Conventional wisdom says that to win an election, you need to play to your constituencies’ basest, most divisive instincts. But as a candidate for mayor of Tulsa, Oklahoma, G.T. Bynum decided to skip the smear campaigns, tell voters what he wanted to accomplish and give them ways to measure his success — and it led him to win the election. In a hopeful, funny talk, Bynum shares how he’s tackling his city’s most pressing issues and says that we need to set aside philosophical disagreements and focus on the aspirations that unite us.

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