You keep using that word...

Except for BAMN supporters' falacious and specious rants, the most frequent observation about Domestic Terrorists in Ferndale (posted February 3, 2009) in Tif's and my in-boxes are concerns about the word terrorism.

Webster's New World Dictionary defines terrorism as: the use of force or threats to intimidate, etc. [ibid] esp. as a political policy.

It's possible the colloquial use of the word terrorism has moved beyond Webster's, Princeton University's, or others' definitions. None of the definitions I read required violence, murder, assault, or property destruction. Threats as a means to coerce is a good enough definition.

To make our case for us, BAMN's national coordinater, Donna Stern, couldn't help but make more threats in The Woodward Talk regarding attempts to stop their intimidation:

The topic of police intervention led Stern to deliver a taut reminder that BAMN is well aware of its civil liberties. “If Ferndale (tried to stop us from protesting), they would be in violation of our freedom of speech and our freedom of assembly (rights), and we would sue,” she said. “Just because you don’t like what we’re doing doesn’t mean you have the right to block democracy.”

Maybe the problem with describing BAMN's actions as terrorism isn't with the word terrorism. Rather, it may be because the terrorists we're most familiar with; Hamas, al-Qaeda, Timothy McVeigh, as well as eco and animal-rights activists, have taken terrorism to extremes previously thought unconscionable. Sure, al-Qaeda may represent the vanguarde of uber-terrorists, but their pushing the envelope doesn't make BAMN's threats and intimidation any less coercive, it only makes other terrorists more blood-thirsty and desperate.

If you'd like to suggest another word than terrorism to describe BAMN's threats to Ferndale businesses to join their fight against a 3rd party or risk pickets, boycotts, harassing customers, and economic penalties to business and employees, I'm anxious to hear from you.

Domestic terrorists in Ferndale

Words are important. They have meaning. When used indiscriminately we either fail to communicate or dilute the meaning of the words we misuse.

Domestic terrorism is an appropriate and fitting description of BAMN's protests in front of Western Market, Como's and other Ferndale businesses. Before continuing let's look at some definitions.

Princeton University's WordNet on-line dictionary defines it:

terrorism practiced in your own country against your own people. "the 1995 bombing of a federal building in Oklahoma City was an instance of domestic terrorism."

The method of domestic terrorists, or terrorists in general, isn't to attack their enemies directly, it's to cause enough collateral damage that civilians, the ones paying the terrorists' prices, force their enemies to give in. BAMN doesn't really have a fight with Western Market, but they're hoping that slandering the owners and employees of the store, shouting at shoppers, and ultimately hurting them economically, that Western Market will give in to their demands and hang BAMN's posters accusing the Ferndale School District of segregation.

Wikipedia has a good introduction to their definition of terrorism:

Terrorism is the systematic use of terror, especially as a means of coercion.^[1]

As far as the definition of terror is concerned, the owners of Western Market, Steve and Tony Selvaggio, are justifiably scared. They're scared their customers and employees will be intimidated and harassed. They're scared disruption to their business may cause them to fail to meet financial obligations to their families and employees. They're scared that in our battered economy the employees they've come to treat as family may be unable to get new jobs if they're forced to lay them off, or that BAMN's slander may be irrepairable.

Terrorists should not be negotiated with.

"All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing."

-- Edmund Burke

For reasons that infuriate me beyond words (and should also infuriate businesses) both Ferndale's DDA and Chamber of Commerce are incapable of defending businesses or supporting them against BAMN's attacks. Neither, I suspect, have they put as much effort into brain-storming how to protect Ferndale businesses or our city's reputation as they have increasing dues or taxes.

I oppose BAMN's methods. I oppose BAMN's tactics. I oppose BAMN's disregard for others' rights.

BAMN may wrap themselves in Dr. M.L. King's imagery, but their fruit has fallen a long way from the tree.

Please join Tiffani and me and stand up for Ferndale businesses', residents', and vistors' rights to work, live, and shop in Ferndale without intimidation. Please download the graphics I've attached to this post, print them at home, and display however you wish to demonstrate your opposition to BAMN's extortion, coercion, and yes, their terrorism.

BAMN nominated for annual Basket Crab Award

The Detroit-based community activist group known as By Any Means Necessary (BAMN) has since last fall accused the Ferndale School District of Segregation.

No, you didn't misread that.

BAMN is alleging Ferndale Schools is segregating students. To be honest, I had to look-up the definition of segregation just to be sure I wasn't misreading the newspaper articles. And to make sure we're all on the same webpage together, here's my working definition of segregation for this conversation:

Laws and policies designed to separate black students from white students.

BAMN throws the term Jim Crow around a lot as well. Jim Crow is the common name for laws designed to keep blacks out of white schools, restaurants, neighborhoods, and in the back seats of buses.

One last example for those of you born after 1965: if I were to write, "This is a whites-only article. I've written a separate but equally compelling and inflammatory article for colored people at the bottom of this page," I could be accused of segregation.

Admittedly, it wouldn't work well here because you can choose to read it or not (choice is important later in the article). I would never write such a thing anyway because I haven't time to write separate articles for black and white readers. I do write some for liberals and recent college graduates. Those posts use small words, shorter sentences and simple imagery so they may keep up with the rest of us.

The good news is, BAMN knows our school board is neither discriminating against nor segregating black students. Their own website article betrays this as its Jim Crow arguments are the weakest and least compelling of all the points they make.

The bad news is BAMN also knows racially divisive politics are good for business. It provides a steady stream of press clippings and donations to an organization desperately seeking relevancy. That's partially why I've nominated them for the annual Basket Crab award.

In a Washington Post article, writer Clarence Page describes the award just as I would have (if he hadn't published it first):

"The prize, which I just made up, is awarded to the public figure who best exemplifies the often retold legend of the basket crabs: Every time one of them tries to get out of the basket, the others pull it back in."

The problem with segregation and Jim Crow is it requires people not be given a choice. With Jim Crow, black people couldn't choose to sit in the same restaurant, attend the same theater, or drink from the same water fountains as white people without breaking the law.

In the case of University High School, a magnet school jointly operated by Lawrence Technological University and the Ferndale School District, enrollment is a choice. The 400+ students that attend there do so because their parents choose to send them there. Their parents choose that school because they deemed it a better alternative to their neighborhood public school.

To be more specific, their parents discriminated against their local schools and in favor of University High because that's what good parents do--make decisions for their children between available alternatives. Whether it's the school they attend, the music they listen to, the movies they watch, or the friends they hang out with, it's what parents and other responsible adults do for their charges.

It's called parenting.

If BAMN got its way and University High closed, those parents would no longer have that choice. BAMN would be responsible for removing those parents' ability to choose a better education for their children.

From that perspective, who's segregating now? Now you know why they may win the Basket Crab of the Year award. Whenever a crab tries to escape the Detroit Public Schools' basket, BAMN reaches out and pulls them back in.

BAMN's real issue isn't with Ferndale Schools or University High. And it certainly isn't with Ferndale businesses like Como's, Western Market, or The Record Collector. Their issue is with the Detroit Public School system.

Ferndale resident and possible council candidate, Greg Pawlica, described it this way: "If you want a Whopper you should go to Burger King, not picket Taco Bell because their Spicy Chicken Crunchwrap Supreme isn't a Whopper."

BAMN is tilting at windmills because they lack the credibility, clout , or perhaps the critical evaluation to hold Detroit's own school board accountable. As the dentist Doug Madsen (Tim Allen) said in the movie Wild Hogs while recovering from a stress attack, "I'm in a hospital. It's a lot easier for me right now to blame other people for my problems."

In other news, both good and bad, even BAMN picketers know what the boundaries of Ferndale's DDA should be. They haven't wasted any time visiting business more than a block-or-so from Nine Mile because even BAMN knows where the foot traffic is. Coincidentally, representatives from the DDA are rarely seen that far from Nine Mile as well.


To read more about this specific issue, the Ferndale School District has created this web page with links to BAMN's articles, newspaper articles, and the school district's own responses.

Council tables vote to award $280,000 no-bid contract

At last night's council meeting, Councilperson Gumbleton motioned the agenda item that would award a $280,000 contract to Plante Moran CRESA without bidding be tabled until the next regularly scheduled council meeting.

I agree that some must-bid requirements are ridiculous. The costs for creating, publishing, and reviewing bids can often exceed either the amount of the service or item being bid-for or the potential savings between the high and low bidders.

But in this case, $280,000 (the projected upper limit) is a lot of money and there is little risk a proper request for proposal (RFP) would exceed either the potential savings or the value of the service.

There are many things we may share with Detroit, Eight Mile among them. But awarding no-bid contracts without considering alternatives or entertaining competitive bid process risks Ferndale sharing more with Detroit--like its council's ineptitude and corruption--than we'd like.

Imagine our own Kwame Galloway or Jakie do-you-know-who-I-am? Baker turning a reputable firm like Plante Moran CRESA into a Bobby-Ferguson-like subsidiary. Or relying on wink-and-grin agreements and ignoring the appearance of impropriety. It is also worth mentioning that Detroit's city council suffers little inconvenience to responsibly guard and spend its citizens' money--hiring unqualified relatives and granting undeserved raises to favorites at taxpayer expense and deteriorating service to residents and businesses.

To Plante Moran's misfortune, the city manager's premature solicitation of the management contract means all competitive bidders know the scope and cost of Plante's bid and are certain to under-bid it or provide more services and improved terms. Regardless, Plante Moran isn't new to municipal contracts, bidding, politics, and the risk that no-bid contracts may raise citizen ire.

The subject should appear on council's January 26th agenda. I encourage everyone concerned with responsible government and opposed to our council following Detroit's example attend the meeting. All council meetings start at 7:30 at City Hall.

American Free Enterprise: RIP

It matters little what's taught in college anymore, free enterprise and capitalism haven't existed in the United States for years. Not in the sense that businesses are allowed to compete and survive in the market strictly on their own merits, creativity, and ability to compete for consumer dollars.

You don't need to be a professor or fellow at an ivy league university or institute to appreciate the demise of free enterprise. You can see the effects of government interference right in Ferndale. City Council, at the behest of the DDA, spent valuable time June 23 considering then passing ordinances regulating the size, shape, and fees permitting a potential health risk to civilians: sandwich boards. You know, those little signs shops put on the sidewalk hoping to catch your eye with their lunch menu, specials, promotions and sales.

I'm unsure how Ferndale has survived this long without rigorous standards for sandwich boards. This must be the blight and rejuvenation the state legislature was thinking about when it wrote the laws authorizing DDAs to micro-manage. Between this and other ordinances, millages, expanding the district to tax more business, eventually the DDA will transform Ferndale's character to be as unique and appealing as the inside of Oakland Mall.

Would the car sticking out of the second story at Wetmore's be allowed if the DDA had anything to do with it? I think not. I credit Steffie Loveless, publisher of Ferndale Friends, with the observation that the DDA is slowly removing everything that was once "authentic" Ferndale.

But back to the Big Three, the bailouts requested from GM, Ford, Chrysler, and the UAW is a small part of the expense to government for interfering with the markets in the first place. In addition to CAFE standards, where the government tried to force manufacturers to build cars the public doesn't want to buy, there are numerous safety standards that perhaps the public ought to have voted for with their purchases rather than legislated.

Every large corporation is also a welfare agency of its own--employing people that if they weren't for fear of discrimination lawsuits would have been let-go a long time go. The same goes for minority suppliers--for fear of more government intervention and bad press from Jesse Jackson's Rainbow Coalition, the big three could have spent less time propping-up weak suppliers with preferential price and payment terms than with established suppliers. As part of the bailout, the big three should hold a Survivor-like tribunal to vote some of its staff off the island--including management.

When I worked at Comerica there were people we all knew were unproductive by virtue of laziness or incompetence that wouldn't make it to the second episode. The reality is such a thing isn't possible because public opinon wouldn't allow it. The only time such a move might be tolerated would be during bankruptcy--which might be one of the opportunities the big three may exploit--along with the elimination of suppliers that require too much hand-holding. The result would be a stronger staff and a stronger supply-chain.

Wonder if government interference influences the price of things or free enterprise? Ethanol is cheaper to produce from sugar cane than corn, but those quantities of sugar cane are more likely to come from Brazil than midwest corn farmers. So to make corn-based ethanol more attractive (and not just to congressmen and senators) the government subsidizes it. And because the government doesn't think consumers are willing to pay for electronic cars at prices that reflect the cost to make them, they're offering a $7800 tax incentive to new owners.

I've already gone on record as believing embryonic stem cell (ESC) research shouldn't be illegal, but I strongly oppose any public funding for it. If ESC therapies are really as promising as its supporters claim it to be, then some entreprenurial capitalist should be funding their own development of the technology so they may profit from their patents, treatments, and medicines. Adult stem cell therapies have already proven successful without hype. Where ESC is all promise, hope, lobbying, grants, government funding and sympathetic advertisements, adult stem cells are helping people today.

One last example while I'm thinking about it. If Ferndale residents had to pay the whole cost of the totem pole at Woodward and Cambourne, would we have paid the $100,000 cost? No, but since government grants picked-up much of the cost not only did we get fragile monument for only $30,000 but we contributed to earmarks, pork, and wasteful government spending.

So, as citizens, if we think government intervention and social engineering is a good thing in commercial markets, that minimum wage should be set by law and not the market, that the government should manipulate credit-worthiness through Fredie and Fannie whether borrowers have a job or income, then we should applaud the bailouts and be anxious for more of them--because bailouts are the price we're willing to pay for feel-good public policy in commerce than free-enterprise.

Battered Detroiter Syndrome

Amber Arellano wrote an interesting piece in July 7's Detroit news likening Detroiters to wronged-women, who doesn't appreciate themselves enough to know they're with the wrong men and they deserve better.

Detroit is like a wronged woman who deserves a good man and gets nothing but deadbeat suitors, manipulating her, robbing her, taking advantage of her desperation.

Her betrayers are many: the despicable schemers at the Detroit Public Schools who have looted the district of millions of dollars for years, according to a new lawsuit.

Or take school district's leaders who, for years, failed to implement basic procedures to protect their students of the Tammany Hall-like corruption that infects the district. Their incompetence was revealed by a new report conducted by the Council of Big City Schools.

Or take Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick, who persuaded City Council members last week to approve the beginning of a deal that, if passed in its entirety, will cost the city more than $300 million, according to figures provided to the Detroit News.

These are just some of the headlines of the last two weeks. Almost daily, the litany of offenses grows.

I was immediately reminded of Battered Wife Syndrome. DivorceNet.com's, What is battered woman's syndrome?, explains is like this:

It is also important to understand why battered women stay in abusive relationships. The Court in People v. Aris, 215 Cal App 3d 1194, 264 Cal Rptr 167, 178 (1989) stated that "battered women tend to stay in abusive relationships for a number of reasons." Among those reasons: women are still positively reinforced during the honeymoon phase; women tend to be the peacekeepers in relationships - the ones responsible for making the marriage work; adverse economic consequences; it is more dangerous to leave than to stay; prior threats by batterer to kill self, or children; or to abscond with children; lost self-esteem; and no psychological energy to leave - resulting in a learned helplessness or psychological paralysis.

I've taken the liberty of rewriting it to apply to Detroiters.

It is important to understand why battered Detroiters re-elect abusive politicians and tolerate public administrators. Battered Detroiters put up with it because they are told by their abusers that they're the heart of the metro area; the suburbs are the enemy; whites made them do it; what you may get next could be worse than what you have now, or if you vote for someone else I'll make life worse for you. All this results in political paralysis.

This past November's election swept many republicans from office, but Detroit's representation is mostly unchanged. America will celebrate the election of its first black president, but hasn't Detroit already proved the color of your leaders doesn't change the color of your prospects?

What I didn't know about France, and don't want to find in America

Thomas Sowell wrote an interesting piece for Independence Day titled, Does Patriotism Matter? In it he writes about how after the first world war the French, where the French fought heroically against the Germans, the French teachers union insisted school textbooks be changed to instill students with a greater sense of internationalism and pacificism.

Children were bombarded with stories on the horrors of war. In some schools, children whose fathers had been killed during the war were asked to speak to the class and many of these children-- as well as some of their classmates and teachers-- broke down in tears.

In Britain, Winston Churchill warned that a country "cannot avoid war by dilating upon its horrors."

But they were voices drowned out by the pacifist and internationalist rhetoric of the 1920s and 1930s.

Did it matter? Does patriotism matter?

During the First World War, France fought on against the German invaders for four long years, despite having more of its soldiers killed than all the American soldiers killed in all the wars in the history of the United States, put together.

But during the Second World War, France collapsed after just six weeks of fighting and surrendered to Nazi Germany. At the bitter moment of defeat the head of the French teachers' union was told, "You are partially responsible for the defeat."

At the outset of the invasion, both German and French generals assessed French military forces as more likely to gain victory, and virtually no one expected France to collapse like a house of cards -- except Adolf Hitler, who had studied French society instead of French military forces.

Did patriotism matter? It mattered more than superior French tanks and planes.

I edited the quote above and encourage you to read the whole article.