"Snark Bites" 2/15-21

2/20
TBI Shuts Down Knox Trustee's "All-You-Can-Eat" Employee Lunch Buffet
"I asked TBI to help me with my New Year's Diet resolution," says Trustee Sisk

From APB reports. KNOXVILLE, Tenn. Employees of the Knox County Trustee's office were compensated with hundreds of thousands of food items in an employees-only all-you-can-eat buffet over the past two years, including one who got $182,000 worth of roast beef, mac 'n' cheese, mashed potatoes and green beans beyond his base meal allotment. Trustee Fred Sisk, who said he recently started a strict diet of non-buffet food only, called for an investigation into the office's buffet system by the Tennessee Buffet Investigators.

Sisk said he asked for the TBI investigation after firing operations manager John Haun, 43, earlier this month after he discovered Haun was "using the system to give himself unauthorized breakfasts, dinners and take-home meals." At the time, Sisk estimated Haun's buffet overeating was "approaching 5 or 6 belt notches."

Records obtained by the News Sentinel this week show Haun consumed about 195,440 cafeteria-style French fries from the buffet last year and 122,888 in 2007, far more than his regular allotment of about 68,000 fries a year. His extra compensation was categorized primarily as comped meals.

"My diet is an ongoing struggle," Sisk said. "The employee buffet part of it, I trusted to somebody else. I asked for the TBI to come in and look at the full menu and the overall operation. When they get through, we'll have a clean bill of health for everybody, even if we all end up in Overeaters Anonymous."

The trustee's office collects taxes for the county.

Sisk explained that "comped meals" represents meals accumulated by employees if they were dissatisfied with service, unhappy with the selection or otherwise had specific complaints about the buffet.

Sisk declined to release his office buffet meal records, however, citing a directive from the Knox County Diner's Clubs Office.

Rachel Ray, special consultant to the Diner's Club, said Thursday that the records are part of an ongoing employee weigh-in and won't be released.

"They appeared to be going whole hog at the public trough," giggled Ray. "So we're weighing employees and checking before and after weights, then comparing the weights with meals charged at the buffet, to try to figure out who may have benefited most from ill-gotten nanner puddin'. How good is that?"...

2/19
UT Plans 'Revolving-Door Presidency'
Bowing to reality, UT board announces plans to recruit presidential candidates guaranteed to be 'gone in 60 months or less"

From APB reports. KNOXVILLE, Tenn. In the face of President John Petersen's sudden resignation, the third president to do so this millennium, UT's Board of Trustees yesterday accepted the inevitable and began making plans to incorporate a "revolving-door" presidency into the university's mission statement. The board also announced plans to aggressively pursue a "Gone in 60 Months" approach to hiring new presidents.

To symbolize the university's new strategy, Jan Simek, distinguished professor of anthropology at UT Knoxville, will be appointed as UT's first official short-term "Revolving-Door" president, with a term guaranteed to be 2 years or less. In the meantime, Petersen took credit for instigating the university's refocus on short-timers.

"This was my choice," Petersen, 61, said during a press conference at Andy Holt Tower. "It seems like if you're going to transition to somebody else, you need to recognize our new economic reality, in which short-term jobs rule. I also thought it important to follow in the footsteps of the proud tradition begun by President J Wade Gilley of going out in a blaze of controversy. It just seemed like an appropriate time -- we've done a lot of what I came here to accomplish."

"We've tried everything, and it just doesn't work," said board of trustees vice chairman, Nashville lawyer Jim Murphy. "We rearranged the furniture in the president's office. We fumigated the president's house. We even brought in exorcist to drive out 'spirits of incompatibility' from the university. It's time we accepted the inevitable truth: We're a career dead zone."

Asked to explain what he meant, Murphy expounded at length.

"In simplest terms, we're the rock career ships founder on, the hurdle that vaulting ambition can't clear, the occasion when overweening pride gets weaned off, the secret place where once promising professional futures go to die," said Murphy. "And it's about time we adjusted our recruiting strategies to reflect that reality. Because we can use it to our advantage. There are benefits to us and benefits to the candidates if we just admit that they ain't gone be around long enough for their boots to get old..."

2/17
County Commission Resigns from Itself as Commissioners Seek to Obey Law
"But you're gonna miss us!" cries defiant Chairman Strickland

From APB reports. KNOXVILLE, Tenn. In a stunning display of exaggerated caution, Knox County commission took steps this morning to bring themselves into compliance with the law regarding membership on boards and committees by resigning from itself.

"Effective immediately, the entire 19-member Knox County Commission is resigned from itself," announced Knox County Commission Chairman Thomas "Tank" Strickland at a special meeting on the issue this morning.

"It's not as if most of us weren't already resigned to our lot anyway," added Vice Chairman Craig Leuthold. "But trying to suss out this law was really putting a dent in our sense of importance. Knowing that whether we chose to err on the side of caution or courage, there would be those who criticized our choice, we decided to make the best of a bad situation and just go ahead and err..."

"Snark Bites" 2/08-14/09

2/14
Knox Area Legislator Asked to Produce 'Certificate of Sanity'
"If he's sane, surely he has the documents to prove it," says citizens group

From APB reports. KNOXVILLE, Tenn. State Rep. Stacey Campfield of Knoxville has been asked to prove that he is of sound mind after joining Frank Niceley of Strawberry Plains and House Republican Caucus Chairman Glen Casada as supporters of a lawsuit trying to force President Barack Obama to turn over a copy of his birth certificate.

Campfield acknowledged that he, along with Nicely, Casada and Rep. Eric Swafford, R-Pikeville, would back a lawsuit to be filed by the Darn, Our Derangement's Obvious Squad (DODOS), which regurgitates the hoary chestnut that Obama may have been born outside of the United States. Campfield acknowledged that he joined the suit to draw attention to himself and be a general nuisance.

"Look at me! Look at me!" said Campfield. "I'm pestering the president! I'm important! I'm somebody! Look at me, look at me! Blast it, look at me, I said!"

Members of the National Organization to Defend Our Democracy from Obstinate Stupidity (NODODOS) say that this is just the latest in a series of outrageous, unproductive stunts Campfield has pulled during his tenure in the state legislature - stunts that only distract from the job he is supposed to be doing.

NODODOS contends that Campfield's constant posturing and support of silly legislation are signs of mental illness. The citizen's group is demanding that he produce a "certificate of sanity..."

2/13
County Mayor Eyes Sunshine Institute
"After losing the Sunshine Lawsuit, Knox County is the logical location for it," says Ragsdale

From APB reports. KNOXVILLE, Tenn. Gov. Phil Bredesen's call for a new institute dedicated to the Open Meetings Act, also known as the Sunshine Law, has caught the attention of Mike Ragsdale.

Knox County's mayor on Thursday called for local officials to work "very aggressively" on a proposal that would create a home for the Sunshine Institute locally. During a meeting of the board of The Development Corporation of Knox County, Ragsdale cited the City County Building and the proposed Midway Industrial Park as possible locations for the institute. The mayor also mentioned the possibility of hosting an online "virtual Sunshine Institute" at the URL currently hosting the County Commission Chat Room, "because that's mostly just a vacuum of wasted cyberspace right now."

"Because Knox County lost the landmark Sunshine Lawsuit in 2007, it's only logical that Knox County should be the home for the Sunshine Institute," declared Ragsdale.

The mayor suggested that county commissioners consider donating records of the Sunshine Lawsuit they lost for the institute. Ragsdale professed his hope that the institute could be located "outside the fence, in the sunshine, out of the shadows, in broad daylight," apparently a reference to his preference that the the institute be located someplace sunny. He also suggested that the current contretemps between tempestuous current Knox County Commissioner "Our" Larry Smith and pugnacious former commissioner Scott "Scoobie" Moore be used as a case study for the institute.

Mike Edwards, president and CEO of the Development Corp., concurred with Ragsdale's suggestion.

"There's nothing we ought to go harder after than what you're saying," he said. "Having the 'Our' Larry-Scoobie Moore donnybrook as a showcase of bad government would be a perfect symbol for how hard up Knox County is."

Edwards added that the Development Corp. should engage the City of Knoxville, the University of Tennessee and TVA about the proposal.

"All local governmental, quasi-governmental and pseudo-governmental entities should be involved in this institute," he said. "Except, of course, for the Development Corp. We're special..."

2/12
TVA Board: Recycled Coal Waste PR 'Has Many Uses'
Reams of press releases "can be made into paper dolls and hats" says chairman

From APB reports. Long before a coal ash spill deluged a rural Roane County neighborhood, TVA was spreading million of tons of publicity materials from its coal-fired power plants - as recycled materials.

"Yes, we are taking these PR materials and we are reducing the amount that goes into landfills and beneficially reusing them," said TVA Chairman Over T. Transom at yesterday's TVA Board of Directors meeting. "They are good products for paper dolls and hats, for example."

PR is just one naturally occurring byproduct of coal ashification.

Some activist groups have warned consumers of the possibility of high levels of casuistry, suggestio falsi, artifice, equivoque, canards, tergiversation, perfidies, prevarication and dissimulation in reused PR materials, and at the very least, they say users should be wary of ink smudges. TVA President and CEO Kilmore Trout scoffed at the notion.

"PR is one of the few things in life that can reduce consumer pressure on and improve the acceptance of" a company without producing any tangible benefit to the consumer, said Trout.

Transom countered that up to 70 percent of the PR material is pulp, roughly 20 percent is cellulose fiber and about 10 percent is chicanery, with only tiny amounts of ink.

"So when they talk about the ink smudges, they are talking about only faint trace marks ... because it is such a small concentration," Transom said.

PR materials "are about as toxic as Muzak," said Michael McDonald with the Center for American Public Relation Studies...

2/10
County Law Director Declares 'Government Quarantine'
"Until further notice, county officials must keep their hands to themselves," says Lockett

From APB reports. KNOXVILLE, Tenn. Knox County Law Director Bill Lockett said Monday he has declared county government officials under quarantine until further notice. Apparently already weary of the constant scandal eruptions after only months in office, Lockett said county officials were "a danger to citizens from exposure to a scandal bug" and that they were to "keep their feet on the straight-and-narrow, their heads out of the clouds, their eyes peeled, their ears open, their mouths shut, their noses to the grindstones and their hands to themselves."

Suiting words to deeds, Lockett last week sent a letter to county commissioners advising them to resign from any boards they had appointed themselves to. On Monday Lockett also filed a motion in Knox County Chancellor John Weaver's court that "seeks to extricate Knox County from the dirty deeds case" that Knox county joined with Bradley Mayes against Natural Resources Recovery of Tennessee. In his motion, Lockett declared that the county's continuing inclusion in the case could expose "innocents to a scandal contagion."

"County officials seem to have contracted some form of the buffoonic plague," wrote Lockett. "They may have been exposed to it from dirty money that had been mixed in with the mulch. Or possibly from serving in government with Scott 'Scoobie' Moore. But, in any event, it appears to be highly toxic to higher brain functions, and the farther county officials are from that mulch, the better. Because that stuff stinks."

Lockett also appointed private investigator Thomas Magnum to conduct an investigation into the county's relationship with the mulch to determine if the buffoonic plague had indeed originated there.

The investigation into the county-mulch relationship was called for by Weaver. He chastised the (county) Department of Engineering and Public Works for allowing county officials to "play in the mulch without supervision..."

"Snark Bites" 02/1-7/09

2/6
Knox County to Host 'Big Mouths' Festival
"It's the perfect fit!" proclaims Mayor Ragsdale

From APB reports. KNOXVILLE, Tenn. The idea behind the Big Mouths Festival, organized by AC Entertainment, is to meld some of the most creative and important experimental entertainment acts with the perfect backdrop for cognitive dissonance - Knox County, Tennessee.

"Yes, being headquartered in Knox County gave us the idea for the festival," confirmed AC Entertainment President Ashley Capps. "Avant-garde or experimental music and entertainment can seem to be abrasive, atonal and dissonant, but it can also be meditative, droning, somnolent, and occasionally, it even makes sense - which pretty much sums up Knox County politics. So we thought, 'Why not bring these elements together and put on a really big show?' That's how the Big Mouths Festival came about."

The resulting event is a sprawling music and entertainment festival that kicks off today at the Knoxville Museum of Art with an "Alive After Five" performance by Romanian Gypsy Punk band The Luminescent Orchestri. The weekend then rolls on, pairing eclectic avant-garde musical acts such as composer Phillip Glass and chamber-pop act Antony and the Johnsons with a variety of entertainment performed by local officials from both city and county.

"The Big Mouths Festival is an important step in the evolution of Knox County entertainment," said Dwight Van de Vate, PR specialist and talent scout for Knox County Mayor Mike Ragsdale. "As you know, Mayor Ragsdale has been honing his 'Stand-Up Mayor' routine for months, anticipating an appearance on a revival of 'The Gong Show.' But this festival may be the chance for him to get his foot in the mouth- errr, door."

"The Big Mouth Festival is the perfect fit for Knox County!" exclaimed Mayor Ragsdale. "What could be more appropriate? I mean this is no one-size-fits-all type of foot-in-mouth measurement we're talking here! We're talking big mouths, large mouths, mouths of stature. And nobody's got mouths of more stature than us!"

Besides classic bits from Ragsdale's stand-up routine, such as "Seven Words I Wish You Couldn't Say in Knox County (Audit, Investigate, Impound, Impeach, Impanel, Indict, Imprison), "Take My P-Card...PLEASE!" and "When I Think about Me, I Clear Myself," the mayor is expected to add a magic trick to his repertoire. Word of the stunt has already generated considerable buzz.

In the act, Ragsdale, in tandem with Knox County Commissioner Paul Pinkston, will attempt to make $154,000 in discretionary funds for the county mayor and county commissioners vanish. The two will then fight a duel of words to determine who actually gets to take credit for the magic trick...

2/2
Knox Meteorologists: Secret Masochists?
"We enjoy being wrong," say prominent weather casters

From APB reports. KNOXVILLE, Tenn. In light of their latest round of missed snow predictions, local forecasters are coming forward and acknowledging that they enjoy having jobs in which they're usually wrong.

Matt Hinkin, a member of WATE Channel 6's 6 Storm Team, said it was hard at first to admit he took pleasure in being wrong so often. But once he got accustomed to it, the pain grew on him.

"I have to say, I didn't want to admit it to myself, but what really made me want to be a TV meteorologist was knowing that I'd have the chance every day to sort of go into hundreds of thousands of households and embarrass myself by telling folks something they basically knew was going to be wrong," said Hinkin. "The constant humiliation, the neighbors yelling in the morning, 'Hey, Matt! You forecast sunny skies! Better take an umbrella, har, har, har!" - all of that, it kind of hits you like an adrenaline rush. Once you get used to it, you don't want it to stop. It keeps you going. Seriously, to do what we do, you have to like the pain."

It's the constant challenge of delivering the same inaccurate forecast that delights WVLT Volunteer TV Channel 8 Super Pinpoint 8 chief meteorologist Scott Blalock.

"You want to know how I ended up forecasting in Knoxville, Tennessee?" said Blalock. "When I was in weather school, I asked my advisor, 'Where's the most miserable place to try to forecast the weather?' That's how I ended up here. With the plateau on one side and the mountains on the other and the air getting trapped in the valley sometimes and the heat absorption as we continue to cut down and pave over formerly forested areas, it's absolutely brutal to try to forecast the weather here. Doing your absolute level best to get the prediction right, knowing full well that come the morning, thousands of people are going to be stepping out their front doors saying, 'Well, Blalock got it wrong again.' It's addictive. It's painful. And I like it..."

2/1
Knox Area Super Bowl Predictions
Knox officials weigh in on NFL championship game

From APB reports. KNOXVILLE, Tenn. With Pilot Travel Centers President and CEO Jimmy Haslam rooting in Super Bowl XLIII for the Pittsburgh Steelers, a team of which he is now a minority owner, other area officials weighed in on the big game. Haslam's brother, Knoxville Mayor Bill Haslam, said that he would be rooting for the Arizona Cardinals because of "friendly sibling rivalry."

"Jimmy and I have always been a little competitive," acknowledged Haslam. "So if he's got the Steelers, I'm taking the Cardinals. D'ya hear me, redbirds? Whup some Pitt butt!"

In his last official act before resigning his term-limited seat on City Council, Knoxville Vice Mayor Mark Brown said that the Knoxville City Council would unanimously line up behind Mayor Haslam.

"We discussed it among ourselves on Market Square the other day, pulling in several passersby to share their opinions so as not to violate the Sunshine Law," said Brown. "We were all in agreement that we saw no reason to fight the mayor on this issue and could unanimously support him on his Super Bowl initiative. Go Cards!"

Former County Commissioner Diane Jordan, who is rumored to be interested in Brown's council seat, is also supporting the Cardinals, but not out of solidarity with the mayor.

"No, it's because those Steeler outfits are so drab, although those Cardinal costumes could use some sprucing up, too," remarked Jordan. "Accenting those helmets with some strikingly iridescent plumage would be a fashionable touch. And if elected to council, that's what I'll bring: innovative ideas and fashion sense..."

"Snark Bites" 1/25-31

1/30
Fear of Snakes Stops Judicial Commissioner Candidate
Would have to deal with them all the time as commissioner

From APB reports. KNOXVILLE, Tenn. Knox County General Sessions Court judges on Thursday rejected one judicial commissioner appointed by County Commission earlier in the week and approved another with strings attached, but didn't explain why he had to be tied up with string. Judicial commissioners are licensed attorneys who sign criminal warrants and conduct the initial court appearances of prisoners.

In a letter to County Commission Chairman Thomas "Tank" Strickland and copied to all commissioners, General Sessions Court Presiding Judge Andrew Jackson VI wrote that the appointment of Assistant Deputy Law Director David Creekmore was "not approved," apparently because of his longstanding fear of snakes. Meanwhile, the appointment of Knoxville Vice Mayor Mark Brown was "conditionally approved, pending whether Mr. Brown can snatch the string from his finger."

Jackson asked that Commission act quickly to replace Creekmore as an appointee, indicating his preference for a snake charmer in the position. The judge did not, however, offer an explicit reason for the decision either in the letter itself or in an interview with a reporter.

"He was not approved. Other than that and saying that, in this job, you have to deal with snakes all the time, I can't comment," Jackson said.

Law Director Bill Lockett said he was surprised by the decision but wouldn't ask for an explanation.

"When I'm surprised or puzzled or confused by the mysterious ways of judges, I don't ask for explanations," Lockett said. "I don't think that's proper. It's not showing sufficient deference. They prefer to cast this impenetrable veil of inscrutability over their proceedings, and I bow down before that. Because I'm only a lawyer, and I know what's good for me..."

1/29
UT: $416,000 in Bonuses "Proves the Importance of Education"
Dumb PR move said to be part of overall strategy to answer the question, "Is our administration learning?"

From APB reports. KNOXVILLE, Tenn. The $416,000 in bonuses the University of Tennessee's development staff will receive is part of an overall strategy to show how much the UT administration could have learned from its own public relations classes, said President John Petersen.

"Awarding these bonuses demonstrates how clueless UT's administration is," explained Petersen. "And in doing so, it shows how important education is. Just think how much better we'd have handled this if we'd actually taken some of our own PR courses."

Petersen went on to explain that awarding the bonuses was part of an overall strategy to demonstrate the administration's incompetence.

"Oh, yes," said Petersen. "The bonuses are just a small part of an overall strategy of impotence. You can count on more moves like this one garnering us more bad press in the coming fiscal year. We're hoping to demonstrate such a crying need for our own education that we start getting donations out of sheer pity."

UT explained the details of the "Administration Incompetence Compensation Plan" Wednesday, even as UT students and employees continued protesting as much as $100 million in state funding reductions.

President John Petersen sent notice Monday to members of UT's board of trustees explaining that bonuses were part of last year's money and couldn't be cut from this year's budget.

"It's old money, so we couldn't use it in the new year, anyway," wrote Petersen. "It's sort of like that annoying cell phone commercial about old rollover minutes. This old 2008 money just isn't any good in our 2009 financial crisis..."

1/25
County Fleet Task Force to Mull Replacing Take-Home Vehicles with Tricycles
Sheer vanity, keeping up with the Joneses among justifications given for needing take-home vehicles

From APB Reports. KNOXVILLE, Tenn. Sport utility vehicles and big pickup trucks are the preferred forms of transportation among Knox County employees who have offered excuses for having take-home vehicles to the County Commission task force examining fleet expenditures. Excuses offered thus far for the big gas-guzzlers include "staying one step ahead of the bad guys," "it's the only type of vehicle that befits the necessary level of comportment and decorum for the importance of my station," and "hey, I have to have something to haul my ego around in."

The task force, which began meeting this month, has expressed interest in shifting the county fleet more toward vehicles that are more environmentally friendly. Vehicles under consideration include tricycles, Big Wheels and Radio Flyer Wagons.

There are 52 SUVs among the 136 take-home cars reported by executive branch departments and independent offices such as the property assessor.

The Sheriff's Office is not included in the list because the sheriff's chief counsel, Mike Ruble, got snippy and flashed some major 'tude when the News Sentinel requested a list of which sheriff's office vehicles are take-home cars and who drives them.

"As I am sure you know, it is not our duty to create unofficial documents for the sole purpose of media consumption," said Ruble. "Rather, it's our duty to protect the citizens of Knox County, and to do so, we must stonewall and obfuscate when we get information requests. Because if the criminals we pursue knew the size and model of the vehicles we drive, they'd just steal bigger vehicles with greater horsepower, more legroom and better gas mileage. Pretty soon, we'd be in the middle of an escalating Vehicle Size War and find ourselves battling the villains in fighter jets. To stay one step ahead of the bad guys, our vehicle information must stay confidential, so we aren't just keeping up with the Joneses, but supassing them..."