Tuesday, July 15, 2008
News Take that, Andisheh
Posted by Scott Henry @ScottTheHenry on Tue, Jul 15, 2008 at 4:47 PM
Where my colleague Andi sees the mayor's office as half-empty, InsiderAdvantage CEO Matt Towery sees it as half-full…or something like that.
On Monday, Shirley Franklin got all up in the grill of a group of folks loudly protesting the closing of a city fire station. That much is not in dispute. But Andi saw the incident as evidence of a mayor too lately given to confrontation:
What’s with Franklin’s defiant attitude? It was her administration’s mismanagement of the budget that precipitated the city’s budget crisis and the fire station’s closing. A little contrition would go a long way, but Franklin seems incapable of it at the moment.
Towery, on the other hand, perceived an embattled leader showing her mettle:
At one point, Franklin, who originally hailed from Philadelphia, said that if the boisterous crowd pushed her, they would see her Philadelphia side come out. What, in fact, we saw was her Atlanta grit.Hard decisions made by good leaders and backed up by a willingness to be right at the center of the action. It’s the stuff that future leaders need, and Shirley Franklin’s got in abundance. We think she is one tough, strong, and good mayor. We are proud of Mayor Shirley Franklin.
If we may be allowed a psychological musing, the difference in perspective may come from Towery's own political past as a state legislator, when he must've confronted his share of hostile crowds. And while Andi ran for president in 2000, sadly he did not receive a plurality of the vote. If he had, much misery and bloodshed could have been avoided – although the administration would undoubtedly be in the thrall of big bio-diesel.
Comments (6)
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Maybe people wouldn't be so pissed off if Shirley didn't adopt such a laissez faire attitude towards her job in her second term. Apparently jet setting to India and other points in between were much more important than being the Mayor of Atlanta. Also, she has repeatedly defended the incompetence/thievery of that class act "CFO" Janice Davis - herself a major proponent of the "poop runs downhill" style of management. Let's see, the city can find money at the drop of a hat for a NASCAR museum, multi-million dollar failure Brand Atlanta campaign or payoff towards the King family for the MLK papers, but it apparently can never find money to hire more cops or firefighters - two municipal services which this city desperately needs. I've said it before and I'll say it again - if Barack Obama wins the presidency and offers her any position in his administration, Shirley will bolt in a skinny minute. According to Towery, we should thank Shirley for falling asleep on the job.
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Indeed. I'm guessing Towery's dance moves extend no further than the 'shopping cart' and possibly a half-assed attempt at 'the hustle.'
Andisheh suffers from that particular male ego disease that makes him think women should behave contritely. Too bad they're all too busy laughing at his obvious lack of (fill in the blank any way you wish) prowess, let alone dance moves, to do anything but snicker. Given such conditions, there's precious little time left over for that contrition stuff. Like we'd waste any on sniveling little wanker-journo boys anyways.
Actually, I believe politicians who make serious mistakes should apologize for them.
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