It was ironic that at the same precise moment that Judge Lyons was seeking to put Darbi Boddy, a Lakota school board member in jail just for being on school board-related business in Columbus, Ohio where he imposed a restraining order keeping her from Isaac Adi, another school board member, that the Chairman of the Republican Party of Butler County, Ohio was sending out a letter trying to unify the party after a tough election. Here was a prime case of some old washed-up crusty crab who has been trying to destroy a mom with fines and incarceration because Darbi essentially didn’t kiss the ring of Lynda O’Connor, who had just lost the election, and that same GOP endorsed her. Literally, just a few days before, I was at another political event where Isaac was there, and he was telling me how much Darbi was like a sister to him and that he loved her. Yet just a few days later, he and his attorney, another sucker for Lynda O’Connor, were trying to put Darbi in jail while her husband was overseas serving our nation. And they have a child at home forming opinions about the world and she sees all this harassment of her mommy by really ruthlessly diabolical people. Smart judge. Smart Isaac. Isaac wasn’t lying to me, was he? Actions always tell the truth. And to all the other people who have gone way out on a limb of injustice to stand behind Lynda, who positioned everyone for failure out of pure selfishness. As I read that letter from Todd Hall, my phone was constantly going off from a lot of Darbi supporters who wanted to go to war with these people in a very vicious way. Somehow, I don’t think this is the kind of unification Todd was talking about in his letter. But I read it carefully and tried to find something positive about it.

I’ve known Todd Hall for a long time, and I like him. I’ve stood up for him when many people wanted his head in much the way I stand up for Darbi. I like to see good people trying to do good things. If they stumble their feet along the way a bit, I don’t get hung up on it. I judge intent for what it should be, and actions mean a lot in determining that intent. And I understand what Todd Hall wants to do after a tough loss, which is good. To get the Republican Party all pointed in the right direction. The trouble is that everyone has a different opinion about what the right direction is. It is the job of leadership, no matter if it’s a political party, a company, or a sports team to figure out what “right” is and get a team accomplishing it together. And in the Butler County Republican Party, over the last several years, Jennifer Edwards at Fox 19 is always there to stoke the fires, as I warned everyone about. She doesn’t do to Democrats what she does to Republicans. She was again pushing the Darbi story in Butler County just as she did the story against Roger Reynolds where Sheriff Jones went after him, and other people completely maliciously, just to show power over other rivals within the party. When power becomes more important to these teammates, any organization is destined to fail; in this case, voters have been taking notice. And Todd tried to point that out in his letter with motivational quotes to get everyone’s attention. But one particular quote I thought was especially relevant and was the point of the entire letter:

Talent wins games, but teamwork and intelligence win championships – Michael Jordan.

That sounds generic enough, but there is a good story to this. Everyone knows Michael Jordan was probably the greatest NBA player ever to live, in a time when people liked professional basketball before the league started eating from the hands of communist China. But while Jordan was with the Bulls, they won six national championships, so obviously, he was essential to the team. But a lot of background stuff went on that allowed Michael Jordan to be all he could. He had teammates like Scottie Pippen, who was always a quiet background player who was excellent in his own way, so he drew double teams away from Jordan and allowed some of those games with such spectacular results. Then there was Dennis Rodman, the crazy character who was always causing trouble and drew a lot of attention, again allowing Michael Jordan to be more of what his talents could provide to their full extent. Then there was the coach, Phil Jackson, who had a unique leadership ability to get all those crazy characters pointed toward wins on the court when, if left to their own devices, they would likely have flown apart and destroyed each other. Putting all those unique personalities together in one place without fights is tough. But a good leader like Jackson was able to, and the results were evident, as Todd Hall pointed out in his letter. Perhaps he was thinking about teamwork generically; even Michael Jordan needed a team. But it’s more than that; it’s a leadership element that is the most desired in the world, much more than gold or any precious metal, winning leadership, no matter what organization we are discussing. The Chicago Bulls had it; teams that had Tom Brady on them had it. We see it in specific companies, entertainment, music, and art. And we see it in politics with President Trump.

When you don’t have your version of Phil Jackson in a leadership role but have lots of wild personalities on a team, like Dennis Rodman, Michael Jordan, and Scottie Pippen, winning isn’t guaranteed.  Great talent can do what great talent does, but wins are hard to come by without leadership.  Someone should have told Judge Lyons and Sheriff Jones that being a bunch of stingy old mustache men with about five minutes left in their careers isn’t enough.  They should be recruiting new, bright people so the Republican Party can win next week, next month, and next year.  But after the way people have seen how the GOP has treated Darbi; who in their right mind would want to play for that team?  Who wants to be thrown in jail because they refused to kiss the ring of some egomaniac that is only in politics because they don’t have that kind of respect anywhere else?  Once they step out of politics and go to Ace Hardware to buy some nails for the house, people stop saying hi to them and treating them like local celebrities.  So they seek personal fulfillment in destructive ways, bringing the party down which reflect in losses at the ballot box.  If the Republican Party isn’t giving the public wins, then people aren’t interested.  And that was what fueled the Chicago Bulls when Jordan was playing there.  Without the successes, they would have just been another team.  But what we have now is a Butler County Republican Party run by older relics hanging on to their past who are jealous of the young, beautiful people, and they aren’t interested in winning.  They are interested in the power of their position.  And if they are shown disrespect, they want to put their critics in jail.  That is precisely what happened to the former Butler County auditor, Roger Reynolds.  And that’s what they are trying to do to Darbi Boddy and many others who are challenging the old farts with playing time, looking for a victory.  But victory isn’t essential to the Republican Party, and the public is losing interest.  And it will take more than a letter from Todd Hall to fix any of that.

Rich Hoffman