Ohio

On the surface, it's one of the Associated Press's better dispatches from the real world on the state of the economy as people are experiencing it. Datelined in Twinsburg, Ohio, Megan Barr's Monday morning report, "Recession is ending? Some Americans don't buy it," does a good job of mixing macro and micro elements, painting a picture of a struggling town, a non-improving state economy (now…

The Associated Press seems to have two unwritten rules on how and when to write stories about leftist controversies and setbacks: Rule Number 1 -- Do little or nothing with the story until you can figure out a way to make center-right critics or victors look like the bad guys. Rule Number 2 -- If you're thinking about covering the story any other way, refer to Rule Number 1. On Thursday, the…

As Austin Powers would say, "it's a man, baby!"A male health care worker from California outed himself to the Cleveland Plain Dealer yesterday as "Ellie Light," the pro-Obama letter writer who duped nearly 70 newspapers into publishing his letters.The Plain Dealer's Stephen Koff has the story:A man who identified himself as Winston Steward, 51, of Frazier Park, Calif., says he made up the name "…

The declining (or is it dying?) newspaper industry has suffered another blow to its image as punctilious skeptic with the motto "If your mother says she loves you, check it out." It turns out a pile of American newspapers can’t manage to check out the most basic information about people who are flat-out using their pages to push political agendas.A person with the name of "Ellie Light" has been…

On January 1, 2009, the final 4.2% stage of a four-year, 21% cut in individual income taxes took effect in Ohio. State tax withholding tables reflecting the lower rates went into effect. Ohio employees began seeing a bit more net pay in each paycheck. This past week, the state legislature, faced with an $850 million shortfall and threats of immediate school funding cuts by Governor Ted…

If there's a Ground Zero for America's foreclosure mess outside of much of California and metro Las Vegas, it's probably Cleveland, the Northeast Ohio city known in most of the rest of the state as the Mistake on the Lake. The Cleveland Plain Dealer's Mark Gillespie got out from behind his desk, committed some good old-fashioned journalism, and went looking for the mistakes that exacerbated the…

Somebody at the Columbus Dispatch has a bit of explaining to do.You see, Ohio Governor's former Director of Community and Faith-Based Initiatives, one Robert "Eric" McFadden, after "years" of not getting caught, pleaded guilty last Thursday of two felonies for trying to market the "services" of a 17 year-old prostitute. Yes, a 17 year-old.In his original report late Thursday morning on McFadden's…

Something must be in the water at the Cleveland Plain Dealer.In the past couple of weeks, longtime columnist Connie Schultz, who happens to be married to U.S. Senator Sherrod Brown, has come out in favor of changing copyright law to "save newspapers" (the relevant columns are here and here). Its Readers' Representative has also jumped on board.This hostility towards blogs and bloggers is not a…

Democratic Cincinnati City Councilwoman Laketa Cole was pulled over by city police on Wednesday afternoon along with a friend while each was driving their own motorcycle. WCPO-TV Channel 9 investigated the incident, and found that Cole appeared to attempt to get special treatment to avoid having her friend's motorcycle seized. The video verion of WCPO's report ultimately notes that Cole and her…

On May 15, I posted (at NewsBusters; at BizzyBlog) on the Obama administration's and government-run Chrysler's blatant deception concerning whether plants would be closed as a result of the company's bankruptcy filing. Specifically, on April 29 and 30, Obama, the administration and Chrysler told senators, congressmen, state and local politicians, and local and regional union leaders that the…

Those who believe that Politico is a hangout for former establishment media journalists who want to recreate a combination of the New York Times and Washington Post on the web -- complete with the insufferable biases of those two publications -- can look to the disparate treatment of two challenges to party congressional leaders as affirmative evidence. In a search on "Cindy Sheehan" at Politico…

(UPDATE: See circulation chart below.)In early March (covered at NewsBusters; at BizzyBlog), Toledo Blade Columbus Bureau reporter Jim Provance named the party of Ohio's Republican State Auditor Mary Taylor, who sharply criticized Democratic Governor Ted Strickland's serious lateness with the state's financial statements -- so late that they couldn't possibly be audited until after the Ohio…

Appearing today on the Toledo Blade's Web site is the article "Candide: Toledo Opera production offers the liveliest aspects of opera, musical theater, and operetta."  Author Sally Vallongo writes:In the 1950s, as then-Sen. Joseph McCarthy (R., Wis.) and his House Committee on Un-American Activities investigated liberal and progressive artists in search of Communist-oriented dissidents, Hellman…