Voting for the New Orleans mayoral election 2010 candidates is February 6. It looks like Mitch Landrieu has shown his true colors. The coalition he talked about creating ended up being a smoke screen. When Stacy Head showed up at his campaign announcement I should have known. Mitch Landrieu is trying to take over this city all by himself. You have to give him credit for having the courage to try and do it. He waited until late in the ball game to announce he was running(nice move by the way). This caused a traffic jam of candidates to enter the race. I knew that Barack Obama becoming President was inspirational to a lot of people but I did not count on this. Second of all we have to remember that politics have always been fun in New Orleans. It's part of the tradition. This race has been a joy to watch. I wish all candidates the best of luck on Saturday. Many people have no idea the effort required to run for mayor. You have to put your life on hold for six to eight months, well only 3-4 months for Landrieu(had to sneak that one in). Still, everyone is to be commended for their efforts.
Sorry I have not been writing as much as I used to. I cover Michelle and Barack Obama . I must say David Vitter has not stopped running Google ads for the last eight months. David is not taking any chances. Can't wait until we get to budget talks. Michelle and Barack are in the news literally everyday in every way. But I still got love for New Orleans politics. I just don't have time to grind it out anymore like writers for American zombie. My man said he went down to the library and looked it up. NOLA, please hire this dude. The little Who Dat! ads are cute. Go Saints!!
CR, I know you got my message about the Obama town hall. That's cool, you should have seen your face. On a lighter note, I was at traffic court today. Please fix up the traffic court facilities, I see why the DA can not attract better attorneys. No parking, building falling apart. The next mayor should take a look at this.
Anyway, back to the mayor's race. The other candidates for the most part are not seasoned politicians(which they did not play up) and ran very rough campaigns in terms of strategy. It's been good in a way, new ideas, fresh faces, and a lot of discussion. The problem is some of these guys got so excited about actually being in the race that they lost focus. You have to know when your beat.
Troy Henry- smart is a whip, has all the tools but the timing may be a little off. He's built up some good name recognition in his first run at public office but unfortunately he's too heavily invested to quit now. If he would have entered the race earlier in may have been a different story. I got in contact with some of his campaign team but they never followed up with me. DH, this Cliff baby. May be they were gate keepers in disguise, at any rate my hats go ff to the Henry team for running a strong and competitive race. He presented himself well. They could have done a little more on the internet but you get what you pay for in terms of advisors. McKenna who is running for Orleans parish coroner for example got some good exposure off of the video he released the other day. In the end I think Troy has too many hangers on.
James Perry- I love you my man. The way you presented yourself and stuck to the serious issues. You deserve a round of applause. Your campaign had energy and was started on a wing and a prayer. That takes guts and a lot of heart. Even though I think a few of the TV stations in the area kind of dragged you along at the end, you live and you learn. Those television producers are something else. Norman Roberts and the whole crew are all just puppets. Every word that comes out of their mouth is carefully scripted. If they stray to far off of the script, their history. I think Perry should have gotten out about 5 weeks ago. Given the excitement of running for mayor and his age, I'm not surprised he hung in their this long. He's gotten enough exposure in the race to help his career. Next time Perry, if their is a next time, do like the professionals do(Murray). When the math does not add up, bow out. It pays off in terms of your image.
Nadine Ramsey- Proud of you, ran a very polished campaign. The media did not give you a fair chance. You did women proud though. Not quite sure why you would leave a judge position with six years left to enter a mayor's race. We all have our reasons, I'm sure you have a good one. Well you did it, if you decide to stay in politics a city council seat or U.S. representative position is well within reach.
Couhig- You had your best chance ever before Mitch stepped in. I think you could not believe your luck. At the end of the day though I think you made a good showing. Couhig seems to have a good business sense so I'm sure he has his reasons for continuing to enter these races. Sometimes the only reason you need is the fact that you are able to. This may be the only city I know of that does that. We'll get over that hump soon.
John Georges- This is my pick. I think John Georges is the best candidate at this time. I read the scare article that American Zombie wrote about the Tulane fraternity. I'm saying so what. New Orleans is at a cross roads right now and the old way of doing things is not working and has never worked. Mitch Landrieu is the old way. We need a fresh face without all the political baggage. John Georges doesn't owe anybody a dime. May be he has some open loans from a bank, but I doubt he owes individuals anything in the way of political favors. That's important to kick this city into over drive. I see where the New Orleans Tribune endorsed him. I want to point out my endorsement has no affiliation with theirs. Nothing against those guys and what their doing. I wish them all the luck in the world, the internet is nothing like print media though. I'm 100% independent for the record. Yes, Georges has made some off the cuff remarks, he's doing what he needs to do. He may have went to Tulane and a good high school but I'm sure he has felt like an outsider because of his Greek ancestry plenty of times in the deep south.
Mitch Landrieu- Too much political baggage Mitch. Under all the rhetoric he's never going to be a main stream Democrat. He's a Dixiecrat. So much baggage that he never really reached out to anybody. Just, hey I'm Mitch, you know me. He ran a few ads with a few black supporters in the commercials. Does that mean blacks are behind him?, no. The lady in the commercial said, " I'm voting for Mitch Landrieu " with an exaggerated accent. I had to pinch myself, Mitch's plantation politics were offensive to a lot of black women I know. The bottom line is it's not the right time for Mitch. Your daddy being a former mayor is not good enough this time around. May be before the hurricane New Orleans could take that chance, not now.
That's all for now, good luck everybody from the Bryan family.
Clifford Bryan
AKA- Dream Weaver, The Professor, Commander of the Hidden Black Horde,......
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