In 1986 – one year after the state of Ohio sanctioned oil & gas waste “brine” spreading on roads – it was discovered that brine contains high levels of benzene. State protection agencies were alarmed and lobbied for a ban of brine spreading, but the practice continued. In 2017, tests by the Ohio Department of Natural Resources (ODNR) confirmed that brine also contains high levels of radioactive radium, but still no ban. After 36 years of spreading toxic and radioactive oil well brine on Ohio roads with the silent acquiescence of state officials, the people are clamoring to end this poisonous practice.

After months of speculation and rumors as to whether or not current Columbus Mayor Andy Ginther was going to run for re-election in 2023 ( or some other ordained Franklin County Democratic Party Democrat) it is rumored that Mr. Ginther will announce this evening at the Ohio Brewing Company that he will be seeking another four-year term.  

Since early spring of this year, lifelong Columbus resident, former Columbus City Council candidate and longtime community advocate Joe Motil and his supporters have been gathering the required 1,000 valid signatures in order to have his name placed on the ballot for the May 2, 2023 Columbus mayoral primary election. Motil has 1,844 signatures on hand and will be submitting about 2,100 signatures to the Franklin County Board of Elections when they are due in February of next year.

Wednesday, November 30, 6:30am-9pm, using your telephone

Will you help protect Ohio families from radioactive oil and gas waste by making one phone call on Wednesday? Ohio has 226 Class II injection wells that accept 20-30 million barrels of radioactive oil and gas liquid waste every year.

Last month, Buckeye Environmental Network, Sierra Club, EarthJustice, and 30 grassroots organizations petitioned the United States Environmental Protection Agency, (US EPA) to revoke Ohio’s authority to manage Ohio’s Class II oil and gas waste injection program. The program, currently run by the Ohio Department of Natural Resources (ODNR), consistently fails to act against violations, allowing serious problems to continue unaddressed, posing threats to our drinking water and public health.

Ohio communities have lived with leaking class II injection wells, accidents, blowouts, and spills for years. And, Ohio does not have a way for impacted residents to file a formal complaint.

Please help protect Ohio families by taking five minutes to call US EPA Administrator Debra Shore on Wednesday.

Though brief, the exchange between Chinese President Xi Jinping and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on the sidelines of the G20 summit in Indonesia on November 16 has become a social media sensation. Xi, assertive if not domineering, lectured the visibly apprehensive Trudeau about the etiquette of diplomacy. This exchange can be considered another watershed moment in China’s relationship with the West.

 “If there was sincerity on your part,” the Chinese President told Trudeau, “then we shall conduct our discussion with an attitude of mutual respect, otherwise there might be unpredictable consequences.” 

 At the end of the awkward conversation, Xi was the first to walk away, leaving Trudeau uncomfortably making his way out of the room. 

This past June 5 marked fifty-four years since the assassination of Senator Robert F. Kennedy. He was forty-two years old when he was struck down by an assassin’s bullet after claiming victory in the California presidential primary. (Sirhan Sirhan, the convicted assassin, was granted parole last year, the sixteenth time he tried. While he was approved by the parole board and two of RFK’s children supported his release, six of their siblings and his widow did not. California Governor Gavin Newsom declined to free Sirhan.) Although race relations in America have, in many ways, greatly improved over the years, they are in just as many ways not much different than when John and Robert Kennedy were in power.

Sullivan, a history professor at the University of South Carolina, is an accomplished civil rights historian who has written three books on African American history and edited two others. While many historians have written about Robert F. Kennedy and his role in the freedom movement of the 1960s, she is the first who has done so in such detail.