Skip to content

Jan 15

Screen Shot 2012-01-15 at 1.02.38 AM

A Short Preview of An Interview With Daniel and I In The Upcoming Documentary Film “The American Way”

A few weeks before we both moved from Alexandria, my friend Daniel T. Smith and I were interviewed for the upcoming documentary film, “The American Way.” Quoting from the movie’s official website:

The American Way, a documentary chronicling the journey of one man across the country in search of the genuine American voice, has begun shooting. Joshua Cook, who created the project, will serve as director and will be conducting the interviews. Dane Kroll will serve as cinematographer and Adam Macy will be producing the project through Temporary Productions, his production company based out of Los Angeles. In each city that they visit, the crew will interview average Americans on the state of the union, the state of political discourse and what they see and want for the future. Between destinations, the crew will both film the natural beauty of the American landscape and interview fellow travelers. The final produced film will juxtapose the words of Americans from a variety of backgrounds and iconic images of the nation with the narrative of Joshua’s quest to find the common ground and shared experience that defines America in the 21st Century.

Daniel and I spent a couple of hours with Joshua, giving him a tour of Alexandria, and then, we sat down with him for an interview at the Alexandria Riverfront Amphitheater. This is, literally, the last minute and a half of a forty-five minute interview, an interview that focused, primarily, on the ways in which the corporate consolidation of small to mid-sized media markets has affected the democratic process, the fair and accurate reporting of news, and the nature of civic engagement.

So, if we appear to be somewhat tongue-tied, blame it on the fact that we had been talking on camera nearly non-stop for 45 minutes.

Regardless, it was an honor to be able to participate, and I wish Joshua and the rest of his team the best of luck as they prepare for the festival circuit. Here’s the short preview:

And here’s a short clip of me ranting about the relationship between money and small, local elections:

Dec 20

Screen Shot 2011-12-20 at 5.14.09 PM
77 Comments

Louisiana College Denied Reaffirmation of Accreditation, Placed on Warning Until At Least December 2012

Update III: From The Town Talk (bold mine):

“We’re going to get some help with this,” said Searcy, who has been at LC for less than two years. In the years before that, he was at New Orleans Seminary and at a college in Colombia, South America.

Searcy also has been on SACS review teams inspecting colleges and universities. He said LC being on “warning” instead of probation is a sign SACS thinks LC is “moving in the right direction.”

Yes, you read that right: Somehow, the fact that Louisiana College wasn’t placed on probation is a sign it is “moving in the right direction.” Does anyone actually buy this? As a commentator on the SaveOurLC forums noted, this is potentially the worst example of “spin” ever.

Update II: Earlier today, Allison Brucchaus, Louisiana College’s Director of College Communications and Public Relations, tweeted me, “Did you go to LC?”

No, Ms. Bruchhaus, I did not. I went to Rice University and am now a graduate student at Southern Methodist University. And while SMU was once sanctioned for paying its football players, neither school has ever had their accreditation in peril. Louisiana College, under the leadership of President Joe Aguillard, has been sanctioned not once, but twice. And while I am not a graduate of Louisiana College, I have always been a supporter. One of my best friends in the world is an LC graduate, and so are several members of my family and many other close friends. LC is an important part of Central Louisiana; it’s a huge economic engine. Sorry, Ms. Bruchhaus, I don’t feel like I need to “qualify” myself.

During the last 24 hours, since posting this story, what has bothered me the most is the ways in which some LC administration apologists have refuted the basic facts. You disagree with LC? You must somehow lack faith in Jesus Christ. You criticize LC? Oh, you’re doing the work of Satan.

Wise up, people. Louisiana College was not founded by God. Joe Aguillard is not the Second Coming of Jesus Christ. During the last few years, I’ve criticized Louisiana College’s administration several times, and pathetically, the response has always been the same: Satan! There’s this bizarre belief that Louisiana College is somehow ordained by God and that any perils it confronts are all a part of a divine plan. That’s not the way ANY institution of higher learning operates or should ever operate; that’s the way a cult of personality operates.

Even at the risk of appearing to be an obnoxious, arrogant dilettante: I have a degree in Religious Studies from one of the finest and best institutions in the world, and in my humble opinion, the greatest threat to the Christianity isn’t the skeptic or the cynic; it’s the self-ordained, morally-conflicted blowhard. It’s, for example, the kind of guy who would order an exorcism on his lesbian daughter while trolling for men online. GET REAL, LC.

Update: At this point, given the lack of coverage, The Town Talk must credit.

Louisiana College has not yet permanently “lost” its accreditation, but it is now in serious jeopardy. These sanctions are serious, and LC’s non-compliance on a host of issues is very troubling. If you are a student or a graduate of LC, then you should be seriously concerned about the short-term and long-term viability of the institution and the value of your degree. You should be sounding the alarm bells, and if anyone tells you otherwise– if anyone suggests that these issues can be resolved by simply writing down a “policy” paper, as some anonymous administration apologists have suggested on the SaveOurLC forums– then you need to question their true allegiances and motives.

I’ve been writing this blog for more than six years, and this post, somehow, is the most viral ever. So forgive me, but because I have your attention: The solution at Louisiana College begins with firing President Joe Aguillard and replacing your Board of Trustees. I’ve met your Board, LC, and I’ve met, on multiple occasions, with President Aguillard.  Oh, the stories I could tell.

I believe in Louisiana College. I earnestly want Louisiana College to thrive and succeed, and I can’t help but feel real anger at the actions of LC’s Board and its President. LC, only a decade ago, was thriving. Today, it is a laughingstock. It has been hijacked by a small and extremely right-wing group of anti-intellectuals who have taken cover through a series of grandiose pronouncements– a law school, a film school, a divinity school, a medical school– and who have countered any and all criticisms by claiming that their mission is somehow ordained by God Himself.

Meanwhile, the school with which they were entrusted to care has fallen into disrepair. Meanwhile, Louisiana College is now, for the second time under Joe Aguillard, threatened with de-accreditation.

The solution is simple and obvious.

***************

According to a recent press release from the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools, Louisiana College was recently denied reaffirmation of its accreditation and placed on “Warning” until at least December 2012. LC was cited for “significant non-compliance” with SACS standards.

Quoting (bold mine):

Louisiana College was denied  reaffirmation of accreditation and placed on Warning because the Commission’s Board of Trustees determined that, at the time of the institution’s decennial review, it had failed to demonstrate compliance with Core Requirement 2.5 (Institutional Effectiveness), Comprehensive Standard 3.2.9 (Faculty/Staff Appointment), Comprehensive Standard 3.3.1.1 (Institutional Effectiveness: Educational Programs), Comprehensive Standard 3.3.1.2 (Institutional Effectiveness: Administrative Support Services), Comprehensive Standard 3.3.1.3 (Institutional Effectiveness: Educational Support Services), Comprehensive Standard 3.4.11 (Academic Program Coordination), Comprehensive Standard 3.5.1 (College-Level Competencies), Comprehensive Standard 3.5.4 (Terminal Degree of Faculty), Comprehensive Standard 3.7.1 (Faculty Competence), Comprehensive Standard 3.11.1 (Control of Physical Resources), and Federal Requirement 4.1 (Student Achievement) of the Principles of Accreditation.

The cited standards expect an accredited institution to provide evidence that it (1) engages in ongoing, integrated, and institution-wide research-based planning and evaluation processes, (2) identifies expected outcomes of and shows improvements in the areas of student learning/educational programs, administrative support services, and educational support services, (3) publishes policies regarding appointment and employment of faculty and staff, (4) assigns responsibility for program coordination and curriculum development to academically qualified faculty, (5) determines the degree to which graduates attain college-level general education competencies, (6) employs qualified faculty to teach assigned courses, (7) exercises appropriate control over its physical resources, and (8) evaluates success with respect to student achievement.
(To read the full statements for the standards cited above, access the Principles of Accreditation at http://www.sacscoc.org/principles.asp)

For those of us who have been critical of LC’s current administration, particularly the people at SaveOurLC- who first broke this story a couple of weeks ago, this likely comes as little surprise. During the last few years, under the leadership of President Joe Aguillard, LC’s campus has been plagued with million of dollars in deferred maintenance, and when at least one professor had the courage to challenge the questionable decisions of the administration, he was summarily fired and temporarily banned from campus.

Recently, we also learned that Louisiana College’s leadership actively sought $70 million in funding from the governments of Saudi Arabia and Kuwait in order to underwrite its proposed medical school. When the damning internal memo was leaked to the media, President Joe Aguillard took to the pages of The Baptist Message, claiming that these reports were an assault on LC by the “liberal media.” Aguillard suggested LC was engaging in a “spiritual battle” with the media and completely denied the reports, stating that LC would “never ask for any operational funds from a non-Christian entity,” despite the reams of evidence to the contrary, including an elaborate powerpoint presentation prepared by the LC administration.

From the very beginning of his tenure, Joe Aguillard has been a controversial and polarizing leader. Before he was first appointed, the faculty at LC voted 53-12 in opposition, and in an act of defiant usurpation, the Board of Trustees reseated the Presidential Selection Committee, stacked it in favor of Aguillard, and got their man in office. This led to a series of protracted lawsuits and, sadly, resulted in the resignations of dozens of faculty members, some of whom had served the LC community for decades.

And, of course, there was this, which, embarrassingly, was picked up by The Chronicle of Higher Education:

So, it seems, unfortunately, that as Joe Aguillard criss-crosses the State and the country– meeting with foreign diplomats and conservative celebrities in an effort to raise money for  proposed medical and law schools, the school he was elected to lead is struggling to maintain both its core infrastructure and its core academic performance.

I am told, by people who work in academic administrations, that correcting all of these significant non-compliance issues in less than a year may be a practical impossibility and that there should be a real concern that LC will completely lose its accreditation for as long as a decade.

Nov 18

Screen Shot 2011-11-18 at 2.01.10 AM

In Less Than 48 Hours, City Council and The Town Talk Demonstrate Everything Wrong About Alexandria

Update: I recognize that, to some readers, I may seem harsh. I’m okay with that. I think this particular subject requires some harsh words. And no, it has nothing to do with this particular development, because, in truth, this development was never actually evaluated on its merits. Instead, its opponents cobbled together a series of patently untrue and, at times, obliquely race-baiting distortions, and then, afterward, their actions were lauded by the newspaper as an great example of community engagement.

Look, of course, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with people exercising their free speech rights, but when one person shows up to a Council meeting and pretends to speak for an entire neighborhood– thousands of people– by adamantly and repeatedly saying, “We do not want any more multi-family,” both the newspaper and the Council owe citizens at least a little bit of fact-checking. Is that true? No, not really. In fact, according to a recent study by J-Quad, new and additional housing options was one of the top priorities of that very neighborhood. J-Quad didn’t merely analyze the data; they also conducted a series of community meetings. Nothing has changed since that study was conducted, except for the construction of 56 moderate-income apartments and the million-dollar renovation of an existing apartment complex.

What bothers me most is that Ms. Norris and others suggest that the predominately white areas of Alexandria don’t have nearly as many apartments as the predominately African-American neighborhoods. Just not true. Not even remotely. In fact, there are disproportionately more apartments south of MacArthur Drive, hundreds and hundreds more.

People are attracted to neighborhoods that provide choices. Not everyone actually wants to own their own home, and as we now know, the whole “home ownership” initiative spearheaded under the George W. Bush administration resulted in a catastrophic collapse that primarily affected the poor and the lower middle class. So ironically, while leaders and officials continue to reject additional multi-family and affordable housing options, effectively turning away millions of dollars in private-sector investment, they are only further contributing to their neighborhood’s struggles; they are hurting the very people they ostensibly seek to help. If you truly care about Lower Third, then this should make your blood boil, as it does mine. People need options. Not everyone can afford to buy their own home. At the very least, as a community, we should be focusing on providing all people with access to quality and affordable housing.

Lower Third needs and deserves more retail. It needs and deserves a grocery store. And clearly, something is not working right now. There are hundreds of vacant and dilapidated homes.

Pull up an aerial map of Alexandria and locate all of the grocery stores within the city limits. You’ll find something interesting: Every single grocery store in the City of Alexandria is located either directly adjacent to or within a half of a mile of an apartment complex. Every single one, even the new Wal-Mart in the Lakes District. Makes you wonder whether or not these major grocery chains have a formula, right? They do; it’s called density.

To Greg Aymond, who thinks I’m totally wrong (not surprised): I absolutely love this line from your most recent post (bold mine):

But the greatest amount of venom spewed by Freddy was aimed at Paul Carty’s editorial entitled “Our View: When civic-minded neighbors rally in Alexandria, they are heard” but Freddy didn’t criticize the article which appeared in the newspaper a day earlier by Freddy’s rumored friend Bret McCormick entitled “Alexandria council denies housing project after residents protest“).

Greg, go read the comment section on the article I apparently “didn’t criticize.”

Again, my criticism isn’t really concerned with this particular development, though I most definitely believe that rezoning should have been approved. I am mainly concerned and frustrated by the knee-jerk reaction, the ways in which lies were accepted as facts, the myopia, and the shameless race-baiting that was employed, particularly by Ms. Norris. If I’m an awful person for wanting to rip these arguments to shreds, so be it. If you can show up at a public meeting and rail against any and all multi-family developments in a neighborhood that desperately needs them by attempting to scare your neighbors into a panicked frenzy and injecting a ridiculously wrong-headed race-based conspiracy, then, sorry, but I think you should be called out. And if you’re the editor of the local newspaper and you attempt to frame all of this foolishness as virtuous “citizen-driven action,” then you also should be called out.

Greg’s right about one thing: I do know Lewis Lauve and Cole Finn, the two developers, but I haven’t spoken to either of them in years. I do know this, though: They’re young professionals who have returned to Alexandria and who are willing to risk their own money to invest in building the future of Alexandria. Lewis wisely pointed out to the Council that the City’s own adopted consolidated plan calls for increased affordable and alternative housing, and indeed, the J-Quad study specifically recommends cottage homes. Single-family homes. For sale, actually. Affordable.

As Chuck Fowler pointed out, “all of the objections were to multi-family housing,” rental housing, and that’s not what Lewis or Cole actually proposed.

Regardless, the neighborhood and the City have both prioritized and noted the need for multi-family housing. Again, the knee-jerk reaction is destructive and wrong-headed.

After Lewis presented the actual proposal, Ms. Norris, bafflingly, said there was an “excess” of housing in Lower Third and that it didn’t matter whether the project called for multi-family or single-family housing, that the neighborhood was “over-flooded” with housing. Not true. Not true at all. There’s a dearth of housing.

Lewis was completely and totally correct, and Ms. Norris and Mr. Goins were completely and totally wrong. Mr. Goins, there was no “overwhelming” opposition to “this” project; five people showed up, and none of them were actually opposing this specific project. Essentially, they argued that Lower Third should not be the beneficiary of ANY and ALL new residential development.

If you don’t believe me, watch the meeting for yourself. It’s insane.

****

Paul Carty, get real. This is just garbage.

In the civic-minded world of Alexandria, two things are clear:

—One: Many residents of South Alexandria do not — repeat: do not — want additional multifamily housing in their neighborhoods. Not now, thank you.

—And two: Some of them could charge a decent fee to give presentations on how to give effective presentations.

Tuesday’s citizen-driven action at the City Council meeting is the latest effort by property owners and other residents from the area to take their concerns to City Hall, state their case thoughtfully and persuade council members to act on their behalf — unanimously, in fact.

They should be proud of their actions, and the council gets points for listening carefully to the people who take the time to step forward and speak for their own interests. This is what America is all about.

Mr. Carty is the editor of The Town Talk. Even if he didn’t write this particular editorial (he probably did), he’s still responsible for it. And despite his rhetorical flourishes (“This is what America is all about”), he fails abysmally, epically. He’s either lying, pandering, ignorant, or all of the above. (And look, I understand this sounds harsh, but you need to consider what he’s talking about here and why his words aren’t merely wrong; they’re also destructive).

Mr. Carty was referring to a recent unanimous vote by the Alexandria City Council to deny the rezoning of 46 acres in Lower Third in order to provide for a “multi-family” development of affordable housing; I put the term multi-family in quotations because, in truth, the plans called for a series of affordable, single-family, modular cottages, competitively-priced new construction. He botched his editorial, and The Town Talk botched its news coverage.

Forgive my exasperation, but holy hell, five people show up to a City Council meeting to oppose a new development in their neighborhood. Most of them talk complete nonsense. One lady, Brenda Norris, who is provided the most time, implies that there’s some sort of racist conspiracy to keep the people of Lower Third down. She rambles on about how neighborhoods south of MacArthur Drive don’t have nearly as many apartment complexes as her neighborhood. If that were only slightly false, I’d give her the benefit, but it’s just utterly detached from reality. Lower Third has fewer multi-family rental units than any other contiguous neighborhood in Alexandria. The overwhelming and vast majority of apartment units in Alexandria are located south of MacArthur Drive; Brenda Norris lied. She lied. Ms. Norris is a liar, a lying liar, a race-baiter who dishonestly presented herself as a representative of her entire neighborhood.

The truth, insofar as I can see it, is that she doesn’t care about her neighborhood; she attempted to speak for everyone, forcefully and theatrically, but in truth, she represented only herself.

Sorry, Ms. Norris, but you presented, on public television, one of the most dishonest and ridiculous arguments I’ve ever witnessed, and you should be ashamed. (I can be theatrical too).  Instead, though, you’re praised. Paul Carty thinks you get it, even though you get all of your facts wrong. You accuse developers and the government of a racist conspiracy, while, at the same time, standing in opposition to investment. (News-flash: major retailers don’t care about the color of anyone’s skin. They care about the population and the spending capacity of their service area. If there aren’t enough rooftops, they’ll go somewhere else. Duh. If it’s ever going to be targeted for large-scale commercial and retail development, Lower Third needs additional and improved housing).

People like Brenda Norris not only hold back Lower Third; they hold back the entire City of Alexandria. They stand in our way to growth. They attempt to frame the discussion about our shared future around racial identity.

Local, state, and federal studies have all demonstrated that Lower Third is one of the most severely underserved neighborhoods in the State of Louisiana; the neighborhood desperately needs more housing options, and it desperately needs newer housing stock. That’s why, even though it wasn’t a victim of the mortgage crisis, it still qualified for millions in funding from the Bush Administration’s Neighborhood Stabilization Program. Once upon a time, only three years ago, the residents of Lower Third clamored for improved and additional housing. It was even more important than drainage improvements. Perhaps the political climate has changed, but the data hasn’t.

Today, one person can show up at a Council meeting and defeat projects that are desperately needed. Ms. Norris, Mr. Goins, and Mr. Larvadain all claim they want commercial investment in Lower Third, and during the last few months, they have, both collectively and individually, protested and/or denied MILLIONS of dollars in PRIVATE-sector development. Idiots.

Let me be abundantly clear, unlike Paul Carty: Jonathan Goins and Edward Larvadain III, acting disingenuously on the staged presentations of people like Brenda Norris, are destroying African-American neighborhoods. They are rejecting millions of dollars in investment, not because they really disagree with the merits; it seems to be mainly about the potentiality of a white person making money in a majority African-American neighborhood.

It’s a difficult thing to say, particularly from a liberal Democrat like me. But ugh, you’re making this about race. That’s awful.

No, Paul Carty, this isn’t what America is all about. You’re confused. This represents all that is wrong about America.

Nov 12

Screen Shot 2011-11-12 at 12.04.47 AM

Talk Radio Host Tony Brown Paid Thousands By Hilton Campaign

Update: Moonbeam at CenlaBriarPatch links to this post and raises a few interesting points.

Is William Earl Hilton’s ad really all that wrong? Wagner, without a doubt, has made a fairly big deal about drugs and drug dealers.

More often than not, drug-related convictions are the result of a consensual crime, and it’s been proven repeatedly that rehabilitation is a far more effective public policy than large-scale incarceration. We’re facilitating a culture of repeat offenders. In my personal opinion, the War on Drugs is the most expensive blunder and colossal failure in American history. I also believe that enforcement of drug laws disproportionately targets low-income families. I agree with the two main points of William Earl’s ad:

1) “Nonviolent drug offenders need rehabilitation, not mass-incarceration.”

2) “Criminalizing poverty by locking up the poor, people who need treatment and the underemployed is not the answer.”

So, what’s wrong with William Earl’s commercial? Isn’t he actually raising a valid concern?

No, he’s not. It is provocative to think about the ways in which America’s drug enforcement policies have been counterproductive; it’s a conversation worth having. But it’s completely disingenuous for a man who led the Rapides Parish Sheriff’s Office for well over a decade to suggest that the guy who replaced him three years ago, with his blessing I might add, is somehow targeting “poor black neighborhoods.” As slick as it may sound, it’s just not true, and it’s a shame that William Earl has spent money promoting this insidious meme. People think it’s a racist ad because, well, it is a racist ad. It directly accuses Chuck Wagner of race-based police enforcement; it directly accuses him of invading “poor black neighborhoods.” If that were even remotely true or if there was even a scintilla of evidence that the incumbent Sheriff of Rapides Parish was invading “poor black neighborhoods,” then I’d support his immediate ouster, even if it meant voting for the guy who used to be Sheriff.

But that’s not the case here. It’s just a race-baiting radio ad, worth at least $7500, written by a couple of unsophisticated campaign workers. The ad is not worth defending; it was an obvious mistake. (Incidentally, I think I recognize the female voice at the very end of the ad).

One more point: Tony Brown, to me, appears more like an agent of the Hilton campaign than an”objective” messenger. In his correspondence with Greg Aymond, Mr. Brown talks about negotiating radio deals with other stations on behalf of the Hilton campaign. I’d be very interested to know where, exactly, the ad was created, along with the entire cast and crew.

**********

Former Rapides Parish Sheriff William Earl Hilton has generated some heat for a commercial that his campaign placed on certain urban radio stations in Central Louisiana, a commercial that attempts to assert that Hilton’s challenger, incumbent Sheriff Chuck Wagner, believes in perpetuating a type of institutional racism against African-Americans. Listen for yourself. The transcript, via The Town Talk:

“Since Rapides Parish Sheriff Chuck Wagner has taken office, more and more of your sons and daughters are behind bars. Nonviolent drug offenders need rehabilitation, not mass-incarceration. Wagner’s aggressive invasion of poor black neighborhoods adds to this state having the highest wrongful conviction rate in the world. Criminalizing poverty by locking up the poor, people who need treatment and the underemployed is not the answer. If we don’t stop Boss Wagner now, we could be stuck with Chuck for another 30 years. Your children and grandchildren deserve better. “Paid for by the Committee to Elect William Earl Hilton for Rapides Parish Sheriff.”

Seriously, who is advising William Earl Hilton? “More and more of your sons and daughters are behind bars”? Chuck Wagner’s one of the reasons we have the “highest conviction rate in the world”? In the world? Really? Does anyone really believe that? “Criminalizing poverty by locking up the poor”? “Aggressive invasion of poor black neighborhoods”? Rapides Parish has many problems, but Hilton’s ad is terribly deceptive and, at the very least race-baiting, if not racist. I understand there is a real possibility that William Earl Hilton may win re-election, but after this radio commercial, he shouldn’t. The ad specifically targeted the listenership of talk radio host Tony Brown, an African-American, and as Hilton’s campaign finance disclosure reports indicate, Tony was paid a small fortune for running those ads. That’s $7500 in less than six weeks, all paid to Eyes Wide Open, Tony Brown’s company. Either Tony has the most expensive radio spots (per capita) in Louisiana or he’s being compensated for something other than merely running a 30-second commercial on his local morning radio show. There is a third option, of course: Tony Brown may just ripping off the Hilton campaign. (If only Hilton were always running for election, Tony could be making more than $100,000 a year, from only one account). Given Tony’s recent remarks, it definitely appears as if he considers himself to be more of a paid spokesman than an objective businessman. Earlier this week, Tony repeatedly embarrassed himself by resorting to profanity and incredulity after Greg Aymond wrote about his involvement with the Hilton ad. Greg, a former member of the Ku Klux Klan, for some reason, considered himself to be Tony’s friend, which was backed up by Tony’s phone call to Greg Aymond’s home. Once again, politics makes for strange bedfellows. Incidentally, until now, no one has written about what, exactly, Tony Brown has been paid for his services. Ooops.

← Older Entries