Great post, excellent points. (Did you just land a big government contract or one of those big TVA bonuses or something? Heh.)

I think the nut of the problem is summed up nicely by the quote in this post.

Are all who dissent patriots? Or are some Libertarian radicals? Are only the worthy who dissent able to ascend to the realm of patriots? And who will judge who is worthy? Only the noble. Who among you are the noble? The ones who judge and cast stones? Who in desperation cry out, "See that person, they are a Libertarian hater of all government". Or maybe, just maybe, Jefferson was right. And his words are as correct today as they were in his time. And of course edens will claim Jefferson was not the source. Because the world of New Urbanism must be protected at all costs. Cast out those who doubt the integrity of government. Because government is our collective will. We are the government. And we will choose how to mold and change our society. But there will be dissent. Will you consider the dissent or will you marginalize and diminish the dissent as being the sounds of cranks who cry out at the rain. Only one thing is certain. There will be dissent.

I think you should submit this to the next Bulwer-Lytton Contest.

If I walked into the Small Guvmint Ideology Store and was met by Salesman No. 9, I'd run out screaming. Jim Henley might close the deal, though. I don't think I could pass up that shiny new foreign policy he brags up.

Are we the most self-loathing populace around?

For a City of 178,000 residents Knoxville has a total debt of 235 million dollars. No schools, no libraries, no jails, and no sewer is part of that debt.

(link...)

Where is the self-loathing?

That is $1,320 of debt for each resident.

Now the City proposes adding 139 million dollars to that debt?

For a project that few people know about and even fewer understand?

Has any major project in the last ten years paid for itself or even come close to breaking even?

Self-loathing is not the problem. Self-restraint is the problem.

It is monstrously ironic that so many people in East Tennessee harbor latent or open hostility toward the government.  The government employs an awful lot of us in one way or another.  The government pulled us into modernity -- not without many errors along the way, of course -- via the TVA and the Rural Electrficiation project.  The combined effect of UT and the DOE presence in Oak Ridge is arguably what keeps this area from suffering severe economic swings, as many have noted here before.

It may seem paradoxical, but I see mostly coincidence. I read frustration by many in this region as the inherent characteristic temperament of the individualist which evolved over a few centuries of relative geographic isolation.

The fact that there are many government backed paychecks is mostly irony in the face of what would otherwise be a different landscape. And those feeding at the public trough around here are not usually the ones doing the lashing out, maybe those on the "outside" feel a need to shout a little louder among the complacentocracy.

There are areas of local government, UT, TVA, DOE, and numerous contractors (primarily in Oak Ridge) that perpetuate and support maintaining massive spending within their ranks, and they have little incentive to cut waste or point fingers. There are essential and respectable things these institutions are contributing, but their failure to find ways to sunset programs and missions and employees, along with containing their spending, just makes them another target for cynicism. Your TVA example is good, but it should have been privatized after achieving its original mission.

Yet a vocal core of people in this area is predisposed to lash out at any government initiative and try to kill it in its infancy. Why?

But I'm afraid we're losing sight of the chief upside of government: to enable us to do things that individually we might never be able to make happen.

This waterfront thing is has viability to take off without excessive public spending. Some of us just want to see government spending directed at areas that need the jump start and have fewer prospects to get going from private  initiatives.

Maybe everyone else has been hip to this paradox for a while, but it just hit me.  We hate what keeps us going.  Why is that?

uh, our local leadership recently brought us an unneeded convention center, chopped and sold part of World's Fair Park, and failed to fight closing interstate 40 through downtown. I don't see that where we have been going has always been that impressive. 

the City of Knoxville CFO Dave Hill will be on Lloyd Daugherty's show Tuesday at 8:00 AM. He will be there to answer questions on the South Knox Waterfront.

AM 1180 Radio Free Knoxville

"This plan is based on assumptions of a market that does not exist in Knoxville.

This project must have the West Knoxville customer in order to succeed. That will not happen so the project will fail."

This whole post reminds me of a conversation I had with GT Ballenger Sr.,  the dean of Knoxville's appraisers, in which he assured me that "No house will ever sell for more than $50,000 on Scott Avenue because no house ever had and therefore there'd never be the comps"

The likely condo customers will be from outside the area.  Or they will be newer transplants who don't harbor a negative attitude to the location. 

The offices will be medical offices and won't compete with downtown.   Or they will be a corporate HQ recruited from outside the area.

Customers to the restaurants and shops will come from all over. The restaurants can attract the west knox crowd.  I agree the plan is ambitious but it can proceed without all the retail being built.