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Give Ohio townships viable opportunities to evolve as cities

In coming weeks and months, leaders of the 15 townships with 5,000 people or more in Mahoning and Trumbull counties likely will keep their eyeballs squarely peeled on the evolution of state House Bill 592. That’s because that legislation, sponsored by state Rep. David Thomas, R-Jefferson, would open long-locked doors to those townships’ potential to evolve into much stronger local governments. For decades, informal whispered talk of transforming weak township governments into much stronger city governments have been floated, particularly among such larger and urbanized ...

Tax the dog (walker)

At first it seemed like something from the satirical website Babylon Bee. The new governor of Virginia, the “moderate” Democrat Abigail Spanberger, has proposed a tax hike on services such as dog walking and grooming. Additional proposed tax hikes include levies on guns and ammunition, storage facilities, dry cleaning, home repairs, food delivery services, package deliveries and a new personal property tax on electric leaf blowers (but not gas-powered blowers?) and electric landscaping equipment. There is no economic reason for raising taxes in Virginia. When his single term ...

Selling U.S. security: A Trump family business

The U.S. makes artificial intelligence chips so special, so advanced, that the Biden administration limited their export for national security reasons. They didn’t want them to get into the hands of China or Russia. But days before Donald Trump was sworn in for a second term, go-betweens for an Abu Dhabi royal signed a secret deal that delivered $187 million into Trump family ventures. So far, as far as we know. Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed Al Nahyan — nickname, the “spy sheik” — had long been frustrated in his campaign to obtain this highly sensitive AI technology. The fear ...

American Gestapo/American Psycho

Two weeks ago, a half-dozen masked and unidentifiable Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents killed a 37-year-old federal employee, a nurse, by spraying pepper spray into his eyes, pushing him to the ground, stealing his lawfully owned and carried handgun, and then shooting him nine times in the back. The thugs from ICE whom the federal government has sent to Minneapolis have produced murder and mayhem on a scale far more violent, disruptive and disturbing to human life than have the immigrants residing there without papers. Under the Constitution, immigration — who can ...

Melania: The movie, the bribe, the shame

I haven’t seen it. I hope you don’t, either. This, from one of the kinder reviews: “Across some 104 minutes, the first lady delivers these blatantly scripted and meaningless narrations with all the conviction of someone who just woke up from a two-hour nap and can’t remember what day it is.” Manohla Dargis of The New York Times sees a “glossy, curiously impersonal” portrait of a woman who “rarely drops her Sphinxlike deadpan.” Nick Hilton of The Independent calls the first lady a “scowling void of pure nothingness in this ghastly bit of propaganda.” ...

SB 348 addresses dangers of potential date-rape drugs

Worried parents often warn their children — of any age — to be wary when they go out to bars and restaurants. Generations of bar patrons have received these admonitions from friends and family: “Keep your eye on your drink! Be careful!” Despite those warnings, too many continue to fall victim to drugged drinks each year. According to a report by WTVG, state Sens. Louis Blessing III, R-Colerain Township, and Bill DeMora, D-Columbus, cited data that 1 in 13 college-aged people suspect they have been drugged at some point. They brought up the numbers as part of their introduction ...