« Guns and Cyber Ashes | Main | A Passel of Mayors »
May 16, 2007
You Can't Fight City Hall When City Hall Can Time-Travel
The Chattanooga Pulse ran a lament today by publisher Zack Cooper regarding the decision to re-open a renovated City Hall by dressing everything up in turn-of-the-century — uh, that's last century — costumes and mannerisms.
The most important part, because I know what you're thinking (same as I did):
You may think to yourself that I am being a bit too negative about such a seemingly minor thing, but I believe, over the past two years, city leaders have been taking too many long gazes in the rearview mirror of history. This just seems like a rare, public display of the attitude that all too often seems to prevail just under the surface.
I think he's a bit focused with the "past two years" part, because this symptom didn't just pop up. Sure, maybe it has gotten worse with a nostalgic Littlefield at the wheel. But I don't attribute all the foolishness to one well-meaning man.
Anyway, if that didn't get you over there, here's something a little spicier:
[L]et’s really make fools of ourselves and celebrate the fact that no one could think of any better way to celebrate a newly renovated City Hall than to wax nostalgic about them old-timey good days when women couldn’t vote, segregation was the norm and the average life expectancy was about 47 years. Yeah! The good ol’ days!
UPDATE: It should be obvious, but I am not the "Joe/Analyst/Chattanooga" commenter on the Pulse website, even if all three of those labels fit.
Government | By joe lance | 09:40 PM