Wow. An exposé:

Today is the one-year anniversary of my termination from Ohio Learn and Earn. I’m pretty sure that the non-disclosure period has expired. When I was terminated from the Learn and Earn campaign for this post I was required, along with the other 2 office managers, to sign a non-disclosure agreement and as I’ve said, I believe the non-disclosure period has lapsed.

With that said, it’s time for news from the office, and I mean beyond how our toilets were usually brimming with feces and urine, how soap was never available, how I paid a worker $300 out of my pocket because the company wouldn’t, and how many unscrupulous people we employed.

Working for Ohio Learn and Earn was one of the most stressful periods of my still young life. From the time I began office work until the point of my termination, I put in 100-hour work weeks, frequently not arriving home until 1-2 AM after having arrived there at 8AM, seven days a week. I find myself torn between hating it and not hating it: I surfed the internet freely for hours on end, fell asleep in the office on a couple occasions, read a lot, but at the cost of nearly losing my girlfriend and my best friend. We hired any schmuck off the street, registering them to vote, making sure they had a driver’s license and a social security number. I filled out their I9s and W4s, made them sign on the dotted line, and passed the information along to campaign HQ in Columbus. Interviews were cursory: Could you walk up to people and make sure that they were registered to vote and make them sign a petition? Are you an American citizen? A resident of the state of Ohio? If you can answer yes to all three of these questions, you can work for Ohio Learn and Earn…

Definitely click thru. There’s a ton more!
blogginryan: Learn and Earn: A post-mortem on that adventure

I tried to find an excerpt for this, but you really need to read all of it to get the gist:

On a recent sunny Saturday, a city councilman got up in front of a crowded auditorium in the Seaport Museum at Penn’s Landing, and did something shocking.

An audience of 400 had arrived at 9 that morning to hear what Philadelphia could learn from New York, Portland and other cities that had successfully restored their waterfronts.

It was mid-afternoon, and lunch was lulling the audience to sleep. But they were jolted awake by a comment on a topic about which most longed to hear.

“Casinos are in the mining business,” the councilman told the crowd, “and they’re here to extract money from you.” As applause erupted, I thought we should elect this guy as Philadelphia’s next mayor.

But no such luck. Councilman Peter Steinbrueck is serving his third term in Seattle. An architect by profession, he chairs that city’s planning committee.

Steinbrueck’s remarks had been printed earlier in the Inquirer. And the casino money-mining comment was definitely off-script, which both pleased and concerned the event’s organizer, Harris Steinberg.

“I’m glad that I didn’t have to say it,” quipped Steinberg. Sadly, in fact, Steinberg isn’t permitted to say anything about casinos.

When Mayor Street charged the Penn professor last fall with running a public planning process for the central Delaware riverfront, Steinberg had to pledge that casinos would not be on the agenda. Likewise, the group’s funder, the William Penn Foundation, also demanded silence on the topic — or else it would yank funding.

Since then, the Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board has announced that the riverfront stretch will be bookended with a set of casinos — which a plurality of Philadelphians in a recent poll now believe will harm the city.

So when Seattle’s Steinbrueck queried, “Are 5,000-slot casinos the only way to power urban revitalization along the riverfront?” his question was met with silence….

The emphasis I’ve added was what Ed Morrison sent in the email along with the link. Do you really think Issue 3 has gone away?

Silent Menace :: Opinion :: Philadelphia City Paper

I’m confident that bloggers like Jill Miller Zimon will fisk it throughly:

If a gambling issue does come up again, voters will find it easier to reject, Zanotti said.

“History proves and gambling experts predict that the market share for gambling expansion will get smaller and smaller in the coming years,'’ he said. “There’s just not enough of the pie to go around anymore. I think this was a last-ditch desperate attempt by some very shrewd business people to catch the last train, if you will, into the gambling profits.'’

One last thing. Caputo needs to shut his piehole: “Ohio has yet to come to that level of understanding, but it will come and very soon.'’

Beacon Journal | 11/10/2006 | Experts say gaming issue will be back

Whatever, Michael.

“We think [final results] will be a lot closer, but if the current trend continues, it looks like Issue 3 will fail,” said spokesman Michael Caputo.

Issue 3 backers spent more than $20 million, making it probably the most expensive issue campaign in Ohio’s history.

What a waste of money. Who did the learning and earning here?

Ohio voters unwilling to bet on slots amendment

A email in limerick form:

Since my local-based postings are rare,
Here’s a limerick I’m happy to share
With your BFD throng.
Please pass it along,
Though, I’m sure, they’re already aware.