Halloween of 2011 for me was a day of rebirth instead of mocking death with the typical rituals of that pagan holiday. My sister brought twins into the world so a good part of my day was spent at the hospital. However, over the weekend the No Lakota Levy had lost between 500 to 700 signs and Channel 19 was covering the story where Tiffany was kind enough to see me at the hospital as the twins were born to discuss the missing signs. You can see that report at this link.
The little bird said, “Many of us parents were trying to save the band program from severe cuts by having a fund raiser, where we could have covered all the costs for that extracurricular activity. We wanted to pay for it ourselves but were told we weren’t allowed.”
“Why,” I asked.
“Because we were told that the band was an emotional issue that the public enjoyed, and that if the public didn’t pass the levy, it would be taken away until they did pass a levy.”
The long time family friend said to my wife after I left, “I hope the levy passes because I’m tired of having to drive my kids to school. It’s really hard on me.”
“But don’t you see that’s why they are doing it,” My wife said.
I ride roller coasters so much in fact that when my publisher accepted the manuscript to my latest novel, they commented on how intense the action was, and wondered how I could write such a thing. I explained that much of the original manuscript had been sketched out on my hand while riding The Stunt Track at Kings Island, which I road again will thinking about the Hume story at Lakota East. There is something soothing in that catapult launch, and the run through the police cars that gets my blood boiling in a positive direction and organizes my thoughts. The faster the roller coasters, the more clear things become for me.And as for settings, strange creatures, gothic music, and smoke machines actually provide context for the metaphors they represent in the real world. My wife and I grabbed some steak fries from Rivertown and I pondered more of the perplexing quagmires percolating in my mind from the week. I think I like this time of year at Kings Island best simply because they don’t play all the pop music throughout the park. I prefer symphonic pieces most of the time as a musical choice, especially playful pieces themed around horror films.
A reporter called me, “Rich, not too many people like you do they?”
“No, and I like it that way,” I replied.
“You like it that way?”
“Yes, because if you are good and fair to people, yet they still don’t like you just because you are asking legitimate questions, it’s because they have something to hide. So the more people who hate me means we’re uncovering things they want to hide and their anger is the mask for which they use to hide it,” I said. “Did you call to tell me that?”
“I received a strange message from someone who didn’t leave their name or number. They were furious that I spoke to you about the school board story.”
I thought about the story that had broken earlier in the week, along with everything else mentioned. You can see the article that started the rift on the Lakota School Board at this ink:
“They said you weren’t qualified to speak about school board matters and that we shouldn’t talk to you.”
“Well, there’s your answer, it’s one of the school board members themselves. What do you think?”
“You’re the one who gave us the flyer,” the reporter said. “If you hadn’t done that there wouldn’t be a story.”
“So because I’m not a school board member I’m not qualified to look at a flyer from a school board president and see what she’s up to, trying to stack the board in her favor, and therefore the position of the union? So because you interviewed me, they are trying to put pressure on you to not speak to me in the future. Is that how you take it?”
“Sounds that way to me,” the reporter said.
“Well, do you regret talking to me?”
“Hell, no!” the reporter said. “You are a fun guy to talk to. I just thought it was funny is all.”
I laughed. “Well, if they are pissed off, it means I’m doing something right. And before I’m done, there will be a lot more pissed off people, you can count on that. Sounds like mafia tactics to me. What do you think?”
“That’s the first thing I thought of,” the reporter added before we went into another interview for a story being prepared for another article.
In Ohio the NEA (NATIONAL EDUCATION ASSOCIATION) contributed $1 million to defeating Issue 2 and they are a radical organization. Look at their reading list, shown on their website. These are the books that the NEA wants the teachers you pay for to read. The NEA is the parent union to the OEA (Ohio Education Association) and specific to Lakota the OEA is the parent organization to the LEA (Lakota Education Association.) These books are listed as they appear on the NEA website.
Rules for Radicals
Saul Alinsky, Vintage Books, 1989
The classic book about organizing people, written by one of America’s foremost organizers.
Organize for Social Change
Midwest Academy Manual for Activists
Third Edition, Kim Bobo et al, Seven Locks Press, 2001
This is one of the best books about collective action and putting the screws to decision-makers. It’s about winning battles.
Building More Effective Unions
Paul Clark, Cornell University Press, 2000
Penn State Professor of Labor Studies Paul Clark applies the latest in behavioral sciences research to creating more effective unions. His insights are both astute and highly practical.
The Trajectory of Change: Activist Strategies for Social Change
Michael Albert, SouThend Press, 2002
Z Magazine’s Michael Albert has assembled a collection of thoughtful articles on ways to overcome various obstacles to social change.
Roots to Power: A Manual for Grassroots Organizing
Lee Staples, Praeger, 1984
This is a good nuts and bolts guide to organizing. It is especially good on recruiting, developing action plans, executing them, and dealing with counterattacks.
Taking Action: Working Together for Positive Change in Your Community
Elizabeth Amer, Self Counsel Press, 1992
Written by a Toronto community activist, this book is easy to read, full of examples, and sprinkled with how-to-advice.
Organizing: A Guide for Grassroots Leaders
Si Kahn, McGraw Hill, 1981, Revised 1991
This book is well organized. You can find relevant material for your situation without reading the whole book.
Ethical Ambition: Living a Life of Meaning and Worth
Derrick Bell, Bloomsbury, 2002
A gem of a book that delves into the question of “Why become an activist?” It is both thought-provoking and energizing.
Soul of a Citizen: Living with Conviction in a Cynical Time
Paul Rogat Loeb, St. Martins Press, 1999
Provides solace for the activist‘s soul and juice for the activist’s battery
What’s happening is through radical union activity and small little rewards like higher wage compensation and benefits, grants and other perks, the radical unions are nudging their teachers to embrace radical ideas camouflaged behind carefully planted smiles and a public image. School boards are constructed to maintain that façade to the public, as the direction of the school boards is then controlled by the OSBA, the Ohio School Board Association who also reads the same types of books. School board members who don’t play nicely are pushed off the board, because the aim of a school board is to achieve public consensus. The game is a very subtle one, and for people who are more interested in watching Dancing with the Stars or picking up a magazine which features Jennifer Aniston’s newest love interest, they probably will think what I’m saying is a bunch of crazy talk. In fact, many school board members and even some superintendents might think so because their thinking is so specialized and focused on a specific task that they fail to see static patterns outside of their own experience. (TO UNDERSTAND STATIC PATTERNS AND WHAT THEY MEAN TO YOU CLICK THE LINK FOR REFERENCE.)
As I looked at all the costumes around Kings Island on the Haunt night I saw that it is the masks that the unions show us. The education institutions themselves are all wearing them and they want you to buy into the product they are selling, care and education for your children with service and smile. But what the larger organizations of union control want are teachers to pay them dues so they can use that money to inflict social change. READ THIS ARTICLE TO UNDERSTAND WHAT THEY ARE AFTER.
As if the No Lakota Levy campaigns were not enough, my work on Issue 2, my occupations, and my family, I have been working through a critical edit and rewrite on my new book tentatively titled The Tail of the Dragon. My publisher is exploring a title change however to capture the epic quality of the story to something like Legend of the Misty Mountains. But it’s still early. So my mind was spinning late in the night as I was thinking about all these tasks at the same time when a friend of mine from those Misty Mountains sent me the picture you see displayed here.
I would say, “This book is about how politicians use public officials and legal manipulation to climb into power. That is the essence of how the governor in the story is using the police unions to solidify his bloc voting in a run for the White House.”
She said, “That is certainly an important part of the story, but it’s not the main theme. This is a pirate story. The main character is a pirate, and a violent one at that. This is also a love story, and a journey of self-discovery. It’s much more epic than the political subplot.”
My anger at systems, at orthodox, at wasted money, at stupidity has its roots in this elementary concept. I think we should all be freer as a people, but to be free, it requires people to be somewhat intelligent and to think. It is evident that we are being herded about like animals in a barnyard by masters who consider themselves above us in the political class. If one of those animals declares, “I’m not an animal, I’m a human being” trouble is not far behind that declaration.
Over the weekend the No Lakota Levy group began to put out our signs. We started with 200 beginning Friday afternoon however by Saturday morning, during the darkest part of night, 50 of those signs were gone, some of them ripped out of the ground and thrown all over parking lots. And in the yards of a couple of people who had big 4’X5’ No Lakota Levy signs driven into the ground with 2”X2” posts, those signs were completely taken and in their place hanging from a tree was the sign you see shown in the picture.
“Someone paid for your education, time to pay for ours.”
Now, who believes that these children did this on their own? I can hear their voices now while at Steak and Shake at 2:30 in the morning, “Hey let’s go help our teachers by stealing the signs of the No Lakota Levy people, those selfish, evil, corporate bastards.” See, kids typically don’t think of things like this on their own, because they don’t understand or know what the financial situation is. In the case of the message from these little vandals, “we are paying for your education! Most every house you see in the community, like the ones you trampled through with no respect to their property rights, pay a property tax of $2000 to $4000 a year and that money goes to your education! The community has been supporting a $160 million dollar budget that fleshes out to $250 million in undeclared money. Who’s not supporting your education?”
• Since you are clearly a tea bagger I will assume you have zero intelligence. Kids need a well-rounded educational experience including arts and sports. Hey since you are so smart – google it. I live in Lakota and pay more than my share of taxes. i am sure more than an ignorant SOB like you but my kids and their future are worth it. Go back to your trailer park. By the way YEAH for the kids that took the signs, Kids are aware of the greed of people like you
A young man the other day was complaining to me that he thought we’d have flying cars by now. He reminded me that in the film Back to the Future 2, flying cars were in fact a reality in the year 2015. I told him not to fear, that a flying car did in fact exist right now. All he had to do to see it was visit www.mollar.comSEE MY ARTICLE ON FLYING CARS HERE:
“Well, why don’t we have them yet?” he asked. “Why can’t I buy one now?”
I told him, “Because of government regulation.”
As I made that statement I was thinking of a friend of mine who is trying to build a Frisch’s in Liberty Twp by Lakota East, which all logic would dictate should be a slam dunk. Everyone likes Frisch’s. It is the perfect community meeting place and there is almost no downside to that type of commercial business.It’s another taxable revenue source, its family friendly and attractive to potential home buyers. It’s a win, win, win all the way across the board. But the Director of Zoning in Liberty Twp, Jonathan West is holding up the project because he has a rule that buildings such as restaurants cannot have statues in front of them, and anyone who knows anything about Frisch’s knows that they always have a statue of the Big Boy in front of the restaurant, always.
I can only speculate on why Jonathan West is holding up this development over a simple statue, but by experience in dealing with hundreds of people similar to him, it’s all in the nameplate. TO LEARN WHAT THE NAME PLATE GODS ARE, CLICK THIS HOT LINK.There isn’t any real logic to such a statue provision, yet it’s there and holding up something as obviously good as a Frisch’s Restaurant in a clearly commercial area. So for more complicated creations such as Flying Cars, medical improvements, and virtually all inventions that improve on an existing job sector, it is nearly impossible to get anything approved through the “Nameplate Gods.” It is in their infantile little minds that they cling to the past where they control the information. They are in fact the characters in Plato’s Republic who control the shadows on the wall. I wrote an entire article about this complex. You can read that here:
If you want to see more of what we are missing in medicine, which Nameplate Gods in the pharmaceutical industry are holding back in the same way that Jonathan West is holding back a Frisch’s in my local community I have an article about that too at the next link. Chances are you have a John West in your community, and there are thousands upon thousands of them in the state and federal government, and they keep all of us from having the technology I show in this article: (DO YOURSELF A FAVOR AND WATCH ALL THOSE VIDEOS COMPLETELY. IT’S REAL)
I told the young man who in just twenty years, aging could be a thing of the past. This nonsense of driving a car everywhere will be grossly outdated. You’ll simply get into your SKYCAR and punch in your destination the same way you operate MAPQUEST and the car will take you there while you sleep. For instance, if you wanted to fly down to Disney World for the weekend but you want to stay up with your friends the night before you could do both. You could go to your SKYCAR dead tired and ready for bed, punch in your destination and wake up in Florida 5 to 6 hours later. The Sky Lanes set up by NASA and the GPS system would speak to your SKYCAR and fly you up to a ceiling of 30,000 feet and a speed of 300 MPH while you slept. It will be as common to your life of tomorrow as an IPhone is to you now.
The young man looked at me,“are you serious?”
“YESSSSSSSSSSS” I said jumping up and down. “We allow politicians to hold us down, but the human mind is pressing forward anyway. It’s going on ahead and busting from the shackles of ignorance.”
He looked at me puzzled. So I answered the question I knew he wanted to ask. “Why do you think I hate unions? Why do you think I want to see education expand and become innovative?It’s not that I hate teachers, but they are protecting themselves and a static order to the old world.This new world is there for us to grab, and we must seize it!!!!! NOW!!!!!!! We cannot allow the Nameplate Gods to hold back our civilization!”
I was excited more than usual during this conversation because of the new Spaceport built in New Mexico which cost the taxpayers $209 million and centers around the new spacecraft built for Virgin Galactic which will take passengers into space for the first time in human history. See the source article of my excitement here:
I was in Florida over the summer at Cape Canaveral and there was a gloom over the area from the budget cuts by small-minded politicians like what President Obama had implemented for NASA. I told my friends in the Aerospace community that getting government out of space travel was a great thing. Yes NASA is one of the few government organizations that actually work. (CLICK THIS HOTLINK TO SEE HOW).I wrote this next article to rest their minds and let them see where the world was going. At the end of it I mentioned Virgin Galactic as a ray of hope.
Richard Branson is one of my favorite people on this planet and I think it’s wonderful that he has 200 customers on his Virgin Galactic list to spend $200,000 a ticket to fly into space, and return back to earth. That will generate $40 million dollars minus expenses and that’s only the beginning. If Branson can get Virgin Galactic to where it’s producing billions of dollars per year, then that investment will far outpace the kind of spending that NASA has been regulated to, and mankind will finally leap into space for good after being a prisoner to earth for all of human history.
Rather than speak about Branson and Virgin Galactic, I’ll let the videos and links speak on that. Instead, let me give you my dear reader a preview into what’s in store. Now that Virgin Galactic has built a practical craft that does not consume massive amounts of fuel to propel a craft into space past escape velocity with a ballistic missile, we can finally take people affordably into space routinely. This means that just as cruise ships now are vacation destinations, there will be hotels in space soon. Look for a new Hilton to be built as a space station in the foreseeable future. Vacations in space are within reach. From there manufacturing will move into orbit. Imagine what could be built in a zero g environment. What about agriculture, where a space platform could always face the sun? 24 hours a day there would be light. Think how large plants could grow without having to fight gravity? Where does the water come from? Why mining on the moon of course. The gravity is less there and much more obtainable. That’s also where materials for manufacturing would come from. What about garbage and waste on earth? We will now be able to fly it off planet and dump it into space to be consumed into some atmosphere 100,000 light years away. Now that’s GREEN TECHNOLOGY! Manufacture in SPACE!
So while the small people in this world argue over why Frisch’s cannot build a new restaurant because of a statue, people like Richard Branson, and Paul Mollar are inventing the world of tomorrow.
The world is just now coming to grips the genius of Steve Jobs. They still don’t understand the genius of people like Walt Disney, who didn’t even graduate high school. They continue to be baffled by my personal favorite in George Lucas who is so forward thinking many people can’t even see his caboose. CLICK THE LINK BELOW TO UNDERSTAND WHY THIS IS. I HAVE A CHART WHICH EXPLAINS IT.
The sin of the modern age is the same as it was for Christopher Columbus who tried to convince people who the earth was round, as the Vikings had already discovered. Many people who didn’t want the change in perception insisted that the earth was flat, yet there were those who knew better. Today we have labor unions and government bureaucrats who make a living off seeing the world as a flat plain, and they scoff and belittle those who say otherwise. Thank goodness there are people like Richard Branson and his Virgin Galactic. And thank goodness there are companies like Frisch’s. But the reason we often can’t have the benefits of vision, and investment is because of people like Jonathan West, who use the Nameplate of their position to fulfill everything they could never be on their own merit. They are the types who proclaim that the world is flat, that space travel for civilians is science fiction, and that you can’t have a Big Boy statue in front of a Frisch’s Restaurant, because once we discover otherwise, we will learn that such people are irrelevant to us, and unnecessarily hold back the entire civilization of the human race, and are tyrants as ruthless as the most despicable despot because their motives are the same; to control those who have money, to control those who innovate, because the Nameplate Gods lack the ability in themselves to do the same. They hold society back to their level of comfort. They are why we don’t have Flying Cars.
I look forward to the day where I can go to a Frisch’s on Cincinnati Dayton road before heading to a local Spaceport on vacation to earth’s orbit with my wife to relax a bit in zero G’s. Although that may seem like a long way off, it takes about that long to get things approved through bureaucrats like Jonathan West. Let’s just hope that West’s next job doesn’t end up on the board of Orbital Building Code Administrators, where he will have to approve the building the first Orbital Hotel, because he might get upset if they want to build it with a statue facing earth and hold up the construction for decades.
For the answer to everything click the link below!
I am willing to pay a certain price in taxes for my friends and neighbors who aren’t so self-reliant. But I am not willing to pay too much.I am not willing to support the unions which these employees are a part, because I do not support progressive politics, and the AFL-CIO is a progressive organization as defined by Richard Trumka. I do not want my money in his pocket, and if I give too much money to police, firefighters, and teachers who then give with union dues money to any group backed by the AFL-CIO, my money ends up in his pocket, which is theft from me. I see all progressive groups as detrimental to the kind of America I want to live in.
I am sick and tired of listening to moochers declare what heroes they are because they stand between criminals and the public, how they run into a fire when I run out. Such people are no different from the soldier who says to a naive 19-year-old girl in a bar just before he goes oversees, “I may be killed tomorrow, so will you sleep with me tonight?”
“Oh, you’re such a hero,” says the young girl. “Yes, I would love to be your last time.”
This is what people make in America on average by salary range.
Salary range: $20,000-$29,999
1. Personal home and care aides: $20,280
2. Manicurists and pedicurists: $22,150
3. Funeral attendants: $23,880
4. Landscaping and groundskeeping workers: $25,340
5. Dietetic technicians: $28,530
Salary range: $30,000-$39,999
6. Veterinary technologists and technicians: $30,580
7. Travel agents: $32,450
8. Dental assistants: $34,000
9. Police, fire and ambulance dispatchers: $36,470
10. Massage therapists: $39,780
Salary range: $40,000-$49,999
11. Surgical technologists: $40,710
12. Law clerks: $41,960
13. Flight attendants: $43,350
14. Firefighters: $47,270
15. Health educators: $49,060
Salary range: $50,000-$59,999
16. Food service technicians: $50,850
17. Respiratory therapists: $54,200
18. Anthropologists and archaeologists: $57,230
19. Editors: $58,440
20. Public relations specialists: $59,370
When I tell some of these local public workers that they make too much, and they used emotion, the heroics of others to get it from the public in the form of tax increases, I hear back that I’m being cheap. “Can’t you afford just $24 a month more to support your local public servants?”
“I would if they were broke, or even making a middle-class wage, but they are doing exceptionally well. They don’t need an increase. I need that money to pay for my Netflix account. That’s more important to me than giving someone who has too much even more.” Is that selfish? No, because for many, some people may not be able to pay their cable bill, or the cell phone bill, or may have to give up Netflix so a public worker can have a 2 to 3% increase on a top salary of over 70K per year. Give me a break!
The video below starts with the short segment Doc and I did together on 700 WLW then ends with the West Chester Tea Party speech. Doc couldn’t attend since he had to speak at an Empour U event about trade with China. And I couldn’t attend his event because I had to speak in West Chester. But this issue over the Lakota Levy is an important one because it’s happening in our own back yard. So go pop some popcorn, grab a drink and sit down and watch the video below by clicking on it. You’ll hear all about why you should VOTE NO on the Lakota Levy, and all the reasons that Issue 2 (the collective bargaining reform bill) is such a wonderful bill that you should VOTE YES on. I cover a lot of ground, so have a seat and fasten your seat belt.
As I said during the speech toward the end, “After Issue 2 holds we will still have teachers, we will still have cops and firefighters. We as a community will still employ those people. But we are not going to do it completely on their terms.”
• You know what a-hole. My kids are now suffering because the Levy didn’t pass and a-hole’s like you will probably cause the next levy to fail which means they will suffer even more. No buses for HS – limited for junior high and elementary. Honors, sports and any type of arts cut or extreme costs to parents. I bet your kids are out of the house. Do you give a damn about the kids! They suffer. Our schools decline and property value’s decrease. That last one might interest a greedy SOB like you
My response, to the union apologist:
• You want to know why your kids are suffering…………………..look in the mirror. If you are going to endorse this kind of behavior, you are clearly part of the problem.
• If your kids grow up to be not what you expected, you can blame yourself. Don’t push it off on me that you are an insecure parent.
That mug shot of Diana Frey represents to me the problems of public sector unions. It’s not the individual members themselves who are the problem, but collectively they pave the way to corruption. As a general rule, the larger the organization, the more opportunities for corruption, and that corruption usually comes from the leadership. Diana Frey had access to vast sums of money from a union she started, and she abused that trust for her own gain. There are people like her in the leadership of most unions to varying degrees. They may not be embezzling money on the scale of Diana Frey, but the power they wield does corrupt their intentions for the so-called “greater good.”
A hard look at the Stacy Schuler case in Mason and the sexual promiscuity going on at that school not just among that one teacher, but the several who are also involved, and the situation I recently learned about at Lakota where a teacher thought nothing of using a child to seduce the mother of a family is that all these participants are functioning within a bubble of protection which the union gives them. Because unions destroy competition, there are no real rivals in the work place that must be out-performed, and this allows the mind to wander to sexual promiscuity on the light end of corruption and on the heavy end, Diana Frey and her embezzlement of three-quarters of a million dollars in union dues. See the sad sex story of the Lakota parents here:
As I was riding to work this morning in the crisp cool autumn air I thought of a friend of mine and frequent reader here who announced to me last night, “I’m the one of the first to sign the petition for Ohio to become a Right to Work State!” I had to smile at that, and not just because the mask I wear in the cold attracts a lot of attention, but because it has been talked about for a long time. Many of us who have wanted education reform have been waiting to see the results of Issue 2, but after seeing how much money the unions from outside Ohio have spent attempting to defeat that very fair bill, it has been decided to proceed with our plan to put Ohio Right-to-Work on the state ballot. This is something that needs to be implemented as fast as possible. The ugliness, the fear tactics, the misleading information that has come out of the unions during this campaign against Issue 2 has sealed the deal and convinced many people who there just isn’t a happy co-existence with labor unions. Employees need to have the option to belong to them or not, and in the future I will judge the value of employees based first on whether or not they are in a union. If they are in a union I will assume that they are a weak employee who is relying on collective-bargaining to receive a level of pay they do not deserve. Those not in a union will naturally earn my respect because they obviously are proud of their work and don’t wish to hide it in a collective mass.
Rich Hoffman
