World Class New Orleans

Gumbo Z'Herbes: Happy New Year!

2012-01-01T21:30:00.002-06:00

Here's my Nana's recipe for Gumbo Z'Herbes. I made it over last night and this morning.

Gumbo Z’Herbes

6 or 8 bunches fresh spinach or 6 or 8 packs frozen (or some of each)
1 bunch of mustard greens
1 bunch of collard greens
1 bunch of turnip greens
Greens from 1 bunch of carrots (Tops)
Greens from 1 bunch of beets (Tops)
Outer leaves of lettuce – use romaine or endive or other
Outer leaves of cabbage
Leaves from top of celery
Leaves from top of radishes
Leaves from 1 bunch of broccoli
1 lb. of fresh hot sausage
1 lb. of ham seasoning or smoked sausage
2 or 3 big onions -- chopped
1 or 2 sweet peppers – chopped
2 or 3 bay leaves
A few tablespoons flour
Gumbo file
Salt, pepper, and hot sauce to taste
Cooked rice
1. Wash the greens thoroughly. Take out the stems or tough midribs. Put the greens in a big pot with water to cover and bring to boil. When it boils, turn fire down to medium and let cook for about 15 or 20 minutes – uncovered.

2. While the greens are simmering, cook the hot sausage (in small bite-size chunks) and diced ham or smoke sausage in a large heavy skillet. When cooked, remove the meat and put on a plate. Drain off some of the grease, then add the onions and peppers. Cook until the onions and peppers are soft.

3. After the greens have cooked down, use a strainer to drain them, but retain the water (the stock) that the greens have been cooking in. Run the greens through a food processor—chop them just enough (but not too much). Add the greens back to the large pot, and stir in the cooked onions, peppers, meat, bay leaves, and seasonings. Get the mixture nice and hot.

4. Add in stock until the texture is gumbo-like. Simmer for at least an hour. If the gumbo gets too thick, add in some more of the stock. To get the consistency that you like, mix some flour with water in a separate bowl, then add some of this paste to the gumbo. You can also add gumbo file to get the desired texture. As the gumbo cooks with the flour, you may want to add salt, pepper, or hot sauce. Be careful; the hot sausage will also add plenty of spice as well.

5. Serve in large soup bowls over rice.

Does Anybody Know Where Billy Delle Went?

2011-11-27T10:09:00.002-06:00

The last show posted on WWOZ's website is from August.

Now when we tune in on Wednesday night, we hear another guy, who does a nice job, but he's not Billy Delle, and he has a different crypt.

Some things I learned from Mayor Mitch Landrieu

2011-11-26T13:40:00.003-06:00

1. The average postal worker at the downtown post office earns $72,000 per year. There are over 800 people who work there, and we know nobody is earning a million. That means the people who work there make a decent living. Most of them clearly make far more than I was making as a high school teacher. I'm not sure how to react to this, as I am a fan of the United States Postal Service. I almost always have a good experience when I go to the post office (feels good not to capitalize that, as one would with "Fedex" or "UPS." The post office is OURS, as Americans). However, I have to say that I feel a little bit duped having gotten two post-graduate degrees and yet making not even half of what downtown postal workers make per year throughout most of my adult life.

2. Fedex and UPS have contracts with the USPS? I did not know that.

3. I agree with the Mayor: we need a major downtown post office. Closing this one would be short-sighted.

Let's Name Names

2011-11-19T07:22:00.004-06:00

One thing I've never understood about 9/11 and 8/29: in both cases, clearly, people in government and private industry failed to do the jobs they were paid to do, and in both cases thousands of people were killed as a result.

Media coverage of these events and their causes has focused on governmental or industry failure--failure to collect good intelligence, failure to use good intelligence that had already been collected, failure to provide adequate security checks of passengers, failure to use good design for levees, failure to execute well the parts of the levee design that were adequate, failure to respond to the flooding and people rendered homeless, and so on.

Here's the thing. The government agencies and private companies that failed in these disasters (one caused by fanatical malevolence, one caused by negligence) are nothing without the people, the persons, who run them. Government institutions and private companies didn't fail airline passengers, New Yorkers, DC'ers, and New Orleanians; individual persons did.

It's not that I want unnecessarily to ridicule or belittle people here. My point is that I see little cause for an improved future until individual people take responsibility or are held accountable for the screwups that led to or exacerbated these human-made disasters. The same guys who failed to coordinate intelligence or inspect levees just might be the same guys who can fix the problem. Those guys have names. Why can't the media or governmental watchdogs name them, ask them hard questions, and push hard to get the problems fixed?

I see Lee Zurik do it all the time on Fox 8. He gets in people's faces.

So here we go. Our local paper today has an article about how the Southeast Louisiana Flood Protection Authority-West Bank has discovered that once again, the Army Corps and its contractor Phylway Construction have built a levee filled with chunks of debris; the embedded debris makes the levee unsound, according to an independent geologist.

It's a good article--except that it's good only because it's covering the GREAT work being done by the SLFPA-WB. (One board member's comment--comparing the levee to a jelly doughnut--reminds me of Ashley's rant about the Corps stupidly building levees on jello.)

Here's the other thing: the article doesn't name names! Okay, thanks to the article, we know that Phylway Construction allegedly has been building a levee that clearly violates Corps standards. Well, Phylway Construction has an owner/manager. Her name is Phyllis Adams.

Phyllis Adams should take responsibility for this problem. Her company is being paid very well to protect the people of the Westbank. It is alleged that Phyllis Adams's company is not taking this responsibility seriously and has put a water heater and a shopping cart into a levee that should be made up of dirt and clay.

There. I did it. I named a name--the name of a person who can make a difference by correcting her company's error and possibly saving thousands of lives in the future.

It wasn't hard for me, and I didn't do anything wrong.

Why can't the Times-Picayune do that?

Danger, Will Robinson

2011-10-20T07:03:00.002-05:00

So even though Coach Joe Vitt was never indicted, Saints fans might remember that he seems to have an interest in vicodin.

And now Coach Sean Payton of Our New Orleans Saints is going to be under treatment for the foreseeable future for pain related to his nasty spill on Sunday. I assume pain-killers will be around.

I'm hoping Coach Payton keeps his supply in a safe place, ya know?

Jay Dardenne: Klingon? It All Goes Back to Star Trek

2011-10-18T07:30:00.008-05:00

The choices for Lieutenant Governor in 2011 in Louisiana are pretty grim, nowhere near world class.

On one hand, we have Billy Nungesser, who is running an ad that talks about "illegals taking our jobs" and uses bigoted words and images that appeal to people's least thoughtful impulses. (What does he mean by "our jobs," anyway? That brings an awfully entitled attitude to the process of finding and having a job, an attitude that seems out of place in a free-market economy. Is Billy Nungesser a socialist?)

On the other hand, we have Jay Dardenne.

[CORRECTION!!!! I had posted that Diaper Man endorsed Dardenne. In fact, of course, as indicated to me by a helpful commenter, Diaper Man has endorsed Nungesser. I am red-faced over this egregious error in the earlier version of this post.]

Perhaps the most interesting thing about Jay Dardenne is that I have photographic evidence below that Jay Dardenne is a Klingon. Captain James T. Kirk proved this without a doubt by using a tribble's innate Klingon-detecting abilities in the Star Trek episode "The Trouble with Tribbles."

Let me say this definitively: Now that the Federation is at peace with the Klingon Empire, I would be fine with having a Klingon lt. governor; a more aggressive approach to the tourist industry might be just what our state needs.

Nagin and the Times-Pic

2011-06-26T12:41:00.002-05:00

This blog has often referred to Ray Nagin as Mayor Curly, because he's always been more of a clown and stooge than a leader.

Now he's got a book that continues to prove that point.

However, the Times-Picayune is helping itself or the cause of justice and reform by piling on at this point. For days and weeks, it's been publishing articles whose purpose is clearly to ridicule the guy.

There's no need to do that at this point. He does it all by himself. The clumsy, ham-fisted way that Ashton Phelps's mouthpiece is doing this only encourages Nagin and his friends in their belief that Nagin is not the problem; it's the White Power Establishment that is.

Cheesh, Times-Pic: just let the guy screw up on his own. Report the facts. Nothing else needed.

What it feels like . . .

2011-05-28T00:35:00.000-05:00

So Esquire magazine (one of my faves) has a regular feature called "What it feels like." I enjoy it.

Here's one Orleanian's partial perspective on what it feels like to live in this amazing city at an amazing time:

After complaining (along with other, better bloggers) so long that America, or at least the American government, didn't get it, didn't understand that "We are not OK," I sort of feel as though America did end up getting it. They (and yes, they are a "they," because the last 5 years have made it clear that we are not they) do understand that New Orleans is a special place. They understand that America would be forever less if this city were to go under water permanently, or if we were to become crippled as a city.

However, while I feel Americans' understanding of why New Orleans matters, I doubt our (humanity's) ability to do anything about disappearing wetlands, global climate change, and rising sea levels. Yes, people care. No, people aren't willing to turn this problem into some kind of Manhattan Project or Stranded Chilean Miners' Project. In the end, the threat of "six feet of water in the streets of Evangeline" hasn't seemed to inspire anything extraordinary. The Army Corps of Engineers has done a lot of scrambling around and spending and PR stuff, but does anybody REALLY think we are OK now? I don't. We're better off, but I don't think we are OK.

And I don't see anything promising on the horizon. The uncontained oil gusher didn't inspire serious change either. (However, it did inspire the spectacle of free-market Republicans criticizing a Democratic president for not being big government enough. Amazing.)

As I said the other day, the New Orleans Bingo! Show's song "Memory Parade" pretty much has it right, until further notice.

The People Who Know What They're Talking About Know We Are Not OK

2011-05-25T07:31:00.003-05:00

Here's Loyola New Orleans Professor David White, after a recent flyover of the wetlands:

“Flying over the coast and the Mississippi Delta, it is a terrifying and powerful image because of what is no longer there and it proves to me that the city is more vulnerable to another significant storm surge than I previously imagined. If every citizen of Louisiana had this kind of flight opportunity, we’d be moving much quicker and with far more attention to protecting and restoring our coast.”

Over many years, Dr. White, his colleague Dr. Don Hauber, and intrepid Loyola science students have been studying the wetlands of the Mississippi Delta.

Their basic research is crucial to addressing this national security issue. And loss of these wetlands is a national security issue, to be sure.

As Things Stand, NOBS Could Well Be Right

2011-05-21T13:24:00.004-05:00

In the many months since my blogging activity trailed off, I've become a devotee of the New Orleans Bingo! Show. In my more enthralled moments, I don't think of them as the best artists working in New Orleans; I think of them as the ONLY artists working in New Orleans. Yes, that's ridiculously untrue and unfair to the carnival of brilliance in which we live, but the Bingo gang just knows how to stir me.

I've been to multiple shows over the past few years, the first of which was at Voodoo Fest in the fall of 2009, when I wandered into their show while I was chaperoning my then 17-year-old (who needed some chaperoning). Until recently, at the 4 or 5 shows I had seen, Bingo! opened every time with "New Orleans," a graphic and rousing description of our city streets at their disgusting best. It always got the crowd off to a great, drink swaying start.

AT their 2011 Jazz Fest show, however, Bingo! started with a new song from their newest album. It's "Memory Parade," a slow, wistful-sounding song. Hearing it live, I didn't really get what it was about. During the show, Clint Maedgen, the lead singer, talked about our disappearing wetlands and yelled out to the crowd, "New Orleans! Get it while you can, y'all!!"

I'm embarrassed that it wasn't until this morning that I listened carefully to the song "Memory Parade." It's an amazing bookend song to "New Orleans," as the latter song really captures what the streets of the city have been like since the early 1990s. "Memory Parade," however, looks beyond the streets to notice that the whole city is under threat. We all seem to know it, and nobody seems sure exactly what to do about it, given the short-sighted politics and economics of our city, state, and nation in these times.

"It's understood,
It's understood,
All of this is gonna wash away."

For some, this might be a fatalistic and depressing song. For me, it's a placemarker, a line being drawn here, a motivator.

I hope this day and my finally listening to that song is the start of something good for me.

Okay, NEXT?

2011-01-08T19:23:00.002-06:00

So the Saints lost today. Congrats, Seahawks.

Should we tear down the levees? Should we reinstall Nagin as mayor? Should we resuscitate Harry Lee as Sheriff of the Chalmetairie Parish?

No.

We should continue to work. We should finish strong.

This was a setback.

As if 80 percent of our city flooded wasn't enough.

This was nothing.

We're fine.

Two out of three ain't bad.

New Year / Trading Places

2011-01-01T10:24:00.003-06:00

This post has been a long time coming, and I'll confess I'm rusty. The Muse has been visiting during these many months, but somehow I've known it was time to be quiet for awhile.

Perhaps that's ending.

Anyway, to start the new year, I'm posting the menu I'll be handing out at the Saints game tomorrow.

You see, Chef Who Dat and I have something special planned for the Bucs (and, by extension, the Falcons). At this point, I will say that the jumpsuit has left the Uptown area and has landed in Lakeview.

Danny Barker Instructs Us About the Saints

2010-08-11T09:09:00.001-05:00

Dave Dixon Passed Away Today; He Changed Our Lives for Better

2010-08-08T13:25:00.004-05:00

Link.

This is a sad day for New Orleans. He was a visionary and passionate advocate for our city and the spirit of innovation and entrepreneurship.

Everything the Saints have ever done, every event that ever took place in the Superdome, every smile and tear that we Saints fan have shared--all those things happened because of Dave Dixon.

Ground Zero NYC / Ground Zero NOLA

2010-07-31T11:35:00.003-05:00

I'm intrigued by the debate over whether an Islamic Center and mosque should be built near the 9/11 Ground Zero in New York. (I'm intrigued only by the reasonable voices of goodwill in the debate. This excludes you, Fox News.)

To try an analogy that New Orleanians might get, how's this? Saying that a mosque shouldn't be built near Ground Zero in NYC is a bit like saying a civil engineering firm shouldn't be able to build a new office near one of the levee breaks in NOLA.

Why conflate the acts of a few idiots with an entire group?

I'm so impressed with what Mayor Michael Bloomberg of New York has said about the proposed mosque:

“What is great about America, and particularly New York, is we welcome everybody, and if we are so afraid of something like this, what does that say about us?” Mr. Bloomberg asked recently.
“Democracy is stronger than this,” he added. “And for us to just say no is just, I think — not appropriate is a nice way to phrase it.”

Either we let freedom reign at Ground Zero, or we restrict everybody and build a John Lock / John Stuart Mill / John Rawls Museum.

I prefer the former.

As Greg Peters says, the guy's got a point . . .

2010-06-25T13:55:00.001-05:00

Weak posting lately, but I hope to improve. Don't we all?

Check this out. Louisianans should listen and reflect.

Light During Dark Times

2010-06-06T11:40:00.001-05:00

Steps Will Be Taken

2010-05-07T13:48:00.001-05:00

Tomorrow, in the Louisiana Superdome, steps will be taken.

Over the past two years, when steps were taken both years, the Saints have compiled a 13-4 home record, with a Super Bowl win.

Steps will be taken.

A Version of Ashley Morris Lives on in "Treme"

2010-04-09T11:48:00.002-05:00

Link.

Good to see Ray and Mark quoted in here.

The Sanctity of Dome Family and Neighborhood, by Chef Who Dat

2010-03-30T23:52:00.001-05:00

Beautifully done, Chef Who Dat.

Reasons for Hope in NOLA: Money to be Spent, Things That Have Been Done

2010-03-28T08:13:00.003-05:00

I went to a public event Friday that featured Greg Rigamer (a demographer), Patrick Quinlan (Ochsner CEO), and Paul Pastorek (state superintendent of education). Here are some reasons for hope that I gathered from their respective presentations on recovery in New Orleans, healthcare in New Orleans, and education in New Orleans:

According to Rigamer, only about a third of the money allocated for housing and infrastructure recovery has been spent. The good news: although Nagin has been no good, his tragic inefficiency in spending recovery money means that perhaps a more competent and focused Mitch administration will have some money to spend.
Rigamer also reported that the Army Corps has committed $15 billion to levee building, which is significant when one considers that the Army Corps only spends $2 billion nationally on levees each year.
Quinlan's presentation wasn't so much about healthcare in New Orleans broadly. It was more about "Ochsner is really great." Hey, that's what he's paid to say, I guess. However, on the upside, he made a great case for the excellent medical outcomes that Ochsner achieves overall. Using statistics, he made a great case for the fact that the hospitals actually do get good healthcare results in metro New Orleans relative to the rest of the country, even if we are starting with a relatively unhealthy population due to poverty, obesity, and so on.
Pastorek made a forceful case for the progress on educational reform in New Orleans since Katrina. Now, I know this process has been controversial in the NOLA blogging world. And I know that kids with extra needs haven't been well served by the reform process (I've experienced that in my family.) However, kids with extra needs weren't well served by the old system either. AND--and this is the thing I like about Pastorek--he holds EVERYBODY to the same standard. This is the guy who went to St. Tammany Parish and ripped public school leaders there for patting themselves on the back for their "great" results when they are educating kids from relatively wealthy families with relatively more involved parents. I like Pastorek because I think he wants to bring accountability to the system so that there is true competition between public and private schools. That's the best future for all of us--not the current system wherein many well-off families have withdrawn from the public school system and placed their children in private schools with great reputations, even thought there is no way to find out if those reputations are well-deserved.
Pastorek added that Louisiana is now on the cutting edge of school reform in the country and that Tennessee has used the recovery school district model as a standard for their recent reform efforts. That's something to be proud of for us. RSD: Perfect? Of course not, but light years ahead of what was here before. If we stay with this, in 10 years New Orleans will be setting a world-class standard, perhaps.

I walked out of this presentation with a good feeling about what we're up to here.

Now if we could just get us some wetlands . . .

Troubling Fallout for Saints from Their "Final Solution" for 1,200 Fans

2010-03-26T07:29:00.004-05:00

We've already discussed a solution for how the New Orleans Saints can have a new press box, new suites, AND Chef Who Dat and his 1,200 friends in the house. I am in the process of presenting that plan to top Saints brass.

In the mean time, the Saints should pay attention to troubling signs for their marketing and merchandising efforts. Here's a picture I snapped this morning at my local Winn Dixie. Hostile fan reaction to the displacement and disenfranchisement of 1,200 roofbangers has resulted in radically decreased demand for Saints gear, resulting in this:

The Death of Cafe 641 and the Fate of 1,500 Season Ticket Holders

2010-03-19T08:45:00.003-05:00

In New Orleans, especially the new and resurrected New Orleans, we understand the necessity for change, even change that involves sacrifice--maybe especially change that involves sacrifice.

We need to remind the executives of the New Orleans Saints about just how creative New Orleanians are.

Right now, according to this (and confirmed by my conversation with Chef Who Dat), 1,500 season ticket holders (including Chef and his merry band in Cafe 641) are homeless this season and perhaps forever. In order to build a new press box (which everyone supports), the Saints are telling 1,500 people in the top of the Terrace that they have no seats for next year.

This cannot stand.

The old New Orleans would be complaining and whining right now, looking for conspiracies, and so on.

The new New Orleans assumes we are all in this together--including the executives of the Saints--and searches for creative solutions that bring renewed life to our community.

So here's my solution:

For the next season or two, while the Dome reconfiguration goes on, put those 1,200 people on the floor of the Dome, in temporary bleachers. Their view won't be great, but I have no doubt they will love it. Do you know how great it will be to look down from the Terrace and see former roofbangers whooping it up on the field for a season or two? Those roofbangers will surely miss their usual perch, but I think they would be willing to sit in bleachers for a couple of years in the name of progress.

Those displaced neighborhoods would become something special for the rest of the Dome and the whole region--a symbol of what New Orleans is doing to get better, and the creative and humane ways we are doing it.

With this kind of creative solution, the Saints will be heroes. Without it--with the current "Final Solution" they have in place--it's going to get old-New-Orleans ugly.

Nobody wants that.

Killing the Dome neighborhoods of 1,500 people? Imagine plowing under Treme or the Irish Channel.

We don't do that here.

C'mon, Saints. I know you're just as creative as we are. We can turn a death into a resurrection, just like we always do in New Orleans.

Why New Orleans is the Perfect Place to Run

2010-03-14T12:42:00.004-05:00

1. It's beautiful.

2. It's temperate.

3. It's visually complex.

4. It's flat.

5. When you run up Camp Street toward downtown the day after the Irish Channel Parade, you find this (and you leave behind lots more on the street):

Katrina as Matchmaker

2010-03-14T09:47:00.001-05:00

Odd. From today's New York Times wedding announcements:

Ms. Gomez and Mr. Crosby met in October 2005 through a mutual friend who had gone to the University of Florida for a semester when Loyola University in New Orleans had temporarily closed after Hurricane Katrina. The friend had a get-together shortly after her arrival in Gainesville. “We were just drawn to each other right away,” Mr. Crosby said of Ms. Gomez. “She has an attractive face, it’s proportional, high cheekbones and gorgeous blue eyes.”

Section 635 Discusses Free Agency and Draft Matters with Saints Brass

2010-03-13T08:01:00.002-06:00

Discernment: What, if anything, does it mean, Dr. Morris?

2010-02-20T09:23:00.013-06:00

Many of us remember Dr. Ashley Morris's role in the 2006 Krewe du Vieux parade. He called himself Mime-boy. The image made it all over the place, including CNN. Here's how it looked in 2006:

Then, of course, we lost Ashley prematurely, in April 2008. I still feel the loss.

Fast forward (abruptly) to a few nights ago, Friday evening, February 19, 2010. My friend Kongo Johnny was visiting from Miami for a conference. He had told me earlier in the day he wanted to hear some blues. I asked my friend Grandmaster Michael (who knows a lot about music) for some recommendations about where to go to hear some good blues. At first he suggested Mississippi or Chicago, but then, settling down, he checked the T-P's Lagniappe section. After some discussion, we agreed that going to dba to see Joe Krown, Walter Wolfman Washington, and their gang play just might fit the bill; they at least would be in the bluesy sector of local music.

Without knowing that Mr. Krown is my favorite New Orleans keyboard guy, Grandmaster Michael made this recommendation. I should have known then that it was going to be a special evening.

I got to Frenchman Street around 9:45 (the show was to start at 10, and it actually did start on time). Kongo Johnny and his friend Stefan the Swede arrived a bit after 10, and we went into dba.

Kongo Johnny LOVED the music, as did Stefan the Swede. They were totally into it (as was I), and I felt happy that I had picked well tonight, with Grandmaster Michael's able help.

My friend Scholarly Nabil also joined us for the concert, and it was a good scene all around.

I stood near the entrance of dba, beer in hand and feeling satisfied with myself, enjoying the first minutes of the concert. Then the corner of my eye caught something large and well-lit moving in the street, approaching the front of dba. Through the open door of the bar, I saw this:

I grabbed Kongo Johnny's arm, blabbered something to him and Scholarly Nabil, and ran out of dba, stunned.

I snapped the picture you see, and just stood there. A chill went through me, and not from the cold.

Then I remembered what Peter had mentioned on Facebook. The new HBO series "Treme" is filming in town, and for an episode they were recreating the 2006 Krewe du Vieux parade. This was in my head somewhere, but to see what they had actually done was just. . . well, I don't know what it was. It was a punch in the gut and a joy at the same time. I didn't even really get tears. I was too stunned.

I saw Peter and Grace marching in the parade, so I went up and talked with them. They were tired and had been filming for at least 7 hours. It's a lot of work to recreate a Mardi Gras parade.

I went back into dba. The parade ended up passing the bar four more times--reshooting again and again, I guess.

After midnight, I think, I noticed that the krewe members then came in to get drinks. I saw Ashley Mark Two standing near the bar, so I walked up to him and told him how Ashley was a good friend of mine. Of course, Ashley Mark Two knew Ashley as well, as I guess he is a krewe member too. (In my stunned state, silly me assumed that "Treme" had hired some actor to do the part.)

I bought Ashley Mark Two and his companion beers, and then I asked him his name. "Chris," he said.

Wow. That stunned me again. That name has some significance for Mr. Clio.

Anyway, that's my story from Friday night. I don't know what it all means. I really have trouble with discernment, reading the signs (if they are signs) that the universe/the Infinite may be sending.

It might mean nothing. It might be (as some would call it) a kiss on the cheek from the cosmos. Or a brush on the wrist. Or a kick in the butt.

The one thing I'm sure about in the art of discernment is that a good guide for the validity and goodness of a sign is its real-life effects. Judge something by its fruits.

So far, the fruits for me have been gratitude and a feeling of connectedness to my friend Ashley. Not bad.

On Mardi Gras Day, Praise for Mr. Paul Tagliabue

2010-02-16T16:33:00.002-06:00

Happy Mardi Gras!

I have been remiss in doing a post on this topic, and then the New York Times did it for me.

Instead of remembering some of the unfortunate dealings of a certain team owner in the fall of 2005, I want to focus on how Paul Tagliabue ensured that our city would retain a source of of civic pride and racial unity.

I'm all for James Carville's idea:

“The city fathers,” Carville said at the time, “should take down the statue of Robert E. Lee at Lee Circle in New Orleans and put up a statue of Paul Tagliabue.”

Dear Mitch

2010-02-12T06:54:00.003-06:00

Four years ago, you ran a Mom-and-apple-pie, just-trust-me-I'm-competent-and-sane campaign against Ray Nagin, Mayor Curly.

And you lost. I'm still a little mad at you for that, because the last four years have been awful politically--four squandered years.

This year, you ran a Mom-and-apple-pit, just-trust-me-I'm-competent-and-sane campaign against a bunch of minor candidates.

And you won big. Historically big.

I ask you this: Please don't BE mayor in the same way you ran for mayor. This city needs major re-engineering. We don't need a mayor who just tries to tinker with what is there. A competent guy running this system will get us nowhere. If you do that, you will be eaten alive, and the city will continued to be mired in a mess, artificially sustained by massive federal aid dollars. We will slouch on, wearing our black and gold clothes but knowing we could do better.

If the latter happens, then the Saints' Super Bowl win is nothing more than bread and circuses.

Please, get some advisers who are more creative than you are, who have a little more of a crazy spark than you do. I admire your competence and your love for this city. Please make a team who will take radical steps to lead us to greatness. Do something about all the vacant buildings downtown (tear some of them down). Do something about New Orleans East, a low-lying former wetland with miles of slab-on-grade housing, filled with people who really care about this city and who want to make a life here. Do something about NORD; make it world class again.

Do it.

Sincerely,

Mr. Clio

Why have I cried so many times about the Saints over the past couple of weeks?

2010-02-10T05:26:00.004-06:00

Ever since the Saints beat the Vikings to advance to the Super Bowl, it's been common to see tears from New Orleanians and people who care about New Orleans. I've cried multiple times since then. It's ranged in me and others from simply misty eyes to gentle crying to staggered-breath, sudden-release bawling. For me, it usually only lasts about a minute or two.

It happened to me first in the Superdome, a few minutes after Hartley made his kick. It continued to happen during the following two weeks, when I would hear replays of Jim Henderson's radio description of the winning moment, or when I would see TV or Internet highlights of the kick. Sometimes even just video of fellow Saints fans being emotional would set me off a little. It's continued since the Super Bowl win.

[NOTE: I'm not making this up. It just happened again. It's 5:30 a.m. My dog started barking because the newspaper arrived. I went out to get the paper. I read a subtitle under the Times-Picayune's "Dat Tuesday" headline today: "'We have endured the American nightmare. It's our time to live the American dream.'" Tears again. Cheesh.]

Why? How? How can the play of a football team cause such an emotional response? I just wanted to reflect a little on the outburst of tears in New Orleans over the past couple of weeks.

1. All those years of basic sports fan emotionalism. It's a release, the kind of release that a sports fan might have after many years of hope and frustration. Did the same kind of thing happen in Boston in 2004--grown men and women of all ages crying after the Red Sox beat the Yankees and then won the World Series in 2004?

My first Saints game was at Tulane Stadium when I was 8 years old or so. I think it was against the Redskins, and the Saints lost. My dad didn't really want to take me--he preferred playing sports to watching sports--but I think my mom prevailed upon him to do so. I appreciate that he endured a hot, sunny day in that stadium watching a bad team lose. That day was part of the process that hooked me, and I was hooked not on the football, but on the people there and the smells of the stadium and the spectacle of the colors.

I moved overseas a couple of years later, and the distance only increased my love for the Saints. My grandmother would mail entire T-P Sports sections to us, and I would devour them even though it took 10 days or more to reach us.

In high school, I would buy my own tickets for a couple of games per year, and I would take the ferry from the Westbank and walk up Canal Street to get to the Superdome. More love, more losses.

My love for the Saints--and what I was willing to do for that love and as a result of that love--has caused many arguments in my marriage. That's a lot of stress for my poor spouse, but also for me.

So maybe the tears are a release of all of those times. So many varied emotions over the years. So much time and money spent. So much time questioning deeply why the hell I have this near-obsession, when I could be doing more productive things for my family and society.

2. The loved ones who aren't here to see this with us. I know this has been heavy with me, and other people have talked about it too. The Times-Picayune even did a story about it. We remember the people who suffered with us through bad seasons and near-misses and ridiculous referee calls. For me, it's Ashley Morris and Brian Bordelon. It's my Nana, who pretended to scoff at the Saints and would make fun of my brothers and me for even being interested. Underneath, though, I knew it made her happy, and I know she would be dancing her funny little sway right now. That makes me cry.

How could one not cry about this stuff? Ashley Morris was our Moses, the guy who helped us ALMOST get to the Promised Land. However, the Infinite--who/which always retains a sense of humor--had to take Ash away before the Saints could do it for us. I'm glad Dr. Morris got to glimpse Drew Brees and the gang in the NFC Championship loss to the Bears, but I cried with Hana and shared big hugs with her after the win over the Vikes and the Super Bowl win over the Colts.

My tears disappear when I think that Ashley and Brian and Buddy D. and so many others helped push the Saints through this year.

3. A deeper release after what's happened in New Orleans since August 29, 2005. Scenes from New Orleans have been making people all over the world cry for the past four and a half years. This could be part of that continuum, except that this time it's tears of release and joy after so many months of hurt and desolation. I really do have a feeling of hope right now, and I guess others share that.

And there's this, too: I spent many months being angry about governmental failure and the people who bashed New Orleans and wanted to give up on us; I was also relentlessly angry about people who ditched New Orleans, such as the people who run Ruth's Chris. These days, all I'm thinking about are the thousands of volunteers who have come here to help and the millions of people around the U.S. and world who were cheering for the Saints BECAUSE THEY ARE FROM NEW ORLEANS. I'm also thinking about Paul Tagliabue, who made sure the Saints stayed in New Orleans even though things looked bleak in 2005 and early 2006. That all gives me strength. That causes me some tears, but it also makes them go away quickly.

There may be more to say about this, but this is my first stab. And that's what a blog is for, yes?

Today Much of the World is Thinking about New Orleans

2010-02-07T10:35:00.004-06:00

People in this city have worked hard to get to this day.

It's a step, one of many that we need to take, toward New Orleanians affirming fully its place as a world class city.

We can compete with anybody, and we can win big.

Thank you, Saints, for helping to pull us through the past four and a half years.

Who Dat! Let's go win us a world championship.

Symptoms I've Displayed Since the Saints Advanced to the Super Bowl

2010-01-29T05:49:00.003-06:00

1. Intermittent crying and teary eyes (though this has diminished since Tuesday, January 26, which was two days after the precipitating event)

2. Intermittent beaming smiles

3. Intermittent giggling

4. General euphoria

Those have been aspects of my basic emotional response.

Rationally, however, my take has been this (and I'm sticking firmly to this line):

We belong here. This football team deserves this (and this success in the end is all about the football players and coaches, as Grandmaster Wang so rightfully and righteously points out). They have worked hard--this year and three years prior. They are talented. They are smart. Many of them, especially the player leadership, seem very committed to the good of New Orleans.

In sum, although this is a new experience for us and me based on history, I should not be shocked that we are here. Again, we belong here.

Let's get used to this. Let's not settle for less than first place. Let's not settle for less than world class.

We settled for allegedly Category 3 levee protection, levees that were horribly designed and built. Look at what that got us.

We settled for Edwin Edwards, who was effective but corrupt. Look what that got us.

We settled for Ray Nagin, who made the right businessman noises but was untested and (ultimately) unstable. Look what that got us.

We settled for lower-cost, slab-on-grade housing in New Orleans East (a wetland) and elsewhere, and look what that got us.

We settled for abandoning and ignoring the public schools, and many sent their kids to private and Catholic schools with "good enough" reputations. Look what that got us.

I've said this before: I love the Saints. I love Saints' fans even more.

But if we enjoy the football and the parties, and then go back to doing things the way we've always done them, it's all just bread and circuses.

I've been hearing "This is not your father's Saints." Thank goodness.

I want to start hearing "This is not your father's New Orleans."

General Honore Says What We All Should Have Been Saying

2010-01-20T06:25:00.004-06:00

From today's Times-Picayune:

"People have taken us more than once. We should stand up more than anybody else and say, 'We'll take 500, we'll take 1,000.' I'm not hearing that from anybody in Louisiana and last year we evacuated our vulnerable population twice," said Honore, who commanded Joint Task Force Katrina.

This is dead right and so obvious, and I haven't even thought of it once. I've been almost silent about Haiti because I can't get my mind around it and what I can do about it, other than send money. However, if getting people out of there for awhile, or for a lifetime if that is what is best, will help, then General Honore is right. And Louisiana should take the lead.

I would hope Governor Jindal would second this and then actually do something about it.

My second-favorite thing about what General Honore says is that he uses the first person plural--"us" and "we" and "our." During the last evacuation, he was living in Atlanta, and as a career military man he lived all over the world. But at heart he is a Louisiana guy, and now he and Mrs. Honore have moved back home and live in Baton Rouge.

Berto Has Been Working Out to Prepare for the NFC Championship.

2010-01-19T15:28:00.002-06:00

Change of Pace

2010-01-19T00:01:00.002-06:00

This song (and this version of this song) is reassurance to me that there are larger powers at work in the Cosmos.

Saints vs. Vikes: Snakes. Why Does It Always Have to be Snakes?

2010-01-18T08:19:00.003-06:00

Hey, Indiana Jones stared down the snakes.

We've already vanquished the reigning NFC champs.

Now it's time to beat the Nemesis. Remember Daunte Culpeper and Grady Jackson's big flop. Remember 44-10. Remember playing a playoff game in Minneapolis with, like, no running backs. Remember last year, when we wasted Reggie's two beautiful punt return TDs.

This is our time. This is OUR time.

On Saturday, Please Save it for the Dome, Your Fave Bar, or Your Living Room

2010-01-13T23:32:00.003-06:00

This is an appeal to Saints fans.

Berto, Fleur D Licious, others, and I were troubled by the performance that occurred in the Superdome against the Dallas Cowboys on December 19.

I'm not talking about Our New Orleans Saints' performance that day.

I'm talking about the fans' performance. People seemed quiet--and got quieter still when the Cowboys took an early lead.

By early in the 4th quarter, I actually saw empy seats in the Club level.

The next day, my ears weren't ringing the way the usually are after a big game.

My theory: people were so excited that day and had spent so much time and energy drinking and carousing all day in the streets, that they had little left for the ACTUAL FOOTBALL GAME that was to be played that night. The Saints lost, and perhaps we got what we deserved.

So let's all commit ourselves for this playoff game. Enjoy our beautiful city before the game. Eat, drink, be merry outside. But save plenty of noise and liver capacity for inside the Superdome. Our New Orleans Saints need us at our world class best.

Look at Who Is Featured on the Saints' Website Today

2010-01-11T15:16:00.005-06:00

Mr. Willie Jackson. 3 touchdown catches in the Saints first playoff win ever, against the St. Louis Rams on December 30, 2000.

I'd never make it as Saints coach, because Willie Jackson would STILL have a spot on the roster if I were in charge. I never would have been able to cut the guy. Beautiful day, indeed.

And who was the quarterback on the losing team that day? Kurt Warner.

Yes, the Saints' web people know what they're doing by reminding us all of this.

Why We Lost to the Cowboys (and Panthers and Bucs), Part II

2010-01-04T07:09:00.004-06:00

Okay, I'm going to get a little wacky about karma and such. I'm a little uncomfortable doing this, but I think it must be done. Please ignore this if you're not into such speculation (and note that I don't do this kind of thing much because I'm so bad at at, and it has backfired on me many times in the past).

The Saints have lost three straight games because it had to happen, given the emotional/spiritual dynamics that were starting to stir, on the team and among Saints fans and in the city of New Orleans and on the Gulf Coast. Simply put, in order to achieve the goal we all want--the Lombardi Trophy--we "needed" these losses, because most of us were getting cocky and feeling a sense of magic and destiny. Dangerous stuff, "magic" and "destiny." We shouldn't think of such things.

This is not to say that the team threw the games on purpose. Of course not. I'm just saying that built into the growing sense of power and destiny we were all feeling were the seeds of trouble. Now that we have looked at ourselves and found ourselves quite human and quite capable of losses and silly pride, we can buck up and move on to great things (or at least hard work).

I wrote (and had published in the New Orleans and Dallas newspapers) letters to the editor noting some poor behavior by Saints fans at the Dallas game. In some cases, Saints fans resembled Bears fans at the January 2007 NFC Championship Game (well, maybe not that obnoxious, but still pretty bad).

After the loss to the Bucs, Charles Grant (okay, it's Charles Grant, but still . . .) reported that Saints fans were booing the team as they left the field. I was at the game. I was as disappointed as anyone, but I didn't think the Saints' efforts were boo-worthy. We lost in overtime. We were 13-2 at the time.

As 2010 and the playoffs begin, let's focus on the cleansing that just went on. We and our team were humbled. In 2005, our whole city and region were humbled.

One response to this is to take the entitled approach to it all. You may have seen this (or even done it--I'm sure I have): "I paid my money. I put in some effort. If I don't get the result I want, then screw it and screw you. I'm picking up my toys and going home to pout and to criticize and to blame others that I didn't get the result I wanted."

When most people talk about an attitude of entitlement, they are criticizing "lazy" people who expect things (welfare payments, whatever) for doing nothing.

A far more damaging and insidious attitude of entitlement exists in those who put in some effort or spend some money, and then expect perfect results--or results that far exceed the effort or money put into the process.

The booing fans at the Bucs game, the abusive fans at the Dallas game--that came from a sense of entitlement. "I bought my ticket. I deserve to have my inflated expectations fulfilled!!!"

Now I am hearing rumors that since the big win over the Patriots, a significant group of Saints players are spending very late hours (till 4:00 a.m.) in the French Quarter. Again, a sense of entitlement. "I put in my hours. I've played hard. I deserve this, and I can do it and still get the excellent results I've gotten up to now."

We can't be guaranteed any results--for the Saints, for our city, for our region.

At its best, New Orleans and its residents know this. We know that we can only work hard, have fun, and care for one another along the way. We are guaranteed nothing.

So let's work hard in January and in 2010, and let's have fun, and let's care for one another, and let's see what the playoffs bring.

We Knocked Ourselves Down, BUT WE'RE STILL THE #1 SEED!

2009-12-28T23:45:00.002-06:00

Yes, the Saints need to do much better, but let's enjoy tonight and tomorrow.

Why the Saints Have Lost Two Straight Games, Part I

2009-12-28T08:38:00.004-06:00

Okay, so I confess. The loss to the Cowboys was my fault. I was in a hurry, and for the first time this season I did not pull my bike into Fat Harry's for a quick dirty martini. Of course, the loss ensued. My bad.

However, this week, I redressed that issue. I got a dirty at Fat's (hmmm, although it was in a go-cup. Maybe I should have gone with a proper glass). In any case, with this variable eliminated, the main reason for the loss is clear today.

At approximately 11:15 a.m., while Berto and I were giving the "first down, Saints" sign to cars at Tivoli Circle, we spied and waved to Jeffrey and Menckles whizzing around the Circle in their swanky automobile.

Now, as far as I know, Jeffrey and Menckles are usually streetcar riders. I believe this to be an important ingredient in Saints' wins.

So there it is: Reason #1 for the Saints' loss yesterday.

Get on the streetcar for the playoffs, please.

UPDATE: Berto reminds us of a voice we need to remember as we move into the Carolina game and beyond.

Merry Christmas from World Class New Orleans

2009-12-25T13:09:00.002-06:00

Even a bad day in New Orleans is still a gift to me. That's what I really believe in my best moments.

I hope you have a similar sense of gratitude wherever you live.

Buon Natale!

Letters I Sent to the Editors in New Orleans and Dallas

2009-12-22T08:02:00.003-06:00

1. To the Times-Picayune

To the Editor:

As a longtime Saints fan and season ticket holder, I was proud of my team's effort against the Cowboys Saturday night, but I was ashamed of some of my fellow Saints fans' treatment of Cowboys fans.

Ever since I was treated poorly as a Saints fan on a trip to a game at Indianapolis a few years ago, I have made it a point to welcome opposing teams' fans to the Superdome. They are always appreciative, and I've had some nice conversations with people from all over the country.

This past Saturday night, every Cowboys fan with whom I spoke told me that that he or she had been treated badly by some of my fellow Saints fans. In addition, a friend who was on the field at the end of the game witnessed a Saints fan verbally abusing (with profanity) the Sports Illustrated reporter Peter King, who is a Saints season ticket holder.

To my fellow fans: we can do better. That is not who we are. New Orleans is a city of hospitality, warmth, and acceptance of difference--even if that difference means that the other person is wearing another color jersey.

Our warmth comes from knowing that we live in a city like no other, a city that we love. We don't have time for abusing other cities. We're too busy loving our city and our team.

Sincerely,

Mr. Clio

2. To the Dallas Morning News:

To the Editor:

As a longtime Saints fan and season ticket holder, I was proud of my team's effort against the Cowboys Saturday night, and I was impressed with the Cowboys. However, I was ashamed of some of my fellow Saints fans' treatment of Cowboys fans, and I ask Dallas fans to forgive New Orleans if you were treated badly at the game.

This past Saturday night, every Cowboys fan with whom I spoke told me that that he or she had been treated badly by some of my fellow Saints fans. Dallas fans: please know that this is not who we are. New Orleans is a city of hospitality, warmth, and acceptance of difference--even if that difference means that the other person is wearing a jersey of another color.

New Orleanians' warmth comes from knowing that we live in a city like no other, a city that we love. We don't have time for abusing other cities. We're too busy loving our city and our team, and we love sharing that joy.

I have been to Dallas several times and have always enjoyed my trips there. Congratulations on a big win Saturday, and please come back. I and many other New Orleanians will do our best to welcome you with class.

Sincerely,

Mr. Clio

Saints Saturday Night Theme

2009-12-18T00:18:00.001-06:00

Gonna be some sweet sounds comin' down on the night shift.

They Found the Unknown Who Dat

2009-12-17T06:42:00.002-06:00

He's coming to the Superdome this weekend, for the first time ever.

Read his history at the link above.

One question: the Saints had a ticket office at Lee Circle? I've never heard that before. Does anybody know which building it was in?

Hey, Buddy D., It's Happenin'

2009-12-10T19:18:00.000-06:00

Geeky Comparison

2009-12-10T00:43:00.005-06:00

Just sayin'. From the terrible Saints records of the 1970s to 12-0. As Buddy in the Jumpsuit said, "It all started with a supernova that destroyed Romulus."

The Feds and Coastal Restoration

2009-12-07T07:10:00.002-06:00

The T-P tells us that the feds are taking a "fresh look" at restoration efforts.

Good, but now is the time for action.

Now. Now. Now.

Which is a greater threat to my family and me? Al Qaeda? Or diminishing coastlines?

Wetlands: the fundamental homeLAND security issue.

Jared Diamond Makes a Useful Analogy

2009-12-06T07:34:00.004-06:00

Professor Diamond's essay in the NY Times compares the stupidity of corporations who refuse to spend short-term money on long-term sustainability to the federal government's negligent treatment of New Orleans over many years:

Economic reasons furnish the strongest motives for sustainability, because in the long run (and often in the short run as well) it is much more expensive and difficult to try to fix problems, environmental or otherwise, than to avoid them at the outset.

Americans learned that lesson from Hurricane Katrina in August 2005, when, as a result of government agencies balking for a decade at spending several hundred million dollars to fix New Orleans’s defenses, we suffered hundreds of billions of dollars in damage — not to mention thousands of dead Americans.

It's a small point in a longer article, but the casual way he drops this is a testament to how ordinary this point ought to be.

Is Obama a Saints WR or a Pats DB?

2009-11-26T21:26:00.002-06:00

In this video, is the President catching a pass from Drew Brees, or is the President being a total weenie and stepping in front of a pass intended for a kid?

In any case, it's good to see Mike McKenzie in a Saints uni in a commercial whilest knowing he's actually a Saint again.

Dave Dixon: World Class New Orleans Visionary

2009-11-25T06:22:00.005-06:00

In the 1960s and 70s, New Orleans and Louisiana took a risk by investing in the Louisiana Superdome. There was strong and principled opposition to the project. I have no doubt that there was corruption somewhere in the process of construction.

In the end, though, the result was a world class building with staying power. Poydras Street and a whole section of downtown were transformed. Dave Dixon and others got all of this started.

I bring this up today, because now we learn that the Pontiac Silverdome, built AFTER the Louisiana Superdome, has been auctioned off for $583,000--less than the cost of many homes in greater New Orleans.

I am thankful for the visionaries of New Orleans who built a great facility--soon to be renovated further for yet another new life--in downtown New Orleans, and not in the suburbs (as Detroit's not-so-visionaries did). One of the real assets here is that the Dome is walking (or biking!) distance to and from so much of what we consider the core of our city and region.

Good Corps / Bad Corps

2009-11-24T07:39:00.002-06:00

One the one hand, the Corps wants to be able to inspect levees while the river water is high. This need threatens the river parish bonfires. Maybe I'm a Scrooge, but levees seem pretty important to me, so on the face of it I'm glad the Corps is looking out for us.

On the other hand, the state says the Corps has been wasting precious river silt as they dredge. If true, this is the kind of almost criminal negligence that must be highlighted by all of us as often and as loudly as possible.

Join my campaign this week: They Aren't the Patriots

2009-11-23T06:39:00.004-06:00

No, the New England football squad are either "the Pats" or "the Past."

When I think of the Pats, I think of old times.

Pats starring a quarterback named Grogan.

Pats getting beat down in the Louisiana Superdome.

Past indeed.

When I think of Our New Orleans Saints, I think of the present and future.

50 Percent More Fun in Section 635

2009-11-20T11:53:00.003-06:00

The third Dillyberto brother will join Berto and me for the Saints-Patriots game on Monday Night Football.

And he will be properly attired. See below for my order today.

Time for Payback

2009-11-13T06:39:00.003-06:00

Look, revenge is a very unattractive thing, but I just gotta get this out.

I spent three terrible, horrible, no good years in the state of Missouri. Those were the three worst years of my life.

Then I returned to New Orleans, and a few years later had to endure the Rams winning the Super Bowl, followed by some very disappointing losses by the Saints to them (although that playoff win by the Saints was a beauty).

Then two years ago we were subjected to the humiliation of losing to a winless Rams team whose defense was coached by Jim Haslett and Rick Venturi.

Look, I'm human. I want payback this week. I need to see a little Ahab/Picard out of the Black and Gold:

Pregame Grilled Oysters at Lee Circle

2009-11-09T14:01:00.002-06:00

This is what it looked like at Lee Circle (Tivoli Circle) yesterday at around 2:15 p.m.

Saints vs. Falcons = Parasol's vs. Appleby's

2009-11-02T06:15:00.003-06:00

Do it, Drew. Crank it up.

Charles Grant, show your homeboys what you've become in New Orleans.

What I Did During the Saints Win Over the Dolphin

2009-10-29T18:04:00.003-05:00

Daneeta showed me the link to the Josephnils blog, which documents the way we watched the Saints beat the Dolphins--on the porch, while shucking, eating, or grilling and eating, oysters.

Are raw oysters a bigger threat to health than McDonald's fries?

2009-10-28T07:18:00.005-05:00

According to this excellently placed (front-page) story from the T-P, 15 people--many of them already sick from something else--die from eating raw oysters each year.

This occurs in a country with over 300 million people, many of whom are overweight. Tens of thousands of us die each year because we are fat and get fat-related diseases.

The FDA's way of dealing with the oyster "menace," we learn now, will be to require processing of raw oysters 7 months out of the year.

Step back: so what we now know is that the federal government refuses to protect the homeland in Louisiana by doing little to restore wetlands and by trying to implement a flood protection system on the cheap. Now the federal government wants to ruin a key industry in Louisiana and one of life's pleasures here that many of us enjoy.

Fat-related diseases that kill millions of Americans are often caused by foods (made poisonous by bad agriculture and then heavy processing) in areas of the country that are more "American" and more palatable than we "exotics" are in south Louisiana. Midwestern corn, for example, is fine, even though it is used to make products that kill many of us.

All-natural oysters, however, kill 15 people a year, but they must be heavily regulated.

Inadequate levees, disappearing wetlands, and screwed-up oysters. This is what the American federal government is doing for us through a combination of inaction and willful stupidity.

UPDATE: Here's a nice link from Jeffrey. While the feds fret about oysters, the Army Corps' head is waving the white flag.

Best Op-Ed Page in America Today; Thanks, Times-Picayune

2009-10-25T07:54:00.002-05:00

Although the overarching purpose of this blog is to point to a positive vision of what New Orleans can and should be, sometimes I use that vision to criticize our city's newspaper titan, the Times-Picayune. (It's a "titan" because it's the only one.)

After the storm, the Times-Picayune and its reporters and photographers were heroic, at least for me. Their work kept New Orleans on the informational map; they helped to remind us that we remained a community despite the chaos and destruction. They kept the idea of New Orleans alive even when the reality was that we were dispersed and sometimes despairing.

More recently, however, I have expressed disappointment that the T-P has reverted back to being a "normal" newspaper with silly headline stories. I just want the publisher, Mr. Ashton Phelps, and the editors to know that they don't need to lead with the Saints and kitty cats and naked burglars to get me to buy the paper.

Today, though, I am really proud of the Times-Picayune. What a great op-ed section!

An editorial summarizing where we are on flood protection and wetlands loss and restoration (and the news is not good).

A from-the-neighborhood essay from Dennis Persica about what it's like to use gritty determination and faith to return to a neighborhood in Ray Nagin and George W. Bush's free-market world of rebuilding (and the news is inspiring at the individual level but pathetic at the communal level). Persica talks about jack-o-lanterns, and not because it's Halloween time.

And then a James Gill essay (I love that guy) in which he pointblank calls Nagin a fool.

It feels especially good to be a New Orleanian today.

Of course, it helps that I'll be eating home-shucked oysters while watching the Saints play the Dolphins.

World Class Cartoon Time

2009-10-20T14:21:00.002-05:00

What a beautiful thing by the Preservation Hall gang and Mr. James Tancill.

Sustainable Recovery: Carpetbaggers Need Not Apply

2009-10-20T09:14:00.007-05:00

Ed Blakely is gone (that's old news), but his departure and other things I'm seeing help me to conclude that we are arriving at a significant and stirring phase of the resurrection of our region.

We are more than four years beyond the levee failures that temporarily crushed our spirits and our confidence in American know-how.

I have been inspired by the ongoing stream of volunteers who come to our city to help rebuild at the micro-level. Church groups, schools, national organizations of every strip--they came early, and they continue to come.

At the macro-level, however, I sense something significant and stirring.

The carpetbaggers are getting bored, and they're starting to leave. You may have experienced carpetbaggers over the past four years. I certainly have.

These are the people who smelled the chance for immediate financial gain from the plight of a city on its knees.

In many cases, we made it easy for the carpetbaggers--witness Ed Blakely. We offered them ridiculous compensation packages because "we" thought that's what it would take to attract allegedly national and international "experts" here to help us.

We didn't have enough confidence in ourselves--in our knowledge, our hearts, our passion, our work ethic.

And so the city and some major institutions in the city squandered precious dollars to bring in people who brought us . . . nothing. (Well, they did bring us heartache and frustration.)

The real action has been at the grassroots. The grassrooots generates its own expertise, and I don't just mean some romanticized notion of the "wisdom of common folk." The new New Orleans features people who take advantage of the explosion of the accessibility of knowledge, and we combine that with hardcore know-how. New Orleanians are great students of human nature. We know what makes people tick.

We are applying all this to building a better New Orleans.

We know how the world works. We can spot a carpetbagger or a "Simpsons" monorail-builder. (Many of our mayors seem to lose that ability.)

We have great meals and and great parties--we know how to live--because we know what motivates people.

We have all that, but because we are naturally a little skeptical--even of ourselves, especially of ourselves--in 2005 and beyond we spent top dollar to bring in "experts" to "lead" us out of our mess.

The good news is that having extracted plenty enough cash to last them for awhile, people like Blakely are leaving now. Four or five years is about all they could take.

The people who remain, natives and truly committed people who came after the levee failures, as well as the people who are still streaming in, are up to something great.

Now is when the resurrection takes a really interesting turn. Our monorail days are over.

The Most Important Stories Run on the Last Page of the Sports Section in the Times-Picayune

2009-10-15T00:07:00.004-05:00

A few days ago, the Times-Picayune ran one of those stories that should change the outlooks (or confirm them) of any thinking people on the planet.

The story ran on the back of the Sports section.

We are sinking. The Gulf is rising. And our congressional delegation (ALL OF THEM) are in the back pocket of the idiots who are helping to create and sustain the problem.

Thank you, Bob Marshall.

To Ashton Phelps and anybody else who helps decide what goes on the front page: YOU ARE CLUELESS.

Naked guy burglars on the freaking Northshore. Kittens thrown from the Causeway.

Give me a freakin' break.

You, Mr. Phelps, are what is killing our community.

I love the Saints.

But they don't belong on the front page of a serious newspaper.

Battle Over Low-Income Housing Reveals Post-Katrina Anxiety - NYTimes.com

2009-10-03T22:56:00.000-05:00

Battle Over Low-Income Housing Reveals Post-Katrina Anxiety - NYTimes.com

ESPN Radio Teases Us Who Dats

2009-10-02T06:36:00.002-05:00

The Mardi Gras beads are a bit much, but this made me smile anyway.

I couldn't get the You Tube video to embed correctly, so here's the link.

Thanks for Zeitoun, Mr. Eggers

2009-09-25T23:30:00.002-05:00

I finished Zeitoun, by Dave Eggers, during my trip to New York this week.

I was on a plane from JFK to Memphis as I read the last 50 pages. I couldn't swallow, such was the lump in my throat.

I think it would be a striking read for anyone. For New Orleanians--at least for this one--it is downright overwhelming.

Eggers gets the city right; he captures feelings and scenes that we all experienced.

On top of that, though, Abdulrahman Zeitoun's story is one that most of us couldn't imagine would happen, I think. Having read the story, I now feel stupid for thinking that this wouldn't happen. It seems obvious now that it would happen, given the country we've created for ourselves.

Great. The T-P is now covering fake games.

2009-09-17T23:41:00.000-05:00

What up with this?

More Lyrical Whimsy from Saints DE Bobby McCray

2009-09-17T07:13:00.006-05:00

As part of the Occasional Gridiron Poetry Series at World Class New Orleans, we present a new poem by Saints defensive end Bobby McCray, as taken from today's Times-Picayune:

So until Monday afternoon,

we can still be high off our victory.

You know,

talk about it,

talk to your parents about

it.

'We saw you on TV, you did good.'

You know, 'blah,

blah, blah.'

But then

once 4 o'clock hits,

it's Philadelphia.

This has been today's edition of the Occasional Gridiron Poetry Series.

David Byrne's Essay on the Ideal City, Biking, and New Orleans

2009-09-12T13:40:00.002-05:00

Berto and I are preparing today to ride our bicycles to the Superdome tomorrow for Our New Orleans Saints' first regular season game. Fittingly, at breakfast this morning I read a great essay by David Byrne in today's Wall Street Journal, "A Talking Head Dreams of a Perfect City."

Before I get to the really good stuff, I want to cite the lines that really grabbed me:

As someone who has used a bicycle to get around New York for about 30 years I've watched the city—mainly Manhattan, where I live—change for better and for worse. During this time I started to take a full-size folding bike with me when I traveled so I got to experience other cities as a cyclist as well. Seeing cities from on top of a bike is both pleasurable and instructive. On a bike one sees a lot more than from a freeway, and often it's just as fast as car traffic in many towns.

That's the paragraph that made me take the article seriously. Bikes are the way to come to know a city. Period.

Anyway, he cites New Orleans a couple of times, and I think he pretty much gets it right. Byrne's perfect city involves the correct proportions of the following: size, density, sensibility and attitude, security, chaos and danger, human scale, parking (he correctly doesn't much care about this), boulevards, mixed use, and public spaces.

He rates New Orleans high on sensibility and attitude. I was struck by the fact that he mentions New Orleans as often as or more often than he mentions places like San Francisco, Venezia, and Berlin.

Here's what he says about the sensibility and attitude of World Class New Orleans:

New Orleans is a city where people make eye contact. There's a more open sensuality there as well. I'd take that in my perfect city, minus some of the other aspects of that town, such as its tragic poverty, corruption, and crime.

Here's what he says about chaos and danger:

To some, security means rigid order and strict rules. I do believe we do need some laws and rules to guide and reign us in a bit, and I don't just mean traffic lights and pooper scooper mandates. But there's a certain attractiveness to New Orleans, Mexico City or Naples—where you get the sense that though some order exists, it's an order of a fluid and flexible nature. Sometimes too flexible, but a little bit of that sense of excitement and possibility is something I'd wish for in a city. A little touch of chaos and danger makes a city sexy.

I will get more and better work done today because of Steve Gleason

2009-09-11T07:25:00.002-05:00

Why? Because he said all of this, but particularly this (in remembering the Greatest Play in Saints History):

So I remember that moment. And I remember thinking -- as I broke through the line -- that I wasn't going to get there. I was like: I don't think I'm going to make it. I don't think I'm going to make it. And then: I am going to make it! And I remember running through the end zone and dropping to my knees. I remember looking at the crowd and fully comprehending the magnitude of the moment. It was pure joy. And I thought: This is it. We're back.

I will also have a better day because Jeffrey wrote this, but I don't have time to riff on it right now.

I Sent a Message to Senator David Vitter Using His Advertisement on the NY Times

2009-09-08T21:25:00.001-05:00

. . . though I'm not sure it's the message he wanted.

I was peacefully reading an article at nytimes.com when I saw his ad in the sidebar. The ad was an attempted slander of Charlie Melancon. I didn't like the looks of it.

So I clicked on the ad--I have clicked on an actual Internet ad maybe 4 times in my life.

Anyway, I clicked through and found a way to send Senator Vitter a message. And here's what I said (you can use the same form here):

Sir, You bring dishonor to yourself by slandering Mr. Melancon. I am not a registered Democrat, but it's just wrong what you're doing. Please run on a positive agenda. I know almost nothing about what you are for. I only know what you are against. Your agenda seems purely negative. The only other thing I know about you is the horrible scandal that you have brought to our state. Feel free to contact me if you think it would be useful. Thanks, Mr. Clio

Congrats to Dambala

2009-08-31T08:08:00.003-05:00

I was privileged to meet him last week at Rising Tide IV.

Now it looks as though he's in for an adventure dealing with City Hall people.

Dambala is a world class part of the new New Orleans.

The City Hall people described in the T-P article sound like old New Orleans.

Big Week for World Class New Orleans

2009-08-21T06:32:00.004-05:00

Why?

1. I'm a practicing Catholic, which means I'm not very good at it. But our city took a step forward out of its leadership crisis when Archbishop Alfred Hughes stepped down. (Can you imagine? The city has gone through the failure of federal levees, Katrina, utter chaos, and the leaders we get include Archbishop Hughes and Mayor Curly. Awful.)

I'm glad a local guy, Archbishop Greg Aymond, is taking over. However, he apparently started his tenure by calling himself a shepherd, which is unfortunate because it implies I'm a sheep. Jesus could get away with that. It doesn't sound good in 21st century New Orleans, though.

2. Rising Tide IV is happening tonight and tomorrow, and for the first time, I'm going. And I'm even on the Sports panel. Scary. NOTE: You can still register for the conference, attend, but then skip out before my panel starts so that you don't have to listen to Jeffrey and me arguing about the merits of Reggie Bush.

Speaking Through (the flashing of) the Barrel of a Gun

2009-08-19T07:22:00.004-05:00

On WWL 870 radio today, I caught the tail end of a talk that Tommy Tucker was doing with the director of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence. The director was talking (via phone) about how it goes against common sense to have people showing up to townhall meetings about healthcare flashing guns.

Tommy Tucker was acting like it is an open question, that this is something that we should actually spend time discussing, and he was soliciting calls for either side of the question.

(Silence.)

So this is what things have come to.

What other things will WWL radio hosts and listeners want to debate? If we actually think this issue is an open question, I suggest we debate the following:

A. Whether or not it's right to herd all illegal immigrants into concentration camps and then gas them.

B. Whether or not it's right for Fox News host Sean Hannity to hold a knife to President Obama's throat while interviewing him.

C. Whether or not it's right to incarcerate anyone who criticizes insurance companies.

Because, you know, rational citizens with a right to free speech need to discuss things like this.

On radio.

During drive time.

UPDATE: I wrote this before I read Jeffrey's excellent post about Tommy Tucker's lunacy of yesterday.

A Modest Proposal for the Nicholls State Colonels

2009-08-16T08:41:00.007-05:00

(Thanks to the T-P for highlighting this amusing story.)

Look, we shouldn't be mad at the graphic design people who came up with this:
Because when your mascot is a Colonel, there really aren't too many good places to go. After all, you started with this:

A mascot that takes you from the Confederacy to Nazi Germany just isn't hanging out in good neighborhoods. Forget the debates about recalling our racist past vs. preserving history. A Colonel just doesn't do much for the average sports fan.

Thus, I propose that Nicholls State (if you're going to stick with a mascot with so few inspiring images) use the only Colonel I can think of who actually makes almost everybody smile:

Football GOLD, Jerry! GOLD!

2009-08-12T08:00:00.001-05:00

The Wangmaster is producing spectacular stuff at moosedenied, but few are commenting on it.

This bothers me.

Mayor's Race

2009-08-12T07:53:00.002-05:00

I'm not blindly jumping on to the James Perry bandwagon(as some might want to accuse me of doing). However, I've done some research on him, and I like what I see so far. At least he's using the language of progressive politics. And he seems intelligent, interested in real coalition-building and collaboration, and uninterested in personal material gain.

And I'm not really inspired by the other two declared candidates.

Civility Really Is What Separates Us from Packs of Howling, Growling Dogs

2009-08-08T10:31:00.002-05:00

Cousin Pat chimes in elegantly and effectively on all the screaming that's been going on.

The Wisdom of Saints DE Bobby McCray

2009-08-06T07:05:00.006-05:00

From Mister McCray's training camp memoirs, which one day will be reviewed in the New York Times Book Review and the Times Literary Supplement, but for now is being excerpted in the Times-Picayune:

This is training camp. No leaving the hotel. I call it jail. If you need something, have somebody drop it off to the hotel for you. But you don't need anything. This is training camp. As long as you don't forget your helmet, your mouthpiece and your shoulder pads, that's all you need.

This could all be a quiet and clever effort by Mister McCray to update the Tao Te Ching for a modern Western audience. To wit, please consider this excerpt from the great Chinese work:

When the ancient Masters said,
"If you want to be given everything,
give everything up,"
they weren't using empty phrases.

In fact, let's rearrange some of Mister McCray's words into a more poetic style:

This is training camp.
No leaving
the hotel.
I call it jail.

If you need something,
have somebody drop it off
to the hotel
for you.

But you don't need

anything.

This
is
training camp.

As long as you don't forget
your helmet,
your
mouthpiece
and your shoulder pads,
that's all

you need.

Cash for Clunker Levees

2009-08-05T06:56:00.003-05:00

This brief post grows out of a comment my brother (let's call him Mr. Thalia) made to me on Facebook.

Where's the urgency to provide cash for clunker levees and cash for oil-industry-clunkered wetlands?

Now that the T-P has taken the Saints off of the front page and put Army Corps of Engineers news there (thank goodness), we see that it can take 40 years for the ACOE to design and then build something.

So let's think about this. The ACOE is very excited to give us levees that have a 1 percent chance of failing in a given year (e.g. the "100 year protection" we hear about--a misnomer that Tim has warned us about).

Are you willing to go 40 years knowing that in each of those years, there is a 1 percent chance of failure?

I grew up in a country filled with smart, can-do people, people who say "Why not?" We can do this. Let's do 10,000 year (.01 percent failure rate) flood protection.

And let's not take 40 years to do it.

UPDATE: Mr. Thalia adds some helpful words and a nice graphic.

The Times-Picayune and nola.com Have Lost a Sense of Proportion

2009-08-03T07:13:00.002-05:00

Look, I'm as big of a Saints fan as there is, and perhaps my brother Saints fan Berto will disagree with me, but here goes:

I'm uncomfortable with the over-prominence of Saints coverage in the paper and on nola.com.

The Sports section (as far as I'm concerned) can be All Saints, All the Time.

But there is way too much prime news real estate being occupied by Saints news in NOLA's primary for-profit news source.

Instead, given how dependent our mere survival is on this, there should be a levees and wetlands story EVERY day. There should be some kind of countdown meter measuring how long until the Army Corps of Engineers gets us 100-year protection (which the Dutch roll their eyes at and is sufficient, I believe, for farmland and cattle). There should be a running blog on how little the Obama administration has done to lead a real recovery in New Orleans. And so on.

The Saints stuff is just a bit much.

On the front page and home page, that is.

On the Sports page, I'm all about the Black and Gold, BAYBEE!

Mayor's Race

2009-08-02T07:46:00.002-05:00

Just sitting around on a Sunday morning at the beach, trying to get this here blog restarted.

For me, the big issues that our next mayor will need to deal with (since the current guy hasn't), need to be:

1. Crime
2. Housing
3. The drainage situation directly in front of my house
4. Infrastructure (fix the streets, cut the grass)
5. Economic Development
6. Education (I only rank this at this low level because I don't think the mayor can do much about this in Orleans Parish. It has to come from other sources.)

NOLA Gets the Fox News Treatment

2009-08-01T09:32:00.002-05:00

Normally, I wouldn't like that, but this is okay:

World Class Innovation and Collaboration in NOLA

2009-07-30T06:56:00.003-05:00

Entrepreneur magazine already featured our city on its cover this month, and now the New York Times has picked up the story too.

I am most inspired by these lines:

“The thing about this city, like no other — everybody wants everyone to succeed,” said Seema Sudan, the owner and director of design at the knitwear company LiaMolly, who moved to New Orleans in October 2007. “I have never been in a place that is so community-oriented,” she
said. “Competitive gets you nowhere. It’s about being collaborative. And this city is so like that, from the people helping each other rebuild their homes to building businesses.”

She said she also appreciated the quality of life, and the fact that she paid $800 for a 900-square-foot studio in the Garden District, and $1,800 for a three-bedroom apartment with a yard and tree house.

Two years into his project, Mr. Cummings remains enthusiastic.

“I am blown away by the caliber of talent,” he said. “It’s a thriving creative culture of invention. And it is growing every day.”

It's a Bad Day for NOLA When Shelley Midura Steps Back

2009-07-15T17:53:00.002-05:00

I'm an unapologetic fan of Shelley Midura.

This is a bad day for World Class New Orleans.

She's World Class.

I liked her anyway, but I had the privilege of attending a lunch at the World Trade Center when the Ambassador from Saudi Arabia to the United States visited New Orleans.

Shelley welcomed him in a two or three minute speech IN ARABIC.

World Class.

I wish she'd run for mayor.

A Toxic Culture for the Heart

2009-06-27T09:21:00.008-05:00

Governor Mark Sanford's public meltdown and Americans' reaction to it are good evidence of a basic illness in our popular culture (and our political culture as well). Actually, let's just call it an illness in our culture as a whole.

I suppose that most of us (me included) have been somewhat amused by but also horrified at the totally inappropriate public performance of a guy who until now was a go-getting man of alleged principle. It's been both riveting and cringe-inducing.

But really, why do we have this reaction to him? Our outraged or amused or uncomfortable reaction to him is in total contrast to the kinds of movies and songs and stories we all make popular.

In "High Fidelity," Nick Hornby is on to this oddity:

People worry about kids playing with guns, or watching violent videos, that some sort of culture of violence will take them over. Nobody worries about kids listening to thousands, literally thousands of songs about heartbreak, rejection, pain, misery and loss.

Think about this comment from the other side of "love." We don't worry about our kids (or us) watching movies or listening to songs that cajole us into "following our heart" and searching for true love, or looking for and finding our "soulmate." Disney and other studios churn this stuff out by the bushel, and we eat it up.

And yet when we are confronted by a guy who actually did this, the reaction is "What a loser!" or "How horrible!" or "What a hypocrite!" or "This is hilarious!" And we want to know all the details so we can stomp on the guy.

I'm not defending Sanford, and I know that this mess is having a terrible effect on his wife and children. Families and spouses and children are never the same after this kind of thing happens.

Sanford is a self-indulgent guy at this point in his life. His affair and then his shrink-session-style press conference are evidence of that. His abuse of the language of religion and faith is at least as unforgiveable as his infidelity is.

It's just that I think we all participate in some kind of bait-and-switch for the heart.

In Disney movies, we often cheer people who shun convention and "dull" long-term commitments to family and chase the whims of their hearts.

In political life or other important arenas, we give them the "tsk tsk" and a sneer, and we feel superior.

Governor Mark Sanford is a Hybrid of Ray Nagin and Bill Clinton

2009-06-25T09:43:00.002-05:00

Gov. Sanford at a press conference: "I spent the last five days of my life crying in Argentina."

First, that's a GREAT title for a country song.

Second, can't this guy save the blabber for the shrink's couch? Sort your life out, please, but don't do it on national TV. On a human level, I feel for the guy. But this is undignified, even for a Republican.

Third, disappearing for days then melting down in public. Pure Nagin. Chasing skirt in Buenos Aires. Pure Clinton. An unholy amalgam indeed.

Comparative Beers

2009-06-20T18:39:00.003-05:00

I find Lazy Magnolia's Indian Summer Ale to be FAR superior to Abita's Satsuma Harvest Wit.

I am a BIG fan of Abita, but the Satsuma stuff just doesn't do it for me. I'm not a fruit and beer guy, and this particular brew from Abita tastes more like a Holiday brew than a summer brew to me. But that's just me with this one brew. I love every other Abita brew.

The Lazy Magnolia Indian Summer just nails it. Summer and beer and fun and nice with food. Beautiful. World class. Thank you, Kiln, Mississippi.

Naked Bikers in French Quarter

2009-06-14T09:34:00.002-05:00

This opens up all sorts of possibilities for us in the Black and Gold Bike Patrol.

I hope that these people were able to display some Saints pride somewhere on their persons.

I wonder if anybody had a fleur de lis hardhat on.

If we adopted this uniform standard for the bike patrol, I would miss the jumpsuit.

I think most viewers would wish Berto and I were wearing the jumpsuits too.

Do-ers, Trek, New New Orleans

2009-06-07T09:09:00.004-05:00

1. From the NY Times Magazine today:

“How do I say this delicately?” [Senator Max Baucus] asked. “President Bush, he liked being president. You know, there are be-ers, and there are doers. And I think he liked being president, as opposed to doing.” Obama, on the other hand, strikes Baucus as a doer. “You’ve really got to work at it, rather than just enjoying the job,” he said.

Most of us aren't in a position at this point to assess whether President Obama actually is going to be a real do-er--and I think he does in fact like BEING president (Who wouldn't?)--but I take this comment from Senator Baucus as a positive sign.

This comment also leads me to reflect on people I encounter in my professional life. I am often confronted with people whose job is to have and keep his/her job. These people are not interested in doing much, in taking the risks necessary to accomplish great things. Popular mythology would lead you to believe that those sorts work exclusively in government. To the contrary--I see these people all the time in private business and in the supposedly more entrepreneurial world of private or religious education.

Be-ers--that's old New Orleans, old Detroit, millenial New York City. These are the people who show up to work with the number one goal of impressing others with how in tune and smart they are, showing how much they are into "moving forward," and protecting their salary and company car and weekly meetings with those in the know.

Do-ers--that's new New Orleans. These are people who show up to work trying to stir the pot and get things done, willing to say "no" or "I disagree" or "Waitjustaminute," willing to be fired in the cause of trying to push the envelope.

Old New Orleans is still around, protecting turf and overpaying for "smart" people from out of town who help them protect the status quo in subtle ways. Are you listening, Ed Blakely and others of your ilk in key positions around the city? Carpetbaggers, your days are numbered.

2. New New Orleans also includes the likes of Oak Street. Have you been there since the initial round of street repairs? Wow! The T-P quoted a guy in his 80s who said Oak Street has NEVER been this nice. These ARE the good old days.

Check out the new Rock N Bowl, too. Old New Orleans will tell you what a shame it is that it had to move and everything. Baloney. John Blancher has done it right--moved it a few blocks away in Orleans Parish, next to his other business to promote efficiencies of scale. And the new place is great.

3. To answer Tim's question: I love the new "Star Trek." I confess I've seen it three times in the theater. And I enjoyed the third time MORE than the first two times.

Even Snarky Stacy Head Should Be Forgiven a Little Indiscretion

2009-05-14T07:06:00.003-05:00

Look, I'm not a big fan of Stacy Head. Not a fan at all. I didn't vote for her in the original race for the seat.

But cheesh. This email business ain't right.

Like any redblooded American, I read the few emails posted here at nola.com.

The stuff I'm reading in these emails--it sounds like a normal person with normal questions and the First Amendment right to be snarky.

What's wrong with that?

Tracie Washington disgusts me.

In the age of email and Twitter, either we all have to be indulgent of one another's foibles and moments of snark, or no one will ever be eligible for a job or politics or membership in a church.

What NOLA Looks Like

2009-05-11T22:31:00.000-05:00

If you squint just a little . . .

Steps Have Been Taken

2009-05-10T13:57:00.002-05:00

I have been informed that certain fans of the Black and Gold have initiated efforts with benign supernatural forces to ensure a Black and Gold Super Bowl in Miami 2010.

Last year, when similar efforts were made, the Saints went from 3-5 in the Dome to 5-2 (6-2 if you count the London game).

This year, the efforts have been intensified so as to achieve a 10-0 home record (8 regular season, then a bye week, plus two playoff wins).

Two Saints Players Make Like Norman Robinson

2009-05-03T14:21:00.003-05:00

So two benchwarming Saints players made like Norman Robinson last night by urinating publicly in an Elmwood apartment complex parking lot.

Lovely.

Not world class.

A few brief thoughts:

Let he among us who has not sinned thusly, cast the first stone.
I can almost guarantee that this kind of behavior was MORE common on Saints teams in the 60s and 70s, with players like Doug Atkins, Steve Stonebreaker, and Danny Abramowicz around.
I hope that the next time something like this happens in Orleans Parish, I don't read or hear comments about how trashy the city is. These two goofs marked their territory in Jefferson Parish this time. And you know it's going on in suburban Dallas and Houston and St. Louis and Miami.

Ashley Morris Day

2009-04-01T14:29:00.004-05:00

I had thought that tomorrow was Ashley Morris Day. But Hana reminds us it's today.

I have more to say about our champion, the man who lived the Warrior's Code. (Thanks for that song, Greg. You cost me 99 well-spent cents on iTunes that will lift my spirit forevermore.) But this will have to suffice for now.

Deuce News

2009-03-23T12:09:00.002-05:00

I still say we should re-sign him after the dust of the draft clears.

Thanks to the Jackson newspaper and Fletcher Mackel for staying on the Deuce story.

Anybody like me and want a #26 Network on cable? You know, All Deuce, All the Time.

STILL Not Stuck on Stupid

2009-03-02T12:19:00.002-06:00

General Russell Honore was the speaker Sunday for NPR's "This I Believe" segment.

He tells a good story and still serves as a witness to truth and decency.

I should note that General Honore will be in New Orleans in May to receive an honorary degree from Loyola University New Orleans. Fittingly, that will take place in the Louisiana Superdome.

Chin Up, We Will Poke Fate in the Chest and Sneer

2009-02-17T23:22:00.003-06:00

In the past 10 months, Ashley Morris moved on from our midsts, and Deuce McAllister was released by the Saints.

And we trudge on, because that is what we do in World Class New Orleans. That is what Dr. Morris and Mr. McAllister would have us do.

They task us.

They task us.

In Praise of the Krewe of King Arthur

2009-02-15T16:19:00.002-06:00

The first weekend of parades, I really don't pay a whole lot of attention. Oh, I attend a few.

The one parade that I truly relish is the Krewe of King Arthur.

As Ashley and Berto and I used to discuss regularly, the Krewe of King Arthur is a parade that looks and acts like New Orleans--not just one sector of New Orleans.

Westbank. Eastbank. Black. White. Brown. Tan. Hispanic. Palewhitelikeme. Asian. Jazz. Hip hop. Brass bands. Dance teams with speakers blaring electronic garbage.

It's all there, all out there, with no pretense, other than the quite-accurate pretense of being a damned good time.

King Arthur is the Gentilly, the Superdome Terrace, of Mardi Gras Parades.

A parade in FrenchAfricanItalianIrish New Orleans named after an English king.

I love this city. I love this parade.

Disappointment in Washington, DC, Leads to More Thought of Secession in World Class New Orleans

2009-02-14T13:42:00.004-06:00

The economic stimulus package that just passed Congress has engendered mostly disappointment in me.

1. The biggest disappointment for me has been the groupthink of the Republican Party and the behavior of my congressman, Joseph Cao. I will discuss below why I am not a fan of the bill that just passed, but it is simply stunning to me that NOT A SINGLE MEMBER of the congressional GOP was able to vote for it. Not a single member. So much for the Republican Party being a "big tent." It's a Big Tent of Zombies, as far as I'm concerned, until they prove otherwise. I'm not a registered Democrat, but the GOP is going to make me become one.

2. The Times-Picayune told me really all I need to know about our new congressman. Earlier this week, Congressman Cao told us he would vote his conscience and probably vote for the bill. Then he voted against it, completing the GOP "Big Tent of Zombies" sweep of no's. From today's paper, we hear the following from Republican Congressman Eric Cantor of Virginia:

"Mr. Cao is a terrific representative and voice for the people that elected him. I think he understands that even in a district as challenged in terms of the economy as his, that was devastated by the hurricanes, by Katrina, even in his district that polls indicate that 55 percent of people are against this bill."

So it turns out that Mr. Cao's "conscience" is determined by 55 percent of the voters in his district. Thanks, Mr. Cao, for voting against the bill after voting for it (with your public words). I hope you go the way of John Kerry.

I don't necessarily believe that 55 percent number anyway. More importantly, Mr. Cao has lost my vote in two years with this kind of indecision, weakness, and lack of independence. He can win it back, but it will take work. And a sustained display of manly virtue.

3. The stimulus package shows why this republic is in trouble. The congressional Democrats acted like bad stereotypes, as did the Republicans. President Obama seems to have just gone along in order to get a win.

We need more than a win. We need real change. This ain't it. That's why the bill doesn't excite me. $787 billion of meh.

4. Furthermore, the Louisiana congressional delegation (the whole lot of them) ought to be ashamed of themselves. First, a few facts:

Louisiana makes up 1.38 percent of the U.S. Population
As one state among 50, Louisiana is 2 percent of the U.S.

Now, consider that of the $787 billion total in expected spending, Louisiana is expected to reap approximately .48 percent of the spending in the bill.

Louisiana isn't being represented in the United States Congress. We are being ROLLED OVER, and have been for years. It's wrong. It's just wrong, and the clowns we have there now are just enablers. Clowns indeed. I consider Steve Scalise to be the biggest clown of all, although at least he's not a diapered clown.

5. We provide the nation with oil and seafood and coffee and soul, and we get rolled. I will repeat the need to explore secession. The New Republic of West Florida--this time to include New Orleans, St. Bernard, Plaquemines, Jefferson, and the Bayou parishes stretching all the way to Beaumont, Texas.