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A Cincinnatian’s “Bohemian Rhapsody”
Monday, February 08, 2010

The Columbus Dispatch gave a nice-straight to the point-review of a new book by University of Cincinnati professor Mark A. Lause, The Antebellum Crisis & America’s First Bohemians.  The Dispatch describes it as an introduction to a clique of pre-Civil War New York writers, artists, musicians and actors—radical in both lifestyle and politics—dubbed themselves “bohemians” and exerted an influence on American society that has long been underappreciated.

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Posted by Justin Jeffre
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CPS kids lose skills between 3rd and 5th grade
Sunday, February 07, 2010

Photo courtesy of here.

We are relatively familiar with the performance of Cincinnati Public Schools on the school and system level. In 2008-09, 3 out of 4 CPS schools failed to meet their adequate yearly progress targets under No Child Left Behind. And 11 of 59 CPS schools have been in No Child Left Behind “improvement status” for five or more years.

What’s new in this report is data that compares the percentage of students who meet state learning standards in third grade with the percentage that meet state learning standards in fifth grade.

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Posted by komarek
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Spotlight: Alex Triantafilou getting it wrong again and again (Part III)
Saturday, February 06, 2010

In Hamiclton County GOP leader Alex Triantafilou’s latest post he calls the Extreme Supreme Court’s recent ruling which allows corporations to spend an unlimited amount of money into our political system “a victory for free speech” and that the “landmark ruling “struck a blow FOR the First Amendment””. He calls Obama’s verbal shot at the court “unprecedented”, but Triantafilou is wrong.

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Posted by Justin Jeffre
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Enquirer takes on “Who Dat,” misses the point entirely
Saturday, February 06, 2010

This week, The Cincinnati Enquirer took on the “Who Dat” issue, and its connections to our very own “Who Dey” chant—and in so doing they ignored the documented racist history of both phrases.  This is troublesome because Paul Daugherty presents his piece as a researched and documented exploration of the phrase.  Is it possible he doesn’t know the truth of the phrase, or is he willfully jamming certain details down the memory hole to appease his audience and/or advertisers?

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Posted by Jason Haap
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County Commission News
Saturday, February 06, 2010

The Hamilton County Democratic Party Nominating Committee met Thursday night to interview three candidates for the County Commission seat: Hubert Brown, Jim Tarbell and Cecil Thomas.  They decided not to make an endorsement. 

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Posted by The Dean of Cincinnati
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Happy Birthday, Henry Heimlich (and a look at some choking stats!)
Friday, February 05, 2010

Photo courtesy of here.

This week, Phil Heimlich wished his father, Henry Heimlich of “Heimlich Maneuver” fame, a happy 90th birthday.  The pride in Phil’s typing is almost tangible as he boasts that his father has saved the lives of over 50,000 people.  That’s no small feat, right?  This story line would have us believe that choking deaths decreased after the introduction of the Maneuver in 1974.  After all, if there were no change, or an increase, then how could the Maneuver be credited with anything?

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Posted by The Dean of Cincinnati
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Donald Caster’s “Left Out in the Cold” underscores Cincy’s homelessness problems
Thursday, February 04, 2010

I was reminded why I bother looking at the Cincinnati Blog when I saw Donald Caster’s interesting article “Left Out in the Cold”. He describes his frustration when he tried to help a homeless client find shelter from the freezing temperatures. He links to this WLWT story about how the city’s cold shelter failed to open leaving 60 people without shelter.

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Posted by Justin Jeffre
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Where’s the “Liberal Media Bias”? CBS, Ms. Tebow and their right to choose
Thursday, February 04, 2010

Most people have probably heard about-the latest blow to the “liberal media bias” myth-CBS’s controversial decision to run a pro-life commercial during the Super Bowl after they’ve refused to run other issue advocacy commercials. The ad features a story about Pam Tebow’s opportunity to choose not to have an abortion.

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Posted by Justin Jeffre
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Is Massachusetts Republican Senator Scott Brown a dirty slut?
Wednesday, February 03, 2010

I was talking to a feminist friend of mine recently and she pointed a huge double standard in the Massachusetts Senate race. “He posed naked; if it came out that a female candidate had done that her political career would have been over. But it was a male so it’s not a big deal” she said.

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Posted by Justin Jeffre
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Were the streetcar advocates full of sh!t?
Wednesday, February 03, 2010

Photo courtesy of here.

During the campaign, I voted against the anti-passenger rail charter amendment.  I agreed, and I still do, that its language was too broad for the purposes it alleged to address.  But that broad language would have only been problematic if a real issue had come down the tracks to do what rail supporters claimed.  So when President Obama announced his inter-city rail proposal, it sure looked like Cincinnati would be left ouf of the loop on national, high speed, intercity rail development.  As I did not want the streetcar issue spilling into these other domains, I endorsed a “No” vote on that issue.  After all, or so the streetcar advocates proclaimed, wouldn’t it be goofy if the intercity rail line stopped at Sharonville?  But now we see it will anyway!

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Posted by The Dean of Cincinnati
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The Daily Bellwether busts the Enquirer, twice
Tuesday, February 02, 2010

It looks like the Bellwether scooped the Enquirer with this story. They reported on it 5 days later but failed to give the Bellwether credit. And Sloat nails them for failing to do any real reporting on another national story that involves corporations headquartered in their own circulation area. Their failure to cover national stories about big corporations in their area sounds familiar doesn’t it?

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Posted by Justin Jeffre
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Revising Hell’s History:  Col. Larry James, Interrogation Policies, and Calls for Accountability
Tuesday, February 02, 2010

If ever the collective mindset surrounding a single word has changed over the last decade, it can be argued that the word “torture” must be high on that list.  Prior to the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, one may have used the word in passing to describe sitting through a boring lecture in college or their feelings about their grueling nine to five work week.  Torture.  Nearly a decade later, when one utters the word, their mind probably flashes to images that came out of Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq and the many reports that have been released detailing how this word, how torture, became official governmental policy of the United States.  The 2000’s took the concept of torture from that of something unlawful that was only put into practice by brutal dictators, to accepted policy that was put into place by a democracy.  Torture had been rebranded and even had a snappy new euphemism: “enhanced interrogation techniques”.  Cleaner, professional, sanitized.

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Posted by Chris Johnson
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Reality Check! ‘You mean “reality TV” (Gasp!) isn’t real’?
Monday, February 01, 2010

Photo courtesy of here.

I find it really amusing that some people are freaking out because they’ve found out that reality TV isn’t very real. Though MTV’s “Taking the Stage” is shining a very positive light on Cincinnati’s best school, CPS, historic OTR and the entire city itself, for some that isn’t enough because the reality TV show just isn’t real enough.

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Posted by Justin Jeffre
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Hubert E. Brown announces his candidacy for Hamilton County Commissioner
Monday, February 01, 2010

Hubert Brown, better known as “Brownie” to his friends, announces he will be a Democratic candidate for Hamilton County Commissioner for the seat being vacated by David Pepper.  He will be filing his petitions at 2:00 p.m. at the Hamilton County Board of Elections on Monday February 1st.

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Posted by Media Release
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NORML in Northside, Feb. 6th!
Sunday, January 31, 2010

Posted by Media Release
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Jobs, jobs, jobs, and greens
Sunday, January 31, 2010

Guest article by Dr. Vlasta Molak

While it appears that casinos have replaced the banks in gambling with our money,  the State of Ohio,the HC, and the City “deciders” still expect great increases in revenues from gambling.  Perhaps they should hold their enthusiasm and explore the experience of NY State with the same endeavor.  Read this article from New York Times to see that we cannot gamble our way to economic prosperity. 

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Posted by The Dean of Cincinnati
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Great news for high speed rail fans
Saturday, January 30, 2010

The state of Ohio has been awarded $400 million in federal stimulus funds for high speed rail. The proposed 3-C rail system will connect Cincinnati, Dayton, Columbus and Cleveland. Unfortunately it will only run to Sharonville at first, but hopefully it won’t take long to connect it to the city.

Posted by Justin Jeffre
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Woman Says She Will Marry for Health Care
Saturday, January 30, 2010

Terri Carlson, a 45-year-old divorcee, has a debilitating genetic disorder and can’t get insurance. She says she’ll marry for health care coverage, as long as your co-pays aren’t too heavy. “There is no other health care option for me,” she said. And, “I can never ever get health care insurance unless I marry. I am stuck in the middle. I can’t get Social Security.”

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Posted by Justin Jeffre
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Tangled Web: Smitherman’s friend Finney’s friend Phil on Race and minority contracts
Saturday, January 30, 2010

Sir Walter Scott once wrote, “Oh what a tangled web we weave, / When first we practise to deceive!”  That’s why I’m amused at some of the relationships at play between the NAACP/COAST alliance, featuring people on Cincinnati’s far-right lunatic fringe.  With COAST activist Christopher Finney acting as the NAACP’s lawyer and branch president Christopher Smitherman’s new BFF, it’s interesting to note what Finney’s old crony, Phil Heimlich, is doing with regards to issues like minority contracts.

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Posted by The Dean of Cincinnati
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Smitherman’s Press Release and The Beacon’s Records Request for CPS
Friday, January 29, 2010

Photo courtesy of here.

Today, local NAACP president Christopher Smitherman sent a demand letter to Cincinnati Public Schools.  He has given them until February 5th to hire black contractors before he says the NAACP will take action.  Now that Charlie Winburn’s (R) friend Sam Malone (R) is on the job, it looks like Smitherman is ready to make things move quickly.  Additionally, Smitherman says he sent CPS a list of all the contractors ready to accept work.  I have long maintained that such a list should be publicized—so the general public could know for whom to look at local construction job sites.  So below you can find Smitherman’s demand letter to CPS, as well as our records request for the list of contractors provided (since Smitherman has a long record refusing to respond to simple inquiries).

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Posted by The Dean of Cincinnati
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Suicidal Tendencies: A shocking first in American Military History
Friday, January 29, 2010

Tragically, for the first time ever, in any American war, suicides now officially outnumber combat deaths. That is 6,000 suicides to roughly 4,500 combat deaths.

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Posted by Justin Jeffre
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Dr. Cornel West’s video message to Obama
Friday, January 29, 2010

Dr. Cornel West, the celebrated Princeton University professor of religion and African American studies, has put out a video message to President Obama urging him to move in a new direction. West recently released his memoir, Brother West: Living and Loving Out Loud.

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Posted by Justin Jeffre
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Right now, every American is in debt $40,000, that’s basically $113,000 per taxpayer
Thursday, January 28, 2010

(Guest article by anonymous)

This is what happens when you spend a generation cutting taxes, especially for those who can most afford to pay them…while giving those same fat cats fat subsidies and kickbacks…that and going to war with robots and boutique-priced mercenaries with whopping contracts to the ex-vice president’s company.

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Posted by Justin Jeffre
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Save money, local media and local businesses with CityBeat’s BOC Card
Thursday, January 28, 2010

If you like saving money (40%) when you go out to eat or drink then CityBeat’s Best of Cincinnati Card is just the thing for you. You can save money at some great local spots (over 20 some restaurants) while supporting local media and our local economy. You can get the card for free until Jan. 31st by clicking here and entering the promo code BOC4FREE.

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Posted by Justin Jeffre
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Managing Chronic Disease through Healthy Lifestyles
Thursday, January 28, 2010

Photo courtesy of here.

Guest article by Noble Maseru, Ph.D., MPH, Cincinnati Health Commissioner

Each New Year promises to eat healthier, exercise more or quit smoking top many of our lists’. The results of these efforts, including weight loss and increased physical fitness, are especially important because they can often prevent or reduce chronic disease and lead to a higher quality of living. 

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Posted by The Dean of Cincinnati
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Howard Zinn, historian who challenged status quo, dies at 87
Wednesday, January 27, 2010

Howard Zinn was a writer, activist, WWII Veteran and a renowned historian. “His writings have changed the consciousness of a generation, and helped open new paths to understanding and its crucial meaning for our lives,” wrote Noam Chomsky. His book “A people’s history of the United States” changed the way we view American History.

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Posted by Justin Jeffre
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The Bellwether is back!
Wednesday, January 27, 2010

Photo courtesy of here.

I thought Bill Sloat at the Daily Bellwether had stopped posting altogether. Apparently I was wrong and he’s going strong with lots of regular posts. He has an update on Peter Bronson’s latest move to Cincy Magazine and some interesting info about the busted bubble in Portland among other things.

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Posted by Justin Jeffre
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Michael Moore on the Supreme Court decision and the “disgusting” Democrats
Tuesday, January 26, 2010

On Democracy Now! Moore discusses Haiti, the Supreme Court decision on corporate campaign financing and President Obama’s first year in office. “The Democrats] don’t have the guts. They don’t have the courage of their own convictions. They’re disgusting. I’m embarrassed,” Moore says. “I want really nothing to do with them. And if they don’t find their spine, well, they’re in for a huge surprise in November.”

Posted by Justin Jeffre
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School Bans Dictionary
Tuesday, January 26, 2010

A California school decided to ban the dictionary because it contains a definition of oral sex.

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Posted by Bearman
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Democrats don’t need a supermajority to push their agenda forward
Monday, January 25, 2010

Much has been made of Sen. Brown’s election to the Senate and the loss of the Democrats supermajority. Many are acting as if it is impossible for Democrats to move their agenda forward, but Republicans haven’t had a 60 vote Senate majority since 1923 and that hasn’t stopped them.

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Posted by Justin Jeffre
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