Category: Mystery

Mitch McConnell and His “Conceal the Steal”: Caught ‘Red Handed’ selling out to communist China

With both Mike Pence and Mitch McConnell recently coming out as a way of justifying the focus of making January 6th into a big deal, when in fact, the real causes of the problem were ignored entirely, one of them is much worse than the other. With Pence, it’s quite evident that he is naïve and wants to believe in the political system, and to him, a challenge to that system is disruptive. His support of the “conceal of the steal” of the 2020 election is similar to how he might react to people questioning scenes from the Bible. He certainly doesn’t have the mind to think critically about matters of faith, and he wants to have confidence in our government. It’s beyond comprehension for him to consider just how broken our government is. But McConnell, on the other hand, started his time in the senate with a new marriage to Elaine Chao, working with her father James in a shipbuilding business that the Chinese State Shipbuilding Corporation contributed directly to the family shipping business, where its fleet expanded incredibly over the next several decades. Elaine’s father had been classmates with the president of China at the time, Jiang Zemin. We are talking about a marriage of connections here, where the purpose of the union was power and control. James wanted to secure his shipping business. His daughter married an American senator, and China’s leadership wanted very much to get a foot in the door of American politics at the highest levels for their own strategic needs. The old crow, McConnell, knows how the game works and how all this Chinese business evolved over time, with him at the center of it. When Trump lost the election due specifically to political corruption allowing the steal to occur, which is now well documented, Mitch knows he’s lying when he says the “election was legally certified and fair.” No, instead, Mitch played his part in crippling America to protect the family business, which was at the center of his marriage to Elaine. They wanted to get rid of Trump as much as everyone else in Washington D.C. wanted, for all the same reasons because they had sold out their country and empowered China to take over America by selling us all out for easy cash.

Peter Schweizer’s new book is easy to get, called Red Handed. I bought my copy off a big stack at Costco, so it’s not like it’s a massive book from a fringe right-winged conspiracy.   Peter is president of the Government Accountability Institute in Washington D.C. and has a staff of researchers looking into everything he reported in that fantastic book. I’ve read all of Peter’s books over the years, many times. And I’ve already read this new one many times over now, and let me just say; it’s got the goods. Schweizer does what the First Amendment was meant to do and allows freedom of speech to keep pressure on the political class to check power at the door. The result is books like Red Handed, which goes into vast details on the level of corruption that people like Mitch McConnell, Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerbucks, Labron James, and the Biden crime family have conducted in direct relationship with China, our known enemy. When Mitch McConnell started his relationship with China, it was widely viewed that the communist country might become more like America. But over time, they have stated quite bluntly that they intend to destroy the West and resurrect their status in the world as the dominating global power. And they intend to bring down America by cutting off the head of what they think our leadership is and destroying the country from within. All that is documented with evidence in Peter’s book. All that and much more. There simply is no excuse for people not to know this information as easily as Schweizer has made it for people to see. It’s not like people have to go to a library somewhere to do all this research on their own. It’s available next to the eggs and milk at one of the most popular shopping destinations in the country. Read it, and yes, it will shock you. Buy one and give it to all your family and friends. Buy several copies. You might just save their lives. 

But McConnell knows everything that’s happening in Washington. He doesn’t have to read Peter’s book; he could have written the book himself. When McConnell participated in the election fraud of 2020 by trying to rush the process through, he was simply protecting what he had built over many decades of corrupt politics. He didn’t go out and marry a nice girl from Kentucky. Without question, there was plenty to choose from. No, he married Elaine, whose father just so happened to be friends with the president of China at the time and knew they wanted to use him for the family business. He was a willing participant in that corruption, and he is more than guilty of suppressing the intentions of the Chinese government at the expense of his own country. Like many in Washington and within the media have done, they have made their deals with the communists who gave away wealth easily for the partnership. Mitch married his second wife, knowing how things work in Washington; it’s about connecting people who have gained power through looted wealth. Elaine was in banking, and moving finance meant power in the Swamp, so he got into the family business fully awake, which has undoubtedly impacted the way he governs. Understandably, when Trump was in the White House, he put Mitch’s wife in his cabinet as Transportation Secretary to align the power couple to his administration. But behind the scenes, the two would plot against Trump at every turn that would make Shakespeare blush. 

When Mitch could have stood for election integrity, or even the origins of Covid, he has punted every time in obvious protection of China and its relationship with Beltway politics. Not only does he know about all the scams he’s been involved in, but he knows about all the others as well. He is fully aware of just how deep the Chinese communist party is entangled with his fellow senators, lobbyists, and media members, and he has done nothing about it. That’s because he can’t because if he did, all those ships that were built for his father-in-law would suddenly be called into question. They weren’t free; they came with a price tag. And that price tag was to put his daughter in the bed of a powerful senator, give him a little of the cheese, and shut him up for the rest of his life, which has been the case. And when McConnell had a chance to stick a knife in Trump’s back, he did so, not for political ideology, but for the protection of the system that made him rich and more powerful. In a world where that kind of power is valued, Mitch McConnell put himself at the top by selling out to China. And even if he wanted to be critical of China now, he couldn’t because he has gone too far with them and seen too much. When we want to know what corruption politics is, Mitch McConnell is the face of it. And when he said that the 2020 election was “legally certified,” what he really means is that he was in on the “steal to conceal” because what they had to protect was all this vast corruption that they had involved themselves in to sell us all out, to the enemy. China.

Rich Hoffman

Click to buy The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business

The Legacy of Mike Pence: Now more people will be hurt in order to win our country back

A little note to Mike Pence after his ridiculous comments recently about his role in certifying the illegal election of 2020, you are not a good guy if you allow evil to grow. He did not stand for truth and justice in his role as the Vice President; instead, he punted to the process of certifying an illegal election knowing that the real issue was a process crime, and he simply did not dare to do what needed to be done when it needed to be done. Instead, he tried to justify his actions by saying that we’ll win next time, and when we do, Kamala Harris and whoever else will have to accept our results, as if this was a story about the “high road.” The election of 2020 was “certified” because the people involved in the vote count wanted to run out the clock on the legal system and get Trump out of office before anybody could check the results. It’s like a football game where there was a questionable play, and the team with the ball seeks to run the next play before the opposing coach can throw a challenge flag. In the world of Mike Pence and Mitch McConnell, the integrity of the process is more important than the results, so they weren’t going to do anything to bring that process into question, even though at the time, the questions were already starting to stack up. Now, over a year later, it’s obvious there was election fraud. The evidence is pouring forth in Arizona, Georgia, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Michigan. Additionally, it’s getting hot in states that haven’t been discussed much, such as Colorado, Nevada, and even California. There was so much election fraud that the only responsible thing to do would have been to kick the certification process back to the states, as Pence was required to do, and make those states work out their issues right then and there, instead of dragging the country through the garbage we are seeing now. 

Just by reading the book Red Handed, which is newly out and on the best sellers list, it becomes clear quickly why so many politicians on both sides of the House and Senate wanted to see Biden elected and Trump out. They had all taken lots of money from China, and they were guilty of selling out their country. And the only way they were going to get away with it was to have Biden in the White House. That’s undoubtedly why Mitch McConnell was in such a hurry to certify the election. Those politicians who took money from China, and have been dancing to the tune of Blackrock, needed to keep the political system intact that allowed them to make that kind of money, and once they had the money in their bank accounts, they had to preserve that system. It’s a huge problem, probably the biggest problem we have ever faced in our country, and it has become this way because nobody wanted to deal with the reality of the vast amounts of corruption that was on full display. The book Red Handed lays the case out elaborately; there really is no question about the intent of the crimes. And there is no excuse not to get Red Handed and to read it. They have stacks and stacks of them at Cosco. It’s easy to get. Then, of course, knowing that it’s clear why they all signed up to conduct election fraud under “emergency Covid rules,” and that was to cover up the money they had taken from a hostile foreign nation. It was clear at the time, but in hindsight, as we have now the privilege, it was the crime of the century, and Pence had it in his power to stop it with his vote, but he didn’t have the guts to stand up to evil when it fully showed itself.

Pence has said that “no one person has the right to overturn the results of an election,” speaking of himself, of course. However, there were no legal results of the election to certify; the count that was presented that day was a mere formality and nothing more. The content was corrupt and faulty as it was delivered. And everyone who turned away from justice when it was under their guard to take action is guilty of perpetuating further crime against our country and the people in it, especially in the judicial system. When it mattered most, none of them had the stomach to stand up to what was happening because they thought the election would be certified, and people would forget about it. They felt that because of the bubble they live in. If they knew the people who lived in the country and voted all across America, they would have known that deep anger was forming, and there would be no way to repair it. Pence tried to justify his punt that day with an eye to the future, to elections where all this will be corrected in 2024, and that by taking the high road, the Democrats would be forced to do the same. Pence should know better coming from the Trump White House. He knows how things are behind the scenes. But he’s like the preacher in a train robbery telling everyone to do what the robbers are telling the occupants, just put up your hands and give the thieves what they want, so nobody gets hurt. In the world of Mike Pence, that is the way to fight evil, to yield to it so we can live another day. But in actuality, when evil presents itself, however inconvenient, we must fight it then and there, so it doesn’t grow and become emboldened like we are seeing now a year later from a government obviously not doing the work of voters but the work of the Davos Party and their Chinese insurgents intent on world domination.   Mitch and the gang are not working for the American people, that’s for sure. 

For Pence to double down on his actions that day, when he punted the illegal 2020 vote to certification, he allowed the pressure of the SWAMP to entice evil to continue its malice. He foolishly believed that Republicans would win in the end by taking the high ground. If there was anything that Trump did more wrong in his first term, it was trying to bring hostile never Trump types into his administration like Pence, Nikki Haley, and McConnell’s Chinese wife, hoping to win them over as all executives do. Keep your enemies close. But in Washington D.C., that was where the leaks came from and the undercutting. Trump rightly figured he was a big enough personality to overcome all those antics, and with that arrangement, Pence was a decent Vice-President, that is, until real courage was needed. And in the end, that is what allowed the election fraud to occur was that too many people in D.C. wanted to preserve the system that enriched them so heavily. Trump was a threat to that system, and they thought that by getting rid of him, people would fall in line and forget about all this “draining the swamp” business. And Pence thought it was the good Christian thing to trust in the law, in the lord, and of fate to sort out evil from the good. But what was needed was for people to stand up to evil and fight corruption where it showed itself. When it mattered most for Mike Pence, he punted like a coward, and now we have in the world what we have, evil more committed than ever, and to beat them now, many, many more people will end up hurt. That is the legacy of Mike Pence. 

Rich Hoffman

Click to buy The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business

‘Red Handed’: America can’t be decapitated by China, but corruption has been exposed

In the video above, I told a story about a recent event where I was offered a lot of money to do a job, about 10X more than my present rate. Yet to do that job, I would have to give up many things that I do every day, which make up essential parts of my character. So, of course, I turned down the offer, even though it would have been well in the seven figures. I would not say that the proposal was one rooted in corruption. In this case, a very hungry CEO needed some challenging problems solved, which I specialize in. A unique skill set, of course, has a value all its own. But it was in a market that I often criticize, and to do a job in that realm, I would have to give that up, which I’m not willing to do. Not for any amount of money in the world. In fact, with me, there are many things that I do every day that I enjoy, and there simply is no amount of money that could be offered to me to give any of them up. I’ve been like that all of my life, and I will remain that way. I get offers like that all the time, not always that big, but every couple of years, those opportunities come up, and I always say the same thing. I’m not telling that little story for a cookie or anything, but only in context to what I have to say about Peter Schweizer’s new book, Red Handed, where he spills the goods on the money machine of Washington D.C. culture and exposes clearly that China has purchased the ethics of many of our politicians all to destroy our nation. The best thing about not taking offers, as I mentioned, is that I am one of the few people who can really criticize corrupt political behavior. Because apparently, by the narrative of Peter’s book, nobody else is functioning from any kind of ethics or moral code, and it shows in the end product.

China has one primary goal: to destroy the West, what they consider western civilization. They mean to destroy us culturally and, of course, economically, and they have been very aggressive in their methods of doing so. They have not been shy about this stated goal; they feel empowered because they have been able to throw money at so many in our political class, and within our business climates, they have no respect for us. They think all American’s will do anything for money so they can purchase our ethics with endless amounts of money. They believe they can buy corruption. So, of course, they hated President Trump, because as a wealthy person, he didn’t need their money, and he was free to function on his own accord. That was why China and many others in the world who plotted against America wanted to do anything to get rid of Trump, including their participation in election fraud. Money bought a lot of silence when the act of election fraud occurred, and it also bought a lot of misdirection until the evidence simply outpaced the purchased opinions of “there is no evidence of election fraud, 2020 was a free and fairly certified election. Trump is trying to overturn our Democracy!” That’s China talking and all the money that has been stuffed in the pockets of Mitch McConnell and many others to stay silent on the matter for the theft of our nation like a train conductor allowing their train to be robbed and people killed on it, but being promised a lifetime of riches to let it happen.  

Ironically, China has made several fatal flaws in its strategy, which is typical of all collectivist-based cultures. First, it must be understood that China is not that powerful. Most of their current wealth is looted. America propped up China from a third-world nation. The agents of chaos worldwide have been looking for a straw man character to do their global bidding. China was just the kind of communist power they could use to be the face of their insurrection.   Just like when Trump ripped that mask off with North Korea, which had been hiding China as the neighborhood bully, China was playing that role with the World Economic Forum, what many are calling the Davos Party now, because of their political influence around the world without a home country to give away their intentions. They exist outside of the political theater so that they stay invisible to the political press, and thus, the rest of the world. But in such a way, they control all the governments of the world, including China. That much was apparent this past year at Davos, where China danced to the strings of Klaus Schwab and the Davos gang just like Biden, Janet Yellen, and Dr. Fauci did. To understand how corruption flows into our own political system, you have to understand what’s behind the corruption, and these days the Davos gang are the robbers of the world most behind it. But China thinks of itself as its own master of destiny, even though they wouldn’t exist today without the United States. And like some rebellious teenager that thinks they can throw off the West and be the family leader, the Davos gang has other ideas. 

China thought the key to bringing down America was cutting off what they believe is the head of our nation, something they call “leaders,” like Mark Zuckerbucks, Bill Gates, Ray Dalio, the corporation of Disney, and the heads of our political class. However, the key to understanding the West, which I talk about often in my book The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business, is that capitalism is all about decentralization, not top-down leadership. So China has spent countless amounts of time and resources buying off American companies and members of the political class. Yet they don’t control the direction of the nation. All that has happened and will continue to happen is that the corrupt will appear disjointed from the rest of American society who don’t follow leaders. They tend to do what’s best for them. Such as in politics, that is why many of them still support President Trump after all that has happened to leave China, Davos, and much of the Washington D.C. culture paralyzed with that reality because they don’t understand it. If people followed leaders and those leaders were purchased with corruption, then that should be the end of America. Well, wrong. Because we have a decentralized society where there really isn’t a class system, anybody can be anything they want in America, which is not the case with the rest of the world. And as a result, America can’t be decapitated. If the leaders are cut off from the rest of society, society will still function. However, it has made it easy for Americans to see corruption in the context of action, chiefly revealed in the book Red Handed. Peter Schweizer certainly delivered the goods in a free press with a book that names the names. And while my little story shows the value of maintaining integrity, so long as some people act in that manner, America will never fall to corruption. It just makes it easier for us to see who does. And to see who is most guilty worldwide, where all indications point directly to China and their hostilities toward us all, for malice that is unjustified and malevolent, it’s all in the book, Red Handed. 

Rich Hoffman

Click to buy The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business

The Indictment of Roger Reynolds: Is it the pursuit of justice, or a political hit

I brag all the time about how great the Republican Party is in Butler County, and with the corruption indictment of Roger Reynolds that is the hot story this week, I still feel that way. Yet, I’ve known Roger for more than a decade, and I know him to be an excellent auditor for the people who elected him. As I said before, I view the land story that Channel 19 covered back in September of 2021 as a hit piece by Jennifer Edwards, who looks to target Republicans often in stories pitting people against each other to make news, not just reporting it. Her hit piece against Roger and other members of the Liberty Township trustees was obviously political, to attack the Republican brand ahead of the November election. Essentially as I see it, the Roger Reynolds story is one where old family entanglements can get mushy with the duties of an elected office. I find much of it hard to believe, and I think the story is mainly about emotions than logic. But for me, it doesn’t erase all the good work Roger has done over the years. And as I always say, the law is the same at 9 AM as it is at 9 PM or any other day of the week or year. If Roger broke the law, then the law should apply. However, watching Sheriff Jones’ face glow with glee during the indictment announcement made me think of some hypotheticals. Jones was too happy about the indictment, and some of the ways he said words in his presentation triggered questions that are worth consideration since what we are all talking about here are the ethics of an elected office and whether or not Roger Reynolds actually broke any laws, or that the case is a legal dispute between two parties over land. Did Roger abuse his office? Well, if we conclude that he did, doesn’t it open up a whole lot of questions about Sheriff Jones?

I’ve often thought of Sheriff Jones as a great asset to Butler County. But, since Trump left office and Joe Biden has been in the presidency, Jones has turned more into a Democrat than the guy who plays a Republican on TV and at public speeches. The way that Jones went after Congressman Thomas Hall over a voting record, with name-calling and sheer intimidation in public, comes to mind as an abuse of power of an elected office. Voters picked Thomas, yet the Sheriff made quite a public spectacle out of destroying his credibility on WLW radio to many thousands of people. I thought Thomas defended himself well, but the question remains about Sheriff Jones, what was he thinking in doing so? Was he trying to intimidate an officeholder, to exert power over the Republican Party of Butler County in ways that didn’t represent the voters? Surely not. But based on the kinds of things that Jones said in his press conference about the indictment of Roger Reynolds, doubt was indeed cast on the situation. Why would Sheriff Jones be so happy to bring about an indictment of a fellow Republican? His glee sounded as if he were a Democrat about to put a Republican in jail over some bogus charge, an allegation anybody could make against anybody. Given how the Sheriff treated Thomas Hall, might it not be logical to conclude that the Sheriff took a particular interest in the Reynolds case for some strategic move? For a local land dispute to make it to the Attorney General of Ohio directly, some political investment would have to be involved, raising eyebrows. 

Then there was the strange action on Sheriff Jones’ mask politics, where he had been leading the country against mandates. Suddenly, a few weeks ago, as the new school board at Lakota was getting set to vote to remove mask mandates, and the teacher’s union was all upset about it, Sheriff Jones flipped his position. It was an extraordinary move for him. What was going on? Well, I know more than I’m letting on here. But for the sake of the hypotheticals of this evolving case, questions are good to ask, especially in public figures who are declaring injustice among long-time Republicans in the team-building of party politics. I remember years ago when I published the pay rates of the local police departments, and I was shocked by how many family members Sheriff Jones had in many townships. It brought a question to my mind about Sheriff Jones himself and his relationship with members of Congress, senators, and area trustees. What was he really saying when he bragged about beating down some politician like Thomas Hall on city-wide radio? “Don’t get on my bad side. Or the same thing will happen to you.”  Whether or not that was the intention, I can say that I know many politicians who feel that way. Was that feeling created on purpose by the Sheriff? Is that part of his brand within the party? And is he really a Democrat trying to infiltrate the Republican Party with liberalism disguised as good ol’ fashion police work? 

Watching Jones stumble over the word “start” in his press conference, I couldn’t help but wonder if he was getting stuck trying to justify to himself how the investigation into Reynolds even started. By the way, I watched his body language. He acted like a guy who knew he was doing something wrong yet was trying to hide it behind justice. Thinking of all these things, I couldn’t help but wonder if some family member of Jones had worked in the office of Roger Reynolds and maybe had a falling out like many employees do with their bosses. With so much family on the government payroll, it would certainly be a conflict of interest if Jones was out in the county intimidating public officials into behaving the way he wanted them to, to protect his family members employed by some of those politicians. And if that were the case, which it may or may not be, how would it be different from what Jones was accusing Reynolds of doing, based on a Channel 19 report, meant to smear area Republicans and refer the investigation up the food chain to the Attorney General’s office, and smear the headlines all over the national news? It comes out looking like a lot of “unlawful use of authority” to me and many spoonfuls of “conflict of interest.”

If the law was broken, everyone should pay for their incursions. If Roger is guilty, then he is guilty. I would be surprised if he were, but I’ve seen plenty of railroad cases before, and this whole issue has the smell of a political hit. It looks like some kind of revenge scheme that is being hidden behind some token law and order façade. I hope that’s not the case. But if Roger is guilty, then where do we draw the line between public life and protecting family concerns? Roger might have made mistakes with his case because of family entanglements, things that he wouldn’t usually find himself involved in. But couldn’t the same be said when an officeholder, such as a sheriff, intimidates officeholders who employ family members? And what happens if there is some termination of employment? Would the Sheriff get personally involved? Would he retaliate? Well, he has shown the signs of that behavior. I’m sure we’ll find out. For now, I feel I need to defend my political party in my hometown from this embarrassment that the Sheriff has communicated to the world. Should we be mad at Roger? Or should we be angry at the Sheriff? Well, I want to see all wrongdoers get punished for their crimes. But are we talking about crime here, or are we talking about revenge? Time will tell, but politics is a blood sport, and to my way of thinking, I think these kinds of debates are necessary to make the best party possible under the most divisive circumstances that may emerge. 

Rich Hoffman

Click to buy The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business

The Best Option for Dry Fire Practice: Having a great relationship with your firearm

Not to take anything away from one of the most incredible people in the world, Tommie, the owner of Premier Shooting in West Chester, but I am excited to report on a great new dry fire technology that many people may not know about. I mention Tommie because she told me about her exciting new dry fire range at Premier, the latest craze in shooting, for a good reason. Much of the time, dry firing involves a laser in the gun instead of a bullet and can be measured against a target by some electronic method. It’s becoming more common to use a smartphone for dry fire action. More sophisticated dry fire can be utilized like they do at Premier. There is still nothing like live fire with a real bullet striking a real target. But dry fire can be a great way to stay proficient with a gun without all the expense of firing live ammunition and can be every bit as enjoyable. Well, I have found that practicing for my Cowboy Fast Draw events a wonderful invention sold by the Cowboy Fast Draw Association called the Gunslinger Mark IV laser targeting system that I finally treated myself to, and I’m in love with it. It has been around in the fast draw community for several years but has only recently been perfected to a near-perfect system, as shown in the video above. I can’t think of anything better than this as a dry fire option for people looking for a home dry fire solution to their shooting needs. Practicing with one of these dry fire systems makes the range time much more valuable. I’m certainly not saying gun enthusiasts should replace range time for dry fire time. But that dry fire will make that range time much more useful. 

As I say all the time, especially these days, it’s essential to have a relationship with our Constitution, specifically the Second Amendment. Some people lose touch with the Constitution because they live in areas where they get used to concessions to utilize Constitutional rights in favor of collective need. For instance, in urban areas where it’s almost impossible to shoot every day in the backyard, it’s hard to maintain a relationship with your favorite firearms because they stay locked up all the time. One of the things that I like most about Cowboy Fast Draw is that it allows me to have a wax firing range in my workshop that makes it possible to shoot every day. When I want to fire real lead bullets, I go down and see Tommie at the range. But it’s not possible to shoot every day for me, because of time really, so having a range in my home makes it that much more practical. For many years now, I have enjoyed going into my shop and shooting at my strike plate range. But, for me, that wasn’t enough. I want to shoot while sitting in my reading chair and watching movies and football games. So I had been looking to get one of these Mark IV laser targeting systems, which essentially does everything my strike plate range does, except fire actual primers. Firing live fire rounds in the house and having wax bullets explode all over the living room just was not possible. But with a laser, I can shoot all day and all night long, as much as I want without the expense of using up rounds of ammunition. 

This particular unit is unique because it was invented by the Cowboy Fast Draw Association for the specific problem of fast fire and the need to register the hit in thousands of a second. Much dry fire activity is specific to just hitting a target and seeing how you do from shot to shot. The added element of speed is something special. Whenever the laser hits within the 8″ circle on the target system, it picks up a hit and measures it within fractions of a second. The light blinks three times in practice mode to let you know that your shot is coming. Then the light comes on solid and counts the time it takes you to hit the target. I not only use my target system for fast draw for all types of target shooting. I shoot from 30′, 21′, 15′ down to 5′ like I did in the video, up close so that the camera could pick up the gun and the hit in the same frame and still see the indicator. Even better, the unit is free from an internet connection, so nobody is snooping around on you while you are target shooting. It’s free of internet control, leaving target shooting the personal relationship between you and the practice and nobody else. Other types of dry fire where the smartphone is involved are giving vast amounts of information on all of us to some data collection company. So while convenient and neat, there is a cost to the technology. The Cowboy Fast Draw Association people make the Mark IV advance the sport. So, it’s a trusted source of shooting applications that makes using the Mark IV a much better experience. 

Best yet, the Mark IV Laser system allows shooters to have that daily relationship with their guns. It takes away a lot of the taboo that politics has placed on guns over the years and will enable users to use their firearms more for sport than just self-defense. Practicing with dry fire lasers has the feel of shooting baskets in the driveway. Shooting is a sport just like basketball or football—even golf. But until dry fire technology evolved to the level it is now; it wasn’t possible to practice with firearms virtually anywhere at any time of day. With the Mark IV, as I showed I was using inside my RV, shooting can be done anywhere. Even in a McDonald’s parking lot in Vail, Colorado, while you are waiting for the grandkids to get a Happy Meal and use the restroom. And the system is so reliable that it works perfectly every time. Once you have one of the Laser Training Cartridges that ignite the laser and allow the shot to fire down the barrel, you can shoot all the time, with the only cost being batteries for the cartridge. The total cost of the whole setup is around $800 for the laser and the targeting system and can all be purchased from CowboyFastDraw.com. I buy from them all the time, and they are always good about delivering high-quality items. I even recently ordered from them on New Year’s Eve, and they fulfilled the order that very night. They are like dealing with the way America used to be, always attentive to the customer’s needs, and competent. So overall, I can’t recommend one of these dry fire units more for all the reasons I mentioned and more. The best thing about it is that it takes shooting into the realm of every day and allows shooters to become much more proficient with copious amounts of practice than they could get otherwise. And making better shooters with much more handling only helps everything, from Constitutional consideration to the advancement of shooting sports, because more people can now participate. There is no downside, and for shooters everywhere, knowing that something like this is out there is something that could be life-changing in a good way.

Rich Hoffman

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Justin Trudeau Runs and Hides: Socialists are easy to beat, all you have to do is confront them

I don’t know that it was a big secret, but if there was any doubt about how to defeat socialists in general, what has been going on in Canada is the recipe that will work everywhere. Truckers protesting the vaccine mandates of Justin Trudeau, the socialist prime minister there, gathered outside his home. It scared him so bad that he suddenly came down with Covid and fled to an undisclosed location to avoid the mob. At times, it had the feel of the French Revolution, even though it never descended into actual violence or even the January 6th incident in Washington D.C. One true thing about all socialists is that they became that way out of their timid natures. As liberals, they seek the protection of what they think of, like a big, parental government. And from behind the leg of that parent, they lash out at their siblings as if suddenly empowered with strength. But when they realize that the parental government can’t protect them, it is the scariest thing in the world to them. That is how American politicians reacted when they realized that President Trump was not the leader of the MAGA movement, he was the result of it, and that the people who protested their corrupt government on January 6th, 2021, were not shackled to the rules of society when angered, it was terrifying to them. That is the same kind of fear that Justin Trudeau was reacting to when a mob of protestors took their action to his front door. The Prime Minister got into politics as a form of protection from the real world, and this was not how the script was supposed to read. So he retreated and lashed out in predictable ways, which showed the world, just how little power these little tyrants really have when things start getting tough. Only through deceit can socialists have power; once people are on to them, the house of cards falls apart rather quickly.

I warned everyone about Justin Trudeau back in 2015 when he was first elected as Prime Minister of Canada. I told everyone here and everywhere that I spoke that the kid was a socialist and was part of this global script to remake the world into a socialist one, as indicated by Socialist International at the time. Over the years, of course, that group of globalists who have that script written in the Carroll Quiggly book Tragedy and Hope so blatantly has changed their names many times. These days that whole effort has migrated over into the World Economic Forum, which meets in Davos each year to plot the destruction of the world by controlling governments like Wild West train robbers from beyond a country of their own, all to bring them down into the control of the United Nations, which they manipulate through banking. At the time, Barack Obama was their guy in America, and Justin Trudeau was the outright member of the socialist party in Canada who was put there to do their deeds. I pointed it out; many thought it was a vast conspiracy unrooted in reality. But of course, it turned out to be all true.

Additionally, most of the similar leadership positions in all of Europe were like the socialist Justin Trudeau. Justin’s hook was that he was a nice-looking young man who made women feel safe supporting him. Men had to go along if they didn’t want to alienate their women, and in that way, Canada adopted socialism ever so subtly. I immediately noticed the turn toward authoritarian government behind the smiling face at the border at Niagra Falls, which I like to visit every so often. Suddenly the border went from a popular tourist spot to a pretty cold check of authoritarian control, a preview of what was to come when the United Nations and the Great Reset crowd unleashed Covid to the world for the purpose of a complete socialist takeover of the world behind the shared threat of a virus outbreak, hatched by Dr. Fauci through the Department of Defense in direct partnership with the Chinese government. 

Yet, you won’t hear me talking about how scary any of these losers are. Socialists become socialists because they are weak. They are timid people, which is why they were so quick to adopt mask mandates from out-of-control governments. As liberals, they are conflict-averse and always look for that big parental leg to shield them from their actions in the world. And it’s straightforward to defeat them. Just confront them and watch them wither away like the Wicked Witch from The Wizard of Oz. The real secret to stopping socialism and communism in the world is to confront the bullies hiding behind those parental legs of government. Once socialists like Justin Trudeau realize that government can’t protect them from bad decisions and people angry at authority, they can do nothing. There will come the point where the Chinese people figure this out about their communist government, the overly parental figures there where the few rule the many quite tyrannically. It is not like the Chinese to think for themselves. Still, once unemployment can’t overcome the nanny state problems of an economy built entirely on looted wealth, people will be mad, just as they were in Canada, Washington D.C. and many other places in the world erupting in anger over an authoritarian government more interested in telling people what to do than actually solving problems. When people realize this, the socialists and communists always fall. Because that delicate balance between fear and lack of opportunity quickly takes over reason, social collapse is always imminent. 

What is happening in Canada can and will happen everywhere. I wish people would have listened to me six or seven years ago about Trudeau. It was about that time that I put my support behind Trump because I could see how things were stacking up. Many people like me saw what the socialists and communists in the world were doing, and we wanted to make our own declaration in defense of capitalism; what better way to do it than to elect a guy who fully embraced capitalism and lived in a golden tower that he built in New York City with a beautiful supermodel wife. That was who we wanted to run our government; we didn’t want these Barack Obama, Justin Trudeau socialists that the world wanted to give us. Looking back on it now, isn’t it obvious why they had to get rid of President Trump? He wasn’t part of their script. The world didn’t recognize the American concept of self-government. They had it in their mind that they’d give us someone, and we would like it, just as they did in Canada. But when things don’t go well, and people want recourse for the injustice done to them, like the vaccine mandates in Canada, then when people do rise up, and Trudeau doesn’t have a script that tells him how to solve that problem, the great fear emerges for everyone involved. Socialists and communists do not know what to do. And it is there that they always fail, time and time again, and always will. People always have leverage over the administrative masses, and when the socialists realize that there is no parental leg to hide behind, it is the worst thing in the world. 

Rich Hoffman

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The Honor of Dueling: We had a better and more honest society when fighting to the death was important

I often talk about the books I keep right next to my reading chair. The Federalist Papers and The Anti-Federalist Papers are a few that I look at often as I think about Constitutional applications to modern society and the vast history of human achievement that brought us all to this point in history. Because of my study of those books, I think of the American Constitution as the most outstanding philosophy for a mass society ever put to paper. It could have only occurred under the unusual circumstances of America’s creation and early evolution. But with those books, I have another one that I glaze through several times a week just for the pleasure of it. Of course, I’ve read it many times, but the frequent visits to its contents have a nobility to them that I get nowhere else. John Lyde Wilson’s little guidebook for dueling was written in 1838 called The Code of Honor. Wilson had been governor of South Carolina and felt a guidebook for dueling needed to be put to paper because so many people had gunfights to solve personal matters. Wilson, like President Jackson, would eventually feel dueling to the death to be an unfortunate thing to do. But, they also understood the premise of the personal possession of the concept of the words “I” and “My.” In their time, “my reputation” had meaning, significant meaning, and it was worth fighting to the death to defend it. Understanding this little nuance of intellectual philosophy helps to understand the premise of the American Constitution as it was written at the time to reflect this necessity of protecting personal virtue. 

As I have pointed out in Ayn Rand’s work, specifically her dystopian novel, Anthem, the word “I” was pushed entirely out of their culture and replaced strictly with “we,” and society devolved along the known Vico Cycle to the point where they had to discover the light bulb once again, literally. In that future society, The Council of Candle Makers ran everything. The nature of that collective-based society was to do everything for the greater good as interpreted by those in charge of that interpretation. All personal needs and values are surrendered to the mass of culture in general, which means that the direction of the entire society gets dumbed down to the weakest links of social discourse instead of the best and brightest. That is why those societies always fail, as they are in our present time. Ayn Rand provided significant warnings about these collective philosophies because she came from the Soviet Union as a young woman and saw up close and personal the results. As the last century evolved, we watched communism spread through most of the Asian world coming out of Russia, and it is to this day, the influence is seeking to conquer the West. China is not shy about their statements, and they have bought off many of our political class with stolen wealth to do precisely as Ayn Rand warned about in her book Anthem. That is why there is more of an emphasis on “teams” and “teambuilding” over individual development. Such emphasis is a process in erasing individual effort for the good of the whole, and it is the biggest challenge of our present time.

Clearly, to achieve their goals, the foreign and domestic forces that are the enemies of our Constitutional law desire to “progress” beyond such a concept into a world of global governance ruled by the United Nations. Study history, as I often do. You can see the apparent path of achievement by the international governing class that has been trying to undermine the American Constitution since it was written. English nobility was never crazy about the Magna Carta in their society. They indeed found it preposterous that the American colonies Declared Independence from them during the Revolution and that a new country was formed in the wake. Among the aristocracies of Europe, they never understood the concept of “I” and “My” to the level that it developed in the vacuum of power, when people were far from their overly controlling governments, how people tended to evolve into personal virtue instead of concern for collective based reasoning. And it was in such a breakaway environment some of the best forms of government have ever been created by mankind, starting with the democracy that was invented in pirate societies in the Caribbean then evolving into the Republic of America. In both cases, pirates helped topple the powers of Europe, first with John Paul Jones during the Revolution, then when England tried to take New Orleans during the War of 1812, it was Jean Lafitte who joined with Andrew Jackson to defeat the British forces, who were much more superior. The unregimented individualism of America, with all its variety and creativity, continued to win out over the old forces of collectivism from Europe eventually Asia, time and time again. And that attitude then went on to create the greatest economy the world has ever seen, and it still outpaces all the ruthless mechanisms to bring it under the control of Europe and Asia to this present day. 

Much of that magic came from discovering and protecting the self that the American Constitution afforded people everywhere, including the European concept of slavery. Free people simply outperformed those under the team concept of collective-based societies. Dying for the Queen or an emperor did not match the efforts of gunfighting for the right to a good life and all that could be built with it under the premise of the self. And when the honor of that self was questioned, it meant more to the people who wrote the Constitution to defend their honor to the death than to surrender that concept over to mass society and the bureaucracy of an administrative state which we find ourselves in now. Clearly, we were a better society of law, order, and economy when we fought to the death to preserve our individual honor than when we punt that honor to lawyers and governments to fight on our behalf. We have found that corruption tends to seep into such a society at a maddening pace because there is no individual honor to check it at the door. Without any fear of individual judgment and death by dishonor, there is nothing to keep a criminal class from rising out of chaos and forming right under our noses since honor and personal satisfaction of all concepts of the word “I” have been abandoned in favor of collective rule. When the criminals seek to hide their actions behind the “team” concept, there is no mechanism to identify the evil as individual achievement. Therefore, nobody is ever punished for committing the crime. The crimes then become collective-based because individual judgment can’t be applied to mass culture. That is how criminals are flourishing and why they see to it their best strategy of getting rid of the American Constitutional altogether and thinking of it as archaic. Yet looking back over history, it is clear that we were a better society when individuals could call on each other to have a duel to the death if the value of “I” and “My” needed to be defended. History shows us that protecting “we” has no meaning if the value of personal responsibility is surrendered in the process. And with that in mind, perhaps we should bring back dueling in America and worldwide. I think we would find the behavior of the criminal class that seeks to hide their malice behind rules and regulations under the protections of inefficient mass governments suddenly at a severe disadvantage. 

Rich Hoffman

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China’s Attack of America Through the Tyranny of Safety: Most of Cincinnati called off work over a little snow

I always hate to see mass call-offs of work when there is a significant storm or some other weather emergency. To me, it’s a distinctly American thing to work hard, work more than eight silly little hours a day, and work weekends. I have worked well over 24 hours per day when it’s called for, and I’ve spent many years working seven days a week. Of course, I have slept when needed, but I have never understood people who don’t get going when the going gets tough. There is something very un-American about calling off work and sitting around in your pajamas when productive things need to be done. When I was a kid, I was the one who had perfect attendance in school. And as an adult, I am always the one who never calls off. I have worked through severe injuries, including three times when I had bones sticking out of my hands. I always finished my shift and got stitched up later. I superglued my skin together to get through the rest of the work period to stop the bleeding. When I’ve had major surgeries that I was told would keep me in bed for months, I returned on the next available workday after and pushed myself to recover within a few weeks completely. When it has snowed too much to drive a car, I have ridden motorcycles and bicycles to work, whatever worked. And if I got to work and felt it better to stay until the weather cleared, I always have done so, as long as it takes, so the work that needed to get done always got done. So, on February 3rd, 2022, a snowstorm hit the Cincinnati area. Most of the city decided to call off work based purely on what the weather people said on television; it made me sick and reminded me of the real meaning of the war we are in with China. 

One of my favorite chapters in my book The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business is the chapter titled “The Tyranny of Safety.” When I wrote that book, I felt some things needed to be addressed in American business that was being ignored. Yet, every company everywhere wanted to know the secret sauce to success and how to unlock it within their work cultures. I am a practitioner of all the trade’s modern Lean tools and process improvement tricks. But due to my long experience and work history, even plowing through injuries to get a competitive advantage over a rival, whether they be domestic or some foreign power, nobody wants to deal with the elephant in the room that China set out years ago to destroy the West. They mean to do it by attacking us through every little measure of safety protocol that can be imagined. They don’t follow their own safety initiatives, which have flowed down through WHO, the UN, and into the CDC. Just as they don’t follow climate initiatives, they push us to follow them to commit economic suicide in their favor. The Chinese have intended to get us in the West to play by different rules than they do, and they have done so by getting us to fall for Wokeness, Climate Change, and Workplace Safety. They have spent a lot of money buying up politicians that would sell these attitudes to the public, in media that would strike fear in all who watch and listen to their programming over every little snowstorm.   Their goal has been to get us to work less so that China could catch up to American GDP and eventually overtake it within this decade. That is the emphatic goal of China and the world in general. Whenever I see massive call-offs over snowstorms and other weather-related issues, it makes it very apparent that China is attacking us in a worse way than with the use of any military. 

When I say that all labor unions are communist organizations, I mean it—every single one of them. Labor unions trace back to the start of Karl Marx and all his followers through the early 20th century, and we can’t help but talk about Chinese communism as we see the impact of their strategy of work stoppages. Communists everywhere want to see less work to leverage the money generated. The current supply chain problems in the United States are caused by China restricting its supply and the labor unions at the shipping ports refusing to work harder and longer to unload what’s coming in. Why, well, Covid is the new global snowstorm that communists have used to get people to call off work and stay home. And remember, China made the virus, and they did so for this very reason, to slow the world down to catch up economically. It wasn’t so much to kill people but to kill economic activity. I was at Kroger right before the snowstorm came through Cincinnati, and the shelves were mostly wiped out. Add to that the problem of supply chain issues on imports, and what we have are communist unions and communist countries who are trying to slow down the engine of our country for their own benefit. 

After two years of Covid, people have become used to calling off work over everything, making this 2022 snowstorm different from past snowstorms. This time, the media culture that had been scaring everyone to death over Covid had their ear when they cried about ice and snow hitting the Midwest, and people were calling off work before they even got up and gave it a try to get to their employers. They just gave up without much of a whimper, and that is the work of the powers against productivity that are well at war with America’s can-do spirit and have been for centuries now. The way to beat America is to convince it to stay home and not be productive while the rest of the world works and churns out their widgets at a maddening pace. China is making a show of playing lockdown with Covid, but you can bet they won’t sacrifice a dollar of GDP to it. But America has found itself crippled by the value of safety over productivity as a new measure. Productivity is now viewed as reckless, while staying home, staying safe, and staying unproductive is now promoted by our governments as a virtue. The terrible governor of Ohio, Mike DeWine, was quick to announce on the news that people should stay off the roads, let the government workers do their jobs, make it easy for them to keep the roads clear, to hell with the production needs of our society. Whether it’s snow or Covid, the message from the government is, all the same, it’s an act of God, and we don’t control God. So yield to the more powerful powers than us, including the almighty centralized government.

Nobody is saying that we should have an unsafe society. That is the point in my book.   But safety is not about staying home and hiding; it’s about being skilled and competent. And if people don’t have those skills, they need to work hard to get them. That is the American way. But this “safe” way preached in our industrial compliance culture these days does not come from our need for safety. Still, foreign desires to slow down America and ultimately control our output with many communist tentacles that ultimately extend back to China in almost every way imaginable, where money flows in the bloodstream of an unseen monster, is a real threat to all that is good. Yes, China’s war machine is “safety,” and it flows down to us through our bought and paid for governments for the strategy of stopping American productivity. Every time people stay home from work over conditions of concerned safety, that is what is happening. We see the actions of war and our inability to meet the foe where they live and strike back. Because too many people are hiding from the snow, the rain, and every cut finger because they believe the experts without knowing who really controls those experts. It’s war from China for sure, just not the kind of war people expect to see. The way to beat western capitalism from the view of the orient is to convince them to stay home, not to work, and get used to a big government check, while the communist Chinese surpass America in every way imaginable.

Rich Hoffman

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Dark Money Tries to make the Pig DeWine Look Good: But Renacci is 8 Points up on the governor, and growing

As I was listening to 55 KRC recently, an ad by Free Ohio, a Super PAC for Ohio’s lost stooge, Mike DeWine attempting to show the troubled governor in a contrasting light to Joe Biden, let me know that after all these years, these political insiders haven’t learned a thing.  After all that Republicans should have learned regarding the Trump presidency, it is evident that these dark money professionals still didn’t understand modern politics.  Mike DeWine has been a disaster for Ohio.  When he runs for office, he always runs as a conservative, but when he’s in office, whether as a senator, Attorney General, or a governor as he is now, he becomes overnight a liberal.  And if Ohio had elected Joe Biden as Governor of Ohio himself, we wouldn’t have done any worse.  So, it was laughable that there was an assumption among the professional political class out there that just a few months before the primary in May of 2022, money spent on ads like the ones Free Ohio is putting out would shape public opinion enough to change minds.  People were there to see how badly DeWine managed the state, especially during Covid, in which he led the nation in lockdowns, being the first to do so and to change election laws which led to the massive corruption of the 2022 election.  DeWine was the first in the country to change election laws during a primary, opening the door to all the other states that did similar things with mail-in ballots, all in the name of “maintaining social distancing during the Covid Plandemic.” 

I had a chance on several occasions during those terrible days of lockdowns in Ohio where members of the business community were on mass conference calls with Governor DeWine to attempt to work out concessions to the rules he and the liberal Obama activist Amy Acton came up with that were costing everyone millions and millions of dollars, by the day.  I have met Mike DeWine at a few events here and there but never really had a chance to talk to him.  Let me just say, DeWine is one of the dumbest people I have ever heard speak.  Under those conference call environments, he had no clue what to do and punted everything in Ohio to the CDC and the Dr. Fauci types, which was scandalous even then.  Now in hindsight, we know that to be even worse advice.  But even when few people really knew the severity of Covid was, DeWine sounded like a complete idiot giving the keys to Ohio over to a bunch of bureaucratic health department types to run all our affairs the way some pot-smoking, stringy-haired hippies might only fantasize about.  I always wondered how DeWine ever called himself a conservative coming from Yellow Springs, Ohio—certainly not my favorite place.  You can almost always smell the pot smoke in Clifton Gorge from Yellow Springs when visiting.  It’s not likely many Republicans would be able to put up with such an environment.  And obviously, getting to know Mike DeWine a bit over these last several years, he’s not a conservative, but the very definition of RINO that there is in the world. 

The Super PAC plans to spend many hundreds of thousands of dollars on this attempt to paint DeWine as a contrast to Biden.  Unfortunately, like many have tried over the last several years, thinking of Mike Bloomberg in Florida against Trump and the Bush money machine against Trump in 2016, they could never move the needle in a significant way in those races.  It is unclear why they would think they could move any opinions in Ohio when the people living in the state have very recent memory and pain over how DeWine ran the state.  Without question, Fox News and traditional outlets like Clear Channel radio corporate advertising are all too happy to take the money of this Super PAC.  For them, that’s what politics is, a chance to sell ads and pay for their content.  But reality shows that DeWine and Joe Biden have been aligned on just about everything over the last four years.  Even topics that don’t involve Covid.  It would be impossible to tell Joe Biden and Mike DeWine apart on paper by voting record.  And to think that money can change people’s memory of these things is pretty insulting, really.  Without question, some people don’t know much about these issues and might fall for such ornamental hype.  But in a primary, which is very surgical in nature, it’s a different kind of voter.  Primary voters are very engaged on the topics and not so easily fooled. 

As I’ve said many times, it’s hard to beat someone in a primary, especially with the corrupt money machine behind DeWine.  He has his voters who profit off the way he has done business over many years in politics.  But with an above-average primary turnout, someone like Jim Renacci could easily beat him in the primary.  Even with all this dark money flowing into traditional media, Jim Renacci is 8 points over DeWine going into February of 2022, which is horrible news for the current governor.  This is good news for those who want to see a more conservative governor in the general election this fall.  But that’s a steep hill for changing opinions no matter how much money is spent.  I suppose it’s worth trying from their perspective, but do they really think that the voters in the upcoming primary are watching Fox News?  I would say most of those people have moved over to other options, more Trump-friendly options.  And Trump is still the kingmaker in Ohio, and of the two candidates that are most in consideration in the primary, Renacci is the Trump guy.  DeWine is about as far from Trump as a Republican can get.  The last time DeWine was on stage with Trump in Ohio, he was booed for being there because of his role in the Covid lockdowns.  Trump is an executive and can get along with anybody.  But he’s certainly not going to go out of his way to support DeWine.  And an endorsement of any kind by Trump can erase away millions and millions of dollars spent by dark money to attempt to change opinions in traditional media. 

More than anything that has been exposed here is the distance between perception and reality.  Fundraising and what can be done with that money is part of the problem in politics.  The money machine creates leverage; that’s how DeWine was able to get many politicians to endorse him for the primary.  If they don’t support the money candidate, which DeWine certainly is, then they would find themselves short during their next election fundraising cycle, which all politicians dread.  One of their biggest problems is picking up the phone and raising money for their campaigns; no matter how good they might be at it, it’s something none of them likes to do.  But listening to this ridiculous Super PAC of DeWine unroll their 2022 primary strategy reveals just how archaic the current system truly is.  Traditional media has lost a lot of power over the last few years, and Trump showed that money in politics couldn’t beat a good message or a great candidate.  And that is certainly the case between Renacci and DeWine.  Renacci is an excellent candidate.  DeWine is a really corrupt and terrible one.  And no amount of money in the world can make the lipstick on that pig look good.

Rich Hoffman

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Trick or Treat in February at Lakota: Darbi Boddy wants to remove masks and give parents freedom of choice, the LEA wants to impeach her over it

The Union Wants to Impeach the School Board over Mask Freedom

I watched the school board videos from January’s Lakota meetings several times, and I still think they are very good. But apparently, the mask police at Lakota is so insulted by Darbi Boddy’s proposal to remove mask mandates from the Lakota school culture and give parents the right to choose has caused the LEA union to begin proposing talk of impeaching the young school board member. During the last meeting, you would think it was trick or treat at Lakota as the mask lovers got up and left while Darbi was talking, obviously meaning to show her disrespect. But none of that is a surprise. This has been a problem for a long time at Lakota, where the inmates run the asylum. Actually, that’s how it is in most public schools, the unions run everything, and the school boards get sucked into believing their goal in life is to show uniformity. I would argue that the point of having five members on a board is to fight it out and debate to convince two other voters to either approve or deny a resolution. The goal of a school board is not to get along but to run the business of a local school the way our “republic” was designed. And to me, that’s what I see happening. This was Darbi’s second meeting, and she’s very passionate. There are a lot of high expectations behind those who went door to door for her to win, and she feels the need to get there and get something done instead of just being another bobblehead on a school board. She ran on getting rid of masks in the schools, as other schools have done around the state of Ohio. So short of getting more comfortable with the rules of school board business and not feeling like a sell-out for doing so, I am more than happy with how the Lakota school board is functioning for the first time in three decades. 

I know people are wondering, especially the sweat bees from the teacher’s union, what my relationship is with all this. Just remember what some of those same people who are all stirred up over Darbi, what they did to me about ten years ago in the parking lot of Kroger by Lakota East. Julie Shaffer played her role in that along with Joan Powell and many other tax increase supporters back then. So now is not the time to play innocent. I’ll stay mad over that forever; I will never forget. But that isn’t the fault of the current crop of kids moving through Lakota or many of the characters who are now involved that want to make the public school work for the benefit of the area’s parents. It took Lynda O’Conner more than a decade to win me over to believing that she was a Republican. I know her to be a very good one now. But I used to be so angry at the Lakota school board that everyone on it was what I thought were scum bag liberals. It took seeing Lynda at many GOP events over the last several years that I learned that Lynda was one of the good people. We have very different ideas about the worth of public education. She really believes in Lakota and is hopeful about public schools’ role in all our lives. I personally want to blow it all up, metaphorically, as a concept given to us by the significant progressive loser, John Dewey. I had been asked to run for school board many times, but that just wouldn’t be fair. We all pay taxes to the school, right or wrong; I’m happy to not get in the way if people like Lynda who want to fix it to the best of their ability. I’m also happy to offer solutions or help people who want to be part of the solution find their way to the school board by helping connect all the right dots. But for me personally, I’m all about getting rid of the Dewey system completely. 

Lynda and I usually agree to disagree on education, and when we see each other, we talk about other things besides school board business. Usually, we have a shared interest in GOP-related topics locally and nationally. If we talk about school board items for too long, I quickly blow it all up intellectually, while she desperately wants to save it. I tell that little story to those who are wondering, which are quite a few people these days. And I can also relate to the problems that new school board members like Darbi and Isaac Adi are feeling now that they are inside. It’s empowering to help be a part of the solution. The rules of the game are there to make it something of a functioning republic, and most of the time, no single person gets it their way all the way.

In Darbi’s case over this mask resolution issue, it’s her job to get two other votes on the board to support her. Many people backing her might think it’s a sell-out to work with people on the board. But they aren’t on the board. It’s tough, at best, to represent so many people and still do what you think is right. I have a policy that I do not pick up the phone, or text anybody ever, like Sheriff Jones might do, to never put my hand on the scales and threaten people to vote a certain way. I would never call up Lynda and tell her that I wouldn’t like her anymore if she didn’t vote the way I wanted her to. I believe firmly in finding people who want to do a job correctly and putting them in power to do that job. I may not always like what they do, but they should know more than me about it in a republic, which is why they are my representative there. You must trust the people you vote for to do the ultimate right thing and always keep the big picture in mind. If they don’t, then you vote them out. That’s the way the game works. 

But for the teacher’s union at Lakota, they already don’t like Darbi because they can’t imagine how they might get her under control and intimidated by their presence. That is something they have been doing for years, threatening school board candidates first with the offerings of friendship but then taking away that civility if they step out of line. That was what was implied by them walking out on Darbi in the second meeting of the year while she was speaking. I can understand not liking what Darbi was saying. It may not be their politics. But if they really wanted to understand what’s going on in the district, they would know that Darbi represents people in Lakota who think worse of public education than I do. I’m a moderate on the issue, believe me, there are lots of people who hate it far worse, and to them, Lynda might as well be Satan incarnate because she doesn’t put everyone on trial and burn them at the stake. Nobody will ever make everyone happy, but what we want is for good people to do good work on behalf of the kids and taxpayers who are stuck paying many thousands of dollars a year for this ridiculous product. And there isn’t a lot of tolerance for these teachers’ union shenanigans. As Issac and Darbi get more acquainted with the conduct of these school board meetings and the agreed rules of the game, they will get better. But so far, these meetings are what I think all school boards should look like. They may be a little bumpy. But I’ve never liked a lot of hand-holding, especially when millions of dollars are at stake and many lives are impacted. And for those who are used to bullying their way into a one-sided argument, well, those days are over.  

Rich Hoffman

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