Bob Blog: Roll over Damschroder and tell Rove the news

I’m always amazed at the political career of Matt Damschroder, Deputy Director of the Franklin County Board of Elections. He’s just been named to the bipartisan Committee to Modernize Voter Registration (CMVR).

Matt first came to political prominence in Columbus when he managed the right wing “Flag Lady’s” campaign for City Council. The visibility of her little flag shop on High Street allowed her to do much better than expected in a close defeat.

Matt went on from there to be known as “the chauffer” – the guy who drove around and literally wheeled around former Franklin County Republican Party Chair Michael F. Colley. He went from being Colley’s wheel-man to replacing Colley as the Franklin County Republican Party Chair.

The Columbus Free Press seeks your input on The American Clean Energy and Security Act, which is headed for the U.S. Senate this fall

****To whoever may be interested in responding to the following arguments made against the legislation, which is also known as the Waxman-Markey Bill, here are many of the points made at a public event that US Rep. John Boehner (R-Ohio) and US Rep. Mike Pence (R-Indiana) hosted on Sept 2, 2009, at the Ohio State University.
Your input will be added to this article if you phone in, email, or otherwise communicate your ideas. Send comments to:
thomasover@gmail.com and/or phone them in at 614 202 0178. ****

House Minority Leader John Boehner, (R-OH) said "the president said that with cap and trade, only the polluters are going to pay. But who are those polluters? One of them is AK Steel. Under the proposal, AK Steel would be out of business, because their competitors in India and China will be able to produce steel at a much cheaper rate."

Ohio’s Democratic Leaders Spurn Their Party’s Traditional Values

Ohio Gov. Ted Strickland and House Speaker Armond Budish claim to be Democrats. But in the biennial state budget they approved in 2009, they gave Ohioans more reasons to wonder whatever happened to the Ohio Democratic Party that once billed itself as “the party of the people.”
Trickle-down Dems?
In recent years, state Democratic leaders have endorsed tax cuts for the richest Ohioans. Strickland boasts of his support for the across-the-board 21% income-tax reductions enacted in 2005 by Republican Gov. Bob Taft and the then-Republican General Assembly. The cuts were to be phased in over five years, and Strickland has protected them since becoming governor in 2007.

Moreover, in his first year in office, Strickland expanded Ohio’s homestead exemption to include wealthy older Ohioans, even billionaires. The exemption excludes property taxes on up to the first $25,000 of a home’s market value and previously applied only to older Ohioans making below a certain income level.

Book Review: Jim Crow America: A Documentary History

Jim Crow America: A Documentary History
Catherine M. Lewis and J. Richard Lewis, eds.
University of Arkansas Press 2009
234 pp
Annotated Bibliography and Index

If slavery was the most pernicious chapter in American history, then Jim Crow is a close second. Defined as the legal, extralegal and customary separation of the black and white races, the system of Jim Crow successfully returned much of the United States, especially the eleven states of the Old Confederacy, back to slavery. It meant the loss of citizenship rights for African Americans, and was accompanied by crushing poverty and terrible hopelessness. A dual society allowed whites to retain financial, emotional and physical control over African Americans and was used to prop up the doctrine of white supremacy.

I am Barack Obama's political prisoner now

The United States Department of Justice has once again made a mockery of its lofty and pretentious title.

After releasing an original and continuing disciple of death cult leader Charles Manson who attempted to shoot President Gerald Ford, an admitted Croatian terrorist, and another attempted assassin of President Ford under the mandatory 30-year parole law, the U.S. Parole Commission deemed that my release would "promote disrespect for the law."

If only the federal government would have respected its own laws, not to mention the treaties that are, under the U.S. Constitution, the supreme law of the land, I would never have been convicted nor forced to spend more than half my life in captivity. Not to mention the fact that every law in this country was created without the consent of Native peoples and is applied unequally at our expense. If nothing else, my experience should raise serious questions about the FBI's supposed jurisdiction in Indian Country.

Will the Corporate Supremes now dance on democracy's corpse?

The Four Courtsmen of the Apocalypse are poised to finally bury American democracy in corporate money. The most powerful institution in human history---the global corporation---may soon take definitive possession of our electoral process.

It could happen very soon.

While America agonizes over health care, energy and war, Justices John Roberts, Antonin Scalia, Sam Alito and Clarence Thomas could make it all moot. They may now have the fifth Supreme Court vote they need to open the final floodgates on corporate spending in political campaigns.

In short, the Court may be poised to shred a century of judicial and legislative attempts to preserve even a semblance of restraint on how Big Money buys laws and legal decisions. The ensuing tsunami of corporate cash could turn every election hence into a series of virtual slave auctions, with victory guaranteed only to those candidates who most effectively grovel at the feet of the best-heeled lobbyists.

Not that this is so different from what we have now. The barriers against cash dominating our elections have already proven amazingly ineffective.

Stop Glenn Beck show advertisers from supporting stupidity

Below are the advertisers on the Glenn Beck Show. If you feel like it, contact them and let them know whether or not you appreciate their sponsorship of Glenn Beck's show. You can remind them of Glenn Beck's comments, like "I think President Obama is a racist" and "The Hurricane Katrina survivors are scumbags" and ""I didn't think I could hate victims faster than the 9-11 victims." You could ask these advertisers if they endorse or reject Glenn Beck's comments and insinuations.

Click here

Click here

The Glenn Beck Show can be heard between 9 AM and noon weekdays on 610 WTVN, Brian Dytko, General Manager, phone number 486-6101. You could suggest that WTVN's parent company, Clear Channel, return Progressive Talk to the radio airwaves in Columbus so the majority of people in our community have a station that they do not find insulting and hateful.

Aesthetics

Tonight on Glenn Beck: Victory!

The resurrection of Antioch College: A small victory for humanity

The struggle and victory to re-open Antioch College as an independent institution separate from Antioch University is a major victory for peace and progressive forces in the United States. On Friday, September 4, Antioch University officials signed a 750-page closing document after 14 months of negotiations to turn Antioch College assets over to the Antioch College Continuation Corp. (read: the alumni).

A group of Greene County citizens recently dropped a complaint filed with the Ohio Attorney General’s office to strip the University of its tax exempt status. The complaint alleged that the University had neglected and wasted the assets of the former College, including severe damage to the historical main building at the Yellow Springs campus.

The Attorney General’s office acknowledged that the withdrawal of the complaint helped pave the way for the final settlement.

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