Brunner the Best for Ohio Democrats

Democratic voters have an excellent chance this fall to send a strong new voice to Washington as Ohio’s next U. S. senator. Almost from the day George Voinovich announced in January 2009 that he would retire at the end of his term this year, it was clear that Democrats would be choosing their nominee between two of their best state officials, Lt. Governor Lee Fisher and Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner.

The last 15 months of head-to-head political campaigning have made two things clear: Jennifer Brunner would be a stronger Democratic standard bearer against the Republican nominee in November, and Jennifer Brunner would be a stronger US Senator for Ohio and the nation.

When voters are faced with two strong and capable candidates who hold roughly similar political views, who to vote for becomes less a matter of policy positions and more a question of character and style. This is perhaps especially true when the electoral prize is one of just a hundred seats in the US Senate, often referred to as “the world’s most exclusive club”.

Ohio’s Democratic leaders seem to have had that paradigm of exclusivity in mind as they fell into near lockstep behind Fisher. For Gov. Strickland on down through the party apparatus of Democratic state legislators, county party chairs and the rest of the old guard party hierarchy, Fisher has been the sanctioned choice.

That he would serve capably there is really no doubt. He is an experienced legislator and was a very good Ohio attorney general. He is a well-seasoned politician who would fit easily in the Senate. He is a prolific fundraiser, but is a two-edged sword. The ability to put big-time contributors at ease seems to make even the best-intentioned politicians less like public servants and more like leaders who follow lobbyists. In the wake of the recent abominable Citizens United decision by the US Supreme Court that seems to encourage unprecedented corporate intrusion into the electoral process, this is likely to be an even larger problem.

Brunner is much less likely to be a handmaiden to the corporate interests that dominate the club. For starters, she hasn’t been a career politician, having been in public office only since 2000, when she ran successfully for common pleas judge in Franklin County. Two years later, she was re-elected, serving about six years before resigning to run statewide for Secretary of State.

Notwithstanding her relative freshness as a public official, Brunner, 53, possesses considerable political savvy. She worked four years for Sherrod Brown in the mid-eighties when the latter was Ohio’s Secretary of State. Additionally, she represented many elected officials during her private practice on issues involving election law and campaign finance. She was an innovative judge in Franklin County, not from the standpoint of being an “activist” judge, but as a jurist who sought to improve the system by working with her colleagues. We think she can help President Obama do the same in Washington.

My direct observations of Brunner in different settings — as public official and on the campaign trail — suggest that she is a thoughtful and committed public servant, both open and approachable. She gets the idea of servant leadership. She acts from a strong and secure principled base, with more quiet tenacity and much less bombast than most politicians. What you see in public is likely what you will get in private.

Probably no place is that attribute more significant — and rare — than in the US Senate. Our local daily, in its weakly-supported endorsement of Fisher, suggested that he was more likely to get along in the clubby Senate than she. No doubt. But it’s not clear why that was a virtue.

Ohio has never sent a woman to the US Senate, where women are outnumbered by worse than four-to-one. And it should be noted that among GOP senators, it is the women senators from Maine who are the least doctrinaire and partisan. As the junior US senator, we think Brunner would be inside the room, but more likely than most to insist that the door be open for the public interest.

All the Democratic bigwigs are behind Lee Fisher in this race. That Brunner has neither bent, buckled nor broken in the face of the behind-the-scenes bullying is telling. She has stayed the course in the race, connected with voters in large settings and small, campaigning with a quiet ease and grace that have been impressive.

While some who have worked with her express concern about her administrative skills, she has run an impressive and imaginative campaign with far fewer resources than her opponent. She is clearly but quietly a formidable candidate. If she wins the nomination, she will have an outstanding to chance to win in November and become an equally formidable Senator for progressive issues.

Democrats who have yet to cast their primary votes should put Brunner at the top of the ticket. President Obama told us during the campaign that he could not bring change by himself. Nominating Jennifer Brunner as Ohio’s Democratic candidate for Senator would signal change about the role of money in campaigns, and address the concerns of many local Democrats about fostering a more open and transparent party process.

Party rank-and-filers: if you want to feel better about your party and your choice -- both in November and for the next six years – vote for Brunner.

• • •

Fisher gears up for stretch run

Lt. Governor Lee Fisher was in his best campaign mode on Saturday when he appeared at the new Lancer Restaurant, across the street from its original historic location. He had invited the Cuyahoga County Young Democrats to breakfast, though its membership was considerably outnumbered by the old political heads that comprised the majority of his audience. Fisher’s campaign struck some new tones in calling upon old friends to help carry him to victory in the next 30 days in the May 4 Democratic primary battle to win the Democratic Party nomination to run in November for the open seat to succeed the retiring George Voinovich.    

 

The stakes are high, as Fisher himself noted. Ohio is a pivotal state in national politics, and its current senatorial and gubernatorial races are likely to have significant effect upon the 2012 presidential playing field.    

 

Fisher is no stranger to tight races. In 1990 he won the race to become state Attorney General by 1,234 votes out of 3,360,162 cast, or only 0.037% of the total number of votes cast, the closest statewide election in Ohio history. Twenty years later, “Landslide Lee”, so dubbed as a result of that earlier race, certainly did not expect to be in a race that is polling about as tightly as that 1990 race. But huge advantages in fundraising and statewide political experience, together with the backing of the vast majority of the party’s establishment and apparatus, have not been sufficient to separate him from the tenacious and resourceful challenge of Jennifer Brunner, who abandoned a likely easy re-election campaign for the chance to win an open Senate seat.   

 

Fisher now seems reconciled to being in a tough battle, and he may be warming to it. He referred to his challenger by name at least twice, and with respect. He invoked President Obama’s name repeatedly, and cited the president’s election in 2008 as being a major factor in his desire to go to Washington and engage in the national struggle for economic justice. He also put his humble side on display as he repeatedly asked for his audience’s help.   

 

Fisher’s performance appeared to find resonance with his audience. Some in the black community have been piqued at Fisher’s reported aversion to citing the President by name, an apparent hangover from his fervent support of Hillary Clinton in 2008. And current Fisher campaign literature argues that “Washington is broken”, a perplexing position given that his party controls the White House and both houses of Congress. The candidate gave Obama credit for the historic health bill achievement, and noted that the president has been besieged by some on account of his race as well as his politics.   

 

Fisher reminded his breakfast guests that he is the only statewide candidate from northeast Ohio on the ballot this year. Democratic turnout in Cuyahoga County has always been critical to the party’s success statewide. This year the county's impact is likely to be no different, and moreover will probably determine whether Landslide Lee gets a chance to return to a November ballot.   

 

Fisher has put a new team in place for his stretch drive to the nomination. He brought on a new and savvy communications director in January, and is apparently finding some new African American counsel to go along with longtime political ally and adviser Arnold Pinkney. 

• • •

Grits ain't Gravy [Miscellaneous Political Notes]

 

Terri Hamilton Brown has told friends that she is likely to throw her hat into the ring for county executive. Brown’s current gig is director of the Opportunity Corridor. She earned high marks as a manager in Cleveland’s community development department and as chief executive of the county’s public housing authority. With a resume that also includes stints as president of University Circle Inc and as a National City Bank vice president, she clearly possesses the executive depth to handle the job.  But doing a job and campaigning for it require different skill sets, something she is probably doing due diligence on as you read this.

• •

We only got to speak to her for two minutes, but District 10 county council candidate Sharon Cole was ready. She managed to tell us that she has two engineering degrees [Purdue and Case Western Reserve universities], and fell in love with public service while doing constituent service work for the late Congresswoman Stephanie Tubbs Jones. She currently is executive assistant to Cleveland councilman Eugene Miller. District 10 includes Cleveland Heights, East Cleveland, Cleveland Wards 10 & 11, and Bratenahl.

• •

Lost in the primary season has been the issue of a new county chair of the Cuyahoga Democratic Party. Interim chair Pat Britt has told supporters she doesn’t want the position permanently. Party rules call for the party’s central committee to meet between May 10 and May 19 to elect the new chair. Campaigns for the position have typically been conducted over the phone or person-to-person. Some party activists are hoping to initiate a more open process this year. More on this is likely to emerge soon. 

• • •

 

The Plain Dealer: What Do They Know, When Do They Know It, and What Do They Do About It?

With apologies to the alternative weeklies, Cuyahoga has essentially been a one-newspaper community since the controversial closing of the Cleveland Press in 1982. By default, the Plain Dealer became our town’s newspaper of record. It represents us whether we like it or not. So its deteriorating coverage and declining editorial standards, compounded by increasing arrogance, is a cause for both anger and sadness.

But even as a hopelessly habituated newspaper reader, I find myself challenged to explain how the Plain Dealer has failed to publish the fact that one of the community’s most prominent citizens — Bill Patmon — a major candidate in the recent Cleveland mayoral race, is now running for the Ohio House in District 10.

Patmon filed his petitions at 9AM on Friday, February 18. An experienced and canny politician, he no doubt had political reasons for pulling his petitions anonymously and waiting until the last day of filing. But the story is not Patmon’s campaign. It is why the Plain Dealer has failed for three weeks to inform its readers that Bill Patmon is challenging incumbent Robin Belcher and longtime Cleveland city councilman Roosevelt Coats in the May primary.

The Plain Dealer has often bestowed favorable coverage upon the voluble Patmon in the past, so we do not presume in any way that their failure to report his candidacy represents any sort of bias. Rather it seems to us an arrogance of power and a disdain for its readers, especially those who live within House District 10, an area comprising parts of downtown Cleveland as well as inner-city neighborhoods both east and west.

Sloppy or hurried reporting could have accounted for the initial failure to report Patmon’s candidacy. If the story was reported solely online at the paper’s website, as is happening with greater frequency, then readers should be told what they can no longer expect in the increasingly lightweight print edition.

But consider that three weeks after the filing deadline, and after two calls from Patmon to a reporter, and even several days after interviewing Patmon and his rivals in their editorial suite, the paper has not deigned to provide its readers — many of whom are without online access — an accurate list of the candidates.

We would be interested in knowing if our readers have other instances of significant omissions in coverage.

P.S. At the time of this posting, our call to the reporter had not been returned [o.k., it was only a few minutes ago.] If we get a reply, we’ll let you know.

County Transition: Choosing the Messenger Sends a Message [Updated]

Burges & Burges has withdrawn from consideration from the competition for the communications consultant contract. See the story here: http://www.cleveland.com/cuyahoga-county/index.ssf/2010/03/burges_burges_withdraws_its_bid_for_cuyahoga_county_tra

County Transition: Choosing the Messenger Sends a Message

The biggest question surrounding the new form of county government is this: will anything really be different? Will the new government be more honest? More efficient? More inclusive? More imaginative? More effective? More attuned to the 21^st century? Of better service to its constituents? More able to attract new residents, new jobs? Will it be a new form of the status quo, going to the same insiders to repackage the same approaches to the same problems and obtain the same results?

The old political structure is being swept away by a decisive electorate that wanted something new. But a new political structure does not preordain a new political culture. Whether a new culture emerges will depend in large measure on the extent that same electorate wants it badly enough to help create it.

One early measure of whether a new political culture is developing is the work of the various volunteer groups that are participating in planning for the transition. Earlier this week I attended a meeting of the Public Engagement Workgroup. The group’s membership includes several familiar names representing such well-known civic players as the League of Women Voters, Cleveland AFL-CIO, COSE [Council of Smaller Enterprises], RPM International, First Energy, and ThompsonHine.

Cuyahoga’s establishment power is often wielded in public settings by its law firms, public utilities, foundations and large corporations. If change is truly in the air, it will be reflected in new outcomes influenced by these establishment representatives.

Thanks to public attention and outcry, the work of these groups is public in unprecedented ways. Thus there were about fifteen members of the public, including this scribe, in attendance as the Workgroup heard presentations from three companies seeking to provide communication consulting services to the County’s Transition Advisory Group.

Briefly put, the work to switch from a two-century old commissioner structure to the new executive-council form ratified by the voters is an enormously complex operation. Cuyahoga County is a billion dollar plus government operation with roughly 8,000 employees providing vital services to more than one million people every day. It is about to undergo radical neurosurgery as it shifts to an all new management team that at present is wholly unidentified, unselected, and collectively may have zero experience in working together.

The idea of public engagement, it would seem, is to establish a two-way line of communication that will attract the public’s best ideas about how to go forward, and to keep the public apprised as much as possible about just what the heck is going on. Or, if you are a cynic about the whole process, public engagement will be about meaningless participation and opaque transparency: volunteers will be kept busy and feel involved, and information will be shared, but the real decisions will continue to be made offsite and out-of-sight.

Either way, the communications professionals who participate in shaping and broadcasting the transition process will themselves be central. Five companies submitted written proposals to the County. These proposals were evaluated and rated, and three teams were selected for further consideration. [When the team of Lesic & Camper Communications/ Cleveland State University decided to drop out, the fourth-ranked team — GAP/365 moved up and got a second chance.]

Tuesday afternoon’s meeting took place in a large second-floor room at COSE headquarters in the former Higbee/Dillard department store on Public Square. Each team was given 10-15 minutes to introduce itself and make its pitch, followed by a Q&A from the workgroup, with each member asking one of ten scripted questions to the team over the next 30-45 minutes.

All presenters came politically correct, with appropriate nods to race, ethnicity and gender. In fact, the majority of presenters were women, although men led or co-led every team. Every team featured people of color, with the first two teams emphasizing that their joint venture partners were longtime collaborators and not just accessories put on for the occasion. The third team, comprising two black-owned companies, had no need to offer such reassurance.

 * * *

But this is only partly about color and race and ethnicity, which are always in play, because we are human, and we live in America. It is also, and more importantly, about our political culture.

All of the teams are qualified in a competition like this. There is no test with an objectively marked grade. There are submissions, track records, auditions, and oftentimes winks and nods. But this process is about the public’s business, transparent to perhaps an unprecedented degree, and we submit, a likely harbinger of what is to come over the next year.

The first presenter was the team of Burges & Burges in tandem with Brenda Terrell & Associates.  Burges is the heavyweight of local political consultants. They have been around over a quarter of a century, they have been in lots of high-profile campaigns, they are super-connected. They know exactly what they are doing and how to do it. They have run, often simultaneously, levy campaigns, issues campaigns, and candidate campaigns. And, by the way, they were the hired gun for the Issue 6 campaign that stomped the opposition. So they know what to say, when to say it, who and where to say it.

Burges has such a big local footprint that they will not commit to avoiding representing candidates for either county executive or county council during the term of the contract.

And that’s pretty much what they said in their presentation. ‘We know what we’re doing, we’re the best around, we just got finished doing this stuff, and we are the safest, surest choice.’ Team leader Bill Burges was so laid back he was practically avuncular. His team answered all the Workgroup questions as if they had written them last week and donated them to the group.

Next up was Landau Public Relations. Principal Howard Landau had assembled a formidable team, including former Citizens League exec Jan Purdy, onetime East Ohio Gas man Terry Uhl, and the well educated, highly talented, broadly experienced and extraordinarily lovely Montrie Rucker Adams.

[Correspondent disclosure:  Montrie is a friend of longstanding, as are the aforementioned Brenda Terrell and the soon-to-be-discussed Alexandria Johnson (“I prefer to be called ‘Alex’) Boone.]

Landau was earnestness personified. His background is public relations, not political intrigue. His clients are mostly corporate or nonprofit, and he seemed drawn to this assignment out of a sincere desire to serve and participate. He appeared easy to work with and had a diverse and capable team. He would have been my second choice.

Last on the meeting agenda was the team of Gap Communications Group and Cleveland365.com. Alex Boone, who has been around at least as long as Burges and Landau, heads Gap. As a black woman, her opportunities have been restricted, her challenges more severe. But she didn’t present that way, because, well, this is 2010, folks, Obama is president, and there will be no reparations.

What she did bring was energy, humor, confidence, and excitement. She brought a tight, no-name team that has worked together for most of this century. She brought handouts. She brought a power point presentation. And she brought interactive, as presented and demonstrated by Terry Thomas of Cleveland365.

All of the teams talked about social media as a key part of the communications mix. All seemed to understand that you couldn’t rely on it totally in a community with large pockets of technophobes, the unwired, and the impoverished. But Thomas clearly had an edge when it comes to social media. He articulated a vision of transparent and instantaneous two-way communication, and he demonstrated it hands on with his audience.

The Gap/Cleveland365 presentation had the least polish and the most sizzle. It was the best prepared, the best orchestrated, and the most hopeful. Boone and Thomas have the fewest establishment credentials, but they are the most Cleveland. They presented with the most energy, verve, and imagination. You can bet that if they win the contract they will assuredly treat it as the best opportunity they have ever earned, as it surely will be. And it will be a signal that this community is ready to be open, bold, adventurous, and interactive.

 * * *

One final note. In summer 2008, I attended a Cleveland365 event at the Botanical Garden in University Circle. The topic was regionalism and the speakers included representatives from Cleveland, Akron, and Youngstown. The joint was packed. I was astonished because in my four decades of attending local civic events of this type, I had never witnessed such a diverse crowd: an extraordinary mix of generations, geography, color, ethnicity, and attitude.

Local civic and political leaders like to talk about our diversity as if it were an accomplished fact. People who hear that talk might believe it if they have never been to Washington, DC, New York City, San Francisco, Los Angeles, etc. We remain a very segregated and stratified community. It is rare when an event takes place in this community that is so democratic in tone, tenor, and style that you wonder who put it together. Cleveland365 has done it, and they have done it more than once.

Burges is the safe choice. GAP/Cleveland365 is the best choice. If they are selected, you can believe that a groundswell is afoot, and that a new political culture might just be on the way to accompany the new political structure.

State Senator Nina Turner files today to return to Ohio Senate

Regular readers of this space have no doubt observed that The Real Deal is an evolving blog. Last week we offered our first commentary on the Cleveland Cavaliers. Today we offer our first news scoop, not a biggie as scoops go, but perhaps a harbinger of things to come, especially for followers of the Cuyahoga political scene.

We learned just a few moments ago that Nina Turner, whose name has been bruited about as a possible candidate for the new post of Cuyahoga County chief executive, filed today to run for a full term as state senator representing the 25th District. Turner was appointed to this position to fill the unexpired term of Lance Mason, who resigned in 2008 to accept an appointment by Governor Strickland to be a common pleas judge.

We think this represents the sound move for Turner, who rocketed to local political prominence last year as one of the few black elected officials to endorse Issue 6, the successful ballot measure creating the new form of county government that takes effect next January 1. Our guess is that she realized that popularity with the Plain Dealer and Issue 6 proponents would have been of little avail in a run for county executive against opponents who plan to raise and spend the estimated cost of such a campaign.

While the Senator could still file to run for county executive before the June 24 deadline, the idea is improbable given the May primary for the race she has just entered. She would either have to abandon her supporters if she won, or file to run for a bigger office after being unable to hold the home base seat to which she had been appointed. In neither instance would she be displaying the sound political judgment she has shown at this stage in her relatively young career.

Her return to the Ohio Senate is by no means guaranteed, as she may face substantial challenge from foes eager to punish her for her Issue 6 stance or hoping to capitalize on her perceived weakness as a result of carrying the Issue 6 banner in one of the very areas where the issue was rejected by voters.

Past as Prologue

             It seems, as one becomes older,
That the past has another pattern, and ceases to be a mere sequence—
Or even development: the latter a partial fallacy,
Encouraged by superficial notions of evolution.
Which becomes, in the popular mind, a means of disowning the past.
The moments of happiness—not the sense of well-being,
Fruition, fulfillment, security or affection,
Or even a very good dinner, but the sudden illumination—
We had the experience but missed the meaning.…
—T. S. Eliot, The Dry Salvages



Today is the halfway mark of African American History Month. Last February, there was spirited debate among many Americans, some of whom — in the wake of the Barack Obama’s election as president — questioned the need for continuing an annual four-week Black History observance.
Most of the discussion, though entertaining, was silly, as if the perfect convergence of circumstances resulting in Obama’s victory proved that we had entered a post-racial era in America.
We Americans tend to be spectacularly ahistoric. This trait has worked to our advantage as the nation was built. We focused on the practical as our nation was built. We explored, we cleared, we built, we invented, our eyes focused always on the possibilities of the present or the promise of the future.
The country had no history to study at first. We were once the world’s newest nation, in a hurry to achieve our manifest destiny in the most bountiful and expansive land known to civilized man. History was what Americans left behind in Europe, where folks were mired in a past of religious, royal and feudal castles and tunnels. We had frontiers to tame.
Our most energetic tamers were often people who disdained tradition. They blazed new paths. When they encountered failure, they shrugged it off, moved west, and started anew.
Having subdued much of the continent until there was no more west, we moved overseas, proselytizing, conquering, annexing. The first President Roosevelt established and pursued an expansionist policy with a clear eye. We became an imperial nation as a matter of presumed birthright, though our national fable of exceptionalism still blinds most contemporary Americans to that reality. But you could look it up.
We are not casting blame or pointing fingers here. Readers of this column have probably already supplied some missing pieces in our two-paragraph condensation of U. S. foreign and domestic policy: the all but complete eradication of Native Americans; the dispatch of Mexican Americans back to earlier points of origin; and the theft of Africans from their original homelands, cultures, languages, families, and histories.
Whether we understand it or not, our past catches up with us. As the Eliot passage suggests, if we look back at where we have been and what we have done, we often see a pattern different from what we thought we were doing at the time.

[Real Deal Confession: I wouldn’t know any other T.S. Eliot passage from a hieroglyphic. I know this one as a frontispiece to the memoirs of former Under Secretary of State George W. Ball.]
Acting locally, if we understand the pattern of our past as a community, it can help us make better decisions moving forward. It can help us to make sense of otherwise incomprehensible situations, such as the current plan of Cleveland schools ceo Eugene Sanders to close nearly a score of schools, many of which had recently received hundreds of thousands of dollars in renovation and repair expenditures, or last year’s near-unanimous opposition of black political leaders to the new form of county government.

We have a tendency here in Cuyahoga to reduce all discourse on public policy issues to personality-driven motivations. But while it is true that for many public officials, as for most people in general, where they stand depends upon where they sit, it is also true that human motivation is seldom linear, and that governing is complex. It may be helpful to keep this in mind as we begin to assess chief executive and council candidates for our new county government.

Cavs on a roll!!!

Don’t look now but the Cleveland Cavaliers are clearly the best team in the NBA: they have not only the best home record [22-3] in the league, they also boast the best road record [19-8]. They have moved to the top of the heap even though two of their best players — Mo Williams and Delonte West — are injured. [West returned last night.]

Regular season dominance is no guarantor of posts-season success, but we like the makeup of this team from top to bottom. Coach Mike Brown has done a good job of experimenting with the team’s pieces and parts, while obviously looking ahead to the “second season”, i.e., the playoffs. We’ll have more to say on this later, but these Cavs can play fast or slow, big or quick. And they almost always will defend tough.

Undeclared Ronayne impresses with low key, high energy speech

He may not have been auditioning for the job, but Chris Ronayne offered a vision last night to the Cleveland Heights Democratic Club of just what an effective county executive would look like. With a manner that was folksy but not phony, affable but analytical, and practical yet almost poetic, the former Cleveland planning director persuaded an audience peppered with skeptics that Cuyahoga’s new charter government could facilitate a promising new era of cooperation and prosperity.

Ronayne spoke directly but optimistically about tough challenges facing Cuyahoga and its new leaders. Embedded in his discussion of job loss, parochial attitudes, urban sprawl, the state government’s anti-urban attitude no matter which party was in control, the inefficiencies of 59 political entities within the county, and other daunting issues was a sense that workable solutions existed.

Ronayne, president of University Circle, Inc., conveyed an easy familiarity with the political process although he disavowed being “an insider’s insider”. He spoke of smart-growth policies and shared service networks as tools to build a better region. But he emphasized more than once that “personnel is policy”, stressing how critical it was for citizens to evaluate candidates for both county executive and the county council with extreme care.

It was only a brief talk but long enough to display a keen and supple intellect, an appreciation of Cuyahoga’s diversity, a practical but dynamic approach to problem solving, and a “yes we can” spirit.

Two declared candidates for county executive — Democratic mayors Ed Fitzgerald of Lakewood and Georgine Welo of South Euclid — were in attendance. They and several judicial candidates spoke to the club before Ronayne’s talk.

Following a brief Q&A, a retired public official from an old and distinguished political family seemed to speak for many when she said that, although she had voted against Issue 6 and for Issue 5, she was beginning to think the new county government could turn out to be a good thing.

Teachable Moment in Harry Reid’s Candid Comments

Perhaps the best thing to come out of the hypocritical and out-sized attacks upon U.S. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid may be the sober realization of just how far the country is from entering a post-racial era.

Appraising Barack Obama’s electoral chances a private conversation during the presidential campaign, Reid is reported to have essentially acknowledged what has been confirmed countless times by social science research: light-skinned African Americans who speak what is widely accepted as standard American English are less likely to be negatively prejudged by white Americans by surface criteria and thus stand a better chance of success in society.

For stating what is basically a matter of fact documented by historians, social scientists, and the life experiences of most African Americans, In short order, Reid was vilified as a racist and called upon to relinquish his post as majority leader. The story dominated the Sunday talk shows and has been pretty much been pontificated to death by pundits of every stripe.

The partisan attacks are understandable to the degree that they are in large measure related to the understated and under-rated way that Reid has deftly guided much of President Obama’s agenda through the Senate. But these have gained no traction in the wake of Reid’s quick apology for his remark and the “no problem” acceptance of his apology by President Obama, members of the Congressional Black Caucus, and other representatives of the supposedly offended group.

The Republican assault upon Reid is simultaneously comical and offensive, with both reactions arising from the transparent hypocrisy of those who choose to acknowledge race only when it can be used as a wedge to divide or distract.

What this latest dust up does reveal however, is just how far away we are as a nation from having honest dialogue about the past, present, and future of race in America. Jeremiah Wright, Henry Louis Gates, Eric Holder, Harry Reid: each of these names is now part of a recurring pattern where an heartfelt observation about America’s racial record or its structural consequences results in lots of heat but little light.

Pain, fear, and mistrust combine to turn most public attempts at racial understanding into grandstanding. We have no common vocabulary to talk about race. I wish that instead of apologizing, Senator Reid had instead elaborated. It could have been like one of those moments when Jesse Jackson talked about a heightened level of apprehension on possible engagement with a congregation of young black men. Who didn’t identify with that unexpected moment of candor?

Too often, the anguish of the nation’s festering racial wounds gets a brutal sanitization. If we can’t put a Band-Aid on the cancer, we just shut the door and hold our noses. [Greater Clevelanders, think Imperial Avenue].

Reid’s apology just added to the confusion. What was he apologizing for? For being politically incorrect in his politically correct observation? Who was he apologizing to? Was he apologizing to dark-skinned black people for the prejudices that white people carry that limit opportunities for jobs, education, housing, and political success? Was he apologizing to all black people for a private comment that may now lead to the outing of intra-racial color prejudice? Was he apologizing because that outing may give comfort to white people who can perversely find justification for their prejudices in the prejudice of others? Or maybe he was apologizing to white people for his having dared to acknowledge that they really aren’t as color-blind as they like to pretend?

I read a lot of online commentary and watched a lot of the television coverage of Reid’s statement in an attempt to get some kind of grasp on these issues. Much of what I read and heard was singularly unimpressive. But I did encounter one or two commentators who offered a special vantage. Jonathan Walton offered this observation:

“If anyone should be offended it should be the critical mass of Americans, of all racial, ethnic and political perspectives, who are so informed by the logic of white supremacy that they fail to interrogate the correlations between dark skin tone and negativity or lightness and positive attributes.”

And this:

“There is one major problem that I do have with Senator Reid’s statement, however. For him to contend that President Obama has “no Negro dialect” reveals a parochial comprehension of the breadth and artistic beauty of black vernacular culture. President Obama is most lauded for his gifted rhetorical ability. His persuasive use of narrative, rhythmic timing, and common employment of alliteration and assonance are all creative staples of the African American homiletic tradition.” http://www.religiondispatches.org/blog/mediaculture/2181/


Speaking of black preachers, next week the nation observes Martin Luther King Jr. Day. Perhaps instead of recalling King’s wonderful rhetoric and soaring phrases, we might reflect on how much listening he must have done before he could articulate a vision so compelling that it helped to galvanize a national movement. Perhaps we could honor his memory this year by listening to others with his spirit of understanding and reconciliation, and then by following up, as he did, with some action.

Cultural Divides

When I was young I used to think that the key to success in Cleveland was to observe what was being done on either coast and to adapt that to the local scene. It seemed to me at the time that we were ten years or so behind what was happening in the leading business and cultural trend-setting centers of the nation.

Now, 30+ years later, [as we embark upon a new, yet to be named decade], as political and cultural evolution accelerates more rapidly in much of the rest of the country and the world than here in Cuyahoga, we may be facing a larger gap.

The perceptive Fareed Zakaria observed last year in his book, The Post-American World, that America’s real problem was not one of excellence but one of access. Recognizing the danger posed by the country’s inequalities, he argues that the country will decline “if we cannot educate and train a third of the working population to compete in a knowledge economy.”

An application of this global political analysis to our beloved crooked river community suggests that Zakaria’s concern has special resonance in our County. Indeed, apprehension over the effects that the new county charter would have in exacerbating the County’s existing inequalities was a paramount concern for many opponents of the charter.

Charter champions touted the ability of a sleek new county government to drive economic development. Others, sensitive to the county’s historic role as provider of essential health and social services to those in need, worried about the neglect of those services by a county administration focused on bringing new development in. This worry was joined by concerns that the fruits of any new development would be skewed towards those Cuyahogans who already enjoy the most fruits of America’s competitive marketplace.

In reality, both sides of the Charter dust up may have been guilty of a too-narrow focus. Greater Cleveland’s competitive advantage once relied on its “great location”. Once upon a time we touted that with great community pride. The refrain now echoes plaintively as if emanating from a scratchy phonograph record still looping; everyone has left the party and nobody stayed to clean up.

In today’s wireless digital age, a company’s choice of where to locate may have more to do with the owner’s preferred lifestyle than the economics of manufacturing. But what has remained constant for business success, of course, is human capital.

This area once boasted one of the largest, most highly skilled and best trained manufacturing workforces the world has ever seen. The guts of that workforce are now largely deceased, retired, transferred, migrated, or casualties of globalization.

The establishment of Plato’s Republic along these southern Erie shores will not be sufficient to attract new businesses if we cannot replace that legendary workforce with its modern equivalent: tech-savvy, open-minded, versatile, young men and women with a global appreciation of possibilities.

Those kinds of workers flock to Silicon Valley, Route 128, Austin, the Research Triangle, and other dynamic locales. We have some of them here, concentrated in world-class enterprises like the Cleveland Clinic and hey, the Cleveland Cavaliers [key workers come from Lithuania, Brazil, Mississippi, Akron, and wherever Jamario Moon is from].

Today’s workers are increasingly people of color, some with ethnic self-descriptions and sexual orientations that defy the white bread, black-white, male-dominated, racial and religious, manifest destiny, nine planet world reference points we were once fed as universal and eternal truths. Many are multi-lingual and untethered from our own sense of limitation.

Here in Cuyahoga, we are going to have to work diligently and creatively to unleash the creativity in our most precious resource, our children. Where in our community is there greater hunger and energy than in our public schools?

My son struggled with some typical black-male issues in his suburban high school years, persevered, got an M.B.A., and now runs a successful company in … Hong Kong [www.chunkyonion.com]. His customers are those who aspire to a global understanding for their children so they can compete internationally. Do we want as much for our community’s kids?

We have bought or been sold a new form of government. Left untouched in the transaction was any discussion of consolidation, of working across municipal boundaries that would go unrecognized but for differently colored street signs, or of cooperating safety, sanitation, or [!] school systems.

Zakaria understood that part of the universal appeal of American culture is rooted in its celebration and reinforcement of a problem-solving attitude that questions authority and thinks heretically.

The authors of the new county charter should have included a provision for those traits to be embedded in the DNA of all county office seekers. They omitted such a clause, so county voters are going to have to demand it from candidates. Maybe we should start demanding it from all of our leaders. Maybe we should demand it of ourselves.

• • •

Building Community across Cuyahoga

I have been speaking with a lot of our community’s political leaders lately in the aftermath of last month’s volcanic decision to smash the existing political compact.

There were many civic-minded citizens on both sides of the question of how best to reform a Byzantine system of government that promoted nepotism, encouraged inefficiency, rewarded mediocrity, and tolerated corruption. But the decision was made in the crisis atmosphere that typifies much of our community decision-making: winner-take-all snake-oil salesmen on one side and we-are-all losers demagogues on the other.

The voters were fed up, thanks to a tanking economy accompanied by blaring headlines signaling widespread corruption. In our collective wisdom, amidst despair over the economy and disgust with many of our politicians, we have jumped into the treacherous waters of structural reform. Next up: selecting a captain and a crew to steer our vulnerable county ship.

My discussions about leadership with some of our most savvy and successful politicians — including some at the top and several on the rise — have led me back home. I want to talk about my mother.

Maybe that’s because I write this on Christmas Sunday morning, an especially sacred day in my household, and often the busiest day of the year. My father, re-channeling his inner Oliver Wendell Holmes, had at age 40 been called to his first pastorate by one of Cleveland’s oldest black churches, Mt. Zion Congregational Church. My mother, a music professor at Howard University, resigned her job and came to Cleveland with her husband and two grade school children to start a new life in the bustling Midwest metropolis that 1953 Cleveland seemed to be. She was 38 and I had no idea that her earthly life was more than 3/4 spent.

She might have known that, however. Several years earlier, she had undergone a double mastectomy, undergoing radical radiation that left scars and disfigurement that I can still see. Radiation burns and extraordinary edema notwithstanding, she was beautiful both inside and out.

The church was in a precarious position. Its last pastor had moved onto a bigger church in Chicago. The last church home had been sold and converted into a nursing home by new ownership. Sunday service was held in two small meeting rooms at the Cedar YMCA. The church office was down the street, sharing a suite of rooms with a dental practice. The dentist was a church trustee who lived upstairs from his practice. There was a parsonage in Glenville, with a huge sycamore tree that dwarfed the two-cent postage stamp of a lawn.

And there was a choir. It seemed to sing only dirges.

But the church congregation was not without assets, primary among which was a core of faithful members. These included several leaders who even in de facto segregated Cleveland of the 1950s were accomplished professionals and community leaders.

But about that choir. My mother, Marjory J. Andrews, became the organist and choir director sometime in that first year. Within no more than three years, she had five choirs going, for everyone from preschoolers to the transformed Chancel Choir. It was the latter where her impact was most dramatic. The Mt. Zion music ministry became known throughout community. Its repertoire included Tchaikovsky, Handel, Beethoven, and prominently featured brilliantly arranged Negro spirituals.

On the Sunday before Christmas, Mt. Zion Vesper Service began at 6pm. If you weren’t there early you either had to stand in the back or along the sides, or sit and hear through loudspeakers from an anteroom. Worshippers came from all over, from Lakewood and Rocky River to Chagrin Falls.

My soft-spoken mother was a totally dedicated, demanding, professional. She was upbeat and optimistic, and she accepted no excuses for anything less than excellence. Her approach began to attract some of the area’s best singers and musicians, a process accelerated by the Church’s buying property in University Circle and building a magnificent sanctuary.

The choir included at least a dozen solo-quality singers, blended together in near perfection with supporting voices. Members were schoolteachers, basketball coaches, grad students, housewives, engineers, and probably a couple of roués. They were black, white, straight, gay, young and seasoned.

Long story short: I never thought of my mother as a leader, though clearly she was. She was my mother. I did understand that professionally she was an accomplished and dedicated musician who, despite the severe physical limits under which she labored as a result of her cancer, always found the stamina to practice.

But with half a century to figure it out, I realize that my mother was not just a leader in her profession. She was a builder. And she worked with everybody. She built an outstanding music program by focusing on the mission. She never sought personal acclaim and did everything she could to enhance the ensemble over any individual. And she found a place for everyone. If you couldn’t sing especially well, maybe you could maintain the music library.

She never assumed that your social status, skin color, or previous condition established your talent or worthiness in support of the common endeavor. And she never accepted that excellence and equity were incompatible.

I could say more, but I hope the point is made. Cuyahoga is a venerable institution with a rich history. We face daunting challenges that are both real and spiritual. Our choir sings dirges. We have lots of talent, though we stifle much of it.

We seldom focus on excellence and equity as partners.

We need builders who will focus on our joint mission to create a healthier community and not worry about who gets the credit.

United Pastors initiate Community Dialogue for Reconcilation and Unity

About 60 citizens took up the invitation extended by the United Pastors in Mission to attend a community meeting called in the wake of the recent controversy over the tasteless assault upon State Senator Nina Turner in the Call & Post for her alliance with the architects of the successful Issue 6 campaign to change the form of county government.

The tone of yesterday's meeting was restrained for the most part. UPM president C. Jay Matthews, pastor of host church Mt. Sinai Baptist on Woodland Ave., stated at the outset “you can’t have private reconciliation in a public debate” and sought throughout the 90-minute session to focus attention on moving forward with outreach and community engagement. While he had some success in this effort, many in attendance were still preoccupied with the last campaign and the passions it exposed throughout the community regarding change, political power, and economic and social inequalities.

These passions were best put in perspective by the Rev. Tony Minor of Lutheran Metropolitan Ministry, who first arrived in Cleveland 25 years ago, dispatched here, he said, by Rev. Joseph Lowery of Alabama, to re-establish a local chapter of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. Minor recalled a conversation with one his parishioners, a single mother who had come to him seeking aid because her cupboard was bare and she was being evicted. In the midst of assisting her, he asked her opinion about the Aunt Jemima depiction of Sen. Turner. As might be assumed, the woman, consumed by hand-to-mouth necessities, was totally unaware of the controversy.

Minor used the vignette to argue that “the town needs to change; the old guard needs to open up and change.”

This theme was echoed by Matthews, who said, “Leadership is not born or made. It has followers.” He said that there was a “process of opportunity”, and that while we certainly had not become a post-racial society, the election of President Obama suggested that there are some new opportunities open to African Americans that should be seized.

Yet and still, there was discussion of issues further polarized by the Call & Post cartoon. Deborah Plummer, chief diversity officer at the Cleveland Clinic, rose to express her appreciation to UPM for standing up on behalf of women. Attorney Michael Nelson argued that the cartoon merely depicted what many, if not most, of Cleveland’s black community were thinking and saying about Sen. Turner, including all … of Cleveland’s black councilmen.

County Commissioner Peter Lawson Jones, saying that he felt a newfound liberation in his new, charter-mandated lame-duck status, spoke of the importance of participating in the election of new county officials next year. Pointing to his obligation as a countywide official to pay attention to the “aspirations, needs, and desires” of all county residents, he expressed concern whether county council candidates would feel similarly obliged.

The meeting, which began with a presentation on behalf of Christians United for Israel, concluded with a stirring Advent homily from Dr. Marvin McMickle, pastor of Antioch Baptist Church.

In the brief press conference that followed, Rev. Matthews, who during the meeting lifted up the diversity of the black community, was backed by nearly 20 members of UPM as he resisted any line of questioning that sought to exploit fissures in the ongoing relationship of the black clergy and the Call & Post. While that posture may appear ironic, his answer was both adroit and accurate, as UPM’s stated intent is to continue dialogue both with the paper’s leadership as well as with those who are involved in delineating the new county government.

Paean to a Cleveland Landmark

We received this email from our good friend Dick Peery, who "broadcast it to the ether". It struck us as a love song to a lost era. Reproduced here with his permission, we wonder how it strikes you.

•••


The flames that destroyed the Lancer Steakhouse Sunday took more than a business from the community. They consumed a legacy of Cleveland's finest memories.

When the Lancer opened 49 years ago, its well-dressed patrons included physicians, lawyers, successful business owners and numbers bankers who prospered before the state encroached on their territory with the lottery. As Carl Stokes ran for mayor in the mid-1960s, the Lancer was where campaign workers swapped information, recharged their political batteries and planned new activities after an evening of volunteer work. It was considered the unofficial campaign headquarters. Stokes was elected by a hairsbreadth in 1967 as the nation's first black mayor of a major city and launched a political revolution that opened urban leadership to all citizens across the country. Arguably, it was the Lancer that put him over the top.

The political importance of the Lancer continued throughout the Stokes administration as the mayor opened the full range of positions in City Hall to black job seekers for the first time. Municipal workers, city council members and anyone wanting the back story on developments at City Hall knew they could get a good political conversation going at the Lancer. The upstairs conference room was the place of choice for strategy sessions.

As a reporter for the Call and Post while Stokes’s was mayor I found the Lancer invaluable. I started at the Plain Dealer in 1971 shortly before Stokes' announcement that he would not run for a third term. When the bombshell dropped on a Saturday, I was told to go out in the black community and get some reaction. I guess the editors assumed I would buttonhole people on the street. I made a beeline for the Lancer where I took a stool at the middle of the bar and sat there the entire afternoon taking notes. Virtually everyone I would have thought to ask for an opinion came by. Elected officials, heads of neighborhood organizations, activists who had been in the news one way or another, all flocked to the Lancer seeking understanding of the shocking news. When I turned in the story, several editors told me no other reporter would have known how to get such a comprehensive wrap up. I didn't tell them it wasn't me. It was the Lancer.

Of all the sessions I attended in the upstairs meeting room, the most unique was hosted by Ron Bey. He was a black Muslim protégé of Louis "Babe" Triscaro, a colorful Teamster official and Mafia figure. Bey owned businesses, headed some anti-drug programs and was a City Hall frequenter during the Stokes and Perk administrations, but his primary occupation was assumed to be as a hit man for the mob. He was a fixture in Little Italy when few African Americans dared to visit the area. He helped calm a community uproar after kids threw rocks at a school bus carrying black students on Murray Hill road in Little Italy. Bey arranged a press conference at the Lancer at which businessmen Al Micatrotto and Tony Hughes said they wanted to apologize on behalf of the Italian community. Micatrotto was especially eloquent as he emphasized the right of everyone to travel on any street without fear of attack. When the local Mafia unraveled years later, Micatrotto and Hughes were identified as longtime members.

Over the decades politics, economics and demographics changed and so did the Lancer. As the old customers faded and the next generation of professionals were welcomed in new hangouts downtown, the base for a center of black social and political activity also waned. But not completely. When there was a need to gather, old timers resurrected the past at the Lancer. For instance, whenever boxing promoter Don King came back to Cleveland for a political event or the funeral of former colleague, he bought out the house and everyone was welcome.

The most significant celebration in the Lancer s history occurred just a year ago. The local NAACP wanted to have a viewing party for the election of Barack Obama as president and there was just one logical place to go. International television broadcasts emanated from the large tent in the parking lot where euphoric voters rejoiced in Obama's incredible victory. Of all the passionate statements from gatherings throughout the country that I saw on television that night, the most profound was from the Lancer patron with long braids down his back who told the world, "Tomorrow I can cut my dreads."

Owner George Dixon says he will rebuild. He must. It will be great if his new restaurant brings back the enchantment of the original Lancer. In any case, a monument to that magic time is needed.

Dick Peery

NAACP Youth Gathering Holds Promise

Christmas came early for the three dozen or so aspiring young political activists who responded to the NAACP flier inviting them to a primer on building a framework for leadership in the new political landscape ushered in on election day last month, even if the lessons didn’t go exactly as planned.

More than 250 people filled the atrium at Cleveland State’s Levin College of Urban Affairs last night in a pulsing, buzzing swarm that in some ways resembled a political convention. There was an intriguing mix of officials serving as faculty, but the audience included a rich array of political activists whose roots go back to the black community’s heady successes of the late 1960s and early ‘70s, and a surprising number of current elected officials whose presence [in a delightful departure from normal protocol, was not officially recognized]. There was also a healthy dose of the hoi polloi, whose dismay at the perceived loss of black political power in the wake of the county’s new charter provided hot sauce for the evening’s brew.

An enterprising political aspirant could reflect on the mixed bag of wisdom that came from the invited panelists [State Rep. Robin Belcher, Lakewood mayor Ed Fitzgerald, Cleveland council members Mamie Mitchell and Zach Reed, Young Democrats president Curtis Thompson II, Jose Feliciano Jr. of the Hispanic Roundtable, and for good measure, community activist Eric Johnson and Chris Ronayne, president of University Circle Inc. [State Senator Nina Turner was an invited panelist but chose not to participate.]

Perhaps the most important lesson a novice politico could have learned was the need for patience and composure in the face of the untidy part of public life: when citizens, feeling disempowered and deeply upset with the state of public affairs, take the microphone and say so in all kinds of ways.

Charged with keeping the proceedings under control were recent law school graduate NeKima Hill of the NAACP Youth Council and radio talk show host Basheer Jones. Hill focused on keeping both panelists and audience on point, though her predetermined questions left panelists groping to respond at times. Jones showed promise as a moderator, and earned audience gratitude when he gracefully but firmly forced ever-garrulous Gerald Henley to give up the microphone after an overlong declaration of his intent to run for a seat on the new county council.

Panelists expressed a range of views when asked why Issue 6 had passed. Lakewood mayor Fitzgerald observed succinctly that people had lost faith in the existing system, and expressed it by overturning the existing order. He said, “Sometimes elections are about an idea, and not about the specifics.”

Eric Johnson argued that Issue 6’s mandate was weak because of poor turnout. Councilwoman Mamie Mitchell pointed out that very few of the politicians who stated opposition to the new charter actually campaigned against it.

For Curt Thompson II, three factors contributed to the result: the overwhelming amount by which Issue 6 proponents outspent the opposition, the ongoing corruption revelations and allegations, and a lack of engagement by Issue 6 foes. Speaking to The Real Deal in a post-forum analysis, he said matter-of-factly, “there is no more Issue 5 or Issue 6. Issue 5 is dead and Issue 6 is a law. We must concentrate now on putting people into office who will concentrate on progress and growth.”

Councilman Zach Reed was blunt in his analysis. “Issue 6 passed”, he said, “because the Plain Dealer wanted it to pass, and they took advantage of the corruption issue.” He said several times, in apparent reference to Republicans and their allies, “the people who couldn’t get in the front door came around the back door.”

Reed did have some cogent advice for those young people who want a place set for them at the table. It’s about power, he told them, and it’s not in the nature of power to yield except in the face of a greater power.

Among those on hand, possibly to recruit new blood or take the measure of potential rivals, were Cleveland council members Mike Polensek, Eugene Miller, and councilman-elect Jeff Johnson; mayor-elect Gary Norton of East Cleveland, and Highland Hills councilman Kenneth Roberts. Also in attendance was former county commissioner Tim McCormack, giving fuel to talk he may be considering a run for county executive.

Other public officials observed at the forum were former election board chief Jane B. Sheats, former Cleveland safety director James Barrett, chief Cleveland Municipal Court referee Greg Clifford, former Central State University board chair Betty Pinkney, and deputy county administrator Lee Trotter.

• • •

The Plain Dealer account of this event reported attendance as “more than 100” and seemed to suggest that the event was a downer because many older citizens lamented the passing of the old order.

In fact, more than 125 attendees signed in according to the organizers, and at least an equal number did not.

Whether or not a sizable number of young people attended depends in part not only one’s ability to guess ages, but also how old you can be and still qualify as young. I saw a vibrant mix of young and old, tried and true, straight and crooked. There was pessimism yes. There was despair, yes. But when I left after 90 minutes, finally tearing myself away from a fascinating evening to keep a commitment a few blocks away, I left feeling that I might be witnessing multiple manifestations of the law of unintended consequences. First, that a ballot initiative developed with the intent by at least some of its partisans to diminish some segment of the electorate, might prove a galvanizing force to greater involvement by that very segment. Second, that the evening’s takeaway for a young leader could plausibly include receiving not only a realistic dose of what his or her constituents likely feel, but a commitment to work to channel the intensity and depth of those feelings in positive ways, and to feel supported in that quest by the veteran troops who came out to be a part of a night for the new and the young.

Kudos to the NAACP, its Youth Council, and its executive director, Stanley Miller. Here’s hoping they do it again, east side, west side, all around the town.

Déja` Vu Act Ignites Vision of Era’s End

There is no surprise in the despicable attack by George Forbes upon state senator Nina Turner in the pages of the Call & Post. Forbes has a long and practiced history of vulgarity. His attack upon Turner’s intelligence and character is no different than his calling [then councilman] Jeff Johnson a “mulatto punk” a political lifetime ago. It parallels his routine denigration of the entire community back in the days when he performed as a shock talk jock on radio while running Cleveland City Council. Déja` vu.

We’ve seen this act countless times, sometimes disguised, often not. Sometimes toned down, sometimes not. Forbes is an equal opportunity offender. He has cursed white folks for whiteness and black folks for blackness.

The man long ago showed he had no shame in his game. And this community has repeatedly shown him he didn’t need to be ashamed for his behavior, even though his contempt for the community he has purported to serve has never been hidden.

The true shame in this stale scenario belongs to the community that has tolerated it for so long. And nobody is innocent. Why does a community with upwards of a thousand active local graduates of a program called Leadership Cleveland repeatedly turn to the same negative sources for positive solutions? Can we possibly expect different results?

It cannot be a failure to understand. Forbes’ public tactical practiced and public use of anger, ridicule, and scorn has always and only been directed at carefully selected targets for well-defined strategic goals. Those goals have always been related first and foremost to the accrual and preservation of Forbes’ personal political power.

Forbes is a past master at invoking the downtrodden and abandoned as props to show that leadership in the black community must continue to be trusted only to him. “Fifty thousand black schoolchildren are suffering.” “The police want 9mm ammunition to gun down black people.” “White folks won’t treat black people fairly.” “Black businesses can’t catch a break.” Forbes is always willing to step up and negotiate with wealth and power behind closed doors in the name of the community to protect the community.

The chief benefactor in these situations has always been George Forbes. He entered into personal business transactions with Jim Stanton, denounced as arch-nemesis to the black community in the 1960s and 70s. Forbes did legal work for multi-millionaire developer Dick Jacobs. He was confidant and mentor to former Cleveland mayor, Ohio governor, and current lame-duck US Senator George Voinovich. Despite the careful public posturing, Voinovich — who may be on his way back to town to run for county executive — has never been a friend to the black community. But he is a friend to George Forbes.

The pattern of personal gain as public denouncer and private negotiator has continued apace since Forbes became local NAACP president. He was legal counsel to Shell Oil when that company was gouging the community he claimed to represent. This summer he served as personal escort to Dan Gilbert’s triumphal march through portions of the black community, dispensing confections and reassuring words about future African American involvement in his casino business. But Gilbert uttered not one firm, enforceable commitment.

[A new form of gaming has already come to the black political community, as wags place wagers on where, how, and when Forbes’ law firm will appear as counsel to which company tied to Gilbert’s burgeoning empire, now enshrined for life into the Ohio Constitution.]

This structural pattern of designated spokesmen negotiating in private as nominal representatives for a vast and diverse segment of the community can only exist when the community stays in shadow. If any potential dissent emerges, its champion must be isolated, ridiculed, and rubbed out by any means necessary, including page one cartoons and editorials.

Nina Turner’s public defection from plantation politics represents a core threat to Forbes’ status as black political broker and overseer. He knows better than anyone that suburban mayors, business leaders, the regional GOP and statewide politicos will no longer employ him as a toll booth if alternate routes — more modern, straighter, less treacherous — are readily available.

A Better Future
One consequence of county charter reform, possibly unintended is the probable emergence of black political leaders who are not beholden to plantation politics. For example, serious citizen thinkers and activists like former Cleveland municipal judge Ellen Connally and Shaker Heights councilman Earl Williams are considering running for the new county council from the new county District 9. These potential candidates, like Turner, inner ring suburban activist Julian Rogers, and rising Collinwood resident Curtis Thompson II, are building coalitions and political paths independent of the black old guard.

Of equal consequence, other voices are bubbling to the surface. Brian Hall, a voice of quiet authority in Cleveland’s tiny black business community for decades, and a leader by example, took the unprecedented step of circulating a community letter denouncing the work of the Call & Post and calling upon Forbes to resign as NAACP head. As a result, 500 people who have joined the Facebook page “ We demand an apology”. Boyd’s Funeral Home has pulled its advertising. Local corporations and businesses are being asked to declare there will be no support for the NAACP’s 2010 Freedom Fund dinner if it does not stand up and denounce the Call & Post for its use of the Aunt Jemima image.

Forbes will no doubt display a steely resolve and attempt to turn aside the disgust he has generated in the black community by his disrespect of Turner and the symbolic use of its ugly racial imagery. He will bring out the hostages — Cleveland’s schoolchildren — and say this is what we should focus on.

Those schoolchildren are involuntary testimony to the power relationships that exist in our community: within the black community, between the City of Cleveland and its more affluent neighbors, and between private self-interest and public duty. The opportunity is at hand to re-structure some of those relationships, to set a broader table for public discourse, and to call an end to the era of I-win-you-lose political relationships.