Tuesday, December 31, 2019

That's About it for 2019

Is there a good reason to reflect on a year? For the world this has been another shit filled 12 months.  For Cincinnati I would call it (at best) a "meh" year.  There were not many big issues to fill news cycles or political chat rooms that were important.

There still were some really crappy moments:

  • There were poorly chaperoned teenagers acting shitty in DC.   
  • There were many in the media who continued to use tabloid terminology as a means to demean members of Cincinnati City County they don't like personally or politically. If they keep it up into next year, I think I may be forced to come up with term that fits their actions.  The term Cabal comes to mind.
  • There was a dumb ass Trump supporter who punched a protester outside the Trump Nuremberg-style rally. That was almost expected and promptly forgotten by the local media.
  • There was former Kentucky Governor Matt Bevin demonstrating how horrible a human being he is with his pardons of a murder and of a child rapist. An investigation is underway to determine if the wealthy relatives of the criminals made any type of trade with Bevin for the pardons. His actions are morally corrupt, so the fitting punishment would be his conservative Christian community punishing him would be less than he deserves, but something.  Him behind bars would be the right thing, but it will be likely be tough to prove unless someone turns on him.
  • There was the local media in this town collectively focusing on click-bait crap, overall being conservatively biased, and/or just being understaffed because the public is too lazy to read and pay for valid journalism. Two of the three points are common with most local media across the country.  The conservative bias here stems from so much of the exurban areas the TV news and the Enquirer are desperate to keep. Also, there are locals in the media who are actually Republicans.
  • There were the seven days the Republicans had a candidate for Hamilton County Commissioner. That ended with the neo-fascist Trump Supporter Dan Hils (also local FOP president) quitting. We are all better for him quitting, but the CPD rank and file are stuck with him now. It would be good for them to vote him out, but the rank and file CPD has too many right-wing Republicans.
  • There were Chabot and Wenstrup embarrassing Ohio during the Impeachment hearings. When you can't deal with the facts and instead jump into false process dogma or outright conspiracy BS, you just need to resign.  Neither will, but history will not forget how they chose the political party and the personal futures over the county and the state of our democracy.
  • The Suburban Republicans continued to attack the City any chance they could.  This is a regular occurrence, year after year, so nothing new, just something people need to be reminded occurs again and again.
So, kinda shitty.  I wanted to find the positives.  I really didn't find many.  There were some wait and see actions like the music venue at the Banks deal and the Streetcar "divorce," but that was about it.

The only moment that stood out the dignity of Todd Portune. He stands out as a man with a deeply held sense of public service.  The widespread praise given to Todd by all corners of the political spectrum is the lone shining moment for the Cincinnati area this year.

2020 will be a year with lots of turmoil. Most of it will be coming from the national political race. Some of the above shitty moments will repeat.  Some will get worse. There will be many new ones that will drop on the Cincinnati Area like a ton of bricks.  We will be moving from "meh" down to a "fuck this" year, based on history. The more I write about about, maybe the more I can make lemonade with the shit on the horizon. Bring on Bing with Auld Lang Syne.

Saturday, December 14, 2019

If You Don't Want It On Microscoops, Don't Do It.

If I could blame Jason Williams on another generation I would, but I am fairly certain he is a Gen-Xer and my generation has it share of hacks, just like any other, but his latest column stretches into the territory normally reserved for NY Post Page Six gossip columnists.
POLITICS & JOURNALISM: It's been known in insider circles for weeks that Hamilton County Prosecutor Joe Deters and WCPO anchor Tanya O'Rourke are dating. It seems that became more widely known this week, when Hamilton County GOP Chairman Alex Triantafilou posted a photo of him and his wife, Jennifer, standing alongside Deters and O'Rourke at a Christmas party. Why is this worth mentioning? Well, Deters and O’Rourke are high-profile figures in the community and you might see them around town together.
Williams is more than willing to help float this trial balloon in the air for Deters and the Republican Party. He's in their pocket and lives off their scraps scoops. What I judge this to be is an effort by the Deters Campaign to test the waters. They need to find out if there is going to be any flack for the divorced Catholic forming a high profile relationship. Williams is able to help serve that goal, while still being able to play the otherside, with his mouth watering for a new scandal that he can dive into.

This is just so tawdry. Williams is just begging for there to be controversy so he can defend Deters and O'Rourke.  The WCPO anchor will gain respect with Suburbanites with her affiliation with Deters, but any serious person who wants good journalism would not trust any story she is involved on. So any controversy that is made feeds into both Williams and Deters' playbook. Spin it on Talk radio, avoid questions, but attack, attack, attack.

Let's be honest, Joe Deters is fucking asshole. He is a huge problem for Hamilton County. He has been representing the Republican 'Establishment' he entire career and has let that influence who goes to trial and who does not.  He stands on the scales of justice and leans the way he wants, to help or hurt those he wants.  He is everything wrong with the Justice System in America and needs to be dumped to curb.

I don't care who he is sleeping with, however.  Local TV 'news' is bullshit anyway and if O'Rourke can keep clear of Deters or big Hamilton County Trial stories, nothing much will change. The bias on Crime stories is baked into TV news. The only risk is that WCPO producers will be dying for her to get more dirt on crime (the sexy ones) that they can sell to suburbanites.

Williams belongs on TV or radio.  He's a tabloid writer, who wants clicks and eye balls on him.  Truth isn't his focus (or concern), emotion is what he cares about.  Well, he cares about exploiting it in others. If he gets an offer to start a local version of Inside Edition, he should take it.

Also, as an educational side note to Jason Williams: people and specially musicians/composers can be icons too, not just buildings.

Monday, December 02, 2019

Early Look at the Candidates for Cincinnati City 2021 Council Race

You maybe thinking: "Woah, Woah, Woah , it is only 2019 and there nearly two years to go before the next Cincinnati City Council election, what are you doing? "  Just so you are clear, this blog does not cover the national primary races and that appears to be sucking out all of the political analysis wind out of the sails of near every political pundit around, so bear with me for having an early look at who may be running for Cincinnati City Council.  The political party notations listed below are NOT endorsements, they are my understanding of their affiliations.  In a couple of cases I don't know what they are, currently.

Incumbents Eligible to Run
Tamaya Dennard (D,C) *
Greg Landsman (D) *
Jeff Pastor (R) *

Announced Candidates
Jeff Cramerding (D)
Michelle Dillingham (D)
James Jenkins (I)
Brian Garry (D)

Prior Candidates Likely to Run
Derek Bauman (D,C)
Laure Quinlivan (D)
Henry Frondorf (D,C)
Seth Maney (R)
Kelli Prather (D)

Prior Candidates Who Might Run
Ozie Davis III (D)
Cristina Burcica (I)
Manuel Foggie
Tamie Sullivan (R,I ?)
Leslie Jones (D)
Tonya Dumas (D)
Erica Black-Johnson (I)

Rumored Or Speculated Candidates
Cam Hardy (D,C,I ?)
Matt Woods (C)
Dadrien Washington (D)


Candidate Twitter List: I have created a list of candidates on Twitter. Here is the actual list Twitter handles for the candidates.

As always:  If anyone has any other names please send them my way (editor@cincyblog.com) or if anyone named above wants to confirm they are not running, I'll remove them future postings of this list. If there are other social media or full websites I don't list, send them along as well.

Key
* = Incumbent
‡ = On Ballot (signatures turned in)
D= Democratic Party
R= Republican Party
C= Charter Committee (aka Charter Party)
G= Green Party
I= Independent