Ingram's November 2022

B E T W E E N T H E L I N E S

Pointed Perspectives & Penetrating Punditry | by Jack Cashill

Where the ‘KC Spirit Playbook’ Goes Wrong An immersion in feel-good jargon completely overlooks what really matters to residents. The good people in Kansas City’s Planning and Development Department are putting together a 20-year comprehensive plan in an evolving document called “The KC Spirit Playbook.”

Tuesday, we could not get reservations for 7 p.m. The place was packed. I live within walking distance of the Country Club Plaza and prefer to eat nearby, but I understand why other people don’t. At Mission Farms, I could pull right into one of the plentiful parking spots and walk 50 feet to the restaurant door in complete confidence that I would not be mugged, and that my vehicle would not be ransacked. In its 10 “goal statements,” the playbook authors make not a single reference to safety or security—not even obliquely. Have they not spoken with anyone over 30 who lives in metro Kansas City? I suspect not. Instead of shaping the city to satisfy the needs of the ordinary

By asking us all to “weigh in on the future of KC,” they gave me, an otherwise shy and retiring KCMO resident, the green light to do just that. I’ll try to be diplomatic. Almost 20 years ago, the late author and doctor Michael Crichton spoke at the famed Commonwealth Club in San Francisco. Organizers had handed Crichton a weighty assignment, namely, to address the most important challenge facing mankind. The one he chose was unexpected: “distinguishing reality from fantasy, truth from propaganda.” Without the ability to make these distinctions, Crichton argued, it was useless to try solving more tangible problems. The authors of the KC Spirit Playbook have been handed

a weighty assignment as well, namely, to address the most important challenges facing Kansas City. So far, at least, they have failed to separate reality from fantasy and have been hung up on propaganda right out of the gate. “Equity” is the propagandist’s word du jour . In their two-sentence mission statement, play-book authors use this guilt inducing word or one of its derivatives three times. They envision Kansas City as an “equitable” city. They plan to “address past and current inequities.” And they will do so “by fostering equitable community and economic development.” Young readers may not know this, but the word “equity” has insinuated itself into common parlance only in the last five or 10

citizen, they try instead to reshape that citizen to satisfy their own ideological needs. Even Pol Pot couldn’t make that formula work. When it comes to reality, the play book’s “Big Ideas” have precious little grounding. Consider, for instance, “Achieve a Carbon-Neutral, Equity-Focused, and Resi l ient Kansas City by 2040.” The draconian s teps needed to satisfy this

We are not supposed to notice the semantic shift from the concept of ‘equality’ to ‘equity,’ but it is tectonic. History has shown that only tyrants can assure equal outcomes—and not pleasant ones, either.

years. It has largely replaced the concept of “equality,” which had a healthy run in America of more than 200-plus years and is still honored in some cultural backwaters. We are not supposed to notice the semantic shift, but it is tectonic. The playbook authors suggest that “equal opportunity,” given its failure to produce “equal outcomes,” has passed its sell-by date. It is time, they tell us, for a more muscular approach toward producing those outcomes. Voila: “Equity!” “The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings,” Winston Churchill reminded us. “The inherent virtue of socialism is the equal sharing of miseries.” Good democratic government can assure equal opportunity. Only tyrants can assure equal outcomes. Recently, I met some Kansas friends for dinner at a restaurant in the Mission Farms development near I-435. Although a routine

big idea, we are told, will enable this city to “adapt to flooding, extreme heat, and other climate-change impacts we are already facing.” “Already facing?” This is pure propaganda. Until the summer of 2022, Kansas City had not experienced a day over 100 degrees in the previous 10 years . (And we surpassed that mark on a single day this year, by a single degree.) By way of comparison, had 53 days of 100 degrees or above in the summer of 1936, with a peak of 113. We have not had a catastrophic flood of the Missouri River since 1951, nor on the Plaza since 1977.

Jack Cashill Ingram’s Senior Editor P | 816.842.9994 E | Editorial @ Ingrams.com

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Kansas City’s Business Media

November 2022