Tuesday, February 25, 2003

Local Crews Could See Record Number Of Potholes
West Bound Columbia Parkway between Beechmont and Dead Man's curve has a 100-yard stretch with about 20 huge potholes. The Parkway has several other big holes closer to Delta. It is like dodging chipmunks on my commute into work.
NKU Professors sue former finance chair
This type of academic research scandal is not usually associated with business schools, this case with the Finance Department. The data collection on business is not something that can be faked easily. The data would generally be from known sources, not from self-generated processes, like medical testing for example, where a researcher could make up data more easily. This is an interesting tactic these professors are taking to save their reputations from the stink of the former department chair.

The Notherner, student newspaper at NKU, puts Miami's to shame. The Miami Student may be the oldest the in country, but age does not equate to quality.
Based on this post Zee over at Spiced Sass has drunk the Freeper kool-aid. I think someone needs a vacation.
Chris Anderson picks up on the problem with the boycott's lack of consistency in definition and scope.
John Schlagetter catches the CJC in an apparently blatant lie. That is unfortunately not unusual based on my observations.
County will revise Memorial Hall lease
Phil Heimlich "doesn't want "hate-mongers" to be allowed to use it." Phil wants to keep the boycotters and the Nation of Islam out of Memorial Hall. Here I have a mixed view point. I do not want county property to be used by hate groups, which the Nation of Islam is. I would say the CJC members are hate-mongers, but their group has yet to take a formal hate-based position. I also do not want the government, the county, curtailing free speech. What I do not want to see is the county allow other groups preaching hate to use the facility. I do not want to see Phil's buddies at the CCV to use the facility if the CJC can't. Todd Portune also needs to rethink this quote:"When you talk about the boycotters, there you've got an issue of, I think, pure political speech and not hate speech," he said. I guess Todd has not heard the speech from the Black Fist or the new and defused CJC.

Monday, February 24, 2003

A Point of Clarification, asked by John Schlagetter
John wonders that since the boycott of Downtown Cincinnati is targeted to "consumers," why are not consumers of legal services of attorneys located downtown subject to the boycott? I would ask how can any boycotter use their phone and not be breaking the boycott? Last I checked Cincinnati Bell is located on 7th Street. I think John is on to something.

Sunday, February 23, 2003

Gay-rights group to push partners registry for ballot
If John Cranley and David Crowley want to really help gays and homosexuals, then lets seem them support an ordinance in Cincinnati creating a "domestic partner registry." This registry would allow for all couples, homosexual or heterosexual, to register with the City as a couple who are living together as a domestic couple. This registry would allow a means for people to gain access to see domestic partners in hospitals where only "family" is admitted. It also might create a means where other similar accommodations made to traditional married couples might be extended to those who are part of the domestic partner registry. This registry is not in my opinion the best solution for discrimination against gay marriage, but it might be a means that under current law could not be touched. The state of Ohio should legalize Gay Marriage or create a Civil Union provision allowing for equal levels of right for homosexuals to live in a domestic partnership as any other couple might.
John Schlagetter is calling out the CJC. I am sure Nate's ego will not let this go without a response. Stay tuned to their website forum for their regular dose of bigotry and racist dogma. Same bat time, same bat channel.

John refers to WCIN's "50 Most Influential Blacks in Cincinnati" event. I do not think people putting on this banquet are racist, but I don't see this as a very race friendly kind of event to have. There is no 50 most influential whites in Cincinnati event that I know of. If there were, I would bet nearly all 50 of these people would condemn it as racist, and call for a protest. WCIN's event might be subjected to protest, but not by any so-called "white organization." Instead a sect of Black Nationalists will likely be the only protestors. This is a double standard. Many might call this a justified double standard, but if you do un to others, they will do un to you in return. The cycle of racism and bigotry has been allowed to swing back as a subtext that allows minorities to do things that if the majority did would be considered offensive. I don't know why this is allowed to occur, but it goes with little objection from the minority community and the media.
Round up the Usual Suspects!
Peter Bronson of the Enquirer is shocked, SHOCKED that Aaron Sanders, head of the Miami University College Republicans, was fired as a columnist for the Miami Student. Peter has no clue that this is the best thing that could have happened to Mr. Sanders in his political career. In one simple action he has been made into a right-wing hero. He is a martyr for the cause of conservatism. He not only was fired for opposing what he called "pornography", but he has created a fight with one of the biggest enemies of the theocratic fascist jet set: the college professor. Freepers around the country are surely frothing at the mouth, while the CCV and its kin are beating the war drums both with Peter Bronson, their champion, pumping up his protégé. I shed no tears for Mr. Sanders. He will be laughing all the way to his cushy political job very soon, and by making FOX News, he surely will not have a problem getting a job in a Republican administration somewhere. Senator Doug White could use some help I am sure.
Damn Yankees Syndrome
If the USA were a baseball team it would surely be the New York Yankees. Why do those damn Yankees always win the World Series? Most baseball fans either root for the NY Yankees or they hate them with a passion. Now, after 9/11 the Yankees have received much sympathy from all of American along with most all things New York. That not with standing the history of hating the Yankees is a tried and true tradition. That tradition is at its core nothing more than jealousy. When the Yankees won nearly countless pennants and World Series from the late 1920’s through the early 1960’s, it was almost natural for people to start hating them. It is natural. Envy is a human failing, but an unavoidable one.

Is this the bottom line composition of the bulk of the hard-line protests against the American led campaign to go to war to disarm Iraq of WMD? Are all of the cries against alleged American hegemony nothing more than some envious French pundits shaking their fists at those damn Yankees? Does that make Jacques Chirac into Joe Boyd/Hardy? Shoeless Jacques from old Iraq? France would have to then be the Washington Senators. They Irony there is incalculable. Saddam Hussein would then have to be Mister Applegate (the Devil of the Faustian story) temping Jacques with victory over those Damn Yankees as long as he sells his soul. I can’ t figure out who Lola is in this fictionalized musical made real. There are several candidates for the role. Yasser Arafat is the most obvious choice. Germany might be a possibility, but their role might be closer to a Benny Van Buren. Right-wingers would want to use the anti-war protestors as their Lola, but I will not give them the satisfaction. Robert Mugabe fills the role almost as well as Arafat, but Yasser has to be the sentimental choice.

The pièce de résistance and the crème de la crème of my little conflagration of analogies is the fact that from 1995 to 1997 the most beloved American comedic actor in France, Jerry Lewis, starred in the National Tour of a Damn Yankees revival. Irony is best served with a little cheese and champagne.

Saturday, February 22, 2003

FOX News Watch Faux Pas
FOX News's Eric Burns made a couple of mistakes that got my ire on today's edition of the FOX News Watch program. I sent an email with my complaint.
Eric,

In covering the Aaron Sanders, college student columnist, you made two major mistakes. First you failed to include the fact that Aaron is the Chairman of the Miami University chapter of the College Republicans, one of the biggest chapters of that group in the country. Mr. Sanders’ ties to the GOP and his ability to gain the attention of a local columnist and your program are evidence that his motives are at a minimum less than pure journalism. Second you made a more serious mistake. You referred to Miami as the "University of Miami of Ohio." Miami was a University while Florida still belonged to Spain. Coral Gables University may be a fine school, but they do not have the history of Miami University, nor the storied alumni. As an alumnus myself I am often forced to write emails to media outlets and reporters correcting them on this mistake. I do have a bias in the issue, but it might help that you re-read Peter Bronson's Cincinnati Enquirer Column, or better yet my blog post on the issue. What is worse is that Jim Pinkerton, while commenting on the topic, correctly referred Miami as "Miami University." It is difficult for me to praise Mr. Pinkerton, but he earned it in knowing his Miami's.

Brian Griffin
Cincinnati, Ohio
Miami University Class of 1994
I don't think it is "pithy" enough for FOX, so I doubt it will be noticed. This program is entertaining, but it is really biased. It has two conservative partisan columnists and two liberal media analysts. The analysts discuss the quality of the media, while the columnists mostly scream about the "so called liberal media."
Man pleads guilty to fraudulently billing porn Web sites to county
If Simon Leis has anything to say about this man he will get the electric chair. Not for fraud or theft, but for viewing porn websites.
One World Politics?
Much of the dispute over the Bush Administration's impending war on Iraq has rested on and been exasperated by Bush's overall international policies. He has been forging a policy that most analysts would concur is a neo-conservative one, stemming from a modification of Reaganite Cold War dogma. Most of the anti-war movement is in many people's opinions just an anti-Bush reaction. I tend to agree that a large part of the anti-war movement is based on politics. Their mantra would be that Bush is the enemy in politics, so all of his polices should be opposed. This is an idea that is not just in one country. It is common in most of Europe and a large part of the rest of the world.

On the other side the biggest supporters of the War are taking a similar stance. They are condemning those protesting in the same manner that most debate from conservatives make calling everyone either liberal, socialists, or communists, usually interchanging the words.

Is this event a sign of the Internationalization of politics? Through much of history geo-politics did not have huge political ideologies attached to them. The old American adage states that politics ends at our shores. Now we are moving to transnational progressives and evangelical Christians as the fault line of international politics that do not draw the line of belief at a nation's border. Is this a first step towards a real world government? The UN is not much of a government, but with he move of the EU to federalize, will this time be seen as the beginning of a real Planet Wide Central Government? I do not have a clue what form or what power it would have, but is this the beginning of its formation? Are we creating political alliances based on political party to political party, instead of nation to nation? A single planet government will eventually happen here on Earth. It might take another 500 years, but it will happen. I wonder if the Iraq UN crisis will be seen as an example of the first real act of a central world government? So many questions, and so few answers.
Macy's to Launch Eminem Clothing Line
Is this a step up from Puff Daddy (P. Diddy) or a step down? Both have had scandal surrounding them, but are very popular with the morons in the world. There are a plethora of morons with money in the world, and their money is as good as the next guy's. Show me the Money!

Friday, February 21, 2003

Recent Tragedies Surprise Local Nightclubs
Why do local news outlets continue to localize national news? Well, since the nationwide media outlets regularly nationalize local news, I guess all is fair in love, war, and the news.
Morrison Collaborating on Slave Opera
I like opera, but I don't know how much I will like a newly written one. I am pleased to see the Cincinnati Opera being on the edge of new artistic work. This event I would guess will be tied into the Underground Railroad Museum when it comes to town in a few years.
People Push For Cincinnati Anti-War Resolution
Please read the headline again. "People"? What people? I think it is safe to assume that dogs and cats are not lobbying City Council. I am also sure that most people are not pushing for a meaningless resolution opposing war with Iraq. A better term to use in place of “people” would have been “anti-war activists” or just “activists.” If you want to present a biased report, not that it isn’t already, the headline might read “Morons Push For Cincinnati Anti-War Resolution.” It just rolls off the tongue like spit into the sink.
Council won't join antiwar effort
Local politicians have no business grandstanding on International geo-politics. Crowley, Cooper, and Reece should be ashamed of themselves for wasting city time and money.
Fans reeling as Phish returns
I implore local media not to cause panic by invoking the Who's 1979 concert in any coverage of the Phish events tonight and tomorrow. Doing so would not only be gross sensationalism, it would be a crass action in the middle of a ratings season that would be a clear case of exploitation for profit.