A Barney Fife Layoff May Be In Order

Someone in the Hamilton County Sheriff's office needs to quickly become the victim of budget cuts for allowing a laptop to be stolen with personal information from an undisclosed number of people. For an organization charged with providing security to the citizens of Hamilton County, someone should lose their job over this. How much other equipment or evidence is stolen throughout the year? This incident only became public because people could have their identity stolen, therefore letters are being sent out to those affected.

Is Brad Wenstrup or the HCRP Running For Mayor?

I know there's not much of a Republican Presence in the City of Cincinnati, but one would think that the Republican mayoral candidate would have his own events calendar on his website instead of the Hamilton County GOP's calendar. I really hope this is not Wenstrup's appearances, because if it is, then he's spending more time outside of the City, then in it. That's where likely more of where his contributions are coming from. When his campaign finance report is available on-line, check the addresses.

Good Luck Peter Bronson

I think Peter Bronson's political and many of his social views especially are terrible. I've spent many of the last 7 years writing on this blog in rebuttal to the unchallenged conservative view point Bronson was able to spouse in the Enquirer. I am not going to jump for joy now that Bronson has been laid off. I instead wish him well and hope he lands a new job soon. I only met Peter one time at the BOE when Joe Wessels made a point of introducing me. He was nice. Everything I heard from people who met him in person would say without question that he was a very nice guy. They would just agree that they couldn't stand his political views.

One element of politics and media that many people fail to do is see the opposition as human beings. There should not be glee when a hard working person loses their job. Bronson is a good reporter, when he takes his opinion and bias out of a story. In life it never bodes you well to kick a dog when he's down. I hope to hear that Peter has transitioned to a new job or maybe new career soon. Good Luck Peter!

Enquirer Layoffs

A source indicates that Peter Bronson, David Wells, and the entire CinWeekly staff were laid off today.

UPDATE: Via Twitter Tom Callinan, #2 at the Enquirer, stated "Need to clarify: CiN in print and online will continue with Metromix as dominant brand. That does not lessen the sadness of layoffs."

Mob Rules

Randy at UrbanCincy strongly points out where the COAST cabal is trying to steer Cincinnati City Government. Their destination is a mob rules state where the gang that can round up biggest number of people with clubs to beat up the opposition with, wins. It's not about Representative Democracy, the form of government this Republic was founded on it, is about forcing your views on others with fear, tricks, and an abuse of the system.

COAST will scream about voting. They don't want people actually voting, they want to destroy government and create a society where only the strong rule and rule by force. They are conservatives with a far right-wing agenda and seek to make everyone succumb. Anyone who thinks otherwise is fooling them self. If you support what they do, what you are supporting is the destruction of City Government and along with it the City of Cincinnati and Hamilton County with it.

Think I stating things too strongly, then I have to ask why? Where else could they possibility be headed? Their rhetoric is clear. At worst they are conservative anarchists, at best they are just old fashioned Reactionaries. If they wanted good government, they would be talking about reforming the charter, not trying to put some insane exemption in it. If you are against capital spending, then try to add an amendment that requires a plebiscite if it is over a certain dollar amount. Instead, the anti-rail and general conservative views are what are trying to push. If 100 million was going to fund a new religious university, COAST wouldn't be doing a damn thing about this. At that point, the Constitution they claim to support would be ignored. Can you imagine the the changes they would try pass if we had a straight up vote on amending the Constitution? That is where and why Representative Democracy works best. Mob rules is thuggery. Don't let the thugs go unchallenged and don't support them, in any form.

Council Candidates

The Fourth of July is a big day for Cincinnati Council campaigns and the parades on Saturday were filled with candidates and their supporterss. I saw two parades myself (Northside and Madisonville). I didn't see all of the candidates, but a majority. At this point, the only analysis of the race that can be made is by their foot print on web and each has a website of various types. As time goes on, the key to the race is who has troops on the ground, signs around town, and commercials on the air. If you don't see a candidate's face or name on t-shirts out at events this summer, the first of two reasons is: the candidate is so well known they don't need to do much until October, which is a foolish thing to believe about one's self. The second reason is that the candidate doesn't have much of a campaign, either money or volunteers. On election day the real measure will be who has both reached the most voters and gotten the most of them to come out and actually vote.

It is still early enough for other candidates to get into the race, but at this point here is who I believe is running. If I am missing anyone, please chime in with the name and/or website.

Incumbents
Jeff Berding (D)
Chris Bortz (C)
Laketa Cole (D)
Greg Harris (D)
Leslie Ghiz (R)
Chris Monzel (R)
Roxanne Qualls (C)
Cecil Thomas (D)

Endorsed Challengers
Tony Fisher (D)
Kevin Flynn (C)
Nicholas Hollan (D)
Amy Murray (R)
Laure Quinlivan (D)
Bernadette Watson (D)
Charlie Winburn (R)
Wendell Young (D)
George Zamary (R)

Independent Challengers
Anitra Brockman (I)
Darryl Cordrey (I)
Scott Pavelish (I)
LaMarque Ward (I)

Please note that some of the above may not actually get the valid number of signatures to appear on the ballot, and others might jump into race before the August deadline, meaning this is not a final list by any means.

Pools ARE a Basic Service

I thought City Council--led by Laketa Cole--was off the mark with its mid-year budget correction. Some ideas (like having police park their cars an hour per shift) don't seem likely to save the city money, and others (like the new environmental bureaucracy, a first-of-its-kind proposal that adds to the city payroll when the city is furloughing its existing staff) simply prioritize the city's agenda incorrectly.

But Cole has taken far too much flak for her recent argument that city pools are a "basic service" of municipal government. Leading the derision is HamCo GOP Chair Alex Triantafilou, who twittered that he was "laughing" at the statement, which Cole made to the Enquirer's editorial board. GOP council members piled on, and Triantafilou has since added a blog post on the topic (featuring a picture of what must be Green Township's public pool).

The truth, however, is that Cole is absolutely correct. Public pools have long been a staple of municipal government services. In Contested Waters: A Social History of Swimming Pools in America (2007), Jeff Wiltse writes that one of the first municipal pools was opened in Philadelphia in the summer of 1884. Municipal pools were a central battleground in the fight for desegregation in the United States during the middle part of the twentieth century.

If someone were to argue that public pools should be provided by the federal government, then that, of course, would be worthy of laughter. That's simply not a federal function. But municipalities provide services--police, fire, trash collection, and parks and pools--that don't come from national or state government. And cities have been providing pools since the nineteenth century. Public pools are not part of the FDR-era expansion of government. They're not even a service added by the City during the 1990's when the economy was strong and tax money was easy to find. Instead, from an historical standpoint, they are a core service of municipal government and woven into the fabric of our communities.

Laketa Cole is trying to protect a municipal service utilized primarily by the working poor and lower-middle class. While some of the more affluent Republicans in town may view that as worthy of laughter, their jocularity is not supported by reality or history. And their chronic disregard for the underserved and underrepresented may help explain why Republicans typically do pretty badly in City-wide elections.