Please join me in thanking the real reporters at the Toledo Blade

[burythehatchet]

http://toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dll/frontpage

Check out their home page. They have doggedly pursued the exploding scandal in Ohio that has now snared all elected republican officials in the state from the Gov. on down.

Again, the warmstream media has just started to report on the story after weeks of ignoring it. The Ohio officials who are all corrupt republicans are going to get swept up. There will be criminal endictments. And here's the kicker, Tom Noe, the man behind the entire maze of corruption, theft, money laundering, and who knows what else is a Bush Ranger. The money he was stealing from Ohio, he was giving to aides to give to Bush. This is huge.

Quick summary - the Ohio workers comp fund is a huge (billions) amount of money that is set aside to pay for worker injuries in Ohio. Interestingly, Ohio is what is called a monopolistic state in the WC business. That means insurance companies cannot write WC in Ohio, it is all done by the state. So basically the Republicans raided this WC fund and started giving out investment management contracts to their buddies. Hilarity ensued. The money lost or stolen amounts to hundreds of millions of dollars.

So the original purpose of this post is to officially thank the great team at the Toledo Blade for showing us what it means to be journalists.

THANK YOU!!

[BrklynLiberal]

1. Pulitzer Prize coming...for sure.

[burythehatchet]

4. did you catch the reporter they interviewed on air america?

he was great

[BrklynLiberal]

5. Very humble for someone doing such a fantastic job...

[MountainLaurel]

10. Didn't the Blade win just a couple years ago? n/t

[MountainLaurel]

12. Answered my own question

They won just last year for reports on a group called Tiger Force and the atrocities they committed in Vietnam.

[Sapphire Blue]

36. Link - Tiger Force investigation

http://www.toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dll/section?Category=SRTIGERFORCE

[kittenpants]

2. My husband grew up in Toledo...

he's one of the good guys, but he says my conservative father-in-law always hated the Blade. Now I see why!!!:D

Keep pissing them off Blade!

[faithnotgreed]

3. thank you toledo blade!

[LightningFlash]

6. So the hands of justice are finally tipping.....Ohio Fraud 2004.

We never forgot....Never got over it!!!!

Slap out the indictments and bring on the biggest treason middle america's seen in years. :mad:

[Snotcicles]

7. Did you catch there prize winning work on Tiger Force

I love the Blade there the only paper with integrity printing today.
IMHO.

[slor]

8. They had to stay in power to keep this story...

hidden, and it did not work.

[Hubert Flottz]

9. That's GREAT!

This could really be the straw that breaks the camel's back! Are any other papers in Ohio telling the same story?

[burythehatchet]

13. they are now!

[Hubert Flottz]

23. I'll send a link to the story to a West Virginia paper or two.

That's a tale that needs to see the light of day! I hope Blackwell is in the mix too! It would be fun to see him marchrd off in an orange jumpsuit!

[burythehatchet]

25. Blackwell is most certainly in the mix

not only that 5 of the 7 state supremes had to recuse themselves because they took money from Noe.

[Hubert Flottz]

29. DAMN!!!!!!!

I'll send out your link to the Blade story ASAP! A lot of folks in the border counties read Wv papers!

[Hubert Flottz]

30. Sent story and will post any emails I might get back...

Kick

[johnaries]

32. Hot dam! I was about to ask about Blackheart. Was the judge that screwed

Arnebeck's motions one of the ones involved?

[burythehatchet]

34. that I do not know off hand

[madmom]

38. my home town paper still has it buried on page 9..n/t

[snot]

11. Done. (n/t)

[rucky]

14. Also on the home page, check out the strawberry rhubarb pie

recipe. that'll give us ohians something to celebrate with(I'm a transplant as of 2 weeks ago).

[athena]

15. The best way to bring the republicans down is to expose their corruption.

I recently read a very good article in The Nation that made this argument. It pointed out that Illinois used to be a swing state. What turned it blue was the state democrates exposing the corruption of then-governor George Ryan. He points out that Ryan's corruption was nothing compared to those of Delay and others.

excerpt:

For much of the twentieth century, Illinois was the quintessential swing state, the Ohio of its day. Its state government tilted toward moderate Republicans. It voted for the winner in the presidential election twenty-one of twenty-four times in the twentieth century through 1996, going for Reagan in 1980 and 1984, George Bush I in 1988 and Clinton in 1992 and 1996. The rock-ribbed Republican suburban "collar" counties around Chicago canceled out the heavily Democratic city, leaving the fate of statewide elections to the fiercely independent voters downstate. Now the state looks like a Democratic lock--Gore and Kerry both won it by double-digit margins--and in these dark days you've got to wonder, How did this happen? And are there any lessons to be gleaned for Democrats elsewhere?

...

"What has caused the collapse really goes back to corruption," says Dan Proft, president of the conservative journal Illinois Leader. "It goes back to a former governor who's awaiting federal trial; it goes back to more than seventy convictions of people from Ryan's administration in the last three years. It really goes back to a systematic undercurrent of corruption that's been part of Illinois politics for a long time."

...

Congressional Democrats should take a page out of Gingrich's and Blagojevich's books and propose comprehensive ethics reform. They should talk about the "corrupt Republicans" and "restoring transparency and integrity" at every turn. They should use DeLay's mounting ignominy to tar fellow Republicans who benefit from his fundraising and clout. In short, they should make Republican scandal and Democratic reform one of the central narratives of their opposition over the next two years. "Newt Gingrich came to power because of an ethics scandal," says Obama's state political director, Dan Shomon. "Rod Blagojevich got elected partly because of scandal. You can defeat an incumbent if you can catch his or her hand in the cookie jar."

Here is the full article. You have to be a subscriber to read it, and it's definitely worth subscribing.
http://www.thenation.com/docprem.mhtml?i=20050502&s=hayes

Go here to subscribe: only $18 for 28 issues. And it's the best magazine there is for investigative journalism.
https://ssl.thenation.com/sumo/ROLLBARVOUCHER

[tsuki]

16. And those that want to give the SS money to Wall Street had better

read and beware.

[burythehatchet]

20. that's the real nugget in this story

this is what politicians do when they get a hold of your money. It becomes their personal piggy bank to do with as they please.

[TOhioLiberal]

17. As a lifelong resident...

...of Toledo, I say 'Thank You' to the Blade. :woohoo:

[northzax]

33. as a former paperboy for the Blade

I also extend my thanks, I still use my Blade bag as a shopping bag.

[TOhioLiberal]

37. Me too!

:hi: howdy neighbor...
are you still in the Toledo area?

[northzax]

39. naw, in DC

I grew up, and delivered papers to, East Front Street in Perrysburg.

[Straight Shooter]

18. Hear, hear!

Toledo Blade, we salute you!

:patriot:

[PittLib]

19. I used to read the Blade when I was a student...

at Bowling Green State. It is also a sister paper of the Pittsburgh Post Gazette, my home paper of choice. Nice work guys!

On edit: the Blade got me hooked on crossword puzzles, and I am oddly grateful.

[tsuki]

21. The Toledo Blade has provided some fascinating

reading for months now. It's Pulitzer Time.

[burythehatchet]

22. they must not be owned by a mega corp.

Seems that they are completely independent. That's how it should be.

[northzax]

40. Family owned

The Blocks, I think, still own and run it.

[salin]

24. Since the initial concerns were raised last fall

and ignored/buried...

I would love to see a poll in Ohio - if you had learned about the huge losses of public monies by friends of the governor and president - and the lack of oversight that allowed it to happen - would it have changed your vote in the presidential election?

Ya, I know, that is push poll wording - but they do push polls all the time...

[burythehatchet]

26. that's another wonderful aspect of the scandal

the Gov was aware of the losses prior to the Nov election, but his that fact from the voters. If I'm an Ohioan, I'm especially pissed today.

[dzika]

27. Toledo Blade has been first and best on Coingate

I read their articles daily and it's real reporting.

GOP has basically cut ties to this Noe creep.

Many thanks should go to the Blade.

[burythehatchet]

28. they can cut ties but they're screwed

I found it hilarious that the Ohio GOP is now requiring an ethics lesson for any candidate wishing to run for public office. Yeah, that's the ticket.

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

31. [e-mail]

Send James Drew and e-mail and thank him for his work. This sort of thing can't be encourage enough.

I hope he wins the Pulitzer Prize for this.

[burythehatchet]

35. thank you, in fact I will send him a link to this thread.

[Coexist]

41. done - thanks for the email addy