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Friday, January 21, 2005
Getting Ideas and Structure
A somewhat uneven, but overall good piece on how and why the left must change.
These days, all that has been stood on its head: In the wake of September 11, the right claims it wants to free oppressed people -- why, democracy is on the march! -- while the left is too often caught saying "I told you so" about the mess in Iraq, even as that country speeds toward an election that any decent human being should hope goes well. In 1968, who would have believed it possible that the left would be home to the dreary old "realists" while the right would be full of utopians?
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2. It must reclaim freedom. ... But when it comes to foreign policy these days, the left appears lost. I get depressed hearing friends sound like paleocon isolationists or watching them reflexively assume that there's something inherently tyrannical about the use of American power. It's not enough to mock Norman Podhoretz's insistence that the battle with Islamic terrorism is World War IV. Just as the left lacked a coherent position on what to do with murderous despots such as Milosevic and Saddam -- it won’t do to say, "They're bad, but . . ." The left now needs a position on how best to battle a Muslim ideology that, at bottom, despises all the freedoms we should be defending. America should be actively promoting the freedom of everyone on the planet, and the key question is, how would the left do it differently from the Bush administration? 3. It must reclaim pleasure. For the last 30 years, the right's been having fun -- Lee Atwater playing the blues, Rush Limbaugh giving that strangulated laugh, The Weekly Standard running those mocking covers -- while the left has been good for you, like eating a big, dry bowl of muesli. This isn’t simply because leftists can be humorless (a quality shared with righteous evangelicals), but because, over the years, they've gone from being associated with free love and rock & roll to seeming like yuppified puritans; hence the Gore-Lieberman ticket talked about censoring video games and brainy leftist Thomas Frank tirelessly debunks the pleasure of those who buy anything Cool or find Madonna meaningful. ... [Emphasis added.]
It's worth reading the whole thing. If the Democrats can figure some of this out, it wouldn't be hard to get voters like me going their way.
Thursday, January 20, 2005
Maybe It Will Actually Be Funny
I love old Mel Brooks movies. After History of the World, Part I, though, something seemed to be missing from them. The wife loves Spaceballs, but I find it a rather boring spoof -- it has some moments, but overall it wasn't nearly as funny as hoped. Now, it could be a limited cartoon series.
"We are thrilled to be working with a comic genius like Mel Brooks on what we're sure will be the highly successful translation of his classic film comedy to the medium of animation for TV," said BFC chief Rainer Soehnlein. "We look forward to our collaboration with him and with MGM, and to bringing 'Spaceballs' to a new audience." Brooks and Meehan, who co-penned the original screenplay, are set to write the pilot then supervise writing on the rest of the series. Brooks will also voice the two main characters, President Scroob and Yogurt for the cartoon. The comedic duo — who also teamed on the 1983 comedy "To Be or Not to Be" — are preparing for the forthcoming release of the screen version of their Broadway musical The Producers. Meehan (who also penned Hairspray and Annie previously told Playbill.com that they are also at work on a stage musical version of the Brooks film "Young Frankenstein." A musical version of Young Frankenstein? Ooper Duper!
The initial run of episodes is expected to be a 1 hour pilot and 13 half-hour episodes. While there are no details as to where it will be shown, the MGM Domestic TV group has several shows airing on the Sci-Fi Network.
The Circle Is Closing
Around former Mayor Mike White. Local exploiter of minority contracts businessman/consultant Nate Gray, a close friend Mr. White, has been indicted.
The 45-count indictment unveils the extravagance that Gray used to get public contracts for clients in Cleveland, New Orleans, Houston and East Cleveland. In one conversation with an associate, Gray said "90 percent of getting public contracts required greasing the palms of public officials," the indictment charges. And few used grease like Gray, authorities said. Gray, 47, of Orange, sought technically complex engineering and energy-savings contracts for such national firms as Honeywell Inc., CH2M Hill and Camp, Dresser & McKee, even though his education ended with high school and he has no training in engineering or architecture, according to the indictment.
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The indictment follows a two-year investigation into Gray's business dealings that included the FBI placing a hidden camera in his office. Authorities also placed wiretaps on Gray's phone and the phones of business associates, according to court documents. Gray made his name during the administration of his close friend former Cleveland Mayor Michael R. White by obtaining parking contracts at Cleveland Hopkins International Airport. Using hustle, well-placed friends and connections made with mayors and consultants at national conventions, he became known across the country as someone who could deliver contracts for businesses in urban markets. U.S. Attorney Gregory White declined to discuss Gray's relationship with the former Cleveland mayor.
Others were also indicted. The firms who hired Gray, and paid him the consulting fees have not been indicted. For now. They deny any wrongdoing or knowledge of what Gray was doing. As would be expected. I guess it will be a matter of what Gray knows and how much of a deal he can cut. Gray knows a lot. He's further up the food chain.
There are a lot of people having sleepless nights these days.
Wednesday, January 19, 2005
Typical Untypical Day
It's real hard to have an actual routine with a 2 1/2-year old. Rough approximation of a "typical" day is to get up before the wife; get showered and dressed; wake her up and get her to the shower, and make sure she has her stuff together to leave for work; Angie goes to bed late, so she usually gets up between 8:30 and 9 -- until she gets up is my morning time to work and blog; then its play/breakfast/getting dressed/tv in no particular order. This takes us to lunch. After lunch, it is some activity, errand or just more play. Then it is nap time -- more blogging and work for me. After about an hour she is up and we play and maybe watch a DVD. Then the wife comes home to let me get dinner started.
Today was a non-stop Angie fest. I came out of the bathroom to hear her chattering away quite happily -- up before 7 am. Angie-centric forecast with increased moodiness to full tantrums by noon. And so it went. By 1pm she was stressed and upset at everything. She finally collapsed on my lap some time after 1:30. But this was the kind of nap that doesn't allow me to lay her down. She wants to stay napping on me for the duration, and this would be a long nap. Thankfully, I had expected this happening and had Red Dwarf, Season 2 in the DVD player at the ready. Watched for about 2 hours.
This being Wednesday, the wife and Angie have a play class in the evening so I could look forward to a nice bit of quiet time in the house. So, of course, the wife wasn't feeling well tonight. I got to take her to play class. About 13 straight hours with the little darling.
I'm now in decompression mode in the office with a bit of vodka. Just my way of explaining why no blogging today.
Tuesday, January 18, 2005
Reports on Convention Centers
An article in the Cleveland Plain Dealer talks about a new report from the Brookings Institute that shows how the Convention business has been in serious decline even as more and more cities are putting more and more money into building and/or expanding convention facilities. As a result, more and more of the facilities are not even able to pretend that the convention facilities aren't taking major financial losses.
The Executive Summary of the report is here. The report is here (in PDF).
So how does Cleveland and Cuyahoga County treat such information:
Local leaders know competition is fierce in the convention center market. But they say the big-ticket investment is needed to recover market share lost because the Cleveland Convention Center is subpar. "We're very unattractive," Cuyahoga County Commissioner Peter Lawson Jones said Monday. "And it's not because we don't have complementary assets, but because our convention center is outmoded and antiquated."
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The Cleveland-Cuyahoga County Convention Facilities Authority will decide soon between building a new convention center behind Tower City or renovating the current center, at Lakeside Avenue and East 6th Street. Debate will also begin on financing hundreds of millions of dollars for the project. Cleveland is among 44 cities planning or building new or expanded centers, the study said. Fifty-three cities have built new or expanded centers since 2000. Yet convention attendance continues to slide, nearly 30 percent in cities such as Baltimore and Indianapolis, the study noted. Due to the glut of space, convention centers are offering deep discounts and operating at a loss. Brilliant. At the end of the article, the talk turns only somewhat to job creation, but more on job preservation. That may be the new tact. The people pushing it, may have finally figured out that people aren't going to buy the "thousands of new jobs" BS any longer. So, the new approach might be to scare people that things will get worse.
They also counter with their own report,
But those in the industry believe better times are ahead. Six of 10 meeting and convention planners said activity will pick up, according to a study released last June by Cleveland State University's College of Urban Affairs with Convention, Sports & Leisure, Inc. Think about that for a minute. Convention planners have livelihoods dependent on not just more conventions, but expectations for more conventions. And even then, only 6 of 10 could admit they expect business to improve. That study can be viewed here (also PDF). It's some 91 pages, and has some great stretches for the imagination. Here's one of my favorite from the conclusion (page 78).
Building a new convention center will require a public/private partnership. Greater Cleveland?s track record in terms of the performance of these partnerships should offer confidence that a financing and development plan can be designed to meet a host of objectives that include and satisfy progressive and practical fiscal goals. Since the 1980s, Cleveland and Cuyahoga County have designed and implemented a series of public/private partnerships to not only assist in the rebuilding of downtown Cleveland, but to improve the financial base of Cleveland and its public schools. There is important evidence that impressive progress towards these goals has been achieved, permitting Cleveland to provide services to its neighborhoods and to address the funding needs of the Cleveland Public Schools.
At a time when decentralizing and suburbanizing trends in the American economy persisted, the number of private sector jobs in downtown Cleveland actually increased. This is not an insignificant outcome, as the earnings tax paid by workers supports more than half of the city?s operating budget. Had downtown Cleveland lost jobs and earnings tax revenue at the same rate that the city lost residents, the ability to provide neighborhood services would have been severely reduced.
Cleveland?s public schools also benefited from the new development in downtown, which, for a period of time, retarded the decline in property values. Property taxes paid by business account for more than two-thirds of the local revenue generated to pay for the Cleveland public schools, thus the support of property values reduces fiscal pressures on the school district. Recent evidence illustrates that the success of the past public/private partnerships may have run its course. Despite an impressive level of private sector investment in Cleveland?s downtown area, market values for commercial property have eroded across the past 24 months. Given the importance of these values for the fiscal security of Cleveland?s children and neighborhoods, it may well be appropriate to consider if another public/private partnerships could sustain property values or slow the current decline. [Emphasis added.]
Good God, are they serious? I don't know which is a more insane line of reasoning: that the Cleveland area has a good record of public/private partnerships that meet fiscal goals? For who? Not for the public part. Name one that didn't totally favor the private side? Tower City, BP Building, Gateway, Rock Hall, Browns Stadium. All screwed the public sector with costs, tax abatements and hollow promises of job creation.
Then there is the "funding" for Cleveland Public Schools. The same Public Schools that keep needing tax levies to meet operating and building expenses? The same that has to cut over $30 million from the budget after the last tax levy failed? The same Public School that doesn't get any money from much of the tax abated or tax exempt property downtown because of the public/private deals? The best it seems to claim is some sort of halo affect from the tax free properties to the taxable properties -- keeping property values from sinking further. That's inspiring.
Another item, from the Sunday paper was the architectural writer/critic. He basically did his best to take out the Forest City plan at the knees.
According to the newest model and accompanying drawings, completed by Thompson Ventulett Stainback of Atlanta with KA Architecture of Cleveland, a 350,000-square-foot exhibit hall would be raised up on gigantic columns with its floor level 125 feet above the river. The roof of the exhibit hall would rise another 45 feet, topping out at roughly 170 feet above the river. The facility would be served by an outdoor truck dock running nearly the full outer edge of the facility - about 900 feet.
Structural columns supporting this giant pancake would be recessed 30 feet back from the river's edge. But the overall experience from a promenade along the water directly beneath the exhibit hall and truck docks high overhead would be like walking under a gigantic bridge.
It might be tolerable. After all, the Flats is full of bridges, and some of them are quite beautiful. An architect might be able to treat the mighty columns up to the exhibit hall as powerful, expressive elements.
But the Huron Road side of the convention center, an overhead walkway that parallels the exhibit hall, would bulge out over more than half the width of the road below. According to an estimate by Cleveland City Planner Linda Henrichsen, the walkway would reach 70 feet over the 100-foot right-of-way of Huron. In essence, this would turn the street into a virtual tunnel behind Tower City Center.
On the north end of the convention facility, where it would be linked to The Avenue at Tower City shopping mall, the convention center actually would bridge the street entirely, fusing it to Tower City. This vast, hybrid megastructure could turn out to be a disorienting labyrinth. The aesthetics alone would be an issue, but consider the costs involved in creating something like this. It would require a lot of unknown cost issues to set the foundation and pillars to support the entire structure in the form being pitched. It could easily become a poured concrete nightmare.
Final thought. You know what, once again is missing from any discussion on building a new Convention Center? The I-X Center. If a new Cleveland Convention Center is built, then the City of Cleveland is on the hook to pay the I-X Center's leaseholder in excess of $12 million dollars. The last time they tried the new CCC, the County wasn't going to help pay a red cent. Haven't read any indication that anything has changed regarding that.
Competing Editorials
The main paper for Lake County, the News-Herald, has an editorial blasting the Ohio Secretary of State's decision to mandate optical scan voting machines.
Lake County is one of those seven counties using electronic voting machines. As anyone who lives in the county and has cast a ballot in an election is aware, they are easy to use.
Push a button and it points at the name of a candidate. Want to change that vote? Just push another button and the arrow moves to where you want it.
When you have made your selections, simply review your choices and push the magic button that casts all of your votes.
But the seven counties have a problem. Ohio Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell, following guidelines established by Ohio Substitute House Bill 262 passed in 2004, and to ensure compliance with the Help America Vote Act (HAVA), issued a mandate that would force all 88 counties to use Precinct Count Optical Scans.
He maintains that is the most cost-effective way to provide voter verified paper audit trails, as required in HB 262.
Lake County - and the other counties that use electronic machines - are hollering "foul." They cite Blackwell's mandate as a perfect example of trying to fix something that is not broken.
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The paper-trail element of HB 262 was controversial. At the time is was passed, State Sen. Randy Gardner, a Bowling Green Republican, was outspoken on the issue. He tried to block the mandate but was unsuccessful.
Jon Husted, a Kettering Republican and newly chosen speaker of the House, would like to review the subject. He says legislators may have acted prematurely when they passed HB 262 last April.
Meanwhile, Lake County elections officials want to protect their $3 million investment in the electronic machines, as well as a voting system that is a model for the entire country - if any politicians from Columbus or Washington would care to come here and take a look at it. They may be slightly overstating the "model voting system" of Lake County's electronic voting, but the key point is that the electronic voting system in Lake County was implemented 5 years ago and runs without a hitch or complaint.
So how does The Plain Dealer editorial on the subject address the decision.
Optical-scan voting machines were selected by Secretary of State Ken Blackwell last week as the preferred equipment, putting a sudden end to the debate over electronic touch-screen machines. It was the proper decision. The optical-scan equipment is not only more practical, but is more affordable.
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Fans of electronic voting devices are unhappy. They argue that their preferred machine is more accessible to voters and that the technology to provide a paper trial for each ballot is being developed. Other critics, such as Michael Vu, the highly regarded director of Cuyahoga County's Board of Elections, chafe at Blackwell's unilateral decision, especially given that Vu's board reportedly was leaning toward the electronic equipment. So seven counties, including a sizable county that has a substantial number of commuters to Cleveland, are merely "fans of electronic voting devices." They aren't say, counties that have already made their own expenditures without waiting for the state and federal monies to migrate to electronic voting.
Blackwell certainly could have done a better job of articulating his reasoning to election directors on the ground level, rather than going through their associations and county commissioners. So could the PD Editorial Board.
But given approaching federal deadlines for conversion and the limited amount of federal money provided for equipment, he seems to have made a prudent choice. Counties that wish to add their own money to the federal contribution may buy more expensive electronic equipment if they wish - if it meets state and federal requirements. But such a decision would make little financial sense. Blackwell estimates that the optical-scan equipment will cost Ohio taxpayers about $80 million less than the electronic devices. Except that the counties can't buy more expensive equipment. The order from Blackwell stated that only 2 machines are presently certified as being valid. That isn't giving the counties any choices, and far exceeds the language of the Ohio law from which it was based.
I'm no fan of the News-Herald Editorial Board, but it is kind of embarrassing to be so factually deficient to them by comparison.
Maybe Not So Safe
Disturbing story from St. Louis on how the police there, manipulated reporting criminal incidents to make it appear crime was dropping in the city. Makes you wonder about other cities that are struggling to convince people not to flee for the suburbs. *cough*Pittsburgh*cough* Or in Cities where they are trying to attract people into the city, especially downtown. *cough*Cleveland*cough*
Family Visits
Took advantage of the long weekend to visit my family in Pennsylvania. The darling daughter, as always charmed the socks off of everyone, and she collected another bounty of toys and new clothing.
Just damn cold today.
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