In the interest of keeping score fairly -- I did my undergraduate work at Georgia State University, smack in the middle of John Lewis' district. I also lived on the eastern part of that district at one time. That part of Atlanta was, at that time, full of drugs and hookers and run-down storefronts. It was a fun place to be at the age I was in those days. There were empty warehouses for parties, and those run down storefronts could be hired cheaply enough that even young people could afford to open a punk-rock-themed coffee shop or whatever. On the other hand, it had a real crime rate. Atlanta was the murder capital of America at points during those days. But I was young enough that this only added to the sense of adventure.
The intervening twenty-plus years have seen an ongoing expansion of Atlanta's wealth, and that district is not the crime-and-violence haven that it used to be. First, the Atlanta police turned an abandoned factory into a major precinct headquarters right at the center of the drug-and-prostitution trade. That dried up very soon afterwards. Then, all that money coming into Atlanta felt safe expanding into the area.
Today the eastern area is full of stores like Whole Foods. A lot of the fun aspects of the place are gone. They were replaced by less crime, more green space, and upscale shopping. There remain some nasty areas, in a kind of ring between the true downtown (where Georgia State is) and the nicer areas in the east and west. The district compares favorably on some measures with Georgia or America as a whole, and unfavorably on others.
Insofar as it's proper to judge John Lewis' performance in Congress by his district, I think it must be said to have improved during his tenure. I'm not sure that it is all that proper to do so: these are mostly state and local duties, not Federal concerns. But if that's the conversation we're going to have, it's poor grounds for criticism of the gentleman from Georgia.
4 comments:
What gentleman? I thought this post was about Congressman John Lewis.
What Lewis is carefully omitting in his remarks about the coming Trump presidency is that his beatings and arrests and those of others of the time were ordered by Democrats—the leadership, for instance, of states like Mississippi where Bloody Sunday occurred. What Lewis is carefully forgetting is his racist slur that Tea Partiers peacefully, if loudly, protesting the passage of Obamacare on the steps of the Capital Building shortly after passage were themselves racist. What Lewis is choosing not to acknowledge is that since that day he has done his best to obstruct whatever Republicans have tried to accomplish, not because he disagreed with the programs and bills being debated, but because they were Republican programs and bills rather than Democratic.
Lewis richly deserves his legacy, perhaps (I lived through those times, and I recall the fundamental dishonesty of SNCC). All he's doing now, though, is badly abusing and cheapening that legacy with his selective remembering, his recent behavior, and his latest behavior.
Eric Hines
That's a different criticism from the one suggesting his performance as Congressman has neglected his district. I don't doubt that there are fair criticisms of Lewis, who has a habit of saying some pretty nasty things that are unfair himself.
Like all Congressmen, the Honorable John Lewis is a gentleman by custom and tradition -- ex officio, as it were. That's often the only way in which Congressmen are gentlemen, or 'honorable' for that matter. But as you say, this man did good things once.
Like all Congressmen, the Honorable John Lewis is a gentleman by custom and tradition....
What does it say about the alleged gentlemanliness of a man who so thoroughly abuses that status with his behavior?
What does it say about the gentlemanliness of a man and his supporters who hold himself (my tortured grammar not withstanding) above reproach concerning his recent and current behavior solely on the basis of those bygone times?
And as you pointed out, the improvements in Georgia's 5th district are almost exclusively local- and state-driven; Lewis had very little to do with it. Trump's response is entirely legitimate: what has Lewis actually done lately? Besides being obstructionist, I add.
Eric Hines
What does it say about the alleged gentlemanliness of a man who so thoroughly abuses that status with his behavior?
That he's a Congressman, I suppose. Perhaps there are exceptions.
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