Today's Edition of the World Getting Worse

Sometimes, it's just hard to have hope for this country. Democrats continue to give and give and give on increasingly extreme Republican budget demands. The budget "compromise" was yet another huge win for Republicans, with the vast majority of cuts coming from traditionally Democratic programs. Obama has now embraced the absurd Simpson-Bowles budget proposal. Republicans are already demanding more cuts to raise the national debt limit, which I am sure they will receive.

Is there anything to be optimistic about in this country? Anything at all?

Meanwhile, here in Ohio, John Kasich and the Koch Brothers' budget begins to have its desired effect of impoverishing working people. In Pickerington, somewhere between 50 and 120 teachers will be laid off next year. I'm sure that those left will still be blamed for our kids not learning. And it seems that about 30 workers at the Job and Family Services Department in struggling Stark County (Canton) will lose their jobs. 1/6 of Stark County families receive food aid from Job and Family Services.

This is kind of liberal way of thinking about the country's past, but I wonder what things were like to live in the 1940s-60s, in the sense that people like me saw the country improving day by day. Of course, "people like me" means white dudes and I realize the complex history of that period and the problems of postwar liberalism.

But today, each and every day, this country gets worse. Everything I value in this nation, at least when it comes to economics, labor, environment, protection for women, etc., is falling apart. And it makes me want to cry.

Historical Image of the Day

Opposition to coal strip mining, Hendrysburg, Ohio, 1973

The Essence of Ohio Food

I'm not sure if this supposedly legendary fried bologna sandwich from G&R Tavern in Waldo, Ohio intrigues me or scares the living hell out of me.

John Kasich's Jim Crow Cabinet

Ohio Governor John Kasich has proven "meritocracy" to be exactly what conservative whites always want it to mean--his entire cabinet is made up of white people and almost all men.

Keep in mind, in the last half-century, Ohio has had 10 governors, most of whom have been Republicans. All of them had at least some racial diversity in their cabinet -- until Kasich, who's the first Ohio governor since 1962 to have so far picked an all-white cabinet.

It's always best to be cautious before throwing around casual accusations of racism. That said, Kasich's move is hard to understand, especially given the size and diversity of a state like Ohio.

For his part, Kasich insists he doesn't pay attention to "any of these sort of metrics." As far as the governor is concerned, he has jobs to fill, and he went out and looked for the best person for the job.

John Kasich--a northerner even Haley Barbour could love!

Historical Image of the Day

Suburb of Akron, Ohio, late 1930s.

Perhaps We Can Rename Ohio "Ohio, Brought to You by McDonald's"

Well, it's great to know that a McDonald's in my congressional district are now openly suggesting their employees vote Republican. Isn't this simply the next step for direct corporate control over politics in the wake of Citizens United?

I Know This Is How I Want My Congresswoman Talking to My 6 Year Old

Mean Jean Schmidt is awesome in her brazen tastlessness. Schmidt spoke before a class of 1st graders recently. At the end of it, she decided to tell the kids about abortion. The letter from the school to parents:

"Unexpectedly, towards the end of her address, Congresswoman Schmidt brought up the topic of abortion, and I am writing you to make you aware of this. Your children may come home with questions, especially if this is a topic that has not been broached in your home. I do not recall the exact words she used, but she paused towards the end of her speech and stated that this would be the only time when she would be ‘political’ in her address. She defined abortion as the taking of a child’s life in the mother’s womb. She indicated that abortion involves the killing of a child before it is born. She was not graphic or any more detailed in this regard. Later, when a child asked about it, she indicated that an abortion is something that a doctor does when a mother requests this. It was not a particularly long segment of her address (1½ minutes or so), and these words may not match the exact words she used, but this description does, I believe, express what your child heard. Her point was to address the increase of governmental activity in the abortion issue and her political resolve to fight against this."

Wow. Of course, as you can see from the letter, the kids didn't even know what abortion was. Nor should they. And Mean Jean will be elected once again to represent the fine suburbs of Cincinnati. 

Fall in Ohio

Fall in Ohio is incredibly beautiful.

That is all.

Historical Image of the Day

This week's images will explore the the suffrage movement in the late 19th century.

Broadside for Elizabeth Cady Stanton lecture, Massilon, Ohio, 1875.

You Can Combine Racism With Travel Too!

In case you can't read this travel advertisement created by a Columbus, Ohio radio station, let me block quote it for you:

610 WTVN would like to send you where Americans are proud and illegals are scared, sunny Phoenix, Arizona! You’ll spend a weekend chasing aliens and spending cash in the desert, just make sure you have your green card! Win round trip airfare to Phoenix, hotel accommodations, and a few pesos in spending cash — just register below! City employees encouraged to enter.

It's been awhile since this nation has so openly combined tourism and racism. I wonder what that looked like:

Ah yes. The good old days....

Historical Image of the Day

As I now have enough time again to find and blog about historical images, the series begins again. Since we are mid-week, I am going to run a series of images of American cities for the next week and a half. These all come from the National Archives website.

Cincinnati, 1883. Like London apparently!

Historical Image of the Day

Manumission papers of America Barnett, Cincinnati, OH, 1859

Things They Don't Teach in Ohio History Classes

My father is originally from the Ohio River Valley, not too far from Wheeling (WV) on the Ohio side of the River, and some of his family has never left that area. When visiting, we often had to pass through Steubenville, Ohio (the birthplace of Dean Martin of all people, and the city doesn't fail to announce this with signs; strangely, there are no signs boasting Steubenville's status as also being "home to Wu-Tang Clan affiliates 4th Disciple, Beretta 9, and ShoGun Assason"). As you go through Steubenville, along the river, you see the remains/recreation of Fort Steuben, which was built in 1786 as a major outpost for surveying the Northwest Territory, and which was named after Friedrich Wilhelm von Steuben, a Prussian officer who came to the rebellious American colonies in 1777 and trained the Americans in warfare. Steuben was central to the war efforts, as his training left the ill-equipped American colonists much less ill-equipped. Steuben even ended up writing the Revolutionary War Drill Manual, which was the major training guide for the military until the War of 1812, thereby occupying a fairly important piece of American history. All of this is common knowledge to anybody who has to spend more than 10 minutes in Steubenville.

However, what I never knew until watching the final few seconds of the interview with Nathaniel Frank on the Daily Show last night, was that Steuben very well may have been gay (this also appears in American National Biography Online, but you need university access to log in). Yes - in spite of the don't ask/don't tell policy being in place, and the anti-gay policies of the military for decades, the author of America's first military training manual, which would be essential to early military training in America, the man without whose training the colonists very well may have never beaten the British, was gay, a fact that, as Stewart alludes at the end of the above interview, renders current policy even more surreal.

Historical Image of the Day

Neo-Nazi rally. Toledo, Ohio, 2005

I Assure You, the Crazy Happened After I Left

Although I claim Akron as the city I grew up in, I spent 7 fairly formative years of my youth in a tiny little town called Mt. Vernon, in central Ohio. We were pretty much in the middle of nowhere (Mt. Vernon was the largest town in the county, coming in at a whopping 15,000 people, and we had to drive an hour south to Columbus to do any decent shopping). Mt. Vernon is so small, it's one of those places that had to boast of who was famous from there in order to prove it's worth (and for what it's worth, the two claims to fame it had were doozies: birthplace of Dan Emmett, the author of Dixie, and birthplace of Paul Lynde). It's like hundreds of small towns in the U.S. - it stays out of the news for the most part.

However, Mt. Vernon is making its claim for national recognition, as John Freshwater, a science teacher at Mt. Vernon Middle School, is facing firing for burning a cross into a student's arm with "an electrostatic device." This isn't Freshwater's first brush with crazy, either, as he apparently "was also reprimanded several times for refusing to move his Bible from his classroom desk and teaching creationism alongside evolution, according to the 15-page independent report. The report also cites evidence that Mr. Freshwater told his students that "science is wrong because the Bible states that homosexuality is a sin and so anyone who is gay chooses to be gay and is therefore a sinner."

But I speak from experience in saying that the crazy must have set in relatively recently, maybe in the last 10 years or so. Why would I think this? Well, I actually had John Freshwater as my science teacher 14 years ago. Given what he's done to his students and his stances, he absolutely should lose his job. Funny thing is, none of that happened when I had him as a teacher (in what must have been his 7th or 8th year of what are now 21 years of teaching "experience"). There was no creationism (a fact that might have been aided by the fact that, in 1994, we were still using science books from 1981). No Bible. No rantings on homosexuals. And certainly no branding of religious symbols. Yet here it is, 14 years later, and "Freshwater," as we called him, has clearly gone off the deep end, with national news picking it up.

Definitely a great day for Mt. Vernon, OH. And it definitely gives me one more reason I'm actually glad to claim Akron as the place I "grew up."

Historical Image of the Day

Mennonite church tent, Camp Sherman, OH, 1918