Buzzer

Give a read to Kathy Wilson's article in this week's City Beat on 1230 the Buzz. It has a great profile of Jeri Tolliver, who I must admit I thought was younger than she is. I hope she does not take that negatively, but I would have put here in her mid thirties, not over 40.

This profile leaves out some of the Buzz's problems. It still has a huge deficit in production quality. It still has whole lot of racism on the air, not only from callers but also from many weekend hosts. Things have improved now that most of Boycott B folks don’t get on the air right away, but when racism is put forth there is often no rebuttal from some of the hosts. On WLW blatant racism is met with mockery and harsh retort, on the Buzz it is all too often treated with an “oh my goodness” or “don’t go there.” It would show more civic quality if the hosts had a policy to stamp out racism in any form, no matter who says it, even if it is a favorite caller or popular weekend or late evening host. The daily hosts are good, but on the weekend they often seem to put anyone on the air who either will pay enough money, or just can speak and push buttons.

Mike Allen's Political Career Is Over

No one can say that for sure but admitting you've had a 3 1/2 year affair with someone who works for him, well that is big time shit. No conservative family values man can live through that, and expect to run for office again. He will be lucky not be run out of town on a rail. Now, I am sure his defenders will support him, yell Bill Clinton's name a few hundred times, and quote scripture. That will not do much good. Any respectable candidate could smash Allen, who will now likely have to trash his former lover, while he may be open to ethics violations or possibly even worse.

Allen's public statements came because he reportedly believes he is about to be sued, presumably for something along the lines of sexual harassment or a hostile work environment.

I now open up speculation about who will be the next Hamilton County Prosecutor. Would Cranley or Pepper want that instead of mayor? Pat DeWine? I think all three are lawyers.

Most funny of all is that Mike Allen is working for the Bush Campaign getting ready for next week's GOP convention in NY. I would love to see his face every time a speaker says family or values from the podium.

More from The Cincinnati Post, include his full statement.

UPDATE: Clarification, Mike is up for office this November, and shockingly he made this announcement after no one else could get on the ballot. He is so very honest and straightforward. How we all can feel good that the man elected to prosecute the law is good at lying to his family. Being a good liar is something public officials, especially lawyers, can really take pride in doing well.

The Enquirer Doesn't Get it

First they equate swift boat liars and Moveon.org which is right out of the Bush/Cheney talking points:

Then there's Bush's service. Earlier this year, critics alleged that Bush had been AWOL from the Texas Air National Guard. Release of dental records quieted the storm, but suspicion about Bush's wartime whereabouts still simmers below the surface, as last week's ad for the anti-Bush advocacy group MoveOn.org demonstrates.

Now they come with an attack on all 527's almost like they have Bush's arm up their ass, parroting his comments from yesterday. Once again the Enquirer looks foolish when they comment/report on an issue but are unable to consider the most recent story showing one of the Bush campaign's lawyers was also working for the "Swift Boat Veterans for Truth" group.

Cincinnati Mills Discriminating?

So what is happening Forest FairCincinnati Mills Mall? Are they discriminating against blacks or do we just have a case of anecdotal evidence.

What is unseemly is this report:

Security guards at the mall are handing out yellow code of conduct slips to anyone who doesn't pass "their" test when it comes to dress and behavior.

Now, this paragraph contains a blatant level of opinion (bias). The bias still points out an issue: where can I read the "code of conduct?" I can see what it might be in a picture from WCPO, but nothing is on the Cincinnati Mills website.

Blog Roll Changes

Some Updates to the blog roll:

Greg at NFGL and Michael at Rantophilia have joined forces to form the Cincinnati Group.

I have taken a couple of links down who are no longer blogging and also have added: Shaun at Liberal Angst.

UPDATE: Adding Axinar too!

Turncoat

There is a simple name one can give to people like Zell Miller and Youngstown Mayor George McKelvey: a Republican. If you can't support your party's nominee for President, then you should quit the party. If you disagree with John Kerry that much to publicly oppose him as an elected official, then don't play games by being a Democrat.

It pisses me off that the media loves to find guys like these and paint them as anything more than aberrations. The man lives in a town where you have to be a Democrat. You don't have to believe in any Democratic issues, but you have to be one to get elected.

I wonder now if we will get any RINO's jumping ship stories? One reason we don't, the GOP eats turncoats alive.

Lemonade

It appears pointless to me to protest the Freedom Center at this point. I mean protesting the fact that money was spent to build it at this point is really rather useless. One can complain about certain aspects of it, it's purpose, it's message, it's lionization of local financial supporters, etc.

All Damon Lynch's group seems to be really doing is taking advantage of the presence of the national press. It's the media stupid. That is the driving force over the timing of most any protest that occurs on what ever topic.

At this point I think Damon Lynch would have done a service to this entire community by embracing the Freedom Center. I know that would be seen as "selling out to the man," but if wants to get elected or more importantly if he really wants to integrate the people he represents into the mainstream of the city, then he has to stop driving wedges between blacks and whites.

This does assume he wants to integrate people into one society, and he does not share the goals of Boycott B.

Woman Shot at Black Family Reunion

A 26 year old woman was reportedly shot inside Sawyer Park during the Black Family Reunion last night. A suspect was taken into custody and the weapon reportedly was located.

It is horrible that an event that is meant to bring families together was hit by violence. This incident was the worst at the event, but reports indicated that unsupervised young people (mostly teenagers?) where getting out of hand. This is similar to what happen in 2002, but with the gun violence takes on a whole different level of concern.

The local media coverage I felt was good in showing adults at the family reunion very upset about the security situation and the teenagers left with out structure to get out of hand. WCPO's report was lacking in a basic element: what happened to the shooting victim? WKRC had the facts and reported it as the lead correctly.

WLWT had no story and I guess the Sunday Paper goes to bed really really early on Saturday night. This incident happened before 7PM.

The Enquirer looks foolish with its story that has the sub-headline of "Black Reunion: 'One big happy family'." Timing makes this look worse than it was, but that is what happens in the game of news perceptions.

Yet Another Poll

UC's poll shows virtually the same results as the recent Gallup poll. The full poll results are here (pdf).

The most interesting thing was the age range breakdown. 18 to 29 year olds favored Kerry 55% to 39%. 30 to 45 year olds favored Kerry 50% to 47%. Bush has the edge with 46 to 64 year olds 48% to 44% and leads 65+ 50% to 43%.

I would have said the middle agers would have been more for Bush and the younger range more for Kerry than the percentages list. It is also funny that in this poll the older the range the higher the "Don't Know" response was. I guess old people are either not sold on anyone yet, or are not paying as much attention.

Love and Honor and a Great Education

Miami U. moves up list of top colleges

Cincinnatians assess damage

Good Follow-up article on the Hurricane. Here is a good way the media can place a local angle on a national story.

Kerry Coverage in the Enquirer

From my point of view the Enquirer did a good job of giving generally the same "amount" of news coverage to the Kerry speech as they did the Bush speech. I hope that is continued during the whole campaign and something made equal during the 2008 primary season, which was lacking this year.

The Exception: Bronson. Why don't we have a liberal columnist giving a biased view on Bush and Kerry that would favor Kerry? Here instead we have another bullshit homer job that provides political fodder favoring Bush, but none from the left.

Now, I really hope I don't read some moron saying that the rest of the reporters are pro-Kerry, because I just showed below about how the positive Kerry Poll results were not touted as they could and should have been.

UPDATE: Wes Flinn thinks we hade some bias. I would not disagree. I think at least we had a phote shoot and a link to the text of both speeches. That is a positive step.

Spinning Ohio Polls

No one knows who is going to win Ohio, but thisarticle seems to go over the top in painting the race as even

"The poll is the latest of several surveys showing the Buckeye State is still up for grabs among likely voters."

I for one can understand that a smart political observer wants to hedge his bets, but this story clearly shows Kerry with an edge here in Ohio, at this point. Up until this point the race has been very even. When Kerry is ahead by 10 among registered votes and up by 2 among likely voters, that indicates that clearly Bush has tapped out his vote. His hope is to maximize his base and keep the fair whether voters home. That is a tough job.

Introducing: Freedom Center B

First we had the Boycott A Group and then the Boycott B group crawled out of the gutter.

It appears that since we have the Freedom Center (a great organization and facility by the way), we now must have the Freedom Center B, who happen to be the folks from Boycott A. Will we be having a Freedom Center C from the racists in Boycott B?

Felonious Voting

I can predict the reactions to this story. Some Conservatives will say we should not give the vote to criminals. By that they likely don't grasp the fact that these are ex-cons or just people who in the past were convicted of a felony, regardless if they served time or not.

Liberals will say, right so, that these people served their time, and should be treated like anyone else at the polls.

I do not think there has been a systematic plan to disenfranchise people from voting. It has happen because voting systems and poll workers in the state and most of the country are generally the most educated or knowledgeable people around.

One way to get rid of this problem is to make election day a national holiday, and then get better skilled people to work the polls, those who normally have to work that day.

In search of...

Carl Weiser of the Enquirer is "in search of protestors" planning on protesting the RNC National Convention in New York.

Yes, all I can hear right now is Leonard Nimoy's choppy voice on a bad film projector in science class.

Bronson 'Drunk'?

Bronson must have been drunk when he quoted this:

He had three Purple Hearts and never lost time in a hospital. That's what we've been talking about. These guys know about Purple Hearts and they wonder if Kerry is lying.

Gee Peter Why don't you ask someone what they think about Bush's "honesty" about where he was during 1972? Or ask them why he failed to get a physical to keep on flying in the National Guard?

Peter, why don't you tell them that you supposedly agreed with Kerry about Vietnam and protested against it?

Peter's chicken hawk status looks big when he spews this gem:

Maybe Kerry should quit telling colorized war stories about Vietnam and tell us which Kerry is reporting for duty in the war on terrorism - hero or hippie?

Bronson, did you serve? I love how idiots today bitch about supporting the troops and value service, yet when someone who did his duty, was wounded in battle is then questioned about it only because he is running for office. The same people ignore their candidate's lack of honest about his "service" in the military where he saw no combat and at a minimum was given easy duty so he could work for a political campaign.

This is what makes me sick. People are this stupid to value this kind of crap, yet when the person has the values they want (combat experience) they deny it was real, but ignore that their guy never was even close to seeing combat.

Will Bronson go see Kerry speak now? I doubt it. Will the Enquirer provide a commentary about Kerry Speech as biased and pro-Kerry as Bronson's was? Hell No. Kerry will be luck to get a photo shoot like the Enquirer gave Bush's visit. At least they did give a little coverage to the Vets protesting. Best picture had a Vets for Kerry protestor holding up a sign saying "Mr. President, Here is my DD214, where is yours?"

Civil War?

Can there be anyone out there who does not think that Iraq is int he middle of a civil war? Now, it is not nearly as modern and unconventional as Bush's "War" on terrorism, but it is not your typical power struggle, which would mostly be caused by multiple ethnic factions plus an occupying military force in the mix.

What exist though are coordinated forces fighting the government and the US Military. That is a civil war if I every heard of one. People have been saying we have been facing the possibility of one for long time. I say it is true now, not just speculative. The Iraqi National Conference has nearly 100 members ready to boycott if the central government does not start negotiations again with people fighting against it. Seems kind of an odd request, but also one that signals a huge rift in the country.


I don't see the blood flow stopping anytime soon.

Shell Game

With Bush's election year exploitation of troop levels and world politics, I have to ask a simple question. Is is all just bullshit? Is is just a numbers game? Have we already pulled 70,000 troops out of Europe and Asia(Japan or Korea) and are now just adjusting the paperwork? I ask this with the understanding that we pulled at least one division out of German for Iraq. I assume now that that division, when its tour in Iraq is up, will go home to the USA, not to Germany. How much of similar occurrences will eat up the 70,000? I also wonder how much of this is includes the Navy, with reduction of the Persian Gulf fleet as another source for this number.

I also really wonder how smart this is? I guess that pulling troops from Asia means that North Korea and China are not a threat to anyone? What kind of policy do we have where we say the world is threatened by an axis of evil and then pull troops from the places where one of these axis members could strike? Is this some kind of concession to the North Koreans? I guess that would depend on how many of the 70,000 are actually from South Korea and Japan.

I also really don't think Bush is doing himself any good by holding big foreign policy speeches here in Cincinnati. Now, I grant this one is not in front of a crowd of local people, but it still just looks odd. I also pity downtown workers, don't bother trying to drive downtown while Bush is here.

Tainted Gift Horse or Dirty Money?

Say goodbye to 50K Hamilton County GOP. Now, if the local media really cared they would ask who got this money and whose election was tainted by dirty money. Getting elected with help from money collected from the proceeds of a bribe is something that should make for a scandal. We all know, however, that unless it has sex or murder, the TV news does not care. The conservative print press will report it, like link above shows, but hell they have no local angle yet. It was written from Columbus. Where's the comment from the local GOP officials??? You can go beyond Barrett and Kriss, why not fucking ask MIKE ALLEN?????????? You don’t think the Hamilton County Prosecutor and big GOP Leader would have a comment?