Life in the News Cycle

It was basketball vs. Jesus last night and, for once, I went against my gut instincts. I chose Jesus. OK, it may have been a modern-day theatrical Jesus but I must say he put on quite a good show.

Faced with the choice of staying home and watching my beloved Michigan State Spartans in the NCAA’s Sweet 16 or going with my family to the Little Theater of Gastonia to see Godspell, I went with the God thing. It was the opening performance and my first visit to my hometown theater since moving back to Gastonia in March 2010.

This year’s presidential primary season is shaping up to be one of the weirdest in modern political history.

We’ve seen Mitt Romney go off on a tangent about healthcare in which he beamed “I like to be able to fire people.”  I know, that was only a small snippet cut from a larger commentary he tried to make, with the larger point being that consumers ought to be able to pick their own health insurers as opposed to their employer picking the insurer for them. But Romney’s choice of words was suspect. Does he not know that, in today’s brutal economy, any speech that includes the phrase “I like to fire people” is destined to be taken out of context and used as fodder by his opposition?

Sure enough, rival candidate Jon Huntsman seized on the opportunity to play Romney’s comment in an ad. One does wonder if maybe Romney made a Freudian slip. He is, after all, the former CEO of Bain Capital, where he exhibited a penchant for laying off workers and using other people’s money to enrich himself. It’s all legal, of course, and is actually the mark of a clever venture capitalist at work. But please, spare us the braggadocio about creating 100,000 jobs Mitt.

This is the same Romney who spouted off at a Republican debate that he wanted to bet one of his counterparts “10,000 bucks” that he was right about a particular point being debated. Now that’s a statement that will endear any politician to the working man. You know, we all have a spare $10,000 sitting around waiting for one of those “I’m smarter than you” moments when we need to prove our point with an argumentative cousin. I can already see the puzzled look on a foreign leader’s face when a ”President Romney” knifes in with “I’ll bet you all of the gold bullion in Fort Knox that you’re wrong and I’m right!”

On another occasion Romney, while making a stump speech, felt the need to tell folks that he has at times in his past feared being handed a “pink slip.”  This is a situation where he may have been trying too hard to relate to us “commoners.”  One thing we don’t appreciate is being talked down to and this glib remark could only make us wonder if the multi-millionaire also remembers a time when he once did his own grocery shopping or folded his own clothes.

Then you’ve Got Rick Santorum. Here’s a guy who is very much a social conservative and seems to be a likeable guy. He actually has a tax plan that is less punitive than Romney’s. He doesn’t seek to punish those of us who have not been successful in climbing more than halfway up the proverbial socio-economic ladder. But the guy seems to have a hard time relating to the younger crowd. He got booed off the stage at a New Hampshire college when he started comparing gay marriage proponents to polygamists. He’s also brought up bestiality and other gross topics when trying to explain why true, legal marriage ought to be reserved for one man and one woman. 

Of course Rick Perry is another one with a rhetorical silver tongue. You never quite know what’s going to come out of the Texan’s mouth. Sometimes he will garble things up and start rambling in five directions at once, causing some in his audience to wonder if perhaps he has taken to the bottle.  I did, however, appreciate Perry’s self-depricating sense of humor after that famous debate snafu when he forgot the third federal agency that he wanted to eliminate. Here’s a man who doesn’t take himself too seriously.

That’s not something that could be said about Newt Gingrich, who never forgets to remind us of his status as a famous author/historian and seems utterly without humor. He’s the angry candidate whose facial expressions almost seem to match his name. Is he a Newt or simply a Grinch?  He did, however, recently pick up the endorsement of Todd Palin, husband of Sarah Palin. I’m not sure what Gingrich was thinking when he sought this endorsement. Maybe it will ensure him of getting the votes of dogsledders everywhere while also making some headway with the reality TV vote? Seriously, is this the “almost Sarah Palin” endorsement? I can hear him now, “Sarah won’t commit but at least her hubby likes me.”

A homeless couple living out of their van. I never would have thought this would be the story of the year, the one that gets everybody fired up on one side or the other, but it looks like it just may be turning into that.

A man called me out of the blue one afternoon to inform me that an elderly couple kept showing up in the Walmart parking lot in Belmont, in a green Ford minivan with a small cardboard sign claiming to be homeless.

“They’ve been living in their van,” the caller told me. “First they parked at the BiLo and now they show up at the Walmart, parked in the shade during the day. They look like they’re trying to collect money. That’s an awfully old lady to be sitting in a van all day. We’ve brought them stuff, and other people do too, but I’d like to know their full story.”

I agreed with the caller that it could be a good story. I assigned it to Diane Turbyfill, who grabbed her notebook and headed straight out the door with photographer Mike Hensdill on her heels.

Diane is a skilled interviewer who relates well to real people with real problems, but she also is adept at describing a scene and painting pictures with words.  I wasn’t disappointed. The story about Eddie Carroll and Dianna Taylor focused on what it was like to live in a van for 16 months with your two dogs. The story  moved people from across the county to help the beleaguered couple. The outpouring just continues to grow, and warranted a followup story the next day reporting how the couple’s life has been changed by the Good Samaritans of Gaston County.

A local restaurateur has put the couple up in a hotel and given the man in the van a job. We’ll see how it plays out, but this couple definitely has been given a new beginning on what had become a very dismal life.

It made me feel proud. I was proud of Diane for writing such a great story that moved people to action. The idea of giving a voice to the voiceless is what inspired many of us to be journalists in the first place. Yet, it’s becoming more rare in journalism today. In the Internet age, people are pummeled with so many written messages that compete for their attention, and sometimes that crowds out the truly important ones — a cry for help, a person stuck in a nasty fix, even if it is partly of their own making. But once in a while a story comes  our way that shows we still have that power of the written word and that it can make a difference for positive change in our community.

Of course there are the naysayers. Those who always look for the negative. I’ve received several emails from people who say The Gazette has done a great disservice to the community by reporting the story of this homeless couple. They’re just no good con artists who “work the system,” I’ve been told.

“They need to be stopped from taking advantage of kind giving people.  You check back with them in one month, and they will not be working at any of the jobs offered, not living in a home, and still begging in Wal-Marts parking lot!” one emailer wrote.

“This has nothing to do with the dogs, and everything to do with two lazy and rotten people who are happy to live in the van, because they make more money pan handling than working, and you just helped them to make a lot more!”

I say, let’s err on the side of benevolence and basic human kindness.

I’m not going to let the naysayers take away from the joy I felt when Diane told me about the outpouring of support and the businessman with a big heart.

Are Eddie Carrol and Dianna Taylor the perfect little homeless couple who bear no responsibility for the predicament they’re in? I doubt it. But that doesn’t cloud the fact that they are both elderly, lacking in education and job skills. They are exactly the type of folks whom have been left behind economically by the rapid technological advances and heightened global competition of the Internet age. I can’t guarantee that if I were in their shoes that I wouldn’t “work the system,” if that’s what you call accepting a handout where it is offered.

If you think they are getting rich on those handouts in the Walmart parking lot, you are fooling yourself, and maybe you should try it for a day. They truly are disadvanted in every sense of the word, and if The Gazette telling their story resulted in a bed and a job and a roof over their heads, then I say that’s a good, honest day’s work on our part.

I’ve just completed my first year as city editor at The Gazette, my first year of living in Gastonia, and it’s been a year of de-je vu.

Why am I getting these flashbacks, you ask? OK, I must confess, this isn’t my first stint at The Gazette, or as a resident of Gastonia. I lived here for five years in the late 1980s and early 1990s. It’s amazing how the problems of 18-20 years ago are the same problems facing the city today.

One of those problems is downtown. It was plagued by vacancies and failed startups then, just like it is now. But unlike 20 years ago, downtown Gastonia now has at least a sliver of hope for the future. Just in the year I have been here, I’ve seen a lot of activity: artists creating public art, developers redeveloping old commercial buildings into living quarters, and a Charlotte businessman converting the historic Webb Theater into a restaurant. And, of course, it’s hard to miss the sight of a $25 million conference center now rising at the corner of Marietta Street and Franklin Boulevard.

While the risks are obvious, it looks like the central city could be poised for a renaissance, and I am cautiously optimistic, which is something I couldn’t have said in 1990.

Yet, with all these signs pointing towards hope, all you read is negativity from readers who post online comments about the downtown stories we’ve reported in The Gazette. It’s all doomed to failure, they predict.

This sounds strange and unfamiliar to me. Most places I’ve lived seek the best, wish for the best, for their central city, their “main drag” or whatever you want to call it. Then de-je vu strikes and I remember, this is Gastonia. This is exactly how is was 20 years ago. Different people, same opinions. Perhaps these feelings of negativity toward anything downtown were passed on to them by their parents? I don’t know, but the feelings are strongly held.

I wonder if these folks ever feel even a small tinge of jealousy when they visit, say, Greenville, S.C., or some other Southern city that has managed to retain an actual working downtown in spite of the growth of suburban areas? Are they against downtowns in general or only Gastonia’s downtown?

Many point out that they are not rooting for downtown Gastonia to fail, they simply wish that city government would stop intervening on its behalf. They say downtown should be allowed to succeed or fail on its own merits. Let the free market determine its fate, they argue.

That sounds good in principle but is it realistic? The city doesn’t “throw money” at downtown any more than it has thrown money at other areas to encourage development. Just one, striking example of this is the City Council’s decision to pay $3.1 million for the construction of an access road for the new Target discount store at Gaston Mall. The money will come from retail sales and property taxes generated from the new development.

Likewise, the money for grants given to startup businesses downtown comes from a tax levied only on downtown businesses. This seems like a fair use of tax dollars to me.

Let it be noted, too, that the problems that plague downtown are now spreading to the east side of town. When Target moves to its bigger, newer, nicer store at Gaston Mall, it will leave behind a gaping hole on New Hope Road, next to another empty store recently vacated by TJ Maxx. Those “dark” spaces join a growing list that includes two Circuit City stores, Backyard Burger and others. Pretty soon the east side of town will be looking pretty old and out of fashion, too. Maybe then downtown won’t look so bad and may even begin to look good once the new projects at the Webb and the conference center are done.

As my grandmother used to say, “what goes around comes around.”

Rep. William Current’s behavior Wednesday in Raleigh sank so low on the professionalism scale, even for a politician, that if he were a school boy he would have been ordered to stand with his nose in the corner for the rest of the legislative session.

But Current is not a school boy. He is a 77-year-old state legislator representing Gaston County. Part of any elected office holder’s job description inherently involves a bit of graciousness, showing some ability to listen to those whom they represent. Evidently this is asking too much of Rep. Current. His crude rant against a dozen of his own constituents who took time out of their schedules to drive to the Capitol for a sit-down with His Highness can only be described as elitist. The group wanted to talk about the $1 billion Garden Parkway toll road proposed for Gaston County, and why they opposed it. Regardless of how Current feels about the toll road, it is a state project that is on the Legislature’s agenda this session and building it will require millions of dollars in public tax dollars.

Current is a big proponent of the toll road. That’s a given.  Yet, one would think that if he had any sense of fair play, not to mention political savvy, he could have bit his tongue and listened to the group air their views before politely stating his own.

No, Current resorted to name calling and condescension, reportedly calling one constituent an “idiot” and telling a Gazette reporter that he would do all he could to educate the public on why the toll road would be a great thing for Gaston County.

It is just this sort of holier-than-thou attitude among politicians that is wearing thin on voters across the country, and people across the world. They know what’s best for us, and if we don’t agree with their conclusions then it could only be that we haven’t been sufficiently “educated.” They reserve their ear and their respect for those with whom they agree, or those who come with checkbook in hand around re-election time.

I wonder if it had been a lobbyist for Duke Energy, or one representing home builders, who had invaded Current’s little world that day, would he have given them such an icy reception?

“They bombarded me with all of these facts I wasn’t interested in hearing,” Current told the Charlotte Observer.

Regardless of where you stand on the Garden Parkway, take note. Current sent a loud-and-clear message to all of the voting public in Gaston County with his tirade in that Raleigh office Wednesday: If you don’t agree with my decisions, don’t bother talking to me. You’re wasting your time.

I was sitting in a country club listening to a politician give one of those feel-good speeches before the Chamber of Commerce recently when I was jolted from my day-dreaming, my eyes going from glazed over to laser beams shooting straight at the man behind the microphone.

It wasn’t the coffee. It was an anecdote from Pat McCrory’s speech that perked me up and piqued my interest.

McCrory, the former mayor of Charlotte, was talking about reinventing ourselves in the wake of this horrible economic recession.  He talked a lot about cities and counties in the region all being “in this together” and how they needed to work together to solve problems. Education was key, he said, and educators needed to make sure that students graduated with skills that industries want.

To illustrate his point, he referenced a young man who he said had recently graduated from college with a degree in political science.  After many months of looking for a job in his field and finding no success, he decided to go back to school and get a new skill — as a welder.

McCrory said the man earned his welding certificate and immediately got placed in a job “making more than many of you sitting here in this room.”

Now, first off, I didn’t believe the punchline because the room at the Gaston Country Club that evening was filled with middle to top managers, bankers and healthcare professionals all pulling down incomes well into six-figures. Maybe the preacher who prayed the blessing over the filet mignon made less than a welder, but few others in that room (besides us newspaper editors) could’ve made such a claim.

But McCrory’s story bothered me not because of the presumptious punchline. It needled me for days not because of what he said, but because of what he didn’t say. The story made me sad for the young man, whose passion was political science. Yes, he’s found a new career that allows him to provide for his family, but is he happy? I wished he could have gone back to school for advanced degrees and become a political science professor. Or maybe he fancied himself a lawyer, but couldn’t afford law school.

Did he settle for something other than his dream? Was his dream drowned out by the system? For whatever reason, he stopped pursuing it. I could relate to this young man because I myself, way back in the 1980s, had dared to pick a major in political science. I’ve used that knowledge in my career as a journalist covering everything from crime and politics to business and religion. I’ve always been interested in public affairs, and I’ve pursued my passion. Despite not being able to line my pockets, I love my line of work.

What made America special was that it was a place where one could pursue dreams. In the old Soviet Union, where elites ran the system, people got steered into jobs that the government decided were right for them. They became cogs in the wheel. In India, your livelihood depended on the social caste you were born into. They became hopeless.

One of the young Egyptians protesting in Cairo last week told a reporter that, in Egypt over the past 30 years, your future was decided for you, and that was why his generation was rising up in revolt.  That same spirit is now sweeping the Arab world. They’ve grown tired of being kept down, of doors being closed.

For the first time, I can actually see the same trend taking shape in America. People can’t find decent jobs, and students, if they can afford college at all, are graduating with huge amounts of debt. This may be the first American generation that can’t anticipate a standard of living at least as bright as their parents.

I can almost see a day, possibly in my lifetime, when Americans take to the streets. They will grow weary of being kept down by the power of the government and the special-interest corporate sponsors who pay for the campaigns of most of the lawmakers who sit in Congress. They can only milk the system for so long. As Tunisia and Egypt have shown us, it’s only a matter of time before people power prevails.

OK, so we’ve entered the new year and while some people may see 2011 as the last full year before the end of the world (you know, that Myan Calendar thing), there are other milestones sneaking up on us.

This summer we will commemorate the 150th anniversary of the Civil War.  The Gazette would like to acknowledge this historical milestone with stories from local families that went through the most devastating war in American history. One-hundred and fifty years later, even the way in which we remember this war has been controversial.

So dig out those old letters, notes, muskets, knives, or other paraphernalia that may have been passed down from generation to generation and share with us the stories that go with them. We’d love to include them in a series of stories about Gaston County during the Civil War.

They could be stories about family members who didn’t make it through the war, why they fought, where their sympathies truly lied, and maybe where they didn’t lie. The war, as we all know, was a very complex wedge that existed between people from all walks of life.

In the meantime, happy digging. I know our area is full of interesting war stories.