Tag: Sheriff Jones

Sheriff Jones, The R.A.T.: When Trump comes to town, he will have very clean shoes

Well, you could see why people would be concerned, and they are. Now that there have been whistleblowers who have pointed out things that Matt Miller has been involved in, the superintendent of Lakota schools, of extremely bad character, those whistleblowers are now worried about retaliation from the superintendent’s friend Sheriff Jones. During the transcript of the police investigation into Matt Miller’s very controversial sex life, the scraggly, overpaid, online dating addict name-dropped Sheriff Jones to the investigators to let them know about me and my role in a few recent political campaigns purely to garner favor with the police to support him in the matter. And in all likelihood, it worked. It was out of context to the rest of the investigation when Miller brought up my name in connection to the recent election of Thomas Hall over the Sheriff Jones-supported Matt King.  Sheriff Jones had paraded King around purely out of spite against Hall, and I worked to help the very good incumbent Hall as Sheriff Jones went about to utterly destroy the very nice young man, purely out of vengeance. Well, everyone knows when I support a candidate, they usually win. And Jones has found his brand to be much less influential in these post-Tea Party years. There has been a similar rift between the Sheriff and me over Roger Reynolds, the Butler County auditor. The Sheriff wants him out and to replace him with another friend of mine, Bruce Jones. Why, well, Bruce isn’t as radically transparent as Roger is with the books, and Jones wants to send a message, complete with seven indictments, including jail time. So clearly, for his defense with the police, Mat Miller was doing a little name-dropping from information he would have from behind-the-scenes activity. And people worry that now that Sheriff Jones is helping Matt Miller perceptually with his major social problems, people assume that the wrath of Sheriff Jones and the power of the Butler County Sheriff’s Department will be turned toward them for a destiny of misfortune. 

I would say, fear not. I have known Sheriff Jones for over 20 years. While he might be vengeful, he’s generally a good man, and I would vote for him again for Sheriff. I’ve had these kinds of rifts with him over that entire span of time, and my impression is that he’s been a good sheriff. We’ve worked together on things like immigration issues during the early days of the Tea Party. Then we’ve been enemies regarding public sector unions. I’m against unions altogether, while he thinks they are the greatest thing in the world. People can have disagreements without things getting out of hand. What is going on with Matt Miller has been an investigation into criminal wrongdoing. So far, the evidence points to bizarre sexual practices with adults who think about kids. And that’s for the public to figure out if they are comfortable with. But for the police to suddenly become Matt Miller’s personal hit squad led by Sheriff Jones, that’s not going to happen. People should not worry about the fear of political wrath in the aftermath of all the events of 2022.

Many people say that Sheriff Jones is the biggest RINO in Butler County. (Republican in Name Only). I wouldn’t say that. I think Sheriff Jones is a Democrat most of the time, that he plays a Republican on stage when he gives a speech or is on WLW radio with his friend Bill Cunningham, a fellow Democrat also. When there are Democrats in the White House, Sheriff Jones is a Democrat in public. But I can say that when Trump was in office, Sheriff Jones was very much a Republican. He was one of the early supporters of Trump. And from 2015, there was great harmony in the Butler County Republican Party for the first time in years because of Trump. And during that time, Sheriff Jones and I were even friendly with each other in public. I even saw him at Ace Hardware in Liberty Township and said hi.

So if Jones isn’t a RINO, then what is he? I would say he’s a R.A.T.  (Republican Around Trump). When Trump makes his announcement soon that he is running for president again, then Sheriff Jones will start acting like a Republican again. And Republicans aren’t known for abusing their authority to use the power of their office to fulfill political hits like Matt Miller is obviously hoping to cover up his bad behavior from public opinion. So even if today Sheriff Jones is acting like a vindictive Democrat with all the power of the police at his disposal, fear not, Trump will be running for president again soon, and Sheriff Jones being the very political creature that he is, will want to be on the right side of history. After all, Trump used to be a Democrat, so moderates who spend most of their lives on the fence between liberalism and conservatism find Trump very appealing. And the Republican Party of Butler County will be united again. I certainly didn’t spike the football when it came to Thomas Hall. Sheriff Jones put his personal brand all in behind Matt King. I thought Matt was a nice young man, but I supported Hall, who worked like a saint amongst sinners in Hell to redeem their very souls before an apocalypse to win that election. And Thomas won despite all the wrath of Sheriff Jones. And the same thing will happen when it comes to Roger Reynolds and any other character Jones has taken aim at for purely political reasons. Once Trump announced that he was running again, which he will do because the FBI has raided Trump’s home and gone through the personal clothes of his wife, Melania. Sheriff Jones will rediscover his Republican nature, and the world will be much better off.

And when Trump comes to Butler County the next time, he will have very clean shoes from all the bootlickers who want a picture next to him. People who today are denying that there was election fraud and have been saying that Trump is too mean to be president. I’ve seen Sheriff Jones around Trump, and when he is, the Sheriff starts glowing like a little boy. The bootlickers do line up to be near real power, and Trump has that real power that comes from inner self-confidence and a sense of purpose in life. The top of the food chain in political sentiment. It’s very interesting to watch. But by the time Trump returns to Butler County, Ohio, for future political events, many of these fears about Matt Miller will long be over. People don’t have to worry about the police following them home and harassing them to no end. Just put a Trump sticker on your car, or wear a MAGA hat, and you will be fine. Because when Trump is running for office, and when he’s in town, Sheriff Jones the R.A.T. will be a valuable ally. He will be less inclined to support scandalous characters and will quickly adapt to the Trump agenda. A lot of the trouble mentioned here has come from the power vacuum of Trump not being in office and the thought that progressive politics would be making a comeback under Joe Biden in the wake of the Covid lockdowns. But that is not the future. Trump is the future, and when he is in Butler County, Ohio, his shoes will be clean, and the personal vendettas will be directed elsewhere for the good of the Republican Party. 

Rich Hoffman

Click to buy The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business

Government Schools are All About the Employees: The kids are used as a means to expand easy jobs and administrative nonsense

Everyone wants to know what’s going on with Lakota schools and why there has not been any mainstream news regarding the very serious allegation against the public school administration. Given the nature of the offense, as indicated in the official police report from the Butler County Sheriff’s Department, many were expecting at least an arrest or a leave of absence. But there has been nothing but an acknowledgment of documents, one from the police indicating that on August 8th, 2022, the complainant responded to the Butler County Sheriff’s Office to report that she had received and compiled information from a third party of potential criminal wrongdoing by the suspect regarding juveniles. Then there is a short email from the president of the Lakota School Board speaking on behalf of the entire Board, saying, ” Ms. (former candidate for Lakota school board), The Board has reviewed your email and attachments. The safety and security of the district’s students is the Board’s highest priority. As noted in your email, this issue has already been escalated to law enforcement and is now in the capable hands of the Butler County Sheriff’s Office. When the Sheriff’s Office concludes its investigation, the Board will review its findings and determine if any further action is warranted. On behalf of the Board. ”  I thought all that pretty interesting, especially after the press conference Sheriff Jones held recently stating that he was investigating wrongdoing in the direction of Ohio Representative Thomas Hall, because years ago, when he was a trustee for Madison Township, there were questions as to whether or not he recused himself on Fire Department matters since his father was the Fire Chief. As discussed before, Thomas sought legal advice on when to recuse himself and when not to, so he was clean. But, with a Sheriff talking tough like that, you would think that a Lakota school administrator with an ex-wife putting in writing some really charged content would inspire more action on behalf of the “safety” of all. But after a month of tranquil activity on the matter from the administrative perspective, there hasn’t been anything to satisfy people’s fears.

I was wondering myself, knowing all the characters involved. When I first saw the material, I could have published it and beat the rest of the media to a really salacious story. But I was more concerned about the criminal side of the story and wanted to know how much some of the people in charge cared about what was happening in the school. Unfortunately, we have our answer, and it’s one I thought we would have from the beginning. Over the years, I have witnessed too many of these stories to think anything else. But I thought it was worth a try. We trusted the system and hoped for a reasonable outcome. With a case like this, it would be expected to have at least a note from the Board to the parents, much like they have on other things in the past. I remember when someone left a threatening note in a bathroom during a levy campaign, and a lot of drama was made about it. Lakota always seems to send home notes to the parents, letting them know when something is wrong and that the administration is all over the issue so they won’t have to worry. But on this issue, they have been oddly silent. They might say that it’s purely political, the entire escapade. But then again, what hasn’t been political? The moment that new school board member Darbi Boddy was voted in as a new school board member, many board members and the administration have been trying to remove her in any technical way they could, using every excuse possible to make a media story out of her, to put pressure on her to resign. So why wouldn’t there be political opposition flowing in the opposite direction? They should expect it; they created that atmosphere. 

The truth is that all public schools, Lakota being just one of them, are all about filling the needs of the employees. They could care less about the kids involved. This is the case today, and it has been the case over the many decades that I have been involved in these public school issues. Government schools like Lakota use children as a playground for the adults, making these schools some of the largest employers in the region. Yet they expect to never get in trouble for bad behavior. If what was happening at Lakota were happening at any large corporation, there would be, at a bare minimum, paid administrative leave while everyone sorted out the matter. There would be press conferences updating the taxpayers on what was being done to investigate the matter and assuring the public that good people were doing good work. I wanted to think differently of Lakota, knowing some people the way I do. I really didn’t think they would be willing to put up with bad behavior when they saw it and knew about it. Even if it was just the remnants of a bad marriage, when a personal life starts to impact the public life of someone, that is a factor in work performance that can be very negative. But there was just a case the other night where a person was caught regionally just downloading child porn, and the police were all over them with arrests and significant news coverage. Why, with this case, did everyone suddenly want to show a benefit of the doubt toward the evidence presented, even as crazy as much of that evidence has been? 

A Message from Lakota Local Schools May 5, 2022

Dear Lakota Staff, Parents and Guardians, The end of the school year is a time to celebrate our students and staff and all that we have achieved since August. This year, we have even more to celebrate as we have been able to lift our COVID protocols and return to a much more normal school experience for our students. It is unfortunate that, over recent weeks, instead of this being our focus, district leaders have been forced to respond to baseless allegations and escalating threatening behavior by an elected member of our school board.As a result of a school board member’s blatant disregard for policy and procedures that are in place to help ensure the safety of our students and staff and a productive learning environment, this morning, Lakota Local Schools was forced to issue a notice of trespassing to Mrs. Darbi Boddy. As such, Mrs. Boddy will no longer be allowed on district property without prior authorization and unless invited for official Board business.Yesterday morning, Mrs. Boddy violated Board Policy and Administrative Guidelines 9150 by visiting two schools without first notifying the building principal – a requirement of all visitors to our schools. Entering through the main offices, she then proceeded to ignore staff requests to remain there until the principals met her. Instead, she left the offices and proceeded to walk the hallways, violating safety protocols and causing a disruption in learning at both Lakota East High School and Liberty Early Childhood School. While some may question why such a seemingly steep action was taken against Mrs. Boddy, let me explain. We welcome our parents into our schools; we welcome our community into our schools; and we certainly welcome our school board members into our schools – as long as they follow safety procedures and policy. These are not difficult. They involve alerting building administrators of the interest in visiting and setting up a time that is convenient for all involved. Yesterday, this did not happen. This is also not the first time that Mrs. Boddy has ignored board policy, nor is it the first time she has disrupted learning in our schools. Our decision was not made lightly and was done in consultation with law enforcement. It is my hope that by sharing this information with you, I am able to stop rumors from circulating and reassure you of our commitment to safety. The safety of our students and staff is always my first priority and a responsibility I take very seriously. I will do everything I can to ensure that our students and staff feel safe, welcome and included when they walk through our doors.

Sincerely,

Matthew J. Miller
​​​​​​​Superintendent

Of course, we all know the answer, which is the painful part. Many people knew the answer from the beginning but didn’t want to believe it. I was very skeptical about everything. As things have transpired over the last month, it became an apparent human resource problem without consistent standards, which is a tremendous management problem. I didn’t care much about Lakota at the start of this process. My hope was that by electing better school board members, the proper management of the district’s largest government school might improve. I have seen complaints about her since Darbi Boddy was elected and sworn in because she’s a conservative. It has become grossly apparent that the only thing the teachers and administrators care about at Lakota is not the kids but their easy jobs with high pay rates. As bad as the accusations are in the police report, I know that there is far worse going on behind the scenes that nobody is even talking about because they are either scared or don’t trust anybody to say anything. Not even the police. With the kind of threats that have been tossed at this whistleblower occurs, the message is clear, don’t mess with the breadbasket and playground of the adults who work at the school. The community and the children of the community are there to serve them and them only. That’s not what they say, of course. But that’s the message they convey. To say I’m disappointed would be a misplaced description. I had optimistic hope that I might be wrong. Government schools are all about politics, liberal politics at that, and they waste money on a garbage product while they treat the place like their personal Tinder app. And the way the public employees behave is reprehensible. But why wouldn’t they be when management allows them to behave that way? 

Rich Hoffman

Thomas Hall Wins the 46th Ohio Representative Seat: Sheriff Jones has no clothes

I don’t think I’ve ever seen a political candidate who deserved election or re-election more than Thomas Hall did in a very tough year where districts were redrawn at the last minute. There was more internal party opposition against an opponent than what he not only survived in an August 2022 primary but excelled. In the end, Thomas Hall beat his rival, Matt King, by almost 12%, although with the addition of Liberty Township to the new 46th district, it looked like the race might tighten up. By the time the smoke cleared, it was an easy win for Thomas Hall despite the opposition. Part of that was that he has had an excellent record during his first term. But the rest of it was that he just worked so hard to win, personally knocking on over 6000 doors and meeting voters face to face. And many members of the Butler County Republican Party, led by Sheriff Jones, threw everything they had at him, including the kitchen sink and all the plumbing, to defeat him. But it didn’t make a dent in Thomas, which didn’t surprise me in the least. I had called the race over eight months ago and given my personal endorsement. And as history shows, when I endorse someone, they tend to win. Not so much for anything I do, but for the quality of people, the candidates tend to be and for knowing the trends in politics. Nobody was going to outwork Thomas Hall, and as I have come to know him, he’s a good, sincere person to his very core. Nobody would beat Thomas Hall as long as he let voters know who he was, which he did, walking neighborhoods for many weeks now, shaking hands and talking to people instead of just sending out mailers, robocalls, and hit pieces on Facebook. Thomas was well funded and did all the usual political stuff, which I mentioned. But in addition to that, his campaign put in many thousands of hours of labor into direct communication with real people cutting out all the traditional media from hijacking the process. And for voters, they have come to realize they are lucky to have someone like Thomas to vote for. 

The sad part of this story, as positive as it has been, was the tragic fall of Sheriff Jones, who made it his personal vendetta to destroy Thomas Hall in every way, shape, and form. For several months now, I have felt sorry for Sheriff Jones. I see what he is going through now in many of the competitive shooting events that I do throughout the year. It’s tough to be the best at something, then suddenly, some young kid who can do it better, faster, and more often than you comes along, and it hurts. I’ve seen that kind of jealousy destroy many people, and many never recover from it. Thomas Hall wasn’t willing to kiss the ring of one of Butler County’s kingmakers in the Republican Party. Jones obviously took it personally and decided to primary Hall for a second term in the Ohio legislature as a Representative. I watched over much of the fall of 2021 as many fellow Republicans were unified and would attend events together in great camaraderie, to suddenly being enemies with one another. That’s about when Sheriff Jones went on WLW radio and went out of his way to embarrass Thomas Hall because the Sheriff didn’t like his voting record. So, he wanted to show himself as the kingmaker in Butler County and put his aggressive efforts behind Matt King to primary out of office Thomas Hall. Suddenly, many of those same Republicans weren’t getting together anymore, and by the spring of 2022, the sides were split. Most Republicans who wanted to maintain a relationship with Sheriff Jones had turned against Thomas, betting that his political career was over because Sheriff Jones had decided it was. 

I’ve known Sheriff Jones for a long time. I have liked him most in the early days of the Tea Party movement, then again during the first Trump term. To his credit, he was one of the first area Republicans to join behind Trump in 2016. But I remind people often that Trump used to be a Democrat. So did Kari Lake, for that matter. Sheriff Jones, to me, has shown himself to be a big government Democrat who dresses as a 50s-style cowboy sheriff. I like the look. But his actions are much more Democrat than conservative. We had a mutual friend in David Kern, so we have tolerated each other the way relatives do at Thanksgiving Dinner. Sometimes we got along, sometimes not so much. I’ve always liked what he brought to the “Republican” brand as an image. But have been embarrassed by him often as a public official. I understand that he’s never done anything but public life. So it’s been a relationship I’ve been willing to take the good with the bad. That holds until I see him start abusing his power as he clearly did with Thomas Hall. Then anything good Sheriff Jones had done all these years suddenly gets tossed out the window as he does the very Democrat thing, abusing his authority to exert power over others. He went way out of his way to make an example out of Thomas Hall, and many other Republicans followed after him. 

In the end, the good guys won. Thomas won due to his great reputation and his very hard work. He didn’t need a party endorsement, even though he should have had it as a good incumbent. Nobody wanted to cross Sheriff Jones and feared what their own political futures might become if they did. So, things got very ugly during the campaign. Nobody would have thought poorly of Thomas Hall if he had caved under pressure. I always thought he was the clear winner, and I would tell him that. I knew if people could get to know Thomas the way I had, that they’d easily vote for him no matter what Sheriff Jones said. I also knew that Sheriff Jones didn’t have the political capital that he thought he had. Outside of some Lakota school board members, some reporters at Fox 19, and some thankful tax increase moms in the neighborhoods around his house in Liberty Township, a lot of people don’t like Sheriff Jones because they have come to know him as a bully. And so long as Jones has stayed in that bubble, he hasn’t had to face the truth about how people really feel about him when his back was turned. I have often thought some of those feelings were unfair. I always thought Sheriff Jones meant well, looking at him through the eyes of someone like the late Liberty Township trustee, David Kern. But after what Jones did to Thomas Hall during this election cycle and other Republicans who dared to support him, I could see why so many people would not like the Sheriff. So, I knew when it came time to vote; people would pick Thomas Hall. And, of course, they did. After all the money that was spent against Hall by the Sheriff Jones-led Matt King challenge, it’s evident that many of those characters were stuck in the past and had not learned the lessons of recent political trends. You couldn’t buy elections anymore with ads in the paper, simple yard signs, or robocalls with the Sheriff talking endorsements. I had many tens of thousands of hits on this site over the last several months from people looking for more information on Thomas. And what they found was the truth, the truth better than paid ads and sheriff endorsements can give. People were able to see Thomas Hall for the excellent person that he was. And that’s why he won and will continue to well into the future. 

Rich Hoffman

Click to buy The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business

People are innocent until proven guilty, not the other way around: The media often helps the real villains get away with crime while the innocent are prosecuted

One thing I have no tolerance for is bullies. I’ve never looked away from bullies when they show their ugliness in the world, and I’m not going to start now. When people wonder why I get up at 4:30 AM in the morning every day to write on this site and do the number of news stories I do, its because I have a lot of experience with the courts, I have known a lot of judges, lawyers, and media people, and I know how the game of law and order works from all sides of it. So to answer the question that I have heard from dozens of people over the last few weeks when they say that they have noticed that I have been supporting a lot of people who are accused of pretty serious crimes, I say to them, I don’t support criminal activity or law-breaking. If I come out in support of someone in some way, it is because I think them to be good people who are victims of bullying, and when I see it or even hear about it, I will help them at every opportunity. Not to the point where it leads to a trap, but where applicable. And when it comes to Steve Bannon from the Warroom and the false prosecution against him from the Biden Department of Justice, or the Darbi Boddy drama at Lakota schools in my neighborhood, or the Roger Reynolds case of corruption in Butler County, Ohio by the Sheriff’s department, if I come out in support of them, its because I think they are victims of abuse of authority by political bullies, and that is not something I am willing to tolerate. That is the reason I run my own news service in the form of this blog. I have learned over the years that the media is too lazy or lacks the philosophical parameters to explain things the way they need to be stated for the general public to understand, so I just do the job myself. So if I come out in support of some controversy, there is a really good reason why. 

The Steve Bannon case is self-explanatory. I know firsthand how the law can be used as a weapon to destroy people, and that’s clearly what is happening with Bannon. I like Steve; I have corresponded with him on occasion. We both have busy lives and work in different spheres of influence, but I greatly sympathize with him. The Biden DOJ is clearly abusing its authority in prosecuting him, just as Congress has abused its authority in the two impeachments of Trump, and this phony January 6th commission to attack Trump allies on popular podcasts to attempt to scare off a second Trump term. The law is being manipulated and used purely for political theater, and people’s lives are being threatened to be destroyed because of it. I would point to the local George Lang case of purgery several years ago where the very good man in the now Senator Lang was drug through the courts purely to attack him for knowing John Boehner. The target was Boehner, who was poised to be Speaker of the House in the not too distant future, and his political enemies wanted to get to him through his friends. It was one of the most disgusting court cases I had ever seen, and I’ve seen a lot of them. If I live another hundred years, I still would not have exceeded my many personal court appearances and ridiculous entanglements with the law. Just because you are accused of something doesn’t make you guilty. We are supposed to be innocent until proven guilty, but in cases like the one against Steve Bannon, and others like him over the years, who are convicted just because they know someone who is the real target, political assassinations through twisted concepts of law and order are not acceptable and must be punished. In the end, that will be what happens coming from Steve Bannon. The bad guys will get it in the end because tolerating the kind of society that would convict him is not acceptable. 

Darbi Boddy at my home school district of Lakota has made national news over essentially being attacked as soon as she was sworn in after she had just won an election. I understand that not all the school members like her or like each other. I get that the administrators did not like the newly elected school board member who asked too many questions and didn’t seem to respect the administrative red tape that they hide so many bad things behind. For instance, the attempt to vote her off the board over a minor incident and to make a media circus out of it was reprehensible. It showed a willingness by the board to undo a person the voters had just assigned to do a job. Then to make matters worse, the school superintendent added fuel to the fire by citing her with trespassing in two of the schools as Darbi went to them unannounced as part of an official investigation into CRT, which other board members were dragging their feet on. What makes this case so bad is that the superintendent, Matt Miller is not a person of high moral integrity. Based on things he has done, he should not have a job, and he only does because other school board members have helped him keep it. I haven’t said much about it because I have not wanted to destroy Lakota schools. I have wanted to see this new school board work. But some people are really afraid of Matt Miller and what he did to Darbi Boddy; based on what I know about him was a classic case of transference, where a guilty party will assign blame to other people for actions for which they are really guilty of. That kind of behavior is a classic problem of liberalism when they abuse law and order to hide crimes they are actually guilty of. But Darbi is not a danger to student populations. There are many more accusers of Matt Miller who would say that he is the dangerous one. I have been willing to look beyond accusations in his case for the benefit of the school and the school board in general. But it disgusts me to see someone attempt to put crimes of trespassing and other bad conduct out to a predatory media intent to destroy Darbi just to protect all the other bad things that I know are going on behind the scenes; that probably should be the focus of everyone’s attention. With all that said, I am very happy with Darbi Boddy and would like to see many more like her on the school board at Lakota. She is doing a great job.

Then there is the case of corruption thrown at Roger Reynolds. I’ve known Roger for a long time. I think he and I both love Liberty Township and remember how it used to be. I think Roger, an auditor for Butler County, has done a great job. I’d go on to say that I think he is one of the best auditors in the country for any county. I think the charges against him are politically motivated, and the Sheriff’s office could not hold up to the same scrutiny they have put on Roger. When evidence is presented to a grand jury the way it has been, they have no choice but to advance the cause. But if the tables were turned, I could think of dozens and dozens and dozens of people who would happily come forward and accuse Sheriff Jones of abuse of authority and unlawful interest in public contracts. That wouldn’t mean he’s guilty of those accusations, but there are plenty of people who would accuse him of it, and that would be enough to present to a grand jury. The media has pretty much thrown Roger Reynolds to the wolves with a play-by-play narrative that clearly is trying to destroy him as a person. I haven’t wanted to see the same applied to Jones; he’s been a good sheriff. Ending a career with so many black marks would not be good. It wouldn’t be good for Butler County. But the case would be much worse if the same investigations leveled at Roger Reynolds were applied to Sheriff Jones. So in that context, I support Roger Reynolds, he is being bullied for personal reasons, and the law is being used as a weapon to make it happen. If the law were equally applied, we’d lose a lot of public servants. Maybe it should be. But this picking and choosing of law and order to take out political rivals, there is no place for that in any society. And it’s a case of bullying that is reprehensible whenever it’s done and is unforgivable. 

Just because people are accused of something doesn’t make them guilty. Often, what it means is that the accusers are up to far worse and hope to divert their crimes to the innocent. Unfortunately, this is a common practice dramatically under-covered by a complicit media that has helped perpetuate it to the doom of our culture ostentatiously. And when I see it, I have never accepted it and never will. We have a very corrupt society because law and order are not respected by those most in their care. And if we ever want that to change, we must see through the smoke screens and the media hype at the real villains who are often the most vicious accusers because what they are attempting to hide is often far worse.

Rich Hoffman

Click to buy The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business

Abuse of Power in Butler County: And it’s not Roger Reynolds doing it

I’ve talked about it before; I sympathize with the Steve Bannon contempt of congress case that is happening at the end of July 2022 more than other cases because it’s personal for me. I don’t communicate with him a lot, be we occasionally do. He has shared some of my articles on social media, and we have exchanged text messages on occasion, so it’s more personal to me to see what is happening to him than it would be if I didn’t know something about the person himself. As I watch him go to federal court every day and the judge lecture the defense about not making a circus out of the case, it is bewildering to think that Eric Holder was found in contempt of Congress in 2012, yet no punishment ever came his way. But because Bannon is a member of the Trump White House, he is being treated like a criminal, guilty before proven innocent, just by association. And all this has made me think of the case of George Lang several years ago, who was facing jail time just for knowing John Boehner, who was poised to be speaker of the house, and the Democrats wanted to sink him through his friends. George, of course, was found innocent, but it was scary for sure. We could all point to misconduct in court proceedings that were purely politically motivated and shake our heads. But we often don’t say much about it because we fear that injustice being turned in our own direction, so we just move along and try to ignore it. Yet, I see the same thing happening to Roger Reynolds in Butler County, where political rivals are accusing him of corruption in his office. And I just don’t see it in any of the indictments, for which a 6th came out just recently to add to the pile, intent on knocking him out of office. It’s an election year, some rivals want Roger out as a political character, and they’ll do what they must do to sink him. 

Believe me; I’d rather talk about a million other things than this case, which I’ve discussed in detail. I’d prefer to leave all this mess to the courts to decide but based on a ridiculous article by Jennifer Edwards Baker from Fox 19 about the details of the 6th indictment against Roger Reynolds, which now involves Lakota schools, the issue is so preposterous that we just can’t ignore it. Obviously, the prosecution in the case against Roger, much like the case against Steve Bannon, doesn’t have much to go on, so they are prosecuting the case in the court of public opinion through reporters who might sway public sentiment ahead of upcoming elections. And that is the entire goal of the proceedings. And we can’t ignore the case because it could be any of us falsely accused. It’s not that I love Roger Reynolds. I think he has been an excellent auditor. But he’s made political enemies over the years, which is all part of the blood sport of politics. I think he could handle many things better regarding social interactions, but I recognize that he’s an A-Type personality, as is Sheriff Jones, and a clash among those types of people is bound to happen. I see it as more of a human resource problem than a legal one. If those two people have problems, they should resolve them in some other way than in political tricks ahead of elections and wasting the time of courts for personal vendettas, which is clearly the case with this indictment against Roger involving Lakota schools.   

The Fox 19 article says many things that could easily be misconstrued, leaving out all the relevant factors, such as all the axes to grind among public employees, especially those who handle money. The indictment indicates that Lakota schools were due to get back $750,000 from the auditor’s office. Roger suggested to the treasurer Jenni Logan that they spend that money on the Four Bridges Golf Course in a partnership. A whole series of emails between Jenni and the school attorney show an interest in Roger’s proposal. Ultimately, they decided it probably wasn’t a good idea, so the concept was rejected. That was back in 2017, a long time ago. So why is this story coming out now? Jenni is retiring on August 1st, 2022, and this is something for the road that fits into the motivations of Sheriff Jones and his political needs regarding putting someone else in the seat of the Butler County Auditor. So, they completely made up the word “coercion” in the indictment and tried to build a case that forced Roger to prove he wasn’t guilty of it due to pressure from public opinion, rather than proving that Roger actually used coercion in any way during the proposed spending of the money. When people see $750,000, they might think that’s a lot of money, but in reality, within the budget of Lakota, it’s much less than 1% of their expenditures and is actually about 11 or 12 teachers. Teachers make a lot of money, despite what the unions say about compensation. I can easily see how Roger would suggest that Jenni spend the money on something more useful, like an elevated lifestyle for the students of Lakota, rather than just blowing it on more activist teachers. Jenni must have thought the idea a good one because she pursued it through emails which are part of the case. But she did so voluntarily. That is not coercion; it’s a discussion among professional adults. 

All this doesn’t change my opinion of Roger Reynolds. As I indicated, I could tell stories all day long about court cases that were purely intended to destroy a political rival and had nothing to do with actual justice. I mentioned a few here based on personal experience. But it’s quite common as a practice. I’m all for law and order, but justice should be blind. What is going on with Roger Reynolds is that laws are being applied against a political rival instead of uniformly applied. It’s an abuse of authority, but it’s not Roger doing the abuse. It’s the accusers, not the recipient. I’ll still be voting for Roger Reynolds in the upcoming election. All the people participating in the investigation against him should be trying to work with Roger instead of getting rid of him over their personal problems they might have. Destroying people’s lives is not the way to solve a problem. It might be common, but it’s certainly not right.

The courts are not private playgrounds to bully people into fight resolution that might have been settled on a playground when everyone was kids. As adults, judges, attorneys, and media bottom feeders are not replacements for fists to the face. When the courts are abused, as they are clearly being abused in this Roger Reynolds case and the case of Steve Bannon, that gives politics and our justice system a bad name, and everyone involved should be ashamed of themselves, as far as I’m concerned, all six of these indictments against Roger Reynolds are political witch hunts. If I had been Roger, I would have handled things differently, where there was no question as to blurred lines. But social mistakes aren’t against the law. Intent to commit a crime is, and to assume intent where there clearly isn’t any evidence, just for the political theater of altering an election is despicable at best and gross abuse of authority at the very least. 

Rich Hoffman

Click to buy The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business

Butler County’s Version of Liz Cheney: As Thomas Hall said of Sheriff Jones, “he’s a bully, using his office for political motives until people stand up to him”

When I first heard about this sixth charge from the Butler County Sheriff’s Department, as they have been investigating Roger Reynolds as the auditor for several accusations of corruption, I thought it was ridiculous before. But now, it had become just as much of a kangaroo court as the January 6th Commission for which Liz Cheney was leading in an attempt to keep President Trump off the 2024 presidential ticket. Roger Reynolds has been an excellent auditor in Butler County for a long time, and he has a political rival in Sheriff Jones who wants to show him how much political power he has, and the two have been at it for well over a year now. And instead of fighting in a parking lot somewhere, this is how modern bullies fight; they use the legal system as a weapon against their political opponents. I watched in bewilderment how a grown man like Sherrif Jones could have such a press conference announcing so much of nothing as he did with this latest stack of accusations against Roger, declaring that this latest one on the pile was some kind of big crime of corruption in line with the recent case of P.G. Sittenfeld from Cincinnati who was just found guilty of similar charges. In Roger’s case, he is nothing like the dirty politicians like P.G. Sittenfeld or the very dirty politics that occurred in the FirstEnergy case in Columbus, which isn’t about money at all. The FirstEnergy controversy is an attack by the political left against the Ohio energy grid and using political infighting among Republicans to hide it. When you see cases like this, where a Sheriff is so personally involved in finding anything to knock off a political rival within the Republican Party, you can tell easily that it’s not a case about the crime but about power and control over other people.

I know the characters involved in the new indictment, such as Jenni Logan, the treasurer from Lakota schools. She stated she thought Roger Reynolds was asking Lakota to invest money owed back to the District into a golf academy at Four Bridges. Ben Dibble, who was president of the school board around that time in 2017, was involved as well, according to the liberal activist from Fox 19, Jennifer Edwards Baker, who would love to erode away the very good Republican Party of Butler County any way possible. She’s been at it for a while, and area Republicans have been targeted for anything resembling impropriety. Of course, that’s tough because many of the modern Republicans are not like they were back in the Michael Fox days or when Bob Shelley was a trustee in Liberty Township. Lakota has their own problems, and if there was some incidental conversation about a golf academy from money coming back out of the auditor’s office, which Roger Reynolds represents, it was likely out of polite conversation. I’ve seen the lunch circuit Jenni Logan has been a part of for a long time, and I understand how talk can be made. For a while, especially before Covid, almost everywhere I went to lunch, I saw Jenni Logan and Matt Miller, the Lakota superintendent, there talking with other people. I can easily see in such meetings how talk about how money should be spent would occur. Is that legal or illegal? Well, suppose we start picking pepper out of fly droppings like this over legal issues meant to show the sheriff’s department’s power over things people say and go from there. In that case, we will likely create a business and political environment where nobody can talk to anybody about anything anywhere. Knowing the characters involved in this latest indictment, it didn’t change a thing about my opinion about Roger Reynolds. I will still happily vote for him and support him in the upcoming elections. I care more about what good of a job he has done for my community than what kind of political enemies he has made along the way. And after that press conference by Jones, I could only conclude that he has now become Butler County’s own version of Liz Cheney, who hates President Trump so much that she would attempt to bend the law and waste endless amounts of money in investigations just to keep him out of the political theater.

The level of ridiculousness really overflowed when Sheriff Jones tried to bring up Thomas Hall, who is a current State Rep running for the 46th District, which now includes Liberty Township.   Jones indicated he was continuing to investigate Thomas Hall for conflicts of interest even though a recent Keith Faber report from way back in 2018 and 2019 failed to show anything wrong, even under a microscope of a state audit generated based on what people “say.” Those old-style political hits aren’t going to work in this new world where people have seen so much done against President Trump. The public is much more savvy about these things than they used to be. In reaction to Sheriff Jones indicating he was going to continue investigating Thomas Hall, whom Jones is supporting a rival to run against Hall in the primary on August 2nd, Hall simply called Jones a “bully.” Hall said specifically to the Journal News, “this whole thing is ridiculous, for the sheriff to want an investigation I think is wrong, using his office for political motives when there’s an election 19 days from today. (when the statement was made and referring to the August 2nd primary race)  The sheriff is a bully and will continue to do what he wants until people stand up to him.” That’s one of the reasons I’m supporting Thomas Hall; he’s a good, sharp young man who can handle the heat in the kitchen and make a wonderful meal with it. And the sheriff doesn’t like him because he won’t kiss the ring and allow Jones to be a token kingmaker. 

I’ve talked to Roger Reynolds, and I know why Jones doesn’t like him, at least from Roger’s perspective. Roger runs a great auditor’s office in Butler County. People say all kinds of things, and if the roles were reversed, Sheriff Jones could easily find himself on an indictment list based on “what people say.” People could say that Jones is a bully because he wants to put the fear of the law into local trustees who vote on budgets from which his family and friends benefit. Jones has family and friends employed all over Butler County, and he doesn’t like it when they get laid off for not showing up for work. I know Roger pushed for more transparency on how money gets shown to the public, and Jones wasn’t a fan. And from there, their relationship, which had been a good one, fell apart. Those things happen; I see it as a human resource issue of county employees fighting over power and prestige. But when that hatred escalates to the level where a sheriff is willing to abuse his power to the extent he has with Roger Reynolds and Thomas Hall, purely over political power within the Republican Party, then it becomes a big problem. What we really have is a Butler County version of Liz Chaney. This name used to have significant meaning in the Republican Party until she was revealed to be a liberal hack by the Trump administration. And the phony hearings happening now in Washington D.C. are the same phony hearings that have been thrown at Roger Reynolds because he has pushed for more transparency and accountability for public officials. Not less. And for all the reasons that the political establishment hates Trump, they hate people like Roger Reynolds and Thomas Hall. And when it comes time to vote for them, I will happily pick Roger and Thomas every time over the opinions of Sheriff Jones. 

Rich Hoffman

Click to buy The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business

Thomas Hall Comes Out Squeaky Clean: Ohio Ethics Investigation by Keith Faber shows a great track record and no wrongdoing

It’s a few weeks away from the August 2nd primary for the Ohio Representative election between the incumbent Thomas Hall for the newly drawn up 46th District seat and his challenger Matt King.  And it wouldn’t be a typical election cycle if there wasn’t some kind of dirt being thrown by somebody.  After all, a lot of money gets tossed into the ring from numerous contributors, and they all want to see their pick win the election, and the belief that people can be significantly influenced by finance and sentiment perpetuates a lot of malice.   That is how the typical blood sport of politics works, and what we usually end up with in office, if done well, is the best possible candidate that we can get because of the grueling process.  But when you see bad behavior in that election process, we must talk about it because it shows where the real cracks of a campaign genuinely emerge.  And in the case of Thomas Hall, he is so squeaky clean that any attempts to say otherwise about him come out sounding ridiculously overinflated.  And that’s what emerged from a shot of desperation coming not so much from the challenger for the 46th District, Matt King, but certainly from those who want to use Matt to knock out Thomas from the very high bar he has set because many in politics simply don’t want to live up to that level of measure.  There was some controversy coming out of a group “Ohio News Hotline” that was trying to stir up trouble for Thomas, and an Ohio Ethics Investigation was discussed based on the years 2018 and 2019, hoping that they could dig up something to make Thomas look bad.  In short, there was nothing there, but the elements who wanted to knock off Thomas Hall were trying to stir up trouble, so setting the record straight is mandated.

It had been a good week for Representative Hall, the week after the 4th of July 2022.  I had just reported on how great he did at a local Tea Party meeting where he made an excellent case for why he should be re-elected to a somewhat hostile crowd.  Then on Thursday, he spoke at Lakota schools and did a fantastic job there as well.  Probably too well because Democrats and RINO Republicans who are very uncomfortable with Thomas Hall moving his influence into Liberty Township as the new 46th District is mapped out aren’t comfortable with the strong record of conservative politics Hall represents.  He’s rock-solid in every Republican measure based on his track record, and the NRA just came out with a glowing endorsement of Hall, so plenty of political enemies were stirred up by those two public speeches.  Then on Friday, there was a fund-raiser with several Democrats involved, and they were more than energized to support Matt King, hoping to take down the very conservative Thomas Hall.  Now that’s not unusual.  I know Matt and the King family, and they tend to be solid conservatives.  But Matt is unknown as a politician, so obviously, Democrats are hoping for that variable to help them, so they support King for obvious reasons.  Thomas is a known threat to them as opposed to gaining leverage over someone they might be able to call in favors later because they helped with the campaign.  Sheriff Jones has been working against Thomas because he doesn’t like the strong voting record of Hall, so there some inner Republican theatrics going on as well that have been fueling Democrats to help King gain some steam, much the way Democrats got involved in the governor primary helping put DeWine over the top in that recent election. 

That’s when the timing of the ethics report, done by Keith Faber, became an inflated issue and an anonymous tip attempted to stir up trouble through the Ohio News Hotline, prompting a media hit piece against Thomas Hall.  I also know Keith; I think he’s a good guy too.  Investigations like what his office does, I think, are great because they keep politicians clean.  It’s a good check on the balance of power, and without the Auditors Office from the State there to investigate, there would be much more corruption in politics than there is.  While all this talk was going on, P.G. Sittenfeld in Cincinnati was found guilty of bribery, so these topics were fresh on the minds of the desperate when the contents of the Ohio Ethics Investigation on Hall were made available.  Now here’s where unethical behavior starts to really show itself.  I’ve read the report on Thomas Hall from Keith’s office, which is squeaky clean.  There is nothing bad or disingenuous there at all.  But the radical elements and Democrats who want Hall gone tried to take things out of context to at least create doubt in people who haven’t read the report and never plan to.  Just the mention of an ethics report might be enough to inspire them to make a change from Thomas to King on August 2nd.  As mentioned, the report covered 2018-2019, but it wasn’t released to the public until June 16th, 2022, just a month and a half before the election.  That in itself is more than a bit suspicious. 

The report states that Thomas did not recuse himself as a trustee on matters involving the fire department in Madison Township, where his father, a hero who stopped the school shooting at the school there, was the fire chief.  In those instances, Thomas sought legal counsel on the matter and provided the proper distance required when dealing with financial matters.  But on voting for equipment and supplies for the fire department, he participated with the other trustees under explicit direction from that legal advice.  The report from the auditor simply mentions that it was unusual.  Not that it was inappropriate.  Then the report shows that Madison Township had some late tax filings and negative balances during Thomas’ term.  This was a problem with the fiscal officer they had at the time and was a common problem many trustees face.  Nothing improper, just commonplace management problems.  And with all the digging that the vast resources of Keith Faber’s office could utilize over a lengthy period of time and sit on a desk somewhere for three years until just before the August 2nd election, there turned out to be nothing to see regarding anything improper done by Thomas Hall.  I would propose that the timing of the report’s release and distribution to the public was meant to create doubt in the public to affect the election.  By the time people learned that the report contained no wrongdoing by Thomas Hall, the election would be over, and from the Democrat perspective, hopefully, King would win the election.   For the enemies of Thomas Hall, all they need to do is create doubt which was where the tip to the Ohio News Hotline went out to stir up enough buzz in the final two weeks of the campaign to push some voters maybe away.  The report was and is a last-ditch effort by a political class, both Republicans and Democrats, who don’t want the high measure Thomas Hall has forced them all to live up to.  Very few could go through a Keith Faber Ohio Ethics Investigation and come out as clean as Thomas did.  And that truly scares them.   Another term of Thomas Hall may make it so they can’t compete in the political world ever in the future.  And for voters, that’s very good news indeed.

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

Sheriff Jones Endorses the Governor of the Most Corrupt State in America: A solution to the stupidity of Mike DeWine

Another Reason Corruption is Good to See

This is precisely why I value the measurement of corruption, which I talk about extensively in my book, The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business. For the last several weeks, people around me have been asking, “what is going on with our great Sheriff Jones” the Butler County figure that is internationally known for his support of President Trump. Suddenly he has thrown his support to Governor Mike DeWine and made a whole lot of other flip flop decisions that seem ultimately at odds with the MAGA movement. So there is a bit of a panic on the matter, which I have explained as a form of corruption that must be accounted for to understand the decision-making process of Sheriff Jones. Corruption isn’t always just about money, but in the case of Jones and DeWine, without a Trump in the White House, many in the Republican Party are drifting back into the cave of power for the sake of it, and that is why we are seeing rifts forming ahead of the Ohio primary coming up in May of 2022. Unless we have a way of understanding the nature of corruption, we would otherwise have no other means of comprehending these strange behaviors. Trump has at least three more years before he’ll have a chance to be back in the White House. Naturally, Jones must align himself to the world between now and then. Yes, he is perfectly willing to adjust his beliefs to the power void that has formed in Trump’s wake, and from his point of view, the smart money points at the current governor of Ohio, the most corrupt state in all of the United States, Mike DeWine. 

As all this is going on, the challenging governor and my pick for the upcoming primary, Jim Renacci, is up 8 points over the incumbent DeWine. I had the opportunity to listen to Mike DeWine on many conference calls during the Covid mishap that his administration unleashed on Ohio. I have seen behind the veil just what an idiot DeWine was. I voted for him in the last election because he called himself a Republican. What I heard during the government-imposed shutdowns was a complete fool out of touch with reality. One moment in particular that impacted me was when I had to listen to Cedar Fair Amusements in May of 2020 try to explain their problem to DeWine about the trouble with not knowing when they could open their amusement parks because they had to hire, prepare their parks, and take all kinds of measures to get ready for a summer season that government had destroyed, and couldn’t give any guidance going forward. As a right-to-life governor, DeWine had put the pro-abortion Obama activist Amy Acton as head of his Health Department. She was running the state the way a stringy-haired pot-smoking hippie would run it, which was costing the business community billions of dollars during a lockdown over Covid that nobody could see the end of, especially Cedar Fair Amusements who ran a seasonal operation in two Ohio locations. It was worth hundreds of millions of dollars to them, and DeWine wouldn’t commit to anything to help them out. That was pretty much what DeWine said to everyone on those many teleconferences concerned over their businesses. His message was, we’re the government, and we’ll tell you when and what you can do and how long you can do it, and you’ll like it. Mike DeWine showed himself to be just as bad as the worst of Democrats during his first three years in office, and what he has done to Ohio will take decades to fix. So for me, it’s easy; Jim Renacci is the answer to the Mike DeWine debacles of the first term in office as governor.  DeWine has been a disaster.

Sheriff Jones has been something of a thorn in DeWine’s side while Trump was in office. DeWine was one of the first in the country to attempt mask mandates leading all other governors to the mandate first, just as he did with lockdowns. Without DeWine, many other governors only fantasized about it. DeWine was the first to do it. He was also the first to unconstitutionally alter election laws which would then pave the way for massive cheating that the Democrats would perform later that year with mail-in voting to remove Trump from office before the courts could even process the assault. Sheriff Jones, who advertised himself as a “pro Trump” member of law enforcement, suddenly endorsed DeWine for governor after all that DeWine had done to Ohio. Why? Well, the first thing is that the DeWine money machine is kicking in. Corruption and DeWine are never far from each other, and Sheriff Jones is always attracted to a kind of power. I’ve known Sheriff Jones for several years and what’s most valuable to him is his brand. For instance, when his brand is aligned with the Trump White House, it’s a wonderful thing. But I’ve seen it negatively align with big government union business, especially in 2013 when he backed the Lakota school tax increase, which he put his name behind to get it to pass by the most narrow of margins. So the Sheriff isn’t always a hard conservative; he just plays one on TV and in public appearances. And with Biden in the White House for the foreseeable future and Jones up in years himself, he needs to protect his brand while the political world sets itself in a new reality. 

What does Sheriff Jones like to do with his brand? Well, we have seen what he did to Thomas Hall, an Ohio Representative from Middletown who didn’t vote the way that the Sheriff wanted him to vote in Columbus, so the Sheriff used his name to berate the young man on WLW radio to thousands of people, personally attacking Thomas. Nobody elected Sheriff Jones to control other members of congress that we have elected to vote on our behalf. The Sheriff is supposed to take care of law enforcement concerns, not to dictate the terms of how other Republicans vote in our community by bullying them to his will. As a reaction to Thomas, the Sheriff went out of his way to put a primary candidate up against the Ohio Rep by dragging Matt King into the race, which naturally was pitting Republicans against Republicans on purpose for the intention of getting his way and making his point as being the “king maker” of the party, which put all kinds of people into a difficult position. Sheriff Jones didn’t care. He just wanted to show who had the power and what they had to do to kiss the ring to appease him, to hell what the voters of Butler County thought about the matter. That is why Jones had to align with Mike DeWine. Even though the governor is known to be attached to corruption, that power overflow gives Sheriff Jones the power to his brand that feeds his need to stay relevant as a man coming to the end of his career. Jones doesn’t have time to wait for Trump to be back in the White House. The need for power is always present, and DeWine is the quickest way to keep it. 

Now, of course, Jones would never admit to any of this. I’ve spoken to dozens and dozens of people affected by this situation, and they don’t know what to think about it. They feel betrayed and don’t have the words to put to the matter. That is why I like corruption so much, because if we didn’t have some way to measure corruption, no matter what form it exists, we wouldn’t have a way to explain this behavior. From his big labor union perspective, everyone thinks they are doing right; Jones thinks he’s doing what’s right for the Republican Party. He’s a moderate at best, and Thomas Hall has turned out to be way too Trump for his taste, so he is taking action. DeWine loved the way Amy Acton’s hair smelled after she took a shower, so he gave her the keys to Ohio and let her destroy it. As a long-married guy who is a closet Democrat, DeWine thought Acton knew what she was doing, so he defended her against all those evil business leaders who were outraged that DeWine and Acton had closed them down over Covid. DeWine showed himself to be an idiot who thought he was doing right. That’s why we have elections so that when we learn these things about people, we can get rid of them with an option, in this case, Jim Renacci. But honestly, there is only one right, not the right that Sheriff Jones comes up with, or his new buddy, Mike DeWine. But in our Republic, for it ever to really stand, it takes the taxpayers and respect for their vote. If they pick Thomas Hall, it’s not for Sheriff Jones to decide otherwise. Or for DeWine to attempt to hide four years of horrible management of Ohio behind one deal from Intel worth 20 billion dollars and to ride it like a bucking bronco at a rodeo. Corruption seeks to hide its misdeeds behind a façade that, if you know what you are looking at, can tell you the truth about the matter and allow voters to understand who they are getting involved with. And that is why corruption is a lot better to understand than to pretend like it doesn’t exist at all.

Rich Hoffman

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Sheriff Jones Sides with DeWine Liberals on Masks in Schools: Finding the corners of the political puzzle pieces

Sheriff Jones Flip Flops, But Why?

Here is how politics works, and even though Sheriff Jones probably won’t admit it, the timing of the Butler County health alert from the Sheriff’s Office says everything we need to know about the situation. Sheriff Jones often goes out of his way to contribute himself to the politics of the Lakota school system; he has done it against Thomas Hall’s H.B. 99, which would arm teachers in the classroom; he did it again in 2013 by siding with the tax increase the teacher’s union wanted. He certainly did it again recently as Darbi Boddy initiated a proposal to remove mask mandates in the public school even as Sheriff Jones announced his endorsement of the mask governor, DeWine struggling with a primary election. Puzzles like this can be hard to figure out until you put them together a few times, but with this one, the edge pieces were easy to spot, so the rest of the thing goes together very quickly. To help out the teacher’s union position on mask mandates, which they want to keep going infinitely, Sheriff Jones, who made international headlines with his former position on not forcing people to wear masks concerning Covid, has now reversed his position just enough to help with the upcoming vote in February on providing mask options to parents in the Lakota school district, or to impose mandates for further unforeseen durations, supposedly until Trump is in the White House again. Because the Biden administration will keep the mask mandates going as long as they can get political capital out of them, and the teacher’s union, all teacher’s unions, support the Biden presidency and mask mandates to hide that political incompetency. So this business of using kids to force a political message is exceptionally negligent, and all the participants are guilty in their own ways. Look at who is at the top of the list in endorsing Mike DeWine for re-election, who started all this mess in the nation to begin with. Remember, Ohio is #1 in the country for corruption under Mike DeWine’s first term. Does that sound like the kind of person a law and order politician would support?

Here is the List of RINO Republicans Who Have Empowered Governor DeWine to Destroy Ohio with Corruption.

Just as a criminal couldn’t break into a house and claim ignorance of the law once caught to avoid going to jail, the case for Covid now is well known. Just because many people have not come to terms with the reality that much of Covid has been purely political and points to political schemes extending beyond America’s nation, that doesn’t mean ignorance is an excuse for the further perpetuation of sheer stupidity. This is what all mask mandates are at this point. Just as we proved during 2021 that CRT was moving into all our public schools, and Lakota picked up new school board members because the blatant Marxist intrusion was well known before school officials could attempt to slide it back under the rug, the mask mandates are another progressive policy that has more to do with politics than safety, by a lot. For the actual situation on Covid and the political players involved, I would refer everyone to read the book by Kennedy, The Real Dr. Fauci. Kennedy is a Democrat, but he tells the story of Covid and who the players are and why they are. For those who are claiming ignorance as to why Covid is here and what we should be doing about it, I would refer to that starting point for reference. But for those who do know what’s going on want to return to life before March of 2020, which was the proposal that Darbi Boddy put forth for a February vote. 

Well, we knew this would happen once Darbi and Isaac Adi were elected to the school board. We had to have an election to bring some sanity to Lakota schools and all public schools, for that matter. And this mask issue was on the ballot in November, and Darbi is moving forward to fulfill an issue she ran on. Of course, the previous school board members and management team that has been in place during the Covid mess want to cover up for their complicity in the matter. And it is not surprising that Sheriff Jones is coming to their defense. He advertises himself as a Republican, but he has a soft spot for teachers’ unions.

The game goes like this, Darbi puts forward a controversial resolution. Kelly Casper immediately said that the resolution to lift the mask mandates went against the legal counsel of Lakota. She and Julie Shaffer have been pro mask for the kids since the beginning of Covid, for all the reasons that some people still think that Dr. Fauci is a nice guy they see on T.V. and not the snarling rat that most everyone else sees. To attempt to break up a possible 3 to 2 vote, Sheriff Jones comes out on Friday, January 21st appearing to have had a change of heart about Covid. However, for the last two years, Sheriff Jones has led the nation and the world to stand up against mask mandates in many cases. He has stated that he would not be the mask police even on foreign television. So why the change of heart? Well, you can ask him. I’m not sure he’d give a straight answer. Instead, we should listen to what people do, not necessarily what they say. 

I first noticed the Sheriff’s attempts to sway the newly elected Lakota school board on WLW in November of 2021, right after the election. His concern then was Thomas Hall and the proposal he sponsored to give teachers the option to carry weapons in class as first responders to potential school shooters. Sheriff Jones mentioned Lakota several times on his broadcast on the Bill Cunningham Show out of all the public schools in Butler County. Obviously, he was sending a message to Lakota, and knowing something about the political theater of Butler County; it’s not hard to find the edge pieces on this one. Several liberty candidates were newly elected in Butler County, and the Sheriff is known for asserting himself as the kingmaker in politics.   Many politicians won’t say anything to him because they want an endorsement from him when it comes time to go through the next election process. And like Sheriff Jones will say, “I’m just the Sheriff,” meaning he intends much more than what he indicates in most everything. That’s OK, I always say, politics is a blood sport, and I think that’s all fair in love and war. But all too often, these big government types, they believe that the rules are for everyone else but them and that they control the dictates, which everything always comes back around to where they should be, which is happening now, in Lakota. Julie, Kelly, Sheriff Jones, and the teacher’s union activists should have learned some hard lessons over the years. If they didn’t, they can’t claim ignorance now.

Meanwhile, the kids are genuinely suffering from the political theater that has gone on with Covid. They have been caught in the crossfire, and they have no idea what to make out of these things. The adults have let them down. Society has let them down. And now that we know better about Covid and the political motives, we have an obligation to do the right thing. Someone must take leadership, and that is what Darbi Boddy is proposing with her resolution to take the school safety measures back to pre-March 2020 normality. The tricks of scaring school board members who are typically more like Kelly Casper, who will take the advice of the experts over her own intellect, are not going to work forever. It’s disrespectful to see this game play out, where lawyers advising Lakota will point to Sheriff Jones and say about the Covid danger, “see, even the conservative sheriff is supporting masks.” Obviously, Darbi is very passionate about this mask situation and she wants a quicker resolution than the school board process typically allows. But she’s only on her second meeting. I think over time, things will smooth out. Passions are wonderful, but the game is the game and everyone has to play it to win within the rules.

All that theater is meant to sway a vote in February, hoping to scare off one of the three conservatives. If we haven’t seen this game play out many times in the past, it might not be so obvious. But unfortunately, we have. The teacher’s union even has Republicans to manipulate to their cause. Whether they are Republicans or Democrats, they all share a common problem; they are government employees who make their livings off taxpayers. And fear keeps taxpayers paying and not looking through the puzzle box to figure out how the pieces go together. This mask policy is crucial to them for many political reasons that go far beyond safety for students or teachers. It requires ignorant people to follow them or people too scared to think. So don’t think for a second that Sheriff Jones just woke up and changed his position on masks overnight. No, it has to do with politics and not caring one bit about the kids of the district, but the strength of the teacher’s union to win their first battle against an incoming conservative administration. And like they do at levy time, and the Sheriff is playing his part, they use children as their vehicles for political destruction to fulfill their member’s desires for selfishness. 

Rich Hoffman

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