just because I do not edit a paper does not mean that I do not take my words seriously or that I am somehow less entitled to speak my mind on the future of the city in which I have chosen to raise my family. Many bloggers have credentials that rival or exceed those of the journalists who lodged the attacks I endured last week, and while my initial impression was to play nice and try to convince Mr. Brewer and Ms. Garrigan of my basic humanity, all I got from them was scorn.

With all due respect to Sean, I am not eager to be fast-tracked into journalism, especially if it means that I must start disparaging legitimate opinions and questions from citizens in order to uphold "journalistic standards." Ms. Garrigan is right that I would not last an hour in journalism because I could not stand silent while I simply printed the press releases of the candidates and call that news. I could not take a victory lap for a poll that "nailed it" when all that was accomplished was fortune telling or prognostication. I would expect that I could only look the citizens of the city in the eye and say I "nailed it" when I managed to point out the superficial responses and manipulation of the process that the candidates so easily undertake. I am a citizen. I live here. I love this city. And just because all CNN and FOX News give us on the national level is prognostication, that does not mean I have to be grateful when I get it on the local level.

As a citizen, I need good journalists. That's why I tried to be so indirect and humorous in my criticism, but the subsequent attack was not funny. Not because I can't take criticism...I can, I do, and I expect it; but because I need so much better from the mainstream press. Mr. Brewer and Ms. Garrigan hold positions that privilege them to ask the questions that we citizens cannot ask. With that power comes responsibility, and I understand it is hard to bear, but turning on citizen voices, credentialed, experienced, compassionate, and well-meaning voices, undermines the very hope I have and abdicates that important responsibility, letting candidates off the hook.

Likewise, I believed that responsible journalists would want nothing more than engaged readers. These are the people that make it possible for them to ask the tough questions and print evaluations of the campaign press releases instead of simply being manipulated into printing whatever the campaigns want them to print. For the record, I offered critical evaluations of the coverage of all three papers, even though the Tennessean did not take me on. That is not to privilege the Tennessean, because citizens of Nashville deserve better coverage than our papers are giving us.

Horse race coverage means that the best the papers can do is accurately predict a winner before an election. I have pointed out the counterproductive side of that (with NO RESPONSE AT ALL FROM MY CRITICS), but even without the counterproductive side, what does that give us? In what way is that a public service worthy of celebration? That coverage might be useful if you were in Vegas gambling on the outcome of the contest rather than living in Nshville gambling you future on the policy decisions of the eventual winner during the next 4-8 years. Let's move to celebration of a press that makes the mayoral candidates tell us what they will do in the real budget crunch that we all know is coming.

Mr. Brewer gloated that he was 48 hours ahead of me on NCLB...WRONG! People who have been active in supporting public schools (including specifically me) have known that result was coming for some time (I mean years). Reactive journalism and reactive politics are supportive of each other. Anyone who asks the tough questions in advance is labelled a cynic or a doomsayer, and yet, invariably the events unfold, and all of a sudent, they are reported as news. We are not drawing this information from our overly-active imaginations; we draw it from careful, consistent, and reasonable assessment of the data.

This is not a personality contest, and it is time the so-called war between "bloggers" and journalists be called what it really is: a serious appeal by real, involved, active, experienced, and qualified citizens for a press that will ask the tough questions for us. We need you, Mr. Brewer and Ms. Garrigan. We cannot do it without you. Our voice is limited, but it is not illegitimate. Every time you label well-meaning citizen voices as radicals, liberal, or bloggers, you attempt to silence the people and play into the hands of the campaigns that manipulate your coverage.

This is not a personal attack, although I know I will be accused of that. I will not answer nitpicking manipulations and get into a further struggle. You say your door is always open, although you have no desire to have lunch with a real person. You would rather ridicule and attack me with false accusations than deal with my legitimate concerns.

Enough!

I have a family, and we love Nashville. I care about the education this city provides, and I know first-hand how crucial the complete support of the mayor is to achieving the education for Nashville's kids that they all deserve. I don't know the family status of either of my detractors, but I suspect we share in common a desire that this city will grown and prosper, and everyone pays at least lip service to the notion that universal education is a key component of that growth and prosperity whether we are parents of public school students or not. I know I believe it, and

I will not be intimidated by labels and attacks from journalists who act as if they have my best interests at heart when they successfully tell me who will win an election before it actually happens. When journalists tell me that candidate A will deal with the impending school budget crunch this way and candidate B will deal with it another way, then I will congratulate and thank them for their work. It is hard work, but it is essential work if our city is to move forward.

Until then, please do not label me a blogger. I am a citizen. You say your door is always open? Well, the only thing the new technology has done is to make THIS your front door. If you do not deal with these challenges on their merits here, and if you do not demand that the campaigns answer tough questions rather than expecting their press releases to be printed every day without evaluation, you can expect to see me at this door. I invited you to lunch, and you treated me like a misguided child. I am at your front door right now asking for more challenging coverage.

You and I would both be better off if our candidates were held to higher standards. You have the power and time to make it happen for both of us and all of the other citizens of Nashville. I am simply here as a citizen and reader to encourage you to do that.

We can't do it without you; andwe certainly can't do it if you treat us like an enemy.

Does Disagreeing with 77% Make you wrong?

Where to begin? Bob Clement is hitching his wagon to the anti-tax movement. Pressing Karl Dean to express his opinion on last year's property tax referendum, Bob Clement is pressing the implicit assumption that the referendum is good policy. Karl Dean seems understandably reluctant to point out the potential damage this legislation will do to the City's budgeting process because if he does, he will immediately be labeled a tax and spend liberal who is out of touch with Nashville.

Kudos to Clement for painting Dean into a rhetorical corner, but shame on him for so completely sidestepping the real issues raised by that referendum. When voters have incomplete and biased information, leadership demands moving in another direction. Don't get me wrong, leaders should step out of line from public opinion only carefully, cautiously, and making every effort to help people understand and support the move. The blunt instrument that Clement is waving right now discourages any attempt to try to educate the people of Nashville about the quite reasonable disagreement that exits on this tax referendum issue.

Unfortunately, when the fiscal crunch hits, and we have not grown our way out of the problem (see More Statements on Education), severe budget cuts in education or a property tax increase will be our only choices. How will these two behave under those circumstances?

We know a property tax increase will be unpopular and presumed to lose in referendum. Only a full court press by the mayor has the chance to educate people to what will be lost and gained by such an increase. The mayor needs credibility on the issue, and unfortunately, neither man is showing the capability or credibility to argue for tough choices now.

Clement is sounding very much like a man who never met a tax he liked while also proposing a raft of new "ideas." One can easily wonder where the money for those will come from and what will remain when the crunch hits.

Dean, on the other hand looks almost incapable of making an aggressive argument for the money our schools will need. I understand the political game that Clement is playing, and right now, I blame him more, but I am discouraged by how completely that game (which will not go away) seems to paralyze Dean, whom I predict will gravitate toward more narrowly unpopular cuts rather than making the important case for a broad civic support and sacrifice on behalf of public education.

That's unfortunate, because it is all connected...to borrow a phrase.

Education Not a Real Issue in Campaign

Platitudes!

Several Dean voters said they were drawn to his major campaign theme, "It's All connected." In a barrage of television advertisements, candidate forums and speeches, Dean made the case that reducing Metro schools' dropout rates would get kids off the streets, cut juvenile crime and eventually propel more residents into the city's work force.
"I think Karl will be business-friendly in terms of continuing growth and getting companies to move into Nashville," said Glynn Dowdle, president of Baron + Dowdle Construction. "You have to have good schools and police to attract those companies."
David Cain, an attorney with Baker Donelson Bearman Caldwell & Berkowitz, said Dean "has a better understanding of what needs to be done with education."
"The dropout rate creates problems. The more people drop out, the more people we have here that can't be productive members of society. So we have an obligation to everybody.
Karl has a real understanding of that," Cain said. (The Tennessean, August 8, 2007)

WHAT? What will he do to reduce dropout rates? What is the mayor's role? There is no argument here yet. To illustrate, let me pose this question: If dropout rates increase next year, what will you do about it as mayor? Will you fire the schools director, take over the schools, add funding to the school budget, push the school board to accept a new program or school design?
It isn't so simple when you think about it in real terms, is it?

Your turn, Bob:

Joseph Sweat, who retired as executive director of the Tennessee Municipal League, said he committed to supporting Clement early on. But he also was impressed by Clement's emphasis on vocational education for some high school students. "That's something that's not stressed very often, and it's something we need," Sweat said.(The Tennessean, August 8, 2007)

Wow!
That's not all, I know. Bob Clement has hundreds of ideas on his web site. So does Karl Dean. I've read the ideas and the plans. It IS all connected, but that simply doesn't explain how we will get the education piece of it right.

I need to know, how will these ideas and plans come to pass? We know there will be a serious funding crisis in the next four years. How will these men address that? Do they have a proactive plan to manage the funding squeeze so that families who put their children in the schools will be able to feel comfortable that their education will proceed with minimal disruption, or will they each be forced to slash budgets and blame the school district for fiscal mismanagement?

Nashville is a great city. People who move here are always very impressed by how many of the aspects of big city life we have well figured out. Growth and development issues have been handled pretty well so far, and the big money in this mayor's race is primarily concerned to see that continue. But, of course, we all are. Smart growth is important. LEED standards on new construction are an important part of smart growth as is real, usable mass transit. These guys are not bad on those areas, but when the budget crunch comes, we need to know how these guys will react.

I am not confident at this point that either side has articulated a proactive plan to use the mayor's office to be sure that the school district plans and executes a solid strategy to make it through and continue to improve at the same time. I further don't believe that when the chips are down and kids are losing their teachers that either of these guys will put forward bold initiatives with a real chance to improve our schools.

And here's the punch line: I don't believe the voters are really demanding this of them. We hear all the time that education is very important to Nashville. I suppose. But are voters and government officials REALLY willing to make the sacrifices that will make our public education system strong? I want to believe, and I am looking for evidence. Many people at Bransford Avenue, on the school board, among the parents, and students of the district are working hard and making sacrifices.

What sacrifices are these mayoral candidates really willing to make for public schools that are actually strong enough to attract businesses?

More statements on education

Michael Cass has pinned the candidates down a little more on what to do about funding schools in light of the property tax referendum requirement added by voters last year. In a Metro Dispatch entry raising the challenge that the next mayor will have to choose between cutting services and cutting costs,

Clement said he would find another way: growing the Metro tax base by recruiting new businesses to town and promoting tourism.“You can grow your way out of some problems,” he said.

Dean, meanwhile, said he would work to cut administrative costs. “Obviously, my preference would be to cut overhead and give more emphasis to providing the services,” he said. “But you have to manage the resources that are available.” (Metro Dispatch, August 8, 2007)

The contours of some different approaches are evident here. Dean's response mirrors the fiscal management approach of the Purcell administration, while Clement's approach follows the growth path as the solution to funding limits. Of course, these are both good and bad responses. They probably are not exclusive of each other, and the best solution lies in the middle. Dean needs to remember his point that "it's all connected," since the city's growth potential is ultimately weakened by poor public education. Funding uncertainty and continual belt-tightening also undermine parental confidence and participation in the system, however, so those parts are connected too.

So far, from my admittedly limited observation, neither man has articulated a clear picture of the Mayor's role in all of this. We need to grow, and we need to manage our spending wisely. Given. What will you do as mayor to see to it that we do both?

Education and the Men who Would be Mayor

Today's City Paper gets the candidates on record on the question of what each would do to improve Nashville's schools in light of the NCLB sanctions. Each candidate seems to hit some of the important issues, but not surprisingly, each dodges the Mayor's role a bit, at least according to the article. Nevertheless, we are on the right track, and hopefully the next few weeks will offer opportunities for more probing follow ups to be asked.

Bob Clement:

“I will work with the school board and director of schools, but as next mayor I am not going to sit on the sidelines and say nothing,” Clement said about his efforts to move the system off the list. “I’m not going to be that kind of mayor. If it means being confrontational, if it means speaking my mind, I will do that.” (City Paper, August 8, 2007)

The City Paper had to go to Clement's web site to see what that might mean:

According to Clement’s Web site, his plan for education in the city is to oppose efforts to drain money from public education and fight to make schools stronger. (City Paper, August 8, 2007)

That sounds good, but we need to know what that means in terms of the mayor's role. Will Clement veto City Council budgets that do not include the money the School Board deems necessary to fund School Administration priorities? Will Clement fund education first and force budget battles over public safety instead? Will Clement employ staff who tell the School Administration what priorities will be acceptable? In short, to whom will he speak his mind and be confrontational?

Karl Dean:

Dean said the district’s improvements in the elementary and middle school levels are to be highlighted, but improvement was also needed in increasing parental nvolvement.

According to his detailed education plan, topping the priority list is parent involvement, increased graduation rates in high schools and support for teachers.

He suggested holding more school meetings in the neighborhoods and communities around Nashville to allow parents access to information about their child’s education.

“I do think it’s a complex problem and not unique to Nashville,” Dean said about the district’s new “corrective action” status. “I think I would look at increased parental involvement. I think you accomplish that by educating parents on how they can be involved and we should work to make it easy for them to do so.”(City Paper, August 8, 2007)

This reply also sounds good, and Mr. Dean is definitely right about the impact of parental involvement. Dr. Garcia has structures to help facilitate parental involvement in place, but broader participation is needed. So, how will Dean promote that involvement. Meetings in neighborhoods are a good start, but who will he rely on to organize and lead those meetings? Also, how will he cope with the challenges of families whose work schedules and other children do not allow participation at school? What will he do about magnet and enhanced option schools whose parents supply transportation from all parts of town and face extra hurdles in getting to the school to help? Parental participation is absolutely essential, but Mr. Dean needs to explain how he will use his power as mayor to promote it. Otherwise, parents too easily become the scapegoats for failing schools, and principals wind up spending more and more of their limited time educating parents rather than children.

Supporters of these candidates need to help me go deeper. Established news outlets cannot press and press on these questions because they don't have space, and if the candidates get tired of answering, the news outlet will simply lose access to the candidates. This space can be used to press harder because I have no access to the candidates here to lose.

I am glad we are on this track, and I commend the City Paper for asking the initial questions. I am pressing for more specifics. The NCLB news is not new. Everyone involved in education has known that these sanctions were eventually coming. Now they are here, and we need decisive action. We also need community-wide understanding of the situation and support for efforts to improve it.

No individual can do it alone, but the mayor can play a large role. I am looking for the mayor that help can do that.

Three Weeks is Too Long

The Election Commission gives losing candidates 3 weeks to collect their signs according to the Tennessean. I think that's too long, and I place this on the campaign supporters. I have collected all the signs I placed, but if you pitched into a campaign by placing signs, I strongly encourage you to do your part and remove what you placed. I hope that everyone will do a little with the signs that are nearby. Even if you did not place a sign, you know which ones need to go.

Elections are messy, but let's all pitch in to at least reduce the criticism that democracy is intrusive.

Enough Diverting Fun - Back to Why this Blog Exists in the First Place

I don't mind asking tough questions. If I am wrong, I am happy to be shown to be with warrants. Name calling makes me laugh, and sometimes I enjoy playing back with a name caller, but that's all in good fun.

This morning's main issue and central question should be, with Metro Schools now officially in NCLB hot water, what distinguishes how the remaining mayoral candidates will respond. It isn't as if these numbers are a surprise. Dr. Garcia has been talking about them for some time, and there are problems with NCLB.

I'd like to peel all of that away for a minute and ask supporters of each candidate to make the case for some specific actions the next mayor will take to deal with the issue.

We'll take as the null hypothesis that neither man will be any better suited to handle the situation than the other. Please tell me why the null hypothesis is wrong.

I guess I struck a nerve

Clint Brewer has really gone after me for not conforming to the standards to which the MSM must conform. Liz Garrigan agrees that I wouldn't last a minute under the conditions that she must operate. I don't disagree with either of them, and I never set out to become a journalist.

However, if I am free to speak my mind about the impact of polls on voting behavior, but the exacting standards under which the MSM must labor does not permit that, then I think we may have a bigger problem.

All I did to provoke this response was point out that calling me a "nattering nabob" was just name calling, and that the last guy to use that phrae was in the wrong.

My original posts simply tried to point out other interpretations that the polls could be given as a way of reminding people that voting, not the polls ought to determine the outcomes of elections. That point is relatively non-controversial, but it almost never finds its way into the frontline news story. The editors will blog about it, but by their own disparaging of blogs, the work they do there lacks credibility compared with the work they do in print.

I let the gloating "We Nailed It!" post stand unchallenged, but what journalistic investigation could prove the hypothesis that the poll accurately REFLECTED the electorate was more true than the hypothesis that the poll CREATED the electorate? I raise a question, because the answer to this question is not proveable. One simply decides to believe that a poll is MORE LIKELY a reflector than a shaper.

For the record, my posts have raised questions about the three major print outlets in Nashville as well as other bloggers. Here's what Clint did not quote:

I am not saying that this poll won't end up being correct, but I would hate for any survey of 564 people to be correct because it led people to vote as if the poll were an instruction sheet. Everyone needs to make his/her own decision and vote that way. That is the only way democracy really works. Polls are fun to talk about, but if the polls shape how we vote, we are giving our decisions away.

In each election, there are many polls taken. Often on a national level, one of them ends up being pretty close to the results. The problem is that you never know which one will be accurate until after the results are in.

Don't let anyone (polls, bloggers, pundits) decide who you want to be your mayor. You get to make that decision on your own. With just a little over a week remaining, you still have time to consider all of the candidates thoughtfully, and make your own decision. If you want that decision to help shape Nashville's future, just be sure to act on it.

I am concerned that implicit questions of my ethics have been tossed around in comments to the post. What did I do in the above statement that was unethical?

Print journalists have hard jobs, and I respect their efforts to do them as well as they can. Why they don't report the negative implications of polling and horse racing is because if they did, it might leave them without a story on the polls.

I don't think that would be so bad, but it is not my place to tell them which of their opinions they can write.

I'd love to see a print article about the limitations of the polls and the potential that they will shape, rather than reflect the results. Until then, I guess I will have to keep putting that stuff here, in my own diary of personal opinions.

At least now someone important is listening, and I sincerely appreciate that.

Blog Influence?

S-town Mike makes a good point about blog influence, but a useful rejoinder in the Knoxville Sentinel is worth considering as well.

Bloggers' role in Nashville's mayoral race
S-town Mike has a nice, succinct post on that issue. I think he's perhaps a bit humble on the issue, but then I'm not in Nashville and I haven't been covering the race. I will say, though, that the blogging of the mayor's race is the most I've seen in a city election, and I'm no rookie to blogging.

In his post-election post, Mike says:

Before any hyper-analysis and hyperventilating over the question of the influence of bloggers on elections starts up tomorrow, I just have to say that I do not assume that my endorsements of candidates have any more impact on people than any other voter who talks to friends and co-workers about whom they vote for. If candidates do not already have a base of people that they have organized or if they lack maximum media saturation, then the "netroots" cannot contribute much. However, in a close race, having bloggers in one's corner certainly doesn't hurt a candidate. It is one more medium among many.

He also comments:

I never had any delusions of grandeur of what I might do for the Briley Campaign, so his note of appreciation helps close tonight's results in my mind. Let's just put questions of influence to bed, which is exactly where I am now headed.

This may sound snarky but I'm serious. Don't sell blogging's impact short, Mike. After all, the bar has not been set very high:

Research suggests that newspaper endorsements have only a slight impact on election results. From 1940 to 2002, newspaper endorsements changed perhaps 1 percentage point of the vote.

(For the record, I've never liked newspaper endorsements. Their role in elections is antiquated to say the least, especially with the advent of the Internet. If I were an editor, I'd dump endorsements and use the space for something people actually care about.)

The influence cannot be zero. I met alot of new people with whom I expect to be able to continue to build a larger conversation. Even if it means no more than a face to face conversation, I at least met alot more people than I would have face to face. That's worth something.

All Right - I'll play a little...but just for fun, Clint

Clint Brewer's triumphant celebration of his polling data lacks substance and relies on an allusion to a phrase deployed by Spiro Agnew to dodge discussions of his flaws (like tax fraud). I'll have a little fun with the allusion. It doesn't help his claims. As Inigo Montoya said in The Princess Bride, "I don't think that word means what you think it does."

The phrase, "nattering nabobs of negativism," was originated by Spiro Agnew. It is the argumentative equivalent of "you stink." As Agnew was being nailed to the wall for tax evasion and the Nixon administration's Vietnam policy was falling apart, Agnew was reduced to complaining frequently about the harsh criticism he experienced from the news media.

It's kind of ironic that the phrase would be deployed BY a member of the media against the criticism that the media has become a tool of the mainstream. Simply pointing out that polling and the "horse race" coverage of elections shifts attention from the real issues, I have become a nabob.

It was Agnew who preferred not to have to face criticism by what was then a watchdog press; holding people in power accountable.

Today, it is bloggers who try to hold the mainstream press accountable. The nattering nabobs of negativism were the good guys when they held Agnew accountable, and it seems to me that nabobs in this case may well do the same thing with a press that has lost its way a bit. The "nabobs" were right about Agnew's tax fraud. They were right about Nixon's criminal activities, and they were right about bombing Cambodia and Laos. The mainstream guys (Agnew and Nixon) didn't want to hear it, but since they were wrong, all they could do was dismiss criticism with name calling.

For the record, I agree completely with Clint's observations about Gentry's having run a solid campaign. My main points about polls, however, are not addressed in this triumphalist post, but you can read those elsewhere if you want to.

Here's to the nabobs. They usually force us to think.

First Blush

The next horse-race is already under way. This morning's Tennessean
handicaps it this way:

The near-six-week sprint to the Sept. 11 runoff will contrast the candidates' differing visions: Clement's idea that Nashville is "at a crossroads" that will determine whether it goes "from good to great" against Dean's assertion that the city is already great and needs to build on its momentum.

Is it really that simple? Or artificial? Or meaningless?

What if I think the city is great but can and should get better? Don't both candidate sound-bites really support that idea? To think otherwise is to assume from Dean's perspective that Clement is a doomsayer who just can't stomach a progressive Nashville, OR from Clement's perspective that Dean is satisfied with good while Clement is striving for great. These simple and simplistic assertions and their implied criticism of each other will be around alot in the next few weeks. I hope that someone is willing to point out how unhelpful they are in deciding the real issues that confront our city. Can we dispense with the idea that these guys have conflicting visions about whether Nashville is good and whether we should strive to make it better or not? Neither could possibly disagree with either, and the whole silly mess will be nothing but a battle of meaningless semantics that will quickly turn to the personal attack since "real" evidence of the unprovable assertion cannot be found.

What is the issue? What does it all mean?

The Tennessean is willing to help us out. The ISSUES?:

The issues are: How will each candidate build a majority? How will they pick up enough votes from the David Briley, Buck Dozier and Howard Gentry campaigns to win?

WHAT?!?!?! Leaving aside the poor subject-verb agreement where are is used with only one actual issue, how can the horse race BE the issue???

Maybe I don't understand the term. My impression has always been that issues involved questions like what mass transit plan is better for Nashville and why? How will the mayor reduce dropout rates and make sure that our schools are the envy of the state?

In today's Tennessean the ISSUE of this election is how each will win the election? That's so circular my head spins.

I am going to call the campaigns' arguments for what they are. When I hear arguments that address the issues, I will lay those out for us to see and discuss. When I hear arguments that are just code for something I am supposed to feel, but which would be hard to say out loud, I intend to point that out.

Let's see where that leads us.

Exit Polls

When I voted last week, I answered an exit poll outside the door. The company was Yacoubian Research, and they told me they were hired by Fox News. I am curious about that data. Where is it? Who has it? What do they think it says?

I know that the media outlets use exit polling data to improve the accuracy of their extrapolations on election night. Some returns plus the polls allow them to make very accurate calls early in the evening so that we can all go to bed knowing who won and still make it to work on time the next day...Remember 2000?

I also know that campaigns sometimes use this kind of information. I am not drawing any conclusions, but as I researched this question, I discovered that Yacoubian Research is a company from Memphis. It is named for pollster Berge Yacoubian who has advised many political candidates in his career, including Bob Clement (Memphis Flyer, February 7, 2002). I also discovered that Bob Clement's campaign has used Yacoubian in this campaign (now, I wish I could produce this evidence, but I cannot get the City Paper links to work. Google Clement and Yacoubian, and you will see the links...I just can't get them to display).

Here were the questions:

1. Whom did you vote for today?
2. For whom would you vote in a Clement-Dean run-off?

That's it. I am happy to be asked and answer these questions, and I did, but when the interview was over, I got to ask my questions. The pollster, who was very nice, by the way, said she was with Yacoubian Research and that this company was hired by Fox News.

This is not a blog about specualtion and inuendo. So, let me be clear: I could care less who really hired the group. I am willing to take them at their word, and I expect the Fox affiliate in Nashville will use the data tonight. I am interested in this poll as one who spends alot of time looking at them.

What is curious about this poll is that it only asked these two questions. The second question could easily be designed to elicit certain perceptions about the race. This practice is called push polling. I hope that the Fox affiliate will produce a story tonight in which they analyze this whole concept of defensive voting as it played out in this race. I can see a direction for interpreting the data from these two questions in order to extrapolate how much Briley and Dean affected each other and whether anti-Clement sentiment really played a role in selecting one candidate or another. We'll see. That could be interesting stuff.

I will only say this: If I were the editor in charge at Fox, I would try to use a company with a more plausibly independent face than Yacoubian which has obviously worked for one of the candidates in this election. I don't ever want this blog confused with a cynical conspiracy theory joint. All media whether institutional or blogospheric make selection decisions about what to include and what to exclude. I just want people to remember that so they will investigate further and make up their own minds. At Fox they like to say that they report, and we decide. I am just including a little more reporting that might be useful in deciding.

Leave a comment if you are polled today.

Good Discussion - Hope vs. Fear

I like and appreciate the people who differ with me about the candidate they support. Their ideas and thoughts are important because they have them, and getting to know and hear those thoughts in this forum sharpens and improves my own. David Briley has my vote because he approaches disagreement this way. He is a leader who can listen and evaluate without becoming paralyzed by inaction. Many politicians today act decisively, even ignoring opposing views in order to show their ability to lead. I say leadership lives neither in the tyranny of decisive but blind action nor in the paralysis of endless conversation. David Briley has convinced me that he best understands this razor-thin expectation we place on leaders. He has led well. He listens, he learns, and he acts wisely. He is an inspirational leader. This city is on the verge of exploding as a major city in this country, and our destiny will be best shaped by forward looking, thoughtful deliberation coupled with the courage to act wisely. The danger, as David says often, is not that the other guys will be bad, but that they will not quite expect as much.

David Briley stands for hope and courage. He stands against the efforts to create fear of the other guys. What are the reasons people list for choosing the other candidates? Many (and a generalization here is always somewhat right and somewhat wrong) try to make you afraid to vote for David. They say, "A vote for David is a vote for Buck." "David wants to take over the world." "David denies Dean his rightful momentum."

They are all wrong. There are reasons to prefer the other candidates. As I have repeatedly said, they are all good men who will serve the city well. My vote is for hope...the optimism that we can be served BETTER than well. One candidate convinces me that he can do that - David Briley.

Now, those who take issue with my claims about democracy. Specifically, those who try to say that there is a logical fallacy in saying that person-to-person persuasion can actually determine the outcomes of an election...You have to understand my frustration. When you buy into that cynicism; when you deny hope; you create the fearful, discouraging world that you say you want to avoid.

This conversation will continue after tomorrow. I hope that the seeds of those reading this blog will lead many of you to join this conversation. Hope and optimism CAN work. In the end, hope and optimism will always overcome fear and cynicism in the same way that light overcomes darkness. But, unfortunately, fear can prevent us from having hope in the first place. If we can get a big enough group to reject fear and vote with hope, we will be able to make an incredible impact on our collective future.

Tomorrow is the first round. Win or lose this time, I say that one by one we can take back the political process and be the Nashvillians we want to see.

Here we go

Well, good morning Nashville! One day to go. Thursday is an important election day. Let's do all we can today to involve as many citizens of Nashville as possible. Go ahead and take the risk. Talk to those 20-50 people you come into contact with each day; those people you don't want to "bother" with your political views. Today is the political equivalent of the Great American Smokeout. On that day, perfect strangers accost one another to discourage smoking. Is this irritating to smokers? Yes, but it is also in their best interests, and most smokers reflect on those unsolicited opinions, and some stop smoking.


So, today, I am declaring a Greater Metropolitan Nashville Political Apathy Out. Today, everyone is not only encouraged to share his/her opinion on the Mayor's race, everyone should realize it is his/her responsibility to share political opinions with anyone who hasn't voted. Only early voters are exempt...and no lying; but even early voters are obligated to speak with others. For the next 24-36 hours, everyone gets to know your opinion on the Mayor's race, your local council seat and the at-large candidates. You can do it, and we can all stay friends.

I know people find politics awkward, but the problem is not politics. The problem is the personalization of politics. Zero-sum attack politics leaves us all poorer, but politics that is positive sum enables us to engage our differences and search for compromises that leave us all better off. When politics is at its best, no matter who wins, everyone really wins, but increasingly we all treat politics like sports. In sports, if your team has a bad year, makes bad moves, or employs questionable characters, you stick with your team and hope they will straighten it out. Any Cubs fans understand what I'm saying? Lately, that's the way we've treated our political party affiliations, and it isn't something that is brand new, it has probably always been that way to a greater of lesser degree.

Yet, in politics, the question is not which TEAM wins...the question ought to be which IDEAS win, because when the best ideas are vetted, tested, tweaked, and accepted, WE ALL WIN. The goal is not showing loyalty to the team; the teams ought to be loyal to us. To make that happen, we have to be willing and able to walk away. In short, we need choices.

In this local election, we have some real choices. Each of us has to ask some important questions and do some real looking to find out which choices he or she prefer. What an opportunity!

So, make a decision. It matters. Then share your decision with everyone you see. Start by sharing it here, but make sure you share it with the real potential voters you meet every day. In If you do, you will be building a climate of discussion and dialogue...productive debate. It may feel awakward at first, but you will soon find it isn't all that threatening. Then, our candidates will have to impress us all in order to lead us.

The reference to What's the Matter with Kansas that is the allusion in the title of this blog is instructive here. Nothing is the matter with Tennessee if every person sincerly evaluates electoral choices, if those choices are real, and if we are all able to compromise in order to govern well.

Remember the Mayor's Role in Education

It has gotten pretty far down the list of posts, so I want to bring it back because it is central to my judgement that David Briley will make a better mayor for education than the other candidates. He, more that the rest, has the experience and understanding that will enable him to hit the ground running with the proper role for the mayor's office in the educational policy context. Clement and Dean have good ideas, but it will take a while for these ideas to be translated into actions. The school board, and central administration guard the idea side of things by tradition and authority. The mayor must create a context in which those good ideas move forward and educational policy is supported and celebrated. Dean, Clement, Dozier, and Gentry may be able to do that, and on that list, I think Gentry has the most promising experience and statements, but Briley knows exactly how to do it. He has done it both at the Lockeland school and on the City Council. If you support public education, and everyone has called this the education election, then Briley is the clear choice.

Good work Rascoe and friends!

I was happy to see the story of Rascoe Dean in the Tennessean. Rascoe was one of my favorite students, and as I always told his classmates and him in class, I did not care if their opinions matched mine, but I did care that they had an opinion. I am happy to see the involvement of young voters that Rascoe is getting for this campaign. Building that involvement at a young age will spread to a vibrant civic involvement that will bolster any community. For those who tend to attack the motives of people with different political opinions, I hope this story will make an important point. When I say I respect all the candidates in this race, and appreciate the passion of their supporters, I mean it. I made a choice that I feel passionately about, but in the end, politics is what allows us to debate our collective futures, agree and disagree, and find ways to move forward benefiting from all of that deliberation. It is important that Rascoe's generation be involved. This generation represents a demographic that doesn't vote much, and I hope this election, whatever the outcome will hook large numbers of young voters on that important civic participation.

Rascoe is doing his part, and I'm trying to do mine. Now, you do yours.

And so on, and so on....

Well, this morning's City Paper is already handicapping the runoff between Dean and Clement. I wonder which campaigns released internal numbers showing that foregone conclusion? Fortunately, however, the article provides us yet another reason to vote for Briley. The paper predicts that the runoff will be ugly. Now, I am not going to spend much time on media criticism today. Suffice to say that no one can be sure who any of the alleged "sources" for this story are really working for. The press is too easy to manipulate for anyone to believe much of what each side "says" about the campaign. That's the point I've been trying to make about the inevitability claims by Clement and Dean supporters.

Enough. Thirty two of the visitors to this site said they thought David Briley was best qualified. If each of them found 10 new voters today, the number would be 320 tomorrow. If each of those found 10 new voters tomorrow, the number would be 3200. If each of those found 10 new voters Wednesday, the number would be 32000. That number, 32000 new voters turning out for one candidate on Thursday would more than lock up the election for that candidate. So, nothing is inevitable if people are committed to work for it. 32000 new votes, combined with the 12,000 plus already identified by the campaign would get close to the 50% mark to avoid a runoff. But, let's not get giddy.

Can you find 10 new voters today who will find 10 tomorrow, and so on, and so on....

RIP Skip

I started this blog to join a political discourse in Tennessee, and for the past day I have resisted commenting on the loss of a good man. Yet, as a Demon Deacon and part of the Wake nation, I am deeply touched by the passing of Wake Forest Basketball Coach Skip Prosser. He began as a high school history teacher before moving into the upper echelons of college basketball coaching. I liked him because he was a leader I could be proud of. He did things the right way, treated others fairly, and taught his players to do the same. His sudden passing reminds us all to "learn like we will live forever, but live like we will die tomorrow."

If you want to read about a good man, click here.

I am taking time out to hug my family.

Enclave: No More Deliberation. My Mind is Made Up. David Briley Should Be Our Next Mayor.

Enclave: No More Deliberation. My Mind is Made Up. David Briley Should Be Our Next Mayor.