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Tuesday, October 27, 2009 - 13:23:11
Flexing their Muscles
I wrote this piece in 1996, about the property rights movement in Northwest vArkansas. Some may find interesting similarities between then and now, when the Tea Bag folks and the Sarah Palin/Glenn Beck Orcs seem to dominate conservative thought.
Then, as now, a lot of people were manipulated by forces much higher than their pay grade - corporate forces which really much didn’t give a damn about freedom, or the America that these people claimed to care so much about.
Notice the gutless Washington County JP, who caved to pressure after his initial vote.
This is included in my book, Ozark Mosaic: Adventures in Arkansas Alternative Journalism, 1990-2002, which makes a a dandy holiday present.
Flexing their Muscles?
Property Rights Advocates gaining Visibility and Influence
Written by Richard S. Drake
“Recognize forestry as a private industry to be managed by private owners. Avoid pressures by third parties to ascribe “sacred” status to trees or to any other agricultural commodity" - Sustainable Development Coalition Council, Draft Recommendations, 1995
“I love to see a log truck going down the road with a load of logs to get sawed up to make a home for someone. It looks good to me. The ranches, the cattle, the homes . . . I love to see Tyson trucks . . .” Ivan Denton, address to monthly meeting of Take Back Arkansas, Inc., April 4, 1996
On April 4, artist Ivan Denton addressed the April meeting of the property rights group, Take Back Arkansas. Denton, whose column “The Cowboy Whittler,” runs in the Northwest Arkansas Times, gave a talk warning against what he termed as “false environmentalists.”
In his half-hour address to the small group of less than 30 people, he claimed environmentalists “have their own agendas,” and that the battle raging over property rights in much of the United States is “where it is all centered.”
In addition to members of Take Back Arkansas, several candidates for Washington County Quorum Court were in attendance. Also on hand were several sitting members of the Quorum Court, including Darius Mullins, who voted the next week to repeal the controversial billboard ban ordinance, which the group had opposed on the grounds that there were no provisions made to provide property owners with recompense for the lost income that they claimed the sign ordinance would cause.
Mullins had originally voted for the ban.
Market Forces Best Able To Protect Environment?
Denton was appearing before the group in part to report on a recent trip he made to Kansas City, Missouri, to attend a meeting of the Sustainable Development Coalition Council. This coalition formed partially as a response to the President's Council on Sustainable Development (PCSD).
Created in 1993, the PCSD attempted to balance industry and the environmental community. The Vision Statement of the PCSD states in part, “Our vision is of a life-sustaining earth . . . We believe a sustainable United States will have an economy that equitably provides opportunities for satisfying livelihoods and a safe, healthy, high quality of life for current and future generations . . .”
The goals of the PCSD have come under sharp attack from some who see a deification of nature in their goals, as well as an anti-industrial bias. In response, the Sustainable Development Coalition has emphasized private property rights, free markets and individual freedoms.
Those in Fayetteville may remember similar battles in the last several years, with a Planning Commission whose most outspoken members claimed that “market forces” must be the determining factor in city planning and growth management.
The Coalition was organized by several conservative organizations that claim to be environmentally oriented. One goal is to “Promote the understanding that ‘Sustainable Living’ means to provide for one’s self and for those whom he/she is responsible, integrating awareness that individual freedoms guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution make ‘Sustainable Living’ possible.”
Struggle Local/National
Mary Denham, one of the founders of Take Back Arkansas, says she is probably in agreement with most, if not all, of the Coalition’s goals. Take Back Arkansas is a local group of citizens concerned about their private property in an age when environmentalists and governing authorities are placing tighter controls onto property owners.
Like many such groups, Take Back Arkansas claims to be concerned about so-called “hidden agendas” that place restrictions on property rights. They claim that property rights will be the civil rights issue of the 1990s.
Prior to Denton’s address, the group watched a videotaped interview with Michael Coffman, affiliated with the Sustainable Development Coalition. He was featured discussing the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development, held in 1992. He claimed that some in the environmental movement were inspired by their involvement with pagan religions, in which all life is considered equal.
The Cowboy Whittler
This sentiment was echoed by Denton in his talk, in which he claimed that religion was very much a part of the environmentalists’ agenda.
Among other issues that Denton discussed were the ban on DDT (at which point he made the claim that more people were actually harmed by the ban than were helped by it), and recent criticism of his newspaper column, to which he seemed particularly sensitive.
He said that, “Property owners are the true environmentalists. Property ownership makes people proud and they take care of it.”
After Denton’s talk, more of the video program was shown, followed by a question/answer period.
Battle Looms over Billboard Ban
On Thursday, April 11, the Washington County Quorum Court took a first step in repealing a controversial billboard ban for four specific highways in the county. Placed on its first reading, it will be taken up again at the regular Quorum Court meeting on May 9.
Mary Denham feels that the next go-around will be more difficult, because she is sure that the local Sierra Club and representatives of Friends For Fayetteville will speak for the ban. Essentially, she claims, their message is a simple one:
“We want your rights.”
Denham says that she has no desire to sit down with members of the above groups because she believes that their agenda is set in stone.
While saying that she didn’t want to get into an ugly war of words, Denham claims that a “propaganda machine” is running groups such as those she suspects will be out in force to speak against repealing the ban. Denham has been at odds with members of the Friends For Fayetteville before, most notably with Fayetteville Alderman Len Schaper.
She is confident that the repeal will stand, however, because “we have the constitution and law on our side, and they don’t.”
Ozark Gazette - April 15, 1996
Monday, October 26, 2009 - 10:26:36
An Open letter to my friend on the Telecomm Board
Since I resigned from Fayetteville’s Telecommunications Board, I have been reluctant to criticize the board or any of its actions, but I find I can no longer do that. But in order to break my silence, I will have to admit to a certain amount of public dishonesty on my part.
I offered up several reasons when I left the Telecomm Board, among which was the standard catch-all that I had other obligations. What I didn’t mention was that despaired of the fact that some of the meetings resembled nothing so much as a high school debating society, with the same points being argued back and forth, back and forth, many times over in the course of the same meeting.
Even as Telecomm Chair, I was unable to fully reign in this tendency on the part of certain individuals to be overly anal retentive.
I draw now to the crux of this letter.
I have several friends on the Telecomm Board, but this letter is addressed to one in particular, a man of great talent and intelligence who, for whatever reasons, seems unable to get past a certain sticking point - the C.A.T. contract.
You have been at odds with Community Access Television for over ten years over some points in the contract, some of which you feel they are not living up to. This has led you into open conflict not only with C.A.T. staffers, C.A.T. board members, but also members of the Fayetteville city staff.
You have even been in conflict with other Telecomm Board members, when they did not fully support you in your efforts.
On more than one occasion, you suggested to me that I should pull my head out of my “public access.”
There were those who opposed you being appointed to the Telecomm Board, though I was not among them. I still feel that having you on the board is potentially one of the wisest decisions the city has ever made.
But, rightly or wrongly, you appear vindictive. It looks as though you have an axe to grind. There are those who point to your behavior as evidence that they were right in opposing your appointment.
You have been counseled on this subject on several occasions, yet you continue to engage in the sort of behavior that drives wedges between people, and not bring them together.
The problem is, I think, that there are so many good things that that you could accomplish with the Telecomm Board, but this one issue - which seems to consume you - may be your undoing, my friend.
I’m not suggesting that you leave the Telecomm Board. Just leave the C.A.T. negotiations to others, and use your generous talents on other areas which would benefit both the city and the board.
******
Quote of the Day
Noise is the most impertinent of all forms of interruption. It is not only an interruption, but a disruption of thought. Of course, where there is nothing to interrupt, noise will not be so particularly painful. - Arthur Schopenhauer
*****
Mohja Kahf: The Girl in the Tangerine Scarf
A lot of people know Mohja Kahf through her appearances with the Ozark Poets and Writers Collective. But there is a lot more to her than that. An associate professor of comparative languages at the University of Arkansas, she has also written several books, including Western Representations of the Muslim Woman: From Termagant to Odalisque.
Recently, she wrote an op-ed for the Washington Post.
Now she has a novel to add to her many credits. The Girl in the Tangerine Scarf is the story of Khadra Shamy, who (like the author) was born in Syria, but raised in the United States. Though Kahf will tell you that the novel is not autobiographical, it is clear that living for a time in Indiana left a lasting impression on her - for that is where most of the novel takes place, as Khadra and her family struggle to find a place in an often bigoted society, while maintaining the standards that their culture demands of them.
In one sense this is very much a traditional “coming of age” novel, even while many readers may find themselves immersed in a world they know little to nothing about. People struggle to find a sense of identity, no matter the culture.
But in a larger sense, Kahf is taking the non-Muslim into the Muslim world, helping us to understand and appreciate why things are the way they are. And she does so not in a preachy manner, but in a highly entertaining story that demands to be read more than once.
And it isn’t just 1970s Indiana that Khadra explores; the story ranges all the way to Saudi Arabia and Syria and back. We see through Khadra’s eyes as she discovers (to her chagrin) that not all the youth in her homeland are as devout as she and her family, and she is shocked to learn about the hard choices that family members have had to make, just to survive.
As a non-Muslim, The Girl in the Tangerine Scarf made me realize just how ignorant I was about the culture of so many people who live amongst us. I am grateful that not only that I learned so much through the novel, but also that Kahf is such as exceptional writer.
Though there has been much praise for Kahf’s novel, I came across a fascinating website - muslimmatters.org - where a spirited discussion was taking place about the issues in the book. Though many of those who posted were critical of the book, a lot of the comments actually inspired me to reread the novel, and understand things from their perspective.
It was just as rewarding an experience reading The Girl in the Tangerine Scarf a second time. And you haven’t read it once yet?
Get thee to a bookstore.
Wednesday, October 21, 2009 - 12:01:28
Proselytizing for C.A.T.
Yesterday, as I was the only one in my doctor’s waiting room, I did what I often do in a public place when I get a chance - I turned the TV over to Fayetteville’s Community Access Television, and settled back on the couch, half-watching, and half-reading.
A few minutes later an older woman came into the office, and began to stare at the TV. “Can you turn that up a little louder,” she asked.
Playing at the time was C.A.T.’s famous Short Take program, in which anyone can come down and speak their mind for a few minutes on any topic they wish. It could be politics, religion, or the state of wool in the universe.
You could even come down and perform that song or poem that have written. It’s all good. Several times a week, the program is aired. A long-standing tradition of public access in Fayetteville, it has attracted probably thousands of our fellow citizens over the past 29 years.
I’ve even used Short Takes to practice some my comedy routines. That I’m writing this blog this morning, and not on stage somewhere, may tell you something of the quality of my attempts.
As with many of those who have worked with Fayetteville’s public access station over the years, I have often promoted the station to others. I have written about the station in newspaper articles, on my blog, and been interviewed on radio. Now that I have discovered Facebook, I promote the station there, as well.
Just ask the poor Tea baggers; I am after them relentlessly to use the station. I’m still not sure where their reluctance to use C.A.T. comes from.
The morning after Fayetteville Open Channel lost the contract to Access 4 Fayetteville in a bitter dispute in 1992, I was up early the next morning, speaking to the Lion’s Club about the value of public access.
It’s what most of us who are involved with access do. We show up.
But to get back to the my doctor’s waiting room, and the elderly woman who was suddenly entranced by the Short Takes: she turned to me and said, “I’ve heard a lot about C.A.T. over the years, but never thought to turn it on.”
“Well,” I said,” I hope you enjoy it.”
We reach out to individuals and groups on a weekly, even daily basis. The truth is, that most Have heard of C.A.T. Polls undertaken by the station over the years show that folks turn oit n at least a few times a week.
What is difficult, I think, is getting groups and organizations to naturally consider C.A.T. when they promote themselves and their events.
While true that folks can use Short Takes to promote their events, many still don’t realize that the event or program they enjoy may be enjoyed by an even larger audience, if only someone had thought to set up a video camera.
A case in point: The long-running Women’s Festival and Conference, so popular with many before the UA killed its funding, still lives on today. Since many of its programs - speakers, musicians, etc. - were preserved on video. Today, the Women’s Festival lives on, reaching an entirely new audience.
For all too many, it is as though a light-bulb has gone off over their heads when I ask them if the event was taped so that a wider audience might hear the message. After they investigate C.A.T. and all it has to offer, they never make that mistake again.
They and the viewing audience are the richer for it. Why not check out their website at http://www.catfayetteville.org/
******
C.A.T. and the Community Quilt
A few years ago I was in the Northwest Arkansas Mall, looking at a display of quilts, when my eye fell on a patch on one quilt depicting Community Access Television. I asked the folks at the station about it, but no one knew anything about it.
Obviously, it was made by someone who felt deeply about the station, and wanted to share that feeling with others.
I began to use that quilt whenever I spoke about C.A.T., especially in terms of the diversity in our community, and how that diversity is shown, every time someone turns on public access in Fayetteville.
We reveal ourselves to each other. Our passions, our eloquence, our music, our poetry, our faith. We share them with one another. C.A.T. accepts everyone who comes in the doors who has a story to tell, and wants help to tell that story.
Of all the programs the city of Fayetteville funds, this is truly diversity in action.
*****
Quote of the Day
In some ways. bloggings’s gifts to our discourse make the skills of a good traditional writer much more valuable, not less. The torrent of blogospheric insights, ideas, and arguments places a greater premium on the person who can fully make sense of it all. - Andrew Sullivan - “Why I Blog”, The Atlantic, November, 2008
****
The Dumbing Down of CNN - Chapter 976
I was watching CNN this weekend, and I actually heard one of their Junior Varsity weekend anchors use the words “America’s Frenemies.”
Can’t add much to that.
***
Arkansas Democrat-Gazette: Most repulsive letter of the week and it’s only Wednesday . . .
Glen Couture of Eureka Springs had a letter in today’s edition in which he suggested that our national symbol be changed from Uncle Sam to Uncle Remus.
It has long been my belief that there are certain editors at the ADG (Paul Greenberg, Mike Masterson?) who drive through the country-side, tossing out boxes out boxes of crayons, crying out, “You, too, can be a writer!”
But this goes too far, even for the ADG. Too far, and way, way too low.
Sunday, October 18, 2009 - 11:57:06
Well, if it was a hoax, it will sail right over Wolf Blitzer's head
Watching the proudly sycophantic Wolf Blitzer interview the family of Falcon “Balloon Boy” Heene, I found myself - along with millions of others, I suppose - shouting questions at the screen that never occurred to the preening CNN anchor to ask.
Hey, you even looked in small drawers in your house, but but you never though to look in the attic?
What kind of punishments does Richard Heene dole out that this kid had to hide out in the attic, underneath a cardboard box?
You just happened to have a video camera running at the time the balloon took off?
And did the Bearded One also say that it was his “great honor” to announce that the boy was safe, after the whole country was worried that day? He was honored? Honored?
Honored?
Ye gods!
My favorite moment came when he asked Ms. Heene if she had watched any of the CNN coverage that day when the search was going on. I realize that he was stretching what was basically a 15 minute interview into an hour long show, but what was he thinking?
CNN: The Place Even Frantic Mothers Go For News?
Of course, this morning it looks like charges may be filed against someone in this bizarre affair. It will be interesting to see Blitzer’s (if I can stand to watch) take on this.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=113908194&ps=cprs
http://www.eonline.com/uberblog/b149261_was_balloon_boys_whirlwind_day_all_show.html
******
Quote of the Day
A bore is someone who persists in holding his own views after we have enlightened him with ours. - Malcolm S. Forbes
*****
The Ultimate Working man’s Song - Monty Python’s Lumberjack Song
40 years of Monty Python! Who says that life isn’t good?
Composers: Terry Jones, Michael Palin, & Fred Tomlinson
Authors: Terry Jones & Michael Palin
Arranger: Fred Tomlinson
Lead Singer: Michael Palin
BARBER:
1. I'm a lumberjack, and I'm okay.
I sleep all night and I work all day.
MOUNTIES:
He's a lumberjack, and he's okay.
He sleeps all night and he works all day.
BARBER:
I cut down trees. I eat my lunch.
I go to the lavatory.
On Wednesdays I go shoppin'
And have buttered scones for tea.
MOUNTIES:
He cuts down trees. He eats his lunch.
He goes to the lavatory.
On Wednesdays he goes shoppin'
And has buttered scones for tea.
He's a lumberjack, and he's okay.
He sleeps all night and he works all day.
BARBER:
I cut down trees. I skip and jump.
I like to press wild flowers.
I put on women's clothing
And hang around in bars.
MOUNTIES:
He cuts down trees. He skips and jumps.
He likes to press wild flowers.
He puts on women's clothing
And hangs around in bars?!
He's a lumberjack, and he's okay.
He sleeps all night and he works all day.
BARBER:
I cut down trees. I wear high heels,
Suspendies, and a bra.
I wish I'd been a girlie,
Just like my dear Papa.
MOUNTIES:
He cuts down trees. He wears high heels,
Suspendies, and a bra?!
[talking]
What's this? Wants to be a girlie?! Oh, My!
And I thought you were so rugged! Poofter!
[singing]
He's a lumberjack, and he's okay.
He sleeps all night and he works all day.
He's a lumberjack, and he's okaaaaay.
He sleeps all night and he works all day.
Well, if it was a hoax, it will sail right over Wolf Blitzer's head
Watching the proudly sycophantic Wolf Blitzer interview the family of Falcon “Balloon Boy” Heene, I found myself - along with millions of others, I suppose - shouting questions at the screen that never occurred to the preening CNN anchor to ask.
Hey, you even looked in small drawers in your house, but but you never though to look in the attic?
What kind of punishments does Richard Heene dole out that this kid had to hide out in the attic, underneath a cardboard box?
You just happened to have a video camera running at the time the balloon took off?
And did the Bearded One also say that it was his “great honor” to announce that the boy was safe, after the whole country was worried that day? He was honored? Honored?
Honored?
Ye gods!
My favorite moment came when he asked Ms. Heene if she had watched any of the CNN coverage that day when the search was going on. I realize that he was stretching what was basically a 15 minute interview into an hour long show, but what was he thinking?
CNN: The Place Even Frantic Mothers Go For News?
Of course, this morning it looks like charges may be filed against someone in this bizarre affair. It will be interesting to see Blitzer’s (if I can stand to watch) take on this.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=113908194&ps=cprs
http://www.eonline.com/uberblog/b149261_was_balloon_boys_whirlwind_day_all_show.html
******
Quote of the Day
A bore is someone who persists in holding his own views after we have enlightened him with ours. - Malcolm S. Forbes
*****
The Ultimate Working man’s Song - Monty Python’s Lumberjack Song
40 years of Monty Python! Who says that life isn’t good?
Composers: Terry Jones, Michael Palin, & Fred Tomlinson
Authors: Terry Jones & Michael Palin
Arranger: Fred Tomlinson
Lead Singer: Michael Palin
BARBER:
1. I'm a lumberjack, and I'm okay.
I sleep all night and I work all day.
MOUNTIES:
He's a lumberjack, and he's okay.
He sleeps all night and he works all day.
BARBER:
I cut down trees. I eat my lunch.
I go to the lavatory.
On Wednesdays I go shoppin'
And have buttered scones for tea.
MOUNTIES:
He cuts down trees. He eats his lunch.
He goes to the lavatory.
On Wednesdays he goes shoppin'
And has buttered scones for tea.
He's a lumberjack, and he's okay.
He sleeps all night and he works all day.
BARBER:
I cut down trees. I skip and jump.
I like to press wild flowers.
I put on women's clothing
And hang around in bars.
MOUNTIES:
He cuts down trees. He skips and jumps.
He likes to press wild flowers.
He puts on women's clothing
And hangs around in bars?!
He's a lumberjack, and he's okay.
He sleeps all night and he works all day.
BARBER:
I cut down trees. I wear high heels,
Suspendies, and a bra.
I wish I'd been a girlie,
Just like my dear Papa.
MOUNTIES:
He cuts down trees. He wears high heels,
Suspendies, and a bra?!
[talking]
What's this? Wants to be a girlie?! Oh, My!
And I thought you were so rugged! Poofter!
[singing]
He's a lumberjack, and he's okay.
He sleeps all night and he works all day.
He's a lumberjack, and he's okaaaaay.
He sleeps all night and he works all day.
Wednesday, October 14, 2009 - 10:53:28
Deification of the Founding Fathers
I have been examining this odd painting this morning - “One Nation Under God” by Jon McNaughton- www.mcnaughtonart.com/artwork/view_zoom/?artpiece_id=353 - which is yet another in the long line of attempts to show that somehow the men who wrote our Declaration of Independence and Constitution were ordained by God, and should be treated accordingly.
I rebel against this, with every fiber of my being.
It isn’t that I don’t revere these documents. I do, with a passion that, as Elizabeth Barrett Browning once wrote, “ . . . with the love I seemed to lose with the lost saints." It is a great, and all-encompassing love that I feel, and a pride, that these men brought forth these documents.
As a society, we have conflicted views of the Founding Fathers. On one hand, we have the Jon McNaughtons, The Tea Baggers, and the GOP crowd, who seem to honestly believe that these men couldn’t have written these without help. And they deify them, make them larger than life, and deny any blemish on their characters as some sort of liberal revisionist history.
And then there are those who point out that they were slave holders, and adulterers, and drinkers and god knows what else.
Well, so what?
As a people we should revel in every mistake they ever made. Not that we should try to emulate their actions, or even that they were right - because they were wrong on so many levels - but they were human beings, every but as human as we are.
We screw up. We can’t keep our pants up. We drink too much. But things haven’t changed that much. What they did, we can do. It’s done every day across the country, across the world, in thousands of countries and communities, by men and women who have the same failings - and many even worse - than our own Founding Fathers.
I’m not terribly interested in anyone’s private life, as long as it doesn’t hurt anyone else, and they don’t do it in the street and frighten the horses. But we have this tendency to weed our brilliance and creativity - does she drink too much? Did he have an affair? Even if it didn’t involve public money?
If you want a society run by plaster saints, well, you pretty much get what you deserve.
Did the men who created our country mess up in a lot of ways? Hell, yes, and one of the prices we paid was the Civil War. But for all their mistakes, they were flesh and blood, and privy to the same temptations and confusions and indecisions that bedevil us today.
Maybe we should have a holiday honoring that.
******
Election of 1800 Trivia
During the election of 1800, some preachers warned their flocks that if Thomas Jefferson were elected, Christians would have to hide their Bibles in the well, because he would no doubt have them confiscated.
Well, he won, and he didn’t.
*****
Quote of the Day
A fanatic is someone who won’t change his mind, and won’t change the subject. - Winston Churchill
Tuesday, October 13, 2009 - 12:13:20
Insurance companies - time to take the gloves off?
For months now, whenever many politicians open their mouths, we often hear the statement, “Insurance executives are not bad people.” Well, people are people, and I think that we are all willing to give folks the benefit of the doubt - even insurance company executives.
But maybe the time has come to say, “Prove it.”
Like a lot off people, I just shake my head whenever that statement is made; it almost seems that it is some sort of price exacted by the insurance industry for them taking part (even if only on some farcical level) in the national health care debate.
Maybe it’s time for an aggressive PR assault on the insurance industry. There have been TV ads going after their lackeys (yes, people like you, Blanche Lambert Lincoln) but for the most part, except for the Will Ferrell parody ad, we have been sort of pretending that these companies are actually in this with us.
Ha!
Maybe we should just assume the attitude - to borrow from Jimmy Carter - of the moral equivalency of war. Because they have, haven’t they?
How many dead or dying have insurance companies left in their wake, in their climb to the top of the financial markets? The truth is, they have a record that is the envy of any terrorist organization on the planet.
Maybe it’s time to take the gloves off, because they did, a long time ago.
******
Quote of the Day
Everybody has the right to express what he thinks. That, of course, lets the crackpots in. But if you cannot tell a crackpot when you see one, then you ought to be taken in. - Harry S. Truman
*****
Oh, no! Political corruption in Afghanistan? Say it ain’t so, Hamid!
Gee, I dunno, what were we expecting? Of course, good reporting from Afghanistan has been the rarity, rather than the norm. How many of us cringed when newly elected president Hamid Karzai visited the United states for the first time, and cable reporters waxed eloquently on what a great dresser he was?
Health Care Debate: A Modest Proposal
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