Tag: At Large

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At Large Opinion

A Digression

This layabout lacks ambition. (Photo: Bruce VanWyngarden)

I have been living by myself for the past week or so. My wife went to a legal convention in Minneapolis, and then went to visit our grandchildren in New York. In the old days, I would have said I’ve been “batching it,” meaning I’m living like a bachelor. But now, as I type it, I don’t understand why there’s a “t” in “batching.” Or is there? If I weren’t temporarily living alone, I’d ask my wife. She probably wouldn’t know, but she’d have an opinion, and that’s all you can really ask for in a relationship.

And now I’m reminded of the phrase, “confirmed bachelor,” which those of you of a certain age will remember. My favorite uncle was a confirmed bachelor. He lived for 30 years or so with his friend Richard, who was also a confirmed bachelor. That was some seriously confirmed batching it. My father always said he wished his brother would find a “nice gal” and settle down. I never knew if he was really that clueless or just trying to hide the truth from his children.

Anyway, I digress. But, to be honest, this column is beginning to look like a string of digressions in search of a point. I hope you’ll bear with me. I’m on my own here. Except for my dogs, who are both lying on the floor in my office. Their lack of ambition is appalling.

Sorry, another digression. My bad. I will find a point. I promise.

So, I read this week about the Sentinelese Tribe, who for 50,000 years have lived on one of the Andaman Islands in the Indian Ocean. They are the most isolated group of people in the world. They violently reject all visitors, firing arrows and slinging spears at any who dare approach their beaches. They killed the last person who tried to land, in 2018. It is thought that they are so violent against visitors because whenever an outsider has made contact in the past, the tribe was exposed to diseases that wiped out large segments of the population. After decades of various attempts at contacting them, the government of India has determined that no further attempts shall be made to communicate with the Sentinelese and that they should be left alone. Like me. So I can finish this column.

A friend recently sent me a video of a compelling commencement speech at Northwestern University by Illinois Governor JB Pritzker. It addressed the subject of kindness: “When we encounter someone who doesn’t look, live, love, or act like us,” he said, “our first thought is rooted in fear or judgment. It’s an evolutionary response. We survived as a species by being suspicious of things that we aren’t familiar with.”

The governor went on: “In order to be kind, we have to shut down that animal instinct, that fear, and force our brain to travel a different pathway. Empathy and compassion are evolved states of being that require the mental capacity to step past our basic instincts. … When someone’s path through this world is marked by acts of cruelty, they have failed the first test of an advanced society. They never forced their animal brain to evolve past its first instinct.”

I disagree somewhat with the governor on this latter point. Yes, there’s an instinctual cruelty that comes from fear — like that of the Sentinelese — but there is also rampant in our society — and our politics — an intentional cruelty that uses weak and disadvantaged people for personal gain, that weaponizes the fear in others, that mocks their disabilities, body shape, and speech, that demonizes skin color, religion, gender, and sexuality, not because of some primordial fear, but for selfish ambition.

Governor Pritzker ended his speech by saying that in his experience, “the smartest person in the room was often also the kindest.” In my experience, the reverse is also true. Dumbasses are often mean. Avoid them. Don’t vote for them.

So, all of this digression needs a finish. Maybe this quote from Kurt Vonnegut will work: “And how should we behave during this Apocalypse? We should be unusually kind to one another, certainly. … Jokes help. And get a dog, if you don’t already have one.” Or two. At least. You’ll never be alone. Or cruel.

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At Large Opinion

Math Hysteria

Photo: Steve Mann | Dreamstime.com

You are about to enter a column with math, which I’m not usually great at, but this is important stuff. According to a recent Tufts University study, there were an estimated 8.3 million voters who were newly eligible for the 2022 midterm elections — “newly eligible,” meaning those who had turned 18 since the previous general election in November 2020. They are members of what’s commonly referenced as Generation Z (those born between 1997 and 2012).

The newly eligible voters — approximately 4.5 million of them white and 3.8 million people of color — turned out in historically high numbers, and voted overwhelmingly (by 27 percent) for Democrats in the 2022 midterms. Tufts reported that young voters swung results in Georgia and Nevada, and tilted races toward Democrats in Arizona, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania.

Another report, published by NPR in February, polled Gen Z-ers about their political concerns. They ranked “protecting abortion access” at a higher level than any other age group. It’s worth noting that Gen Z voters will be the most educated group in our history, statistically, and the higher a voter’s education level, the more likely they are to vote. And the majority of Gen Z college graduates are female.

Using this data, you could predict that women and young people are going to have an increasing say in electoral outcomes in the U.S. Or you could just look at recent statewide elections, where it’s already happening. Start with the abortion referendum in 2022 in blood-red Kansas, where abortion rights prevailed by a nearly 60 percent to 40 percent margin, thanks to an unprecedented turnout by women and young people. There were similar results in Michigan a few months later, where abortion rights prevailed 57 to 43 percent, and last week in Ohio, where pro-choice voters also won by a 57 to 43 percent margin.

Along with abortion rights, Gen Z voters cited racism, the environment, gun violence, and LGBTQ/gender issues among their top concerns. They are the least traditionally religious generation in our history.

It’s almost as if the Republican Party read that NPR report, saw the recent state election returns, and said, “You know what? Let’s see what we can do to really piss off young voters. Maybe we should start something like ‘a War on Woke,’ where we force women to have babies against their will and demand open-carry laws and suppress LGBTQ rights and drill for oil in baby seal habitats. That’ll show ’em we mean business!” I don’t know how else you explain what appears to be a GOP death-wish agenda for 2024.

It’s enough to make a logical person think that the upcoming election will be a walkover for the Democrats, but these coots ain’t made for walkin’. In the midst of this epic demographic swing toward youth, the Democrats are stuck ridin’ with Biden, an 80-year-old who Republicans are painting as a barely sentient geezer who can’t tie his own shoes. It’s ageist, unfair, and unfortunate, but it’s where we are.

Fortunately for the Democrats, in addition to the genius strategy of going against every policy favored by young people and women, the GOP seems hellbent on renominating a multiple-indicted 77-year-old loon with a Grateful Dead-like following of cosplaying cultists. He’ll be running for president in between court appearances and possible jail time for witness tampering. The media will consume and regurgitate Trump and his lies ad nauseam. Orange will be the new gack.

Frankly, given mortality tables, the odds of both of these Boomers getting through a stressful, yearlong presidential campaign without a health crisis seem slim. It seems more likely that we’ve got 14 months of chaos of one kind or another looming ahead.

This is when it helps to remember that even though the candidates might look the same as four years ago, the electorate will not. In the four years between the 2020 and 2024 elections, the country will have gained another 16 million young eligible voters. And in each of those four years, 2.5 million older Americans will have died, meaning there will be 10 million fewer older voters. That’s a net swing of 26 million younger eligible voters. I may not be good at math, but I know how to count change when I see it.

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At Large Opinion

An Innocent Man

Unbelievable. (Photo: Photographerlondon | Dreamstime)

“Good morning, sir. Do you know why I pulled you over?”

“No, I don’t.”

“You were going 67 in a 35-miles-per-hour zone.”

“No, I wasn’t.”

“Sir, I have your speed recorded on my radar gun.”

“Well, your ‘gun’ is wrong. There’s no way I was going that fast. In fact, I was going well under the speed limit.”

“No sir, you were going almost twice the speed limit, and I’m going to have to issue you a speeding ticket.”

“I wasn’t speeding.”

“Yes. You. Were. Remain here. I’m going back to my car to pull your vehicle information and write you a ticket.”

“Fine. I’m going to call my lawyer.”

“You do that.”

Five minutes pass.

“All right, sir. Here’s your citation. I’m required to inform you that you will have to appear in court, since you were going more than 25 miles per hour over the legal speed limit.”

“That’s fine. My lawyer just said, and I quote: ‘Don’t worry. They’re going to have a hell of a time trying prove you knew you were speeding.’”

“Sir, we don’t have to prove you knew you were speeding. We only have to prove you were speeding — and you were. My partner is in the squad car and he also can attest to your breaking the speed limit by more than 30 miles per hour. You also sped through a school zone, which doubles the fine.”

“Well, my lawyer said we’re going to get an alternate slate of cops, and they will testify that I was not speeding. And all I have to do is say I believe them. Check and mate, my friend.”

“An alternate slate of cops?”

“That’s right. If I sincerely don’t believe I was going that fast and I didn’t see any school-zone signs and an alternate slate of cops testifies I wasn’t speeding and I say I believe them, there’s no way they can find me guilty.”

“Uh, okay. Good luck with that strategy, pal. Your court date is on the citation. I suggest you don’t miss it. Going more than 25 miles per hour over the speed limit in a school zone can lead to jail time.”

“My lawyer says we’re going to subpoena your radar gun. He says we have evidence that it’s been tampered with by the manufacturer in Venezuela.”

“What? That’s insane.”

“Not if I sincerely believe it.”

“That’s not how the law works, sir.”

“Yes, it is. If I don’t believe I was going that fast and I didn’t see any school-zone signs and I have an alternate slate of cops and your radar gun has been tampered with, there’s no way those charges stand up in court. It’s a free-speech issue.”

“Okay [sighs, heavily], I’ve had enough of your bullshit for one morning. Tell it to the judge.”

“The judge is a biased thug who was appointed by someone who hates me.”

“The judge was not appointed by anybody. She was elected.”

“AHA! It was a stolen election! Boom! Case closed! If I don’t believe I was going that fast and I didn’t see any school-zone signs and I have an alternate slate of cops and your radar gun has been tampered with and it was a stolen election, there’s not a court in the country that would convict me. I’m an innocent man!”

“Whatever, sir. See you in court. You’re free to go.”

“Good! I’ve got a crowded theater to get to. I hear there’s a fire.”

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At Large Opinion

Lights Out!

These storms are no joke. (Photo: Shara Clark)

While driving through the city in recent weeks, I’ve found myself being re-routed around fallen trees and/or limbs several times. There were at least four big ones restricting access to streets within 10 blocks of my Midtown home. Out east, and up north in the Bartlett area, things were much worse.

It’s becoming the new normal. Over the course of several storm systems this summer, the number of Memphians without power at various times was well over 100,000, often for days.

And if it’s not wind turning off our lights, it’s ice, as heavily coated trees and limbs fall on power lines and leave us in the cold and dark. After February’s ice storm, thousands of people were without power, some for up to 10 days. The winter before, it was the same thing — with the added bonus of making our water undrinkable for several days.

MLGW says its infrastructure is outdated and being upgraded, but there’s no getting around the fact that the magnificent trees that shade us through Memphis’ asphalt-melting summers also shut off our air conditioners (and furnaces). If you add up the number of people in the city who’ve lost power just this year as a result of various weather incidents, it’s well into six figures, certainly well above the 100,000 number I cited above.

This was a tweet from MLGW in response to criticism from city council members during the 2022 ice storm: “It took three years to get our budget with a rate increase to fund our five-year improvement plan approved by City Council. We are in the third year of the five-year plan, which has been hampered considerably by the pandemic.”

So, now they’re in the fourth year of the plan. Forgive me if I remain skeptical — and not because I don’t think they’re trying. MLGW workers have been magnificent, working long hours, doing their best to fix a system not built for the increasing frequency of severe weather. They’re trying to play Whac-A-Mole and the moles are winning — with a big assist from global climate change.

The outcry always arises that we need to put our power lines underground. The utility’s response, and I think it’s legitimate, is that it would take decades and cost several billion dollars. So maybe let’s think outside the Whac-A-Mole box.

Some people are already doing it, of course. This has mostly taken the form of buying a gas generator to provide power when storms strike. I get the appeal, but let me suggest another option that came to me when I drove through the back roads of Arkansas last week. I couldn’t help but notice the surprising number of solar panels on rural houses and businesses, many of them new, some even being installed as I drove by. These folks are likely taking advantage of the Inflation Reduction Act’s solar Investment Tax Credit, which reduces tax liability on solar installation by 30 percent of the cost. In addition, taxpayers will be able to claim a 30 percent bonus credit based on emission measurements, which requires zero or net-negative carbon emissions.

So, instead of getting a generator, maybe consider installing solar panels. The initial cost is higher, but the long-term advantage is significant. In addition to a tax credit, you can even get paid for selling electricity back to the grid. Not to mention, solar panels are quiet and don’t pollute.

And here’s another thought: Maybe the city and/or MLGW could divert some of those theoretical funds for burying power lines into incentives to Memphis home and business owners for going solar.

I’m under no illusion that thousands of Memphians will immediately begin installing solar panels, but some will, especially if the benefits are publicized. It beats snarky tweets between city council and MLGW. And there are similar federal tax incentives for businesses that have solar technology installed, so why not sweeten the pot with local funds? Maybe we could get solar panels on our grocery stores. Or our 10,000 Walgreens.

We have to start somewhere. Continuing to chainsaw ourselves out from under fallen debris and wait to be reattached to the grid after every major weather event is not a plan. It’s time to re-route our approach to keeping the lights on.

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At Large Opinion

The Pander Posse

Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson (Photo: United States Supreme Court, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons, Photographer Fred Schilling)

Right-wing radio host, election denier, and rabid Trumper Charlie Kirk said last week that MSNBC host Joy Reid, Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee, and former First Lady Michelle Obama “used affirmative action” because they “do not have the brain processing power to otherwise be taken really seriously, so they had to steal a white person’s slot.”

This racist and misogynistic statement was part of Kirk’s response to the Supreme Court’s recent ruling that Harvard University and the University of North Carolina could no longer use affirmative action or any other race-based criteria in their admissions policies.

Did SCOTUS rule thusly because racism doesn’t exist any longer? (Maybe they don’t listen to Charlie Kirk.) Or because people of color are no longer discriminated against in the United States? Or because economic and educational opportunities are no longer intrinsically more difficult for minorities to attain? Or because white supremacist media stars with millions of listeners and viewers have ceased to exist?

Or did the Supreme Court rule against affirmative action because it has become a bought-and-sold verdict factory for the Republican Party’s troglodyte wing? I’m going with the latter, but that’s just me.

Not missing an opportunity to get some media attention, Tennessee’s noisy GOP attorney general, Jonathan Skrmetti, immediately jumped on the “reverse racism” bandwagon, along with GOP attorneys general from Kansas, Iowa, Indiana, Missouri, Nebraska, Arkansas, Mississippi, Alabama, South Carolina, Montana, Kentucky, and West Virginia. This pander posse proudly announced that they’d sent a letter to each of the country’s Fortune 100 CEOs warning them not to try any of that nefarious DEI (diversity, equity, and inclusion) stuff in their states, by God.

Here’s the money shot from the letter: “The Supreme Court’s recent decision should place every employer and contractor on notice of the illegality of racial quotas and race-based preferences in employment and contracting practices. As Attorneys General, it is incumbent upon us to remind all entities operating within our respective jurisdictions of the binding nature of American anti-discrimination laws. If your company previously resorted to racial preferences or naked quotas to offset its bigotry, that discriminatory path is now definitively closed.”

In other words, “You bigoted companies better not try any of that ‘woke’ stuff in our state or we’ll see you in court!” Ron DeSantis would be proud. These 13 gas-bags are pursuing the same economically suicidal policies that caused Florida’s largest employer (The Walt Disney Company) to drop plans for a nearly $1 billion corporate campus in Orlando that would have brought 2,000 high-paying jobs to the state. DeSantis’ anti-woke crusade has also resulted in the cancellation of several major conventions and conferences, a “brain drain” of the state’s scientists and teachers, and a drop in tourism. ‘Woke’ isn’t going to die in DeSantis’ Florida,” wrote the editorial board of the Miami Herald. “It’s just taking its dollars elsewhere.”

Tennessee, it should be noted, is headquarters to two Fortune 100 companies: FedEx and HCA Healthcare. Both corporations have active DEI programs. Google “DEI FedEx,” if you doubt it. I guess this means General “Stonewall” Skrmetti is about to absolutely, positively come down on them hard, right?

Tennessee is also home to facilities for several other companies on the Fortune 100 list, including Nike, Sysco, State Farm, Lowe’s, The Home Depot, and, not least, Ford, which is in the process of constructing a $5.6 billion plant in Western Tennessee to build EV pickup trucks.

Just for fun, here’s Ford’s DEI statement from its corporate website: “For more than a century, Ford has been a pioneer in providing opportunity to people regardless of race, gender, ability, sexual orientation and background. We view this less with pride than the sober realization that we must go further to create a company where our differences are truly valued and every team member can bring their whole selves to work. Creating a culture of belonging isn’t just the right thing to do, it’s also the smart thing. Diversity breeds innovation and the companies that attract the most talented and diverse workforce will succeed in our rapidly changing world. We are family. We celebrate our differences. We all belong.”

What kind of snowflakey bilge is that? Built Ford Tough? Really? It’s clear these woke assholes need to straighten up or get the heck out of Tennessee. Your move, General.

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At Large Editorial Opinion

Smoke on the Water

Try saying Naromiyocknowhusunkatankshunk Brook 10 times fast, we dare you.

Greetings from the shores of Naromiyocknowhusunkatankshunk Brook. Not the literal shores, to be honest. I just wanted to work the name of that stream into my column. I’m actually down the road a couple of miles, near the little town of Sherman, Connecticut, where my wife and I rented an Airbnb for 10 days and are being visited off and on by our children and grandchildren who live in and around New York City. 

Sherman is a quaint village (pop. 3,527) named after Roger Sherman, the only person who signed all four founding documents of the United States, but you knew that. (I think he was also one of the stars of Rocky and Bullwinkle, but don’t quote me.) Anyway, Sherman, the town, has one intersection, a nearby boutique IGA and liquor store, and not much else, except lots of swell-looking white clapboard houses and zillions of orange day lilies everywhere.

According to Wikipedia, Sherman is home to Daryl Hall, Jeffrey Toobin, Diane von Furstenberg, and Rob Zombie, though we have not run into any of them during our stay.

Our Airbnb is pseudo-rustic and has lots of beds and futon couches spread over three levels, plus a couple of big decks to sit out on and enjoy the surrounding forest, so it’s been nice. The temperatures have been wonderful — low- to mid-70s — and the rain sparse enough to allow plenty of beach and fishing time in the crystal waters of nearby Candlewood Lake. I have also spent some time fly-fishing in the melodiously named Squantz Pond, which is either a damn lake or the largest pond in America. Anyway, we are having good times.

Except for the smoke, and honestly, it’s only been really bad for one day. It seems we scheduled our vacation to happen just as those annoying Canadians began wafting wildfire detritus into the colonies again. (We really need to secure that border!) But it didn’t last long, so we held our breath and persevered.

We also timed our vacation to coincide with the hottest day on Earth since record-keeping began more than 40 years ago, according to scientists at the University of Maine’s Climate Reanalyzer project, but that was just luck. Over the July 4th holiday, the global average temperature reached an all-time high of 62.9 degrees Fahrenheit. This followed a June that was the warmest on record, worldwide. The heat index 70 miles south of us in New York City was 100 degrees on Independence Day, even though the actual temperatures in Sherman and New York were not that far apart. The difference being that we were in the woods, near cool water, and under tall, shady trees while New York’s concrete-and-exhaust-filled hellscape was exacerbating the sun’s heat to near-intolerable levels.

And, meanwhile in Memphis …

I pull up some local news sources on my laptop and read that things are pretty much in line with the new normal for summer: 100-degree days, one after another. Oh boy, I think, I cannot wait to get back.

I find myself heat-scrolling on what’s left of Twitter and end up reading a vox.com story called “Bus stops and playgrounds are too damn hot.” It addresses a problem that cities will increasingly deal with as temperatures rise over the next couple of decades: a lack of shade. It sounds simplistic, but it’s true. The temperature difference between the corner of Union and Cooper and the center of Overton Park’s Old Forest — four blocks away — can be more than 20 degrees, according to a study conducted a few years back.

While it’s true that Memphis is blessed with a canopy of trees over much of its landscape, we still need to ensure that public spaces such as bus stops and the like are adequately shaded. That would also include our public parks — making sure canopies, picnic shelters, or other shade options are plentiful, as well as water features such as sprinklers and wading pools. The days of frolicking in a big, open, unshaded space during the dog days of summer are behind us, Memphis. And for what it’s worth, the new Tom Lee Park is looking increasingly like genius — a project that’s gotten here just in time. Take it from Sherman.

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At Large Opinion

The Remissionary Position

Congressman Jamie Raskin of Maryland rocks a kerchief. (Photo: @CalltoActivism | Twitter)

I wrote a column in late January called “Daze of Christmas Past,” in which I recounted how I got diagnosed with cancer — large B-cell non-Hodgkins lymphoma — a couple weeks before Christmas. It was a really not-fun holiday surprise. As a bonus, since the tumor was attached to the front of my spinal column, I had to undergo a reconstruction of my upper spine to stabilize it prior to cancer treatment.

By the time I got home from the hospital, on Christmas Day, no less, I was stiff, sore, using a walker, and breathing from an oxygen tank at night. I felt like I was 95 years old. It will get better, the doctor said. Be patient. Or a patient. I can’t remember which. I didn’t move around much for a couple of weeks, but I began keeping a daily journal that I cleverly called “Cancer Diary.” I was scheduled to begin chemotherapy in late January. The odds of a cure, they told me, were 70 percent. Not so bad.

I watched on television as Congressman Jamie Raskin announced that he’d been diagnosed with the same cancer I had. He was about a month ahead of me in treatment, it appeared, so I decided to keep an eye on his progress. He was wearing a kerchief to cover his newly bald head — not a great look.

I read a lot about various natural cancer-fighting foods and decided to begin each day with a bowl of Cheerios and fresh berries, and with liquid mushroom extracts — lion’s mane, turkey tail, and reishi — on the highly scientific theory that it couldn’t hurt.

On January 24th, I began the first of six chemo treatments — one every three weeks — at West Clinic in Midtown. After I arrived and had some blood taken, I was escorted into the chemo area, a large room with 20 or so matching reclining chairs, each next to a rolling stand holding medical drip bags. There was a wall of windows facing Union Avenue, the cars filled with people who, like me, had probably never noticed this building or had any idea what happened inside. A Wendy’s was across the street.

I was taking the “R-CHOP” protocol, a well-established treatment for large B-cell lymphoma. It’s a regimen of cyclophosphamide, doxorubicin, prednisone, rituximab, and vincristine. So there. Mmmm.

The process began with three 40-minute drips: Tylenol, Benadryl, and an anti-nausea medication. The heavy stuff was to come a couple hours later. I was to be there “all day,” the nurse said. Two of my fellow drippees chattered ceaselessly on their phones. Others slept or listened to music through headphones. I guessed they were old hands at this. Six hours later, and I was no longer a chemo virgin.

Thus began the next five months of my life. I never had the horrible reactions to chemo that many people get — headaches, nausea, and other gastric thrills — but I got three or four days of extreme fatigue about halfway through each three-week cycle. My hair fell out in mid-February. I tried wearing various theoretically cool-looking toppers but decided finally to just roll with a chrome dome. Once my facial hair was gone, my head looked like a thumb.

I started writing my column again in late January and only missed a couple of weeks. I read voraciously on the Kindle my son bought me. It’s light and easy to hold in bed. My mother-in-law came from Spain to stay with us and help out until I “got better,” and she was a delight.

I had a couple of setbacks that led to visits to the ER and hospital stays, but I weathered the storms. The scans I took showed the tumor was shrinking — from an egg, to a walnut, to a grape, over the course of three months. Then, in late April, Congressman Raskin announced that “chemotherapy has extinguished the cancer cells.” I took this as a good sign. In the meantime, I was starting to feel pretty “normal.”

After my last chemo on June 5th, I got another PET scan. Three days later I got an email from my oncologist. “Scan showed remission,” it said. “More details when we meet.” Details, schmetails. I still have some follow-up treatments to get through, but apparently “chemotherapy has extinguished the cancer cells,” and I count myself a lucky man.

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At Large Opinion

Who’s Zooming Who?

Empire State Building (Photo: Nbogdev | Dreamstime.com)

“25 Empire State Buildings Could Fit Into New York’s Empty Office Space.” Now that’s a headline. The article, in the May 10th New York Times, was equally compelling, citing the high office-vacancy rates in the nation’s major cities and suggesting some creative possible solutions.

As many sociologists have pointed out, the physical layout of most large American cities is not set up to handle the work-from-home economy that was spurred by the pandemic. After the onset of the high-rise office building, circa 1920s, American cities became increasingly segmented into geographic spaces for home, work, and play.

That 100-year-old urban game plan is no longer working. The national office-vacancy rate as of April 5th, according to an FDIntelligence report, was 18.5 percent. The rate in Memphis for the first quarter, according to Cushman-Wakefield, was 16.2 percent. From Cushman-Wakefield: “The [Memphis] office market continues with lower than typical leasing activity though absorption remains positive. … Tenants continue to downsize into smaller spaces.”

The company I work for, Contemporary Media, Inc., is doing just that, moving from a lovely old Downtown building with brass elevators to a space that makes more sense economically. We learned during the pandemic that we are capable of putting out the Flyer and Memphis magazine and our other publications with our writers, editors, art staff, and sales staff working from home.

I’m writing this column from my couch (along with my dog, Olive), and have the Flyer’s Slack app open on my laptop so as to be able monitor communication between my co-workers and chip in with editing help when needed — or when I feel like joining in the genial smack talk. It’s like a free-flowing group text, only much more useful. We do have weekly in-person staff meetings, as well, so we can put on grown-up clothes, brainstorm, gossip, and remember what we look like. But it’s a far cry from the 40-hour-a-week office-and-cubicle farms we occupied for the first 40 years of the company’s existence.

Back to the Times: “To create a city vibrant enough to compete with the convenience of the internet, [cities] need to create mixed-use, mixed-income neighborhoods that bring libraries, offices, movie theaters, grocery stores, schools, parks, restaurants, and bars closer together. We must reconfigure the city into an experience worth leaving the house for.”

Is Downtown Memphis worth leaving the house for? Well, I can look out my soon-to-be-former office window and see the nascent construction of a new Memphis Brooks Museum, one that will cascade down the bluff to the river. There, it will overlook the spectacularly reimagined Tom Lee Park. A Downtown grocery store has sprung up on the south side, not far from a snazzy movie theater, which is adjacent to the city’s largest farmers market and the thriving South Main district. The Cossitt Library has just been beautifully redone. New restaurants are coming on, and long-time favorites are still thriving. Old buildings are getting new life. FedExForum, home of the Grizzlies and Tigers and big-ticket touring concert acts, is getting a multi-million-dollar facelift, as is AutoZone Park, home to the AAA Redbirds and the 901 FC soccer team. And I can think of at least five standalone breweries in the 38103. So yeah, I’d leave the house for some of that action — and do.

“We are witnessing the dawn of a new kind of urban area,” the Times concludes: “the Playground City.” That sounds nice, but it can go wrong. Consider, for example, how Downtown Nashville’s party wagons, mobile hot tubs, and cheesy honky-tonks are choking the city’s urban center at night — and demonstrating how a “playground city” can chase locals away rather than attract them.

Memphis needs to be smarter. If we want more people to live Downtown, we need to keep the noise down after a reasonable hour and restrict the more boisterous action to Beale Street and other designated areas. (Talkin’ to you, party wagons.) And Downtown needs to be closely monitored by police, with a presence that protects citizens and visitors without stifling the Memphis vibe.

The truth is, our Downtown probably doesn’t even have one Empire State Building’s worth of vacant office. We’re fortunate that mid-size cities like Memphis are poised to recover and adapt to a post-pandemic economy much more quickly than mega-cities. Let’s not screw it up, Memphis.

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At Large Opinion

No Ifs, Ands, and Bots

It was not obvious that something could go wrong. (Photo: Devidgrutz | Dreamstime.com)

I was shocked and dismayed recently at the most unlikely of places: a company lunch. I don’t get to the physical office much these days, so a co-worker kindly brought my mail to the get-together. Imagine my horror when four of the letters turned out to be hate mail, each criticizing a different column I’d written in the past few weeks.

The person who wrote the letters didn’t sign them (shocker), but it got me to thinking — maybe I’ve been too harsh lately. Maybe I need to tone down the rhetoric a bit. My wife, who’s much more tuned into the zeitgeist than me, suggested I try one of those new AI bots designed to help writers fine-tune their prose. I thought, why not?

After downloading a popular AI program, I submitted this week’s column to my new digital editor. It bleeped once and told me my options were: Proofread this but only fix grammar; Proofread this strongly; Proofread this lightly, improving clarity and flow; Proofread this significantly, improving clarity and flow. I went for the latter — I mean, why do things halfway? It was a revelation! What follows are samples of the column, followed by the digitally edited version in italics:

Just exactly what level of greed did it take to impel CNN to give twice-impeached, serial philandering, tax-cheating, insurrection-leading, secret-document-stealing, election-tampering, lying douchebag Donald Trump an hour of free television to spew his lies in a “town hall”?

Hello, fellow humans. This week’s column (by me) in the Memphis Flyer newspaper is about the CNN cable television network’s decision to hold an hour-long Town Hall on May 10th with Donald Trump, the former (2016-2020) president of the United States (the country in which we both reside). I think this is a bad idea.

This is the kind of unmitigated media avarice that got us Trump in the first place. From the moment the former president descended on that damned escalator to announce his candidacy in 2015, the television networks swooned, thrilled to learn that letting an orange-colored, poofy-haired, former reality-TV star spout racist, misogynistic garbage and lie his ass off made for stratospheric television ratings. Trump was the golden boy, and the networks gave their viewers wall-to-wall coverage of the candidate from that point forward, raking in unheard of levels of ad revenue all the while. What could go wrong?

When Donald Trump announced his candidacy in 2015, he rode an escalator down two levels. Television networks covered the event — which got excellent ratings — and continued to broadcast coverage of Mr. Trump for many hours a day throughout the campaign for the 2016 presidency. During this period, Mr. Trump made many controversial statements, which raised viewership levels and allowed television networks to earn high profits. It was not obvious that something could go wrong.

CNN says it will have a moderator for the town hall, but that Trump will answer direct questions from the audience, which, according to a network spokesperson, will include “Republicans and other voters.” In other words, Trump will have free rein to continue to lie about the 2020 election, the January 6th insurrection, those missing official documents, his rape trial, President Biden, the “Russia hoax,” and whatever other stream-of-consciousness fantasies erupt from his addled cortex. Awesome stuff, CNN!

CNN has announced that Mr. Trump will answer questions from members of the Republican Party and other voters. There will be a moderator for the discussion, topics for which are expected to include the 2020 election, the January 6th event at the U.S. Capitol, the handling of official government documents, and other possibly controversial subjects. CNN is awesome.

Fact-checking Trump in real-time is like standing under Niagara Falls with a bucket and expecting to keep your shoes dry. It can’t be done. He uses his mouth like an AR-15, and his lies are the bullets. Letting this ass wander around a stage with a microphone and a national television audience will only further normalize this dangerously aberrant behavior. Simply put, it’s journalistic malpractice, CNN. And I have two words for you: “You’re fired!”

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At Large Opinion

Look Away, Dixieland

Abraham Lincoln (Photo: Alexander Gardner, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons)

Here’s something of an ode to the South, my home for 30 years now. It’s called “Red States.” Enjoy.

Red States, where the state amphibian is the gerrymander; where the GOP supermajorities rule with a closed fist and minorities have no voice; where legislators are mostly rural, ignorant, and mean; where the governors are small men with small intellects and smaller hearts.

Red States, where Confederate flags still fly; where racism — subtle and blatant — still lives; and where its long, ugly history isn’t allowed to be taught in school.

Red States, where LGBTQ rights are threatened; where drag queens are vilified; where you can’t say gay (or gender) in school; where hateful ignorance (and lustful hypocrisy) comes dressed in the cheap suit of a rural preacher.

Red States, where books are banned; where libraries get unfunded; where public schools are starved and tax dollars go to private academies; where college students are urged to report their professors for thought crimes.

Red States, where abortion is murder; where forced pregnancy is the law; where doctors, hospitals, insurance companies, and pharmacies must conform to a religious doctrine; where 10-year-old rape victims must carry their rapist’s baby to term.

Red States, where more people live in poverty; where salaries are lower; where hunger is more common; where more housing is substandard; where homelessness is rampant.

Red States, where voting is harder; where precincts are fewer in poor neighborhoods; where students have to jump through hoops to register; where you can’t offer rides to the polls or a cup of water to those waiting in line.

Red States, where hospitals are dying from a lack of funds because Obamacare was named for a Black man; where health insurance isn’t for everyone; where alcohol, drugs, and cigarettes kill more people; where the infant mortality rate is high and getting higher; where life expectancy is low and getting lower.

Red States, where guns are sacred totems untouchable by the laws of man; where you can buy a pistol in 10 minutes and walk out with it strapped to your body; where innocent people are slaughtered; where the shrieks from grieving families go unheard; where mass shootings by disturbed humans carrying weapons of war are a necessary sacrifice, an offering that must be made to the Holy Church of the NRA, blessed be thy name. …

Oh Lord. Amen.

I’m so sick of this shit, so sick to death of what is happening in our so-called red states. And I’m particularly angry — and sad — about how this hateful cabal is slow-murdering the American South, turning it into a one-party banana republic and rolling back the calendar to the 1950s for all who dare to color outside the lines.

Not all red states are Southern, but all Southern states are red (with the possible shaky exception of Georgia). And those of us living here are experiencing what the entire U.S. would look like under unbridled GOP rule. Yes, we reside in a “blue” city, but you have only to look 180 miles to the east, to Nashville, where now-unchecked GOP legislators are trying to take over the airport authority, and where they attempted to reduce the number of members of the Nashville Metro Council because it voted to reject holding the Republican National Convention there. And if these bozos are jacking with Nashville, just imagine what mischief they could do in Memphis — a city they already hate because we have the nerve to be majority Black. (Not to mention, that uppity Justin Pearson comes from here.)

So is there any hope of changing any of this? Yes. Tennessee, for example, was a blue state until a decade or so ago. We can hope that the gun-reform furor that erupted in the wake of The Covenant School shootings will sustain, here and elsewhere. We can hope the pro-choice vote that has swung elections around the country in the past few months will turn out in 2024. And we can hope that at some point the South will rise again. Only better.

I’m reminded of a closing line from Abraham Lincoln’s second Inaugural speech, given as the bloody Civil War was staggering to a finish. It summed up his hopes for his divided country: “With malice toward none,” he urged, “with charity for all.” Amen to that. Amen, amen.