As often happens, I wholeheartedly agree with Liz Garrigan and her column in this week’s Nashville Scene:

The [mayoral] field is too fragmented, and it amounts to some bad juju for Dean and Briley. So, gentlemen, we know it’s not fair to ask one of the two best candidates in the field to abandon your pursuit. But politics is rarely a fair game. Once Briley’s TV is up and there’s a clear sense of your respective support, one of you needs to get out and throw your support behind the other. Do what’s best for your city. You wouldn’t have to make a pact with the devil—only with one another.

Look, guys, I’ve spent time with both of you on several occasions this year. I think you’re both smart, intelligent people who will lead this city in the direction I’d like to see it go. I wish you were in separate races because I’d likely vote for you both under those circumstances, but unfortunately you’re not.

I fear, as Garrigan does, that neither of you can win while both of you are candidates. If you are genuinely as inclined to act in the city’s best interest as I firmly believe you are, lock yourselves in the same room (leaving your staff members and consultants behind) sometime in the next week or so and figure this thing out. One of you needs to do the right thing for Nashville and leave the race. Whichever one of you does will earn a lot of respect–and future viability–by doing so. Both of you may suffer politically in the long run if you insist on charging ahead in futility.

As happens more often than not, I agree with Liz and her ode to Councilman Eric Crafton in this week’s Scene:

We do conduct our business in English and always have. Not once, as editor of a newspaper that makes frequent requests for public information—and roots around daily in the recesses of government offices for documents and other city goings-on—have we encountered an arrest record, a legal filing, a personnel file, an interview with a bureaucrat, or any other manifestation of municipal business in a non-English format. Well, except for the usual Metro-mangling of the English language—e.g., “let me have him to call you,” “you can quote me per beta,” or the classic plea for secrecy, “I need this to be unanimous.” (And there’s always the Metro Council favorite: “I have a qwerstion….”) …

That said, you have accomplished wonders in uniting some of the city’s most fragmented factions. There could not be a more widely assorted, contradictory cast of characters who find your intention repulsive. The Scene and Bishop David Choby…on the same side? Liberadio! and the Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce? Bizpigs and African American clergy? The list of multifarious hand-holders who have come together for what may be the first and last time goes on and on—a testament to how spurious and ill-motivated your scheme truly is …

Here you are, assuming that others who find themselves needing to learn a new language don’t have the same willingness and eagerness you did. It’s unfounded. No doubt when you were in Japan you tried to speak the language the best you could, but you probably needed a little sympathetic assistance from time to time—a stranger recognizing your effort, and reaching to meet you halfway. That’s all your mob of critics is saying.

Instead, by saying you’ll back the effort to put the measure on the August ballot, you’re assuming the worst of people in (or off) the same boat. And by trying to create a law where none is required, you’re diluting the good nature of Nashville’s citizens.

The last point here is the one that bugs me the most. This is a great place to live with a lot of kind-hearted people in it. We’re consistently named the nation’s friendliest city (although occasionally not to the homeless), and there are wonderful and amazing things taking place here as people continue to discover and explore Nashville. Yes, we have problems, but our ability to communicate in English is not one of them. How does this help us when we have bigger problems, including Dickerson Pike, to tackle?

Thanks also to Garrigan and the Scene for reviving her weekly editorial. Yes, it’s been adapted into a column headlined “Garrigan” apparently because Scene corporate owner the Village Voice has a no-editorial policy, but it’s still the same good read that is usually my first stop in each week’s issue. Garrigan is a knowledgeable and convincing writer, one who is married to likely incoming deputy mayor Curt Garrigan. It will be a shame if Garrigan (Liz) has to curtail her city politics coverage when her husband assumes the post. Granted, Liz is reportedly expecting soon, so readers can likely anticipate at least a temporary hiatus one way or another.

According to the City Paper, Lieutenant Governor John Wilder claims he will be re-elected speaker of the state Senate in January. I hope he is wrong.

Wilder (D-Mason) has served as speaker of the Senate and therefore lieutenant governor since 1971, surviving attempts by both Republicans and Democrats to oust him. The most recent effort came in 2005 when, with the Republicans holding a 17-16 majority, the GOP tried to oust him, but two Republican senators crossed party lines and voted for Wilder.

In January, another vote can be held to elect the Senate speaker, and again the Republicans hold a 17-16 majority. One Republican who voted for Wilder in 2005, Sen. Mike Williams (R-Maynardville), remains noncommittal on whom he will support in January – Wilder or the Republican nominee, Senate Majority Leader Ron Ramsey (R-Blountville).

Senator Williams has every right to vote for whichever candidate he thinks is in the state’s best interests, and I sincerely hope that he will not vote for Wilder on those grounds. As I’ve previously mentioned, in my opinion it is time for someone else to hold this important position. This is not a partisan issue for me: It’s more important to me that the speaker be someone other than Wilder than anything else. I very much agree with Liz Garrigan’s recent column on this subject.

This is by no means the first time, but I wholeheartedly agree with Scene editor Liz Garrigan that Tennessee’s Lieutenant Governor John Wilder should be replaced when the General Assembly returns in January.

Last year, when a handful of state lawmakers were indicted on bribery and corruption charges, Wilder condemned not the behavior of profiteering and unscrupulous public officials but instead the federal government for offering “bait to get someone in jail.” His interest is with the small cadre of those who have embalmed him politically, not with the millions of Tennesseans who count on sound policy regarding health care, taxes and other state issues.

We frankly find it troubling that, during 35 years of power, Wilder has yet to risk his hide over any meaningful principle, issue or ideology. As a speaker with nothing worthwhile to say—and, we might add, a tenuous grasp on both standard methods of communication and basic English grammar—his greatest political accomplishment is self-preservation…

We’d urge party elders to try again in the upcoming legislative session. Keeping a cartoon character behind the Senate podium is a good way to get Tennessee on The Daily Show, but that’s about it.

Well said. Here’s hoping Tennessee has a new speaker of the Senate in 2007.