Springfield Navistar Hopeful
Folks at Springfield's Navistar facilities are hopeful that production and sales will improve in what is, currently, a pretty bleak market for trucks.
The are pinning their hopes on military sales to the US & the UK and the hybrid trucks that are produced exclusively in Springfield.

Noose Son article, here.

Angert's RIP
This sucks. I bought a stove and refrigerator from Angert's Appliance Store almost exactly a year ago. Their prices compared to the big chain stores and their service was superior.
They had just advertised a big warehouse sale - nothing uncommon - dunno if that's where this guy in the WLWT video made his purchases or not.
Anyway, it sucks losing another local business that had to compete with big national chains and it is another blow to the College Hill business district that just recently lost the Visconti pharmacy only a couple doors down from the appliance store.
WLWT story here.

Social Studies Champion City Style


How would you teach kids about ancient Egypt in a town that hosts a leading mortuary supply company like Champion ?
duh
You'd mummify some Cornish hens of course !
Emmanuel Christian Academy social studies teacher, Alicia Kidder did exactly that with her class of sixth graders and some help from high school honors students.

When King Cluck, Queen Winney and Cleopatra ZuZu are properly mummified, they hope to bury the hens and then disinter them at the end of the school year to see how good a job they did.
Noose Son story here.
Check out The Modern Embalmer.

Some Remaining Talibanders on the Loose

Click on the image for a larger picture.
Report to 888-352-3040 or 513-352-3040.

Quimbob's Crush de Jour


Julie McNiven in Supernatural
What can I say ? I'm just a sucker for spooky red headed fallen angel types.....

Cincinnati Unchained
Saturday, Nov 22, the biggest local shopping event of the year goes down.
BuyCincy is sponsoring a citywide event to promote "shopping local", featuring deals at 44 Cincinnati stores.
In Northside, Shake It Records, Melt, NVISION and Shoetopia are participating.
Up north in College Hill, American Heritage Flooring, College Hill Coffee, Bacall's Cafe and the ever cool St Theresa's Textile Trove are participating.
Up the other hill to the south, the Mustard Seed Boutique and Duttenhofer's are offering discounts.
For more information and to see wnat other stores and neighborhoods are participating go here:
www.buycincy.com/unchained.html

The Numbers
On Monday, 11/17, the Cincinnati police performed a sweep of a violent criminal gang mostly residing in the Northside community. The police claim the gang had about 100 members.
That night I went to a Northside Community Council meeting to hear Councilwoman Qualls discuss Form Based Zoning Codes and got an earful about the big bust. I also heard the Community Council's Membership Secretary, Melody Smith, report that the number of citizens active in the Northside Community Council topped out at just over 200.
The population of Northside is a little over 9,000 with about 6,600 adults. this means roughly 3% of the population are officially active in the community. Obviously you don't have to be a member to be active and not all the members actually do anything. From what I have seen, probably less than 2 dozen people are actually doing 99% of the work. From what I have heard, Northside is one of the most involved communities in the city.
So, how the hell can our communities improve when the numbers of people who give a pooh are so close to the numbers of people who want to tear the community apart and establish a warlord type rule of fear and violence ?
My level of community involvement works out to about an hour a week (woopteedoo). I am not a member of the NCC but I think I might just go down and plunk down the $5 membership fee. If Northside's 9,000 residents each put in an hour a week toward their community, the neighborhood would put wealthier communities in the area to shame. Just communicating and being aware of what is going on is incredibly important.
I am probably preaching to the choir, but -GET INVOLVED.
Here are links to other neighborhoods websites councils in Cincinnati.

Camp Washington
Clifton
College Hill
Columbia Tusculum
CUF
Downtown
Hyde Park
Kennedy Heights
Madisonville
Mt. Adams
Mt. Lookout
Mt Washington
North Avondale
Oakley
Over the Rhine
Pleasant Ridge
Roselawn
Sayler Park
University Heights
Westwood

Northside Population Quickly Shrinks
41 members of the "Taliband" arrested in gang sweep.
Will they be out in time for dinner ?
Channel 12 story here.

Fido

I really liked this movie. It takes place kinda after Night of the Living Dead and depicts a world where the living just have to deal with the fact that when people die they come right back to life with a hankering for living human flesh.
Actually, if it weren't so ludicrous, the attention to detail would be fine for a serious story.
Early in the movie, children sing during school firearms instruction, "In the brain and not the chest. Head shots are the very best."
Describing a couple of the other facts of life -er- death -er- reanimation.....
"Well, she is over sixty-five, Helen, and old people can't be trusted."
"Get your own funeral. Timmy and I are going zombie !"
Anyway, control collars have been developed that allow for the domestication of zombies but they tend to fail a lot. Mrs Robinson (Carrie-Anne Moss) desperately needs a zombie to "keep up with the Jonses" and brings home the zombie her son, Timmy, names Fido.
The movie has about a zillion period and period media jokes. The Lassie parody is pretty obvious and you realize you just have to wait for it. While the movie could have been a one joke thing it actually has a few.
One of the things that really makes the movie stand out is the soundtrack with music by Kay Starr, Tom Maxwell and the Squirrel Nut Zippers and Ian Whitcomb & His Bungalow Boys.
The movie is big on laughs and not a gore fest at all.

IMDB entry here

Buying An Election Part II
In the 2008 presidential campaign, Obama spent $573,000,000.00 and received 66,495,305 votes. That comes out to $8.62 a vote.
McCain spent $293,000,000 for 58,123,414 votes, coming in at $5.04 per vote.
If these guys had done no campaigning and had just stood outside the polling stations offering the cash directly to the voters, who would you have voted for ?
And if that had been the extent of their campaigning, would the media have even mentioned a presidential race ? Doubt it. That would, of course result in fewer votes overall, meaning the candidates could have offered us even more money per vote.
Campaign finance reform, indeed.

Hospital buys Savoy for $450,000

OK, Let me describe it this way. I have been to some horrible, horrible bars in my life. The Savoy Lounge is one I was always afraid to enter.
The Springfield Hospital Group, Community Mercy Health Partners, has decided they want to own this health code violation waiting to happen. This is not testimony to what hard asses the Springfield medical community are, and the place isn't worth $10,000. They just want to tear it down. Bad.

By Kelly Mori
Frogtown Noose Son
Wednesday, November 12, 2008

Community Mercy Health Partners, parent corporation of Springfield Regional Medical Center, has taken ownership of the Savoy Lounge property for $450,000.
The property, which abuts Ohio Valley Medical Center, the soon-to-open downtown surgical hospital, was originally purchased for Community Mercy by a third party. However on Wednesday, Nov. 12, Community Mercy spokesman Jim Senese said "a decision was made in the spirit of transparency to take full ownership of the property."
The purchase intensified the tension between Community Mercy officials and Ohio Valley surgeons, who announced nearly two years ago that they were going to build their own hospital.
The Turner Foundation had promised to try to acquire the land for Ohio Valley when the surgeons agreed to build downtown. However Ohio Valley officials, said on Wednesday the property is not critical to their operations.
Community Mercy, which is building a $230 million acute care hospital about two blocks north of Ohio Valley, has no immediate plans for the property, Senese said.

A protest in favor of equal marriage will occur at Cincinnati's City Hall on Saturday, November 15 at 1:30 p.m. Local students, activists, and community members lead this event as part of a day of national protests in reaction to the passage of Proposition 8 in California, re-banning equal marriage in that state.

www.jointheimpact.com/
Cincinnati contact queercincinnati@gmail.com

The church is supposed to operate outside the political arena. Recently, in California, Catholic groups backed with Mormon cash (not from CA) promoted a law banning same sex marriage. This circumvents the authority of religious organizations (churches) and prevents them from doing what should be in their sole domain.
That specific religious groups would force their beliefs on others is anti-American.
This is not much different from previous bans on inter-racial marriage that most of us would consider un-American and racist.
Churches should be allowed to marry who they want and should not be compelled to marry same sex couples or inter-racial couples or inter-faith couples or people who just don't conform that faith's beliefs. Churches should create standardized marriage contracts that can be modified to regional standards as they see fit and can have leeway for individual concerns as well. The first line for divorces should be through the church that performed the marriage and the courts should not be enlisted but as a last resort.
The only role of the government should be through the courts to enforce the contracts.
ok, I'm not a lawyer and I am sure real lawyers can bollox the whole thing up, but that's my plan. :-)

While most of SW Ohio goes blue, Clark County gets redder.
Democrats are at a loss to explain (surprise) & cite, possibly, independents. That is kinda weird, since the Dems were the ones "Getting Out The Vote" and the Republicans spent all their time "Consolidating The Base" (whatever that is in the splintered party).
Republicans appeared similarly clueless (more surprises) as to the results, citing the great job Republicans have done over the last eight years having influenced the outcome.
Final unofficial results for the county were 31,821 McCain and 29,122 Obama.

Noose Son story here.

The Damn Dog
One of Obama's campaign promises was to get a family dog, primarily, at his daughter's, Malia's, request.
Thanks to Bush's pup, Barney, biting a reporter, this promise has been brought to light. Thanks, Barney, for holding the press' feet to the fire to hold the president elect's feet to the fire on this burning issue.
Now they just have to pick a pup.

....oh god....
Because many people would refer to Mr Obama as a "half breed", he has to be careful about his choice. Because he is a liberal and has to appease crazed liberal animal rights groups, he needs to decide if he should get a traditional purebred dog or a new combo breed or a mutt. because Malia has allergies, does he get a hairless or.....
Apparently, Malia wanted a Cockapoodle, which is supposed to be a good choice for owners with allergies. Animal rights activists, who hate, despise, and loathe the notion of purebred dogs and consider anybody who breeds them to be the embodiment of Cruella De Vil, have succeeded in convincing Mr Obama to get a "rescue". No idea if this means a Cockapoodle is out. I would hate to see the kid's hopes dashed by cockamamie political correctness run amok.
I feel sorry for these guys and the hoops they are going to have to jump through and the BS that is going to be slung at them over what should be a very personal family decision.
FWIW, I like "mutts". I have allergies and like dogs - LOVE cats. You get used to 'em after awhile allergywise. In a place that will be as impeccably maintained as the president's, 16 cats and platoon of pups shouldn't be much of a problem.
I am sure Malia will grow to love whatever she ultimately gets. I would only suggest a female, so the kids can experience their pooch having a litter of puppies. Shouldn't be too hard to give away some presidential puppies.
oh wait - HSUS & PETA will need to stick their noses into it.....

LA Times story here.

The Cost
Ohio votes Dem and America gets it's first non-white president.
But at what cost ?
Toledo is nothing but smoking ruin in the aftermath of the election.
Tooleedoo Blade story here.

Happy Guy Fawkes Day
Or as it was referred to in colonial America, Pope's Day.
Colonial America was almost entirely Protestant Christian. Anglicans to the south and Puritans to the north. One of he things they had in common was hatred of the Catholic Church. On the 5th of November they celebrated the failure of Catholic terrorist Guy Fawkes to murder the royal family of England in 1605. The celebrations included bonfires and burning the pope in effigy.
During the Revolutionary War, General George Washington needed every man he could muster to defeat the British army and Catholic recruitment was kinda rough with a majority of the soldiers being as openly anti-Catholic as much as anti-British and going around burning the pope's effigy on 11/5 every year. Washington forbade the practice amongst the soldiers and that was pretty much the beginning of the end of the celebration of the day in America.
Even, after the Revolution, Catholics didn't have full rights in America. Today, Catholicism is largest Christian denomination in the US and Catholics enjoy all the rights any American might enjoy.
John F. Kennedy was the first Catholic president of the US. Yesterday we elected Joe Biden as a Catholic vice president.
Right wing fundamentalist politicians have stacked the Supreme Court with a majority of Catholics, largely in a singular effort to restrict women's reproductive rights. Catholic politicians generally gain much support from these groups, too. In California Catholic groups have banded together to deny homosexuals marriage rights under Proposition 8.
Boy, have we have come a long way !
Happy Guy Fawkes Day, everyone !

Independnts & 3rd Parties Need Not Apply ?
Linda Johnson of Urbana writes about how her efforts to be a Champaign County poll worker were stymied since she refuses to be a drone of the corpo-political system.
"I was politely informed that each precinct was bipartisan, staffed by two Republicans and two Democrats.
Never content with, "No." I tried logic, "As an independent, I would have no agenda, who could be more fair?"
The board employee could not sanction my reasoning.
I tried a slightly different tact, "What about the other parties? The Green Party, the Libertarians, the Socialists or Communists? They aren't represented?"
"Nope. Just Republicans or Democrats.""
Moral: Don't Think For Yourself.

Noose Son story here.

Quimbob's Endorsemens
This is primarily for the 45223 zip.
For President of the US - None of the Above
No presidential candidate deserves my or your vote.
US Congress, Dist 1 - (holding nose) Steve Chabot
Driehaus doesn't offer much more than Chabot and Chabot has some seniority ranking at this point. A major sticking point with Chabot is reproductive rights but I don't see any improvement with Driehaus. Chabot voting against the bailout and for the Delta Queen are pluses.
State Representative Dist 32 - (in the category of anybody but Dale Mallory) Theo Barnes
Theo Barnes seems to be a goofball but Mallory seems to be a ghost when he is not getting impeached or having charges filed against him. He couldn't even be bothered to fill out the LWV SmartVoter form.
Judge Court of Common Pleas - (in the category of anybody but Pat DeWine) Norma Davis
County Commissioner - Ed Rothenberg
County Commissioner - Chris Dole
Pat DeWine, Todd Portune and Greg Hartmann are all part of the unholy pact made by the local Republican and Democrat parties to rig the elections. I endorse all their opponents. Rothenberg is a joke, Davis seems ok and Dole actually looks pretty good. Honestly, is the county being served best by the 3 Cincinnati lawyers on the Hamilton County Commission ?
A Crosby Twp trustee and a Realtor® sound like good alternatives.
issue 1 - NO
Issue 1 makes it harder for citizens to get initiatives on the ballot. (notice I am voting against most of those - go figure)
Issue 2 - (holding nose) YES
Issue 2 issues bonds to fund environmental projects that need to be done. We will still have to pay back these bonds in the future. Here's hoping the economy is better when they are due.
Issue 3 - YES
Issue 5 - NO
Issue 5 The restrictions on
"Payday Lenders" are too severe. This is too lenient. A compromise is needed.
Issue 6 - NO
Issue 6 Casinos are no answer to anything.
Issue 7 - NO
Issue 7 Red Light Cameras are a use of technology that frees up valuable human resources and deals with people with bad to malicious driving habits who threaten the lives of people daily. Concerns about their implementation can be addressed.
This is not a vote to use or not use the cameras. This is a vote to amend the city charter to disallow the use of a technology for all time. This is an inappropriate bit of legislation to be added to the city charter.
Issue 8 - NO
Issue 8 Instant Run off voting is not needed, it is expensive and the effort to implement it is pushed by people with racist and fringe social agendas. It might have been valid when we transitioned from a ward based government to an at-large government but it provides no benefit today to the general public. The efforts by non-residents to promote this and the not too ethical methods used in the campaign are also disturbing.

Information about the cndidates and issues can be found at the LWV's Smart Voter.

Halloween Gone Wrong

I received this in a recent newsletter:
Mother Holle’s Halloween Adventures
$40 per day/per child
Halloween can be a very confusing and even scary time for the young child who is completely bombarded by Halloween hype.
Miss Chris and Miss Vicki are offering a lovely alternative experience to this based on the story of ‘Mother Holle’, a classic Grimm’s Fairy tale. Children 4-6 year old will travel on a magical journey that frees the imagination and gives a sense of accomplishment for their good work at the farm during this time of harvest. The children will engage in an artistic project, gather apples from the orchard, collect firewood to feed the dragon (oven), and bake a feast of apple dumplings and pumpkin bread to share as a reward for their service and hard work.
OK, here's the story of Mother Holle.
The story cites a great work ethic, even in slavery is rewarded with material wealth.
It also equates physical beauty with good values and ugliness with poor values.
First of all, that's weird and second of all, it has nothing to do with Halloween.
Since the Holle sisters are charging parents to submit their kids to slave labor, I guess it all kinda makes sense. Dunno what it has to do with Halloween, tho. Seems like more of a neocon indoctrination drill.
Folks, there's a reason for the season. Take your kids to the cemetery and celebrate your ancestors. Celebrate the harvest and eternal life.
Halloween isn't about Mother Holle - it's about the Queen of Disks.