N&R editor Jeff Gauger responds to last week’s NYT editorial on the supposed decline of North Carolina —with (gag) cornpone humor:
“Vern, did you see that editorial about North Carolina?”
“Huh?”
“Did you see the editorial The New York Times wrote about North Carolina, the one that made us look heartless and backward?”
“I don’t bother with that crap.”
“Vern, you get your face out of your buttery grits this instant. Listen to me. Now!”
“Wha–”
You’re on your own, dear reader, to try and determine if Gauger actually agrees with the NYT. With that in mind, check the conclusion of Gauger’s column on Gboro’s downtown teen curfew:
Downtown has come far, and it is now at a tipping point. What I want to hear from the candidates is what they want downtown to become.
An urban scene with people of multiple cultures, varied household incomes and, yes, ages mixing?
Or the preserve of downtown dwellers, those blessed to work downtown and the comfortably well off who can visit for an evening of thee-ah-tuh and escargot?
That’s a newspaper editor for you —an elitist mocking the elite. No doubt Gauger was the inspiration for Joe Killian’s front-pager that makes (imagine that) Gboro’s problems downtown a race issue (question -do the people in the photo look ‘upscale’ to you?).
I’ll say what I’ve always said about municipalities pushing high-density urban living because it’s so cool and so good for the environment because nobody will have to drive their cars anymore because everybody catch a streetcar or share bikes: —when you encourage large groups of people to share small space, inevitably you’re going to have conflict, and you need to be prepared to deal with it. Evidently Greensboro isn’t.
