Smedley Butler won’t be around next year to save us.

       The former Marine Corps general was offered a ton of money in 1933 to murder newly-elected president Franklin Roosevelt and stage a fascist coup.

Armed with the then-huge sum of $3 million, infamous billionaires funded a “Banker’s Plot” with 500,000 armed thugs set to erect a corporate dictatorship atop FDR’s grave.

Butler had led US troops throughout Latin America during the “Dollar Diplomacy” 1920s. He crushed grassroots uprisings and installed brutal dictators. America’s richest barons now wanted him to do the same thing here.

But they chose the wrong guy. In shocking Congressional hearings, Butler blew the whistle on (until then) US history’s best-funded attempted coup. “War,” he warned, “is a racket.”

The super-rich plotters hotly denied Butler’s account. None of them went to prison.

Butler won’t be around next year to expose the Trump coup attempt, already in progress. He won’t have to. It’s already visible for all to see.

Friday, December 11, 6pm, Franklin County Municipal Court, 373 S. High St.

Facebook Event

Enough is enough. After months of demonstrations against police brutality and the disproportionate murder of Black people, it has happened again.

Join us in a peaceful protest to demand justice for Casey Goodson Jr., the beloved son, brother, cousin, friend, neighbor, and community member.

As always, wear masks, social distance, and bundle up! Bring your signs and help us demand justice, accountability, and transparency.

Casey, aka Tank, was murdered by a 17-year-experienced Franklin County Sheriff Deputy who was working with the U.S. Marshal to capture an individual who was not Casey.

The media has reported multiple lies and facts that don’t add up. Casey was murdered as he entered his home, holding a Subway sandwich, in front of his family. His back was to officers and he was not a threat. Yet they killed him anyway.

#JusticeForCasey

No one seemed as excited about the election of Joe Biden being the next President of the United States as Palestinian Authority President, Mahmoud Abbas. When all hope seemed lost, where Abbas found himself desperate for political validation and funds, Biden arrived like a conquering knight on a white horse and swept the Palestinian leader away to safety. 

Our post-election hope couldn’t be more fragile.

Does Joe Biden see his mission as merely reclaiming situation normal from Donald Trump? How aware is he of the big, beyond-our-lifetimes future and the crucial need to address climate change? Is he able to acknowledge that human “interests” go well beyond national borders? And if so, how much political traction would he have to have before he could begin turning vision into policy?

When a podcast titled “Whites of the Roundtable” is focused mainly on Central Ohio’s most prestigious old-money suburb Upper Arlington (UA), by railing against any affordable housing moving in, this old-money suburb probably has a white supremacy problem.

But it’s no laughing matter when on an invite-only and unsearchable Facebook group called “UA Golden Pride,” veiled threats are made against a UA Ohio House of Representative Democrat.

Or when UA’s most vocal right-winger takes his explosive anger to Facebook as UA Golden Pride cheers him on.

The Free Press wants to be clear, UA is not the Republican stronghold it once was even though it still has the lowest percentage of Black residents in metro Columbus.

In 2016 it went Clinton by 15 points (3,300 votes), and while the Free Press was unable to obtain 2020 presidential vote totals, Ohio House of Rep. Catherine Allison Russo, of UA’s District 24, won her re-election over Republican Pat Manley by 15 points (12,000 votes).

UA is jammed with million-dollar homes and good people. For some of them it’s win-at-all-costs, an attitude reflective of Ohio State’s football program.