Outside Memphis, all the women are strong, all the men are good looking, and all the children are above average.
Out in God’s country, people have higher educational attainment, higher incomes and little poverty.
So, what in the heck happens to all these superior people when they enter the voting booth?
Arlington Mayor Russell Wiseman. Tennessee Representative Curry Todd. Tennessee Representative Ron Lollar. Tennessee Senator Brian Kelsey. Shelby County Commissioner Wyatt Bunker. Shelby County School Board Chairman David Pickler.
Addition by Subtraction
It’s been said that we’ve entered an era of lowest common denominator politics, where politicians embody the lowest common denominator of a community. For them, it’s all about them and the slice and dice politics that promotes division as a personal cynical strategy.
What makes all of this interesting to us is that it is these suburban voters always have a mote in their own eyes when they criticize Memphis elected officials, particularly in the hostile letters to the editor from residents of county towns.
Where does all this hostility come from if it’s not essentially race-based?
It’s hard for us to say. Although it’s tempting, we’re reluctant to chalk up all of this to the neverending yin and yang of race in our community. Perhaps these suburban folks are simply mad that they had to move out of Memphis in pursuit of the good life (so often defined as lower taxes) or maybe they’re frustrated that the good life today is characterized by higher gas prices and lower house values.
Proud and Prejudiced
Maybe they are just remarkably proud of their suburban towns. After all, unlike the towns in most metros of the country, our county towns have histories just as lengthy and proud as Memphis.
Regardless of the cause, they are obvious evidence of the growing coarseness of the civic square. Outside of Memphis, these suburban politicians are avatars of that harsh digital world that’s been ushered in.
The disgraceful display of raw prejudice and un-Christianlike behavior by Mayor Wiseman is but the latest reminder of how shallow the prejudice and hatred lurk below the surface, and sadly, how willing some of these family values, religious right politicians are to play the ugliest cards in the local political deck.
There’s always been a strong anti-intellectual bent to religious fundamentalism in this country, but as the Republican Party became more and more defined by its entanglement with the religious right, it too has mined the depths of intellectual poverty, as Mayor Wiseman did with a passion last week.
Peanuts Gallery
In his world, the president of the United States is not only a closet Muslim (and he sneers the term as if an epithet) but that as part of the jihad on Christianity, Barack Obama – consulting the TV Guide on his desk in the Oval Office – hatched the insidious plan to delay Charlie Brown’s Christmas special.
The roots of this idolatry of Peanuts go back farther than most think – to Robert Short’s book in the 1960’s interpreting the cartoons to illuminate Christianity’s themes. It was rare in those days to find a pulpit that wasn’t preaching the gospel according to Peanuts and the cartoon’s creator Charles Schultz’s name was muttered as if he was the 13th disciple.
Lost in all of this was the fact that Mr. Schultz moved from his fundamentalist religious background to describe himself as a “secular humanist.” “I do not go to church anymore…I’ve come around to secular humanism, an obligation I believe all humans have to others and the world we live in,” he said. As for us, we’ve always seen “It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown,” as a commentary on the folly of blind faith and zealotry, but apparently, that doesn’t get on Mayor Wiseman’s favorites list.
But we digress. More to the point, this kind of demagoguery seems part and parcel to so many prominent suburban elected officials. And all the while, they and their constituents are easily capable of identifying the cancerous effects of some Memphis politicians on the body politic.
Pandering as Political Strategy
Meanwhile, there legislation championed by Rep. Todd in particular to open up parks and restaurants to guns despite opposition by the people who have to enforce it – the state sheriffs and police chiefs – and in the face of the opposition from the people who know their industry best – the restaurateurs association.
Their resolve to do it anyway is testament to a characteristic that defines politics way too much these days. It’s all about them. It’s all about winning and losing, no matter what degree of pandering it takes.
So in addition to guns in parks and restaurants, suburban politicians offer up legislation that would prevent Memphis from passing living wage ordinances, that would close public records of people with permits to carry guns, that would dumb down ethics rules and weaken public meetings laws, that would use schools as vehicles for their version of Christianity, that would have rejected stimulus funding, well, you get the picture.
It’s a Rovean strategy in which there is no saturation point for partisanship and the motivation of their own political success, damn the best interests of the community or any responsibility to contribute to meaningful public discussion or to healing our divisions.
In this way, on their best days, they are suburban Joe Browns, and on their worst, they are just embarrassments whose behavior, as Mayor Wiseman reminds us, has similarities that are all too familiar to Peanuts. They’re both cartoonish.
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That pretty much sums up the idiocy we have in our own backyard. Have any of these people ever even spent a day talking to people in Memphis and getting their opinions on the issues of taxes, wages, etc?
I am routinely amazed at the never-ending supply of people who reject individual liberty
Interesting choice of tags too! “Arlington Mayor Russell Lang”
Nice! Please allow me to guess . . . that was an “accident”. Yeah.
Given SCM’s penchant for “fairness”, the tag probably should be expanded to include their father’s first name too!
Heck, why stop there? Maybe the Arlington mayor has a wife and kids. You could grow the tag to include his immediate family and any nieces and/or nephews.
Yes antisocialist he really is talking about “growing coarseness” while calling people: “Rovean” and “un-Christianlike”. Hypocrisy thy name is smart cities.
Oh and the guns thing that’s just anti liberty.
Municipal cities = bad
Memphis = good
Arlington = evil racists
Memphis = all that is wholesome in the world
When did calling someone a muslim translate to racist. Or is this an example of those infamous “code” words. I never can keep track, maybe some one should post a list.
Hector, I am a minority in the great City of Memphis. Believe it or not, there are leaders in the community that have said publicly that I cannot represent them because of my race.
Think about it. Memphis Community leaders who say that I am unqualified to serve in the U.S. House of Representatives because of my RACE.
I must have missed the SCM blog post on that bit of overt racism within the confines of the City of Memphis.
Despite its drawbacks, I really have enjoyed living in Memphis, but it is attitudes such as this that make me anxious to leave for the suburbs and never look back. Mayor Wiseman’s rant seems like a molehill made into a mountain. Plus the pro-gun/pro-liberty attitude prevalent in the suburbs is tremendously appealing to someone with an affinity for liberty.
Suburbanites are frustrated by higher gas prices and lower house values. Really? Cheaper housing, property taxes, better quality of services (heck, I have had bags of leaves sitting on the curb of my Memphis home since the first week of November!). That all sounds grand to me.
Memphis is a losing proposition and this SCM blog post suggests to me it will remain that way in perpetuity.
A move to Mayor Wiseman’s fair city would add less than five miles to my commute. I’d be much closer to a vastly wider selection of goods and services than I am in the City. It will be safer, especially in the parks, where I can carry a weapon for protection or fun. In Memphis, I can’t go to the park unless I want to forgo my liberty or break the law.
Compared to Memphis, any increase in driving costs would be negligible. My property taxes would be lower. Schools will be better quality. My house will be more efficient and save me on utilities. I will not have 30 bags of leaves sitting on my curb for over a month!
All I need to do is wait for my inner-city home value to recover and get out before houses become too expensive in suburbia.
Without even trying I have identified over a half dozen reason to leave Memphis for the suburbs. I bet the cheerleaders who want to limit choice and force people to stay in Memphis can’t give me a half dozen compelling reasons to stay.
And don’t even bother with the canard about how Memphis taxpayers subsidize the suburban municipalities. It simply is not true. Hector and I have both done the math thanks to the rural school bond and showed our work!
The icing on the cake: I can carry a gun in a municipal park without worrying about the laws of of a bunch of anti-liberty bed wetters having me arrested. Just kidding. The real icing on the cake is I-269. It will make it even easier to get around the metro area to visit friends and family, etc.
Antisocialist: I’m sure they will welcome you with open, hypocritical arms – their own and their .45s.
antisocialist:
who appointed you to decide what liberty is? Your liberty always seems to trample on mine.
Hector
you need to ask Wiseman about how Muslim is used as racist term. he’s the one who did it. He did in fact use it as a code word, just like a lot of you right wingers do.
antisocialist:
Come on out. The person who wrote this post lives outside Memphis.
How does my liberty trample upon yours, anon? That doesn’t even make any sense!
There are some pretty agreeable definitons for liberty in various mainstream dictionaries. You might start there.
Anonymous 10:48 (oh SCM fix your clock)
Yes us libertarians are out there passing laws preventing enlightened humans from their natural right to defend themselves. Not to defend anti because he obviously doesn’t need my help.
I only came by to comment on the hypocrisy of SCM calling out a suburban mayor for calling Obama a poopy pants by – calling the suburban mayor a poopy pants.
Meet the new boss same as the old boss.
SCM I take it you are conceding my point. No half dozen compelling reasons to stay…
Hey, folks, this guy ran for office, didn’t he? He should have known better than to make his city a laughing stock.
Bet you’ve never been so forgiving of statements by Obama aka Muslim in White House.
Anti:
For more than a week earlier this year, we posted 10 reasons we love Memphis. And an awful lot of people contributed theirs as well. So, half a dozen just isn’t challenging enough for us.
Hectorspector:
He didn’t call Obama a poopy pants. He lied about the facts as part of the Big Lie that is too, too common these days.
anonymous 10:50
I really really hate that if you don’t like someone’s ideas (the POUTS), you are labeled a rasist. What would be racist about calling someone a muslim. Are they Indian? – Arabic? – Persian? – Russian? – Philipino? – Chinese?. et al. It ‘s a game of I don’t like your politics – so I will call you a racist.
Boy, you guys sure can dish it out but you never can take it. And if Wiseman can’t handle the heat, get a day job.
SCM
You bemoan the lack of civility in modern politics, and then practice the same personal attacks. You think Wiseman is a fool – Ok – then ignore him. I think this has been made into a big deal because his brother seems to be the local repub. party chair. Just another mudslinging backstabbing game between dems and repubs. See see look the local repubs chairman’s brother is a nutter – haha.
Heck: We didn’t think we were bemoaning it. We were just pointing out how low the threshold is to get elected outside Memphis.
This is a big deal because it was a Big Lie.
PS: We really like his brother.
10 reason you love Memphis? Those are just 10 reasons to visit.
The sad thing about the false “Obama is a Muslim” rant is, so what if he was?
It seems to be presumed–by those who are both pro and anti Obama, that being a Muslim is a slur under received wisdom.
Why is that? In an honest debate, that would be the issue.