Black Family Reunion
Organizers made every effort to avoid a repeat of last year's melee. Last night they could not stop a group of what WCPO reported were 500 teenagers converging on downtown. There were some minor scuffles, but no injuries or property damage was reported. A few fights were reported and a few arrests were made. Pictures show a large group of kids on Government Square presumably waiting for bus rides home. It appears the same problem existed as last year. Parents either left their kids down at the family reunion, or did not go with them at all, forcing the kids to travel home in mass by bus. This year trouble was avoided because police and other security were better prepared and kept order. Last year they were not prepared. What will the response be after the event? What will happen tonight after the event? If organizers keep up their efforts and police keep up their efforts, then nothing worse than a few kids will get out of hand. I hope the police will be thanked for keeping things from getting out of control, and not vilified for doing what parents should be doing.

Friends of Simon Leis?
Are the Troy, Ohio Police friends of the Hamilton County Sheriff? If they are not friends, they seem to have the same target: porn. This time though it is a strip club, not video stores. I have to ask, is this an election year in Troy? I also must ask, have they solved all crimes with actual victims in Troy? If not, why are they grandstanding with a PR induced prosecution? Yes, Virginia, yet another rhetorical question.

Commissioner Dowlin to Run Again
The 73 year old will seek another term next year for Hamilton County Commissioner. Dowlin is anti-rail and it would be nice to get someone not as set in his ways, yes you can read old in that comment. Age is not a factor, but when based on age you don't wish to change, that becomes a problem. This fellow thinks "Even though he opposes light rail, he says were it adopted today it would take 30 years to implement and he was[sic] other, faster alternatives." Just because he will not alive to enjoy a rail system is not a reason for it not to pass.

This announcement will surely piss off some Republican upstarts from the Northern Suburbs, who are surely itching to run.

UPDATE: The Enquirer reports that Dowlin will likely face a democratic challenge from former state Representative Wayne Coates. The Post reported that the GOP chairman Mike Barrett felt there would be no competition. Barrett thinks Dowlin's name will carry him through. What name? Sure, his has the advantage of incumbency, but it is not like his name is Luken, Deters, or Heimlich.

More Power Outage Fodder
It is not newsworthy, but the rain yesterday knocked my power out here at the palatial Griffin Estate. I was at work at the time, but I had to reset a clock and my stereo was on "demo," a sign the power was out.

Giz over at afternoon.para-bellum.net reports of some more significant power outages recently in Delhi, but still relatively short. Giz's blog needs permalinks. Both incidents are noteworthy for local news, not national news. 50 million people losing power is national news and demands coverage. Some talk radio folks were scolding the media for making to much of this. I guess they don't know anyone in the area's hit. This was huge news and it got big coverage in part do to the simple fact that the TV networks are headquartered in the affected areas. When news is close to home, human journalists are opted to give it more attention. That is in part why Detroit and Cleveland's troubles got little attention. This power outage makes it clear that local news coverage is not well served by national networks. The Ohio News Network (ONN) did a good job here in Ohio with Ohio specific news, mostly carrying feeds from Toledo and Cleveland TV stations.

The Cincinnati Post has the typical "are we ready" story. Here's the Enquirer's story.

Lawmakers are "demanding" answers. Give it a rest folks. Let the water pressure build up before you start the blame game. Both Democrats and Republicans in Washington are playing this game, so if anyone tries to say one side is worse than the other you might want to correct their ignorance.

UPDATE: Ethan Hahn has some thoughts.

Not MY Bag
I am sure to be pressured by my co-workers to try this, but I will not join the insta-date group described in Maggie Downs' latest column. I hate first date chitchat and doing it over and over again in one evening is about as appealing as having my teeth drilled. I will stick to randomly meeting women in bookstores. Judging a person by what they read and how they drink expensive coffee is more my style of date screening. I guess I better start setting foot in bookstores more often, and keep my nose out of my book. I have had no luck with this approach, but hey, it beats having to expose one's inability to socially interact with other human beings. (I have to work on that inner monologue.)

Follow-up: Couldn't I have found a better cliché than "having my teeth drilled?"

Hispanics vs. Whites
Here is the problem with this article about housing discrimination. I am 1/8th Latino. My Great Grandmother was from Panama/Columbia. She was "white." So, like most others out there, the Enquirer wants to paint Hispanics/Latinos as one monolithic group to compare with monolithic whites, a nice simple "black and white" story. I would surmise that most of the Hispanics in question were Mexican, and were mestizo (mixed Amerindian and white). So what are we trying to compare here, ethnic groups or races? There is no "Hispanic Race," and comparing race is really a no win action. Ethnic discrimination would have required the disclosure of the white people's ethnic groups, unless they are some how considered falsely blanketed as "ethnic Americans." I therefore find this report to be comparing apples and oranges. I would consider without much evidence that Mexicans and other Latin-American ethnic/nationality groups are treated poorly by landlords and often discriminated against. I wonder how many non-white landlords treated the Hispanic people differently than white landlords.

UPDATE: Similar treatment in the Post.

FOX News is a Sucker for Power (Blackout Story)
FOX News just reported they had reports that the power was out in Dayton and even Cincinnati. At this point no one else is reporting Dayton, and none of the Dayton outlets are reporting that. I can surely testify that Cincinnati's power is working fine. Rumors really have no place being reported on a story as big as this. People in this part of the state clean out Kroger’s when an inch of snow is forecasted. If even a few ignorant souls believed the faux reports, it might turn tragic. Jumping the gun is a fault of most Cable News Outlets, and FOX is known for hyperbole.

UPDATE: WLWT-TV is reporting no local outages. A Dayton TV station did report a report in Middletown, Ohio (between Dayton and Cincinnati.

UPDATE #2: The Enquirer is reporting there was an unrelated power outage in Middletown that cut power to the south side of town due to a transformer going down after 5 PM tonight. This outage was not related to the larger outage affecting NYC.