Youngsters aren’t just using the Internet to learn about street gangs and how to mimic them, but actual gangster go online to recruit members.
A gang investigator from Yonkers, N.Y., provided me with a link to a very enlightening story:
http://newamericamedia.org/2011/11/cyber-banging-when-gangs-take-it-from-the-street-to-the-web.php
Last night’s Athens-Clarke Commission meeting brought to mind that old Hunter S. Thompson chestnut, “When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro.”
If that’s the case, commissioners Doug Lowry and Ed Robinson were first-round draft picks. And so, after months of a brief and boring commission, we bring you the triumphant return of Late and Loopy, a blow-by-blow of the late-night (and sometimes early morning) shenanigans of our sleep-deprived government.
Robinson announced at the end of the meeting that he’s not running for re-election next year. He’s brilliant but a bit of an oddball who showed up for his first meeting in a plaid flannel shirt and is perhaps best known for carrying a two-liter bottle of Coke Zero everywhere he goes. He’s letting it all hang out, so the next 15 months ought to be quite entertaining.
Like an Irish drunk with a PhD, Robinson veered among lauding his colleagues, joining Lowry in attacking county management and lecturing on history, economics and horticulture. I halfway expected him to break down crying, put an arm around Mike Hamby and start singing Pogues songs.
At one point, the Green Party member said he’d like to invite George W. Bush over for a backyard barbecue and called John Kerry “a weirdo.”
On redistricting and the Voting Rights Act, Cornell West Jr. over there launched into the legacy of slavery. “We threw those people into a pit,” he said.
He voted in favor of a plan to reward recyclers with coupons in spite of calling it a stupid idea. I think he meant that he didn’t care because he represents the old county, where only one of about a dozen haulers will offer the program, but, sounding like a tea partier on Prozac, what he said was he’s “happy to see the inner-city folks continue to spend money on ineffective programs.”
The best part, though, was when Robinson voted against a rezoning on Carr’s Hill because other commissioners wouldn’t go along with his demand that the developer plant pecan trees.
Robinsons’ harmless ramblings paled in comparison to the unprecedented attacks Lowry leveled against Deputy Manager Bob Snipes and other unnamed county officials, calling them “weasels” and accusing them of ignoring elected officials, withholding information and spinning issues to their own ends.
“I’m tired of it,” he said. “I’m taking the gloves off. No more.”
Other commissioners squirmed and, no doubt, department heads stewed in City Hall’s green room as Lowry launched broadside after broadside on, of all things, a couple of relatively minor solid waste issues that private haulers had spoken out against. As Flagpole reporter John Huie put it, “I wish they’d argue about something important.”
I guess we know who’s going to be funding Lowry’s mayoral campaign in 2014.
Commissioner Kathy Hoard and Manager Alan Reddish offered rather limp-wristed defenses of staff, but all in all everyone else seemed stunned. If he hadn’t before, Lone Wolf Lowry certainly alienated himself from the rest of the commission Tuesday.
It’s too soon to say for sure, but maybe these meetings are going to become must-see-TV again. I’ll be missing “Sons of Anarchy” a lot, but it’ll be worth it.
The Hobohemians know their roots
The Hobohemians don’t really play bluegrass music, and yet they are on the card for the Terrapin Tuesday bluegrass show at the Melting Point tonight.
I think the traditional bluegrass fans will be OK, however.
The Hobohemians remind me a bit of a Michigan band called Steppin’ in It, which is a good thing. Like their brothers to the north, the Hobohemians play a rootsy mix of old time music that your grandparents dug.
They have a brass section for blues and jazz and a diverse string contingent for folk. They also have an all-star lineup that borrows from a lot of different bands. The Corduroy Road, Curley Maple, Deerhunter, Packway Handle, The Jumpin’ Jesus Christers, Solstice Sisters and String Theory are all represented.
You can get a feel for their music on the band’s website here.
The show starts at 7 p.m. tonight. Tickets are $5.
Fundraiser set up for local child
A few weeks ago, I wrote a story about Marcus Trey Greene, a 12-year-old who has sickle cell and a tumor around his heart. The condition is known as Rosai-Dorfman Disease. You can read the story here.
Anyway, the family has set up a donation fund at Bank South in Greensboro to help cover medical expenses. If you would like to learn more, contact Penny Davenport at Bank South. She can be reached at (706) 453-2236.
I’m hearing that the family will also hold some local fundraising events in the near future.
The Petit Le Mans at Road Atlanta is still far from over, but plenty of pretty pictures have already been made.
I’ve spent the day with Andrew Murphy, the editor and publisher of the eBrake Blog. He’s been taking photos while I’ve been taking notes.
If you didn’t make it out to Road Atlanta today, here’s a little bit of what you missed.
The Chevrolet Corvettes are the loudest cars in the field.
The BMW GT cars have been very strong today.
Some cars have struggled staying on track. I’m looking at you, Ford GT.
The coolest thing about Road Atlanta? Fans can get close to the cars while standing in the shade.
This Audi R18 TDI may not win today, but it’s the quietest, fastest car that we’ve seen.
You are the film critic at Cine
That headline may be a little off. Then again, the Manhattan Short Film Festival is a little different than most festivals.
Cine is just one of 115 theaters in cities all over the world that will screen these 10 shorts at the same time tonight. Everyone in the global audience gets a vote to determine the winner.
The 10 finalists came out of a field of 429 entries. The U.S., United Kingdom, Mexico, France, Australia, Canada, Poland, Germany and Croatia are all represented, making this festival more of a cinematic Olympiad.
The films are all around 10 minutes long. “Push Bike” follows a woman on her way home as she rides a bike in the nude. “12 Years” chronicles a relationship with two dogs. “Underground” takes viewers on a trip from Mexico into America via a forgotten sewer.
Needless to say, the length is the only thing these shorts have in common.
Showtime is at 7:30 p.m. For more info, visit www.athenscine.com.
Jonathan Byrd brings Cackalack to Athens
Jonathan Byrd can call North Carolina whatever he wants — his latest album “Cackalack” has the North Carolina state flag as its cover.
He can certainly call the state home. He’s a seventh generation Carolinian. He also did his tour of duty in the Navy.
Now, the 40-year-old plays folk music with a bluegrass arrangement. The arrangement landed him a gig this evening at the Melting Point. He’ll share the stage with Jason Kenney, John Keane and David Blackmon.
The combination may be the best Terrapin Tuesday lineup I’ve ever seen. Keane and Blackmon are always treats no matter what kind of music they are playing.
Byrd will hold his own in this group. You can hear some of his chops here.
The show starts at 7 p.m. Tickets are $6.
Broun draws another likely opponent
In a rematch of a 1992 race, a former congressman from Middle Georgia says he might challenge U.S. Rep. Paul Broun in next year’s Republican primary.
Mac Collins said there is a better-than-even chance he’ll run against Broun in a radically redrawn 10th District. He said he expects to make a final decision by the end of October.
Collins said he’s more experienced than Broun, who’s served four years to his 12. “I’ve been there at these tough times like we’re having today,” he said.
These two have a history. They both ran for the same congressional seat in 1992, when Broun lived in Americus. Back then, though, Collins was the establishment candidate and Broun was an unknown upstart.
Fast forward 19 years. After pulling off a shocking upset in 2007 and easily surviving a mainstream GOP effort to oust him the following year, Broun is the establishment. Where once he was on the fringe, his party has shifted to the right to embrace him, and he’s an entrenched third-term incumbent with access to money and a fantastic grassroots organization. Collins, meanwhile, has been out of the public eye since his failed 2004 Senate bid and unsuccessful 2006 effort to regain his House seat.
But then there’s the new district. When Republican state lawmakers approved new district lines last month, they lopped off the northern half of Broun’s district to create a new one centered around Gainesville and added parts of Middle Georgia and metro Atlanta, including Collins’ home in Butts County. About half the district will be new to Broun, and Collins once represented parts of it.
Oh, and one more X-factor. Stephen Simpson, a wealthy Macon businessman and retired Army officer, is considering moving to Athens and jumping into the Republican race as well.
Broun is surely the favorite, but he’ll have his hands full.
Ole Miss: A great place for visitors
I didn’t know I was going to the Ole Miss-Georgia game this past weekend until about 9 p.m. Friday. My neighbor, his girlfriend and I drove off a Marietta car lot with his new ride and went west instead of east.
I’m glad we went. Ever since my prior trip to the University of Mississippi in 2002, I have been smitten by the school and its football team. The cheers, the Grove, the Dixie undertones — it’s all a reminder of this proper Old South that has disappeared from most of the Southeast.
But I discovered this past weekend that the Old South went away for a reason. Mississippi is either not what it used to be or exactly how it’s always been. Neither cases are that good.
There is a reason Ole Miss is in the cellar of the SEC. The football team is awful. Houston Nutt is a dead coach walking.
Really, it’s a dead program. The fans get on each other for cheering too loud when the Rebels are on defense. The result is a rather tranquil setting for visiting offenses. I’ve been to churches that were louder than Vaught Hemingway Stadium.
The Grove outside, the tailgating area that Ole Miss is known for, is a little overrated. Sure, the scenery is nice, but I saw way too many floral arrangements and too few grills and smokers. The only folks I found who were drinking were Georgia fans.
Georgia fans understand SEC football. I’d rather drink and wear a T-shirt and yell a lot than take the passive approach of Ole Miss fans.
I’ve always wanted to go to an Egg Bowl — that’s the name given to the annual Mississippi – Mississippi State game — in Oxford. Maybe it will be more fun in Starkville.
Patterson Hood and I agree on at least one thing: If you want to see a good concert tonight, you should head to the 40 Watt. The Low Anthem is back in town.
Earlier this year, the Low Anthem played as an opener at the venue and won so many hearts that they were invited back. Tonight, they’ll go on last.
Hood is ecstatic. So am I.
“Needless to say I can’t wait to get to see them finally play a headlining set at my favorite club,” he wrote on Facebook last night. “I highly recommend this show and hope to see you there.”
Here’s what you need to know about this band. In February, they released “Smart Flesh,” an album that they recorded in an abandoned factory in the Northeast. It’s in the running to be my favorite album of the year.
The group plays a mix of orchestral pop and addictive rock with really cool arrangements. The clarinet gets a lot of work. So does the cello.
You can listen to a bunch of their music by heading over to www.lowanthem.com.
Easter Island and Sleepy Sun are also on the bill. Tickets to the show, which starts around 8:30 p.m., are $13.
I’ll see you there.