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Photo of Amos Lynch

Amos Lynch
(1925­2015)

Everyone refers to Amos Lynch as the “godfather” of black journalism. But he was more than that.
He helped set the black political agenda in Columbus as well as covering stories of Jim Crow
practices that inspired progressives to action. For 33 years he edited the Call and Post and launched
the career of perhaps Ohio’s most famous black writer, Wil Haygood. I remember reading the front
page of the Call and Post in the 80s and 90s and contrasting it with the Dispatch and the difference
was literally black and white. All the great moral issues of the day were covered first and more
complete in the Call and Post. Whether it was freeing Nelson Mandela or police brutality – the
actual existing conditions for the poor and minorities and advocacy on their behalf was to be found
in the papers edited by Amos Lynch. The Free Press hopes that we can, in a small way, carry on
his legacy. Lynch died at age 90 on July 24, 2015. ~ Bob Fitrakis

B/W photo of man and woman from band

Monday, the Tenth day of August in the Hundred-Score-and-Five-and-Tenth year since B.C.(E.)
  We wanted to see Die Antwoord and we got word the opener, Get Weird, wasn’t worth watching, so DJ and I intentionally showed late just as the wayward warmup got offstage and what we’d paid to see got underway. The LC Pavilion was filled with White people from all walks-of-life and economic backgrounds. But so many White people at a hip-hop show? Why?
  White rappers.
  I played “spot the other non-Whites” and found a total of maybe two-dozen Brown people and ten Black people, not counting those who appeared masked onstage. I may have miscounted, but the multitudes were White. I felt like Ahab, swallowed into the Great White Whale.

Here at the Free Press’s Department of Etiquette and Common Decency, we have been receiving a great deal of inquiries with respect to the propriety of male musicians performing onstage while wearing shorts. It is not entirely clear as to whether these queries are being propounded by the genuinely confused, anticipatory contrarians, or outraged audience members seeking something definitive in writing. Regardless, it is apparent that the wearing of shorts on stage is becoming increasingly frequent, and that the issue needs to be conclusively addressed.

  As a general matter, the answer is that shorts (or cut-offs, umbros, jams, jorts, hot pants, bermudas, footer-bags etc.) should not be worn by any performer who is or might be in view of an audience and is not AC/DC’s Angus Young. Most sources agree on an exception for certain members of thrash metal bands, and there appears to be some support in instances of life-threatening heat (although this is far from universal acceptance). Beyond these carefully circumscribed exceptions, however, there is uniform consensus that wearing shorts on stage makes you look like a fucking idiot.

Renaming a mountain is better than beheading it.

And the pseudo-uproar from Donald Trump and other Republicans over the presidential renaming of the continent’s highest mountain, Denali — “the great one” — is so much yammering in a cage.

The cage is “Americanism.” The small-mindedness of this concept is suddenly more apparent than ever: Hey, we’re the greatest! Obama’s taking Mount McKinley — our mountain — away from us, giving it back to the Indians . . .

Would that it were true. Would that a sense of earth-reverence had entered the national consciousness through this act of renaming, this acknowledgement that our world isn’t merely the plaything of the American political ego. Would that President Obama meant what he said when, as he began his symbolic, climate-change-awareness trek to Alaska, he declared: “The time to plead ignorance is surely past.”

By the latest count, the nuclear agreement with Iran has enough support in the U.S. Senate to survive. This, even more than stopping the missile strikes on Syria in 2013, may be as close as we come to public recognition of the prevention of a war (something that happens quite a bit but generally goes unrecognized and for which there are no national holidays). Here, for what they’re worth, are 10 teachings for this teachable moment.

 

 

Now that General David Petraeus wants to arm and train al Qaeda killers, a number of questions arise that might be raised with the great leader:

1. Should people who said that anyone was a traitor who called you David Betray-Us while you were fighting al Qaeda, now call you David Betray-Us or a traitor?

2. Do you imagine that just because you can share all sorts of secrets with your girlfriend and get off easy, there are no hardcore nut cases who believe in the "material support for terrorism" law more than they believe in you?

On Monday morning the protesters outside the the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio were fewer in number than in June, but no less determined to prevent a consumer bailout of FirstEnergy's Davis-Besse nuclear plant and Sammis coal-fired plant. After three postponements, the PUCO was holding the first evidentiary hearing on FirstEnergy's request for a rate hike to support the aging power plants.

"We are on the brink of a major breakthrough," said Harvey Wasserman, editor of nukefree.org and history instructor at Capital University. "We have a nuclear plant and a coal-fired plant that this utility is begging, tin cup in hand, to keep operating. About a decade ago, we heard FirstEnergy and others say that they wanted competition in the electric power business. Now they are begging for more money to keep these reactors open, because they can't compete in the market.

Musicians

39th HOT TIMES COMMUNITY ARTS & MUSIC FESTIVAL,

Sept 11, 12, 13, 2015

240 Parsons Avenue, (Main & Parsons)

Hours:

Fri – 5PM - midnight

Sat – Noon - Midnight

Sunday – 11AM - 8PM

 

3 Stages - The Main Street, Parsons Avenue and Porch Swing Stages

The Hot Times Annual Art Car Show is the largest gathering of Art Cars in Ohio

Great vendors line the Loop Road creating a lively Street Fair

Fabulous Food!

Whole line up at www.hottimesfestival.com

Two men

The Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction is proud to announce in their 2014 Annual Report that their already record-low recidivism rate has dropped again and is now 27.1 percent and continues to be well below the national average of 49.7 percent. Recidivism is the act of a person repeating an undesirable behavior after he/she has either experienced negative consequences of that behavior, or have been treated or trained to extinguish that behavior.

  The report attributes Ohio’s reduction in recidivism to the use of evidence-based programs such as reintegration units within the prisons, programs to connect offenders with families and resources while incarcerated, community corrections programs and their continued work with local communities and reentry coalitions.

  As of January 11, 2014, Ohio’s prison population was 50,604 and these prisoners are “housed” in the state's 28 prisons which were built to house a total of 38,579 inmates. That’s 12,025 inmates too many. Some have served their “reasonable” time and now await the decision of the Ohio Parole Board to release them. One of these inmates is Norman Whiteside.

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