Hank Stram and Tootie Montana

They died.

Who were they?

Hank Stram coached the New Orleans Saints for two terrible seasons. Sure, they weren't seasons that were any more or less terrible than many of the Saints seasons, but Hank Stram was a championship coach who had great success with the Kansas City Chiefs. Over the course of his two years, the Saints won a total of 7 games and lost 22. He wore a bad hairpiece and clapped a lot. Archie Manning, Tony Galbreath, Chuck Muncie, and Henry Childs all played for Hank.

What in the world would make Hank Stram "beloved" in the minds of Saints fans? I think it's because he loved NOLA and he stayed there. He died in Covington, in St. Tammany Parish Hospital on the 4th of July, the day after I moved to New Orleans. Hank Stram, Super Bowl Winner, was just one of the thousands of folks who came to NOLA and couldn't leave.

Tootie Montana was something else altogether. He died on June 27, defending the Mardi Gras Indians at a City Council meeting.

The Indians are/were an expression of the black community in NOLA, an expression of pride and a celebration of an unbowed spirit. Tootie Montana was the King of the Indians, the "Chief of Chiefs." I don't know much about the Indians, all I know is really what I read after Tootie died and from what I saw in "Make it Funky." And what I know is that Tootie was speaking out against NOPD harassment of the Indians. Why? Who the hell knows. I don't know why the NOPD did 90% of the shit it did in NOLA. I don't know why a cop who was well known as a sensitive poet would refer to kids as "animals." The NOPD is a mystery wrapped up in an enigma.

All I really wanted to do was to mention that this summer, two people who were inexorably tied to the soul of New Orleans passed. And then the storms came, and New Orleans passed, too. Where is the produce man who continued the long tradition of singing about his goods as he drove through the Fairgrounds area? Has he gone the way of the New Orleans Pelicans?

With every passing second that we are kept from our city, more and more of the people who lived in New Orleans because it was old and beat up and full of fucked up drunks and it was slow, they won't be able to afford to return. That will mean the death of the city. We will face a New Orleans where Rue de la Course is replaced by Starbucks. And I for one cannot accept that. We CANNOT allow New Orleans to become Dallas or, God forbid, Atlanta.

That is why I am hereby announcing my candidacy for mayor of the City of New Orleans. My platform will be "Save New Orleans!"

Save New Orleans from the carpetbaggers and the speculators! Save New Orleans from the yuppies and Baptists! I tell you here and now that the first things to go when "the respectable people" move in will be our liberty to do what we want, when we want. These yuppie trash will take away our freedom to drink, our "to go" cups, our Mardi Gras, our gambling; they will say that "decent" people don't need such things. And I say to them: GO BACK TO ATLANTA, YUPPIE BAPTIST TRASH!

Vote for me, and Save New Orleans!

(I am not joking.)