Yesterday in St. Petersburg, former mayoral candidate Deveron Gibbons led a group reported to be around 30 who held a news conference in front of City Hall, denouncing Kathleen Ford's comments last week on a radio program as being racially insensitive.
The interview (done with Bubba the Love Sponge) became news on Saturday after it was discovered that Ford quoted Princeton Professor Cornel West's line about "HNIC"(standing for "Head Negro in Charge") when referring to deputy mayor and former police chief Goliath Davis.
Davis was critical of Ford in that Saturday article, and extends his thoughts on the manner this morning in an op-ed published in today's Times.
Entitled, "Don't return to divisiveness, strife" Davis says (in case anybody wasn't certain) that the term is derogatory, and
Individuals I've encountered since Ford's remark was reported by the Times on Saturday find it inconceivable that the local St. Petersburg NAACP president or anyone else could logically conclude that Ford was not referring to me as an HNIC given the immediate juxtaposition of her response to the preceding comments by the radio host describing his opinion of me. Since Ford says she is the "detail" candidate and made specific references to Princeton University professor Cornel West and his theory, her assertion that she did not know the meaning or connotation of the term is also suspect.
Davis goes on to write that he will not call Ford racist, but does question her judgment, as has Bill Foster in the wake of the controversy.
This is a big development, because those are watching this race closely believe the black vote could be the deciding factor in it. Sunday's Times/Bay News poll indicates that close to a quarter of the population is undecided going into the election in two weeks, and this is not positive coverage for Ford.
This article appears in Oct 15-21, 2009.