Scioto County, Ohio: State officials close down the last pain clinic in the county

From abcnews.go.com:

Attorney General Mike DeWine said Tuesday that local and state officials shut down Greater Medical Advance in Wheelersburg, about 100 miles south of Columbus.

DeWine says an investigation found 14,000 prescriptions came out of the clinic in nine months.

Well, I guess it's back to doing heroin.

Seriously though, these people are going to feed their addictions one way or another. I'd rather have them popping pharmaceutical grade opiates than shooting up with dirty hypodermic needles.

High School Football Coach forced to step down after handing out "Hurt Feelings Report"

The head coach of Buffalo High School's (Wyoming) football team has been forced to step down after handing out a "Hurt Feelings Report" to the team before heading off to their first-round playoff game.

From trib.com:

Pat Lynch, who led Buffalo to two state football championships, has resigned as the team’s head coach after handing out an offensive survey to his players.
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“I would like to apologize for my lapse in judgment and the poor choice that I made from my position as the Head Football Coach for Buffalo High School,” the statement said. “I know that this situation has caused you pain and discomfort, and for that I am truly sorry. As a person and a professional, I believe I will learn and grow from this experience and use it to help others.

We've received a copy of this Hurt Feelings Report, part of which can be seen below:



Now we here at People Liking People are all for treating kids like shit and acting like their feelings don't matter but Pat Lynch seems to be a bit too focused on the sexual orientation of his players. Yeah we get it, you gotta be a tough strong man or else you're a wimpy fag...sure. It's just that the people who have this type of mentality the most are the ones dealing with their own homosexual tendencies. And do you think it's a coincidence that his job for the past 22 years just so happens to involve being in the locker room with a bunch of hot sweaty guys day in and day out? Sure Mr Lynch, the high school guys just wanting to play a game of football are the queer ones, not you.

And how did Pat Lynch react when this came to light and before the school board? He said "Deal with it bitches" right? No, he apologized like a little bitch.

The strange thing about this whole story is that while he was forced to step down as head coach, he is allowed to continue his job as a guidance counselor at the school. Isn't that even worse than having him as a football coach? I mean you kind of expect coaches to be assholes, it sort of goes with the territory. But for a guidance counselor position you're going to want a higher standard of professionalism.

"You want to sign up for orchestra and art class?? What are you some kind of pussy??"

High Tech Lynching?

High tech lynching: it's a phrase we've been hearing a lot lately in reference to the media's treatment of Herman Cain and a possible scandal involving sexual harassment allegations. It all started Sunday night with Politico reporting that 2 women had accused Herman Cain of sexual harassment back in the 1990s when Mr. Cain was head of the National Restaurant Association. This is the first time Herman Cain has faced such intense media scrutiny since he started leading the polls and many on the right are calling this a smear effort by the "liberal leftwing media".

Now call it what you want to, but if you're running for President of the United States and you have a sexual harassment claim in your past, especially a situation where multiple accusers were actually paid off, are you really going to be surprised if that comes out at some point during the campaign? Do you really think any media organization worth their salt is going to ignore it if they run across that story? Of course that is going to come out. There's no way it couldn't. It's too juicy, it's too scandalous, and it's the perfect counter-story to the candidate that seemed perfect.

Right now we don't have all the details of the allegations, or if there's any merit to them at all. We're giving Herman Cain the benefit of the doubt that he didn't sexually harass these women. But the Cain camp has made a lot of terrible mistakes in dealing with this campaign crisis. Cain started out as a second-tier candidate, seemingly having not a chance of hell at winning. Right now he's leading the polls but it looks like his campaign is still staffed by second rate people and is still being run as a second rate campaign.

They didn't have a plan to deal with this, demonstrated by the fact that their response to it changed many times within the same day. First he refused to comment on it at all, evidently expecting the whole thing to just blow over. He was forced to address it when pressure started mounting but it was handled very poorly.

From Politico.com:

In an appearance on Fox News — his first of the day — Cain said that he had been “falsely accused” of sexual harassment and was unaware of financial settlements with any accusers.
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But by the end of the day, Cain had reversed himself on many of the essential facts of the case, telling both PBS’s Judy Woodruff and Fox’s Greta Van Susteren that there had been cash payouts to a woman who accused him “falsely” of harassment.
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Cain’s confirmation of a settlement clashed with his earlier comments denying any awareness of a financial agreement with one or more accusers.

Now we're seeing conservatives quickly coming to Cain's defense - and he certainly could use support from his base in this difficult time in his campaign. The narrative from the right is that Cain is being targeted by the left because they hate seeing a black man succeed; they can't stand black Republicans and will do everything they can to stop them "just like they did with Clarence Thomas". To some extent that could very well be true (we did see some of this earlier by MSNBC's Lawrence O'Donnell). Most blacks in America vote Democratic and the black Republicans could be seen as somewhat of an outcast or someone confused and not in touch with the rest of the group. But in this instance what we're seeing is pretty par for the course for political coverage. When you run for president you get highly scrutinized by the media. And if you have something like a sexual harassment allegation and payoff in your past you better believe that's going to come out and be reported. And you are going to be questioned about it, and no, it's not going to just go away in one day.

We get the support of Cain and those that are defending him, but it's getting a little ridiculous when people start calling this a high tech lynching. It's not any better than when people use Hitler comparisons. We've heard the phrase being tossed around by several prominent right wingers from Rush Limbaugh to Michael Savage to Herman Cain's Super PAC.

There has been one refreshing voice of reason in all this and it comes from former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. From cbsnews.com:

"I actually am someone who-- doesn't believe in playing the race card on either side. I've seen it played, by the way, on the other side quite a lot too. And it's not good for the country," Rice told CBS' Norah O'Donnell in an interview that aired on CBS' "The Early Show" on Wednesday.

It's make it or break it time and whining around about the other side high tech lynching you or about some leftist conspiracy just isn't going to cut it.

Update: Now the Herman Cain camp is saying that Rick Perry is behind the surfacing of the sexual harassment allegations. So much for the liberal high tech lynching idea..

Update 2: John Dickerson at CBS News has written a great article, Why Cain's story isn't like Clarence Thomas'

Hill's story appeared in the paper, catching Thomas off guard. Cain was given 10 days to respond to questions about the matter before it was made public. Politico wasn't fishing--tell us anything wrong you've ever done--it was asking questions about a specific legal matter.