Cops Targeted?

An AP Wire report alleges that Cincinnati Police are being targeted by gunman. They report on 7 incidents since last November where gunman opened fire on police. Those situations were not disclosed except to say that three of them were when police were not confronting suspects.

Being a target for violence for no other reason than just being a police officers is reported as being rare, and the number here in Cincinnati are seen as strange:

"I can't think of any where our officers were shot at while they were just out on patrol," Cleveland police spokesman Wayne Drummond said.

Are local drug dealers targeting certain police officers for revenge? Is there a lone nut out there out to kill police officers? If this keeps up, I don't see crime rates improving. Police will be forced to stay in their cars and off the beat.

In the Woods on the Way Out?

WVXU reported this morning via the Business Courier that the restaurant/bar In the Wood is suing to prevent and eminent domain proceeding to take over the property to make way for new development on the south side of UC's campus.

I have only been there once, but it was good cheap food. I don't know what they plan on replacing it, but do they need to? Does UC need this much expansion? Why should a viable business be forced to move for a small project? It is one thing to move someone for a highway or a sports stadium, but for condos?

A Blog that 'Shocked'

Carl Weiser is reporting that a female staffer for Sen. DeWine was writing what is being called an 'explicit' blog.

Wonkette has the story covered best, including a line up of department chief of staffs alleged to have been her "loser john".


This looks and acts like a hoax, but it appears to have legs. The Plain Dealer has more, as well as the Springfield Sun. It hits the big time when it makes the Washington Post.

No comment from Mike DeWine's office. No denials either, so it is likely at least that this person is real and the blog was real. I still would guess that the person was having a little fun, and the fiction she was writing got away from her.

If this is true, then I can only say: holy shit. That scandal would make Bill Clinton's affairs look like Pilgrim Sex.

UPDATE: Greg Mann has more.

Hot Air, Meet Kettle

Ray Cooklis starts off his column Hot air: Raising McCain with a gem of a sentence:

"Some news operations appear so eager to create an anti-Bush political groundswell that they'll grasp at any straw."

Gee, Ray, what can we say about your news operation? Who do you and your management want on the Kerry ticket? Let me guess, Hillary Clinton? How many times has some conservative journalist tried to claim Hillary was either going to be VP for the Dems or some kind of fairy tale last minute candidate? The Enquirer even dragged Hillary into your editorial endorsing Bush back in 2000. When Ray starts harping on the major news outlets that like to gin up anti-Clinton fund raising drives by making fools fear Hillary running for President, at that point I might see this as anything but a political hack job on both McCain, Kerry, and the New York Times.

Moose on Main Shooting

The shooting of bar tender at Moose on Main appears to have followed a fight. This is better than random violence, but it is bad in whole different way. I will wonder if Race was involved? I wish I did not have to wonder that, but this story leaves that out and it there are signs that it could have been an issue. The fight allegedly stated after an "unpleasant conversation" with locals. What was the conversation about? Bad service? Loud Music? What?

Truth from Bronson

We got some truth from Bronson today that no one will dispute:

"My idea of 'high culture'' is the top row of seats at Oklahoma! I live on Square Street with Joe and Jane Burbs. "

Peter however insults Rodgers and Hammerstein with use of Oklahoma. Why not just use something like the musical version of "The Green Berets" as your ideal Cultural production. I can see Pete getting weepy over the finale of "The Ballad of the Green Beret" with the fake smoke doing most of the work to wet his eyes.

The biggest insult Bronson levels is his double talk:

That usually means stuff about AIDS, sex, race, women's issues, sex, gays and AIDS.

I wonder what the actors appearing now think about AIDS and how it affects people? I bet they would not perform for you Pete, after that shot at an issue many in the arts care about.

Bronson is writing himself as a cliché. He is saying don't break new ground, stick to the traditional. In other words, progress bad, the mythical past good.

Oklahoma! is a great musical, I just recent saw the movie, which I recommend. People should also hit the Fringe Festival and see art from the outside of its institutions. See art/theater from perspectives that Peter Bronson dismisses, ignores, and fears.

Bad Reporting

Headlines and leads are all too often the only part of a newspaper story that people read. In the case of the The Cincinnati Post's story from Saturday entitled "Equality remains an issue: Many local schools as segregated as ever" has a lead that along with the headline misleads the public:

Fifty years after the U.S. Supreme Court changed the course of history by ordering America to desegregate schools, many Greater Cincinnati schools are as racially segregated as ever.

If anyone were to read only the headline and opening paragraph they would have been subjected to a clear falsehood. What local school anywhere in this country is as segregated as ever? There are none. No public school in this country can legally segregate students based on race or ethnicity. That is the element of Brown v. Board of Education that everyone can celebrate 50 years later. Brown is a success on that front. The intention of the writer/editor may have been to say that schools are largely still divided by race, but the language used implies that the legal victory won by Brown was not achieved, and it was, so no school has the same segregation as before.

Those who see Brown as a catalyst of integration, as opposed to segregation, give it too much power and not enough reality. This country is nearly as unintegrated as it was 50 years ago, but to say it is segregated is wrong. Segregation in terms of our society has the implication of forced or required separation of the races. To use the term misleads the public, whether intentionally or unintentionally, to believe that things are largely no better than it was 50 years ago. I am sure that is what the boycotters want people to believe, that brings them power from angry people. That is not the truth. The reasons why schools today are not integrated are because most communities are not integrated. Asking why our communities are not integrated would have been a better focus of this story, if your concern is why many local schools are largely only one race.