Please sign the petition below to remove the statue of Jefferson Davis currently in Kentucky’s Capitol Rotunda, and replace it with a tribute to Muhammad Ali, “the Louisville Lip” and “the Greatest of All Time.”
I just heard from the Ali family: It is the Champ’s belief that Islam prohibits three-dimensional representations of living Muslims. Accordingly, I have adjusted the petition to call for a two-dimensional representation of Ali (a portrait, picture or mural) in lieu of a statue.
UPDATE (Tuesday, December 2, 2014)
In this interview with WHAS-TV’s Joe Arnold, Governor Steve Beshear endorses the idea of honoring Muhammad Ali in the State Capitol (although he disagrees with removing Davis). Arnold explores the idea further on his weekly show, “The Powers that Be.”
Click here to check out WDRB-TV’s Lawrence Smith’s coverage of the story.
And here’s my op-ed in Ali’s hometown paper, the Louisville Courier-Journal.
UPDATE (Saturday, June 4, 2016)
In the wake of the 2015 Charlestown tragedy, in which a Confederate flag-waving murderer united the nation against racism, all of the most powerful Kentucky policymakers — U.S. Senator Mitch McConnell, Governor Matt Bevin, Senate President Robert Stivers and House Speaker Greg Stumbo — called for the removal of the Davis statue from the Rotunda. Today, as we commemorate last night’s passing of Muhammad Ali, there is no better moment to replace the symbol of Kentucky’s worst era with a tribute to The Greatest of All Time.
UPDATE (Wednesday, June 8, 2016):
Great piece by Lawrence Smith of WDRB-TV in Louisville on the petition drive to replace Jefferson Davis’ statue in the Capitol Rotunda with a tribute to Muhammad Ali.
UPDATE (Thursday, June 9, 2016):
Excellent piece on the petition drive by Jack Brammer that was featured on the front page of the Lexington Herald-Leader.
Highlight of the article:
Miller said he has received a few “angry comments” on his call to honor Ali.
“One of them encouraged me to kill myself,” he said. “You can quote me that I have decided not to take their advice.”
UPDATE (Friday, June 10, 2016)
The petition drives continues to show the Big Mo(hammed): check out these stories from WKYU-FM public radio in Bowling Green and WKYT-TV, Channel 27 in Lexington:
UPDATE (Saturday, June 11, 2016):
Still not convinced? Check out this excerpt from today’s New York Times:
We welcome a new partner at the site, Vote-USA.org, with a piece by its founder and director, Ron Kahlow:
With two clicks and an address, Vote-USA.org provides voters with their customized sample ballot containing pictures of the candidates and their social media links. In another click, a voter can compare the candidates’ biographical information for any office in a side-by-side manner. Subsequent clicks allow the voter to compare the views and positions of the candidates on the particular issues that concern the voter, always side-by-side for easy comparison. In addition, all of the information comes directly from the candidates themselves or is extracted from their campaign websites, i.e., there is no marketing spin or deception. That is the real power of the Vote-USA.org website. It is the ability to provide each voter the specific unfiltered views and positions of the candidates that they seek, quickly and easily. It is to enable the independent-minded voters to make their own decisions about candidates and ballot measures, and help them vote on a more informed basis.
Vote-USA.org has been providing this service to voters since the 2004 General Election. But many voters would probably ask why they have not found this resource during the last 8 years. Frankly, it is a tale of triumph and disaster, a tale of naivety, a tale of obsession, a tale of pride and embarrassment, a tale of not knowing when to give up, and a tale of David and Goliath.
My tale begins when I went to the polls to vote in the 2003 Virginia off-year election for Virginia Senate and House offices. When I entered the voting booth, I didn’t know anything about any single candidate or anything about the ballot measures. I didn’t even know there were any ballot measures. As I stood in the booth, I thought, what’s the value of voting if you don’t know who you are voting for, and making thoughtless decisions about ballot measures? Then driving home, I saw all those political posters trashing up the highways. This got my blood boiling. I thought to myself, is this any way to select the people to represent me? And, when I reached home and turned on the TV, there was an insulting, deceptive candidate-bashing political ad. The idea of spending billions of dollars to deceive me to vote this way or that pushed me over the edge. At that moment, I envisioned creating Vote-USA.org to fix this blatant fundamental flaw in our political system.
In 2003, I owned an Internet digital marketing agency, Business OnLine (BusinessOL.com), and I was convinced I could use my for-profit company resources to develop a solution to fix this problem. On a hobby basis, I built the first version of what is today Vote-USA.org and it was operative for the 2004 General Elections. I sent letters to all of the Federal and State candidates with their login credentials to enter whatever information they wanted. Few responded because the system is stacked in favor of incumbents. I was too naïve not to have realized that there was no incentive for them to change the game with this new Internet trump card. But, voters responded overwhelmingly. Remember the 2004 TV ad of people watching the number of hits promoting a product via ecommerce? Well that is what we experienced. As Election Day approached, a trickle turned into a torrent and then simply exploded. Triumph quickly turned to disaster as word spread. Our servers became overloaded and could not respond to the overwhelming demand. Frankly, for somebody in the Internet space business, this was an embarrassment.
Clearly we were easing the pain of voters because there was such enormous demand for this tool. So, the next couple years were spent attempting to rectify the problems of the 2004 elections. We built a farm of servers to handle the expected load. Since most candidates would not provide us with their information, we built the tools necessary to easily scrape their websites. Then, we hired a firm to do the scraping. We also developed tools to readily enter state election rosters.
Our efforts marginally paid off in the 2005 and 2006 elections. It seemed that regardless of how many servers we employed, the demand always exceeded the capacity. Although we keep Vote-USA.org up for longer periods of time, we could never keep the website up through the entire voting period.
But the biggest problem of all was cost. The financial resources needed far exceeded everybody’s wildest imagination. Voters were very kind with their tax deductible donations to support our operation, but this was only a very tiny fraction of what was needed. So, I and a friend covered the difference. Now, any reasonable thinking person would have thrown in the towel. But, one of my flaws is not knowing when to give up. I became obsessed with the mission and too proud to call it quits.
But that was not the end of our pains. Not long after the 2006 elections, we were hammered by the Internet Goliath Google. Vote-USA.org suddenly stopped appearing on all of Google’s search listings and all our pages had no Google ranking. We were totally blocked by Google and other search engines. We made numerous attempts, over a period of years, to find the reason(s) for this action and made numerous attempts to get the block removed. Finally, only after a very powerful Washington insider approached Google with our complaint did Google reveal the reason for its blocking action and finally we managed to resolve this problem. So, if you ask why you have not found us sooner, it is because the gatekeeper of the Internet locked the gate on us and only recently has it been opened. We believe there was nothing malicious on Google’s part. The problem centered on Google’s inability to effectively spider and index our website.
Our final, and most significant problem of voter traffic at election time has been solved by moving our website onto the cloud. We now have almost unlimited power at election time.
So, where are things today? Well we have built what we set out to build in 2003 and all of the problems and obstacles encountered so far have, to my knowledge, been solved. We are, however, without financial resources to continue; so, we manage to keep things running on a month-to-month basis. But, our most valuable asset is the will to continue regardless of what is thrown at us. And, we believe that what we are doing is not only helping citizens vote on a more informed basis but also serving as a counterbalance to the corrupting influence of money in politics. We believe that these are things worth fighting for regardless of the cost.
By John Y. Brown III, on Fri Apr 20, 2012 at 12:00 PM ET
Want to know how honest you really are?
Do you pride yourself as being someone who would never cheat?
Someone who when a game is being played doesn’t blur the rules in order to do better?
And tell yourself you would never make an exception?
And are proud of the example you’ve set for your children in this area?
Me, too.
But last night I backslid. I made that exception and did cheat and tried to conceal it.
I was playing Marco Polo in the pool last night with my daughter and her friend. And squinted to see where they were (several times) after going over 5 minutes as “IT” and hearing non-stop giggling and scraping my elbow and later knee on the side of the pool.
I have no regrets about how I handled this and am calling this the “Marco Polo Exception.”
By Jonathan Miller, on Fri Apr 20, 2012 at 10:00 AM ET
Cincinnati.com is running a terrific story about how one of my childhood best friends, Bret Caller, and his business partner, Steven Miller (no relation) have used their business saavy for some exceptionally noble purposes — including helping rescue Ethiopian Jews living in abject poverty.
Steven Miller and Bret Caller, managers and co-founders of Blue Ash-based Viking Partners, don’t do anything halfway.
They’re aggressively capitalizing on the flood of failing commercial real estate loans, and recently made the first two acquisitions – shopping centers in Louisville and near Indianapolis – from their second private equity fund.
Away from the office, the business partners and friends have established themselves as leaders in the community, largely thanks to their work with the Jewish Federation on a local and national level. Caller also is active in the United Way’s Tocqueville Society, whose members donate $10,000 annually. Miller recently became involved with the Boys & Girls Club of Greater Cincinnati.
Those who know them say their reputations as tough businessmen precede them, as does their belief in the importance of helping others. The two aren’t mutually exclusive, Miller says.
“One of the reasons we do what we do is to provide for our families first and foremost, and secondly to provide for others,” Miller says.
In 2006, they were part of a group that helped rescue and transport Ethiopian Jews who were living in third-world conditions without running water or electricity to Israel. James Miller, the chairman of downtown’s Bartlett & Co. and a Viking investor, first met Steven Miller while he was giving a presentation about the Ethiopia trip.
“The first time I saw him, he couldn’t stop crying,” James Miller says. “It was pretty moving; he can’t talk about Israel without tearing up. The funny thing about it is he’s a very tough guy.”
Yes, the president was guilty of hyperbole: although it is unusual for the Court to declare laws unconstitutional (once or twice a year on average), it is not unprecedented, as the president said.
Still, that doesn’t mean a senator should call the President of the United States “stupid.” While microblogging encourages impulsive bursts of misplaced candor/emotion, Grassley could have easily – in 140 characters – noted that the president had exaggerated, or questioned the president’s decision to take on the Court.
I will be interested to see if Grassley notes any of Mitt Romney’s serial exaggerations and distortions, which Dana Milbank nicely sums up in yesterday’s piece “The Facts vs. Mitt Romney.”
By John Y. Brown III, on Thu Apr 19, 2012 at 10:30 AM ET
Spy Parents
It’s not a movie. That’s Spy Kids. Spy parents is when a parent puts monitoring software on their child’s computer to monitor the websites visited.
I did this to my son when he was about 12 years old. As I looked over the first weeks batch of websites visited, I was pleased to see there were no “inappropriate” websites visited.
Just a lot of kid stuff with an unusually high number of political websites visited. However, upon closer examination, I noticed almost all the political websites were republican-leaning.
I didn’t know what to do.
Was my son a “Closet Republican?”
Was this the kind of thing I should talk to my child about alone or shouldI involve a counselor?
Was 7 conservative-leaning websites visited (coupled with a Google search for Glenn Beck) in a two weeks period grounds for an intervention?
Should I explain that some of my closest friends are republican and that this is nothing to be ashamed of?
In fact, there were groups and fundraising activities for people who eventually make conservativism a “life choice” —even though many Democrats don’t believe it is really a “choice?”
Read the rest of… John Y. Brown, III: Honoring My Son’s Choices
For three generations, John Y. Browns have been active Democratic politicians in Kentucky.
John Y. Brown Sr., my great-grandfather, was an avid supporter of FDR’s New Deal while serving a term in the US House of Representatives and was a champion of various liberal causes in Kentucky’s state House for several decades.
John Y. Brown Jr., my grandfather, served one term as a Democratic governor of the Commonwealth and was the national chairman for the Democratic Telethons of the early 1970s.
My father, John Y. Brown III, was a two term Democratic Secretary of State and delegate to the Democratic National Convention in 1996.
Being the fourth John Y. Brown, most people would expect that I would follow the tradition and become a Democrat. However, when I turn 18 later this month, I plan on registering with the Republican Party. It has been a decision that I have thought out fully and feel good about—even if it appears to break with a family political tradition.
As my political philosophy developed over the years, it became clearer and clearer that I was drifting rightward. My father would tell me that he believed the temperament we’re born with influences our political philosophy—as much as our ideas and beliefs. My personal political journey has confirmed this in many ways. Every time I heard about an issue where there was major disagreement between the political parties, I found myself siding with the Republicans over the Democrats. Eventually, I stopped resisting this and embraced my inclination toward a conservative political philosophy.
Read the rest of… John Y. Brown, IV: Why I’m Registering As a Republican
When Barack Obama is not being re-cast as a principled defender of progressive values, his defenders in the press try another sleight-of-hand, defining him as a pragmatist desperately seeking responsible Republicans with whom to cut deals. Enter Paul Krugman’s latest column, “The Gullible Center”,which is a warmed over attack on Paul Ryan’s “extremism” (the ninth from the New York Times editorial pages in seven days, but who’s counting) and a mildly more original jab at moderates who allegedly lavish the undeserved label on seriousness on Ryan’s budget cutting, while missing the genuine article in President Obama.
A few observations about Krugman’s revisionism. First, I’m not exactly a Ryan devotee for a variety of reasons: marginal tax rate reductions are overstated in Ryan’s model as a tool of economic growth; at the same time, his plan leaves too little room for additional investments in worker retraining, infrastructure, and education (it is particularly worrisome that he would leave Washington with fewer resources to incentivize the wholesale reforms on education that have to be effected at the state level) and it slices out too many elements of the safety net without doing a rigorous accounting of what has and hasn’t worked. Budgeting, Ryan style, is much too vulnerable to the criticism that it is a theory of emasculated government and an ideological tool rather than a blueprint for expanded prosperity.
But the notion that President Obama is the misunderstood centrist in the budget wars? It’s a fantasy; to paraphrase Krugman’s closing jab at moderates, a naked conceit that has not much substance. Obama’s current budget repeats his minimalist approach to entitlements from last year—a series of mini-measures on cost reduction for Medicare, no rethinking whatsoever of how to restore Social Security to a safety net rather than a substantial net windfall for its beneficiaries. While Ryan has at least traded future structural realignments in Medicare for a safe haven for current beneficiaries, Obama resists countering Ryan, by defending the status quo while outlining an alternative of what a sustainable future looks like. To the contrary, Obama’s budgetary approach to Medicare and for that matter Obamacare mimics conservatives when they load all manner of unrealistic growth assumptions on top of their tax cut proposals: Obama’s version of fanciful thinking is the cost-cutting from comparative efficiency techniques that may or not survive congressional review, and that may or may not be scalable.
Read the rest of… Artur Davis: The “Obama is a Moderate” Fantasy
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