Stephanie Grace's article, I didn't care for very much. After all this time, she still appears to subscribe to two of the popular myths about Nagin which sort of get him off the hook with a lot of people. Those myths, we all know by now, are 1) Nagin, the "outsider businessman" was not prepared or equipped to take on the big nasties of local politics and so was taken advantage of by them and 2) Nagin mysteriously "changed" or "lost it" after Katrina and suddenly became some sort of unhinged criminal clown.
I, unlike, I assume, Grace, was never much a fan of Ray Nagin's. The primary reason he became Mayor in 2002 was that he was seen as kind of on the outs with the Morials and that appealed to most white voters in the city. At that time, white voters concentrated in significant enough numbers made up an effective enough block to swing an election with no incumbent. One way to concentrate enough white voters into significant numbers was to convince them you are a "reformer" and so that's the role Ray Nagin played.
Of course, as we all know, "reform" is an empty and open term which can mean all kinds of crazy things or nothing at all. But as long as one pulls enough reformy-ish looking stunts then the empty-headed fetishists of the empty term remain fairly well placated. The headdy days of the first Nagin term were comprised of a series of these stunts. He frog marched a line of poor hapless cab drivers in front of TV cameras, closed a few brake tag stations and claimed that this indicated he was cleaning up City Hall. He attempted to privatize our municipal water system in the name of reforming local government. He hired Greg Meffert to Jetsonize our Flintstonage or something and was widely praised for it. (Even the cynical T-P columnist James Gill was still referring to Meffert as a "Whiz Kid" even as the allegations of corruption in his department were beginning to take shape.) Through all of this, Nagin seemed to me to be as at least as criminally full of shit as the next guy. Maybe I thought he was a somewhat more remarkable phony than most but that's become a difficult field in which to distinguish oneself these days.
Grace writes that Nagin's weakness, if we are to call it that, rested in his entrepreneur's distaste for detail as compared to his talent for the "Big Idea". Nagin feels differently about that quality and describes it this way.
"I know this city," Nagin said in an interview last week. "You throw one idea out and everybody swoops around and kills it. My strategy is to throw eight to 10 out at time. And if six or seven got through, to me that was a hell of a batting average."
I think Grace has charitably misinterpreted Nagin's "strategy" here. Rather than the tragically undisciplined "Idea Man" Grace sees, I see a con-artist who at heart just doesn't give a shit about anything but himself.
Jarvis DeBerry's was the superior column in the Sunday paper. I didn't agree with all of it, but DeBerry does come closer to nailing the essence of Nagin from my point of view.
What matters is that he survived Hurricane Katrina. After that, he survived what his critics said was his insufficient response to Hurricane Katrina. Even if it meant appealing to voters who had spent most of his first term hating him. Even if it meant accepting his abandonment by voters who, in 2002, said they loved him so.
No matter the devastation lingering around him, no matter the criticisms he got for his flippant remarks, his laissez-faire approach to the city's recovery, or for the incompetence of his staff, Nagin persevered.
Was the mayor's gift for survival good for New Orleans? Clearly it wasn't. Nagin seemed interested in surviving for surviving's sake, surviving just to say he'd survived; not to accomplish anything once he could prove he wasn't dead.
After Katrina, the phony just found new ways in which to be that way. In order to succeed politically, Nagin no longer needed to appear a "reformer" so much as he needed to tap into the reactionary spirit of an electorate confronted with an all-out siege of its homes, communities, and way of life. Nagin survived the 2006 election and the following four years by stroking the limbic brain of a traumatized populace. Nagin exploited the racial fears of many, the conspiratorial impulses and political mischief of some, and the general rancorous mood of everyone to maintain his advantage. As DeBerry says, Nagin's advantage was usually not the city's gain.
I take issue with those who see Nagin's trademark flippant and often outlandish remarks and chalk them up to insanity, incompetence or stupidity. Like DeBerry, I think Nagin was quite competent at promoting and maintaining himself for the sake of his own gain and ego. And nothing in his behavior ever led me to question his sanity. As for intelligence, I think that's such a misunderstood and misapplied term that it's nearly as empty as "reform". One can be clever or well-informed or analytically gifted or, as we've heard a lot in recent years, "intellectually curious" to greater or lesser effect on the world around oneself. And none of this should be considered remarkable. Most politicians possess adequate magnitude of enough of these qualities to do whatever job it is they're tasked with.
In an older post that I frequently refer back to, I compared Ray Nagin to the other quintessential man of his age, George W. Bush. Like Bush's, Nagin's brain is often misunderestimated. What both men appeared to lack in so-called intellectual curiosity they more than made up for in cunning. Both had a talent for connecting with voters in a way that appeared authentic or folksy at a time when many people were wary of the shadowy motives of the haughty pretentious alternatives.
Neither man was known to have what you would call a passion for detail. Which is a key reason both men presided over the decade of Disaster Capitalism, a term coined by Naomi Klein in her book The Shock Doctrine to describe the booming business of manipulating crises to the advantage of the governing parties and their cronies. Both men were "survivors" in DeBerry's since. As they survived, they or people close to them were able to take advantage of terrifying events. Most of the people who elected them were worse off for it.
One of the most remarkable things I've read about Ray Nagin was this article by Ethan Brown in Details magazine where it turns out that Nagin is not only reading Klein's book but offers the following thoughts on it.
“I understand exactly the premise that they’re presenting,” Nagin says, holding the book aloft, “that’s for sure. Look, man, after this disaster there is big money! The shock-and-awe piece of what they’re talking about is absolutely correct.” I ask if he’s read the chapter in which Klein laments that the public sphere in New Orleans is “being erased, with the storm used as the excuse.” Nagin replies cheerily, “I haven’t gotten that far! I just picked it up.”
One can read that comment a number of ways. Many suggested that Nagin was using the book as a how-to manual. I don't know if we can go that far but we do have to grant him credit for a certain amount of self-awareness there. And the implication of that paints a pretty damning picture of Ray Nagin. One of a man who knew more what he was doing (or not doing) at a crucial time during which he was this city's steward. And one of a man who more than likely just didn't give a shit.
Update: Here's a fun fact. It has been pointed out to me that Nagin arranged to have a copy of The Shock Doctrine delivered to Oliver Thomas in prison. From Sunday's email dump
-----Original Message----- From: Cheryl Mendy To: Ray Nagin Sent: Fri Nov 07 14:16:05 2008 Subject: RE: Oliver Book
It is in paperback and has been ordered.
----Original Message---- From: Ray Nagin Sent: Friday, November 07, 2008 10:36 AM To: Pat Smith Subject: Oliver Book
Can you check to see if the book, The Shock Doctrine - Disaster Capitalism, is in paperback so we can send it to Oliver Thomas.
C. Ray Nagin - Mayor Bringing New Orleans Back! 2008 will be great! Sent from my BlackBerry Wireless Device
It's hilarious that they were passing this book around. My theory is that Nagin just kind of thought it was cool his disaster was in it. I wouldn't be surprised at all to learn he has a large collection of books at home acquired solely because they contain his name somewhere in the text. Perhaps he would be interested in donating this collection to the library someday. Perhaps someone will be inspired to open an entire Excellence in Recovery Reading Room complete with Veronica White's masterpiece the forthcoming works of Ed Blakely and the photography of Bernardo Wade. Think of it as my own personal "Big Idea"
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