Posted by redusmfan (anonymous) on July 17, 2008 at 7:29 a.m. (Suggest removal)

Being strong and being an arrogant a------ are 2 different things. Natchez has too many boards that hamper development anyways, so if you bog down a couple of them, it will only slow down the process of having a request stopped at the next committee.

People, Natchez has about 20,000 people on a really great day, but realistically, it has about 18,000 people in the town. Of these, stats prove that only 8,000 people really are working and trying to keep the town going. Of those, only the 10% that are considered rich are ever assigned to the committees and boards and they are only concerned about keeping their wealth and making sure nothing happens to it.

So, in conclusion, these boards and committees are only there helping there little piece of the town. If the mayor would do away with these boards and find a town of similar size and population make-up and see what they are doing to boost development, then they would see how top-heavy Natchez is and has always been.

Just my opinion, so if you have an opinion, post it. But do NOT attack mine if you can't form your own.

Thanks and have a great day.

Posted by triscuit (anonymous) on July 17, 2008 at 7:52 a.m. (Suggest removal)

I think the city needs a planner that will do the job. Strong would be good too. I'm not convinced the new planner is as consistent with reviews and approvals as this editorial implies, although I had high hopes when he came.

I wonder what his commission thinks about him. Not carefully worded opinions that they would allow to be published, but what they REALLY think.

Posted by EnKiKur (anonymous) on July 17, 2008 at 8:25 a.m. (Suggest removal)

If Natchez keeps on the current track downtown will turn into a gated community.

No board of adjusters, the planning commission making, enforcing, and judging property use and rights laws.

Zoning laws and codes for which there is NO use variance allowed or possible to obtain. Unless of course the mayor and board of aldermen decide to change the law back to what it was.

A board of aldermen and city attorney willing to violate the spirit of the Mississippi Constitution in providing taxpayer capital for private enterprise.

A board of aldermen allowing bond issues to fund car dealerships. Exactly how did that work?

A police department buying cars from that car dealership.

A board of supervisors willing to move water, sewage, and trash collection away from Public Service Commission jurisdiction and give it to a separate political entity having the power to enact and enforce water rates, fees, and assessments within itself. Also having the power to disregard the fourth amendment in quest of its goals.

What else has been done and will be done?

Posted by Idefinitelymight (Tom Scarborough) on July 17, 2008 at 8:59 a.m. (Suggest removal)

Mr. Lewis is an excellent planner. He is precisely the kind of highly qualified, conscientious, and completely professional person we have lacked in this position for several years. Do not mistake his determination to do his job for arrogance.

Once again--if you don't want to conform to the planning and preservation ordinances that apply to the downtown historic district specifically, don't locate your business or buy your house there. The district is a comparatively small area of the entire business area of Natchez. The ordinances that are intended to protect the unique character of downtown don't apply to the many other areas of Natchez in which one can do business. There is no mystery to what the ordinances are--they are clearly spelled out. Geez, people--does everything have to look like Carter Street or D'Evereaux Drive around here?

In no way is preserving our historic district an impediment to economic progress in Natchez, or a sinister plot to deprive individuals of their property rights. Though it is our downtown, in a very real sense belongs to all American citizens as part of our national architectural and historical legacy. The arrogant ones in all of this are the folks around here who believe that anyone would have a reason to visit Natchez, or establish a business here, if only the historic district were opened to unfettered development and modernization. The biggest economic asset our city has is our downtown. Disfiguring it will do nothing to attract or promote new industries or businesses.

Posted by redusmfan (anonymous) on July 17, 2008 at 9:59 a.m. (Suggest removal)

Architectural legacy??? Ok Tom, That is your opinion. I will let it be.

Look at New York City. They have history and progress next door to each other. The tourist love it and go there daily by the thousands. Could Natchez try that?

Posted by EnKiKur (anonymous) on July 17, 2008 at 10 a.m. (Suggest removal)

Tom, where do you get this idea that all of America owns downtown Natchez as part of our nationall architectural and historical legacy? Do the rights of all Americans take precedence over the rights of the persons who purchased the property downtown?

Take a look at this:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=...

Posted by Idefinitelymight (Tom Scarborough) on July 17, 2008 at 10:58 a.m. (Suggest removal)

Enki--Obviously I don't mean our downtown is literally owned by the American people. But as possessors of something that has well-established historic value, I do feel we have a responsibility to preserve and maintain the physical artifacts of our history--just as do those who live and do business in the French Quarter of New Orleans, or in the historic areas of Boston, Charleston, Savannah and any number of other US towns and cities whose combined local histories comprise the fabric of our national history. And it makes economic sense for us to do so. For better or worse, tourism is our biggest source of income. Visitors come to Natchez because they appreciate the beauty and the intrinsic historic value of what we have here.

Posted by EnKiKur (anonymous) on July 17, 2008 at 11:20 a.m. (Suggest removal)

I just ask because a lot of traditional boundaries are getting very blurry these days Tom. I hope you have time to watch that video.

Two of the major organizations blurring these lines are the US Conference of Mayors and the National Association of Counties.

Posted by Idefinitelymight (Tom Scarborough) on July 17, 2008 at 12:58 p.m. (Suggest removal)

---"People, Natchez has about 20,000 people on a really great day, but realistically, it has about 18,000 people in the town. Of these, stats prove that only 8,000 people really are working and trying to keep the town going. Of those, only the 10% that are considered rich are ever assigned to the committees and boards and they are only concerned about keeping their wealth and making sure nothing happens to it."---redusmfan

redusmfan--I would like to know the source of your demographic figures.

Posted by EnKiKur (anonymous) on July 17, 2008 at 1:06 p.m. (Suggest removal)

Here, Tom. The 2006 figures showing 16,637 residents, from the Economic Development Authority website.

Posted by Idefinitelymight (Tom Scarborough) on July 17, 2008 at 1:14 p.m. (Suggest removal)

I'm specifically interested in red's assertion that "only 8,000 people really are working and trying to keep the town going...of those only the 10% who are considered rich are ever assigned to the committees and boards..."

I'm calling BS

Posted by EnKiKur (anonymous) on July 17, 2008 at 1:18 p.m. (Suggest removal)

I'd like to know how he arrives at those figures too, but I suspect in reality he is not too far off even if he is just guestimating.

But I wonder, really, how many "rich" people there are in Natchez. And I wonder what qualifies as rich. There certainly seem to be a large number of people able to borrow more money than others, but that isn't the same as being rich.

Posted by EnKiKur (anonymous) on July 17, 2008 at 1:26 p.m. (Suggest removal)

Tom, please go read this site, you will see that I have been right in my assertions all along regarding the UN and devlopments in Natchez. This is a site from Preserve America, it explains the UNESCO connection in the government's own words:

http://www.preserveamerica.gov/docs/Glob...

Posted by Idefinitelymight (Tom Scarborough) on July 17, 2008 at 1:34 p.m. (Suggest removal)

Enki--I will look at it. At this moment I now have to go make a living! Thanks for your contributions. Always a pleasure to consider alternative viewpoints, particularly ones as well expressed as yours.

Posted by triscuit (anonymous) on July 17, 2008 at 1:38 p.m. (Suggest removal)

I had to come back to this editorial, because I started to wonder what the point of it was. The message seems to be "Give Rusty Lewis a chance," but if it's an important enough message for an editorial, perhaps it's because there has been some public cry for his removal that I'm not aware of. The only negative comments regarding Mr. Lewis that I've been privy to are those of people involved in development who've had to work directly with him. (Those particular comments involved Mr. Lewis' inability to clarify some of the ambiguities in the written rules, but that is not to say he was not willing.) And of course, there have been a few in these forums. But I know the ND editorial staff is used to the profuse negativity spouted herein.

So, what's the scoop behind the need to express the opinions in this editorial? Certainly not just to quell the discontent in online reader remarks, because they should know by now that will only fan these flames.

Posted by DHOLMES (anonymous) on July 17, 2008 at 2:28 p.m. (Suggest removal)

Give Lewis a chance...he comes in to an office confused with all sorts of politics and bad policies. He is really trying to do the right thing, but he has to work within the System that unfortunately exists. He has been very careful about making statements because all around him are landmines ready to blow up.

Give him a year, then judge him.

Posted by EnKiKur (anonymous) on July 17, 2008 at 4:09 p.m. (Suggest removal)

I would bet a hundred dollars an historic town has to have a planner to get certain types of free (rolling of eyes) money, and that is why all the hoopla.

Posted by Idefinitelymight (Tom Scarborough) on July 17, 2008 at 6:05 p.m. (Suggest removal)

Enki--I watched the video while I was doing my ironing. It certainly clarifies for me where you have been coming from in your posts--that paranoid fringe tradition that since the time of the Antimasons has been shrieking about the impending New World Order (or the Illuminati as it was called in its earlier incarnation). Instead of a cabal of Jewish bankers and their minions taking over the world, the new bogeymen are the environmentalists who--gasp!--are calling for sustainable development.

In the depth of their paranoia and conviction that a vast international conspiracy is afoot, the people in these movements remind me somewhat of the brilliant Nobel Prize winning mathemetician, John Forbes Nash (the subject of the movie, "A Beautiful Mind"), who was also a paranoid schizophrenic. Like Nash, from a mass of random and disparate data and figures these conspiracists synthesize coded messages from which they glean dark plots and conspiracies to subordinate individual freedoms under a collective One World government.

I'm sorry, Enki--I just ain't buying it. Apart from the fact that Joan Peross is a blithering fool who can barely speak, in a world of 6 billion people (and counting exponentially), it makes perfect sense for nations to come together for the purpose of discussing how to conserve and sustain the finite resources that make life possible for all of us. To me that is not sinister--it is responsible.

You are much too intelligent to be taken in by this pablum.

Posted by EnKiKur (anonymous) on July 17, 2008 at 7:37 p.m. (Suggest removal)

You know Tom, it does sound reasonable on the surface.

But read all of Agenda 21 and read the writings of the people who created it. Their aim is to change the world, that is what they say they are going to do. That change includes the abolition of private property rights, the institution of an earth based religion, and global socialism.

The people you are calling the paranoid fringe in this case were among the first people to attend the training seminars for implementing Agenda 21. They are not blithering idiots.

There is no vast international conspiracy. There is, available for all to read on UN and US government websites, a cohesive plan for bringing about these changes. This plan is being enacted and if you choose not to believe it, that is your choice.

In George H.W. Bush's State of the Union Address of Jan. 29, 1991 Bush said:

"What is at stake is more than one small country; it is a big idea: a new world order, where diverse nations are drawn together in common cause to achieve the universal aspirations of mankind -- peace and security, freedom, and the rule of law. Such is a world worthy of our struggle and worthy of our children's future."

How have these universal aspiratons of mankind been carried out through the last three presidencies? Through war, through massive escalation of public debt, through deceit and corruption. Policies aimed at creating this new world have brought us what?

You are dismissing something you are not familiar with. Look up Henry Steele Commager and see what he managed to get 32 Senators and 92 Representatives to sign in 1975. It is called "Declaration of Interdependence" and it also calls for a new world order.

Bush used the phrase "new world order" over 250 times while he was in office. Adolph Hitler used it as well, that was the whole purpose of the Third Reich, to bring about this new world order.

The nations are coming together for far more than discussion. Once Agenda 21 is ratified, and it soon will be, our constitution will be subordinate to it. Many people believe global socialism is a desirable thing. I am not one of them because purge has always been an element of socialist movements.

The term "sustainable development" was first used in 1938 at the Fourth International congress, also known as the World Party of Socialist Revolution. The idea was to institute global socialism using the environment as well as war to bring about the world revolution. Here is their present day site: http://www.socialistaction.org/fi.htm

What you buy, or believe, or choose to believe is not rooted in fact. Calling people paranoid and conspiracists is simply another way of saying "I don't care to look". Some words are so emotionally laden that when people hear them they quit thinking.

Posted by EnKiKur (anonymous) on July 17, 2008 at 7:37 p.m. (Suggest removal)

You are right, I am too intelligent to be taken in by the pablum that tells me I should enjoy giving up 50% of my income to various taxes, that I should enjoy being forced to use imaginary money with no value, that I should sit silently by while even more is taken from me. This same pablum tells me that for the good of the world, due to impending doom from imaginary terrorists and man made global warming I should be frightened silly into giving up my belief in the absolute rights of man. I would be paranoid if I believed all that pablum.

Posted by EnKiKur (anonymous) on July 17, 2008 at 8:02 p.m. (Suggest removal)

"Looking back at the 20th Century, we can see that a socialist culture of war has failed. Therefore, the strategy for revolution in the 21st Century should aim toward a socialist society based on the principles of the culture of peace.

There are hints of the culture of peace in the classic revolutionary literature. For example, in his last writings, Lenin spoke of the need to move away from war communism toward an economy of peace, and the need for a cultural revolution to lay the basis for communism. In the midst of planning guerrilla war, Mao Tse-Tung dreamed of a coming "epoch of peace." And another great guerrilla warrior, Che Guevara seems to be describing a culture of peace in his most famous essay, Man and Socialism in Cuba. The same can be said for the most famous essay by Joe Slovo, the Communist leader of Umkhonto we Sizwe, the guerrilla army that helped liberate of South Africa from apartheid rule."

" 3. The culture of peace requires that economic development be based on "sustainable human development for all." "Social development, social justice and the eradication of poverty are indispensable" as well as preservation of our environment. In contrast the culture of war has always benefited "from military supremacy and structural violence and [is] achieved at the expense of the vanquished and the weak." - from UN Resolution A/53/370, 1997 http://sfr-21.org/cop.html

I know what I am talking about because I actually visit socialist, UN, and US government websites and read them. Who created the UN Tom? And for what purpose?