Dan Baisden

In Cairo, faith wasn’t passive, it was the center of cultural and social life. Throughout the city's history, people faithfully organized, protested, and demanded change.

To many, Cairo is unknown, but to those that do know the community, recognize its unmatched power in America's story.

Reading Pimblott’s "Faith in Black Power" alongside Chapell’s "Ye That Are Men That Now Serve Him" reminds me how Cairo, Illinois was more than any ordinary American town, it was a battlefield for America’s soul.

"The configuration of social capital is the key in shaping resilient city dynamics. Rather than simply increasing the number of civic organizations, what is most important is how social capital is deployed, called upon, and realized by the actors within a community."

- Sean Safford

"We live in a fragmented society of individuals who have no conception of the common good, no way to come together to pursue a common good, no way to persuade one another what the common good might be, and indeed we believe that the common good does not exist."

- Ted Clayton
iep.utm.edu/p-macint/

"WE'VE ARRANGED A society based on science and technology, in which nobody understands anything about science technology. And this combustible mixture of ignorance and power, sooner or later, is going to blow up in our faces. Who is running the science and technology in a democracy if the people don't know anything about it?" "Science is more than a body of knowledge, it's a way of thinking. A way of skeptically interrogating the universe with a fine understanding of human fallibility. If we are not able to ask skeptical questions, to interrogate those who tell us that something is true, to be skeptical of those in authority, then we're up for grabs for the next charlatan, political or religious, who comes ambling along."

I think a lot about what Carl Sagan said in one of his final interviews.

Had a great week in Omaha Nebraska for the IAP2 Conference to talk about how Engage #FortWayne is leading the way in community engagement.

I had a chance to explore the Old Market Neighborhood and enjoy beautifully crafted social environments and shelter during a tornado warning!

What an honor it was to present at this year's International Association for Public Participation in #Omaha about the work we're doing in #FortWayne with ENGAGE Fort Wayne.

YouTube video by HBO The Dark Money Game | Official Trailer | HBO

Watching The Dark Money Game about the corruption in Ohio's House of Representatives, and talk about an eye-opening documentary!

It exposes the corruption of the Ohio Republican party.

youtu.be/dykZuyO7RUU?...

...and?

Can't wait til May ☘️

Democrats need a leader like ASU President Michael Crow to rescue them | Opinion ASU's Michael Crow is the prototype that Democrats should look for in a leader, someone known less for ideology and more for sheer competence.

As an alumnus of @arizonastateuni.bsky.social I would agree, the @democrats.org need to act more like Crow. It's about the outcomes.

www.azcentral.com/story/opinio...

6th Street looking north on Commercial, probably sometime around 1930.

hickscarworks.blogspot.com/2021/11/

#CairoIllinois #Cairo

And of those, several hundred are kids and young adults.

This is a great piece about Cairo's basketball team and its importance in giving the youth an activity. AND a focal point of pride, grit, and determination where together they can bond and build community in the face of adversity.

Even former HUD Secretary Dr. Ben Carson completely wrote off Cairo on a visit calling the town "dead" and saying residents would be better off if they left.

But Cairo isn't dead. There's still 1,500+ people who call the community home.

Since I first traveled to Cairo, at the junction of the mighty Mississippi and Ohio rivers, the first thing that always came to mind was the youth. Imagine growing up in a place that everyone writes off as dead, decaying, desolate and destroyed.

Don’t Count Them Out: The Impact of Basketball on the Youth of Cairo, Illinois The maroon bleachers. The polished wooden basketball court. The white walls that echo the sounds of squeaky basketball shoes. The Cairo Pilots have been here before. A few months prior, in fact, they....

"We making some strides, some positive changes ... we got some people here that are really fighting for this community ... for these kids."

-Josh Baldwin, Cairo HS Basketball Coach

pulitzercenter.org/stories/dont...

"History, despite its wrenching pain, cannot be unlived, but if faced with courage, need not be lived again."

- Dr. Maya Angelou

#ElaineArkansas #ArkansasDelta #MississippiDelta

Elaine is believed to be the deadliest racial confrontation in Arkansas and bloodiest in American history, but no one ever spoke a word about it in my years of education. That was on purpose, for a century, the history and stories of Elaine were purposely hidden or destroyed.

I am excited to get a copy of Grif Stockley's "Blood In Their Eyes" about the 1919 Elaine Massacre. Are you asking yourself, Elaine Arkansas? Yeah, I did, too, when I first heard about this on a drive to Cairo Illinois working on my Masters thesis.

Shifting Patterns of Social Interaction: Exploring the Social Life of Urban Spaces Through A.I. Founded in 1920, the NBER is a private, non-profit, non-partisan organization dedicated to conducting economic research and to disseminating research findings among academics, public policy makers, an...

This is important research about how public space has shifted.

We know that when people spend less time in public spaces, social and unplanned connections (Granovetter's weak ties) decline.

We have to invest in and focus on more thoughtful and meaningful public spaces.

www.nber.org/papers/w33185

"Screw the argument, win the election."

- James Carville

25 years in radio
Spent a decade at the #1 spot in afternoon drive
Was Program Director of the year twice
Mike Posner, Chainsmokers and The Script are still my favorite artists

The Flooding Will Come “No Matter What”: Climate Change is Already Forcing People From Their Homes The complex, contradictory and heartbreaking process of American climate migration is underway.

The Flooding Will Come “No Matter What”

The complex, contradictory and heartbreaking process of American climate migration is underway.

By @abrahm.bsky.social

The Great Grocery Squeeze How a federal policy change in the 1980s created the modern food desert

Food deserts are not an inevitable consequence of poverty or low population density, and they didn’t materialize around the country for no reason. Something happened. That something was a specific federal policy change in the 1980s.

www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archiv...

A stunning sunset over LaRez in Fort Wayne.

#FortWayne

‘Intangible Heritage’ and How Cities Decide What to Preserve A gay bar. A bookstore. Fresh salt air. We could learn to preserve what matters most to people.

Thorny questions around intangible heritage, or whatever we choose to call it, come down to how we wish to define and enshrine our neighborhoods, our culture and ourselves. The discussion itself is a crucial part of the preservation process.

www.nytimes.com/2024/11/30/a...

Your IKEA product name is your name backwards with an umlaut.

I am LEINÄD, a reliable standing desk.

there are a lot of industrial towns in pennsylvania, but there’s no place like monessen

This is a must read:

'Slow and Sudden Violence' by Derek Hyra