b.rox

My neighbor Dawn posted some invective on New Orleans recovery czar Ed Blakely that caught my attention.

Through nefarious means I have acquired two documents from last year which clearly show that some vendors decided not to bid on the garbage contract because of (and I quote) “the onerous collection requirements.” Also cited: “The potential overlap of collection of ‘unlimited bulky waste’ with the ongoing Hurricane cleanup efforts, which we expect will [...]

Thanks to my friend Carol, I got a sweet gig tonight: vote reporting! I never knew this before, but after the polls close they post the results on the door. Since I live one block from my polling place, I just walked down there. I waited for a while chatting with Deborah Langhoff’s brother-in-law. When [...]

The pundits have been remarking on how nice and polite the race for City Council At-Large has been, but yesterday the attack ads hit the radio.
We also got a mailer from the “City Council Integrity Committee.” (Looks like Varg got it too.) It’s allegedly humorous theme is “Mission: Impossible.” The facts are attributed to LouisianaTruth.com, [...]

Let me see if I got this straight. The American Society of Civil Engineers got pissed off about the video PSA produced by high school students and posted by Levees.org to YouTube. ASCE demanded the video be removed. So Levees.org removed it. Then, the Times-Picayune wrote a story about it. As part of their online [...]

We’re voting again Saturday. In the fifth precinct of the fourth ward we’ll have three items on the ballot: Attorney General, Judge, and City Council At-Large.
Attorney General
It’s a Republican named Royal versus a Democrat named Buddy. I couldn’t make this stuff up if I tried. I’m really note sure who I’ll support, but if Royal [...]

My friend at City Hall advised me to tune in to Cox Cable Channel 6 today at 1PM. I see on the Best of New Orleans Blog that the City Council is holding a public hearing at that time (Fri. Nov. 2, at 1:00 pm) at the City Council Chambers to discuss curbside recycling. I [...]

This is what I was talking about last Friday. The “dirty deal” relates to the city’s trash disposal contracts. Now that it’s the top story in today’s paper, I can talk about it.
Are you yawning yet? I don’t blame you — unless you live in New Orleans. In that case, you should be [...]

Often there’s little glory in doing the right thing. It can’t be easy to step down from a powerful political office. But Eddie Jordan did just that today. If we take him at his word, he did it for the good of New Orleans.
In January I said, “Shame on you, Mayor Nagin, Superintendent Riley, District [...]

Southern Leftist says Jordan’s going down this afternoon; nola.com confirms he might resign very soon.

I really hate this. I just got a call from a well-informed person in city government, who shared some juicy info that I’m just bustin’ to share. It concerns some dirty dealings related to a recent post on this blog. Problem is, in order to get in on this fascinating dope, I had to promise [...]

I was amazed by the front page of the paper this morning. Apparently a robbery suspect took refuge at the house of District Attorney Eddie Jordan, before rushing off to shoot a cop and his wife. This happened earlier in the month but is only coming to light now.
Separate but related story: The D.A. owes [...]

Yesterday I referred to Bobby Jindal as a “right-wing nutjob.” I regret that, as I prefer not to call names. I got carried away.
I should have said that he seems like a right-wing nutjob. A friend of mine says Jindal acts like that to get the so-called “Bubba vote.” He says Jindal has to play [...]

My voting philosophy is pretty simple. Here are my general rules:

Vote against the incumbent, if there is one.
Don’t vote for a candidate of either of the two major entrenched parties.

These are not rigid by any means. I’ll make an exception if I believe in a particular candidate or if some other calculus suggests itself.
Of course, [...]

Last night I attended the New Orleans City Council At-Large candidate forum at Xavier.
Twelve of the thirteen candidates were there, Kimberly Butler being absent. There were nine rounds of questions, adding up to 117 mini-speeches. Candidates were limited to one minute in length in some cases and 30 seconds in others, and the limits were [...]

A friend of mine voted early and sends the following report.

Since you gave me some advice, I’ll tell you how I voted. Just a little FYI. When it’s relevant, I’ll tell you why I made the choice I did. Generally, I don’t vote for Republicans. Also, when I’m trying to make a decision [...]

Many people on campus today are wearing black in support of the Jena Six.
I’m reminded of my high school days in Greenwood, Indiana. We often had “Spirit Weeks” to support the football team with different dress-up days. One time we had something called “Black ‘Em Out” day. Everybody was supposed to wear black.
One guy thought [...]

I can’t make it to Jena, Louisiana, tomorrow so I will be wearing black to show support for the Jena Six.

Friends of New Orleans is mounting a campaign to bring a presidential debate to New Orleans.
I have mixed emotions about this.
The presidential debates are something of a farce. They should be organized by a nonpartisan group, but they’re not. They’re organized by the Commission on Presidential Debates. They claim to be nonpartisan, but they were [...]

One of the most interesting things I got out of the Green Party of Louisiana convention on Saturday was a press release distributed by the People’s Hurricane Relief Fund. Strangely enough I can’t find this information on their website nor on the website for the International Tribunal on Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, so I thought [...]