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Nashville, Tennessee

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Nashville Scene - Pith in the Wind

The Nashville Scene News Blog

The State of Dean's Speech is....Crapalicious

Posted May 16, 2008 at 03:40:11 PM by Matt Pulle

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Well, the reviews are in—Mayor Karl Dean's State of the Metro Address has been panned by both the City Paper and the Scene, the two papers that actually follow local politics. The address was bland, unchallenging and had several head-scratching moments, which we mock and ridicule after the jump.


Continue reading "The State of Dean's Speech is....Crapalicious"...
Category: By the Way, Crazy Crap, Education, Politics, Pulle
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Confabulation on the Left

Posted May 13, 2008 at 10:47:43 AM by Bruce Barry

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Progressives statewide will gather Friday and Saturday for the Tennessee Alliance for Progress’s fifth annual Compass conference in Nashville. The Friday highlight is a celebration and awards ceremony featuring celebrity populist Jim Hightower. Saturday brings a morning keynote by former Mayor Bill Purcell, and a bunch o’ panels on social justice, the environment, workers' rights, globalization and more. A closing keynote late Saturday tackles “Hip-Hop as a Force for Community Empowerment.”

The full scoop here. I’ll be a panelist Saturday on the topic “Government as an Agent for the Common Good.” (This one’s for you, Gilbert M.)

Category: Barry, By the Way
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Another Chance to Show Off His Sticks

Posted April 03, 2008 at 10:51:44 AM by Liz Garrigan

Yet another opportunity for Mayor Karl Dean to expose these gams.

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Will he wear the yellow socks to the 2.5-mile Richland Creek walk/run? I've challenged Metro Council member Mike Jameson to race me. Haven't heard from him yet, though he was pretty talkative earlier in the week. Mike, you gonna take a pussy pill?

Category: By the Way, Garrigan
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We'll Do What It Takes to Make You Read About Our Blog Developments

Posted March 27, 2008 at 04:12:21 PM by Liz Garrigan

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Pith Nation,

You may have noticed that we've been a bit more prolific here lately. (Matt, in fact, has been so busy posting he's still in his pajamas, while Woods is off somewhere drinking as usual. I'm in an undisclosed location cussing html code.)

What the hell is going on? We're retooling Pith in the Wind as we speak, refocusing our efforts on what this blog's primary contributors know best—politics, media and news—and in fact narrowing Pith's authors to the lineup of Matt Pulle, Jeff Woods, Bruce Barry and yours truly. On infrequent occasions, other bylines will appear here—special guest Roger Abramson, for example—but Pulligan Woodbarry is what you can generally expect.

Bear with us as we update, revise, change our minds, delete, change our minds again, add, start over and add some more to our links and blogroll along the right-hand rail. We're also working on some design elements that will be joining the mix soon. They involve a really ugly bitch, a dude who looks like an ex-con, a guy with a huge nose, and a balding academic with a baby face.

If you've been removed from the blogroll and want to make your case for why the new Pith should keep you, email me. Flattery will get you everywhere.

Love and links,

Liz and the rest of the Pith crew

Category: By the Way, Garrigan, Media
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They Shoot; They Don't Score: Shan Foster, Mark Silverman and John McCain

Posted March 24, 2008 at 10:11:16 AM by Matt Pulle

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Oh yeah. About the Vandy men's team and Shan Foster. Who knew there was a Nashville Scene jinx? Turns out when we wrote that Foster is having the kind of year even Disney couldn't script, well, we were right.

More problems for CCA as The Tennessean's Kate Howard reports that a mentally ill inmate went nine months without a shower, making him not unlike many of my neighbors in East Nashville. Hit me.

“Fact is, some stories are just plain scary. But we still need to report them,” so sayeth Tennessean editor Mark Silverman, who mails in his Sunday column so often it should come inside a sealed envelope. No writer in local journalism, not even Dwight Lewis, spends less time with a sentence. By the way, dear Pith reader, I'm not going to link to Silverman's column and not just because it's so lame. I want to see how long it takes you to find a day old column on The Tennessean's website. Personally, I'd rather be in charge of retrieving the Holy Grail. (Oh and no using Google either.)

Our post about good and bad spokespeople has prompted a vigorous debate about whether state flacks should do their jobs. This is one where reasonable people can’t disagree.

Finally, I'm going to assume this is a joke. But if it's not, John McCain will lose all 50 states. Even Bill Hobbs realizes this is weak. Tip of the hat to DailyKos.com.

Category: By the Way
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Next Small Nashville

Posted March 13, 2008 at 07:08:09 AM by Steve Haruch

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Nashville's Smallest Art Gallery opens this Saturday, March 15.

"In a former life," the curators write, "the gallery was a neglected, graffiti-covered glass display case on 21st Avenue between Posh Shoes and Peabody Shoe Repair."

At just 29 inches by 40 inches, NSAG is easily smaller than the Locker 50B Gallery at Virginia Commonwealth University, but it does lack miniaturized wood floors.

Nashville's Smallest does boast solar-powered lighting, however. The first exhibit, "The Ides of March," features work by Ferris Plock (San Francisco), Matt Curry (Washington DC) and Rachel Briggs (Nashville).

Opening reception is at 7 p.m. at 1807 1/2 21st Ave. South.

Category: By the Way
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On Track

Posted March 12, 2008 at 10:05:42 AM by Steve Haruch

Reading this post, I was surprised to learn that public transportation use is up—to the highest level in 50 years—according to recent data released by the American Public Transportation Association. I was even more surprised when I got to this graph:

The five commuter rail systems with the double digit ridership growth rate in 2007 were located in the following areas: Nashville (257.9 percent); Santa Fe (96.6 percent); Harrisburg (41.3 percent); Seattle (27.4 percent); Oakland (14.2 percent); Dallas/Fort Worth (12.1 percent); Stockton (11.9 percent); Portland, ME (11.8 percent); and Pompano Beach, FL (10.3 percent). (Emphasis mine.)

But then I realized that Music City Star only began running in September 2006, so ridership had almost nowhere to go but up. But at least it went.

(Via Green Car Congress.)

Category: By the Way
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The Friendly Skies

Posted March 11, 2008 at 10:19:53 AM by Damian Winthrop

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Love advice from the Scene's resident literary lothario

Dear Damian: What is it about air travel that makes me fall in love so easily? On a few occasions, I’ve struck up a conversation with women sitting next to me on a flight. Within minutes I’m enamored, and thinking, “Where have you been all my life?” And if they live near me, invariably I ask them out. (I’ve even initiated a long-distance situation, albeit a brief one.) After a date or two, without fail I wind up thinking, “What in the hell did I see in this woman?” Is it just me? Does this happen to anyone else?
The Aviator


Continue reading "The Friendly Skies"...
Category: By the Way
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Satan Is Comin' to Town

Posted March 07, 2008 at 03:02:36 PM by Brent Rolen

We just received a meaty fax from PETA titled " 'SATAN' TO GREET ANNUAL MEAT-CONFERENCE ATTENDEES."

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Their beef is with the hellish nature of factory farms. They'll be at the Gaylord Opryland Resort at noon on Monday to give the American Meat Association attendees a devil of a time. The costumed character will lead others in a protest, which could include you, radical vegetarians/vegans of Nashville—if you're not chicken.

Category: By the Way
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Without a Trace

Posted March 07, 2008 at 12:32:22 PM by Liz Garrigan

Scene food critic Carrington Fox on The Trace's demise. A spicy thread follows. A teaser:

Just who will take the next shot is still unclear. Attorney Adam Dread—coincidentally, Dread was the first general manager of Faison’s restaurant, which predated The Trace in that location—has a list of prospective tenants. Dread is working with the Hayes family, who own the property, to select a business that complements the neighborhood. Dread is unusually tight-lipped about the process, but he says the transaction could happen fast.

Category: By the Way
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