Today in the mail I received a letter from the Traditional Values Coalition. They are asking me to contribute to their campaign to “help defeat the ACLU’s anti-God agenda and restore voluntary prayer in school as called for by President Bush.” In the packet they sent me, they sent a “national survey” with a check for $1.75 attached. In asking for my support, they asked me to return the check to them and send an additional contribution.

Personally, I think I should endorse the check and send it over to the ACLU. What do you think?

While in Florida, I got a copy of the Sun-Sentinel where I discovered two interesting stories in the local section:

Meanwhile, Florida was a fun place. I got to see the Miami Beach area, which on first sight looks like a New Urbanist’s dream. The one thing I couldn’t figure out was that despite a very active street life, I didn’t see very many places to live. My grandparents live in an area close to West Palm, where you can find a lot of retirees. With the retirees, there are also some flea markets where you can find clothes that only tourists and grandparents would wear, wicker furniture, and things to do with lucite.

The two favorite moments of the trip were when grandma and grandpa cooked dinner for everybody, and the next night when we all went out to celebrate grandma and grandpa’s anniversary. Other highlights included Keith the New York waiter with a “me me” attitude, a Monopoly game with my cousins that ended in a happy draw, mom catching the flu from my cousin (well, maybe that wasn’t really a HIGHlight), watching Edward Scissorhands as we approached South Beach, teaching 185 to my cousins, learning how to send text messages from my phone, and Dr. Brown’s Cel-Ray at the Mega Deli of Doom.

Well, I’ve just returned from a trip to Florida to visit my grandparents. I got to see some family that I haven’t been able to see in a VERY long time. We all had a great time. More blogs after I’ve finished unpacking.

Late last night I just finished reading J. H. Kunstler’s book The City in Mind. The premise of the book was in Kunstler’s travels to eight different cities that he belived represented in some way the future of American cities. In the preface, Kunstler explains that he is trying to redirect debate on urban life and how we live. The actual debate that Kunstler is trying to redirect is not explained until the last chapter, London. I won’t spoil the book here by explaining what the debate is here.

Among the cities, Kunstler has a chapter on Atlanta. He hates Atlanta. There is nothing good about Atlanta. Some other Atlanta-based reviewers of the book noticed this little detail as well. Overall, Kunstler believes that Atlanta has become so suburbanized and unlivable that it will never recover. When I saw him lecture at my school Kunstler proclaimed a bleak future for the sunbelt cities. Atlanta and the other sunbelt cities have a dark future once oil prices rise and it becomes too expensive to live in suburban and exurban areas.

If you have not read The City in Mind, I wouldn’t recommend it unless you fit into one of a few very neat categories. Kunstler’s primary source of inspiration comes from Jane Jacobs’ revolutionary book The Death and Life of Great American Cities. If you have not read that book, then The City in Mind may leave you lost in a few places. While Kunstler makes no direct reference to the book, his perspective is mostly derived from that offered by Jacobs. Even if you have not read Jane Jacobs, it helps to read some other material first. Both Jacobs and Kunstler make references to some of the early to mid 20th century urban visions. Overall, they both hate modernism and post-modernism for things like lack of coherence and proclivity toward life-draining architecture and planning. They both hate the Radient Garden City vision because it is a vision that does not celebrate city life, but drains life from the city.

In my own mind, I think that Jacobs’ book is one of the best I’ve read, and I plan on eventually reading it again. I think there is a great value in celebrating the civic culture advocated by Jacobs. Kunstler, however, does not do such a good job at inspiration. He’s too “honest” for my taste, whatever “honest” may mean. It’s like what you would get if you combine the ideology of Jane Jacobs with the style of Rush Limbaugh or Neil Boortz. Is this really what we need in order to advance our civilization towards a new reality of living? For crying out loud, Kunstler has never even received any formal training in architecture or policy. He’s like — no, he IS — an armchair sociologist trying to predict the future of our economy. I don’t think this is his intention, but in his hubris, it is what he becomes with his writing.

Having said all that, there is some merit to Kunstler. There is merit to his argument that the 20th century brought about reversals in our civic culture. I would not be suprised if these reversals could be correlated with sprawl, radient garden city, modernism, and other related products of 20th century philosophy. On the other hand, we should also consider the merits of each of these things. Kunstler makes no attempt to do so, with the exception of his placing Olmstead within the context of early industrialization.

You may not be sure what I’m referring to, but that’s okay. I would recommend The City in Mind to anyone with an interest in the future of America’s cities and our civic life. Kunstler is a big fan of New Urbanism, and for anyone who has heard of New Urbanism and is interested in finding out some of the reasoning behind the movement should check out The City in Mind. There may be other (or maybe I should say better) books and authors out there who would provide a more inspiring text on the subject, however Kunstler’s book is a noteworthy addition to the debate.

After adding the Blog to the site, I’ve started making some design changes. The site menu is now on the top and links are now featured more prominently on the sidebar. In addition, links to books I’m reading and music I listen to have been added to the bottom. If you happen to make purchases from those links, then a part of your purchase goes toward the “Help Joe Buy Books for College” fund. Feel free to offer me some feedback for how I can make the site design more eye & user friendly.

And now, back to our regularly scheduled Blog…

Well… It happened two days too late, but Trent Lott realized the futility in his quest for keeping his position in the Senate. At one point there was talk that some Democrats were trying to work behind the scenes in supporting Senator Lott. Why? Simple. For Lott to stay makes the Republicans look bad. Keep the racist segregationists in leadership positions and the Republicans virtually guarantee their own defeat in 2004. Well, I think it’s worth noting that if truly the ideological positions of Republicans are so out of line with the rest of the nation, then the Democrats should simply let the Republicans defeat themselves. This is a time for political Judo. This is a time for the Democrats to allow the Republicans to set the direction and the Democrats to enhance the momenteum. How? Simple. Expose them.

Of course, if only it really were that simple.

Today, the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation unveiled seven new proposals for rebuilding the WTC site. The seven proposals replace a set of previous proposals that each served not only as adequate replacements for the office space lost in the terrorist attacks, but also served as simple, elegant, and respectful memorials to the victims killed in the attacks. Rather than choose from any of the original proposals, the public revolted against all of them. They demanded that the LMDC should instead build a monsterous block of cheese on the site. Well, citizens of New York, you got what you asked for. The question now is what brand of cheese you prefer.

Here is a cool quote from Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes. It was used as the opening for
The Death and Life of Great American Cities, by Jane Jacobs.

Until lately, the best thing that I was able to think of in favor of civilization, apart from blind acceptance of the order of the universe, was that it made possible the artist, the poet, and the man of science. But I think that is not the greatest thing. Now I believe that the greatest thing is a matter that comes directly home to us all. When it is said that we are too much occupied with the means of living to live, I answer that the chief worth of civilization is just that it makes the means of living more complex; that it calls for great and combined intellectual efforts, instead of simple, uncoordinated ones, in order that the crowd may be fed and clothed and housed and moved from place to place. Because more complex and intense intellectual efforts mean a fuller and richer life. They mean more life. Life is an end in itself, and the only question as to whether it is worth living is whether you have enough of it.

I will add but a word. We are all very near despair. The sheathing that floats us over its waves is compounded of hope, faith in the unexplainable worth and sure issue of effort, and the deep, sub-conscious content which comes from the exercise of our powers.

Random items on the web:

• An article in Creative Loafing goes through 30 years of Atlanta [counter-] culture.
• A leading researcher on Community Development Corporations: Alexander von Hoffman from Harvard. Check out his work titled “Fuel Lines for the Urban Revival Engine.”
• James Howard Kunstler thinks that bad architecture killed Atlanta with no hope of recovery. What do you think?

Do you get the News for Civic Leaders? You don’t? You should. Go to the Civic Strategies web site and subscribe to their twice monthly newsletter on some of the innovative and sometimes insipid ways cities work.

Today’s newsletter took note of a recent letter to the editor at the AJC from four former Atlanta mayors. The four mayors decided to shower praise upon the current mayor, Shirley Franklin. They said, among other things:

It is well reported that our city has monumental shortages, and that our sewer system and other infrastructure needs and operating procedures are in deplorable condition. It is very possible the situation is worse than we know. The city we love is broke and broken, and there is no fix we will like — yet it must be done.

This paragraph in particular, though it didn’t mention Atlanta’s immediate former mayor, Bill Campbell, was a direct reference to his performance in office. Needless to say, Mayor Campbell was the only one who didn’t sign the letter, but only because he wasn’t invited to. As it turns out, according to the News for Civic Leaders, if Mayor Campbell had been asked to sign the letter, he would have. According to a spokesman, Campbell didn’t take offense to the letter when he saw it. When the letter referred to the city as being “broke and broken,” Campbell thought that it was a reference to the economy, not to him.