Gutter: At least David Johnson cares

The cliché says that you can judge a society by the way it treats its prisoners. By the same token, you can judge a city - or town or region - by the way its local television stations handle news.

In that regard, Pittsburgh’s interest in the election of its next mayor could be described as secondary, at best.

Of course, this isn’t news for anyone who has watched this city live in inertia since the 1970’s - or before - and in situations like this, new evidence of apathy can have just as much impact as the original evidence of apathy.

Anyway, we knew the voter turnout would be low for Tuesday’s primary. But the local news coverage of the election was so unbelievably disinterested that you almost have a hard time blaming the body politick for its lack of civic involvement (which was reportedly at 21%).

We’ll start with the positive.

Channel 11 did what was supposed to be done: a live broadcast on PCNC starting at 8 PM when the polls closed with live look-ins on the Ravenstahl, Dowd, and Robinson election night parties. The broadcast wasn’t without its shortcomings - referring to District 2 candidate Georgia Blotzer as “Georgia Blouser” both in a graphic and from the mouth of David Johnson - but the mere existence of live coverage at least implied that the election was relevant.

Then there was the 11 o’clock news. The primetime-iest of primetime news broadcasts, the top dog of local news, the main course for relevant information. The 11 o’clock news has a time-honored tradition as the pulse of what’s happening each day in your city or town or region. So on the night of an absolutely essential election, what led the local news broadcasts?

Some kinky sex and a closet-pooper who lost his car.

KDKA led with the sordid tale of a student and teacher from Carrick who possibly had sex with each other. For WTAE and WPXI, the most important news of the day was the woeful story of Najeh Davenport, the former Steeler running back whose car was stolen and totaled, which reinforces the old adage:

“If it bleeds (black and gold) it leads”

Except in this case, it used to bleed black and gold.

Just to reiterate: this was a story about FORMER Steeler running back Najeh Davenport. And WTAE and WPXI led with it.

WTAE did assure us all that at 11:15 they’d have a special report on the day’s election, thus buying themselves a quarter-hour before they had to talk about the primary.

WPXI made up for leading with the Davenport story by following it with a long segment of election coverage, including more field reports from all three election night parties.

KDKA went from the teacher-student sex story to an update on repairs to those notorious steps in Greenfield that led to the rape of an 11-year old a few weeks ago, while WTAE segued from Davenport into a story about a dog getting tasered and killed.

From the Greenfield steps, KDKA went into something that included the graphic “Car vs. Motorcycle” - which I think was about an accident - and then a story about a car crash on Route 28. Still no election talk.

After that, KDKA caught up with the other two stations with a report on Najeh Davenport and his Impala before giving an update on the light pole that crushed a woman at a bus stop in East Liberty. Then, finally, at 11:07, KDKA let us in on the fact that there was an election, with a good block of coverage.

WTAE really bought themselves some time with the “special report at 11:15.” I guess the first 15 minutes or so of a broadcast are probably the most-watched minutes, so WTAE was smart enough not to waste any of it with silly election coverage. Instead, they hit on Davenport, the tasered dog, a young boy who wandered away from school, the Carrick student-teacher sex, James Harrison’s White House refusal, a weather report, a very special story about Ryan Clark (including a very special one-on-one with Sally Wiggin), a sports report, and a shameless pimping of a special Penguins playoff t-shirt (the shirt says “Stixburgh” with an image of Marc-Andre Fleury).

After all of that, WTAE went to commercial before coming back with its “special report on the election,” the best part of that report being Bob Mayo’s interview with Luke Ravenstahl, parts of which I’ve already posted about.

And through it all, WPXI just kept plugging away with election coverage, even dedicating time to races other than mayor and examining the Georgia Blotzer slate card issue. By contrast, KDKA let us know that we could find out about the other races by going to their website.

So I’ll give some credit to David Johnson, personal favorite Darieth Chisholm, and WPXI/PCNC. At least in terms of coverage minutes, they made it seem like they were interested in this election.

Gutter: This guy...

Talk about being gracious in victory.

On Channel 2 after being declared the winner, re-elected Mayor Luke Ravenstahl touted his "positive campaign" and said (as transcribed by me):

"Patrick [Dowd] was very offensive to me. I hope he would offer an apology. We asked for it many times."

Ravenstahl then said that he looks forward to working with Councilman Dowd, but cautioned that "[Dowd] has some explaining to do."

Then on Channel 4 he said it again, talking about how his mother told him to not say anything if he had nothing nice to say.

"So that's what I did. Patrick crossed the line and I asked for an apology. He didn't offer it; hopefully in the very near future he will."

You deserve nothing. No apology. Nothing. Dowd pointed out truths about you and your administration. I can only hope that the new City Council makes your professional life difficult at every turn over the next four years.

Nothing is over. Nothing.

Gutter: Damnit

Luke wins.

http://www.postgazette.com/pg/09139/971285-455.stm

Not that it's a big surprise. Just disappointing.

More tomorrow.

Peak: Go Pat go

Peak: Some questions on the eve of the primary

- Any other 6th or 9th warders out there looking forward to the trip to St. Mary’s Lyceum on Tuesday?

- Is it just me or does Tonya Payne have the biggest campaign ads of any candidate in the city?

- Upon seeing one of those omnipresent “Ravenstahl Getting It Done” signs, has anyone else had the urge to knock on that person’s door and ask just exactly what Ravenstahl has gotten done for them?

- Is it hard to not read too much into the fact that the Bakery Square site has two of those signs?

- And does anyone else see a certain “pandering to the lowest common denominator” in the Ravenstahl camp blatantly co-opting the whole “Git ‘R Done” subculture?

- Is it wrong if I vote for Anthony “Tony” Ceoffe because the Lawrenceville United newsletter makes for a nice bi-monthly toilet reading? (Okay, that’s probably not a good idea)

- Is it wrong if I vote for Susan Evashavik DiLucente just because those “I’m choosin’ Judge Susan” signs are stuck in my head?

- Are there any political leanings I should know about when weighing the Allegheny County Bar Association judicial recommendations?

- Do newspaper endorsements carry weight to anyone other than newspaper editors and campaign managers?

- Wouldn’t it be interesting if some of the current City Council members issued endorsements of their own in this primary?

- Would Carmen Robinson’s efforts have been better-spent in the District 6 city council race?

- Wouldn’t it be nice to get some sign of involvement, some sign that apathy has not completely taken over this city?

- And wouldn’t it be nice if the indication that apathy has not won comes in the form of a plurality for Patrick Dowd?

- Is a there a percentage of votes that gives Dowd - win or lose - some kind of moral victory?

- And if Dowd doesn’t win, does a strong showing give him any added political clout on council or in the city?

- Why didn’t this get more pub, particularly from the Dowd camp? (***Update below***)

- In the Post-Gazette’s Twenty Questions for the Would-Be Mayor feature on Sunday, how many of Luke Ravenstahl’s answers could have been summed up with the response: “the status quo is fine”?

- How many people in this city think the status quo is fine?

- Isn’t it obvious that certain notions - like transparency in government and accountability for city officials - are good things?

- As a matter of fact, can anyone give one good reason why Luke Ravenstahl should be re-elected?

- If I put a picture of me and a picture of Luke Ravenstahl next to each other, do you think I could convince people that the Mayor endorses this blog?

- And from there, how many steps will it take to get my name on a garbage can?

- At the very least, could I get invited to Ravenstahl’s Election Night Party at Hofbrauhaus in the South Side Works (since I can’t get a table there otherwise)?


***Update*** - Just got an e-mail from the Dowd people. They sent out a media advisory about the call, but apparently the local press didn't really bite on it. Here's the text of the e-mail that was sent to the media:

An interactive telephone town hall where voters will have an opportunity to ask Democratic Mayoral Candidate Patrick Dowd questions about his reform vision for Pittsburgh.

Patrick Dowd will bring cutting-edge technology to his grassroots campaign for reform, reaching out to tens of thousands of Pittsburghers in the decisive final days before Tuesday’s primary, something that has not been done before in a mayoral primary. “This campaign for reform is about giving Pittsburghers a voice.” Dowd said. “My campaign is grassroots – not astroturf – so I don’t have millions to spend on TV commercials. Instead I’m trying to find new ways to bring people together so we can talk about how to reform Pittsburgh, whether it's answering a voter's final question before she heads to the polls or talking to someone for the first time. Together, we can bring change.”

Personally, I think it's a pretty cool idea. We'll see if it helps tomorrow.

Peak: Fair and balanced

While my blog has been largely dormant for the past two years - with only smatterings of activity, generally between May and July - I haven’t lost touch with Pittsburgh’s online community. The list of links on the right side of this page includes the blogs I read the most, and if you keep a regular diet of those sites, you’ll generally have some sense of what’s going on in Pittsburgh.

Anyway, if you spend any considerable amount of time on those blogs - and their comment threads - you’ll likely encounter The Pittsburgh Hoagie, aka Matt Hogue, a member of the Allegheny Democratic Committee. Mr. Hogue is a political blogger who also frequently posts on other blogs, and it doesn’t take long to see where his alliances fall. Mr. Hogue is a staunch party member and his full support lies with Luke Ravenstahl.

As such, it has become fairly expected to see Mr. Hogue show up on local blogs announcing his support for the current Mayor in Tuesday’s Democratic primary. The problem is, Mr. Hogue’s support is so unfailing, so determined, and so relentless that it comes across as a blindly and thoughtlessly towing the party line.

Now, I don’t know Mr. Hogue. I’ve never met him, never corresponded with him, and only once or twice posted a comment on his blog. So I don’t wish to speak for his study of the Mayor or his challengers, Patrick Dowd and Carmen Robinson, and I am only presenting the perception of Mr. Hogue’s comments and postings, not his actual line of thinking.

Anyway, as I was reading the local blogs one day - probably a comment from Mr. Hogue (aka Matt H) like the one on this post, which offers very little insight and screams of blind obedience - I started thinking about the recurring themes in Mr. Hogue’s posting. And it occurred to me that, if Mr. Hogue truly is thinking for himself and not just following the line of the party, then the best thing he could do would be to voice his own concerns about the current Mayor. By showing some objectivity, Mr. Hogue might sway some of the perceptions about him that exist in the so-called “Burghosphere” (if he were so inclined).

But then I realized that what’s good for the goose is, indeed, good for the gander. If Mr. Hogue can grant himself some credibility by showing some critical thinking about the Mayor, then so should I. Throughout the recent history of this blog, I have spoken against Luke Ravenstahl and in favor of Patrick Dowd and Carmen Robinson.

But the truly informed, truly objective voter understands that there are no absolutes: Dowd is obviously not an absolute positive, nor is Ravenstahl an absolute negative. He became Mayor in September of 2006; surely something good must have happened in the past 32 months, right?

So, in an effort to be as objective as possible - and to convince myself that I’m not just following the “Anyone But Ravenstahl” party line - I set out to find some positive things the Mayor has done for the city of Pittsburgh.

I figured the easiest way to accomplish this was to go to the Mayor’s home court. There is no purer form of self-serving rhetoric - and I say this in reference to all candidates for all elected office - than a campaign year website. Surely we’ll find some positives in there, and then I can feel good about myself when I go to the polls on Tuesday and vote for Patrick Dowd.

So let’s see; what can we find…

Okay, here we go:

During his three years in office, Mayor Ravenstahl has been "Getting it Done" for Pittsburghers. Clean and safe neighborhoods, new development, balanced budgets, diversity, technology, transparency and green are just a few of the ideas that come to mind to define the Ravenstahl agenda.

Ugh. This is not going to be easy.

Safe neighborhoods - Yeah, no. Last year’s homicide rate kind of screws that one up.

New developments - Yes, I suppose there have been some new developments. But with the near-daily emergence of new developer-slash-campaign contributors who end up getting benefits from city government - check the sixth paragraph in this piece for a recent example - (with a hat-tip to The Radical Middle, as well as a thanks for the shout-out) the new developments all seem to carry a little stink.

Balanced budgets - That seems to fall under the umbrella of “things he takes credit for but doesn’t really deserve to.”

Diversity - I don’t have any real numbers on this but I have to say that it’s hard to imagine this administration really being that diverse.

Technology - Sure I guess the Mayor has probably kept the computers on Grant Street up to date. Or something.

Transparency - You’re kidding, right? This administration wouldn’t have half the problems it’s got right now if there was any kind of transparency. This one falls under the “It wouldn’t be listed here if Dowd didn’t say it so damn much” category.

Green - Yeah, the city seems to be making some strides on the green front. I guess.

Okay, so that didn’t go so well. There have to be some things that he’s done well, but since that blurb in his bio didn’t help, I’ll have to come up with some on my own.

The Pittsburgh Promise - This thing seems to have a lot of detractors, and I can admit that it’s not a perfect system, but it’s a good start and the intentions are at least headed in the right direction. Ravenstahl didn’t come up with it and he wasn’t the one who noticed it working in Kalamazoo and he wasn’t the one who decided to bring it to Pittsburgh, but he helped the process along once it got started, and I’ll give him credit for that.

311 - I don’t know what other people’s experience has been with 311, but I’m okay with it. I like the concept, and the few times that I’ve called it, I’ve gotten results. Plus, I’ve noticed a lot of patches getting done on streets and alleys around me - including the one that was used in the famous Pokey Politics video (watch the second video on the page) - and I’m assuming that 311 calls were the source of the fixes.

The baseball field in Bloomfield - This one hits home since I live in Bloomfield and have lived near the baseball field for more than six years. The ballfield under the Bloomfield Bridge used to be a mess. It had a bad turf rug that was always bunched up in numerous places, and I can’t imagine anyone ever really wanted to play on it. Now the field is really, really nice. Grass, good dirt, big foul poles, a warm-up bullpen beyond the outfield; I mean, I’d say it’s almost state of the art. And Ravenstahl was behind it; I know this because there was a sign with his name on it for a year or two after it was finished.

(Sorry about the quality of photo; my cell phone's camera lens is pretty dusty)

So I did it. I came up with three good things the Mayor has done for Pittsburgh. That’s pretty good, right?

Now I can feel a proper sense of self-righteousness about voting for Dowd on Tuesday because I am an objective voter. Hooray!

Peak: A good reason to run

Photo: Post-Gazette

In the past few weeks of blogging about next week’s Democratic primary, I think I’ve been pretty up-front about my opinions regarding the three candidates for the party’s mayoral nomination: Luke Ravenstahl, Patrick Dowd, and Carmen Robinson.

Not surprisingly, I’m pretty firmly in Dowd’s camp for a number of reasons. But lately I’ve been thinking back to the first time I met the District 7 councilman. It was back in January at one of his Council-to-Go meetings, which provide a unique opportunity to interact with the councilman in a localized small-group setting.

The Council-to-Go I attended was in Polish Hill. I was living in Lawrenceville at the time, but I couldn’t find any info about a meeting in my neighborhood so I decided to crash the party. At the time, speculation was running rampant that Dowd would be announcing a candidacy for the Democratic mayoral nomination so I figured I’d head up to Polish Hill and see if he’d say anything about that.

Naturally the Council-to-Go meetings are more geared toward the voicing of local concerns, and the Polish Hill gathering was very much in that vein. But at one point in the evening, a resident somewhat off-handedly remarked "So I hear you're running for mayor." A quiet, almost uncomfortable chuckle came from the group, but Dowd didn’t shy away from the question.

“We’re talking about it,” he said. “It’s about frustration, and maybe that’s not a good reason to run.”

That really caught my attention. Was frustration a sound reason to seek public office? That was the question I asked myself from time to time over the next month until Dowd officially announced his candidacy.

And as the campaign went on, I kept thinking back to that night in Polish Hill. After attending the meeting I began writing a blog post that never made it online, but here’s part of what I wrote/thought:

Is frustration a good motivational tool?

I’m really not sure. I think that running out of frustration is somewhat different from running in the interest of change/progress, and even if the two overlap and intersect in a number of ways, there are still some distinctions that could affect the end results.

And I tossed these questions around throughout March and April. But in the past few weeks, as I’ve watched the three candidates debate and I’ve read their comments in the press and observed their actions, I’ve come to believe that not only is frustration a good motivational tool, it could be the most appropriate cause for running in this election.

Frustration is - or at least should be - a major part of next Tuesday’s primary. For progressive, reform-minded voters and candidates, frustration is the driving force behind everything that will happen at the polls next week. With each new item of indiscretion and each new thwarting of responsibility that comes to light, the danger of Luke Ravenstahl and his administration becomes more and more threatening.

But it’s not just the threat of Ravenstahl that creates the frustration; it’s the complete and utter lack of - and disregard for - accountability and leadership that has led this city into its current state. And because the Mayor and his administration refuse to accept responsibility or even answer the queries about their actions of the past three years, the city’s residents grow frustrated.

And that frustration is the bond that links us - all of us, regardless of socioeconomic status - to Patrick Dowd, he of the doctorate in European intellectual history.

I didn’t get this at first. But slowly, Dowd’s frustration has come more and more to the forefront. I remember during the WPXI debate (can’t find any video to post) when the topic of trash cans came up, Ravenstahl famously accused Dowd of being on “three sides of an issue,” attempting to cloud Dowd’s accusations by juxtaposing the purchase of $1,000 trash cans with Dowd’s request for trash cans in his district.

The Mayor’s “logic” - at least as he stated it - said that, since Dowd requested trash cans, then he couldn’t criticize the Mayor for the purchase of $1,000 trash cans in the South Side. Obviously the rub is that Dowd likely never intended for his requested trash cans to cost $1,000, but it almost feels silly to point out how ridiculous Ravenstahl’s claims were, so I’ll leave to it The Radical Middle who summed up the situation pretty well:

Mr. Dowd again attacked Mr. Ravenstahl for buying $250,000 worth of garbage cans, and the mayor again noted that the councilman's office had requested the cans before twice criticizing their price tag.

"Mr. Flip-flop over there," the mayor called Mr. Dowd. "That's pretty creative. I didn't know you could be on three sides of an issue."

The Mayor is not that stupid. No one could possibly be that stupid. But he could, of course, be that disingenuous.

Okay, I’ll go with disingenuous. That makes the point.

But what was most interesting to me was that, as Ravenstahl was spewing this disingenuousness (which is actually a word), you could feel Dowd’s blood boiling. Hell, my blood was boiling. And as Ravenstahl spoke - with confidence, I might add - the “three sides of an issue” nonsense, Dowd was heard off-camera uttering the sarcastic laugh of a man who is debating with someone who is relying on twists of logic that few would actually believe.

It was the kind of laugh that you emit when you’re trying to avoid saying the words that are surging up your throat and into your mouth. Sometimes when you feel like you might throw up, a few hearty spits can do the trick to bed it back down temporarily, and that was the kind of laugh that came from Dowd.

Anyone who has ever been in a discussion/argument/debate with someone who is using poor logic and ridiculous miscontructions (not a word) of reason knows what Dowd was experiencing at that moment.

It was frustration.

And to further the dicussion of frustration, we have this (courtesy of The Pittsburgh Comet):



About halfway through, Dowd starts getting fired up, and by the end, he’s as animated as we’ve seen him in this election.

And I think it’s fantastic. Dowd is allowing the frustration - his original reason for running and perhaps the purest reason for running - to become his dominant emotion. He’s letting it all out, asking us all why we are sitting by and allowing these improprieties and illicit acts and everything else that has happened under this Mayor’s watch. He’s fed up with it, he doesn’t want it to go on any longer, and he believes that Pittsburgh should be in better hands.

Are his hands the best to do the job? Maybe. He seems to have a pretty good idea of what needs to be done.

But best of all, he has looked at the current situation and he is frustrated by it. That’s where he and I and hopefully many others share common ground.

Peak: Getting on board

Patrick Dowd was probably already the popular choice in the local online community. Now the local mainstream media is on board as well:

The Post-Gazette endorses Patrick Dowd for the Democratic nomination for mayor on May 19.

The editorial board starts off its approach to the primary the way most of us have:

By pointing out why you shouldn’t vote for Luke Ravenstahl.

The string of youthful missteps that marked Luke Ravenstahl's first months in office have evaporated and the mayor has matured in the job, but Pittsburgh still lacks a leader with a broad, deep vision for the city's future.

You don't lead by arguing that there is nothing wrong with city contracting practices, even if -- in the face of numerous examples of pay-to-play politics and an approaching election -- you eventually order a long-needed ban on most no-bid professional contracts.

You don't lead by announcing good intentions, as the mayor has done in backing city-county consolidation efforts, but then doing little to pressure legislators to support them.

And you don't lead by mixing politics with the provision of government services, as Mayor Ravenstahl did when he reopened a city police station in the West End, which didn't make sense given the zone's relatively low call volume.

With its shrinking population, impending contract negotiations with city unions and growing pension and debt problems, Pittsburgh doesn't have time to wait for Mr. Ravenstahl, 29, of Summer Hill, to gradually evolve toward more sound positions. The city needs a stronger, forward-looking mayor who can move Pittsburgh ahead now.

I can’t really disagree that the first conclusion you must reach in this primary is that Ravenstahl needs to be replaced (“needs replaced”?). And while the P-G goes on to point out a number of reasons why Dowd is a pretty good candidate to do the replacin’, I think that they hit on one of the biggest issues right off the bat:

Leadership.

In my admittedly nascent position as an observer of city government and politics, one of the main truths I’ve absorbed over the past two or three years is that possibly the biggest quality Pittsburgh needs in a mayor is leadership. Strong, willful leadership. While Ravenstahl is probably directly responsible for a fair portion of the nonsense and chicanery that has taken place and continues to take place around the city, a major part of the problem appears to be that there are plenty of people working throughout city government who have milked their positions for all their worth.

And it’s a lack of strong leadership that permits this kind of environment to fester and grow.

So, first and foremost, Pittsburgh needs strong leadership. A close second behind leadership in the city’s list of needs is accountability for that leadership. And to get the accountability, you need transparency in all city government acts.

Leadership. Accountability. Transparency.

Sounds like three Patrick Dowd talking points, doesn’t it?

If nothing else, the guy seems to get it, and I suppose that’s why the Post-Gazette - and me, and most of the local blogs I read - are on board with Dowd.

Gutter: More on the over-wrought front

In the aftermath of the first televised debate, I wrote two weeks ago about how Patrick Dowd’s shot at the pay-to-play culture in Pittsburgh missed the mark slightly because it was somewhat overwrought/over-worded/over-spoken. I argued that Dowd’s claim - which I agree with - would have been more effective if issued in simpler terms.

It’s not dumbing down your position; it’s making it more effective.

Now we get this from the Dowd campaign:



So let’s look at that.

“Luke Ravenstahl is making headlines for the wrong reasons, and it’s turned into a national embarrassment.”

Seems like an okay start, even if we ignore the fact that when the words “National embarrassment” are on the screen, they’re backed up by an image of an article by Rich Lord in the Post-Gazette.

“First, Luke’s 1,000-dollar trash cans.

Visuals: “Ridicule nationwide;” a trash can with a $1,010 price tag; and a USA Today article with the headline “Pittsburgh mayor puts his name on 250 trash cans.”

“Then, his risky Wall Street-style bond deal that cost taxpayers millions and put our city in more financial peril.”

Since most people in the city don’t really understand what the bond deal is - myself included - I suppose a six-second mention (from :10 to :16) isn’t really going to change anyone’s opinion on the matter.

“Now, Luke’s done it again, embarrassing himself nationally by taking credit for tax cuts he actually voted against…twice.

Which is backed up by an AP release headlined “Pittsburgh mayor apologizes for misleading campaign ad in which he touted mandated tax cuts,” with Los Angeles Times and Baltimore Sun logos floating around.

“It’s time to end the waste and political games. It’s time for Patrick Dowd.”

And those are all good points. Dowd picked his biggest issues - incompetence, misuse of taxpayer funds, and a lack of accountability and transparency - and jammed them all into a 30-second ad.

And by the end of it, what is the general impression the viewing public is supposed to come away with? I guess it’s that Luke Raventsahl has embarrassed the city of Pittsburgh on a national scale, and that’s why the people should elect Patrick Dowd.

Because anyone outside the 412 area code really gives a damn about Pittsburgh. Seriously. I watched The Hills Monday night and all that L.C. could talk about was how she couldn’t get over the fact that Ravenstahl has been trumpeting the tax cuts that he actually voted against…twice.

Okay, that’s a bad example. But have Ravenstahl’s antics really caused that much of a stir nationally? Maybe he made some waves for being so young when he took office, and maybe the Tiger Woods thing got a little attention. But we’re not talking about Kwame Kilpatrick here. Hell, even the mayor of Braddock seems to have gotten more national press than Ravenstahl.

So while Ravenstahl is something of an embarrassment to all of us living in the city, I’m just not sure that that’s the best angle to take in a campaign ad. There are so many things you could use as ammo to fire at the Mayor, but somehow the embarrassment claim just seems to miss the mark.

But I think the presentation of this ad is just as much of a problem, if not more. As I alluded to earlier, there’s a lot of info jammed into the 30-second spot (like the :06 appropriation of the bond deal). Upon posting video of the ad, our friend The Pittsburgh Comet made some inquiries into the Dowd camp and generally got this reaction to the ad:

"Luke has done so much awful stuff over the past three years, it was impossible to fit it all in to a 30 second spot."

(The Comet goes into a discussion of other issues that could be touched upon, and that’s a worthwhile read, but I’m going in a different direction.)

The Dowd people are right: it is impossible to fit the Mayor’s three-years’ worth of indiscretions into a 30-secodn spot. So don’t even try. I know you want to talk about garbage cans and bond deals and the political appropriation of tax cuts, but understand the medium you’re working with. 30 seconds is a short amount of time, but the most effective commercials - in any realm, be it political or otherwise - aren’t the ones that attempt to load as much information as possible into the spot. Rather the effective commercial lands a simple, solid blow.

“Under Luke Ravenstahl, Pittsburgh is for sale. Whether it’s illegal billboards, 1,000-dollar trash cans, or illicit sex clubs, the city of Pittsburgh has been open for business at the pleasure of the Mayor and his cronies for the past three years. So it’s up to you to decide who should be in charge of this city: the deep-pockets campaign contributors or the taxpayers, voters, and residents of Pittsburgh?”

Land a strong, solid right and get people thinking about the issue that you think is most important. And then close with something like:

“Because the city can’t afford any more Luke Ravenstahl.”

And boom goes the dynamite.

But instead, the Dowd campaign tried to get as much info and issues into one 30-second spot as possible. Just like when Dowd was asked in the first televised debate if the perception of a pay-to-play culture exists in the city of Pittsburgh and he responded:

“In this culture that we live in, given the administration we have, it’s easy to see that.”

When he could have just as easily hit with a hard “Yes, there are pay-to-play politics in this administration. There are too many dots to connect to feel otherwise.”

Dowd’s not pulling his punches in this campaign; in fact, I think he’s hit the Mayor with a lot of shots, assailing Ravenstahl’s record and integrity (and all with good cause). But the message needs to come through clearer.

Gutter: Juxtaposition as a humor device

The third and final debate was held earlier this week. Channel 11 WPXI/PCNC originally broadcast the debate Monday night and re-aired last night. More or less the debate looked a lot like the previous two, and near the end one of the candidates observed that they have been answering the same questions and arguing about the same topics. Not too much has changed throughout this trio of debates, but I guess that’s to be expected when you have an incumbent who is full of targets and a couple of challengers who are all too willing to take their shots.

Oh yeah, and a city that’s rife with corruption, financial peril, a shrinking population, and all kinds of other good times.

Naturally, the debate saw each candidate issue his or her respective go-to statement, whether it’s the need for transparency and accountability in city government (Patrick Dowd), the importance of understanding that Pittsburgh is a city full of distressed neighborhoods and distressed people who need individual and specific attention (Carmen Robinson), or simply the notion that things are a-okay (Luke Ravenstahl).

And, of course, Ravenstahl’s “things are good and we’ll keep getting them better” claim included the expected reference to Pittsburgh as America’s Most Livable City (Incidentally, if you Google “Most livable city” you come across the website Mostlivable.org, which bears no mention of Pittsburgh on its front page).

But when I heard Ravenstahl hit on the Most Livable claim during the re-broadcast last night, I got all excited and giddy inside because I remembered that I had just read an article about how this area has the highest rates of vacant properties in the state. “Most livable?” I scoffed. “That’s hard to claim when no one lives here!”

But alas, when I went back and re-read the article today, the high rates of vacancy are limited to Duquesne, Braddock, and Monessen, where more than 25% of the city’s houses are empty.

Unfortunately for my witty, biting, cynical observation, all the high vacancy areas are outside the city of Pittsburgh.

So there goes that one.

But the mention of the Most Livable claim does provide another jumping-off point from which to talk about Carmen Robinson and why she seems to “get it,” certainly more than the Mayor and perhaps even more than Patrick Dowd (or maybe at least more than Dowd has let on). Robinson has made her campaign about dedicating city resources to the tired, huddled masses. Robinson’s campaign is about going to the lowest depths of the city - the areas that could never be described as “Most Livable” by anyone - and starting the revitalization of Pittsburgh there.

On her campaign website, if you click on Politics 101, you get an in-depth discussion on gentrification. And at a time when Whole Foods, Trader Joe’s, and Target are being/have been identified as keys to a rebirth of East Liberty, that seems like a pretty relevant topic.

From the opening statement of the first televised debate, Robinson has hit on the “tale of two cities” theme. Ravenstahl jumped right into the “Most Livable” claim and Robinson fired right back, citing the “two faces” of Pittsburgh, one being the Most Livable/City of Champions, and the other being a distressed city.

“I don’t think our Mayor is being honest with the people,” Robinson said. “We have to look at both sides of the coin.”

More than either of her competitors, Robinson seems to be looking at both sides of the coin.

I think I’ve said before that I hope Robinson ends up serving in city government in some capacity after this election cycle and that it’s a good thing that she has emerged as a relevant public figure. Part of me now wonders if perhaps she overshot the mark by running for mayor. Last I heard, there was an election in District 6, too; Robinson lives in the Hill District, and the incumbent city councilperson certainly has her share of detractors.

Gutter: Mayor Big Mac

The mayoral candidates squared off again last night, and while that debate won't be available for public consumption until the hot primetime hour of 7 P.M. on Saturday night, the Post-Gazette got to witness the events in real-time live-action (I'm pretty sure the Trib was probably there, too, but for some reason the Trib's website is very unpredictable on my computer; today is one of those days when it's not working).

Anyway, the debate that happened last night but will only exist in theory until tomorrow night was also the debate that almost never happened, and Carmen Robinson used last night's debate as another opportunity to point out the fact that the Mayor tried to duck public forums as much as possible.

Carmen Robinson, 40, took the mayor to task for saying two weeks ago that he could not change his schedule to appear at last night's event. Although he eventually agreed to last night's taping.

"Once public opinion said 'that's really bad,' he called here and said I only had one day [that he could appear]," said Ms. Robinson.

"We're here. Let's not waste our time talking about the past," Mr. Ravenstahl responded to the Hill District attorney.

Yes, let's not waste our time talking about the past. If you're an incumbent who would rather run on trumped-up paper-thin claims of success that crumble at the first hint of scrutiny, if you're an incumbent whose track record is so spotty that infomercial salesmen hawking dishwasher detergent use it to represent the results of Brand X, if you're an incubment who would much rather campaign on phony promises about what you're going to do rather than stand accountable for what you've already done, then yes, I can see how you'd rather not talk about the past.

Mr. Ravenstahl leapt into the fray when he got there. His foes, he said, "continuously talk about me and make this campaign about Luke Ravenstahl and my administration.

"I have chosen to make it about you," he told the few dozen people in the Sunnyside Elementary School auditorium.

To which The Pittsburgh Comet succinctly replies:

YOU ARE THE INCUMBENT.

Exactly. Challengers for elected seats are, first and foremost, charged with pointing out why the incumbent should not be re-elected. So yes, Mayor Ravenstahl, they are talking about you. Because that's what they are supposed to do. And you are supposed to run on the merits of your administration.

To put it another way: you're supposed to talk about the past.

But for some people, that's not exactly the most ideal subject.

Peak: The best thing to come out of this election

Let’s face it: Pat Dowd and Carmen Robinson probably aren’t going to win the upcoming Democratic primary in the race for mayor of Pittsburgh. It’s just not likely. There’s a unique brand of apathy that leads a voter to the polls without really paying attention in the months - and years - leading up to the election, and that seems to be the prevailing approach for the greater Pittsburgh public.

The result of that kind of philosophy is that the incumbent wins, despite the best efforts of the challengers and a pretty strong group of reform-minded individuals who would really like to see something change.

Nevertheless, even if Pittsburgh re-elects Luke Ravenstahl, some good will have come from this campaign cycle. With any luck, the average city dweller has gotten exposure to some new ways to approach Pittsburgh’s problems. Ideally, this exposure would lead the general public to put more pressure on the city’s elected officials down the road, demanding accountability and responsibility for Pittsburgh’s future (and the best case scenario would have the demand for accountability and responsibility turn the next mayoral election into a referendum on the administration, which is what this election should have been, but that’s another topic altogether).

But one of the biggest benefits for the city that can come from this election is the emergence of Carmen Robinson as a relevant voice in Pittsburgh. Robinson entered the election as a private practice defense attorney with a checkered history on the Pittsburgh police force (“checkered” by some sexual harassment lawsuits) but at this point, with about three weeks left before the primary, she has established herself as an important public figure in the city.

Check out Tony Norman’s take on Robinson in the Post-Gazette and then read the P-G’s mayoral profile on Robinson. Several recurring themes:

Public servant. Public safety. Blue collar. Outsider. Not a politician. Community. Neighborhoods.

And I’m good with all of those things. The quality Robinson brings that neither Dowd nor Ravenstahl has been able to embody - in Dowd’s case - or seems to want to embody - in the case of Ravenstahl - is a real “from the bottom-up” approach. Robinson believes, and I agree, that you fix the problems of a city by starting at the lowest levels of the city and working your way up. Real, hands-on work that addresses problems one-by-one with real solutions.

Maybe I’ve taken too much influence from The Wire, but it seems like that’s the best way to address the real problems of urban life. Not with institutional overtures and governmental grandstanding, but with a real understanding of the nature of the urban problems.

Robinson seems to have that understanding, and some good ideas on how to begin the process of correcting some of these issues that have been festering for decades. In looking over some notes from the WTAE debate, time and again Robinson came back to the same notions:

- In her opening statement she talked about how there are two faces of Pittsburgh. One is the “most livable city” and the “city of champions,” but the other is, in her words, “a distressed city.”

- On the question of violence in the city, Robinson said that “violence is a preventable illness” and that the city must “approach it from a public health point of view.”

- Robinson also seems to understand that one of the most basic and crucial steps in curbing many of the shortcomings of urban life lies in correcting the school system, advocating that the mayor use his or her “bully pulpit to encourage the school system to change their ways.”

- Further on the school system, Robinson said that the Pittsburgh Promise was flawed because it needed to be extended to middle school students, hoping to get younger children into the program earlier so as to increase the likelihood of those children completing high school. Getting kids into college is good, she said, but they need to finish high school first.

And Robinson’s right about that: high school drop-out rates are a bigger problem than kids who graduate high school but don’t go to college. You need to do everything you can to ensure that kids at least get through high school. Another big campaign issue of Robinson’s - at least on the topic of education - is that there needs to be a focus on post-high school education for students who aren’t going to college. Trade schools and career-centered post-grad education is just as vital to creating a sustainable citizenry as sending kids to college is.

Robinson gets all of this, and I like that about her. I really do. But like I said, I just don’t see Robinson nor Dowd beating Ravenstahl.

Hopefully, though, Robinson’s support has swelled enough and her public presence has grown enough that she doesn’t just slide back into the private sector as a defense attorney. The best thing that could happen would be for whichever candidate wins the election - probably Ravenstahl - to find a position in city government for Robinson. Something relevant, something influential, something where she can be right behind every decision that gets made, ready to call out the Mayor or Council or whoever needs to get called out. Someone to kick a little ass when a little ass needs to be kicked.

Even if she doesn’t get to be mayor this time around, Carmen Robinson can serve this city well. I just hope that the powers recognize her value.

Gutter: The debate in one overwrought sentence

It’s been two days since the debate with Luke Raventsahl, Patrick Dowd, and Carmen Robinson, and I still think the Mayor “won” the night, based largely on the old adage of “it’s not what you say but how you say it.” The Mayor’s points were largely based on half-truths and misleading statements, but for the city’s residents who were looking to the debates for guidance on which candidate presents the best options for Pittsburgh’s future, the young mayor was pretty convincing.

That is to say, if you didn’t know that much of what he was saying was illegitimate, you’d probably think he was a pretty good candidate. And since I suspect that a fair majority of the Pittsburgh voting public might not have seen through the Mayor’s crap, then John Q. Pittsburgh’s lasting impression from the debate will probably be something along the lines of “He’s got us heading in the right direction.”

Which is disappointing. Despite the fact that Dowd and Robinson both made relevant points throughout the debate, the Mayor came out looking the best due to an impressive display of politicking.

Dowd and Robinson each needs to focus more on relating to the viewer in that kind of forum and understanding how to best convey his or her points.

One specific instance stuck out. WTAE reporter Bob Mayo asked the candidates about the perceived atmosphere of so-called “pay to play” politics in Pittsburgh city government and whether each candidate felt that the perception was pervasive.

Dowd went first. Without an official transcript, here is my recollection of his response to the question:

“In this culture that we live in, given the administration we have, it’s easy to see that.”

I apologize if I didn’t get the exact wording - I typed as fast as I could during the debate - but you get the gist of it: verbose and over-spoken. To this point the debate, Dowd had been constantly on the offensive, going after the Mayor at every turn (even when it wasn’t appropriate or timely). And yet, when the question of pay-to-play came up, he dropped into some wordy near-hypothetical.

So I ask: why pull your punches? Or worse, why drape your punches in qualifiers and clauses? Hit him with a strong right and say what you feel:

“Yes, there are pay-to-play politics in this administration. There are too many dots to connect to feel otherwise.”

Now, Dowd did follow up his statement with some good talk about wanting “a government we can be proud of” and needing “strict measures” to be “in place for a long haul,” and he also reiterated his favorite talking point: transparency.

And I can get on board with all of that. But why cloud it up with a slow-to-get-rolling multi-clause statement about “in this culture we live in” and “given the administration we have?” Go for the jugular. Don’t let there be any doubt; I don’t think Dowd has any doubt about the existence of pay-to-play, and I don’t think he wants the public to have any doubt. But when you say what he said the way he said it, the forming of the sentence lends itself stylistically to creating doubt.

I’d be remiss to not mention that Robinson followed up Dowd’s response with one of the better points of the night, essentially talking about how perception is king at this point. But maybe I’ll work on a separate post about that.

Gutter: Who's got a "Word of the Day" calendar?

Pittsburgh democratic debate with Mayor Luke Ravenstahl, Councilman Patrick Dowd, and attorney Carmen Robinson just wrapped up. Each candidate appeared to have his or her own Word of the Day calendar.

My approximation of what each of those calendars said this morning:

Dowd: "Leadership"

Robinson: "Disingenuous"

Ravenstahl: Not sure, but it must have been something funny, since he was smirking the whole time.