Kilpatrick Surrendered

The Rise, Fall & Revolution of Kwame Kilpatrick
1. Auflage 2012
ISBN: 978-1-61339-246-1
Verlag: Made For Success Publishing
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: Adobe DRM (»Systemvoraussetzungen)

E-Book, Englisch, 100 Seiten

Reihe: 9.59

Autoren/Hrsg.

Kilpatrick, Kwame

Leseproben

prologue
We’re not always a forgiving nation. We do intolerance and rigidity when it fits our purpose. ~TIM KEOWN, ESPN columnist KWAME MALIK KILPATRICK, the former mayor of the City of Detroit who is currently serving a one-and-a-half to five-year prison sentence for violating terms of his probation, is a brilliant man. That’s no understatement. He is one of the most intelligent individuals I have ever known. I should qualify that statement. U.S. President Bill Clinton was known for remembering the names of people he’d shake hands with in even the most obscure places, such was his gift of recall. Kwame also has that ability. His retention skills sometimes seem photographic. He’s a natural conversationalist and possesses that rare, innate talent that makes just about everyone feel at ease in nearly any social setting. He’s also clear on his abilities, which makes him very confident. His decisions tend to come quickly and resolutely. If he says, “Let me think about that,” he doesn’t waste a lot of time. He returns with a decision, and an argument to support it. But even in disagreement, he remains affable and open to other perspectives. He is one of those individuals who balances a firm strength of conviction with a fair-minded quality of temperance. Needless to say, it’s a disarming quality for adversaries, but fortunately, Kwame rarely meets an enemy. He is a humanist who sees the natural good in people. That might have hurt him early in his career, but more on that later. I’ve communicated with Kwame several times a week for the past two and a half years, and we’ve disagreed on things, but we have never argued or debated. We shared points and counterpoints, and arrived at amicable decisions befitting successful writing partners. All of the aforementioned observations amount to good leadership skills. But Kwame’s most impressive quality, his sense of compassion for people in need, probably clashed with his most glaring fault, professional immaturity, and created a perfect storm of controversy and conspiracy that ruined his career. He went from a rising star to one of the most scandalized political leaders in American history. This book explores it all. Among the many details in that “perfect storm,” Mayor Kilpatrick had a vision for Detroit, and the chops to make it reality. Perhaps his willingness to enforce checks and balances threatened the wrong peoples’ bottom lines. Striking an imposing figure at 6’4”, and being black and assertive in a city with a long history of racial discord didn’t help, either. The other element of that storm was the personal strain the Kilpatrick household endured, due to the pressures of his job. This is where Kwame’s maturity failed him. His actions and reactions regarding his personal life and his underestimation of the dangerous political atmosphere around him led to his downfall. If a perfect storm is a convergence of critical events that aggravates a situation, then Kwame Kilpatrick’s story qualifies as a hurricane. My fear, even as we go to press, is that the storm continues to rage, and that this book could either balance public perspective or further upset it, leading to his federal trial. I’m afraid that some of Kwame’s enemies wouldn’t mind seeing him dead, not just imprisoned. In a society that is fiercely individualistic and too singular of thought to concern itself with, be outraged over, or suspicious of the kind of conspiracies that claimed the lives of icons during the Civil Rights era, it’s not far-fetched to think it could happen to him. Kwame wrote me from prison about two weeks before I composed this prologue and asked me to be brutally honest in my process—specifically, about my opinion of him. I initially thought it odd to ask a supporter to lend a public critique, but he truly wanted me to disclose my true feelings about him and his situation, even after working so closely together for such an extended time. I’ve been a proverbial fly on the wall of his life for more than two years. But after some thought, I understood and respected his rationale. I’ve felt the same fear as Kwame’s one-time supporters, who have distanced themselves from him, either out of fear of career suicide or frustration. On the latter point, Kwame is loyal, possibly to a fault, and some believe that individuals in his administration created enemies for him, even as he made allies. He may offer a different opinion on that assertion, but the conversation certainly made rounds in Detroit political circles. How much loyalty it cost him is anyone’s guess, but I can understand why he would want to know what his remaining allies think of his situation. It’s akin to the question Jesus asked the Disciples—”Who do you say I am?”—just days before His crucifixion. The Disciples tried to dodge the question at first, describing what others said about him, but when Jesus pressed, only one, Peter, spoke up. The others masked their doubt with silence. At times, I have doubted Kwame during this process. It’s hard not to when newspapers run salacious headlines almost weekly. The political atmosphere in Detroit became overwhelmingly negative, and the city became emotionally depressed. To Kwame’s credit, however, he never ducked. I took my doubts to him in the form of questions, and he responded, apolitically. I also paid close attention to the feelings of people in the streets. Neighborhoods are great sources of intuition. So-called everyday folk often sense what they don’t see. And those on the streets overwhelmingly sensed that something was not right in the press’s portrayal of Kilpatrick. I soon became convinced that the media had as much of an agenda in his saga as anyone. I also became convinced, after much interaction, that if Kwame were mayor of Detroit today, he’d not only be in his third term, but would be considered by many as one of Detroit’s most progressive mayors. Beyond his faults, he truly believed he owed the people of Detroit his service. His eye on community development and his empowerment of his staff to fulfill that vision with a certain degree of autonomy would have, ten years on, triggered an educational resurgence that by now would have resulted in a sharper sense of professionalism among Detroiters, most of whom are African-American. That would have triggered pride, which would have encouraged neighborhood care, cleanliness, concern, and heightened safety. In short, people would be happier and hopeful. I’m not saying things would be perfect, but I believe they would be better. Detroit would still be in the national conversation as a city that matters, instead of being described as a town whose time has come. I think Kwame, as he’ll describe by finally telling his story in this book, had the ability to lead such a charge. I have other opinions on the former mayor. To me, his youth was both a blessing and a curse. To voters, it’s sexy to be young, smart and talented. It’s also dangerous if you are not attuned to the dangers of image, and the depth of the ever-present political cesspool. Kwame knew these dangers existed, but I truly believe he thought he could build bridges over them by embracing them, when he should have protected himself more carefully. His vision clashed with the city’s wealthy and elite, and damn how much they liked him, he wasn’t good for their bottom line. Those kinds of people are usually eliminated, by removal from position, or even death. My problem with Kwame—my friend, brother and cousin (full disclosure: we are related by marriage, but I am also very close to some of the people who, at times, disagreed with him – Detroit is “towny” that way)—is his rose-colored perspective that keeps him from protecting himself. He gives people too much credit. Other than that, the only thing I believe he actually did wrong, without outside influence, was cheat on his wife, and then lie about it under oath. That’s a misdemeanor and, in a just world, he would have gotten no more than 90 days in jail for being a first-time, non-violent offender, and his future would be left to the druthers of the voters in the next election. But in this scenario, he wouldn’t have resigned, and he wouldn’t be in prison today. I wanted to help Kwame write this book because innocence is not nearly as much of a question in his case as is fairness. He is not a villain, as the local media and the Wayne County prosecutor have characterized him. And the only way anyone will come to understand that is by reading his story—uninterrupted and unreported. I also wanted to help him because Kwame Kilpatrick is too valuable not to become a contributor to someone’s community, if not Detroit’s. Talent like his is uncommon, and he was at once blessed and unfortunate to be given control of a major city before he had firm control of his own life. A mature Kwame Kilpatrick, however, would be like a mature Malcolm, a mature Tupac Shakur. Today, he is ferociously visionary, and consistently representative of the people. For once, we need to preserve those of this ilk, place their imperfections in perspective, and protect them from those for whom money and power are all that matter. The last reason I wanted to help him is that, even as this book goes to press, the Detroit media has firmly established itself as the sole biographer of Kwame’s professional history. That’s just flat-out...