Gatten to Bellamy-Small: Resign.

N&R quotes Gatten at a news conference she called today: "Why do we have this rogue City Council person? Why do we have someone that is obviously spinning out of control?"

Previously on Theater of the Absurd.

UPDATE: Troublemaker's got video of part of the presscon. Gatten also talks about the GPD, voicing "steadfast support for acting chief Bellamy" and referring to "abuses" now under investigation; and calls for a Code of Conduct for the City Council.

Another update: Looks like Holder's got the only video of the speech -- nothing at WFMY, Fox 8, or the daily paper...and nothing on Gatten's website, either. How very 20th Century of them all. Except Troublemaker, of course.

Update on video: Lenslinger says in the comments that Fox 8 has video. Super; next time, let us see it in a timely way, will ya? Boast about your technically-adept footage all you want, but the blogger had much more available, much faster.

Comments

[Fred Gregory]

Flo. You go girl ! Recall is probably not an option but I am not sure what is in the City Charter. Could the council remove on of their own ?

[Don Moore]

Actually, DBS brings to the City Council some of that Fun Political Action that we have only been able to enjoy from our County Commissioners. All we need is the city's version of Mr. Hennis.

[Roch101]

Gatten called a press conference? News to me.

[Ed Cone]

Nobody told me about it. Holder, Hammer, and the N&R were on the list, but I guess it was invitation only.

[David Hoggard]

Ya think she is trying to sound mayorial?

I hear Holliday might be out for the next campaign, perhaps this is Florence's opening volley.

Good volley, though. It won't change anything, but still.... good volley.

[cindy]

Sounds like Gatten has finally spun out of control. She's been teetering angrily for a long time.

Hope DBS's constituents tell Gatten to shut up and mind her own business. Surely she can find something better to do. There's plenty of mess in her district that needs oversight.

Talk about the Queen of Busybodies.

[cindy]

Watched the video.

"Some of us even have a reverence for the law."
"This is our [Greensboro's] finest hour."

And of course, there's the bit about the "I am a victim song", which, gee, doesn't sound at all like sorority-girl bitchiness and race-baited condescension personified.

Gatten's totally gone. Not a glimmer of reality. I suspect there was major head trauma. I realize that she styles herself Queen of Good Old White Greensboro to Jim Melvin's King, but I'm afraid I must call for the resignation of Florence Gatten.

Oh wait -- she was duly elected by the people in our democracy. Never mind. Let the voters decide.

[Jim Rosenberg]

Florence Gatten, I dub thee: Bizarro Cindy Sheehan.

[Danny Wright]

Cindy, I would say that DBS's behavior over the past few months has resembled that of a 5 year-old -- and a poorly behaved one at that. If ever there was a candidate for procedural removal from the Greensboro City Council, Diane Bellamy-Small is it. Don Moore hit the nail on the head; her actions are unbecoming an elected official representing the city of Greensboro.

[Ed Cone]

As an at-large member, Gatten's district is the whole city...

I hear rumors of a fancy new job in Holliday's future, which might free him up to run again...

[Laurie]

Lord, if there is a way to recall her, I'd sure like to do it. I'm tired of not having a city council person from my district.

[Laurie]

Maybe I'll fax her a message that I wish her to resign.

[benholder]

READERS:
Holder was not on any list at all. I was not notified by the city or city council of the press conference. I found it out by an outside source. I was not directly invited.

[Joe Killian]

Cause if you had been...that'd be terrible.

[L]

Actually Ed, we DID have the footage of Gatten's call-out on-line and on-air - and unlike the good Mr. Holder's video, ours didn't trigger epilepsy in the viewing public at large. No offense, Ben - but next time follow an old cameraman adage and 'zoom with your feet'.

Just sayin'.

[Lenslinger]

Lenslinger, that is.

[benholder]

Joe,

The only thing that is terrible is your reporting. Lens...zoom deez nuts.

[John G]

Gatten calls for "A Code of Conduct" for the City Council. Jezz! And all along; I thought there was one. http://www.greensboro-nc.gov/CityGovernment/about/corevalues.htm
Huh? Oh, never mind. That is thier "Core Values" not a code of conduct.

[Joe Killian]

Ben:

I didn't insult your reporting or your camera work. I just suggested it wouldn't have been the worst thing in the world if someone had, as Ed suggested, put you on a list of people who are likely to report things and would like to be informed.

Save the invective for someone who's earned it.

[benholder]

Joe,

You reported "Cause if you had been...that'd be terrible." I knew you meant "it wouldn't have been the worst thing in the world if someone had, as Ed suggested, put you on a list of people who are likely to report things and would like to be informed." But it was really a poor way to report that. And Ed hardly suggested it..he reported it as a fact...without seeing any kind of list...He reported Holder was on it...Holder was not on any list for gatten's speech.

[Patrick]

Boy, you guys like talking about who's a real reporter and who's not. Most people couldn't care less.

I agree that Bellamy-Small is a one-trick pony, and the victim rap is fair. Based on one of her performances I caught on public access TV, we should all just be grateful that she doesn't insist on her constitutional right to sing at council meetings.

Bellamy-Small, however, could never even approach the infuriating, condescending, nails-on-a-chalkboard torment Gatten unleashes every time she opens her mouth, with her 3 points and six verboten sub-points, all foreshadowed at the beginning and repeated at the end, carefully calibrated to *subtly* achieve both primacy and recency. Somebody should tell her "clients" they can go to the first day of anyone's introductory speech communications course and learn all the stuff she's telling them without having to listen to her say it.

And just who is this "legal department" that's advising her about the "only way we can counter potential lawsuits"? Does she mean the City Attorney's office? Is it their job to help city council members avoid slandering other members of the council? If that was advice they gave, someone should tell them about the NY Times v. Sullivan case from 1964 that makes it virtually impossible to defame public figures. Then they can take the rest of the day off, and Gatten can talk down to her colleagues at will.

Is it possible she's running for something?

[Patrick Eakes]

If rudeness is cause for resignation, then Gatten should set the example and jump first.

[Joe Killian]

Ben:

My not thinking it would be a bad thing if people did invite you to a press conference because Ed erroneously assumed you'd been invited makes my reporting terrible how? I didn't do any reporting on this. I just suggested it'd be nice if they WERE inviting bloggers as well as reporters, irrespective of whether they did this time.

Why not just call me ugly and tell me my mother wears combat boots? Makes as much sense and is much more true.

[Lenslinger]

Ouch - a public smiting by the Blogfather. Remind to look for the horse head when I rise in the morning. Seriously though, I'm not ot out to rain on the troublemaker's parade. Instead, I'd love to help all citizen lensers with a few common sense tips. Do I do so to gloat? Perish the thought. I merely want to raise the level of personal video journalism a bit, for I contend that basic camera management will silence the burgeoning form's critics a bit.

See, being new or independent doesn't make it good in and of itself. Nor does a disdain for aesthetics and a cyber-chip on one's shoulder doesn't help the cause of citizen media. I'm biased of course, a little punchy if you will from the blanket assertions that any granny with a lens and a laptop can beat me at my own game merely by throwing away the rule book. It reminds me of the dawn of e-mail, when it was briefly believed that punctuation, grammar and capitalization were unwated shackles of the past. That bugged me too.

[Joe Killian]

Lenslinger - I owe you an old media drink on this one.

The idea that posting police press releases verbatim on your blog or posting a poorly written, poorly sourced, rhetorical nightmare of a blogpost on some subject before the daily paper, television or radio has gotten to giving it an actual story the day after something's happened (or even later in the same day) means you've single handedly proven what crap traditional media is...it's worse than silly.

That doesn't mean bloggers don't have a lot to teach journalists and vice-versa. I feel really lucky to be in the business at this particular time in history. But this animosity between the two groups (and even in a newsroom full of people who don't blog I percieve more from bloggers to journalists than vice-versa) is ridiculous.