State of the City

Mayor Luken gave his annual speech to council yesterday. The text of his speech is here. The interesting point is that this is Luken's tenth such speech and he started the tradition back in 1987.

How is the city? The critics will say we are dying. I say we have potential. What we do have are a large number of apathetic citizens and two rings of suburbs who hate the city, except for the sports stadiums and the big city image they feed off of.

Feed Issues

I got an email saying I have problem with my Atom Feed. I think I have updated it, please let me know if it is working. Once it does I will be deleting this post.

More Money and Is Ghiz Not Out?

More on the Mayor/Council money from Korte. He has more on Mallory's PSA effort.

Also Ghiz has a few bucks left over, so Korte suggests we not count her out as a candidate. I don't know. I think she might be sick of it.

A new name has been mentioned as a candidate: Chris Bortz, who be a Charterite if he choose to run. Bortz is the nephew of former Mayor/Councilman Arn Bortz, a long time Charter Committee member.

Nick Spencer is also mentioned and I must admit I don't understand what he is saying about Nick's campaign finance issue. I guess it might be good news, but he makes it sound like he's avoiding trial by getting treatment for a bad memory or something.

Hartmann For Secretary of State?

The Enquirer is reporting the Hamilton County Clerk of Courts Greg Hartmann (R) plans a run for Ohio Secretary of State. He was sure nice to get elected last year to a four year term and turn around a few months later and possibly start running for another office. I hope he resigns if he gets the nomination. Who will fill his seat if he gets in?

Also, interesting fact, he has only lived in Ohio for 7 years. I did not know Republicans actually vote for outsiders. Is he from maybe Northern Kentucky or some place that is almost Cincinnati?

State SC Justice Arrested for DUI

Democratic Justice Alice Robie Resnick has been arrested on charges of DUI. If you do the crime, face the time. This is stupid, stupid, stupid. Why would a 65 year old Judge try and drive home drunk? Why would anyone let her? Call a freakin cab!

I understand that she is one of the few left of the court with an ounce of fairness for the consumer, but doing this does nothing but tarnish her career. It sounds like her career will not be affected much. That is good for her, but is it good when a Justice make such a stupid mistake? What will be sad is how she will be pounced on by her foes. Yesterday as a fluke I had on 700 WLW during part of my drive to lunch and heard Bill Cunningham mentioned it. He managed to sound almost fair in the minute I listened to it, and then it went into news, so I don't know how he hammered her after the break. She has been a big target of Business leaders in the past. She will have a big problem if she seeks re-election.

Big Money

Raising money in the race for Mayor is not going to be a problem for Pepper or Mallory, who have raised $251,870 and $111,138 respectively. Once the GOP fields their candidate and start pushing in money, this should be the most expensive Mayoral race in Cincinnati history.

Expo Store In Oakley On Hold

The Expo Store, a Home Depot division, slated to be built in Oakley looks like it will not be built at all. Home Depot is stating they are evaluating the Expo store line and will not go forward with any new locations during that evaluation period. I think that means in real terms, they can't afford to build any stores right now or it means that the Expo locations are failing a business model and either will be scrapped or retooled. The land for the store is cleared. I hope Home Depot does not hold it hostage. The new retail center going up the Oakley area needs a full allotment of big box retail as a support ring to make the shopping experience work. That is what I think makes the Easton Town Center in Columbus work well, better than Newport on the Levee.

Mark Mallory PSA?

What is with the Mark Mallory Public Service Announcements on TV? These are not something sponsored by any government agency, they appear to be paid for by Senator Mallory himself. These are not labeled as campaign commercials, but in all practical purposes they are. They talk about snow storm damages and people who may qualify for state assistance. This is a shrewd move. He might even have been able to use official state funds for this, since the purpose was basically communications with constituents. He gets his face on the air and in the minds of possible voters.

It might be wise for him to report how these commercials were paid for. They are called a PSA, so could they be virtually free from Time Warner? Only production costs? They are running quite often to be an actual PSA. I think I have seen it about 10 times over the last few days, on various cable channels.

DDN: Coleman to Run for Governor

The Dayton Daily News is reporting that Columbus Mayor Michael Coleman will will seek the Democratic nomination for governor of Ohio. He is reportedly set to announce later on today.

UPDATE: More from the Enquirer.

Target 5 Takes Action Against Bird Shit

An actual headline from WLWT's website: Target 5 Takes Action Against Bird Droppings. Yes, bird shit is the topic of hard hitting investigative journalism in our fair city. I am just going to pack it in now, I think I have seen it all in Cincinnati Media spectrum of mindless drivel.

Cincinnati.com Blogs

There are now more than just CiN Weekly's Staff Blog from the Cincinnati.com family of blogs, including bios or intros from the bloggers:
Photographers
Tech Tipsheet -- Bio
Sports Roundtable -- Bios
Pop Culture -- Bio
Popo's Sports Blog -- Intro
The Arts -- Bios

I am holding judgment in addition to the blogroll until I see how they go. One thing you will notice that is missing, a political/current events blog. I am please they have comments on all the blogs. I hope they don't need to be approved before they are posted, but the legal department may have butt in.

Witch in the Old Mill Creek

Today is your last chance to send in comments to the U.S. Army Corp of Engineers on the project to widen the Mill Creek. You can still email your comments. Be sure to add "Mill Creek" to the subject line. Or you can call: (502) 315-6769.

Pete and Repeat Were in a Boat...

In reference to my post from yesterday and a comment from said post we get a history lesson via Kevin Drum.

Kids Today Are Uneducated

Kids today are either really uneducated on the workings of a Democracy or they are misled by equally uneducated parents.

Come on, have the government approve newspaper stories? Are these kids on crack or have they spent to much time in Pastor Bob's destroy the liberals bible study class?

Xer's or Just an Unknown?

Via Rob Bernard we get an article from the Dayton Daily News announcing changes to the paper, mostly the renaming of several weekly sections with the inclusion of "X" to the title. I don't know if this is some type of a marketing ploy to gain the attention of us slacker Gen Xers or if this is meant to trick teenage fans of the Xtreme Games into thinking their business reports are featuring Tony Hawk. Either way I don't think it will do much for circulation.

Chick Rock Fest

I don't know much about this event, but when you combine chicks, rock music, and the Southgate House it must be good. Look for it on April 8th and 9th.

More at their website www.chicksrockfest.com.

Everyone Hearts Berding

Jeff Berding has officially announced his candidacy for Cincinnati City Council. At his announcement once could not find a more motley crew of local politicians. Get this list as compiled by Greg Korte: Mark Mallory, David, Pepper, Charlie Luken, David Mann, Arn Bortz, Tom Brinkman, Pat DeWine, and Pete Witte. Are the last three actually going to vote for Berding? If yes, then I will applaud all three for being non-partisan, but does that make Jeff Berding another Dusty Rhodes, who is as much of a Democrat as Bob Taft.

I don't know much about Berding. I would surmise that as part of the Bengals organization he would likely be very pro-business. The article reports he already has raised $40,000. That kind of bread at this point in time puts him in line as the front runner to fill Pepper's open seat. The fact that he is only one of two declared challengers for council might have something to do with that as well.

Will Berding keep a Rucker or Harris from running? That I hope only depends on Reece's and/or Smitherman's choices to run for mayor, freeing up their seats as well.

Private Parts

When people push the privatization of Social Security they are failing to provide the details. Now, most people don't care about the details, even though the say they want to know them. When they start to hear about COLA's, administrative policy, and PIA's their eyes start to roll back into their head.

Even with that in mind I have a laundry list of unanswered questions, problems, and issues that would have to be answered, solved, and addressed before any private accounts were established.

1. Who is eligible for a private account? What will be the cut off age?
2. What percent of individual's contributions will be eligible for contribution?
3. Will the tax status of the private account be on a Pre-Tax or After-Tax basis?
4. If it will be Pre-Tax, that creates a tax cut, how will the massive loss in revenues be made up?
5. If it will be After-Tax, will that point be made known when this is made to look like a 401K Plan?
   
6. Who will administer these accounts? Employers? The government? Are Individuals forced to go to a Financial Institution on their own?
7. Who pays the administration fees?
8. Are administration fees included in Bush's Plan?
9. What investments can be included? Private Funds? Stocks, bonds, options, futures, commodities? Anything? Who Decides what a person can invest in?
   
10. Who manages those investments? Are they owned directly or in a mutual type fund?
11. Who pays the brokerage fees? Are they straight fees or discounted?
    
12. If these are collectively owned in mutual type fund, who does the accounting?
13. If the private accounts are use, who then who votes the proxies?
14. Will lump sum distributions now be allowed?
15. Will beneficiary benefits continued to be offered.
16. How will beneficiary, minor dependent, disability, and death benefits be funded?
17. Does Bush's plan cap the level of earnings on private accounts to pay for existing and future "traditional" benefits?
18. Is Bush using the "Cash Balance" type of retirement plan as his basis for this? Those type of Plans have not yet received favorable determination letters from the IRS.
    

I could on and on with questions that are not being asked by the media and not by politicians. This issues should be debated in public, and not just on CSPAN. CNN, FOX, MSNBC, PBS, talk radio, and we in the blogosphere should be discussing the details and understand it BEFORE a lobbyist writes the bill and passes it around an hour before the final vote.

In the Wood & Acropolis Chili Lose Battle to Stay

A Judge has ruled in favor of developers paving the way for the destruction of two long time UC and Clifton Heights establishments, In the Wood and Acropolis Chili. No indications on any appeals or other avenues to allow these property owners the continued rights afford to most all other property owners.

UPDATED for the Spelling Guy

Reaction to Police Shooting

Yes, it has been muted if you measure it by the media coverage. The Buzz appears to not have had a glut of angry callers. No negative comments outside the suspect's family have been heard, but since when has Cecil Thomas been a bellwether for the mood of black activists?