Ohio Follies

Pennsylvania state politics is crazy. Our Republican nominee for Governor not only attended Jan 6 but chartered buses for his many friends who wanted to join him. Sadly, no video exists of him inside the Capitol unless he was disguised as that Indian medicine man.

We look positively sane compared to the next state over. The current “New Yorker” describes state-wide politics in Ohio. After deriding the story of the 10 year old Ohio rape victim who had to go to Indiana for an abortion, an Ohio legislator stated that the girl would have been better off having her rapist’s baby and raising it, too. “A child will always do best with its natural mother.” A reporter asked, “Even if the mother is in grade school?”. He replied, “Yes.” What a surprise. The legislator is a man.

The same legislator proposed a bill (passed by the Ohio House) that allows genital inspection of any student participating in girl’s interscholastic sports if a question is raised about that athlete’s true gender. I felt uncomfortable when the smirking doctor reached into my shorts, cupped my balls, and asked me to cough during high school pre-season physicals. I empathize with Ohio field hockey girls.

Guns remain a “hot button” issue in the Buckeye State. In response to the school shooting at Uvalde, the Ohio Legislature passed a bill enabling any school employee including cafeteria workers and bus drivers to carry concealed weapons on school property after all of 24 hours of training. Law enforcement officers in Ohio must undergo 700 hours of firearms training to be certified. But they aren’t stationed in high-risk areas like behind the cafeteria candy counter or in the boiler room. The bill was written by a legislator who just happens to own a “tactical firearms training business”. I’m surprised he didn’t require 1,000 hours of training specifically at his company.

Education did not escape the attention of the Ohio Legislature. Representative Sarah Fowler Arthur introduced a bill requiring that “both sides” of any topic be taught in Ohio public schools. Sarah actually said, “Students should consider the Holocaust from the perspective of a German soldier.”

I’ve often wondered whether those concentration camp guards were really into what they were doing.

According to Sarah, Holocaust victims were killed “for having a different color skin.” Jim Crow and the Holocaust are really the same according to Sarah.

Sarah heads the Ohio House Education Committee despite being home-schooled her entire life and never attending college. You missed quite a lot, Sarah.

I feel a whole lot better about Pennsylvania politics now.

By Ed Dufton