Bad Debate at NKU

A pox on both sides from me. This anti-abortion display should never have been erected on a public university's grounds. It is a religious display and demonstrates where 99.9% of the anti-abortion motivation is sourced.

That being said, the professor and students involved should not have removed the display in the manner they did. They should have protested it being there and sued to have it removed. In the article NKY's President refers to it as the destruction of property, that is over the top, but what was done was the wrong way to handle it. It is a form of protest, and they can argue a 1st Amendment defense, but the freedom of speech clause may not be their best bet.

This sounds like it would have been much simpler to have the anti-abortion side hold a protest, with temporary crosses while they are there, but be forced to remove them when the protest ended. If that was what was supposed to happen, well, then the students just helped clear the grounds of discarded items.

None of this improves the situation. It will just drive a bigger wedge into the growing cultural gap in our society. That I fear is the goal of many on the anti-abortion side.

UPDATE: The Post has more. The most interest element here is that a police report valued the crosses at $600. Now if that is true, then why they hell didn't these anti-abortionists cut to the chase and buy $600 worth of condoms and pass those out on campus? They would have a great protest cheer: "Reduce Abortions by reducing unwanted pregnancies!" Instead they turn to symbols instead of actions that could actually have results.

UPDATE #2: Nice to see the anti-abortionists seeking to turn the other cheek. Oh wait, lol. This story from the NKU paper has photos of the destruction. The professor involved looks, shall we say, nutty! I will repeat something I post in comments. If a group of students is not allowed to erect a 6 foot penis, or, for that matter, take 400 dildos and plant them in the ground, then there is a clear violation of the 1st Amendment.

UPDATE #3: The AP has the story, so this should be making the talk radio rounds in the coming week. Once Bill O'Reily gets a chance, he will drag this thing out till the cows come home to roost.

Howard Beatty Charged with Shooting Oba

Self Defense is the reported defense.

It is most telling seeing the varied reactions. From the near ranting of Nate to the foolish post at the Beacon, this was a big event in the City. How quickly Nate has turned on someone who was his steadfast ally.

What I find most offensive is how on Television last night the story at WLWT was painting Oba as a nice guy who is likeable and pleasant. They failed to mention his past anti-Semitic and anti-white remarks that came out of his mouth nearly every time he called into 1230 AM's call-in shows. I can understand not attacking the man while he clings to life, but that does not mean you have to put a package together that equates a self professed black-separatist to a civil rights leader.

Kabaka Oba Shot Near City Hall

Details are here and here.

Reports in the articles state he was targeted specifically and one or two African Americans are sought for questioning or are outright suspects.

He was shot multiple times and his condition is not currently known.

Picture Contradicts Article

I believe this article is talking about the City of Cincinnati proper and Hamilton County, not metro Cincinnati. The picture accompanying this article lists the following caption:

"Mohamad Ramlawi, owner of the Halal Market in West Chester, has some fun with customer Asiya Chaudhry, holding her granddaughter, Eman Chaudhry, 2, of Mason. Ramlawi is a native of Lebanon, and Chaudhry is from India. Immigrants made up almost half of Cincinnati's population in 1850; now they make up just 2.6 percent."

If immigrants are going to save the "city," then how are they going to do when they are out in West Chester? This is a very poor job of Editing. I don't know if this picture or the caption made it to the print edition, but the online version makes the entire article appear off kilter.

UPDATE: Edited for the Lebanon City-Country confusion. That doesn't alter the point of the post.

We Ain't Uneducated

Cincinnati ranks highest among Ohio Big Cities in residents with a college degree at 34%.

Bad Boys, Bad Boys

Whatcha Gonna do!

Simon Leis' deputies are going to be patrolling in the OTR. How far behind is a new COPS! Cincinnati episode?

BushCo Is Scum

Most are failing to see what the disclosure that the Bush Administration authorized the Plame Leak means.

First ask yourself, why did they do it? What was their motive? The motive was politics. It was meant as a means to discredit a critic and make there political position (the war) look better. It did not benefit the county in the least. It is not a national security issue to ruin the career of a whislteblower.

How is this different from other slime politics? Well, take the Swift Boat crap. There you had Bush using proxies to smear John Kerry with lies. That is dirty politics, but crosses a different line. Here Bush used his powers of the Presidency, his governmental powers to tear down a domestic foe. This was meant to ruin the life of Wilson and his wife. That is an abuse of power. An Abuse of Power is a high crime, an impeachable offense.

Now, a nice wrinkle to this is that Bush, via Executive Order, gave VP Dick Cheney the power to declassify information. That may be enough to shield Bush, but Cheney should resign or be impeached.

The election of 2008 would be greatly altered if Cheney resigned and someone else popular was made VP, someone who would be running in 2008. If I were a Machiavellian, I would be looking at the likelihood of this playing out. (Yes, my mind is looking at this.)

Bottom line, Bush, Cheney, Libby, Rove, etc. are scum. If they get by without feeling any consequences from this, it is an example of how truly ignorant, or blindly loyal people are to a man who has lied regularly to them. If Bush gets no flack for this, his cult following really is a cult.