Vote for Joe

I interviewed a representative involved with Ohio Northern University’s Chapter of Amnesty International this week. As one example, he said his chapter was focusing on gun violence in America. He attributed part of the escalation to a commensurate increase in violent media/entertainment. He would be right. What’s more, watching violence increases viewership numbers, and, in turn, increases advertising dollars to those kinds of shows, which, of course, then generates more of those types of shows. So people who watch the violent shows, become, in a very real sense, “accomplices.” Not to mention just watching much of the media violence these days is sin behavior. Period.

In the last week, I’ve interviewed two people who have a Volkswagen Beetle and a Smart car, respectively. The Beetle gets 30 mpg, highway. The Smart car gets 45 mpg, highway. Now on this climate change thing… Bernie Sanders, for instance, is decrying “big oil.” Ha! Whose creating the demand for the oil? Uh, us. Our vehicle choices (sans the Beetle/Smart cars) are, oh, not the best. What’s more, our driving habits aren’t either. Read: gluttonous. The reason Sanders isn’t saying that is because he wants your votes, but isn’t necessarily too concerned about your souls. Our transportation policy , based on years of cross country research, is concerned about your souls — not to mention the planet’s longevity. I mean, what kind of parent would want to leave a world of climate chaos to their children?

I covered a village council meeting the other night for the local newspaper. Some political science class students from Bluffton University were in attendance (as a class assignment). Afterwards, I interviewed one of the students. She said she is from Columbus and had attended several city council meetings there. What struck her most about this small village council meeting was all the nuance and discussion on even the smallest of points. Note: Our platform calls for a shift, with much more power/decision making happening on these local levels — where people are more in touch with he issues they face.

Now that I’m one of the presidents of the United States (I just “declared” that. Why not, huh.), you can count on this not happening again in the aftermath of something like “9/11,” which today happens to be the 18th year anniversary. What you specifically can count on not happening is a “cycle of retaliation” that is tremendously disproportionate. As president, it’s my job to protect the American people — and what I would be most concerned about protecting, is their souls. It’s my contention that what George W. Bush set in motion in 9/11’s aftermath (and that the American people blindly, and wholeheartedly, got behind), was a tremendous, even sinful, retaliation that unnecessarily killed many innocent people — all the way up until today with the war still going on. Note: My tact would have been to rely on intelligence and Special Forces to surgically target the terrorist groups responsible, and if possible, capture them and bring them to trial in an international court. Note: The is a newspaper column I wrote a few days after 9/11 in 2001.

On the way back from my kid’s soccer game in Archbold, Ohio, I stopped at the McDonald’s in Defiance, Ohio, to do a little “populist stumping.” While passing out campaign cards, I got in a conversation with this guy, Jay Solether. He’s a personal trainer, was on his way to a Revival Rally in Defiance, and told me he’s also been part of the Bill Glass Prison Ministry. (Glass, who just passed away, was a well-known,Cleveland Browns lineman during the ’60s, who parlayed his notoriety into creating a nationwide prison ministry.) Solether’s enthusiasm for his faith was palpable. Note: I also got in a conversation with a couple older gentlemen, one of whom said that while he’s a Democrat, he didn’t vote in the last election. He said everything was getting so crazy in the country he didn’t feel much like participating.