Facts Don't Care About Your Religion
Sorry but it's true.
Some business brained genius devised a scheme to charge people $65 to spend 45 minutes in a revamped cocktail lounge of a defunct airline and put it in Freaky Franklinton.
I have come to hate the River and Rich buildings with my life. We don’t claim any of their residents in The Bottoms and I have no doubt they tell their coworkers they live on “the Scioto Peninsula.” Bunch of nerds who want to charge $600 for their kindergarten paintings while driving up rent for the rest of us.
RELIGIOUS ZEALOTS ON THE MARCH IN THE STATEHOUSE
Religious zealots founded private schools primarily to keep the education system racially segregated and avoid paying taxes. But also because they could teach kids in science class that the Earth is only 6,000 years old and that a senior citizen once built a boat big enough to peacefully house every animal in the world.
I have never liked private schools but what can I do I’m only one man? But now since Republican policies have forced young people to flee our state and gerrymandered districts have allowed right-wing extremists to seize power they’re now pushing their religious dogma into public schools as well.
From Laura Hancock of cleveland.com:
COLUMBUS, Ohio – The Ohio House sent to the Senate on Wednesday a measure that would prohibit public schools from penalizing students for some work that contains religious beliefs.
Critics have called the bill unnecessary or valuing religion over secularism. One critic said under the bill, if a student turned in homework saying the earth is 10,000 years old – a belief held by some creationists -- they couldn’t get docked in their grade. However, the bill’s sponsor said it was more nuanced than that.
…
Children these days face pressures over drug use, student violence and increasing rates of depression and suicide, said bill sposnor Rep. Timothy Ginter, Youngstown-area Republican.
“We live in a day when our young people are experiencing stress and danger and challenges we never experienced growing up," he said.
Ginter said he’s convinced that allowing religious self-expression would be positive.
How dumb do you have to think allowing kids to misstate facts on public school tests will cure them of the “stress and danger” older generations never experienced because they lived in a world where minimum wage was a living wage and houses cost $500?
What’s scary is this could absolutely become law thanks to the Religious Right’s vise grip on Ohio Republican leadership. I would hope this idiocy would be overturned in the courts but you never know in this day and age as President Business Deals has stacked the judiciary with Federalist Society ghouls for the next 30 years.
OHIO AIR WILL KILL YOU TOO
I have long suspected Republican leaders are attempting to kill me. But only recently did I learn the air I breathe in this state is also trying to kill me.
From Max Filby of dispatch.com:
Ohio has the 13th highest rate of lung cancer in the country and it may be linked to a lack of testing for the disease.
Few Ohioans get screened for lung cancer, and a new study from the American Lung Association shows that lack of testing is likely contributing to the state’s higher rate of cases of the disease.
About 68 cases of lung cancer are diagnosed per 100,000 Ohioans compared with around 59 cases per 100,000 people across the country, according to the study released Wednesday.
Lung cancer screening via a CT scan has been offered since 2015, but only 5.2% of eligible Ohioans submit for testing. The statistic can be chalked up to a lack of awareness around screening, said Kim Hehman, director of cancer and respiratory care at OhioHealth’s Doctors Hospital on the Far West Side.
I took out a life insurance policy this week and I picked up a cancer option because I’ve always felt that I’m going to die of some ridiculously painful strain of cancer so at least when that happens I’ll have at $250,000 in treatments which should be good enough to extend my life for another week as I attempt to overdraft my account by $40,000 before the cancer devours my brain and the lights go out forever.
THIS STATE IS DRIVING PEOPLE TO SUICIDE IN RECORD NUMBERS
Maybe one day our legislators will fairly tax the wealthy in this state so we can expand the social and mental health services our citizens desperately need.
From wlwt.com:
Five people in Ohio die by suicide every day.
New numbers from the Ohio Department of Health show between 2007 and 2018, suicide deaths increased by 45% among all Ohioans and increased by 56% among people ages 10 to 24.
Suicide is now the leading cause of death among children ages 10 to 14.
I’m not sure who needs to hear this but you are cherished and somebody loves you. Suicide merely a permanent fix to a temporary problem.
BIPARTISAN PRAISE FOR CULT’S NEW DIGS
Scientology is a cult disguised as a religion whose primary purpose is to isolate vulnerable people from their loved ones and liquidate them of all their cash before they die.
It doesn’t pay any taxes either so it’s no surprise the Columbus branch could move from downtown to swankier digs in the suburbs. And of course Ohio House Speaker Larry Householder (R) and Representative Adam Miller (D) were in attendance to pretend Scientology is a regular church and not a blood-thirsty cult of weirdos.
From Jeremy Pelzer of cleveland.com:
COLUMBUS, Ohio—State lawmakers welcomed the opening of a gleaming new Church of Scientology in Columbus last weekend, praising the work done in Central Ohio by the controversial church.
The 50,000-square-foot building, just northwest of downtown, was opened to great fanfare on Saturday, with a brass band playing “Hang On Sloopy” and speeches delivered by Scientology leader David Miscavige and state Rep. Adam Miller, among others.
Miller and Ohio House Speaker Larry Householder, a Perry County Republican, also signed a commendation on behalf of the Ohio House of Representatives congratulating the Church of Scientology on its new Columbus location.
…
Miller, a Columbus Democrat, said in an interview that he agreed to speak at Saturday’s grand opening at the request of some local Scientologists who live in his district. Miller said church members have been very involved in organizing neighborhood block watches and promoting anti-drug campaigns in local schools.
I expect this shit from Larry Householder. But I am extremely disappointed in my Statehouse representative Adam Miller. For a district unwinnable for a Republican I think we can do better than a Householder-voting centrist lawyer who lives in Marble Cliff and thinks Scientology is just another run-of-the-mill church worthy of praise because they don’t allow criminals to prey on their neighbors or push anti-drug messages in schools (which begs the question who are the schools letting the Scientology quacks through their doors?).
REPUBLICANS LOOK TO STOMP ON BEXLEY
Remember: Ohio Republicans only love Home Rule if cities go along with their agenda. The second they step outside their agenda then Republicans morph into big-government regulators.
This time it’s over something as asinine as a plastic bags ban.
From Ana Staver of dispatch.com:
A Bexley ban on using plastic bags for groceries and other purchases could be stopped before it ever goes into effect if state lawmakers pass one of two bills before the end of the year.
Supporters say a “preemption law” is necessary to prevent a patchwork of regulations from hurting retailers and manufacturers. But opponents, such as Bexley Mayor Ben Kessler, told The Dispatch that such a law would be a clear violation of his city’s constitutional right to home rule.
“Cities have laws and regulations that are unique to them across the board,” Kessler said. “To single out an environmental initiative and say this is the one thing that should be uniform across the state is disingenuous.”
Both House Bill 242 and Senate Bill 222, which had its second hearing Tuesday morning, would block local governments from imposing a “fee, assessment or other charge” on the use of “auxiliary containers” such as bags, boxes and cups given out by restaurants and retailers.
As I’ve been saying: It’d be better for Ohio if our government never convened. Nothing but bad things seem to happen when the Statehouse is open for business.
MORE LAYOFFS COMING TO THE DISPATCH
I love the Columbus Dispatch and I’m a proud subscriber. Is it perfect? No. But then again The Rooster Newsletter is the only perfect media outlet in Columbus.
But I couldn’t do what I do without actual journalists doing work and I quote something interesting I read in The Dispatch almost every day. Unfortunately private equity ghouls purchased the paper a couple years back and now they’re doing the only thing vultures know how to do which is pick the flesh off a corpse.
More layoffs will be bad for the city but good for the crooks in local and state government.
THOSE WMDs. Midsize cities pose bigger problems for Democrats than rural areas… Being busy is killing our ability to think creatively… When squirrels were America’s most popular pets… The mistake we make… Why leave a bustling city like Columbus for Dayton?