OpEdiTude: Finding His Real Purpose In Life

"My purpose is to serve the Lord," Gov. John Kasich repeated yet again this week, the Cleveland Plain Dealer reported. "My purpose is to try to live a life a little bigger than myself."

Jesus Christ, John, you're not running for National Chaplin, so give the God thing a rest already. You had a chance early in life to serve the Lord, but you ditched Him for a long career in politics that's made you very rich and a legend in your own mind.

If at the ripe old age of 64 you still don't know what your purpose in life is, who's fault is that? Here's a start: Your purpose for the last two years of your final 4-year term as state leader is to not screw things up any more than you already have, which has been a lot so far, as only God and those who pay close attention know.

Your Master didn't want you to be elected president, so you can erase that big one purpose from your chalk board of bigger than life purposes. And for obvious reasons The Lord didn't want you to join the Trump Administration, so erase that one, too.

Is your real purpose to fade into history sitting on your back porch waiting for the Lord to send you a sign about what to do after 2018, when your two terms as Governor of Ohio ends? Not likely since your ego has always been a little bigger than yourself.

Is your real purpose to go back into the media world, the industry that lost all credibility this year because it couldn't tell the difference between fake and real news? Roger Ailes, your former aggressively horny but now disgraced employer, is gone at Fox News, but you can probably nab yourself another lucrative post-public-service, know-nothing spot being the petulant adolescent you've earned a well-deserved reputation for from those left running the most unfair and unbalanced network in the world.

Is your real purpose to go back to being a salesman on Wall Street, like you were at Lehman Brothers, where as a rainmaker you expected doors to open so your team members could milk and bilk taxpayers, as you helped make possible with Ohio's retirement systems that lost bigly from bad deals you helped match make? Now that you've tasted the sweet fruit of CEO world for almost eight years, it's unappetizing to go back to being just an employee for someone else more powerful who gives you orders and expects to carry them out.

Is your real purpose in life to continue your Quixotic quest for a federal balanced budget amendment? You'll be off the taxpayers dime, so you'll travel without a cadre of state funded police protection and have to foot the bill for expenses along the way. You didn't have much money in your presidential run, and that's when you were governor, so it's not likely the flood gates of funding will open for you when you're out of office, operating on a smile and a shoeshine like Willy Loman.

Is your real purpose in life to finagle moving Michael Drake out of the president's office at your Alma mater, OSU, so you can take it over, making some real money again in the process, moving your team from state to OSU, marketing the university with tentacles around the world and delivering a homily to each graduating class of 10,000 or more? Word is that, while you will have appointed most of the members of OSU's board of trustees, they aren't keen on you being president.

Is your real purpose in life to write yet another book that cunningly associates you with people who have done wonderful things? You've stood for something your entire political life, but what you've stood for other than making life difficult for everyone but yourself has escaped most of us.

Is your real purpose in life to lay a plan for your return in 2020, when you'll be as old as Hillary Clinton was this year, mostly out of sight and mind, with President Trump ready to obliterate anyone who dares think they can topple the Great Donald? Good luck with floating your presidential prospects in four years.

Is your real purpose in life to actual run a business, something you talk about but have never done yourself? Be a reak CEO again, but of your own profit-making business, not some grifter's think-tank or policy institute that survives on rich people's money to continue ideas and programs that benefit the few while leaving the many with loaves of bread and fish. Jesus took a few fish and loaves of bread and multiplied them for the hungry masses. Your political ideology always wants to reduce food for the hungry so they get weaned off of being too dependent on government handouts when they need help the most.

Is your real purpose in life to take on Josh Mandel, and maybe your former driver, Pat Tiberi, in the Republican primary in 2018 to see who survives to then take on Sherrod Brown for Senator? Mandel, the former Marine who spent $40 million to take out Brown in a losing campaign in 2012, will cut your heart out without wincing once. If you choose that purpose in life and survive, Sherrod Brown won't be Ted Strickland. You'll have your eight years of bad governance to defend, and Brown won't let you do to him what Strickland let happen in 2010 and this year.

Is your real purpose in life to to give back to schools and local governments the billions you stole from them in your first terrible budget? That would be a good start in confessing your sins as governor. Remember, not stealing is one of the Ten Commandments.

Is your real purpose in life to stop closing abortion clinics for women who need them? In case you missed it, Pope Francis just said that anyone, even a woman who's had an abortion or a doctor who helped her, can be forgiven by God if they are truly repentant.

Maybe your real purpose in life should be to confess all your sins to your Master, then beg for forgiveness and grace. There's hope for you after all, but you just have to ask for it.

You asking for forgiveness would truly be living a life a little bigger than yourself.

OpEdiTude: An op-ed with attitude, meant strictly to reflect the opinion of the author.

OpEditude: Clinton's 'Careless' Email Record Versus Illegal Actions By GOP Presidents

It's hard to recall any Republicans saying a discouraging word at the time about President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney's federal crimes of lying about information they had about Iraq's involvement in the 911 attacks, and ginning up information they didn't have, that opened the door to war on Iraq. 

It's hard to recall those media reports of Republicans taking the Bush White House and Administration to task because there weren't any. Like a wagon train under attack, Republicans formed a circle around the Bush administration's criminal actions to take America into a war of political convenience against a nation that wasn't involved in the attacks carried out on September 11, 2001 in New York city. President Bush the Junior, our 43rd Commander-in-Chief, has cost this nation trillions in taxpayer funds so far with more to come since soldiers are still stuck there due to the deal George W. Bush cut with new Iraq leaders who wouldn't give immunity to actions committed by American Soldiers. Obama inherited Bush's exit agreement, and has done the best he can with a bad hand.

Not learning from former Republicans' illegal and costly mistakes, Republicans and their all-but crowned presidential nominee, Donald Trump, are raring to go to gin up another costly war, this time the pretext is defeat ISIS. Saddan Hussein was a brutal dictators, as most dictators throughout history have been, but he kept tight control on his Shiite citizens, who now control Iraq courtesy of Bush totally misunderstanding that religious sects don't really care about democracy. They don't hate us for our liberty and rules of law, as Republican neocons would have us believe. The west has been playing in their religious sandbox for decades, and Bush letting the furies of hell lose was the opportunity Shiites saw to persecute Sunnis. Catholics and Protestants warred against each other for centuries, and Shiites and Sunnis have been at it since the death of Mohammed in 632 A.D. Little has changed since.

Thousands of dead American soldiers and tens of thousands more who returned home wounded or maimed by a senseless war that in another era might have seen the powers behind such a ruthless agenda go to jail or meet their maker, is America's reward for allowing brazen rulers like George Bush and Dick Cheney to go unchallenged and unjailed.

With the news that FBI Director James Comey did not recommend prosecution of Hillary Clinton's "careless" misuse of state department emails, which contained various levels of classified information, Republicans have hyperventilated that the Clinton's, this time Hillary, skirted laws again that have ensnared other lesser officials.

Discouraging as it may sound to Republicans, who despite one exhaustive report after another that cleared her of any legitimate crimes allegedly committed, this report from Director Comey again found Mrs. Clinton was not out to sabotage America as Trumpian Republicans accuse her of doing. Hillary Clinton's arrogance and carelessness maybe character flaws, but they are not federal crimes.

Shame: George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, The Iraq War

Republicans have yet to apologize, let alone atone for George W. Bush's terrible, awful years in the White House. He left the nation with soaring job losses and an economic meltdown that nearly created a second Great Recession. But for a Democratic president who enjoyed a Democratic Congress for his first two years, GOP officials' austerity budgeting and misdirected tax programs would have paved the path to true economic devastation had they been the path pursued instead of the one approved by a Democratic congress that enabled President Obama to staunch the bleeding from dramatic job losses.

The stimulus package President Barack Obama proposed, that all Republicans obstructed at every turn and voted against, saved millions more jobs being lost by stabilizing state budgets, and saving an auto industry that Republicans like venture capitalist Mitt Romney, Ohio Gov. John Kasich and Rob Portman, the Buckeye State's junior senator in Washington, would to a man have let disappear. Following their led would have caused economic hardships across the nation, and especially in auto parts-supply chain intense Ohio, that would have taken down America, then the world, in a spectacularly irresponsible way to gruesome to even contemplate. America is still paying the price for George Bush's war in Iraq 13 years later.

Shame: Dick Cheney, Energy Meeting Minutes, Karl Rove, Missing WH Emails

In today's digital era full of emails, Hillary Clinton using a private email server is not unique, given so many others, including top Republicans in former administrations, have done the same. Republicans were suspiciously silent when Vice President Cheney fought to keep records of his secret meetings with energy industry leaders at the White House from prying public eyes. When George W. Bush did leave the White House, tens of thousands of emails on a separate email system set up by White House officials, including Bush kingmaker Karl Rove, went missing. The GOP establishment wasn't at all concerned then on what they did, so why are they now so intent on seeing Hillary Clinton wearing government -issue pinstripes?

Shame: Richard M. Nixon, Watergate, Gerald R Ford

Republicans today should reflect but won't on the full pardon Richard M. Nixon received in 1974 from his then vice president, Gerald R. Ford. President Ford took the oath of office when President Nixon resigned his office as roads from the Watergate Hotel break-in two years earlier in 1972, which Mr. Nixon knew about even though he said he didn't, led directly into his Oval Office redoubt. For the good of the country, President Ford issued a full pardon for all offenses President Nixon committed against the United States so his illegal criminal actions could pass into history books. Mr. Ford justified this decision claiming that a long, drawn-out trial would only have further polarized the public.

Democrats could have turned Gerald Ford's pardon of Nixon for violating the constitution into a national crisis. But they didn't. President Nixon's abuses did open the Pandora's Box of government distrust that haunts us to this day. After World War II, government was an asset, not an enemy as many today see it.

Shame: Ronald Reagan, Iran-Contra

Then there was the Great Communicator's administration in the 1980s. Ronald Reagan blatantly violated American law when he lied directly to the American public in a TV appearance about trading arms for hostages in what became known as the Iran-Contra affair. It was all true, as the nation learned later, but Republicans revere Ronald Reagan as a political saint to this day when he clearly wasn't. Democrats complained at the time, but The Gipper served out his term in Washington instead of a federal jail cell.

And how can Casper Weinberger, Reagan's secretary of defense, be forgotten? He participated in the transfer of United States Hawk and TOW missiles to Iran during the Iran–Contra affair. As history and Wikipedia tells us, Prosecutors brought an additional indictment against Weinberge four days before the 1992 presidential election that cited a Weinberger diary entry contradicting a claim made by President George H.W. Bush. Republicans claimed that it contributed to Bill Clinton beating President Bush. Weinberger dodged a bullet when a judge threw out the indictment on technical grounds. 

"Before he [Weinberger] could be tried on the original charges, he received a pardon from President George H. W. Bush, who was Reagan's vice president during the scandal, on December 24, 1992.

Careless: Hillary Clinton, Emails

If Hillary Clinton should be prosecuted for her email faux pas, as Republicans want and Donald Trump would do if elected president, appointing New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie to do the hunbting, George W. Bush and Dick Cheney should be dragged into federal court like Germans were dragged to Nuremberg to stand trial to answer for their high crimes and misdemeanors. Bush, Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and Condolezza Rice all intentional created catastrophic conditions that to this day still plague America, her allies and the world.

OpEditude: Clinton's 'Careless' Email Record Versus Illegal Actions By GOP Presidents

It's hard to recall any Republicans saying a discouraging word at the time about President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney's federal crimes of lying about information they had about Iraq's involvement in the 911 attacks, and ginning up information they didn't have, that opened the door to war on Iraq. 

It's hard to recall those media reports of Republicans taking the Bush White House and Administration to task because there weren't any. Like a wagon train under attack, Republicans formed a circle around the Bush administration's criminal actions to take America into a war of political convenience against a nation that wasn't involved in the attacks carried out on September 11, 2001 in New York city. President Bush the Junior, our 43rd Commander-in-Chief, has cost this nation trillions in taxpayer funds so far with more to come since soldiers are still stuck there due to the deal George W. Bush cut with new Iraq leaders who wouldn't give immunity to actions committed by American Soldiers. Obama inherited Bush's exit agreement, and has done the best he can with a bad hand.

Not learning from former Republicans' illegal and costly mistakes, Republicans and their all-but crowned presidential nominee, Donald Trump, are raring to go to gin up another costly war, this time the pretext is defeat ISIS. Saddan Hussein was a brutal dictators, as most dictators throughout history have been, but he kept tight control on his Shiite citizens, who now control Iraq courtesy of Bush totally misunderstanding that religious sects don't really care about democracy. They don't hate us for our liberty and rules of law, as Republican neocons would have us believe. The west has been playing in their religious sandbox for decades, and Bush letting the furies of hell lose was the opportunity Shiites saw to persecute Sunnis. Catholics and Protestants warred against each other for centuries, and Shiites and Sunnis have been at it since the death of Mohammed in 632 A.D. Little has changed since.

Thousands of dead American soldiers and tens of thousands more who returned home wounded or maimed by a senseless war that in another era might have seen the powers behind such a ruthless agenda go to jail or meet their maker, is America's reward for allowing brazen rulers like George Bush and Dick Cheney to go unchallenged and unjailed.

With the news that FBI Director James Comey did not recommend prosecution of Hillary Clinton's "careless" misuse of state department emails, which contained various levels of classified information, Republicans have hyperventilated that the Clinton's, this time Hillary, skirted laws again that have ensnared other lesser officials.

Discouraging as it may sound to Republicans, who despite one exhaustive report after another that cleared her of any legitimate crimes allegedly committed, this report from Director Comey again found Mrs. Clinton was not out to sabotage America as Trumpian Republicans accuse her of doing. Hillary Clinton's arrogance and carelessness maybe character flaws, but they are not federal crimes.

Shame: George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, The Iraq War

Republicans have yet to apologize, let alone atone for George W. Bush's terrible, awful years in the White House. He left the nation with soaring job losses and an economic meltdown that nearly created a second Great Recession. But for a Democratic president who enjoyed a Democratic Congress for his first two years, GOP officials' austerity budgeting and misdirected tax programs would have paved the path to true economic devastation had they been the path pursued instead of the one approved by a Democratic congress that enabled President Obama to staunch the bleeding from dramatic job losses.

The stimulus package President Barack Obama proposed, that all Republicans obstructed at every turn and voted against, saved millions more jobs being lost by stabilizing state budgets, and saving an auto industry that Republicans like venture capitalist Mitt Romney, Ohio Gov. John Kasich and Rob Portman, the Buckeye State's junior senator in Washington, would to a man have let disappear. Following their led would have caused economic hardships across the nation, and especially in auto parts-supply chain intense Ohio, that would have taken down America, then the world, in a spectacularly irresponsible way to gruesome to even contemplate. America is still paying the price for George Bush's war in Iraq 13 years later.

Shame: Dick Cheney, Energy Meeting Minutes, Karl Rove, Missing WH Emails

In today's digital era full of emails, Hillary Clinton using a private email server is not unique, given so many others, including top Republicans in former administrations, have done the same. Republicans were suspiciously silent when Vice President Cheney fought to keep records of his secret meetings with energy industry leaders at the White House from prying public eyes. When George W. Bush did leave the White House, tens of thousands of emails on a separate email system set up by White House officials, including Bush kingmaker Karl Rove, went missing. The GOP establishment wasn't at all concerned then on what they did, so why are they now so intent on seeing Hillary Clinton wearing government -issue pinstripes?

Shame: Richard M. Nixon, Watergate, Gerald R Ford

Republicans today should reflect but won't on the full pardon Richard M. Nixon received in 1974 from his then vice president, Gerald R. Ford. President Ford took the oath of office when President Nixon resigned his office as roads from the Watergate Hotel break-in two years earlier in 1972, which Mr. Nixon knew about even though he said he didn't, led directly into his Oval Office redoubt. For the good of the country, President Ford issued a full pardon for all offenses President Nixon committed against the United States so his illegal criminal actions could pass into history books. Mr. Ford justified this decision claiming that a long, drawn-out trial would only have further polarized the public.

Democrats could have turned Gerald Ford's pardon of Nixon for violating the constitution into a national crisis. But they didn't. President Nixon's abuses did open the Pandora's Box of government distrust that haunts us to this day. After World War II, government was an asset, not an enemy as many today see it.

Shame: Ronald Reagan, Iran-Contra

Then there was the Great Communicator's administration in the 1980s. Ronald Reagan blatantly violated American law when he lied directly to the American public in a TV appearance about trading arms for hostages in what became known as the Iran-Contra affair. It was all true, as the nation learned later, but Republicans revere Ronald Reagan as a political saint to this day when he clearly wasn't. Democrats complained at the time, but The Gipper served out his term in Washington instead of a federal jail cell.

And how can Casper Weinberger, Reagan's secretary of defense, be forgotten? He participated in the transfer of United States Hawk and TOW missiles to Iran during the Iran–Contra affair. As history and Wikipedia tells us, Prosecutors brought an additional indictment against Weinberge four days before the 1992 presidential election that cited a Weinberger diary entry contradicting a claim made by President George H.W. Bush. Republicans claimed that it contributed to Bill Clinton beating President Bush. Weinberger dodged a bullet when a judge threw out the indictment on technical grounds. 

"Before he [Weinberger] could be tried on the original charges, he received a pardon from President George H. W. Bush, who was Reagan's vice president during the scandal, on December 24, 1992.

Careless: Hillary Clinton, Emails

If Hillary Clinton should be prosecuted for her email faux pas, as Republicans want and Donald Trump would do if elected president, appointing New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie to do the hunbting, George W. Bush and Dick Cheney should be dragged into federal court like Germans were dragged to Nuremberg to stand trial to answer for their high crimes and misdemeanors. Bush, Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and Condolezza Rice all intentional created catastrophic conditions that to this day still plague America, her allies and the world.

OpEditude: Clinton's 'Careless' Email Record Versus Illegal Actions By GOP Presidents

It's hard to recall any Republicans saying a discouraging word at the time about President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney's federal crimes of lying about information they had about Iraq's involvement in the 911 attacks, and ginning up information they didn't have, that opened the door to war on Iraq. 

It's hard to recall those media reports of Republicans taking the Bush White House and Administration to task because there weren't any. Like a wagon train under attack, Republicans formed a circle around the Bush administration's criminal actions to take America into a war of political convenience against a nation that wasn't involved in the attacks carried out on September 11, 2001 in New York city. President Bush the Junior, our 43rd Commander-in-Chief, has cost this nation trillions in taxpayer funds so far with more to come since soldiers are still stuck there due to the deal George W. Bush cut with new Iraq leaders who wouldn't give immunity to actions committed by American Soldiers. Obama inherited Bush's exit agreement, and has done the best he can with a bad hand.

Not learning from former Republicans' illegal and costly mistakes, Republicans and their all-but crowned presidential nominee, Donald Trump, are raring to go to gin up another costly war, this time the pretext is defeat ISIS. Saddan Hussein was a brutal dictators, as most dictators throughout history have been, but he kept tight control on his Shiite citizens, who now control Iraq courtesy of Bush totally misunderstanding that religious sects don't really care about democracy. They don't hate us for our liberty and rules of law, as Republican neocons would have us believe. The west has been playing in their religious sandbox for decades, and Bush letting the furies of hell lose was the opportunity Shiites saw to persecute Sunnis. Catholics and Protestants warred against each other for centuries, and Shiites and Sunnis have been at it since the death of Mohammed in 632 A.D. Little has changed since.

Thousands of dead American soldiers and tens of thousands more who returned home wounded or maimed by a senseless war that in another era might have seen the powers behind such a ruthless agenda go to jail or meet their maker, is America's reward for allowing brazen rulers like George Bush and Dick Cheney to go unchallenged and unjailed.

With the news that FBI Director James Comey did not recommend prosecution of Hillary Clinton's "careless" misuse of state department emails, which contained various levels of classified information, Republicans have hyperventilated that the Clinton's, this time Hillary, skirted laws again that have ensnared other lesser officials.

Discouraging as it may sound to Republicans, who despite one exhaustive report after another that cleared her of any legitimate crimes allegedly committed, this report from Director Comey again found Mrs. Clinton was not out to sabotage America as Trumpian Republicans accuse her of doing. Hillary Clinton's arrogance and carelessness maybe character flaws, but they are not federal crimes.

Shame: George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, The Iraq War

Republicans have yet to apologize, let alone atone for George W. Bush's terrible, awful years in the White House. He left the nation with soaring job losses and an economic meltdown that nearly created a second Great Recession. But for a Democratic president who enjoyed a Democratic Congress for his first two years, GOP officials' austerity budgeting and misdirected tax programs would have paved the path to true economic devastation had they been the path pursued instead of the one approved by a Democratic congress that enabled President Obama to staunch the bleeding from dramatic job losses.

The stimulus package President Barack Obama proposed, that all Republicans obstructed at every turn and voted against, saved millions more jobs being lost by stabilizing state budgets, and saving an auto industry that Republicans like venture capitalist Mitt Romney, Ohio Gov. John Kasich and Rob Portman, the Buckeye State's junior senator in Washington, would to a man have let disappear. Following their led would have caused economic hardships across the nation, and especially in auto parts-supply chain intense Ohio, that would have taken down America, then the world, in a spectacularly irresponsible way to gruesome to even contemplate. America is still paying the price for George Bush's war in Iraq 13 years later.

Shame: Dick Cheney, Energy Meeting Minutes, Karl Rove, Missing WH Emails

In today's digital era full of emails, Hillary Clinton using a private email server is not unique, given so many others, including top Republicans in former administrations, have done the same. Republicans were suspiciously silent when Vice President Cheney fought to keep records of his secret meetings with energy industry leaders at the White House from prying public eyes. When George W. Bush did leave the White House, tens of thousands of emails on a separate email system set up by White House officials, including Bush kingmaker Karl Rove, went missing. The GOP establishment wasn't at all concerned then on what they did, so why are they now so intent on seeing Hillary Clinton wearing government -issue pinstripes?

Shame: Richard M. Nixon, Watergate, Gerald R Ford

Republicans today should reflect but won't on the full pardon Richard M. Nixon received in 1974 from his then vice president, Gerald R. Ford. President Ford took the oath of office when President Nixon resigned his office as roads from the Watergate Hotel break-in two years earlier in 1972, which Mr. Nixon knew about even though he said he didn't, led directly into his Oval Office redoubt. For the good of the country, President Ford issued a full pardon for all offenses President Nixon committed against the United States so his illegal criminal actions could pass into history books. Mr. Ford justified this decision claiming that a long, drawn-out trial would only have further polarized the public.

Democrats could have turned Gerald Ford's pardon of Nixon for violating the constitution into a national crisis. But they didn't. President Nixon's abuses did open the Pandora's Box of government distrust that haunts us to this day. After World War II, government was an asset, not an enemy as many today see it.

Shame: Ronald Reagan, Iran-Contra

Then there was the Great Communicator's administration in the 1980s. Ronald Reagan blatantly violated American law when he lied directly to the American public in a TV appearance about trading arms for hostages in what became known as the Iran-Contra affair. It was all true, as the nation learned later, but Republicans revere Ronald Reagan as a political saint to this day when he clearly wasn't. Democrats complained at the time, but The Gipper served out his term in Washington instead of a federal jail cell.

And how can Casper Weinberger, Reagan's secretary of defense, be forgotten? He participated in the transfer of United States Hawk and TOW missiles to Iran during the Iran–Contra affair. As history and Wikipedia tells us, Prosecutors brought an additional indictment against Weinberge four days before the 1992 presidential election that cited a Weinberger diary entry contradicting a claim made by President George H.W. Bush. Republicans claimed that it contributed to Bill Clinton beating President Bush. Weinberger dodged a bullet when a judge threw out the indictment on technical grounds. 

"Before he [Weinberger] could be tried on the original charges, he received a pardon from President George H. W. Bush, who was Reagan's vice president during the scandal, on December 24, 1992.

Careless: Hillary Clinton, Emails

If Hillary Clinton should be prosecuted for her email faux pas, as Republicans want and Donald Trump would do if elected president, appointing New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie to do the hunbting, George W. Bush and Dick Cheney should be dragged into federal court like Germans were dragged to Nuremberg to stand trial to answer for their high crimes and misdemeanors. Bush, Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and Condolezza Rice all intentional created catastrophic conditions that to this day still plague America, her allies and the world.

Ted Strickland Talks About His Senate Race with Rob Portman

Futuristic departure lounge might be just what the doctor ordered

For fans of the movie "Soylent Green" that features a futuristic world that's hot and crowded, the departure lounge Edward G. Robinson visits to end it all could be a good idea if society would just admit that committing suicide isn't the taboo it's been made out to be over time.

Actor Edward G. Robinson
plays Levi in Soylent Green

"Death has always been scary," Ronni Bennett writes on "Time Goes By," her popular outlet for thoughts on aging that has a world-wide following. "For centuries, humans have tried to mitigate that fear with ghost stories, with goblins and skeleton costumes on Halloween and the popularity of vampires in books and film, all of which have in common the possibility of some form of continued consciousness of self after death."

Bennett, who just turned 75 and lives in Oregon even though she left her heart in her beloved New York City after years of working there in the media industry, notes that the taboo against death talk has begun to loosen. She says it's connected, in part, "with the realization that for the foreseeable future there are going to be a whole lot more old people, in relation to the entire population, than has ever been seen on earth."

That means growing numbers who are concerned with and want to know more about how to control their deaths, Bennett said in a recent post that includes some help from one of her friends. Not too long ago, I sent her my view on the inevitable:

"Maybe a smart, fashionable, modern-day departure lounge equipped with all the amenities, including lawyers and accountants to put one's affairs in final order before takeoff, would be the right recipe for anyone who might want to walk into one one day and feel comfortable saying adios. 

"The first one could be located in the middle of a western state desert, so it wouldn't be convenient to get to for anyone who wasn't determined to get there. Of course, if lines start forming, other locations could be considered."

I also sent a YouTube clip to her from the 1973 science fiction movie Soylent Green that features a scene where Levi, played by Edward G Robinsin, who died shortly after he filmed the scene, enjoys a tranquil, comfortable exit. I have watched it many times, and now think it's not gruesome at all but actually something that just might work if given a chance.

The movie became notorious for its shocking end plot twist. You can read about it at Wikipedia if you want. I sent the clip to her, and she included it in a post on the subject of a "good death." 

"John and I had been emailing about death with dignity laws when he included a link to this Soylent Green clip titled, “Levi Goes Home,” in which Edward G. Robinson (in his last film role) goes, as John explained in his email, “to the futuristic service center that caters to people ready to say goodbye.”

Bennett reveals the emergence of Death cafes, which now commonly attract people to neighborly discussions of dying without too much flinching from anyone, she writes. "My favorite mortician, Caitlin Doughty, not only keeps a popular blog titled The Order of the Good Death which demystifies all deathly things, her Ask A Mortician videos on YouTube are as much a hoot as informative," Bennett informs us..

A student of all things aging and age related, Ms. Bennett said it came to mind a few days ago when The American Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry in its April issue released a study titled Defining a Good Death (Successful Dying). She reports on the study, a review of 36 previous studies that includes patients, family members and healthcare provider stakeholders.  

Eleven core themes of good death were identified by the researchers: • preferences for a specific dying process, • pain-free status, • religiosity/spirituality, • emotional well-being, • life completion, • treatment preferences, • dignity, • family, • quality of life, • relationship with the health care provider, • other

Bennett tells us that one kind of control is physician-assisted suicide. Four states currently allow what is also called “death with dignity” under very strict rules and California, later this year, is likely to join Oregon, Washington, Vermont and Montana with such a law, she says.

"Many people oppose this kind of legal suicide as a slippery slope that can lead to pressure on people, the old in particular, I suppose, to hurry along their journey to whatever comes next," she notes.

Bennett says she welcomes death with dignity laws and thinks the rules are too strict. "But the idea that anyone would suggest that a person end his/her life to save the government some money is disgusting and dangerous," she says in rebuttal to a reader who reported on some thinking that was a good reason to end it all for the wrong reason. 

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The Little Blockbuster Case On Kasich Dirty Tricks That Won't Go Away

Plaintiff attorneys representing the Libertarian Party of Ohio [LPO] and its candidate for governor in 2014 just won't give up. Their case that exposes what Gov. John Kasich and his political friends and allies will do behind the scenes to assure him a win by eliminating his competition has another life to live, this time in an appeal filed Monday with the Court of Appeals of Ohio, Tenth Appellate District.

Ohio Gov. John Kasich in the Lincoln
Room at the Ohio Statehouse

Plaintiff attorneys Mark Brown and Mark G. Kafantaris filed the appeal after it was dismissed by out-going Republican Franklin County Administrative Judge Patrick Sheeran, who ruled in March that the Ohio Elections Commission made the correct decision when it voted 5-2 in May of 2015 to not investigate coordinated activities between Mr. Kasich's campaign staff, the Ohio Republican Party and a long-time friend and political operative to derail LPO's candidate for governor, Charlie Earl. At the time, Camp Kasich thought Earl popular enough that he could drain enough votes away from Gov. Kasich and make the election with the Democratic candidate closer than Camp Kasich wanted it to be.

The Walking Dead Of Court Cases

According to the court document outlining the reasons for an appeal, LPO's team of lawyers argued that Judge Sheeran erred in his decision to dismiss the case. "The Common Pleas Court erred in concluding that the Commission's record 'absolutely refuted' the possibility that the full Commission's dismissal might have been on the merits," Plaintiff attorneys wrote.

101 Refresher on Kasich Dirty Tricks Squad

In a short refresher course, the filing says the case to dump Earl from the 2014 ballot, which with the help of Ohio's Secretary of State was successful, starts with the 2014 gubernatorial election in Ohio, when LPO had on January 7, 2014 won back its right to participate in Ohio's elections. That presence, the argument goes, threatened "Kasich's hegemony in Ohio. Not because its candidate, Charlie Earl, would win the election; but because Earl threatened to siphon votes away from Kasich's campaign."

When Mr. Earl qualified for the ballot, the filing says, "Kasich's campaign became concerned that Earl could draw votes away from Kasich in the general election. Earl had to be stopped."

Gov. John Kasich's dirty tricks squad went to work, but it's task wasn't easy. "As the record makes clear in this case, it cost almost $600,000. For legal and political reasons, the Kasich Campaign went to great lengths to distance itself from Earl's removal. It constructed a 'secret client,' Terry Casey, to take care of the needed financial transactions. It was Casey, a secret operative, who hired the lawyers (the Zeiger firm or "ZTL") to remove Earl. Casey hired the Zeiger firm; Casey received the bills from the Zeiger firm; Casey agreed to insure that the bills -- which came to $600,000 -- were paid," the filing says. Mr. Casey has been a friend of John Kasich's going back to Mr. Kasich's first run for office in the late 1970s. When Kasich became governor in 2011, one of his first appoints was to install Mr. Casey to headsup the state's powerful personnel review board. Casey has argued he was a "self starter" and did not take direction from anyone from Kasich's team.

"Political espionage is a nasty business. When allowed to prosper in the shadows, it grows. It infects. Soon, the political process is consumed by this cancer. Only public disclosure and strident enforcement can prevent it," Brown and Kafantaris argue in the brief.

This State's campaign finance laws must be enforced, the appeal says. "This case is about enforcing Ohio's plain and understandable campaign finance laws. It is about preventing political espionage like that perpetrated by the Kasich Campaign."

Gov. Kasich, who is running for president for the second time in 16 years, and who finds himself one of three Republican candidates still in the 2016 race for GOP nominee, has not had to explain the findings of fact presented by LPO in this case. Mr. Kasich's reliable refrain is that he's above politics and only wants to bring people together. His record, from his early days to today, show that claim to be false on nearly all accounts.

As he struggles to remain relevant as voters in one state after another not choosing him but Donald Trump or Ted Cruz instead, Ohio's term-limited governor has managed to avoid any serious scrutiny from state or national media, who are more interested in his town hall meeting song playlist or his faux pas of eating pizza with a fork in New York City. Mr. Kasich has lots of scandals on his watch waiting to be delved into, and his underhanded tactic to take down a potential challenger that smacks of Nixonian era dirty tricks appears to have little interest among social media reporters who appear too lazy to look into the case let alone even mention it.

'Late Show' Lampoons John Kasich For 'Fargo' Film Rant

For everyone who watched the Friday night edition of the "Late Show" with Stephen Colbert, the surprise and hilarious treat was a sketch that lampooned Ohio Gov. John Kasich for the rant he wrote in his book "Stand For Something" about the disgust he and his wife had after watching the quirky film "Fargo."

Stephen Colbert, who will forever be remembered for his searing take down of President George W. Bush at a White House Correspondents dinner with Mr. Bush sitting just feet from him,  hasn't been a friend to Mr. Kasich on either of his two guest appearances on the popular CBS late night anchor show featuring actors and musicians among other guests.

Colbert's first guest, Steve Buscemi, who is well known for his many riveting roles on TV and at the movies, starred in the Cohen Brother's production of "Fargo," a crime drama set in Minnesota in 1987. The plot of the film involves a car salesman in Minneapolis who has gotten himself into debt and is so desperate for money that he hires two thugs to kidnap his own wife. One of those thugs was played by Mr. Buscemi.

Colbert, who moved to the Late Show on CBS from his Comedy Channel show where he played a right-wing pundit identical to Fox News' Bill O'Reilly, handed John Kasich's book "Stand For Something" to Buscemi, then asked him to read passages written by Kasich on how the film disgusted him and his wife so much that he tried to get Blockbuster Video to ban it.

Buscemi read aloud Kasich's story of renting it, watching it and being revolted by it. The two then did a sketch with Buscemi, whose bad-guy character that eventually gets ground up in a wood chipper being the tipping point for John Kasich, using Kasich's own words as the script. It was a hoot.

Unfortunately for Gov. Kasich, he does stand for something, but as his long record tells shows, it's the wrong stuff. Meanwhile, as one of the three amigos remaining in the race for Republican presidential nominee this year, he finds himself far behind league leader Donald Trump and Ted Cruz in second place. Kasich was in Wisconsin today, ahead of next Tuesday's primary. With only one first-place finish in 30 races so far—he won his home state of Ohio with less than 50 percent of the vote—polls show he's a shoe-in for third place. With 18 more state primaries to go, the smart money isn't being bet on John Kasich winning those either. His plan, as reports on what Camp Kasich is planning, is to try to steal the nomination when Republicans convene in Cleveland in July.

The 63-year old term-limited governor is ripe for picking, and some reporters did that this week when the former Congressman and Lehman Brothers banker was caught eating pizza with a fork. Colbert and Buscemi didn't include that faux pas this time, but there's little doubt that Colbert's supper smart writers took notice since it happened in the Big Apple.

"In 2006, the film was deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" by the Library of Congress and inducted into the United States National Film Registry for preservation, making it one of six films to have been preserved in their first year of eligibility.[5] The American Film Institute named it one of the 100 greatest American movies of all time in 1998," according to Wikipedia.

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