While Rome burns...

The emperor Nero, it's said, fiddled while Rome burned. We might say that our town's only daily newspaper is following suit.

In today's Knoxville News Sentinel you can find an article by Knox County Mayor Mike Ragsdale on the importance of education in developing and maintaining a work-force that will attract employers to the area. It's pretty standard stuff, and says little more than much of the self-serving material available on the county web site.

In letters to the editor, several citizens lambasted the Knox County Commission in general and a couple of commissioners in particular. It would be an interesting exercise to compare the number of letters the KNS has printed critical of County Commission to the number critical of the Mayor since last summer. My impression is that the former outnumber the latter, but I'll freely admit my error if shown otherwise.

What's more troubling is the ongoing absence of a strong editorial voice in addressing the scandal in the Mayor's office. Certainly the KNS has provided "straight news" coverage as one after another of the Mayor's former employees took one for the team, but where is the call -- nay, the insistence -- that this cancerous executive branch be excised so the body politic can heal?

There are compelling reasons to demand such action, not the least of which was the recent in your face audit response in which Ragsdale and his remaining staffers "cleared" themselves of any wrongdoing in the p-card matter. A bill of particulars against this mayor would include such niceties as publicly insulting citizens who complained of the administration's accounting practices; maintaining an illegal off-the-books "hospitality fund;" disguising compensation to himself and senior staffers as "travel allowances;" living the high life at pricey restaurants on taxpayer money; winking at obvious conflicts of interest in the community grant program; and the latest, yet to come, but wait on it, over-committing the county's financial resources with such profligacy that the next budget must contain cuts and possibly a proposed property tax increase.

Historically, daily newspapers have been agents of political change. Now, in our community, at a time when the print medium is branded as increasingly irrelevant in an age of citizen bloggers and in-the-moment electronic news broadcasts, the KNS must fulfill the daily newspaper's traditional watchdog role and call for a meaningful investigation into the Mayor's office. One overworked internal auditor with minimal assistance from the state comptroller isn't going to get the job done.

No one is asking that the KNS rush to judgment, but they who have eyes to see and ears to hear know that the continuation of this mayor in office can bring nothing good to Knox County.  Ragsdale relinquished the moral authority to lead some time back. What will it take for the KNS to recognize and act upon this self-evident truth?     

Comments

[Judy B]

Exactly! What's it going to take??? Maybe if he were caught in bed with a live boy or a dead woman (Edwin Edwards used to say that was the only way he would not be elected Gov of LA - years before his subsequent indictment).

Sorry to say I voted for Ragsdale - being unaware of any reason not to. And the KNS endorsed him. The local news media are in a position to investigate and report what is really happening behind the scenes. Gene Patterson used to do that on WATE - has he gone to the dark side? Kay Watson at WBIR is staying on the story and is currently my hero.

So I guess it's up to Metro Pulse, the Shopper, and the internet...
Thanks for taking the KNS to task, Mr VG.