Addendum to Councilors & Tickets Post

I received a thoughtful e-mail from City-County Councilor Angela Mansfield. She is not one of the councilors who received Superbowl tickets from the Colts for face value. She took great care in point out that she made no judgment about those who did take the tickets and noted her belief that each councilor had to agree to not sell the tickets for above face value. She also noted that it is disrespectful to assume a councilor would try to profit of of the tickets, regardless of contractual restrictions.

Councilor Mansfield is right, which is a recurring phenomenon for her. For me to so assume perpetuates the very cynicism I seek to eliminate. For that, all councilors have my apology.

But the councilors who took the tickets know they got something not available to the general public, and that's my point and nothing more. I never said it was unethical to take them.

Respectfully, whether something is illegal or unethical is not the ceiling I want for my party's elected officials. It's the floor. If you disagree, tell me.

But as I told a good friend of mine recently, before Andy Jacobs, Jr. retired, I went to his office in D.C., and as I walked through the halls, I saw names of representatives everywhere. Outside of Jacobs' office, though, it said only "10th District of Indiana." When I went inside, the receptionist was answering the phone the same way. I told the Congressman he was really losing out on the opportunity to make a positive name association with every call, and he responded, "I just don't want there to be any confusion on who owns this seat."

Whatever people may have thought about his politics, Andy Jacobs, Jr. lived his congressional tenure as a true servant-leader, and I see our current Congressman moving in that direction. My hope is that the Democratic Party can be imbued with that spirit, and if periodically, I have to ask them to live up to higher ideals, I won't hesitate.

Addendum to Councilors & Tickets Post

Friendly Advice for Marvin Scott

Don't.

That's my advice. Just say no. You announced you are running as a Republican candidate for U.S. Congress against Democrat Andre Carson. My only question is why? Are you a glutton for punishment? Do you have that much free time to spend on self-aggrandizing, pointless pursuits?

Are you not aware of the people in my own party who had reservations about an extremely gifted political figure, Joe Hogsett, because he had run for office a few times and been defeated? Respectfully, you're not as politically gifted as Hogsett, and at least he was elected Secretary of State in 1990. You lost to Andy Jacobs, then to Julia Carson, and then to Evan Bayh.

You can claim only persistence, which I suppose is cool in a kind of rogue Pat Paulsen/Ron Paul/Ralph Nader/Bobby Hidalgo Kern kind of way. But there is no scenario under which you can be elected. The district is too Democrat, the Congressman is working too hard, and if anybody in the national party felt you were anywhere near striking distance, they would open a floodgate of funds to protect an incumbent seat.

Obviously, you believe you have the skills to be worthy of being one of the 535 decision makers for this country. Frankly, I do not know you well enough to say whether this is true or not.

But if so, take that energy, skill, time, and money and invest it in the Indianapolis non-profit community. Imagine how empowering you could be as a mentor with Big Brothers. Imagine what you could do as a volunteer for Child Advocates, Inc. Imagine the money you could amass if, instead of spending time trying to get people to set their money on fire (which is about the same thing as donating to your campaign), you told them to donate to United Way, which is struggling this year.

I thought Republicans' believed in the market because it would compel people to move to the highest valued use for their skills. Yet, while you have unlimited choices for trying to make Indianapolis better in a tangible and meaningful way that would result in gratitude from most of your neighbors, you choose the one that will never bear fruit while simultaneously making you look politically delusional.

Time to rethink this thing, professor. Class dismissed.

Friendly Advice for Marvin Scott