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An amazing thing happened in Washington DC. No, it didn’t involve the President, or at least not yet. But it did come from the Republican camp. Congress’ most powerful politician – Washington’s red light, green light – is championing the “Hemp Farming Act of 2018.”
This groundbreaking legislation would redefine hemp as an agricultural commodity, regulate it under the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), and drop it from the list of tightly Controlled Schedule I Substances. Water rights, federal grants and banking accompany this bill. Yes, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) is leading the pack, and because of him, the Act has a good chance of passing. Once signed by the President, hemp will emerge from 80 years of prohibition darkness and move into the light as a recognized crop like soybeans or corn.
The infamous Trumputin consigliere Paul Manafort worked with the GOP operatives who stole Ohio’s 2004 presidential election at the same time they teamed up to install the Kremlin’s chosen mafia don in Ukraine.
Manafort is Donald Trump’s former campaign manager. He’s been convicted of a wide range of high-profile crimes by a jury evaluating charges brought by Special Prosecutor Robert Mueller.
Manafort also worked in Ukraine following the 2004 popular Orange Revolution with Ohio-based IT specialist Michael Connell and Tennessean Jeff Averbeck to install the Putin-backed Viktor Yanukovych as president of Ukraine. Connell and Averbeck have been deeply implicated as being among the chief architects of the stolen Ohio 2004 vote flip that gave George W. Bush a second term in the White House.
Craig Unger, in his essential book House of Trump, House of Putin, places Manafort in Ukraine in “late 2004.” Manafort worked out of a small six-to-eight-person office at 4 Sofievskaya Street in Kiev. Over the next decade, Manafort made 138 trips to Ukraine, according to Unger.
With the passage of Labor Day comes fall, football, pumpkin patches and Hot Times. The 42nd Annual Community Festival on the Near East Side returns to the Columbus Health Department Grounds from September 7 through 9.
The annual community festival will feature food vendors, a flea market and entertainment on two stages, the Parsons Stage and the Main Stage. On Saturday and Sunday, afternoon there will be performers on the Swing Patio, on the front patio of the Health Department.
The Hot Times Community Festival started as a Flea Market by the Olde Towne East Neighborhood Association (OTENA) in the late 1970s. The festival is now, according to the Arts Foundation of Olde Towne (AFOOT) Website, an “all-volunteer driven community and arts festival.”
Cop’s hand injured – civilian executed with eight shots in return: Once again a Columbus Police Department (CPD) officer dubiously reveals what a pathetic abject coward he really is (though the Free Press is cautiously suspicious of every version of an officer-involved killing that involves the phrase “I feared for my life.”)
In Franklinton on August 23, Officer Andrew Mitchell shot 23-year-old Donna Dalton (Castleberry) eight times in his cruiser after she allegedly stabbed his hand with a knife.
Think about it. You are a 30-year grizzled veteran on the CPD vice squad. You’ve got 80 prostitution arrests under your belt just this calendar year, because your beat is the west side of the city where young women gather.
You are undercover. You are in an unmarked car. The rest of the story is unclear.
Of course, we don’t have a “he said, she said” situation since “she” is dead. And there are no witnesses.
Two recent local news stories offer compelling, if baffling, insight into the priorities of the media in and around Columbus. On August 22, the media descended on Ohio State University to learn the future of Urban Meyer following the football coach’s handling of a domestic abuse scandal involving one of his assistants.
Two days later, the same news outlets failed to appear at the Franklin County Board of Elections to learn the fate of a citizens’ initiative to protect Columbus, and thus Central Ohio, from the toxic and radioactive dangers of fracking. During this hearing, the board would decide whether to place on the ballot the Columbus Community Bill of Rights (CCBOR) proposal to “establish a community bill of rights for water, soil and air protection” from fracking operations and its waste. Strangely, the same media that comprehensively covered Meyer and his football program demonstrated little interest in an issue that affects the health of all Central Ohioans and their environment.
Crazy Rich Asians has been hailed as a possible game-changer, being the first Hollywood movie in 25 years to feature a predominantly Asian cast. As a harbinger of a more-inclusive future, though, I’d rather look to a smaller film called Searching.
Directed and co-written by Aneesh Chaganty, it’s the story of a widowed father desperately trying to learn why his teenage daughter has suddenly disappeared. This new entry is unusual for two reasons. First, the plot unfolds almost entirely on computer screens as the dad searches the girl’s social-media outlets for clues. And second, the dad is an Asian-American named David Kim (played by Star Trek’s John Cho).
The offbeat casting seems almost as revolutionary as the offbeat filmmaking.
In last month’s least surprising news, media sources are reporting that the 2019 Rock on the Range Music Festival will not be moving to Three Creeks Metro Park from its existing home at Mapfre Stadium. The annual festival, which features an assortment of post-grunge, nu metal and a smattering of classic rock (collectively “butt rock”) had reportedly been considering a new site in light of the possible relocation of the Crew to Austin, Texas. According to a statement, the Metro Park decided not to host due to concerns over infrastructure and the fact that “butt rock fans are a bunch of dumb animals who will piss all over themselves and try to eat the trees like beavers.”
&Juice Co. has three locations around town and has a fantastic variety of 100 percent vegan juice blends as well as allergen-friendly (gluten-free/nut free, seed-based alternative) options in Columbus. I was positively impressed by their brunch at their Italian Village/4th Street location this past weekend.
If your idea of brunch includes a gluten-free waffle, a grilled cheeze sandwich, an Italian style marinara chickpea-based “meatball” sub, a carrot and lox bagel, or a supercharged infusion of fresh juice, this place is for you. Brunch happens every other weekend.
They have a variety of toasts, too: avocado, hummus, deviled “egg” (tofu) salad and an ever-changing list of specials. All produce is 100 percent source identified organic, most coming from within 20 miles – and they are a minority woman-owned business.
Only one smoothie has honey that can be substituted for agave. This is a great, open space with an inviting clean atmosphere, community seating, and peaceful music in the background.
To accomplish something means that you have successfully achieved what you set out to do when you started a task. If you accomplish something you are a person that has done well, typically because of study or practice. It takes hard work and dedication to accomplish anything successfully in life and on the job.
Columbus Police Department Chief Kimberley Jacobs is one of those people who has accomplished many tasks in her career. She joined the CPD in 1979 and was promoted to Commander in 1995. She moved to Deputy Chief in 2009 and has been in her current position as Chief of Police since 2012. She was the first woman to be promoted to each of those positions.
One woman is willing to sacrifice for the good of the Democratic Party.
Another woman is not.
Betty Sutton, the Democratic candidate for lieutenant governor, originally was a candidate for the gubernatorial nomination.
In the early polls she was running neck-and-neck with Richard Cordray. She would have made history as the first women elected governor of Ohio.
Political leaders and party insiders sat down with her and asked her to make a significant sacrifice. Give up her campaign for the state's highest office and become Cordray's running mate.
She accepted.
One insider told me that Betty Sutton was willing to defer her own ambitions for the good of the party and to increase the chances that a Democrat will win.
This contrasts with 2010 when several Democratic state officeholders declined a relatively safe race for re-election and ran for higher office only to lose and drag down the rest of the ticket with them.