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Rights Renovation

In the National Civil Rights Museum’s opening gallery — titled
“Unremitting Struggle” — a giant cut-out of Abraham Lincoln
dominates a busy wall. There are pictures of the earliest civil rights
leaders, newspaper headlines, placards of information, and a
timeline.

On the opposite wall hangs a single framed map. It depicts the
museum’s emergency exits.

“One of the firms suggested we could use both walls,” says
Gwen Harmon, the museum’s marketing director.

After 17 years, the National Civil Rights Museum is planning a $10
to $15 million renovation, mostly to make the museum more accessible
— in every way — to visitors.

“Our lobby is beautiful,” Harmon says, “but there’s no place to
queue up tour groups. They hang out outside.”

The museum started the process with 12 design firms. Recently, it
asked the top four firms to present at a public forum what they see as
the museum’s exhibit and interactive opportunities.

During a recent visit to the museum, about 100 tweens from Nashville
— most wearing hoodies and museum headphones — stood four
and five deep in the first gallery. For those close to the wall, there
was a wealth of information. For those a few feet behind them, they
could easily see, well, Abraham Lincoln.

“With this group of energetic young people, some are going to read
it. Some aren’t,” Harmon says. “It’s text, text, text.”

With the renovation, the museum hopes to make its exhibits more
accessible and more interactive.

“What museum visitors expect today is a lot different from what they
expected 17 years ago,” says Tracy Lauritzen Wright, the museum’s
director of administration/special projects and project director for
the renovation.

Aquariums allow visitors to touch stingrays and sea anemones; D.C.’s
Newseum includes an interactive newsroom where visitors can see what
it’s like to be a reporter or photographer. (They call it “Sitting in
the Hot Seat.”)

“We’re not a science center,” Lauritzen Wright says. “We don’t want
the latest and greatest technology just because. We want what is going
to help us tell the story.”

It’s not only museum visitors who have changed since the museum
opened. The world has changed, as well. For starters, several similar
museums now exist.

“When the museum was first designed, we didn’t want to leave
anything out,” Lauritzen Wright says, noting that schools today teach
more about the civil rights movement. “An encyclopedic presentation is
no longer the expectation.”

The museum also is cognizant of the need to update its current
galleries. For instance, one section — which accommodates
only about four people comfortably — focuses on the 1962
integration of Ole Miss.

“They just hosted a historic presidential debate,” Harmon says. “Ole
Miss alumni would like that reflected here, as well.”

Other ideas for the renovation include listening posts outside the
museum, a new orientation film at the beginning of the tour, and adding
video of 1950s-era Montgomery “outside” the bus windows in the museum’s
“Montgomery Bus Boycott” exhibit.

“We don’t want so much technology that we lose the soul of this
place,” Harmon says. “That’s going to be the biggest challenge.”

But it’s one that will probably be easily met, especially given the
historic nature of the site. Every firm in the running thinks the King
room, the place where Martin Luther King Jr. spent his last moments,
should get more significant treatment.

“Our purpose has shifted,” Lauritzen Wright says. “It used to be a
lot about commemoration. Today, it’s more about helping people find
their place in the civil rights movement.”

The museum hopes to pick a firm by the end of the year and begin the
design process in January. Construction should begin in early 2010.

The National Civil Rights Museum is offering discounted admission
from now until the end of December.

Categories
Letters To The Editor Opinion

Letters

David Duke

It’s interesting how Memphis Flyer writer Chris Davis thinks
it’s okay to call David Duke “America’s most easily recognized racist”
(“White Noise,” November 13th issue) in a so-called news feature.

Davis went on to happily chronicle how Duke was harassed and booted
from various Memphis motels during his weekend here for the
European-American Unity Conference. Let’s be real: If Duke were leading
a conference for blacks or Jews, his activities would have been seen as
“activism,” and the media — and Davis — would have covered
it as straight news.

As Duke said in the article: “They’ve got free speech in Cuba, too.
Just as long as you don’t say anything bad about Fidel Castro.” Think
about it.

Walter Lewiston

Charlotte, North Carolina

Gay Rights

In his “Viewpoint” (November 13th issue), Jim Maynard makes the old
mistake of conflating civil rights with sexual rights. One is a
nationality/birth condition; the other, a chosen behavior. Even Colin
Powell acknowledged this fallacy and major error a few years ago.

It is also a slippery slope. Where do we draw the line? Why not have
men marry animals, birds, and insects? If evolution is true, we are no
different in a “civil rights” genus/category. Maynard gets his quotes
and statistics a bit blurred by leaving out many polls across the
nation: From yes2marriage.org,
African-American leaders and pastors show a 65 percent rejection of
homosexual marriages and civil-union rights.

A homosexual couple can cohabitate and get “married,” but they can
never consummate physically due to incompatible sexual organs, unless
they make drastic alterations. Maynard’s appeal to “separation of
church and state” has nothing to do with this issue. He says that
government should not impose laws upon others. That means we should
release all criminals in jail that had laws legislated against their
actions. All law is legislated morality. The question is: Whose morals
do we legislate?

Charles Gillihan

Bartlett

Who is Obama?

Bill McAfee is right on in his letter to the editor (November 6th
issue). I just never knew Obama was from Africa. Thanks for telling me
this, Bill.

Is Obama proud to be an American or is he proud to be an African
American? I am sure he would give an answer if asked. But none of his
supporters can tell me what qualifies him to be president. No one can
tell me his tax proposals, how socialized medicine will cure all, and
how, when he becomes president, he will become militarily inclined, and
how economics can become one of his strong points. That’s what he said
in the debates: “I am not militarily inclined. Economics is not one of
my strong points.”

What are his strong points?

Jeremy Scruggs

Memphis

Hopefully, everyone who did not vote for Barack Obama will pledge to
be just as respectful, trusting, unbiased, and supportive of him in the
next four years as the editors, writers, columnists, and contributors
in the Memphis Flyer have been of President Bush these past
eight years.

Herbert E. Kook Jr.

Germantown

Marijuana Talk

In the memphisflyer.com
article “Marijuana Talk at Rhodes” (November 6th), it seems to me that
the speaker asked the wrong question. The question should be: Should
marijuana remain completely untaxed, unregulated, and controlled by
criminals?

Because marijuana is illegal, it is sold only by criminals. And they
often offer free samples of more dangerous drugs to their marijuana
customers, thus creating the so-called gateway effect.

In a regulated market, this would not happen. Do Flyer
readers know of anyone who has been offered a free bottle of whiskey,
rum, or vodka when legally buying beer or wine? I don’t either.

If we regulate, control, and tax the sale and production of
marijuana, we close the gateway to hard drugs.

Kirk Muse

Mesa, Arizona

Regarding “News of the Weird” (November 13th issue): The first story
mentions a “.22 gauge shotgun.” There is no such thing. Second, how did
the stove shoot her? (The story said she was “shot in the leg” by her
stove.)

P.J. Trenthem

Germantown

Editor’s note: I don’t know. That’s so
weird.

Categories
News News Feature

News and Notes

With the Memphis Music Foundation recently adding staff and
expanding its programming in the form of the Memphis Music Resource
Center and an alliance of local music-related businesses coming
together in the form of Music Memphis (see Music Feature, page
26), the long-maligned Memphis & Shelby County Music
Commission would seem to be in danger of further slipping off the
city’s musical radar.

But the lone governmental arm of the local music community made its
own bit of news last week with the arrival of its latest executive
director, Johnnie Walker.

Walker, a longtime music-industry executive, is a Mississippi native
who got her break in Memphis radio before being hired by Russell
Simmons in 1990 to work for his Def Jam label. Walker worked
her way up to senior vice president of promotions for the Def Jam Music
Group but left the company earlier this decade to become head of urban
promotion for DreamWorks Records. Walker is also the founder of
the National Association of Black Female Executives in Music and
Entertainment.

Walker was hired to lead the music commission this past summer and
made her debut last week at a monthly commission meeting that was
reportedly sparsely attended (by commissioners). Whether Walker’s
tenure will revive an organization that has lost relevancy in recent
years or be more of the same remains to be seen.

This will be a good weekend for local folk music fans.
Louisiana-born, Nashville-based folk singer Kate Campbell, who
brings a decidedly “grit-lit” sensibility to her work, makes a
semiregular appearance at the Center for Southern Folklore this
weekend. Campbell, whose latest album, Save the Day, is a
collection of songs inspired by literary works and historical icons
from To Kill a Mockingbird to Henry Ford, plays the center
Saturday, November 22nd, at 8 p.m. Tickets range from $15 to $25.

The next night, the Memphis Acoustic Music Association
returns for its first concert in six months when it hosts British
guitarist and folk singer Martin Simpson at the Pink Palace
Mansion Theatre. Simpson is touring the U.S. for the first time in
five years and will be stopping at the Pink Place for a 7 p.m. show
Sunday, November 23rd. Tickets are $20 and are available at
Otherlands Coffee Bar and Davis-Kidd Booksellers.

Speaking of Otherlands, the Midtown venue will be hosting a
fund-raiser concert for the Memphis-based Folk Alliance Friday,
November 21st, with The Dan Montgomery Three, Deering &
Down, and Marissa Lynae.

Congratulations are in order to a couple of Memphians who will be
recipients of the Blues Foundation‘s Keeping the Blues
Alive award. The awards will be given as part of the International
Blues Challenge weekend in February, but winners were announced this
month and included local documentarian Willy Bearden in the
“Film, Television, and Video” category and Betsie Brown in the
“Publicist” category.

Brown works with roots acts of all stripes via her Blind
Raccoon company and has a couple of clients making news right now.
Memphis musician Kim Richardson recently won the
singer-songwriter contest at the Ozark Folk Festival in Eureka
Springs, Arkansas. Richardson has a new album out, True
North, and will next perform locally alongside Susan
Marshall and Reba Russell at Otherlands on December 6th.

Additionally, area blues stalwarts Billy Gibson and Super
Chikan recently traveled to Spitzbergen, Norway, to perform at the
Dark Season Blues Festival.

Local rockers Lucero have been quiet since signing to
major-label Universal earlier this year and celebrating with their
second-annual Lucero Family Picnic. With guitarist Brian Venable
celebrating the birth of his first son, frontman Ben Nichols has
taken the opportunity to record his solo debut, The Last Pale
Light in the West.

A seven-track “mini LP,” The Last Pale Light in the West was
recorded with occasional Lucero sidemen Rick Steff and Todd
Beene and features songs inspired by the Cormac McCarthy novel
Blood Meridian. The album will be released in January on the
band’s own Liberty & Lament label. But you can get it early
— meaning now — via the band’s website,
LuceroMusic.com, either in
hard-copy form or as an instant MP3 download. Nichols has also recorded
a cover of Johnny Cash’s “Delia’s Gone” for All Aboard: A Tribute
to Johnny Cash, now available on Anchorless Records.

Categories
Music Music Features

Collective Front

In recent years, Memphis has had no shortage of music-industry
organizations looking to help shape the city’s scene. The city boasts a
very active regional chapter of the national Recording Academy, a
government-funded Memphis & Shelby County Music Commission forever
trying to find its footing, and the Memphis Music Foundation, a private
group spun off from the commission that has in the past year ramped up
its staff and programming.

Is another large-scale music organization really needed? According
to the 32-and-counting local music businesses that have come together
to form Music Memphis, the answer is yes.

The organization had its genesis at last year’s South By Southwest
Music Festival, where Third Man guitarist Jeff Schmidtke organized a
Memphis music showcase with help from his music-enthusiast friend Eric
Ellis. In the process, they struck up a relationship with Louis Jay
Meyers, a SXSW founder who relocated to Memphis a few years ago as the
executive director of the Folk Alliance.

Back in Memphis, the trio called around to local music businesses to
organize meetings with the purpose of finding out how everyone could
help each other. Music Memphis was born.

“Music Memphis is a collection of Memphis music business, primarily
focusing on people who deal with consumers,” Meyers says. “It was
created with one purpose in mind: Put butts in the seats, get people
into record stores, create more activity for local music
businesses.”

Among the 32 local entities listed as Music Memphis members on the
group’s website are record stores (Goner, Shangri-La, Spin Street,
Cat’s), clubs (Hi-Tone, New Daisy, Minglewood Hall), labels (Makeshift,
Madjack, Archer), music stores (Amro, Memphis Drum Shop, Guitar
Center), and other organizations (Folk Alliance, Memphis Rap.com, Live From Memphis).

Despite the crowded field of music organizations in town, Meyers
thinks Music Memphis has a niche of its own.

“We’ve worked hard not to be redundant,” he says. “Our goal is not
to supplant other organizations. My experience is that most
organizations in the music industry tend to be focused toward the
artists. We’ve got people promoting Memphis to the world, and we’ve got
people helping musicians with career development, but there was nobody
dealing with the consumer aspect of the music business.”

Right now, Music Memphis is a pretty loose-knit group, but Meyers
says the organization will be applying for legal nonprofit status and
will be forming a board of directors. Most funding, however, is likely
to be internal.

“A goal was for us not to pursue funding from governments and
foundations and stuff like that,” Meyers says.

For Meyers, Schmidtke, and Ellis, all transplants to Memphis,
motivation seems to be getting more locals participating in and
appreciating the city’s music scene, with Meyers and Ellis both citing
outreach and cultural development in East Memphis and the suburbs.

“Jeff and I are both from New Orleans, but I’ve never been in a city
that, across the board, in so many genres, has this much talent,” Ellis
says.

“It’s been awhile since we’ve had a real music city in America, the
way Austin was at one time and Seattle was at one time,” Meyers says.
“Memphis has the ability to be that music city.”

Here are some of the first initiatives Music Memphis is focusing
on:

Memphis Music Night at Grizzlies Games: The organization has
created a partnership with the Grizzlies to program a “Memphis Music
Night” at one home game each month this season. The first one is on
Saturday, November 22nd, against the Utah Jazz. Local music acts will
perform throughout the arena — in the lobby, in each of the
four restaurant/lounges, at halftime, and for the national anthem. In
addition, the Grizzlies are supplying game tickets for Music Memphis to
distribute among its member organizations to use as incentives to drum
up business.

Music Memphis Card: The organization is working on a discount
card to be purchased from member organizations and to be used for
discounts and other opportunities to drive business. “Let’s say
Minglewood Hall has a show, and they know they’ll have about 300
tickets they aren’t going to have sold,” Meyers says, providing an
example.

“They could have a 2-for-1 special for Music Memphis card-holders.
The idea is direct promotion to consumers.”

TV Show: The most ambitious of projects Music Memphis has
announced is the development of a weekly local-music television
program.

“It’s gone through a metamorphosis,” Meyers says of the project’s
status. “We’re in the process of confirming the venue to shoot it in.
We don’t know exactly what the final product will be like. It will have
a live element but will be pre-recorded.”

Meyers says the group has been offered a weekly timeslot with a
local network station. “I believe we’re looking for a pilot episode in
December with a goal of launching on a weekly basis in mid-to-late
January,” he says.

It sounds like a daunting undertaking for a new organization that
currently lacks funding or central leadership, but Meyers says the
television piece is key:

“We feel like we need the TV show to market everything else. We
don’t want to be preaching to the choir. We want to reach the people
who aren’t going out to clubs.”

South By Southwest: Promoting Memphis at Austin’s South by
Southwest Music Festival was part of the origin of the Music Memphis
idea, and Meyers, Ellis, and Schmidtke plan on building on this
pre-existing relationship, working with the Memphis Music Foundation on
“a massive Memphis presence at SXSW,” according to Meyers.

“As Music Memphis, we’re producing a second showcase and working on
other unofficial events, but in a complementary role with the
foundation,” Meyers says.

“Last year, when Jeff basically organized that whole thing, about a
month later, SXSW called us and said, ‘We need what you did last year
on paper.’ They’re taking what we did last year to other music cities
and selling it: ‘Look at what Memphis did. You can do this.'”

MySpace.com/MusicMemphis

Categories
Politics Politics Feature

The Judgment Stands

Mark Brown, the communications/political director of the
Tennessee state Senate caucus, has responded to last week’s wrap-up in
this space concerning his party’s 2008 electoral misfortunes.

In the course of an extended e-mail conversation, Brown begins with
this assertion: “There was never a television ad that claimed
Dolores Gresham ‘had voted X number of times’ to raise her pay.
Our accusation, which was fully documented in our ads, was that Gresham
voted to increase her pension, which is pay. Also, this was a vote for
a very specific bill, which, again, was documented in the spot. This
was not a vote ‘for the same routine bookkeeping resolutions that
everyone else had.’ To the contrary, Gresham specifically voted for a
bill that increased her legislative pension. Your assertions are flatly
incorrect, and I believe you should print a correction.”

The context of my discussion of the race for the state Senate in
District 26 between Democrat Randy Camp and Republican Dolores
Gresham was the fact that, as I saw it, in race after race, the
Democrats, who lost the state House and trail the Republicans in the
Senate now by five votes, had largely invited misfortune by depending
too heavily on negative, patently misleading advertising.

Brown’s objection is well-taken in two particulars: 1) that, as he
says, mailers sent out by the Democrats did reference the party’s
candidates’ position on “the economy, jobs, and health care”; and 2)
that the indicated pay-raise ad did not claim that Gresham had voted
for an increase multiple times, only a single time.

That’s as far as I can go in crediting Brown’s objections, however.
As he acknowledges, the 2006 vote that the anti-Gresham ad references
was in two parts — a main bill that passed the House by the
nearly unanimous margin of 86-1 and an amendment to it that was so
uncontroversial as to pass by acclamation. Moreover, the
bill-cum-amendment did no more than adjust legislative pensions to
cost-of-living increases.

Given the fact that, of members present, only one member of the
House, Harry Tindall (D-Knoxville), voted against the measure
while another, Stacey Campfield (R-Knoxville), was recorded as
“present, not voting,” it is obvious that it enjoyed virtually
universal support across party lines and that it was as close to a pro
forma “routine bookkeeping resolution” as ever comes before the
legislature.

Moreover, to contend, as Brown does, that a pension is “pay” is a
stretch, and his subsequently made points that the amendment component
of the bill was introduced on the floor by a Republican and was
discussed out loud would seem to be irrelevant.

Brown also takes exception to my having noted that official
Democratic Party statements attempted misleadingly to saddle write-in
candidate Rosalind Kurita, a Democrat who had significant
Republican help, with support for a state income tax solely because she
was financially backed by former Republican governor Don
Sundquist. (For the record, Kurita was resolutely opposed to
Sundquist’s income tax proposals as a senator.)

Brown’s response to that is something of a nolo contendere. After
acknowledging that “we hit Kurita on Sundquist because Sundquist gave
her campaign contributions,” he amplifies on that later by claiming
that Republicans often have made unfairly sweeping allegations
concerning Democratic support for an income tax (a point well taken),
so that “[w]e pushed back by pointing out that Republicans were taking
campaign contributions from Don Sundquist, the father of the state
income tax; however, other than press releases and a few automated
calls, this was never a major piece of our messaging.”

I’ll let that statement speak for itself.

I appreciate Brown’s polite and responsive way of dealing with
points made both in my column and in e-mails to him. In defending his
party’s electoral strategy, ex post facto, he’s arguably doing what a
dedicated party spokesperson should be doing.

However, I stand by my original proposition that state Democrats
lost ground in the election at least partly because of reliance on
negative and misleading advertising. Granted, numerous Republican ads
were equally offending. But, if anything, Brown’s response seems to me
to confirm my original argument.

• In a ceremony on Monday, Kemp Conrad, winner of a
special election to succeed Scott McCormick, now president of the
Plough Foundation, was sworn in as the newest member of the City
Council.

Categories
News News Feature

QA

Q&A: Murray Wells,

attorney for transgender murder victim Duanna Johnson

Last summer, transgender woman Duanna Johnson was the victim of a
beating by a Memphis police officer inside the Shelby County Jail. One
evening last week, she became the victim of murder.

Johnson’s body was discovered near the corner of Hollywood and
Staten in North Memphis. Police say she was shot in the head, and
witnesses claim to have seen three men running from the scene, but no
suspects have been arrested.

Prior to her death, Johnson was suing the city for $1.3 million.
Though she lived to see officers Bridges McRae and James Swain fired
from the police department, the case was on hold pending possible
criminal indictments against the officers.

Her attorney, Murray Wells, spoke with Johnson the day she was
killed. — by Bianca Phillips

Flyer: What did
you and Johnson talk about the last time you spoke?

Wells: I knew she was going through a tough time. I suggested
she go home [to Wisconsin] where her mother was. Duanna was living in a
house with no power. She had no money. I told her I’d buy her a bus
ticket and give her some money to get there. She called on Sunday and
said she was ready to go.

What was life like for her? Because of who she was, she
wasn’t able to work. People wouldn’t accept her. There were two faces:
the side of her that was funny and warm and the other side that was
tension and frustration.

Johnson’s birth name was Duannell, but
Memphis police called her Dwayne in their statement about the homicide.
They also called her Dwayne after video of her being beaten at the jail
was leaked.

I’m pretty offended by the insensitivity of the Memphis Police
Department. The very onset of the beating of Duanna was precipitated by
them failing and refusing to call her by her name. They’ve never
acknowledged that her name was Duannell or Duanna.

I find it offensive that, with the city taking all these steps to
assure the public of how open-minded they are, they would release a
press statement that called her Dwayne and called her a
male.

What will happen with the lawsuit against the city?

Our intention is not to walk away from the situation. We think harm
occurred, and someone needs to be held responsible. We think the
lawsuit can still be an effective mechanism to promote policy change in
law enforcement.

The only remedy we’ll be able to get is a finding that [the police
department is] guilty, and the only punishment we can get is monetary
damages. The theory is, you make it sting bad enough, and it’ll never
happen again.

If you win damages, who would get the money?

An estate will be opened up for Duanna, and someone will have to
administer her estate. I suspect that would be her mother.

Were
the officers who beat Duanna criminally charged?

We expect that McRae will be criminally indicted and will face
prison time.

Do you think Duanna’s gender identity had anything
to do with her murder?

Regardless of who did it or why they did it, she was where she was
that night because she had no other place to go. I think being
transgender made it hard for her to live a normal life in terms of
employment and relationships. Many people think that being transgender
was a choice Duanna made for herself, but it was not.

Categories
Opinion The Last Word

Rant

White House staffers have been revealing a

“genuine sadness” around the West Wing these days. One report

said that President Bush was concerned that his presidency is being
compared

to Herbert Hoover’s. But that would be an insult to Hoover. His
morale was reportedly so low, he practically

gushed when honored by the Air and Space Museum that everything was
“fabulous,” from the brave troops to his fabulous Dad. Sarah Palin went
out of her way in a Miami speech to thank Bush for keeping the nation
safe from another air attack of hijacked domestic carriers, while our
currency sank like the Lusitania. An anonymous assistant
explained that Bush is so distraught because his administration had
planned to spend his last few months in office doing “legacy stuff,”
but the sudden economic collapse prevented them from accomplishing
much. Let me clue the Bush folks in: The economic collapse is
his legacy.

While all crashes down around him, Bush still persists in believing
that a deregulated free market is the soundest regulator of itself
— a true believer until the bitter end, just like Herbert Hoover.
No, Bush’s “legacy stuff” consists of criminal capitalism masked by a
populist concern for small “bidness,” the war in Iraq, torture,
rendition, Abu Ghraib, Gitmo, Blackwater mercenaries, illegal
wire-tapping, the corruption of the Justice Department, and the No-Fly
List. And who doesn’t know in their heart that it was Dick Cheney who
ordered the outing of CIA agent Valerie Plame to get even with his
critics and that it will only be a matter of days before the criminal
Bush gives a full pardon to the patsy Scooter Libby? And now we’re
treated to a battery of headlines in the conservative media about how
horribly Bush has been treated by all parties in the recently concluded
election.

Are we supposed to feel sympathy for Bush because his name was
exceeded in toxicity only by Cheney’s? No one wanted to be seen with
him, including McCain. Bush was the bubonic plague, the kiss of death,
and the evil eye for any Republican who dared utter his name. All he
has attempted is in tatters, especially the Constitution, so it will
take the new president at least half his first term to unravel Bush’s
political dingleberries. But now he’s feeling lonely because he’s no
longer popular. This from a man who came to the office with no vision,
only a cult of personality that carried him along like a leaf in a
gutter after a rain storm. The Bush presidency was the biggest farce
foisted upon a gullible populace since Milli Vanilli, and the full
effects are yet to be felt by all those hapless loyalists who have lost
their jobs and don’t even know it yet.

Possibly Bush’s greatest accomplishment, aside from re-starting the
Cold War, is his escaping impeachment. When Speaker Nancy Pelosi
announced in 2006 that “impeachment was off the table,” I remembered
Tip O’Neill, who said in reference to Nixon in similar circumstances
that “the best interests of the country must come first.” Nancy, you’re
no Tip. And Bush’s most egregious and visible violation is that he
betrayed his oath of office to protect and defend the Constitution and
he knows it. That’s why he’s working double time to write immunity for
himself and his cronies into law before he leaves office. Bush
envisions a leisurely life, commuting between a home in Dallas and the
ranch, when he’s not off on a lucrative speaking tour to “fill the old
coffers.” But I envision Bush answering summons after summons without
protection from a Republican president, in the way Gerald Ford
protected Richard Nixon. This is a man with questions to answer, and
it’s best that they be asked under oath.

George W. Bush is the Frankenstein monster created by the unholy
alliance of fundamentalist Christianity and a godless corporatocracy.
He was a Pied Piper, born-again evangelical, ruthless free-market
capitalist who granted access to untold riches for the already rich
while preaching that “government is the problem” to the social
conservatives. Even now, while jobless claims are skyrocketing, retail
sales are plummeting, and the GOP coalition has been shattered, a Pew
Poll found that 60 percent of people who identified themselves as
Republicans believe the party should go in a more conservative
direction. Nixon’s 1968 “Southern strategy” has come to its fruition,
the GOP has become the party of the Old South.

Mine is not the only family who has decided to cut back this
Christmas. Instead of lavishing presents on everyone, we’re going to
draw names and buy one nice present each. Other families are teetering
on the verge of bankruptcy or foreclosure this holiday season, with
nothing to hope for but a new administration. So when Bill O’Reilly
revs up his annual “War on Christmas,” he need look no further than the
White House to see the Grinch.

Categories
Fashion Fashion Feature

Shop This

So, you’ve made a commitment to shop locally. Thank you. You’re
doing your part to help the economy, at least in your own backyard. But
there’s more. Now, let’s save the planet — one commute at a time.
By changing the way you get from point A to point B, you can
significantly reduce your carbon footprint and your waistline (yea!)
while putting more cash into your pockets.

EASY RIDER. Why bike? For starters, you’ll stop pumping carbon
monoxide into the atmosphere and you’ll start pumping endorphins. The
health benefits of cycling include boosting metabolism, minimizing
risks of coronary heart disease, and increasing stamina. Beyond that,
imagine how cool you’ll look on this super-stylish on/off-road beauty.
As an extra bonus, you’ll save money on gas and parking is a breeze.
This bike features power-assisted, one-hand 8-speed shifting, plus
leather grips and saddle. And if getting fit, saving money, and cutting
down on your carbon emissions aren’t enough to convince you, check out
the rave user reviews at bikeforum.net. Bianchi Milano Café
Racer, starting at $600. Find it locally at Outdoors,
Inc., 833 N. Germantown Pkwy. (755-2271) or 1710 Union
(722-8988).

RUN TIME. According to Eric Flanders, owner of Fleet Feet, the
biggest thing in “green” running is the new BioMOGO foam midsole from
Brooks. Typical midsoles use EVA (ethylene vinyl acetate) and take
about 1,000 years to decompose in a landfill — now that’s a
serious carbon footprint. The BioMOGO foam used in some of Brooks’
newer shoes is treated with a product that attracts microbes that will
consume the foam (in a landfill environment, not on your foot) causing
the shoe to break down in about 20 years. Pick up the Brooks Trance-8
for $140 (men’s and women’s). Fleet Feet, 571 Erin Dr.
(761-0078).

GET SMART. If driving is your only option, there are a few ways to
at least drive smarter. One option is to invest in a car equipped with
a hybrid engine; the other is to drive a smaller, more fuel-efficient,
gas-powered vehicle. Say hello to the Smart Fortwo. It may not be the
fastest car on the road, topping out at around 90 mph, but the Smart
Fortwo gets a reported 46.3 mpg in the city and a super-impressive 68.9
mpg highway. And according to Mike Butler, new car sales manager at
Infiniti Memphis, the Smart Fortwo isn’t just for tiny folks; the
interior is roomy enough to accommodate a driver or passenger over 6
feet tall. Infiniti Memphis has one on the lot, a silver Fortwo Passion
for $23,500. Infiniti Memphis, 1831 Getwell (744-1111).

ECO-HIP SUV. What’s that? You have a long, bike-prohibitive commute?
You have kids, dogs, soccer gear, and you need to carry more than one
bag of groceries at a time? Don’t beat yourself up. You still can be a
savvy, eco-friendly traveler and do your part to save the earth, one
mile at a time. The ever-gorgeous Lexus RX 400 hybrid gets 21 mpg in
the city, 24 mpg on the highway and wildly favorable reviews from the
likes of U.S. News & World Report. Starting at $49,555.
Lexus of Memphis, 2600 Ridgeway (362-8833).

Shop This is compiled by Shopgirl. E-mail shopgirl@memphisflyer.com with
tips and suggestions for items to be promoted. Please send a daytime
phone number and print-quality digital images for
consideration.

Categories
Special Sections

Looking for Love

Perhaps Memphis needs its own personal ad: “MIXED-RACE CITY ISO
singles ranging in age from mid-20s to early 30s. The city offers rich
musical history, affordable housing, and the best barbecue in the
world.”

In a recent national study on cities’ abilities to attract singles,
Memphis and the metropolitan area came in number 70 out of the 100
largest U.S. cities.

“Memphis is a work in progress,” says Bert Sperling, the president
of Sperling’s Best Places, the company that conducted the research for
Worldwide ERC and Primacy Relocation’s 2008 Best Cities for Relocating
Singles.

“When it comes to the best places to live these days, Memphis isn’t
usually one of the first places people think of. It has a nasty crime
rate and that tends to hurt a city in studies like ours,” Sperling
says.

For comparison, Little Rock ranked 35, and Nashville came in at
number 41.

The fifth annual study looked at economic factors such as
unemployment, job growth, and affordable housing. It also took into
account adventure opportunities, prevalence of bars and restaurants,
health clubs, and sporting events. Weather, crime rate, and the number
of residents who subscribe to an online dating service factored in, as
well.

“We gave cities an arts and recreation score based on the number of
museums with an ability to attract significant traveling exhibits,”
Sperling says. “And we looked at sporting events because that’s a great
place to take a date.”

Sperling says Memphis rated a four out of 10 for arts amenities.

Memphis resident Rachel Stinson relocated here from Batesville,
Arkansas, in 2004 to attend Rhodes College and now works in human
resources for Target.

“I don’t go to clubs, so I’d rather meet someone at a cultural
event, such as at the Orpheum or the Cannon Center or the Brooks
[Museum of Art],” Stinson says. “But when I’m visiting those places, it
seems like everyone there is already there with a date.”

Stinson doesn’t subscribe to an online dating service, but she says
she does get plenty of offers through MySpace. So far, though, none of
them has panned out.

“On my profile page, I wrote that I voted for Obama, and a few days
ago, I got a message from a guy that said: ‘I voted for Obama too.
Wanna have lunch? Call me,'” Stinson says. “I deleted the message
without even checking his profile.”

Rob France, a 24-year-old instructor with the Teach for America
program, moved here from Wilmington, Delaware, in 2006. He says finding
dates in Memphis hasn’t been a problem.

“It’s kind of a difficult city to break in and get to know people,
but when I first moved here I was pretty busy in the classroom,” France
says. “Now I’m settled in, and it’s a lot easier to meet people.”

Though Memphis scored low in the study, Sperling says Memphis has
done a good job at retaining young people. The percentage of singles in
Memphis ages 25 to 34 is on par with the national average.

“This is a snapshot in time, and overall I think Memphis is
improving,” Sperling says. “It’s not like Detroit, which is not doing
well at all. Memphis is actually making progress in becoming a better
place to live.”

Categories
Theater Theater Feature

Nine Lives Playhouse on the Square gets Seussical.

Viva el gato en sombrero! Apparently, Memphis audiences just can’t
get enough of that Seussical stuff, which is something of a
miracle when you consider that when it debuted in 2000, the ambitious
Dr. Seuss musical nearly transformed the world’s most famous feline
into rank road kill in a red-and-white-striped hippie hat. The original
production was conceived on a massive scale and combined characters,
locations, and plot elements from more than a dozen or so of Theodor
Geisel’s most beloved stories. And it didn’t survive too long on
Broadway, either. Reviewers trashed it and called it a snore; some
viewers thrashed it and thought it a bore. It was badmouthed and
trashmouthed and called consonantal. It couldn’t even be saved by Ms.
Rosie O’Donnell.

The most common diagnosis provided for the show’s critical and
commercial failure was that Seussical, while colorful,
thoughtfully scored, and based on tried-and-true source material, was
also an unfocused mess, crammed with too much Seussishness for anyone’s
comfort. Although his imagination could be baroque, Geisel was
essentially a minimalist. The original Cat in the Hat was
written as an exercise for young readers and only uses 236 mostly
monosyllabic words, so it’s not hard to imagine how Dr. Seuss’ simple,
delightfully strange imagery was swallowed whole by the glitz and
sizzle of a Broadway megamusical.

The show has since been recut, re-arranged, and turned into a
serviceable, not entirely uncharming little one-act focusing almost
entirely on the stories Horton Hears a Who! and Horton
Hatches the Egg, with brief forays into Yertle the
Turtle, How the Grinch Stole Christmas!, Green Eggs
and Ham, and I Had Trouble Getting to Solla Sollew.

There’s a lot to like about POTS’ Seussical and perhaps even
a lot to love. But there’s plenty to loathe too, especially if you’re a
purist and don’t want anybody messing with the shape of your childhood
memories.

Andrew Moore provides a hangdog take on Horton, the philosophical
pachyderm who can save an entire planet full of microscopic people but
can’t save himself from being conned into hatching an egg for a
brightly painted bird that would rather have fun. Kim Baker is even
more beguiling and tragic as Gertrude McFuzz, a less than fancy bird
who loves Horton but can never seem to catch his eye. As the Sour
Kangaroo who’s out to prove Horton a fool, Jennifer Henry makes the
most of Seussical‘s gospel-tinged score. Courtney Oliver, POTS’
able Jane-of-all-trades, has lovingly remounted director Gary John La
Rosa’s frenetic, whimsically theatrical staging.

On the other hand, it’s more than a little disconcerting that the
Wickersham Brothers are costumed as though they were part of a gay
minstrel show, in broadly stereotypical black leather pants, bar vests,
and motorcycle hats. Just as I started to think I might be a
dirty-minded so-and-so reading more into the costuming than was
actually there, out came the banana-shaped microphones. Adults will
giggle, and the kids will only see it as fun. But c’mon, people. What
happens in Tuna, Texas, really should stay in Tuna, Texas.

On this rare occasion, Rebecca Powell’s costumes are never much to
get excited about. The colors pop out against Bruce Bergner’s
magnificent white-on-white set, but the nonrepresentational outfits are
seldom Seussesque and never quite imaginative enough to spark the
imagination.

Bergner’s icy set reflects every color of the spectrum and is
another matter entirely. Using nothing but a jagged squiggle of a stair
unit, a pair of dangerously angled ladders, and a tree made from an
upside-down ceiling fan, Bergner forces the imaginations wide open with
austere silliness and a dash of horror.

And what of the Cat in the Hat? A manic, rubber-faced Eric Duhon
gets everything just about right. But this isn’t really the Cat’s show.
Even as a narrator he seems superfluous: a dangling, vaguely menacing
trademark bouncing and prancing across the stage.

Through January 11th at Circuit

Playhouse