Flint.
Most people from "other parts" conjure up negative images when they hear you are from there. This is not surprising when you consider that their exposure to Flint probably includes Michael Moore's "Roger and Me," where he goes to great lengths to present the city as an endless sting of boarded up houses and partially burned shells amongst the few that are actually inhabited; albeit with desperate souls that skin and eat wild rabbits to survive.
I will go on record and state emphatically that I would not have wanted to grow up anywhere else than where I did - Lockhead Street on Flint's south side. The pickup baseball games at Freeman park, street hockey, Basketbrawl games, the infamous nightly keggers... and then we hit our teens.
Sure Flint isn't perfect and we have the occasional brawl involving 80 or so youths at the local Chuck E Cheese. But is Forbes correct to state that Flint is the third most miserable city in the US?
Don't forget that we had the fourth place finisher on last year's American Idol, LaKisha ‘KiKi’ Jones! And Mark, Don, and Mel of Grand Funk Railroad were Flintstones. "Can I get a witness?!"
The big news around town this week is the premiere of Will Ferrell's new movie, Semi-Pro, the comedy about a fictitious area basketball team (The Flint Tropics). Hey, this movie is as accurate and factual as anything Michael Moore has spewed out, but a lot more fun I'm sure.
On a more serious note, we do have the dubious distinction of suffering the youngest school shooting in history, when in 2000, a 6-year-old brought a gun to school and shot and killed his kindergarten classmate. Native son Michael Moore seemed to blame Republicans for this tragedy when shortly thereafter he wrote:
How do Mr. McCain and Mr. Bush feel this morning? Just
seven days prior, John McCain's "Straight Talk Express"
bus rolled past Beecher on I-75, but it didn't stop. It rolled
on down near Ann Arbor where McCain blasted those who
seek gun control... Mr. Bush never stopped in Flint either.
I guess we all feel sorta proud that they both avoid us like
the plague. There is not -- and has not for nearly thirty
years -- been a single Republican state or federal
representative elected from Flint. Another reason, I
suppose, for our neglect and punishment. But we're proud
of how we've made it almost a crime to support a
Republican in Flint...
Hmmm. Might be a clue in there as to the reason behind Flint's woes Mikey.
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