Daily Archives: November 21, 2006

Defeat William Jefferson! Vote Karen Carter! Thos… 10

by • Social Activism

Defeat William Jefferson! Vote Karen Carter!

Those of us in Central Louisiana may not be in the same Congressional district as our friends in the 2nd. (We’re represented by Rodney Alexander. Remember him? The guy whose page got creeped out by Mark Foley, the guy whose secretary was pen pals with convicted murderer Scott Peterson, the guy whose chief of staff, Royal, is now being sued for sexual harassment… and all of this came to light only two months before the election. Yeah, that’s our Congressman!).

But even those of us in Central Louisiana have a limit to what our leaders can get away with (and still expect to be re-elected).

Consider, say, $90,000 in cash in a Congressman’s freezer as a metaphor for that line.

It doesn’t matter how it got there, and it doesn’t matter how Jefferson intends to eventually explain it all away: When the feds find 90K in your freezer (after you’ve been accused of taking a $100,000 bribe), you shouldn’t even consider making a run for Congress.

I’m certain Karen Carter is more qualified than Jefferson for Congress. Why? One reason: No one has ever found $90,000 in cash in her freezer.

Daniel T. Smith tells a good story:

Last weekend, Matt Stoller of MyDD called on 100 people to donate $100 a piece, and when they received 11K plus dollars they decided to hire a man named Tim Tagaris, who covered the Ned Lamont race for MyDD, and send him to NOLA for the next thee weeks to follow the La-02 runoff.

www.mydd.com/story/2006/11/15/154230/71

In the comments of MyDD’s announcement, they put forth an open invitation for people to contribute blog names of New Orleans activists (I signed up to MyDD to plug the Roy election victory and your blog, btw). It’s an interesting list, and here’s the motherload:

thinknola.com/wiki/New_Orleans_bloggers

Anyway, Oyster over at YourRightHandThief (a nicely written progressive NOLA blog) in his most recent entry titled “MyDD: Moral Ghostbusters” (I couldn’t find a permalink), has some interesting opinions about Stoller/MyDD’s portrayal of Landrieu as a “moral ghost” and MyDD’s decision to send Tagaris to NOLA. In the first comment blogger Adrastos (.blog-city) calls Tagaris a “carpetblogger.”

righthandthief.blogspot.com

Tagaris actually left a comment of his own on the thread, and it’s really conciliatory and he immediately won the support of Oyster’s readers (no small feat in the blogosphere). He seems extremely motivated, and in spite of his benefactor and previous jobs he is not directly attached to the Carter campaign. Here’s his first segment, which has okay comments as well, the highlight (lowlight?) being a picture of a Katrinacorpse.


www.mydd.com/story/2006/11/16/195119/10

I’m sorry to give you so much to look at all at once, since you have more than you can handle with one city already, but this is all going to be irrelevant after December 9.

I thought you’d be interested because this actually represents the national blogging community refocusing on New Orleans, and an example of how bloggers are not simply a bunch of computer potatoes. There are real projects that bridge the gap between the virtual and the visceral. It is also informing my opinion of Landrieu (Oyster at YRHT defends her pretty well, and he has the same reservations that we do, i.e. Holy Joe, and with the upcoming coastal oil revenue sharing proposal she and Blanco are going to be in the spotlight a bit more over the next two months). It’s also interesting that Tagaris seems to completely understand the importance of engaging a community through it’s bloggers, especially considering that his medium is professional internet journalism as well.

Read more: MyDD.com
The Legal Woes of William Jefferson
William Jefferson Filmed Taking Cash
PS: Yesterday, RightHandThief Said Jacques Roy is a Rising Democratic Star.

Initial Dispatch from the Roy Transition Team Yes… 10

by • Social Activism

Initial Dispatch from the Roy Transition Team

Yesterday, Mayor-elect Jacques Roy and his transition team gathered at the Bolton Avenue Community Center to begin work on laying out a foundation of ideas and plans for the next four years. Mr. Roy spoke for approximately forty-five minutes, instructing team members on their duties and his vision of smart growth (or community-based planning) for Alexandria.

Urban planner Pat Moore, who will advise the Mayor-elect on Vision, gave a twenty-minute presentation on smart growth principles and what he called “growing buffalo food” (which, he explained, are ways in which a community can bolster its ability to attract and keep jobs).

The team then broke into committees and subcommittees.

I can only speak for the discussions we had in two subcommittees to which I was assigned, housing and community development.

The initial findings of the community development subcommittee were that Alexandria needs to better market itself and its cultural and artistic communities and events. Additionally, I believe (and I’ve said this before on the blog) that we need to improve our amphitheater. The subcommittee discussed, among other things, ways in which we can diversify and increase the conventions we hold, city-wide events like Quein’ on the Red and Third Street block parties, and utilizing public access television to share regularly updated information about upcoming events in the city.

The housing committee recognized the dearth of affordable housing in Alexandria and developed several strategies for dealing with this problem. (All of which will be explained as the ideas become more fleshed out). The initial summary conclusion of the housing subcommittee says it best:

“The biggest housing issue for purposes of quality of life is the lack of affordable housing. This stems in part from the high percentage of residents living below the poverty line. It should also be noted that the last public housing project was built 30 years ago.”

If you have any questions or suggestions for housing or community development, please feel free to leave a comment.