Local
White Boy Rich
Now it all makes sense. In 1992 I ran against John Kasich in Ohio’s 12th Congressional District. Everyone told me Kasich liked to smoke a little dope, and later Roger Stone would finger him as the man who was kicked out of the 1976 Reagan campaign for selling pot to the field staff.
Also running that year was Richard Cordray. You wouldn’t think about approaching Rich for a blunt, let alone a three-finger lid of primo bud.
But apparently I had it all wrong.
Ohio Attorney General and Republican governor wannabe Mike DeWine set me straight. Heretofore I will only call Richard Cordray by his street name – White Boy Rich.
This is what I learned from a DeWine commercial. Cordray, raised on the mean streets of Grove City, headed a huge cartel beginning at Grove City High School. White Boy Rich was smart enough to throw the DEA off his trail by joining the high school quiz team and working a minimum wage job at Mickey-D’s. All the time, building his southside suburban drug empire.
I woke up today with what Devo would call an uncontrollable urge.
And the urge was urging...what?
To watch Downton Abbey?
No, grandma.
To learn the chords and lyrics to Carmen Ohio?
God, no. (There are lyrics?)
To send all my money to the Clinton Foundation so one person in Haiti might get at least a hamburger next week?
To paraphrase Adolf Hitler in Inglourious Basterds, "Nein, nein, nein, nein, nein" (I've counted the neins).
As I laid propped up on my three mismatching pillows, I eagerly dialed up on You Tube my guiltiest of pleasures: Deep Purple – the greatest British hard rock band of the '70s (Led Zeppelin being the worst) – and their 1972 or thereabouts live version of one of the greatest headbangers ever made. And I mean one of the two or three best ever, bubby.
No, not Smoke On The Water. Highway Star!
The year was 1968. The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated. Senator Robert F. Kennedy was assassinated. The nation was in turmoil. There were riots in cities across America. That following school year, the Columbus East High School Basketball and Baseball Teams both won State Championships in Ohio, an unheard of feat at that time.
The events of that championship season, both on and off the baseball diamond and basketball courts, is the basis of the latest book, Tigerland 1968-1969: A City Divided, A Nation Torn Apart, and a Magical Season of Healing, by Wil Haygood.
Haygood made several appearances around Columbus to promote the book upon its September 18 release, including the place that was the focal point of the book, Columbus East High School.
On September 20, Haygood spoke to an audience at Columbus East High School, where several surviving members of the 1969 State Championship Baseball and Basketball Teams were in attendance.
“It was (East High Principal) Jack Gibbs that kept East High School together during the days after Dr. King was shot,” Haygood said to a full audience at the East High School auditorium.
As we barrel towards Election Day, it’s become clear the Ohio Debate Commission wasn’t actually created to ensure robust debate for Ohio’s voters. On the contrary, it was meant to stifle any real discussion about the issues and keep Ohioans from knowing about all their options on the ballot in the gubernatorial race this year. Case in point – the recent debates held between the two major party candidates for governor, Republican Mike DeWine and Democrat Rich Cordray, that excluded half of the candidates on the ballot, including myself, the Libertarian Party candidate, and Constance Gadell-Newton with the Green Party.
As was to be expected, all this exclusion did was allow for the “debates” to descend into the typical arguing and mudslinging Americans have become accustomed to in our duopoly-dominated discourse, as opposed to actual conversation about policies and the problems facing our state. DeWine and Cordray predictably attacked each other on their equally dismal records as attorney general, directly quoted their negative ads and blamed each other for Ohio’s opioid crisis, all while only offering big government solutions that waste more taxpayer dollars.
Wanted: Election Protection Volunteers
Help us protect our right to vote.
Green Party/Free Press will again be placing election observers inside the polling places for the critical November 6th election. Fair elections require vigilance. The Free Press continues to be the leader in election reporting. We held the public hearings after the 2004 election debacle, and have worked hard on election issues since. For more information: http://freepress.org/article/election-protection-2018
Election Protection Observers:
Ohio law allows election observers inside the County Board of Elections and/or local polling places if appointed by a political party 10 days in advance of the November 6th election. The Free Press, in conjunction with the Green Party, is looking for interested activists to observe and report on this election. Training and materials will be made available.
What is the job of an Election Observer? The answer is to show up, to observe, to ask questions and take notes.
Brian "Clash" Griffin, honored at last year's Free Press Annual Awards Event, will perform with the Coffee House Rebels at the 2018 Free Press Awards ceremony on Monday, October 8 at Woodlands Tavern, 1200 W. Third Avenue. The Coffee House Rebels are an electric, folk-rock blues, acoustic punk, rock band made up of Brian Clash on vocals, guitar, and harmonica, Chuck Oney on bass and vocals and Sarah Noble on drums and vocals. To hear them, come to the event!
Ye’s Asian Vegan Kitchen just opened in Hilliard’s West Point strip mall just south of the Kroger at Roberts and Hilliard Rome on Sept 16, 2018. While vegan options are expanding in many dietary diversity conscious restaurants globally, Ye’s is now the fourth 100% vegan restaurant operating concurrently in the Columbus metro area (Loving Hut, Portia’s, Eden Burger) where one does not have to worry about any animal product cross-contamination. There are a full spectrum of vegan appetizers, main courses rice-based and noodle based dishes, soups, salads, spring rolls, dumplings and more. The only thing they have yet to develop is their dessert menu. The Vegan Columbus community has been raving about their Ye’s Asian Vegan Kitchen experiences, so check it out!
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1SFPd9yE8ZdRtkQUQiOz8VmV3UWG2uoQ3gw1-MIBHNpc/edit?usp=sharing
Columbus’ own anarcho-comedy duo Street Fight Radio will perform alongside Chapo Trap House as part of the Chapo Trap House tour for their book The Chapo Guide to Revolution on October 10. They both represent a revolution in comedy.
Street Fight Radio started as a community radio show on the local WCRS LP (92.7 & 98.3) in 2011 and now has fans around the world. It was a project by two local comedians, Brett Payne and Bryan Quinby, who were disenchanted with the state of comedy in Central Ohio and wanted to do their own thing. The two started performing skits and providing a working-class anarchist critique of politics. In 2016, the show transitioned from a hobby project to a full-blown gig as the duo found success with the crowd funding platform Patreon. I asked Bryan what about their recent success.
GW Pharmaceuticals: Savior of mankind or bane of human existence?
Once upon a time, there was a guy who knew a lot about marijuana. He attended cannabis conferences and participated in presentations. He hobnobbed with a wealthy well-known insurance magnate. Eccentric described him, but he also had a wonky, biochemical side intent on legitimizing marijuana as medicine. He claimed he had “no beef with people who grow, smoke, or provide their own cannabis.” He decried the drug war’s toll on U.S. marijuana policy.
But there was another side. He’s been portrayed as the master mind behind an unfair marijuana monopoly that patents plants, extraction techniques, medicines and extract inhalers – and then sues violators. A Monsanto that resorts to heavy-handed police state scare tactics. A purveyor of prohibition that prevents people from managing personal healthcare or growing personal medicine.
Politics rears its head only toward the end of the National Geographic documentary Science Fair. That’s when various people complain about the current status of science in the U.S., whose officials routinely dismiss research on issues such as climate change and environmental health.
Otherwise, the film is an uplifting celebration of high school students who vie for the chance to win honors at Los Angeles’ Intel International Science and Engineering Fair (ISEF), a huge event that annually attracts 1,700 of the best and brainiest from across the globe.
Sure, the students are competing for a shot at fame and glory—and to impress the colleges and universities they hope to enter. But in the process, they put their intellectual skills to work on complex problems whose solutions could benefit us all.
The implicit message: If given half a chance, nerds could save the world.