As you may be aware of, I transposed a letter(rough draft)of things that are going on in this current city council race and asked in a public forum area if someone would be willing to take my letter and its ideas and run with it and see if it might get published in either of our news outlets.
Larry Melton, husband of Jackie Melton(a contributor of the Community Free Press) replied back that he would run it by Breck Langsford(owner of CFP) and his wife to get it published. I have known Larry for longer than I have known Jackie. Larry and I are active in the FairTax movement and Larry helped me some on a campaign that I was involved in a couple of years ago. Larry is also active in our local taxpayer advocacy group and he seems to volunteer for quite a lot, I do not hold this against him. There are involvements that Larry volunteers for that our local taxpayer advocacy group will not use him for because of the possiblity of a preconceived idea that might occur because of his wife's position with the CFP. I believe a person can maintain a business relationship and a personal one without the two becoming intertwined but we will avoid anything that might bring to light any improprierity real or not.
Back to my point. Mrs Melton has taken exception that I would rough draft a letter and ask someone else to sign there name to it for the letter to get published, somehow I guess she sees this as being dishonest or something. Many candidates have positions within their own political platform that has been read and reread and changed by various people to make it sound much more coherent and yet I don't see anywhere that gives credit to those who have shaped and molded the wording of these positions.
I have a position paper on the issues which was quite a rough draft until I shared it with others for there input, according to the some in this community I should take those sections not authored by me and give credit to the individual(s) who actually made it sound correct.
I don't know if my letter is going to get printed or not or even if it is in the same context of how I transposed it, if it does great if it doesn't who cares, but it some instances it is best to have someone other then the writer attribute there name on the documentation so the actual writer does not get slammed for expressing a concern in a manner of which it wasn't meant.
Will this cost me the election, I'm not odds on favorite anyhow and I don't have the deep pockets of my competition which puts me behind the 8 ball. What I do have is a compassion to speak up when the city is heading off in the wrong direction, to voice my opinions in front of city council whether they agree with it or not, and a penchant to call people out when they are not what they profess to be.
Every one of these current crop of candidates can make excuses on why they weren't active during the timeframe of the pension collaspe, West Central Neighborhood crime problem, the container issue, and currently issues which are too numerous to mention but all of the excuses don't wash. This is your government people and if you do not get involved then do not complain when they do something to take away your piece of the American Dream whatever that might be to you.
I'm involved locally, others are invovled on state issues while many others are involved on the federal level, meanwhile many on the ballot in FEB are only involved because of an upcoming election.
2 comments:
Tom, I wish you well in the upcoming election. I hope things are beneficial for you in the upcoming Metro Republicans City Council forum as well. When I read your email, I knew there would be a problem with it. I don't think it is a significant problem, but I don't think you should continue to pursue having it published under another name. If you want it to be reviewed by your political peers, I think that is a wise thing to do, however in the end, if you wrote it, you should attempt to get it published under your own name. It just smells funny to try to get your own words published under someone else's name. It doesn't mean you're actually doing anything wrong, but it doesn't leave a clean scent in the air.
One need look NO further than Steve Helms to see why this happens. I have been asked on occasion to submit something to a publishing company that was NOT of my own hand, if I agreed with it, because the author didn't want any concerns being raised about the issue. I agreed with said work and sent it out as it was something that needed to be out in public view and I also understood why they were asking for it not to be in their name. It is quite similar to anonymous post.
The letter was a rough draft that could have been changed and reworded and the recipient was aware of that.
Whether it gets published or not I won't know until I read it, but after seeing what Mr Helms goes through I'll wait until I'm an actual private citizen to sign my name on any letters for publication.
There is a contrast difference and your position should never be listed unless you yourself have made that distinction.
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