Tuesday, August 14, 2007
The Dog Days of Summer
Yes, posting has been nearly non-existent lately. Part of this has been due to too much work at the firm (heck, I had two trials last Friday - a mistake I will never do again). However, part of the slow times here at VOLuntarilyConservative have to do with slow times - period.
Nothing much is going on.
Yes, the Ames Straw Poll occurred, but no one bothered to show up - either in the way of candidates or voters (participation was down 50% from the last contested Ames Straw Poll in 1999).
Knox County has been interesting lately, as the Knoxville News-Sentinel has been resembling an actual newspaper, exposing the multitude of scandals in the Knox County government involving credit card misuse, Knox County Commissioners apparently committing perjury (because, in reading the story, either Paul Pinkston lied under oath or Larry Clark did, as their stories simply don't add up), grant money being handed out to friends and relatives of elected officials, and Knox County's laughable attempts to have the valid lawsuit filed by the KNS regarding violations of the Sunshine Law thrown out of court.
And y'all keep asking why I haven't decided to enter the mess that is Knox County politics...
(A quick note - in the story regarding the criminal appointment process linked to above, I can back up the story of Knox County Commissioner Larry Smith. I did receive a call from Larry several days prior to the coronation of the new commissioners, at which time we spoke of my vision for county government and what I perceived to be early signs that something was gravely wrong with the entire process.)
But this is a good time of the year for me, too, folks.
While I am quite stoked that football season is right around the corner (just 18 days until IT'S FOOTBALL TIME IN TENNESSEE!!!), it's also that time of the year that I reflect on what has been over the past 12 months. While with the Alliance Defense Fund's Blackstone Fellowship, I met with Dr. Bob Biehl, one of those guys that major corporations bring in to speak with their management staff in order to make them better at their jobs. We spoke on many topics, but one thing has stuck with me through the years - the importance of managing your life through reflection. Now I know that it took me some time to buy into this, and many of you now are probably thinking that it's some new age psycho-garbage. Fair enough. However, I ask this question: how often do you think about where you have come from? I guess I am one of the converted in that I find it hard to plot a path to where you want to go without at least recognizing where you have been. A good deal of my time counseling clients has to do with this very subject, because so many of them are only living in the "now" and have no concept of tomorrow or yesterday.
I mention this today because it is my annual time of reflection. Dr. Biehl imparted on me the need to take an annual assessment of my life. While I constantly become too busy (too busy to work-out, too busy to hike, too busy to fish, too busy to spend time with my friends, too busy to blog, too busy to golf...), I intentionally carve out some time around my birthday to just think about what has been and where I need to go. I suppose that many people may do this around New Year's, but it just seems too inconvenient of a time with Christmas celebrations (and with little Baby Huddleston coming this Christmas season, impossible this year) and New Year's plans to achieve any real analysis of your life during that time for me.
In any case, with the news cycle being relatively non-existent (with the exception of the Nashville mayoral contest, in which I would have voted for one of these two men) and football being a few weeks away, this is the best time for recharging the old batteries and seeing if they are adequate for the future. Maybe if it cools off a bit, then I might even catch up on some of that hiking, too.
Labels: 2008 GOP Presidential Primary, Home, Knox County Politics
