I wrote a column titled "Sherrod Bets It All On Nan" last month.

On Tuesday May 3, Sherrod won his big bet. What follows is my take on the election outcome and what it means for the future.

1. Sherrod Brown is the both the king and king/queen-maker of the Ohio Democratic Party. The U.S. Senator made a brilliantly executed television commercial for Nan Whaley that saturated the airwaves, gave her instant name recognition around the state, and, more than any other factor, is responsible for her one-sided victory over John Cranley in the Democratic primary for governor.

2. Now the challenge for Sen. Brown is to get Whaley elected governor. She has about 1 chance out of 10 of knocking off incumbent Gov. Mike DeWine. Brown will have to orchestrate several effective TV ads, some of them negative against DeWine, in order for Whaley to have a chance. He will have to help her raise $50 million because DeWine has access to $100 million, if he needs it, to hold onto his job.

Given the rhetorical prominence that right-wing Ohio Republican candidates for U.S. Senate and House districts gave to the 45th  president's erroneously titled "America First" agenda--not program or policy--in their election campaigns, it's time to revisit the absence of an actual platform and the "Agenda's" consequences.

J.D., or J.P aka J.D. Mandel according to 45, Vance should be asked by all, especially our media, to explain and justify the true content, contradictions, and failed results of "America First," which played out often as "America Last."

Here is my column “America First: An Excavation of Trumpism and the Trump Agenda,” Busting Myths, Columbus Free Press, Oct. 24, 2021 which was shared across the U.S.:

Surveying the terrain and scratching the surface 

Amidst the craziness of the 2022 election season, we are doing another screening of our hit short documentary How America Killed My Mother at the historic Studio 35 Cinema & Drafthouse this Friday, May 6! Doors open at 11 PM, the screening starts at 11:30 PM and will be followed by a Q&A with myself and more, so please see the details below and let us know if we can get into your outlet's weekend list of activities, etc as y'all see fit:

Ticket link: How America Killed My Mother - Fri 6 May 11:30 PM - Studio 35 Cinema & Drafthouse

V.I. Lenin proclaimed: “For us, the cinema is the most important of the arts.” The leader of the Russian Revolution said this around 1922, the year Benito Mussolini’s blackshirts rose to power in Italy, and later decreed: “Film work facilitates fascist penetration.” Both extremes of Left and right recognized the central role motion pictures could play in propaganda, in reaching the masses with their messages and agitating them to take action. Albanian director Roland Sejko’s The Image Machine of Alfredo C. is about an Italian cameraman who shot newsreel-type footage for Il Duce’s fascists and then for the Communists in Albania.

Senior Crawl is this thing where graduating Ohio State students all wear white shirts, and walk from the various bars while signing each other’s shirts.

I didn’t graduate college so it’s usually this thing where you analyze the idea of signatures. As a graffiti writer, the idea of writing your name seems relevant. But because booze is involved, writing on a drunk college girl’s shirt seems problematic.

While I will quickly respond I-O if someone yells O-H…I wasn’t a senior graduating from Ohio State.

Interacting with normal people used to be a sort of exoticism for me.

Awhile ago, a white sorority girl was crying out of empathy for some things she had heard had occurred to me. The fact a white sorority girl even knew I existed….

The weirdest thing about this conversation. I told a white sorority girl she had been the first white sorority girl I’ve interacted with to my knowledge.