Yesterday in the Eye on City Hall blog Zack McMillan poses the question ”Has Memphis Ever Had a ‘Great’ Mayor? Can AC Become One?”. It’s an interesting read that lists many of the challenges facing our newly elected Mayor as well as the failures of past Mayors. From the post:

Generations of Memphians have taken history from University of Memphis historian Charles Crawford, and he often makes the point that the problems that plague Memphis, with roots dating back to the 19th Century, are so vast and complicated that even the best and boldest civic administration would have difficulty solving them. Each subsequent generation of Memphians — and by Memphians we include all those who live in the eight-county Memphis metroplitan area — wants to believe that problems just shot up out of the soil, but in fact things like deep-seated poverty, violent crime, lackluster universal public education and a low-wage low-skill job base have been here for a long time.

“He will run into the traditional Memphis problems that previous mayors have run into and that I won’t say are impossible but are intractable,” Crawford said in a story we have running today. “Some of these things are outside the capacity of anyone as mayor to solve.”

You know, on several levels, he’s right. First of all the …” deep-seated poverty, violent crime, lackluster universal public education and a low-wage low-skill job base”… is a problem that has faced Memphis for generations. Even our own city history page lists many of these problems. Further, Crawford’s assertion that many in the metro area want to believe that these issues “just shot up out of the soil” couldn’t be more right. Many of these issues have been going on since the inception of Memphis, which is not to say that solving them is hopeless, but that it presents challenges that are far greater than even we may recognize.

Which gets me back to the point of the post I referenced at the beginning. In order for us to determine whether a Mayor or community leader has been “great”, we have to define what “greatness” is. If greatness is fixing everything, then no, we have had no great Mayors. But as the post rightly points out:

“Some of these things are outside the capacity of anyone as mayor to solve.”

So, if these things are outside the capacity of any mayor to solve, then what really defines greatness in the position of Mayor of Memphis?

The truth of the matter is, under this standard no leader of any stripe could be considered truly great. No matter how many problems any leader might solve, there are a hundred more lurking around the corner waiting to be discovered. Taking this reality into account, how does a leader achieve “greatness” in the face of generational challenges that are, to a large degree, outside of his or her power to fully address?

Think back to the beginning of our nation. While the Declaration of Independence may spell out the foundation of American philosophy, and the Constitution may spell out the rights of citizens and the responsibility of government, the truth of the matter is that what we think of as “freedom” today, wasn’t the freedom of the late 18th Century. Just look at the right to vote. Early on many states had restrictive rules about voting. Unless you were white, male, and a land owner, you didn’t necessarily have the right to vote (Source). Over time, as the nation matured, these rules changed, and became less restrictive, removing property restrictions and other hurdles, then allowing women to vote, and eventually guaranteeing the right to “All Americans of voting age” (though for some, particularly those who have served their time in jail, having their right to vote restored is still a huge hurdle).

Of course, none of these changes came thanks to any one individual. It took the voices and actions of thousands of people working for a common goal to extend these rights to the disenfranchised. And while each of these accomplishments are “great”, with every victory came the recognition of another form of disenfranchisement. A good example of this is protecting the choices of the voters through legislation like the Tennessee Voter Confidence Act which is a long way away from early attempts to bring voting rights to the disenfranchised and is still being fought out.

That said, I don’t think anyone would say that those who fought for voting rights for the disenfranchised weren’t working toward something “great” regardless of whether it was for women, minorities, or the poor. While achieving these goals certainly is great, it isn’t the achieving that defines greatness to me, it’s the willingness to stand up and fight for the betterment of those around you. Inspiring that action in yourself and your fellow man is the definition of greatness. Recognizing that the fight is continually ongoing and continuing work on the big goal, long after the little goal is achieved is the definition of greatness.

So, under that definition what would a great Memphis Mayor be? A great Memphis Mayor would be someone who inspired the public at large into positive action…a Mayor who, through their advocacy, action, and attention worked for the betterment of the city and those who have been wanting for generations. A great Mayor would connect the sick with the healthy, the poor with the wealthy, and the undereducated with the scholarly for the benefit of both sides of the equation in every instance.

True lasting solutions cannot be dictated, they have to be discovered. Connecting people of all stripes and backgrounds is the way to discover our individual and societal solutions. Removing the barriers of class, race and God knows what else, and encouraging people to discover the humanity of their neighbors is the way to transformational change that raises tides and lifts all boats.

So I’ll ask again, what would a great Memphis Mayor be? Well, solving all our problems certainly would qualify, but we all know that’s highly unlikely. How about we start with the small goal? Using the office to bring people together, opening up the lines of communication and helping nurture a community wide conversation that lead to community wide action would start a Mayor down the path of greatness.

Will this be AC’s legacy? Only time will tell.

Two months ago I wrote about the changes that have been going on in my life this year. Needless to say, it’s been interesting so far, and signs point to more interesting developments over the coming months. My recent absence from this blog and the twitter are partially the result of a wacky work schedule and a concerted effort to start down the path of many of the changes I talked about in that August post.

Aside from working my ass off, I’ve also been preparing to sell my house. This is by necessity more than anything else. While my original plan was to continue working and traveling through my first part-time semester back in college, the outlook on the work front isn’t that promising, so I’ve been looking at other avenues.

This is how life goes, and while it’s frustrating and challenging, I feel very hopeful and positive about what has happened so far, and what will inevitably be coming down the pike.

Through all of this, I’ve had little time to devote to the reading necessary to write. Longtime readers of this blog know that while I write a lot of opinion pieces, I usually make a concerted effort to source my material with as many supporting links as possible. I feel this is necessary because opinions ARE like assholes, everyone has one, but opinions pieces backed up by sources don’t necessarily suffer the problems that plague the typical opinionated blog post. This may sound a little arrogant, but I like to back up my opinions because I feel it not only makes them stronger to you the reader, but it also allows me the time to better formulate and hopefully strengthen my argument.

The downside of this is that it takes a REALLY LONG TIME to write…well, anything. Between work and work on my house, I really haven’t had the time. To be honest, even though the work I’ve been doing on the house has largely been of the manual labor sort, there’s a lot of thought that goes into the process, as well as a lot of Advil. I hope that I can get back to writing at the beginning of November, but I’m not making any promises.

In the course of all of this, I’ve also been re-evaluating just what I want this blog to be. For me Vibinc has been about advocacy, policy and politics from a decidedly liberal perspective. I don’t see that changing anytime soon, though I am looking at ways to better focus my attentions and perspectives to things that effect not only the way we live here in Memphis and Tennessee, but also the way we perceive the political environment in our community. I’m not really sure how this will manifest itself, or where it will take me, but I think it’s an interesting path to pursue.

Even though I’m re-evaluating the blog, that doesn’t mean I don’t have some things to say about the election Thursday. I know I promised some people, including @ MphsBlckPolitcs to write about it in the run-up to the election, but for the reasons listed above I never quite made it past the incubation stage. So, consider this a Post-Mortem of the election if you will…

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If you didn’t see the complete and total landslide that was Thursday’s election coming, then you aren’t really paying that much attention to local politics. Back at the beginning of the campaign I said that someone (presumably Wharton) could win with only 30% of the vote considering the large field. Under normal circumstances this could have been the case, but the abbreviated nature of the campaign and the strength exhibited by the Wharton camp made that circumstance highly unlikely.

As Mayor Pro Tem Myron Lowery said election night, AC Wharton has been running since the 2007 Mayoral election, had more money than anyone, and a better organization. This is neither “interesting” nor “odd” nor any other descriptor that would cast doubt on the election results. AC’s campaign organization was ready, and no one else’s was. As a result, EVERYONE that got into the race after the retirement announcement of Mayor Herenton was stuck in a situation that made winning a virtually impossible task.

There were some surprises…

Myron Lowery’s strong showing, despite a late start and a small war chest showed that, given more time, he could have made a run at Wharton. I like much of what Lowery has done so far and hope that Wharton will take note of some of the changes that have taken place at City Hall over the past two months and maintain them through his administration. On the flip side, I’m glad that Lowery will be returning to the City Council. For all his faults, Lowery can be a calming voice on a body that can be quite contentious from time to time.

Carol Chumney’s third place finish should be a wake-up call for the former City Council member and State Legislator. Any rumors of her exit from future runs are not only premature, but also ignore her resolve. Carol wants to be a part of making Memphis better. Through her work in the state legislature and City Council this should be more than evident. However, Chumney suffers from a multi-faceted public perception problem. Part of this comes from what I called her ”cold and combative” posture at the first Mayoral debate. While Chumney did herself no favors in this first performance, media accounts, including my analysis of the first debate, perpetuated many of the long-held stereotypes of women seeking positions of power in the political realm.

As Mary Cashiola reported in the Memphis Flyer, “Women are twice as likely to be described emotionally in the media,” according to Erika Falk, author of Women for President: Media Bias in Eight Campaigns.

Folks, this has to stop. We need women and men of all races and socio-economic backgrounds to engage in the political process. The manner in which women, particularly strong, passionate women, are covered in the media is shameful, dismissive and downright ugly. As consumers of media, we deserve better. As candidates, women deserve to be treated with the same level of respect as their male counterparts. Snippets like this are simply dismissive and disrespectful. Not only is the quote used in the piece not bitter, it is a relevant critique of her political opponent that should have been researched rather than used as a blunt object to further a stereotype.

All that said, Chumney did commit some serious tactical errors that likely led to her weak showing at the polls. First and foremost, the early lack of any clear messaging from her campaign, despite a run less than two years before, allowed her opponents to get a jump on her in an area where she could have shown early strength. Considering her strong showing in the 2007 race, the meme of the campaign should have been “Chumney vs. Wharton”. By allowing so much time to pass before any clear message emerged, Chumney ceded a great deal of ground to Wharton early, and Lowery late. Campaigns are about momentum, and unfortunately for the Chumney campaign, this early lack of momentum made the difficult task of overcoming a well-funded candidate even more difficult.

Charles Carpenter was the fourth place finisher, and while he only received 5% of the vote, there is little doubt that he will use this as a springboard for a future run. Carpenter brought some interesting ideas to the campaign, and even though I disagree with him on many of his campaign positions, I hope he continues to engage in local politics. We need all kinds of voices in the mix, even ones I disagree with.

While the rest of the field accounted for less than 7.5% of the total vote, their impact on the race shouldn’t be ignored, particularly from Lawler and Whalum. Both had potent messaging operations, though Whalum seemed to show more late momentum than Lawler. In the end, all the messaging in the world can’t overcome a strong, well run, and well-funded campaign.

Running for any office requires a level of intentional preparation that cannot be thrown together in three months. With the next Mayoral election just two years away, anyone considering a run should start making preparations now. Memphis is best served by a strong and diverse field of candidates competing to lead us forward, not the dominant dynasties of the far and recent past. It is through this competition of ideas that we can grow as a community. Without competition, comes stagnation like what we saw in the final years of the Herenton Administration. Regardless of the intentions of any elected official, it is critical that we foster this kind of competition going forward, lest we fall back into the patterns of the past, and allow the future to slip by us.

This morning, the Wharton campaign released its first TV spot on YouTube that will be played locally. Sets a pretty high bar for the other candidates. Take a look:

Tonight marked the first debate for the office of Mayor of Memphis. This was, quite simply 90 minutes of some of the most bizarre TV ever. The candidates present were required to have filed their petitions, which cut the field to nine. The candidates present were; Charles Carpenter, Carol Chumney, Wanda Halbert, Robert “Mongo” Hodges, Jerry Lawler, Myron Lowery, Kenneth Whalum, AC Wharton, and Sharon Webb.

Like I said, this was highly entertaining, if you take some time to suspend the reality that there is a possibility of a very strange outcome in the Mayoral race. There were some winners, and losers, and people that really had no business being there, or in public life for that matter. Here’s my rundown.

Winners

Myron Lowery – Myron totally exceeded my expectations earning him the top spot in my “Winners” column. There was nothing flashy about Myron’s presentation. His answers, for the most part, were concise and to the point. He tooted his own horn, but more to show that even as a “Mayor Pro Tem” he was taking the job seriously. Myron’s answers served to dispel some of the criticism levied on him by former Mayor Willie Herenton. He was sharp, that’s all there is to it.

AC Wharton – AC was polished and had it totally together, but that just earns him a second place finish in my mind. I’m being a little unfair because as the frontrunner expectations are higher than they probably should be. Still, expectations are part of the game and as the front-runner, AC is in a position of defending his frontrunner status. I think he defended his position tonight, but I don’t feel that he gained any ground. This is AC’s challenge as the frontrunner, gaining ground to reach a mandate, and that didn’t happen tonight.

Charles Carpenter – Carpenter comes in a distant third. He’s a winner because he did something to distinguish himself both from the field and from the shadow of his former candidate. I don’t agree with some of his positions, but his ability to articulate them coherently, puts him in the top three.

Losers

Jerry Lawler – The candidate with the most name recognition in the race, Lawler’s answers were short on substance. He started out clumsily, as if he was not comfortable with the format, and then relied on right wing talking points to further his cause. I respect Lawler’s commitment to Memphis, and his desire to make things better, but it might behoove him to spend some time working IN the city, through non-profits, etc. before he tries this again.

Carol Chumney – As the second place finisher in the 2007 Mayoral election, Chumney’s expectations were high. Unfortunately, she came off as cold and combative early on, and continued that trend throughout the debate, including an exchange with County Mayor AC Wharton involving the performance of City and County employees after the last big storm. Chumney had the opportunity to shine in this thing, with a polite, but firm, “I told ya so” message, that she never got to. Between that, her virtual absence from the campaign in the past month, and her lightly populated, but nicely designed site that she pimped in the debate, she’s got a big hill to climb to win this thing.

Kenneth Whalum Jr. – The best of the losers, Whalum also started off combative, and then relied on initiatives that he’s led to prop up his platform. Really, his message wasn’t horrible, but the way he delivered it was reminiscent of our most recent former Mayor, which was a turn-off. Also, his unwillingness to clear the air about the incident at his church this weekend raises questions that CANNOT be answered until he addresses them.

Not Worth Mentioning

Halbert, Hodges and Webb were the sideshow. Halbert came closest to being a real candidate, but just about every time she spoke, I found myself wondering what the hell she just said.

Hodges (Mongo) had several lines of the night, including arming people with Uzi’s, flushing the political class down the toilet like turds, and putting comic books and video games in Libraries.

Webb was disjointed and confused, and at one point, couldn’t answer a question because she couldn’t stop laughing, which I can understand considering the dumb shit that was probably said right before her answer. Still, that’s no excuse, and she never really said much anyway.

Conclusion

The debate wasn’t a success or a failure, it was a sideshow. The inclusion of people that weren’t serious casts serious doubts on this part of the process. Still, it happened, and we have to live with it.

You can watch the debate here.

By now just about everyone has head about twitter, even if you don’t know what it is. The best evidence of this widespread knowledge is the fact that at least 5 of the potential candidates for Mayor (County Mayor AC Wharton, Mayor Pro Tem Myron Lowery, Charles Carpenter, Jerry Lawler, and Rev. Kenneth Whalum Jr) are not only using twitter, but using it fairly effectively, to get message out and build campaign funds/volunteers.

Yesterday, after the revelation that a certain former Mayor had pulled a petition to run for his old job broke on twitter nearly all of these candidates sprung into action on the social networking service.

(Not Necessarily in chronological order)



And the tweet that is my personal favorite…

These were followed by event announcements and ways to get involved with the campaigns. As weird of a day as it was, I think it’s of the good, regardless of what the former Mayor does. The evolution of media and message is FINALLY starting to filter down to local races here in Memphis. It’s a huge opportunity, and an even bigger responsibility for the people of the city.

They’re talking to us. They’re talking DIRECTLY TO US and listening to us as well. You would do well to listen, learn, and make your voice heard. It won’t stay like this forever if we don’t take advantage of it now.